Global
The hoofprints of Lucifer are everywhere. And since this is
America, eternally at war with the darker forces, the foremost Enemy Within
is sex, no quarter given. Some bulletins from the battlefront:
In February 2000, Matthew Limon, who had just turned 18, had oral sex with a schoolmate, a boy just shy of 15. A Kansas court sentenced him to 17 years in prison, a punishment upheld by a federal court in February, even though, under Kansas law, had his partner been a girl, the sentence could not have been so severe.
Last July, Ohio sentenced 22-year-old Brian Dalton to seven years in prison because of sex fantasies he penned in his diary, and you can get decades in U.S. jails for possessing images created purely from imagination.
A woman teacher in Arizona on trial last month for a relationship with a 17-year-old boy faces 100 years in prison.
In February 2000, Matthew Limon, who had just turned 18, had oral sex with a schoolmate, a boy just shy of 15. A Kansas court sentenced him to 17 years in prison, a punishment upheld by a federal court in February, even though, under Kansas law, had his partner been a girl, the sentence could not have been so severe.
Last July, Ohio sentenced 22-year-old Brian Dalton to seven years in prison because of sex fantasies he penned in his diary, and you can get decades in U.S. jails for possessing images created purely from imagination.
A woman teacher in Arizona on trial last month for a relationship with a 17-year-old boy faces 100 years in prison.
AUSTIN, Texas -- In response to President George W. Bush's call
to all Americans to give service to our country, some are enlisting in the
Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, Senior Corps or the armed services. Others have
begun putting in their suggested 4,000 hours at a variety of charitable
endeavors, through everything from the volunteer fire department to
mentoring programs. And still other Americans are moving their companies to
Bermuda and the Cayman Islands to avoid paying taxes. Isn't that special?
AUSTIN, Texas -- One rarely sees a thoroughly bad idea advanced
by government. Lots of stuff from silly to smelly gets done, but somebody
usually benefits, even if it's not the American people. But can anyone see
an upside to having an office of government propaganda with an official
license to lie?
They say if you fight someone long enough, you become like your enemy, but this Soviet notion is such a bummer it was useless even to them back in the day. But the Bush administration is apparently determined to bring us not one but two bureaus of propaganda. The "Office of Strategic Influence" -- isn't that a beauty? -- at the Pentagon will use "the media, the Internet and a range of covert operations to try to influence public opinion and government policy abroad, including in friendly nations," according to The New York Times. "Strategic Information" will include both information and disinformation. Disinformation, in case you haven't figured it out, is made of lies.
They say if you fight someone long enough, you become like your enemy, but this Soviet notion is such a bummer it was useless even to them back in the day. But the Bush administration is apparently determined to bring us not one but two bureaus of propaganda. The "Office of Strategic Influence" -- isn't that a beauty? -- at the Pentagon will use "the media, the Internet and a range of covert operations to try to influence public opinion and government policy abroad, including in friendly nations," according to The New York Times. "Strategic Information" will include both information and disinformation. Disinformation, in case you haven't figured it out, is made of lies.
FREEP HEROES
Cincinnati City Council
Seven members of the Cincinnati City Council voted in December for a death penalty moratorium resolution. While symbolic, the resolution in nonetheless significant since Ohio’s third largest city sits in Hamilton County where the County Prosecutor has sentenced more people to death row than Franklin and Cuyahoga counties combined. State Representative Tom Brinkman, Jr. gets special kudos for pushing the moratorium issue. Others such as Professor Howard Tolley have waged a brave campaign to educate the residents of Hamilton County on the human rights abuses associated with the death penalty. Our only question is, when will the so-called more moderate City Council in Columbus act accordingly.
THE FREE PRESS SALUTES
Progressive/peace activists
Cincinnati City Council
Seven members of the Cincinnati City Council voted in December for a death penalty moratorium resolution. While symbolic, the resolution in nonetheless significant since Ohio’s third largest city sits in Hamilton County where the County Prosecutor has sentenced more people to death row than Franklin and Cuyahoga counties combined. State Representative Tom Brinkman, Jr. gets special kudos for pushing the moratorium issue. Others such as Professor Howard Tolley have waged a brave campaign to educate the residents of Hamilton County on the human rights abuses associated with the death penalty. Our only question is, when will the so-called more moderate City Council in Columbus act accordingly.
