Mike Whitney: 'Drifting towards a Police State'

Contributed by megsdad on Saturday, November 05 @ 08:56:20 EST
This article has been read 3130 times.

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Mike Whitney

"Those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid the terrorists for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America's enemies and pause to America's friends"
-- Former Attorney General John Ashcroft

Did you know that under the terms of the new Patriot Act prosecutors will be able to seek the death penalty in cases where "defendants gave financial support to umbrella organizations without realizing that some of its adherents might eventually commit violence"? (NY Times; editorial 10-30-05) So, if someone unknowingly gave money to a charity that was connected to a terrorist group, he could be executed.

Smoking Gun on Manipulation of Iraq Intelligence? 'NY Times' Cites New Document

By E&P Staff

Published: November 05, 2005 1:30 PM ET
NEW YORK Ever since the Democrats briefly closed the U.S. Senate from view earlier this week, to protest alleged Republican foot-dragging in probing Bush administration pre-war manipulation of intelligence, the press has been asking: So what new evidence do the Democrats have in this matter?

Tomorrow, in its print edition, The New York Times starts to answer the question, with reporter Douglas Jehl disclosing the contents of a newly declassified memo apparently passed to him by Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee.

It shows that an al-Qaeda official held by the Americans was identified as a likely fabricator months before the Bush administration began to use his statements as the basis for its claims that Iraq trained al-Qaeda members to use biological and chemical weapons, according to this Defense Intelligence Agency document from February 2002.

The FBI's Secret Scrutiny

In Hunt for Terrorists, Bureau Examines Records of Ordinary Americans

By Barton Gellman

Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 6, 2005; Page A01

The FBI came calling in Windsor, Conn., this summer with a document marked for delivery by hand. On Matianuk Avenue, across from the tennis courts, two special agents found their man. They gave George Christian the letter, which warned him to tell no one, ever, what it said.

Under the shield and stars of the FBI crest, the letter directed Christian to surrender "all subscriber information, billing information and access logs of any person" who used a specific computer at a library branch some distance away. Christian, who manages digital records for three dozen Connecticut libraries, said in an affidavit that he configures his system for privacy. But the vendors of the software he operates said their databases can reveal the Web sites that visitors browse, the e-mail accounts they open and the books they borrow.

Daily Kos: Shameless. Absolutely Shameless.

By Hunter Fri Nov 04, 2005 at 04:56:04 PM PDT

This is just sick.

The Senate approved sweeping deficit-reduction legislation last night that would save about $35 billion over the next five years by cutting federal spending on prescription drugs, agriculture supports and student loans, while clamping down on fraud in the Medicaid program. [...]

The focus now shifts to the House, where the Budget Committee voted 21 to 16 yesterday to approve a more extensive bill saving nearly $54 billion through 2010 with cuts to Medicaid, food stamps, student loans, agriculture subsidies and child support enforcement. The House measure would allow states to impose premiums and co-payments on poor Medicaid recipients for the first time.

So, hey, it's tough times in America. To pay for Katrina, and the Iraq War, and these massive deficits, we all need to pull our weight, right? Tough economic conditions mean tough choices, we all have to accept some sacrifices.

The Virginia GOP's Dirty Money

by MAX BLUMENTHAL

[posted online on November 4, 2005]

Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Jerry Kilgore has made illegal immigration a centerpiece of his campaign, promising an aggressive crackdown on day laborers and undocumented immigrants attending state universities. "Will we reward illegal behavior with hard-earned dollars from law-abiding citizens?" he asked a campaign rally crowd this August. "I say the answer to this question should be an easy one: no!" While Kilgore accepts the financial support of an anti-immigrant group with racist ties, he also has taken massive contributions from companies notorious for exploiting undocumented immigrant labor.

Virginia Republican Attorney General candidate Bob McDonnell has declared himself "a drug dealer's worst nightmare," while appearing in ads slamming imaginary crooks behind prison doors and pledging to protect Virginians from sexual predators. McDonnell has not only financed his campaign through a possibly illegal slush fund but has hired three former associates of indicted Republican über-lobbyist Jack Abramoff. One of them, who once served as McDonnell's campaign manager, is now in prison for soliciting sex with a young boy.

The Consequences of Covering Up

Washington Post withholds info on secret prisons at government request

11/4/05

On November 2, the Washington Post carried an explosive front-page story about secret Eastern European prisons set up by the CIA for the interrogation of terrorism suspects. While the Post article, by reporter Dana Priest, gave readers plenty of details, it also withheld the most crucial information--the location of these secret prisons--at the request of government officials.

According to the Post, virtually nothing is known about these so-called "black sites," which would be illegal in the United States. Given the abuses at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, news that the U.S. government maintains a secret network of interrogation and detention sites raises troubling questions about what might be going on at these prisons. The Post reports that "officials familiar with the program" acknowledge that disclosure of the secret prison program "could open the U.S. government to legal challenges, particularly in foreign courts, and increase the risk of political condemnation at home and abroad."

Spending Inquiry for Top Official on Broadcasting

By STEPHEN LABATON

Published: November 5, 2005

WASHINGTON, Nov. 4 - Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, the head of the federal agency that oversees most government broadcasts to foreign countries, including the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe, is the subject of an inquiry into accusations of misuse of federal money and the use of phantom or unqualified employees, officials involved in that examination said on Friday.

Mr. Tomlinson was ousted from the board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting on Thursday after its inspector general concluded an investigation that was critical of him. That examination looked at his efforts as chairman of the corporation to seek more conservative programs on public radio and television.

Digby: Turdblossom Special

Via Pre$$titutes

If it comes to pass that Karl Rove is indicted, or even if he loses his security clearance (which he damned well should) I would hope that someone in Washington has the guts to smash this fellatory daydream in Mark Helperin's face and twist it like a grapefruit until he screams for mercy. I'm not sure if "The Note" think this is funny or if they seriously believe that Karl Rove was just an innocent bystander in the Plame outing, but either way their little fantasy is ludicrous.

Another Thunderbolt from Wilkerson

By Dan Froomkin

Special to washingtonpost.com
Friday, November 4, 2005; 12:45 PM

Another shocking accusation by former administration insider Lawrence Wilkerson appears to be going under the media radar today.

On NPR yesterday, the former chief of staff to the secretary of state said that he had uncovered a "visible audit trail" tracing the practice of prisoner abuse by U.S. soldiers directly back to Vice President Cheney's office.

Cursor's Media Patrol - 11/04/05

A Star Tribune editorial calling for the U.S. to 'dismantle its secret CIA gulag,' asks: "Just how far is this nation willing to follow Cheney's ghastly way in the war on terror?"

A Times report that the head of Italian intelligence named "occasional spy" Rocco Martino as the disseminator of the Niger forgeries, and which also revealed that the FBI exonerated the Italian government, prompts the question: "Did the FBI interview Martino before making a conclusive judgment about the forgeries?"

A new Zogby-conducted poll commissioned by AfterDowningStreet.org finds that 53 percent of respondents want Congress to impeach Bush if he lied about the war in Iraq.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg has filed an amendment to change the official name of the "Deficit Reduction Omnibus Reconciliation Act 2005" to the "Moral Disaster of Monumental Proportion Reconciliation Act."

The Quiet Oil-for-Food Scandal

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet
Posted on November 4, 2005, Printed on November 4, 2005
http://www.alternet.org/story/27792/

We aren't going to hear much about the corporations that paid bribes in the Oil-for-Food scandal because Bush's family, friends and closest advisors are in it knee-deep, along with some Democrats.

Last week, the Independent Committee investigating the Oil-for-Food program (OFF) released its final report detailing how Saddam Hussein's regime skimmed just under two percent from the otherwise successful relief effort by charging kickbacks and "inland transportation" fees to companies doing business with Iraq.

The small group of conservative writers who I've dubbed the "Scandal Pimps" have been less enthusiastic about the release of this report than they've been about those that preceded it. The day after the release, the Wall Street Journal editorialized that the report didn't really add anything new, it just filled in some details.

Youths in Rural U.S. Are Drawn To Military

Recruits' Job Worries Outweigh War Fears

By Ann Scott Tyson

Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 4, 2005; Page A01

As sustained combat in Iraq makes it harder than ever to fill the ranks of the all-volunteer force, newly released Pentagon demographic data show that the military is leaning heavily for recruits on economically depressed, rural areas where youths' need for jobs may outweigh the risks of going to war.

More than 44 percent of U.S. military recruits come from rural areas, Pentagon figures show. In contrast, 14 percent come from major cities. Youths living in the most sparsely populated Zip codes are 22 percent more likely to join the Army, with an opposite trend in cities. Regionally, most enlistees come from the South (40 percent) and West (24 percent).

