The Left Coast of Iowa

2009-08-24T16:18:00.004-05:00

Press Release Issued by the Iowa Democratic Party

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

August 24, 2009

Des Moines, August 24 -- Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Michael Kiernan today called on GOP candidate for Governor Christian Fong to halt the airing of "materially false and misleading" radio advertisements.

“We are calling on Fong to take down this ad on his own before any other action is taken,” Kiernan said.

Despite the fact that the Culver/Judge administration has a strong fiscal record, balanced the budget every year and raised the state’s bond rating to the highest possible AAA rating, Fong has released a 60-second radio spot that asserts "we have a state government that has borrowed nearly a billion dollars to pay its bills."

“To suggest money borrowed for the I-JOBS initiative means the budget is out of balance is false,” Kiernan said. “It’s like telling Iowans who have home mortgages that their personal finances won’t be balanced for 30 years. It makes no sense.”

“Facts are facts,” Kiernan said. “We have balanced the budget every year, and at the same time we are making smart and needed investments in the future.”

“Because I am confident someone with Mr. Fong’s experience has a very solid understanding of the state’s finances, I can only assume someone on his team made a factual error and the ad will be taken down promptly,” Kiernan said.

The Chairman noted the Iowa Democratic Party just last week successfully used the legal process to halt the airing of a false and misleading attack ad that had been airing on television in support of the Republican candidate for Iowa House in the upcoming District 90 special election in Jefferson County.

Kiernan said the claim in the Fong ad is patently false and shows a radical misunderstanding of the state budget. I-JOBS is Culver's $830 million bonding plan that is creating jobs, stimulating the economy and repairing Iowa's aging road and bridge infrastructure. "The fact is, Iowa's bills are paid," Kiernan said Monday. "We had a balanced budget for the fiscal year just ended and will have one for the coming year."

Iowa is uniquely positioned to weather the national economic crisis, Kiernan said. "We were recently named the 8th fastest growing economy in the United States, and we have the 4th best business climate," Kiernan said. "That's not the picture of a state that had to borrow to pay its bills."

Kiernan cited as an example the state of California, which had a $26 billion budget deficit for this year and put out $470 million in IOUs before making major cuts to state programs and services in an effort to balance the state budget. "To lump Iowa in with states like California is fundamentally incorrect, misleading and false," Kiernan said. "Fong is being dishonest."

# # #

Fear Not

2009-02-09T10:53:00.001-06:00

Recently our Congressman, Steve King wrote an op-ed piece where he tried to make voters afraid of the Stimulus package currently before the Senate by comparing Obama's strategies to those of FDR. King wants to blame the Great Depression.

"The short-term result of FDR's spending was minimal. Food shortages remained, millions of Americans still lacked jobs and true recovery did not occur. In the long run, FDR's stimulus led to higher tax rates and greater government involvement in Americans' lives. "

But tale a glance at this graph from the depression era and the correlation between New Deal policies and prosperity are pretty plain. You don't have to be an economist to see it. Once again, Republicans are pandering in fear and paralysis rather than practical, pragmatic action meant to bring about progress.
Stop listening to the fear-mongering. We need some good old fashioned Relief, Recovery and Reform. King and the national Republicans want to make us scared because they're scared because they were the ones who benefited most from dismantling all the New Deal reforms that Reagan and both Bushes managed to do over the last few decades. Lobbyists, special interest money and the whole culture of corruption were designed to take advantage of the working middle class.

The best thing for our economy would be if President Obama WERE more like FDR. Tell King to go back to school and take a few History and Economics classes.

2009-01-21T09:10:00.000-06:00

The 800 Pound Gorilla in the room

2008-11-05T13:57:00.001-06:00

I posted 'Dear Republican friends, neighbors,' a paraphrase of Lincoln's inaugural address, which Barack Obama quoted last night in his speech, on Facebook. Now, honest to God, I meant it in a genuinely conciliatory spirit. I truly believe that to heal our nation, Republicans and Democrats need to work together and try to find common ground on whatever issues we can. Well, someone must have felt like I was being condescending or gloating or something because the next thing I know people are posting comments on my note back and forth getting in a big heated argument over abortion (which I never mentioned, I deliberately go out of my way never to mention it if I can ever help it). Holy guacamole!

Look, I'm not in favor or abortion on demand, but I'm also not prepared to deny abortions to victims rape or incest. Clinton and Obama have had the same position, "safe, legal, and RARE." To assume that Obama is going to force everyone to support abortion is just as irrational as to assume he's going to take away all our guns and raise all our taxes and make us all godless socialists or punish us all for segregation and slavery.

Please, if you're staunchly Pro-Life, don't let yourself be gripped by fear and hatred of everyone on the left. As a matter of fact, you may discover that we value life too. My personal problem is that it has sometimes seemed like, at least the Bush administration claimed to want to protect the rights of the unborn, but totally disregarded the rights of anyone who's already been born.

Some statistics have suggested that the number of abortions in the United States dropped during the Clinton administration. I know it's hard to accept, but what many Democrats and Christians on the left want to do is discover the conditions that lead women to consider abortion as an option and reduce the number of abortions by addressing those possible "causes."

I don't know how to be careful about this next thing I have to say, but I want you to know that I really mean it, I'm not trying to just be flippant or glib- Maybe abortion activists need to rethink their alliance with the Republican Party. There was a time when George W. Bush and the Neo-conservative movement controlled all three branches of government and yet they didn't overturn Roe v. Wade, pass sweeping legislation or executive orders prohibiting abortion or amend the constitution. Instead, the tapped phones, conducted torture, politicized the Justice Department, and unilaterally and preemptively started a war in a small country that had nothing to do with 9/11. Is it possible, perhaps, that the Republican Party, or at least the Bush Administration only used your passionate belief about abortion to take advantage of your political leverage?

I don't know a lot. I know my children are miracles and blessings from God that I would never trade. I believe that like a Grandpa, God loves babies. I know that using abortion callously as a convenient alternative to birth control is vile. But I don't know when life begins, is it before conception? At conception? When there are brain waves? When the baby is viable outside the womb? I'm not prepared to declare definitively for everyone because I am not God. I don't even know if Roe v. Wade should be overturned. It seems to me that Republicans used to be the party of States' Rights and the original argument against Roe was that whether abortion should be legal should be left up to the individual state. But I also know that far fewer women have died in back alleys from having wire coat hangers shoved up them since abortion has been a professionally supervised medical procedure nation wide and I know that I for one don't want to go back to those days.

Am I wrong? Plenty of you may think so.

Does that mean that we can't work together to dig our way out of the mess our country is in after the last eight years of mismanagement? Does it mean that you can't be friendly or neighborly to me? Does it mean that you can't bring yourself to pray for our new duly elected President because you can't see him as anything but some kind of vicious baby killer?

Wow, what a shame if it does.

I'm not trying to be pious or holier-than-though when I beg you to remember the words of our Lord: "Love your enemies and pray for those that persecute you."

If you think that I'm under the Devil's control, or you seriously fear for our nation because Obama just got elected. Please, lean on love not hate, on mercy not anger, on Gospel rather than Law- If you think I'm wrong, don't judge me, pray for me. Don't curse the new administration, pray for them. Leave it in God's hands.

"Love your enemies and pray for those that persecute you."

Now, when do you want to argue about gay marriage?

Failure of Supply-Side Economics

2008-10-31T16:30:00.000-05:00

Okay, quick economics lesson:
Demand-Side Economics, you raise wages, that increases the spending and saving ability of the middle class- heck it even grow the middle class. That demand, drives a need for greater supply. It works like a perpetual motion machine, the demand drives the supply, the supply feeds demand. That sustains the economy (although, admittedly, it may not grow the economy beyond what is reasonable).

Worked pretty dang good from 1932-1980, it even provided tax revenue to provide for things like the providing for the common defense, securing domestic security, promoting the general welfare, and especially securing the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity (the "American Dream," where each generation had it a teensy bit better than the last one.

Supply-Side Economics (aka Reaganomics, aka Bushonomics) on the other hand is SUPPOSED to work so that if you drastically cut the taxes of the wealthy and corporations, they'll (theoretically) reinvest in research, production, and infrastructure (see the cartoon above on the current bail-out) which (in theory) would provide more jobs to the middle and lower classes and make up the revenue short-fall with payroll taxes. The idea was that "a rising tide lifts all boats."

IN PRACTICE, human nature being what it is, greed plays a roll. CEOs pay themselves 400x as much in salary as their employees make, executives put their own interests ahead of both their share holders and the common good- and certainly their share holders still come before the common good of the community, state, or nation. Investors use their tax cuts (and looser regulations) to gamble on bigger and bigger and quicker and quicker returns.

Was it Aesop or the Grimm brothers who told us about the goose that laid the golden eggs? Feeding, caring for, and nurturing the goose gets you years of golden eggs. Butchering the goose to get what eggs are in it's belly only gets you that one or two eggs. Greed vs. sustainability. Bubbles of rapid growth, or perpetual but gradual climb? Which is better for America in the long run?

As someone with a college degree in History, I'm here to tell you friends that 1980-2008 looks a lot like 1909-1929. A "gilded age" of conspicuous consumption , unregulated corruption, and unbridled ambition. PLEASE think about this when you vote on Tuesday. PLEASE.

This is not the difference between "Socialism" and "Pro-American," this is the difference between moral (good steward, civic-responsible) capitalism and amoral (malignant, cancerous) capitalism. PLEASE put America back on the right track.

"Nature still offers her bounty and human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply. Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.

True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.

The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.

Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort. The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow men." ~ From FDR's first inaugural address, 1932

We REALLY Can Beat Steve King

2008-10-18T10:25:00.002-05:00

This poll really makes me smile. It was taken by SurveyUSA on October 8 & 9 of voters in Iowa. Of course, we know that Obama is projected to beat McCain in Iowa by a large margin, but here's the happy part: the poll breaks out western Iowa.

Northwest Iowa: Obama 49% McCain 45%

Southwest Iowa: Obama 51% McCain 42%

You will remember that the 5th District is the western side of Iowa, and that means a SOLID win for Obama in the 5th District. Now consider the voters who will vote for Barack Obama -- how many of them do you suppose will vote for Steve King? And how many McCain voters in the 5th are disgusted enough by Steve King to vote for our Democrat, Rob Hubler?

Rob Hubler has run an aggressive and smart campaign, raising well over $200,000 - that is light-years better than we have done in the last decade. And he happens to be a great guy who will make us proud.

Here's a link to Hubler's new mailer that is going out this week: http://www.hublercongress.com/images/voters_guide.pdf

And, of course, here's information on our incumbent, the inimitable Steve King: www.kingwatch.org

None of this matters if WE don't make it happen. We have the power in our hands and feet to knock the doors, walk the neighborhoods, make the calls and do all the things we know how to do to win an election.

If you don't show up THIS WEEK and help Rob Hubler, then just when are you going to? Don't just sit back and feel sorry that we are stuck with Steve King for another term. Make this happen: we can do it.

This is our campaign. This is our election. Now get busy.

What to tell your Republican friends

2008-10-14T08:06:00.001-05:00

I got another one of those emails this morning that claim that Obama is not just a Muslim, but also the Antichrist. This time I think my response is a little less vitriolic, tying to "speak the truth in love," and as usual, hit "reply all." This time someone send me back another email saying "I don't need to be preached to." Ever hearing and never listening, whatchyagonna do? But God says that His Word will not return to Him empty. People will believe what they want to believe. God help us.

But please feel free to copy and paste this post and use it as a reply to the same kinds of emails when YOU get them. Maybe we can spread God's TRUE word around a little instead of fear, hate, and lies. Aren't you tired of right-wingers hijacking Christianity? Join me in this crusade against crusaders.

"There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear..."
~1 John 4:18

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God ; trust also in me." ~Jesus (John 14:1)

You want to vote against someone because of their stance on taxes, abortion, or the war, by all means, it is you duty to vote your conscience, but please, don't let your vote be decided by desperate last minute rumors and lies driven by fear or anger.

An anti-Christ is anyone who takes attention away from the true Christ.

Check out 1 John 4:1-3 (the same John who wrote Revelation)

"Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world."

Obama publicly acknowledges Jesus as his Lord and savior.

Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit." ~1 Cor 12:3

Please, prayerfully consider what emails you send, and what you believe and who (and in what spirit) they sent it to you. Or at least please take me off of your list of people you forward these things to.

I for one am praying that God will heal our country from the huge rifts being caused by how polarizing this year's election has become.

"But I tell you:Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you" ~Matthew 5:44

Seems to me that whether your perceived enemy are Liberals, Democrats, Obama, or Muslims or Muslim extremists, our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual forces and the way to take captive hearts and thoughts is not by traditional dirty politics or letters to the editor or angry emails, but by prayer and by turning the other cheek, going the extra mile, giving them the cloack off our back (Matt 5:38-48)

In Jesus' hands and with His love and peace (Philippians 4:7)
Your brother in Christ and fellow American who respectfully disagrees with you.

When will the truth finally set us free?

2008-10-03T15:19:00.002-05:00

Recently someone forwarded an email to me warning that Barack Obama is the Antichrist because the book of Revelation says that his reign will be 42 months, the same as a U.S. Presidential term. Big mistake. I hit the "reply" button and preached that brother a sermon. Here's what I wrote:

It's not possible for the book of Revelation to claim the anti-christ is of Islamic decent, 1) Islam wasn't invented yet when it was written, 2) it's a religion not an ethnicity so you can't be of Islamic decent.

An anti-Christ is anyone who takes attention away from the true Christ.

I suggest you read the 1 John 4:1-3

"Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world."

Obama publicly acknowledges Jesus as his Lord and savior.

While you're at it, you need to bone up on your both your theology and your eschatology a little bit. Many fundamentalist strains of Christianity believe in a false doctrine called dispensationalism that is not truly found in Scripture, but rather was developed in 19th century America.

You're trying to frighten Christian voters into being afraid of Barak Obama, a devout Christian himself- not a Muslim or the anti-christ. This is NOT a Christ-like behavior.

1 John 4:18 tells us that "There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love." Besides, Jesus tells us in Matthew 5 and Luke 6 to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.

What you're doing is "the ends-justifies-the-means." You're so afraid of Obama yourself, that you're willing to spread lies and propaganda about him to insure that McCain/Palin win. That's not Jesus- that's Machiavelli.

Dispensationalists pretend to be friends of Israel because they think that Jerusalem will be some kind of celestial star-gate for Jesus' second coming, when in reality they are anti-semitic, hating Jews and blaming them for killing Jesus. They can't wait for them to be "Left-Behind" and sent to Hell. Whereas, granted, Jesus may be the only way, truth and life (John 14:6) BUT- God does not WANT ANYONE to perish (2 Peter 3:9).

It's so unfortunate that politics makes such strange bedfellows because Catholics that are so adamantly opposed to abortion find quick and fervent allies among fundamentalist and evangelicals in the religious-right movement, yet many of these allies suspect the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church itself of being the Antichrist and/or the Beast!

How do we know that Jerusalem won't be a cosmic star gate for his arrival to usher in some millennial reign? Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4:22-24 that His true worshipers will worship in spirit and in truth, not in physical, geographical or political locations.

As for predictions and prophecies and televangelists who think that the market crash is a sign of the end times or Sarah Palin's prediction that Christians will find refuge from the tribulation in Alaska- Jesus tells us that he will return like a thief in the night in 1 Thessalonians 5:2 and in Matthew 24:36 He assures us that "No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father." We need to love and trust Him and not worry about signs or trying to help arrange things for Him politically. He doesn't need any help.
I know you mean well and I'm sure you truly love God and America, I'm sure you're a good person. But be careful not to be corrupted by politics and political messages, whether they're from the right OR the left. Don't be motivated by fear or anger. Be motivated by love and a desire to reconcile everyone to Jesus.

As God tells us in 2 Peter-
" 3His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins."
Thank God, He's granted us liberty and privilege to elect our own leaders in the United States. If you want to vote solely on social issues that are important to you so be it. This is your right. But please, don't be frightened into any choice based on shoddy theological assertions of people who seek to use religion as a means to assert their political agendas.

Remember Galatians 3:28- "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."
Guess what- there is neither Republican nor Democrat, Independent nor Libertarian, Black nor White, Asian nor Hispanic, Urban nor Suburban, Metropolitan nor Rural, either. Believe it or not, there ARE Liberal Democrats who LOVE Jesus and America and want what's best for everyone. I'll even bet that when we get to Heaven, we might just find a few Socialists, Communists, and even Anarchists there!

When will we ever live up to our motto? "E Pluribus Unum"- From many, one.

Soon, I pray.

Please forgive me if I've come off as angry or condescending in either of these emails. I happen to love Jesus and to love America and I have been wounded and persecuted and attacked and alienated and ostracized and doubted, slandered and shunned because I disagree with other Christians who watch Fox News more than they read their own Bibles and I feel like I have to either take a stand like Luther or gradually be pushed away from my Savior by His own "sheep."

Please forgive me, but please, please, don't fall prey to fear, lies, or political propaganda, let alone to false prophecies, false doctrines, and foolish heresies. Read the Bible, not political email forwards. Share God's love and His good news of forgiveness, not fear and racism.

Remember

2008-09-11T09:46:00.000-05:00

8:46:26 a.m.: American Airlines Flight 11 impacts the north side of the North Tower (1 World Trade Center) of the WTC between the 94th and 98^th floors. American Airlines Flight 11 was flying at a speed of 490 miles per hour (MPH).

When American Airlines Flight 11 struck the North Tower, "it set up vibrations which were transmitted through the building, through its foundation, and into the ground," says Lerner-Lam. Those vibrations, as indicated by seismographs at Lamont-Doherty and other locations, were the equivalent of a magnitude 0.9 earthquake, one too small to be felt.

Where were you by Alan Jackson
Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day
Out in the yard with your wife and children
Working on some stage in LA
Did you stand there in shock at the site of
That black smoke rising against that blue sky
Did you shout out in anger
In fear for your neighbor
Or did you just sit down and cry

Did you weep for the children
Who lost their dear loved ones
And pray for the ones who don't know
Did you rejoice for the people who walked from the rubble
And sob for the ones left below

Did you burst out in pride
For the red white and blue
The heroes who died just doing what they do
Did you look up to heaven for some kind of answer
And look at yourself to what really matters

I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love

Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day
Teaching a class full of innocent children
Driving down some cold interstate
Did you feel guilty cause you're a survivor
In a crowded room did you feel alone
Did you call up your mother and tell her you love her
Did you dust off that bible at home
Did you open your eyes and hope it never happened
Close your eyes and not go to sleep
Did you notice the sunset the first time in ages
Speak with some stranger on the street
Did you lay down at night and think of tomorrow
Go out and buy you a gun
Did you turn off that violent old movie you're watching
And turn on "I Love Lucy" reruns
Did you go to a church and hold hands with some stranger
Stand in line and give your own blood
Did you just stay home and cling tight to your family
Thank God you had somebody to love

I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love

I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love

The greatest is love
The greatest is love (1 Corinthians 13:13)
Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day

What Sarah Palin Doesn't want You to know about Wasilla, Alaska

2008-09-09T12:27:00.003-05:00

Pete Hauschka is a principal of a school in Alaska, where he and his wife Bonnie also teach. The following letter, written by Pete, is shared here with his permission.
---------------------
August 29, 2008, 11:58 p.m.

Good evening,

Lots of friends and relatives have been asking me (as an Alaskan) what I think of Sarah Palin, our Governor, and new choice for McCain as a VP candidate.

Here it goes:

This pick floored me. Sarah Palin is a nice person. I've met her, I've even talked to her for a few minutes at a principal's conference a couple of years ago. She has lots going for her superficially. She speaks from the heart, like a spitfire mother; she can even be sort of funny sometimes. She is quite beautiful; athletic, and has that radiant glow of someone who actually spends time doing things outside. Unlike many politicians, she has lived a 'real life' and done things that few living and working in DC could ever do....like dipnettin' fish, shootin' stuff and eating it out on the tundra, and havin' 5 kids.

Personally, I'd never vote for her. She has an extremely simple view of the world. I don't even think she has ever been abroad. As governor she has repeatedly shown us that she is unable to grasp the demands of leadership. She is very prone to cronyism of the worst kind. Every cabinet level political appointment she has made she has over-ridden suggestions of our state advisory boards, and instead promoted those who had granted her direct political favors. Not that other politicians don't do this, they do, but most of them are able to balance their appointments to ensure that at least a few people with real skill and experience are running big state agencies.

She also has been unable to pay attention to her Alaskan constituency. Personally, I've written several of our previous gov's and been asked to comment publicly on education policy. All the previous gov's have always acknowledged that contribution, criticism or comment; sometimes by direct reply, or at least by that of a staff member. Palin's office has been a zone of silence. Not I, nor one person I know commenting has ever gotten any sort of reply. Her claim of running an open or transparent government is totally false; the public simply has no role in her administration.

Her previous claim to fame was being mayor of Wasilla, a growing town about 40 minutes from Anchorage of about 15,000 people. Wasilla is a hellhole, even by Alaskan standards, where there are plenty of hellhole towns and villages. Wasilla is an ugly place that shows a complete absence of planning, design, or sense of public vision. Gov't agencies and services are completely overrun in this town; things are so bad that they can't even track their population or build schools in the right place, because most parts of the town don't require building permits, so the only clue about where people are settling are utility receipts. Imagine trying to be an emergency responder in this kind of place: Houses don't just catch on fire in Wasilla, they burn to the ground, because by the time the fire department has figured out which road to take (no signs) or whose house it is (no directory), the place is done for. Palin was mayor this town for at least 2 terms before being elected gov. a year and a half ago.

Her moral sense is simplistic and not inclusive. She is the sort of person who is used to using their 'faith' to divide and isolate minority groups of human beings instead of uniting them. To her credit as Gov. she has kept out of this arena pretty well, but when in comfortable company (i.e the Matanuska Valley Republican Women's Club), she lets her moral cat out of the bag.

I will do what I can to ensure her defeat and that of her running mate as well. :) Please share this information with those who can use it well.

Cheers, Pete Hauschka

Add forgery to the list of high crimes and misdemeanors

2008-08-09T09:06:00.001-05:00

From http://www.impeachbush.org (Aug 7, 2008)

Another smoking gun is not needed to proceed with the impeachment of George W. Bush.

But new evidence of criminal wrongdoing provided by Pulitzer-winning journalist Ron Suskind, is so explosive, that if true, impeachment and the criminal indictment of President Bush and other senior officials is required by U.S. and international law.

This story has become big news with major stories in the Washington Post, major television networks and elsewhere.

Suskind, in his new book: The Way of the World, asserts that the Bush White House ordered the CIA to forge a letter from Saddam Hussein’s Chief of Intelligence, Tahir Jalil Habbush, stating that alleged September 11 hijacker, Mohamed Atta, had received his training in Iraq.

The Bush White House and the CIA were getting secret, direct reports from Saddam’s Chief of Intelligence in January 2003 that stated that Iraq had no nuclear weapons program since 1991. When the U.S. invasion started in March 2003, the Bush administration “resettled” the Iraqi Intelligence Chief in Jordan and paid him $5 million dollars in what could be considered “hush money.”

After the Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame expose in July 2003, that proved that Bush and Cheney were trying to destroy those who were uncovering their lies about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and so-called links to the September 11 attacks, a new plot was hatched to cover-up Bush’s bold-faced lies.

Suskind explains the plot:

"In the fall of 2003, after the world learned there were no WMD — as Habbush had foretold — the White House ordered the CIA to carry out a deception. The mission: create a handwritten letter, dated July, 2001, from Habbush to Saddam saying that Atta trained in Iraq before the attacks and the Saddam was buying yellow cake for Niger with help from a “small team from the al Qaeda organization.”

"The mission was carried out, the letter was created, popped up in Baghdad, and roiled the global newcycles in December, 2003 (conning even venerable journalists with Tom Brokaw). The mission is a statutory violation of the charter of CIA, and amendments added in 1991, prohibiting CIA from conducting disinformation campaigns on U.S. soil."

John W. Dean, who served as Richard Nixon’s White House Counsel, drew the connection on MSNBC between the new allegations and those that brought down Richard Nixon in 1974 just weeks after the House Judiciary Committee voted in favor of Articles of Impeachment.

John W. Dean being interviewed by Keith Olberman stated:

"I don‘t think people are looking at it too narrowly or Suskind is when I read his book. What happens when you tie that with a criminal conspiracy statute, 18 USC 371, which nailed countless people in Watergate for misusing the agencies and departments of government—that‘s where they‘ve got a problem.

