MARCH 20, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

IMPEACH CHENEY

THE REAL AMERICA HATERS

If you disagree or criticize George W. Bush, the right-wingers in this country like to say you "hate America." But I would say it is they who hate America. This country stands for liberty and equality, and those concepts are anathema to right-wingers. They demonize the poor, they demonize the working class, they demonize gays and lesbians, they demonize anyone whose religious beliefs don't fit into a nice little cubbyhole, they demonize women, and they demonize minorities. "America" to them is mostly rich white males, who on the surface profess a love of Christianity, while they live their lives in total opposition to the principles of Christianity. In this column Jon Carroll, whose daughter is a lesbian, talks about the America haters. The column is at www.sfgate.com:

The people who hate America are the members of American Family Association and its ideological fellow travelers. They're the ones who do not believe that all people are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, and that among these rights are life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. They're the ones who believe that this country was founded on hate and fear; they're the ones who want the hate and fear to continue.

LIKE OLD EUROPE

In the runup to the Iraq war Donald Rumsfeld once referred to European critics of this misadventure as "old Europe." "New Europe" was those few countries in the Coalition of the Willing that jumped on board with the United States. Isn't it ironic, then, that our economic system is becoming like "old Europe"? We see an increasing concentration of wealth in just a few hands. How long until we have castles with drawbridges and moats? This story by Donald A. Love is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

A December 2005 research paper by Ian Dew-Becker and Robert Gordon of Northwestern University reported that between 1972 and 2001, the income of people in the top 1 percent grew by 87 percent. For people at the very top - the 99.99th percentile - the income gain was 181 percent. By contrast, the bottom 20 percent grew by only 3 percent. What's more, an analysis of income-tax data by the Congressional Budget Office found that the top 1 percent of households own almost twice as much of the nation's corporate wealth as they did 15 years ago.

MARCH 19, 2006

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UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

Lord knows there has been plenty of spin put on the Iraq war. We heard about Bush's doctrine of "preemptive war" after the terrorist attacks on 9/11. We heard a speech about the "axis of evil." We heard the build-up to the Iraq war that claimed Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and we were just one mushroom cloud from destruction. After the invasion and no weapons of mass destruction the spin changed to how the Iraqi people were better off and that "freedom was on the march" in Iraq and would even spread throughout the Middle East. It hasn't worked out that way. This article by Warren P. Strobel and Hannah Allam is at www.makethemaccountable.com:

Instead, said officials and analysts in the United States, Arab countries, Israel and Europe, the invasion has produced a vortex of unintended consequences.

Militancy is on the rise. Terrorists are using Iraq as a training base and potential launch pad for attacks elsewhere, according to U.S. officials and documents. Democratic reform remains largely stymied…

NO CHOCOLATES, NO FLOWERS

There was once a right-wing e-mail circulating that claimed that things in Iraq were so much better since the U.S. occupation. According to the memo, girls were getting educated, infrastructure was being built and improved, and the health care system was never better. Now three years after the launch of the war the truth is that almost everything is worse. Riverbend, a blogger I really respect, lives in Baghdad and writes about the way Iraq is now. This article is linked at www.smirkingchimp.com:

I don't think anyone imagined three years ago that things could be quite this bad today. The last few weeks have been ridden with tension. I'm so tired of it all- we're all tired.

Three years and the electricity is worse than ever. The security situation has gone from bad to worse. The country feels like it's on the brink of chaos once more- but a pre-planned, pre-fabricated chaos being led by religious militias and zealots.

March 18, 2006

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THE IRAQ WAR: DISASTER ON MANY FRONTS

As we see the United States military bogged down in Iraq, facing a bloody civil war, we have to consider all the implications of this terrible war. The most obvious example is all the unnecessary death and carnage. The violence of the war has spun off violence in the form of torture. The war has ruptured unity here at home because the Bush administration has deliberately branded dissenters as friends of terrorists and other such bilge. The United States has probably been guilty of war crimes by using white phosphorus. We have been using depleted uranium in Iraq for years. Depleted uranium remains toxic for hundreds of thousands of years. Our credibility has been devastated. The whole war was built on lies. We are bleeding profusely from the financial impact of this war. This article by Bob Burnett looks at the far-reaching effects of this war. The article is linked at www.commondreams.org:

The US is the strongest military power in the world; we spend more on defense than all of our competitors combined. Nonetheless, the Iraqi venture has pointed out glaring weaknesses in our defense posture. The entire world has seen the Bush Administration override sound military advice-the number of troops necessary for an effective occupation-for political purposes. They have seen America make a series of bad decisions indicating that while we may be strong, we are not very smart.

As powerful as the US is, it does not have unlimited resources. Our costly commitment to Iraq has had three deleterious side affects: the first is that it has impaired our ability to fight another, parallel, ground campaign. Faced with the possibility of Iran becoming a nuclear power, the US has only a limited range of options. Because it cannot threaten Iran with an invasion aimed at eliminating its nuclear enrichment capability, the US can bomb Iran, fall back on diplomacy, or simply hope for the best.

The second negative side-affect has been to weaken our commitment to domestic security. After 9/11, there were a number of reports-most notably that of the 9/11 commission-that suggested common-sense steps that needed to be taken to reduce the probability of another major terrorist attack. Most of these steps have not been taken-scanning all incoming cargo containers being a prime example. Part of this failure can be attributed to the incompetence of the Bush Administration, but a major portion is due to the fact that money that should be allocated to nuts-and-bolts homeland security is being spent in Iraq.

WE HAVE TO REJECT RIGHT-WING ECONOMICS

We should have learned from history. The conservative administration of Herbert Hoover and its economic policies helped contribute to the Great Depression. It took an activist administration headed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and a war economy to finally escape the Depression. The programs enacted by FDR and subsequently by Harry Truman set the stage for the most prosperous time in U.S. history. Then along came the right-wingers with their claptrap about "punishing the achievers," the very rich, and how a "welfare state" was bringing the imminent end of the country. We got tax cuts for the rich during the Reagan years and we got massive deficits. Bill Clinton, a conservative Democrat, restored some sense of fiscal sanity, which was promptly smashed by the extremist policies of George W. Bush. Now our economic security is fragile. The standard of living for most of us is melting like ice on a summer day. Holly Sklar writes about it in this column at www.commondreams.org:

Households have propped themselves up in the face of falling real wages by maxing out work hours, credit cards and home equity loans. This is not a sustainable course. The low road is like a "shortcut" that leads to a cliff.

We will not prosper in the 21st century global economy by relying on 1920s corporate greed, 1950s tax revenues, downwardly mobile wages and global-warming energy policies. We will not prosper relying on disinvestment in place of reinvestment. We can't succeed that way any more than farmers can "compete" by eating their seed corn.

As Business Week put it in a special issue on China and India, "China's competitive edge is shifting from low-cost workers to state-of-the-art manufacturing. India is creating world-class innovation hubs, and its companies are far better performers than China's."

The United States will not succeed by shifting increasingly from state-of-the art manufacturing and world-class innovation hubs to low-cost workers.

March 17, 2006

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IMPEACH CHENEY

PARTY FIRST, COUNTRY SECOND

When I learned about the Downing Street Memos, which showed that the Bush administration was fixing intelligence to justify a war against Iraq, I contacted my local Congressman George "Rubber Stamp" Radanovich. I told the Congressman it was time to introduce Articles of Impeachment against Bush and Cheney. I asked him then if he was loyal to his party or to the country. I never got a response, which was a kind of response in itself. "Rubber Stamp," like all the Republicans in Congress, places loyalty to Bush above loyalty to the country. A Congress with any dedication to the Constitution and any love of country would have drawn up Articles of Impeachment long ago. This article by Steve Chapman is at www.chicagotribune.com:

This is an absurd parody of the checks and balances our system is supposed to provide. If the framers of the Constitution had thought a single branch of government could police itself, they would not have created three branches.

As James Madison wrote, "The great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others ... Ambition must be made to counteract ambition."

The idea was that each branch would jealously guard its powers against the others. But in this case, Congress passed a law, the president ignored it, and Congress applauded him for doing so. Stalin's Politburo could not have been more compliant.