Bush administration's moral compass is lost

November 4, 2005

BY CATHLEEN FALSANI RELIGION WRITER

The morning after George W. Bush won his second term in office and many of his Republican colleagues also claimed victory last year, I received an e-mail from one of my dearest friends, Amanda.

It's a note that has haunted me since, a niggling at the back of my mind like an overdue library book or an insult hurled in anger that can't ever be taken back properly.

Amanda is one of the most moral, ethical, intelligent and kind people I know. She also happens to be a Jewish atheist, more or less.

We've known each other since we were teenagers, and the subject of faith -- the peculiarity of my born-again-ness and the absence of her faith in any religious way -- had been a perennial topic of discussion. I respect her deeply and care about what she thinks, particularly about spiritual matters.

Tomlinson quits public broadcasting board

Fri Nov 4, 8:04 AM ET

Kenneth Tomlinson, the former board chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting accused by critics of trying to politicize public television and radio, has resigned from the board, it said on Thursday.

Tomlinson, a Republican, quit shortly before CPB Inspector General Kenneth Konz was to publish a report after investigating his activities, including paying outside researchers to check public programing for liberal bias.

Critics, including broadcasters and congressional Democrats, accused Tomlinson of trying to advance his own conservative agenda in public broadcasting, which is supposed to be non-partisan.

Source of Forged Niger-Iraq Uranium Documents Identified

By ELAINE SCIOLINO
and ELISABETTA POVOLEDO

ROME, Nov. 3 - Italy's spymaster identified an Italian occasional spy named Rocco Martino on Thursday as the disseminator of forged documents that described efforts by Iraq to buy uranium ore from Niger for a nuclear weapons program, three lawmakers said Thursday.

The spymaster, Gen. Nicolò Pollari, director of the Italian military intelligence agency known as Sismi, disclosed that Mr. Martino was the source of the forged documents in closed-door testimony to a parliamentary committee that oversees secret services, the lawmakers said.

Senator Massimo Brutti, a member of the committee, told reporters that General Pollari had identified Mr. Martino as a former intelligence informer who had been "kicked out of the agency." He did not say Mr. Martino was the forger.

The revelation came on a day when the Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed that it had shut down its two-year investigation into the origin of the forged documents.

DeLay Asked Lobbyist to Raise Money Through Charity

By PHILIP SHENON
Published: November 4, 2005

WASHINGTON, Nov. 3 - Representative Tom DeLay asked the lobbyist Jack Abramoff to raise money for him through a private charity controlled by Mr. Abramoff, an unusual request that led the lobbyist to try to gather at least $150,000 from his Indian tribe clients and their gambling operations, according to newly disclosed e-mail from the lobbyist's files.

The electronic messages from 2002, which refer to "Tom" and "Tom's requests," appear to be the clearest evidence to date of an effort by Mr. DeLay, a Texas Republican, to pressure Mr. Abramoff and his lobbying partners to raise money for him. The e-mail messages do not specify why Mr. DeLay wanted the money, how it was to be used or why he would want money raised through the auspices of a private charity.

Health-program cuts pass in Senate budget

By TODD ZWILLICH

WASHINGTON, Nov. 3 (UPI) -- The U.S. Senate passed a sweeping budget bill Thursday approving more than $10 billion in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid over the next five years.

The cuts mostly spare beneficiaries of the two huge programs any reductions in benefits or access to healthcare. But Medicaid benefit reductions are still likely to be on the table in a House version of the budget bill expected to be released next week.

The bulk of savings in the bill, which passed 52-47, come from cuts to Medicare subsidies to insurance companies and an increase in Medicaid prescription-drug rebates drug manufacturers must pay to states.

The Family Values Sideshow

E. J. Graff
November 04, 2005

E.J. Graff, a Brandeis Women’s Studies Research Center resident scholar, most recently collaborated on Evelyn Murphy’s book Getting Even: Why Women Still Don't Get Paid Like Men--And What To Do About It.

When did lying become a family value? Maybe it’s naïve of me to be shocked, but honestly: The family values folks lie. And you should pay attention to exactly how they lie, because any minute now they’ll be bringing their campaigns to your state.

Here’s what they’ll tell you when they’re trying to persuade voters to pass a one-man-one-woman marriage amendment: The amendment will merely put velvet ropes around the word “marriage.” It won’t be mean; it won’t deprive lesbian and gay couples of job benefits; it won’t close the door to other protections for same-sex couples and their families. But once the amendment passes, those same proponents will shout that any recognition whatsoever of a same-sex couple is an incursion into that sacred territory, marriage.

For Americans, Getting Sick Has Its Price

Survey Says U.S. Patients Pay More, Get Less Than Those in Other Western Nations

By Rob Stein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 4, 2005; Page A02

Americans pay more when they get sick than people in other Western nations and get more confused, error-prone treatment, according to the largest survey to compare U.S. health care with other nations.

The survey of nearly 7,000 sick adults in the United States, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Britain and Germany found Americans were the most likely to pay at least $1,000 in out-of-pocket expenses. More than half went without needed care because of cost and more than one-third endured mistakes and disorganized care when they did get treated.

Who's in Charge Of Rebuilding New Orleans?

Awash in Commissions, City Waits for Someone to Take Lead

By Manuel Roig-Franzia
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 4, 2005; Page A03

NEW ORLEANS -- New Orleans can be rebuilt, or so they say.

Just ask the mayor's commission. Or the governor's commission. Or, wait a bit, and see if the congressman's commission flies. The city council's commission was even unveiled with something important missing: commission members. But it was trumpeted as a commission nonetheless.

Time for Some Blood-Letting?

By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Thursday, November 3, 2005; 12:21 PM

The hunker-down strategy doesn't seem to be working very well for President Bush right now.

So faced with an increasingly festering problem, there are signs that some blood-letting may be in the cards.

Jim VandeHei and Carol D. Leonnig write in The Washington Post: "Top White House aides are privately discussing the future of Karl Rove, with some expressing doubt that President Bush can move beyond the damaging CIA leak case as long as his closest political strategist remains in the administration.

Bush's Popularity Reaches New Low

58 Percent in Poll Question His Integrity

By Richard Morin and Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, November 4, 2005; Page A01

For the first time in his presidency a majority of Americans question the integrity of President Bush, and growing doubts about his leadership have left him with record negative ratings on the economy, Iraq and even the war on terrorism, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows.

Republicans plan to cut 40,000 kids from school lunch program to pay for ANOTHER tax cut in the next month

by Chris in Paris - 11/03/2005 01:27:00 PM

They're asking the poor to suck it up and do without because of those critical tax cuts for the wealthy, corporate welfare and a failing war of convenience are more important than food for the poor. How long before they change the child labor laws so the kids can go out and work for their food? Nice compassion and isn't it great to see that we're all in this together?

Don't believe me, read the article. The Republicans are planning on ANOTHER TAX cut in the next few weeks that will cost even MORE than the cuts to the poor and elderly that they're making today:

But some Republicans worry that social service cuts, though relatively small, might have outsized political ramifications, especially when Republicans move in the coming weeks to cut taxes for the fifth time in as many years. Those tax cuts, totaling $70 billion over five years, would more than offset the deficit reduction that would result from the budget cuts.

Cursor's Media Patrol - 11/03/05

Referring to "The latest story from the Dante-esque depths of this administration," which has found a world of takers, Bob Herbert predicts that "Ultimately the whole truth will come out and historians will have their say, and Americans will look in the mirror and be ashamed."

As 'Democrats intensify Bush slams,' the 'White House ducks prewar intel questions,' with spokesman Scott McClellan saying at a press gaggle that Democrats "might want to start with looking at the previous administration and their own statements."

"More than 1,000 students" cut class "to protest the war in Iraq and the presence of military recruiters on campus," reports the Star Tribune, part of a national student walkout organized by Youth Against War and Racism.

Senate OKs Bill That Delays Meat Labeling

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: November 3, 2005

Filed at 10:04 a.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Senate on Thursday sent a $100 billion food and farm spending bill to President Bush that includes a two-year delay on labels telling grocery shoppers where their meat comes from.

A separate vote was expected later Thursday on whether big farms should be allowed to continue collecting millions of dollars from the government to subsidize their operations.

Goodbye, My Sweet Deduction

By EDUARDO PORTER and DAVID LEONHARDT
Published: November 3, 2005

There are no cows more sacred in the tax code than the deductions for mortgage interest and property taxes. Together, they add up to at least a $75 billion annual subsidy for housing and homeowners. President Bush, in establishing his advisory panel on tax reform, specifically asked the group to preserve support for home ownership.

