'Gee, I wish I were poor'...

...is a statement I have never heard anyone seriously make, yet the impoverished person is often persecuted multiple times, once by poverty and then by the acrimony of others, leading to a psychology of victimization--the having of which ALSO seems for some a call for persecution--over and over. Why do some want to punish others for the mere condition of being poor?

Poverty is complicated and there are many subsistence levels within it, from people on total government subsidy to the working poor receiving little or nothing in assistance. Disability (inlcuding the invisible ones like mental health), family catastrophe and economics play a fundamental role in poverty. All or some of those factors in combination on the wrong day at the wrong time can lead to a single outcome or pattern of making the best decisions possible that still lead to a deepening poverty.

To an ousider decisions of the already-poor may look selfish or otherwise 'wrong' (take abortion for example) when in fact such a decision may be responsible. Maybe even going on a 'drinking bender'--a form of self-medication for an addict (seen as nothing but irresponsible in the eyes of a moralizer)--may be the only medication available for a man or woman with no health care and possibly no idea that addiction is an issue of mental health, not character.

In a cursory search for recent articles on just one of the intersections of poverty's effect on human life (health) I didn't find anything to answer my question but found this instead; it goes to the economic mechanism of poverty through the current event, Katrina, that has put poverty back on the table for discussion. We need to keep it (and our compassion) on the table for as long as it takes:

The Other America:

"The primary economic problem is not unemployment but low wages for workers of all races. With unions weakened and a minimum-wage increase not on the GOP agenda, wages have not kept pace with the cost of living, except at the top. (In 1965, CEOs made 24 times as much as the average worker; by 2003, they earned 185 times as much.) Since 2001, the United States has lost 2.7 million manufacturing jobs. New Orleans's good jobs left much earlier, replaced by employment in the restaurant and tourism industry, which pays less and usually carries no health benefits. Medicaid covers poor children but few poor adults, who put off seeing the doctor, cranking up the cost. For the poor, the idea of low-wage jobs' covering the basic expenses of living has become a cruel joke."

Dick and Don's (Excellent) Cabal

TomPaine.com created this 'map' of the major player's in the neocon's (Cheney/Rumsfeld) campaign to invade Iraq. You'll have to resize the image to fit your screen or scroll around a lot, but the information is worth the effort...

Libby, Libby, Libby Means Nothing, Nothing, Nothing...

From a comment on a blog that seemed to sum up the value of the Libby indictment nicely:

It appears to me that Fitzgerald has decided to hand off the hot potato “issues” that go to the heart of his case against Libby and are of paramount importance to exposing the “culture of corruption” in today’s Republican Party.

From what I can tell, Fitzgerald essentially has indicated that he will not be an “activist” prosecutor delving into the reasons behind Libby feeling compelled to commit perjury, obstruction of justice and making false statements. In other words, Fitzgerald has apparently decided to blow off getting to the bottom of “why” Libby lied and “what” motivated Libby to lie.

So, Fitzgerald will not reconstruct a historical timeline dating back before Bush started war in Iraq, with all the administration hype about Iraqi WMD, which Mr. Wilson rebutted, which caused some neo-cons to retaliate by exposing the CIA NOC identity of Mr. Wilson’s wife, which goes to the heart of why Libby lied and tried to cover up the lie.

From what I can tell, Mr. Fitzgerald has decided to punt these hot button “issues” to Congress, and into the hands of any stout-hearted, patriotic souls still remaining in Congress who might want to conduct hearings into the impeachable offenses of the rogue Bush administration.

Fat chance that this will happen.

In other words, Fitzgerald has said it’s not his job to hold a presidency accountable for any impeachable misdeeds like lying our country into war. He is indicating in his indictment of Libby that he believes it is Congress’ responsibility to look into this preamble of the Plame affair…if anyone in Congress is interested.

In other words, ZERO.

That Gas Bloating Got You Down?

Even Fox's O'Reilly had a problem with this!

"Exxon Mobil Corp. had a quarter for the record books. The world's largest publicly traded oil company said Thursday high oil and natural-gas prices helped its third-quarter profit surge almost 75 percent to $9.92 billion, the largest quarterly profit for a U.S. company ever, and it was the first to ring up more than $100 billion in quarterly sales."

It was funny as hell to hear a guy who probably thinks anyone impoverished can blame only themselves complain when a mutli-national hits everyone's pocket. What? Doesn't he know that working Americans should be stock-piling gas in the garage along with bucks in the 401-K's? We're adults--it's a dog-eat-dog world--he should just go bio-diesel, get an underground gas storage unit or just stop whining already!

Distractions, Background Noise and Bears, Oh My!!

I couldn't pass up this from Is That Legal?:

John Hinderaker, yesterday:

Tomorrow may bring indictments of Karl Rove and Scooter Libby on charges that can charitably be described as trivial. Tonight, one of our readers urged us to link to President Bush's great speech to the Joint Armed Forces Officers' Wives' group rather than being distracted by the minutiae of the day. Good suggestion.

