The Politics of National Security

There is an extension for Firefox (what you don't have it yet?) called the US Department of Homeland Insecurity Idiocy Level indicator. This extension shows the current threat level, as specified by DHS, along with a more appropriate tag (ie: Yellow is Scared).

The reason I bring this up, is that The Carpetbagger reminds us that the terror threat level has only been raised once since Bush was reelected:

Or was the old threshold a joke anyway? Let's not forget that former DHS Chief Tom Ridge explained, after leaving his post, that "there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level," which, coincidentally, happened quite a bit in 2004. Remind me, was there some kind of presidential election or something going on at the time? Something about the need for people to be afraid?

The Boston Globe noted today that the GOP is putting all of its midterm-election eggs in the national security basket. Does that mean a return to threat-level orange before November? It's tempting to think the administration would hesitate before pulling too blatant a stunt, but if desperation sinks in, I have to assume every option is on the table.

Yes, it is a shame that the Bush gang has made cynicism the norm.

If I recall, there were a couple of polls that were released just before, or just after the election in 2004 which indicated that a majority of the public were suspicious of just how the Bush administration was using this color coded system for political fear-mongering purposes. Based on the distinct lack of attention being paid to the threat level (except maybe Fox News), it only seems to reinforce that notion.

Now, as with GOP plans to use the Iraq War, and National Security as its platform for the 2006 elections, it is prudent to wonder, if magically, Al Qaeda will suddenly be "trying to influence" the election in favor of Demcorats, and there will be more "Terror Alerts", and raising the "National Threat Level" to promote more fear-mongering?

Technorati Tags: GOP, DHS, National Security, Elections, Firefox

Thought for the Day

"The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents."

--Nathaniel Borenstein

Detroying Unions Through Promotion

The Bush Administration is anti-worker.


That statement would go unchallenged just about anywhere. The rules and regulations promoted by the Bush Administration for the past 5+ years, have largely, if not entirely, pro-management. The latest is no different:

I have this vision that because I own a dog, soon I will be legally prohibited from joining a union.

It's not quite that bad -- yet. But a series of decisions expected this summer from the Bush- appointed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) could destroy the existing union memberships of millions of people in the United States, and prevent any future unionization attempts by tens of millions more.

Under 1947's notorious union-busting Taft-Hartley Act, supervisors in the U.S. workforce are considered “management” and therefore have no legal right to unionize. The anticipated NLRB rulings, of three disputes collectively known as the Kentucky River cases, would allow employers in a wide array of industries to reclassify as “supervisors” any employee who has any type of oversight, no matter how fleeting, over a lower- ranked or less senior co-worker. Workers who take on apprentices. Lead men in manufacturing crews. Nurses who direct nurse aides.

And, well, I order our dog around. A lot. She seems to like it.

I have two dogs, so I wonder if I would get classified middle management?

This is yet another attempt by Bush and his corporate cronies to remove as many worker protection laws as possible. By defining anyone who has anything resembling a supervisor as management, regardless of whether they have any management authority or not, is about one thing, and one thing only. Removing Unions from the American workplace. Corporate management hates them, because they force the company to pay their employees a good wage, provide them benefits, ensure worker saftety, and provide retirement income for decades of service.

There was a time in this country, when most companies did that without labor unions. But this isn't only about screwing the worker. This is also about rewarding upper management. Encouraging, and expanding the already largest gap in pay between CEO's and the people who make their companies work.

Technorati Tags: Labor, Unions, NLRB

Repubilcan America

Where taxes are low, and fruit rots on the trees:

Millions of oranges will rot on the trees of Florida this year because a shortage of fruitpickers has been aggravated by fears about more stringent US immigration laws, local media reported yesterday.

This is what the Republican fearmongering on immigration has wraught. Farmers paying substandard wages to migrant workers who, fearing deportation, don't come to work.

The end result is crops rotting, either on the trees, or in the ground because there is not enough workers available to pick them.

Some may say, 'good'. They're illegal immigrants anyway. Others see this as an opportunity to create new jobs for Americans. Prices will go up (or government subsidies will), and every American will pay for this failed immigration policy the Republicans are pursuing. However, as I see it, the farmers will press Congress to back off on immigration, and we will return to the status quo.

It wouldn't be the first time.

Technorati Tags: Immigration, Oranges, Florida

The Maginot Line

Despite the elitist punditocracy thinking so, it's not the bloggers:

Gentlemen, it has come to my attention that your strings of pearls are being worn thin from clutching, at the intemperate and potty-mouthed "fascism" of liberal blogs. Apparently, you don't like these self-appointed kingmakers "purging" the Democratic party of anyone who doesn't toe the line, as seen most clearly in the current Senatorial primary race in Connecticut. You have picked up the whiff of intolerance and fascism behind the near-unanimous support for Ned Lamont, versus the incumbent Joe Lieberman. You think that the full-court press to elect Mr. Lamont is, apparently, almost a crime against basic human decency. And so you have started several sandbox fights with your arch-enemies, the guys (and girls) with blogs.

As you are so fond of explaining to the rabid pre-teens on the internets what is really good for them, let me explain what's good for all of you: NOT calling the exercise of democracy "fascism" or "purging." Some people with websites do not hold the reins of governmental power. They do not direct party funds. They don't run the military. They have, in other words, no actual power. What they have are opinions and some facts. Sort of like yourselves. When they advocate the election of Ned Lamont, the only ability they have to effect this is to convince people that he is a worthy candidate. Worthy of votes, donations, and word of mouth to Connecticut voters. The voters of Connecticut will decide whether they agree. This is the point you seem to be missing. If enough voters in Connecticut decide that their views will be better represented by Ned Lamont than by Joe Lieberman, he should be elected. Right? This is how democracy works. If you disagree, you are just as free as Markos, or Jane Hamsher, or Atrios, to make your argument why Joe Lieberman is the better choice.

This really is a quite simple idea. However, because the pundits who get paid their 6 figure salaries to tell us what to think, are now being challenged at every turn, they have decided to attack our (the bloggers) fire, with their vitriol.

The pundit class, have decided that the Lieberman-Lamont primary is the proverbial Maginot Line, that the netroots are not to cross. Only, just like the Germans invading France, we in blogistan (the so-called Fascists) just go around. So, in their war on words, we in blogistan, and especially left blogistan, are labeled, of all things, fascists. By the corporate owned (and government controlled, some would say) media.

Ironic, isn't it.

In the end we are reduced to the big money players in the media calling members of the American public, specifically that portion of the American public who regularly read their writings, names. And like the French in WWII, by the time the Punditocracy realizes that they are truly irrelevant, it will be too late.


Technorati Tags: Pundits

Thought for the Day

"Why does the Air Force need expensive new bombers? Have the people we've been bombing over the years been complaining?"

-George Wallace

Ah, the Suburban Life

I just wish someone would pay me enough, so that I can afford a full service landscaper.

The only thing worse than mowing the law in near 100° F temps, is having to pull weeds (and very insidious ones at that), and the native invasive grasses from your flower beds.

Ahh, suburbia.

Thought for the Day

"I look at what the phone company does and do the opposite."

--Craig Newmark

DeLay News

Faced with the prospect of being forced into running for the Congressional seat he just resigned, Tom DeLay is hinting at running a campaign:

SUGAR LAND, Texas (AP) - Former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay suggested Friday that he may not be ready for retirement just yet, a day after a federal judge ruled that his name must remain on the November ballot even though he resigned from Congress.

DeLay, who came home to Sugar Land for a previously scheduled event, also criticized U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks' ruling that the former House majority leader's name had to remain on the ballot.

"For this guy to say he can't tell where I'm going to be on Election Day, and that I am forced to be on the ballot, well, they may get exactly what they want," DeLay told supporters to raucous applause. Sparks is a Democrat appointed by Republican former President George Bush.

Later, reporters asked Delay if he now planned to run. He didn't say no.

"We have to wait and see what the 5th Circuit does on appeal," he said.

Unless the appeals fail, which, if I understand Judge Sparks ruling properly, it is likely to do, DeLay will have to do something.

Let's hope the DCCC recognizes this race for what it is, and helps Nick Lampson win.



Technorati Tags: Tom DeLay, Nick Lampson, TX-22

Even More Data Theft

By this point, you have to wonder if they are allowing this stuff to happen on purpose?

For the second time in two weeks,
Social Security numbers and other personal information of Navy personnel have been discovered on an Internet site, triggering an investigation.

The Navy said Friday that information on more than 100,000 naval and Marine Corps aviators and aircrew was on the Naval Safety Center Web site and on nearly 1,100 computer discs mailed out to naval commands.

No doubt, just like the VA laptop episode, the Navy will tell sailors that they have nothing to worry about, and there will be no credit monitoring offered.

I don't really know what to add to this. At this point, data breaches are happening every other week, and the Government does not seem to be doing anything about it. From that, what can you conclude, other than that they want it to happen.


Technorati Tags: Data Theft, Data Security, Navy

More Narrative

At what point will Democrats other than Joe Lieberman, stand up to the forming media narrative?

HARTFORD, Connecticut (Reuters) - A combative debate between Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman and challenger Ned Lamont has exposed Democratic Party fault lines on the Iraq war and set a harsh tone for next month's primary showdown.

Lieberman, a three-term senator and vice presidential nominee in 2000, emphasized his experience and bluntly dismissed Lamont as a political novice whose call for a timeline on withdrawing troops from Iraq was "dumb."

But Lamont, a millionaire businessman who has gained on Lieberman in the polls by portraying him as too supportive of President George W. Bush, attacked Lieberman as a knee-jerk cheerleader for the war.

I didn't see the debate between Lieberman and Lamont, but this media narrative that it is the "anti-war Democrats" versus the "pro-war Democrats" is utterly ridiculous on its face.

Particularly when 2/3rds of Americans want out of Iraq.

There are multiple facets to the Democrats view of the War in Iraq, however, except for Joe Lieberman, most, if not all Democrats believe this war has been prosecuted horribly under the "leadership" of George Bush, and his Administration.

Never mind the non-existent WMD's that the media keeps pretending was never the reason for going to war. Never mind the lies that were told about the capabilities of the Iraqi military, and what weapons it did have, and were held over all American's heads as a threat. Never mind 9/11. None of these facts are relevant to the media. The only fact that seems to be relevant, is that Lamont, and the "left-wing Internet bloggers" are "Anti-War".

However, it appears that the Democratic Party leadership, in its effort to prevent itself from being branded "Anti-War", bend over backwards, not to counter the media narrative with the truth, but to do whatever possible to distance themselves from the "Anti-War" monniker. Thus permitting the narrative to promulgate.

Gee, thanks guys.

Technorati Tags: Lieberman, Lamont, Iraq, Democrats, DNC, Media, Narrative

Facade of Political Theater

As Congressional Republicans start their farcical "We Hate Immigrant" tour of the United States (as opposed to doing something in Washington), we get provided the first, of what will, no doubt, be many moments ranging from simply ironic, to outright stupidity:

Royce said he wanted the out-of-Washington hearings so the immigration debate would not be kept secret from the public. Democrats participated, but denounced them as political theater.

Rep. Silvestre Reyes, a Texas Democrat, said the hearings were political, not practical.

"Congress needs to get back to work in Washington to reach a compromise agreement on comprehensive border security and immigration reform legislation," Reyes said.

Royce wanted to get out of Washington, to put on the facade of resolving this issue, and the Democrat wanted to get Congress back to Washington to actually resolve this issue.

I keep harping on this issue, yet it is only those of us on the political left who recognize that the majority party is the most inept, ineffectual, and seemingly disorganized group of people in recent history. It is a sad, sad commentary on the state of our elected leadership.

Technorati Tags: Immigration, Republican, Laredo

Equivalence?

For the sake of argument, let us pretend that I am a somewhat popular blogger.

To continue the argument, let us say that I wrote something that pissed someone off (the reason doesn't matter for the purposes of this discussion).

With this basic premise, let us posit three different responses to this scenario.

1. Being that there is an open comment system here at Supreme Irony, make a comment refuting what I wrote, or, if that person had a blog, write a post doing the same.

2. Post my email address, with the demand that his readers email me, and say whatever.

3. Find my home address, and telephone number, and subsequently post it, with the implied message of instigating contact.

According to some people, option 1 is the least desirable. According to these same people options 2 and 3 are equivalent.

Discuss.


Update: Let me add just one more point. Some of those people who think that posting the address and telephone number of an antagonist is equal to posting their email address (which is usually available on their webpage), also find it unacceptable when they are the target of the publishing, yet cannot understand why people would be upset when they do it to others.

It's Just a Focus Group

From the "bring 'em home" coalition:

A new Gallup poll finds that roughly 2 in 3 Americans urge a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, with 31% wanting this to start immediately.

Technorati Tags: Iraq

Thought for the Day

"No man remains quite what he was when he recognizes himself."

--Thomas Mann

I Can See Clearly Now

There has been a bit of a brouhaha on the right over the issue of posting personal information of "targets" on blogs. Unsurprisingly, internment camp supporter Michelle Malkin doesn't like receiving the hate mail, even though she directs her readers to regularly do the same.

More importantly, there are those on the Right who are beginning to see her hypocrisy for what it is, and decided that they don't like to see it in themselves.

Technorati Tags: Michelle Malkin, David Weigel

Presidential Presser

I am watching the Presidential press conference in Chicago on C-Span.

I am sorry, and this isn't just a partisan dislike for Bush. He sounds ignorant.

Maybe he is trying to sound all "down home" and folksy, but all too often it comes accross as unprepared, not knowledgable on the subjects, and just generally like he is making it all up as he is going along.

Compare and contrast this with previous Presidents and Presidential candidates.

I am not the type of person who thinks there are "qualifications" for a person to be President (beyond Constitutional qualifications), and honestly believe that any American has the right to run for President, or Congress, or any other elected office. That said, after having been President for 6 years now, he should be able to deal with these events a bit more professionally.

*sigh*

Calvin and Hobbes: Prophetic

Look at this Calvin and Hobbes comic strip from 7 July 1995, and tell me that Bill Watterson wasn't prophetic.

Technorati Tags: Calvin and Hobbes, Fundraising, Bill Watterson

Statement from Tx Democratic Party

Chairman Boyd Richie on Tom DeLay ruling:

"This is not partisan victory, but a victory for the rule of law. This case was about protecting the electoral process and preserving the U.S. Constitution, and we are extremely pleased with Judge Sparks' ruling.