So it was quite a shock that the panel, which released its final report on Tuesday, concluded that it had no choice but to significantly trim the home mortgage deduction and eliminate state and local tax deductions if it wanted to find a way to simplify the income tax.

Rights Suit Is Filed Over Maryland Arsons

By THE NEW YORK TIMES
Published: November 3, 2005

BALTIMORE, Nov. 2 - Lawyers representing 32 homeowners in a southern Maryland subdivision heavily damaged by arsons last December filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday, asserting that the fires were racially motivated and violated the homeowners' civil rights.

The Washington Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, a nonprofit group, and a Washington law firm filed the suit on behalf of the homeowners against five young white men accused of setting the Dec. 6 fires and a security firm that employed one of the men.

Mixter at Mixter's Mix: The World Can't Wait -- Milwaukee

Yep, we went to The World Can't Wait convergence this evening. Wow, was that something! I'd say about 200 people attended, and the crowd was very well-behaved.

My husband and I both attended. He carried a sign I made (I wish I would have saved it, but I gave all my signs to people in the crowd who didn't have any.) I handed out flyers for Progressive Democrats of America (PDA), talked to people in the crowd, and had a great time.

Someone you don't expect to meet at a rally like this: My gynecologist was there! I introduced her to my hubby. (I almost said something like, "John, she knows me almost as well as you do," but I decided to take the high road for the intro.)

IEA warns of 50% oil price rise by 2030

By Carola Hoyos in London
Published: November 2 2005 22:12 | Last updated: November 2 2005 22:12

The International Energy Agency, the oil sector monitoring body, on Wednesday said that oil prices by 2030 would be 50 per cent higher than today if Saudi Arabia did not muster the political will to invest billions of dollars in new production.

Fatih Birol, the group's chief economist, said in an interview with the Financial Times that Saudi Arabia, the most important oil producer, might not make the investment needed to ensure production met the strong demand growth in China and India.

AP: DeLay's Staff Tried to Help Abramoff

By JOHN SOLOMON and SHARON THEIMER, Associated Press Writers2 hours, 26 minutes ago

Rep. Tom DeLay's staff tried to help lobbyist Jack Abramoff win access to Interior Secretary Gale Norton, an effort that succeeded after Abramoff's Indian tribe clients began funneling a quarter-million dollars to an environmental group founded by Norton.

"Do you think you could call that friend and set up a meeting," then-DeLay staffer Tony Rudy wrote to fellow House aide Thomas Pyle in a Dec. 29, 2000, e-mail titled "Gale Norton-Interior Secretary." President Bush had nominated Norton to the post the day before.

Rudy wrote Abramoff that same day promising he had "good news" about securing a meeting with Norton, forwarding information about the environmental group Norton had founded, according to e-mails obtained by investigators and reviewed by The Associated Press. Rudy's message to Abramoff was sent from Congress' official e-mail system.

Jury finds Merck not liable over Vioxx

Thu Nov 3, 2005 10:45 AM ET

ATLANTIC CITY, New Jersey (Reuters) - A jury in the second product liability trial against Merck & Co Inc. found the drug maker gave doctors adequate warning about possible health risks from its painkiller Vioxx and did not commit consumer fraud in marketing the drug.

Food Stamp Cuts Are On Table

House Plan Would Affect 300,000

By Jonathan Weisman

Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 3, 2005; Page A01

House Republicans are pushing to cut tens of thousands of legal immigrants off food stamps, partially reversing President Bush's efforts to win Latino votes by restoring similar cuts made in the 1990s.

The food stamp measure is just one of several provisions in an expansive congressional budget-cutting package that critics say unfairly targets the poor and disadvantaged, especially poor children.

The Daily Howler - 11/02/05

MAKING SCHOOLS (SEEM TO) WORK! Hedrick Smith makes “enormous” claims. But do his claims actually work? // link // print // previous // next //

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 2005

WINERIP DOES IT AGAIN: Michael Winerip does it again in today’s New York Times. He helps us lay out two basic points about state-run testing programs:

State-run tests are sometimes “easy:” Many states run testing programs which report the number of kids who are “proficient” on a given grade level. But “proficiency” is in the eye of the beholder; a state can set the bar for “proficiency” as high or as low as it wants. How “easy” are some state-run programs? Winerip notes the contrast between results on some state-run programs and results on the federally-administered NAEP (the National Assessment of Educational Progress, known as “The Nation’s Report Card”):

WINERIP (11/2/05): Take Florida, where 30 percent of fourth graders were proficient in reading on this federal test in 2005. Yet on the Florida state test, 71 percent of fourth graders were proficient in reading in 2005. It's a big difference: Are nearly three-quarters of your fourth graders proficient? Or less than a third? And it's typical.

As Winerip notes, the gap is similar in New York—and even wider in Tennessee. Where do you set the bar for “proficiency?” That is always a matter of judgment—and states can set it as low as they want. Citizens need to keep this in mind when they get pleasing scores from a state-run program. Why, other journalists might even consider this point—if it isn’t too taxing, too boring, too depressing, too awkward or just too much trouble, of course.

Billmon: The Dirty War

Not long after 9/11 -- a few days maybe -- I was thinking about where the "war on terrorism" might take America and the world, and it seemed to me at the time that there were three broad paths it might follow.

One would have been the path of recognition, in which the American people woke up and started asking the hard questions about how we got into this mess, and demanding answers that didn't consist entirely of inane slogans about how the terrorists "hate our freedoms."

That path would have still led to the war in Afghanistan -- it was inevitable -- but we might at least have come to some glimmer of public understanding that the real war was a war of ideas and influence in which America would need all the allies it could get, both inside and outside the Islamic world. Who knows? Maybe the rest of the story would have developed very differently.

Billmon: The Dirty War

Not long after 9/11 -- a few days maybe -- I was thinking about where the "war on terrorism" might take America and the world, and it seemed to me at the time that there were three broad paths it might follow.

One would have been the path of recognition, in which the American people woke up and started asking the hard questions about how we got into this mess, and demanding answers that didn't consist entirely of inane slogans about how the terrorists "hate our freedoms."

That path would have still led to the war in Afghanistan -- it was inevitable -- but we might at least have come to some glimmer of public understanding that the real war was a war of ideas and influence in which America would need all the allies it could get, both inside and outside the Islamic world. Who knows? Maybe the rest of the story would have developed very differently.

Publius at The Third Estate on America's Chief Problem

...The chief problem facing America is NOT immigration. It's not civil rights, or abortion, or gay marriage. These are all issues that matter, but they will not in the end fundamentally alter American life. The central challenge facing the country is the steady erosion of economic opportunity and the slow disappearance of the middle class....

Senator: Reed helped to conceal Indian payments

By ALAN JUDD
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 11/02/05

Ralph Reed helped orchestrate an effort to conceal payments he received from the gambling revenues of a Louisiana Indian tribe, according to a U.S. Senator speaking at a hearing in Washington.

Reed directed that his compensation from the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana be routed through "a variety of entities ... because of his concern about being publicly associated with gambling money," U.S. Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) said as the Senate Indian Affairs Committee opened its latest in a series of hearings into lobbying fees charged to tribes that own casinos.

Cursor's Media Patrol - 11/02/05

In addition to 'hinting' at an increase in U.S. troop levels in Iraq, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld also defended the decision not to permit U.N. human rights investigators to meet with Guantanamo detainees, and said it was taken not by the Pentagon but by the U.S. government.

Less than 48 hours after a prayer breakfast at which he reportedly offered his "Nightstalker" battalion tearful assurances of safety, a California National Guard colonel became "the highest-ranking American officer to die since the war began."

In an interview with Larry King, Joseph Wilson gave props to Talking Points Memo and Left Coaster for their coverage of the Niger forgeries, including La Repubblica's series, which Justin Raimondo credits for helping to make "Neocon-gate ... bigger by the day."

As a Washington Post analysis concludes that 'Nominee's reasoning points to a likely vote against Roe v. Wade,' a new Gallup-conducted poll finds that "if it becomes clear" that Judge Samuel Alito would vote to reverse Roe v. Wade, "Americans would not want the Senate to confirm him, by 53 percent to 37 percent."

Records Expunged in '99 Texas Drug Sting

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: November 2, 2005

Filed at 6:18 a.m. ET

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) -- Thirty people convicted in a discredited drug bust that sent dozens to prison on bogus charges had their criminal records wiped clean.

