Op-Ed
With its ruling that the Bush administration lacks the authority to put Guantanamo detainees on trial before military tribunals, the U.S. Supreme Court has dealt the Busheviks a huge blow in its unprecedented, ongoing quest to expand the president's powers. King George has finally been told he cannot do whatever he wants, to whomever he wants, whenever he wants. Like it or not, he's finally being reminded that America governs under the rule of law and holds sacred the separation of powers and our system of checks and balances. Finally, someone has said, "We will not allow you to defile the U.S. Constitution, circumvent Congress and violate international law."
The unending game of "pretend" that the U.S. media allow George Bush
to play on the global stage, so often letting his lying utterances
hang suspended, unchallenged, in the middle of the story, as though
they were plausible - as though a class of third-graders couldn't
demolish them with a few innocent questions - feels like the
journalistic equivalent of waterboarding. Gasp! Some truth, please!
I suggest the prez has forfeited the right to command a headline, or half a story, or an uninterrupted quote: ". . . we'll defend ourselves, but at the same time we're actively working with our partners to spread peace and democracy," he said last week in Austria.
Surely "spreading democracy" should no longer be allowed to appear in print, between now and 2008, unless accompanied by a parenthetical clarification ("not true," stated as profanely as local standards allow). And that, of course, would only be the media's first step back into integrity with the public.
I suggest the prez has forfeited the right to command a headline, or half a story, or an uninterrupted quote: ". . . we'll defend ourselves, but at the same time we're actively working with our partners to spread peace and democracy," he said last week in Austria.
Surely "spreading democracy" should no longer be allowed to appear in print, between now and 2008, unless accompanied by a parenthetical clarification ("not true," stated as profanely as local standards allow). And that, of course, would only be the media's first step back into integrity with the public.
When Frank Gehry gets around to designing America's answer to the Sistine Chapel, I trust this postmodern Temple of Mammon on Las Vegas Blvd. will have a ceiling fresco depicting Warren Buffett's consignment of $31 billion to Bill and Melinda Gates. As the older billionaire sits on his pillow of cloud, his outthrust hand with its bag of securities is grasped by Gates -- the Adam of Software Commerce -- while seraphs and cherubs muse delightedly over the IRS regulations governing the sheltering of Buffett's swag in tax-exempt non-profit foundations.
AUSTIN -- -- Y'all, this isn't gonna work.
North Korea is threatening to launch a long-range missile against us, and we're threatening to reply with an anti-missile missile.
Sorry to remind you, but our "missile defense system" does not work. Good old Star Wars flopped again when tested in 2004 -- in fact, it failed to launch. Since then, several tests have been delayed or cancelled due to technical problems. Just because we spend $130 billion on a bad idea doesn't mean we can ever get it to work. The latest Bush budget has $10.7 billion for Star Wars, almost twice as much as Homeland Security is spending on customs and border patrol.
The good news is that the North Korean rocket doesn't work, either. The last time they fired a long-range missile, it went 1,300 kilometers (807 miles) and could not put a payload into orbit.
The Korean missile was supposedly tanked up and ready to go more than a week ago, but, oops, experts now say if that were true it would have been fired by now, since the fuel is highly unstable.
North Korea is threatening to launch a long-range missile against us, and we're threatening to reply with an anti-missile missile.
Sorry to remind you, but our "missile defense system" does not work. Good old Star Wars flopped again when tested in 2004 -- in fact, it failed to launch. Since then, several tests have been delayed or cancelled due to technical problems. Just because we spend $130 billion on a bad idea doesn't mean we can ever get it to work. The latest Bush budget has $10.7 billion for Star Wars, almost twice as much as Homeland Security is spending on customs and border patrol.
The good news is that the North Korean rocket doesn't work, either. The last time they fired a long-range missile, it went 1,300 kilometers (807 miles) and could not put a payload into orbit.
The Korean missile was supposedly tanked up and ready to go more than a week ago, but, oops, experts now say if that were true it would have been fired by now, since the fuel is highly unstable.
