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October 31, 2005

Haiku for whores

I was going to play Fisk the Wingnut again, but Lauren's commenters had some hilarious limericks goofing on this snivelling member of the American Taliban.

I'm more of a haiku fan, myself.  Such as:

Fear the vagina!
The clitoris spawns evil
cold showers can’t kill

Any others?

Posted by at 02:12 PM |

Halloween Fantasies & Delusions (pt. 1)

Good article on possible future events, post-Fitzmas, but ending with this:

"But should we expect, given the Republicans' attempts to belittle and politicize the case thus far, that President Bush will pardon his senior administration official if Libby is convicted on these serious charges? The 1992 Christmas Eve pardons of Iran/contra defendants by former President George Bush Sr. provide cause for concern. Let us hope that the current President Bush will not undermine the rule of law in this way."

Pardon? He can frame it and hang it on his wall, right next to his Medal of Freedom plaque. It'll look spec-TAC-ular! I'm sure social planners at the White House have already pencilled in a long weekend in December 2008 for a "Beg Your Pardon?" Christmas bash.

Posted by Jeff at 07:35 AM |

Bush throws the right a bone(r)

Scalia redux:

Alito's conservative stripes are equally evident in criminal law. Lawrence Lustberg, a New Jersey criminal defense lawyer who has known Alito since 1981 and tried cases before him on the Third Circuit, describes him as "an activist conservatist judge" who is tough on crime and narrowly construes prisoners' and criminals' rights. "He's very prosecutorial from the bench. He has looked to be creative in his conservatism, which is, I think, as much a Rehnquist as a Scalia trait," Lustberg says.

Alito is a conservative's conservative..apparently completely content with a wife's uterus being the sole property of her husband.

Who wants to take bets as to when the first rightie will screech about how the Senate shouldn't stand in the way of a President's nominee?

Posted by Carla at 06:40 AM |

October 30, 2005

Just a thought

Now that Scooter Libby (who the hell goes by that kind of nickname after age 10??) has been indicted, folks on the right and left are lining up to give George Bush advice on how to save his Presidency from the trash heap of history

Here's the thing--he doesn't care. And frankly, it should be obvious to anyone who's watched this administration run amok that the damage they've caused is pretty significant.

They lied about WMD's in Iraq. They then kept changing the reasons why we had to invade and occupy another sovereign nation. Then they tried to blame faulty intelligence when they tried to spike the intelligence. They put a CIA operative in danger, and gave us quite a show as Bush backpedaled his statement that he'd come down like a ton of bricks on the leaker. They shortchanged the army, screwed soldiers and veterans, questioned the patriotism of anyone who looked askance at their policies, and spent money we didn't have while giving tax cuts to the wealthy.

I don't want just an apology, or a resignation, or new blood in the White House administration. I think it's high time we impeached George Bush for the lies leading to the Iraq war and the danger he put Plame--and the US--in. Because he might not have been the leak, but he's been happy to give the leak succor, and I'm sick to death of it.

I think this warrants an impeachment more than orals in the Oval Office.

Posted by at 04:08 PM |

The definition of insanity

A nation gripped by fear laid down upon it not by terrorism but by the political machinations of a reelection juggernaut may finally be jolted from it's paralysis.

The indictment of the aid to Vice President Cheney this week and the masterful press conference of the prosecutor have finally, it seems, given the nation pause.

The big questions: why was a top White House official giving classified information to reporters? Why did the White House pay so much attention to an unknown former diplomat? And why out his wife? And if the yellowcake uranium from Niger story is a put up job, then which other arguments for invading Iraq were put up jobs as well?

Jonathan Alter offers some perspective in today's Newsweek:

According to Fitzgerald, Libby had conversations with at least seven other government officials about Joseph and Valerie Wilson that he did not disclose to the grand jury. Why were top White House officials and Vice President Cheney so concerned about an obscure former diplomat like Wilson? Because he had the temerity to offer public dissent. By showing how evidence of Saddam's WMDs had been cooked, Wilson undermined the very reason Augie Schroeder and the rest of the U.S. military went to war. He was more than "fair game," as Karl Rove called him. He was a mortal threat.

This has been the Bush pattern. Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill presciently says a second tax cut is unaffordable if we want to fight in Iraq—he's fired. Bush's economic adviser Larry Lindsey presciently says the war will cost between $100 billion and $200 billion (an underestimate)—he's fired. Army Gen. Eric Shinseki presciently says that winning in Iraq will require several hundred thousand troops—he's sent into early retirement. By contrast, CIA Director George Tenet, who presided over two of the greatest intelligence lapses in American history (9/11 and WMD in Iraq) and apparently helped spread "oppo ammo" to discredit the husband of a woman who had devoted her life to his agency, receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Some might write this off to the hard ball game of politics in Washington. Except the demand for loyalty above everything else has up until now obscured the fundamental incompetence and dangerous insulation from critical discussion at the highest levels of the US government.

We've been watching the quagmire of Iraq unfold mercilessly before our eyes. The massive onslaught of hurricanes leaving so many of our fellow citizens helpless while a hapless FEMA neglects it's duties. A national debt that has once again spiraled out of control while another Republican President signs spending bill after spending bill...tax cut after tax cut.

This has been allowed to take place under our noses because of men like Karl Rove...who instill fear of brown people in robes to the electorate. And then put up their guy as the only patriot who can possibly deal with the scourge. To prop Bush up as this lone patriotic figure is a feat indeed. A man without curiosity or a breadth of intellectuality is a tough sell. Absolute loyalty and lockstep message control has to take place.

And in the meantime anyone who speaks up is an unAmerican, unpatriotic, yellow-bellied leech who is sucking off the very teat of the freedom provided to them by the Cowboy-in-Chief.

Alter's piece in Newsweek also includes a quote from a father who lost his son in Iraq:

"When you do something over and over again expecting a different result," Augie's grieving father, Paul, told me, "that is the definition of insanity."

Indeed. When Americans reelected George W. Bush to the presidency after a truely horrible first term expecting him to do better, that was insanity. But maybe...finally...the people and the press have decided that being whipped into a state of fear-riddled paralysis is no way to live. And no way to elect a President.

Posted by Carla at 07:05 AM |

Plamegate timeline, Perrspectives style

Perrspectives has compiled an outstanding timeline of the Plamegate saga, which you can access here.

The timeline includes the major relevant news stories, links that show the genesis of the scandal, the Times and Wiki timelines, key White House briefings and some other extras. If you're looking for a superb outline on what's gone on and what's going on a la Plame, there's your clickage.

(via Blue Oregon)

Posted by Carla at 06:54 AM |

October 29, 2005

Does Oregon have ANY Democrats in Congress???

Congressman David Wu has made several votes over the last couple or so years that have raised eyebrows in his district. Earlier this year he voted for the anti-family, anti-veteran, anti-poor bankruptcy bill. Now we learn that he has again voted for corporate interests over citizens. I'm focusing on Wu because he is my representative. But, he has had plenty of company in Congress.

NewsHog first alerted me to this story and Cernig has more details there. But, here's the gist of it:

The Federal Housing Finance Reform Act of 2005, which passed the House of Representatives yesterday by a vote of 331-90, contains a provision that establishes a national fund for developing affordable housing, by skimming 5 percent off the profits of the government-sponsored home-finance companies Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

The funding would be a boon to the nonprofit housing sector – worth up to an estimated $1 billion within two years – but it comes with strings attached: nonprofit organizations would not be able to tap into the fund if they have recently engaged in activities that encourage people to vote. - The New Standard

As always, context is everything. In 1993, the year before the so-called Republican Revolution, Congress passed the National Voter Registration Act. The Act, initiated and passed by Democrats, requires nonprofits across the United State to provide voter registration services in order to receive housing and other social services money. This new Bill effectively guts that provision. In so doing it overtly sides with corporate fatcats over the poor in America.

The Final Roll Call vote results tell the tale of the tape:

• 209 GOPers vote for and only 15 vote against. Kudos to Rep. Ron Paul of Texas for demostrating once again that common sense and a conservative world view aren't necessarily mutually exclusive.


• 122 Dems vote for and only 74 vote against. Every single Oregon Democrat vote FOR this bill.

I would like to suggest yet once again that this pattern of Democrats voting in favor of corporate interests and against fundamental access by citizens is part and parcel of why folks like Howard Dean and Paul Hackett are perceived as such a threat by the powerbrokers in the Democratic Party. The reality is that Ralph Nader was telling the truth when he described the Democrats (as a party) as Republican-lite.

In this case there was a substantial minority of Congressional Dems who refused to rubberstamp this heinous piece of legislation. But at the end of the day they were a minority and as such are not reflective of the majority.

Posted by Kevin at 12:59 PM |

Sorry I'm not home right now, I'm walking into spiderwebs...

...leave a message and I'll call you back...

I've some new tenants taking up residence on my deck out back:

Spiders are one of the gardener's best friends. And while I personally find them creepy and icky...they're always welcome in my garden.

Posted by Carla at 08:59 AM |

October 28, 2005

Friday Random Ten: Grouchy Carla Edition

It's been a terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad week for my bank account. My oven crapped out and now with the holidays breathing down my neck, I've got an unexpected major expense. And can I just buy a regular free-standing range? Noooooooo. I have to buy a "slide-in" because of my kitchen lay out. The cheapest, low-end one I can find is $800. Argh.

Just get it fixed, you say? It's going to cost almost as much to fix it as to buy a new one. Apparently parts and labor on this range is just a little less than Exxon/Mobil's profit for last quarter.

So instead of dwelling...I'll list my old fogey music:

1. No Doubt--ExGirlfriend

2. Matchbox 20--Bright Lights

3. Queen--Fat Bottom Girls

4. Alison Krauss--I Am A Man Of Constant Sorrow

5. Led Zeppelin--Black Dog

6. Aerosmith--Crazy

7. Steve Miller Band--Fly Like An Eagle

8. Paul Simon--Me and Julio Down By The Schoolyard

9. The Eagles--Take It Easy

10.Sheryl Crow--Maybe Angels

Posted by Carla at 01:19 PM |

Defrauding Oil-For-Food served Bush's interests

Paul Volker's list of corporations that participated in cheating the Iraqi oil-for-food program is good as far as it goes. But it doesn't go far enough. And because of that it gives a skewed picture of who all was actually complicite in turning the program into a farce.