John Hinderaker, December 17, 1998:

"Like many others, we have been frustrated by the apparent inability of much of the American public to take the Clinton scandals seriously. "It's not about sex," we have patiently repeated to our benighted friends. "It's about perjury. It's about obstruction of justice. The sex is only incidental. At most it was the motive for the crimes. You wouldn't think murder was unimportant just because the motive for the murder was sex, would you?" So goes our argument."

Well, they're not indicted yet and certainly not proven guilty, but either way I agree with the opinion of one commenter to the above: "I am waiting for the day the American people realize that what the right wing is saying is that adulterous oral sex is worse than outing a CIA operative."

Good News! Davis-Bacon Suspension Reversed!

Now if we could just get the last election results reversed...

American Chronicle: Reversal on GULF COAST WAGE CUT

Bowing to pressure from a united Democratic front, a small group of members of his own party, the religious community, and the labor movement, President Bush announced today he would reverse the decision he made in September to remove wage protections for construction workers in the areas affected by Hurricane Katrina.

Big Pharma Loves Bird Flu

Oohhhh, it's okay, I wasn't using that civil right anyway...

In the middle of last week, one short day after the bill had been introduced, the powerful Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee -- by a quick, simple voice vote of the full panel -- passed something called the "Biodefense and Pandemic Vaccine and Drug Development Act of 2005."

--snip--

It would establish an efficient-sounding Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Agency (BARDA) to speed up and "provide incentives and protections" for the "domestic manufacture of medical countermeasures" -- vaccines and drugs -- that would help stop pandemic or epidemic sickness within the United States.

--snip--

Further, Fisher points out, the government, under this bill, "could force all citizens to use these drugs and vaccines while absolving everyone connected from any responsibility for injuries and deaths which occur" in their wake.

Sen. Burr is himself the chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Bioterrorism and Public Health Preparedness. In his bill, BARDA -- the new R and D agency mentioned above -- would be established as the single point of authority in the federal system for the advanced research and development of vaccines and drugs in response to bioterrorism and outbreaks of natural disease.

And BARDA would operate in secret.

The agency would be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act and from the Federal Advisory Committee Act, which requires public public transparency -- making it almost certain that no evidence of injuries or deaths caused by drugs and vaccines labeled as "countermeasures" to bioterrorism or new disease epidemics would ever become public. The bill would not only provide Big Pharma impenetrable cover, it would exempt lots of federal cost oversight requirements, and would forbid government purchases of generic versions of such new drugs or vaccines, a current practice that saves taxpayers millions of dollars.

--snip--

The timing of the new attempt at congressional protection for Big Pharma -- the Burr bill -- is exquisite.

The wording "natural outbreaks" of disease and "pandemics" mentioned by Sen. Burr in his call for support of the bill are designed to make citizens and fellow senators alike think of one thing -- avian flu.

This new biological "threat" is increasingly on the minds of Americans and is reaching near-panic level in terms of public perception.

--snip--

How many human cases of the bird flu have been reported in the United States? Zero.

That's right, none. The bird flu, which originated in South Korea more than two years ago, rarely spreads from birds to humans, and hasn't even been shown to affect poultry yet in this country.

--snip--

The virus might be an eventual threat to the flocks of poultry farmers here, but many scientists seem to think H5N1 influenza won't sicken or kill humans on a mass basis unless its mutating properties change dramatically.

--snip--

Several Democrats in that chamber have criticized the Burr bill, but mostly from the perspective that it would do little to provide any response to an avian flu outbreak.

"I hope that people don't think this is going to solve the problem of the possible avian flu pandemic that is on our doorstep," warned Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat.

This legislation is obviously fast-tracked. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, the Tennessee Republican, is a co-sponsor, as is Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg, a Republican from New Hampshire.

They obviously don't care that if signed into law, this proposal would eliminate both legal and regulatory safeguards, applied to vaccines and drugs, that need strengthening, not weakening or elimination. They obviously don't care if children or adults harmed by vaccines and drugs will have to forfeit their right to present a case in front of a jury in a civil court of law.

Don't think this never happens. The Food and Drug Administration is legally responsible at present for regulating Big Pharma, and for ensuring that vaccines and drugs released to the public are safe and effective. Drug companies marketing pain-killer and anti-depressants that have injured thousands are being held accountable in civil courts all the time. And the FDA has come under intense criticism for keeping information from the American public about drug dangers.

For almost two decades, vaccine makers have already been protected from most liability in civil courts through the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 and a concurrent compensation program that offers victims an alternative to civil courts. That program has already awarded almost $2 billion to injured victims of mandated vaccines -- yet two-thirds of the plaintiffs are turned away from such compensation through vigorous defense of the manufacturers by Justice Department lawyers.

--snip--

She continues: "It's a sad day for this nation when Congress is frightened and bullied into allowing one profit-making industry to destroy the Seventh Amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing citizens their day in court in front of a jury of their peers."

The Folly of War is a Statistical Fact

"Peace will NEVER be the answer"

...is the title of a post on this site arguing against the anti-war position. Stunning to see set out as such a bold conclusion, isn't it? When I first saw it my jaw actually dropped.