Visiting Judge Ron Chapman ordered the records expunged Tuesday. At an evidentiary hearing in June 2003, the judge called the undercover agent who built the cases, Tom Coleman, ''simply not a credible witness under oath.''

Coleman arrested 46 people, most of them black, in this small, predominantly white farming community, leading civil rights groups to question if the busts were racially motivated.

Abortion Least - Known Measure in California Ballot

By REUTERS

Filed at 9:30 a.m. ET

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - California, seen as one of the most sexually liberated U.S. states, could limit teenagers' access to abortion next week in the least known but most divisive ballot measure in a lackluster special election.

Proposition 73 asks voters to decide whether doctors should be required by law to notify parents or guardians of girls under 18, 48 hours before they can legally perform abortions or administer the so-called morning-after pill RU-486.

Proponents of the November 8 ballot measure -- a coalition of anti-abortion groups, family organizations and the Catholic and some Protestant churches -- say it is about parental rights and the protection of children.

Coloradans Vote to Give Up Tax Refunds

Published: November 2, 2005

DENVER, Nov. 1 (AP) - Colorado voters agreed Tuesday to give up $3.7 billion in tax refunds over the next five years to allow the state to bounce back from a recession, ignoring the arguments of fiscal conservatives who say the government does not need more money to spend.

With 83 percent of the expected vote counted statewide, 463,841 voters, or 53 percent, had approved the plan, compared with 419,236 , or 47 percent, who voted against it.Supporters said Colorado could not afford to vote no, not with higher education, health care and transportation already suffering from millions of dollars in budget cuts.

Congress Is Warned of Veto if Insurance Funding Is Cut

By ROBERT PEAR
Published: November 2, 2005

WASHINGTON, Nov. 1 - The Bush administration threatened Tuesday to veto a huge budget bill if Congress withdrew $10 billion set aside for health insurance companies participating in the Medicare program.

The veto threat came as the Senate began work on the omnibus bill, intended to cut $39 billion from federal benefit programs over the next five years. Democrats said the savings would be dwarfed by tax cuts that Republicans planned to pass in coming months.

Top al-Qaida Figure Among Afghan Escapees

By DANIEL COONEY, Associated Press Writer1 hour, 27 minutes ago

Security has been tightened at the U.S. military prison in Afghanistan following the escape of a suspected al-Qaida leader, a U.S. official said Wednesday. Indonesian anti-terrorism officials accused Washington of failing to tell them of the breakout.

Omar al-Farouq, born in Kuwait to Iraqi parents, was considered one of Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants in Southeast Asia until Indonesian authorities captured him in 2002 and turned him over to the United States.

He was one of four suspected Arab terrorists to escape in July from the detention facility at Bagram, the main U.S. base in Afghanistan. It was not clear how long he had been held in Afghanistan.

Although the escape was widely reported at the time, al-Farouq was identified by an alias and the U.S. military only confirmed Tuesday that he was among those who fled.

Nominee's Reasoning Points to a Likely Vote Against Roe v. Wade

By Charles Lane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 2, 2005; Page A06

As far as anyone yet knows, Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. has not made any public declaration calling for the overruling of Roe v. Wade , the 1973 Supreme Court decision that recognized a constitutional right to abortion.

At least on the surface, Alito's record as an appeals court judge contains something for everyone. In 1991, he voted to uphold a Pennsylvania law that would have required married women to notify their husbands before getting an abortion. In 1995, however, he cast a deciding vote on a three-judge panel to strike down what abortion rights advocates saw as Pennsylvania's onerous regulations on federally funded abortions for victims of incest or rape. And in 2000, he concurred in a ruling that struck down a New Jersey ban on the late-term procedure called partial-birth abortion by opponents.

Elite Marine Unit to Help Fight Terrorism

Things like this make me nervous--Dictynna

Force to Be Part of Special Operations

By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 2, 2005; Page A14

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld yesterday announced creation of a force of about 2,600 highly specialized Marines intended to address a shortage of elite troops available for counterterrorist operations and other missions requiring exceptional skills.

But in a marked departure for the fiercely self-reliant Corps, the new contingent will report not to the Marine leadership but to the multi-service command responsible for other Special Operations troops.

U.S. Brings Back 30-Year Treasury Bond

By MARTIN CRUTSINGER
The Associated Press
Wednesday, November 2, 2005; 10:28 AM

WASHINGTON -- The new 30-year bond will debut on Feb. 9, helping the U.S. Treasury to raise an estimated record $171 billion during the January-March quarter, the government announced Wednesday.

The Treasury Department said the first 30-year bonds will be auctioned on Feb. 9 and the total amount of bonds that will be sold will be announced on Feb. 1. The government had announced in August that it was bringing back the 30-year bond but it had not specified the date for the first auction.

Mad About You

By Dana Milbank
Wednesday, November 2, 2005; Page A05

In the genteel club that is the United States Senate, Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) had a screaming temper tantrum yesterday.

Minutes after his Democratic counterpart, Harry Reid (Nev.), used a surprise parliamentary maneuver to throw the Senate into a rare closed session, Frist burst from the chamber and approached the cameras in the hallway.

FDIC Chairman to Oversee Storm Recovery

Another crony...hope this one does a better job--Dictynna

By Spencer S. Hsu and Terence O'Hara
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, November 2, 2005; Page A02

Donald E. Powell, chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and a major Texas backer of President Bush, was named federal coordinator of long-term hurricane recovery efforts on the Gulf Coast, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced yesterday.

Powell, 64, will report to the president through Chertoff and be the main federal contact for Congress, state, local and private leaders in supporting "mid and long-term recovery and rebuilding plans," such as economic development and infrastructure reconstruction, Chertoff said in a statement.

GOP Angered by Closed Senate Session

Meeting Reopened After Two Hours

By Charles Babington and Dafna Linzer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, November 2, 2005; Page A01

Democrats forced the Senate into a rare closed-door session yesterday, infuriating Republicans but extracting from them a promise to speed up an inquiry into the Bush administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's weapons in the run-up to the war.

With no warning in the mid-afternoon, the Senate's top Democrat invoked the little-used Rule 21, which forced aides to turn off the chamber's cameras and close its massive doors after evicting all visitors, reporters and most staffers. Plans to bring in electronic-bug-sniffing dogs were dropped when it became clear that senators would trade barbs but discuss no classified information.

CIA runs secret terrorism prisons abroad: report

2 hours, 41 minutes ago

The CIA has been holding and interrogating al Qaeda captives at a secret facility in Eastern Europe, part of a covert prison system established after the September 11, 2001, attacks, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday.

The Soviet-era compound is part of a network that has included sites in eight countries, including Thailand and Afghanistan, the newspaper reported, citing U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement.

Thailand denied it was host to such a facility.

"There is no fact in the unfounded claims," government spokesman Surapong Suebwonglee said.

The newspaper said the existence and locations of the facilities were known only to a handful of officials in the United States and, usually, only to the president and a few top intelligence officers in each host country.

David Neiwert: The ultimate Newspeak

Monday, October 31, 2005

Newspeak, you may recall, has a special quality: It combines two ideas that, conventionally speaking, are virtual (if not precise) opposites, and presents them as identical -- thereby nullifying the meaning contained in each word: "War is Peace." "Ignorance is Strength." "Freedom is Slavery."

Newspeak serves two functions:

1) It deflates the opposition by nullifying its defining issues, and throws the nominal logic of the public debate into disarray.
2) It provides rhetorical and ontological cover for its speakers' own activities and agenda.

Via Atrios, we learn that none other than Jonah Goldberg has emerged with perhaps the most crystalline example of Newspeak possible, one that projects the right's own totalitarian impulses onto its opponents: Liberal Fascism: The Totalitarian Temptation from Mussolini to Hillary Clinton.

Echidne: What An Odd Coincidence

Gilead, the wingnut world of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, is also the name of a company which owns the rights to Tamiflu. Tamiflu may be one of the only treatments for any avian flu pandemic; may be, because the virus could mutate into a form that is not amenable to Tamiflu. But right now many people are hoarding the medication, in the hope that they are safe from dying when/if the pandemic strikes. This hoarding causes shortages for those people who get the run-of-the-mill flu this winter.

But it has also raised the value of Gilead stock. Donald Rumsfeld owns lots of this stock:

Rumsfeld served as Gilead (Research)'s chairman from 1997 until he joined the Bush administration in 2001, and he still holds a Gilead stake valued at between $5 million and $25 million, according to federal financial disclosures filed by Rumsfeld.

The forms don't reveal the exact number of shares Rumsfeld owns, but in the past six months fears of a pandemic and the ensuing scramble for Tamiflu have sent Gilead's stock from $35 to $47. That's made the Pentagon chief, already one of the wealthiest members of the Bush cabinet, at least $1 million richer.

Digby: Generative Consequences

"Men's liberation" aside, there are many many people, both male and female, who believe that a woman should be required to inform her husband that she is pregnant -- after all, they reason, the baby is his too, right?

I don't believe that women should have to inform anyone of their decision to have an abortion because it infringes on her fundamental right to personal autonomy. But even those who disagree with that should recognise that it's not always so simple:

The name of the woman pictured below is Gerri Twerdy Santoro. She was just 28 years old. She was a sister, a daughter, and she was the mother of two daughters when she died a very painful and frightening death.

Digby: Catastrophe Strategy

I'm reading a lot of comments in the blogosphere saying things like this today:

"...we'd be far better off politically if Roe were overturned and Griswold were curbed. And if a couple states -- say Kansas and Alabama -- enacted medieval restrictions that made the rest of the country puke."

This is a great idea and I don't know why we don't use it for everything. For instance, why don't we stop talking about torture. Our position is "soft" and it turns off the NASCAR dads we need to reach. Certainly, the prohibition against torture, which nobody even considered was in danger of being repealed until a couple of years ago, cannot be easily abandoned. Once people become aware of this medieval behavior, they will "puke" and step in to do something about it, right? Isn't that how it works? When the right pulls some outrageous stunt, the country stands up en masse and rejects it.

Digby: Unleashing The Id

Can somebody explain to me why American interrogation techniques seem to always involve sticking objects up prisoners' asses? This has got to be some sort of "method" because it is reported over and over again:

"He had two, 10-hour beatings from the Americans and I said to David, 'Sure they were Americans?' (because) he said he had a bag over his head and he said, 'Oh look ... I know their accents, they were definitely American'," Mr Hicks told Four Corners.

"Some pretty horrific things ... were done to him."

Digby: The Liberty Platform

Yesterday I got chastised by at least one reader for never offering any solutions, just criticisms. It reminded me that I haven't gotten on my personal soapbox lately and harrangued my audience with the notion that I think we should adopt a western and southwest red state strategy using a platform of personal liberty, economic responsibility, land conservation, energy independence and effective national security. If you've heard this before, feel free to move on. Otherwise, here is my super-duper message package to capture at least a couple of western red states and tip the balance to our side.

I understand that building a coalition of rural western states and big city blue states has its problems. But we have to find common ground with some red states somewhere and this seems like the most fertile ground requiring the least compromise on matters of primary importance to both. That's the only way a coalition can be successful. You can't force people into a mold, you have to mold the coalition around shared principles.

The Daily Howler - 11/01/05

HUMEAN “ERROR!” Brit Hume and a panel of hacks insisted that Fitz never said it: // link // print // previous // next //

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 2005

SLOWLY WE TURN: For the record, our future intentions: In January, we plan to start a new web site focusing on low-income education. In so doing, we hope to start a daily discussion of this forgotten but crucial concern.

Tomorrow, we’ll start a three- or four-week study of the PBS program, Making Schools Work with Hedrick Smith. As we do so, we’ll continue to offer reports on traditional subjects. But slowly, our focus will turn.

CASEY as the Bat

Having finally tracked down and read Judge Alito's 3rd Circuit dissent in Planned Parenthood v Casey, I certainly hope that over the next several weeks pro-choice voters in Maine (Snowe, Collins) Rhode Island (Chafee) Ohio (Voinovich, DeWine) and the other haunts of "moderate" Republicans are made aware of the fact that Bush's nominee believes husbands have a vested property right in their wives' uteruses.

I will say right upfront that I'm not knowledgeable enough about the case law that Scalito cites to say whether his interpretation is merely out there, or way out there. But the fact that Justice O'Connor -- whose various balancing tests Scalito relies heavily upon in his dissent -- basically slapped him down cold ("Section 3209's husband notification provision constitutes an undue burden, and is therefore invalid." full stop) suggests she at least thought he was full of it.

Billmon: Borking Does Not Equal Sliming

If what Chris Matthews said tonight is even remotely true, then the DNC needs to leave the Borking to people who actually know what the word means:

"I'm sitting here holding in my hands a disgusting document, put out not for attribution. The Democrats are circulating it. It's a complaint sheet against Judge Alito's nomination. The first thing they nail is he failed to win a mob conviction in 1988. They nail him on not putting italian mobsters in jail. Why would they bring this up? This is either a very bad coincidence or very bad politics. Either way it will hurt them. This document, not abortion rights, not civil rights but that he failed to nail some mobsters in 1988. This is the top of their list. Amazingly bad politics."

The document in question is, in most respects, a run-of-the-mill hit job on Scalito's judicial record. If anything, I don't think it punches hard enough when it comes to describing Lil' Nino's wing-nut jurisprudence. (The writing is also atrocious.)

Billmon: Rove's Other Lie

The Washington Post confirms that Turdblossom ain't out of the woods yet -- and that Patrick Fitzgerald has more on his mind than just Karl's email habits:

A source familiar with the discussion between Rove and Fitzgerald said the Tuesday meeting was about a lot more than "just an e-mail from Levine." He would not elaborate.

Rove remains a focus of the CIA leak probe. He has told friends it is possible he still will be indicted for providing false statements to the grand jury.

"Everyone thinks it is over for Karl and they are wrong," a source close to Rove said. The strategist's legal and political advisers "by no means think the part of the investigation concerning Karl is closed."

This is a welcome antidote to Michael Isikoff's foolish Newsweek story, in which a two-year-long investigation is halted in its tracks because Karl Rove didn't tell his flunky that he just outed a CIA agent to Bob Novak, prompting the special prosecutor to sashay over to the president's own criminal defense attorney to tell him he's going to indict somebody else's client.

Billmon: Secret Sauce

I gotta tip my hat to Harry Reid -- that was a sharp manuever he pulled off today, taking the Senate into secret session in order to punch a hole through the stonewall in Pat Roberts's Senate Whitewash Committee:

After about two hours, senators returned to open session having appointed a six-member task force -- three members from each party -- to review the committee's progress and report back to their respective leaders by Nov. 14.

In some ways, the reaction of the GOP grandees was an even bigger treat than watching the Democratic jellyfish rear up on its hind tentacles and sting someone. Outside of a nursery school, I don't know if I've ever heard such a chorus of crying and whining from a bunch of babies before. The Republicans have been in power so long now they've started to take on the pompous self-righteousness of those who believe power is their due.

3 New Studies Assess Effects of Child Care

By TAMAR LEWIN

Published: November 1, 2005

For most working parents, no other issue is so fraught with worry as the choice of child care. In a field long plagued by overheated headlines and complicated political overtones, three new studies offer some solid information on the pros and cons of different arrangements.

Two bolster research that found that long hours in group child care are linked to better reading and math skills but worse social skills and more behavioral problems. The third suggests that children in child care centers are safer than those who receive care in private homes, whether in a neighbor's home or by a nanny in the child's own home.

Democrats Force Senate Into Closed Session Over Iraq Data

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: November 1, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Democrats forced the Republican-controlled Senate into an unusual closed session Tuesday, questioning intelligence that President Bush used in the run-up to the war in Iraq and accusing Republicans of ignoring the issue.

"They have repeatedly chosen to protect the Republican administration rather than get to the bottom of what happened and why," Democratic leader Harry Reid said.

Taken by surprise, Republicans derided the move as a political stunt.

Behind Gold's Glitter: Torn Lands and Pointed Questions

By JANE PERLEZ and KIRK JOHNSON

Published: October 24, 2005

There has always been an element of madness to gold's allure.

For thousands of years, something in the eternally lustrous metal has driven people to the outer edges of desire - to have it and hoard it, to kill or conquer for it, to possess it like a lover.

In the early 1500's, King Ferdinand of Spain laid down the priorities as his conquistadors set out for the New World. "Get gold," he told them, "Humanely if possible, but at all costs, get gold."

In that long and tortuous history, gold has now arrived at a new moment of opportunity and peril.

Step Aside, Talking Heads. It's Time for Bigger Fish

By JANET MASLIN

Published: October 31, 2005

The picture of Al Franken on the cover of Al Franken's new book is much bigger than the picture of Al Franken on Al Franken's last one. Al Franken has come a long way lately, not least in the area of self-promotion.

Since the 2003 publication of his "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them," Mr. Franken has progressed from taking potshots at talk-show hosts to joining their ranks (via Air America Radio and the Sundance Channel). He has expressed nascent political stirrings, positioning himself as a possible senatorial candidate from Minnesota for 2008.