Today's ruling confirmed what we have believed all along - that this attempt by the Republican Party to replace Tom DeLay on the ballot is at best a manipulation of election law and most importantly, a sham attempt to circumvent the primary process and ignore voters in the 22nd Congressional District. We felt it was important for somebody to stand up and fight against the Republican scheme to hand-pick the candidate of their choice and subvert the most fundamental aspect of popular democracy - the right of voters to pick their representatives."

Technorati Tags: Texas, Tom DeLay, Boyd Richie, TX-22

When All Else Fails

blame others:

"I think it's a sad day for the voters of the 22nd district of Texas," said Gary Gillen, the chairman of the Republican Party of Fort Bend County, which is one of the four counties in that district. "I think [the ruling] denies the voters the opportunity to select the candidate they want to vote for."

As the DCCC helpfully reminded Mr. Gillen, there was a little process, called the primaries which saw Tom DeLay chosen by the voters of Texas' 22nd Congressional District to represent them in the November general election.

This despite the fact that Tom DeLay stayed in the primary race so that he, and not the voters of TX-22 would choose the Republican candidate for the general election.

Mr. Gillen needs to assign blame where blame is deserved.

At the feet of Tom DeLay, and those who voted for him.

Technorati Tags: Tom DeLay, Gary Gillen, TX-22, TxGOP

The Deluded Life

People who work for Fox News Channel, must only watch Fox News Channel:

From the July 6 edition of Fox News Live:

COLBY: And that was, of course, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq wishing the president a happy birthday today, but also the two leaders talking about the progress that has been made in Iraq. I want to go back now to Colonel North. And the president brings up a good point. We are a nation of our word, something that North Korea clearly hasn't been, Colonel. So, why would North Korea push our buttons, so to speak, by firing off these missiles when they know -- they can see in Iraq -- when we come in, we get the job done?

Wow. Just, wow.

Technorati Tags: Jamie Colby, Fox News, North Korea, Iraq

Thought for the Day

"There is nobody so irritating as somebody with less intelligence and more sense than we have."

--Don Herold

DeLay Woes

Via Atrios.

Federal District Court Judge Sam Sparks just ruled in favor of Texas Democrats who sought an injunction to prevent Republicans in Texas Congressional District 22 from replacing Tom DeLay on the congressional ballot.

Texas Democrats argued that the U.S. Constitution, not State law, defines eligibility to serve in the U.S. Congress. Judge Sparks agreed.

More details from The Houston Chronicle:

A federal judge ruled today that Republicans cannot replace former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay on the ballot for the 22nd Congressional District race.

U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks, a Republican appointee, ruled that DeLay must appear on the Nov. 7 ballot as the GOP nominee for the congressional seat that DeLay abandoned last month. Sparks ruling was confirmed by Texas Democratic Party spokeswoman Amber Moon.

Details of Sparks ruling were not immediately available.

Sparks ruling halts the process of replacing DeLay on the ballot, but the GOP is expected to appeal the decision to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.

If the Republicans lose on appeal, DeLay will have to decide whether to campaign for an office from which he already has resigned.

It looks like DeLay will be the candidate on the ballot.

Nick Lampson is the Demcratic candidate for DeLay's seat, and he will need help.

This seat was going to be a tough one to win. DeLay was confident he would win, so this district has a higher representation of Democrats than it had previously, post redistricting. This is a real opportunity for a Democrat in a fairly conservative district.

If you can, volunteer, or donate.

Nick Lampson (TX-22)	$

Technorati Tags: Tom DeLay, Nick Lampson, TX-22, Texas, Elections, 2006, Judge Sam Sparks

Coulter the Plagarizer?

In a followup to the allegations of plagarism in Ann Coulters writings, Justin Rood at TPMmuckraker.com spoke with the individual who did the analysis for the NY Post:

It didn't take long to find evidence of plagiarism, Barrie said. "After we found three in the book, we called it quits. I think we found four of her syndicated columns that had problems." But the task proved draining, he said -- on himself, not his technology. "After combing through Ann Coulter for a while, it doesn't take long before you want to call it quits. I want to prove the technology, but I don't want to make my eyes bleed."

Barrie confirmed that Universal Press Syndicate, which distributes Coulter's columns to over 100 newspapers around the country, called him twice yesterday. UPS' Kathie Kerr had told me yesterday that they want to review a copy of Barries "report" before making a comment.

Oops.


Technorati Tags: Ann Coulter, NY Post, Plagarism

Coulter the Hunted?

Wow, what a difference a day makes.

TPMmuckraker contacted Universal Press Syndicates about the alleged plagerism that Ann Coulter perpetrated in her latest book Godless, and numerous columns she penned.

At first, UPS demurred, saying she needed to answer these charges herself. Now, things have changed and they are asking to see the documented evidence of her plagarism.

Who'd a thunk it.

Technorati Tags: Universal Press Syndicates, Ann Coulter, Plagarism

Republican Pre-9/11 Mindset

Included spying on Americans:

The U.S. National Security Agency asked AT&T Inc. to help it set up a domestic call monitoring site seven months before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, lawyers claimed June 23 in court papers filed in New York federal court.

The allegation is part of a court filing adding AT&T, the nation's largest telephone company, as a defendant in a breach of privacy case filed earlier this month on behalf of Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. customers. The suit alleges that the three carriers, the NSA and President George W. Bush violated the Telecommunications Act of 1934 and the U.S. Constitution, and seeks money damages.

``The Bush Administration asserted this became necessary after 9/11,'' plaintiff's lawyer Carl Mayer said in a telephone interview. ``This undermines that assertion.''

Seven months before.

So when Cheney and others asserted that if they had domestic spying before 9/11, they could have caught the hijackers?

Apparently not.

It would seem that George Bush did not, as he asserted, order this program in response to 9/11.


Technorati Tags: Domestic Spying

American Civil War II?

Billmon makes the case that one could be possible

Talk of disunion and civil war may seem like hyperbole. I'm sure it would certainly seem so to the vast majority of Americans who don't think much about politics or culture and just want to get on with their lives. I'm sure most Spaniards felt the same way in the summer of 1936, just as most Americans did in the winter of 1860.

But the historical truth is that civil wars aren't made by vast majorities, but by enraged and fearful minorities. Looking at America's traditionalists and the modernists today, I see plenty of rage and fear, most, though hardly all, of it eminating from the authoritarian right. For now, these primal passions are still being contained within the boundaries of the conventional political process. But that process -- essentially a system for brokering the demands of competing interest groups -- isn't designed to handle the stresses of a full-blown culture war.

Compared to most countries, America has been very lucky so far -- those kind of passions have only erupted in massive bloodshed once (well, twice if you count the original revolution.) By definition, however, something that has already happened is no longer impossible. It's easy for newspaper columnists to fantasize about disunited states, but only madmen would actually try to make them so. Unfortunately, the madmen are out there. It's up to the rest of us to keep them under control.

Is any of this possible? Go read the entire post, and judge for yourself.

However, this is something I have pondered for many years. Years ago what colored my thoughts about this, was that I am a child of New England. While I lived for a number of years in Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina, I primarily was raised in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. While central Pennsylvania has gained the nickname Pennsyltucky, people in central Pennsylvania don't really fancy themselves part of the "Old South", and wouldn't desire to become a part of the Confederacy. My beliefs towards the "Old South", and the Civil War were colored by US history as taught from the perspective of the Yankees who defeated Johnny Reb.

Today, after having lived a third of my life in Texas, I have a different perspective. Not one colored by the "I'm a Yankee living in the South" any longer. I have in-laws whose own family history is entwined with the Confederacy. Old southern families who were slave owners, and fought the "Yankee Invaders". I also have learned a bit about how US history is taught in the south. It sometimes reinforces the Civil War as the "War of Northern Aggression", though not to the degree that my Father-in-Law was taught in the 50's.

So what does this have to do with the prospect of another "War between the states"? Directly, nothing. Indirectly, however, it has a lot of influence. Today we are witnessing the beginnings of a culture war, not unlike what billmon described as the beginnings of the Spanish Civil War. This culture war is being stoked by extremists on both sides, however, from the far right we are getting rhetoric that is trying to paint Liberals, and particularly Liberals from the Northeast, as Godless heathens, not too dissimilar from al-Qaeda.

Islamic fundamentalism has given the Authoritarian Right a convenient target to direct, not only their ire, but drive comparisons (however specious) of Liberals. These "traditionalists", as billmon calls them, are trying to create an environment of ultra-nationalist beliefs, where USA above all is the only acceptable level of patriotism. Beyond that there are a host of social issues that these same people are trying to drive. From abortion to gay rights, from religion to social safety nets to racial equality, these social conservatives are pushing for an agenda that creates an "us versus them" tension that gets built on repeatedly until we see a situation such as in Delaware.

As extremists who are driving this cultural division, and trying to deepen the rift between those who oppose cultural assimilation, and those who promote it, get their "successes", they can build on them, and create more tension.

The outstanding question, then becomes: will there be a backlash against these extremists?

And more importantly, how will that backlash manifest itself?

Violence is the easy route.

The harder route will be to convince people that they are being manipulated into these extreme positions by the leaders of the movement.

I personally advocate taking the hard route. I don't want to see Civil War II.

Net Neutrality Action

If Congress follows through with the Commerce Committee's recommendation to eliminate network neutrality from the Internet, Google promises to act:

Google warned on Tuesday it will not hesitate to file anti-trust complaints in the United States if high-speed Internet providers abuse the market power they could receive from U.S. legislators.

The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee last week approved sweeping communications reform legislation that would make it easier for telephone companies like AT&T to offer subscription television to consumers.

But it narrowly rejected attempts by some lawmakers to strengthen safeguards on Internet service, which had pitted high-speed Internet, or broadband, providers such as AT&T against Internet content companies like Google.

The battle centred on whether broadband providers can charge more to carry unaffiliated content or to guarantee service quality, an issue called Net neutrality.

"If the legislators ... insist on neutrality, we will be happy. If they do not put it in, we will be less happy but then we will have to wait and see whether or not there actually is any abuse," Vint Cerf, a Google vice-president and one of the pioneers of the Internet, told a news conference in Bulgaria.

"If we are not successful in our arguments ... then we will simply have to wait until something bad happens and then we will make known our case to the Department of Justice's anti-trust division," he said on Tuesday.

I would hope that other companies who have a stake in this fight, will be willing to join with Google to prevent companies like AT&T from killing the Internet.

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality, Google

Thought for the Day

"The only reason some people get lost in thought is because it's unfamiliar territory."

--Paul Fix

Sense of Entitlement

Joe Lieberman continues to defend the sense of entitlement he thinks he has as Senator from Connecticut, and backtracks at the same time:

Senator Joseph I. Lieberman tried to reassert his commitment to the Democratic Party today, after announcing on Monday that he would run independently for reelection if he loses the state Democratic primary next month.

"I have one goal, and it is to be the Democratic nominee and win this primary," Mr. Lieberman said after an Independence Day parade in this eastern Connecticut town, where he marched with a few dozen people, drawing both cheers of support and shouts of opposition.

[...]

"He's going for two bites at the apple," said George Jepsen, the immediate past chairman of the State Democratic Party, who recently endorsed Mr. Lamont. "It violates people's fundamental sense of fairness."

But in his announcement, Senator Lieberman described the primary as an incomplete reflection of voter will, hinting that he feared a strong turnout from the impassioned supporters of Mr. Lamont.

"If 30 percent of the Democrats come out and vote, that's about 210,000 people," Mr. Lieberman said. "That means 105,000 plus one will win the primary. There's 2 million voters, registered voters, in the state of Connecticut. That would mean that 5 percent of the registered voters would have the opportunity to decide whether I continue to be Connecticut's senator or not."

Party primaries are designed so that the party can decide who will represent the party in the general election. Any of the candidates may think they are the best candidate, however, in the end it is not the candidates choice. It is the voters choice.

If Lieberman is worried that he doesn't have enough support within the Democratic Party of Connecticut, he has a couple of options.

Either figure out why and change, or leave the party. He cannot have it both ways. Just because he says he is a Democrat, doesn't mean that he will automatically gain the support of Democrats. Neither is he entitled to be Senator. That is for the party members who participate in a contested Primary to decide.



Technorati Tags: Lieberman, Lamont, Connecticut

Ethnic Cleansing in America

The General takes on Jew Hater Nedd Kareiva.

I am sure that Nedd Kareiva would like to hear from you.

Just be polite, after all, if Jews are offending his sensibilities, then I am sure that naughty language would cause apoplexy. And that wouldn't be civil.

Technorati Tags: Nedd Kareiva, Stop The ACLU, Delaware, Indian River

The Last Refuge of the Defeated

David Horowitz hurls invective:

The main security concern in my mind in writing the piece was not al-Qaeda but deranged cranks whipped into a frenzy by the reckless hatred directed at the Bush Administration by the left from Michael Moore and Huffington Post to Ted Kennedy and Al Gore. Anyone remember John Muhammad, the DC sniper? So far as we know, he a lone individual ginned up on the passions of the times. For those who don't catch my meaning, consider this email I received today, one among many that I receive virtually every day:

Horowitz has been roundly beaten about the head and shoulders on this issue. Knowing that his suggestion that the taking of a picture of Rumsfeld's house constitutes a security risk so grave as to warrant the execution of the photographer (particularly when the photographer was given permission by the homeowner to take the picture) is idiotic, and based on the response from the Right Wing Froth Machine™, beyond the pale. Horowitz had to resort to the last refuge of the Right, flail. Compare the Left to, not Hitler this time, but the DC sniper, John Allen Muhammad.

At least Horowitz is being "intellectually honest" with himself. His argument is lost. He lost so badly, and his inability to admit his error, prevents him from being gracious and retracting or apologizing for inciting even more eliminationist fantasies from his Right Wing bretheren.

Glenn Greenwald has more. Apparently even the "rational" Michelle Malkin is taking the position that even though Rumsfeld himself gave permission for the photograph to be used, it is even more proof of a "moonbat" conspiracy.

It goes on and on, and the Right have obviously decided that attacking the media, as traitors to America, and specifically the New York Times as the leader of the pack, is a winning strategy.