Forget the fact that it neatly parallels such reversals of common sense understanding that are endemic in today's Republican party (new air-standard policies gutting clean air regulations are tagged "Clean Skies"; giving logging industry access to old-growth forests is policy creating "Healthy Forests" and of course, questioning abuse of power is Unpatriotic, Treason, Anti-American...ho-hum...but all that is fodder for another post).

No, "Peace will never be the answer" deserves it's own post. Going on, the writer states:

I've always taken umbrage with the anti-war protesters cloaking themselves under the flawed premise that if they seek pacifism and do not favor war, they somehow are more in favor of peace than us "warmongerers."

William Shawcross recently opined upon such in the LA Times.

For once, I urge one liberal to explain to me, with facts (not with relativism, legalities and their hearts) where this presented rationale is flawed. I await breathlessly. I'm sure I will wait awhile.

Hmmm...I thought, I know that statement is flawed...the 400 year war between England and Ireland immediately rushed to mind (there was a failure if ever there was). Not more than 5 mintues later a Google search returned a most fascinating online "book": KNOWING THE ROOTS OF WAR; Analyses and Interpretations of Six Centuries of Warfare (Collected Papers), Frank H. Denton, 2003.

Denton writes (in part):

This paper is the core of the study of Knowing the Roots of war. It evolved from the original subject of investigation – the study of the making of foreign affairs decisions in government. Pursuing that aim I found patterns in these data that on first discovery were extremely hard to believe.

Across all time periods, in all types of governments, for any power relationships other than big/small, the party making the decision to go to war, that is firing the first shot in a war, has for two hundred years had less than a fifty-fifty success rate, often much less, in achieving its objectives in firing that first shot. Time-after-time, year-after-year, conflict after conflict, political leaders took decisions to initiate wars in which they failed to achieve their objectives. Based on a listing of 500 incidents of warfare that took place in a two century interval this provides a hard to dispute validation of Barbara Tuchman’s statement in the first paragraphs of The March of Folly.

A phenomenon noticeable throughout history regardless of place or period is the pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own interests. Mankind, it seems, makes a poorer performance of government than of almost any other human activity. In this sphere, wisdom...is less operative and more frustrated than it should be. Why do holders of high office so often act contrary to the way reason points and enlightened self-interest suggests? Why does intelligent mental process seem so often not to function?

Why did successive ministries of George III insist on coercing rather than conciliating the American colonies though repeatedly advised by many counselors that the harm done must be greater than any possible gain? Why did Charles XII and Napoleon and successively Hitler invade Russia despite the disasters incurred by each predecessor?

Former Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara makes a saddened assertion in his memoirs of the Vietnam War build-up that is strangely similar to Tuchman’s:

Readers must wonder by now...how presumably intelligent, hardworking and experienced officials-both civilian and military-failed to address systematically and thoroughly questions whose answers so deeply affected the lives of our citizens and the welfare of our nation.

There is perhaps no better way of stating the results found here than to assert that Folly Marches Onward.

--snip--

The data I do have show that wars are commonly started that do not produce intended results, as often as three cases in four the initiator of violence fails. Digging further it is also shown that wars do not normally resolve the conflicts that brought on the violence. The prospects for re-fighting a war within a generational time period are very high. Wars are often even fought for a third time.

Extending the data some, I was able to produce indirect evidence as to a possible partial explanation for this pattern of failed decisions. It is not the direct evidence used in determining success rates, Rather, I used indirect indications to suggest that attaining the moral high ground is extremely important in the successful use of violence and that perhaps being attacked tends to give one an initial position on a moral peak, relative to the aggressor/initiator, accounting for some of the poor performance shown by aggressors.

So, righteous wars do a bit better. Hmmm--going into Afghanistan--righteous. Invading Iraq...take a guess.

Rest in Peace Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks' arrest photo. Courtesy of Alternet via BoingBoing.net.

Best Protest Sign at Anti-war Demonstration in Washington, DC.

"WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE
GIVE HIM A BLOW JOB
SO WE CAN HAVE HIM IMPEACHED."

Hat-tip to Bratmouse...

GUEST POST: Elmer Gantry Goes to Washington

Submitted to CLB in the hope that the more facts you, the reader has to consider the better informed you are, the better decisions you can make.

Actually fokes, I look at Tom De Lay and see the face of a hick huckster, an Elmer Gantry. I believe it was a fall 2004 issue of Vanity Fair that outlined what a good-government crusader this prosecuter is in Austin, TX. It would have to be Austin in that fetid cesspool of a state, where they wanted their own republic, based on guns and pushing Mex’skins and other people around and of course Texas is God and football Uberalles and so much so that the bohemians have to call themselves Slackers–meaning that God, as every idiot or schoolchild knows, is the god of infinite slack.

