Glenn Greenwald: The AEI, Iran and a Free Press

The American Enterprise Institute sits in the innermost belly of the neoconservative beast, boasting a list of resident "Scholars and Fellows" that includes Richard Perle, David Frum, Michael Ledeen, John Yoo, and Laurie Mylorie (who "has theorized that al Qaeda is an agency of Iraqi intelligence, that Saddam Hussein was behind the first bombing of the World Trade Center, and that Iraqi intelligence was linked to Oklahoma City bomber Terry Nichols"). Paul Wolfowitz and Irving Kristol, among many other similar Middle East warmongering types, are former AEI "resident scholars," and Lynne Cheney is still an active "Fellow."

Blackwater and Colombian workers clash over pay scale

By BILL SIZEMORE, The Virginian-Pilot
© September 2, 2006

About three dozen former Colombian soldiers are engaged in a pay dispute with Blackwater USA, saying their salaries for security work in Iraq turned out to be one-quarter what they had been promised by recruiters in Bogota.

The dispute sheds light on the international flavor of Blackwater's work force and the pay disparities that characterize the burgeoning private military industry.

The Colombians say they are earning $34 a day, a fraction of what Blackwater pays its American contractors in the Iraq war zone.

Digby: Speechless

LIMBAUGH: I love these kinds of stories, 'cause we're just getting them all over the place: Waistlines continue to grow in the United States. Another crisis story here, ladies and gentlemen, from our old buddies at the Associated Press. "The gravy train -- make that the sausage, biscuits, and gravy train -- just keep [sic] on rolling in most of America last year." Thirty-one states showing an increase in obesity. Mississippi continued to lead the way; an estimated 30 percent of adults there are considered obese, an increase of 1.1 percentage points when compared with last year's report. Indeed, "the five states with the highest obesity rates are Mississippi, Alabama, West Virginia, Louisiana, and Kentucky -- exhibit much higher rates of poverty than the national norm. Meanwhile, the five states with the lowest obesity have less poverty. They are Colorado, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont."

Digby: "You're Doin' A Heckuva Job Brownie:" One Year Ago Today

Bush congratulated Brownie even though he had just viewed a DVD with highlights of horrors on the ground on AF One as he made his way to the Gulf for the above photo-op:

The reality, say several aides who did not wish to be quoted because it might displease the president, did not really sink in until Thursday night. Some White House staffers were watching the evening news and thought the president needed to see the horrific reports coming out of New Orleans. Counselor Bartlett made up a DVD of the newscasts so Bush could see them in their entirety as he flew down to the Gulf Coast the next morning on Air Force One.

Digby: One Year Ago Today

Even though the media doesn't seem to be buying it on the merits, I have to give the administration credit for their smooth pivot from their Katrina failure to defeating Hitler. It was savvy, you have to admit, to go down to New Orleans and give a couple of plodding, desultory speeches while Rummy delivered a half-mad stemwinder about appeasement in the 1930's. Then, the minute the Katrina "anniversary" was over, Bush hightailed it out of town and immediately evoked the spectre of the Nazis, commies and martians coming to kill us all in our beds. I'm not seeing much about New Orleans anymore.

Digby: Springtime For Felix

I find it quite interesting that every few years another picture turns up of some powerful Republican Senator with the grand Kliegels of the Council of Conservative Citizens? George Felix Allen is just the latest.

Digby: Nothing To See Here

The Hotline blogometer says:

So What?

In sum, that's Ramesh Ponnuru response to lefty criticism of Club for Growth's targeting of Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-RI) at the possible expense of a GOP majority in the Sen. For months now, progressive bloggers have been decrying the lack of media attention RI SEN has received compared to their efforts to unseat Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT). There are many things that distinguish thetwo races (Chafee was never a GOP VP candidate, for starters) but the more important difference is mentioned by Ponnuru: the Club for Growth does not exist to help the GOP control Congress.

Digby: Closing Out Of Town

It looks like Bush has finished his walk-on performance in the Katrina pageant and is moving directly into his next project, "They're Comin' Tah Gitya! Part VXIII"

So far the critics aren't impressed. From CNN:

QUESTION: So do you think your new series of speeches are going to have an impact on midterm elections?

BUSH: My series of speeches are -- they're not political speeches. They're speeches about the future of this country, and they are speeches to make it clear that if we retreat before the job is done, this nation will become even more in jeopardy. These are important times.

Digby: The Big Picture

I assume that a great many of you have seen An Inconvenient Truth by now. If you haven't, make a point to do it as soon as you can. One year ago today, that picture was on all our television screens and it is one scary image.

It's quite clear to all sentient beings (which excludes the faith based GOP and its corporate masters) that global warming is real, it's very serious and it's vastly important that we do something about it as soon as possible.