To me, it represents a frightening turn of events. The Right, and specifically the Republican Authoritarian Cultists who worship at the feet of George W. Bush, are hostile to the very foundations of our country. Those who criticize Dear Leader are traitors to the cause. They deserve nothing less than execution. Where have we heard this before?

As the Right get more and more unhinged in the denunciations of anyone who dares to stand up to George W. Bush: Cult Hero, I fear that many of these people are going to move from rhetoric to action. While, people like Michelle Malkin, John Hindraker, and Red State may want that, and will probably enjoy seeing those "moonbats get what they deserve", one has to wonder what has caused these people to fall off the deep end like this?

This brings me to one thing that has been really bothering me for the past few months. And particularly today, the day 230 years ago, when a group of people decided that they did not want to be subject to a king. One who claimed that he was above the law. One who claimed that he was granted "a special privilege" by God to rule over man. One who felt it was his duty to " invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity."

230 year ago today, the leaders of what would become the most powerful country in the world, decided that they did not want to be a part of a society who ruled by a leader worshipped as a God. They did not want a leader who demanded that all his subjects not cross him. They declared OUR independence from the king. And a few years later, 1789, created the document, and government that would lead America from being colonies of the British crown, to being the United States of America.

Today, however, we are seeing a reversal. In the United States we have a group of people who have descended to cult worship of a President. A cult worship so strong that they are willing to openly wish for the death of their own countrymen and countrywomen who dare to oppose this particular President. In years past, these cult members were relegated to the sidelines. Not today. They are the mainstream. They are the opinion shapers of the Republican Party. These people have, themselves, a minor cult following. There are people who hang on their every word, just waiting for the call to action. These people, are the true anti-Americans.

These people are the ones who talk about “giving up freedoms, to protect freedoms”. These are the very people Ben Franklin was talking about when warning those who would sacrifice Liberty for Security. These people do not want the America we have today. From removing the right of women to make their own medical decisions, to codifying discrimination in the Constitution, these people claim to be the strongest defenders of the “American way of life”, when in fact, they are the ones who would take away those freedoms, given the opportunity.

If I could have my way, or were able to launch a run for President of the United States, or were able to consult with a campaigh, I would stress protecting those freedoms the Republican Party would be so happy to take away from Americans. The adversarial relationship that the Government is supposed to have with the media, would not be threatened, like the Republicans are so willing to do. I would make it my mission to restore the greatness that is the United States of America.

We are witnessing a very disturbing turn of events. I just hope that it is (very) temporary, and we are not witnessing the death of American democracy. Unless Congress acts to remove this President from office, we are stuck with him for another two years. I shudder to think the damage he, and his cult followers could inflict.



Technorati Tags: David Horowitz, Michelle Malkin, John Hindraker, Red State, Glenn Glennwald, Authoritarian Cultists, July 4th, Independence Day, Donald Rumsfeld

Lamont Responds to Lieberman's Stunt

From LamontBlog:

Today, Joe Lieberman cut-and-ran from the Democratic party on the slowest news day of the summer.

In announcing he would run as a petitioning candidate in November if he loses on August 8th, he has clearly stated he is no longer a member of the Democratic party. The only thing he is concerned about right now is his own desperate attempt to hold on to power.

Members of a party abide by primary results. There is no such thing as an "petitioning Democrat." If there was, Joe could accept the Republican endorsement and run as a "Republican Democrat."

Joe has also clearly stated he thinks he will lose the primary on August 8th. His internal polls must look even worse than I thought.

Just like when Joe ran for Vice President and Senate at the same time in 2000 - meaning that if he and Gore had won, Democrats would have lost a senate seat to a Republican appointment - he is again putting his own career and self-interest ahead of his constitutents and his party (or now ex-party).

In addition, Joe has just created a world of shit for his supposed friends Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, Chris Dodd, Diane Farrell, Joe Courtney, and Chris Murphy. I wonder what they all think of this.

This is how he treats his friends. This is how he treats his party. On the slowest news day of the summer.

These are the actions of a very weak candidate, and a selfish and cowardly man.

What a sorry sight to see an 18-year incumbent senator running scared from a little primary challenge like this. No backbone. No courage. No integrity.

And not a Democrat anymore, either.

I don't really have anything to add to this.

Joe Lieberman has decided that him being in the Senate is more important than the Democratic Party. How will Chuck Schumer react?

He has promised to support Lieberman through the Primary (after hinting that the DSCC will support Lieberman, win or lose). Schumer is unwilling to say if the DSCC will support Ned Lamont if he wins the Primary.

If Joe Lieberman, Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid and the rest of the Democratic Party establishment were truly concerned about obtaining a Democratic Majority in the Senate this November, they should be pressing Lieberman to get out of the Democratic Party now, and throw their support behind Lamont.

Let me use this opportunity to encourage people to support their local Democratic Party candidate for Congress, and help through financial contributions, or volunteering your time.

Technorati Tags: Lieberman, Lamont

Lieberman to Jump Ship

Accoring to Atrios, Joe Lieberman is going to continue to run in the Democratic Primary in Connecticut, but collect signatures for a petition to run as an independent should he lose the primary.

There is a reason that Lieberman is Bush's favorite Democrat. However, I don't think that this will translate into Republican support in the general election for Lieberman. This will most likely drive most Republican Party supporters, who would otherwise support Lieberman, are now going to support the Republican challenger. This maneuver by Lieberman, sets up the possiblity of a reliably Democratic state turning Republican, if he splits enough Democratic Party support.

Because it is all about Joe.

Technorati Tags: Lieberman, Lamont

Thought for the Day

"The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true."

--James Branch Cabell

"Ironically, photos were taken with Secretary Rumsfeld's permission."

This is in reference to one of the things that I was blabbering on about last night.

It appears that Saturday, the New York Times did a puff piece on a town on Maryland's eastern shore (where I would love to be able to live), where Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney have vacation homes. While, according to the Right Wing Froth Machine™ this was treasonous enough, the NYT crossed the line by including a photo of Rumsfeld's house.

Glenn Greenwald took the appropriate course of action and contacted the photographer and writer of this article.

The above quote was the response from the photographer.

I expect that we will see a full apology from Michelle Malkin, John Hindraker, Red State, David Horowitz, and the other members of the Right Wing Froth Machine™ who published the personal details of the photographer, Linda Spillers, and the author, Peter Kilborn. After all, it is the Right who are full of integrity, and value their credibility so much, that they would never dare to leave this sort of thing hanging out there. Right?

Technorati Tags: Don Rumsfeld, Michelle Malkin, John Hindraker, Red State, David Horowitz, NYT, Linda Spillers, Peter Kilborn

Wow, I am Tired.

Of more than one thing.

I just got back from my whirlwind tour of East Texas. Barring a serious downpour that conspired to add 60 minutes to my drive, all went well.

I was reviewing what I missed over the weekend. I'm too tired to link to this stuff tonight, but it apparently has been the talk of blogistan.

It is enough to make me just not care anymore. The media are simultaneously courting the right wing, while the right wing threatens it with treason, and apparently execution by citizens rather than trial by jury. Which brings up the point that I have made, that many in the media are scared to make. Right blogistan is anti-democratic (small 'd' democratic). They are opposed to the very fundamental beliefs of the founding fathers, particularly when it comes to the freedoms America has to offer.

It is fair to say, that when someone on the Right, blabbers on about "freedoms" that are being fought to be protected, that same person, would be just as happy to not have those freedoms.

Apparently we have Gwen Ifill who will lie about her performance during the 2004 Vice Presidential debate. Ana Marie Cox who will say anything about left blogistan to sell books, and get people to think she is "serious". I don't even want to get into the whole Kos/Jerome Armstrong thing, which at this point, is more fiction circulating than truth.

Just one last thing on the incessant threats that the Right lob against the media. We have reached the point where the media is, itself dying. The NY Times publishes an article about tracking finances through the SWIFT network. The President, the Secretary of the Treasury, the Vice President, etc., etc., etc., all talk about the federal governments ability to track finances of suspected terrorists through the SWIFT network.

However, it is the media, and not the President who is violating National Security?
It is the media, and not the President, who should be brought up on criminal charges?
It is the media, and not the President, who is guilty of endangering Americans?

For those who cannot seem to understand the basics. The monitoring of financial transactions through the SWIFT network, IS NOT CLASSIFIED INFORMATION. The NY Times, The Wall Street Journal, The LA Times, and others did NOT reveal ANYTHING that was a secret.

Now that we have that out of the way, let us think about what the Right REALLY wants when it talks about shutting down our ostensibly independent press. The First Amendment of the US Constitution is obviously too American.

And this is what I am really tired over. The Right is trying to take away American's freedoms, the media asks itself that question of whether it is too free, and those of us who question George W. Bush, Cult Hero, are traitors.

It makes me want to give up.

Thought for the Day

"The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder."

--Alfred Hitchcock

Travel Day

Off to pick kids up from summer camp.

Don't know if there will be any posting before Sunday.

Superman Returns

Were someone to ask me "is Superman Returns is a good movie", my answer would have to be, hell yeah.

Technorati Tags: Superman Returns

Republican Score Card

Want to know how you are harming American soldiers?

August J. Pollak has the rundown.

Protecting our Daughters

At the beginning of June, the FDA approved a new vaccine developed specifically to prevent cervical cancer. Today, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices issued an recommendation that all girls aged 11 and 12, and possibly as early as 9 be routinely vaccinated:

Taking up a sensitive issue among religious conservatives, an influential government advisory panel Thursday recommended that 11- and 12-year-old girls be routinely vaccinated against the sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer.

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices also said the shots can be started for girls as young as 9, at the discretion of their doctors.

The committee's recommendations usually are accepted by federal health officials, and influence insurance coverage for vaccination

The human papilloma virus (HPV) has been determined to be responsible for various types of cancers of the reproductive system in women. This vaccine presents the first, in what is hoped to be many, vaccines against cancer. Currently there are trials underway to determine the affect on boys. HPV has been linked to some cancers in males, and if affective against this virus, should be recommended for boys of the same age group.

Fortunately the Family Research Council decided, wisely, not to make a big stink over this one. Particularly since HPV is a sexually transmitted virus that estimates put potential infections at 50% plus of sexually active females.

Chalk one up for the good guys (or girls, as it were).

Technorati Tags: HPV, Gardasil, FDA

Note to Congress: Don't Do It.

Don't give Bush his legislation

President Bush said Thursday he will "conform with the findings" of the Supreme Court that strongly limit his power to conduct military tribunals for suspected terrorists imprisoned at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Bush made his comments during an appearance with visiting Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. The court's ruling was released while the two leaders were meeting, and the president said he had not been able to review the decision fully.

"To the extent there is latitude to work with the Congress to determine whether or not the military tribunals will be an avenue in which to give people their day in court, we will do so," Bush said.

The moment Congress gives him a piece of legislation on this issue, he will put on a signing statement about how he intends to interpret the law how ever he wishes.

Technorati Tags: Gitmo, SCOTUS, Bush, Congress

Thought for the Day

"I keep the subject of my inquiry constantly before me, and wait till the first dawning opens gradually, by little and little, into a full and clear light."

--Isaac Newton

VA Laptop Recovered and More

Via Computerworld :

A missing laptop and hard disk containing personal data on over 26.5 million veterans has been recovered, Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Secretary Jim Nicholson announced this morning.

"The investigation continues to see whether or not this information has been compromised in any way," or whether copies of the data have been made, Nicholson said just before a scheduled hearing before the House Commitee on Veterans Affairs.

Nicholson's announcement appeared to catch those at the hearing completely by surprise and the start of the hearing was briefly delayed.

The laptop theft touched off a firestorm among veterans and government officials angered that the data, which included personal information on active-duty military personnel as well as veterans, had been compromised.

It was not immediately clear how the laptop and hard disk were recovered.

And via The Carpetbagger we learn that in order to fund credit fraud monitoring for the millions of veterans, and active duty military personnel whose credit may be compromised due to this theft, the Bush administration is going to rob Peter to pay Paul:

Two Senate Democrats on Wednesday criticized a White House plan to cut money intended for food stamps, student loans and farmers to pay for credit monitoring for veterans whose personal and financial data was stolen last month.

"The Bush-Cheney administration has no qualms about coming up here and twisting our arms for funding for Iraq, but when it comes to needs here at home for veterans and other ordinary Americans, it's rob Peter to pay Paul," said Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont.

How typical of Bush.

He screws up, and then he punishes other people not involved to pay for the screw up.



Technorati Tags: Bush, Veterans, Data Theft, Laptop

Well, You Knew This Had To Happen, Eventually

Supreme Court rules Bush overstepped his legal limits:

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that President Bush overstepped his authority in ordering military war crimes trials for Guantanamo Bay detainees.

The ruling, a rebuke to the administration and its aggressive anti-terror policies, was written by Justice John Paul Stevens, who said the proposed trials were illegal under U.S. law and Geneva conventions.

The case focused on Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who worked as a bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden. Hamdan, 36, has spent four years in the U.S. prison in Cuba. He faces a single count of conspiring against U.S. citizens from 1996 to November 2001.

Cue up the Right Wing Froth Machine™ ...

now

Technorati Tags: Gitmo, SCOTUS, Tribunals

CNN Hurting GOP?

According to Bill Frist it is:

O'Brien defended CNN, "We are covering but I think there is -- a lot of what you say there -- Americans are not hearing that particular message. As the majority leader, isn't that part of your job?"

Frist replied, "Well, you know, it's part of my job and your job and your whole coming into this was, again, saying [from] Harry Reid that we are spending all of our time on marriage -- which is important. That we're spending all of the time on flag without mentioning what we've done of the floor for six weeks. Iraq, the war on terror, making you safer... where's your coverage of that? What you do is concentrate on things that are spun to you from the other side of the aisle and that's why that message doesn't get out."

Now that is a bit telling.

It is not only Bill Frist's job to spin Republican talking points, it is also CNN's job to do so.

Truth in advertising, I tell you.

Technorati Tags: CNN, Bill Frist

What Do You Mean, You're Out of Beer?

English fans draining Germany dry:

England fans are drinking Germany dry.

Breweries warned that beer could run out before the final due to demand.