"That‘s where Nixon had a problem for telling the CIA to block the FBI for part of the Watergate investigation. Yes, it was obstruction but it was also defrauding the government. This is their real problem with that statute. ... "

What's King so afraid of?

2008-08-08T22:46:00.001-05:00

In less than three months voters will go to the polls and make important decisions about how they are represented in government.

Recently Congressman Steve King declined an invitation to the debate Rob Hubler October 9 at Sioux City North High School, sponsored by the League of Women Voters and the Sioux City Journal. King complained that in a June 29 article, the Journal let Monona County Democratic Party chairman Ken Mertes say that some things King has said seem racist.

What kind of racist comments?

Like when he announced that he was running for re-election and said that terrorists will dance in the streets if America elects Barack Obama president.

Or when he compared Mexicans to cattle while promoting a $3,000,000 per mile wall along the border that people around the world, including the Vatican and former Soviet leaders have compared to the Berlin Wall. And by the way, he offered to have his family construction business do much of the work. (No doubt with no-bid contracts just like we gave to Haliburton and Balckwater in Iraq).

It is a little odd that he voted Against Renewing the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

I suspect that King doesn’t just feel persecuted by the press. The Sioux City Journal is a FAR cry from the Greenwich Village Voice or the Mother Earth News, we’re not talking about some kind of Liberal media conspiracy here. I think that King is afraid to face an intelligent, reasonable, rational opponent.

Who is his opponent this time? Rob Hubler is a retired Presbyterian minister, a Vietnam veteran, and a teacher for severely disabled children.

Hubler received a Good Conduct Medal for his time in the Navy, and when he got home, he worked for peace. He served as a legislative assistant for transportation and military issues in Des Moines. In 1989 he entered the University of Dubuqe's Theological Seminary to become a pastor.
Hubler lives his faith, instead of just using it to sell an agenda or to scare people with wedge issues. He’s shepherded Presbyterian churches in Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska
and been a teacher for severely disabled children.

He believes that Iowa's 5th District deserves a Congressman who is informed, educated, thoughtful, and who will be a positive voice toward creating a more perfect union.

King on the other hand, shamelessly defends the dishonesty of the Bush administration and has lined his pockets with special-interest group and lobbyist money. Like Bush and Cheney, and other "chickenhawks," he never served in the military himself.

He wants to deport the widows and orphans of legal immigrants and is a chief proponent of building an actual wall along the US-Mexican border, of course offering contracts to build it to his son's construction company.

King voted Against Children's Health Insurance, even though most Republicans including Senator Grassley supported it.

King said the events of the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse "amounts to hazing."
Last month he disrupted House Judiciary committee meetings on torture and the politicization of the Justice Department.

He's even voted AGAINST Strengthening Flood Levees in Iowa's flooded towns.

King refused to sign a letter asking Congress' Armed Services Committees that the head of the National Guard Bureau become part of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. King is the only Iowa lawmaker in Washington whose name is not on the request.

When Scott McClellan, Bush’s former spokesman, testified before Congress about Bush lying about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and about there being some kind of link between Iraq and 9/11, Steve King asked McClellen, “Couldn’t you have taken this to the grave with you and done this country a favor?”

King once told the Sioux City Journal that ‘red scare’ Senator Joseph McCarthy as "a great American hero." Joe McCarthy, the demagogue who inspired black lists and witch hunts, who the Army, President Eisenhower, and the Republican party all denounced, who was finally censured by the Senate and drank himself to death? That Joe McCarthy?

He’s one of Steve King’s heroes? “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”

King decrees widows penalized

2008-07-22T10:05:00.001-05:00

by: Douglas Burns | The Iowa Independent
Jul 21, 2008 at 14:05 PM

Congressman Steve King is now using a preposterous hypothetical that characterizes our servicemen as booze-hounds prone to one-night stands and black-out drunk marriages.

King, a Kiron Republican who is not even subtle with his beliefs that America should be populated by native-born whites, is a strong supporter of the so-called "widow penalty." More than 150 foreign-born widows and widowers face deportation because their spouses died less than two years after the marriages and before citizenship paperwork could be processed.

Congress is working to end the tragedy but King doesn't want to cut the widows a break, in large part because he questions the legitimacy of mixed-race families, believing them a product of white men wilding on foreign soils with exotic women. Read his own words:

"A soldier, man or woman, could get drunk in Bangkok, wake up in the morning and be married, as will happen sometimes in places like Las Vegas or Bangkok, be killed the next day, and the spouse who was a product of the evening's celebration would have then a right to claim access to come to the United States on a green card," King said during debate on the widow penalty, according to The Des Moines Register.

Read King's own words:

Ted's Take:

"I will be swift to bear witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired workers in their wages, the widow and the orphan, against those who thrust aside the alien, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts." (emphasis mine)
- Malachi 3:5

That's from this book I read once. Forget what they call it, "Bibliosomething,?" Sounds like Babel. Anyway, King probably wouldn't like it, it wasn't written by a white American. Although I thought it was a big hit with the "family values" crowd for a while a few years back.

McCain earmark opposition assailed

2008-06-22T18:59:00.001-05:00

By JANE NORMAN • jnorman@dmreg.com • June 20, 2008
Des Moines Register

Washington, D.C. - Republican presidential candidate John McCain opposed legislation last year that included money for flood control in Des Moines, which shows he is wrong to push for reforms to the congressional earmark system, a Democratic lawmaker charged Thursday.

State Sen. Jack Hatch of Des Moines said the earmarked money was needed to relieve water problems on the city's north side, which were magnified over the weekend when a levee break forced an evacuation of the Birdland area and ruined several dozen homes and businesses.

McCain aides said the Arizona senator opposed the $23 billion bill because it was bloated with pork and did not set priorities. The aides said McCain does not oppose particular projects, such as the Des Moines improvements, but rather the inside-player process through which the money is doled out.

Hatch chose the wrong time to attack McCain, spokesman Jeff Sadosky added.

"We do not need to play politics with flooding that has brought so much harm and pain throughout the region," he said.

Outdated north-side levees were identified as a weak spot in the city's flood-control system as far back as 1993. The Army Corps of Engineers was granted approval to replace them, but Congress has not set aside the money needed for the project.

Hatch said members of Iowa's congressional delegation pushed to include the earmark in the massive Water Resources Development Act of 2007. It included $6.9 million for work along the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers.

"That's why you have 435 members of Congress, so they can be closer to these projects, so they know what really, really matters," Hatch said.

Sadosky pointed out that the water bill only authorized federal money. Spending is a separate process in Congress.

President Bush eventually vetoed the bill, which authorized more than 900 navigation, flood-control and environmental projects across the country. A report on the bill said the Des Moines metropolitan area suffered more than $152 million in flood damage in 1993.

"The Birdland Park and Central Place levees on the Des Moines River failed during the 1993 flood event and do not provide reliable flood protection, placing nearly 200 homes and businesses at risk," the report said.

Every member of the Iowa congressional delegation voted to override Bush's veto, the first override of his presidency.

McCain strongly backed Bush.

"This legislation is fundamentally flawed, authorizing nearly 1,000 new projects without any method for prioritizing the needs of our national water infrastructure," he told the Senate. He added that the bill was "full of pork projects and unchecked government spending."

McCain and Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., had pushed for a system to set priorities for Corps projects. "Of course, that amendment was not adopted because this Congress values pet projects over national priorities," McCain said.

Design work for reconstruction of the Des Moines levees is under way; earlier design work was inadequate, Hatch said Thursday. Temporary repairs to plug the breach were made this week.

"We have to push that design immediately," Hatch said. "One of the highest priorities of our congressional delegation has to be to shore up these weak levees in the Des Moines River basin."

Talking Points Memo | McCain Breaking the Law in Plain Sight

2008-06-22T18:58:00.000-05:00

Talking Points Memo | McCain Breaking the Law in Plain Sight: "The most generous interpretation of what happened is that McCain's lawyer came up with an ingenious legal two step that allowed him to double dip in the campaign finance system, eat his cake and spend it too. But even if you buy that line, successful gaming of the system doesn't really count as strict adherence. And the point is irrelevant since the head of the FEC -- a Republican -- says McCain cannot do this on his own."

Culver aides: McCain ignored request to cancel Iowa visit

2008-06-22T18:55:00.000-05:00

Culver aides: McCain ignored governor's request to cancel Iowa visit

MIKE GLOVER
AP News

Jun 19, 2008 22:43 EST

An aide to Gov. Chet Culver said Thursday that Republican presidential candidate John McCain ignored the governor's request to cancel a campaign visit amid a massive flood recovery effort in the state.

<br/>

McCain toured flood-damaged sites in Iowa on Thursday, including the town of Columbus Junction in the southeast.

Patrick Dillon, Culver's chief of staff, said the governor was concerned that McCain's trip would divert local law enforcement from the flood recovery effort to provide security for McCain.

David Roederer, who chairs McCain's campaign in Iowa, said McCain's trip didn't hamper Iowa's recovery operation. He said McCain proceeded with the visit because the campaign was providing much of its own security.

"There was really no state resources diverted," Roederer said.

The mayor of Columbus Junction, Dan Wilson, agreed.

"Certainly, Mr. McCain's visit today in no way hindered any relief efforts or any of our efforts on recovery or security or whatever we were working on," Wilson said. He said McCain's staff called him Wednesday night and Thursday to be sure the visit would not cause a problem.

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama canceled a scheduled visit to eastern Iowa last week at the request of state officials.

"As a courtesy — and as we did for Senator Obama — we privately made an effort to make sure that Senator McCain knew that state and local resources were still being deployed to support the flood fight and that now may not be the best time for a campaign trip," Dillon said in a statement.

Dillon's comments came as President Bush toured the state, and hundreds of law enforcement officers were diverted from flood recovery to provide security for him.

Culver, who endorsed Obama well before the primary campaign with rival Hillary Rodham Clinton was settled, is expected to be one of Obama's biggest supporters in Iowa during the general election.

Dillon said the issue was not about the election but about recovering from flooding.

"At the end of the day, it's not about politics but about what's best for Iowa," he said. "We hope any attention brought to the state — from Senator McCain or any other leader — will help bring assistance and enduring commitments to support Iowa's recovery."

Iowa Sens. Tom Harkin and Charles Grassley also have teamed for a tour of their own to see the flood damage.

While these high-profile politicians bring attention to the disaster, they cause headaches for hard-pressed law enforcement. Bush and McCain are protected by the Secret Service, and call in scores of local law enforcement to provide security during local appearances.

Source: AP News

Go Kucinich Go

2008-06-10T08:58:00.000-05:00

a resolution, articles of impeachment of george bush, president of the united states. resolved that president george w. bush be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanor and that the following articles of impeachment be exhibited to the united states senate. articles of impeachment exhibited by the house of representatives of the united states of america in the name of itself and of the people of the united states of america in maintenance and support of its impeachment against george w. bush for high crimes and misdemeanor. it is conduct while president of the united states, george w. bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faith fully execute the office of the office of president of the united states and best of his ability, preserve protect and defend the constitution of the united states and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be safely executed has committed the following abuses of power. article i, creating a secret propaganda campaign to manufacture a false case for war against iraq. in his conduct while president of the united states, george w. bush, in violation of his constitutional oath to faith fully execute the office of president of the united states and to the best of his ability, preserve, protect and defend the constitution of the united states and in violation of its constitutional duty to take care that the laws be safely executed, has both personally and acting through his agents and subordinates, together with the vice president, illegally spent public dollars on a secret propaganda campaign to manufacture a false cause for war against iraq. the department of defense has engaged in a years long secret domestic propaganda campaign

The answer to Bear's question

2008-06-08T18:33:00.002-05:00

Bear asked: How do voters take their district back...? Good question. Even better is that the answer lies right within the question; you'll find it nestled inside the third word -- vote.

But that's the easy part. In the case of House District 55, however, they first needed someone for whom to vote, and that requires involvement and a commitment to candidate recruitment. That in turn at least gives Democrats a fighting chance, which is the first step in taking back our districts.

So how do we convey that message?

Well, if I had an extra $2,136.96, I'd send sympathy cards to the 5,088 registered Democrats in HD-55. It seems quite appropriate, especially since they've basically just lost something very near and dear: representation. Even better would be an additional $2,670.36 for another 6,358 cards for the registered No Party voters. After all, it's their loss, too.

Iowans for Tax Relief may boast record-winning elections for their young republican puppets (see Bret Hayworth's ITR counts primary scalps), but in spite of their teetering stacks of gold coins, there's simply no substitute for a solid vote, and the numbers are doable with a little work.

HD-55 has 6,051 registered republicans. Let's say we earned (and yes, votes are earned) 60% of the NP vote. That's about 3815 votes. The 8903 combined Democratic and NP votes would be enough to topple ITR's gold tower. Sure, not all Dems and NP voters will show up to cast ballots, but neither will the republicans or their 40% share of NPs. But, as Henry Fonda once said in the film Shenandoah, "We've got to try. Because if we don't try, we don't do. And if we don't do, then why are we here?"

Therein, my friend, lies our answers. Representation doesn't just happen. We as Democrats have to make it happen.

So, how's about those sympathy cards? If someone wants to pony up the $4,807.32 for postage, I'll lick all the envelopes. I'll seal them with a kick.

Jason Scultz wins Iowa Primary.

2008-06-05T17:57:00.002-05:00

Democrats failed to recruit a candidate for House District 55 - leaving the door open for another bought and paid for candidate like Matt Windschitl in HD56.

Jason Schultz won the Republican Primary for HD55.
Jason is supported by special interests from SE Iowa.

How do voters take their district back, getting the representation they deserve?

Words that will be written in history books

2008-06-04T11:08:00.002-05:00

"What you won’t hear from this campaign or this party is the kind of politics that uses religion as a wedge, and patriotism as a bludgeon – that sees our opponents not as competitors to challenge, but enemies to demonize."
~Sen. Barack Obama

This has been a dramatic difference between Republicans and Democrats since the days of Joseph Mccarthy in the 1950s. Religion should be a tie that binds, not a tool for political leverage. And TRUE patriotism is standing up for the principals embodied in the Declaration, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights- not just the flag or the pledge or some comfortable, capitalist, WASP way of life. It's not a lapel pin.

It's time for Hillary supporters to join ranks behind Obama to defeat McCain because the stakes are too high. Please, we need you. We honor you, stop the division. Don't act like Republicans.

Choose hope over fear? Yes we can.

Sad for representative government in Iowa

2008-06-04T11:02:00.005-05:00

What a shame. Schultz won the Republican primary for Clarence Hoffman's HD55 seat, and won big.

Schultz had the money- thanks to a lobbying group- to out advertise Friedrichsen big time. How tragic for Hoffman, that the voters in our district would choose idealogical extremism rather than honest and reasonable public servant-hood.

As a Christian, I want Christian voters to wake up and realize that the far right brand of religiosity that King and Schultz represent is one of pure legalism like the Pharisees, not the grace, mercy, forgiveness, love, and compassion of Jesus Himself.

Right-wing religion isn't about Jesus and His teachings, it's about fear, anger, and the desire to control society- not about helping others or first changing yourself. Stop abortions, stop gay marriage, stop immigration- We know what you hate, but what are you for?

Want to go back to the days of coat-hanger abortions? Especially the girls who are victims of rape and incest?

Rather have the gay folks in freaky night clubs and airport bathrooms instead of mundane, monogamous domesticity?

Prefer those immigrants to be bringing all kinds of diseases, involved in crime, uneducated and wallowing in decrepit ghettos instead of working withing the system and contributing to, even though they're culturally different than you and me?

Okay then, make sure you put all of your energy into preventing anything you don't like from happening. Keep trying to make sure those you distrust are driven underground.

As a fiscal conservative, someone who opposes deficit spending and seeks accountability and reform in government- I wish that conservative voters would wake up and see that being beholden to ANY PAC, lobby, or interest group means that you have THEIR interests at heart, not your constituents. No matter how just and righteous their positions seem.

Iowans for Tax Relief? No one likes paying taxes, but we all like decent roads, safe bridges, and competitive schools. Tax Relief is a red herring for Republicans to swindle voters out of paying attention to real issues and it always has been. ITR was an easy way to get some bucks for campaign. Lets say we want to deport all the illegal immigrants, prevent all the abortions, and deny all the homos spousal benefits- we have to have some revenue to pay to enforce all those socially conservative laws. What the Hell, let's go out on a limb and say that we are going to stay in Iraq for another hundred years. How ya gonna pay for it? Taxes are a necessary evil, my friend.

The keys are how you structure the tax burden and what you spend the revenue on. Republicans want to tax the working class the most and millionaires, billionaires and corporations the most and they want to spend the money on no-bid military contracts to corporations they hold stock in. Democrats prefer a progressive tax structure where the more you can afford, the more you're asked bare. And we want to spend it on silly, frivolous things like infrastructure, education, law enforcement, scientific research, and who knows, maybe even health care.

Even more sad than Schultz winning Hoffman's seat in the Iowa House is that the Democrats of Dist. 55 don't have their act together enough to even field a candidate to oppose Schultz this Fall. Come on team, wake up and get it together by 2010!!!

What Price War?

2008-05-03T17:20:00.006-05:00

Reminders are everywhere.

They show up in faces. They show up in roadside signs. They show up in numbers, whether tallying the hundreds of billions of dollars spent or the hundreds of thousands of innocent lives lost (yes, this includes a vast number of innocent Iraqis, and yes, they're human lives, too) and the reminders keep on growing and expanding to populate every aspect of all our lives.

Today I attended Iowa's 5th Congressional District Democratic Central Committee meeting, and as we drove into Denison, Iowa, the signs were there, too ... community placards still waving in the wind from Wednesday's welcome home ceremonies for Denison's Company D, 1st Battalion, 168th Infantry division troops. Before returning to Crawford County April 30, the 120+ National Guardsmen had spent five days at Fort McCoy, Wisconsin, being debriefed.

During today's meeting, one committee member rose to provide other numbers: the cost of the Iraqi War thus far to Iowa's 5th District -- $738,000,000 (seven hundred thirty-eight million dollars).

Iowa's 5th District has 32 counties. We're a rural district, with more counties than any of Iowa's five congressional districts. Our unemployment rates are high here. Yet, if divided equally, each county in our district now has a 23+ million dollar ($23,062,500, to be exact) investment in ... what? Better roads? Schools? Health care for Iowans? Our kids? More jobs?

Don't we wish.

Upon arriving home, I check my e-mail and the news, and another reminder surfaces. On just One Man. His name is Merlin German. He's not even from Iowa. But, his story, I know by now, already must have unleashed more than 738 million tears -- including mine -- and the Iraqi War and all its costs suddenly comes into sharper focus once again.

This is man who, after surviving a roadside bomb in Iraq in February 2005 with burns to 97% of his body, endured 150 operations, became an inspiration to other wounded soldiers and a beloved figure at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, established the Merlin's Miracles charity to help burned children, and then died at the young age of 22 after yet another operation.

The questions keep coming. Why? Why? Why?

Why are Americans so blindly willing to accept a war with a potential economic impact of a staggering $4 trillion or more? Why, when our alleged initial "motives" were to oust Saddam Hussein, does America continue to invest hundreds of billions of dollars into a war long after Hussein is dead? Rebuilding Iraq, yes? Stabilizing Iraq, yes? But why aren't those dollars invested in badly needed programs to stabilize a faltering U.S. economy instead? And why can American soldiers like Merlin German -- who proudly serve and represent their country despite pain and war scars -- recognize so easily the needs here in the Homeland and accomplish more in three short years than an entire administration can accomplish in five?

Marine Sgt. Merlin German is the epitome of an American Hero. In all ways. He fought the good fight. Not just for a war most of us still can't comprehend, but for millions he didn't even know. He waged his own war for all the right reasons, and many children will grow and thrive and live better lives because of his efforts. In the end, to have something to show for one's efforts is man's greatest legacy.

Hail to the Chief amongst soldiers: U.S. Marine Sgt. Merlin German.

In behalf of Iowa's 5th Congressional Democrats, we offer our condolences to the family and friends of this great man.

Bush Budget Proposal Slashes Iowa Law Enforcement and Victim Service Programs

2008-02-08T22:48:00.001-06:00

He's doing it again.

Perhaps he doesn't think crime takes place in Iowa. Or, perhaps he doesn't think Iowans care about the crime taking place within our state. Then again, perhaps he doesn't think crime affects Iowans' lives.

He's wrong. It does. We do. And, yes, it does.

Thank God, our U.S. Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) realizes all the above.

Once again, Sen. Harkin is fighting for Iowans and leading the effort to restore critical funds to this year's budget in response to Bush's latest proposal to slash another 63% from state and local law enforcement programs. This, while Iowans are still recovering from last year's 67% cut to the Byrne funded drug task forces across the state.

Harkin and his Senate colleagues announced on Jan. 30 that they seek to increase funding for the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant Program to $660 million. This would increase Iowa’s estimated share of 2008 funding from $1.5 million to $6.1 million. Harkin -- in his announcement -- was joined by police officers and local sheriffs, including Marshall County Sheriff Ted Kamatchus and Iowa’s Drug Czar Gary Kendall.

"Iowa is already reeling from funding cuts to law enforcement programs, which I am currently fighting to restore in the current year’s budget," Harkin said in response to Bush's latest proposed cuts. "I will continue my work to ensure Iowans do not have to face these devastating cuts.”

Federal assistance allows local law enforcement to better coordinate drug fighting efforts, hire officers and purchase equipment, stop domestic violence and effectively deal with drug dealers. Unless funding is added to the budget, these important programs will be cut.

The Bush Budget Impact on Iowa

· The Bush budget would slash or eliminate many programs aimed at bolstering local law enforcement, including the Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program, which helps local police departments put more officers out on Iowa’s streets. In Iowa, law enforcement agencies would have to absorb a loss of $6.5 million dollars if this was enacted.

· The President’s budget will eliminate Byrne Grants that fund many drug fighting programs across the state. Due to the President’s veto threats, last year’s appropriations bill underfunded the Byrne Grant program. Senator Harkin is already working to restore this money this fiscal year which would restore $3.5 million to Iowa so law enforcement will not need to cut staff and program resources. He will vigorously oppose any attempts to eliminate this program in next year's budget.

· The President’s budget also proposes to eliminate all Department of Justice grant programs for victims of domestic violence including legal assistance, grants for safe havens for children and victims of domestic violence with disabilities. Due to this loss of funding, most, if not all of the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Programs around the state would have to close.

Fellow Iowans, is this acceptable to you?

Bush never got the privilege of meeting Dad Earl. Perhaps the death of Earl Thelander meant nothing to Bush, nor the deaths of many more like Dad Earl whose fates were sealed by Iowa law enforcement entities doing the best they could in the face of numerous budget cuts under an administration whose mantra is and has been Shoot-First-and-Ask-Questions-Later.

But, the People are quick studies. Iowans are quick studies. And, we're watching you, Mr. Bush, just like you've been watching us.

Thank you, Sen. Harkin, for keeping watch on issues that matter not just to Iowans, but to all Americans.

King's Political Future

2007-07-16T13:07:00.000-05:00

As Congressman Steve King of Iowa’s 5th District contemplates whether to seek the U.S. Senate Seat held by Tom Harkin or go for a fourth term as Congressman then perhaps run for Governor in 2010, some interesting thoughts developed.
1. Could King sell the State of Iowa on his concept of representing only those people who share his values and still get elected? I’m still one of those people that have not figured out why anyone would vote for him in the first place.
2. Maybe Washington D.C. is becoming a safer place to live. In June 2006, Rep King stated, "My wife lives here with me, and I can tell you… she’s at far greater risk being a civilian in Washington, D.C., than an average civilian in Iraq."
3. King’ latest perspective on higher fuel costs are environmental regulations. King stated, “every day we are held hostage by environmental regulations that lead to high gas prices.” Maybe as Governor, he could set an environmental standard the whole world could follow.

I find it scary King is on the House Subcommittee of Constitution Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.

What Patriotism Means to Me

2007-07-12T21:48:00.000-05:00

Patriotic is quite simply love of country. In the United States, our forefathers drafted a Declaration of Independence that addressed over taxation, individual rights and freedoms and reasoned the revolutionary motives. Following that, we have a constitution that allows for specific rights and laws that includes our right to bear arms, freedom of speech, and unlawful search and seizure. In the United States we share not only those rights afforded us in the constitution but elect officials to uphold those rights.

