Don't be a weenie, Mr. President

Charlotte Alexandre sent me the following by Michael Moore and you can find the original on his website:

1/10/07

Dear Mr. President,

Thanks for your address to the nation. It's good to know you still want to talk to us after how we behaved in November.

Listen, can I be frank? Sending in 20,000 more troops just ain't gonna do the job. That will only bring the troop level back up to what it was last year. And we were losing the war last year! We've already had over a million troops serve some time in Iraq since 2003. Another few thousand is simply not enough to find those weapons of mass destruction! Er, I mean... bringing those responsible for 9/11 to justice! Um, scratch that. Try this -- BRING DEMOCRACY TO THE MIDDLE EAST! YES!!!

You've got to show some courage, dude! You've got to win this one! C'mon, you got Saddam! You hung 'im high! I loved watching the video of that --just like the old wild west! The bad guy wore black! The hangmen were as crazy as the hangee! Lynch mobs rule!!!

Look, I have to admit I feel very sorry for the predicament you're in. As Ricky Bobby said, "If you're not first, you're last." And you being humiliated in front of the whole world does NONE of us Americans any good.

Sir, listen to me. You have to send in MILLIONS of troops to Iraq, not thousands! The only way to lick this thing now is to flood Iraq with millions of us! I know that you're out of combat-ready soldiers -- so you have to look elsewhere! The only way you are going to beat a nation of 27 million -- Iraq -- is to send in at least 28 million! Here's how it would work:

The first 27 million Americans go in and kill one Iraqi each. That will quickly take care of any insurgency. The other one million of us will stay and rebuild the country. Simple.

Now, I know you're saying, where will I find 28 million Americans to go to Iraq? Here are some suggestions:

1. More than 62,000,000 Americans voted for you in the last election (the one that took place a year and half into a war we already knew we were losing). I am confident that at least a third of them would want to put their body where their vote was and sign up to volunteer. I know many of these people and, while we may disagree politically, I know that they don't believe someone else should have to go and fight their fight for them -- while they hide here in America.

2. Start a "Kill an Iraqi" Meet-Up group in cities across the country. I know this idea is so early-21st century, but I once went to a Lou Dobbs Meet-Up and, I swear, some of the best ideas happen after the third mojito. I'm sure you'll get another five million or so enlistees from this effort.

3. Send over all members of the mainstream media. After all, they were your collaborators in bringing us this war -- and many of them are already trained from having been "embedded!" If that doesn't bring the total to 28 million, then draft all viewers of the FOX News channel.

Mr. Bush, do not give up! Now is not the time to pull your punch! Don't be a weenie by sending in a few over-tired troops. Get your people behind you and YOU lead them in like a true commander in chief! Leave no conservative behind! Full speed ahead!

We promise to write. Go get 'em W!

Yours,
Michael Moore

Excellent. Just excellent!

Nibbling away

Edmund Burke

This has been happening for the last six years:

The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedience, and by parts.

- Edmund Burke

Friday cat blogging!

Henry

Photo by Ellie Finlay

Quote of the week

Now you must admit, this is bold:

I have to say, Madame Secretary, that I think this speech given last night by this president represents the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it's carried out. I will resist it.

-- Sen. Chuck Hagel (R), Nebraska

The President's tears

The article is entitled "Tearful Bush presents Medal of Honor to family of fallen Marine from WNY" and here's the excerpt:

WASHINGTON - A tearful President Bush on Thursday presented the nation's highest military honor to the late Marine Cpl. Jason Dunham of Allegany County, who died in Iraq in 2004 after diving on a grenade to save the lives of two of his comrades.

A little more than 12 hours after announcing plans to send another 21,500 troops to Iraq, the somber-faced president went to the podium in the East Room of the White House which was jam-packed with Washington luminaries and Marines in full dress uniforms to give the Medal of Honor to Dunham's family.

"With this medal we pay tribute to the courage and leadership of a man who represents the best of young Americans," Bush said. "With this medal we ask the God who commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves to wrap his arms around the family of Cpl. Jason Dunham, a Marine who is not here today because he lived that commandment to the fullest."

Bush then presented the Medal of Honor only the second to go to a service member who fought in the Iraq War to Dunham's parents, Dan and Deb Dunham of Scio, and other family members.

It was a moving ceremony for all of those involved, most notably the president.

"I have never been in his presence where I've seen him actually cry," said Rep. Randy Kuhl, R-Hammondsport. "And there were tears running down his face."

First of all, our neighbors, biblically speaking, are not only our comrades in arms but also the Iraqis whose country we have wreaked such destruction upon.

Secondly, what were those tears about? Were they for show? Were they tears of guilt? (Unlikely.) We can't, of course, know for sure because no one can judge another person's heart. Let's just say that, because of Bush's history and his demonstrated lack of concern and empathy for others in the past, his recent tears are not exactly convincing.

New Rule

Jenna and Barbara Bush

Lisa over at All Hat No Cattle says the following:

NEW RULE: The first troops sent over to Iraq will be the Bush twins followed anyone else of military age in the Bush family. Then Bush will bring the troops home.

Right. Snowball's chance in hell, too.

Restrictions?

Well, did you watch the President's speech last night? I didn't watch it, exactly. But I followed it via "live blogging" on AMERICAblog (which also published a complete transcript of the address). There's a lot in it that disturbed me but what I want to call your attention to right now is Bush's statement that not only were there not enough troops in Iraq, but that "there were too many restrictions on the troops that we did have." What kind of restrictions is he talking about? Restrictions against more brutality?

Here's a comment written in response to an article called "Bush is right, it's time for America to change course" by someone whose screen name is "kanuckistani":

"He said that not only were there not enough troops in Iraq, but that "there were too many restrictions on the troops that we did have."

So, Abu Ghraib was just a garden party?"

This is the statement of Bush's that needs to be broadcast. "..too many restictions..." is just like after Vietnam, the cry of "If we were only more brutal, we would have won." As if killing 4 million Southeast Asians somehow wasn't an atrocity. Now it's "We need to go house to house in Baghdad and kill every adult male (and a fair number of women and children) until the people stop fighting back."

What do Americans really think is motivating the average Iraqi, that "fewer restrictions" will change? And is Bush now going to unilaterally change the rules of what is and isn't allowed? Just what specific ruthlessness does he have in mind? Any illusions as to if the Geneva conventions apply?

I hope the Dems (and the average U.S. citizens) can stop this.

Peace

We are hated now around the world. If Bush decides to have "fewer restrictions" on the military on how they conduct themselves we will soon be more than hated. We will be utterly despised. We will be loathed. We will be seen as the embodiment of evil. And those who see us that way will be right.

Iraq plan

Here's a CNN QuickVote:

What is your overall reaction to President Bush's revised Iraq plan?

Positive - 25%

Negative - 75%

Another picture of the"surge"

This article is called, "Intervention needed, stat: Nobody intelligent thinks the 'surge' will do anything except get more people killed" and here's how it gets started:

Imagine a mentally ill person who persists in jamming a fork into an electrical outlet, badly burning himself. "Next time it will feel good!" he keeps saying. Finally, after getting out of the ol' bughouse (and out of restraints) he calls a press conference to say he has changed.

"Tomorrow I will jam a fork into the top outlet with my left hand and a fork into the bottom with my right hand," he says. "I am confident that will bring us success, and that my enemies have misunderestimated me."