In Nuremberg fans drank 1.2 millions pints of beer during the Trinidad game reports The Sun.

Stuttgart landlords said an extra 900,000 pints were sunk last weekend as 60,000 fans celebrated England's win over Ecuador.

In Cologne - where England drew with Sweden - pubs ran out of bottles and barrels.

Wow.


Thanks to Shakespeare's Sister for the link.

Technorati Tags: World Cup, Germany, Beer

Thought for the Day

"There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval."

--George Santayana

In a World Where Up is Down

And Republican shills stump for bigger government, we inhabit Glenn Beck's world:

BECK: Everybody always thinks if you're in the press, you just -- you have to believe that the government is evil, don't you think? I think that's the first thing in Journalism 101 they teach you -- the government is evil and you must take them down at all costs. Or, how is it that they all have that attitude? That's what I'd like to know. That's, you know -- that's the number-one thing on the declaration of principles that I would like to see The New York Times print. Because, you know, we're always saying, "Aw, they don't understand us." Well, I don't understand them. I don't know who these people are.

How can you be fighting for the same things that Al Qaeda wants, you know? Can you imagine -- can you imagine The New York Times coming out and saying "Hey, the ovens aren't so bad," back in World War II? Can you imagine that? I don't know; sure, there are some Jews in there, but I bet they might make some good pizzas in there too. What are you -- what? The New York Times is just -- I don't get it. I don't understand it. Except that I really truly believe that they believe that we're a bad nation, or at least our government is bad and has always been bad. "You know, we've been passing out those smallpox blankets to Indians."

Now, the statement about the NY Times stumping for the extermination of the Jews, is his normal reprehensible stuff, that CNN seems to think is acceptable discourse for todays cable news outlets and their personalities.

The first paragraph is what I find interesting.

According to Beck, the "Liberal" NY Times think government is evil. Or that is what Journalism 101 teaches you.

I am sure that when Bill Clinton was President, he was championing the cause of government. Right?

I am sure that during the David Koresh episode, he was out defending the "Jack-Booted Thugs" of the ATF and FBI. Right?

I am sure that during the Elian Gonzales episode, he was defending the right of those same "Jack-Booted Thugs" to take Elian back to his father in Cuba. Right?

Afterall, today, Beck is championing the same "Jack-Booted Thugs" snooping into your personal life. Listening to your phone call, examining your bank transactions.

Technorati Tags: Glenn Beck, NY Times, CNN, SWIFT, Domestic Spying

Texas and Redistricting

The Supreme Court ruled on the Texas Redistricting case:

The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld most of the Republican-boosting Texas congressional map engineered by former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay but threw out part, saying some of the new boundaries failed to protect minority voting rights.

The fractured decision was a small victory for Democratic and minority groups who accused Republicans of an unconstitutional power grab in drawing boundaries that booted four Democratic incumbents from office.

CNN was spinning this wildly as a "win" for Republicans, but it is not. Although the Court ruled that states can redistrict as often as they wish, they did rule that Texas violated the voting rights of minorities. This was one of the key claims in the redistricting fight.

With Southern Republicans holding up renewal of the Voting Rights Act, and my idiot congressman John Carter pretending that there is racial harmony in Texas, the ruling from the SCOTUS effectively invalidates their entire reasoning for wanting to seek an end to the VRA, and keeping the current Texas district map.

Technorati Tags: Texas, Redistricting, Supreme Court, SCOTUS, Voting Rights Act, John Carter

Perpetuating Stereotypes

It is one thing when Republicans do it towards Democrats. But, when a prominent Democrat does it towards other Democrats, you get a collective WTF?

So, Mr. Obama,

Let me just add to what Matt Stoller, and Atrios said.

Stop perpetuating the stereotype that Democrats are anti-religion. If you feel it is necessary to attack Democrats on this false stereotype, fine. Just don't be surprised when Republicans use your own words to attack you, or Democrats all across the country. Don't be surprised if tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of voters across the country believe you, and vote Republican, because they don't want Democrats snuffing out religion in this country.

Love,

David (Austin Tx).

P.S. I know I am not one of your constituents, however, I do actually want to see Democrats win.

P.P.S. Although I am not one of the Evangelical Christians, you are obviously trying to court, I, as do most Democrats, recognize that Christians, including even Evangelical Christians do represent a significant number of voters, and their votes, along with the votes of every other American, are valuable. Apparently, I, unlike you, recognize that not every Christian voter is an Evangelical Christian voter, and Democrats are not, as you seem to be implying, anti-Christian zealots.



Technorati Tags: Barack Obama, Democrat, Christian, Evangelical

Falling off the Deep End

Congressional Republicans really have lost it this time. After the NY Times published information about the anti-terrorist banking program (which George Bush has talked about many times since 9/11), Republicans and right-wing blogistan, all across the country had a collective hissy-fit. Today, their hissy-fit reached heretofore unknown heights when Republican House members announced their intention to introduce a resolution to condemn the NY Times for their story.

Let's think about this for a moment. Our sheepish press exercises some independence, and publishes a story about how the President is authorizing the federal government to spy on Americans. After 9/11 the President said that he will track the finances of suspected terrorists to track them down.

Republicans think that even though the President announced is intentions publicly, it is a secret, and they want to punish the news media for revealing this.

This is not about the media revealing "state secrets". This is about Republicans trying to eliminate the independent media.

This is how Fascist Governments get started.

Technorati Tags: GOP, NY Times, SWIFT, The Hill, Fascism

Fixing One of My Pet Peeves

Red light runners:

Texas cities have been given the legal green light to install cameras at traffic signals on state intersections.

The ruling from Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott came in response to an inquiry from the Texas Department of Transportation about the agency's authority to enforce traffic laws.

Abbott said the transportation department can permit local municipalities to install and operate the cameras.

I have had more close calls than I care to count, and have known many people who have been hit by people running red lights.

I understand the problems people have with the cameras, and to some degree sympathize with those reasons. However, and I don't know if this is particularly endemic to Texas, but alot of people run red lights here.

And I hate it.

More of This

Yesterday, in my longish post about unions, and what Democrats need to do to speak to working-class Americans, one thing I said needed to be done was for Democrats to speak up.

Like this:

"Congress is going to have earn its raise by putting American workers first: A raise for workers before a raise for Congress," said Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada.

This is a start. By tying the Congressional raise to the minimum wage issue, Republicans will be backed into the corner of having to explain why they deserve a raise, when Americans making less than the average hourly raise don't deserve to have the minimum wage raised.

This is just the beginning. There are a host of issues that relate to working-class Americans that are being ignored or undermined by Republican policies. Democrats need to step up and address them. Not only do they need to be addressed in Washington, but the message needs to be taken out of Washington, and to the people. We are in an election year. One in which Democrats can reverse Republican gains, and hopefully regain a congressional majority. However, pontificating from on high in Washington DC is a sure way to ensure the message gets lost.

So, more of this hardline stance on things like the minimum wage.

Update: Was scanning through the RSS feeds in Bloglines. CNN captioned this article as:

Dems threaten to block their own pay raise

They are saying this as if it is a bad thing. Much like the tone of the coverage of Warren Buffet's philanthropic gift. Last night, the tone of the news was "why would a rich guy offer to help the poor?"


Technorati Tags: Harry Reid, Minimum Wage, 2006, Elections

But I Thought Gore is a Serial Liar?

An Inconvient Truth, verdict? truthful:

The nation's top climate scientists are giving "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore's documentary on global warming, five stars for accuracy.

The former vice president's movie — replete with the prospect of a flooded New York City, an inundated Florida, more and nastier hurricanes, worsening droughts, retreating glaciers and disappearing ice sheets — mostly got the science right, said all 19 climate scientists who had seen the movie or read the book and answered questions from The Associated Press.

Oh, we can't have that, can we?

Al Gore telling the truth?

Technorati Tags: Al Gore, An Inconvient Truth

Accepting Responsibility

Wow, this is refreshing. A member of the Bush administration accepting responsibility for their mistake:

"Unfortunately, a very bad thing happened," Nicholson told a House Appropriations subcommittee. "I am outraged by it and the slow response of some of my otherwise very good subordinates. But I am the responsible person, and it is to me that you are entitled to look."

This entire episode has been a debacle. From how this was allowed to happen, to the pathetically slow response, to the blasé manner in which the VA owned up to its responsibilities, this is a microcosom of the entire Bush administration.

Except for the part where the head of the agency accepts responsibility for the cock-up.

Technorati Tags: VA, Data Security, Data Theft, Jim Nicholson

Froomkin

Why wont they answer the question?:

But not once has the White House definitively answered this question: How are any of these disclosures actually impairing the pursuit of terrorists?

How anyone can honestly say, that the revelation that the White House has authorized spying on Americans, is detrimental to tracking terrorists, is beyond me.

Any criminal with half a brain knows that their phones and/or finances are going to be scrutinized. Since the Bush administration wont answer the question about how they are being impaired, we have to assume that the programs aren't working as advertised. Unless the actual purpose of the programs is to build up a database of information on every American citizen.

If that's the case, then the Administration needs to come clean, and explain to all Americans why.

Technorati Tags: Froomkin, Domestic Spying

From the Department of Why?

Comes two articles that cancel each other out.

First, Bush Urges Senate to Pass Line-Item Veto

Second, Bush Ignores Laws He Inks, Vexing Congress

Out of one side of Bush's mouth he asks Congress to give him the ability to veto provisions in laws he doesn't like. Out of the other side he ignores laws he doesn't like.

I am torn on the line-item veto authority that Presidents repeatedly ask for. If used judiciously it can be a good thing. Eliminating alot of pork from spending bills. However, who believes for a moment that the President will use it thusly?

The whole signing statement issue, which Bush loves to use, in his mind gives him the ability to ignore and/or reinterpret laws however he sees fit. So what's the point in asking for the line-item veto, when he feels it is his obligation to do what he wants anyway?

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Line-item Veto, Signing Statements

Thought for the Day

Today's Thought for the Day is directed specifically at Joe Lieberman:

"Anybody can win unless there happens to be a second entry."

--George Ade

Wink, Wink, Nudge, Nudge ...

say no more:

The withdrawal of 20,000-40,000 U.S. troops from Iraq this fall would greatly help Republican chances in the November election, Rep. Mark Souder (R-Ind.) said at a fundraiser Thursday at the National Rifle Association.

Souder acknowledged in his remarks that the war in Iraq has dampened support for Republican candidates but added that withdrawing 30,000 troops could have a big impact, said Martin Green, Souder’s spokesman.

The congressman said it would amount to an “‘October Surprise’ in its effect, although he dismissed the idea that a U.S. troop withdrawal would begin for domestic political reasons.

That's right. The peculiar timing of the withdrawl plan, which is remarkably similar to the Democrats plan, but different because it was written by a non-Democrat, shouldn't be perceived as a political ploy, despite the fact that it, you know, is.



Thanks to Josh Marshall for the link.

Technorati Tags: Iraq, October Surprise, Mark Souder, The Hill

More Domestic Spying

This time on a student protest at SUNY Albany by the Pentagon.

I am sure that the radical right will say it is justified. After all, this was a protest against the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy the military has. We cannot have teh ghey infiltrate the military.

There has never been a decorated Soldier, Sailor, or Marine who was gay. Right?

Technorati Tags: Pentagon, Domestic Spying, SUNY Albany, DADT

I Double-Dog Dare You!

I'm with Wolcott on this one:

What a gummy uproar. One so loud and ferocious that there almost has to be some follow-through, otherwise you are going to have one frustrated batch of highly indignants. They want the administration to show the Times and the rest of the press who's boss. The neocon contingent is already dismayed with the tiptoeing around Iran's nuclear program, with Ledeen and Perle lodging protests. If the pushback against the Times peters out, if the posse disbands shortly after mounting up, the White House is going to look weak in the bugged-out eyes of its mutant defenders. It'll be interesting to see if the controversy builds or fades over the next few days, and whether or not the Times-bashers will be compelled to call their own bluff. In the meantime, whatever one thinks of the Times's performance leading up to Iraq and the Judith Miller debacle, the ugly threatmongering and barking ("For the Times to release information about secret operations and methods is treasonous”) of Peter King shouldn't go unchallenged.

If you haven't figured out what this is about, it is about the reporting of the Government snooping into your finances to see if you are a terrorist.

Now is put up or shut up time. Bush, Cheney, Snow, and his allies in Congress are all up in arms about the NY Times. The hate-filled Conservative blogosphere is breathing fire demanding that the Bush Administration do something to the NY Times. The more severe the better.

So, let's see if the Bush administration, and specifically George Bush has the cojones to withstand the vilification from his Right Wing base if he fails to act. Let's see if Rep. Peter King has the intestinal fortitude to get the Justice Department to act against the NY Times.

From the Right, the time for political posturing is over. Will Bush act?

Technorati Tags: NY Times, James Wolcott, George Bush

Poor, Poor Tom DeLay

In Texas there is pretty much only one rule when it comes to accepting campaign contributions. It is a very simple rule. Thou shalt not collect campaign contributions from corporations.

Well, now we have another rule, when it comes to running for elected office in Texas, that Tom DeLay cannot seem to abide by. Residency.

It seems that poor old Tom may not be able to get his name removed from the Texas ballot, so that another (non-tainted) Republican can run in his stead. Texas election law is very vague, however, the one thing that is not vague, is the US Constitution when it comes to election law.

According to the Constitution, your state of residence only matters after you have been elected to office. Not before. Since Tom DeLay has been a Texas resident all these long years, and was elected to Congress as a Texan, a Texan he shall remain until after the November election, in which case, as a Virginia resident he will be unable to serve, were he to win.

None of this has been finalized by the court, but the judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks, seems to believe in that line of reasoning. In the end, we could have disgrace, and resigned Congressman Tom DeLay squaring off against his opponent Nick Lampson.

Fun, fun, fun.

Technorati Tags: Tom DeLay, Texas, Virginia

The River of Incompetence ...

... runs deep and wide:

A hotel owner in Sugar Land, Tex., has been charged with submitting $232,000 in bills for phantom victims. And roughly 1,100 prison inmates across the Gulf Coast apparently collected more than $10 million in rental and disaster-relief assistance.

There are the bureaucrats who ordered nearly half a billion dollars worth of mobile homes that are still empty, and renovations for a shelter at a former Alabama Army base that cost about $416,000 per evacuee.