But to love ones country is more than that. From sea to shinning sea, we have a beautiful country that includes the Great Lakes, the Rocky Mountains, the Great Plans, Eastern Seaboard, the Pacific Ocean and Desert Southwest. Having seen a large part of this country, you never forget the Grand Canyon or the Grand Tetons, the Desert Southwest in bloom, not to mention the farm belt before harvest or the eastern seaboard in the fall.

Truly loving ones country means more. It’s the people that continue to live, work and play that makes a country whole. To live in a country that allows you to be as successful as you choose and make those individual life choices are priceless.

Stop Iran War

2007-03-31T16:28:00.000-05:00

Dear Ted,

Click here to watch our latest video blog!

Last Friday, Iranian military forces seized 15 British sailors and marines in the Persian Gulf. Some believe this is an act of aggression by Iran and should be met with a commensurate military response.

I do not.

I believe it shows that the Bush Administration's current policy with Iran is not working. For the sake of stability in the Middle East, it's time for direct diplomacy with Iran -- now more than ever.

Today, we're launching our third video blog for StopIranWar.com. I'm joined by Iraq war veteran Jon Soltz of VoteVets.org and Clark Community blogger Reg to discuss how President Bush's get tough policy with Iran is undermining the security of our most reliable ally in the region, Israel.

Watch today's video blog to understand why George Bush's policy of confronting Iran hurts the Israelis, our strongest allies in this volatile region.

We need to be shaping a new vision for the Middle East. Peace won't come through saber rattling and threats -- it will come through dialogue, negotiation and the hard work of diplomacy. While I would never rule out military action against Iran if necessary to preserve stability, protect Israel and defend America's national security, it just doesn't make sense in our current circumstances.

In fact, attacking Iran now would simply derail the Middle East peace process, further radicalize Israel's enemies, and put our friend and ally at risk. Years of diplomacy aimed at laying the groundwork for peace will be lost.

We must give the people of this region cause for hope -- not just the threat of the Sixth Fleet lurking off their shore. It's time to let the diplomats do their job.

Watch our new video blog today, and then sign our petition to President Bush asking him to pursue diplomacy with Iran -- not more military confrontation.

It's time for the United States to be a beacon of hope and the voice of reason in the Middle East. President Bush's policy of military confrontation has done enough harm. Please, help me change his course by inviting your friends and family to sign our petition at StopIranWar.com today.

Sincerely,

Wes Clark

Visit StopIranWar.com

All the President's Men

2007-03-29T19:42:00.000-05:00

Freelance cartoonist Ted Mallory lives in Charter Oak and teaches at Boyer Valley Schools in Dunlap. ‘Ted’s Column’ has appeared weekly in the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper since 2002. If you’d like to see any of Ted’s editorial cartoons bigger and brighter, you can visit http://tmal.multiply.com/photos/album/2

Obama to visit Denison

2007-03-28T15:42:00.000-05:00

Obama to visit Denison

Barack Obama at Denison H.S.

Start:	Mar 31, '07 5:30p
Location:	Denison High School Gym

Doors open at 5:00, Obama speaks at 5:45.

Ted, you should have shown up at Cronk’s last night to talk to his campaigner. Doors open at 5:00, program begins at 5:45. If you would like to volunteer as usher, crowd control, security, etc. show up at 4 p.m. Admission is free, but we are handing out pretty red tickets as a way to gauge how many people are interested.

What does a "Peacenik" look like?

2007-03-28T15:14:00.000-05:00

I didn't take these, one of my students who just returned from a school trip to Washington DC did. You know, when I was in high school and we were studying about the Vietnam war my best friend at the time (a girl named Dawn) and I went to see a movie in theatres called "Platoon" starring Charlie Sheen. We were both blown away, we were crying at how horrible and hellish war could be. (of course it may have been different if I'd seen it with a bunch of guys. One friend who was in ROTC thought it was a bitchin' cool fun action movie.) Dawn and I asked each other what we thought we would've done if we had been in high school or college during Vietnam. Would we support the Johnson and Nixon administrations, or would we have opposed the war. Would we have protested? What if I had been drafted?

Fortunately it was an abstract, academic exercise, since the most serious military involvement of the Reagan era was the invasion of a teensy, tiny island nation called Grenada. I really didn't know. I knew I'd be scared both to go and fight the Vietcong and to stay and fight the powers-that-be. I had two uncles who were great friends and could talk food and wine and local, municipal politics- but they never talked about the war. One went and served as a medic, the other went to Canada.

Frankly, I think that a lot of us kids of the eighties had unrealistic stereotypes of war opponents. We figured to stand up for peace would turn you into something like the fellow in the picture above, who, I was told, has been protesting for nuclear disarmament six hours a day since 1982. Well, today someone who's opposed to war, looks like a middle-aged, overweight, middle-class, Midwestern, white, Anglo-Saxon, protestant male. Married, father of three, active in his church. Laundered clothes, not too old or ragged. Showered and shaved, doesn't use drugs, has never even tried marijuana. It looks like someone who loves Jesus, loves his family, loves his country, appreciates civility and a certain amount of "law and order," and who does not hate, resent, or blame the troops who are fighting for us.

You can say that I'm lucky or spoiled that I never had to face a draft or that I'm not as much of a real man because I haven't served in the military voluntarily. And maybe you're right. Maybe as a Gen-Xer, I have it too easy. Maybe it's safer to be opposed to this war than it would've been to protest that last one. Frankly, we should all be thanking God that Iraq isn't tearing our families and society apart the way Iraq did. We may disagree, even vehemently, but we just change the subject or avoid the subject. No one is screaming in (or spitting) in faces.

But I guess that if I knew that the government lied and covered it up, if they were unclear or even obtuse about the causes and reasons for entering and staying in the war. If I heard that they were secretly invading and bombing Cambodia (practicing war games, hoping to provoke Iran)... yeah, I'd have a hard time sitting on the fence, even if it could get me in trouble.

Some say, "My country, love it or leave it!!! MY COUNTRY, RIGHT OR WRONG!!!"
I say, more calmly and quietly, "My country, love it enough to tell it that it has a problem instead of enabling it. My country, when it's wrong, speak up and try to get it right."

_________________________________________________________________

Ted Mallory lives in Charter Oak and teaches at Boyer Valley Schools in Dunlap. ‘Ted’s Column’ has appeared weekly in the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper since 2002, you can also read it at http://tedscolumn.blogspot.com . If you’d like to see any of Ted’s editorial cartoons bigger and brighter, you can visit http://tmal.multiply.com/photos/album/2

Uh oh...

2007-03-27T19:36:00.000-05:00

Visit http://tedscolumn.blogspot.com and/or http://tmal.multiply.com/photos/album/2
to see more cartoons by Ted Mallory

Now, granted, this guy is a conspiracy theorist crank who blames the govt. for 9/11, be that as it may, it is pretty scary. So much for October Suprises, this would be one helluva Easter Egg to take our minds off of Scooter and Alberto. Let's hope this Tarpley is a total whack. Tom Hartman was talking about it on Air America Radio Tuesday night though. And of course, Seymour Hersh has been warning us about it in the New Yorker for a long time. Please, visit http://www.stopiranwar.com right away and show retired General Wes Clark your support right away!

Operation Bite - April 6 Sneak Attack By US Forces On Iran Planned - Russian Military Sources WarnGeneral Ivashov Calls For Emergency Session Of UN Security Council To Ward Off Looming US Aggression
By Webster G. Tarpley
3-25-7

WASHINGTON DC -- The long awaited US military attack on Iran is now on track for the first week of April, specifically for 4 AM on April 6, the Good Friday opening of Easter weekend, writes the well-known Russian journalist Andrei Uglanov in the Moscow weekly "Argumenty Nedeli." Uglanov cites Russian military experts close to the Russian General Staff for his account.

The attack is slated to last for twelve hours, according to Uglanov, lasting from 4 AM until 4 PM local time. Friday is a holiday in Iran. In the course of the attack, code named Operation Bite, about 20 targets are marked for bombing; the list includes uranium enrichment facilities, research centers, and laboratories.

The first reactor at the Bushehr nuclear plant, where Russian engineers are working, is supposed to be spared from destruction. The US attack plan reportedly calls for the Iranian air defense system to be degraded, for numerous Iranian warships to be sunk in the Persian Gulf, and the for the most important headquarters of the Iranian armed forces to be wiped out.

The attacks will be mounted from a number of bases, including the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. Diego Garcia is currently home to B-52 bombers equipped with standoff missiles. Also participating in the air strikes will be US naval aviation from aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf, as well as from those of the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean. Additional cruise missiles will be fired from submarines in the Indian Ocean and off the coast of the Arabian peninsula. The goal is allegedly to set back Iran's nuclear program by several years, writes Uglanov, whose article was re-issued by RIA-Novosti in various languages, but apparently not English, several days ago. The story is the top item on numerous Italian and German blogs, but so far appears to have been ignored by US websites...
http://www.rense.com/general75/bite.htm
http://fr.rian.ru/world/20070319/62260006.html

http://fr.rian.ru/world/20070321/62387717.html

A.G. the A.G. should go

2007-03-26T19:49:00.000-05:00

A fox was protecting the hen house
Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper — Schleswig Leader, Thursday,March 22, 2007 – Page 3

I was really starting to believe that the treasonous outing of CIA agent Valarie Plame in retaliation for her husband, career Ambassador Joseph Wilson’s criticism of the Bush Administration lying us into the war in Iraq would be their undoing. Especially after Vice President Dick Cheney’s former Chief of Staff Scooter Libby was found guilty on four of five perjury and obstruction of justice charges relating to the leaking of Plane’s identity to conservative pundit Robert Novak and others. Extra especially when Congressman Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Oversight Committee, said Thursday he wants Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to testify before his committee about his investigation. There was even a chance that Waxman would eventually subpoena the vice president and senior adviser to the president Karl Rove.

But then another scandal broke. Boy, it’s amazing what the power of subpoena and proper congressional oversight of the executive branch can bring to light.
It seems that at least eight U.S. Attorneys were fired because they weren’t loyal enough to the Bush administration and weren’t aggressive enough in investigating Democratic candidates in the 2004 and 06 elections.

Some people compared the Libby decision to when Nixon aide Alexander Butterworth let it slip before a Senate committee that there was a secret tape recording system in the Oval Office. People are comparing the firing the of eight U.S. Attorneys to the “Saturday Night Massacre” in 1973.

What happened that night is that President Nixon, sick of taking so much heat during the Watergate investigations, called Attorney general Elliot Richardson and asked him to fire Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox. Richardson let the President know that he was overstepping his Constitutional bounds, refused to fire Cox and resigned. Nixon then called Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus and told him to fire Cox. Ruckelshaus also refused and Nixon fired him. That meant that the Solicitor general, Robert Bork became acting Attorney General, and loyalist that he was, he gave Cox the ax. Nixon then declared that there was no longer an independent prosecutor and all of the Watergate investigations would come under the responsibility of the Justice Department and it’s new boss, Bork. This was one of the high crimes and misdemeanors that were described in the articles of impeachment that were started against Nixon before he so graciously resigned.

According to ABC reports last Thursday, March 15, one e-mail from Kyle Sampson, who worked at the Justice Department to then-deputy White House Counsel David Leitch shows that White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and then White House Counsel, now Attorney General Alberto Gonzales were both thinking about firing all 93 U.S. attorneys as early as January 2005.
Gonzales first told a congressional committee that White House counsel Harriet Miers (who was later a Supreme Court nominee) had brought up the idea, but that both he and Rove rejected the idea out of hand. Then he changed his story and half-admitted that “mistakes were made.”
In one e-mail they discuss replacing “15-20 percent of the current U.S. Attorneys,” because “80-85 percent, I would guess, are doing a great job, are loyal Bushies, etc.”

Bush defenders argue that many Presidents have fired U.S. Attorneys, but what they fail to mention is that they do it as soon as they come into office and they replace people who their predecessors had appointed. This administration fired their own appointees because they obeyed the law rather than letting themselves be pressured into letting the White House abuse the Justice Department for political means.

Gonzales attempted to place limitations on the Freedom of Information Act by restricting access to the records of former presidents.

Gonzales authored a controversial memo in January of 2002 that concluded that the Geneva Conventions were “quaint” and outdated He wrote a Presidential Order allowing for secret prisons and torture. He’s also deported people to nations that allow torture.
He fought with Congress to keep Vice President Dick Cheney’s Energy task force documents secret.

Gonzales was a major proponent of the USA PATRIOT Act. Things like secret wire tapping without warrants and opening U.S. citizen’s mail.

It’s ironic that someone with so little regard tor the Constitution should have been appointed top law enforcement officer of our Nation. Our only hope is that like with Nixon, our system still works. If it does, he will eventually be prosecuted under it.

Ted Mallory lives in Charter Oak and teaches at Boyer Valley Schools in Dunlap. ‘Ted’s Column’ has appeared weekly in the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper since 2002. If you’d like to see any of Ted’s editorial cartoons bigger and brighter, you can visit http://tmal.multiply.com/photos/album/2

‘King George II’ should learn his place

2007-02-08T15:09:00.000-06:00

All of my Republican friends like to give me a hard time because they think I never draw cartoons that pick on Democrats. Well, here ya are. But now to make up for it, you need to read the column below, which is more Bush-bashing than I've done in a few months:

‘King George II’ should learn his place
Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper Schleswig Leader, Thursday, Febrary 8, 2007 Page 3

Some of the Latin we were taught as History Majors are the phrases “Rex Lex,” and “Lex Rex.”
I’m not entirely certain which means which, but one roughly translates, “The king IS the law,” or at least “the king is above the law.”

This refers to absolutist rulers like the King George III against whom we fought our Revolutionary War, and Kaiser Wilhelm II who loused up the diplomacy and foreign policy left him by Otto von Bismarck and entangled Europe in World War I.

Waaay back during Robin Hood’s time, the English were sick of the absolutist Prince John (who was really just the substitute monarch for his brother Richard the Lion Hearted, who was off fighting the Crusades.) Those clever Brits made John sign a thing called the Magna Carta, which basically said that not even the king was above the law, but instead actually, the LAW is king.
We yanks like that idea so much that we adopted one big über-law called the Constitution. Bottom line is, in the United States, the Constitution is sovereign, over states, and over government officials; both law makers and those charged with executing the laws. They’re sworn to uphold and defend it, not circumvent it or erode it’s basic principles.

According to the Boston Globe, “President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.”
He has done this with things called “signing statements,” in which a President explains which part of a law he plans to enforce or not enforce when he signs bills into law that have been passed by Congress.

The American Bar Association has expressed their concern that President George W. Bush’s use of signing statements has been excessive and “contrary to the rule of law and our constitutional system of separation of powers”

Two glaring examples were when Bush claimed to be able to wiggle out of Congress’s ban on the use of torture and when he claimed the right to tap phone lines without first seeking a judge’s warrant.

A great controversy has been brewing over whether or not the new Congress should prevent President from sending a surge of more troops to Iraq. Many Bush supporters site the Constitutional division of powers. They claim that only the President is the Commander-in-Chief of American military forces.

The Constitutional problem with that line of reasoning is that the Constitution gives Congress, not the President, the power to “declare war,” “raise and support armies” and “make rules concerning captures on land and water.”

Unfortunately for this President, Congress has not declared war. Bush can use the rhetoric of “the War on Terror” all he wants, but Iraq did not attack the United States, or have any part in the attack that was made on us by terrorists. Almost four years after Bush ordered the invasion, we still have not declared war on Iraq.

“The constitution supposes, what the History of all Governments demonstrates, that the Executive is the branch of power most interested in war, and most prone to it,” James Madison cautioned. “It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the Legislature.”
Last week, hand written notes from Vice President Dick Cheney were entered into evidence in the perjury and obstruction of justice trial of Cheney’s former Chief of staff, Scooter Libby. The notes suggest that the Vice President would rather have Libby go down than Carl Rove, President Bush’s Deputy Chief of Staff for blowing the cover of CIA agent Valerie Plame in order to silence and/or get even with her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson because he criticized the Bush administration for misrepresenting intelligence in order to convince Congress, the United Nations, and the American public to let them invade Iraq.

Witnesses seem to have implicated Cheney, not Libby in leaking Plame’s identity. This could be to the Bush administration what Alexander Butterworth’s revelation that there were tape recorders in the Oval office was to Richard Nixon.

Republicans like John Warner of Virginia and Chuck Hagel are gradually coming around. They’re now supporting the Senate resolution opposing the President’s buildup of troops. Will it be another Arizona Republican, this time John McCain who will visit the President and talk sense to him, the way that Barry Goldwater did with Nixon in 1974?

This column highlighted just three ways in which George W. Bush likes to think of himself as above and beyond our 230 year old system. I’m not calling for impeachment, just stronger oversight and accountability. Should impeachment come, I hope Congress targets Cheney first. Bush could beat the Democrats to history by appointing Elizabeth Dole his replacement Vice President. Then she’d be the first woman President when Bush resigns or is removed from office. I think it would be fitting, since her husband Bob was Gerald Ford’s running mate.

Ted Mallory lives in Charter Oak and teaches at Boyer Valley Schools in Dunlap. ‘Ted’s Column’ has appeared weekly in the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper since 2002. If you’d like to see any of Ted’s editorial cartoons bigger and brighter, you can visit http://tmal.multiply.com/photos/album/2

"War is Gods way of teaching Americans Geography" ~Anonymous

Mallory's Milieu - CARTOONS

2006-12-07T12:43:00.000-06:00

Mallory's Milieu - CARTOONS

I've wanted to be a cartoonist since about 5th grade. I drew cartoons for my High School and College newspapers and now for my local small-town newspaper. Here is a collection of some of my favorites.

When you go to this page, bookmark it to your favorites because I add to it almost every week. Tell your friends about it, forward the web address around if you enjoy them. Who knows, maybe you can create a buzz for me or a web-following so that eventually I could sell my work to bigger papers, magazines, or best yet, get syndicated. Don't get me wrong, I love teaching, but how cool would it be to get to actually make a living drawing funny pictures.

Anyway, take a look, either laugh or get angry, but either way, enjoy.

Rewards Offered in Two Animal Abuse Cases

2006-09-14T19:39:00.000-05:00

Has anyone checked the whereabouts of Iowa congressman Steve King during either of these time frames?

Reward Offered in Muncie, Ind. Animal Abuse Case

Reward Offered in Portage, Ind. Animal Abuse Case

I mean, he could have been extremely depressed (and feeling a bit retaliatory) after H.R. 503 -- which would ban horse slaughter in the United States for human consumption -- passed the House last week despite his well-rehearsed tirade about the need to keep horses, cows, pigs, sheep, fish -- and even our PETS!) in their place and his vote AGAINST the horse slaughter ban.

Just think what one could do with that $5,000.00 ($2,500.00 for each case) reward:

1) Donate it to the Steve King Psychiatric Wellness Fund

Or

2) Donate it to a cause where there's actually HOPE for successful results: Joyce Schulte for Congress.

Playing into Bin Laden's hands?

2006-09-07T08:28:00.000-05:00

There'a a bunch of great information out there on terrorism that Americans should consider with the 5th anniversary of 9/11 coming up.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5770651
Book Explores Latest Jihadi Thinking
All Things Considered, September 5, 2006 · Several lesser-known thinkers whose work is widely read on the Internet are more influential than Osama bin Laden in shaping the views and actions of Islamic radicals. That's the view of New Yorker writer Lawrence Wright, author of the book 'The Looming Tower.'

9/11/2006 issue of the New Yorker- http://www.newyorker.com/main/magazine/
'The Master Plan' by Lawrence Wright
What will the next stage of jihad be?

This may be the book that Wright mentions in his interview, it's sort of to Al Quaida what 'Mein Kampf' was to the NAZIs. The most disturbing thing is that they expected and wanted us to invade Iraq and hope we'll do the same with Iran. Why? Let's see... destabalize the region, politicize and radicalize the Islamic world in general so that they'll resent the U.S. and boost terrorist recruiting, spread our troops and resourses too thin. Hmm. By the way, the plan is to establish a pan-Arab state that will be the new dominant superpower by 2040.

Al-Qaida's Playbook

June 27, 2006 · The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point has translated a 268-page book written by al-Qaida (PDF). The book, written in 2004 by a top al-Qaida insider, is called Management of Savagery. I think it's safe to assume we're the savages. It's a really interesting read. I think it's easier for us to think of al-Qaida operatives as idiots, or at best, misinformed. Well, turns out that's exactly what they think of us. And boy, they don't appreciate our media slogans.

"There is no doubt that the power which God gave to the two superpowers (America and Russia) was overwhelming in the estimation of humans… Yet all of that is not enough... Therefore, the two superpowers must resort to using a deceptive media halo which portrays these powers as non-coercive and world-encompassing, able to reach into every earth and heaven as if they possess the power of the Creator of creation.

I'd also love to reccomend
The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation
On December 5, 2005, the 9/11 Commission issued its final report card on the government’s fulfillment of the recommendations issued in July 2004: one A, twelve Bs, nine Cs, twelve Ds, three Fs, and four incompletes. Here is stunning evidence that Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón, with more than sixty years of experience in the comic-book industry between them, were right: far, far too few Americans have read, grasped, and demanded action on the Commission’s investigation into the events of that tragic day and the lessons America must learn.

Using every skill and storytelling method Jacobson and Colón have learned over the decades, they have produced the most accessible version of the 9/11 Report. Jacobson’s text frequently follows word for word the original report, faithfully captures its investigative thoroughness, and covers its entire scope, even including the Commission’s final report card. Colón’s stunning artwork powerfully conveys the facts, insights, and urgency of the original. Published on the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the United States, an event that has left no aspect of American foreign or domestic policy untouched, The 9/11 Report puts at every American’s fingertips the most defining event of the century.

Changing the conversation - www.sojo.net08.31.06

2006-09-01T07:57:00.000-05:00

Changing the conversation -

God’s Politics turned out to be the book that opened the door to that new and wider conversation. Publishers tell me it has opened up space for a long list of new and upcoming books on the subject. The media now profiles many diverse voices on religion and public life, not just the same old cast of characters on the Right. Political leaders from both sides of the aisle are entering into the important discussion of not just whether faith should influence politics, but how. And, perhaps most important, the faith community (especially a new generation of young people) is speaking and acting on a wider and deeper range of moral issues beyond just abortion and gay marriage - including poverty, the environment, HIV/AIDS, sex trafficking, human rights, and war and peace.

Learn more about God's Poitics and it's author, Rev. Jim Wallis at www.sojo.net

to investigate the Administration's intent to go to war before congressional authorization, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, encouraging and coun

2006-08-31T12:43:00.000-05:00

Please! write, call, or email your representatives and URGE them to vote yes on 635! Let's get to the bottom of the Iraq fiasco.

HR 635

Resolved, That there is hereby established in the House of Representatives a select committee to be known as the Select Committee on Administration Predetermination to Go to War and...
Creating a select committee to investigate the Administration's intent to go to war before congressional authorization, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, encouraging and countenancing torture, retaliating against critics, and to make recommendations regarding grounds for possible impeachment.

God Help Iowa: Congressman King is Off His Meds Again

2006-08-17T07:38:00.000-05:00

I honestly can't believe IA U.S. Rep. Steve King actually had the guts to send me the letter he did. I mean, this gives a whole new meaning to career suicide! Blanket statements -- assumptions -- outright falsehoods -- and all from a mind-gone-bad that has dug one too many deep dark ditches.

I'd written Mr. King in regards to animal abuse legislation, specifically H.R. 817 -- the Animal Fighting Prohibition Enforcement Act. Luckily for voters, King expanded WAY BEYOND the issue of transporting animals across state lines for fighting purposes, and actually went on to make ludicrous (and extremely out-of-touch-with-reality) statements like:

"I currently oppose making animal fighting a felony because it degrades the value of human life."

Sure, whatever you say, Mr. King. (Has somebody called for a doctor!!) I'm going to forget all about those 48 states where animal fighting is ILLEGAL (including IOWA -- yeah, remember Mr. King? -- The state YOU represent?). Yes, Mr. King, there's no reason to become upset and I promise I'll stay right here until the doctors arrive. And yes, of course, Stevie, I'll sit with you and watch (fingers crossed 'cause my eyes will really be closed) those two dogs rip each other to shreds while spectators watch and clap and scream out in victory because...oh yes...to make something like that illegal would "degrade the value of human life."