That's George "Captain Ahab" Bush, who the press persists in treating as a sane and rational person worthy of respect. He is not.
...
Nobody intelligent thinks the "surge" will do anything except get more Americans and even more Iraqis killed. There are some military men who think if you threw in a few hundred thousand more, we could hold Iraq in some kind of a sullen, Roman- or British Empire-style long-term occupation.

Except we don't have the money, men or will to do that.

It's really going to be interesting to see how this all plays out. Probably it will play out badly. It's a pity we all have to stand by and watch more or less helplessly. Of course we can all send emails of protest and I hope everybody has.

That surge

Well, the president is going to give his speech tonight. For those of you who can tolerate listening to him, more power to you. I'll get my information from the blogs because listening to George Bush does unsavory things to my blood pressure. I consider following the "live blogging" instead to be a self-care discipline! :-)

I want to call your attention to an article entitled "How the World Will See the Surge" by John Brown. Brown offers ten possible interpretations that the international community will have concerning the escalation Bush is proposing. Here are a few:

1. The surge is yet another expression of US unilateralism. The Americans do what they want when and how they want, no matter what non-Americans -- including Iraqis -- think. They are not bothering to get international support or approval for their surge. The rest of the world be damned.
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3. Elections in the U.S. don’t really matter. Americans in November didn’t vote for more troops in Baghdad, but their president is doing precisely that. The so-called opposition party in the U.S. is just part of an American imperialistic system that wants to dominate the rest of the planet, including its oil reserves, and that allows the White House carte blanche in carrying out aggressive military operations like the surge anywhere, any time.
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5. The American international media, both private and US government-supported, are not to be trusted. Their coverage of American military actions, with its traditional neglect of civilian victims, will try to show the surge in the best of lights. As for USG-funded outlets like Alhurra, they don’t offer the real news. For more accurate reports, better to turn to the BBC or Al Jazeera.

6. The surge will result in more US casualties, but that’s the Americans’ own fault. They are bringing disaster after disaster upon themselves because they refuse to understand or negotiate with the world outside their own borders. The Americans have no idea of the real situation in Iraq, where they are occupiers, not liberators.

Go on and click through to read the rest. I really with Bush would read this article. Not a snowball's chance, however.

Blatantly ignoring the law

All right. I'm shocked. And I'm not being facetious here. I am truly shocked. Look at this beginning to an article entitled "The White House Threatens to Ignore Congress":

"The President has the ability to exercise his own authority if he thinks Congress has voted the wrong way."-- Tony Snow, January 8, 2007

We've jumped the shark. If this idea doesn't outrage the American population, the media and the opposition party (and even his own party), then we've lost track of what America is all about. Do we have a constitution or don't we?
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If you asked whether a president could do this in an eighth grade civics class and anyone answered -- "Yes, a president can exercise his own authority if he thinks Congress voted the wrong way." -- you would unquestionably fail them. That is not the correct answer. At least not in our system of government.

Look, I know Bush has been acting this way for a long time - what with his signing statements and all. But for Tony Snow to come right out and claim such a level of executive authority this publicly is truly sinister. I can't believe he actually said that. Here's more from the article:

You know what this kind of "executive authority" used to be called before? The divine right of kings, dictatorial power, authoritarian rule. I would like anyone to explain how a president in our constitutional form of government can claim the right to ignore laws passed by the legislative branch.
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This is madness. We are supposed to be a country of laws. What do we do when we have a president who expressly tells the country that he is not constrained by the law?

It is madness. You know it is. Now, are the Democrats going to do anything about it? That's what I'm waiting to see.

Some numbers worth knowing

The New York Review of Books published an article in 2005 that has just now come to my attention called "Europe vs. America". Here's something I want you to see:

Back in 1980 the average American chief executive earned forty times the average manufacturing employee. For the top tier of American CEOs, the ratio is now 475:1 and would be vastly greater if assets, not income, were taken into account. By way of comparison, the ratio in Britain is 24:1, in France 15:1, in Sweden 13:1. A privileged minority has access to the best medical treatment in the world. But 45 million Americans have no health insurance at all (of the world's developed countries only the US and South Africa offer no universal medical coverage). According to the World Health Organization the United States is number one in health spending per capita—and thirty-seventh in the quality of its service.

As a consequence, Americans live shorter lives than West Europeans. Their children are more likely to die in infancy: the US ranks twenty-sixth among industrial nations in infant mortality, with a rate double that of Sweden, higher than Slovenia's, and only just ahead of Lithuania's—and this despite spending 15 percent of US gross domestic product on "health care" (much of it siphoned off in the administrative costs of for-profit private networks). Sweden, by contrast, devotes just 8 percent of its GDP to health. The picture in education is very similar. In the aggregate the United States spends much more on education than the nations of Western Europe; and it has by far the best research universities in the world. Yet a recent study suggests that for every dollar the US spends on education it gets worse results than any other industrial nation. American children consistently underperform their European peers in both literacy and numeracy.

I just think we ought to be aware of these numbers when we hear Americans spouting off such nonsense as "America is the greatest country on earth." I guess it is if you're already obscenely rich or if you're a top tier CEO. Otherwise, not so much.

Signing statements

As I told you earlier, the President recently signed a signing statement saying that he has the right to open our mail. I thought it would be a good time for a repeat of an April 2006 article on signing statements from the Boston Globe:

Since taking office in 2001, President Bush has issued signing statements on more than 750 new laws, declaring that he has the power to set aside the laws when they conflict with his legal interpretation. The federal government is instructed to follow the statements when it enforces the laws. Here are 10 examples and the dates Bush signed them:

March 9: Justice Department officials must give reports to Congress by certain dates on how the FBI is using the USA Patriot Act to search homes and secretly seize papers.

Bush's signing statement: The president can order Justice Department officials to withhold any information from Congress if he decides it could impair national security or executive branch operations.

Dec. 30, 2005: US interrogators cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

Bush's signing statement: The president, as commander in chief, can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

Dec. 30: When requested, scientific information ''prepared by government researchers and scientists shall be transmitted [to Congress] uncensored and without delay."

Bush's signing statement: The president can tell researchers to withhold any information from Congress if he decides its disclosure could impair foreign relations, national security, or the workings of the executive branch.

Aug. 8: The Department of Energy, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and its contractors may not fire or otherwise punish an employee whistle-blower who tells Congress about possible wrongdoing.

Bush's signing statement: The president or his appointees will determine whether employees of the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission can give information to Congress.

Dec. 23, 2004: Forbids US troops in Colombia from participating in any combat against rebels, except in cases of self-defense. Caps the number of US troops allowed in Colombia at 800.

Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can place restrictions on the use of US armed forces, so the executive branch will construe the law ''as advisory in nature."

Dec. 17: The new national intelligence director shall recruit and train women and minorities to be spies, analysts, and translators in order to ensure diversity in the intelligence community.

Bush's signing statement: The executive branch shall construe the law in a manner consistent with a constitutional clause guaranteeing ''equal protection" for all. (In 2003, the Bush administration argued against race-conscious affirmative-action programs in a Supreme Court case. The court rejected Bush's view.)

Oct. 29: Defense Department personnel are prohibited from interfering with the ability of military lawyers to give independent legal advice to their commanders.

Bush's signing statement: All military attorneys are bound to follow legal conclusions reached by the administration's lawyers in the Justice Department and the Pentagon when giving advice to their commanders.

Aug. 5: The military cannot add to its files any illegally gathered intelligence, including information obtained about Americans in violation of the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches.

Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can tell the military whether or not it can use any specific piece of intelligence.