New Study Warns of Total Loss of Arctic Tundra

By ANDREW C. REVKIN

If emissions of heat-trapping gases continue to accumulate in the atmosphere at the current rate, there may be many centuries of warming and a near-total loss of Arctic tundra, according to a new climate study.

Over all, the world would experience profound transformations, some potentially beneficial but many disruptive, and all at a pace rarely seen in nature, said the authors of the study, being published today in The Journal of Climate.

"The question is no longer whether we will need to address this problem, but when we will need to address the problem," said Kenneth Caldeira, an author of the study and a climate expert at the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology, based at Stanford University.

"We can either address it now, before we severely and irreversibly damage our climate, or we can wait until irreversible damage manifests itself strongly," Dr. Caldeira said. "If all we do is try to adapt, things will get worse and worse."

CBS' Mary Mapes, in 'Vanity Fair,' Defends Role in 'RatherGate'

By E&P Staff

Published: October 31, 2005 8:20 PM ET
NEW YORK In the upcoming December issue of Vanity Fair, Mary Mapes, the CBS News producer who lost her job after the disputed "60 Minutes II" Bush/National Guard report, writes, "I must answer the bloggers, the babblers and blabbers, and the true believers who have called me everything from 'feminazi' to an 'elitist liberal' to an 'idiot.'

"If I was an idiot, it was for believing in a free press that is able to do its job without fear or favor. ...I didn't know that the attack on our story was going to be as effective as a brilliantly run national political campaign, because that is what it was: a political campaign."

Cursor's Media Patrol - 11/01/05

Democrats force Senate into closed session, "questioning intelligence that President Bush used in the run-up to the war in Iraq and accusing Republicans of ignoring the issue," reports the AP. It followed Minority Leader Harry Reid making what Sen. Trent Lott called "some sort of stink about Scooter Libby and the CIA leak."

Following a White House 'Personnel Announcement,' Knight Ridder finds 'Cheney's new security adviser linked to bogus information on Iraq,' and his new chief of staff was "a principal author of the White House memo justifying torture of terrorism suspects."

"'Regime change' in Syria is proceeding along lines suggested by the Iraqi template," writes Justin Raimondo, following Seymour Hersh's claim that the Mehlis Report on the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, is "built on the same anemic foundations" as Colin Powell's U.N. presentation.

U.S. planning for 'Cuba without Castro' has "entered a new stage," reports the Financial Times, with the Office for Reconstruction and Stabilization leading an "inter-agency effort" which "recognises that the Cuba transition may not go peacefully and that the U.S. may have to launch a nation-building exercise."

'The Real Reason' why "the strategic decision by the United States to nuke Iran was probably made long ago," is "just to demonstrate that it can do it," writes Jorge Hirsch, who earlier suggested that "The stage is set for a chain of events that could lead to nuclear war over chemical weapons in the immediate future."

Hitler in Virginia

By Max Blumenthal, TheNation.com. Posted October 31, 2005.

The Governor's race in Virginia is heating up, but the ads produced by the GOP candidate's attack-dog media consultant are backfiring and could sink the Republican.

Nearly two weeks after Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Jerry Kilgore ran two of the most controversial commercials in recent political history, his media consultant would not stand by their truthfulness. "I'd love to belabor that with you," Scott Howell told me when I asked him about the accuracy of his advertisements. "I just don't have the--I can't stand to talk to somebody in the media and be wrong." He then described his ads as "tasteful."

Howell's circumspection was a startling inversion of his public persona. Notorious for his audacious, hyperemotional attack ads, he describes himself as "Little Lee Atwater" after the late fabled Republican negative campaign consultant who was his and Karl Rove's mentor.

'The Blade' Takes Scalpel to GOP Funding in 2004 Campaign

By Joe Strupp

Published: October 31, 2005 1:00 PM ET
NEW YORK The Blade of Toledo is at it again.

On Sunday, just six months after blowing the lid off a major coin investment scandal that rocked Ohio's Republican Party, the Blade launched a four-part series looking into statewide GOP fundraising practices.

Whereas its "Coingate" reporting focused largely on fundraiser Tom Noe, who was indicted last Thursday for allegations of illegally funneling money to Bush's 2004 re-election effort, the latest investigation is far broader in scope. What the paper uncovered is evidence that the Republican Party's fundraising efforts reward big-money donors with influence, state contracts, and appointments, a practice that goes back some 20 years.

Sweet Victory: United Methodist Church Calls For Withdrawal

It's one thing when former high-ranking members of your own Administration come out against your war. It's another thing when two-thirds of the country calls the invasion and occupation a mistake. It's really something when your own church issues a statement urging you to pull out the troops now.

Last week, the United Methodist Church Board of Church and Society--the social action committee of the church that both President Bush and Vice President Cheney belong to--resoundingly passed a resolution calling for withdrawal with only two 'no' votes and one abstention.

Bush critics say US is losing war on terror

By David Morgan
Tue Nov 1, 1:52 PM ET

U.S. terrorism experts Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon have reached a stark conclusion about the war on terrorism: the United States is losing.

Despite an early victory over the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan, the two former Clinton administration officials say President George W. Bush's policies have created a new haven for terrorism in Iraq that escalates the potential for Islamic violence against Europe and the United States.

America's badly damaged image in the Muslim world could take more than a generation to set right. And Bush's mounting political woes at home have undermined the chance for any bold U.S. initiatives to address the grim social realities that feed Islamic radicalism, they say.

"It's been fairly disastrous," said Benjamin, who worked as a director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council from 1994 to 1999.

Judge Removed From DeLay's Criminal Case

By APRIL CASTRO, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 5 minutes ago

AUSTIN, Texas - In a courtroom victory for Rep. Tom Delay (news, bio, voting record), the judge in the campaign-finance case against the former House Republican leader was removed Tuesday because of his donations to Democratic candidates and causes.

A semi-retired judge who was called in to hear the dispute, C.W. Bud Duncan, ruled in Delay's favor without comment. Duncan ordered the appointment of a new judge to preside over the case.

Grim Statistics - Part One

by jpol
Tue Nov 1st, 2005 at 09:49:54 AM EDT

There is a little-known report known as the National Security Index, put out periodically by the Senate Democratic Policy Committee. It contains some truly grim statistics that are rarely reported by the mainstream media even though the report is available on the Committee's web site, along with footnotes documenting every statistic.

Iraq Statistics From the October 17, 2005 National Security Index:

General:

* Approximate number of U.S. troops currently in Iraq: 152,000
* Percent of coalition forces contributed by the U.S.: 87.4
* Weeks since the Pentagon developed a plan to draw down U.S. forces in Iraq to roughly 40,000 by mid-2005: 104* (now 106)
* Approximate amount appropriated by Congress for Iraq operations so far: $218 billion
* Approximate amount spent by the U.S. in World War I: $205 billion
* Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) found: 0
* Number of U.S. service members killed in Iraq: 1,962* (now 2,027)
* Number killed since the President announced the end of major combat: 1,823* (now 1,883)
* Number reported wounded by the Defense Department: 15,063* (now 15,220)
* Approximate number of medical evacuations of U.S. military personnel performed since the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom: 55,000
* Number of National Guard soldiers killed in Iraq through August 27, 2005: 300
* Number of National Guard soldiers killed in the entire Vietnam War: 97

Trial Could Pit Libby's Interests Against Bush's

By Jim VandeHei and Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; A02

Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, is expected to plead not guilty to charges that he lied and obstructed justice in the CIA leak probe when he is arraigned Thursday, setting the stage for a possible courtroom fight in which Libby's interests could collide with those of the Bush White House, according to several Republican officials.

Libby, who was charged with five felonies, is putting the finishing touches on a new legal and public relations team. It will argue in court and in public that he is guilty of nothing more than having a foggy memory and a hectic schedule, according to people close to him. He is scheduled to appear in U.S. District Court before Judge Reggie B. Walton.

Tax 'em Till They Turn Red

The Bush tax panel's plan to screw Democrats.
By Daniel Gross
Posted Monday, Oct. 31, 2005, at 5:02 PM ET

The president's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform will present its proposals tomorrow, and the bipartisan commission seems to have reached the following conclusion about how to improve revenue collection: Screw the blue states.

In the name of simplification and fairness, the panel is proposing to do away with the dreaded Alternative Minimum Tax, a pernicious levy that effectively increases taxes on millions of people each year by robbing them of some deductions for property taxes and state and local income taxes. According to the Treasury Department, some 4 million Americans will pay the tax in 2005. If Congress doesn't extend a law that limits the reach of the AMT, it could hit 21 million people next year. Abolishing the AMT would seem to be good news for blue-staters, since it falls largely on people who live in Democrat-dominated areas.