[...]

Two other men, Mitchell Kendrix of Memphis and Paul Nelson of Lisbon, Me., have pleaded guilty in connection with a scheme in Mississippi in which Mr. Kendrix, a representative for the Army Corps of Engineers, took $100 bribes in exchange for approving phantom loads of hurricane debris from Mr. Nelson.

[...]

Congressional investigators, meanwhile, have referred another 7,000 cases of possible fraud to prosecutors, including more than 1,000 prison inmates who collected more than $12 million in federal aid, much of it in the form of rental assistance.

As the headline of the article calls it, the waste and fraud is "Breathtaking".

Thank you, George W. Bush, for making incompetence acceptable again.

Technorati Tags: FEMA

Out of Touch, or Tone Deaf?

Kevin Drum has an interesting question, which I would like to see answered properly:

Everyone at the table seemed to agree that the Democratic Party was out of touch with the working class in America, broadly defined. Why? Because Dem leaders are a bunch of college-educated elites who make a lot of money and don't really identify with the problems of people who make $30,000 a year.

OK, fine. Let's suppose that's true. But the Democratic Party in the 30s and 40s was mostly headed by Harvard-educated rich guys, and they seemed to do pretty well on working class issues. FDR wasn't exactly a prole, after all. So what's the difference?

The answer Kevin received was 'Unions'.

Kevin is right in saying that labor unions had a very powerful position within the Democratic Party. I grew up in that environment, as my grandfather was involved in unions, and held leadership positions in the AFL-CIO, as well as other international union organizations in Washington. Growing up in that environment, I got to see, first hand, how the labor movement was a positive force for working class Americans. I also was witness to the fall of the labor movement through the late 70's and 80's.

Why the labor movement faltered, and does not have the same impact today, that it had through the 60's before its decline, particularly in the 80's when the decline became precipitous, is that the Democratic party became, not just entrenched with its comfortable leaders. It really began with the Democratic party allowing the Republican Party to marginalize organized labor.

In many union organizations, people who aligned themselves with the Socialist movement, and in some cases the Communist movement became easy targets for the "Red Scare" Republicans. These charges of Communist sympathizers in organized labor began to scare people off. Many Democrats were afraid of being tarred with that overly broad brush. Jump forward to the 1980's, and Reagan's strong stance against the USSR, and the Democrats inability (or maybe unwillingness) to adequately counter the Communist sympathizer charges that stuck to members of the labor movement really began to hurt.

This lack of an effective counter created the situation in which Reagan was able to enact some tough anti-union laws, reduced enforcement (or actively undermined, in some cases), and businesses were able to set about preventing workers from organizing in the workplace. Jump forward again to the 1990's and we have NAFTA, and globalization shifting our manufacturing base (strong union representation) offshore, as well as the rise in the IT industry.

The problem with the IT industry and its workers, is that many tend towards the Libertarian (or so they think) bent. The late 1990's, 2000 - 2002 were ripe for the picking (and probably still are to some extent, today), as far as organizing collectively goes. IT personnel were being forced into working extremely long hours (80 hour work weeks were more common than not), and pay and benefits were being eschewed for stock options, most of which never materialized into anything beyond the value of the paper they were printed on. However, because there were a few examples of people who hit the big time (Mark Cuban, et al), the thought of giving up the chance of becoming a dot-com billionaire held more sway, than the thought of having a secure job with good benefits, and reasonable pay.

Now with offshoring of IT jobs a permanent fixture of the future of IT in America, the prospect of a company such as Microsoft, or Dell, or IBM having to contend with their staff organizing into a union, is slim. The ease by which IT companies, and non-IT companies with large IT staff, can shift stuff offshore at the threat of employees demanding collective bargaining rights is nullified, even before they can start.

What is left is the service industry. While unions such as the SEIU have made significant strides in signing up new members, and expanding their operations, some have charged that these new unions are too management friendly. Maybe it reflects the current economic environment. More likely it reflects a weakness in the Democratic Party.

We don't have high profile Democratic Party representatives stumping for union priorities. The best we get is legislation to increase the minimum wage. Instead of hitting the airwaves, and the roadways going to the electorate to champion this cause, and generate grassroots support, the Democrats hope that the media will cover the story. They did, and they portrayed it as a "Democratic Party election-year issue".

To be honest, from where I am sitting, that is what it looked like. Where is the organized campaign, where are the Senators and Representatives out stumping for this issue?

Is the Democratic Party truly out of touch with the American working class?

Looks like it.

So what should the Democratic Party do?

That depends on what the leadership wants. Do they want to become representative of the working-class again? Or are they happy abdicating that group of people.

Starting in the 1990's the media began lumping groups of voters together. Southern voters, Values voters, Soccer moms, Safety moms, NASCAR dads, etc. It is my belief that these groupings successfully divided the electorate, and particularly the working-class electorate along lines that harmed Democrats.

While there is a traditional resistance to organized labor in the South, and the Southwest there has been a migration of workers from the parts of the country that have been traditionally favorable to organized labor to these areas. There are people in the South and Southwest who are amenable to a resurgence in the labor movement. This presents an opportunity for the Democratic Party to reestablish its connection to working-class Americans.

Will Democrats act?

The Republican Party remains faithful in its opposition to organized labor, so there is no fear of Republicans co-opting this issue from Democrats. However, by no means does that mean these individuals will jump on the Democratic Party bandwagon. Particularly if the Democrats don't start speaking to them. What will likely happen, and what is happening today, is that national union organizations will begin to split their loyalties, or start to support a third party. While the possibility of a third party is attractive, and probably desirable, it will be disastrous to the Democratic Party. It will allow the Republican Party to continue to strengthen, and consolidate its power, possibly for a generation or more.

I know I am not the first person to think along these lines, nor will I be the last. What needs to happen, and happen soon, if the Democrats don't want to lose this vital support (what of it is left), is to start speaking to REAL working-class issues. Job security, benefits, retirement, and wages. These are the issues that are largely absent from the national discourse.

Elections are largely won on domestic issues. Republicans have telegraphed their intention to run on the Iraq war, and its attendant issues, all the while ignoring the domestic problems we are faced with today. The Religious Right have begun to make it clear that their pet issues (gay marriage, abortion, etc.) are getting short shrift from the Republican Party. They are basing their support on these (although reprehensible) domestic issues. Americans care about domestic issues, and foreign policy issues, while important, are not make or break issues. The make or break issues are these other things that are being ignored by politicians, and the media, yet affect Americans directly.

This all ties back to the media narrative that is being developed. Democrats have the opportunity to turn the debate back to domestic issues, but only if they take strong, vocal stands. Political grandstanding in Washington D.C. on the minimum wage issue only works, if it is followed by taking the word to the streets. Going to the people, and telling them directly, what is at stake will make the difference.

When Joe Biden said to Wolf Blitzer:

BLITZER: All right. You want to respond to the vice president, Senator Biden?

BIDEN: No, I don't want to respond to him. He's at 20 percent in the polls. No one listens to him. He has no credibility. It's ridiculous.

That is how all Democrats need to respond to, not only Cheney, but Bush whose popularity is mired below 40%, and dropping.

Then, the debate can shift. Then, Democrats can start speaking to the issues that Democrats should be promoting.

Then, and only then, will the perception that the Democratic Party is out of touch with the working-class American, be reversed.

Technorati Tags: Organized Labor, Unions, Democratic Party

Yet Another Data Security Breach

Were the consequence not so serious, it would be pure comedy.

28,000 Sailors personal information appears on a website.

The data contained in 5 spreadsheets contained names, birth dates, and Social Security Numbers of the sailors.

How this data ended up on a public website, no one knows.

How many breaches of data security have to happen before the Government really begins to take this stuff seriously? They say they are, but again, and again we hear of laptops being stolen, data appearing on websites, and other breaches of security.

It is as if the utter incompetence of the Bush administration is contagious.

Technorati Tags: Data Security, Navy

Thought for the Day

"Never fight an inanimate object."

--P. J. O'Rourke

Thought for the Day

"Never fight an inanimate object."

--P. J. O'Rourke

Prosecution or Persecution?

I have a lot of problems with the NY Times, and its coverage of the Bush administration. From Judith Miller's fantastical reporting of WMD's, to the shameless cheerleading for the war in Iraq. However, I feel The Times has been trying to redeem itself somewhat (only just) with the reporting of the domestic spying activities of the Bush administration.

The latest outrage from the Right is over the revelation in The Times of the SWIFT program which tracks banking activities of Americans.

The reaction from the Right has been predictable. NY Times is destroying America's ability to track and capture terrorists, and if innocent American citizens get caught up in the program, well, if you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to worry about.

Bill Keller, the executive editor of The Times, has written a letter that explains The Times reasoning for exposing this latest intrusion into Americans privacy:

It's an unusual and powerful thing, this freedom that our founders gave to the press. Who are the editors of The New York Times (or the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and other publications that also ran the banking story) to disregard the wishes of the President and his appointees? And yet the people who invented this country saw an aggressive, independent press as a protective measure against the abuse of power in a democracy, and an essential ingredient for self-government. They rejected the idea that it is wise, or patriotic, to always take the President at his word, or to surrender to the government important decisions about what to publish.

While it would be nice if The Times, and other news media around the country took this idea a bit more seriously all the time, the few instances where the news media exercised its independence has turned up some rather egregious abuses of power.

And predictably, when the media exercises its independence, its the Conservatives who unquestioningly accept what fearless leader George W. Bush tells them is necessary (even, it seems, flushing democracy down the toilet), react as good little soldiers:

The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee urged the Bush administration Sunday to seek criminal charges against The New York Times for reporting on a secret financial-monitoring program used to trace terrorists.

Rep. Peter King blasted the newspaper's decision last week to report that the Treasury Department was working with the CIA to examine messages within a massive international database of money-transfer records.

"I am asking the Attorney General to begin an investigation and prosecution of The New York Times -- the reporters, the editors and the publisher," said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. "We're at war, and for the Times to release information about secret operations and methods is treasonous."

Mind you, this is the same group of Republicans who, until 9/11/2001 thought the government was intruding too much into the private lives of Americans. The same group of Republicans who challenged Bill Clinton on every action he did to try and stop Al Qaeda, and Osama bin Laden, with "Wag the Dog" charges.

Today, we are witnessing a reversal of roles. The Liberals were once the party of Government intrusion, and were the ones who were trying to subvert democracy by interfering in peoples lives. Liberals were the ones who where trying to dictate to Americans how they should live, and be willing to give up their privacy for the sake of America. Conservatives were the strong advocates of privacy, and keeping Government out of our bedrooms, personal, and financial lives.

No more. Conservatives today are the ones who advocate spying on Americans. Conservatives today are the ones who advocate the Federal Government listening in on your phone calls. Tracking your banking transactions. And yes, even your bedroom activities.

Liberals are the ones who are expressing outrage at the trashing of the Constitution. The document that defined America. That created the freedoms the Conservatives used to value.

(Never mind that this is how it always was, but perceptions are hard to change)

So, I challenge the news media all across the country to wake up, and recognize that their very independence, the foundation of a strong and valuable "fourth branch" of government, has been eroded, almost to the point of extinction. More importantly, when people like Republican Representative Peter King say that you should be criminally charged for exposing these abuses of power, don't run away. Stand up. As the saying (over used, and cliche at this point) goes:

"The job of the newspaper is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable."

--Finley Peter Dunne

Technorati Tags: Peter King, SWIFT, NY Times, Bill Keller, Domestic Spying

This is Just Pathetic

It is also very meta.

Just to recap what has been roiling the blogsphere this past week.

The New Republic, an ostensibly "Liberal" publication, through one of its "journalists", Jason Zengerle, wrote a piece that purports to expose the deep, dark underbelly of the Liberal blogosphere. Apparently, everyone who blogs from the left, is under mind control, or financial control, or being blackmailed by Markos Moulitsas Zúniga.

This secret information was revealed to Zengerle via three anonymous sources, who have access to a mailing list called "townhouse". I'm not a member, and didn't know anything about this "townhouse" list until a few days ago. One of the emails which was purported to be "evidence" of Markos' control, was from Steve Gilliard who maintain The News Blog.

Only that email was a fabrication.

Enough for background, that is probably all you need (or want to) know.

The truly pathetic part, aside from watching The New Republic hammer the last nails into its own coffin of credibility, was that Zengerle, knowing he had been burned by his source(s), offers a tepid "clarification", and refuses to identify who it was that embarrased him, and his employer.

Then, David Brooks writes a childish anti-blogging column, attacking Liberal bloggers, and pretending the Conservative blogosphere doesn't exist. And, No. I will not link to the opinion pages, because I wont pay their fee to read David Brooks. I think they should pay me.



Technorati Tags: David Brooks, Jason Zengerle, New Republic

Thought for the Day

"There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don’t know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president."

--Kurt Vonnegut

A Little Hard Truth

No doubt there will be lots of criticism from Republicans about how the anti-American "Jew" York Times hates Republicans. However, it is nice to see the NY Times address the issue of Chickenhawks in Congress:

REPRESENTATIVE Patrick McHenry, a 30-year-old Republican from North Carolina, rose during the recent debate over Iraq in Congress and declared that the struggle against "Islamic extremists" was his generation's great challenge. Unlike the "white flag" crowd on the left, he vowed, he would not shrink from the fight.

That was a little too much for Representative John Murtha, the senior Democrat on the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, an ex-marine and Vietnam vet and also — in the current debate — a leading advocate of a speedy withdrawal of the troops.

"It is easy to stay in an air-conditioned office and say, 'I am going to stay the course,' " he said, angrily, after Mr. McHenry, who never served in the military, was finished. "It is the troops that are doing the fighting, not the members of Congress that are doing the fighting."

The issue of chickenhawks is a big one. Because Republicans like Patrick McHenry really fancy themselves as being a warrior in this "global struggle". They think that by making speeches, or in the case of rightwing bloggers, by posting with steely resolve to "see this thing through to the end", that they are sacrificing something.

The reality is, that we have a significant portion of our military in a combat theater, Republicans want to leave them there indefinitely. The President is asking for tax cuts, as expenditures for the war are spiraling out of control.