So anyways, this prosecutor goes for politicians of every party, not just De Lay, as I’m sure most of the press forgot to mention. Ack–Tom DeLay. I grew up listening to preachers just like Gantry, now I see how De Lay and other Repub's of the Bushitter stripe hook the rubes. Gantry--he'd get you listening, point out how beautiful the stained glass (property) was, point out how the beauties and comforts of Heaven were only for people who believed (voted for) him, point his finger outside the church and rail against the sinners (those who get shafted more every day by being women, gay, poor, uneducated, or long-haired) get his muscular ushers (bagmen) circulating so they could turn the parishioners (voters-lobbyists) upside down and try to get ev’ry wallet and coin to fall into the aisles. That’s the meanness of TX politics, fokes. That is becoming the model for the Fourth Reich, ah, bless their lil’ raisins of hearts. To me, him and the whole gang of Texas Bushitters are wolves in sheep’s clothing, angelic faces, short hair, trophy wives, and yet--could there be justice? We can only pray. --WOE said Jeremiah; WOE to those blinded by "the letter" of "born-again law" instead of the fact of God's infinite grace; and to those poodles of the rich who fill their campaign coffers for breaks on taxes and more jails cells for enterprising pot farmers. I say woe to those who would fleece the sheep while smiling. They may be religious but they don’t understand one angel’s hair about spirituality. I look forward to the day when they exit this life and face St. Peter who then sends them back to be a 21st Century Chinese cooley for 70 years and look through latrine pots for bits of undigested food.

&&&&&&& 'Xcuse if a little rabid today but it is Sunday and it gets me thinking of Hunter S. Thompson, Spaulding Gray and other sensitive souls too good to live in these crazy times. But cheers up chirren, it’s always darkest before the dawn. I think even the national press is starting to catch on that –is anybody else watching "Rome" on HBO? –that these Bible-shielded folks who give the theory of hands-off-conservatism a bad name-- are taking this country away from it’s constitutional, republic-an roots and toward a government partnership with the patricians, the military and the mulitnationals. Around this time 100 years ago Teddy Roosevelt started busting trusts because monopolies do restrain trade, and can set their own prices. I want to remind you that one reason General Wesley Clark ran for President in 2004 is that a GOP friend called him after 9/11, confiding, "after all this has happened, I don’t think you’ll see another Democratic president in our lifetime." That fact is also documented in a national magazine, and I’ll cite the reference for that and the facts on the De Lay indictments later this week.

We have yet to reach the point where this potential 4th Reich can restrain "trade" in ideas; but I’m here in this bully pulpit to tell you, the price of liberty IS great and a lot of good people are just standing by today while the Bushitters are getting off scot-free with dirty, corrupt, smear-your-opponent and silence dissent-type Texas politics.

Regards,
Unofficial archivist of underground histories "Cisco"

Gay Sex is Equal to Het Sex (Except When it's Not)

Isn't this interesting?

"TOPEKA, Kan. -- The Kansas Supreme Court on Friday unanimously struck down a state law that punished underage sex more severely if it involved homosexual acts, saying 'moral disapproval' of such conduct is not enough to justify the different treatment.

In a case closely watched by national groups on all sides of the gay rights debate, the high court said the law 'suggests animus toward teenagers who engage in homosexual sex.'

Gay rights groups praised the ruling, while conservatives bitterly complained that the court intruded on the Legislature's authority to make the laws.

The case involved an 18-year-old man, Matthew R. Limon, who was found guilty in 2000 of performing a sex act on a 14-year-old boy and was sentenced to 17 years in prison. Had one of them been a girl, state law would have dictated a maximum sentence of 15 months.

The high court ordered that Limon be resentenced as if the law treated illegal gay sex and illegal straight sex the same. He has already served more than five years."

Moralists will insist on mischaracterizing this ruling as being that of activist judges interfering with a state's right to create uneven penalties for the same crime on the basis of their feeling offended (boo-hoo).

Those same moralists will of course fail to see how offensive it is to women that their moral outrage is based not on the victimization of one by age but by same-sex gender, squarely suggesting that women are second-class citizens--mere beggars at the table--when it comes to justice.

Why is Tom Delay Smiling?

Because he has no respect for the law.

In America, it is the law that supposedly keeps the playing field level for rich and poor alike. Many of us know the law is blind (and sometimes even crippled) but in theory we at least believe that through law, injustice can be addressed. Otherwise why would we be proud to be a country of laws?

Tom Delay is a prominent elected official of the Republican party to the branch of government where this fundamental American process of creating law is undertaken. You would think that he would know when and where appropriate respect for the institution should be modeled. At the very least, in this moment where not only his personal behavior but that as it represents the Republican party should reflect appropriate humility. He is instead posing for his next fund-raising event, the one where he proudly crows about denying Democrats a negative photo opportunity. Doesn't he get it? This isn't about him! It is about Americans--WE, the PEOPLE--and our right to fairly elect our representatives. He apparently thinks the particular law under which he's been indicted is nothing more than a partisan 'gotcha' invented to suppress his political ambitions!

Think about it. If he doesn't know better than to show respect for the law (and appropriate humility when he's been arrested) AND when all of America's eyes are on him, do you think his behavior is any better behind closed doors...?

God to Republicans: "TAKE A HINT"!

While the New Puritans shrill about intentionally mischaraterized positions of America's most patriotic institutions (like the ACLU), this is the behavior of the party they support:

Now, with the administration struggling to overcome complaints about its response to Hurricane Katrina and the declining support for the war in Iraq, Bush needs DeLay more than ever. But DeLay, waylaid by yesterday's indictment, won't be there.