Doctor, please! Okay, how about a nurse? An orderly, perhaps? But God forbid, PLEASE don't forget the straitjacket!!

I still must have missed something in Mr. King's maniacal letter, because I can't for the life of me (no pun intended) find a single state where "killing a person is a misdemeanor." I swear on my father's grave he really said that.

The letter below was sent to me by Iowa Congressman Steve King and dated August 8, 2006. If anyone would like a scanned copy of the letter please let me know and I'll be more than happy to send it along.

***PLEASE NOTE***: ALL the grammatical and punctuation errors in this letter belong to Mr. King. I did NOT alter or change or even so much as rearrange a single word. (Gee, who would have needed to, with Steve King digging his own...err...ditch?) I have, however, highlighted in bold some of his more psychotic statements.

(First, may I make a quick toast? Here's to all Steve King's pharmaceutical friends who make Bedlam, Chlorpromazine, Thioridazine, Lithium, Haldol, and all those other anti-psychotic drugs created to protect not only those who pose a danger to themselves, but more importantly, a danger to others.)

HERE IS THE LETTER DATED AUGUST 8, 2006:

Dear Ms. Ewing,

Thank you for contacting me with your support for the Animal Fighting Prohibition Enforcement Act of 2005, H.R. 817 which was referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary. H.R.817 would make it a federal felony to transport an animal across state lines with the intention of using that animal for fighting. Taking these animals across state lines is already a federal misdemeanor. Forty-eight of the fifty States have laws that already address this animal fighting.

I currently oppose making animal fighting a felony because it degrades the value of human life. In the United States, we are faced with the alarming practice of people taking a minor girl across state lines for abortion to avoid their own state's laws that require the minor's parents to be notified. Federal legislation currently under consideration would only make this abhorrent activity, which exploits a young woman and kills her child, a misdemeanor. This legislation has still not become law yet, but it is a step forward in the right direction, and I hope it will be enacted later this year.

I believe that we should not value animal life over human life. It makes no sense that killing a person is a misdemeanor if transporting animals to a fight is a felony. In Iowa we are an agricultural state. We understand the importance of animal husbandry and being good stewards of our animals. However, we also understand that animals are less important than humans. Animal rights activists seek to place heifers and hogs on the same level as people. I disagree.

Although we disagree, I appreciate your views. Please keep in touch with me regarding the issues that are important to you.

Sincerely,

Steve King
Member of Congress
-----------------------

GOD HELP THOSE WHO LIVE IN IOWA'S 5TH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT - and PRAY THAT WITH PROPER MEDICATION AND TREATMENT, DOCTORS CAN EXORCISE THE BATS FROM STEVE KING'S BELFRY

Six for '06 - Ideas That Can Win

2006-07-28T13:22:00.000-05:00

REAL SECURITY AT HOME AND OVERSEAS: Reclaim American leadership with a tough, smart plan to transform failed policies in Iraq, the Middle East and around the world. Require the Iraqis to take responsibility for their country and begin the phased redeployment of US forces from Iraq in 2006. Double the size of Special Forces to destroy Osama Bin Laden and terrorist networks like al Qaeda. Rebuild a state-of-the-art military capable of projecting power wherever necessary. Implement the bipartisan 9/11 Commission proposal to secure America’s borders and ports and screen 100% of containers. Fully man, train, and equip our National Guard and our police, firefighters and other first responders. Honor our commitments to our veterans.

BETTER AMERICAN JOBS - BETTER PAY: Prohibit the Congressional pay raise until the nation’s minimum wage is raised. End tax give-aways that reward companies for moving American jobs overseas.

COLLEGE ACCESS FOR ALL: Make college tuition deductible from taxes, permanently. Cut student loan interest rates. Expand Pell Grants.

ENERGY INDEPENDENCE - LOWER GAS PRICES: Free America from dependence on foreign oil and create a cleaner environment with initiatives for energy-efficient technologies and domestic alternatives such as biofuels. End tax giveaways to Big Oil companies and enact tough laws to stop price gouging.

AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE - LIFE-SAVING SCIENCE: Fix the Medicare prescription drug program, putting seniors first by negotiating lower drug prices and ending wasteful giveaways to drug companies and HMOs. Promote stem cell research that offers real hope to millions of American families who suffer from devastating diseases.

RETIREMENT SECURITY AND DIGNITY: Stop any plan to privatize Social Security, in whole or in part. Enact real pension reform to protect employees’ financial security from CEO corruption and mismanagement, including abuse of the bankruptcy laws. Expand personal savings incentives.

Henry Wallace on our times

2006-07-19T10:50:00.000-05:00

Here are a collection of quotes from one of my favorite historical figures. Henry A. Wallace, like Ben Franklin, was a publisher, a scientist, and a statesman, only Wallace was from Iowa. He published Wallace’s Farmer, started Pioneer Seeds, became FDR’s Secretary of Agriculture, Secretary of Commerce, and Vice President (before Truman.) He ran for President as a 3^rd party candidate (the Progressive Party) with the endorsement of Elenor Roosevelt. He was ahead of his time on détente’ and integration, so he was attacked by MacCarthy and his followers. I think his words have a haunting relevance today. Read what he said in the days after WWII and see if you can’t apply his concerns to the Bush Administration, the “neocons,” the religious right, oil companies, talk radio and Fox News:

“Still another danger is represented by those who, paying lip service to democracy and the common welfare, in their insatiable greed for money and the power which money gives, do not hesitate surreptitiously to evade the laws designed to safeguard the public from monopolistic extortion.

Their final objective toward which all their deceit is directed is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection.

They claim to be super-patriots, but they would destroy every liberty guaranteed by the Constitution.

They are patriotic in time of war because it is to their interest to be so, but in time of peace they follow power and the dollar wherever they may lead.

A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends.

The obvious types of American fascists are dealt with on the air and in the press. These demagogues and stooges are fronts for others. Dangerous as these people may be, they are not so significant as thousands of other people who have never been mentioned.

The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information.

With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power.

If we define an American fascist as one who in case of conflict puts money and power ahead of human beings, then there are undoubtedly several million fascists in the United States.

In an effort to eliminate the possibility of any rival growing up, some monopolists would sacrifice democracy itself.

It may be shocking to some people in this country to realize that, without meaning to do so, they hold views in common with Hitler when they preach discrimination against other religious, racial or economic groups.

If we put our trust in the common sense of common men and 'with malice toward none and charity for all' go forward on the great adventure of making political, economic and social democracy a practical reality, we shall not fail.

A liberal knows that the only certainty in this life is change but believes that the change can be directed toward a constructive end.”

Steve King: Hispanics Are Like Alcoholics

2006-07-17T14:21:00.000-05:00

The speech is in the congressional record, but their site doesn't create hard links, so you'll have to search for the link yourselves, sorry.

Steve King R-IA 5th
House of Representative Floor
May 16, 2006

Illegal Immigration

....Also, Mr. Speaker, there is no excuse for producing multi-lingual ballots of any kind here in America. There is a requirement when you are a naturalized citizen that you demonstrate proficiency in English. And so therefore if you come into this country legally and you acquire citizenship, which is a requirement for voting in America, you will have been required to demonstrate proficiency and literacy in English.

That means then that you can go into a voting booth and vote in any voting booth in America on an English language ballot, not another language ballot. And the only other scenario by which one might be sitting in the United States and eligible to vote and not have command of the English language would be if they were born here in the United States, they had birthright citizenship, which I reject that idea, but it is our practice today, someone with birthright citizenship, and by the time they get to be 18 and register to vote, they go into the voting booth and they had not had enough exposure to English to be able to understand a simple ballot, and so we would give someone who was born in America, an American citizen, lived in an ethnic enclave, never learned English, and give them that interpreter in the voting booth so we can find a way to coddle them and be an enabler, just like an enabler for an alcoholic, hand them a bottle of booze so they do not cure themselves....

Aparently, King believes that you can cure yourself of the disease of being Latino.

Go to www.kingwatch.org for all the latest on Steve King

Night of the Unions

2006-07-14T13:41:00.000-05:00

Come and join us for a night of Union politics with Democratic candidates, elected officials, campaign staff, and Union leadership. Drinks and snacks will be served.

Everyone is welcome – Bring all of your friends and family! For information, contact Lindsay: 712-328-0086.

July 26, 6 to 9 PM

500 W. Broadway
Council Bluffs, IA

News Flash: Iowa Congressman Embarrasses District

2006-07-13T14:47:00.000-05:00

Ok, so it (unfortunately) isn't big news that Steve King says and does things that continually embarrass every thinking person in the 5th District - but yesterday's performance in the House of Representatives is surely a new low.

On July 12 King built another of his model anti-immigrant walls, this time topping it with electrified razor wire.

"We could also electrify this wire," King noted, "with the kind of current that would not kill somebody, but it would be a discouragement for them to be fooling around with it.

"We do that with livestock all the time."

Go to www.kingwatch.org for the latest atrocities from your congressman, Steve King.

Steve King: GOP Hypocrite of the Week

2006-07-07T10:22:00.000-05:00

What an honor!

A national website has named our congressman, Steve King, the "GOP Hypocrite of the Week." As they stated in their press release, "Can someone tell us why Republicans are so mean, offensive and bitter?" Good question!

For more details on King, go to www.kingwatch.org

Religious Left Merchandise : CafePress.com

2006-07-07T09:09:00.000-05:00

Religious Left Merchandise : CafePress.com

Decoding the religious-right

2006-07-07T08:47:00.000-05:00

You've seen a billion books that debunk the mythology presented in Ron Brown's "The DaVinci Code." Now here's a book that sheds light on the lies promoted in the popular religious fiction series, called the "Left Behind" books. These books perpetuate bad theology that leads Christians to support outrageous foreign policies because they assume that it's God's will.

Read this book and find out how non-Christian and misguided these books really are:

Left Behind?
The Facts behind the Fiction
LeAnn Snow Flesher

"There is much to unlearn, and Flesher contributes to that task." - Walter Brueggemann, Columbia Theological Seminary

Flesher's explosive book exposes the misuse and abuse of scripture to support the doctrines of "rapture" and "tribulation" in the popular Left Behind series. Although the books are fictional, they promote an understanding of end-time events not shared by most biblical scholars. Flesher's accessible book highlights the importance of understanding history, context, and literary genre, and presents alternative readings of key scriptures, offering guidelines for applying their message today. A must have book for anyone familiar with the Left Behind series. 0-8170-1490-X Paper $14.00.

To order call, 1-800-458-3766 or visit www.judsonpress.com

Appoint Steve King Ambasador to Iraq

2006-07-05T20:02:00.000-05:00

The Des Moines Register editorial board today suggested that Steve King should be named U.S. ambasador to Iraq, since he believes it is such a safe place to live. That was just one of the four reccomendations the Register made, based on King's fantasy that Bagdhad is safer than Washington DC.

So, rather than take issue with the validity of the comparison, we offer these recommendations:

1. Congressman King should, forthwith, call for the immediate removal of all U.S. troops in Iraq. They obviously are no longer needed there.

2. Deploy those troops in the District of Columbia. Establish a secure area (call it the Red Zone while the GOP is in control; the Blue Zone when the Democrats rule), around the U.S. Capitol and downtown Washington to protect lawmakers, federal workers and K Street lobbyists from the lawlessness.

3. Name Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld chief of police in Washington, D.C.

4. Appoint King as U.S. ambassador to Iraq, where he, obviously, will feel much more secure.

For much more on Steve King, go to www.kingwatch.org

Can racists become representatives?

2006-07-04T10:34:00.000-05:00

The following is an article that just ran in the University of Northern Iowa's student newspaper. Thank God for smart students like Tristan Abbott. Article follows:

Can racists become representatives?

Tristan Abbott
NI Opinion Columnist

The Voting Rights Act, implemented in 1965 and continued under the Reagan administration, has helped hundreds of thousands of minority voters have their voices heard.

Sure, it’s been danced around an awful lot, particularly with the GOP’s shameful efforts during past two presidential elections, but at least it’s prevented some of the very worst practices, including poll taxes and selective literacy tests, both of which were designed to disenfranchise Black voters.

The VRA came up for extension late last week. You’d think congress’ renewal would be a no-brainer, right?

I mean, who in their right mind could take a stand against an act that makes it easier for people to vote?

Even if a few congress people were such bigoted morons, surely they wouldn’t be so stupid as to expose their racism to the entire nation, right?

Right?

Erm… no.

On Wednesday, May 21, 2006, a small group of Republican congressmen overrode huge, bipartisan committee support and prevented the extension of the VAR from being voted upon.

Most of these congressmen were from the south, but lucky for us, one was from Iowa: the fifth district’s Steve King.

King’s reasoning for his work in killing the Act was – and I’m not exaggerating this in any way – that he was against the fact that the VRA might have allowed bilingual voting. Seriously. Go to his website: it offers a whole section about how bilingual voting is the greatest scourge our nation currently faces (aside from Arabs), and he has even introduced legislation aimed towards banning it outright.

King supports his position by saying: “If we want to demolish modern-day obstacles and bring all backgrounds into our voting process to communicate with each other, we must unify the country instead of driving a wedge between cultures.”

His logic, then, seems to suggest that the best way to help non-English speaking immigrants to vote is to effectively prevent them from voting. It’s neat, really: it’s rare that you get to see such flawed and moronic logic on full public display.

There is no other term for King’s actions aside from racism. I don’t care what kind of BS he has to say about “culture wedges,” I don’t care how, according to his Orwellian double-speak logic, he has come to the conclusion that preventing people from voting will help their voices be more clearly heard. He is actively working to politically disenfranchise an ethic subpopulation. That is racism. If you support this, you are a racist.

I don’t know what else to say. I can’t see how anyone could possibly defend this without delving into “Mexicans took my daddy’s job if they want to live in America they should speak American” territory. All I hope is that the VRA is brought back to the floor before next June, when it will expire, and is granted precisely the kind of up-and-down vote that I thought the GOP were fans of.

As for you, if you’re as ashamed as me to hail from the same state as Steve King, give him a call and tell him so. He can be reached in Washington at 202-225-4426. If you’re a true patriot, check out his website at HYPERLINK “http://www.house.gov/steveking/” http://www.house.gov/steveking/ .

Is Steve King INSANE? (aka "That's what I thought.")

2006-07-03T18:47:00.000-05:00

I guess I’m going to have to follow the same advice I keep dishing out to everyone else who says...

“Oh, I don’t get involved in politics...”
or
“I don’t pay attention to politics...”
or
“Politics don’t concern me...”

And my response is...

Me: “Oh, I thought you had kids.”
Them: “But I do.”
Me: “Then politics DO concern you. You’re ALREADY involved, whether you know it or not. You’re just letting OTHER people make some of the most important decisions concerning your kids.”

or

Me: “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you somehow manage to never get sick...or don’t have to worry about a job or gas to get there or health benefits like the rest of us...because if you DO, then politics DO concern you, and you’re ALREADY involved...and you know by now who’s making some of those most important decisions that concern YOU.”

Okay, so I’m not really that undiplomatic. And I’ve really only put it in those specific words to one person, but it was a sister so I could get away with a small crack in my diplomacy methods.

The fact is, I live in Iowa. Western Iowa to be precise. Iowa’s 5th congressional district to be exact. And here, there’s just no ignoring or getting around what our toothpick-chewing illiterate country bumpkin congressman is doing to embarrass ALL his constituents (oh yeah, democratic and republican alike) day after day and week after week and month after month and year after year.

Okay, so I have a new favorite bookmark. You know, the one I "might" have mentioned a time or two ... that one at www.KingWatch.org where King Steve is really getting the royal treatment. (Oh sure, blame me for a lame pun, but it's not like the Kingmeister knows what a pun is, anyway. He probably thinks it has something to do with football.)

I’m not on any kind of blood pressure medicine, so I always have to be careful when I start talking about King or start reading those articles on KingWatch.org. I mean, those folks have done their homework so well I could read for hours, but then again...that blood pressure thing.

So, I tried to ignore the KingWatch.org site for a while and read what else folks have to say about our favorite bigoted congressman, and what do I run across? That our favorite martian from Planet Kiron thinks the solution to our immigration problem is for Americans to HAVE MORE CHILDREN. You know, because it WOULD REDUCE THE NEED FOR IMPORTED LABOR. (Oh boy. I can hear Redd Roxx now...."It's the big one! I swear, it's the big one!"

I swear on a stack of Bibles, folks, I am NOT making this up. He really supports this lunacy he calls his “fertility plan.” (You know, even though I have absolutely Nothing against people without college degrees, it's really starting to piss me off when it's 2006 and an uneducated bigot can still pass himself off as a congressman and won't take the time to educate himself on matters of POPULATION GROWTH!) I mean, IS HE INSANE?? And, doesn't Congress have one of those programs where King could at least "work" on some college courses during his tenure? I'd bet his buddies would even help pay for classes just so he'd quit embarrassing them (again, democrats and republicans alike) with his 4th grade math and 6th grade grammar and pre-Civil War racism.

So, as I'm trying not to get addicted to KingWatch.org, I head on over to the Des Moines Register where I read Jane Norman's article “King says immigration views based on ‘rule of law,’” and Jane says, “There are Iowans who have great distaste for King and his views.”

You think?! There you have it, folks. The GREAT UNDERSTATEMENT of the decade.

And if you can stomach it, take a look at “Who Really Stalled the Voting Rights Act Renewal?” You may want to have a paper sack handy. I wouldn’t recommend using the same one you went running for after reading about King’s involvement with cockfighting.

Then again, who am I to be dishing out such advice?

Answer: An informed Iowa voter who will be voting for Joyce Schulte, OUR next 5th congressional district representative!

Isn't it about time we elected someone who REALLY represents Iowa values?

QUICK! Is there a Doctor in the House!

2006-07-03T09:07:00.000-05:00

RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!!

Especially if you live in Washington, D.C., but make sure you follow Rep. Steve King's advice (yeah, the hick from western Iowa standing next to Jethro) and head to Iraq, where (as he's stated TWICE now on the U.S. House floor) that it's a much safer place to live than Washington, D.C. In fact, King won't quit talking about sending his own wife there. (Hmmmmm -- perhaps he's takin' a likin' to Miss Ellie May?)

The folks over at the (terrific!!) new KingWatch.org site seem to think so. King, he likes dem der hills!

Yeah, he's got his statistics screwed up all right. (Even though unlike his friend Jethro, King did manage to graduate from high school.)

But, considering most of our folks in congress ARE college educated, surely there must be a DOCTOR around! No, not a regular doctor. I'm talking the kind where King can get comfortable on a sofa while he prattles on and on about immigration and argues about the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and how he doesn't want some of our AMERICAN CITIZENS to have the right to vote.

Why? Because they might have a little problem with their English? And King don't? [sic]

Why, yee haw, Mista Steve! Whad'ya done did with your report card, boy? You know, the one ya'll get on the 2005 Middle-Class Record (by a non-partisan, non-profit think tank) that scores how each of you folks in that dangerous city of Washington vote on issues pertaining to the middle class? You know, the one with the complete listing of each Members' grade of how they scored in efforts to "grow the American middle-class in 2005"?

Why, no wonder you done hid that report card! You got worse than an F! You got a big fat ZERO, boy! And you're s'posed to be representin' the values and morals and dreams and ambitions of western Iowans???

It's pretty bad when even Rush Limbaugh -- as a republican -- is embarrassed because of you and -- how shall we put it -- all the negative criticism you're stirring up in the House and nationwide as you constantly vie for the spotlight to tell anyone who'll listen all about that "A" you did get back in 4th grade.

You naughty, naughty boy. Why, 'ppears to me you need a good paddlin'! Then again, I really hate seeing any kind of harm come to anyone. Why don't you just head on over to Iraq with that little wife of yours. There, I'm sure you'll be much safer than you are in D.C. Ain't that right, Jethro?

Steve King Caught on Film

2006-06-30T14:24:00.000-05:00

Independant film maker Matt Kohn's new documentary film "Call It Democracy" features an on-camera interview Kohn did with Rep. Steve King in 2003. Kohn has generously put an 8-minute enhanced clip of the King interview on the web, and it can be viewed on the www.kingwatch.org website by clicking here.

Kohn writes, "It's despicable that King, who claims to be a moderate concerned about counting every vote and making sure that every American who has the right to vote can get that vote counted, would author this letter, and lead this new movement which so obviously disenfranchise voters.

"I've made this video in order to let people know a little bit about how this group can seem to speak about the Voting Rights we cherish, yet work against us behind the scenes. There are plenty of Republicans against this particular charade, including President Bush and House Leadership. We have to contact all our congresspeople, and the President, and let them know all Americans support multilingual ballots."

What the 4th is for

2006-06-28T13:41:00.000-05:00

*See Cartoon Footnote (scroll down below column)

What the Fourth is For

(Note: anyone remotely familiar with any of our most important documents will notice my shameless paraphrasing, the thing is, too many people don't seem to be very familiar with them, otherwise why would we have stupid attempts to desecrate them like the recent flag-burning amendment in the Senate?)

Sometimes as life goes on, you need to cut off your political connections to a group, and take your place in the world as God and nature intended. When that happens, it’s only fair that you explain why. That’s what the Continental Congress did 230 years ago this week.

Thomas Jefferson wrote that everyone is created equal, and have God given rights, including the right to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Everyone agrees that the pursuit of happiness is pretty vague and that that one can be interpreted differently by almost everyone.

Life ought to be self explanatory, but of course two centuries later, there are issues of “quality of life,” end-of-life, of course abortion and don’t forget capital punishment.

“Pursuit of happiness” has to be the one that is the most subjective. What if my pursuit impedes yours? What if yours violates my religion?

Government exists to protect our rights, and it’s a trade-off, they exist because we allow them to. We forfeit some of our rights and privileges in order to, preserve and protect others. When the government stops protecting our rights, “it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government,” and fortunately for us, we don’t have to fight a war for Independence every time we need to do this. Instead, every two years we elect new Congressmen, every four years we replace the President, and every six years we decide on new Senators.

We hope that they’ll look out for our safety and happiness. Unfortunately all experience “hath shewn,” that voters will put up with an awful lot before they finally get fed up and tend to prefer the devil we know over the devil we don’t know.

For the sake of unity, justice, domestic tranquility, common defense, everyone’s best interests, and to guarantee freedom for us and for future generations, made this a nation of laws, not of men.

Here are just a few of our rights and freedoms:

1. Separation of church and state, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom to assemble and to complain to the government when they’re wrong and demand that they make things right.

There is no officially established “Church of America,” but they can’t punish you for believing or worshiping as you wish.

Free speech, means having to put up with a lot of other people’s claptrap. You may not always like what I say here, but that won’t stop me from listening to the Dixie Chicks. (I like Toby Kieth too, if it helps.)

2. “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”

“A well regulated militia”- that sounds a lot like the National Guard, doesn’t it? “Well regulated” Hmmm? Sounds like maybe the founding fathers didn’t think that every white supremacist needed their own semi-automatic grenade launcher after all, at least not without a background check first. But that’s just my interpretation. See there, I exercised my freedom of speech in the press and I bet someone didn’t like it- just let me pursue my happiness without endangering my life, will ya?

3.You have the right not to have to have soldiers take over your home.

4. You have a right to not have your home or your stuff searched or confiscated without probable cause, or better yet a warrant.

5. You have a right to a trial in an actual court- not a military tribunal (unless you’re a member of the military, then you’d face a court’s marshal). You have the right to remain silent- that is you don’t have to testify if whatever you say can be used to incriminate you (You can “plead the fifth”). They can’t take away your life, liberty, or property, without due process of law and they can’t temporarily commandeer your stuff without paying you what it’s worth.

6. You have a right to a speedy trial, and a jury of your peers. You have a right to be told what you were arrested for. You have a right to confront the person who accused you of whatever crime you’re charged with. You have right to a defense lawyer who has to try to find witnesses who can help you.

7. If someone sues you for more than $20, you have a right to a jury, not just a judge, even though it’s civil court, rather than criminal court.

8. They can’t make your bail or fines too outrageous, and any penalties should not be cruel or unusual.

9. The point of the Constitution is to protect rights, not limit them

10. Whatever power that the Constitution doesn’t give to the federal government that the state government doesn’t prohibit, belong either to the state government or to the people themselves.

There are 27 more amendments besides the Bill of Rights. People struggle and sacrifice for these, they fought and died for them. What a shame if anyone would be asked to die for anything less.
____________________________________________

*Cartoon Footnote:

NEW YORK Rep. Steve King, a Republican from Iowa, apologized to Helen Thomas on Wednesday for disparaging comments he made about the veteran White House correspondent.