Not a single sacrifice has been asked of Americans. And then, when someone dares to open their mouth and point out this contradiction, war without sacrifice, these chickenhawks tell us that they are anti-American. That they are the traitors to America. They they are the ones who hate the military.

I am one of those people who get labeled that way. I oppose the war, don't believe we should have gone in the first place. I believe that as long as the military is there, Americans should be demanding tax increases to pay for this effort. Americans should be making sacrifices. Most importantly, and unlike Patrick McHenry, I served in the Army. Not during war time, as I finished my time in the Army before the first Gulf War, however I volunteered to serve.

Is serving in the military a prerequisite to anything? No, not really. However the lofy rhetoric that Republicans like to use, about their "steely resolve", and their "grim determination" to "stay the course", belies the fact that they have no idea what are demanding of our military men and women.

Technorati Tags: Patrick McHenry, John Murtha, Chickenhawk, 101st Fighting Keyboardists, Iraq

Fostering Ignorance

The Christian Right has a real problem with people reading books that aren't the Bible, Purpose Driven Life, or some other drivel.

Case in point, the latest attempt by the Christian Right to ban books:

The author of what has been described as the definitive dictionary of slang is gobsmacked, gutted, throwing up bunches, honked, hipped, and jacked like a cock-maggot in a sink-hole. A North Carolina school district has banned the dictionary under pressure from one of a growing number of conservative Christian groups using the internet to encourage school book bans across the US.

This book is just one of five books that have been challenged in North Carolina.

The Cassell Dictionay of Slang
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
Junie B Jones and Some Sneaky, Peaky Spying by Barbara Park
Reluctantly Alice by Phyllis Reynolds
In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak

Junie B. Jones? What, praytell, could be wrong with Junie B. Jones? Never mind the rest of these books.

The mission statement of the group who is pushing this censorship Called2Action, states:

Comprised of a diverse group of like-minded people, Called2Action exists to empower ordinary people to become effective in the defense of our shared family and social values, and remain true to the Judeo-Christian foundation of our great state and country."

However, it appears that censorship is a part of this "Judeo-Christian foundation of our great state and country".



Technorati Tags: Dictionary of Slang, Called2Action, Religious Right, Censorship

Immigrant Concentration Camps

This is a suggestion that should warm the cockles of Michelle Malkins heart:

A Republican gubernatorial candidate's call for creation of a forced labor camp for illegal immigrants drew rebukes Friday from two GOP lawmakers, who labeled it a low point in the immigration debate.

Don Goldwater, nephew of the late Sen. Barry Goldwater, caused an international stir this week when EFE, a Mexican news service, quoted him as saying he wanted to hold undocumented immigrants in camps to use them "as labor in the construction of a wall and to clean the areas of the Arizona desert that they're polluting."

The article described Goldwater's plan as a "concentration camp" for migrants.

I am sure that Malkin will help him name these camps.

Technorati Tags: Don+Goldwater, Arizona, Immigration, Michelle Malkin

Thought for the Day

"We don't know a millionth of one percent about anything."

--Thomas A. Edison

Not Praising the Liars

The big thing yesterday, was a bit of stupidity from Washingpost Columnist Richard Morin, in which he whines like a little baby about Jon Stewart.

Matt Stoller translates the whining for us into a meaningful sentiment:

Ok, so let's be clear with what Morin is fretting about. He thinks that the Daily Show doesn't make younger viewers feel good enough about politicians and media figures. It's not enough that Daily Show viewers are better informed than any other media consumer, that young people voted in record numbers, that, and that the choice in 2004 for President presented young people with two wildly unappealing old white men. No, it's all about young people not feeling good enough about the people who routinely lie to them.

Young people have very negative feelings about politics, and rightfully so. And they're voting anyway. That's amazing. I suppose what Morin doesn't like is that the Daily Show punctures the media's sense of self-importance (of which Morin displays an amply large amount), and that young people are watching Stewart instead of reading Morin.

Big surprise there.

Yep, that about sums it up.


Technorati Tags: Jon Stewart, Richard Morin

I'ts About Time

VA offers credit monitoring:

The Department of Veteran Affairs said yesterday that it will offer free credit monitoring for a year to the millions of veterans and military personnel whose personal information was stolen last month. The department said the plan will safeguard the credit records of those affected and provide them with peace of mind.

This entire episode was so mishandled, including the misrepresntation of just how many individuals were affected by this data theft. The fact that the Bush Administration at first refused to offer any sort of credit protection, and the fact that it took the threat of a class action lawsuit to spur the VA into action, is inexcusable.



Technorati Tags: Veterans Administration, Data Theft

Reluctantly I Have to Agree ...

Well, not so reluctantly, but The Washington Post editorial board must be stoned:

The illogic begins with the fact that Guantanamo now is, by far, the most comfortable and legally accountable detention facility maintained by the United States for foreign prisoners.

Yeah, I would like to see Fred Hiatt spend an indefinite amount of time there, with no hope for release, and see just how "comfortable" it is. And the "legally accountable" part?

Woah, whatever it is Hiatt and Co. are smoking, give me some.

The US is holding people that it knows to be innocent of anything, yet refuses to let them go. There's your legal accountability.

And to think, this paper was once vying with the NY Times for the status of "paper of record". Now neither one deserves anything resembling that title.

Technorati Tags: Gitmo

Thought for the Day

"Only exceptionally rational men can afford to be absurd."

--Allan Goldfein

It's Not Necessarily What You Say ...

but definitely what you don't say that matters:

Phone service provider AT&T announced Thursday a privacy policy overhaul that removes a key reference from its previous policy, which had said the company "does not access, read, upload or store data contained in or derived from private files without the members' authorization..."

This from the company who cooperated the most with the Bush Administration on spying on Americans.

Technorati Tags: AT&T, Domestic Spying, Privacy

Let's Get It On

I know that many people, both Republican and Democrat, were hoping that Carole 4-Names, and Kinky Friedman wouldn't qualify for November's Gubernatorial election; However, today the Texas Secretary of State certified their petitions for the race this November:

It's official. The Texas governor's race got crowded and quirky with the confirmation that independent candidates Kinky Friedman and Carole Keeton Strayhorn will be on the November ballot.

Texas Secretary of State Roger Williams made the announcement Thursday, setting up a historic election with the two independents, Republican Gov. Rick Perry, Democrat Chris Bell and Libertarian James Werner.

Friedman, a joke-cracking musician and writer, and Strayhorn, the state comptroller who calls herself "one tough grandma," each will try to become the first independent elected Texas governor since Sam Houston in 1859.

It's still early, but with Rick Perry's support hovering between 32% and 40%, it is highly likely that there will be a run off. With whom, remains to be seen.

The Democratic Candidate Chris Bell, is going to need some support, so volunteer if you can, and if you can toss some money his way, I'm sure he could use it.

Technorati Tags: Texas, Chris Bell, TX-Gov

The Predictability of the Dense

In response to the NY Times uncovering, yet another domestic spying program run by the Bush administration, the hate-filled right jerks reflexively.

Hugh Hewitt

AJStrata

Clay Waters

And on, and on, and on.

They all say the same thing, from Michelle Malkin down to the Conservative you never heard of.

Bill Keller is the anti-Christ, and all Liberals hate America.

However, to the Right, spying on Americans is a proud American tradition. So how dare the NY Times reveal to Americans that their government is spying on them.

Technorati Tags: Domestic Spying, NY Times

Even More Data Theft

At what point will the US Government wake up to the problem of data theft?

The government agency charged with fighting identity theft said Thursday it had lost two government laptops containing sensitive personal data, the latest in a series of breaches encompassing millions of people.

Why is this personal information being carried around by people who cannot seem to do something so basic as watch their laptop?


Technorati Tags: Data Theft, Government

Thought for the Day

"I am a Marxist--of the Groucho tendency."

--Anonymous, French slogan

The Anti-Blogging Media

Last week I posted about the media's fascination with blogging being over.

Today, courtesy of Peter Daou we are pointed to the latest grenade lobbed by the "dean" of Washington punditry:

Judging from the amount of publicity they gleaned, the liberal bloggers who gathered in Las Vegas recently for the first annual YearlyKos convention represent the cutting edge of thinking in the Democratic Party.

But the blogs I have scanned are heavier on vituperation of President Bush and other targets than on creative thought.

First, I am curious whose blogs Broder perused, but that is beside the point. The point that Daou has made, which I have heartily endorsed, is that the Beltway Pundit class is feeling the heat that blogging has brought to bear.

No longer are they secure in their cocoons, where they can control the public debate about the goings on in Washington. In response, people like Broder, who cannot come to grips with the fact that there are people who don't hang on his every typewritten word anymore, launch vituperative attacks on these people.

I have no illusion that bloggers will change the state of Washington, however, and this is particular to the liberal side of the blogosphere, bloggers are gaining an important voice in the debate.

As a footnote to that point, Chris Bowers at MyDD.com links to a very interesting Nielsen//NetRatings report that shows "in the single month of July 2005, Kos attracted 4.8 million separate visitors". Think about that for a moment. 4.8 million separate visitors.

I don't know what the accuracy of Nielsen's counting is, however, even if it is 10% or 20% too high, we are still talking about a significant portion of the Democratic party base. And that is just to one site.

So, while people like David Broder attack the progressive blogosphere as being "hate filled anti-Bush partisan wingnuts", the truth is that, we who read, write, and participate in the blogosphere are representative of something much greater.


Technorati Tags: David Broder, Peter Daou, Blogging

Perpetual War

As we have all witnessed over the past days and weeks, the Republicans, enabled by our "media elite" have been pushing the notion that Democrats are advocating a "cut and run" strategy for Iraq, and the GWOT.

I have been frustrated in my attempt to come up with a way to counter that argument. Paul Waldman has spelled out a pretty effective way for Democrats to counter that argument:

So how do they [Democrats] get on offense? Simple: make it about Bush and the Republicans. When a reporter asks you, "The Republicans say you want to cut and run, what's your response?", do not - DO NOT - repeat the phrase "cut and run" in your answer. The answer should be about the Republicans, not about you: "The Republicans want to stay in Iraq forever. We want to figure out how we can redeploy our forces. While our troops are fighting and dying every day, Republicans tell us that everything in Iraq is going great. What planet are they living on? Do they have a plan to end our involvement there, or do they think our children and grandchildren should be dodging IEDs in Tal Afar, too?" Make it about THEM. Put THEM on the defensive. And when the reporter says, "Democrats are divided on this. How will you win in November if you're divided?", DON'T TAKE THE BAIT. Don't talk about how the plan you favor differs from other Democratic plans. Talk about the Republicans, for God's sake.

The problem that Democrats have had on this issue (and really, countering Republicans in general for the past 5 years) is that they refuse to go on the offensive.

To some degree, the media has been perpetuating the Republican gotcha game, but Democrats have fallen into that trap, time and time again.

Here is the perfect opportunity to get ahead of the game. The public is not happy, and Democrats need to start speaking to this general dissatisfaction with Bush, Republicans, and the Iraq War. By highlighting the fact that Republicans want perpetual war (or at least until a future President gains the courage to withdraw from Iraq comes along), Democrats can paint the true picture. The Iraq war is not about winning the war on terror. The situation in Iraq is not getting better, at best we have reached a stalemate, at worst it is deteriorating at an uncontrollable pace. Yet, OBL is still on the loose.

The Republican plan is perpetual war.

Use it. Please.

Technorati Tags: Iraq, Republican, Democrat, Paul Waldman

The Sad, Pathetic State of the Media

They will report on the fevered delusional conspiracies of just about anyone:

Americans mistakenly worried the United Nations is plotting to take away their guns on July 4 — U.S. Independence Day — are flooding the world body with angry letters and postcards, the chairman of a U.N. conference on the illegal small arms trade said on Wednesday.

“I myself have received over 100,000 letters from the U.S. public, criticizing me personally, saying, ‘You are having this conference on the 4th of July, you are not going to get our guns on that day,’” said Prasad Kariyawasam, Sri Lanka’s U.N. ambassador.

[...]

The campaign is largely the work of the U.S. National Rifle Association, whose executive vice president, Wayne LaPierre, warns on an NRA Web site (http://www.stopungunban.org/) of a July 4 plot “to finalize a U.N. treaty that would strip all citizens of all nations of their right to self-protection.”

[...]

LaPierre, who also uses the site to pitch his new book, “The Global War on Your Guns,” asks NRA members to send letters to Kariyawasam and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan warning that “the American people will never let you take away the rights that our 4th of July holiday represents.”

The group also asks members to write to John Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, urging him to “ensure the defeat of this treaty.” Bolton’s office confirmed he had received tens of thousands of cards from concerned Americans.

Not coincidentally the news of this "plot" was spoon fed to the media by none other than Wayne LaPierre, President of the NRA.



Technorati Tags: UN, NRA, Wayne LaPierre

Playing Politics with War

I'm not telling anyone here anything they shouldn't already know.

To the Republican Party, the war in Iraq, and the death of American military members is merely election year politics. As long as there are elections, Republicans will be "downright giddy" (Dana Bash, CNN, 22 June 2006) about the debate over the war in Iraq.

Anyone who is "downright giddy", like the Republicans are, about war, is a sick and twisted individual. Which is why, as long as Republicans hold a majority in Congress and/or the White House, we will have a war in Iraq. Bush does not have the courage to withdraw, and the Republican Party wants its election issue.

To top it all off, Eric Boehlert notes, the press is attacking Democrats for bringing up the issue. We have entered a twilight zone kind of situation here, where Republicans want to use the disasterous war in Iraq and the President's inept running of the war as a positive election year issue. The media, all too willing to go along with Republicans, attack Democrats for wanting to discuss the issue, and maybe, just maybe, get someone competent running the show.

It is as if the Republican Party and the media want America to fail.



Technorati Tags: Iraq, Bush, GOP

Thought for the Day

"I've been on a diet for two weeks and all I've lost is two weeks."

--Totie Fields

You Can't Handle the Truth!

Liberal bloggers banned from Kentucky government.

It really is a sad state of affairs when the "small government" elected Republicans intrude into peoples lives.

Technorati Tags: Kentucky, Bluegrassreport.org

Froomkin Refreshes the Media's Memory

They seem to have forgotten where Safavian worked:

You wouldn't know it from the coverage of David H. Safavian's conviction yesterday for lying and obstructing justice, but some of his criminal activity actually took place while he was working at the White House.