Nov. 6, 2003: US officials in Iraq cannot prevent an inspector general for the Coalition Provisional Authority from carrying out any investigation. The inspector general must tell Congress if officials refuse to cooperate with his inquiries.

Bush's signing statement: The inspector general ''shall refrain" from investigating anything involving sensitive plans, intelligence, national security, or anything already being investigated by the Pentagon. The inspector cannot tell Congress anything if the president decides that disclosing the information would impair foreign relations, national security, or executive branch operations.

Nov. 5, 2002: Creates an Institute of Education Sciences whose director may conduct and publish research ''without the approval of the secretary [of education] or any other office of the department."

Bush's signing statement: The president has the power to control the actions of all executive branch officials, so ''the director of the Institute of Education Sciences shall [be] subject to the supervision and direction of the secretary of education."

Basically what Bush has said over and over again is that he is above the law. That, my friends, is not a democracy. That is dictatorship.

I'm particularly troubled by Bush's declaration that he can have scientific research findings withheld from Congress. What do the scientists know that Bush is censoring?

That definition of insanity

You know the famous definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. That's what President Bush is doing with regard to Iraq. An article from the Toronto Sun called "Lynching Won't Help U.S." goes into it:

Senior American generals charged with Iraq, including Gen. John Abazaid and Gen. George Casey, have openly disagreed with Bush's plans for a "surge" in U.S. troop deployment. These able officers told the media they didn't need more troops. They warned additional U.S. troops would deter Iraq's Shia regime from developing its own security forces and keep it dependant on the U.S.

These statements were a shocker. Generals are not supposed to publicly disagree with their commander-in-chief. Gen. Casey is expected to be fired soon and replaced by a yes man. Gen. Abazaid is retiring early, in disgust, say friends.
...
Many U.S. senior military officers privately say it is small wonder Bush, who styles himself the "war president," is so deficient in military experience and knowledge. A few months in the Texas Air National Guard evading wartime draft certainly did not prepare him to wage two wars. Good, responsible presidents know when to listen to their generals, and when to retreat from stalemated or lost wars. If Bush does send thousands more troops to Iraq, he will be risking more American lives in a desperate, 11th-hour political gamble to show voters he has a new plan to resolve the horrible mess in Iraq he created.

Twenty or thirty thousand more U.S. troops thrown into the cauldron of Iraq will make little military difference. One hundred fifty thousand or more might, but the U.S. has run out of soldiers.

If Bush pours more troops into this -- a lost war -- he will fall into the trap of many bad gamblers who double up their bets in a reckless effort to recoup previous losses.

I don't see this ending any way but badly.

Perspective

Carl Jung

Well worth remembering:

Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word happy would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. It is far better to take things as they come along with patience and equanimity.

-- Carl Jung

Terrorism and peanuts

"Be afraid; be very afraid." That's the message of this administration to the American people. But what is the actually likelihood of being killed by terrorists? An article that explores that question is entitled "Peanuts Kill More Americans Than Terrorists". Here's part of what it says:

The menace of global terrorism has been labeled the greatest threat to western civilization since communism and yet swimming pools, peanuts and lost deer kill more Americans every single year. Why are our governments facilitating the terrorist's agenda by hyping a peril that simply doesn't exist?

The number of Americans killed as a result of international terrorism since the 1960's gives us a benchmark from which we can correctly identify and target other dire dangers to our very way of life.

- Allergic reactions to peanuts
- Accident causing deer
- Lightning strikes

That's correct - all of the above have killed an equal number of Americans since 1960 as terrorism. One could even categorize M&M's, lost deer and the weather as an "axis of evil arming to threaten the peace of the world," as George Bush famously once said.
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To equal the danger that Americans place themselves in every day by driving their car down the highway, there would have to be a September 11 every month.
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The principle goal of terrorists is to terrify populations and governments into acquiescing to their political demands. The only way they can achieve this is by generating a substantial amount of fear and making people believe the lie that their life is significantly threatened by potential terrorism, when in reality the swimming pool in their backyard poses more of a danger.

You know, sometimes I wish statistics were a required subject for graduation from high school. People in this country would be a lot more informed if they understood how numbers behave.

Cutting greenhouse gas emissions

The Toronto Star has an article about easy ways to cut greenhouse gases without making enormous lifestyle changes. Here you go:

1) Lower the thermostat on your water heater from 60 to 55 degrees C (140 to 131 F). All it takes is a screwdriver, but if you are not sure how to change the setting, have a professional do it for you.

2) Replace the shower heads in your home with low-flow models, and install faucet aerators on all of your taps.

3) Run your washing machine with cold water to both wash and rinse your clothes instead of using hot or warm water.

4) Install a programmable thermostat for winter heating and summer cooling, setting it to automatically lower than the room temperature in winter by 1 degree C during the day and 2 degrees C at night.

5) Run your air conditioning system in the summer with the thermostat set to 24 degrees C (75 degrees F).

6) Replace the five light bulbs you use the most in your home with compact fluorescent bulbs, which, unlike incandescent bulbs, do not waste energy by creating more heat than light.

7) Turn off lights in rooms that are not in use, or install sensors that do the job for you in bathrooms, hallways and utility rooms.

8) Maintain the pressure in your tires at the appropriate level at all times, which will improve your gas mileage. Because your car is the source of most of the greenhouse gases your household produces, such simple measures can make a big difference, especially if you drive to work.

9) Follow the regular maintenance guide recommended by the manufacturer of your car, and

10) Drive the speed limit and you won't waste gasoline.

According to Environment Canada, such seemingly insignificant measures would actually produce a 24 per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions for our representative Greater Toronto Area household, which would make for a good start in the fight against global warming.

None of this stuff is hard. A 24% cut in greenhouse gases is significant. Let's start today!

Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran

This is from the London Times. I take it very seriously. Here's the headline: "Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran". It was picked up by Fox. It's not on CNN's website right now and I don't know why not. Here's an excerpt:

ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons.

Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to several Israeli military sources.

The attack would be the first with nuclear weapons since 1945, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Israeli weapons would each have a force equivalent to one-fifteenth of the Hiroshima bomb.

Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce the risk of radioactive fallout.

“As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources.

The plans, disclosed to The Sunday Times last week, have been prompted in part by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad’s assessment that Iran is on the verge of producing enough enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons within two years.

Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may no longer be enough to annihilate increasingly well-defended enrichment facilities. Several have been built beneath at least 70ft of concrete and rock. However, the nuclear-tipped bunker-busters would be used only if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene, senior sources said.

Israeli and American officials have met several times to consider military action. Military analysts said the disclosure of the plans could be intended to put pressure on Tehran to halt enrichment, cajole America into action or soften up world opinion in advance of an Israeli attack.

Soften up world opinion? What? If we hear it often enough we'll all get used to the idea? This is very distressing.

UPDATE: From Fox News: "Israel's Foreign Ministry is denying a British newspaper report that claims Jerusalem has drafted plans for a low-level nuclear strike on Iran to wipe out its uranium enrichment facilities using nuclear-tipped 'bunker busters.'"

A regime of their own

Let's hope the current Congress is able to shift this a little bit:

America's corporate and political elites now form a regime of their own and they're privatizing democracy. All the benefits - the tax cuts, policies and rewards flow in one direction: up.