Last Saturday, Rep. King, while discussing the death of terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi at the state Republican convention, said, "What occurred to me that morning is something that I imagine a lot of you have thought about and he's probably figured it out by now. There probably are not 72 virgins in the hell he's at and if there are, they probably all look like Helen Thomas."

The remark drew wide laughter and applause.

A spokeswoman for the two-term congressman said King has apologized to Thomas, 85, now writing a column for Hearst newspapers.

King is running for re-election this fall.

Joyce Schulte, King's Democratic opponent in November, said
"Mean-spirited remarks are beneath the dignity of any self respecting congressperson, and remarks about another person's appearance are even lower. I hesitate to even use Helen Thomas' name in the same document with so vile a wretch as al-Zarqawi. But I want her and the world to know that Iowans are not insensitive buffoons who make fun at someone else's expense."

KingWatch.org - Now Keeping an Eye on Steve King

2006-06-27T13:52:00.000-05:00

The team at the Progressive Democracy Corps have released their new website: www.kingwatch.org

KingWatch has enough information to make any thinking person sick about the stuff congressman Steve King says and does.

Did you know that Steve King is protecting the cockfighting industry (and has accepted campaign money from their PAC?) Or that King built a model of the anti-Mexican wall he says that he himself would love to build "and make a ton of money." Just click on the "Are You Embarrassed Enough" link for a more complete list of King's accomplishments.

Also be sure you look for the portrait of "Steve Clampett" and his kin on the cockfighting page!

This website is a great resource for everyone in the 5th District. I encourage you to put a link to www.kingwatch.org on your website - spread the word!

Steve King's Uncivil Behavior

2006-06-21T17:37:00.000-05:00

From Democratic candidate Joyce Schulte:

Congressman Steve King continues his vituperative and uncivil behavior during his speech at the Iowa Republican State Convention.

Commenting on the recent death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a most reprehensible person at best, King opined that al-Zarqawi has probably learned that 72 virgins did not await him in the hell he is in. King went on to state "And if there are, they probably all look like Helen Thomas." There was extended laughter by King and his audience.

While we should not be surprised by any of King's remarks at this point in his career, his desultory comments about the appearance of a respected member of the journalistic community is so low as to evoke a response from me.

Mean-spirited remarks are beneath the dignity of any self respecting Congressperson, and remarks about another person's appearance are even lower.

I am not an apologist for al-Zarqawi, and the hell he put many people through; Muslim, Christian and unknown others. I am certain that he is getting his justice and that there is no excuse for the kind of terror he practiced. I let God be God.

I hesitate to even use Helen Thomas' name in the same document with so vile a wretch as al-Zarqawi. But I want her and the world to know that Iowans are not insensitive buffoons who make fun at someone else's expense.

Blinded by: a) Love b) Fear c) Ignorance d) All of the Above

2006-06-20T21:47:00.000-05:00

My mother (and I'll bet yours, too) used to say to me: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

Yet it still ... and I repeat STILL ... took me until 2004 to finally accept the fact that there's a vast amount of voters out there who not only can be fooled once, but twice and three and four times and even throughout their entire lives. (You know, "Who you gonna believe? Me, or your own eyes?")

Guess my mother never really taught me how to *quit* giving people the benefit of the doubt. Now, though, all I can do is watch them line up and actually fight for a place in that line to get their Dixie Cup of Kool-aid. Sort of like cattle led to slaughter (who understand as much as Rev. Jim Jones's followers did), as they ignore ALL the warning signs -- over and Over and OVER again.

It's the Steve King worship thing. AKA -- "Where's my Kool-aid?"

Let's just encapsulate two things from the past week.

#1: Washington vs. Baghdad: Iowa lawmaker gets a reality check

This (June 14, '06) article by Scripps Howard News Service's Dale McFeatters will do a whole lot more than ruffle feathers. We're talking BOLD-FACED LIES here. Okay, so even if King is an uneducated college dropout, this is NO EXCUSE for a U.S. Representative who should (at the VERY LEAST) have learned how to do his homework. In a nutshell?

King says the violent death rate in Washington (D.C.) is far more dangerous than in Iraq.
His "fuzzy math":
Violent Death Rate in Iraq is 27.51 per 100,000 people.
Violent Death Rate in Washington is 45 per 100,000 people.

The Truth?
The murder rate in Washington is 35.8 per 100,000.
The murder rate for Baghdad is 95 per 100,000.

And that's not all. McFeatters quotes the Brookings Institution as saying that even THAT Baghdad number is "too low since many murder victims are never taken to the morgue, but buried quickly and privately and therefore never recorded in official tallies."

Okay. So (even now) I *tried* to give King the benefit of the doubt, thinking since he's not good with numbers, perhaps he just transposed a couple here and there. But, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get 27.51 to transpose into 95, nor could I get 45 to transpose to 35.8.

Come on, folks. We're dealing with a congressman here who DEALS IN NUMBERS on OUR behalf. What other numbers and figures has he fudged and faked as he's bluffed his way through congress picking straw from his teeth?

Which brings me to #2 for the week: And another number. A real one. As in 72 VIRGINS (King's words, not mine -- my mama raised me to be a Christian and never make fun of how ANYONE looks). But hey, it certainly got King a lot of laughs at the GOP State Convention -- regardless of the way his tacky trailer-park speech unfolded. And just because my mama raised me as a Christian, I won't focus on Mister King's lack of grammar skills and his hanging prepositions (guess Math wasn't the only reason he dropped out). Too bad no one told him about those remedial classes, but that's for another day...

The truth is, it isn't his lack of grammar skills or ability to do simple math that has me fuming over this Kool-aid King. It's the inexcusable, ill-bred and poor white trash persona he so deftly portrayed as OUR congressman when comparing 72 virgins in hell to all looking like Helen Thomas.

Shame, shame, shame on you, Mr. King. And shame on the voters too lazy to read or take the time to educate themselves who so eagerly grab that Kool-aid from your pulpit and gulp it down out of fear and ignorance and love of a party they can't begin to understand is poisoning them as they choke on their gratitude for not having to think.

The REAL party of traditional values

2006-06-16T11:09:00.000-05:00

Think about it working class and middle class Midwesterners- today's Republican Party is not conservative at all, it's radical.

No nation has unilaterally invaded another while lying about it's reasons and using propaganda to contabulate the invasion with another agression that was totally unrelated since NAZI Germany.

They're not the party of fiscal responsibility anymore. They want you to believe that Dems" tax and spend," but they cut and spend and spend and spend.

They claim to be the party of "small government" yet they have systematically amassed control for their single party and power for the Executive branch that is unprecidented. They've revoked civil liberties of all kinds especially privacy, and hope to intrude on the most personal aspects of our lives- that's not less obtrusive government, that's totalitariansim.

Where they want less government is in oversight and regulation of massive corporate interests. This is the unscroupulously opportunistic agenda of an oligarcical class masked in the palattable concept of "globalism."

President Clinton ran on the promise of a New Covenant for
America's forgotten working families. After twelve years of Republican
presidents, America faced record budget deficits, high unemployment, and
increasing crime. President Clinton's policies put people first and resulted in
the longest period of economic expansion in peacetime history. The Deficit
Reduction Act of 1993 — passed by both the House and Senate without a single
Republican vote — put America on the road to fiscal responsibility and led to
the end of perennial budget deficits. Having inherited a $290 billion deficit in
1992, President Clinton's last budget was over $200 billion in surplus. The
Clinton/Gore Administration was responsible for reducing unemployment to its
lowest level in decades and reducing crime to its lowest levels in a
generation.

*from http://www.democrats.org/a/party/history.html

Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Democrat who led us out of the Great Depression and through WWII once said, "if you want to live like a Republican, you need to vote like a Democrat.

Take back your party Republicans, throw the "neocons" out, send the Bush Administration a message, either don't vote this November, or vote for Democrats or Independents.

Democrats, take back America, not for control, not for revenge, just for balance and logic and the real values and principles that the United States was founded on.

Over two hundred years ago, our Party's founders decided that wealth and social
status were not an entitlement to rule. They believed that wisdom and compassion
could be found within every individual and a stable government must be built
upon a broad popular base...The late Ron Brown — former Chairman of the
Democratic Party — put it best when he wrote, "The common thread of Democratic
history, from Thomas Jefferson to Bill Clinton, has been an abiding faith in the
judgment of hardworking American families, and a commitment to helping the
excluded, the disenfranchised and the poor strengthen our nation by earning
themselves a piece of the American Dream. We remember that this great land was
sculpted by immigrants and slaves, their children and grandchildren."Thomas
Jefferson founded the Democratic Party in 1792 as a congressional caucus to
fight for the Bill of Rights and against the elitist Federalist Party.*

It's time to fight again. The first President Bush and his advisors tried to paint the Democrats as a party of elitist "boutique liberals," and insinuated that we were controlled by Hollywood (once upon a time that was also a thinly veiled antisemetic insinuation). But think, from MASSIVE deficit inducing tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% of the population to their campaign to repeal the estate tax, to the war profiteering of Haliburton and the Carlyle Group, the corruption of Enron, to all time high oil company profits, today's Republicans want us to believe that they're the NASCAR loving, blue-collar, grass roots, fundamentalis Christian party, when really they are more elitist than any other group in our nation's history.

We can't change the direction of our country and return to our true values unless we gain control of the Congress and Senate in 2006. Please vote and encourage everyone you know to vote and vote for Democrats. If you haven't registered to vote yet, register. And get everyone you know to register Democrat.

Some of my best friends are Republican, please PLEASE, send the neocons a clear message. Re-register independent or better yet Democrat. PLEASE vote Democrat. Congressmen only serve for 2 years, if you're disapointed with the Democrat, by all means, rejoin the Repubblicans and throw our candidates out again in 2008, but you have to see that your party has been stolen from you. Vote Democrat and save the Republican party you used to know.

CLICK HERE to register

The Waltons Will Be OK ...

2006-06-06T13:33:00.000-05:00

The Waltons Will Be OK ...
This came from www.sojo.net, a Christian Progressive's activist magazine,

... the Wal-Mart heirs, that is. But millions of other Waltons, Jones, and Smiths may not.
If Senate leadership has its way, American inequality is about to take a giant step forward with efforts to repeal or gut the estate tax. Never mind it's been in place for nearly 100 years, is a substantial source of government revenue, and has been a major catalyst to charitable giving. And it only affects the wealthiest half of 1 percent of Americans - most family farms and small businesses are exempt.

A repeal of the estate tax will cost an estimated 1 trillion dollars in federal revenue over the next 10 years, substantially increase the deficit, dramatically diminish the resources available to help low-income families escape poverty, and further increase the pressure on the budget from the high cost of war.

Make a call to preserve the common good! Tell your senators to oppose repeal or drastic cuts in the estate tax!
Call toll-free, 1-800-459-1887*, now!
Here's the message: Please tell the senator to vote against any motion or bill to repeal or drastically cut the estate tax. The Senate should not bring up such a vote because we cannot invest in the common good if we hand hundreds of billions of dollars to a tiny number of millionaire heirs.

Use the toll-free number above to reach the U.S. Capitol switchboard and ask to be connected to your senator's office. (The person at the switchboard can figure out who your senators are if you're not sure).

+ See how many estates paid the estate tax in 2004.
* The toll-free number is provided courtesy of the American Friends Service Committee which has launched a budget campaign, http://go.sojo.net/ct/k1w9Ljd1tzI8/. AFSC welcomes groups to circulate and use the toll-free number in support of nonpartisan budget goals and without linking the alert to a Web site soliciting donations or actions which may be used to support partisan lobbying or work.

+ Share this issue with your friends

2006-06-06T09:44:00.000-05:00

recently got an email that complained-
"Americans who support our troops used to be called the "silent majority". We are no longer silent, and are voicing our love for God, country and home in record breaking numbers. We are not organized, boisterous or over-bearing. We get no liberal media coverage on TV, to reflect our message or our opinions."

I couldn't believe how persecuted they felt. They controll all 3 branches of government. I clicked the "reply-all" button and fired back:

How the President and Secretery of Defense FAILED to support our troops:
1. Didn't send enough of them to Afghanistan
2. Began planning to send them to Iraq BEFORE they even got into office, let alone before 9/11
3. Lied to us to make us thing that Iraq had anything whatsoever to so with 9/11
4. Sent them to Iraq
5. Didn't send enough of them to Iraq
6. Didn't send them with enough or good enough supplies, from body armor to vehicle armor
7. Don't take good enough care of their families while they're gone
8. Don't take good enough care of them or their families once they come home
9. Didn't and still don't have a plan for the reconstruction of Iraq once Saddam Hussein was overthrown
10. Contract too many aspects of the oppertation out to private contractors, who get paid insanely greater amounts than our soldiers
11. Extended stays, re-ups, remobilizations
12. Failed to train them adequaitly for coping with IEDs and RPGs
13. Failed to train them adequately for security, infastructure rebuilding and general peacekeeping duties of occupation (which should be reconstruction)
14. Failed to train them in ethics and human-relations OR actually instructed them to violate international treaties, leading to abuses in Abu Grahd, and Haditha- then let them take the fall for it in the courts and the media instead of taking responsibility at the command level.
15. Abused the National Guard system for major combat opperations when they're supposed to be reserved for natural emergencies like Katrina and Rita. Especially when guys like Bush and Cheny conveniently avoided service in Vietnam by joining the Guard

Support our troops, remember them, pray for them, offer any assistance you can to their families at home, welcome them back with open arms when they do ge to come home, thank them for their service and sacrifice, give to veterans' chairities, write to them and send them care packages, vote for them when they run for office once they get home, please, PLEASE keep them and their families in your prayers- but don't stop thinking, don't start hating people who think differently than you do, don't worship our leaders and follow them blindly without scrutinizing them. Support our troops by excercizing the rights that they fight for.

Best of all, support our troops by calling for their return home.

And don't send mindless, arrogant, foolish, prejudiced, right-wing propaganda to me unless you want me to answer back with the truth like this again.

Your fellow American, and member of the TRUE silent majority- the MIDDLE!

Steve King: Another Brick in the Wall

2006-05-22T21:26:00.000-05:00

Did anybody catch Steve King on the floor of the house today? He demonstrated how a wall could be built between the US and Mexico. King's model wall was built in front of the cameras using cardboard boxes, simulated concrete slabs, and a tiny string of barbed wire (in his hands in the photo below.) He touted his son's contracting business to build it, and alternately suggested that Halliburton could get the job done. Gosh, I hope they fast-track it using one of Halliburton's famous "no-bid" contracts.

Here's a link you can use to download and view the clip if you have the patience and intestinal fortitude.

Click for Video Clip of King Bulding the Wall

Counting the Moments

2006-05-22T17:12:00.000-05:00

http://www.backwardsbush.com/

Woodbury County Hosts John Edwards

2006-05-22T14:14:00.000-05:00

John Edwards will be in Sioux City on May 25 for a fundraiser for the Woodbury County Democrats.

This event just keeps getting better: Before Edwards speaks, you can hear brief remarks from our major candidates for Governor of Iowa, and U.S. Congress.

Tickets are $20 in advance, or $30 at the door. Tickets are also available for a private reception before the main event. You can buy your E-tickets at our website online before May 25 with a major credit card. When you buy online, your name will go on the list at the door of "prepaid" ticket holders. Click Here for details.

What Clinton said about Memorial Day

2006-05-19T16:49:00.000-05:00

Memorial Day an opportunity to remember

Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on May 5, 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery.

This is what General Logan wrote:

“The 30th day of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet church-yard in the land. In this observance no form of ceremony is prescribed, but posts and comrades will in their own way arrange such fitting services and testimonials of respect as circumstances may permit.”

Most of the South refused to celebrate Memorial Day until after WWI and even then, several Southern states held ceremonies on separate days.

It is said that after that war the battlefields in France were covered in poppies, so that they looked blood red. Scientists now think that all the iron from the actual blood and decomposed bodies of fallen soldiers actually effected the soil there in such away as to drastically increase the yield of the natural poppy population.

The phenomenon led poet John McCrae to write his famous poem in1915:

“In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.”

This moved a woman named Moina Michael so much, that she wrote her own poem:

“We cherish too, the Poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led,
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies.”

She’s the one who came up with the idea of wearing red poppies on Memorial day to honor those who died serving their nation during war. Not only did she wear one, but she sold poppies to her friends and co-workers with the money going to benefit servicemen in need.

In the 1920’s, the Franco-American Children's League sold poppies nationally to benefit war orphans of France and Belgium. The League disbanded a year later and it’s organizers asked the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) for help. They’ve been selling poppies to help support the families of service personnel and veterans ever since then.

To help re-educate and remind Americans of the true meaning of Memorial Day, the "National Moment of Remembrance" resolution was passed in Dec 2000. President Clinton declared:

“As Memorial Day approaches, it is time to pause and consider the true meaning of this holiday. Memorial Day represents one day of national awareness and reverence, honoring those Americans who died while defending our Nation and its values. While we should honor these heroes every day for the profound contribution they have made to securing our Nation's freedom, we should honor them especially on Memorial Day.

In this time of unprecedented success and prosperity throughout our land, I ask that all Americans come together to recognize how fortunate we are to live in freedom and to observe a universal ‘National Moment of Remembrance’ on each Memorial Day. This memorial observance represents a simple and unifying way to commemorate our history and honor the struggle to protect our freedoms.
Accordingly, I hereby direct all executive departments and agencies, in consultation with the White House Program for the National Moment of Remembrance (Program), to promote a 'National Moment of Remembrance' to occur at 3 p.m. (local time) on each Memorial Day.”

No matter how we feel about the War in Iraq or the threat of war in Iran, we can all send our prayers out for the families of our men and women currently serving in the armed forces. And if only at 3 o’clock in the afternoon this Monday, we should take a moment to remember and give thanks for the men and women who have given their lives in return for the rights and privileges we all enjoy as Americans. And if you have a chance, buy a poppy.

Joyce Schulte: Women's History

2006-05-14T21:42:00.000-05:00

In the late 1990's I was asked to write a play about the history of the Women's Sufferage movement as it was connected to Iowa.
The play is titled...."Take Your Places, Ladies!" and is written around 4 generations of women in one family as Great-Granny tells the story of she & her mother marching and taking their places in history.
It seems that some people think writing on women in history is feminist, and so I now have the honor of being chastised for being a feminist. Isn't that interesting?

When did history get to be so distorted? Steve King makes fun of Sen.
Joseph McCarty and others make fun of the 74-year long effort to get women the right to vote. Is there any difference?

And on Mother's Day I take delight in all the work that women have done, the 74-long years of work to get the right to vote and all the advances in this work brought about by women. But of course, I also take delight in all the advances brought about by men, too!

Join me in simply making more history.....Vote for me June 6th...or via absentee ballot.

With thanks,
Joyce Schulte

"Victory" a Secret?

2006-05-14T17:14:00.000-05:00

Mr. George W. Bush, Commander in Chief: If you and Mr. Cheney, Mr. Rumsfeld and Ms. Rice are waging a "war" on terrorism in Iraq, how can we leave there before all the terrorists are either killed or have surrendered (i.e., won the war the old fashion way), and what would we call it if we did leave? Retreat? Mission accomplished, again? The greatest military ever misled? Iraq, our international Katrina? Rectifying a mistake? Fiscal accountability? Waking up from a presidential nightmare? End to a Texas village idiot’s adventure? A belated Mother's, Father’s, and Patriot‘s Day gift? Please Mr. Bush, use those grate (sic) verbal skills of yours to enlighten us, or is your definition of victory another of your secrets from the American people?

Bob Chambers: Hope, Not Fear

2006-05-12T18:56:00.000-05:00

HOPE, NOT FEAR
By Bob Chambers

Unfortunately for the citizens of Iowa’s fifth district, my opponent for our Congressional seat, the incumbent Steve King, is on a very selfish, ego driven mission to make a name for himself, continuously espousing his ideology in the most outrageous attention-getting way possible whenever there is a camera or a microphone or a reporter anywhere near him.

And I must offer my congratulations and say, mission accomplished sir. You have made a name for yourself. But at what price to your constituents?

Since you arrived in Washington 14,000 of our neighbors have moved out of the fifth district and 15,000 more have moved into poverty, every one of our counties has seen an increase in food stamp recipients, more of our family farms are disappearing every day, non-farm employment in our district has dropped at double the statewide average, bankruptcies have increased by over 30% and most of our counties have lost more businesses than they have gained.

While Nero fiddles, Rome burns.

A recent venomous rant penned by the incumbent under the guise of an op-ed commentary about the May 1 nationwide “Day Without Immigrants” rallies was published in the Des Moines Register on April 27. It will go down in history as a last sickening gasp of a dying breed in Washington: the self-serving fear-monger.

As the incumbent set out to demonize and slander a significant portion of our society, he cited a number of “statistics and facts”, designed to lead readers to the conclusion that there walks among us a clear and present danger which threatens to take our jobs, rape our wives and steal our children; a danger which we must rid ourselves of at any cost. The “statistics and facts” cited by the incumbent in his diatribe are lies, a feeble attempt at creating fear and anger among us, and whose darker purpose is division and control.

The truth is that there are no comprehensive statistics kept by any law enforcement agencies or states regarding crimes committed by people who are in our country illegally. However, the most comprehensive survey to date of national crime data concludes, "In the small number of studies providing empirical evidence, immigrants are generally less involved in crime than similarly situated groups, despite the wealth of prominent criminological theories that provide good reasons why this should not be the case."

Total crime and property crime in California are half what they were in 1980; violent crime has fallen more than a third. The state's Hispanic population during that time has increased 120 percent. Similarly, while Arizona's population grew 41.8 percent between 1993 and 2003, for instance, the rates for every major category of crime fell.

This doesn't mean immigrants from Mexico and Central America are saints -- it just means that they may not be the marauding horde Steve King and his minuteman army wants you to believe they are.

Princeton University sociologist Douglas S. Massey reports that 62 percent of illegal immigrants pay income taxes (via withholding) and 66 percent contribute to Social Security. Forbes magazine notes that Mexican illegals aren't clogging up the social-services system: only 5 percent receive food stamps or unemployment assistance; 10 percent send kids to public schools.

On the work front, Hispanic unemployment has tumbled to 5.5 percent, only slightly above the national average of 4.7 percent and considerably lower than the black unemployment rate of 9.3 percent. According to 2002 Census Bureau data, Hispanics are opening businesses at a rate three times faster than the national average. In addition, there were almost 1.6 million Hispanic-owned businesses generating $222 billion in revenue in 2002.

Rather than panicking, we all need to take a deep breath and attempt a little common sense to find our common ground. Virtually everyone correctly agrees that we need to secure our borders, deport criminals and slackers among the illegal-immigrant population, and revitalize the notion of citizenship by insisting that prospective citizens master the English language and the fundaments of American history and culture.

The Statue of Liberty symbolizes America's affection for the world's tired and poor, the "huddled masses yearning to breathe free." Before our fear-mongering Congressman King starts knocking down Lady Liberty and sets about erecting a wall in her place to "protect" America from the world, shouldn't he at least spend a little time trying to get his facts straight?

I think we all understand the reality that ideology does not put food on our tables or bring jobs back to our towns. Ideology is not action and it is past time to take action. It is time to believe in ourselves. It is time to think about the kind of world we want to leave for our grandchildren and their children, and to take steps to begin creating that world.

To accomplish this, I am proposing an approach which focuses on the truth, not lies; on hope, not fear; on respect, not bigotry; and on the prosperity of community, not the poverty of division. This will leave little room for the self-serving politics of fear-mongering and divisiveness which have haunted the halls of Congress for far too long. Our greatest future is ahead of us as we escape the prison of fear and lies, and breathe the free air of hope and truth.

Simply stated, Steve King must go.

Bob Chambers lives near Essex, Iowa. He is a candidate for Congress from Iowa’s 5^th District.

F.B.I.'s New reportcorruption.fbi.gov offers hope to western Iowans

2006-05-11T11:53:00.000-05:00

Yes, folks, it's true. It's even going to be fun.

The F.B.I. is starting a web site, reportcorruption.fbi.gov, through which people can send tips on corruption and corrupt public officials to be reviewed by agents at the bureau's headquarters.

Can it get any better than this? I suspect Steve King's horrors will trump anything the bestselling author Steve King could write.