The Bush administration actively turned a blind eye to illegal oil shipments that served it's political agenda, as I wrote about this last January.

It seems clear to me that Republicans are using the oil-for-food scandal for three primary reasons. First, it distracts attention from the Administration's own complicity. Second, by focusing on foreign corporation's complicity it provides a convenient red herring for American corporations in the global economy where they compete against the very firms being targeted as having enriched Saddam illegally. And thirdly, it plays directly into the far right's paranoia about the UN.

By demagogueing the issue, Republican politicians like Norm Coleman are serving the interests of their corporate backers. If they genuinely cared that Saddam was being enriched illegally then they would be holding the Bush administration accountable. But they're not and I don't seriously believe they ever intend to.

Posted by Kevin at 09:59 AM |

October 27, 2005

All I want for Fitzmas...

...is an in-dict-ment.

Or what all the good boys and girls will be sending out for Christmas:

(Shop AmericaBlog for all your Christmas needs)

Posted by Carla at 04:44 PM |

The sneaky efforts to recall Judge James

For nonNorthwest readers, Measure 37 is a ballot iniative passed in Oregon in November. In a nutshell, 37 requires government to compensate landowners if the government passes a law that devalues their property.

The passage of 37 has caused major problems for the State of Oregon. It's confusing, vague and often inequitable wording was throwing the various local governments into a mess.

Recently, Judge Mary James overturned Measure 37 based on a laundry list of reasons. A great summary of the Measure and the reasons cited by Judge James for overturning it can be found here at BlueOregon.

In what is turning out to be typical for conservatives nowadays, the rightwing fringe of Oregon politics is rattling it's sabers against James.

Yesterday I came across a blog kept by local radio talk show host Victoria Taft. Taft's show runs as part of a lineup of dubious rightwing talkers such as Sean Hannity and Larry Elder. I've not listened to Ms Taft's radio show, so I have no idea the views she espouses on air. If her blog is any indication however, she's pushing the regular hardcore rightwing fringe views that continue to be out of step with most Oregonians.

Taft is using her blog to pimp the recall of Judge James. What Taft neglects to mention on her recall post are the hard right Constitution Party connections to the recall. The main perp behind the effort appears to be Constitution Party candidate Bob Ekstrom.

Ekstrom is one of the big fish of the western Constitution Party movement as well as one of it's more prominent national leaders. Here's a little taste of Ekstrom's apparently deep seated political views:

Today, few Americans are prepared to strike out in a radically different political direction as part of a small band even if they recognize the ultimate rightness of the project. However, the number of those few is steadily increasing. The Constitution Party stakes its future on that trend.

What fuels that trend? Moral degradation, unsustainable economic practices, cultural upheaval, the continued shedding of innocent blood at America’s abortuaries, the spiritual hypocrisy of wanting a God blessed America while we boot Him from every public venue, the erasure of our borders, the shrinking of anything private, the expansion of all things bureaucratic, the bankruptcy of public education, the loss of private property rights, the growing sense that the two big parties aren’t the answer to the problem – that they are the problem, and more.

Who are the people who make up this small but growing band of political pioneers? Homeschoolers, those who worship God and do not worship the state, those who visualize abortionists on trial, constitutionalists, people who have to be free, sound money advocates, and gun owners. These are dedicated people who fit the “Live Free Or Die” and the “Don’t Tread On Me” pattern. The Constitution Party can go somewhere with these kind of folks. The Republican Party has abused this constituency for a long time thinking that “They have no where else to go.” We will see.

Perhaps Taft is unaware of her the political leanings of the people who's efforts she's pimping. Putting doctors on trial for performing legal abortions? Allowing religion to permeate our government institutions? Or maybe this is sort of antichoice, anti-freedom thing Ms. Taft envisions for the State of Oregon.

James' recall effort thus far appears to be little more than a rightwing conservative attempt to threaten judges who won't do their job. And make no mistake, overturning inappropriate and illegal laws is one of the main reasons we have judges. The rigthwing tends to forget that government is intentionally set up to have checks and balances. They don't get to push laws that go against the basic legal framework of the State. Even if the majority of voters passed it.

Posted by Carla at 10:59 AM |

Miers withdraws

Miers Withdraws Under Mounting Criticism.

Let the rightwing freaks on parade begin.

Posted by Carla at 07:07 AM |

October 26, 2005

White Sox win!

I've never been a big baseball fan. I rarily watch games during the regular season and have only attended one pro game - an exhibition game between the Padres and the Marineers. But, I enjoy watching the playoffs. And this year was a great one to be an October fan.

At the beginning of the World Series I countered Mike's prediction over at The Big Board of the Sox in 7 games with a prediction that they'd win in 6 games. But, they surpassed both of our predictions to win in a four game sweep on the Astros.

And how about that Sox rookie closer Bobbly Jenks? What a fairy tale ride he has been on! He began this season playing in the minor leagues for a AA team in Birmingham. He ended the season on the pitcher's mound as his team won the World Series.

I know that Bobby Jenks' 6'3" doesn't quite match up to Randy "The Big Unit" Johnson's 6'10". But, what he lacks in height he makes up for in girth at a whopping 270lbs. What I'm trying to say is that I think Jenks should be redubbed "The Big Unit." With that girth and the consistent 100 mph pitches it's seems a very apt description.

Posted by Kevin at 09:42 PM |

Bizarre

I realize this is supposed to be a sexy, glamour photo. But does it look to anyone else like her head is strangely too large for her neck?

It looks like her head is floating up in the plants while her body is turned the wrong way. Weird.

Posted by Carla at 10:32 AM |

She's not goosestepping to their beat

Does it bug anyone else that the real reason so many conservatives want Harriet Miers to withdraw is because they don't know for sure that she'll be a hardcore, Scalia-style vote?

Their excuses that somehow she doesn't have the intellectual acumen or the breadth of experience to do the job is meaningless. If Miers were a proven rightwing ideologue with a track record of relentless social conservativism, she'd be a shoe-in with the GOP. They wouldn't care if her law degree was written by Crayola.

It's unlikely Bush could name anyone to the court that I'd be comfortable with. I find conservatism in general to be an onerous ideology which often plays to the most base human instincts. But I'm not in the business of selling people short by attempting deceit to soft pedal the real reasons I dislike conservatism.

Why do the Phyllis Schlafly's of the world pretend that anyone with two brain cells to rub together, can't see through their quite obviously transparent move to dump a person who might not goosestep to their beat?

Posted by Carla at 09:40 AM |

Justice for Jane Doe--OC Gang Rape Three to be sentenced as adults

Greg Haidl, Keith Spann, and Kyle Nachreiner, the Orange County three who were charged with videotaping their gang-rape of a passed out girl (warning: very graphic description) will be sentenced as adults.

It was a brutal blow to family and friends of the defendants. Just days before, they were so optimistic that they provided another odd moment in an already surreal case -- more than 20 of them happily posing for a group photo outside of Briseno's courtroom. Nachreiner supporters from Rancho Cucamonga wore sunglasses inside the courthouse, giggled and then amused themselves by trying to intimidate a reporter.

Briseno's decision likely means the trio will go to state prison for the 2002 videotaped sexual assault of an unconscious minor during a Newport Beach high school party. But the judge also granted the defense one more lengthy delay. Sentencing is now set for Jan. 20, some 1,295 days after the crime.

The defense attorneys for the three used every misogynist, slut-baiting stereotype to excuse the perps. Ghengis Khan himself would have curdled at it. They also went out of their way to intimidate, slander, and terrorize Jane Doe.

[The Haidl defense] called Jane Doe 1 a "slut" who enticed an "innocent . . . little boy" (that would be six-foot-plus Greg Haidl, who has had six known separate criminal episodes in the past three years). In hopes of forcing Jane Doe 1 to decline prosecution, they probed her entire life—tailed her, posted inflammatory fliers in her neighborhood, spread savage rumors about her family, sued investigating police agencies, and released her private medical records to members of the media. Some jurors weren’t bothered; some actually received post-trial checks from Haidl in return for a promise to act as consultants at the retrial, which could begin later this year.

I don't wish violence on these three or their scumbag defenders. But I do want them to be held accountable.

Posted by at 08:57 AM |

October 25, 2005

The Bush Quiz: Water Getter-Ridders Edition

This was sent to me via email. The original can be found here via Paul Slansky of the New Yorker.

There are 20 questions. The first seven are here. You'll find the other 13 on the extended entry. Answers available in comments. The "water getters" thing will become clear (unless you take a shot for every time you miss a question. It'll make the quiz more fun..but by the end you'll be toasted...some of these are tough)

1. Who is Ben Marble?

(a) The Pentagon official who said that George W. Bush’s staged videoconference with U.S. troops in Iraq made him “livid.”

(b) The Texas liquor-authority agent who arrested George W. Bush’s intoxicated nephew John for resisting arrest.

(c) The former White House speechwriter who said that Harriet Miers, the Supreme Court nominee, told him that George W. Bush was the most brilliant man she’d ever met.

(d) The Gulfport, Mississippi, onlooker who twice interrupted Dick Cheney’s conversation with reporters to tell Cheney, “Go fuck yourself.”

2. True or false: During Sky News Ireland’s coverage of George W. Bush’s reaction to Hurricane Katrina, the network paraphrased his comments with the caption “BUSH: ONE OF THE WORST DISASTERS TO HIT THE U.S.”

3. To what was George W. Bush referring when he said, “The best place for the facts to be done is by somebody who’s spending time investigating it”?

(a) The investigation into Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s stock sale.

(b) The investigation into the role of the White House aide Karl Rove in the Valerie Plame case.

(c) The indictment of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on money-laundering charges.

(d) The indictment of the former Bush Administration budget official David Safavian on charges of lying and obstruction of justice.

4. What did Dick Cheney say when asked why he didn’t cut his Wyoming fly-fishing vacation short until several days after Katrina hit New Orleans?

(a) “Go fuck yourself.”

(b) “I didn’t stop smoking until after my fourth heart attack, so some things take a while to sink in with me.”

(c) “I came back four days early.”

(d) “The trout were biting big-time.”

Who said what about stranded flood victims?

5. Barbara Bush.

6. Wolf Blitzer.

7. Bill O’Reilly.

(a) “So many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway. This is working very [chuckling] well for them.”

(b) That many of them were “drug-addicted.”

(c) “So many of these people, almost all of them that we see, are so poor, and they are so black.”

8. While speaking to hurricane victims in Mississippi, Laura Bush twice mistakenly referred to the storm as:

(a) Catalina. (c) Condoleezza.

(b) Corina. (d) Karenina.

9. What was notable about the memo sent by FEMA’s director, Michael Brown, to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff hours after the flooding of New Orleans began?

(a) His repeated references to FEMA as the “Federal Emergency Management Association” instead of “Agency.”

(b) The lack of urgency in his request that a thousand workers be sent to the region “within forty-eight hours,” and his suggestion that those workers bring cash, because “A.T.M.s may not be working.”

(c) His prediction that the disaster could be “just the thing” to lead an “already shaky” George W. Bush to start drinking again.

(d) His suggestion that the agency see about setting up “foster barns” for the region’s Arabian horses.

10. Who is Norris Alderson?

(a) The Food and Drug Administration official who resigned in protest of the agency’s refusal to allow over-the-counter sales of the morning-after pill.

(b) The veterinarian with no experience on women’s-health issues who was initially named to run the F.D.A.’s Office of Women’s Health.

(c) The lawyer who was named to run the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency despite having minimal experience in immigration, customs, or law enforcement.

(d) The Manhattan shopper who confronted Condoleezza Rice at Ferragamo, where she was spending thousands of dollars as the situation in New Orleans was deteriorating, and demanded, “How dare you shop for shoes while thousands are dying and homeless?”

11. Three of these statements were made by George W. Bush. Which one did Michael Chertoff make?

(a) “One of the things that people want us to do here is to play a blame game.”

(b) “So please give cash money to organizations that are directly involved in helping save lives—save the life who had been affected by Hurricane Katrina.”

(c) “Louisiana is a city that is largely underwater.”

(d) “We look forward to hearing your vision, so we can more better do our job.”

Who did what?

12. Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.).

13. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-La.).

14. Representative Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.).

15. Representative Richard Baker (R-La.).

16. Representative Tom DeLay (R-Texas).

17. Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.).

(a) Said that God “finally cleaned up public housing in New Orleans.”

(b) Complained about the people who refused to evacuate, and suggested that “there may be a need to look at tougher penalties on those who decide to ride it out and understand that there are consequences to not leaving.”

(c) Said of Dick Cheney, “I would like to believe he’s sick rather than just mean and evil.”

(d) Said that if anyone, including George W. Bush, spoke another word trying to blame local officials for the magnitude of the disaster, “I might likely have to punch him. Literally.”

(e) Approached three newly homeless children in the Astrodome and said, “Now, tell me the truth, boys, is this kind of fun?”

(f) Said of George W. Bush’s photo op in San Diego as New Orleans flooded, “The President was enjoying the day; he was strumming a guitar. I don’t deny him the pleasures of office, but people were drowning.”

18. What did George W. Bush say to reassure people about Harriet Miers?

(a) “She’s the most brilliant woman I’ve ever met.”

(b) “She’s got the best heart of anyone I know, just a super heart.”

(c) “She helped hide the bodies in my National Guard record.”

(d) “She is plenty bright.”

19. What prompted George W. Bush’s response “I’ve got a life to live, and will do so”?

(a) A question about the propriety of taking a five-week vacation when U.S. soldiers were dying in Iraq.

(b) A question about why he was out bike-riding instead of talking to the war protester Cindy Sheehan.

(c) A question about why he flew to California instead of Louisiana after he heard about the New Orleans flooding.

(d) A question about the propriety of wasting so much fuel on trips to New Orleans that had no purpose but to make the public think he was in charge.

20. What did George W. Bush say that the government had to do in response to the New Orleans flooding?

(a) “We’ve got to solve problems. We’re problem-solvers.”

(b) “We’ve got to do the work. We’re work-doers.”

(c) “We’ve got to fire Brownie. We’re Brownie-firers.”

(d) “We’ve got to get rid of that water. We’re water-getter-ridders. Of.”

Posted by Carla at 04:49 PM |

2000

Posted by Carla at 04:31 PM |

Rosa Parks passes away at 92

Rosa Parks passed away yesterday. She was 92 years old.

Parks had a long history of activism and public service. Contrary to popular belief, she didn't refuse her bus seat on a spur-of-the-moment. It was planned as a way to spur change.

» Civil-rights activist, born in Tuskagee, Alabama, USA. After briefly attending Alabama State University, she married and settled in Montgomery, AL, where by 1955 she was working as a tailor's assistant in a department store. Contrary to most early portrayals of her as merely a poor, tired seamstress, who on the spur of the moment refused to surrender her seat in a bus to a white passenger, she had long been a community activist. She had served as secretary of the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and had worked for the Union of Sleeping Car Porters. She had also been involved in previous incidents when refusing to leave a bus seat. By forcing the police to remove, arrest, and imprison her on this occasion, and then agreeing to become a test case of segregation ordinances, she played a deliberate role in instigating the Montgomery bus boycott (1955–6). Dismissed from her job at the department store, in 1957 she became a youth worker in Detroit, MI. As she eventually earned recognition as the ‘midwife’ or ‘mother’ of the civil rights revolution, she became a sought-after speaker nationally.

Parks wasn't the first person to refuse to give up her seat--but she was the "best" candidate to spur the community into action. She was not the first person to be angry about the treatment of Black people on the bus--the Montgomery Bus Boycott was an idea that had been brewing for a long time.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott officially started on December 1, 1955. That was the day when the blacks of Montgomery, Alabama, decided that they would boycott the city buses until they could sit anywhere they wanted, instead of being relegated to the back when a white boarded. It was not, however, the day that the movement to desegregate the buses started. Perhaps the movement started on the day in 1943 when a black seamstress named Rosa Parks paid her bus fare and then watched the bus drive off as she tried to re-enter through the rear door, as the driver had told her to do. Perhaps the movement started on the day in 1949 when a black professor Jo Ann Robinson absentmindedly sat at the front of a nearly empty bus, then ran off in tears when the bus driver screamed at her for doing so. Perhaps the movement started on the day in the early 1950s when a black pastor named Vernon Johns tried to get other blacks to leave a bus in protest after he was forced to give up his seat to a white man, only to have them tell him, "You ought to knowed better."

The simple version of the story leaves out some very important people, such as Jo Ann Robinson, of whom Martin Luther King, Jr., would later write, "Apparently indefatigable, she, perhaps more than any other person, was active on every level of the protest." [3] She was an educated woman, a professor at the all-black Alabama State College, and a member of the Women's Political Council in Montgomery. After her traumatic experience on the bus in 1949, she tried to start a protest but was shocked when other Women's Political Council members brushed off the incident as "a fact of life in Montgomery." After the Supreme Court's Brown decision in 1954, she wrote a letter to the mayor of Montgomery, W.A. Gayle, saying that "there has been talk from 25 or more local organizations of planning a city-wide boycott of buses." By 1955, the Women's Political Council had plans for just such a boycott. Community leaders were just waiting for the right person to be arrested, a person who would anger the black community into action, who would agree to test the segregation laws in court, and who, most importantly, was "above reproach." When fifteen year old Claudette Colvin was arrested early in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat, E.D. Nixon of the NAACP thought he had found the perfect person, but Colvin turned out to be pregnant. Nixon later explained, "I had to be sure that I had somebody I could win with." Enter Rosa Parks.

Parks had taken an interest in Claudette Colvin's case. She was active in the NAACP. Popular myth portrays her as someone who was thrown into the civil rights movement. That's not the case. Parks was active in it for years. Although she worked as a seamstress, it was not work she chose; she was educated but couldn't find a job to match her skills. Black women were hired for domestic and menial jobs.

Parks was also sitting in the Black section of the bus. The rule was Blacks had to give up their seats for standing Whites. Park's protest highlighted the great absurdity of these 'rules'. Everyone in her row was expected to give up their seats for one White man, since it was forbidden for a White person and a Black person to sit in the same row together. Three out of the four people in her row gave up their seats. Parks remained sitting. She was subsequently arrested and charged.

The boycott sparked legal action against the organizers, attempts at false 'compromises', terrorism, subterfuge, and court challenges. Rev. Martin Luther King was one of 89 Blacks charged under an old law prohibiting boycotts--he was ordered to pay $1000 in fines and court costs or serve over a year in prison. 'Compromises' that were nothing more than the status quo were offered. King and another boycott organizer, E.D. Nixon of the NAACP, became targets of terrorists; their homes were bombed. Blacks citizens created a carpooling system; those with cars provided transport for those without. They were routinely pulled over and charged with minor infractions. Their liability insurance was revoked several times.

Once the Supreme Court decided on the matter, things did not just end there. Snipers shot at the newly-integrated buses. Whites tried (and failed at) starting their own bus system. There was a wave of bombings against churches, the homes of prominent Blacks, and black businesses. The perpatrators never served one day in jail.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott spawned the creation of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, with Martin Luther King as its president. It inspired and launched the civil rights movement.

For that, we owe Rosa Parks and everyone in the movement our gratitude.

Posted by at 03:49 PM |

Natalee Holloway's body found!

"The remains of a woman believed to be in her early 20s were found in recent days in a rural Mississippi chicken house, and authorities said Monday they may be a missing Illinois State University student.

Police in Downstate Normal -- where 21-year-old Olamide Adeyooye disappeared two weeks ago from an off-campus apartment -- were notified Sunday or Monday about the possible link. Illinois authorities are sending dental and medical records to the coroner in Newton County, Miss., about 70 miles east of Jackson and Interstate 55."

"Oh... missing -- woman of color. Not Natalee. Never mind. Put it back on Fox News..." And Amurka rolled over and went back to sleep.

And, in other news you may not find on TV, George Galloway gives an advanced tutorial in how to react when under political attack:

Today Mr Galloway repeated denials that he had ever received any oil cash, and told Mr Coleman to "put up or shut up" by either bringing a prosecution or dropping the allegations. The Respect MP accused Mr Coleman of orchestrating a "sneak revenge attack" motivated by a desire to avenge his "humiliation" at the hearing in May.

"I am demanding prosecution, I am begging for prosecution," Mr Galloway told Sky News. "I am saying if I have lied under oath in front of the senate, that's a criminal offence. Charge me and I will head for the airport right now and face them down in court as I faced them down in the senate room.

"Because I publicly humiliated this lickspittle senator Norman Coleman - one of [George] Bush's righthand men - in the US senate in May, this sneak revenge attack has been launched over the past 24 hours."

Posted by Jeff at 12:16 PM |

Why do they hate America?

The White House is pressing Senator McCain to insert an exemption into the defense spending bill which would allow the CIA to torture people. The exemption is needed to give Bush maximum flexibility in waging his war on terrorism, according to VP Cheney and CIA director Porter Goss.

It's interesting to me how this bunch who so clearly favored so-called federalists consistently push for such patently unAmerican policies that are much more inline with the kind of arrogant presumption among the British royalists that led the federalists to rebel.

We hold these truths to be self-evident:

That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
I can hear the Bush loyalists now. "Oh, but that only applies to American citizens."

Really? Well... no, of course not. The fact of that matter is that many of those who later rebelled against the crown had tried to assert their natural rights without resorting to rebellion.

Perhaps the most damning line from the Declaration of Independence:

He [the king] has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.

Hmmm... can you say Gitmo? The only reason the detainee camp was set up at Gitmo was to evade American judiciary powers. And now he wants formal permission to conduct torture there and anywhere else he deems necessary.

That's not what this great nation was founded on, as the evidence so clearly shows.

Why do they hate America?

Posted by Kevin at 10:49 AM |

Tuesday stuff: Things to chew over

I'll be out most of the day brainwashing America's youth to goosestep to the liberal agenda. Here's some stuff to chew over while I'm away today:

Movie Review: I meant to write about this last weekend and I forgot. I went to see A History of Violence about 10 days ago. I don't often go to the movies at the theatre (I have Netflix and I'm the Queen of Pay-Per-View Ti-Vo). This is definitely a film to rent if blood and guts on the big screen isn't your thing.

This film is one of the bloodiest, most violent non-horror films I've seen in quite some time. Viggo Mortensen (sans the greasy Aragorn locks and clean shaven) is intense and electrifying. Every time he was on the screen I couldn't take my eyes off of him. The film is set in a small town in Indiana, where Mortensen leads a quiet life with his family. One day some thugs try to rob his cafe at gunpoint..and Viggo goes into James Bond mode, disarming the thugs and shooting their brains out.

TV crews show up en masse and Viggo is splashed all over the evening news. All of a sudden some mobsters from Philly show up..claiming they know Viggo from way back. The conflict with Viggo's family and the mafia kicks in after that.

The best part of the movie is the William Hurt character, Richie Cusak. He looks and acts like a really pissed off Quaker. It's genuinely hysterical.

All in all it's a fair film..not great. Definitely a matinee or a rental.

Also, I finally got around to purchasing and starting The Assassin's Gate. It's already sparked some really fascinating conversation between Kevin and myself...which I hope we'll be writing about in the coming days.

And finally...the GOP has to know they're in trouble when even Howard Kurtz thinks their strategy is lame ass:

"Some perjury technicality"?

Did Kay Bailey Hutchison really say that?
She must have. It was on 'Meet the Press.'

Is this the Republican strategy for dealing with any CIA leak indictments? Saying no real crimes were committed, just a teensy weensy bit of perjury? Turning Patrick Fitzgerald into Ken Starr?

I hasten to add that I have no idea whether anyone will be indicted. I've never met Pat Fitzgerald, and had problems with the way he threatened reporters with jail, but as the U.S. attorney in Chicago who went after some Daley cronies, he has a sterling reputation.

It is true that prosecutors who can't prove the original crime often wind up bringing perjury and obstruction charges. But lying to investigators, or to a federal grand jury, strikes at the heart of the law-enforcement process. This happens to be the message that GOPers pounded over and over again when Clinton dissembled over Monica, so surely they take it seriously. Or is that only when a Democrat is president?

When you lose Howard.....

Posted by Carla at 07:58 AM |

October 24, 2005

I report, you decide.

Before we started Preemptive Karma, Kevin and I used to participate in a Senate Simulation game on AOL. It was held on the AOL News message board system (later moved to Games..where it fell apart, hence our need to find a new forum to discuss/debate politics).

When I joined the SIM Senate, I jumped right in to the debate fray. I've loved debating and talking politics since I can remember. I especially enjoy debating those with whom I disagree. The SIM Senate was a perfect place to engage such individuals.

Which leads me to why I bothered to comment on this post that I came across today via Instapundit. The author of the post, Bill Crawford, opines on a piece written by Leonard Pitts of the Miami Herald:

So moral authority gives you the right to speak out, right? Wrong. Here is Pitts October 21, 2005 writing about the father of a murder victim who supports the death penalty:

"The spots -- devastating in their power and staggering in their cynical use of the moral authority that comes with loss -- have put Kaine on the defensive by making him out to be soft on the death penalty."

Apparently Mr. Pitts only supports the use of moral authority when it fits into his liberal world-view.

Except that isn't what Pitts was saying at all. He never once states that those who support the death penalty because their children have been murdered don't have the right to speak out. He is stating (quite obviously) that Kilgore's use of them in his campaign commercials is cynical because of Kilgore's foresworn moral objection to the death penalty because of his Catholicism:

Them's fightin' words in Virginia. Because Virginia, which executes people with a gusto rarely seen in any state this side of Texas, loves its death penalty. Hence, Kaine's conundrum: He's a Catholic who says he has moral objections to state-sanctioned execution. But he has promised voters he would absolutely uphold the law if elected.

Which led me, of course, to respond in the comments section of this blog.

I don't know if this makes me a masochist or just really hard core argumentative.

I report, you decide.

Posted by Carla at 12:09 PM |

"Culture of Corruption"--GOP style

People Powered Howard is at it again.

As one of the few Democrats who manages to be honestly direct on a regular basis, Howard no doubt pisses off the rightwing establishment by cutting to the chase:

The Bush White House is the most corrupt administration in U.S. history since President Warren G. Harding's, said Howard Dean during his first visit to Maine as chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Dean's comments Saturday came as top White House advisers are being investigated for their roles in the outing of a CIA operative and Tom DeLay, the former second-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, faces conspiracy and money-laundering charges.

"The first thing we're going to do is we're going to have ethics come back to Washington again," said Dean, the keynote speaker at Saturday night's annual fundraising dinner for the Maine Democratic Party at the Lewiston Armory.

Bring ethics "back" to Washington? When has Washington ever been an ethical place?

That said, his point remains. The Republican Party has completely abandoned any pretense of ethics. They've managed to do in 10 years what it took the Dems 40 years: completely corrupt themselves right in the public's face.

The least we can do is put the government back into some sort of balance..forcing the two major parties to keep a closer eye on one another.

The leadership of the GOP is in a mess. The Executive Branch is rife with corruption at the highest levels...right next to the President and Vice President. The Legislative Branch has it's entire leadership tainted by the stink of Abramoff scandal. And now we know that the Senate Majority Leader is probably a big, fat liar, which puts him in league with his Republican colleagues.

This is the current crop of conservatives. Hungry for power, lustfull for to make their ideology a reality no matter what the cost in terms of law and order.

And no checks on their power.

Posted by Carla at 10:10 AM |

Count Bloodcount, at your service!

And so Halloween is upon us in earnest, and there's nothing more fright-tastic or scare-ific than how the news is about to get managed, tortured, and abused -- the better to distract you from any indictments! -- in the next couple weeks. Ready; set; SCARE!

FBI Papers Indicate Intelligence Violations
Booooo! The FBI's watching yoooouuuuu!

Britain confirms first case of bird flu.
What will you do, when the big bad flu comes after you?

Look Scooby! over there!
Osama Bin Laden Is Dead And Buried: Multan Newspaper (Pakistan)

And the undead shall walk the earth, fearing no prison or punishment in their re-animated state:
Delighted to be indicted: Congressman DeLay smiles in the face money-laundering charges

"Asleep yet?"
"Nope!"
"Well, ring if you need anything... cup o' cyanide or like that..."

Posted by Jeff at 07:47 AM |

October 23, 2005

Welcoming George Will to the Reality Based Community

Dear Mr. Will:

It is with great excitement that I welcome you to the Reality Based Community. It seems you've finally awoken to the silly, unjustifiable, pungently dishonest and fundamentally illogical excuses made by those who support George W. Bush.

Your column today truely highlights your epipany:

Such is the perfect perversity of the nomination of Harriet Miers that it discredits, and even degrades, all who toil at justifying it. Many of their justifications cannot be dignified as arguments. Of those that can be, some reveal a deficit of constitutional understanding commensurate with that which it is, unfortunately, reasonable to impute to Miers. Other arguments betray a gross misunderstanding of conservatism on the part of persons masquerading as its defenders.

Very interesting insights, George. Ironically those same statements about dignifying arguments and deficits of understanding would appropriately cover much of the Republican Party. Beginning with 9/11 and Iraq, the Republican Party has twisted, lied, bungled and otherwise completely wrecked itself with the majority of the American people and most of the world.

While I realize you've probably considered we liberals a nagging pain in the ass in the past, perhaps now you'll finally be able to understand our very real concerns about the direction this country is heading based on the policies enacted by the Republican Party.

The current brand of conservatism has moved our nation away from world partnerships and back into a robber baron class system. While it's likely you support that in part, it's refreshing to see that you're capable of moving outside the conservative box (even though your chief complaint is about a lack of true conservatism) its at least a step in the correct direction.

Love,

Carla

Posted by Carla at 07:01 PM |

Are the righties planting stories to submarine Miers?

This is weird.

World Net Daily:

Miers panel to hear 'explosive testimony'?

Gag order lifted for ex-lottery boss claiming Miers kept 'lid' on Bush Guard controversy

Released from a gag order, Larry Littwin – the controversial former director of the Texas Lottery under Harriet Miers – is free to appear at the upcoming Supreme Court confirmation hearings to give "potentially explosive" testimony damaging both to President Bush and his nominee, according to WND columnist Jerome Corsi.

As WorldNetDaily has reported, Littwin allegedly was fired by Miers because he wanted to investigate improper political influence-buying by lobbyists for GTECH, the firm contracted to run the lottery.

Corsi believes that Littwin, according to an examination of hundreds of contemporary Texas newspaper accounts, will be able to establish under oath that the GTECH contract was preserved on a no-bid basis by then-chairwoman of the Lottery Commission Miers in order to "keep the lid on" the National Guard controversy involving then-Gov. Bush.

World Net Daily is a notorious planting ground for the rightwing smear machine. Their "journalism" is dubious at best, so whether there's a real story there or not remains to be seen.

Clearly someone (or lots of someones) is clearly unhappy with Miers as the SCOTUS nominee and wants to get some dirt out there on her. Fascinatingly this seems to be from the right..given that it's World Net Daily.

Pass the popcorn. This is turning out to be some hella good political theatre.

(hat tippage to Seeing The Forest)

Posted by Carla at 09:55 AM |

How much is your blog worth?

PK is enough to get me started on that lifestyle to which I'd like to become accustomed:

via Roxanne

Posted by Carla at 08:15 AM |

October 22, 2005

Saturday Garden Blogging: Composting edition

I finally broke down last Spring and bought a composter. And then I let the damn thing sit there all Spring and Summer instead of putting it together and composting.

I've been out most all day doing garden clean up. We had a windstorm here at the front end of this week and it made a hella mess.

My pole beans were up on a trellis in a raised bed. The wind blew the whole thing over and the trellis collasped into a heap into the next bed over. I got part of it cleaned up yesterday but did the bulk of it this morning. And once I get started, I can't stop. I started moving from bed to bed..pulling out the dead plants and cleaning out leaves and debris.

Before I knew it, my entire yard waste can was crammed full. Yard waste pickup isn't for another week and a half and I still have to try and mow the grass (ok, my son does the mowing. I live vicariously through him). So I decided to put the composter together.

Basically, I have a big ass Darth Vader mask in my backyard on the ground near the end of my deck. I opened up the top, dumped in the dead marigolds, tomato plants, leaves, etc..leaving my yard waste container still about 2/3 full. But at least I'm composting now.

By the way if anyone has any good composting tips, lay 'em on me.

Posted by Carla at 02:50 PM |

Loving The Lion King

Last evening I went with my family to see The Lion King at Keller Auditorium in Portland.

My kids have been to the theatre before. They're fortunate enough to attend school in a district where parents and teachers have occasionally sent kids to plays during the school day. But The Lion King is a full blown musical production. And it's beautiful.

Just over a year ago I took in the London production of this show. It's better than the one I saw last night at Keller (with the exception of the young woman who plays Nala, who was easily the best singer in the company and her acting wasn't too shabby either).

This production is a wonderful way to introduce kids to musical theatre. Most of the songs are familiar. It's got a dark side...but most good stories have that dark conflict that needs to be resolved. The costuming and puppetry are beautiful and creative.

The best part of all: I spent the evening with my family doing something special and amazing.

Posted by Carla at 08:38 AM |

October 21, 2005

Waxing nostalgic

From my DC trip last May, the door of the House Majority Leader:

I like knowing that name isn't on that door anymore.

Posted by Carla at 03:11 PM |

Jib-Jab rides again: Big Box Mart

The clever kids over at Jib Jab have a hilarious new animation. It's an homage to the lazy, fast food economics of shopping at deep discount stores.

An excerpt:

Oh Big Box Mart, what do you have for me?
Cuz our shopping carts are empty and we're on a shopping spree.

I come to the Big Box Mart, cuz I do have lots of needs,
And they sell crap the cheapest with their discounts guaranteed.

Go check it out.

Posted by Carla at 02:39 PM |

"Feminists for life"..the ultimate contradiction in terms

I've spent a lot of time since Kev and I started this blog thinking about feminism.

For me, being a feminist means giving women choices about their lives and what they want to do with them. If a woman wants to get married, stay at home and raise a family..that option should be open to her. If a woman wants to go to college and expand herself intellectually that option should be hers as well. Feminism is inherently about choice.

Which is why Feminists for Life is a complete contradiction in terms. This post is a prime example:

The words that pro-choicers use now a days really upsets me. One phrase in particular. "Women should have the same reproductive freedoms as men." They make it sound like men can give birth, and kill their babies whenever they want, but women are these poor slaves shackled to a wall, forced to bear, and raise, these horrible monster children. They fail to realize that Women will *NEVER* have the same freedoms as men, because men can't, and won't ever be able to, give birth. Instead of trying to make themselves 'equal' to men, they need to seriously realize that, due to basic differences of our bodies, we will never be able to be equal. We will always be as good as each other, but we will never be equal.

What they *should* be saying, in my opinion, is "Women need to define themselves, and their bodies, as a species apart from men, and not treat treat them how men, and the male-dominated society says we should treat them, but as we feel our hearts tell us to."
Or something like that. I can't quite get the words in my head to reflect the words on the screen... but still, it just makes me so mad! Even the best-operated transexual will never be equal to women. Again, not better or worse, the same in quality, just not equal.

Gender equity IS about women having equal opportunities as men..not being equal to men. No, men can't bear children. But blathering on about how women "are killing their babies" diminishes the role and responsibility of men while guilting women into bearing an unwanted child. Not only is this the antithesis of feminism...it's degrading to both men and women.

And since when are we not the same species? Men and women are both Homo Sapiens. Women will never be the same as men. That isn't the point. But women must be afforded the same rights, responsibilities and opportunities. This is feminism.

It's not about children being "horrible monsters". It's about a woman taking responsibility and control of her own situation. It's about self-determination because we know what is right for ourselves. Forcing women to carry unwanted fetuses and bear unwanted children (who for the current crop of rightwing power brokers are worthless once they've passed the cervix) takes away the inherency of feminism.

Women must have the right to self determination. This is a basic civil right. Reproductive freedom is the doorway to the inalienable right to pursuit of happiness. Women must be allowed to take responsibility for their lives.

This group is against one of the cornerstones of feminism, in my view.

Posted by Carla at 07:00 AM |

October 20, 2005

Rove throws Libby under the bus

They're starting to cannibalize each other:

White House adviser Karl Rove told the grand jury in the CIA leak case that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, may have told him that CIA operative Valerie Plame worked for the intelligence agency before her identity was revealed, a source familiar with Rove's account said yesterday.

In a talk that took place in the days before Plame's CIA employment was revealed in 2003, Rove and Libby discussed conversations they had had with reporters in which Plame and her marriage to Iraq war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV were raised, the source said. Rove told the grand jury the talk was confined to information the two men heard from reporters, the source said.

The reporters in question are Judith Miller and Tim Russert..both of whom said separately that they didn't reveal the name to Libby and Rove.

The unraveling of the once disciplined, well-oiled Bush machine is causing consternation among the conservative media as well. Their latest meme is the criminalization of conservatives. As if it's the fault of liberals that so many conservatives are under indictment for various scandals.

If you don't want your people to be considered corrupt...stop associating yourself with corrupt people. It's common knowledge that Karl Rove is a mealy mouthed, slimy, no good jerk who will do absolutely anything to win. He did it in Texas. He has a history of being a really bad guy. Stop associating with him. Stop giving him power. It's not that tough to figure out.

Posted by Carla at 07:29 AM |

The Assassin's Gate

I've heard about this book in several places this week. Once on the Al Franken radio show and once over at Crooked Timber.

It appears to be an expose' on the conspiracies and controversies leading up to the Iraq invasion.

Has anyone read it?

Posted by Carla at 07:25 AM |

October 19, 2005

Absolut Corruption

Graphic by Maria at 2 Political Junkies (click on graphic) via TomPaine.com

Posted by Kevin at 09:44 PM |

Chertoff: FEMA to blame for Katrina problems

Well...well...well...

So much for the rightwing theory that the Katrina screw ups were all about Nagin and Blanco.

Chertoff sings:

WASHINGTON -- The Federal Emergency Management Agency's lack of planning, not the failures of state and local officials, was to blame for much of what went wrong with the government's response to Hurricane Katrina, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told member of Congress today.

The assessment by the most senior administration official to answer legislators' questions since the hurricane struck in late August contrasted sharply with testimony offered earlier by former FEMA Director Michael Brown. Brown had blamed the "dysfunction" of Louisiana state and local officials for the problems that hobbled the relief effort.

"From my own experience, I don't endorse those views," Chertoff said.

He told lawmakers that he found the governors and mayors of the region to be responsive as the crisis unfolded.

I wonder if Chertoff had Bush's blessing to shove the whole thing off on Brown. Or will Chertoff eventually be forced to cop to the ill preparedness and screw ups of Homeland Security?

Florida is about to get slammed by Wilma. Hard.

Who are they going to blame for the mess after that?

Posted by Carla at 07:28 PM |

Hillary's opponent gaffes again

If this woman was paid by the screw up...she'd be swimming in loot:

That's a difference between Democrats and Republicans _ we don't want them next door molesting children and murdering women," said the Westchester County prosecutor, according to Wednesday's Elmira Star-Gazette newspaper.

--Jeanine Pirro, New York Senate Candidate

Is she really this stupid?

That kind of rhetorical nonsense might play well in Oklahoma (hello Tom Coburn), but in New York?

Jeez.

Posted by Carla at 02:25 PM |

The naughty, naughty poor

Shorter Dan Seligman: The poor are poor because they keep acting like people who don't have money.

It's getting rather old to chalk off poverty to bad behavior, as if scads of money and some class cred don't go a long way in easing things for our own middle- and upper-class wayward mistakes. Couple this with the usual paranoia about a non-existent liberal media, and you'd normally have a typical bash-the-poor article. This article is different, though. In this article, Seligman proves us pinkos right in his own odd, roundabout way.

But let's get right to the fisking.

The [series] mainly consisted of 11 long articles whose cumulative message was gloomy. In the stage-setting first article, readers were told that we live in a meritocracy, but even so, life remains unfair. How so? "Merit, it turns out, is at least partly class-based. Parents with money, education and connections cultivate in their children the habits that the meritocracy rewards. When their children then succeed, their success is seen as earned." You can always count on the Times not to be taken in by upscale kids merely because they have superior educations and solid work ethics .

Damn those poor people! It's their own fault for not going to a good prep school and getting into Harvard.

When Jonathan Kozol visited schools in poor areas, he found backed-up toilets, malfunctioning heating systems, asbestos, fungus, and leaky roofs. For starters. Some classes are taught--or, more accurately, staffed--by permanent substitute teachers. They don't have enough textbooks, let alone current textbooks.

What poor family can get a kid the medical care he or she needs when they get asthma from the fungus and the mold? What kid is going to think, yeah, I want to stay in school when you can't even use the toilets because they stink so badly?

Smoking. According to the federal government's "Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report," high school dropouts are almost three times as likely to smoke as are college graduates.

Ahem. . .that wouldn't have anything at all to do with the fact that Tobacco companies target poor neighborhoods, would it? That billboards are usually not allowed in wealthy city neighborhoods or towns? Those are reserved for the poor, and often minority, neighborhoods.

A Chicago Lung Association survey found 27% more billboards in predominantly African American wards in Chicago than in white wards. 59 In Washington, D.C. , few alcohol and tobacco billboards were found in ward 3, which is predominantly white; however, 78% of billboards advertised alcohol or tobacco in wards 7 and 8, which are heavily African American. A similar pattern of targeting ethnic and poor neighborhoods was found in St. Louis ,Atlanta , and San Francisco .

Based on the evidence cited elsewhere in this report, it is reasonable to assume that the higher density of tobacco billboards in poor, ethnic neighborhoods is responsible for smoking by large numbers of young people in racial and ethnic populations in urban areas. This is a matter of great concern given the recent report that smoking prevalence increased substantially from 1991 to 1997 among African American high school students (from 12.6% to 22.7%) and among Hispanic students (from 25.3% to 34.0%).

But okay. Smoking means you'll be poor. Or if you're poor you're more likely to smoke, therefore you deserve to be poor. Unless you're wealthy. Then it's okay. Or something like that.

Bad driving. Socioeconomic status is the strongest determinant of vehicle-occupant deaths on the road, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Men and women who have not completed high school are three times as likely as those who have been to college to be killed while in a motor vehicle. Noncollegiates are more likely to drive after drinking alcohol and to not use seat belts.

Besides the fact that men and women who haven't completed high school are more likely to come from poor families, live in poor neighborhoods, and go to the previously-mentioned poor (and horrific) schools, it's their fault for driving badly because they're poor. A rich person would never get on drugs or become an alcoholic, or they'd have the good grace to check into a nice facility to help them dry out. If the poor can't afford that, it's their problem. Certainly, if they were wealthy and got sauced, they'd be driving a Volvo and would walk away from the accident. Not to mention the charges, since they could afford a good lawyer.

Besides which, if a stupid person is going to drive a Chevy Nova and not a Volvo, they deserve what they get.

Overeating. Data from the latest (1999-2000) National Health î Nutrition Examination Survey tell us that women with less than a high school education are 26% more likely to be obese than those with a college degree.

A friend of mine is a pediatrician in a hospital in a poor city. She sees a lot of the people Seligman is talking about. She treats a lot of obese kids, and used to think they were the products of permissive parents, until she stuck around. "There are no grocery stores there," she said. "None." She said if you don't have a car, you can't drive twenty miles to get to a grocery store, unless you're willing to take your kids and commute on a couple of buses, get your groceries, and lug them and your kids back home. On the buses. Possibly between shifts, which means you won't do it, because you can't afford to miss work.

So their options are fast food and whatever fare they can get at convenience stores. Not the cheapest option, but when it's the only one, you go with it.

Spousal abuse. A survey article in the Journal of the American Medical Women's Association reports that income is inversely related to prevalence of domestic violence.

Other studies show that spousal abuse is evenly distributed across class lines. AMWA certainly has some studies that would make a good conservative go apopoleptic, including their findings that men who own guns were more likely to threaten their partners with them. But the survey article's take on it was a little different from Seligman's--instead of inferring that people were poor because they were violent, they inferred that batterers were violent because they were poor. It does make one look askance at the "marry your way out of poverty" solution put forth by the right, though.

Teenage pregnancy. Teenage pregnancies have declined somewhat in recent years but still run around 850,000 annually and are still heavily concentrated in low-status populations. Says the publication Family Planning Perspectives: "Being disadvantaged is associated with an early age of first intercourse, less reliance on or poor use of contraceptives, and lower motivation to avoid having a child."

Again, it's a matter of deciding that they are poor because they are teen mothers, or they became teen mothers because they are poor. But no matter, here's an interesting study that shows pinko nations that actually have decent social welfare and assistance programs for the poor have lower rates of teen pregnancies. And I'm not just talking about a lower rate difference of five percent or so. Sweden, that scourge of libertarians everywhere, has a teen pregnancy rate of four percent. The US has a teen pregnancy rate of 22 percent. If anything, this gives credence to the argument that we should extend a helping hand rather than preach about values and good behavior.

Delinquency. Studies based on the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth show that low social class correlates strongly with (a) likelihood to drop out of high school and (b) delinquency among both males and females.

Well, let's review. . .Jane goes to a school with a leaky roof, backed up toilets, overcrowded classrooms, a few outdated textbooks, and "permanent substitute" teachers. She lives in a firetrap that is supposed to pass for public housing. Both her school and her home have mold and aggravate her asthma, which she can't get treatment for because she doesn't have health insurance. Her diet isn't great because her folks work two jobs to make ends meet and still can't make the trek out to the grocery store, which is a real hike if you don't have a reliable car.

Um. . .delinquency is shocking because. . .why?

So let's review--if you hit your spouse, smoke, drive badly, or are overweight, you're probably poor. And you're poor because you've been naughty.

Seligman makes the common error of taking consequences of poverty and labeling them causes. Aside from all of the moralizing and finger-wagging on his part, he does manage to show that the only way to help the poor is to actually give the poor some assistance, decent schools, a healthy place to live, and everything else that people need to thrive.

Posted by at 10:31 AM |

Weekend plans?

Apart from that, not much goin' on. You?

Posted by Jeff at 10:10 AM |

No one to Plame but themselves

The conventional wisdom on the Plame outing has been that the The Intelligence Identities Protection Act isn't applicable to those who outed CIA agent Valerie Plame. Larry Johnson of No Quarter begs to differ:

Valerie Plame was a "covert agent" as defined by the law. In her cover position as a consultant to Brewster-Jennings, Ms. Plame served overseas on clandestine missions. Just because she did not live overseas full time does not mean she did not work overseas using her status as a non-official cover officer.

Unfortunately, the organized plot by White House officials to expose Valerie Plame also permanently ended her ability to ever serve overseas in an official cover position. At a minimum, U.S. tax payers invested at least $250,000 (that is in 1985 dollars) in training Valerie as a case officer. Karl Rove, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, and others not yet revealed destroyed by their reckless acts her career, a CIA front company, and a network of intelligence assets.

Johnson includes a copy of Intelligence Identities Protection Act in the post linked above. Plame's status as a covert agent when she was outed is already established.

More telling than this however (which Johnson points out as well), is the President of the United States is willing to tolerate people in his Administration who out CIA agents during a time of war.

Even more to the point, this behavior is "normalized" by the codependents in the conservative media. From their lips, it's perfectly normal and acceptable to blow the cover of a CIA operative if her husband has done political damage to the boss.

It also seems evident that the people involved never thought the investigation would get this far. RAW STORY is reporting that Vice Presidential aide John Hannah is now fully cooperating with special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, after being threatened with an imminent indictment.

Cheney aide Lewis Libby may have the biggest of the Plame problems. A lawyer for Judith Miller is saying that Libby is in trouble if he made claims to the grand jury that he had never talked to Miller about Plame.

On a side note, Karl Rove is cancelling appearances at Republican events. Perhaps as damage control for the party due to his own possible indictment?

Posted by Carla at 07:15 AM |

October 18, 2005

Book em, Danno

From the subscription only NYT:

Before Friday, DeLay, a Republican from Sugar Land, Texas, will likely spend about an hour being fingerprinted and photographed, she said. He'll also be required to state his attorneys for the record.

Travis County allows some defendants to do a ''walkthrough'' booking
process, in which the defendant is photographed and fingerprinted. But
DeLay's bond amount would be preset so he could immediately pay it and avoid
a stay in jail.

Oh man...what a great "Write Your Own Caption" that mug shot will make.

Posted by Carla at 07:23 PM |

"I'm Jeanine Pirro. This is as good as I get"

"I got to tell you, was it my best day? Absolutely not," she said before adding emphatically, "Am I better than that? Absolutely not."

--New York Senate candidate Jeanine Pirro, who hopes to overcome a massive drought in the polls against Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Posted by Carla at 03:16 PM |

Suicide?

A British military investigator in Iraq, Captain Ken Masters, was found hanged in his quarters in Basra, Iraq. Captain Masters was a member of the Royal Military Police Special Investigations Branch (SIB).

The Independent:

Captain Masters, who was married with two children, was commissioned from the ranks in 2001 and served most of his career with the SIB. His family is believed to be living in Northern Ireland. He was not receiving any medical or psychological treatment and no suicide notes were found when his body was discovered at the main British military base in Basra. Emphasis is mine.

The only other British soldier to die in Iraq under similar circumstances was... (drum roll)... also a member of the Royal Military Police Special Investigations Branch.

Hmmm...?

This coming from the same Basra where just under a month ago two British soldiers were arrested by local police. The British government has charged that the Basra police are heavily infiltrated by al Queda. They've even charged that the crowds that gathered and threw stones at British soldiers afterwards were orchestrated by al Queda. What they haven't explained is why two British soldiers were driving around Basra "under cover".

Call me a conspiracy nut if that helps. But, something just doesn't add up here.

Posted by Kevin at 02:14 PM |

Judith Miller - more questions than answers

Via TomPaine.Com, David Corn offers up some interesting commentary on the case. But, by far the most interesting thing I've read lately about it is Kevin Featherly's essay questioning Miller's assertion that she had security clearance from the federal government.

And given that we now know Miller had access to government secrets, isn't it in the least bit possible that the secret source Judy Miller is now protecting is, in fact, herself?

Holy something-or-other, Batman! Now that's a possibility that had simply never occurred to me. If true then it is highly troubling on many fronts. If reporters are actively hiding government secrets then who in the hell can we trust to expose the never ending supply of dirty little secrets that politicians seem to begat as a matter of course?

Featherly ends on a note that I heartily concur with:

A Final Note The Society of Professional Journalists, of which I am a member, is planning to hand Judith Miller its prestigious First Amendment Award at its national convention on Tuesday.

I'd like to make a request of the SPJ: Suspend the award.

It may be that Judith Miller deserves it. But there are an awful lot of questions about whether she was working to protect the interests of a free press, or whether she was acting in her own interests, or in the interests of the government that had given her special access to its secrets.

I would request that SPJ investigate this case prior to committing itself to this award, possibly tainting it for all time. SPJ frequently launches investigations in the interests of journalism, for instance when university administrations crack down on campus reportage--and it doesn't always find in favor of reporters.

This is a case where that kind of investigation is more than merited.

My proposal? Hold off on giving this award to anyone until 2006. If Judy Miller is telling the truth, it is hard to imagine a more deserving case of protecting press freedoms will emerge next year. She could legitimately recieve the award--with all due apologies--in 2006.

If she is being evasive, if she is protecting the wrong interests in this case--comforting the comfortable rather than the afflicted--she doesn't deserve any reward.

Hear, hear!

Update: Jazz over at Running Scared seems to concur with Daily Kos that Ari Fleischer may have cut a deal with Fitzgerald and will finger the players.

Posted by Kevin at 01:55 PM |

Poor Bill...somebody has stepped on his falafel...

Waaaaaaaaaaa:

O'Reilly calls the ongoing battles "tremendously wearing and debilitating," adding, "I don't need the approval of the press, but I just wish they'd stop the viciousness.

Welcome to your karma, Bill.

Posted by Carla at 01:31 PM |

Tuesday good reads

I'll be out most of the morning indoctrinating the minds of America's youth. Here are a few good reads to keep you company:

Pen and Sword: Draft beer, not Condi

Think Progress: Email contradicts Pentagon spin

Crooked Timber: Vices and Virtues of the Welfare State

Maha: Plame on

Rising Hegemon: In a historical moment rivalled only by last night's selection of Meat Loaf...

See you this afternoon.

Posted by Carla at 07:19 AM |

October 17, 2005

More liberal media

Headline:

Court Won't Let Bush Push Tobacco Penalty

So Dear Leader was chomping at the bit to go after the tobacco settlement money?

Bush new Chief Justice was just seated and has a huge influence on which cases are heard and which isn't. As the SCOTUS has refused to hear the case...the appellate court ruling stands.

We're supposed to believe that Bush wanted to go after the big tobacco settlement? Would this be because the Bush Administration has such a vast and storied history of penalizing corporate malfeasance?

Not likely. They'd have to commit Hari Cari to do it.

Posted by Carla at 12:30 PM |

Talk to the hand..maybe it'll believe you

John Hinderaker is complaining that the stories on Karl Rove's role in the Plame investigation is nothing more than a hatchet job.

In an attempt to back up his assertion, Hinderaker uses a flawed Weekly Standard opinion piece by Stephen Hayes and a weak editorial by William Kristol to claim that it's the liberals fault that Republicans are cast as criminals. Rove, Libby and even DeLay have actually done nothing wrong. It's the leftwing liberal media using it's power to castigate the poor, downtrodden conservatives who are wielding the sword of truth and the shield of good government.

I wonder if Hinderaker has to hide out to write these posts. There is no way he could be doing this with a straight face:

JOHN adds: It's an astonishing thing. There is only one really significant point about the Plame story: former Ambassador Joe Wilson lied about his own trip to Niger in the pages of the New York Times, as part of the Democratic Party's effort to bring down the Bush administration. This fact cannot be seriously disputed, yet it is virtually blacked out in the mainstream media.

Except the "Wilson lied" claim has been seriously disputed and DISPROVED. Wilson said that at the behest of the Veep's office, the CIA was asked to send someone to investigate the Niger uranium issue. The CIA sent Wilson. There is no lie.

But even Wilson had been lying, it still doesn't explain the need to go after Wilson's wife. All the conservatives had to do was prove that Wilson didn't tell the truth about the Niger uranium issue.

Only they couldn't. Because Wilson wasn't lying.

They were.

Posted by Carla at 10:37 AM |

One Nation Under... Corporations

An interesting, in a geeky way, story this morning on Yahoo caught my interest.

Biggest Wi-Fi Cloud Is in Rural Oregon is an AP piece about wireless local area computer networks. The entire point of Wi-Fi is to allow mobile devices such as laptop computers and PDA's access a local network wirelessly. The coverage area for a Wi-Fi LAN is called a "cloud". Alright... enough geek-speak.

The AP story relates how the largest Wi-Fi cloud in the nation is found in northeastern Oregon. Which is very handy for onion farmer Bob Hale.

"Parked alongside his onion fields, Bob Hale can prop open a laptop and read his e-mail or, with just a keystroke, check the moisture of his crops."

'"Outside the cloud, I can't even get DSL," said Hale. "When I'm inside it, I can take a picture of one of my onions, plug it into my laptop and send it to the Subway guys in San Diego and say, 'Here's a picture of my crop.'"'

So why does Morrow County, which doesn't have a single traffic light, spans 2,000 square miles and is home to only 11,000 residents have access to the biggest Wi-Fi cloud in the nation?

The short answer is: politics. The long answer is: corporate ownership of politicians. And you are paying the price.

Consider the town of Hermiston, the county seat of neighboring Hermiston County, which borders Morrow County and is covered by the Wi-Fi cloud. Their police department has been able to reduce overtime pay because officers are now able to file crime reports from their cars rather than having to drive into the station and rack up overtime writing up reports at the end of their shifts. Guess who pays for that overtime. Citizens pay it via taxes.

The possibilities for Wi-Fi are virtually endless. But, big corporations which are racking in $$$ with competing systems for internet access such as DSL and Cable, such access is only one small part of what Wi-Fi offers, have put up stiff resistance to efforts to introduce large-scale Wf-Fi clouds to heavily populated metropolitan areas.

In Philadelphia, for instance, plans to blanket the entire city with Wi-Fi fueled a battle in the Pennsylvania legislature with Verizon Communications Inc., leading to a law that limits the ability of every other municipality in the state to do the same.

One Nation Under... Corporations and their legislative stooges. And YOU are paying the bill.

Posted by Kevin at 10:20 AM |

D'oh! Those crazy Minutemen

The Minutemen weren't welcome in Vermont. Protestors told them they weren't wanted, that their valiant attempts to save our Great Nation against the hordes of swarthy immigrants was a cover for racism.

What's a protector of the American Way (of Life) to do?

Get lost, that's what.

Some of the men stood at a break in the path, which is crossed by the Canadian border close to where they stood. But the group's leader, Bob Casimiro of Weymouth, Mass., was not sure which way to send them.

He pointed down the path toward a footbridge. The Minutemen started walking.

''Stay within sight," he told them. Within minutes, they were out of sight.

Just what we need. More time and resources wasted rescuing a bunch of Clint Eastwood wannabes from the woodlands of New England.

''National security is a big part of this," said [executive director of the Massachusetts Coalition for Immigration Reform]. ''As far as I'm concerned, I don't care where it is, I just want the border secured. We cannot survive as a nation with porous borders like that. It affects our economy, and it affects our culture. We're just rapidly becoming a nation other than the one I grew up in."

You know, I was going to trash this comment and call it bigoted, but then I remembered that the Wampanoags, the Apache, the Lakota, and every other First Nation on this continent felt the same way. If only they had something like the Minutemen. Not THE Minutemen of the time, who didn't give a fig about the First Nations, but their own version.

Back on the bike path, the three Minutemen trudged on in the rain. Finally, they knocked on Amy Audet's door to ask directions.

The border, she told them, was in the opposite direction.

Priceless.

Posted by at 07:58 AM |

October 16, 2005

The latest scuttle on the Plame investigation

For those who just can't get enough opinionated analysis of the most minute details I offer a couple of very interesting analysis of what's going on in special prosecutor Fitzgerald's Grand Jury. And although I rarily read it, a hat tip to Power Line for both of these links:

First is Andrew McCarthy who is apparently a friend of Fitzgerals and a former prosecutor himself.

Next is JustOneMinute where speculation is that Rove's chances of being indicted are 50/50 while Libby's chances are much higher.

Posted by Kevin at 09:00 PM |

October 15, 2005

How to sell yourself into slavery...by Vox Day

Via Amanda, I came across this ridiculous, Dobsonesque, he-man/woman-hater piece of rightwing advice by an man sporting the handle Vox Day.

Vox Day opines the loss of the subservience of women to their uterus and wonders out loud why any woman would be so foolish as to wait more than two decades to wait for motherhood:

And a woman foolish enough to wait more than two decades before attempting to have children has no one to blame but herself. As for the likelihood that the technological future will eventually solve such problems, it is worth noting that no society that possesses artificial wombs, robot sex dolls, multiplayer video games and 24-hour sports networks is one in which men are likely to show a tremendous amount of interest in relationships or the opposite sex.

There you have it, ladies. It's your own fault if you wait until your breasts begin to succumb to gravity to let a man knock you up. If you're not looking sexy enough to get him to put down the remote control or the PS2 controller long enough to inseminate you, it's your own damn problem. You should have been barefoot and pregnant during those years you wasted in college.

But Vox doesn't leave young women hanging. He offers up his advice to get your man early and often:

1. Don't engage in casual dating relationships after 18. They're fun, and they'll also prevent you from pursuing more fruitful relationships.

So if you do manage to get into a good college...your goal had better to be to find a potentially rich guy who'll knock you up in a hurry before you breach the magic age of 20. Don't forget..ESPN is only a remote click away. Gotta get busy before Sportscenter comes on.

2. Make those potential long-term relationships your top priority. If you put college or your job first, there's a reasonable chance that a job is all you'll have at 40 ... and 60. Consider the president's new Supreme Court nominee. The unmarried and childless Creepy McCrypto is on the verge of becoming one of the two most powerful professional women in the country – does she really represent the ideal American woman?

"The ideal American woman..."? Does this guy masturbate to reruns of Leave It To Beaver? Apparently Vox (who claims to be a member of Mensa, btw) didn't bother to access his alledgedly vast intellectual skills to study at any length the life and career of Sandra Day O'Connor who is married and has 3 children, along with her SCOTUS career. But even more stupidly insulting is the idea that somehow a woman can't enjoy a life of intellectual pursuits because this might yield an empty bed and empty womb. Somehow a man is able to manage this life. But a woman cannot. What utter hogwash.

3.Settle earlier rather than later. I can't tell you how many women I know who blew off good men in their late teens and early 20s who now regret doing so. Those who are not still single at 35 are now married to men generally considered to be of lower quality than the men they spurned before. Remember, your choices narrow as you get older, while men's choices broaden.

Here's some real advice: Don't settle at all. Be with the person that you love and who loves you. You deserve it. And do it when you're ready..not when some troglodyte faux Mensa libertarian says so.

4. Let everyone know that marriage and children is your ultimate goal. Too many women, fearing the wrath of the Sisterhood, secretly wish for them while publicly and piously professing feminist-approved cant to the contrary.

What this creep knows about feminism and sisterhood could fit on the head of a pin. Feminism is about choices. It's about empowering women to take control of their lives and do what's right for them. While it might make Mr. Vox feel manly and superior to give marriage priority women his lame-assed list of how to get knocked up by 20, it's about as anti-empowering as it gets. If Vox is really interested in making the lives of marriage priority women easier, he could direct his mysogonistic energies into healing his own skewed view of women.

Vox has a total of 10 pieces of advice ranging from severely distrubed to mildly amusing. The idea that a young woman who wants marriage and family to be a priority would follow these pieces of utter crap is sad indeed. Not only would she sell herself short by "settling" for whatever she can at an early age...she's undercut her own ability to make good decisions about her life.

Women whose main goal is to get married and have a family should definitely work toward that pursuit. But marriage is a commitment not to be taken lightly (and should be considered for life if at all possible)..and children are a lifetime commitment. Choosing an individual to spend the rest of your life with is not an easy decision for a mature, capable woman who's seen her fair share..let alone a girl barely out of her teens. Advising young women to "settle" early is not only irresponsible..it's downright wrong.

And exactly when does Vox Day hold men to this same type of advice? Should marriage priority men be 'settling' early? After all...when men get older their sperm loses motility and the chances of impregnating a woman drop quite a bit. Should these men be giving their remotes and PS2's a batterectomy in an effort to attract a sweet, young thing who can sire a litter?

Posted by Carla at 12:35 PM |

Abu Graib On The Bayou?

Getting worked up about violations of prisoner's civil rights isn't always easy. After all, they were found guilty and sentenced - they're criminals, right? Why should anyone get worked up if some rapist or child molestor gets the rough end of the stick while in prison?

But what if I told you the prisoners in question were arrested for such minor offenses as sleeping in public, begging and public intoxication? What about if they were never actually found guilty but are still waiting to be brought before a judge? Even if found guilty, they would only have spent 10 days at most in jail. Many would have been released on bond and some would never have been prosecuted. What if many of these prisoners are being abused in custody and seem to have been arrested on trumped-up charges just to provide cheap work-crews for messy, back-breaking and oftimes hazardous clean-up duties?

Would you feel differently then?

Cernig over at NewsHog has the rest of this intriguing story.

Posted by Kevin at 09:04 AM |

October 14, 2005

Question for armchair economists

Here's a question that's been rattling around my head since Monday: What kind of impact does massive private individual donations to foreign disaster relief have on our domestic economy?

I mean... if all of that money was basically money that could be spared, what might have been purchased with it which would have helped drive our economy. Alternately... if it was a sizable portion of discretionary (thanks, Spyder) cash then wouldn't that necessarily limit the amount of domestic discretionary spending on basically "wants" rather than "needs"?

I'm not at all against digging deep to help someone in need. It's not about that. I'm just curious how it impacts our economy.

I guess what sparked it was a piece I heard on NPR as I was driving home work and they rattled off all of these major natural disasters over the last year or so - the Tsunami in Asia, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and the recent earthquake in Pakistan. So I wondered what the cummulative effect of all that very generous giving will be. The hurricanes of course were domestic. So, that's a matter of shuffling money. Sure, it probably had a regional effect. But, not in terms of the overall economy. Or at least not much. But, the Tsunami and now the earthquake are situations where money is being pumped out of our economy and into another economy.

Posted by Kevin at 01:16 PM |

Bush in the hood

From the "Today" show this morning:

RUSSERT: And Matt, the most astounding number in this: 2 percent – just 2 percent - of African-Americans give George Bush a positive rating for his performance as President. The memories of Katrina very much in their minds.

Russert clearly has spent extensive time inside the minds of African-Americans. But nothing like the outreach program W is about to start himself:

Give it up for DJ 2%! Rock da house, POTUS!

Posted by Jeff at 12:40 PM |

Humility

Wednesday and Thursday were huge days for me at work. I gave lectures to upwards of 150 people per day on those two days. And they were good. I was definitely on my game.

Driving home from work on those two days I was really patting myself on the back. I am a woman who gets to help shape the opinions and ideas of thousands of people every year. I'm a powerful person! People at my work respect me!

I looked in my mirror last evening completely confident of my self importance and elevated status in the world.

This morning when I got up I had to clean dog puke off of the kitchen floor, almost stepping in it before I got it wiped up. I just finished cleaning two toilets and two showers. I also wiped out my oven and cleaned out my refrigerator.

Later I'll scrub my kitchen and dining room floors.

The most powerful thing about me today is my smell..from sweating while doing all this housework.

Posted by Carla at 12:19 PM |

Support Miers

I think that Democrats should support Harriet Miers nomination as an Associate Justice. Perhaps doing so would be a gamble for them. But, I think it's one worth taking and here's why.

The LA Times has a very interesting piece today which suggests that the scant paper trail we do have for Ms. Miers, her writings as head of the Texas Bar Association, reveals "a glint of liberalism." It is that same scant paper trail that has conservatives so nervous, and for good reason. As president of the State Bar Miers...

• called for increased funding for legal services for the poor and suggested that taxes might have to be raised to achieve the notion of "justice for all."


• used her monthly column in the Texas Bar Journal to condemn politicians who were trying to score points by disparaging the legal profession. She suggested the criticism was myopic, and noted that it was coming, by and large, from Republicans.


• praised the benefits of diversity, called for measures that would send more minority students to law schools, and said that just because a woman was the head of the state bar did not mean that "all unfair barriers for women have been eradicated."


• was upset that although poverty was rising in Texas, impoverished families received a disproportionately small share of welfare and Medicaid benefits.


• was an unapologetic defender of her profession, even the oft-maligned "trial lawyer."

"Lawyers are about seeking the truth, preserving a system to achieve fairness and justice and protecting the freedom of individuals against the tyranny of the majority view," she wrote.

As the LAT piece notes, Ms. Miers is believed to have undergone something of a political evolution since those days. But, long-time friends state that, "She's just not an ideologue."

Consider the Bush White House's strategy thus far. They're holding her religious faith up as a reason why conservatives should support her. But, so what if she's an evangelical! So what if her church is almost universally pro-life as Rove via Dobson suggest! Isn't ex-prez Jimmy Carter an evangelical? Isn't the demonination that Jimmy Carter proudly associates with (Southern Baptist Convention) almost universally pro-life, not to mention pro-GOP?

Other than her religious affiliation, what has the White House offered by way of assurances to their conservative base? They say to trust Bush. That's it! There is nothing that I can see which supports the notion that Ms. Miers would tilt the court to the right. And frankly, there is zero chance that Bush will nominate an open liberal to the court. It won't happen!

Look at Bush's continually eroding approval ratings. He has every incentive in the world to regain popular support however he can. And if throwing a bone to the vast swath of moderate Americans is in fact what he's trying to do with the Miers nomination, what possible political advantage could opposing Ms. Miers give Democrats?

I think it would be as foolish for Democrats to to react in a knee-jerk fashion to Harriet Miers religious affiliation as it would be for Republicans. So far most conservative Republicans seem all too aware that Ms. Miers' affiliation guarantees absolutely nothing in terms of "judicial philosophy." If Democrats are serious about regaining political power then they can't afford to continue to ceed realistic strategy to the conservatives like they've done for the past decade.

The Harriet Miers nomination offers a superb opportunity for Democrats to frame a h