What the framers didn't anticipate was the rise of political parties, allegiances to which now override every other consideration. This episode makes clear that the best government is divided government--where the party that occupies the White House does not control Congress. Only then can we rely on lawmakers to provide a meaningful check on presidential power. With the GOP dominant at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, the president can treat Congress as an obsolete irrelevancy.

THE LAND OF COTTON

There are some science fiction novels that use "alternative history" to build a plot around the idea that the Confederacy won the U.S. Civil War. As you see the brazen assault by right-wingers on the Constitution these days, you have to wonder if the South did, in fact, rise again. We see assaults on affirmative action, on voting rights, on a woman's right to choose, on the separation of church and state, and the blatant abuse of civil liberties guaranteed under the Bill of Rights. This isn't acceptable. All the rights we enjoy came at a high cost, and we owe it to our forebears, ourselves, and future generations to preserve and advance those rights. This article by Margaret Kimberly is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

The 21st century Confederates are succeeding because no one is willing to stand in their way. The Argus Leader, the largest newspaper in South Dakota, announced it will not take an editorial position on the new law. Spineless editorial page editor Chuck Baldwin made this amazing comment about his decision to gag himself. "Rather than change anyone's mind, we would create another controversy."

Translation: The powerful have spoken, and I'm not bucking the system.

The Civil War of the 1860s came about when the South was not content to maintain slavery but insisted on expanding its reach into new territories and forcing nonslave-holding states to be complicit in their crimes through the Fugitive Slave Law. A South Dakota-instigated rejection of Roe will be felt in states that would never consider banning abortion.

The boldness of the right wing isn't restricted to any single issue. In South Dakota civil rights for women have been eliminated. In Georgia voting rights have been severely curtained.

March 16, 2006

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IMPEACH CHENEY

RANKS OF THE UNEMPLOYED

Yesterday I joined the ranks of the unemployed for the second time since George W. Bush stole the presidency. I was previously downsized on March 15, 2002, with no warning. I was called into the office and told my job was over that day. Yesterday I was called into the office and told my job was over as of yesterday.

In both cases I followed the rules. I rarely missed work, I worked hard, and I was always committed to doing a good job. The employer I left yesterday was never satisfied. They always push "numbers," as though you're working on an assembly line, although you're working with reports that can be quite complex.

I could see the bullet coming a little better this time than I did four years ago. Business has dropped precipitously the past couple of months. Technology was more of a culprit in the previous job. The new technology, in management's view, made it possible to do the same work with half the staff.

I don't think it's just coincidence that the times are hard for me and for other Americans since Bush took office. The crackpot economics of the Far Right always lead to catastrophe. Look at any major policy issue, whether it's war and peace, civil liberties, the economy, disaster relief, or the environment, and it's all a disaster under Bush. This gang is so selfish, so greedy, and so ideologically blind they're leading the country right over a cliff.

March 13, 2006

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TOXIC MARKET FUNDAMENTALISM

Some right-wingers breathily whisper "free market" the way some people would utter the name of God. Free market fundamentalism has largely dominated U.S. economic policy since the Reagan administration. The results aren't pretty. This article by Fred Block is at www.commondreams.org:

Market Fundamentalism has ruled the country for close to twenty-five years. It has produced weak economic performance, corporate crime waves, government corruption and a coarsening of the culture. But the amazing thing is that efforts to hold the Market Fundamentalists accountable have gained so little traction. Perhaps the best explanation for this has been offered by former Labor Secretary Robert Reich. In "The Lost Art of Democratic Narrative," published by The New Republic in March 2005, Reich argues that differences over economic policy have been fought out in American politics over the past century by appropriating four specific story lines--the rot at the top, the mob at the gates, the triumphant individual and the benevolent community. The party that tells these stories most persuasively wins, he observes, and in recent years the prize has gone to the Republicans.

BUSH HAS THINGS TO HIDE

From the beginning of his stolen presidency George W. Bush has been intent on secrecy. Information that should be available to the public is classified. Even the records of previous administrations have been closeted away by Bush. You suspect he wants to hide the activity of his father, who was both vice president under Ronald Reagan and later president. Bush would claim that national security is the justification for the secrecy, but it appears more and more it's because Bush has many things to hide. This article by Tom Teepen is at www.commondreams.org:

As it becomes more beleaguered, with its programs and policies collapsing around it like plague victims - the needless Iraq invasion, Social Security privatization, the bungled response to Katrina, port security, domestic spying and more - the Bush administration is digging ever deeper holes of secrecy in which to hide.

This administration from its start has been battened down, secretive, uncommunicative and even sneaky, and as it has entrenched itself in power, that instinct to keep the public from nosing around in what after all is the public's own business has deepened and hardened.

In recent months we have learned that the CIA has established secret prisons abroad, that foreign law enforcement agencies are investigating U.S. kidnappings in their countries, that the administration has been reclassifying previously declassified documents, that thousands of completed criminal cases are being kept secret and that the White House is threatening journalists who report leaks with imprisonment under the 1917 Espionage Act.

GOVERNMENT'S FUDGED STATISTICS

On the news you get an array of government reports about the economy. You hear about the Gross Domestic Product, unemployment, inflation, the Consumer Price Index, the balance of trade deficit, and so on. Many people probably have their eyes glaze over. But we should be getting honest figures from the government, and we're not. Unemployment, for instance, is far higher than the official figure released by the government. This story by Bill Fleckenstein is at www.opednews.com:

Williams starts by discussing the headline economic data: "Real unemployment right now -- figured the way that the average person thinks of unemployment, meaning figured the way it was estimated back during the Great Depression -- is running about 12%. Real CPI right now is running at about 8%. And the real GDP probably is in contraction." (By "real," he means calculating the data the way they used to be calculated, not as inflation-adjusted.)

He then explains how the employment data are compiled, noting that 5 million chronically unemployed people are not included in the statistics. In fact, there are seven or eight different employment statistics. One called U-3 is the official one. The broadest one, U-6, currently shows unemployment as running around 8.4%. As he explains, the one that's the most historically consistent is running around 12%.

DON'T TRUST MC CAIN

John McCain, Senator from Arizona, has acquired the reputation as a maverick, as the guy who doesn't toe the Republican party line 100% of the time. He's emerging as the Great White Hope for the Republicans in 2008. But McCain in many ways is just as reactionary as George W. Bush, especially on foreign policy issues. And he can't be trusted on economic issues either, despite some professed concern for the middle class and the poor once upon a time. This column by Paul Krugman is linked at www.topplebush.com:

The bottom line is that Mr. McCain isn't a moderate; he's a man of the hard right. How far right? A statistical analysis of Mr. McCain's recent voting record, available at www.voteview.com, ranks him as the Senate's third most conservative member.

What about Mr. McCain's reputation as a maverick? This comes from the fact that every now and then he seems to declare his independence from the Bush administration, as he did in pushing through his anti-torture bill.

But a funny thing happened on the way to Guantánamo. President Bush, when signing the bill, appended a statement that in effect said that he was free to disregard the law whenever he chose. Mr. McCain protested, but there are apparently no hard feelings: at the recent Southern Republican Leadership Conference he effusively praised Mr. Bush.

March 12, 2006

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IMPEACH CHENEY

DATA MINING DOESN'T STOP TERRORISM

Among other things, George W. Bush is a bit of a peeping Tom. His administration has been obsessed with a few things: secrecy and gathering as much information on each of us that it can get, even when that means violating the Bill of Rights. First, there was something called Total Information Awareness that was shut down when there was a public outcry. But Bush and company simply continued the program under another name. Some right-wingers have said they have "nothing to hide" and don't mind being spied upon. I do mind. But even if you wanted to use data mining to stop terrorism, it doesn't work. An effective program generates so many leads it's physically impossible to check them all them all out. This article by Bruce Schneier is at www.wired.com:

Let's look at some numbers. We'll be optimistic -- we'll assume the system has a one in 100 false-positive rate (99 percent accurate), and a one in 1,000 false-negative rate (99.9 percent accurate). Assume 1 trillion possible indicators to sift through: that's about 10 events -- e-mails, phone calls, purchases, web destinations, whatever -- per person in the United States per day. Also assume that 10 of them are actually terrorists plotting.

This unrealistically accurate system will generate 1 billion false alarms for every real terrorist plot it uncovers. Every day of every year, the police will have to investigate 27 million potential plots in order to find the one real terrorist plot per month. Raise that false-positive accuracy to an absurd 99.9999 percent and you're still chasing 2,750 false alarms per day -- but that will inevitably raise your false negatives, and you're going to miss some of those 10 real plots.