This is by no means an insult to the "real" KING Steve (the writer, obviously), because I for one think he can spin a hellavu spine-tingling scary story. But, alas, I doubt he's ever met our 5th district congressman and got thrown by the spin this hack puts into every story.

Boys and girls, gather 'round the fire this cold November evening and listen to a tale of how a man who would be king made a trip to OZ so he could get a brain but got sucked up into a twister faster than he'd sold out and left western Iowans high and dry.

A king indeed.

F.B.I.'s Focus on Public Corruption Includes 2,000 Investigations - New York Times

People For the American Way - Don't Let the 2006 Elections Revisit 2004's Failures

2006-04-30T12:35:00.000-05:00

People For the American Way - Don't Let the 2006 Elections Revisit 2004's Failures

Don't Let the 2006 Elections Revisit 2004's Failures With much national attention focused on the Supreme Court, Election Day may seem far away for some, but the memories of undue burdens and obstacles are fresh in the minds of those voters and volunteers who participated in the 2004 presidential elections. We need to push with renewed vigor for comprehensive election reform that will ensure all citizens have the ability to cast a fair and equal vote.

Stop shameful spam

2006-04-30T11:57:00.000-05:00

I recently received an email forward that said this:

Organizers are planning the May 1 "Great American Boycott," urging illegal immigrants -- who cannot vote and who have only limited political power -- to flex their economic muscle. Protesters are being urged to refrain from shopping,and to stay away from school and work.

This is a movement orchestrated by people who enteredthe US illegally,and then want to scream about their"rights." WHAT RIGHTS? YOU DON'T EVEN BELONG HERE!

The email went on to blame illegal aliens for eveerything from gangs and drugs to illiteracy rates and the economy. It went on to compare them to terrorists and call on good Americans to counter the boycott by going out and buying and selling as much as they could.

What rights? What rights? How about these?

"And we hold these truths to be self evident, that ALL men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

"ALL men," not "all leagally naturalized or native born American citizens," ALL men.

And you know what?

In stead of being angry at poor people who want to work and make a better life for themselves and their families, why not be angry at the oil ceo who hot a $400 million retirement package- thats $3 for every American citizen!? How about being angry that oil companies just reported enough profits to equal over $1,000 for every single American citizen? 270 million times $1,000. Hmmm. This is a MORAL issue, I'd say it's at least as much of a moral issue as war, lying, leaking, gay marriage or abortion.

"The same law applies to the native-born and to the alien living among you."
~Exodus 12:49

That includes this the rights contained in this little law right here:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Being angy at poor migrant workers is a waste of time and a red-herring to divert us from more serious issues. And as both a patriotic American and a Bible believing Christian, I am sick and tired of my faith being used by the religious right to support bigotry and intollerance. Let me lay some Scripture on ya my brothers and sisters-

Ezekiel 22:29
The people of the land practice extortion and commit robbery; they oppress the poor and needy and mistreat the alien, denying them justice.

Jeremiah 22:3
This is what the LORD says: Do what is just and right. Rescue from the hand of his oppressor the one who has been robbed. Do no wrong or violence to the alien, the fatherless or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place.

Exodus 22:21
"Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in Egypt.

Exodus 23:9
"Do not oppress an alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be aliens, because you were aliens in Egypt.

Leviticus 19:10
Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God.

Leviticus 19:33
" 'When an alien lives with you in your land, do not mistreat him.

Leviticus 19:34
The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

Leviticus 23:22
" 'When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God.' "

Leviticus 25:35
" 'If one of your countrymen becomes poor and is unable to support himself among you, help him as you would an alien or a temporary resident, so he can continue to live among you.

And one of my favorites-

Leviticus 25:23
" 'The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you are but aliens and my tenants."

Because...
1) whites took this land from the Indians, and really the Spanish, French and Portuguise were here before the English and
2) NONE of it is ours, it's all God's anyway. People, God's children, are more important than property or places. This is not a pro-immigrant view, and unAmerican view, or a liberal view, this is a Scriptural view.

You don't even realize how UN-Christian, Un-Biblica, UN-Constitutuional, UN-American, unhelpful, and how hateful or racist you're being, do you?

PLEASE think about the emails you forward. PLEASE think and pray about this issue. And most of all PLEASE read the constitution and the Bible.

I think the fact that George Bush angrily said that the National Anthem should only be sung in English is an example of how unintelligent and how racist he is- he who's courted the Latino vote so well for how many years. Hell, I think it might be better sung in Spanish than in English!

1) 60 percent of Americans don't even know the lyrics- at least these immigrants are trying to show how much they love and admire America and believe in what it (used to) stand for.

and 2) How many men fought and died and how many families sacrificed in a war to free the United States from England? Why should ENGLISH be the only or the official language when they were our sworn and mortal enemy in war?

Okay, that's a little silly, but I hope it makes the point that this whole imigration reform debate is rediculously silly and has gotten WAY out of hand.

Feingold Raises the Roof in Osceola

2006-04-30T11:19:00.000-05:00

Ed Fallon, Christie Vilsack and Chet Culver garnered their share of applause, but the real fireworks came when Wisconsin senator Russ Feingold entered the hall at the 5th District Democratic convention held in Osceola Saturday morning.

Feingold was trailed by several staffers, a reporter from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and even a camera crew from Iowa Public Broadcasting shooting the appearance in high-definition video. After cracking a joke about the Wisconsin Badgers vs. the Iowa Hawkeyes, Feingold launched into a brief list of issues that he is passionate about - including health care for everyone, ending the war in Iraq by the end of 2006, and protecting the constitution by censuring President Bush.

At each point he made, Feingold had to finish his sentence by talking over the continuous applause. Major points were met with standing ovations from the hundreds of Democrats in the hall. These Democrats clearly agreed with Feingold's positions and could begin the spark of a Feingold 2008 campaign in Iowa.

In Osceola For the Fifth District Convention

2006-04-29T06:55:00.000-05:00

After driving through car-wash heavy downpours yesterday afternoon, I arrived in Osceola for the 5th District Democratic convention. After going to the convention location to help with setup, I proceeded to the Osceola Country Club for the welcome reception. Nice crowd, and a few candidates: Denise O'Brien, Joyce Schulte, and Bob Chambers worked the crowd.

Everyone put their names in a hat for drawings of some nice Dem swag, and (how strange!) the convention hosts and the local Dem county supervisors seemed to win most of the drawnings! Laughs and polite demurals after each local "won" a prize. My highlight was getting Clarke County chair Rick Conn to buy me the drink he promised me.

Today should be wet and wet and wet outside -- but hopefully it will be a great organizaztional meeting inside the convention hall.

Republican Statements About High Gas Prices in 2000

2006-04-26T10:51:00.000-05:00

From the "Top Ten Conservative Idiots" web page"

With oil jumping to over $75 a barrel last week, I thought it would be worth revisiting an item from Idiots 193, published in April 2005. Here for your viewing pleasure are statements that various Republicans made about the Clinton administration back in 2000, when Candidate Bush was blaming President Clinton for oil at around $30 a barrel and gas prices going over a whopping $1.50 per gallon.

Rep. Terry Everett: "The Clinton Administration has failed in its duty to develop a policy to deal with our national energy supply and is therefore directly accountable for the higher prices Americans are now paying at the gas pumps."

Dennis Hastert: "House Speaker Dennis Hastert accused the Clinton administration Friday of misleading members of Congress about the causes of skyrocketing gas prices in the Midwest."

Rep. Wally Herger: "Congressman Wally Herger recently denounced the Clinton-Gore Administration's complacency during the current gas price crisis. 'Northern Californians are being held hostage at the gas pump,' Herger said. 'The Clinton-Gore Administration has demonstrated a complete and total lack of leadership in preventing this problem. It is a clear failure of domestic and foreign policy.'"

Larry Kudlow: "The Clinton-Gore administration's hapless and incoherent management of foreign policy is nowhere as evident as in their bungling on OPEC's oil-price hike. ... While crude oil prices could drop to $25 per barrel, they will stay well above the average $20 real price of oil registered over the past ten years. And way above the $10 worldwide average marginal cost of producing new oil. Meanwhile gas prices at the pump are likely to be upwards of $2 per gallon well into the summer."

Glenn Spencer: "In recent weeks, gas prices have surged to their highest level in a decade. Prices for home heating oil and natural gas are expected to rise by about 30 percent this winter. ... With the Clinton-Gore administration's policies largely to blame for the pain being felt by consumers, Vice President Gore's camp has pulled out all the stops to shift blame away from his own administration."

Various Repubs: "Representatives Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Menomonee Falls), Tom Petri (R-Fond du Lac), Paul Ryan (R-Janesville), and Mark Green (R-Green Bay) today blasted Energy Secretary Bill Richardson and the Clinton-Gore Administration for their failure to implement a comprehensive energy policy to deal with staggering gas prices Wisconsin consumers continue to face at the pumps."

Where are the loud, outraged voices of these people now? They've gone very quiet for some reason. And what's George W. Bush's solution to the problem? Sorry folks - you're on your own.

Google Help : Add to Google button

2006-04-25T09:10:00.000-05:00

Click here to add the 'Left Coast' to your Google newsfeed or personalized Google home page.

Stop Senate from Overturning State Mental Health Parity Laws

2006-04-24T15:32:00.000-05:00

The US Senate is considering a bill that would repeal state laws that ensure consumers access to adequate mental health benefits. How will your Senator vote?

If passed, the proposed "Health Insurance Marketplace Modernization and Affordability Act" would sweepingly override the work of 39 state legislatures that passed laws to prevent discriminatory coverage of mental health services. It would leave those states' residents (including, perhaps, you) without the help they need should mental health disorders arise in their families.

Your voice can convince your Senators to protect families like yours from losing access to treatment for devastating mental illnesses like addiction, learning disorders, depression, anorexia, and more. Speak up NOW!

The Race is on

2006-04-21T17:42:00.000-05:00

The race is on

In case you didn’t know it, the 2008 Presidential race is already underway. I know, I know, it’s as bad as the stores and Christmastime. I think I saw Wal-Mart employees stocking the shelves with Halloween costumes the Monday after Easter.

In the interest of civic participation, this feature would like to present you with a number of potential candidates for your consideration- since most of them will begin visiting Iowa this summer, if they haven’t been here already.

Since they’re the current party in power, lets start with the Republicans.

The front-runner for the GOP nomination seems to be a woman named Dr. Condeleza Rice. She’s a PhD doctor, not a medical doctor. You’d think that would be a plus, but she doesn’t really seem to have a brain of her own. Her ideas, thoughts, policies, plans etc. are pretty much those of her bosses, Dick, Rummy, and the one known only as “W.”

Right-wingers will try to sell her as the historic, because she’d be both the first woman and the first Black president. But let’s face it, voting for the current Secretary of State would pretty much be voting to continue the Bush administration. With the numbers, the war, the personnel changes, all the retired generals criticisms and the price of gas- this may not be our best bet.

Next there’s Senate Majority Dr. Bill Frist. He’s a medical doctor, not a PhD and he tried to prove it when he diagnosed the late Terri Schiavo as not being in a persistent vegetative state and having plenty of brain activity by watching a few minutes of news clip video of her. Hmmm... the autopsy showed that she had very little brain left let alone brain activity.

If you believe in religious freedom, you may also not be comfortable with the fact that he participated in the whole “Justice Sunday” thing where he and televangelists railed on independent judges who refuse to set up a fundamentalist theocracy.

There’s also Newt Gingrich, the former House Speaker who spearheaded the Republicans’ “Contract on America” back in the 1990’s. He pretty much invented “Talking-point memos” and gave Rush Limbaugh office space in the Capital building. Scary, isn’t it time for the pendulum to swing a little more toward the center?

Now I always used to love Senator John McCain. He’s from my home state of Arizona, he’s a Vietnam Vet, he used to be his own man, a straight shooter who’d break party ranks when it was the right thing to do. Best of all he wanted a balanced budget and to clean up campaign finance.

But alas, he has started to kiss up to the fundamentalist like “guy-smiley” Jerry Fawell and Pat Robertson. How “base” can you get?

My favorite Republican has to be Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel. He’s still a deficit hawk who believes in fiscal responsibility and he’s been very skeptical of the Bush administration’s mishandling of Iraq. Unlike McCain, he seems to still be willing to stand up for what’s right, even if it means standing alone.

Now, in the interest of equal time, let’s turn to the left.

The biggest name among Democrats is still New York Senator and former First Lady Hillary Clinton. Okay, is she capable? Probably. Is she electable? possibly. But there are plenty of problems.

First of all, merely by being who she is, she’s divisive. There’s nothing she does or believes- all Democrats considered, she’s pretty moderate, but people vehemently hate her. Even more viscerally than her husband, and even though he was a liar and a philanderer, he was still a Rhode’s Scholar brainiac student of the law and economics.

I for one think the best way of keeping America sharply divided, keeping the wing-nuts on the extreme right angry and active, and guaranteeing that either Jeb or Prescott Bush will run for President would be to elect Hillary.

Who else is there? Well, there’s Virginia Governor Mark Warner. Centrists and even Republicans may like him. He believes in fiscal responsibility and deficit reduction. Even if it does mean, yes, rolling back the massive Bush tax cuts that benefited the richest 2% of Americans. He’s very articulate, clear, and smart. And yes, he’s a Southerner.

Hmmm. Moderate/Conservative Democrat from the South. He may have appeal.

Don’t forget Former Vice President Al Gore and former Vice Presidential Candidate North Carolina Senator John Edwards. Handsome Southern gentlemen both, but these two are probably more aggressively progressive and have lots of creative ideas for things like health care, education, and tax reform.

Bringing up the rear; New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, former Clinton Secretary of Energy. Hmmm, what was that about working toward not being dependent on foreign oil that President Bush mentioned in his State of the Union Address?

Oh yeah, did I mention that he’d be the first Hispanic President?

Finally may I introduce Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold. He co-sponsored the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (“McCain-Feingold Bill”). He is a recipient of the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award. He actually voted against the Iraq War Resolution and yet voted in favor of funding to support our troops.

Iowa Voted for The Worst President in History

2006-04-20T08:52:00.000-05:00

We know that the intelligent readers of 'The Left Coast of Iowa' were bright enough to vote for Kerry in 2004 and Gore in 2000, but our unfortunately deluded neighbors voted to give America and the world The Worst President in History. The worst EVER. This article by a respected historian explains the case for Bush's title as Worst President in History.

Steve King Has Not Signed H.R. 543

2006-04-19T11:25:00.000-05:00

After more than three years and the death of nearly 2,400 American soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis, Congress has yet to consider, debate, or vote on alternatives to the president's stay-the-course policy - a policy that 72% of U.S. soldiers stationed in Iraq and a majority of Americans now believe should end within a year.

As Christians called to be peacemakers, we have a unique opportunity to demand that Congress stop passing the buck. So far, 95 members of the House of Representatives have signed a petition calling for immediate debate and consideration of all alternatives to the policy of open-ended occupation with Iraq, including proposals calling for immediate or phased withdrawal. All we need is 123 more members to sign the petition for debate to begin. And that's where you come in...

Call your representative today!

202-224-3121

Ask your representative to sign the petition, or thank them if they already have (see below for the list).

Message for non-signers of H.R. 543:

As a person of faith called to be a peacemaker, I ask you to sign onto H.R. 543, a "discharge petition" that calls for open and honest debate on Iraq. We can't just pass the buck to the president - it's time to show strong leadership and lead us to peace in the region.

Message for signers of H.R. 543:

As a person of faith called to be a peacemaker, I want to say thank you for signing H.R. 543, the "discharge petition" that would force debate on solutions to the conflict in Iraq. I hope and pray that this is one important step in building peace in Iraq and throughout the region.

We believe this is an important and historic opportunity for members of Congress to offer alternatives to war without end in Iraq. For more information about the "Open Iraq Debate" campaign, click here.

Peace,

Adam, Duane, Matt, Christa, Yonce, Nadia, and Laurna
The Sojourners Policy and Organizing Team

Has Not Signed H.R. 543

Iowa
Jim Nussle (R-01)
Leonard Boswell (D-03)
Tom Latham (R-04)
Steve King (R-05)

Signed H.R. 543

James A. Leach (R-02)

Who stole my freedom of speech?

2006-04-18T15:25:00.000-05:00

Who stole my freedom of speech?

I had this magnet on my truck, but someone took it.

Hey, I support the troops, I just happen to remember that Jesus is the "Prince of Peace," so I oppose the current administrations' foreign policy which includes an uneccisary war under the guise of fighting terrorism.

Stealing a magnet of someone's car is a small thing. There have been incidents where veterans and parents who've lost children in the war have put up memorials of white crosses representing each of the Americans killed in Iraq, only to have "war-hawks" drive over them to mow them down with their cars. That's anger. I guess I don't understand how that's pro-American or pro-troops, pro-vetrans, or pro-Christian. Isn't it, in fact irreverent, and sacreligeous?

Anyway, if you want your own "Support Peace" sticker, pin, or magnet, click here: http://www.support-peace.com/about.php

Sex, Politics, and Religion

2006-04-18T15:13:00.000-05:00

Sex, Politics, and Religion

In my weekly column in the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and on my own personal blog (http://tedscolumn.blogspot.com) I have a mission, to talk about “sex, politics, and religion- not necessarily in that order…” and I might add, the kitchen sink too.

Religion is also an intensely personal and hopefully intimate thing too. I think it should be personal and intimate anyway, maybe you don’t believe that way. Because religious beliefs are held so intensely and deeply, it can be dangerous to talk about it without offending people. No one really wants to compromise on what they interpret to be sacred or even what they consider to be primary fundamental doctrine. “I’m always right and you’re always wrong,” is the perspective we assume when we become absolutist about our religious beliefs.

Don’t get me wrong, I certainly don’t mean to promote “relativism.” Certainly there are absolutes, there is truth, but the problem is, I’m not God. I hope you’ll agree that you aren’t either. While they may imagine that they’re God’s personally appointed spokesmen on Earth all those televangelists, denominational leaders, and “faith-based” politicians aren’t God either. None of us has a monopoly on the God-breathed, inerrant truth. No one but Him.

Too often we decide not to talk about religion, not because we don’t want to offend someone else, not because we’re afraid they’ll judge, reject, or persecute us, but just because we know it’s likely to make things tense, maybe even lead to argument.

You know it’s true. One of the biggest complaints I hear from atheists is that all the wars have always been caused by religion. I tell them, no people cause wars. Jesus didn’t cause the crusades or the holocaust. Saint Mary and Martin Luther didn’t start the 100 year’s war. You can’t even really blame Muhammad for terrorist attacks or jihads. People go to war, people full of hate, fear, jealousy, greed, and anger. Religion is only their excuse, a convenient pretense.

Then there’s politics. It’s about control. You think my candidate is a liar and a philanderer, so you want to wrest control away from him. I think that your candidate is ill-equipped, ill-advised, has ill-conceived notions and at best made grave mistakes and at worse abuses his power- guess what, I won’t want him in control anymore than you wanted the other guy.

It gets even uglier if our politicians wrap themselves in the banner of faith. How many abused spouses stay in a bad marriage because they love their abuser. Do we sometimes defend politicians like someone enabling an addict? Because we think that they share our beliefs, and by God, we know our beliefs are absolutely right- so somehow no matter much wrong they do, at least they’re right about a few things.

Here is a true story that involves all three- sex politics and religion:

Once there were two people. One was a white, middle-aged man. He taught Religion at a Christian school. The other was an Hispanic teenaged girl who attended that Christian School.

The man and his wife could not have children. They were staunchly pro-life. They boycotted companies that supported candidates or charities that condoned abortion. They marched for the right to life, admirable civic participation. But rather than a day or even a unit of one or two of his Religion classes, anti-abortion indoctrination dominated most of the time in most of his classes.

The girl lived with a single mom. She was interested in history and politics. She especially enjoyed learning about the civil rights movement and women’s rights. The girl grew more and more depressed as she attended the Religion teacher’s class. She became silent and sullen, she doubted her faith and God’s love for her. At one point later in college, she even thought about suicide.

The girl had been the victim of incest as a child. But of course she kept it a secret.

There are some things you just don’t talk about.

Jesus was a dirty, barefoot hippy, radical who was executed by an unjust political establishment because the intrenched institutional religious power brokers didn't want to hear about turning the other cheek, going the extra mile, loving your neighbor (including Mexicans, Blacks, Gays, etc.), and selling all you have and giving it to the poor!

2006-04-18T08:21:00.000-05:00

Beautiful, isn't it? I criticize and complain about the goverment because I love my country.

"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just."
~Thomas Jefferson

How come Democrats never rag on conservatives for whining and ridiculing as if they're unpatriotic or trators or something when we're in power and they disagree or scrutinize us? hmmm.... because we BELIEVE in the principles of democracy on which America was founded like free speech?!

Richard Nixon got nervous because Congress had a little thing called a supena. What would it be like if the Democrats regained a slim majority and therefore had the power of supena? With as much going on now that stinks to high heaven... what will we find out once we have shovels?!

Wisdom of the Ages

2006-03-22T20:22:00.000-06:00

Sage advice

An Old Farmer's Advice:
* Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight and bull-strong.
* Keep skunks and bankers and lawyers at a respectable distance.
* Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.
* A bumble bee is considerably faster than a John Deere tractor.
* Words that soak into your ears are whispered...not yelled.
* Meanness don't jes' happen overnight.
* Forgive your enemies. It messes up their heads.
* Do not corner something that you know is meaner than you.
* It don't take a very big person to carry a grudge.
* You cannot unsay a cruel word.
* Every path has a few puddles.
* When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty.
* The best sermons are lived, not preached.
* Most of the stuff people worry about ain't never gonna happen anyway.
* Don't judge folks by their relatives.
* Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
* Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll enjoy it a second time.
* Don't interfere with somethin' that ain't botherin' you none.
* Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance.
* If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop diggin'.
* Sometimes you get, and sometimes you get got.
* The biggest troublemaker you'll probably ever have to deal with, watches you from the mirror every mornin'.
* Always drink upstream from the herd.
* Good judgment comes from experience, and a lotta that comes from bad judgment.
* Lettin' the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier than puttin' it back in.
* If you get to thinkin' you're a person of some influence, try orderin' somebody else's dog around.
* Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. Leave the rest to God.

Teacher put on leave for Bush remarks

2006-03-04T10:51:00.000-06:00

Once again, questioning Bush in any way brings repercussions.

CNN.com - Teacher's Bush remarks investigated - Mar 3, 2006

Peas In a Pod: Radical Muslims & American Conservatives

2006-02-10T09:22:00.000-06:00

From the blog Huffington Post:

It's striking, isn't it? American conservatives are so like the radical Muslims taking to the streets this week. Both claim moral superiority based on religion. Both use the language of hatred as political speech. Both advocate violence against those with whom they disagree. And they both despise the concept of a free press.

Lest we forget, here are a few choice quotes to remind the Bill Bennetts of this world just what they and their friends really stand for:

"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." Ann Coulter

"And if Al-Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it ... You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead." Bill O'Reilly

"I have to say I'm all for public flogging." Ann Coulter

"(On torture at Abu Ghraib): I'm talking about people having a good time, these people, you ever heard of emotional release? You [ever] heard of need to blow some steam off?" Rush Limbaugh

"If [Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez] thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it." Pat Robertson

"(on the kidnapping of peace activists in Iraq): "I'm telling you, folks, there's a part of me that likes this." Rush Limbaugh

"I'm thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I'm wondering if I could kill him myself." Glenn Beck

"It would be a much better country if women did not vote." Ann Coulter

"[Y]ou could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down." Bill Bennett

President Bush said of the Muslim cartoon riots, ""We reject violence as a way to express discontent with what may be printed in a free press." If he means it, he can finally call Ann Coulter to task for saying "my only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building."

Until then, let all these fanatics (and the politicians like Cheney who appear on their programs) be branded as the hypocrites they are. Muslim extremists and American conservatives: they're soul mates.

Rants Addicted to Tobbacco

2006-02-08T07:31:00.000-06:00

Des Moines Register, 2/8/2006
Cigarette tax supporters berate Rants
A group points out the speaker's acceptance of money from tobacco firms.

By TIM HIGGINS
REGISTER STAFF WRITER

February 8, 2006

Supporters of an increase in the cigarette tax Tuesday accused House Speaker Christopher Rants of blocking the measure because of his campaign contributions from big tobacco firms.