-- Bill Moyers

Two stories

Bill Moyers

I want to recommend an article that is an adaptation of a speech given by Bill Moyers in which he talks about two different stories of freedom being told in America today:

One story would return America to the days of radical laissez-faire, when there was no social contract and the strong took what they could and the weak were left to forage. The other story joins the memory of struggles that have been waged with the possibility of victories yet to be won, including healthcare for every American and a living wage for every worker. Like the mustard seed to which Jesus compared the Kingdom of God, nurtured from small beginnings in a soil thirsty for new roots, our story has been a long time unfolding. It reminds us that the freedoms and rights we treasure were not sent from heaven and did not grow on trees. They were, as John Powers has written, "born of centuries of struggle by untold millions who fought and bled and died to assure that the government can't just walk into our bedrooms and read our mail, to protect ordinary people from being overrun by massive corporations, to win a safety net against the often-cruel workings of the market, to guarantee that businessmen couldn't compel workers to work more than forty hours a week without extra compensation, to make us free to criticize our government without having our patriotism impugned, and to make sure that our leaders are answerable to the people when they choose to send our soldiers into war." The eight-hour day, the minimum wage, the conservation of natural resources, free trade unions, old-age pensions, clean air and water, safe food--all these began with citizens and won the endorsement of the political class only after long struggles and bitter attacks. Democracy works when people claim it as their own.

Do we want freedom only for the big corporations? Or do we want freedom for all of us? Those are the questions before us as a nation.

Experience

Here's a comment I found on All Hat No Cattle:

Having a women speaker gives me hope. After all women have for thousands of years had the job of cleaning up messes made by men. We are well qualified after all this experience.

--Beverly

Thanks, Beverly. So true, so true.

Friday cat blogging!

Leroy

Photo by Ellie Finlay

Leno again

I think he's got the president nailed:

The latest reports out of Washington say President Bush is planning to send more troops to Iraq, but the White House wants to call it a surge instead of an escalation. Well, duh. A one-syllable word versus a four-syllable word. I wonder which one President Bush would pick.

--Jay Leno

Makes sense to me

True heroism and the folly or our president

I want to recommend an article entitled "We All Must Show Some Courage". I really can't do it justice with an excerpt. Just go read it. Now. Thank you.

Presidential snooping

Well, I'm glad to see somebody else is upset about the President's latest signing statement. The Seattle Times has an editorial entitled "George Bush, Snooper in Chief". Here's how it gets started:

Only hours into the 110th Congress, and Democrats have an assignment exactly suited to the role of divided government created by voters in November: Challenge President Bush's claim he can snoop in the mail with impunity.

The president has added his own unique interpretation to existing law and the intent of otherwise ordinary legislation about the U.S. Postal Service. The New York Daily News reported Thursday he claims the executive branch can read America's mail without a judge's warrant. Apparently, no one noticed what the White House was up to during a recess signing of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. In the president's statement on H.R. 6407, he said the executive branch would "construe" a subsection of one of the bill's titles essentially as it saw fit in exigent circumstances. This involves another of those presidential notes that acknowledges a new law was signed, but its application was entirely up to the president.

The president needs to be confronted about this. The press needs to cover this. We really need to raise hell.

Quote of the day

Dave Barry

This actually has serious political implications:

You can only be young once. But you can always be immature.

-- Dave Barry

Leno rules!

Take a look:

Today was the funeral for President Gerald Ford. He passed away at 93. A very nice man. ... Ford was the only person to become president without winning an election ... besides President Bush.

--Jay Leno

Speaker Pelosi

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is sworn in

Just had to show you the picture! Just had to link you to the article!

A VERY disturbing signing statement

Well, dictator Bush has claimed even more power for himself and undermined the Fourth Amendment. Take a look:

WASHINGTON - President Bush has quietly claimed sweeping new powers to open Americans' mail without a judge's warrant, the Daily News has learned.

The President asserted his new authority when he signed a postal reform bill into law on Dec. 20. Bush then issued a "signing statement" that declared his right to open people's mail under emergency conditions.

That claim is contrary to existing law and contradicted the bill he had just signed, say experts who have reviewed it.
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Experts said the new powers could be easily abused and used to vacuum up large amounts of mail.

"The [Bush] signing statement claims authority to open domestic mail without a warrant, and that would be new and quite alarming," said Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies in Washington.

"The danger is they're reading Americans' mail," she said.

"You have to be concerned," agreed a career senior U.S. official who reviewed the legal underpinnings of Bush's claim. "It takes Executive Branch authority beyond anything we've ever known."

We should be in the streets with torches and pitchforks over this. Why aren't civil libertarians absolutely screaming about this?

Christianists in the military

I want to recommend an article entitled "America’s Holy Warriors" by Chris Hedges. It's about the effort of the religious right to take over the military and to install para-military forces (security firms like Blackwater) in American life. I really urge you to click through and read the whole article but I'll give you a little bit here:

The drive by the Christian right to take control of military chaplaincies, which now sees radical Christians holding roughly 50 percent of chaplaincy appointments in the armed services and service academies, is part of a much larger effort to politicize the military and law enforcement. This effort signals the final and perhaps most deadly stage in the long campaign by the radical Christian right to dismantle America’s open society and build a theocratic state. A successful politicization of the military would signal the end of our democracy.
...
The politicization of the military, the fostering of the belief that violence must be used to further a peculiar ideology rather than defend a democracy, was on display recently when Air Force and Army generals and colonels, filmed in uniform at the Pentagon, appeared in a promotional video distributed by the Christian Embassy, a radical Washington-based organization dedicated to building a “Christian America.”

The video, first written about by Jeff Sharlet in the December issue of Harper’s Magazine and filmed shortly after 9/11, has led the Military Religious Freedom Foundation to raise a legal protest against the Christian Embassy’s proselytizing within the Department of Defense. The video was hastily pulled from the Christian Embassy website and was removed from YouTube a few days ago under threats of copyright enforcement.
...
The group has burrowed deep inside the Pentagon. It hosts weekly Bible sessions with senior officers, by its own count some 40 generals, and weekly prayer breakfasts each Wednesday from 7 to 7:50 a.m. in the executive dining room as well as numerous outreach events to, in the words of the organization, “share and sharpen one another in their quest to bridge the gap between faith and work.”
...
“The Bush administration has already come close to painting our current wars as wars against Islam—many in the Christian right apparently have this belief,” Ratner* said. “If these wars, bad enough as imperial wars, are fought as religious wars, we are facing a very dark age that could go on for a hundred years and that will be very bloody.”

Well, you know, of course, that I think this is very disturbing. I saw the YouTube video before it was taken down and it was very disturbing indeed. Let us not think that because the Democrats now have control of congress that we're home free. Our freedoms are still very much in jeopardy.

* Michael Ratner, the president of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Now I approve of this!

Time Magazine has an article entitled "Cracking Down on Pet Owners ". Here's part of what it says:

When he was re-elected to a third term in 2005, [Albuquerque mayor Martin] Chavez made a promise to end euthanasia at the city's animal shelters. He had already been meeting daily with City Councilor Sally Mayer and regularly with breeders and groomers across the city to come up with an animal ordinance that would improve the way the city treats its dogs and cats and increase the number of adoptions. At the time, the city was euthanizing more than 1,000 pets a month.