Instead, there will be the taint of another ethics investigation in the Republican Party at the same time that Senate majority leader Bill Frist answers questions from the Securities and Exchange Commission about his sale of stock in a company that family members founded; as Bush's chief political adviser, Karl Rove, faces grand jury scrutiny over whether he leaked the identity of a CIA officer; and as a Senate committee looks at the relationships between scandal-ridden lobbyist Jack Abramoff and a host of Republican leaders.

And ...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 20 - Secretary of State Colin Powell's former chief of staff has offered a remarkably blunt criticism of the administration he served, saying that foreign policy had been usurped by a "Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal," and that President Bush has made the country more vulnerable, not less, to future crises.

--snip--

"I would say that we have courted disaster, in Iraq, in North Korea, in Iran, generally with regard to domestic crises like Katrina, Rita - and I could go on back," he said. "We haven't done very well on anything like that in a long time."

Mr. Wilkerson suggested that the dysfunction within the administration was so grave that "if something comes along that is truly serious, truly serious, something like a nuclear weapon going off in a major American city, or something like a major pandemic, you are going to see the ineptitude of this government in a way that will take you back to the Declaration of Independence."

Mr. Wilkerson, a retired Army colonel and former director of the Marine Corps War College, said that in his years in or close to government, he had seen its national security apparatus twisted in many ways. But what he saw in Mr. Bush's first term "was a case that I have never seen in my studies of aberration, bastardizations" and "perturbations."

"What I saw was a cabal between the vice president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues," he said.

Pardon me God, Your High-ness, but I don't think they're listening...

State-Run Television is Here--Roger Aisles Guarantees It!

From FreePress:

Fox News Channel’s political agenda is coming to a television station near you.

Roger Ailes, the architect behind the right-wing tilt of cable news, is now remaking 35 local television stations -- broadcasting to nearly 40 percent of America’s homes -- in Fox News Channel’s image.

Tell News Corp 'Don’t FOX with my local news!'

Media consolidation made Ailes' takeover of local news possible. News Corp. already owns both a Fox and a UPN affiliate in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago -- the country’s three biggest markets -- and other duopolies in six more of the top 20 markets, including Dallas, Minneapolis and Washington, D.C.
View the Map

Ailes plans to replace local news and information with the biased and inaccurate infotainment that’s a hallmark of Fox News Channel. He has already moved oversight of the local station group from Los Angeles to Fox News headquarters in New York. He has flown in local news personalities for retraining on how to deliver the news Fox-style.

Read Variety's story on 'Jolly Roger's grand plan.'

News Corp.’s lobbyists are schmoozing officials in Washington to further loosen regulations that prohibit one company from owning even more local news outlets. Instead, we need to break up the big media conglomerates and get higher quality news and information in return for free use of the public's airwaves."

Use your voice to stop state-run (propoganda) TV now, or lose your voice...forever?

"Stop the ACLU" Hates America

Moving right along...

ACLU detractors are an, er, interesting lot (to say the least). Their ability to see into the hearts and minds of people they have never met and will never meet must be God-given. No other mythical being would want anything to do with them! Oh, and did I mention they are paranoid? Woo-hoo...you have no idea.

According to Stop the ACLU, the ACLU promotes pedophilia, child pornography and communism (yes, you read that correctly) and somehow one is related to the other. Look at their logo; a sickle (symbol of the now ex-USSR) replaces the "C" in ACLU!

Sigh. What is it--stupidity, inbreeding (oh, there's where the pedophilia fascination arises) or merely insanity--that inspires the twists and turns such warped-out moralist minds take? Is their fixation on pedophilia a projection of their own stunted sexuality? Is seeing communism--a nearly defunct government system--in EVERY organization they dislike simple early senile dementia?

Go to their site. Read as much as you can stomach. Follow the links of their supporters. Then get a rabies shot. You'll need one...

Ghosts (Still) in the Machine

In the HBO adaptation of Stephen King's "Red Rose", a group of paranormals hired to find the remnants of life in a house beset by vengeful ghosts fight among themselves to (for some) their own doom. In one scene a character 'blessed' by the ability to see ghoulish pranks confuses seeing a team-mate dying of heart failure with an unreal vision. The unbelieving friend covers his ears, squints his eyes and rants "Not there, not there, not there!" as, begging for help inches away, his team-mate dies.

I feel like that team-mate dying at the feet of radical Republicans. So convinced are they of our 'evil' intention that nothing we say, no amount of evidence we provide, not even the evidence in full view (policy related to Katrina failures before and ongoing) can shake them from their conviction that we just aren't 'thinking positively'. Like terrified mamma's boys who refuse to see or accept their position's real negative outcomes, they deny our evidence with eyes and ears blocked tightly crying "NOT THERE, NOT THERE, NOT THERE..."