Digby: Sacrifices

There's plenty of commentary this morning about this Brian Williams interview with the president yesterday. But can I just point out that neither Williams nor Bush make any damned sense? Take this exchange:

WILLIAMS: When you take a tour of the world, a lot of Americans e-mail me with their fears that, some days they just wake up and it just feels like the end of the world is near. And you go from North Korea to Iran, to Iraq, to Afghanistan, and you look at how things have changed, how Americans are viewed overseas, if that is important to you. Do you have any moments of doubt that we fought a wrong war? Or that there's something wrong with the perception of America overseas?

BUSH: Well those are two different questions, did we fight the wrong war, and absolutely -- I have no doubt -- the war came to our shores, remember that. We had a foreign policy that basically said, let's hope calm works. And we were attacked.

WILLIAMS: But those weren't Iraqis.

Digby: Keep Your Nerve

Matt Yglesias has it exactly right. Regarding Rumsfeld's wild-eyed crazy act at the American Legion he writes:

This, I think we can assume, is the fall campaign. The idea is to psyche the Democrats out. To make them think they can't win an argument about foreign policy. To make them act like they can't win an argument about foreign policy. And to thereby demonstrate to the American people that even the Democrats themselves lack confidence in their own ability to handle these issues.

Digby: Kewl Kid Krush

A bunch of people have commented on this kewl kidz exchange as they tried to explain their crushes on Flyboy McCain. Their halting explanations are all perfect illustrations of typical vapid, courtier sensitibilities. But I'd like to address just one comment from Howard Fineman, who seems to have gotten over his Dubya infatuation at long last and gone back to his first love:

MATTHEWS: -- after listening to the four of you. Why does the media like McCain? What's going on here? Does he seem to be more authentic than other politicians?

O'DONNELL: Well --

FINEMAN: Well, I think part of it on this --

O'DONNELL: Well --

FINEMAN: -- part of it on this specific thing, he knows what he's talking about. He clearly has a lot of experience, militarily, from the inside out on the Armed Services Committee.

Digby: The Buck Stops Over There

Poor little Brownie is telling the truth:

Former Director Michael Brown told ABC News' "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" Sunday he stood by comments in a Playboy interview, and President Bush wanted him to take the heat for the bungling.

Digby: Man Of Principle

Here's the man all the kewl kidz just love:

MCCAIN: I believe that the “Christian Right” has a major role to play in the Republican Party. One reason is because they’re so active and their followers are. And I believe they have a right to be a part of our party. I don’t have to agree with everything they stand for, nor do I have to agree with everything that’s on the liberal side of the Republican Party. If we have to agree on every issue, we’re not a Republican Party. I believe in open and honest debate. Was I unhappy in the year 2000 that I lost the primary and there were some attacks on me that I thought was unfair? Of course. Should I get over it? Should I serve — can I serve the people of Arizona best by looking back in anger or moving forward?

Digby: Pimping the Victims

Remember this woman?

Bronwynne Bassier was desperate. Roaming the streets of her Biloxi, Miss., neighborhood four days after Katrina, scavenging for food and clothes for her 2-year-old son, Bassier stumbled upon the one man who presumably could help: President George W. Bush. Rushing toward him, the 22-year-old single mother pleaded and sobbed. "My son needs clothes," she cried. "I've lost everything." Momentarily stunned, Bush appeared on the verge of tears himself as he listened. Bush tried to direct her and her younger sister, Kim, toward a Salvation Army shelter down the road, but ultimately comforted them the only way he knew how: he hugged them. "Hang in there," he told Bassier, kissing her forehead. "We're going to take care of you." Press cameras captured the moment and beamed the image of compassion around the globe.

Digby: Diaspora Lemonade

Jonathan Alter writes in this week's Newsweek:

A year ago, in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina, NEWSWEEK published a cover story called "Poverty, Race and Katrina: Lessons of a National Shame." The article suggested that the disaster was prompting a fresh look at "The Other America"—the 37 million Americans living below the poverty line. "It takes a hurricane," I wrote. "It takes the sight of the United States with a big black eye—visible around the world—to help the rest of us begin to see again." I ended on a hopeful note: "What kind of president does George W. Bush want to be? ... If he seizes the moment, he could undertake a midcourse correction that might materially change the lives of millions. Katrina gives Bush an only-Nixon-could-go-to-China opportunity, if he wants it."

Digby: Ethical Realism

Your Sunday night reading assignment, should you decide to accept it, is this article in The American prospect by Flynt Leverett, former member of the Bush administration, who quit in 2004.

His assessment is one of the most clear eyed views I've seen of the ramifications of the Bush Doctrine as it's been applied in the middle east. He calls for a return to "realism" which not so long ago was considered a dirty word by people like me. But I've learned a few things in the past few years --- there is something far worse than foreign policy realism and it's called neoconservatism in full effect, a lethally stupid combination of puerile Trotskyite idealism with a belief that brute force is the only path to democratic utopia. Combine that with epic ineptitude and you have the chaos that the Bush administration will bequeath to the next administration. And if a Republican succeeds him, the roots of neoconservatism are now deep enough in the party establishment that it will probably carry on for some time.