Trick and Treat

Sammy Alito is the whole bag of goodies.
By Dahlia Lithwick
Posted Monday, Oct. 31, 2005, at 2:26 PM ET

Well, boo.

It's magic. Almost as if the whole Harriet Miers debacle never happened, President Bush has rapidly retreated from his judicial preferences of last month. The urgency of filling Sandra Day O'Connor's seat with another woman has been erased; the importance of balancing the too-scholarly court with a practicing attorney has evaporated; and the need to put an outsider onto the court is long forgotten. Suddenly George Bush's vision for what the high court most needs maps perfectly with that of the movement conservatives who sank the Miers nomination. Never has a pander felt so good.

Labor Deal With Wal-Mart Criticized

Inspector General Cites 'Breakdowns'

By Amy Joyce
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; D03

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. received "significant concessions" from the U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division when the department and Wal-Mart signed a settlement agreement last year after the company was cited for child labor violations, according to a Department of Labor inspector general report released yesterday.

While the agreement did not violate laws, the inspector general's office found "serious breakdowns" in the department's "negotiating, developing and approving" such agreements.

Bush Panel Unanimously Backs Two Alternatives for Simplifying Tax Rules

(Update4)

Nov. 1 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush's tax advisory panel unanimously backed two overhauls to the tax code that would scrap or curb many popular deductions and tax labor more heavily than investment.

The nine-member panel, wrapping up 10 months of work, said in a letter today to Treasury Secretary John Snow that the current code is rife with ``gimmicks'' and ``hidden traps,'' such as the alternative minimum tax, which it recommends repealing. The two proposals would raise about the same amount of money as the current system, the panelists said.

``Both satisfy the president's directive to recommend options that are simple, fair, and pro-growth,'' the panel said in its letter. Snow said in Washington today that the recommendations ``challenge orthodoxy'' and provide a ``starting point'' for altering the tax system.

What the 'Shield' Covered Up

y E. J. Dionne Jr.
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; A25

Has anyone noticed that the coverup worked?

In his impressive presentation of the indictment of Lewis "Scooter" Libby last week, Patrick Fitzgerald expressed the wish that witnesses had testified when subpoenas were issued in August 2004, and "we would have been here in October 2004 instead of October 2005."

Note the significance of the two dates: October 2004, before President Bush was reelected, and October 2005, after the president was reelected. Those dates make clear why Libby threw sand in the eyes of prosecutors, in the special counsel's apt metaphor, and helped drag out the investigation.

The Ivy Curtain

How meritocracy in higher education arose from a system built to keep WASPs in and Jews out.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kittay

Sunday, October 30, 2005; Page BW03

THE CHOSEN

The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton
By Jerome Karabel
Houghton Mifflin. 711 pp. $28

Proof of extracurricular activities, leadership qualities, letters of recommendation -- we take all these as natural, necessary and even enlightened elements of the college application process, though they cause us endless anxiety. Actually, they don't resemble in the least the way people in Europe or Japan get into college. They're a result of a particular American challenge at the turn of the 20th century, which President A. Lawrence Lowell of Harvard then characterized as follows: how to "prevent a dangerous increase in the proportion of Jews."

Panel to Recommend Major Tax Law Changes

By MARY DALRYMPLE
The Associated Press
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; 10:59 AM

WASHINGTON -- Chosen to find a simpler way to tax the nation, a presidential panel is set to recommend two designs that would rewrite virtually every tax law for individuals and businesses.

Under the plan, most deductions, credits and other tax breaks would be eliminated along with much of the paperwork and equations that baffle taxpayers under a drastically simplified income tax.

Questions of Trust in the Press Room

By Dana Milbank

Tuesday, November 1, 2005; Page A09

The question came politely, almost sweetly. Toward the end of the White House daily briefing yesterday, USA Radio Network's Connie Lawn asked press secretary Scott McClellan if he had considered resigning.

McClellan said he had not. In fact, the spokesman added, "I feel pretty good."

Beyond the Bus

Rosa Parks Took a Stand, but Mourners Know Prejudice Still Is Deep-Seated

By Tamara Jones and Petula Dvorak
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; Page C01

Before he enters a crosswalk outside his downtown law office, Johnnie Bond scans the cars stopped before him. Is there a white woman alone? Will he hear it this time?

Click.

Such a tiny sound.

Click.

Like a pistol cocking.

Click.

Guantanamo Desperation Seen in Suicide Attempts

One Incident Was During Lawyer's Visit

By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; Page A01

Jumah Dossari had to visit the restroom, so the detainee made a quick joke with his American lawyer before military police guards escorted him to a nearby cell with a toilet. The U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, had taken quite a toll on Dossari over the past four years, but his attorney, who was there to discuss Dossari's federal court case, noted his good spirits and thought nothing of his bathroom break.

Alito Leans Right Where O'Connor Swung Left

By Charles Lane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; Page A01

In 1991, Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. voted to uphold a Pennsylvania statute that would have required at least some married women to notify their husbands before getting an abortion; a year later, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor cast a decisive fifth vote at the Supreme Court to strike it down.

In 2000, Alito ruled that a federal law requiring time off for family and medical emergencies could not be used to sue state employers for damages; three years later, O'Connor was part of a Supreme Court majority that said it could.

Hunger in America rises by 43 percent over last five years

More than 38 million Americans go hungry, including nearly 14 million children
Waltham, MA, Oct. 28, 2005 –Hunger in American households has risen by 43 percent over the last five years, according to an analysis of US Department of Agriculture (USDA) data released today. The analysis, completed by the Center on Hunger and Poverty at Brandeis University, shows that more than 7 million people have joined the ranks of the hungry since 1999.

The USDA report, Household Food Security in the United States, 2004, says that 38.2 million Americans live in households that suffer directly from hunger and food insecurity, including nearly 14 million children. That figure is up from 31 million Americans in 1999.

Vietnam Study, Casting Doubts, Remains Secret

By SCOTT SHANE
Published: October 31, 2005

WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 - The National Security Agency has kept secret since 2001 a finding by an agency historian that during the Tonkin Gulf episode, which helped precipitate the Vietnam War, N.S.A. officers deliberately distorted critical intelligence to cover up their mistakes, two people familiar with the historian's work say.

The House's Abuse of Patriotism

Published: October 31, 2005

In the national anguish after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Congress rushed to enact a formidable antiterrorism law - the Patriot Act - that significantly crimped civil liberties by expanding law enforcement's power to use wiretaps, search warrants and other surveillance techniques, often under the cloak of secrecy. There was virtually no public debate before these major changes to the nation's legal system were put into effect.

Now, with some of the act's most sweeping powers set to expire at the end of the year, the two houses of Congress face crucial negotiations, which will also take place out of public view, on their differences over how to extend and amend the law. That's controversy enough. But the increasingly out-of-control House of Representatives has made the threat to our system of justice even greater by inserting a raft of provisions to enlarge the scope of the federal death penalty.

The End of Pensions

By ROGER LOWENSTEIN

I. THE LATEST FINANCIAL DEBACLE

When I caught up with Robert S. Miller, the chief executive of Delphi Corporation, last summer, he was still pitching the fantasy that his company, a huge auto-parts maker, would be able to cut a deal with its workers and avoid filing for bankruptcy protection. But he acknowledged that Delphi faced one perhaps insuperable hurdle - not the current conditions in the auto business so much as the legacy of the pension promises that Delphi committed to many decades ago, when it was part of General Motors. This was the same fear that had obsessed Alfred P. Sloan Jr., the storied president of G.M., who warned way back in the 1940's that pensions and like benefits would be "extravagant beyond reason." But under pressure from the United Auto Workers union, he granted them. And as future auto executives would discover, pension obligations are - outside of bankruptcy, anyway - virtually impossible to unload. Unlike wages or health benefits, pension benefits cannot be cut. Unlike other contracts, which might be renegotiated as business conditions change, pension commitments are forever. And given the exigencies of the labor market, they tend to be steadily improved upon, at least when times are good.

Sen. Roberts held up 60 Minutes Niger story

(October 30, 2005 -- 10:45 AM EDT)

At the Washington Post online yesterday, Jeff Morley raised the possibility that last year's Dan Rather/National Guard papers scandal may have prevented CBS's 60 Minutes from airing a story on the origins of the Niger forgeries. Referring to Elisabetta Burba, the Italian journalist who was offered the forgeries in October 2002, Morley writes ...