The law went into effect in October and it follows a nationwide trend of get-tough approaches to pet overpopulation. In Albuquerque, all cats and dogs older than six months must be microchipped and sterilized, unless owners pay an annual fee of $150 to keep their dogs able to reproduce — and another $150 for every new litter. Dogs can be restrained by a chain for only one hour every day, and people who want to have more than four dogs must obtain an additional permit. There is even a provision in the new law that requires dog owners to clean up after their pets in their own yards every week. While authorities won't be checking backyards for hardened poop, Chavez says that additional animal control officers have been hired, to make sure any animals they pick up have been neutered or spayed.
...
To bring even more attention to the issue in Albuquerque, Mayor Chavez now brings a selection of shelter pets to news conferences, department meetings and public appearances. In most cases, the pets find new homes on the spot. The city's euthanasia rate has been cut in half, and Albuquerque is now adopting out more pets than it kills. Chavez's long-term goal: to be able to brag that Albuquerque is a city where all animals that are suited for adoption find homes. "We can't be a complete city as long as we euthanize animals," he says.

Wow. I'm so impressed. This is definitely the way to go.

Two big mistakes

I have found an article that represents what I think about President Ford better than anything else I have read. It is entitled "Gerald Ford's Failure of Nerve" and it discusses his unwillingness for his July 2004 interview with Bob Woodward (in which Ford said the Iraq war was a "big mistake") to be made public until after his death. This is close to the conclusion:

I suspect Ford stayed silent because he didn’t want conflict. From all accounts he was a decent man who believed in compromise politics over slash and burn. So why create a firestorm if he didn’t have to? The same avoidance of controversy may have fed Ford’s decision to pardon Richard Nixon, as Ford talked of wanting to avoid “polarization,” “ugly passions,” and "years of bitter controversy and divisive national debate." Yet Nixon gained and regained office through spearheading an approach of “positive polarization” based on demonizing those who disagreed with him--an approach developed still further by key Republican strategists like Lee Atwater and Karl Rove. Ford’s pardon allowed America to evade seriously grappling with the destructive implications of this approach. It removed a chance to unequivocally reject the premise that, as Nixon said in May 1977, "When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal." The pardon created precedent and encouragement for further abuses, like Bush Senior pardoning his own defense secretary, Caspar Weinberger, 12 days before a scheduled perjury trial in which Weinberger was likely to implicate Bush in Iran-Contra. Or the illegal surveillance of ordinary citizens undertaken by both the Reagan administration and the current Bush regime. By pardoning Nixon, Ford removed the chance for our nation to learn from the most profoundly destructive actions of the Nixon administration, and avoid even skating close to their edge in the future.

That pardon really damaged our country. And we are paying for it today.

Seeing with other eyes

Kent Nerburn

Most years I give myself a Christmas present and this year was no exception. What I did was to order three books from Amazon. Two are by Walter Brueggemann - the most important theologian/Bible scholar writing today, to my mind. The other is a little volume called Small Graces by Kent Nerburn. It is from the Nerburn that I want to quote here:

We must learn to see with other eyes. The world contains many paths, some exalted, some mundane. It is not our task to judge the worthiness of our path; it is our task to walk our path with worthiness. We have been blinded by the bright light of heroes and saints. We must learn to trust the small light we are given, and to value the light that we can shed into the lives of those around us.

It is so easy to get discouraged when we read the news, when we discover the atrocities that are being committed in our name, when we hear of hypocrisies and deceptions, when we are told what is really happening. It is hard to believe we can make a difference if ours is not the path of the exalted. But our job is to "walk our path with worthiness." It is also to see with other eyes. As we educate ourselves, as we open our own eyes, we add to the sum total of people who see - who are not blind to the reality of our world. We move our community and our world in the direction that is needed for there to be a critical mass of those who are waking up.

Don't give up! Don't think that what you do is too small! Every letter written to a congressperson, every dollar donated to an organization working for peace and justice is worthy and valuable. So do what you can do and don't fret about what you can't do. Let today be today and let us support each other as we move forward.

Quote of the day

Could be:

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.

~Isaac Asimov

Not a Stepford wife

It seems fitting today to pay tribute to Betty Ford - a First Lady whose influence is still felt and who can be wonderfully described with the simple word, "real". I want to recommend a New York Times article entitled "Back in View, a First Lady With Her Own Legacy" . Here's a brief excerpt:

She was a product and a symbol of the cultural and political times — doing the Bump along the corridors of the White House, donning a mood ring, chatting on her CB radio with the handle First Mama — a housewife who argued passionately for equal rights for women, a mother of four who mused about drugs, abortion and premarital sex aloud and without regret.

Her candor about her battle with breast cancer, which led to unprecedented awareness among American women about detecting the disease, and her later commitment to alcohol and substance abuse treatment, stemming from her own abuse history, set the stage for widespread acknowledgment and advocacy that is commonplace today.

Given her impact on these crucial health issues and her influence over the modern East Wing, Mrs. Ford’s effect on American culture may be far wider and more lasting than that of her husband...

And so I honor President Ford today, not because of his decision to pardon Nixon (with which I very much disagree) but because of his unwavering respect for and support of Mrs. Ford. May she be comforted.

Bush's absence

I know that President Bush eulogized Gerald Ford at the main funeral service today but I was appalled that he was not in Washington for the earlier ceremonies. Here's what someone at AMERICAblog said about it:

Yep...Bush is on vacation, again. I don't know what his protocol officer recommended,but the Boy King should have gotten off his fat drunk lazy ass, sobered up on the plane on the way in, and been at this event.

If you want to be the leader of the free world, then fucking lead. That means that sometimes, you have to put other people (read: The Nation's) needs above your own petty, selfish greed and self interest. Bush is a national disgrace.

Bush should have been in Washington to receive the body of Gerald Ford when it arrived - if for no other reason than to console the widow. Among other faults, Bush simply has no couth.

Peace Train

Hey, folks! It's a New Year! Fresh. Virgin. Full of possibility. Whatever you do - whether you pray or meditate or think good thoughts - pray or meditate or think thoughts for peace. Give yourself a lift and listen to Cat Stevens now. (And there are some cool pictures of trains on the video.)

Now I've been happy lately, thinking about the good things to come
And I believe it could be, something good has begun

Oh I've been smiling lately, dreaming about the world as one
And I believe it could be, some day it's going to come

Cause out on the edge of darkness, there rides a peace train
Oh peace train take this country, come take me home again

Now I've been smiling lately, thinking about the good things to come
And I believe it could be, something good has begun

Oh peace train sounding louder
Glide on the peace train
Come on now peace train
Yes, peace train holy roller

Everyone jump upon the peace train
Come on now peace train

Get your bags together, go bring your good friends too
Cause it's getting nearer, it soon will be with you

Now come and join the living, it's not so far from you
And it's getting nearer, soon it will all be true

Now I've been crying lately, thinking about the world as it is
Why must we go on hating, why can't we live in bliss

Cause out on the edge of darkness, there rides a peace train
Oh peace train take this country, come take me home again

Well, I've been crying lately, too. I think we all have. But I can do something. I, Ellie Finlay, can get on that peace train myself. And if I encourage one other person in that direction, I've done my bit. If I write to my congressman and senators, I've done my bit. If I give money to an organization that works for peace, I've done my bit. If I keep thinking creatively about what else I can do in the cause of peace, I've done my bit. Never say, "There's nothing I can do." Just start, right now, today. Say a prayer or think a thought; it will change you. Get on the web site of Amnesty International or Buddhist Peace Fellowhip or Veterans for Peace and give them ten dollars; it will change you. I know it's a cliché but it's true: Together we can make a difference.

The New Year is almost here

Dorothy Day

And this seems worth pondering:

The greatest challenge of the day is: how to bring about a revolution of the heart, a revolution which has to start with each one of us?