Digby: Rich Sunday

Frank Rich does a bang-up job this week comparing the Duelling Pageants. He sees the empty Codpiece coming up short on both counts. (Here's a free link to the column.)

The best part, I think, is this:

What’s amazing on Katrina’s first anniversary is how little Mr. Bush seems aware of this change in the political weather. He’s still in a bubble. At last week’s White House press conference, he sounded as petulant as Tom Cruise on the “Today” show when Matt Lauer challenged him about his boorish criticism of Brooke Shields. Asked what Iraq had to do with the attack on the World Trade Center, Mr. Bush testily responded, “Nothing,” adding that “nobody has ever suggested in this administration that Saddam Hussein ordered the attacks.” Like the emasculated movie star, the president is still so infatuated with his own myth that he believes the public will buy such nonsense.

I hadn't thought about the similarities between Bush's plight and that of Tom Cruise before and I should have.

Digby: "I'm Nothing Like Her, Nothing!"

I was perusing the Limbaugh web site (subs. only) for some specific Lieberman info and I was quite surprised at the defensiveness we netkooks seem to engender in the old gasbag. He haaates being being compared to us more than anything:

LIMBAUGH: Isn't it interesting, by the way, these people are just flat out loonies; they are insane kooks, these left wing blog types, yet they are treated with great reverence and great respect and fear in the Drive-By Media and Democratic Party circles -- and yet let Pat Buchanan run for president; let his supporters, you know, do their number, and the whole focus is on how insane Buchanan supporters were, how wacko, how dangerous and so forth they are. These people are being pumped up as though they are actual factors. They can't sell books; they don't generate much of anything other than a bunch of hot air amongst themselves. Because they're liberals and because they hate Bush, the Drive-By Media loves them. So her question again to John Harwood. "Well, we know Lamont's campaign in many ways has been driven by the netroots, many bloggers very supportive of him. What about that?"

Digby: Wingnut Welfare Queens Take On The First Amendment

For several years, Javed Iqbal has operated a small company from a Brooklyn storefront and out of the garage at his Staten Island home that provides satellite programming for households, including sermons from Christian evangelists seeking worldwide exposure.

Mr. Iqbal’s home, a modest two-story stone and brick house on Van Name Avenue in Mariners Harbor, stands out because among the children’s toys in the backyard were eight satellite dishes.

But this week, the budding entrepreneur’s house and storefront were raided by federal agents, and Mr. Iqbal was charged with providing customers services that included satellite broadcasts of a television station controlled by Hezbollah — a violation of federal law.

Smearing Joe Wilson, Again

By Robert Parry
September 1, 2006

In a world that wasn’t upside-down, the editorial page of Washington’s biggest newspaper might praise a whistleblower like former Ambassador Joseph Wilson for alerting the American people to a government deception that helped lead the country into a disastrous war that has killed 2,627 U.S. soldiers.

The editorial page also might demand that every senior administration official who sought to protect that deception by leaking the identity of a covert CIA officer (Wilson’s wife) be held accountable, at minimum stripped of their security clearances and fired from government.

NYT: Did special counsel Fitzgerald properly exercise his 'prosecutorial discretion' in CIA leak investigation?

09/01/2006 @ 10:48 pm

Filed by RAW STORY

An article on the front page of Saturday's edition of The New York Times examines if special counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald properly exercised his 'prosecutorial discretion' in his CIA leak investigation.

"An enduring mystery of the C.I.A. leak case has been solved in recent days, but with a new twist: Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the prosecutor, knew the identity of the leaker from his very first day in the special counsel’s chair, but kept the inquiry open for nearly two more years before indicting I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, on obstruction charges," writes David Johnston for the Times.

Glenn Greenwald: The full-chested warriors -- Up Close and Personal

When Fox News journalists Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig were being held by Gaza kidnappers, they were used as solemn symbols of our grand struggle against Islamic fascists. But ever since they were released, physically unharmed, they have become, as John Amato documented the other day, the targets of the same sort of hostility and bizarre resentment which was directed at Jill Carroll when she was released. It's almost as though the fact that they weren't killed -- and then refused to read some fictitious propaganda script about their captivity -- instantaneously transformed them from glorious martyrs in the War on Terror to impediments which needed to be neutralized through attacks on their mental health and character.

Yesterday, David Warren, a columnist for Real Clear Politics and The Ottawa Citizen, attacked Centanni and Wiig for being cowards and "men without chests" and said that they illustrate so much of what is wrong with the West and why we are losing to the Islamofascists:

The case of the two Fox News journalists, held hostage in Gaza, is worth dwelling upon. . . .

The degree to which our starch is awash is exhibited in the behaviour of so many of our captives, but especially in these two.

Creature From Black Monday . . . Alive

By Brooke A. Masters
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 1, 2006; D01

NEW YORK -- In the late 1980s, whiz kids on Wall Street were experimenting with computerized trading programs, using new technology that allowed them to trade millions of shares of stocks and related options simultaneously. By 1987, this "program trading" accounted for about 10 percent of all buying and selling in the U.S. stock market and was making big profits for big players, such as university endowments and brokerage firms.

Then came Black Monday. On Oct. 19, 1987, investors worried about inflation and rising interest rates suddenly lost confidence in the market and share prices began to fall. Hundreds of program traders responded by hitting the sell button, and the Dow Jones industrial average took the largest one-day plunge in its history -- 508 points, or 22.6 percent. Within hours, commentators and regulators had fingered computer-assisted trading as the villain in the crash. The New York Stock Exchange swiftly adopted new rules to control program trading, and Congress even talked about making it illegal.

That was then.

Thomas Frank: Rendezvous With Oblivion

NY Times, Friday Sept 1, 2006

Over the last month I have tried to describe conservative power in Washington, but with a small change of emphasis I could just as well have been describing the failure of liberalism: the center-left’s inability to comprehend the current political situation or to draw upon what is most vital in its own history.

What we have watched unfold for a few decades, I have argued, is a broad reversion to 19th-century political form, with free-market economics understood as the state of nature, plutocracy as the default social condition, and, enthroned as the nation’s necessary vice, an institutionalized corruption surpassing anything we have seen for 80 years. All that is missing is a return to the gold standard and a war to Christianize the Philippines.

Nightmare Mortgages

They promise the American Dream: A home of your own -- with ultra-low rates and payments anyone can afford. Now, the trap has sprung

For cash-strapped homeowners, it was a pitch they couldn't refuse: Refinance your mortgage at a bargain rate and cut your payments in half. New home buyers, stretching to afford something in a super-heated market, didn't even need to produce documentation, much less a downpayment.

Those who took the bait are in for a nasty surprise. While many Americans have started to worry about falling home prices, borrowers who jumped into so-called option ARM loans have another, more urgent problem: payments that are about to skyrocket.

Private sector 'not the answer to poverty'

By Philip Thornton, Economics Correspondent
Published: 01 September 2006

Rich countries must deliver more money directly to poor nations to avert a growing health and sanitation crisis spreading across the southern hemisphere, Oxfam will say today.

The global charity said investment in health care, water, sanitation and education must be delivered by governments rather than the private sector.

Devaluing Labor

By Harold Meyerson

Wednesday, August 30, 2006; Page A19

Labor Day is almost upon us, and like some of my fellow graybeards, I can, if I concentrate, actually remember what it was that this holiday once celebrated. Something about America being the land of broadly shared prosperity. Something about America being the first nation in human history that had a middle-class majority, where parents had every reason to think their children would fare even better than they had.

The young may be understandably incredulous, but the Great Compression, as economists call it, was the single most important social fact in our country in the decades after World War II. From 1947 through 1973, American productivity rose by a whopping 104 percent, and median family income rose by the very same 104 percent. More Americans bought homes and new cars and sent their kids to college than ever before. In ways more difficult to quantify, the mass prosperity fostered a generosity of spirit: The civil rights revolution and the Marshall Plan both emanated from an America in which most people were imbued with a sense of economic security.

Bush to Lower Gas Prices Before November Elections

Posted by Jon Ponder | Aug. 31, 2006, 10:13 am

President Bush won’t withdraw troop from Iraq before November because it would not be politically expedient for his very meager post-presidential legacy. (What other reason could there be?) But he can help Republican candidates with another nagging issue: gasoline prices. Looks like they’re about to fall, just in time for the elections in November:

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: …We may have a little good news here. Looks like gas prices are coming down, maybe quite a bit. Traditionally they do drop after Labor Day, that’s the end of the summer driving season. Also federal pollution requirements change then making it cheaper to refine, but there are some other things that are going on as well.

Education Dept. Shared Student Data With F.B.I.

By JONATHAN D. GLATER

The Federal Education Department shared personal information on hundreds of student loan applicants with the Federal Bureau of Investigation across a five-year period that began after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the agencies said yesterday.

Under the program, called Project Strikeback, the Education Department received names from the F.B.I. and checked them against its student aid database, forwarding information. Each year, the Education Department collects information from 14 million applications for federal student aid.

Neither agency would say whether any investigations resulted. The agencies said the program had been closed. The effort was reported yesterday by a graduate student, Laura McGann, at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, as part of a reporting project that focused on national security and civil liberties.

Shortcut To Catastrophe

By George Monbiot, AlterNet. Posted September 1, 2006.

A prominent scientist's idea to re-engineer the atmosphere in order to cool the earth could be as dangerous as climate change.

Challenging a Nobel laureate over a matter of science is not something you do lightly. I have hesitated and backed off, read and re-read his paper, but now I believe I can state with confidence that Paul Crutzen, winner of the 1995 prize for chemistry, has overlooked a critical scientific issue.

Crutzen is, as you would expect, a brilliant man. He was one of the atmospheric chemists who worked out how high-level ozone is formed and destroyed. He knows more than almost anyone about the impacts of pollutants in the atmosphere. This is what makes his omission so odd.

Gasp! I Married a Career Woman

By Caryl Rivers and Rosalind Barnett, Women's eNews. Posted September 1, 2006.

Forbes.com is just the latest media outlet to say working women have terrible marriages. Will this myth ever die?

We have a recurring nightmare. We're standing on a mountaintop, being attacked by a huge, winged chimera with an enormous head and a mouth that keeps chanting, "Working women are miserable. Their marriages are terrible. Their husbands are miserable. Their children are wrecks."

We slice off the beast's head with a sharp sword. Instantly 20 more heads appear to take its place, each chanting, "Working women are miserable, their marriages are terrible ...."

Cursor's Media Patrol - 08/31/06

After "highlighting the tragedy of his own incompetence" in New Orleans, a "dishonest, war-mongering, human-rights violating" President Bush gets a "fantastic Utah welcome," as Mayor Rocky Anderson proclaims that "We are fed lie after lie."

A Bush team campaign to 'Cast Foes As Defeatist' reportedly risks "spraying friendly fire on some of their own candidates," and Paul Craig Roberts feels he may have "misjudged Rumsfeld's intelligence. Anyone who can figure out the Muslim conspiracy is off the charts."

As 'Democrats take fire at Rumsfeld,' Helen Thomas urges "spineless" Dems to drop the "phony timetables" and offer voters "a quick exit from a bad show."

Analyzing "the many weaknesses of the war-on-terror concept," George Soros argues that "there will be no end to the vicious circle of escalating violence without a political settlement of the Palestine question."

Reporters and pundits who suggest it's 'Game Over' on the Plame leak story are said to be 'Missing the Point,' as it's argued that "the Armitage angle ... is just the latest diversion."

The Pentagon reportedly objects to the practice of predatory lending, through which military families pay up to 780 percent interest, on grounds that debt troubles can affect security clearances and "keep troops from going overseas."

GOP incumbent Sen. Conrad Burns, after being hailed as "a wonderful leader" by First Lady Laura Bush, warned supporters of terrorists who drive taxi cabs "in the daytime and kill at night," but in Virginia, it's "only the media" who "actually care" about Macaca.

The Myth of the Investor Middle Class

By Marie Cocco

A new study reveals the “ownership society’’ of conservative dreams for the fraud it is; do-it-yourself financing doesn’t work when the upper class owns 80% of the nation’s stock.

WASHINGTON—The “ownership society’’ looks like this: The owners are doing quite well, thank you.

Wealth—the value of assets such as houses, stocks and cash that an individual holds, after debts are subtracted—has become more concentrated over the past four decades, and more intensely so since 1998. Middle-income families who, in contemporary political mythology, are socking away money in mutual funds and soon will see their net worth rise with their stocks are, in truth, holding a steadily shrinking proportion of the nation’s wealth.

Pentagon sees risk in troops' loan debt

By William M. Welch, USA TODAY

As many as one in five members of the armed services are being preyed on by loan centers set up near military bases that can charge cash-strapped military families interest of 400% or more, a new Pentagon report has found.

ON DEADLINE: Read the full report

Steep lending charges have long plagued servicemembers, but the problem has become a more urgent concern to the military as it has struggled to fill its ranks during the Iraq war. That's because debt troubles can keep troops from going overseas.

Clinton Ended Welfare, Not Poverty

By Robert Scheer

Judging from his recent New York Times column, you’d think Bill Clinton doesn’t know the difference between getting mothers and their children off the welfare rolls and getting them out of poverty.

To hear Bill Clinton tell it, his presidency won the war on poverty three decades after President Lyndon B. Johnson launched it, having changed only the name. Unfortunately, however, for the mothers and their children pushed off the rolls but still struggling mightily to make ends meet even when the women are employed, the war on welfare was not the same battle at all.

Clinton masterfully blurred the two in a recent New York Times opinion column, as did most others on the 10th anniversary of the passage of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, writing as if getting mothers and their children off the welfare rolls is the same as getting them out of poverty. In the absence of any evidence that poverty is tamed, he celebrates a “bipartisan” victory, which was good for his image but not necessarily for those it claimed to help.

TPM Muckraker: "Masked" Bill-Blocker Reveals Self

By Paul Kiel - August 30, 2006, 1:59 PM

A spokesman for Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) just confirmed his boss was the man behind the secret hold on the Coburn/Obama spending database bill, which has captivated a segment of the political blogging community in recent days.

Disaster capitalism: how to make money out of misery

The privatisation of aid after Katrina offers a glimpse of a terrifying future in which only the wealthy are saved

Naomi Klein
Wednesday August 30, 2006
The Guardian

The Red Cross has just announced a new disaster-response partnership with Wal-Mart. When the next hurricane hits, it will be a co-production of Big Aid and Big Box. This, apparently, is the lesson learned from the US government's calamitous response to Hurricane Katrina: businesses do disaster better.

"It's all going to be private enterprise before it's over," Billy Wagner, emergency management chief for the Florida Keys, currently under hurricane watch for tropical storm Ernesto, said in April. "They've got the expertise. They've got the resources." But before this new consensus goes any further, perhaps it's time to take a look at where the privatisation of disaster began, and where it will inevitably lead.

Early Warning: Rumsfeld's Enemy: It's Us

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld delivered a fire-and-brimstone speech at the American Legion's annual convention yesterday -- after acknowledging young soldiers serving in Iraq and giving the boy scouts a shout-out, the secretary wove an elaborate picture of an enemy made up of terrorists, morally misguided Westerners, disagreeable military strategists, and a cynical news media.

Rumsfeld stated there could be no appeasing the enemy and any "any moral or intellectual confusion about who and what is right or wrong can weaken the ability of free societies to persevere."

Report: U.S. Secretly Negotiated with Gaza Kidnappers

August 29, 2006 3:14 PM

Hoda Osman Reports:

The U.S. secretly agreed to the "real demands" set by the group behind the August 14 kidnapping of two Fox News journalists in Gaza, according to a report in the pan-Arab newspaper al Hayat.

The paper quotes "informed sources close to the mediations" as saying that the U.S. secretly negotiated with the group through leaders of "the Palestinian popular resistance committees."

Keith Olbermann Delivers One Hell Of a Commentary on Rumsfeld

By: Jamie Holly on Wednesday, August 30th, 2006 at 6:22 PM - PDT

Keith had some very choice words about Rumsfeld’s "fascism" comments tonight. Watch it, save it and share it.

Video - WMV Video - QT

Olbermann delivered this commentary with fire and passion while highlighting how Rumsfeld’s comments echoes other times in our world’s history when anyone who questioned the administration was coined as a traitor, unpatriotic, communist or any other colorful term. Luckily we pulled out of those times and we will pull out of these times.

The Bush-Is-An-Idiot Camp Grows

By David Corn, TomPaine.com. Posted August 31, 2006.

It is getting harder for conservatives to ignore the president's intellectual shallowness.

The other day I crossed paths with a conservative talk show host. We chatted about current events. He noted that he was quite pissed off at the neocons for suggesting that American blood should be spilled to benefit the Iraqis. Let the Iraqis take care of themselves, he huffed. I asked, "Are you in the Bush-is-an-idiot camp?"

This was a reference to a recent segment on Joe Scarborough's MSNBC show during which Scarborough, a former Republican congressman from Florida, posed the question, "Is our president an idiot?" After playing a montage of video clips showing Bush at his tongue-tied worst ("Fool me once, shame on you -- fool me -- you can't get fooled again"), Scarborough said that an former close aide to President Bush had recently told him that Bush is "intellectually shallow and one of the most incurious public figures this man has ever met." Scarborough claimed that Bush is "getting worse instead of better" and that when it comes to presidential stupidity Bush is "in a league by himself." He added, "I don't think he has the intellectual depth."

Will the End of Oil Be the End Of Food?

By Jason Mark, AlterNet. Posted August 31, 2006.

American agriculture is fatally dependent on oil. A few forward-thinking farmers are trying to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.

Farmer Richard Randall doesn't believe in the notion of "peak oil," the argument that civilization will soon experience an acute -- and irreversible -- petroleum scarcity that will fundamentally alter our way of life. A 61-year-old wheat and sorghum grower from Scott City, Kan., Randall says he's seen high oil prices before, and that today's expensive petroleum is just part of a natural market cycle that will eventually adjust itself, leading to lowered fuel costs.

"I think there's plenty of oil there," Randall said recently. "I feel that if we allow the marketplace to work without interruption in the supply, we will find a level. It's not going to be as low as it was, but it will come down. We do need to produce oil where we can."

US accused of bid to oust Chávez with secret funds

· Millions of dollars given to opposition, claim critics
· Venezuelan groups' details hidden from list

Duncan Campbell
Wednesday August 30, 2006
The Guardian

The US government has been accused of trying to undermine the Chávez government in Venezuela by funding anonymous groups via its main international aid agency.

Millions of dollars have been provided in a "pro-democracy programme" that Chávez supporters claim is a covert attempt to bankroll an opposition to defeat the government.

Correntewire: $450 million slush fund for Bush from Canadian lumber deal, just in time for the mid-terms

Submitted by lambert on Wed, 2006-08-30 00:44.

Yes, it seems that Bush has indeed wangled himself and Unka Karl $450 million smackeroos in a slush fund they can get their paws on right now and do anything they want with. Surprise! The story has a lot of detail, but the bottom line is simple: The terms of the Softwood Lumber Agreement with Canada will give Bush complete control of an escrow account with $450 million in it, controlled by a board that Bush appoints, and which can be used for any purpose whatever, with no Congressional oversight.

Hats off to the Kossacks for frontpaging this story, which I’m going to analyze below. (The cocktail weenie-scarfing SCLM, of course, has missed the story completely.) Is the story “interesting, if true”? Let’s see.

NYT Editorial: Downward Mobility

Published: August 30, 2006

If you’re still harboring the notion that the economy is “good,” prepare to be disabused.

Even the best number from yesterday’s Census Bureau report for 2005 is bad news for most Americans. It shows that median income rose 1.1 percent last year, to $46,326, the first increase since it peaked in 1999. But the entire increase is attributable to the 23 million households headed by someone over age 65. So the gain is likely from investment income and Social Security, not wages and salaries.

Beyond Macaca: The Photograph That Haunts George Allen

Barnstorming around Virginia in the re-election campaign that Republican Senator George Allen hopes will provide the impetus for his 2008 run for the presidency, he has suddenly been forced on the defensive. Time and again, he has felt compelled to explain that his mocking of S.R. Sidarth, a young Indian-American staff member for his Democratic opponent, as "macaca," or monkey, was an unintentional gaffe. "It was a mistake. I made a mistake," he told a reporter from a local NBC affiliate at a campaign stop on Thursday. Hours later, he told the ABC affiliate, "It was a mistake, I was wrong." On Fox News's Sean Hannity show, he echoed, "It was a mistake."

Blatantly Boasting War Profiteers

By Sarah Anderson, AlterNet. Posted August 30, 2006.

Profiteering execs don't usually brag about their windfalls from the 'war on terror' -- unless they're talking to potential investors.

Like Sen. George "macaca" Allen in a crowd of white Virginia Republicans and Rep. Katherine "God chooses our rulers" Harris with a reporter for a Baptist newspaper, defense executives tend to let their hair down in conversations with investment analysts.

In their glossy annual reports, military contractors are typically modest about how much loot they've gotten from a bloody and increasingly unpopular "War on Terror." But read the transcript of virtually any Q&A session with Wall Street and the truth comes out. While millions are suffering from the human and economic costs of the Iraq war, the violence has been very good for the bottom lines of military contractors and their top executives.

Global Warning brouhaha heating up among conservative evangelicals

While last month's record-setting heat wave may have convinced televangelist Pat Robertson that Global Warming is a clear and present danger, a healthy number of conservative evangelicals, academics, theologians, and political leaders still have their doubts. In a sweltering summertime concurrence, both Robertson's conversion and a report from a group calling itself the Interfaith Stewardship Alliance (ISA) came while many Americans were escaping the heat wave by shuffling off to movie theaters to see Al Gore's critically acclaimed film "An Inconvenient Truth." Reaction to Gore's film -- which was scorched by the conservative media -- Robertson's second thoughts, and the ISA report are all indicative of how conservatives are responding to global warming.

A clearly distressed Robertson told his 700 Club audience that he now believed that global warming is real.

Cursor's Media Patrol - 08/29/06

As President Bush's claims of progress in New Orleans meet a statistical challenge, a surprise announcement by the Yes Men reignites anger about closed public housing projects in 'a city left to rot.'

Naomi Klein considers the implications of the growing "Disaster Capitalism Complex," which feeds off government funds but is beyond the reach of taxpayer control, as another commentator sums up the apparent strategy of the Bush administration as "feed the beast, but blind it."

CJR Daily's Paul McLeary describes how "the AP, and sometimes other news organizations, continue to cut the legs out from under their own reporting about the sad carnage in Iraq," and E. J. Dionne predicts that "August 2006 will be remembered as a watershed in the politics of Iraq."

Although 'Everything is always good for the Republicans,' Bloomberg's Al Hunt reports that "Privately, Republican congressional leaders are bracing to lose 20 to 30 House seats ... and to barely hold on to their Senate majority."

In an interview about her documentary, "Mr. Conservative," Barry Goldwater's granddaughter reminds that "Hillary was a Goldwater girl." And Stephanie Miller, whose father was Goldwater's 1964 running mate, tells The Progressive: "I can't even imagine what they'd think today about their party."

PZ Myers takes former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson to task over his promotion of 'the new Republican alibi for crippling stem cell research,' and the proliferation of new state 'fetal homicide laws' is examined.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's support for a more Christian EU constitution sparks protest, as the pope prepares to 'embrace the theory of intelligent design,' and the Vatican's chief exorcist discusses Pope Pius XII's attempt to exorcise Hitler.

Drop in SAT Scores Biggest in 31 Years

Tuesday August 29, 2006 4:31 PM

By JUSTIN POPE

AP Education Writer

The high school class of 2006 recorded the sharpest drop in SAT scores in 31 years, a decline that the exam's owner, the College Board, said was partly due to some students taking the newly lengthened test only once instead of twice.