In the old monarchies of Europe, the resident populace were known as
subjects. Here in the New World, where mankind started over, we're
citizens, a word that pulses with self-governing power.
This is pretty scary, and there's plenty of pressure on us not to take this role literally. Democracy is dangerous, after all. It's always a threat to those in power. This is why its expansion over the last 230 years - through abolitionism, trade unionism, women's suffrage, the civil rights movement - has never come without struggle and controversy. But where democracy is healthy, this is what citizens do: expand the terrain.
Welcome to Humboldt County, Calif., a largely rural county 250 miles north of San Francisco where democracy is healthy indeed, and where, thanks to a citizens' initiative called Measure T, which passed at the beginning of the month with 55 percent of the vote, local governance has asserted itself in the face of the threat of Big Money disguised as just another neighbor exercising his right to free speech.
This is pretty scary, and there's plenty of pressure on us not to take this role literally. Democracy is dangerous, after all. It's always a threat to those in power. This is why its expansion over the last 230 years - through abolitionism, trade unionism, women's suffrage, the civil rights movement - has never come without struggle and controversy. But where democracy is healthy, this is what citizens do: expand the terrain.
Welcome to Humboldt County, Calif., a largely rural county 250 miles north of San Francisco where democracy is healthy indeed, and where, thanks to a citizens' initiative called Measure T, which passed at the beginning of the month with 55 percent of the vote, local governance has asserted itself in the face of the threat of Big Money disguised as just another neighbor exercising his right to free speech.
Sixteen U.S. soldiers were killed last week in Iraq, bringing the June total to 46. Sunday alone 29 Iraqis were killed in the escalating violence. On Saturday the NY Times reported that the tony Mansour district of Baghdad--like many of the city's western areas--has basically fallen to insurgents, seeming more like "wartime Beirut" than the peaceful affluent area it once was. On Sunday, Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki unveiled a plan to offer limited amnesty to insurgents. That same day Japan began pulling out its 550 troops. The killing of al-Zarqawi, like the many failed milestones before it, clearly has done nothing to lessen the violence and weaken the insurgency, and the war continues to spiral out of control, with no end in sight, and with the country teetering on the brink of large-scale civil war. According to a new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, when asked whether they'd be more or less likely to vote for a 2006 presidential candidate who favors a complete pullout within 12 months, 54% of respondents said "more likely" while just 32% said "less likely." Add all this up and it spells political disaster.
AUSTIN, Texas -- Yea, Bush! Way to go! I realize this is last week's news, but I'm a great believer in giving credit where credit is due. By designating the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands as a national monument, Bush has put one more level of federal protection around a vast spread of islands and irreplaceable marine life.
As he rather touchingly insisted, this IS a big deal -- 140,000 square miles of water that contains more than 7,000 rare species. Word is the president decided to declare the area a marine sanctuary after watching a documentary by Jean-Michel Cousteau. The thought that it might be possible to move George W. Bush to action by something as simple as watching a movie came as a new thought to many who are dying to try it on other issues.
But the environment is an area in which a simple plea often moves Bush. For example, Ol' Ernie Angelo, who used to be mayor of Midland and represent Texas on the Republican National Committee, sent a note to Karl Rove in 2002 complaining about an Environmental Protection Agency rule designed to keep groundwater around oil drilling sites clean.
As he rather touchingly insisted, this IS a big deal -- 140,000 square miles of water that contains more than 7,000 rare species. Word is the president decided to declare the area a marine sanctuary after watching a documentary by Jean-Michel Cousteau. The thought that it might be possible to move George W. Bush to action by something as simple as watching a movie came as a new thought to many who are dying to try it on other issues.
But the environment is an area in which a simple plea often moves Bush. For example, Ol' Ernie Angelo, who used to be mayor of Midland and represent Texas on the Republican National Committee, sent a note to Karl Rove in 2002 complaining about an Environmental Protection Agency rule designed to keep groundwater around oil drilling sites clean.
AUSTIN, Texas -- Gee, the Republicans seem to have lost their moral compass since Tom DeLay quit. Who knew it could get worse without that pillar of rectitude from Texas? What a snakes' nest of corruption and nastiness.
The latest involves Speaker Denny Hastert and a land deal.
Hastert had sold to a developer a 69-acre portion of a 195-acre farm that had been purchased in his wife's name. The developer also purchased an adjacent plot of roughly equal size owned in trust by Hastert and two of his "longtime supporters." The area of west of Chicago is growing madly, and Hastert -- through an earmark appropriation process -- dedicated $207 million in taxpayer dollars as the first appropriation on the Prairie Parkway, which will run 5.5 miles from the Hastert land. Went through in the fall of 2005. Three months later, Hastert and his partners sold the land for a $3 million total profit, $1.8 million to Hastert.
The latest involves Speaker Denny Hastert and a land deal.
Hastert had sold to a developer a 69-acre portion of a 195-acre farm that had been purchased in his wife's name. The developer also purchased an adjacent plot of roughly equal size owned in trust by Hastert and two of his "longtime supporters." The area of west of Chicago is growing madly, and Hastert -- through an earmark appropriation process -- dedicated $207 million in taxpayer dollars as the first appropriation on the Prairie Parkway, which will run 5.5 miles from the Hastert land. Went through in the fall of 2005. Three months later, Hastert and his partners sold the land for a $3 million total profit, $1.8 million to Hastert.
Against a backdrop of constant Repuglican criticism that Democrats don't have a plan and don't stand for anything, the Dems unleashed their platform this week, "A New Direction," aimed at demonstrating to voters that they're worthy of regaining control after 12 years of right-wing rule. The platform includes the following promises:
-to raise the minimum wage to $7.25
-to make college tuition tax deductible
-to cut the interest rates of student loans by 50%
-to eliminate subsidies to oil and gas companies
-to impose lobbying restrictions
-to negotiate lower drug prices in the Medicare prescription plan
-to maintain social security
-to increase funding for stem-cell research
-to restore the pay-as-you-go policy for federal budgets
-to reduce oil consumption 25% by 2020 through development of fuel alternatives
-to help millions of illegal immigrants work towards U.S. citizenship
-to shore up homeland security
-to bring the troops home from Iraq "at the earliest practicable time"
-to raise the minimum wage to $7.25
-to make college tuition tax deductible
-to cut the interest rates of student loans by 50%
-to eliminate subsidies to oil and gas companies
-to impose lobbying restrictions
-to negotiate lower drug prices in the Medicare prescription plan
-to maintain social security
-to increase funding for stem-cell research
-to restore the pay-as-you-go policy for federal budgets
-to reduce oil consumption 25% by 2020 through development of fuel alternatives
-to help millions of illegal immigrants work towards U.S. citizenship
-to shore up homeland security
-to bring the troops home from Iraq "at the earliest practicable time"
Before me are three press releases for the recent "Campaign for America's Future" (staged by progressive Democrats) conference announcing the three daily schedules for their mid-June sessions in Washington, D.C., entitled "Take Back America." The Iraq war did not feature at all on the first two days, and popped up briefly as one of the last panels on the last day. In other words, in an election year, the organizers decided to avoid almost entirely any scheduling of political discussion of a war to which about 70 percent of all Americans are opposed, and which is topic A on every newscast and newspaper front page.
There was no spot for the prime Democrat calling for speedy withdrawal, Jack Murtha, on these schedules.
The war grinds on, but the pwog Democrats prefer to talk about other matters, such as the fact that Rove is not going to be indicted. Thank God. The left will have to talk about something else for a change. As a worthy hobbyhorse for the left, the whole Valerie Plame scandal has never made any sense. What was it all about in the first analysis? Outing a CIA employee. What's wrong with that?
There was no spot for the prime Democrat calling for speedy withdrawal, Jack Murtha, on these schedules.
The war grinds on, but the pwog Democrats prefer to talk about other matters, such as the fact that Rove is not going to be indicted. Thank God. The left will have to talk about something else for a change. As a worthy hobbyhorse for the left, the whole Valerie Plame scandal has never made any sense. What was it all about in the first analysis? Outing a CIA employee. What's wrong with that?