Safavian managed to avoid being frog-marched out of the White House by resigning three days before his arrest.

As has been par for the course, the media doesn't want to link this Republican corruption to the White House.

Now, if we can only get an honest report about how many times Abramoff visited the White House ...

Technorati Tags: Froomkin, Safavian, Abramoff, White House

"National Security Issues"

That will no doubt be the Adminstrations reason for refusing to turn over NSA requests to telecom companies.

When you have a President who has such contempt for the rule of law that George Bush has, why Congress thinks he will comply with their demands escapes logic.

I guess it doesn't hurt to ask though.

Technorati Tags: NSA, George Bush, Domestic Spying, Congress

Teenagers

Eric Boehlert accurately diagnoses what is wrong with ABC's The Note:

The first thing you notice about The Note is that it sounds like it's written by high school students. Smart high school students--really smart students, even--but nevertheless teenagers who crack themselves up with their wit, rely on hard-to-decipher references to up their hip insider quotient, and have a penchant for words like "ginormous" and multiple exclamation points. Cutesy, creepy, and relentlessly effusive towards the media elite, The Note confirms the old adage that life really is like high school, with The Note filling the role of cheerleader-meets-yearbook editor, keeping tabs on where the cool kids are eating lunch, what they're wearing, and who's having the big party this weekend.

The saddest part about this tone that The Note takes, is that the "media elite" read this thing. Daily.


Thanks to Peter Daou for the link.

Technorati Tags: The Note, ABC News, Eric Boehlert

A Good Question

An Agonist reader asks a very good question:

“Is it just me, or have Administration officials expressed significantly more public angst and concern over a missile launch this week than they did over a prospective nuclear test last May? Condi made a general statement last year essentially trying to call Kim Il Jong's bluff, saying that the U.S. had sufficient deterrent capability to handle any North Korean nuclear arsenal. Why are we so much more public this time around with our concern, and having the President call his Six Party Counterparts? What is worse -- a missile test, or a nuclear test announcing North Korea's formal entry into the nuclear club?”

But is it just something going on in North Korea?

Is there something else that the Bush administration is trying to turn our attention from? Iraq is heading towards the shitter. Iran is going nowhere. Immigration reform is dead. Gay Marriage is dead.

What are they trying to distract us from?

Technorati Tags: North Korea, Distraction

Excuse Me, If I Don't Believe This.

I thought we already captured and tried the 20th 9/11 hijacker.

Or is this going to be like the "al Qaeda number 3", which has been captured and/or killed a hundred times already?

Republican Culture of Corruption

Gays Marrying: Bad

Republican Corruption: Good

Technorati Tags: Republican, Culture of Corruption

The Secrets of Spying

NSA has apparently been operating in the heart of the AT&T backbone.

Just as a point of definition. The Internet "backbone" is the main data trunks in which the vast majority of telephone or Internet traffic may travel. Think your spinal column, only on a nationwide, or even worldwide scale.

If this is true, the NSA had access to literally all data traffic travelling everywhere in the country.

If that's not domestic spying, I don't know what is.

Technorati Tags: NSA, AT&T, Domestic Spying

The Do Nothing Congress

Republicans apparently have made a decision, that the business they were elected to do is unimportant:

In a defeat for
President Bush, Republican congressional leaders said Tuesday that broad immigration legislation is all but doomed for the year, a victim of election-year concerns in the House and conservatives' implacable opposition to citizenship for millions of illegal immigrants.

[...]

Some officials added that Republicans have begun discussing a pre-election strategy for seizing the political high ground on an issue that so far has served to highlight divisions within the party. Among the possibilities, these officials said, are holding votes in the House or Senate this fall on additional measures to secure the borders, or on legislation that would prevent illegal immigrants from receiving
Social Security payments or other government benefits.

That's right.

Playing political games is faaaarrrrr more important then, you know, working.

Technorati Tags: Republicans

Uhh, Greg?

I'm with Atrios on this one.

Haven't you been paying attention to any of the media over the past 10 years or so?

Technorati Tags: John Kerry, NY Times, GOP, Propaganda

Global Warming and Liberal Fear

Dennis Prager so has us pegged.

You are all shaking in your boots. Right?


Technorati Tags: Dennis Prager

Indictment Party

Hot on the heels of the indictment of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Mary Matalin wants to celebrate in style:

Conservative political strategist Mary Matalin will host a reception Tuesday night at her home in Alexandria to help augment the defense fund of indicted Cheney aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby according to an invitation read to RAW STORY.

Barbara Comstock, a spokesman for Libby's fund, declined to comment. No one answered the phone at the RSVP line. Libby has been indicted for obstruction of justice and other charges in connection with the CIA leak investigation.

If you want to go hang out at the home of Conservative political strategist Mary Matalin, and her Democratic Strategist husband James Carville, it will cost you $500.

So, come one, come all. Celebrate the indictment of the man who participated in the outing of a covert CIA agent who was tracking the Iranian nuclear weapons program.

James Carville will thank you for it.

Technorati Tags: Scooter Libby, Mary Matalin, James Carville

Thought for the Day

"If at first you don't succeed, find out if the loser gets anything."

--Bill Lyon

The Implication of Net Neutrality

Degraded service:

Shaw Communications and its Canada-based cable MSO subsidiary have filed a series of court documents that aim to "set to record straight" regarding a "Quality of Service Enhancement" package being offered to Vonage customers and customers of other third-party VoIP services that leverage the public Internet.

The documents, filed in the Alberta Court of Queen's Bench in Calgary, note that Shaw's IP-based phone service is offered over the operator's QoS-enabled, managed network, while Vonage's service travels the public Internet and is open to packet delays and other "inherent limitations."

This is just one example of how net neutrality affects the consumer. Vonage's voice over IP (VOIP) service has been called out by Verizon, and AT&T as one of many services that should be forced to pay for a different level of access, and customers of Vonage are being asked to pay for a different level of access.

This is what we can expect if network neutrality falls.

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality

Abusing Presidential Pardons

I seem to recall that when President Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, the Republicans were all up in arms about how Clinton was abusing the privledge of Presidential Pardons.

I wonder if they will feign the same outrage if Scooter Libby is pardoned.

I have consulted my Magic 8-ball.



The answer?

All signs point to no

Technorati Tags: Scooter Libby, Pardon

Net Neutrality Legislation

The fight is not over yet. This week the Senate Commerce Committee will be voting on their legislation.

Christy at Firedoglake has the rundown of who to call.

Contact the members of the committee, and contact your Senators. Tell them to oppose this anti-neutrality legislation, before it's too late.

Save the Internet has excerpts of a debate between Mike McCurry and Amazon.com's Paul Misener on net neutrality. McCurry's, and by extension the telco's, arguments against neutrality were handily destroyed:

Tiered pricing for access is something we support. Amazon pays a lot more than ‘Joe’s-Internet-retail.com’ simply because we use more capacity… That makes perfect sense to us. You pay for that capacity. But the important component here is that once the consumer has paid for his or her capacity at their home they ought to be able to use that capacity however they want. There’s a fundamental misconception here that somehow delivery of video over the Internet is just like it is over cable TV, over satellite, over broadcast or, frankly, like delivery of content through newspapers or magazines. Those models have always been about ‘push.’ Somebody decides — who either owns the pipe or owns the newspaper — what content goes in their and pushes it out to consumers and they can choose to read it or not.”

This is the core of the argument. A content provider, and even you, the consumer, pay for varying levels of "access" to the internet. The term for this is called bandwidth. Amazon.com, or Google, or Yahoo! pay a significant amount of money each month to ensure that whoever goes to their sites get the content they request delivered to them in a timely manner. The consumer pays for access such as cable broadband, DSL, dialup, etc. and the consumer is given access the internet. Depending on how much bandwidth you pay for determines how quickly the content is delivered to you. The content provided by companies such as Amazon, Google, Yahoo!, or some web page that someone put up with pictures of their kids, is not "pushed" to you. You, using your web browser, send a request, or in technical parlance send a "get" to that site, and then the content is then delivered. This is the fundamental difference between cable television, and Internet content.

Television content is pushed. You are passively receiving the content, even if you are viewing a different channel.

Internet content is pulled. You do not receive the content unless you actively request it.

What the telcos are pushing for is a autobahn type of system. The autobahn in Germany has sections which have different speed limits depending on which lane you are driving in. Telcos want content providers, such as Amazon.com, Google, Yahoo!, or even a small business in your hometown pay, not just for the bandwidth they use, but for the ability to use the faster "lanes" so that their content gets delivered you at whatever speed they have paid for.

Much of the long distance portion of internet content is delivered via fiber optics. Without getting too technical, fiber optics is light. Light has a finite speed, and while there are some technical hurdles yet to be overcome that will allow this technology to be delivered to your house, the data from Amazon's computers that you request, is delivered very quickly to your computer (it could be faster, but that is another very technical discussion). What network neutrality opponents are pushing for, is creating a system by which companies who want to have a presence on the Internet need to make two purchasing decisions up front.

The first decision, is how much bandwidth they need. This decision exists today, and companies have the ability to purchase "bandwidth on demand" and other pricing schemes to ensure that their content can be delivered on request quickly. The second decision, and this does not exist today (by regulation), is do you want to pay for the "fast" Internet, or the "slow" Internet.

Content providers (or the telcos own preferred content) who purchase access to the "fast" Internet will be given priority routing over the faster links so that their content will be delivered to your computer quicker than those who pay for the "slow" Internet.

This will quickly create a tiered Internet. Given the highest priority will be the telcos "preferred" content providers. Be it due to contractual preference, or even political preference. Then most likely there will be some intermediate levels of access, which will give varying levels of priority over the people who pay less, and at the bottom will be those who don't pay extra.

Sounds fair right?

Except that companies such as Google, Yahoo!, Amazon, eBay, and hundreds of thousands of other companies (both successful, and failed) who exist(ed) soley in an online space would never have had the opportunity to become successful if their very ability to deliver the content the consumer wanted was regulated by how much they were willing to pay the telcos, after already paying the telcos for their bandwidth.

Bandwidth versus Access.

Two different things, and the telcos want you to think they are one and the same.



Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality, Save the Internet, Mike McCurry, Paul Misener

Guilty!

Yet another Bush administration official going to the big house:

A jury found former Bush administration official David Safavian guilty Tuesday of covering up his dealings with Republican influence-peddler Jack Abramoff.

Safavian was convicted on four of five felony counts of lying and obstruction. He resigned from his White House post last year as the federal government's chief procurement officer. No date was immediately set for sentencing.

The trial consumed eight days of testimony about Safavian's assistance to Abramoff regarding government-owned real estate and a weeklong golfing excursion the lobbyist organized to the famed St. Andrews golf course in Scotland and London. Safavian went on the trans-Atlantic trip while he was chief of staff at the General Services Administration, and other participants were Rep. Bob Ney, R-Ohio, two Ney aides and Christian Coalition founder Ralph Reed.

For the historians out there:

Ulysses S. Grant's administration has been termed one of the most incompetent and corrupt administration. Does the Bush administration exceed that yet?


Technorati Tags: Safavian

Welcome to Bush World

"I find it strange," he said to the investigators, on the grounds that as a government official "the laws apply to me" anyway.

If I recall correctly, one of the points that Republicans used to get elected to a majority in Congress, was that they told us "we are not above the law".

Seems that never applied to members of the Bush administration.

My Goodness.

Time Magazine's "Liberal" columnist, Joe Klein, gets all moist and breathless over George Bush:

In fact, George W. Bush’s body language—let’s call it the full jaunty—was reminiscent of his last, infamous cockpit trip, onto the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln in May 2003 to announce the "end" of major combat operations in Iraq, beneath a mission accomplished sign. His public language is more cautious than it used to be, but he seemed downright frothy in a private session with the congressional leadership after his press conference.

Ummm.

Technorati Tags: Joe Klein, George Bush

White House Spokesman Relying on Pension for Retirement

Kind of ironic that the White House who is anti-union, and supports weakening pension protection laws, has a spokesman whose retirement income will be derived from a union pension plan and Social Security.



Technorati Tags: Retirement, Pension, Union

Interweb Issues

Again, I am have sporadic connectivity issues with the Internets.

Don't know how much I will be able to post today.

Thought for the Day

"If at first you don't succeed, find out if the loser gets anything."

--Bill Lyon

Retirement and You

MSNBC does some examination into the possibility of Americans retiring.  It doesn't look good.

This is one area where unions have been able to help significantly.  Companies have been moving from traditional pensions, or defined benefit plans, to 401k, or defined contribution plans. Whereas unions have, for the most part, ensured that their members have adequate retirement income.

401k's are nice, as long as you have the necessary investment knowledge to pick the appropriate plans, spread your risk appropriately, and most importantly contribute enough money over the entirety of your work career.  All of this is to ensure that you ensure your retirement.  With all of the mitigating factors it is highly unlikely that the majority of Americans will have enough money to retire at 65, let alone 55 when most people target their retirement date for.

What's worse, is that even with proper planning, some event like the Enron collapse, or a natural disaster on the scale of Hurricane Katrina, ones retirement can be wiped out in an instant. 

As more and more companies either kill off their defined benefit retirement programs, and shift the onus to the worker, or mismanage it to collapse, more Americans are going to be struggling to ensure their quality of life after work.

In the interim it is nice to see someone address this issue to a wide audience.  Hopefully it will be enough to get people to act.  Everyone needs to contact their representatives to ensure that Social Security is protected, and strengthened, and to get Congress to stop weakening pension protections so that workers (and retirees) who are fortunate enough to have defined benefit retirement programs get to keep them. For the rest of us who only have the choice of defined contribution plans, such as 401k's, contribute as much as possible, and ensure that you are adequately spreading the risk to a level appropriate to your age group ( i.e. the younger you are, the more risk you can afford to take with investing).

Technorati Tags: Retirement, Pensions, 401k

From the Department of Let's Make Stuff Up

Since the NY Times decided that people like uber-idiot David Brooks couldn't be read, unless you paid a tithe to the NY Times, I have ignored pretty much anything that has been written in the Op-Ed pages of the "Paper of Record".

However, today we have some truly inane pap, penned by David Brooks.