-- Dorothy Day

Peace on Earth

Well, we have come to the end of another year. I offer for your contemplation today something I've already posted on my other blog, Meditation Matters, but it belongs here too. I'm giving you the lyrics to a U2 song, "Peace on Earth", and a video if you'd like to hear it:

Heaven on Earth, we need it now
I'm sick of all of this hanging around
Sick of sorrow, sick of the pain
I'm sick of hearing again and again
That there's gonna be peace on Earth

Where I grew up there weren't many trees
Where there was we'd tear them down
And use them on our enemies
They say that what you mock
Will surely overtake you
And you become a monster
So the monster will not break you

And it's already gone too far
Who said that if you go in hard
You won't get hurt?

Jesus can you take the time
To throw a drowning man a line
Peace on Earth
Tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on Earth
No whos or whys
No one cries like a mother cries
For peace on Earth
She never got to say goodbye
To see the color in his eyes
Now he's in the dirt
Peace on Earth

They're reading names out over the radio
All the folks the rest of us won't get to know
Sean and Julia, Gareth and Ann and Breda
Their lives are bigger than any big idea

Jesus can you take the time
To throw a drowning man a line
Peace on Earth
To tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on Earth
Jesus sing a song you wrote
The words are sticking in my throat
Peace on Earth
Hear it every Christmas time
But hope and history won't rhyme
So what's it worth
This peace on Earth

Peace on Earth
Peace on Earth
Peace on Earth

May we move beyond the grief and the cynicism and the despair and do our part in making it so. Never forget that peace begins within. Our meditative practice is foundational to peace. Let us enter the New Year with renewed commitment.

Conservatives brains are different

My goodness. You're not going to believe what I've just read. It seems that the brains of conservatives are really different - or at least respond differently - from liberals. The article is by Thomas Bonsell and is entitled "Differences Between Liberal and Conservative" . Here's an excerpt:

After the contentious presidential election of 2000 a researcher at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) pondered if there was a physical difference between liberal and conservative brains. He enlisted dozens of subjects to begin testing, and after the 9/11 attacks on America, he showed images of the victims of the attacks in their agony. Brains of the liberals (Democrats) were activated in the areas associated with concern, caring, empathy; brains of the conservative (Republicans) were unresponsive.

That conservatives are unconcerned about the suffering of others--a well-defined definition of sociopath--has been well observed over the years; this experiment indicates that to be the case and explains the evil political history of conservatism. It shows why Ronald Reagan ignored the AIDS crisis when it hit Americans during his reign and it shows why George W. Bush retards government funding of stem-cell research regardless of the potential it offers. They just don't care about others, and that appears to be a genetic defect in their moral compositions rather than conscious desires to be miserable human beings. And the research explains why right-wingers flock to careers where others' anguish are best ignored, such as the military, policing, insurance (denial of claims) banking (repossessing and foreclosing) and other businesses in which profit is more important than any other consideration. It explains why a right-wing president would start an unnecessary war dreaming of being a modern Alexander the Great only to become a neo-Caligula who would cause hundreds of thousands to die just so he wouldn't have to admit failure.

That liberals show concern for others explains why so many follow careers in which helping others is tantamount, such as education, nursing and social services and why liberal politicians would create government programs that would benefit persons other than themselves.

Yes, it does explain a lot. But this information is pretty depressing, isn't it? If there really is a physical difference then appealing to a conservative's compassion is not likely to work. Of course, there's a chicken-egg question here. Is the physical difference caused by the lack of concern or is the lack of concern caused by the physical difference? I imagine that would be very difficult to test.

The closing of EPA libraries

Frank Ford just sent me a page from the web site of the Union of Concerned Scientists. It's about Envionmental Protection Agency libraries being closed down. I believe I have blogged about this before but now we have an update. This is really very disturbing. Take a look:

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) maintains a nationwide network of 27 libraries that provide critical scientific information on human health and environmental protection, not only to EPA scientists, but also to other researchers and the general public. The EPA libraries are located in each of 10 regions of the country, at EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C. and at various EPA laboratories specializing in certain aspects of environmental protection.

In order to fulfill its mission to protect human health and the environment, the EPA must rely on accurate, up-to-date scientific information as well as the findings of earlier studies. To make the best scientific determinations, scientists need access to information regarding the health effects of toxic substances, records of environmental change over time, impacts on specific regions or communities and other issues. To this end, the libraries represent a unique and invaluable source of scientific knowledge on issues from hazardous waste to toxicology to pollution control. Additional benefit to scientific researchers is gained from the expertise of a dedicated library staff. In 2005, library staff fielded more than 134,000 database and reference questions and distributed almost 53,000 books, journal articles, and other resources to EPA researchers and the public.

In February 2006 under the guise of cutting costs, the Bush Administration proposed cutting $2 million out of the $2.5 million library services budget for fiscal year 2007. Such a drastic cut would ensure the closing of most of the library network, but would hardly register as a cost savings against the $8 billion EPA budget.

Despite the fact that Congress has not yet passed the 2007 budget or approved these funding cuts, the EPA has already moved with astonishing speed to close down several of its libraries to both the public and EPA staff. Three regional libraries, the Headquarters Library and a specialized library for research on the effects and properties of chemicals have already been closed, and four additional regional libraries have been subjected to reduced hours and limited access. Some books, reports and other resources formerly housed at these libraries have been sent to three repositories where they remain uncatalogued and inaccessible to the scientists and others who depend upon them. Other materials have already been recycled or thrown away.

For the life of me I don't understand why "conservatives" want to destroy the environment. I don't understand the war on science either. They have to breathe the same air as the rest of us. Their grandchildren will inherit the same overheated earth as our grandchildren. I really think there's some sort of collective death wish at play. That's the only thing that explains it.

Saddam again

Here's a very brief commentary by Robert Scheer on the execution of Saddam Hussein simply entitled "Silencing Saddam". I'm giving you most of it:

The trial should have been overseen by the World Court, in a country that could have guaranteed the safety of defense lawyers, who, in this case, were killed or otherwise intimidated.

The irony here is that the crimes for which Saddam Hussein was convicted occurred before the United States, in the form of Donald Rumsfeld, embraced him. Those crimes were well known to have occurred 15 months before Rumsfeld visited Iraq to usher in an alliance between the United States and Saddam to defeat Iran.

The fact is that Saddam Hussein knew a great deal about the United States’ role in Iraq, including deals made with Bush’s father. This rush to execute him had the feel of a gangster silencing the key witness to a crime.

It doesn't pass the smell test, does it?

UPDATE: Here are some key quotes from another article called "Bush Lies Again After Saddam Executed: Bush Doesn’t Know What a Fair Trial, or Justice, Is":

Amnesty International called the trial “deeply flawed and unfair.” It was “a shabby affair,” said Malcolm Smart, director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Program.

Amnesty International cited “the grave nature of the flaws,” which included the following:

“The court failed to take adequate measures to ensure the protection of witnesses and defense lawyers, three of whom were assassinated during the course of the trial,” it said. “Saddam Hussein was also denied access to legal counsel for the first year after his arrest, and complaints by his lawyers throughout the trial relating to the proceedings do not appear to have been adequately answered by the tribunal.”
...
Human Rights Watch concurred.

It called Saddam’s trial “deeply flawed,” and termed his execution “a significant step away from respect for human rights and the rule of law in Iraq.”

Among the “serious flaws” that Human Rights Watch noted: “failures to disclose key evidence to the defense, violations of the defendants’ right to question prosecution witnesses, and the presiding judge’s demonstrations of bias.”

Yes, Saddam Hussein was a mass murderer on a colossal scale. But even he deserved a fair trial.

We have a word for trials like that. It starts with a "k" and ends with an "o".