"Speaker Rants should kick the habit of taking big bucks from big tobacco and help provide health care instead," said Sarah Swisher of Iowa for Health Care, a part of the Service Employees International Union.

The group held a news conference on the steps of the Capitol and had a man dressed in a cigarette costume hand out fake dollar bills representing all of the money Rants has accepted from tobacco companies over the past three years.

It included mention of the $60,000 received by a conservative political action group aimed at helping Republicans win legislative seats and the governor's office in this year's elections. Rants loaned the group money to help it get started.

Rants, a Republican from Sioux City, defended himself, saying he's long opposed tax increases. He said a tax hike would send consumers over state lines and hurt small businesses in border communities.

"I've been pretty consistent," he said. "I haven't supported raising taxes. That's not new this year. The only new thing is that somebody contributed to me."

He also noted that Gov. Tom Vilsack, a Democrat, has received $100,000 for his political action committee, Heartland PAC, from Service Employees International Union.

Swisher said Rants received more than 76 percent of tobacco-related contributions to Iowa House members in 2004. Swisher's group also handed out fliers, printed to resemble toy money, noting that Rants received about $5,000 in contributions from R.J. Reynolds and Altria Corp. during 2003 and 2004.

His 2005 records show that he accepted $500 from Altria in October.

Vilsack has proposed raising the tax on a pack of cigarettes by 80 cents and reserving the extra $130 million in new tobacco money for health care programs.

A tobacco tax increase passed the Iowa Senate last year.

Vilsack has had similar proposals in recent years that have been opposed by Rants and other House Republicans.

More Rants and Big Tobbacco

2006-01-30T10:13:00.000-06:00

Drew Miller writes in his blog:
My friend Clint Fichter has a great letter to the editor in the Register today. Updated figures quoted below:

I have always been puzzled by Iowa House Speaker Christopher Rants' defiant resolve to prevent a tobacco-tax hike that makes sense fiscally and can prevent more of our youth from smoking.

In October 2005, Rants was given a donation of $1,384.97 by the RJ Reynolds Tobacco Co.'s political-action committee.

A cigarette-tax increase is supported by the majority of Iowans and is a priority of our governor. Research suggests that the price of cigarettes directly affects the number of new smokers and the cost of smoking on our public-health systems is extreme.

I am left wondering if the Washington Republicans' systemic corruption and manipulation of the public interest for private gain has not wormed its way into Iowa politics. It would be a shame to sacrifice our public health for the health of Speaker Rants' and the Iowa House Republicans' campaign war chests.

—Clint Fichter,

Rants & Big Tobbacco Organize in Iowa

2006-01-19T10:16:00.000-06:00

Chris Woods, from the Blog “Political Forecast” writes about a new conservative group that has been formed in Iowa – partially bankrolled by Christopher Rants and tobacco firms:

Today’s Register reports on a new 527 group founded to help conservatives in Iowa:

“A new conservative political organization has sprouted up in Iowa, financed with corporate contributions from tobacco firms, a giant beer manufacturer and the management company of payday lender LoanMax, according to records on file with the Internal Revenue Service.

In its filing papers, the Iowa Leadership Council said it promotes “conservative principles and engages in advocacy to improve the health, education, prosperity, safety and overall quality of life for all Iowans.” The council is organized as a so-called 527 organization under IRS rules, which means it can accept corporate money and run issue ads in connection with campaigns.

Iowa House Speaker Christopher Rants, a Republican who loaned the council $1,000 for its startup, said the Iowa Leadership Council will serve as the first conservative counter to liberal national organizations such as MoveOn.org that have been active in the state. The council is “organized to promote conservative principles in Iowa,” said Rants.”"

Then, when considering last night’s Thomas Frank lecture at Drake, New Iowan writes this:

“This is precisely what Frank was talking about — the manipulation of working class cultural grievances by entities that work against the economic interests of the working class. Dude.”

Dude, indeed.

Oh, and this little tid-bit just gives us a bit of fodder against Nussle and might give him a bit of bad publicity:

“The council shares the same legal counsel as the congressional campaign committee for U.S. Rep. Jim Nussle, R-Ia., a candidate for governor, as well as his political action committee, the Iowa Priorities PAC.”
So, one could easily assume then that this group has some kind of ties to Nussle–this world really isn’t as small as the song makes it seem. It also would seem to lend credibility to the gossip in this week’s Cityview Civic Skinny column:

“A top Republican said that not only has Nussle raised more money than all the Democratic candidates combined, but Nussle has also been telling top party people that he wants a governing majority in the Iowa Legislature when he “takes back Terrace Hill.” To do this, we’ve heard Nussle has guaranteed that he is going to find $1 million more strictly for legislative and executive council races. “Democrats are going to have to rely on a lot of national money if they hope to get back the governor’s office, because they’re obviously divided and are going to have to spend a ton down the stretch just to settle on a candidate. That hurts the smaller races. Add a million dollars to Republican legislative war chests and that spreads them really thin,” our source said.”

It will be interesting to see if on any of the reports that come out today if this Iowa Leadership Council has contributed much yet…or will be before the November election.

Laughing in the Face of the Devil

2006-01-11T08:46:00.000-06:00

"The Supreme Court confirmation hearings are under way for Judge Sam Alito. Democrats want to know his position on privacy. Republicans want to know his position on prison terms for bribery."---Jay Leno
-
"According to the Washington Post, Vice President Dick Cheney is limping today because he injured his foot. Cheney said, 'If you think my foot looks bad, you should see the old lady I was kicking.'"---Conan O'Brien
-
"You know how sometimes during war time, civil liberties can take a back seat to national security? Well, I got good news and bad news. The good news is this: no Japanese people are being sent to any camps. The bad news is: that time you got hammered and drunk-dialed your ex-girlfriend who's studying abroad and sang her that WHAM! song that was 'your song?' The government's got that on tape."---Jon Stewart
-
"Indicted congressman Tom Delay has announced he is resigning as House Majority Leader. However, he's still going to run for re-election. So apparently he feels he is too corrupt to be a leader but not too corrupt to be just a congressman."---Jay Leno
-
"Congressmen are actually now returning illegal gifts. I called the weather bureau and, sure enough, hell has frozen over."---David Letterman

The Abramoff Affair Is A REPUBLICAN Scandal

2006-01-05T09:29:00.000-06:00

Despite GOP efforts to argue that the Abramoff scandal is bipartisan, the facts show that this is a Republican scandal. Every person who has been indicted or pled guilty is a Republican and every published report that lists potential indictees in the DOJ probe is a Republican – Not one of the published reports listing potential targets of the DOJ probe includes Democratic Members of Congress or staffers.

DOJ IS LOOKING AT REPUBLICANS: According to published reports, the only Members of Congress that the Justice Department has been looking at are Republicans, including Montana Sen. Conrad Burns, Reps. Bob Ney, and John Doolittle. [Washington Post, 11/26/05; Wall Street Journal, 11/25/05]

ABRAMOFF DONATED TO GOP BUT GAVE NOTHING TO DEMS: Despite Bush’s assertion that Abramoff was an equal money dispenser to both parties, the facts show that Republican lobbyist Abramoff didn’t give one cent to Democrats. Abramoff has, however, contributed more than $200,000 to Republican members of Congress over the last decade. [Bloomberg News, 12/21/05; Hotline’s On Call, 1/4/06; www.opensecrets.org]

ABRAMOFF WORKED TO STEER DONATIONS TO THE GOP. According to the New York Times, “Mr. Abramoff tries hard to persuade his fellow Washington lobbyists to give more generously to the Republican Party, its candidates and conservative organizations. He expects to raise as much as $5 million this year, he said, and plans to donate as much as $250,000 personally.” [New York Times, 4/3/02]

LESSON OF 1994: Despite pundits asserting that the Abramoff plea could cause problems for both Republicans and Democrats at the polls in 2006, history shows that the majority party is the one that suffers from these kinds of scandals. In 1994, the House banking scandal that rocked Washington resulted in a wave of Democratic incumbents losing their seats while only one GOP incumbent was defeated. [Washington Times, McCaslin Column, 11/10/94]

CONRAD BURNS STEERED $3 MILLION TO ABRAMOFF CLIENT: Burns – a 2006 candidate and the poster boy for the Abramoff scandal in the Senate – admitted that he included a $3 million school appropriation for the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe in the FY04 Interior Appropriations bill that had previously been rejected by the U.S. Department of Interior for not meeting requirements for federal funding. Burns, who recently reversed himself and said he would return $150,000 in campaign contributions from Abramoff, his associates and clients, had accepted more Abramoff-related money than any other member of Congress. [Washington Post, 3/1/05; Roll Call, 4/11/05; Billings Gazette, 4/17/05; Great Falls Tribune, 11/26/05; Center for Responsive Politics; Washington Post, 12/16/05]

RICK SANTORUM RUNS GOP “K” STREET PROJECT: Santorum - another 2006 Senate candidate, runs the K Street project where he “vets the hiring decisions of major lobbyists.” The K Street project, created by conservative movement leader Grover Norquist and indicted Rep. Tom DeLay, seeks to place Republicans in high-level corporate and lobbyist positions. As of June 2003, Santorum had successfully placed “33 of 36 top-level Washington positions he [was] monitoring.” All positions went to Republicans. As the Washington Post reported, Santorum’s colleagues resorted to “intimidation and private threats” to bully lobbyists who try to maintain good relations with both parties. [New York Times, 6/27/03; Washington Post, 6/26/03; US News & World Report, 10/17/05]

Wag the Dog

2005-11-15T16:57:00.000-06:00

Crisis Scenarios for Deflecting Attention from the President's Woes
By Michael T. Klare
In the 1998 movie Wag the Dog, White House spinmeister Conrad Brean seeks to deflect public attention from a brewing scandal over an alleged sexual encounter in the White House between the president and an all-too-young Girl Scout-type by concocting an international crisis. Advised by a Hollywood producer (played with delicious perversity by Dustin Hoffman), Brean "leaks" a fraudulent report that Albania has acquired a suitcase-sized nuclear device and is seeking to smuggle it into the United States. This obviously justifies an attention-diverting military reprisal. The press falls for the false report (sound familiar?) and all discussion of the president's sex scandal disappears from view -- or, as Brean would have it, the "tail" of manufactured crisis wags the "dog" of national politics.

As Brean explains all this to the White House staff in the film, American presidents have often sought to distract attention from their political woes at home by heating up a war or crisis somewhere else. Now that the current occupant of the White House is facing roiling political scandals of his own, it stands to reason that he, too, or his embattled adviser Karl Rove (not to speak of his besieged Vice President, Dick Cheney) may be thinking along such lines. Could Rove -- today's real-life version of Conrad Brean -- already be cooking up a "wag the dog" scenario? Only those with access to the innermost sanctum of George Bush's White House can know for sure, but it is hardly an improbable thought, given that they have done so in the past.

It bears repeating that this administration -- more than any other in recent times -- has employed deception and innuendo to mold public opinion and advance its political agenda. Indeed, the very scandal now enveloping the White House -- the apparent conspiracy to punish whistle-blower Joseph Wilson by revealing the covert CIA identity of his wife, Valerie Plame -- is rooted in the President's drive to mobilize support for the invasion of Iraq by willfully distorting Iraqi weapons capabilities. Why then would he and his handlers shrink from exaggerating or distorting new intelligence about other hostile powers, and then using such distortions to ignite an international crisis?

Add to this the fact that a rising level of belligerence is already detectable in the statements of top administration officials regarding potential adversaries in the Middle East and Asia. Most striking perhaps was Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's truculent appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on October 19. Under questioning from both Democratic and Republican Senators, she refused to rule out the use of military force against Syria or Iraq, nor would she acknowledge any presidential obligation to consult Congress before engaging in such an action. Asked by Senator Paul Sarbanes (Dem.-Md.) whether the administration actually "entertains the possibility of using military action against Syria or against Iran" and "could undertake to do that without obtaining from Congress an authorization for such action," she replied: "What I said is that the President doesn't take any of his options off the table and that I will not say anything that constrains his authority as Commander in Chief." While insisting that the administration was still relying on diplomacy to resolve its differences with Syria and Iran, she left no doubt as to Bush's preparedness (and right) to employ force at any time or place of his choosing.

There are many who claim that Bush could not possibly contemplate military action against Iran, Syria, or any other hostile power at present. American forces, they argue, are stretched to the limit in Iraq and so lack the capacity to undertake a significant campaign in another country. At the very least, these analysts overlook the massive American air and naval capabilities hardly engaged in Iraq, and certainly available for use elsewhere. But this is not the point. As Wag the Dog suggested, war itself is not the only way to distract public attention from the President's domestic woes. An atmosphere of crisis in which rumors of war or preparations for war come to overshadow all else might well do the trick -- and administration officials don't need fresh armies to accomplish this, only plausible scenarios for the escalation of existing foreign troubles. These, unfortunately, are all too easy to find.

What then are the most promising scenarios at hand for such a purpose? Many such scenarios might be envisioned, but the most credible ones -- barring a major new terrorist attack on the United States -- would entail a military showdown with Syria, Iran, or North Korea.

The Syria Option

Syria appears the most likely candidate for an instant stir-and-mix foreign-policy crisis. To start with, it has already been branded a pariah state -- both because of its suspected involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and because the Bush administration regularly charges it with facilitating the entry of foreign jihadists into Iraq.

The issue of Syrian involvement in Hariri's assassination arose immediately following the February 14, 2005 bomb explosion that killed him (and 22 others) in downtown Beirut. Because Hariri had long campaigned for the withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon, his supporters insisted that Damascus must have played a role in the explosion. The United States and Great Britain persuaded the U.N. Security Council to initiate an investigation of the explosion. A preliminary report by the international team formed to investigate, released on October 24, strongly suggested that Syrian officials had played a key role in organizing the attack. Washington and London then returned to the Security Council on October 31and pushed through a resolution that calls on the Syrian government to cooperate fully with the continuing investigation and make available for questioning any of its top officials suspected of involvement. This resolution also warns of unspecified "further action" -- an obvious threat of economic sanctions -- if Syria fails to comply. The ante was raised further on November 7, when UN investigators requested interviews with six top Syrian officials, including General Assef Shawkat, the powerful brother-in-law of President Bashar al-Assad.

From the very beginning, the White House has seized on these developments to portray Syria as an outlaw state and set the stage for a diplomatic assault on the Assad regime. Condoleezza Rice has been particularly harsh. After the October 31 resolution was adopted, for instance, she declared, "With our decision today, we show that Syria has isolated itself from the international community -- through its false statements, its support for terrorism, its interference in the affairs of its neighbors, and its destabilizing behavior in the Middle East." Then came the clincher: "Now the Syrian government must make a strategic decision to fundamentally change its behavior."

What changes must the Syrian government make? What are the consequences if it fails to comply? There are no clear answers to these questions, nor are there likely to be any. The intent, so far as can be determined, is not to reach some sort of peaceful resolution of this issue but rather to keep Damascus, and the rest of the world, on edge, expecting some new crisis at any moment. This strategy -- "rattling the cage," as it's known in Washington -- was reportedly adopted by senior aides to President Bush at an October 1st meeting at the White House. According to the New York Times, this strategy entails putting relentless pressure on the Assad regime, forcing it to make humiliating concessions to Washington (thus weakening it domestically) or face increasingly severe reprisals from Washington and its allies

The public face of this assault is the diplomatic campaign being waged by Condoleezza Rice and her associates at the Department of State. The Department of Defense, meanwhile, is conducting the dark side of this campaign, involving nothing short of a covert, low-level military campaign against Syria, including commando raids by Iraqi-based U.S. forces into Syrian territory. These raids -- first reported by the New York Times in October -- are supposedly intended to impede efforts by Iraqi insurgent forces or foreign jihadists to use Syria as a staging point for forays into Iraq. Undoubtedly, however, they constitute but another component of the "rattling the cage" strategy, designed to keep the Assad regime off balance, tempting or provoking it into clashes with American forces that would only provide a justification for further escalations of the attacks.

It is easy to see how this could lead to something closer to the outbreak of full-scale military hostilities with Syria or, more likely, escalating air and missile attacks. Indeed, military analyst William Arkin of the Washington Post reports that the Pentagon has already commenced full-scale planning for such contingencies. "U.S. intelligence agencies and military planners [have] received instructions to prepare up-to-date target lists for Syria and to increase their preparations for potential military operations against Damascus," he observed recently. Such operations could include "cross-border operations to...destroy safe havens supporting the Iraqi insurgency" as well as "attacks on the regime of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad." Attacks of this type could be mounted at any time, and should be considered highly likely if Damascus rebuffs U.N. efforts to compel testimony by its senior officials or if conditions worsen in Iraq (as is likely).

The standoff between the United States and Syria has already been ratcheted up to dangerous levels and could be intensified even further in the weeks ahead if Assad refuses to turn over his brother-in-law and other top officials for questioning (and possible arrest) by the U.N. investigating team. Under these circumstances, it would be all too easy for the White House to create a brink-of-war environment in Washington, possibly by stepping up commando raids on the Iraq-Syrian border or by threatening to bomb terrorist "sanctuaries" inside Syria. Even if such strikes were merely hinted at, discussion of a possible war with Syria would monopolize media coverage of the White House and so deflect attention from the President's political woes.

The Iran Option

After Syria, the ongoing imbroglio over Iran's nuclear activities represents the most promising option for a "wag the dog" scenario. This dispute has approached moments of acute crisis before, only to subside following a concession by one side or another -- and this could certainly happen again. At present, however, a very serious confrontation appears to be in the offing. While long in the making, the current standoff with Iran hasn't been eased any by that country's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who seems to be prone to making inflammatory statements. (Israel, he said recently, "must be wiped off the map.") Nonetheless, the primary issue is Iran's apparent determination to engage in nuclear activities viewed in Washington as indicative of a covert Iranian drive to manufacture nuclear weapons. Here, a bit of background is useful.

Iran is a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and, in accordance with the treaty, has asserted its right to build nuclear power plants and to construct the infrastructure needed to "enrich" natural uranium -- that is, increase the proportion of the fissionable isotope U-235 -- for use in its reactors. Over the years, however, Iran has violated its NPT obligations by building uranium enrichment facilities out of sight of inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). These facilities include a plant to convert uranium ore into a gas, uranium hexaflouride (UF6), that can be introduced into high-speed centrifuges which separate U-238 from the lighter U-235, allowing for the gradual accumulation of "enriched" uranium -- the raw material for both power reactors and, in highly enriched form, nuclear weapons. The Iranians insist that they want the enriched material for peaceful purposes only; but their concealment of these efforts in the past leads easily to speculation that they ultimately seek to accumulate highly-enriched uranium for a future Iranian bomb.

The Bush administration has already made up its mind on this subject: "Iran [has] concealed a large-scale, covert nuclear weapons program for over eighteen years," then Undersecretary of State (and now U.N. Ambassador) John R. Bolton asserted on August 17, 2004. "The costly infrastructure to perform all of these [enrichment] activities goes well beyond any conceivable peaceful nuclear program," he added. "No comparable oil-rich nation has ever engaged, or would be engaged, in this set of activities -- or would pursue them for nearly two decades behind a continuing cloud of secrecy and lies to IAEA inspectors and the international community -- unless it was dead set on building nuclear weapons."

Despite such American assertions, the IAEA and the international community have not reached a consensus on Iran's ultimate intentions. The IAEA has, however, repeatedly stated that Iran is in violation of its obligations to fully disclose all nuclear-related activities and to abstain from actions that could lead to the manufacture of nuclear weapons. In 2003, a "trio" of European Union nations -- Britain, France, and Germany -- secured an agreement from Teheran to temporarily suspend uranium enrichment activities while negotiations were under way for a permanent suspension in exchange for a package of EU economic benefits. But neither these negotiations, nor repeated IAEA warnings, have fully halted Iranian enrichment programs. Now, the Bush administration is calling for an IAEA resolution that would find Iran in full breach of its NPT obligations and refer the matter to the U.N. Security Council for possible actions which could include the imposition of economic and other sanctions.

At a meeting on Sept 24, the IAEA Board of Governors formally held Iran in breach of its NPT obligations, but did not immediately refer the matter to the Security Council, presumably to leave more room for negotiations. President Ahmadinejad, however, has since rejected the IAEA resolution, and Iran subsequently announced the resumption of UF6 production in a strong rebuke to the EU trio. Meanwhile, Washington has stepped up its efforts to persuade other states that Iran is determined to acquire nuclear weapons. A showdown is likely in late November or early December, when the IAEA Board next convenes.

Were this matter to be sent to the United Nations, it is unlikely that harsh sanctions would be imposed as Russia and China, both allied to Iran, sit on the Security Council and possess veto power over any vote. What then might the White House do if Iran announces the full-scale resumption of nuclear enrichment activities? Under such circumstances, a military strike against nuclear facilities in Iran has to be considered a genuine possibility. After all, President Bush has already declared that the United States will not "tolerate" the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran, a clear expression of his willingness to employ military force. In addition, as early as last January, Seymour Hersh reported in the New Yorker magazine that U.S. Special Operations Forces units were already conducting secret forays into Iranian territory to pinpoint the location of hidden nuclear installations in preparation for any future decision to launch an attack.

Here again, the kindling exists for a full-blown international crisis. Although the European trio along with Russia and China are determined to avoid a military confrontation with Iran, the Bush administration clearly feels no such inhibitions. It has already laid the groundwork for air and missile strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities and has refused -- in Condoleezza Rice's phrase -- to take any "options off the table." Even the strong hint of an impending assault on Iran would probably push crude oil prices to stratospheric levels and invite anger and concern around the world, but this may not be enough to deter Bush and his advisers from initiating such a crisis if they saw no other way to boost the President's approval ratings.

The North Korean Option

Although less appealing than the Syrian or Iranian options, a scenario entailing possible conflict with North Korea is also likely to be on any White House list of future provocations. This scenario is less appealing than the others because everyone knows that an all-out conflict with North Korea would probably produce a horrendous bloodbath and might even trigger first an Asian economic, and then a global, economic meltdown. Any move to crank up such a crisis to dangerous levels would also meet with fierce resistance from China, Russia, South Korea, and the rest of the international community. At the same time, however, North Korea has long been branded an outlaw state and its nuclear-weapons activities are far more advanced than anything conceivably under way in Iran. The Defense Department also possesses a very robust air, ground, and naval presence in the region, so a confrontation on the Korean Peninsula need not even require the redeployment of American forces from Iraq -- as would presumably be the case in a war scenario involving Syria or Iran.

North Korea is believed to have begun a secret nuclear weapons program after the end of the Korean War. However, under the so-called Agreed Framework of 1994, it pledged to cease all such activities in return for a basket of economic and political incentives from the United States and its allies. Both sides complied with some aspects of the agreement but balked at others. The Clinton administration was well on its way toward resolving these inconsistencies when George W. Bush assumed the presidency in early 2001.

Soon after taking office, Bush foreclosed any serious diplomatic contact with the North Koreans and froze many of America's obligations under the Agreed Framework. In his 2002 State of the Union address, he included North Korea in his famed "axis of evil." In response, the North Koreans announced that they were no longer bound by the Agreed Framework and had resumed their work on the manufacture of nuclear weapons. Rather than deal with Pyongyang directly on such critical nuclear-proliferation matters, the White House insisted than any future negotiations had to be conducted on a multilateral basis. China subsequently agreed to convene "six-party" talks -- involving the United States, Japan, Russia, the two Koreas, and itself -- for this purpose.

At a September meeting of the six-party group, the North Koreans finally agreed to abandon their nuclear-weapons activities but only in return for significant economic benefits from the other parties and non-aggression assurances about an American attack. In subsequent statements, Pyongyang indicated that any such step would be predicated as well on a promise by the other participants to supply them with a light-water nuclear reactor (that could only be used for generating electricity). The United States has since ruled out any commitment of this sort, but has suggested that various incentives might be provided once North Korea commenced the irreversible dismantlement of its nuclear-weapons program.

At this point, there is reason to believe that a peaceful resolution of the dispute is within reach. China and South Korea have worked hard to promote a constructive stance on Pyongyang's part, but it is a situation that could turn sour again in a diplomatic instant. As if to highlight that possibility, the United States has recently bolstered its military capabilities in the area -- sending fifteen F-117 "stealth" bombers and other advanced weapons to South Korea and announcing other efforts aimed at isolating North Korea.