SOME ARAB CONTRIBUTIONS TO CIVILIZATION

It is very easy to be a bigot and think all Arabs are terrorists and fanatics, but that perception is entirely wrong. George W. Bush has consistently played the fear card since 9/11, but he got burned on the Dubai ports deal because of the anti-Arab sentiment he helped to create. It's helpful to see some of the great contributions Arabs have made to civilization. You can even think Arabs in a way for that morning cup of coffee. This story by Paul Vallely is at news.independent.co.uk:

The story goes that an Arab named Khalid was tending his goats in the Kaffa region of southern Ethiopia, when he noticed his animals became livelier after eating a certain berry. He boiled the berries to make the first coffee. Certainly the first record of the drink is of beans exported from Ethiopia to Yemen where Sufis drank it to stay awake all night to pray on special occasions. By the late 15th century it had arrived in Mecca and Turkey from where it made its way to Venice in 1645. It was brought to England in 1650 by a Turk named Pasqua Rosee who opened the first coffee house in Lombard Street in the City of London. The Arabic qahwa became the Turkish kahve then the Italian caffé and then English coffee.

March 10, 2006

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MAKE WAR NO MORE


Isn't it amazing that the people who are loudest in proclaiming their religious convictions are the people most in love with war? George W. Bush has paraded around his supposed Christianity, but Bush is a mass killer. He is responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan, and even more civilians in both Afghanistan and Iraq. If you've ever lost someone close to you, you appreciate the absolute devastation of grief. It's time we all learn that kind of empathy and move toward ending war. This article by Andrew Greeley is at www.suntimes.com:

Every time I see a picture of an American killed in Iraq, I wince. I think of the agony that the death will cause, shattering, rending, paralyzing pain, and the stress and the strain it will introduce into family relationships. I wonder if the family will ever be free from this suffering.

In most cases, it probably will; mourning will replace grief, more or less. In some families, the trauma will be too much, the guilt and anger and magical thinking will persist and blaming will increase -- purgatory now, self-created purgatory. The rationalization that he (or she) died defending American freedom, given bravely to the privacy-violating TV journalist, sounds hollow and will seem more hollow as the years go on.

A MATTER OF SEMANTICS

A few days ago Fox anchor Brit Hume made a big thing about an Associated Press "clarification" concerning a story saying that George W. Bush was aware the levees in New Orleans would breach. The debate centered on the term "overtopping" versus "breach." Overtopping means water flows over the top of the levee, and on the face of it isn't as severe. But the record shows that Bush knew very well that a breach of the levees was a very real threat. His claim a few days later that "no one could anticipate the breach of the levees" was a lie. This article by Ron Brynaert is at www.rawstory.com:

The White House's own "lessons learned" review of the federal response issued last month compared overtopping to a breach of a levee.

....

In a document it called "Setting the Record Straight," the White House said Bush's Aug. 28 videoconference "was open to the press and the full transcript of this videoconference was released to Congress and the public in the fall of 2005."

However, only the opening portion of the conference, where Bush made brief remarks, was witnessed by a small news media pool. And full transcripts of that and other sessions were not released by either the administration or Congress.

THE TAX CUT MYTH

Back in the early days of the Reagan administration we started hearing about supply side economics and the magical results tax cuts would produce. We were told that tax cuts, mostly to the very affluent, would generate so much investment and other activity that the government would rake in greater revenues and the tax cuts would more than pay for themselves. We saw the massive federal deficits that were created during the Reagan administration, and we're seeing the same bleeding now. But people like George W. Bush keep parroting the same old lie. This story by Richard Kogan and Aviva Aron-Dine is linked at www.makethemaccountable.com:

President Bush, for example, commented in a February 8 speech, “You cut taxes and the tax revenues increase.” Similarly, Vice President Cheney has claimed, “The tax cuts have translated into higher federal revenues.” Majority Leader Frist wrote that recent experience demonstrates, “when done right, [tax cuts] actually result in more money for government.” The Vice President also has stated, “The evidence is in, it’s time for everyone to admit that sensible tax cuts increase economic growth and add to the federal treasury.”

In fact, however, the evidence tells a very different story: the tax cuts have not paid for themselves, recent economic growth and revenue growth have not been particularly strong, and revenues remain lower than had been predicted before the tax cuts were enacted…

Those who claim that tax cuts pay for themselves might argue that 2005’s stronger revenue growth represents the beginning of a new trend, and that the tax cuts could pay for themselves over the longer term. Neither the historical record nor current revenue projections support this argument…

March 09, 2006

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IMPEACH CHENEY


WHEN WMDs DON'T MATTER, I GUESS

George W. Bush, Condoleezza Rice, and others in this administration made a big point of saying what a threat Saddam Hussein presented. Images of mushroom clouds were invoked. We know now that was all a big fat lie. Bush had no such problem when he made a trip to India and ignored the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Bush's agreement with India may very well set off a nuclear arms race among India, Pakistan, China, and North Korea. Bob Herbert writes about it in this column at www.topplebush.com:

This mad-hatter thinking was on display again last week. President Bush, who used specious claims about a nuclear threat to launch his disastrous war in Iraq, agreed to a deal -- in blatant violation of international accords and several decades of bipartisan U.S. policy -- that would enable India to double or triple its annual production of nuclear weapons.

The president turned his back on the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (dismissed, like reality-based thinking, as passé) and moved the world a step closer to an accelerated nuclear arms race in Asia and elsewhere. In the president's empire-based, otherworldly way of thinking, this was a good thing.

HATS OFF TO TIM MCGRAW AND FAITH HILL

I'm a country music fan and I'm often dismayed at the right-wing slant of so many country music personalities. Recently, when I visited Merle Haggard's message board some right-wing troll was having a fit that Hag has a song critical of the war in Iraq. Many country music stars have been on board with George W. Bush, and we know how the Dixie Chicks were excoriated for criticizing Bush. So it's refreshing to see Tim McGraw and Faith Hill telling the truth about Bush's mammoth failure to help Hurricane Katrina victims. This story by Andy McSmith is at www.commondreams.org:

Faith Hill and Tim McGraw -- two stars who usually stay out of politics -- blasted the Hurricane Katrina cleanup effort, with Hill calling the slow progress in Louisiana and Mississippi "embarrassing" and "humiliating."

The country music artists -- who are natives of the storm ravaged states -- were at times close to tears, and clearly angry when the subject of Katrina came up during a news conference today. They had met with reporters in Nashville to promote their upcoming Soul2Soul II Tour, but when asked about the hurricane cleanup, the stars pulled no punches.

BUSH UNSCRIPTED

Image making is a big part of life in the United States. Corporations spend millions of dollars with advertising agencies to churn out commercials or ads that worm their way into the public consciousness. The advertising has a way of redefining itself as reality. Public relations firms are engaged to mount campaigns to either create or redeem reputations. If the campaigns are successful, they become the new reality. The strongest supporters of George W. Bush have largely brought into the image making. When you see Bush unscripted he doesn't fare well. The most recent example is the tape that emerged about Bush's meeting before Hurricane Katrina struck. There was Bush on vacation, not even asking a single question. He was hardly the decisive strong leader the image makers would have us believe. This story by Sidney Blumenthal is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

For the first time, last week, the public has seen the spontaneous Bush behind closed doors, in a leaked videotape that recorded his briefing the day before Hurricane Katrina struck. Teleconferenced in from his Crawford ranch, Texas, Bush listens to disaster officials inform him that the storm will be unprecedented in its severity and consequences. "This is, to put it mildly, the big one," says Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Centre, warns: "This hurricane is much larger than Hurricane Andrew ever was." Bush asks not a single question, says, "We are fully prepared", and departs.

The Katrina videotape is defining for Bush's presidency. It exposes a deaf man spouting talking points. After the hurricane hit, he stayed on vacation, went to a birthday party, strummed a guitar with a country and western singer, and on September 1 said: "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." On his flight back to Washington, four days after landfall, his aides gave him a DVD of television news reports of the hurricane's impact about which he had done nothing to learn on his own.