Our inhuman "war" on drugs

Walter Conkite

Just discovered something that I think will interest you and, I suspect, appall you. This is about the injustice of the so-called "war on drugs":

Nicole Richardson was 18-years-old when her boyfriend, Jeff, sold nine grams of LSD to undercover federal agents. She had nothing to do with the sale. There was no reason to believe she was involved in drug dealing in any way.

But then an agent posing as another dealer called and asked to speak with Jeff. Nicole replied that he wasn't home, but gave the man a number where she thought Jeff could be reached.

An innocent gesture? It sounds that way to me. But to federal prosecutors, simply giving out a phone number made Nicole Richardson part of a drug dealing conspiracy. Under draconian mandatory minimum sentences, she was sent to federal prison for ten years without possibility of parole.

To pile irony on top of injustice, her boyfriend - who actually knew something about dealing drugs - was able to trade information for a reduced sentence of five years. Precisely because she knew nothing, Nicole had nothing with which to barter.

-- Walter Cronkite

When are we going to remember what we learned about alcohol - that prohibition doesn't work?

Our hard working president

I'm sorry for that subject heading but I just cannot resist sarcasm here. Look at this from an Associated Press article entitled "Bush taking more time to craft Iraq plan":

CRAWFORD, Texas - President Bush worked nearly three hours at his Texas ranch on Thursday to design a new U.S. policy in Iraq, then emerged to say that he and his advisers need more time to craft the plan he'll announce in the new year.

Mercy! Nearly three hours. Imagine working that long!

You know, we ought to be embarrassed as a nation. I know I am as an American.

Troop surge

Good analogy here:

Well, it sounds to me like when a drunken surgeon, who is losing a patient, is asking for more scalpels. It doesn't make any sense. I mean, that guy has been clueless from day one with regard to this whole war. And, you know, the one voice that is not heard at all in the situation in Iraq, is the voice of the Iraqi people...

– Tom Morello

Saddam

As someone who is opposed to the death penalty, I was sorry to learn of Saddam's execution. I also think it will make matters worse. Interestingly, CNN had a QuickVote on the subject:

Will Saddam Hussein's hanging help bring stability to Iraq?

Yes - 22%

No - 78%

Here's an email that was sent to CNN about the execution:

Scott Franco of Providence, Rhode Island

Saddam's execution will stir further resentment toward the U.S. and the currently installed Iraqi government. Certainly there are many people in Iraq who were wronged by Hussein and take delight in his punishment. He managed his country through fear, but somehow the masses learned to survive under his reign. Now the situation in Iraq is impossible and degrading quickly during the U.S. occupation. We beat his army in days, but through our negligence, created an enormous humanitarian disaster that has no possibility of a good outcome. The highly publicized hearings and eventual capital punishment of Saddam symbolizes an end to a tyranny that somehow is more palatable than their current situation.

I agree.

Friday cat blogging!

Henry

Photo by Ellie Finlay

Massive Arctic ice shelf breaks free

Another disturbing climate change event has occurred:

TORONTO - A giant ice shelf has snapped free from an island south of the North Pole, scientists said Thursday, citing climate change as a "major" reason for the event.

The Ayles Ice Shelf — all 41 square miles of it — broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island, about 500 miles south of the North Pole in the Canadian Arctic.

Scientists discovered the event by using satellite imagery. Within one hour of breaking free, the shelf had formed as a new ice island, leaving a trail of icy boulders floating in its wake.

Warwick Vincent of Laval University, who studies Arctic conditions, traveled to the newly formed ice island and couldn't believe what he saw.

"This is a dramatic and disturbing event. It shows that we are losing remarkable features of the Canadian North that have been in place for many thousands of years," Vincent said. "We are crossing climate thresholds, and these may signal the onset of accelerated change ahead."
...
[Scientist Luke] Copland said the speed with which climate change has effected the ice shelves has surprised scientists.

"Even 10 years ago scientists assumed that when global warming changes occur that it would happen gradually so that perhaps we expected these ice shelves just to melt away quite slowly," he said.
...
A spring thaw may bring another concern: that warm temperatures will release the new ice island from its Arctic grip, making it an enormous hazard for ships.

All right, Senator "global-warming-is-a hoax" Inhofe. Explain this.

Misinformer of the year

Well, the results are in and Media Matters has decided. The Misinformer of the Year for 2006 is ABC. No, not the Archbishop of Canterbury but the network. Here's part of the explanation:

In October 24 appearances on Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor and Hannity & Colmes, ABC News political director Mark Halperin claimed that the "old media" -- broadcast news outlets and major newspapers -- were "biased against conservatives; there's no doubt about it." He stated, "I think we've got a chance in these last two weeks [before the then-upcoming midterm elections] to prove to conservatives that we understand their grievances. We're going to try to do better." But if "try[ing] to do better" to not appear "biased against conservatives" meant offering viewers conservative misinformation, Halperin shouldn't have worried; a review of dozens of items by Media Matters for America identifying and correcting conservative misinformation from ABC suggests that Halperin's network was "try[ing] to do better" throughout 2006.

This year saw ABC air The Path to 9/11, a two-part miniseries that placed the blame for the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the Clinton administration and whitewashed some of the Bush administration's failures leading up to the attacks. Additionally, the network's news coverage frequently reported Republican spin as fact, passed on falsehoods propagated by conservatives, and missed numerous opportunities to challenge or question the administration's actions during solo interviews with Bush and key members of his administration.

These examples, and many more, earned ABC the distinction of being named Media Matters' Misinformer of the Year for 2006. The selection of an entire network for the honor represents a change from previous years, when individual media figures -- Fox News' Bill O'Reilly in 2004 and MSNBC's Chris Matthews in 2005 -- received the award. But a look at some of its most flagrant examples of conservative misinformation confirms that ABC won the Misinformer of the Year the old-fashioned way: The network earned it.

I really recommend that you click through and read the whole article. It's really an eye-opener. For example, look at this about Hillary Clinton:

In citing the results of an ABC News/Washington Post poll on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY), Tapper ignored the positive results and claimed that "a daunting 42 percent of all Americans say they will never vote for her." He added that "[s]ome think she's too liberal. Others think she's untrustworthy." Tapper did not mention the poll found that a majority of respondents said Clinton is, in fact, "honest and trustworthy" and that her views are "about right," while a minority thought she is "too liberal." [5/31/06]

That is simply not right.

The article also goes into the details of the misinformation and promotion of the film The Path to 9/11.

UPDATE: While we're on the subject, you might as well take a look at Most outrageous comments of 2006. Here's a sample:

[Michael] Savage: "I don't know why we don't use a bunker-buster bomb when he comes to the U.N. and just take [Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad] out with everyone in there." [7/21/06]

Really, that sort of thing is beyond appalling.

Polar bears

You probably already heard this on the news. At least I hope you did. I hope this was considerred newsworthy enough that it was reported on mainstream radio and television. The CNN article I want to call your attention to is entitled "Official: Polar bears need protection". Here's how it gets started:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Polar bears are in jeopardy and need stronger government protection because of melting Arctic sea ice related to global warming, the Bush administration said Wednesday.

Pollution and overhunting also threaten their existence. Greenland and Norway have the most polar bears, while a quarter of them live mainly in Alaska and travel to Canada and Russia. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne on Wednesday proposed listing polar bears as a "threatened" species on the government list of imperiled species.

The "endangered" category is reserved for species more likely to become extinct.

