"The Accounts Formerly Known as Private"

As you've no doubt heard, the White House is backing down from private account-speak on their Social Security schemes. To that point I must direct you to an article from Molly Ivens Flip-Flopping on Social Security Linguistics:

Rather than the old liberal habit of creating linguistically awkward phrases to avoid hurting people's feelings – such as African-American rather than Negro or colored people, or special-needs children rather than retarded – this is twisting language for purely political purposes.

And then she goes on to describe exactly how this is done (on a variety of issues, not just Social Security Insurance), the catch-22 it intentionally creates for all media (left and right alike) and in the end how, to avoid falling into the new double-speak reframing trap, one can (must?) use such lines as this post's title - hysterical! Another must read article.

(Sshhh - this flip-flop of BushCo.'s is a sign; they are feeling vulnerable! Pass it on.)

Daily Kos :: Rolling Stone to Young Americans: Draft? Draft! Draft!

Last year I made a two-part bet with a friend, of which I have lost half already. The first part was that Kerry would win. The second was that if Kerry lost, Bush would invade Iran and there would be a draft. My friend and I are already splitting hairs on the definition of 'invasion'.

This recommended diary on KOS highlights the ideas in the Rolling Stone piece and presents links supporting an argument of how the draft is being stealth-implemented now as well as links to anti-draft organizations.

It is a must-read if you have deluded yourself into thinking Bush stating "There will be no draft" means anything. Remember, he was once a pro-choice supporter.

Daily Kos :: Jimmy Carter's Lost Vision: The Solution to War on Terrorism

Being a member of the tailing edge of the boomer generation, I remember the 70's well. As it regards politics and changes in the fortunes of liberals I have always been able to clearly identify the years when everything seemed to change - 1978 through 1982. Until then, the outcomes of 60's introspection as 70's political, rights and economic realism (as evidenced in rights battles like Roe vs Wade, the end of the Vietnam War, the attempt to pass the ERA, environmental regulation and so forth) were ripening, and were yes, restrictive. In short, I understood the material hardships were the economic whiplash of a political realignment that in the end could save us from environmental destruction through material conservation. Things were tight but I was happy, the way one who has been freed from the burden of an addiction might be - it hurt, but I knew it was good for me, my family, my country and by extension, the global community. It was the reverse whiplash of Reagan's full-tilt turnabout straight into Gordon Gekko's "Greed is Good" mentality that lost me.

For years now I have been wondering what happened in that late 70's period and this fascinating take on Jimmy Carter and the war on terrorism holds out some insight:

There's a brilliant piece in The Wilson Quarterly this month by Andrew J. Bacevich, Professor of International Relations at Boston University, excerpted from his upcoming book, "The New American Militarism" (No link to story provided yet). His essential point is a critique of the myth that the War on Terror is the Fourth World War (the Third being the Cold War). Bacevich believes that The War on Terror is actually simply the newest escalation in a World War that was declared 25 years ago by Jimmy Carter.

Bacevich writes:

By the beginning of 1980, a chastened Jimmy Carter had learned a hard lesson: It was not the prospect of making do with less that sustained American-style democracy, but the promise of more. Carter had come to realize that what Americans demanded from their government was freedom, defined as more choice, more opportunity, and, above all, greater abundance, measured in material terms. That abundance depended on assured access to cheap oil--and lots of it.

In enunciating the Carter Doctrine, the president was reversing course, effectively renouncing his prior vision of a less materialistic, more self-reliant democracy. Just six months earlier, this vision had been the theme of a prescient, but politically misconceived, address to the nation, instantly dubbed by pundits the "Crisis of Confidence" speech, though, in retrospect, perhaps better called "The Road Not Taken."

Ah, I miss Jimmy Carter, maybe the only fully liberal president of the last thirty years...

If You Want Torture, YOU Go To Gitmo

I can barely stand the moronic ranting of idiots who think that incurring any physical abuse on a person who is held (without charge) at Gitmo short of death, organ failure or damage resulting in loss of a life function excludes torture. Or the bleating of those who think such abuse, even if it is torture, is acceptable because of 9/11.

Please, someone, arrest and incarcerate these morons in Gitmo so they can be properly enlightened through the experience of such abuse before they have the privilege of voting, again.

KA-CHING: Big Oil Gets What it Paid For - Now Don't You Feel Proud?

I couldn't enumerate the reasons America should not have invaded Iraq because there are so many. But I have always known the only two reasons that it did: Oil and Neocon world domination/perpetual war (for oil) theory.

So, here you go:

On Dec. 22, 2004, Iraqi Finance Minister Abdel Mahdi told a handful of reporters and industry insiders at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. that Iraq wants to issue a new oil law that would open Iraq's national oil company to private foreign investment. As Mahdi explained: "So I think this is very promising to the American investors and to American enterprise, certainly to oil companies."

In other words, Mahdi is proposing to privatize Iraq's oil and put it into American corporate hands.

According to the finance minister, foreigners would gain access both to "downstream" and "maybe even upstream" oil investment. This means foreigners can sell Iraqi oil and own it under the ground — the very thing for which many argue the U.S. went to war in the first place.

As Vice President Dick Cheney's Defense Policy Guidance report explained back in 1992, "Our overall objective is to remain the predominant outside power in the [Middle East] region and preserve U.S. and Western access to the region's oil."

I am wordless.

ELECTION FRAUD UPDATE: Ohio Still Hot?

Bush may be president (for now) but it's worth noting...

Several volunteer workers in the Ohio recount in Clermont County, Ohio have prepared affidavits alleging serious tampering, violations of state and federal law, and possible fraud. They name the Republican chief of Clermont’s Board of Elections and the head of the Clermont Democratic Party Priscilla O’Donnell as complicit in these acts.

These volunteers, observing the recount on behalf of the Greens, Libertarians and Democrats, assert that during the Dec. 14, 2004 hand recount they noticed stickers covering the Kerry/Edwards oval, whereas the Bush/Cheney oval seemed to be “colored in.”

Some witnesses state that beneath the stickers, the Kerry/Edwards oval was selected. The opti-scan ballots were then fed into the machines after the hand recount.

VIEWPOINT: What News Matters?

Over the months I have hoped to find one or more contributors to my blog who could bring not only a viewpoint of unique orientation but of voice as well. Published writer and artist David Chorlton, who will be gracing our datapages now and then, has offered the following essay for our consideration. I welcome his contribution as I hope you will too.

January 26th, 2005

This is a European’s view, albeit from one who has spent little time on his native continent in recent years. Overall, for anything I miss there is a compensation here, but of late I have become increasingly aware of a quality that is noticeably absent in the USA: candor.

I’m not talking about the blunt speech of an ideologue happy to unload whatever is on his/her mind, and not the president’s Texas style of tough talk before an obedient camera. That is self-serving crudeness. No, what I miss is hearing somebody in an official position actually come out in public and say something real. We only have to tune in to a White House press conference to hear all meaning being wrung from language as it is issued in the official, unemotional, corporate, ass-covering tone of a well trained spokesman. This despite the fact that what is being discussed is loss of life, threats to the public, or policy meltdowns. This tactic enables the guilty to slither free of accusations of misconduct by simply talking as if nothing is wrong. This suggests that the supporters of the White House are listening but not thinking. We are subjected in public matters to language that is so far from the one we use in our private lives that it is surprising we understand it at all. The sanitizing of American speech in media and politics can only mask misdeeds. The machine grinds daily. Newscasters. Advertisers. The experts on the talk shows bantering back and forth in a verbal mist. No wonder the FCC is enjoying so much attention for trying to ensure the air waves remain untainted by spontaneity or, Heaven and Heather Wilson forbid, obscenity.

Back to the Europeans: I enjoy listening to Austrian radio over the internet. The orf (Austrian Broadcasting) has a fine range of serious cultural and news programming. Around 6 PM Alpine time the other day, I heard a music show the subject of which was American songwriter/singer, Adam Green, whose CD Gemstones is popular in Austria. Europeans are interested in culture outside their own borders by the way. What I found especially appealing was the way the announcer, a woman, followed the song by articulating some of the lyrics very slowly and deliberately, not flinching when, after shaking hands with George W. Bush the singer “choked on some cock.” As indecency goes, this was mild stuff. As politics it doesn’t say much, but the moment of candor gave me the satisfaction of knowing that the mainstream media doesn’t have to constantly monitor itself lest it sound like a real person. Moreover, I am concerned that behind every example of blandness there is a real horror we should know about. Take Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches as an example of reporting what goes on in Iraq with pictures that show what the war really looks like with its skin peeling away and skeletons bared.

David Chorlton

The Principled Thirteen

Why are these the only dems who voted against Rice today? Why not Clinton? Are these the Democratic Army's 101? Is Hillary a strategist, a general or otherwise just too important to sacrifice? And what about that Independent - hey, a merc among us (and his reward is...)?
Just asking.

Daniel Akaka (D-HA)
Evan Bayh (D-IN)
Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
Robert C. Byrd (D-WV)
Mark Dayton (D-MN)
Dick Durbin (D-IL)
Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Jim Jeffords (I-VT)
Edward Kennedy (D-MA)
John Kerry (D-MA)
Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Carl Levin (D-MI)
Jack Reed (D-RI)

Ex-FBI Agent Charges Feds With Radioactive Coverup at Rocky Flats

Ah, the environment: Liberal domain of stewardship, coveted by cash-greedy conservatives industry-wide; the resource they most love to waste.