The Bush administration has many levers it could pull should a decision be made to provoke a fresh confrontation with North Korea. No doubt this would prove unpopular with China and South Korea, along with most of the rest of the world, but it would be guaranteed to produce a crisis atmosphere in Washington and so distract attention from escalating Presidential problems at home. As a result, it cannot be excluded as a potential wag-the-dog scenario.

Minus a microphone (or a leaker) in the Oval Office, it is impossible for outsiders to determine what attention-grabbing scenarios President Bush, his Vice President, and his closest advisers might be discussing at the moment. To some extent, the state of play will be shaped as well by the unpredictable actions of foreign leaders, especially the leaders and chief aides of Syria, Iran, and North Korea. But if past White House behavior is any indication, we can safely assume that the President's men are considering every option for turning these foreign crises into a compelling distraction from the administration's current political malaise. They have already shown by their decisions in Iraq that they are prepared to spill a lot of blood in pursuit of political advantage, and so the possibility that a contrived crisis with Syria, Iran, or North Korea might erupt into something much greater -- even a full-scale war or economic meltdown -- may be unlikely to deter them from a wag-the-dog maneuver.

Michael T. Klare is the Professor of Peace and World Security Studies at Hampshire College and the author, most recently, of Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependence on Imported Petroleum (Owl Books) as well as Resource Wars, The New Landscape of Global Conflict.

A Special Message from Sen. John Edwards

2005-11-13T09:28:00.000-06:00

From Senator John Edwards:

I was wrong.

I wrote these words about my vote to authorize the Iraq war in a Washington Post op-ed piece and I want to share my views with you as well.

Almost three years ago, we went into Iraq to remove what we were told -- and many of us believed and argued -- was a threat to America. But in fact we now know that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction when our forces invaded Iraq in 2003. The intelligence was deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda.

It was a mistake to vote for this war in 2002. I take responsibility for that mistake. It has been hard to say these words because those who didn't make a mistake -- the men and women of our armed forces and their families -- have performed heroically and paid a very dear price. It is not right, just or fair that we made a mistake, but they pay for that mistake.

The world desperately needs moral leadership from America, and the foundation for moral leadership is telling the truth.

While we can't change the past, we need to accept responsibility because a key part of restoring America's moral leadership is acknowledging when we've made mistakes or been proven wrong -- and to show that we have the creativity and guts to make it right.

The argument for going to war with Iraq was based on intelligence that we now know was inaccurate. The information the American people were hearing from the President -- and that I was being told by our intelligence community -- wasn't the whole story. Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war.

George Bush won't accept responsibility for his mistakes. Along with Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, he has made horrible mistakes at almost every step: twisting intelligence to fit their pre-conceived views about Iraq's threat; failed diplomacy; not going in with enough troops; not giving our forces the equipment they need; not having a plan for peace.

Because of these failures, Iraq is a mess and has become a far greater threat than it actually ever was. It is now a haven for terrorists, and our presence there is draining the goodwill that our country once enjoyed, diminishing our global standing. It has made fighting the global war against terrorist organizations more difficult, not less.

The urgent question isn't how we got here, but what we do now. We have to give our troops a way to end their mission honorably. That means leaving behind a success, not a failure.

What is success? I don't think it is Iraq as a Jeffersonian democracy. I think it is an Iraq that is relatively stable, largely self-sufficient, comparatively open and free, and in control of its own destiny.

A plan for success needs to focus on three interlocking objectives: reducing American presence; building Iraq's capacity; and getting other countries to meet their responsibilities to help.

First, we need to remove the image of the imperialist America from the landscape of Iraq. American contractors who have taken unfair advantage of the turmoil in Iraq need to leave Iraq. If that means Halliburton subsidiary, KBR, then KBR should go. Such departures, and the return of the work to Iraqi businesses, would be a real statement about our hopes for the new nation.

We also need to show Iraq and the world that we will not stay there forever. We've reached the point where the large number of our troops in Iraq hurts, not helps, our goals. Therefore, early next year, after the Iraqi elections and a new government has been created, we should begin the redeployment of a significant number of troops out of Iraq. This should be the beginning of a gradual process to reduce our presence and change the shape of our military's deployment in Iraq.

Most of these troops should come from National Guard or Reserve forces. That will still leave us with enough military capability, combined with better trained Iraqis, to fight terrorists and continue to help the Iraqis develop a stable country.

Second, this redeployment should work in concert with a more effective training program for Iraqi forces. We should implement a clear plan for training and hard deadlines for certain benchmarks to be met. To increase incentives, we should implement a schedule outlining that as we certify that Iraqi troops are trained and equipped, a proportional number of U.S. troops will withdraw.

Third, we must launch a serious diplomatic process that brings the world into this effort. We should bring Iraq's neighbors and our key European allies into a diplomatic process to get Iraq on its feet. It's not just in America's security interest for Iraq to succeed, but the world's -- and the President needs to create a unified international front.

Too many mistakes have already been made to make this easy. Yet we must take these steps to succeed. The American people, the Iraqi people and -- most importantly -- our troops who have died or been injured there and those who are fighting there today deserve nothing less.

America's leaders -- all of us -- need to accept the responsibility we each carry for how we got to this place. Over 2,000 Americans have lost their lives in this war; and over 150,000 are fighting there today. They and their families deserve honesty from our country's leaders. And they also deserve a clear plan for a way out.

John

Politics is Poker

2005-09-22T09:16:00.000-05:00

Politics as poker. The Democratic leadership could take a lesson from David Mamet...

Excerpts from an op ed piece the playwright wrote for the L.A. Times:

One needs to know but three words to play poker: call, raise or fold.
Fold means keep the money, I'm out of the hand; call means to match your opponents' bet. That leaves raise, which is the only way to win at poker. The raiser puts his opponent on the defensive, seizing the initiative. Initiative is only important if one wants to win.

The Republicans, like the perpetual raiser at the poker table, became increasingly bold as the Democrats signaled their absolute reluctance to seize the initiative.
[snip]
Control of the initiative is control of the battle. In the alley, at the poker table or in politics. One must raise. The American public chose Bush over Kerry in 2004. How, the undecided electorate rightly wondered, could one believe that Kerry would stand up for America when he could not stand up to Bush? A possible response to the Swift boat veterans would have been: "I served. He didn't. I didn't bring up the subject, but, if all George Bush has to show for his time in the Guard is a scrap of paper with some doodling on it, I say the man was a deserter."
This would have been a raise. Here the initiative has been seized, and the opponent must now fume and bluster and scream unfair. In combat, in politics, in poker, there is no certainty; there is only likelihood, and the likelihood is that aggression will prevail.

One may sit at the poker table all night and never bet and still go home broke, having anted away one's stake.
The Democrats are anteing away their time at the table. They may be bold and risk defeat, or be passive and ensure it.

George Lakoff on What We SHOULD Learn From Katrina

2005-09-09T08:47:00.000-05:00

The Post-Katrina Era

By George Lakoff
Posted on September 6, 2005, Printed on September 7, 2005
http://www.alternet.org/story/25099/

It is impossible for me, as it is for most Americans, to watch the horror and suffering from Hurricane Katrina and not feel physically sore, pained, bereft, empty, heartbroken. And angry.

The Katrina tragedy should become a watershed in American politics. This was when the usually invisible people suddenly appeared in all the anguish of their lives -- the impoverished, the old, the infirm, the kids and the low-wage workers with no cars, TVs or credit cards. They showed up on America's doorsteps, entered the living rooms and stayed. Katrina will not go away soon, and she has the power to change America.

The moral of Katrina is mostly being missed. It is not just a failure of execution (William Kristol), or that bad things just happen (Laura Bush). It was not just indifference by the President, or a lack of accountability, or a failure of federal-state communication, or corrupt appointments in FEMA, or the cutting of budgets for fixing levees, or the inexcusable absence of the National Guard off in Iraq. It was all of these and more, but they are the effects, not the cause.

The cause was political through and through -- a matter of values and principles. The progressive-liberal values are America's values, and we need to go back to them. The heart of progressive-liberal values is simple: empathy (caring about and for people) and responsibility (acting responsibly on that empathy). These values translate into a simple principle: Use the common wealth for the common good to better all our lives. In short, promoting the common good is the central role of government.

The right-wing conservatives now in power have the opposite values and principles. Their main value is Rely on individual discipline and initiative. The central principle: Government has no useful role. The only common good is the sum of individual goods. It's the difference between We're all in this together and You're on your own, buddy. It's the difference between Every citizen is entitled to protection and You're only entitled to what you can afford. It's the difference between connection and separation. It is this difference in moral and political philosophy that lies behind the tragedy of Katrina.

A lack of empathy and responsibility accounts for Bush's indifference and the government's delay in response, as well as the failure to plan for the security of the most vulnerable: the poor, the infirm, the aged, the children.

Eliminating as much as possible of the role of government accounts for the demotion of FEMA from cabinet rank, for Michael Brown's view that FEMA was a federal entitlement program to be cut, for the budget cuts in levee repair, for placing more responsibility on state and local government than they could handle, for the failure to fully employ the military, and for the lax regulation of toxic waste dumps contributing to a "toxic stew."

This was not just incompetence (though there was plenty of it), not just a natural disaster (though nature played its part), not just Bush (though he is accountable). This is a failure of moral and political philosophy -- a deadly failure. That is the deep truth behind this human tragedy, humanly caused.

It is a truth that needs to be told, starting now -- over and over. There can be no delay. The Bush administration is busy framing it in its own way: bad things just happen, it's no one's fault; the federal government did the best it could -- the problem was at the state and local level; we'll rebuild and everything will be okay; the people being shipped out will have better lives elsewhere, and jobs in Wal-Mart!

Unless the real truth is told starting now, the American people will accept it for lack of an alternative. The Democratic response so far is playing right into Bush's framing. By delaying a response for fear it will be called "partisan," the Democratic leadership is allowing Bush to frame the tragedy. And once it is framed, it is hard to reframe! It is time to start now.

Hurricane Katrina should also form the context in which to judge whether John Roberts is fit to be chief justice of the United States Supreme Court. The reason is simple: The Katrina Tragedy raises the most central issues of moral and political principles that will govern the future of this country. Katrina stands to be even more traumatic to America than 9/11. The failure of conservative principles in the Katrina Tragedy should, in the post-Katrina era, invalidate those principles -- and it should invalidate the right of George Bush to foist them on the country for the next 30 years.

John Roberts, as chief justice of a conservative court, would have enormous powers to impose on the nation those invalid principles. Do not be fooled by the arguments of "strict construction," "narrow interpretation" and the avoidance of "judicial activism" that will be brought forth in the hearings. What Roberts is brilliant at is the use of "narrow interpretations" to have maximal causal effect. Narrow interpretation, in his hands, can serve the purpose of radical conservative judicial activism.

Consider a small example, the Case of the Hapless Toad. The Constitution empowers Congress to regulate "commerce ... among the several states." This clause has been interpreted by the Court to make it the constitutional basis for much of civil rights legislation and all major environmental laws.

Over the past decade, the Court has been diminishing the powers of the federal government over the environment by limiting the scope of that clause, even limiting the application of the Clean Water Act. A completely narrow interpretation could eliminate all environmental laws (e.g., clean water and air, habitat protection) and threaten our civil rights. Roberts has written in favor such a narrow interpretation.

The case concerned a developer who wanted to build a large housing tract in California that would destroy one of the last remaining breeding grounds of the arroyo southwestern toad, threatening its continued existence. The U.S. Courts of Appeals on Washington, D.C., upheld the right to life of the toad species under the Endangered Species Act. But Roberts, in a July 2003 opinion, wrote that the Interstate Commerce Clause, on which the Endangered Species act is based, should not apply to "a hapless toad that, for reasons of its own, lives its entire life in California."

Such a narrowing would threaten the legal basis of the Endangered Species Act. Anti-discrimination legislation is also based on the Interstate Commerce Clause. What about discrimination wholly within one state? Were Roberts to apply a similar narrowing criterion, much of anti-discrimination law would go out the window.

The point is simple. Narrow interpretations can have massive causal effects and be a form of radical judicial activism in the conservative cause. After the Katrina Tragedy, we cannot afford a radically activist Chief Justice with the same philosophy that has failed America so badly. The ultimate moral and political issues apply in both cases. John Roberts as Chief Justice would be a danger to our democracy and possibly to our very lives.

George Lakoff is the author of Don't Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate' (Chelsea Green). He is Professor of Linguistics at the University of California at Berkeley and a Senior Fellow of the Rockridge Institute.

The GOP Agenda in Action

2005-09-02T15:06:00.000-05:00

Dems Must Lead Katrina Relief: The Emerging Democratic Majority WebLog - DonkeyRising

2005-09-02T11:22:00.000-05:00

The Emerging Democratic Majority WebLog - DonkeyRising: "Dems Must Lead Katrina Relief"

One of the more painful lessons in the wake of Hurricane Katrina is the terrible price of political neglect of America’s deteriorating infrastructure. Sidney Blumenthal’s article “No One Can Say They Didn’t See It Coming” in Salon puts it this way:

In 2001, FEMA warned that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S. But the Bush administration cut New Orleans flood control funding by 44 percent to pay for the Iraq war…In 2004, the Bush administration cut funding requested by the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for holding back the waters of Lake Pontchartrain by more than 80 percent. Additional cuts at the beginning of this year (for a total reduction in funding of 44.2 percent since 2001) forced the New Orleans district of the Corps to impose a hiring freeze.

Republicans have rarely provided adequate support for needed public works projects in the U.S., such as strengthening the levees in New Orleans, preferring, for example, to squander taxpayer dollars on dubious Halliburton projects in Iraq. As long-time advocates of public works projects, Democrats have an edge in providing the leadership needed to get New Orleans and other Gulf communities up and running, and we need to amplify the call for critical infrastructure repair as a national priority.

In a related piece, TPM Caf�quotes a June 8, 2004 article in the New Orleans Times-Picayune by Sheila Grissett:

The challenge now, said emergency management chiefs Walter Maestri in Jefferson Parish and Terry Tullier in New Orleans, is for southeast Louisiana somehow to persuade those who control federal spending that protection from major storms and flooding are matters of homeland security.

"It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the price we pay," Maestri said. "Nobody locally is happy that the levees can't be finished, and we are doing everything we can to make the case that this is a security issue for us."

Yes we know. Now is not the time for political bickering, and Americans need to pull together to support the relief effort in New Orleans and the Gulf communities. But now is the time to recalibrate federal spending priorities, and Dems must lead the way.
Posted by Pete Ross at 07:19 AM | link

Timeline: Bush's Choices Impact New Orleans

2005-09-01T18:22:00.000-05:00

CHRONOLOGY....Here's a timeline that outlines the fate of both FEMA and flood control projects in New Orleans under the Bush administration. Read it and weep:

January 2001: Bush appoints Joe Allbaugh, a crony from Texas, as head of FEMA. Allbaugh has no previous experience in disaster management.
April 2001: Budget Director Mitch Daniels announces the Bush administration's goal of privatizing much of FEMA's work. In May, Allbaugh confirms that FEMA will be downsized: "Many are concerned that federal disaster assistance may have evolved into both an oversized entitlement program...." he said. "Expectations of when the federal government should be involved and the degree of involvement may have ballooned beyond what is an appropriate level."
2001: FEMA designates a major hurricane hitting New Orleans as one of the three "likeliest, most catastrophic disasters facing this country."
December 2002: After less than two years at FEMA, Allbaugh announces he is leaving to start up a consulting firm that advises companies seeking to do business in Iraq. He is succeeded by his deputy, Michael Brown, who, like Allbaugh, has no previous experience in disaster management.
March 2003: FEMA is downgraded from a cabinet level position and folded into the Department of Homeland Security. Its mission is refocused on fighting acts of terrorism.
2003: Under its new organization chart within DHS, FEMA's preparation and planning functions are reassigned to a new Office of Preparedness and Response. FEMA will henceforth focus only on response and recovery.
Summer 2004: FEMA denies Louisiana's pre-disaster mitigation funding requests. Says Jefferson Parish flood zone manager Tom Rodrigue: "You would think we would get maximum consideration....This is what the grant program called for. We were more than qualified for it."
June 2004: The Army Corps of Engineers budget for levee construction in New Orleans is slashed. Jefferson Parish emergency management chiefs Walter Maestri comments: "It appears that the money has been moved in the president's budget to handle homeland security and the war in Iraq, and I suppose that's the price we pay."
June 2005: Funding for the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is cut by a record $71.2 million. One of the hardest-hit areas is the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, which was created after the May 1995 flood to improve drainage in Jefferson, Orleans and St. Tammany parishes.
August 2005: While New Orleans is undergoing a slow motion catastrophe, Bush mugs for the cameras, cuts a cake for John McCain, plays the guitar for Mark Wills, delivers an address about V-J day, and continues with his vacation. When he finally gets around to acknowledging the scope of the unfolding disaster, he delivers only a photo op on Air Force One and a flat, defensive, laundry list speech in the Rose Garden.

A crony with no relevant experience was installed as head of FEMA. Mitigation budgets for New Orleans were slashed even though it was known to be one of the top three risks in the country. FEMA was deliberately downsized as part of the Bush administration's conservative agenda to reduce the role of government. After DHS was created, FEMA's preparation and planning functions were taken away.

Actions have consequences. No one could predict that a hurricane the size of Katrina would hit this year, but the slow federal response when it did happen was no accident. It was the result of four years of deliberate Republican policy and budget choices that favor ideology and partisan loyalty at the expense of operational competence. It's the Bush administration in a nutshell.

—Kevin Drum 1:19 PM Permalink

Bush Claims Disaster wasn't predictable

2005-09-01T14:26:00.000-05:00

The Democratic Party: "Bush Claims the Disaster Wasn't Predictable

Bush today:

I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees.

New Orleans Times Picayune story from June 8, 2004:

'When levees are below grade, as ours are in many spots right now, they're more vulnerable to waves pouring over them and degrading them,' Naomi said. 'We're not below storm-surge elevation yet, but we will be if we stop raising our levees as they subside.'

Bush budget falls short

The Bush administration's proposed fiscal 2005 budget includes only $3.9 million for the east bank hurricane project. Congress likely will increase that amount, although last year it bumped up the administration's $3 million proposal only to $5.5 million.

'I needed $11 million this year, and I got $5.5 million,' Naomi said. 'I need $22.5 million next year to do everything that needs doing, and the first $4.5 million of that will go to pay four contractors who couldn't get paid this year.'

Bush is already focusing on avoiding any kind of accountability for this tragedy. But his budget cuts are responsible for for what we're seeing.

UPDATE: FEMA identified this scenario as one of the three most likely disasters that could hit the country back in 2001.

The full Times-Picayune story from June 2004 is after the jump.

Keep reading 'Bush Claims the Disaster Wasn't Predictable'"

Wartime Horrors Just Don't End

2005-08-23T09:04:00.000-05:00

CNN.com - War stress blamed for shootings by vets - Aug 22, 2005

Back to School: Is YOUR Child Opted Out?

2005-08-22T08:45:00.000-05:00

Well, it's Back to School time again, and I wonder how many high school students will be encouraged to "become all they can be," by just signing on the dotted line and taking a number in Bush's War on American Families.

What's that, you say? You want to support America but don't want to fight in a war or have to kill people? You're thinking about a career as a youth minister? No problem! We'll just send in the same Army recruiter who recruited Casey Sheehan. You know, the one who "promised" Casey he could be a chaplain's assistant! Now, where's that pen???

Of course, as everyone who's followed Cindy Sheehan's plight in regards to her son knows, that wasn't the way things turned out. When Casey got to boot camp, they told him -- oops, guess that position isn't available after all. Guess we'll have to make you a mechanic instead, and you know where we send our mechanics.

So, on April 4, 2004, the world lost a fine young man'd been prepared to make the world a better place by spreading the truth about God -- you know, the "real" truth -- not the kind Bush spews to hide his real motives for this war. Casey and his mother didn't just talk the talk like Bush, they walked the walk. Before the war, Cindy was a youth minister at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Vacaville. Also before the war, Casey - her first child of four - was an Eagle Scout and the counselor at the Pendola Church youth camp near Grass Valley.

As of August 21, 2005, there have been 2,053 coalition troop deaths in the war in Iraq: 1,861 Americans, 93 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, one Dane, two Dutch, two Estonians, one Hungarian, 26 Italians, one Kazakh, one Latvian, 17 Poles, one Salvadoran, three Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, two Thai and 18 Ukrainians. Faces, names and numbers, and all for....what????

Unfortunately, there's still a lot of unsuspecting students - and parents - who aren't aware that buried deep in the "No Child Left Behind Act" there's a clause stating that high schools receiving federal funding are REQUIRED to turn over student information to local military recruiters (which in turn is submitted to the Pentagon), unless the parents opt out in writing.

And, they're not just collecting names. Many parents and students are unaware that the Pentagon has developed a database of 30 million 16-25-year-old students, which includes the following information about the student:

their name
their address
their e-mail address (slick move; how many 16-25 year-olds let their parents read their e-mail?)
their cell phone number (another slick move for reasons stated above)
their ethnicity (oh yeah - we know which students really don't have a lot of options once they leave high school)
their social security number (wait a sec - if they're only 16, is this legal???)
their areas of study

This database is updated daily and distributed monthly to the Armed Services for recruitment purposes. To opt your child out, one must submit Opt Out letters by "snail mail" to the School District Superintendent and to the Pentagon. Once they're received, the Pentagon moves the child's information to what they call a "suppression file," though they still "retain" the information. Hmmm. What's "that" all about? So if Bush needs more bodies, he can revoke the opt out option?

By completing the steps on this page, parents can generate letters to both the Pentagon and their child's school that will opt their child out of BOTH local and Pentagon databases. The site has a built-in search to help parents locate the school district superintendent for their child's school, then generates the two opt out letters, ready to be signed and mailed.

Okay, so I'm talking the talk. Have I walked the walk? You bet. I received a letter dated August 8, 2005, from the Sioux City Community School District's Superintendent of Schools, Larry D. Williams, acknowledging receipt of my request and stating that my opt out request is in conformance with [the school's] understanding of Federal statute and my rights as a parent and citizen.

Superintendent Williams also stated, "You make several positive suggestions, which, coupled with information we have received from the attorney for the School Administrators of Iowa, makes sense. I will seek to develop a mechanism whereby families are at least aware of the option that the Federal statute gives them."

He copied the letter to my son's principal and his high school counselor.

Because most high schools turn over their student lists to military recruiters in October, it's imperative we get as many kids as possible "opted out" during the month of September.

If you'd like more information on No Child Left Behind and School Opt-Outs, visit Leave My Child Alone.

For more background information on the Pentagon's illegal database, click here.

Capitol Hill Blue: Is Bush Out of Control?

2005-08-16T10:46:00.000-05:00

"...White House aides ...tell a sordid tale of an administration under siege, beset by bitter staff infighting and led by a man whose mood swings suggest paranoia bordering on schizophrenia.

They describe a President whose public persona masks an angry, obscenity-spouting man who berates staff, unleashes tirades against those who disagree with him and ends meetings in the Oval Office with “get out of here!”

In fact, George W. Bush’s mood swings have become so drastic that White House emails often contain “weather reports” to warn of the President’s demeanor. “Calm seas” means Bush is calm while “tornado alert” is a warning that he is pissed at the world.

Decreasing job approval ratings and increased criticism within his own party drives the President’s paranoia even higher. Bush, in a meeting with senior advisors, called Senator Majority Leader Bill Frist a “god-damned traitor” for opposing him on stem-cell research.

“There’s real concern in the West Wing that the President is losing it,” a high-level aide told me recently."

Click below to read the entire story:

href="http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_7218.shtml">Capitol Hill Blue: Is Bush Out of Control?

World Demand for Oil

2005-08-12T14:42:00.000-05:00
Current world demand for oil is about 84 million barrels per day, and current world production capacity is about....84 million barrels per day. As Amy Myers Jaffe points out, OPEC's spare capacity — and thus the world's — has dropped nearly to zero in the past few years. Everyone is pumping full out.

This is why prices are increasing now even though there's been no oil shock. It's not because of a sudden disruption, it's because demand is now bumping up against supply. What's more, this is a permanent condition: new capacity takes years to develop, so even in the best case supply will only barely keep up with future growth in demand. There's not much margin for error.

RollingStone.com: Four Amendments & a Funeral : Politics

2005-08-12T10:13:00.000-05:00
Rolling Stone reporter Matt Taibbi spent a month with Vermont's Independant senator Bernie Sanders, tracking the progress of some huge bills thru Congress. It ain't a pretty picture: