As the news of republican-lobbyist-consultant pay for play sleaze continues to ooze from DC, the completely non-partisan FBI ;-)has done something, never, ever done in the past. It's raided a Congressman's office. More bad news for a Republican? No! This was on a black dem. Congressman from La., William Jefferson. How interesting that with all the Delays, Cunninghams, Neys, Burns and others out there implicated in slime, the FBI is trumpeting this case. No doubt the man is guilty. He was caught taking $100,000 payoffs and hiding the money in his freezer. Plus two guys who bribed him before are singing like canaries.
But it is clear that the Repubs wanted someone to cancel out Cunningham's conviction and distract from the Abramoff web of sleaze. I've already heard the yapping heads say the dems can't use "culture of corruption" any more to describe the Repubs now that one of their own has been snared.
Pathetic. It's like they don't understand what the word "culture" means. Jefferson is a lone bad wolf, working alone to enrich himself. What the Republicans have done is make moving your agenda in Congress dependent on contributions to get Republicans elected. That is a culture of corruption, by definition.
The great part is, no one is buying their claptrap and they look desperate. The sad, grand carnival continues.
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Monday, May 22, 2006
An Inconvenient Truth
I was hoping to stop with all the "outrage" posts and actually compose a modest proposal, but life intervened this weekend and I didn't get to it. But here's a plug for an very interesting film about global warming, starring Al Gore, the former next President of the United States. (He's the guy most of you voted for, but was passed over by the Supreme Court in favor of King George IV.)
The movie is An Inconvenient Truth, and it is a film version of the traveling road show on global warming Al's been doing for sometime. What he does is present all the evidence and likely consequences in a simple and clear way. It opens May 24th on the coasts and here at the Arbor June 16th. For more info go here.
Pledge to see it the first weekend. Should be good.
Of course, the Oil companies aren't taking this laying down Their stooge, called the Competitive Enterprise Institute, whose mission is to spin all science to match their credo that the Free Market is the answer to everything, is fighting back with ads running May 18 to May 28, that would make Joe Goebbels proud. Here's a expose of CEI.
The movie is An Inconvenient Truth, and it is a film version of the traveling road show on global warming Al's been doing for sometime. What he does is present all the evidence and likely consequences in a simple and clear way. It opens May 24th on the coasts and here at the Arbor June 16th. For more info go here.
Pledge to see it the first weekend. Should be good.
Of course, the Oil companies aren't taking this laying down Their stooge, called the Competitive Enterprise Institute, whose mission is to spin all science to match their credo that the Free Market is the answer to everything, is fighting back with ads running May 18 to May 28, that would make Joe Goebbels proud. Here's a expose of CEI.
Friday, May 19, 2006
Patently Corrupt and Pretty Stupid
I'm pasting a bit from an email I got from a Democratic agitation group:
"Alphonso Jackson, the Republican Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, told a story recently during a talk he gave in Dallas. Here's what he said, according to the Dallas Business Journal:
Jackson closed with a cautionary tale, relaying a conversation he had with a prospective advertising contractor.
"He had made every effort to get a contract with HUD for 10 years," Jackson said of the prospective contractor. "He made a heck of a proposal and was on the (General Services Administration) list, so we selected him. He came to see me and thank me for selecting him. Then he said something ... he said, 'I have a problem with your president.'
"I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'I don't like President Bush.' I thought to myself, 'Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected. You wouldn't be getting the contract unless I was sitting here. If you have a problem with the president, don't tell the secretary.'
"He didn't get the contract," Jackson continued. "Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president? Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe.""
What he said he did is, uh, illegal. He later said the story was "anecdotal" (he meant apocryphal) and that the crime he admitted to in public never actually took place. Still, the last line is telling: "That's the way I believe."
So even if he never did what he said he did, he still admits that he believes in such corruption. So he's corrupt, stupid, and ignorant given he thought anecdotal meant apocryphal. Par for the course in this, the worst administration ever.
"Alphonso Jackson, the Republican Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, told a story recently during a talk he gave in Dallas. Here's what he said, according to the Dallas Business Journal:
Jackson closed with a cautionary tale, relaying a conversation he had with a prospective advertising contractor.
"He had made every effort to get a contract with HUD for 10 years," Jackson said of the prospective contractor. "He made a heck of a proposal and was on the (General Services Administration) list, so we selected him. He came to see me and thank me for selecting him. Then he said something ... he said, 'I have a problem with your president.'
"I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'I don't like President Bush.' I thought to myself, 'Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected. You wouldn't be getting the contract unless I was sitting here. If you have a problem with the president, don't tell the secretary.'
"He didn't get the contract," Jackson continued. "Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president? Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe.""
What he said he did is, uh, illegal. He later said the story was "anecdotal" (he meant apocryphal) and that the crime he admitted to in public never actually took place. Still, the last line is telling: "That's the way I believe."
So even if he never did what he said he did, he still admits that he believes in such corruption. So he's corrupt, stupid, and ignorant given he thought anecdotal meant apocryphal. Par for the course in this, the worst administration ever.
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Can't be Safe AND Free?
When you complain about the lack of oversight of NSA spying, the right-wing rejoinder is better they "gather our phone number than our remains." This can only mean that without these programs, an attack will happen. Never mind that idea is not supported by anything but fantasy, the larger idea is that we cannot both be free AND safe. This is just as ludicrous. But I don't hear Tim Russert or any other objecting to this questionable logic. How would asking the NSA to submit to FISA oversight make an attack any more likely? We'd still be spying, just within the confines of the law. How is that bad?
Monday, May 15, 2006
I don't think that word means what you say it does
The NSA is conducting warrantless surveillance of calls coming from or going to suspected terrorists abroad. We are told nothing unlawful is going on. The NSA is collecting a massive database of every phone call ever made to look for "patterns" that might alert them to terrorist activities. This too we are told is lawful. These proclamations give me no comfort because the people making them don't mean the same thing I do when we use the word lawful.
This President and his legal advisors, especially Albert Gonzales, seem to have such an expansive view of presidential power that almost anything he does as commander in chief is legal as long as he says it is. Honestly, that was Gonzales's argument to congress defending the original NSA program revealed some time back. The president alone is the commander in chief and so if he says FISA doesn't apply to the "War on Terror," then it doesn't.
This is the same kind of logic his legal team uses in his signing statements. He signs a bill into law but reserves the right to ignore portions of it if he decides they unconstitutionally infringe on his perogatives.
So when I jump up and say, "Hey, you can't authorize the NSA to ignore FISA, and therefore broke the law," he might say, "No laws were broken in the application of this necessary program." But what he really means is "FISA infringes on my duty to wage war in defense of the nation and therefore I'm not subject to it." These are very different things. The second statement is far from settled. The Supreme Court hasn't weighed in on this and I believe it would not agree. If I'm right, then the administrations claim of "lawfulness" falls apart. It is based on this implied but rarely spoken premise. It is Orwellian double-speak at its finest.
Will any Senator, Dem or Rep, get this and bear this in mind as they question Michael Hayden during confirmation hearings? Will Arlen Specter bear this in mind during his hearings on signing statements in June? Stay tuned...
This President and his legal advisors, especially Albert Gonzales, seem to have such an expansive view of presidential power that almost anything he does as commander in chief is legal as long as he says it is. Honestly, that was Gonzales's argument to congress defending the original NSA program revealed some time back. The president alone is the commander in chief and so if he says FISA doesn't apply to the "War on Terror," then it doesn't.
This is the same kind of logic his legal team uses in his signing statements. He signs a bill into law but reserves the right to ignore portions of it if he decides they unconstitutionally infringe on his perogatives.
So when I jump up and say, "Hey, you can't authorize the NSA to ignore FISA, and therefore broke the law," he might say, "No laws were broken in the application of this necessary program." But what he really means is "FISA infringes on my duty to wage war in defense of the nation and therefore I'm not subject to it." These are very different things. The second statement is far from settled. The Supreme Court hasn't weighed in on this and I believe it would not agree. If I'm right, then the administrations claim of "lawfulness" falls apart. It is based on this implied but rarely spoken premise. It is Orwellian double-speak at its finest.
Will any Senator, Dem or Rep, get this and bear this in mind as they question Michael Hayden during confirmation hearings? Will Arlen Specter bear this in mind during his hearings on signing statements in June? Stay tuned...
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Outrage, latest
You may have heard that W has never vetoed a bill. Thanks to the reporting of Charlie Savage, political affairs report for the Boston Globe, we now know why. Go here to hear Terry Gross' interview with him. Or follow the link to original story.
http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=13&prgDate=9-May-06
Savage says what he does instead is issue "signing statements," technical legal statements entered into the Federal Record (public records, there's a link to them on the Fresh Air site), that tell the executive branch how to interpret the law. He's done this 750 times to date. His Dad did it about 240 times in 4 years. Clinton issued 140-something in 8 years.
What he has done that is different than before is declare whether he will follow the law or not, based on his interpretation of the Constitution. In other words, he signs a very popular bill, like the torture ban, rather than take the political hit in vetoing it, then he instructs affected executive agencies that they can ignore the ban because only the President, as Commander in Chief, has the constitutional authority to instruct the military and preclude certain activities, like torture.
But it doesn't stop there. Bush has essentially set aside any law Congress enacts to restrict or instruct the executive branch. This includes affirmative action, whistle blower statutes, inspector general acts, and torture bans. Basically, Bush says the congress has no right to oversee or restrict what he or the executive branch agencies do. It's based on an extreme view of presidential power, call the Unitary Executive, which is not the prevailing view in the Judiciary.
Hmmm. I thought only the Supreme Court had the authority to interpret the Constitution. And they've said many times in the last 70 years that Congress does indeed have the constitutional authority to restrict the President's power and only the court is the arbiter of the limits of checks and balances.
Cleverly, Bush has made these interpretations in areas where no one with standing is likely to sue or challenge the law in court. After all, the Pentagon is not likely to challenge the President's telling them to ignore a restrictive law. And because, no one but them was reading these things, no one said boo. Until Savage. Now Arlen Specter has taken notice and will hold hearing on this in June. Hopefully moderate Republicans will join with Dems to resist this.
Otherwise, the President is a dictator. Nice.
http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=13&prgDate=9-May-06
Savage says what he does instead is issue "signing statements," technical legal statements entered into the Federal Record (public records, there's a link to them on the Fresh Air site), that tell the executive branch how to interpret the law. He's done this 750 times to date. His Dad did it about 240 times in 4 years. Clinton issued 140-something in 8 years.
What he has done that is different than before is declare whether he will follow the law or not, based on his interpretation of the Constitution. In other words, he signs a very popular bill, like the torture ban, rather than take the political hit in vetoing it, then he instructs affected executive agencies that they can ignore the ban because only the President, as Commander in Chief, has the constitutional authority to instruct the military and preclude certain activities, like torture.
But it doesn't stop there. Bush has essentially set aside any law Congress enacts to restrict or instruct the executive branch. This includes affirmative action, whistle blower statutes, inspector general acts, and torture bans. Basically, Bush says the congress has no right to oversee or restrict what he or the executive branch agencies do. It's based on an extreme view of presidential power, call the Unitary Executive, which is not the prevailing view in the Judiciary.
Hmmm. I thought only the Supreme Court had the authority to interpret the Constitution. And they've said many times in the last 70 years that Congress does indeed have the constitutional authority to restrict the President's power and only the court is the arbiter of the limits of checks and balances.
Cleverly, Bush has made these interpretations in areas where no one with standing is likely to sue or challenge the law in court. After all, the Pentagon is not likely to challenge the President's telling them to ignore a restrictive law. And because, no one but them was reading these things, no one said boo. Until Savage. Now Arlen Specter has taken notice and will hold hearing on this in June. Hopefully moderate Republicans will join with Dems to resist this.
Otherwise, the President is a dictator. Nice.
Monday, May 08, 2006
Meet the Press Response
MTP sent me a reply to my email:
Dear Mr. Chamberlain,
Thank you for your email and your interest in "Meet the Press."
We are sorry you did not enjoy our program.
You might be interested in knowing that we had Mr. Colbert booked on "Meet the Press" last weekend but he canceled his appearance.
Most sincerely,
The Meet the Press staff
Dear Mr. Chamberlain,
Thank you for your email and your interest in "Meet the Press."
We are sorry you did not enjoy our program.
You might be interested in knowing that we had Mr. Colbert booked on "Meet the Press" last weekend but he canceled his appearance.
Most sincerely,
The Meet the Press staff
My email to Russert
I made the mistake of turning Meet the Press on Sunday. Of course, it spawned a letter.
"I was enjoying the exchange between Dan Balz and Todd Purdum on the May 7th show, when, inexplicably you bring in a Bush impersonator and give him an extraordinarily long time to promote his corporate event speaking business. The real news from the corespondents dinner was Stephen Colbert, but instead you give us this inoffensive hack. Nice.
April 30's show was even more maddening. How is having the Secretary of Energy, the head of the Oil Industry's trade organization and that Cramer guy on the panel with only Dick Durbin to balance their apologies for the oil industry fair? The Secretary of Energy says that Brazil is a model for efforts to become energy self-sufficient and you don't ask him what kind of lack of leadership in this country makes an emerging third world country more energy savvy than the leader of the free world?
And Frankly, your one on one interviews with politicians (Nancy Pelosi, Condi Rice for example) are worthless. They spout talking points and you play gotcha trying to catch them in contradictions. Makes me just want to switch the TV off. Panels are better and having more than one pol on is better to. At least then, the conversation doesn't seem so staged and follows a more organic path.
Please bring us balance, ask the tough questions and call people on their B.S. I wish you guys were more like the BBC shows."
"I was enjoying the exchange between Dan Balz and Todd Purdum on the May 7th show, when, inexplicably you bring in a Bush impersonator and give him an extraordinarily long time to promote his corporate event speaking business. The real news from the corespondents dinner was Stephen Colbert, but instead you give us this inoffensive hack. Nice.
April 30's show was even more maddening. How is having the Secretary of Energy, the head of the Oil Industry's trade organization and that Cramer guy on the panel with only Dick Durbin to balance their apologies for the oil industry fair? The Secretary of Energy says that Brazil is a model for efforts to become energy self-sufficient and you don't ask him what kind of lack of leadership in this country makes an emerging third world country more energy savvy than the leader of the free world?
And Frankly, your one on one interviews with politicians (Nancy Pelosi, Condi Rice for example) are worthless. They spout talking points and you play gotcha trying to catch them in contradictions. Makes me just want to switch the TV off. Panels are better and having more than one pol on is better to. At least then, the conversation doesn't seem so staged and follows a more organic path.
Please bring us balance, ask the tough questions and call people on their B.S. I wish you guys were more like the BBC shows."
Friday, May 05, 2006
Colbert, Cons turn on Bush, Homeland Insecurity
Curiously, the MSM seems to have failed to report on Stephen Colbert's slash and burn speech against the administration and the press.
Web agitators are demanding they address it. If you agree. Go here to sign the petition:
http://www.workingforchange.com/activism/action.cfm?itemid=20751&afccode=n49lk2
See the new and improved transcript of the tirade here:
http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/4/30/1441/59811
Bush's AP/Ipsos poll numbers hit new low as even conservatives and Republicans turn on him.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/republicans_ap_poll
Plus, I meant to mention Clark Kent Ervin's book "Open Target: Where America is Vulnerable to Attack" about how Homeland Security is screwing up. Ervin was the department's inspector general under Tom Ridge and is a conservative Republican. He's also a sharp critic. Go to the fresh air page for this interview.