In Washington, some blog-pleasing politicians think we should quickly leave Iraq. (Emphasis added.)

David "Bobo" Brooks has decided to adopt the George W. Bush method of dismissive rhetoric.

Right now a majority, or nearly a majority (49%+) think this war was a mistake. Last I checked there weren't 130 million bloggers out there. So, like George Bush thinking that 400,000 protestors is a "focus group", Bobo thinks that 49%+ of Americans is wild-eyed lefty bloggers.



Technorati Tags: David Brooks, Bobo, Iraq, New York Times

Thought for the Day

"A marriage is always made up of two people who are prepared to swear that only the other one snores."

--Terry Pratchett

Thought for the Day

"The trouble with facts is that there are so many of them."

--Samuel McChord Crothers,

New Jersey Fights Back

The New Jersey Attorney General has subpoenaed 5 telephone companies to determine if they broke any New Jersey laws by enabling the NSA to spy on Americans.

Natrually enough, the Federal Government has attempted to intervene, stating that New Jersey cannot question the Federal Government, and just for good measure, it is a National Security issue, so New Jersey can just go to hell.



Technorati Tags: New Jersey, NSA, Domestic Spying

Media Criticism from the Left

Media Matters has been doing a series of posts on how the left should act towards the media.

The lesson to be learned from this excellent post, is that the media responds to the right so much, because every Republican from President Busn on down to your local precinct captain has been attacking the media as having a Liberal Bias. However, on the left, there has not been such a campaign against the media. It is time for all Liberals to recognize what the right recognized years ago. The media is not on our side.

Every Liberal needs to say this. Start talking about Conservative media bias.

But, go read the rest, and the previous three parts. There is a lot for LIberals to do.


Update: I am listening to CNN right now. As part of this new Conservative media bias, CNN just picked over all the polls, and said that the President's approval rating has risen from 33% to 37% in one week.


Technorati Tags: Media, Bias, GOP, Liberal

Go Home Already

So says John Zogby to Congress.

No one can really argue with him on this.

Congress is at a standstill. The Republicans are only introducing politically charged resolutions, and bills. They are blocking Democrats attempts to introduce legislation.

Congress will get zero done, but political posturing before the end of this session.

How about they take Zogby's advice, and pack it in.

"They're Not Just Numbers"

We all should remember what the White House's position on the soldiers who have been killed or wounded in Iraq.

"It's a number"

Go read Harry Reid's speech on the political posturing of Republicans.

No soldier is just a number.

The Media Narrative

Bush is strong, Democrats are weak. It doesn't stop.

There is a reason I don't read ABC News' The Note:

There is no way that White House reporters will Note a return of the President's swagger and political chops on this swing. JUST KIDDING.

No Hill aide in either party has thought in the last 12 hours about going to work at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. JUST KIDDING.

And for the sake of fairness, it's nice to see the Democrats in the House and Senate finally coming up with a unified position on Iraq that is a political winner and expresses their heartfelt views about American policy. JUST KIDDING.

Need I say more?


Technorati Tags: Media, Narrative, The Note

Thought for the Day

"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

--Charles Mackay

Republican Culture of Corruption

Democrats take action against Rep. William Jefferson, while Republicans pretend their problem doesn't exist.

But, hey. Democrats want to "cut and run".

Technorati Tags: Republican, Culture of Corruption

"Porcine Draft Dodger--Karl Rove"

Over at No Quarter, Larry Johnson takes Karl Rove to the virtual woodshed.

Boy howdy, does he ever.

The comments, though, is where the real fun starts. It seems (to no ones surprise), that Ann Coulter's supporter, are a sensitive bunch.

Technorati Tags: Karl Rove, Larry Johnson

The Lies of the Media are Visited Upon the Readers

Greg Sargent exposes the uncorrected falsehoods the Washington Post is perpetuating.

As Atrios says:

When reporters take the words of liars and put them into print, they imbue those lies with their authority. Readers expect that newspapers are providing them with accurate information.

It is because of this, basic assumption, that the media are able to define Democrats, yet try and deflect the blame for perpetuating these lies, exaggerations, and falsehoods back to the people who made the quote.

The media should feel an obligation to weed out fact from fiction.

Technorati Tags: GOP, Lies, Media

Texas Needs Your Help

In the past, I have asked, though not pushed, for you to contribute to some candidates and/or causes. ActBlue has a program by which they will help Democratic candidates at the state level. However, before ActBlue is willing to invest in a state, for these deserving candidates, ActBlue asks that each state raise $10,000 in donations. We are nearly there for Texas. Activate ActBlue has raised more than $4,600.

Texas is a state, that although conservative, is ripe for the picking. And much like the netroots, which is working to help national candidates, Texroots is working to help statewide candidates. ActBlue has changed things up a bit for Texas We only need to raise $5,000 to get ActBlue to work with Texroots. The Activate ActBlue in Texas total is just over $4,600. Maybe we can push Texroots over the top.

If you can, please help out Texroots, or any of the Supreme Irony candidates. Texans all across the state will thank you.



I



Technorati Tags: [tagname]

George Bush's War

Eugene Robinson:

Iraq is just one theater in Bush's "war." Elsewhere, Afghanistan is once again ablaze as the resurgent Taliban counterattacks. Somalia is coming under the sway of an Islamic militia that may harbor al-Qaeda militants. America's popularity in the world continues to fall.

But George W. Bush forges ahead, trying vainly to kill a poisonous, retrograde ideology with bullets and bombs. His "war" is self-perpetuating, and no one even knows what victory would look like. Long after he's gone, we'll still be looking for a way to end the mess he began.

Listening to Anderson Cooper on Thursday night. He was interviewing Dennis Kucinich, and some whitebread Republican with an affected southern accent.

Setting aside the "Democrats are weak" theme that Cooper was pushing, the Republican member of Congress being interviewed made it clear, while trying to pretend otherwise, that America will be deeply involved in Iraq for the forseeable future.

The Republicans are not interested in exiting Iraq, in fact with the permanent bases being built, the suggestion of anything but a long term, and very costly occupation is farcical on its face.

What I was happy about, as Kucinich was very good in his responses to both Cooper, and this Republican. Some Democratic members of Congress may need to take a lesson.

Technorati Tags: Iraq, George Bush

Finally!

Representative Jefferson stripped of committee assignment.

If he is innocent of the charges against him, he will clear his name, and more than likely be permitted to reclaim his position in Congress. However, until that time, and as long as ethics is going to be a part of the Democrats election platform, William Jefferson was a blemish.

It has been cleared up for now.

Technorati Tags: William Jefferson, Ethics

The Narrative of Election 2006

Well, today certainly seems to be "define the media day". Dan Froomkin gives us (perhaps unintentionally?) the media narrative for the 2006 elections:

"GOP officials intend to base the midterm election campaign partly on talking up the war, using speeches and events to contrast President Bush's policies against growing disagreement among leading Democrats over whether to support immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops.

Froomkin goes on to quote article after article pointing out the Republicans "firmness on the war in Iraq" and the Democrats "uncertainty".

This is what Democrats are up against this year. The media is attempting to define Democrats as being "uncertain", or "on the defensive", or "weak and undecided" on the future of the Iraq war.

The Republicans are going to run on the Iraq war. Their only position will be that "we must finish the job". Domestic issues will be pushed aside (barring gay marriage, and flag burning), and the primary concern for Democrats should be, do they allow Republicans (and the media) to define the debate?

Democrats must start defining the debate now. The netroots must start defining the debate now. The summer is a period of intense apathy on the part of the public, particularly so in the context of a mid-term election.

However, the results of this election are as important as 2008 with regards to to whether we fix the nations problems now, or whether they devolve into a morass that will take decades (versus years) to unravel.



Technorati Tags: Elections, 2006, Netroots

Republican States and Morals

Granted, this is two different states, however, these are both states in which there is a Republican majority.

#1 Arkansas: Gay Foster Parents are bad

#2 Colorado: 14 Year Old Girls, Old Enough to Marry.

Any questions?

Technorati Tags: GOP, Colorado, Arkansas

Bingo!

Peter Daou hits the nail so squarely on the head, that he drives it into the board with one swing:

Anybody who watched Ann Coulter's June 14th appearance on the Tonight Show had to realize that it was a watershed moment in the war between the establishment media and the progressive netroots, a community fresh off the successful YearlyKos convention. It was also a signal to Democrats that liberal ideology can be denigrated with impunity. Had the words "Jew" or "Christian" or "Conservative" been substituted for "Liberal" we'd be waking up to a national scandal.

Remember this. Take this in the context of my post on Zack Exley.

The media has moved on to the "next big thing". Blogging had its moment in the sun, and the media has moved on. It moved on to Ann Coulter and her ilk who fantasize, out loud about the death of Liberals, and what not.

That she speaks like that isn't news. That the media, the mainstream media, wants her on to speak like that, is news. The media must be held to account. Ann Coulter doesn't care, in fact she wants liberals to spew their outrage at her. It makes her popular, it drives book sales, and she gets richer. NBC, CNN and others, on the other hand, are giving slime-merchants such as Coulter, Glenn Beck, and others air time to provide a bigger megaphone to spew their bile.

NBC must be held to account. The media collectively, must be held to account.

But, some may ask, what can we do, if the media is ignoring us?

Blogs have a higher readership than newspapers. The top progressive blogs draw more readers than CNN draws viewers. It is time to leverage those eyes. It is time for the blogging community, their readers, and all who want to see real change to come together and grow, organically to provide a counter to the media. The media aren't on our side, and I suspect that there are many in those organizations who are actively rooting for the demise of blogging and the netroots. Organizations like Media Matters, MoveOn.org, and others are working for us, and the netroots has a unique opportunity to affect change.

The real fight is just beginning. November 2006 is a real opportunity to change the landscape for the better. The media are hoping for more status quo. The netroots needs to change that.


Technorati Tags: Ann Coulter, Netroots, Media, Elections

"It's a Number"

So says Pony Blow Tony Snow when referring to the number of American Soldiers who have died in the war in Iraq.

Now we really know what the Bush Administration means by "Support the Troops". Afterall, they are just a number.

Technorati Tags: Tony Snow, Pony Blow, Iraq War

What the Hell?

What a farce:

Citing that "married fathers are more likely to have a close, enduring relationship with their children than unmarried fathers," the House Tuesday passed a Father's Day resolution devoted largely to condemning single fatherhood, RAW STORY has learned.

Amid repeated pleas to fathers to use this Sunday as an occasion to spend more time with their children, H. Res. 318 also seems to attack single fatherhood repeatedly, without ever specifying irresponsible or estranged fathers, or making exception for single fathers raising their children.

Still, a whopping 407 United States Representatives voted for the resolution. Just 8--Capuano, Honda, Lee, Lofgren (CA), McDermott, Miller (CA), Stark, and Tierney--voted "present." All were liberal Democrats.

These idiots just gave themselves a raise too!

Technorati Tags: Father's Day

Conspiracy Fun

For those of you who use Microsoft Windows do the following:

1. Turn on the computer, well if you are here its allready on
2. Open up notepad (Start-->programs-->accessories-->notepad)
3. Type the following: bush hid the facts
4. Save the document
5. Close notepad
6. Open notepad
7. Freak out
   

For those that don't know, this is called an Easter Egg. You can check out http://www.eggheaven2000.com/ for some others. They are little things that programmers put into programs and such. Usually because they are bored. As I recall there is a game in Microsoft Excel (or at least used to be).

Thought for the Day

"Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly."

--Voltaire

Locking the Gate After the Horse Escaped

Thus we have the purpose of the new Financial Data Protection Act of 2006:

Congress is considering pre-empting laws in 17 states that allow anyone to freeze their own credit and instead restricting the privilege to ID theft victims.

The proposed Financial Data Protection Act of 2006, expected to be voted on by the House as soon as next week, comes on the heels of the recent theft of sensitive data for 26 million veterans and active duty military personnel. If it becomes law, vets and military personnel who live in states that permit unrestricted credit freezes would lose that option.

A credit freeze cuts off access to your credit history. Since most banks and merchants insist on seeing a credit report before issuing credit, identity thieves can't open bogus accounts using ill-gotten data. Under the bill, backed by the financial services industry, simply having your data lost or stolen isn't enough. You must file a police report describing a specific instance of it being used to commit a crime.

"It's like telling someone you can't put a deadbolt on your front door until after you've been burglarized," says Washington state Attorney General Rob McKenna.

With reports almost daily of data thefts occuring that can compromise someones personal information to enable identity theft, why Congressional Republicans feel it is necessary to remove ones ability to preemptively protect your credit information, is staggeringly incomprehensible.



Technorati Tags: Identity Theft

Veterans Act

Class actions suit filed:

Angry veterans aren't waiting for Congress to take action over the recent Veterans Administration loss of 26.5 million personal records of veterans.

Tuesday afternoon, a coalition of veterans groups filed a class action lawsuit demanding the VA name those who are at risk for identity theft. The suit seeks $1,000 in damages for each person, a payout that could reach $26.5 billion.

According to the lawsuit, the VA's loss of the records violated both the U.S. Privacy Act and the Administrative Procedure Acts.

At this point, I still have not received any of the promised notification from the VA about this data theft. Nor has the VA taken any concrete steps to protect the veterans, and active duty personnel from identity theft. As reports have indicated that Social Security numbers were included in the data that was on the laptop stolen the threat is real.

I fully expect that the Administration will try and make some sort of National Security argument as to why this suit should be dismissed.

Thanks to Holden for the link.

Technorati Tags: Veterans Administration

Anti-Gay Goes Big

Stung by repeated losses in Congress to ban homosexuals from getting married, the anti-gay Right is going to the states to get their amendment.

Earlier this month, efforts to ban gay marriage by amending the Constitution failed badly in Senate. Now the religious right is considering appealing to state legislatures to call a Constitutional Convention under an obscure provision of Article 5 that would allow amendments to the Constitution without congressional approval.

This sets up quite a possibility. If enough support can be generated for a Constitutional Convention, the entire Constitution is open for a re-write.

It makes one wonder what the next US Constitution would look like.

I know what I would like to see added. How about you?

Technorati Tags: Religious Right, Gay Marriage, Constitution

Too Many Implications to Ponder

Get your Daddle

A.K.A. the Daddy Saddle.

Technorati Tags: Daddle