"Polar bears are one of nature's ultimate survivors, able to live and thrive in one of the world's harshest environments," Kempthorne said. "But we are concerned the polar bear's habitat may literally be melting."

A final decision on whether to add the polar bears to the list is a year away, after the government finishes more studies.

Such a decision would require all federal agencies to ensure that anything they authorize that might affect polar bears will not jeopardize their survival or the sea ice where they live. That could include oil and gas exploration, commercial shipping or even releases of toxic contaminants or climate-affecting pollution.

Why do we need more studies? The polar bears are drowning due to the scarcity of ice floes. Their weight is dropping to to lack of food. And it's their thick layer of fat that keeps them warm.

But all in all, I think this is good news. Finally the Bush administration is acknowledging the effects of global warming. That's going to set a precedent and make it harder for them to engage in denial in the future.

You can learn more about the polar bear here.

The opposite of selfishness

Jean Vanier

When I was in the convent I was very much influenced by the writings of Jean Vanier, particularly his book, Community and Growth. Vanier is the founder of the L'Arche communities - places where people with developmental disabilities and those who assist them live and create community together. Here's something Vanier said:

When we begin to believe that there is greater joy in working with and for others, rather than just for ourselves, then our society will truly become a place of celebration.

We need antidotes to the culture of selfishness that has taken over our society. For the life of me, I don't see how people who exalt Christianity also exalt self-centeredness. That is completely contrary to everything Jesus actually taught. But members of the religious right are not really interested in the teachings of Jesus. They are interested in exploiting religion in order to control the masses.

Freedom is always in danger

This is thought-provoking and unsettling:

Freedom is always in danger, and the majority of mankind will always acquiesce in its loss, unless a minority is willing to challenge the privileges of its few and the apathy of the masses.

~ R.H.S. Crossman

Moderate Muslims and the Dalai Lama

I want to call you attention to an article that dates back to April but I just now discovered it. It's called "Moderate Muslims Seek Help From the Dalai Lama" Here's how it gets started:

San Francisco, USA, 16 April 2006 (By Louis Sahugan, L.A. Times) – Prominent Muslim dignitaries on Saturday met for the first time with the world's most influential Buddhist, the Dalai Lama, enlisting his help in quelling fanatical ideologies within Islamic communities and improving the faith's declining image in the West.

The summit was a measure of the desperate concern among moderate Muslim leaders and scholars about religious extremism and increasingly negative views of their faith arising from Western concerns about terrorism. Indeed, Islam traditionally has not recognized Buddhism.

"The main issue of this conference is to provide a platform to teach that there is no room today to say or invest in anything but love," said Imam Mehdi Khorasani of Marin County, who had extended the invitation to the Dalai Lama. "We are happy and grateful for His Holiness' decision to lend his energy to this cause."

Appearing comfortable and jovial in his maroon and saffron robe before a crowd of about 600, the Dalai Lama, 71, was true to his image as one of the world's most avid advocates for peace.

"Some people have an impression that Islam is militant," he said, seated in lotus position on a center-stage baronial chair at the InterContinental Mark Hopkins hotel. "I think that is totally wrong. Islam is one of the world's great religions and it carries, basically, a message of love and compassion." He pointed to his homeland of Tibet as an example of a place where Buddhists and Muslims have existed together in peace for centuries.

In an interview earlier, the Nobel laureate and religious leader of Tibetan Buddhism said, "Promoting the genuine message of Islam and the proper impression of the Muslim world — that is my hope.

I get Islamophobic emails from conservative friends from time to time that really unnerve me. I'm glad the Dalai Lama took this stand. I hope his words have far-reaching influence.

Conservatives and Hollywood

Barbara Sanitee of Tulsa Interfaith Alliance sent out an Alternet article entitled For Religion or Money: Jesus on the Big Screen which, needless to say, is about religious movies. But it was one little paragraph at the end that I particularly wanted you to see:

But a recent study indicated that those with strict religious beliefs enjoy violent and sexually explicit movies as much as any other person. In 2005, a study of 1,000 Americans sponsored by MarketCast and Variety found that those who were the most conservative in their religious beliefs were actually more likely to see films rated R for violence than those who consider themselves more liberal in their religious beliefs.

And the question, of course, is, "What would Jesus watch?"

Global warming and rising seas

I found an article from The Independent entitled Disappearing world: Global warming claims tropical island on AMERICAblog:

Rising seas, caused by global warming, have for the first time washed an inhabited island off the face of the Earth. The obliteration of Lohachara island, in India's part of the Sundarbans where the Ganges and the Brahmaputra rivers empty into the Bay of Bengal, marks the moment when one of the most apocalyptic predictions of environmentalists and climate scientists has started coming true.

As the seas continue to swell, they will swallow whole island nations, from the Maldives to the Marshall Islands, inundate vast areas of countries from Bangladesh to Egypt, and submerge parts of scores of coastal cities.

Eight years ago, as exclusively reported in The Independent on Sunday, the first uninhabited islands - in the Pacific atoll nation of Kiribati - vanished beneath the waves. The people of low-lying islands in Vanuatu, also in the Pacific, have been evacuated as a precaution, but the land still juts above the sea. The disappearance of Lohachara, once home to 10,000 people, is unprecedented.

It's started.

Why didn't we listen to our scientists? Are we going to listen now?

About racism today

John Robbins

I want to call your attention to an article by someone I admire very much - John Robbins. This one is on the continued racism in our country. It's entitled "Is Racism Real?"

It is painful for anyone who appreciates the goals of the civil rights struggles of the 1960s to see that racial disparities still affects the lives of people of color in this country. When you have been taught to believe this nation promises "liberty and justice for all," when you want to see this become a land of equal opportunity, it can be hard to grasp how unfairly people of color in this country are still treated. But despite the efforts and prayers of many people to remedy the injustices, it remains the case that the vast majority of people of color endure not only unequal treatment before the law today, but many other forms of discrimination and injustice, including greatly diminished job opportunities, and far deeper and more intractable levels of poverty.
...
- Today, the median annual family income for whites is approximately $47,000, while for African-Americans it's $26,000.
- Black-owned small businesses are more than three times as likely as white-owned firms to have loan applications turned down, despite the same creditworthiness.
- Hispanics are rejected for home mortgages twice as often as whites, regardless of income.
- The poverty rate for Hispanics is 2.5 times greater than than for whites.
- Less than half the households on U.S. Indian reservations have phone service.

Racism is "the elephant in the living room" in our country. We don't like to talk about it. But it's there.

You can read about John Robbins here. Take a look at part of that page:

Considered to be one of the most eloquent and powerful spokespersons in the world for a sane, ethical and sustainable future, John has been a featured and keynote speaker at major conferences sponsored by Physicians for Social Responsibility, Beyond War, Oxfam, the Sierra Club, the Humane Society of the United States, the United Nations Environmental Program, UNICEF, and many other organizations dedicated to creating a healthy, just, and sustainable way of life. He is the recipient of the Rachel Carson Award, the Albert Schweitzer Humanitarian Award, and the Peace Abbey's Courage of Conscience Award. The widespread media attention he has received has included numerous appearances on national shows including Oprah, Donahue and Geraldo. When John spoke at the United Nations, he received a standing ovation.

His writings influenced me hugely in my decision to become a vegetarian.

Charles Dickens

A reminder:

But I am sure that I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round... as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely.

-- Charles Dickens

Remember that today is just the first day of Christmas. We have twelve in all! Don't stop celebrating Christmas until January 6! But wouldn't it be wonderful if we decided to keep our hearts open all year?