Fatigue wasn't to blame, the College Board insisted, even though this year's class was the first to take a new version of the exam which added an essay. It now takes an average of three hours and 45 minutes to complete the test, not counting breaks, up from three hours previously.

Daily Kos: ABC docudrama will blame Clinton and Dems for 9/11

by theyrereal

Sun Aug 27, 2006 at 10:46:09 PM PDT

I just discovered this tidbit over at Democratic Underground:

The show is called "The Path to 9/11" and it is going to air Sunday, September 10, and Monday, September 11.

Here's one conservative already drooling over it:

Let me start by saying that "The Path to 9/11" is one of the best, most intelligent, most pro-American miniseries I've ever seen on TV, and conservatives should support it and promote it as vigorously as possible.

Paul Krugman: Broken Promises

The New York Times
Published: August 28, 2006

Last September President Bush stood in New Orleans, where the lights had just come on for the first time since Katrina struck, and promised "one of the largest reconstruction efforts the world has ever seen." Then he left, and the lights went out again.

What happened next was a replay of what happened after Mr. Bush asked Congress to allocate $18 billion for Iraqi reconstruction. In the months that followed, congressmen who visited Iraq returned with glowing accounts of all the wonderful things we were doing there, like repainting schools and, um, repainting schools.

Increase in severe poverty in the US has serious implications for public health

Since 2000, Americans have been getting poorer, and national rates of severe poverty have climbed sharply, according to a study published in the October issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. The researchers reported that the growth in the poverty rate is due largely to a rise in severe poverty and that "moderate" poverty has grown little.

The percentage of Americans living in severe poverty--earning less than half of the poverty threshold--grew by 20% between 2000 and 2004, and the proportion in higher income tiers fell. The researchers reported that the number of Americans living in severe poverty increased by 3.6 million between 2000 and 2004.

Judge Blocks Florida Voter Registration Law

The Associated Press

Monday 28 August 2006

Miami - A federal judge on Monday declared a new Florida voter registration law unconstitutional, ruling that its stiff penalties for violations threaten free speech rights and that political parties were improperly exempted.

The 48-page ruling by US District Judge Patricia Seitz means that state authorities cannot enforce the provisions of the law. It took effect Jan. 1 and has been blamed by several labor unions and nonprofit groups for effectively blocking voter registration drives across the state because of the financial risk.

NYT study finds 41% of firms receiving buyout bids in last year show 'abnormal and suspicious' trading before deals went public

08/26/2006 @ 12:05 pm

Filed by RAW STORY

A NY Times study finds that 41% of companies receiving buyout bids in the last twelve months show "abnormal and suspicious trading" before the deals became public.

"The boom in corporate mergers is creating concern that illicit trading ahead of deal announcements is becoming a systemic problem," writes Gretchen Morgenson for the Times.

Democratic challenger Webb pulls ahead of GOP Senator Allen by one point in latest Zogby poll

08/27/2006 @ 10:00 pm

Filed by RAW STORY

Democratic challenger James Webb, former Navy secretary under President Reagan, has pulled ahead of Virginia's Republican Senator Allen by one percentage point in the latest Zogby poll, RAW STORY has learned.

The poll also puts Democrats in front for 14 out of the open 19 gubernatorial races. But the Democratic Party only leads 12 of the 18 Senate races, which wouldn't be enough to regain the majority even accounting for Vermont's independent Senator Jim Jeffords and Connecticut's Joe Lieberman who Zogby shows leading primary winner Ned Lamont by ten points.

Bankrollers of Swiftboat Vets and McCain Smear in Trouble With the Feds

Posted by Trish | Aug. 27, 2006, 10:07 am

The Wyly brothers (as in Wiley Coyote) are finally being investigated for their byzantine finances. The guys who funded the smear campaign on John McCain that led to Bush’s primary victory in 2000, and more recently, the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth, are in trouble for evading taxes.

The Wylys represent the ultra-rich of Dallas.

Evangelical Conversion-for-Parole Program Thwarted

By Rob Boston, Church and State. Posted August 28, 2006.

A Bush-funded prison initiative that fast-tracked parole for Christian converts has been swatted down in the federal courts.

The day after a federal court struck down a taxpayer-supported evangelical Christian program in an Iowa prison, Mark Earley, president of Prison Fellowship, issued a press statement. He was not pleased.

"The courts took God out of America's schools, now they are on the path to take God out of America's prisons," Earley groused.

Bob Novak's Plame Source Identified

By David Corn, TheNation.com. Posted August 28, 2006.

Conservative columnist Bob Novak's first source on the identity of Valerie Plame in 2003 was former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.

One mystery solved.

It was Richard Armitage, when he was deputy secretary of state in July 2003, who first disclosed to conservative columnist Robert Novak that the wife of former ambassador Joseph Wilson was a CIA employee.