March 08, 2006

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GLOBALIZATION MAY KILL CAPITALISM

It's one thing to send jobs offshore and pay lousy wages. It's another to take those products made with cheap labor and sell them. The middle class that worked in the factories that made things in the United States also purchased things. Now those people don't have the money to make purchases. The people living in Mexico and other cheap labor markets don't have the money to purchase things. So is the good fairy going to come in the night and buy things? The whole concept of globalization is insane. This story by Jack Lessenberry is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

Bizarrely, globalization may be the thing that finally validates the predictions of classic Marxism-Leninism. Capitalism as we know it was saved roughly a century ago, starting when Henry Ford decided to pay his workers enough so they could afford to buy his products.

That's a gross oversimplification of labor history, but that's essentially what happened. Later, capitalism was again saved and further strengthened when Franklin D. Roosevelt sold the nation on a social safety net. We thought of ourselves as Americans then.

Today, too many of us, especially those running large corporations, pledge allegiance to the spirit of "I'm getting mine, and to hell with you." Of course, Electrolux doesn't hope to sell many expensive refrigerators to its $35-a-week Mexican employees.

CITIZEN CONSUMERS

A recent study revealed that only one person in a thousand could name all five rights named in the First Amendment to the Constitution. Many people cannot name their Senator or their representative in Congress. But people can tell you about the latest American Idol or hum the McDonald's theme. We've been dumbed down and reduced to the role of consumers. Even that may disappear, of course, since many of us don't have any money in the Bush economy. This story by Ellen Terich is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

The oligarchs in Washington have worked hard to reduce the role of citizen to that of consumer. We are no longer supposed to carefully study the issues, weigh the records of candidates, and gather facts before we vote. Campaigns are now simply the selling of a product, with the help of television advertising techniques. Handlers carefully and dishonestly craft the image of a candidate, based on the polling data they receive, to appeal to the emotions. That's what helped George W. Bush make it into the White House twice. Bush most probably didn't have a majority in either election, but his handlers were able to hide their true agenda, as well as their candidate's incompetence, with clever image-making, and he was able to get just enough votes to allow the Supreme Court, in the first election, and Diebold, in the second election, to put him into an office he was totally unqualified for.

March 07, 2006

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BUSH AS CORPORATE BENEFACTOR

Dick Cheney recently lectured us that we should save more and George W. Bush, on his trip to India, suggested that outsourcing isn't really so bad. You see, all we have to do is get educated for those 21st century jobs that are supposed to replace all the jobs that have been moved offshore. What Bush didn't mention is that Indians are already doing many of those 21st century jobs and at less money that it takes to live in the United States. So I guess we're supposed to be happy with those deadend service sector jobs that the economy is creating now. This column by Paul Krugman is at www.topplebush.com:

The fact is that we're living in a time when most Americans are seeing little if any benefit from overall income growth, because their share of the economic pie is falling. Between 1979 and 2003, according to a recent research paper published by the I.R.S., the share of overall income received by the bottom 80 percent of taxpayers fell from 50 percent to barely over 40 percent. The main winners from this upward redistribution of income were a tiny, wealthy elite: more than half the income share lost by the bottom 80 percent was gained by just one-fourth of 1 percent of the population, people with incomes of at least $750,000 in 2003.

And those fortunate few are the only people Mr. Bush seems to care about. Look at what he had to offer after asserting, in effect, that workers get outsourced because they don't have the right education: lower taxes, deregulation and fewer lawsuits. Funny, that doesn't sound like "pro-growth" policy to me. Instead, it sounds like a wish list for wealthy individuals and big corporations.

THE INCREDIBLY ONEROUS BANKRUPTCY LAW

Those credit card solicitations we get in the mail should probably have the logo of a great white shark on the envelope. Credit card companies are loan sharks in nicer suits. The Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress were very accommodating in giving the credit card companies their wish list. We got a bankruptcy law that makes it extremely difficult for most people to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy even due to extreme circumstances like job loss or health care costs. The irony is that the new law isn't working very well because most people who file for bankruptcy have little choice. This article by Howard Karger is at www.alternet.org:

Who are the "deadbeats" Congress is trying to weed out?

Leslie Linfield of the Institute for Financial Literacy says, "Almost half [of bankruptcy filers] have incomes below $20,000 a year, and almost 40 percent indicate that their indebtedness is due to illness or injury." The other half may be workers pushed into an economic corner. A 2006 Federal Reserve study found that real median income dropped 6 percent from 2001 to 2004, while average family income fell by 2.3 percent. The gap between stagnant or declining wages and the rising cost of living is partly being made up by debt. For example, Americans who roll over credit card balances owe anywhere from $5,100 to $14,000, depending upon whose numbers are used. High debt levels are fueled by easy credit that helps lessen the pressures on business to increase wages.

The Bankruptcy Act erected four major hurdles to deter bankruptcy. First, the Act makes it harder for people to qualify for a Chapter 7 bankruptcy that would erase most of their debt. Instead, most debtors have to file for Chapter 13, in which they face a three- to five-year court-ordered repayment plan.

WHEN HE OPENS HIS MOUTH HE'S LYING

George W. Bush could tell me water is wet and I would have to check for myself. Maybe someday a scientist will discover that lying is a disease, something that someone can't help. But as far as we know, lying is a conscious choice for the most part, particularly by a politician looking to justify his own despicable policies. Every day it's just more of the same from Bush and the members of his vile administration. This article by Bill Gallagher is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

The mainstream American media, which long ignored or supported President George Bush's string of disasters, are finally catching on to what a growing majority of American people know: This frat-boy slacker, selected president because of his name and big-bucks supporters, this media-made Churchillian figure standing in the rubble of the Twin Towers, has been out of touch -- and often out of sight -- for every major national crisis before and since.

Bush, the great leader and commander, the protector of his people, is a myth. His now-dwindling support was built on the manufactured consent of fear, and now a majority rejects his handling of his hallmark issue. A Bloomberg-Los Angeles Times poll shows 54 percent of Americans disapprove of Bush's handling of terrorism. Hallelujah! The biggest lie of our times, that Bush makes us safer, is crumbling.

March 06, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY


THE AMAZING KATRINA DEBACLE

There's no question the Bush administration blew it in preparing for Hurricane Katrina, and they've continued to blow it since the hurricane struck the Gulf Coast. A video tape released last week showed a disturbingly passive George W. Bush as he was briefed about the impending hurricane. Days later he lied on television when he said there was no way they could have anticipated the breach of the levees. Then he made a big speech from New Orleans with an impressive backdrop, ignoring the rubble, promising the federal government would do everything it could to rebuild the Big Easy. Six months after the hurricane very little has been done. This article by Richard Wolffe and Mark Hosenball is at msnbc.msn.com:

Republicans and Democrats in Congress are frustrated by the lack of progress on the ground, saying there are continued delays in producing FEMA flood maps. The maps will effectively dictate which blocks can survive, especially in poorer, black neighborhoods such as the Lower Ninth Ward. "Every day that goes by is another day that a homeowner can't rebuild their home... can't decide whether to take their kids out of school," says GOP Rep. Bobby Jindal. And New Orleans still lacks hospitals for its poorest residents, so doctors have set up clinics under tents. Last month thousands of residents got free treatment amid the animal houses of the Audubon Zoo, the only site big enough to cope.

CAN THE "HEARTLAND" NONSENSE

It's almost a cliche for older people to remember how things were truly different in their day. It's that kind of Ma and Pa Kettle world, or the tableaus of a Norman Rockwell. It's a place that never existed. Back in the Fifties the Beat Generation was a threat. In the Sixties the Hippies and peace movement threatened the conformists. You get the Chicken Little conformists in every generation and they always lament that Hollywood doesn't reflect the "heartland." In this essay James Wolcott shows that the "heartland" is a myth. This essay is at jameswolcott.com:

It doesn't exist. It's a metaphor for all the simple good things Americans would believe in if they flattered themselves by believing in simple good things. (Go reread Sherwood Anderson or Sinclair Lewis if you want to savor the loneliness and cultureless vacuity of so much of the bedrock America we insist on coloring with Norman Rockwell nostalgia.) It's true that more Americans than usual are unaquainted and uninterested in the Oscar pics this year, but how many Americans saw McCabe and Mrs. Miller when it came out? Or Mean Streets? Not that long ago, the Oscars noms were panned because for being an index of popularity, not quality; now quality prevails in the judging, tastes have improved even at the Golden Globes, and the kvetching chorus is complaining that the finalists chosen aren't commercial enough, and don't reflect the interests and values of average Americans. There's no such thing as an average American anymore (if there ever was), unless by "average American" you mean (as news producers and pundits seem to do) white, middle-aged, heterosexual Christian small-towners and suburbanites who won't even be watching the Academy Awards because it'll be past their bedtime and they have elk to milk the next morning.