According to an article in Grist Magazine (online), it seems that the developing of Colorado's ex-nuke site, Rocky Flats, into a wildlife-refuge will leave it scalding hot but you - eager for a respite of natural trails and wildlife - weren't supposed to know that, ever.

Now why would the Department of Justice seal records of this 1989 case to avoid such information being known?

What concerns attorney Balkany the most is that the Rocky Flats cleanup could be used to fuel the myth that nuclear waste can be safely handled. "I believe the main goal of the DOJ and the nuke industry at Rocky Flats is greenwashing. It helps both nuclear power and the nuclear-weapons industries to convince people that industries and government can deal with their waste in a safe way," she said.

This could be of particular interest to the Bush administration, given that just last week, in President Bush's first newspaper interview since his reelection, he told The Wall Street Journal of his hopes to spark a nuclear-power renaissance, glorifying nuclear power in ways that many would deem delusional: "I believe nuclear power answers a lot of our issues," he said. "It certainly answers the environmental issue." He later added: "It's a renewable source of energy." Who's ever heard of renewable energy that creates cancer-causing waste?

"Just watch," said Brever. "They're going to hold up Rocky Flats as the nuclear-waste success story, the flagship. It's going to happen all over the country: Washington is going to make nuclear-waste dumps into plutonium playgrounds."

Next stop, Nevada?

Not One Thin Dime Day: Uhm, maybe...

In theory, I think Not One Thin Dime Day as a protest against the Iraq War is off-base. It won't stop the war. Conservatives know it will pass and make a mockery of it in the process.

I would prefer Not One Thin RED Dime Year. A year in which committed liberals boycott every Republican money engine. A year in which liberals switch banking institutions and change buying and investing patterns to only support liberal businesses, financial institutions and causes. A whole year in which they switch their investments into portfolios of non-war, pro-minority, environmentally sustainable goods and services. One in which, if they can't find a liberal-cause beer company, they stop drinking beer; if their mortgage company supports Republicans, they refinance their home; if they have to eat organic meat once a week instead of slaughter house meat every day, they do that too. In short, an entire year in which 56 million liberals make a commitment of substance. I can hear Republicans laughing already.

So what is the real number liberals need to take that grin off Republican faces? 5% of 56 million - 2.8 million? Less than the population of New York City? I don't have the mathematical answer, but I do know this; if 2.5 million liberals took up a serious effort to change their spending habits from laissez-faire to intention-only, the economy could be affected but even better, those new habits would last years...and years. In significant numbers over time, liberals could shake the foundations of marketing psychology. They could prove consumers, not corporations, are in charge of choice...and that idea scares the shit out of Republicans!

Now, doesn't that sound like a lot more fun?

Armstrong and Beyond

I understand why liberals (and good conservatives) are outraged at the Armstrong Williams scandal, but why shocked I wonder?

If you've been watching media broadcasts since Fox cable news entered the airwaves in 1996, you have noticed news reporting cantilever and twist into crazy-making infotainment. In the last four years top stories of actual national interest (such as concrete WMD reporting) were routinely buried under murder victims long lost, dug up or washed ashore. Coverage of national security scandals like Plamegate disappeared into pundicrat spider-holes until they could be cemented flat under mounting Kerry-bashing. At first I was surprised at the sway Republican-funding media owners had over their paid hacks; I'd mistakenly believed journalism was a sacred trust. I got over that.

Now discovering that the Bush government actually paid free-lance journalists to 'report' its propaganda is surprising, but not shocking. Self-proclaimed "pure-entrepreneur" types like Armstrong Williams are the type to believe any brake on free enterprise is inherently illegal (and if he's of a certain religious type, probably even a sin to boot)! Good luck outing the rest of his ilk now....

For such folks, regardless of their career paths, government regulations prohibiting any particular free-enterprise activity are already dead deals; Bush reforms will be ripping regulatory laws apart in due time so why wait and lose big pay-offs now? Besides, anyone can see that politically juiced rule-breakers (look at Ken Lay and Tom DeLay) receive laughable penalties and a little bad PR, so what's the harm in trying?

Maybe folks like Williams see themselves as pioneers creating an opportunity for their buddy conservative pundicrats to wring their hands over career-crushing, regulation-bound restraints rooted in socialist New Deal regulations. The really creative ones may even figure out how to make payolla regulations First Amendment free-speech violations! And finally, evangelicals will get mouth-foaming wing-nuts to launch letter campaigns to every Republican in government demanding a righteous repeal! Hell, regulatory criminals are reformist heros!

Get a grip folks. Every law conservatives from the super-class choose to break was crafted under a democratic government. Republicans have stacked the deck with their judges to rule against current legal precedents and set new ones reflecting their radical free-market agendas. They seize issues of liberal outrage as excuses to bring stories on topics they want to debate into media play or onto the senate floor where they torture the truth of the inherent principles into twisted skeletons, claim the foundations to be reflections of so-called 'spiritual poverty' and judge the only recourse be a complete reversal mandated by their brave New Order.

When this government claimed it was creating a new reality it wasn't kidding. Blink at your own risk.

ELECTION FRAUD UPDATE - KOS Out, Freeman In

As Markos Zúniga (kos) of blog Daily KOS is slamming election fraud theorists, University of Pennsylvania professor of statistics Steven F. Freeman has updated his paper on election exit-poll discrepancies. In his Summary he continues to include:

Systematic fraud or mistabulation is as yet an unfounded conclusion, but the election’s unexplained exit poll discrepancies make it an unavoidable hypothesis, one that is the responsibility of the media, academia, polling agencies, and the public to investigate.

Admittedly, Kos has been attacked by some fraud theorists for not covering the issue, and he has a point - it's his blog - he can write what he wants. I agree. Then he goes on to add:

So why didn't I find the Ohio stuff compelling? Because the whacked out conspiracy theories hijacked the issue, taking it away from the obvious travesties -- the long lines in Democratic precincts, attempted voter intimidation, etc., to the realm of fantasy.

Us liberal bloggers like to brag that we live in the "reality-based community". It's kind of hard to be reality-based when people are claiming that Kerry won with no hard evidence to the contrary. Was there fraud? Sure. There always has been. Was the GOP ready to steal the election if necessary? No doubt. But they didn't have to steal this one. This wasn't 2000. Bush rode his fucked up war to victory, whether we like it or not. History will judge us right, but until then, we're stuck with the results.

Now, I was open minded at first, letting the fraudsters do the analysis, ready to pounce if the smoking gun was found. But after myriad diaries crying wolf, claiming that this was the evidence to seal the deal, well, it got old. Then it got counterproductive, then it got embarrassing.

All the crying wolf is hurting the cause for electoral reform. This has been painted as a partisan issue pushed forth by wacko liberals who think Kerry won the election when Bush won.

First, I do see his point - that this (I suppose he means election reform) - "...has been painted as a partisan issue pushed forth by wacko liberals," but I don't agree that is the fault of fraud theorists or the activity of election activists in Ohio.

Republicans have proven that they will use dirty tricks and media propaganda to paint liberals as "wacko" no matter what they attempt, even when a legitimate senator such as John Kerry runs for office. And that is accomplished by framing liberals as elitist, amoral, socialist, communist, big government, whatever - you name it - if it is button pushing material regardless of it's legitimacy (take Social Security) it will be thrown into the conversation as qualifier, not topic. The unconscious frame links the Republican noise-machine have crafted simply light up the appropriate belief-system to shut down the rational thinking of the listener. It doesn't matter what fraud theorists, or Kos, actually think or write. If both are liberal, both are wacko. And he goes on to point out that this is not 2000. Well, it wasn't until 2001 that all the recount scenarios from Florida revealed that if the entire state were counted, Gore won under every possible recount scenario. Would that we do the same in Ohio, Bush will be inaugurated and discovery of fraud could emerge in late 2005! Kos may be okay with that, but I'm not.

Second, I would imagine that if Kos has been accused of not covering something it's because activists know Daily KOS is widely read and respected, which is of course one of his points - he intends to remain independent and respected - but I hope he understands that at least one faction of the liberal community expects him to behave like a journalist (even if he isn't actually proclaiming himself as one) and cover the news (especially if it's running contrary to coporate media spin or black-outs). Although unwelcome, to be drafted by your peers in the name of a righteous cause, is a compliment.

Third, I am a member of the fraud theory faction, that probably represents one of the lines or mindsets of which liberals will have to take a stand on one side or the other, eventually. I have completely and entirely lost trust in current administration members of government and their political and corporate support network. As actors in good faith for all Americans, their rights and the constitution, I believe those persons are dangerous, untrustworthy and capable of any evil in the name of their extremist cause. Hence all their actions are suspect. From that point of view, kos' position falls more toward one who believes that if liberals figure out the problem, or otherwise do something different, we will win elections. From my POV, he is in denial, like that of an abuse victim who refuses to see that he can't win.

If statisticians like Steven Freeman continue to believe the fraud theory has validity, it is good enough for me.