Burba "has also been interviewed by the CBS investigative show '60 Minutes ' for a piece on the documents that was pulled in the wake of the problems that brought down Dan Rather," according to the LAT.

Sirotablog: Cheney staffer-turned-reporter now covering Libby indictment for NBC News

Sirotablog - Real-world wisdom from outside the beltway.

10.30.05

Over at the Huffington Post, Dan Carol asks a great question: how can NBC's Pete Williams be allowed to cover the Scooter Libby story for the network, considering Williams was a longtime former staffer for Dick Cheney?

That's right – according to Williams' biography on NBC's website, Williams is "a native of Casper, Wyoming" – where Cheney is from. In 1986, Williams "joined the Washington, DC staff of then Congressman Dick Cheney as press secretary and a legislative assistant. In 1989, when Cheney was named Assistant Secretary of Defense, Williams was appointed Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs."

US soldiers accused of beating detainees

Associated Press in Kabul
Monday October 31, 2005
The Guardian

Two US soldiers have been charged with assaulting detainees at a coalition base in Uruzgan province, southern Afghanistan, the US military said yesterday.

The troops allegedly punched two detainees on the chest, shoulders and stomach. Neither required medical attention. No details were given of when the alleged attack took place.

The allegations come 10 days after the military began an investigation into allegations that troops burned the bodies of two Taliban rebels killed in battle.

Bush picks conservative judge for supreme court

George Bush today put forward a judge with a well-attested conservative track record to replace Harriet Miers as his nominee for the US supreme court.

Mr Bush announced Samuel Alito's nomination as he began an effort to move on from the events of last week, one of the most damaging in his presidency.

The Mahablog:

...in his usual halfassed way, Joe Klein almost gets a clue:

Bush’s White House is a conundrum, a bastion of telegenic idealism and deep cynicism. The President has proposed vast, transformational policies—the remaking of the Middle East, of Social Security, of the federal bureaucracy. But he has done so in a haphazard way, with little attention to detail or consequences. There are grand pronouncements and, yes, crusades, punctuated with marching words like evil and moral and freedom. Beneath, though, is the cynical assumption that the public doesn’t care about the details—that results don’t matter, corners can be cut and special favors bestowed.

Klein, if you don’t know by now the idealism is an act, there’s no hope for you.

On Bush's 39% Approval Rating....

"When millions think that Branson is heaven, that Bruce Willis can act, that Velveeta is cheese, it's never going to be hard to sell George Bush as the President to 39% of the nation." -- commenter Davis X. Machina at Digby's Hullabaloo.

Digby: Turdblossom In The Punchbowl

Karl Rove is spinning like Tanya Harding at the nationals right now, telling everyone who will listen that he wasn't part of any conspiracy to leak Plame's identity to the press, that he has a major case of CRS disease (can't remember shit.) But it just doesn't hold water.

Digby: Fitz In The Tank?

Michael Isikoff reports:

Fitzgerald made another visit early Friday morning—shortly before the grand jury voted to indict Dick Cheney's top aide, I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby—to the office of James Sharp, President George W. Bush's own lawyer in the case, to tell him the president's closest aide would not be charged.

Holy Shit. Can someone tell me why Fitzgerald would go to President Bush's personal lawyer on Friday to tell him that Bush's "closest aide wouldn't be charged?" Is it in any possible sense ethical for the prosecutor to be telling the president's lawyer information that isn't available to the public about members of the president's staff in the middle of an investigation?

Letting the White House Walk?

By Robert Parry

October 30, 2005

As an outsider to Washington, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald appears to have misunderstood the finer points of how national security classifications work when a secret is as discrete – and sensitive – as the identity of an undercover CIA officer.

In his five-count indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff I. Lewis Libby, prosecutor Fitzgerald leaves the false impression that it was all right for White House officials with security clearances to be discussing the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, a counter-proliferation official under deep cover.

Under the rules of classification, however, to see such secrets an official must not only have a top-secret clearance but also special code-word clearance that grants access to a specific compartment governed by strict need-to-know requirements.

Juan Cole: 26 Killed by Car Bomb North of Baquba 3 US GIs Killed

Guerrillas in a Shiite village near Baqubah, northeast of Baghdad, detonated a huge truck bomb on Saturday, killing at least 26 innocent bystanders. In separate violence, 3 US GIs were killed, and US air forces attacked suspected guerrilla strongholds in western Iraq.

Juan Cole: Top Five Resignations the American People Should Demand In the Wake of Libby's Indictment

Apologize? Apologize? Is that all the US Democratic leadership can demand from George W. Bush after it was confirmed that his key aides and those of Vice President Cheney planned a petty campaign of retribution against a distinguished foreign service officer by outing his wife, undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson? I should think not. I should think some high-profile resignations are in order.

Jane Hamsher at Firedoglake: Let's Tell Mikey, He'll Print Anything

It wasn't like Michael Isikoff didn't already have plenty to be ashamed of. After all, it was he who turned the pages of once-respectable Newsweek into a lurid bodice-ripper of Brobdingnagian proportions during Monicagate. I really didn't think it was possible to top a journalistic career built on three-ways with Lucianne Goldberg and Linda Tripp, but it seems I have underestimated the boy.

Isikoff really contorts himself into a shameless media pretzel in order to give Turdy a clean bill of political health today. I mean, I know Luskin is out there spinning -- that's his job as Rove's attorney -- but the idea that any journalist would unquestioningly accept whatever he says as an objective statement of fact and then print it as such is really quite remarkable even in a world of ever-escalating MSM shilling one-upsmanship, especially when Rove's new "alibi" includes accusing Patrick Fitzgerald of prosecutorial misconduct.

Karl Rove: Last-Minute Evidence

Newsweek

Nov. 7, 2005 issue - Special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's decision not to indict deputy White House chief of staff Karl Rove in the CIA leak case followed a flurry of last-minute negotiations between the prosecutor and Rove's defense lawyer, Robert Luskin. On Tuesday afternoon, Fitzgerald and the chief FBI agent on the case, Jack Eckenrode, visited the offices of the D.C. law firm where Luskin works to meet with the defense lawyer. Two sources close to Rove who asked not to be identified because the probe is ongoing said Luskin presented evidence that gave the prosecutor "pause." One small item was a July 11, 2003, e-mail Rove sent to former press aide Adam Levine saying Levine could come up to his office to discuss a personnel issue. The e-mail was at 11:17 a.m., minutes after Rove had gotten off the phone with Matt Cooper—the same conversation (in which White House critic Joe Wilson's wife's work for the CIA was discussed) that Rove originally failed to disclose to the grand jury. Levine, with whom Rove often discussed his talks with reporters, did immediately go up to see Rove. But as Levine told the FBI last week, Rove never said anything about Cooper. The Levine talk was arguably helpful to one of Luskin's arguments: that, as a senior White House official, Rove dealt with a wide range of matters and might not remember every conversation he has had with journalists. In any case, Fitzgerald made another visit early Friday morning—shortly before the grand jury voted to indict Dick Cheney's top aide, I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby—to the office of James Sharp, President George W. Bush's own lawyer in the case, to tell him the president's closest aide would not be charged. Rove remains in some jeopardy, but the consensus view of lawyers close to the case is that he has probably dodged the bullet.

Wilson: There Have Been Threats

NEW YORK, Oct. 28, 2005

(CBS) Joe Wilson, whose wife’s unmasking as a CIA agent is at the center of the special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation, said today that that his wife, Valerie Plame, has been threatened. Wilson talks to 60 Minutes correspondent Ed Bradley, in his first interview since Fitzgerald announced the indictment of I. Lewis Libby, Sunday, Oct. 30, at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

"There have been specific threats [against Plame]. Beyond that I just can’t go," Wilson tells Bradley. Wilson says he and his wife have discussed security for her with "several agencies."

Army secret surfaces: Deadly chemicals at sea

Millions of pounds of unused weapons of mass destruction were dumped in oceans before Congress banned the practice in 1972. The threat is still out there, and may be growing.

By John Bull
Special to The Morning Call
October 30, 2005
First of a two-day series

A clam dredging operation off the coast of Atlantic City, N.J., in 2004 pulled up an old artillery shell.

The long-submerged, World War I-era explosive was filled with a black, tar-like substance.

Bomb disposal technicians from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware were brought in to dismantle it. Three of them were injured, one hospitalized with large, pus-filled blisters on his arm and hand.

The shell was filled with mustard gas in solid form.

What was long-feared by the few military officials in the know had come to pass: Chemical weapons that the Army dumped at sea decades ago had finally ended up on shore in the United States.