SO MUCH FOR PARENTAL CONSENT LAWS

Abortion opponents have tried various strategies to make abortion more difficult or impossible to obtain. One of the worst ideas is parental consent. I have real problems with it because a male guardian or relative may be responsible for the pregnancy in the first place, and then a victimized young woman is supposed to get his permission for an abortion? It's interesting that parental consent laws aren't reducing the number of abortions. This story by ANDREW LEHREN and JOHN LELAND is at www.nytimes.com:

For all the passions they generate, laws that require minors to notify their parents or get permission to have an abortion do not appear to have produced the sharp drop in teenage abortion rates that some advocates hoped for, an analysis by The New York Times shows.

The analysis, which looked at six states that introduced parental involvement laws in the last decade and is believed to be the first study to include data from years after 1999, found instead a scattering of divergent trends.

March 05, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

IMPEACH CHENEY

THE SPIN ON BUSH'S LEVEE LIE

I happened to catch a little bit of an interview with former FEMA head Michael Brown on FOX this morning. Then there was the ensuing panel discussion. Brit Hume stated what has apparently become a right-wing talking point about Bush's lie about the levees in New Orleans. The talking point is that Bush had been told about "overtopping," not breaching. "Overtopping" isn't as serious, evidently. But mediamatters.org has taken a look at the evidence and Bush isn't off the hook. This item comes from mediamatters.org:

On NBC's Nightly News and Fox News' Special Report with Brit Hume, news correspondents uncritically reported the White House's latest attempt to explain how recent videotapes of Hurricane Katrina conference calls that show pre-Katrina warnings to President Bush about the "grave" risk of flooding in New Orleans do not contradict the president's debunked statement two days later that "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." NBC senior investigative correspondent Lisa Myers reported that National Hurricane Center director Max Mayfield "told NBC News that he warned only that the levees might be topped, not breached, and that on the many conference calls he monitored, nobody talked about the possibility of a levee breach or failure until after it happened." Similarly, a Special Report news segment by Fox News general assignment reporter Mike Emanuel aired White House deputy press secretary Trent Duffy telling Emanuel that "overtop means that the water goes over the top, as the word implies. Breaching means that they actually fail, there's a hole in the levee, and a breach is obviously far worse." But neither report noted that key facts undermine the White House's latest explanation.

A GOVERNMENT OF SOUND BITES AND ILLUSION

We're told we're the land of the free and the home of the brave. The process of brain washing us starts almost from birth. Television is an amazing device for brain washing. It instills consumerism into us even as toddlers. Then we go to school and get the very sanitized version of American history and American life. We're not told much of the genocide directed toward Native Americans and we don't get much information about the realities of slavery. We don't hear about the subjugation of women, or the constant war against the working class. We're sold the idea of corporate moguls like Henry Ford, Andrew Carnegie, and John D. Rockefeller as heroes, people we should admire and emulate. Perhaps most of all, we're told the United States has always been righteous. If we wage a war, it's against the bad guys. If we lock up people or execute them, it's because they deserve it. This is an interesting essay at www.consortiumnews.com that looks at the manifold failures of the Bush administration to live up to the hype. The article is by Alex Sabbeth:

Take a look at New Orleans today. It resembles the burned out blocks of Detroit, not rebuilt since riots decades ago, testifying to a basic truth. America's wealth and power are not directed towards our well-being and security.

Maybe it's easier to grasp this when pondering Sept 11. Our vaunted military did not protect us from low-tech attacks. America has over 800 military bases strung across the globe, but the fact is New York and Washington were not protected.

Doubtful? We were warned about Katrina for years. Newt Gingrich is right when he asks how we can think we're safe when New Orleans was destroyed under our noses. [Fox News, Sept. 6, 2005]

March 04, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH AND CHENEY

ONLY URGENCY IS TAX CUTS

There has been a pattern to the way George W. Bush, the CEO president, has conducted the office. Bush never looks ahead. He and his cronies look for short-term gratification. They put some plan into action, even despite warnings of impending disaster, and then let the disaster occur. Bush ignored the danger of a terrorist attack and we got 9/11. He ignored the danger of whopping budget deficits when he pushed through his tax cuts for the rich, and now we're in a debt crisis. He ignored the warnings about Hurricane Katrina, and thousands are dead or displaced along the Gulf Coast. He ignored the warnings about the miserable prescription drug plan that is a boon to drug companies, but horrible for everyone else. This column by Paul Krugman is linked at www.buzzflash.com:

Iraqi insurgents, hurricanes and low-income Medicare recipients have three things in common. Each has been at the center of a policy disaster. In each case experts warned about the impending disaster. And in each case — well, let's look at what happened.

Knight Ridder's Washington bureau reports that from 2003 on, intelligence agencies "repeatedly warned the White House" that "the insurgency in Iraq had deep local roots, was likely to worsen and could lead to civil war." But senior administration officials insisted that the insurgents were a mix of dead-enders and foreign terrorists.

Intelligence analysts who refused to go along with that line were attacked for not being team players. According to U.S. News & World Report, President Bush's reaction to a pessimistic report from the C.I.A.'s Baghdad station chief was to remark, "What is he, some kind of defeatist?"

BUSH AND NUCLEAR PROLIFERATION

George W. Bush should be kept on his exercise bicycle and far away from making any agreements with other countries. Bush has apparently made a deal with India that may spark a nuclear arms race in that area of the world. It's a region that is already unstable. This article by Dan Froomkin is at www.washingtonpost.com:

In addition to all the predictable reactions (pro and con) to the landmark nuclear agreement reached in India yesterday, a powerful and unexpected new concern has emerged based on a last-minute concession by President Bush.

It appears that, to close the deal during his visit, Bush directed his negotiators to give in to India's demands that it be allowed to produce unlimited quantities of fissile material and amass as many nuclear weapons as it wants.

The agreement, which requires congressional approval, would be an important step toward Bush's long-held goal of closer relations with India. It would reflect India's status as a global power. And, not least of all, it would more firmly establish India as a military ally and bulwark against China.

March 03, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

DROWNING IN RED INK

We're hearing about a push to raise the federal government's debt limit again. It would be the fourth increase in five years. Failure to raise the debt limit would mean the federal government would be unable to meet its obligations for the first time in our history. We're seeing a lot of firsts, always the wrong kind, under the Bush administration. This item comes from www.americanprogressaction.org:

Yesterday, Treasury officials told Senate aides that without an increase in the nation's $8.18 trillion debt limit, the government "would default on obligations for the first time in history sometime during the week of March 20." The Senate will have to take up the issue soon since "federal default is considered unimaginable because it would rattle bond markets, force interest rates higher and shake the economy." The debt limit increase to around $9 trillion would be the fourth increase in five years. "I don't think the leadership wants to have any debate on this, and I think the reason is pretty clear," Finance Committee ranking member Max Baucus (D-MT) told CongressDaily. "It's embarrassing." To avoid an extended debate, the leadership is set to vote on the issue as close to the March 17 recess as possible. Finance Committee chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has admitted he wants the debt limit increased "with the least debate" possible. "I would like to see a bill on any Thursday night just prior to a recess," he said. The New York Times warned the Senate bill may "be put to a voice vote, so that no individual would have to go on record as approving the measure. The American people deserve better."

CORRUPT AND INCOMPETENT

Richard M. Nixon was corrupt, but he was a competent president who actually accomplished some good things. When you look at the record of George W. Bush you'd be hard pressed to find anything good about this administration. Not only is this the most corrupt administration in our history, it's also the most incompetent. The one thing this administration has been good at is spin, but spin only carries you so far. This article by James Klurfeld is at www.commondreams.org:

An old acquaintance in Washington - a former member of Republican administrations whose foreign policy views are decidedly hard-line - recently had this to say to a friend about the Bush administration: This might be the most inept administration in American history.