THE FREE PRESS SALUTES
Progressive/peace activists
The disaster that unfolded before our eyes on September 11th has generated a number of articles attempting to explain how this event could have occurred. The majority of these articles tended to start with one of two assumptions. The first assumed that the perpetuators of this crime were purely madmen, religious fanatics incapable of comprehension. Consequently, theses articles required little in the form of analysis, relying primarily on code words anchored by a crass nationalism.
The second assumed that the perpetrators while indeed criminals, nevertheless were not simply madmen and religious fanatics but driven to their actions by some force no matter how perverted. Consequently, these articles were less popular with the public given their seemingly non-patriot stance and more difficult to write since they required, to a certain degree at least, some self reflection primarily that of United States foreign policy.
The second assumed that the perpetrators while indeed criminals, nevertheless were not simply madmen and religious fanatics but driven to their actions by some force no matter how perverted. Consequently, these articles were less popular with the public given their seemingly non-patriot stance and more difficult to write since they required, to a certain degree at least, some self reflection primarily that of United States foreign policy.
When a large company is getting clobbered by news stories
and pundits, the damage-control response often includes packing
full-page newspaper ads with solemn reassurances. That's what the
Arthur Andersen accounting firm has been doing lately to wash
some of the mud off its name as the outfit that assisted with
Enron's phony bookkeeping.
Andersen is "committed to making fundamental changes in its business as a result of the issues raised by the Enron matter," says one of the big-type advertisements -- headlined "An Open Letter from Joe Berardino, Managing Partner and CEO, Andersen." The ad explains that changes "already taking place ... are major steps toward reforming our U.S. audit practice and transforming our firm."
Andersen is "committed to making fundamental changes in its business as a result of the issues raised by the Enron matter," says one of the big-type advertisements -- headlined "An Open Letter from Joe Berardino, Managing Partner and CEO, Andersen." The ad explains that changes "already taking place ... are major steps toward reforming our U.S. audit practice and transforming our firm."
AUSTIN, Texas -- As I write, the most riveting television drama
imaginable is being played out on C-Span, of all places.
The U.S. House of Representatives is debating campaign finance reform, and it's one of those days when all citizens should be political junkies. It doesn't get better than this -- the stakes couldn't be higher, the tension couldn't be thicker, the theater is superb. Passion, drama, comedy, hypocrisy, devious plot devices, splendid villains, noble heroes ... this is just the best. The casting director has a spectacular imagination: Tom DeLay and Dick Armey alternating in the role of Iago -- wow.
Speaker Dennis Hastert himself called the innocuous-sounding Shays-Meehan bill "Armageddon" for the Republican Party. Actually, it's more like "The Perils of Pauline," in which the dastardly villain keeps tying the helpless heroine (in this case, the Shays-Meehan bill) to the railroad tracks again. They've tried to kill this poor bill so many times and in so many ways, it's become slightly ludicrous.
The U.S. House of Representatives is debating campaign finance reform, and it's one of those days when all citizens should be political junkies. It doesn't get better than this -- the stakes couldn't be higher, the tension couldn't be thicker, the theater is superb. Passion, drama, comedy, hypocrisy, devious plot devices, splendid villains, noble heroes ... this is just the best. The casting director has a spectacular imagination: Tom DeLay and Dick Armey alternating in the role of Iago -- wow.
Speaker Dennis Hastert himself called the innocuous-sounding Shays-Meehan bill "Armageddon" for the Republican Party. Actually, it's more like "The Perils of Pauline," in which the dastardly villain keeps tying the helpless heroine (in this case, the Shays-Meehan bill) to the railroad tracks again. They've tried to kill this poor bill so many times and in so many ways, it's become slightly ludicrous.