So it's up to the rest of us in what has become the 'Red Rose' of America to do the heavy lifting (again) and rid our machine of ghosts. Remember what we've accomplished so far: clean air and water (regulated corporate abuse of the commons), given the powerless the safety to speak (victims of domestic violence and pedophilia), given women the right to control their biological destiny (and saved unwanted children futures of neglect and indifference), marched (and even died) with the black grandchildren victimized by American apartheid in the South (to give them a seat at the table), brought down an illegal war in the 70's (Vietnam) and so on; decades of legislation that raised those who had less up while still creating an economy that produced billionaires. When this administration took over America was richer for everyone and now look at it: record debt, an illegal war producing dead Americans almost daily, rising rates of poverty and the abortion rates that attend it, increased terrorism world-wide and now crony appointments and Republican party indictments. We can't rid our country of the forces that divide us, being free to be unlike one another IS an American value. We can rid our country of partisan forces who use our differences to divide us against each other; we must.

As liberals we WORKED to give current Americans a healthy, fair and safe country--the one they say they love so much they'd go into an illegal war to defend--yet some, unhappy with other people's morals and having to pay taxes have been convinced that liberals--not the issues--are the problem. They have been covinced that they should be willing to do anything to destroy the liberal ideology that created modern America! I say to hell with those negativists! Partisan hater's can have my rights to privacy, freedom of religion, freedom from unlawful search and seizure, in fact my American liberalism, when they pry it out of my cold dead hands!

The first battle is always for hearts and minds. How can we get the lies out of people's minds if we can't get them out of the media? Get partisan WH propaganda out of the regular news cycle: Free Press : Stop News Fraud

Earlier this year, several "journalists" were exposed as propagandists on the White House payroll. We then learned that broadcasters routinely air government-funded video news releases without disclosing their source; the White House has set aside a quarter billion taxpayer dollars to hire public relations firms and infiltrate our news system with fake news.

--snip--

A Sept. 30 report by the Government Accountability Office found the White House violated federal law by buying favorable news coverage in advance of the 2004 elections. This is the fourth time the GAO has uncovered the White House's illegal use of taxpayer money to produce "covert propaganda."

These violations may just form the tip of the iceberg. The administration has more than doubled its public relations budget, tapping a quarter billion in taxpayer dollars since Bush came into office. And while the report is damning, the GAO doesn't have enforcement powers to reveal the full extent of the abuse.

--snip--

GAO and the Justice Department, the administration's controlling legal authority, have not seen eye to eye on covert propaganda in the past, specifically on the issue of unidentified packaged video news releases. GAO says VNRs are illegal; Justice says the releases are not, so long as they are fact-based. Worseover, Alberto Gonzalez's Justice Department appears unwilling to take the next step: a criminal investigation into the administration�s use of millions of taxpayer dollars to push fake news upon Americans.

The official silence speaks volumes. Without popular dissent, an emboldened White House will continue to throw up obstacles to full disclosure. It is now up to the public to do what our elected officials are unwilling or unable to: pressure our government to enforce the law and stop propaganda crimes.

The WH's use of your tax dollars to pay for partisan propoganda is illegal and here is what is being done to bring this WH criminal activity to justice. Join this fight, now.

The Alliance Defense Fund Hates America

There is a concerted attack on the ACLU coming from the radical religious right (those folks whom Jesus might tell to hate the porn, not the pornographer but who are just so damn "good" they feel it their duty to ignore their God's injunction). I dislike this kind of hypocritial religiousness so much that even if I didn't already like the ACLU, I'd learn to (just to piss off their detractors).

There are anti-ACLU sites and blogs around the net and I think I should dedicate at least some of my energy toward an ongoing effort to expose them.

Media Matters for America helped jump-start my mission with this: What is the Alliance Defense Fund, and why does Bill O'Reilly advocate donating to it?

Based in Phoenix, AZ the ADF, along woth CO2 Science, give Phoenix the dubious 'honor' of being home to two of the most Republican pandering conservative action groups around. Woo-hoo, lucky city that Phoenix...

Environment: Nearly Half of Americans Cite 'Too Little' Environmental Regulation

WSJ.com: Asked this: "Do you agree or disagree with this statement: Protecting the environment is so important that requirements and standards cannot be too high, and continuing environmental improvements must be made regardless of cost," a nation-wide phone survery of 1, 217 adults revealed that 74% agree.

Here are the percentages by party affiliation and then political persuasion: 60% (Republican), 85% (Democrat), 75% (Independent), and 69% (Conservative), 77% (Moderate) and 82% (Liberal).

How (as wingers claim), if liberals are so out of touch with the values of average Americans, do we so often agree with them? Could it be that we are "them"?

(Gasp)...

Wal-mart Hearts China

Frontline: is Wal-mart good for America -- Interviews with economist Alan Tonelson:

"Most people are thinking that Wal-Mart is good for America. I think you're saying that Wal-Mart is not good for America.

That's right.

Why isn't Wal-Mart good for America?

... Wal-Mart, in my view, hasn't been good for the American economy because even though it's offering more and more people lower and lower prices, by encouraging job flight, it's helping to drive down the wage level of the entire American workforce. And as the wage level falls, Americans become less and less able to pay for products, however low the prices are, in a responsible way. Their only choice is to go deeper and deeper into debt.

And what about the country?

The country goes deeper and deeper into debt as well, and the country is encouraged to import from countries like China much more than it can possibly export. Wal-Mart alone imported an estimated $15 billion worth of goods from China in the year 2003. That's about one-tenth of all the goods that the entire U.S. economy imported from China that year."

-snip-

So you're saying that we're not seeing a level playing field in our trade with China. Is that right?

We're not seeing a level playing field with our trade with China at all. And one big reason is that the Chinese government massively subsidizes industry. Industrial development, which creates jobs that China desperately needs, is a very high priority for the Chinese government, and they're willing to pay a lot of money to make sure that that happens.

What do they do? How do they subsidize their own industry?

They subsidize land costs. They forgive taxes. They subsidize fuel costs, and they also give a subsidy when you export. We don't subsidize exports at all. We don't subsidize production. The Chinese not only subsidize production; on top of that, they subsidize exports, because again, exports create jobs, and the Chinese government desperately needs to create jobs if it's to remain in control. And as a result, there is anything but a level playing field between the U.S. and China.

In addition, China routinely breaks the terms of the trade agreements that it signs with this nation. For example, most of the subsidies that China provides to manufacturers in China, whether they are U.S.- or Chinese-owned, it doesn't matter, you get a subsidy. Most of the subsidies are illegal under world trade law, under the set of rules that the world's trading countries have developed since the end of World War II to make sure that trade can proceed efficiently and profitably for everyone.

China routinely breaks trade agreements and trade rules. The United States government, though, doesn't do much about this. Why not? Because many of the companies that benefit from the breaking of Chinese trade rules are U.S. companies that produce in China. If you produce in China, you benefit from China's breaking of the trade rules. These multinationals are extremely powerful in Washington, and they have told the U.S. government: "Don't enforce the trade agreements. We'll get hurt."

-snip-

So what do we do as a nation to deal with this mess?

We have to recognize that our trade and manufacturing crisis has become so grave that we have no choice but to start thinking seriously about restricting trade in various ways. It's a shame that it's reached this point, but we're there. And by postponing the decision to start imposing tariffs on goods coming into this country, we will only be sure that the problem gets worse and worse, and that the medicine we eventually have to take will be harsher and harsher.

We also have to seriously renegotiate lots of the misguided trade agreements that we have reached, including our membership in the World Trade Organization, which is basically made up of 150 countries that have an overwhelming interest in keeping the U.S. market much wider open to their goods than [their] markets are open to our goods, because despite 10 years or 12 years of breakneck globalization, where the globalization supporters have gotten everything that they wanted, almost no country in the world has figured out how to grow other than exporting to the United States.

The only country that is growing strongly that's not exporting to the United States is the United States. Everybody else depends on us, and the World Trade Organization's politics are very profoundly shaped by that imperative. It's turned into an anti-American kangaroo court. We need to either make sure that the structure is changed completely, or we need to get out and deal with these trade problems as they come up one by one, using our market power -- which is enormous, because everybody has to sell here if they are to prosper -- to set equitable terms of trade for American workers and for U.S. companies, companies that make their products here.

[How will the consumer be affected by trade restrictions?]

... There is no question that trade restrictions are going to exact a short-term economic cost. There is no way to bring the economy back into a balance without some kind of an austerity program. The longer we wait to impose this, the more austerity we'll have to experience. And if we are nervous or dead set against trade restrictions, we have to understand that once we lose the ability to import because our living standards have sunk so low, trade is going to be restricted anyway, but the trade restrictions are going to be imposed by foreigners. ...

Leonard Clark (Update)

New from Kevin Spidel's blog: A Little Insight to the Leonard Clark matter.

This is actually rather old but useful: Blogging Arizona Soldier in Iraq Demoted.

And this (also older) article from Fox has some interesting links and the expected pro-war slant: One Soldier, One Blog, One Punishment: "Leonard Clark, an Arizona Army National Guardsman stationed in Iraq, paid a steep price for using a blog to share his overtly anti-war opinions — he was demoted for putting American troops in danger."

The National "Clandestine" Service?! Tell me This is a Joke (Please)!

It could have been worse. It could have been named The Ajax Spy Service.

Yet another new U.S. spy service created:

"Acting on a recommendation from the commission that investigated intelligence failures before the Iraq war, the government announced Thursday the creation of the National Clandestine Service headed by an undercover CIA official."

That Was a Short War on Poverty

Oh yeah, poverty.

From E.J. Dionne:

"I was naive enough to hope that after Katrina the left and the right might have useful things to say to each other about how to help the poorest among us. I guess we've moved on. You can lay a lot of the blame for this indifference on conservatives. But it will be a default on the part of liberals if the poor disappear again from public view without a fight."

Study: Euthanizing Right-wing Pundits Would Solve Global Warming

Author says that would be reprehensible, but still a tough call.

Hee-hee-hee.

Environment: When You Live in a Desert

SPROL is one of my favorite sites related to environmentalism. Today's post looks at Ethiopia's droughted landscape.