http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=13&prgDate=2-May-06
Web agitators are demanding they address it. If you agree. Go here to sign the petition:
http://www.workingforchange.com/activism/action.cfm?itemid=20751&afccode=n49lk2
See the new and improved transcript of the tirade here:
http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/4/30/1441/59811
Bush's AP/Ipsos poll numbers hit new low as even conservatives and Republicans turn on him.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/republicans_ap_poll
Plus, I meant to mention Clark Kent Ervin's book "Open Target: Where America is Vulnerable to Attack" about how Homeland Security is screwing up. Ervin was the department's inspector general under Tom Ridge and is a conservative Republican. He's also a sharp critic. Go to the fresh air page for this interview.
http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=13&prgDate=2-May-06
Thursday, May 04, 2006
Chasing Ghosts
Interesting interview with National Guard Lt. Paul Rieckhoff whose critical book, "Chasing Ghosts: A Soldier's Fight for America from Baghdad to Washington," has just come out. Here's the link to the show:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5382507
Proud soldier, but harsh critic.
Two things particularly struck me.
He said the "contractors" hurt moral and the mission. They (Halliburton, KBR, et al) don't report to military chain of command. Their services suck. They defy soldier's checkpoints, and they run from fights. One of the contractor commando units, dressed in black with no insignia were equivalent to death squads. Iraqis call them black death. Rieckhoff said they undermined Iraqi trust in his unit. Remember, contractors were implicated in Abu Gharaib, too.
Second, as the 3rd anniversary of Mission Accomplished came was this week, his still raw reaction to a question about this stuck in my mind. He was on the ground getting shot at while Bush was pretending to be a pilot. When he heard about it, he was incensed and you can tell he is still peeved about it now. He knew the job wasn't done and wasn't even close to being done. He said all the soldiers knew that. He said that maybe Bush didn't get that cuz he never "served on the ground." Ironic that Rieckhoff is National Guard too.
He's also the founder of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a service organization trying to see to the well being of those returning from war.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5382507
Proud soldier, but harsh critic.
Two things particularly struck me.
He said the "contractors" hurt moral and the mission. They (Halliburton, KBR, et al) don't report to military chain of command. Their services suck. They defy soldier's checkpoints, and they run from fights. One of the contractor commando units, dressed in black with no insignia were equivalent to death squads. Iraqis call them black death. Rieckhoff said they undermined Iraqi trust in his unit. Remember, contractors were implicated in Abu Gharaib, too.
Second, as the 3rd anniversary of Mission Accomplished came was this week, his still raw reaction to a question about this stuck in my mind. He was on the ground getting shot at while Bush was pretending to be a pilot. When he heard about it, he was incensed and you can tell he is still peeved about it now. He knew the job wasn't done and wasn't even close to being done. He said all the soldiers knew that. He said that maybe Bush didn't get that cuz he never "served on the ground." Ironic that Rieckhoff is National Guard too.
He's also the founder of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a service organization trying to see to the well being of those returning from war.
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
Colbert knifes President and Press Corpse
I hadn't seen it until today. Stephen Colbert was merciless at Saturday's White House Correspondent's Dinner. He savaged both Bush and his cronies as well as the press corps with biting sarcasm and cutting irony. Laura Bush wouldn't even shake his hand, probably because she's smart enough to know how badly he had ripped her man.
Of course, he ripped the press corps too for being meek, mild and timid, until recently. Only he did it subversively by chiding the press corps for finally finding a back bone and questioning the administration. He mocked the President's steadfastness by implying that the Prez stands his ground even as it erodes out from under him.
Here's a perspective on the performance:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/05/01/Colbert/
Try to find a clip of Colbert. It was breath taking!
Of course, he ripped the press corps too for being meek, mild and timid, until recently. Only he did it subversively by chiding the press corps for finally finding a back bone and questioning the administration. He mocked the President's steadfastness by implying that the Prez stands his ground even as it erodes out from under him.
Here's a perspective on the performance:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/05/01/Colbert/
Try to find a clip of Colbert. It was breath taking!
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