Call it another skirmish in the war on terror, which is
translating these days as more or less anything deemed unpalatable to social
harmony. Los Angeles school officials are pulling an edition of the Koran
from the district's libraries because of complaints that the footnotes are
anti-Semitic. This particular edition of Islam's Good Book dates from 1934.
An example of one such offending footnote: "The Jews in their arrogance claimed that all wisdom and all knowledge of Allah was enclosed in their hearts. But there were more things in heaven and earth than were dreamt of in their philosophy. Their claim was not only arrogance but blasphemy."
This doesn't seem so bad, but I suppose you can never be too careful. A story in the Los Angeles Times reports that copies of "The Meaning of the Holy Quran" were donated in December to the Los Angeles Unified School District by a local Muslim foundation. A school district official told the Times that the books, a goodwill gesture in response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, were distributed to the schools last week "without the usual content review."
An example of one such offending footnote: "The Jews in their arrogance claimed that all wisdom and all knowledge of Allah was enclosed in their hearts. But there were more things in heaven and earth than were dreamt of in their philosophy. Their claim was not only arrogance but blasphemy."
This doesn't seem so bad, but I suppose you can never be too careful. A story in the Los Angeles Times reports that copies of "The Meaning of the Holy Quran" were donated in December to the Los Angeles Unified School District by a local Muslim foundation. A school district official told the Times that the books, a goodwill gesture in response to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, were distributed to the schools last week "without the usual content review."
DEA Backs Down in Face of Imminent Court Action
ARLINGTON, VA -- The Drug Enforcement Administration handed a victory to the multimillion-dollar-a-year hemp food industry last night when they told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit they will extend the "grace period" for hemp food products that contain "any THC." The extension reassures retailers stocking and selling hemp food products that, for the next 40 days, the DEA will not commence enforcement action. Ultimately, the hemp food industry expects to prevail against the DEA's attempt to ban hemp foods because Congress exempted nutritious hemp seed and oil from regulation (see 21 U.S.C. §802(16)), and the trace infinitesimal THC in hemp seed and oil is not psychoactive and does not interfere with workplace drug-testing (see http://www.TestPledge.com).
ARLINGTON, VA -- The Drug Enforcement Administration handed a victory to the multimillion-dollar-a-year hemp food industry last night when they told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit they will extend the "grace period" for hemp food products that contain "any THC." The extension reassures retailers stocking and selling hemp food products that, for the next 40 days, the DEA will not commence enforcement action. Ultimately, the hemp food industry expects to prevail against the DEA's attempt to ban hemp foods because Congress exempted nutritious hemp seed and oil from regulation (see 21 U.S.C. §802(16)), and the trace infinitesimal THC in hemp seed and oil is not psychoactive and does not interfere with workplace drug-testing (see http://www.TestPledge.com).
AUSTIN, Texas -- Enron, the biggest financial failure in U.S.
history, is bigger than Enron. It's also bigger than Global Crossing and all
the earn ings restatements headed our way, too.
"Systemic," "structural" and "epidemic" are the key words here. Take, for example, the gladsome tidings that Enron paid no taxes whatever during four of the past five years by cleverly transferring its assets to 881 subsidiaries in tax-shelter countries. (Also take the item that Enron would have gotten a $254 million tax rebate under the Republican "economic stimulus" package -- please. The bill is now mercifully defunct.)
Enron's tax practices are so common that the Center for Public Integrity estimates they cost the country $195 billion a year, which means the rest of us have to make up that missing tax money. That comes to $1,600 per taxpayer. See? Your very own stake in the Enron fiasco.
"Systemic," "structural" and "epidemic" are the key words here. Take, for example, the gladsome tidings that Enron paid no taxes whatever during four of the past five years by cleverly transferring its assets to 881 subsidiaries in tax-shelter countries. (Also take the item that Enron would have gotten a $254 million tax rebate under the Republican "economic stimulus" package -- please. The bill is now mercifully defunct.)
Enron's tax practices are so common that the Center for Public Integrity estimates they cost the country $195 billion a year, which means the rest of us have to make up that missing tax money. That comes to $1,600 per taxpayer. See? Your very own stake in the Enron fiasco.