Considering some of the bozos who have served in the White House - James Buchanan and Warren Harding are two names that come to mind - that is a breathtaking statement. Considering the stakes involved with the United States, the most powerful nation in the world, it is also frightening.

But it should come as no surprise that President George W. Bush has fallen to an approval rating of 34 percent in a recent national poll. Just look at the events in this winter of his discontent:

Iraq appears to be on the cusp of a civil war even as U.S. soldiers continue to be killed each week.

CUTTING THROUGH THE STATISTICAL FOG

Anyone who lives in the San Joaquin Valley can tell you about fog. Every winter we get this ground-hugging, drifting, ethereal stuff that makes it very difficult to see. Fog is the way you would describe many of the statistics used to justify globalization. Propagandists like John Stossel would have us believe things have never been better even as we see our incomes sliding downhill and good jobs getting sent abroad. This article by Paul Craig Roberts is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

When the US Department of Labor, for example, releases the monthly payroll jobs data, the press release will put the best spin on the data. The focus is on the aggregate number of new jobs created the previous month, for example, 150,000 new jobs. That sounds good. News reporters report the press release. They do not look into the data to see what kinds of jobs have been created and what kinds are being lost. They do not look back in time and provide a net job creation number over a longer period of time.



This is why the American public is unaware that higher paid jobs in export and import-competitive industries are being phased out along with engineering and other professional "knowledge jobs" and replaced with lower paid jobs in domestic services. The replacement of higher paid jobs with lower paid jobs is one reason for the decline in median household income over the past five years. It is not a large decline, but it is a decline. How can it be possible for the economy to be doing well when median household income is not growing and when economic growth is based on increased consumer indebtedness?

March 02, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

CHENEY LECTURING US ABOUT SAVING

Gun totin' Dick Cheney gave a speech saying that Americans need to save more. That's a little easier if wages actually keep pace with inflation. It's a little easier if things like the minimum wage allow someone working full time to live above the poverty line. Cheney also made some comments about Social Security. Social Security is fine if right-wingers like him would quit raiding it to pay for their tax cuts to the rich and to fund their illegal wars. This story is from www.usatoday.com:

Vice President Dick Cheney urged Americans Thursday to do a better job of saving and challenged policymakers to strengthen pensions and fix Social Security to help people in their golden years. (Related story: How long can households sustain negative savings?)

"The American dream begins with saving money and that should begin on the very first day of work," Cheney told a conference here exploring how to encourage people to boost savings and be better prepared for retirement.

Too often, workers are living paycheck to paycheck and are not saving sufficiently, Cheney said.

Last year, Americans' personal savings rate dropped to its lowest point since the Great Depression. The dismal state of savings comes as a big wave of baby boomers will soon start retiring.

WHAT ABOUT AFGHANISTAN?

The focus has been on Iraq and the unjustified attack on that country, especially as we have learned that all the justifications for attacking Iraq were lies. Iraq is disintegrating into civil war. But people forget Afghanistan. Many people who opposed the war in Iraq supported the attack on Afghanistan. I never did. The Taliban was terrible, no doubt, but our enemy was Osama bin Laden, not the people of Afghanistan, who have suffered through war after bloody war. Afghanistan has its own version of Guantanamo at Bagram. Warlords are coming back into power and opium is flooding the world from Afghanistan. It is no closer to democracy or peace than Iraq. In this article Ted Rall looks at the situation in Afghanistan. The article is linked at www.smirkingchimp.com:

Everyone loves Bush's war against Afghanistan, even though it was based on just as many lies as his assault on Iraq: Osama bin Laden probably wasn't in Afghanistan on 9/11 and was certainly not there by the time bombs began falling. People approve even though, as in Iraq, Bush didn't send enough troops--8,000 where 500,000 were required--to provide basic security. Even though Afghans didn't greet us as liberators. Even though, as in Iraq, he installed a government composed of corrupt, violent and vengeful minorities, guaranteeing sectarian bloodshed and civil war.

And even though the news from U.S.-occupied Afghanistan--if you can find any--is as relentlessly bleak as that from Iraq. Afghanistan suffers its own litany of roadside bombs, suicide bombs, massacres of foreign aid workers, citizens terrorized by kidnappers and rapists. It even has its own Abu Ghraib.

March 01, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

BUSH LIED ABOUT KATRINA TOO

After the Presidential Daily Briefing that stated, "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the U.S." a major paper ran a headline that said BUSH KNEW. Bush was on vacation in the weeks preceding September 11 and he was on vacation again as Hurricane Katrina was bearing down on the Gulf Coast. After the levees were breached and New Orleans was flooded Bush said that no one could have anticipated the breach of the levees. It turns out Bush and senior officials of the administration knew very well the levees could breach. They are on tape getting briefed about the disaster unfolding with Hurricane Katrina. This story from the Associated Press is at www.nytimes.com:

In dramatic and sometimes agonizing terms, federal disaster officials warned President Bush and his homeland security chief before Hurricane Katrina struck that the storm could breach levees, put lives at risk in New Orleans' Superdome and overwhelm rescuers, according to confidential video footage.

Bush didn't ask a single question during the final briefing before Katrina struck on Aug. 29, but he assured soon-to-be-battered state officials: ''We are fully prepared.''

WELFARE FOR WAR PROFITEERS

Ronald Reagan made it to the White House by talking about mythical welfare queens. But Reagan and the Republican establishment have never been quite so outraged by the corporate welfare that runs like a cancer through the political system. There is something beyond obscene when foreign policy is based on who can make money from a war here, an invasion there, a prison over there, a weapons system everywhere. Halliburton, Dick Cheney's old company, has done quite well thanks to Bush's invasion of Iraq. This story by Derrick Z. Jackson is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

Even though an Army audit determined that $263 million of charges by Halliburton were exaggerated or unjustified on its $2.41 billion no-bid contract for fuel deliveries and oil equipment repair in Iraq, the Army said it will pay all but $10.1 million of it. The Times reported Monday that the decision to withhold only 3.8 percent of the charges in question is far below the average of questionable charges that are withheld. That average has ranged between 56.4 percent and 75.2 percent over the last three years.

Audits and averages rarely matter with Halliburton. While Reagan galvanized the middle class against laundry rooms for the poor, Halliburton is the company whose subsidiary, Kellogg, Brown & Root, charged you and me $100 for a bag of laundry and $45 for a case of soda in Iraq.

February 28, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

MONEY ONE, SECURITY ZERO

It's difficult to believe that after making 9/11 the crime of the millennium the Bush administration now has no problem with a cozy port deal with the United Arab Emirates, a country directly tied to terrorism. It's difficult to believe until you look at the money and who is getting the money. Bush's Secretary of the Treasury John Snow is one of the beneficiaries. David Sanborn, named by Bush to head the U.S. Maritime Agency, is another beneficiary. This story by MICHAEL McAULIFF is at The New York Daily News:

The Dubai firm that won Bush administration backing to run six U.S. ports has at least two ties to the White House.

One is Treasury Secretary John Snow, whose agency heads the federal panel that signed off on the $6.8 billion sale of an English company to government-owned Dubai Ports World - giving it control of Manhattan's cruise ship terminal and Newark's container port.

Snow was chairman of the CSX rail firm that sold its own international port operations to DP World for $1.15 billion in 2004, the year after Snow left for President Bush's cabinet.

The other connection is David Sanborn, who runs DP World's European and Latin American operations and was tapped by Bush last month to head the U.S. Maritime Administration.

HOW DO YOU IMPEACH THEM ALL?

The Bush administration has made me wish we had a parliamentary form of government. A parliamentary system would allow us to declare no confidence in the Bush gang, hold an election, and kick them out. Our system provides only impeachment or resignation as a remedy to egregious and corrupt conduct. The problem we face is that it's not only Bush and Cheney who should impeached; it's the whole rotten administration. This article by James Charles is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

The dilemma for America is: When the whole executive branch is criminal, how do you impeach an entire administration?



* President Bush knowingly lied to Congress when he certified in writing an immediate threat to the security of the United States mandated the need to use armed force to overthrow the regime of Saddam Hussein. As has been well documented over the past three years, the administration knew before Bush's 2003 State of the Union message that there were serious doubts in the intelligence establishment -- the CIA, DIA, State Dept. and Dept. of Energy -- that Saddam had either chemical weapons or a program to build atomic weapons. Lying to Congress is a federal offence, a felony punishable with prison; on its face, it is also a "high crime and misdemeanor" -- an impeachable offence.

February 27, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

FREE TRADERS LIKE SWARMS OF LOCUSTS

One of the plagues Moses reportedly unleashed on Egypt was swarms of locusts. You wonder if there is a latter-day Moses releasing locusts on the U.S. economy. Since the free trade mindset took hold in the early 90s, thousands upon thousands of manufacturing jobs in the United States have been sent offshore. There are no comparable good-paying middle class jobs to replace them, and we find ourselves drowning now in debt. Thom Hartmann writes about the reality caused by the NAFTA and GATT treaties, and the consequences of free trade ideology. This article is linked at www.commondreams.org:

Through a combination of the "Fast Track" authority pushed for by Reagan and GHW Bush, sweetheart trade deals involving "most favored nation status" for dictatorships like China, and Clinton pushing us into NAFTA and the WTO (via GATT), we've abandoned the principles of tariff-based trade that built American industry and kept us strong for over 200 years.

The old concept was that if there was a dollar's worth of labor in a pair of shoes made in the USA, and somebody wanted to import shoes from China where there may only be ten cents worth of labor in those shoes, we'd level the playing field for labor by putting a 90-cent import tariff on each pair of shoes. Companies could choose to make their products here or overseas, but the ultimate cost of labor would be the same.

Then came the flat-worlders, led by misguided true believers and promoted by multinational corporations. Do away with those tariffs, they said, because they "restrain trade." Let everything in, and tax nothing. The result has been an explosion of cheap goods coming into our nation, and the loss of millions of good manufacturing jobs and thousands of manufacturing companies. Entire industry sectors have been wiped out.

COAST GUARD WARNED BUSH ABOUT PORTS DEAL

The Washington Post has a story about a Coast Guard memo to the Bush administration that warns the administration of a possible terrorist threat if a company owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates assumes port operations at major U.S. ports. It would seem you wouldn't even need a memo like this, but this is the Bush administration, after all, the administration that sees and smells money and disregards everything else. Bush is the man who didn't take seriously a Presidential Daily Briefing stating that, "Bin Laden Determined to Strike Within U.S." And we're supposed to believe Bush is looking out for our security interests? This article by Jonathan Weisman is at www.washingtonpost.com:

The U.S. Coast Guard, in charge of reviewing security at ports operated by a Dubai maritime company, warned the Bush administration it could not rule out that the company's assets could be used for terrorist operations, according to a document released yesterday by a Senate committee.

State-owned Dubai Ports World plans to complete its takeover of London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. (P&O) on Thursday, assuming ownership of operations at six major U.S. ports even as it pledges to hold off on asserting control while the Bush administration reviews the national security implications of the deal. The White House has strongly argued that a preliminary review showed that the sale would pose no threat to national security.

February 26, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

BUSH'S KARMA

Since the terrorist attacks on 9/11, George W. Bush and his administration have ramped up the fear about terrorism and have demonized Arabs, although continuing a chummy relationship with Saudi Arabia, home of fifteen of the 9/11 hijackers. In the sloppy and slipshod approval of a ports deal with the United Arab Emirates, a country with al-Qaeda ties, Bush shows how hyperbole can rebound on you. Bush has created the terror monster and now he has to deal with it himself. This column by Paul Krugman is linked at guerillawomentn.blogspot.com:

Mr. Bush shouldn't really be losing his credibility as a terrorism fighter over the ports deal, which, after careful examination (which hasn't happened yet),, may turn out to be O.K. Instead, Mr. Bush should have lost his credibility long ago over his diversion of U.S. resources away from the pursuit of Al Qaeda and into an unnecessary war in Iraq, his bungling of that war, and his adoption of a wrongful imprisonment and torture policy that has blackened America's reputation.

But there is, nonetheless, a kind of rough justice in Mr. Bush's current predicament. After 9/11, the American people granted him a degree of trust rarely, if ever, bestowed on our leaders. He abused that trust, and now he is facing a storm of skepticism about his actions — a storm that sweeps up everything, things related and not.

TALKING TO THE "INVESTORS"

One very effective technique in advertising is called "snob appeal." It's a pitch that says that you are better, more discerning, and more virtuous than the guy next door, and that's why we're making this special offer to you. That guy next door just doesn't have what it takes, but you do. That's how Republican economic policy is sold. You know, we need to cut those programs that take taxes from you and redistribute them to those indolent people over there. But Republican tax cuts rain down mostly on the very wealthy, no matter how much we're told that owning a few shares of stock makes us "investors." This article by Froma Harrop is at www.smirkingchimp.com:

But the Bush administration would like to convince working folk that they are in the club.

Its motives are simple. Conservatives have been remodeling the tax code to move the burden off investment income and onto the earnings that people sweat for. The more Americans fancy themselves players in the stock market, the easier it will be to sell them on tax breaks for investors. Right now, the administration is pitching an extension of the 15-percent tax rate on capital gains and dividends.

Thus, we have Treasury Secretary John Snow asserting that the "typical" investor is "a middle-class person saving for retirement with a household income of about $65,000."

February 25, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

FREEDOM IS ON THE CRAWL

George W. Bush has often stated that "freedom is on the march" in Iraq and Afghanistan. The facts don't support that. Afghanistan has reverted mostly to the control of warlords, and Iraq has been a scene of daily carnage that seems to be getting worse. Iraq stands on the edge of all out civil war now. The country's infrastructure is worse than it was before the war. But the Bush administration keeps asking for more and more money to pour down a rathole. This article by Steven R. Weisman is at www.nytimes.com:

TWO days of mob violence last week after the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine did not simply aggravate Iraq's sectarian hatreds. Like a near-death experience, the carnage seems to have shocked Sunni and Shiite leaders into a new realization of what civil war would cost, and new efforts to avoid it.

But what happens if such efforts — and frantic ones by Americans — prove incapable of stopping an all-out war?

What if, as Abraham Lincoln famously said of America's greatest ordeal: "All dreaded it, all sought to avert it ... And the war came."

BUSH FAMILY'S TIES TO ARAB COUNTRIES

The Bush family has decades of ties to Saudi Arabia and other Arab oil interests. Those ties, interestingly enough, have included the bin Laden family. You have to wonder why the mainstream media hasn't taken a closer look. We have Craig Unger's book from a few years ago House of Bush, House of Saud, and we have the Kevin Phillips book about the Bush dynasty. What weird dynamic fueled the attacks on 9/11, dynamics that exist between the Bushes and the bin Ladens and other Arab oil interests? We see this come into play again with the controversy over allowing a company owned by the United Arab Emirates to take over operations at our major ports. Joe Conason writes about it in this article at www.salon.com:

But Bush's passionate defense of the United Arab Emirates and the ports deal inevitably raises questions -- not only about the due diligence of his administration in this instance but about his and his family's long-standing ties to the Persian Gulf sheikdoms, and specifically to the UAE's rulers. His insinuation that skepticism is equivalent to bigotry cannot deflect such concerns, which first arose in the months after the 9/11 attacks.

By now, everyone paying attention to the furor over the Dubai ports deal should be aware of the UAE's mixed record with regard to terror and global security. The Emirates' ruling families formerly maintained close relationships with the Taliban and Osama bin Laden, whose hunting camps in Afghanistan they frequented; two of the 20 hijackers in the 9/11 plot were UAE nationals who used safe houses and banks in Dubai; and the A.Q. Khan nuclear smuggling network also used facilities there to mask its operations. Since 9/11, however, the Emirates have cooperated with U.S. operations against al-Qaida, and their state-owned corporations have eagerly participated in American attempts to improve transportation security.

RIGHT WING INTELLECTUALS ABANDONING BUSH

Sometimes getting what you wanted isn't as good as you thought it would be. Take the case of right wing intellectuals and George W. Bush. Bush would seem to be their dream come true: a right wing ideologue devoted to the market above all else, steadfast in the belief that American hegemony is the way to remake the world. Now we see the fruits of the poisonous tree that is the Bush administration. Iraq, a country we never should have attacked, is in shambles and the stability of the entire Middle East is uncertain. We've gone from having budget surpluses to being in hock to Japan, China, and South Korea. Our credibility is shattered around the world. This article by Robert Parry is linked at www.smirkingchimp.com:

In just this past week, conservative legend William F. Buckley Jr. and neoconservative icon Francis Fukuyama have joined the swelling ranks of Americans judging George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq a disaster.

"One can't doubt that the American objective in Iraq has failed," Buckley wrote at National Review Online on Feb. 24, adding that the challenge now facing Bush and his top advisers is how to cope with the reality of that failure.

"Within their own counsels, different plans have to be made," Buckley wrote after a week of bloody sectarian violence in Iraq. "And the kernel here is the acknowledgement of defeat."

February 24, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

SHADES OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION

Those images of people standing in lines for soup kitchens from the Great Depression era don't seem like ancient history anymore. In his determination to make the plutocrats fatter George W. Bush's policies have increased poverty, resulted in declining family net worth, and stagnant or falling incomes for most Americans. We're quickly moving toward becoming a Third World country where there is a rich elite comprised of a few people and lots and lots of poor people. More evidence of this is the increase in the use of soup kitchens since Bush took office. This article by STEPHEN OHLEMACHER is at www.washingtonpost.com:

More than 25 million Americans turned to the nation's largest network of food banks, soup kitchens and shelters for meals last year, up 9 percent from 2001.

Those seeking food included 9 million children and nearly 3 million senior citizens, says a report from America's Second Harvest.

"The face of hunger doesn't have a particular color, and it doesn't come from a particular neighborhood," said Ertharin Cousin, executive vice president of the group. "They are your neighbors, they are working Americans, they are senior citizens who have worked their entire lives, and they are children."

WHY ILLEGAL SPYING IS AN ISSUE

I've seen or heard many right-wingers say they have no problem with George W. Bush's illegal spying because they "have nothing to hide." They're convinced Bush's spying will ferret out terrorists and make them safer. Never mind that the spying is in blatant violation of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution that prohibits searches without warrants. Never mind that the FISA court already provides a mechanism for spying on real terrorists.

In this article John Dean, who was the counsel to Richard Nixon and saw presidential lawbreaking up close, talks about some other issues related to illegal spying. The most important issue to me is that people have fought and died to give us the freedoms we treasure in the Bill of Rights. There is also the issue that data mining makes mistakes and may tag totally innocent people as terrorists. Then there is the issue of computer hacking. Dossiers gathered on us might be hacked and the information used to blackmail us, steal our identities, or used maliciously. So, yes, it does matter that illegal spying is taking place. This article by John Dean is linked at www.smirkingchimp.com:

To those who don't worry about giving up their rights, programs like the NSA's may seem fine. But others of us appreciate the blood and treasury this nation expended, both indirectly and directly, in securing those rights. And I am convinced my generation will fight to the end to prevent the zeal of good intention in fighting terror, from letting the terrorists win by permitting the government to take those rights.

February 23, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

FALLING NET WORTH

Since George W. Bush stole his way into the White House the net worth and income for the average family in the United States has dropped. The vast majority of us who are working class are simply fools to vote for Republicans. You see the same pattern repeated over and over again. Republicans will dangle tax cuts in front of us, fool enough of us to get into office, and the tax cuts and other goodies go to the very wealthy. This article by MARTIN CRUTSINGER is at news.yahoo.com:

The gap between the very wealthy and other income groups widened during the period.

The top 10 percent of households saw their net worth rise by 6.1 percent to an average of $3.11 million while the bottom 25 percent suffered a decline from a net worth in which their assets equaled their liabilities in 2001 to owing $1,400 more than their total assets in 2004.

"This is the continuing story of the rich getting richer," said David Wyss, chief economist at Standard & Poor's in New York. "Clearly, the gains in wealth are going to the top end."

Democrats used the new report to blast
President Bush's economic policies, contending it would be wrong to make permanent his tax cuts which primarily benefited the wealthy.

BANKRUPTCY LAW A BUST SO FAR

The new bankruptcy law passed by the Republican-controlled Congress and signed by Bush a few months ago isn't working quite the way they anticipated. This bill was sold as making it tougher for "deadbeats" who carelessly ran up debt to get out of debt by filing for bankruptcy. The new law requires credit counseling, among other things. It turns out that most people considering bankruptcy have suffered a job loss or catastrophic health care costs, hardly the stuff of "deadbeats." This item comes from www.correntewire.com:

A report released by the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys was based on an analysis of 61,335 people who have gone to credit counseling agencies, the required first step before filing bankruptcy under the law that took effect on Oct. 17.

Of the 61,335, 97 percent were unable to repay any debts and 79 percent had gotten into financial trouble because of job loss, huge medical expenses or the death of a spouse, the report said.

“Contrary to the claims of proponents of bankruptcy-law changes that they would zero in on the alleged legions of ‘deadbeats,’” the new law is doing no measurable good, said Brad Botes, executive director of the bankruptcy lawyers’ group. “Instead, (it has) put new hurdles in the path of people who are already flat on their back due to financial crises over which they have no control.”

E-MAIL AND CELL PHONES EASY SPY TARGETS

Technology has evolved faster than privacy laws, and new technologies such as e-mail and cell phones can provide a treasure trove of data to government snoops. Requirements for spying on e-mail are fairly lenient. Cell phones can be tracked so that the government can pinpoint our locations. This article from Agence France Presse is linked at www.commondreams.org:

Fast-evolving Internet and communications technology is outpacing privacy laws and leaving a treasure trove of personal data prey to government surveillance, a new report warned.

The survey by the non-profit Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) appeared as debate rages over a domestic wiretap program in the United States and government lawyers demand search records held by firms like Google.

"The gap between law and technology is widening every day, and privacy is eroding," said Jim Dempsey, the CDT policy director who authored the report.

February 22, 2006

IMPEACH BUSH

THE DENIZENS OF RIGHT WING RADIO

A writer in the letters to the editor section of The Fresno Bee today tried to trivialize criticism of George W. Bush as "hating." It doesn't seem to occur to these people there are plenty of reasons to dislike George W. Bush. You would think from the blather on the right that disliking Bush is akin to spitting on the flag or tossing apple pie into the dumpster.

Another of the many myths you get from right-wingers, but one of the most pernicious, is the idea of the "liberal media." Right-wing talk show gasbags dominate AM radio and similar gasbags dominate cable TV talk shows. I don't know how many of these people who reflexively spout "liberal media" even understand what liberals stand for. This article by Bill Berry is at www.commondreams.org:

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who spoke at last year's Fighting Bob Fest in Baraboo, has been keeping a close watch on this. In a speech in San Francisco late last year, he noted that the notion of a liberal media is a right-wing ruse.

"There is a right-wing media, and if you look where most Americans are now getting their news, that's where they're getting it. According to Pew (Research Center), 30 percent of Americans now say that their primary news source is talk radio, which is 90 percent dominated by the right."

Unshackled by any meaningful oversight from the Federal Communications Commission or any sense of fairness, the right has elbowed its way into the mainstream, backed by big bucks. As Kennedy noted, "Twenty-two percent of Americans say their primary news source is Fox News, MSNBC or CNBC, all dominated by the right, and another 10 percent, Sinclair network, which is the most right wing of all." Sinclair also happens to be primarily Midwestern, a broadcast company whose owner makes news employees swear they won't criticize the war in Iraq or the Bush administration.

CORPORATE AGENDA MORE IMPORTANT THAN SECURITY

When you look at the policies of George W. Bush it's always a good idea to follow the money. There's money to be made for someone in almost anything this administration does. The latest example is the outrageous idea that a company based in the United Arab Emirates should handle cargo at our major ports. David Sirota has some thoughts in this post at www.huffingtonpost.com:

But as the coverage continues, the true motives of Bush's position are starting to slip out, almost inadvertently.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said about the UAE deal that "We have to balance the paramount urgency of security against the fact that we still want to have a robust global trading system." Similarly, the New York Times today quotes a corporate consultant saying that "The location of the headquarters of a company in the age of globalism is irrelevant."

So we are expected to believe that nothing should matter - not even security concerns - other than preserving the corporate America's trade agenda. When you realize that, President Bush's threat to use the first veto of his presidency on the UAE port security issue suddenly becomes not so surprising. He is proudly defending what Jeff Faux calls "The Party of Davos" or John Perkins calls the "corporatocracy" - that is, the multinational interests who really run the show.