The precautionary tale for Americans is simple: "

And as with all shortages, we can expect the poor to stand in line the longest and to pay the most for whatever commodity is in short supply. It’s the rule of supply and demand, the free-market system we Americans are so proud of. There’s just one problem: when applied to life’s necessities, it leads to a tacit caste system in which the rich and powerful survive and the poor and disenfranchised die off.

Flu Awareness Week Wrap-Up

Avian Pandemic Flu Awareness Week, brought to you by dKos and some other blogs (the editors of which Wingers dismiss as partisan and out-of-touch with important American issues) has left a valuable resource in its wake: "Flu Wiki".

Bookmark it. I have, and it's now in this blog's Reference section as well...

Sunday Scripture* from James Madison -- 1803

"The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe with blood for centuries."

* For those readers who see the world through God-colored glasses, please note: the term "Sunday Scripture" is a parody of religion and does not reflect any belief that secularism is a form of religion.

The Deserts of New England

The thing I've mentioned before but failed to do myself is discuss the environment, daily. I think I forget because except for the record temperatures around me, I feel powerless to affect those whose policies attack the environment, that is, affect them directly. Instead I get a sense of empowerment by chipping away at corners of the policy-maker's most tenacious foothold; the Republican party (you do know it is Corporate America, not elected Americans, who run this country, right? I thought you did). And yes, Democrats are at times no better (how sad).

Further, if I read all the available materials on global-warming I'd be so depressed I wouldn't get out of bed in the morning. At least I can hope to affect the opinions of voters to favor policies that support, not destroy, the world in which we live. I can do nothing about calving ice-sheets, polar bears foraging in mud and heat-waves wiping out Europeans.

The bad news, I'm afraid, is that nobody else can affect theses things either.

This piece is depressing. Period. Read it anyway. Then go back to work.

Snippet:

The demon in me wants to say: Party and make merry. No need now to worry about Kyoto, recycling your aluminum cans, or using too much toilet paper, when, soon enough, we'll be debating how many hunter-gathers can survive in the scorching deserts of New England or the tropical forests of the Yukon.

The good parent in me, however, screams: How is it possible that we can now contemplate with scientific seriousness whether our children's children will themselves have children? Let Exxon answer that in one of their sanctimonious ads.

This Miers Chick...

What's up with her?

I don't trust Bush. I know some of you think he's dumb. He's not. I think he's damn crafty. Elite Mac Daddy. He's pimping her for a reason he finds good and that's bad.

This article reports some of her '89-'91 Dallas Board decisions. Even I could agree with one (like voting against use of South African goods by the city government during apartheid).

But then there's this:

"Abstained from an otherwise unanimously adopted 1990 resolution urging Congress to pass legislation bolstering AIDS emergency treatment programs and provide funding to local governments for such programs. Before the vote, Miers said she had a conflict of interest, although no record detailing that conflict was available."

I'd like to know what the conflict of interest entailed...I'd also like to know the winning numbers for this week's PowerBall...

Homeland Security

There's a Lot of Protein in Shoe Leather

From APAF's Under the Radar comes this:

BUDGET -- CONSERVATIVES PLAN TO CUT 300,000 POOR FROM FEDERAL FOOD PROGRAMS: Conservatives in Congress are planning to cut $574 million from food programs for the poor. Earlier this year, Congress passed a budget framework that called for $3 billion in agriculture spending cuts. "Leading Republicans indicated they would rather target food stamps and conservation programs than simply make the deep cuts [in farmers' payments] that Bush was seeking." The $574 million cut in food stamps, brought on primarily because Bush's irresponsible tax cuts have exacerbated the nation's deficit, would come from restricting access to this benefit for certain families that receive other government assistance. The restriction would shut an estimated 300,000 people out of the program. Gerry Roll writes in the Christian Science Monitor, "We can keep our food stamp program intact. It just might mean putting big corporate farmers on a thrifty food plan."

And just for those conservatives who splash by this blog on their way upstream let me explicitly post the dilemna as the Christian Science Monitor succinctly puts it:

Very soon, the Senate is scheduled to make some difficult choices about how the nation spends its agriculture dollars - a mandate to cut $3 billion in the agriculture budget over the next five years will force reductions in some programs. In my state, that decision boils down to whether four big farmers will have to suffer with a $250,000 cap on their government subsidy or half a million people will have to quit eating. The real problem is that we are actually considering the latter.

The food stamp program gives 544,744 Kentuckians access to enough money to adhere to a "thrifty food plan." For a family of four, that equals $471 a month - about $1.31 per meal per person. I wish whoever developed the plan did the grocery shopping at my house. Most of the recipients are from working families, and food stamps subsidize their grocery budget and allow them to balance precariously housing, healthcare, child care, transportation, and other minor life crises that come their way.

Please, conservative readers. You seem to have the skinny on who the dead wood on the cutting end of such 'reform' should be. Who decides what should get cut? Let's see, will it be a calculation that asks 'Why can't a family that can afford a car do without food stamps?' or something else, less likely to affect Big Bidness...

Hell, it's Kentucky. I guess shoes could go...oh wait, there's a lot of protein in shoe leather.