From “Dominion” to domination: the duplicity and complicity of Matthew Scully

In 2002, arch-conservative Matthew Scully wrote a book called, Dominion: The Power of Man, The Suffering of Animals, and The Call to Mercy, that was universally and uncritically acclaimed by the animal advocacy movement. Because this movement is overwhelmingly single-issue in its focus, and in most cases doesn’t care about a person’s views or politics except how they relate to animals, no one had a problem with the fact that Scully was a senior speechwriter for President George W. Bush. He wrote some of the key fear-peddling diatribes that got Bush elected and he was recently re-enlisted to help Bush sell the Iraq war “surge” to the American people.

Logical consequences

Call it creative self-destruction, maybe.

How surreal it’s been this week to watch the Republicans reap a small portion of the divine comeuppance due them, first from a hurricane, then from a pregnant teen-ager. Surely more of the same is on its way, but no one wins, because what is lying in a shambles around the McCain campaign is a harvest of suffering.

The bad ideas of the Republican right, or rather the consequences of those ideas — from pre-emptive war to abstinence-only sex education to the merger of church and state to let’s-drown-government-in-the-bathtub — started taking over the Republican National Convention, bursting the levees of managed news and disciplined hypocrisy. Suddenly eight years of extreme cynicism began generating (it’s a miracle) . . . bad press.

Palin and gay rights: the straight dope

 In the immediate aftermath of the announcement of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as John McCain's running mate, the Arizona senator's campaign had success in portraying the anti-choice social conservative as friendly to the gay community.

Republican Senator John McCain has selected Sarah Palin, Alaska's governor and a little-known conservative with a slim record on gay and AIDS issues, to be his running mate in the 2008 presidential race.

"She's fairly socially conservative, she's fairly anti-choice," said Jeffrey A. Mittman, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Alaska (ACLU).

Palin became governor in 2006 after serving as a councilwoman and then mayor of a small Alaskan town. She made an unsuccessful run at becoming Alaska's lieutenant governor in 2002. Palin has confronted a single piece of gay rights legislation in that time.

In 2005, Alaska's highest court ruled, in a case brought in 1999 on behalf of nine couples, that the state could not deny benefits to the domestic partners of state government employees. The court ordered the state to implement that ruling in late 2006.

Rovian politics chose Sarah Palin

What does it say about John McCain that he picked not only the least experienced Vice Presidential nominee in America’s history, but someone he really doesn’t know? Departing so far from any normal concept of appropriate background, he should at least have had a sense of why this individual is so special. Meeting Palin once at a Republican governors’ conference and having a single phone conversation on the eve of her selection just doesn’t pass muster—particularly for the oldest presidential candidate ever, who’s had four malignant melanomas.

What makes Palin such a cynical choice is that McCain doesn’t know her and doesn’t know what drives her. Until she was selected by the Karl Rove types running his campaign (like campaign manager and Rove protégé Steve Schmidt), McCain might not even have recognized her on the street. Instead, she’s a category selection, made for the crassest reasons by the same kinds of political operatives who brought us George W. Bush.

Bob Fitrakis: Report from the RNC

Election transparency advocates, 9/11 Truth seekers and Ron Paul partisans staged a rally at the Minnesota Statehouse. The crowd of a few hundred was attributed in part to demonstration fatigue and massive arrests during the week. The march to the convention center that housed the Republican gathering still stretched two blocks long. Along the way, there were MPs from the Minnesota National Guard, police officers everywhere – from bike patrols to those in riot gear. The first four young people we passed advocated the “Get it on” agenda with slogans on the back of their shirts saying “evolve.” It turned out they were advertisers for condoms. A few marchers asked the Trojan youth squad why they hadn’t been active earlier and helped VP candidate Palin’s daughter. One marcher suggested that had Trojan been more active, perhaps they could have prevented the conception of Bush, thus making the world a better place to live.

Raiding democracy in St. Paul

Over 300 protesters, bystanders, media, and medics arrested at RNC
Two minors convicted of contempt, sentenced to 30 days in adult jail

St. Paul, MN -- Two days into the Republican National Convention (RNC), more than 300 people have been arrested, including at least 120 people for felonies -- mostly the notoriously vague charge, 'conspiracy to riot.' With no provocation, police have indiscriminately used rubber bullets, concussion grenades, and chemical irritants to disperse crowds and incapacitate protestors. Police appear to be specifically targeting videographers documenting these police abuses. In response, lawyers have filed a federal restraining order against such conduct.

By the end of the day today, only 12 people had been arraigned. Many arrestees are refusing to provide identification, in order to call attention to what they consider trumped-up charges and to collectively bargain. 'These tactics are designed to protect the most vulnerable people in jail, and take a page from the history of labor solidarity,' said Rick Kelley of Coldsnap Legal Collective, an activist-based legal collective

Amy Goodman Arrested in Minneapolis at RNC - Take Action Now

Yesterday, police in St. Paul arrested several journalists, including Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman and an AP photographer as they were covering protests of the Republican National Convention. Amy Goodman and others were released last night, but the story is not over. We need you to cosign our public letter demanding that press intimidation cease immediately, and that all charges be dropped. It will be delivered immediately to St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman, the RNC Host Committee and the local prosecuting attorneys. We need 10,000 signatures in the next 24 hours, so please take action now:

Sign the Letter: Drop All Charges Against Journalists

Shocking choice by John McCain

WASHINGTON-- Senator John McCain just announced his choice for running mate:  Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska.  To follow is a statement by Rodger Schlickeisen, president of Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund. 

Senator McCain's choice for a running mate is beyond belief. By choosing Sarah Palin, McCain has clearly made a decision to continue the Bush legacy of destructive environmental policies. 

Sarah Palin, whose husband works for BP, has repeatedly put special interests first when it comes to the environment. In her scant two years as governor, she has lobbied aggressively to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, pushed for more drilling off of Alaska's coasts, and put special interests above science. Ms. Palin has made it clear through her actions that she is unwilling to do even as much as the Bush administration to address the impacts of global warming. Her most recent effort has been to sue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to remove the polar bear from the endangered species list, putting Big Oil before sound science. As unbelievable as this may sound, this actually puts her to the right of the Bush administration.   

Help the evacuees from New Orleans

This is a call to support the evacuation of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricanes Gustav's potential landfall within the next several days. As many of you know, thousands of our people are presently evacuating the area. In the attempt to learn from preparedness shortcomings of Hurricane Katrina, a network of New Orleans activists, some whom have evacuated already and others whom are intent on staying are in the process of creating a support network which is in need of all our help.
How you can help (outside of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast):
1. Serve as a point of contact in your area for evacuees.

2. Help create safe and accessible relief networks and stations in your city/region. This is particularly going to be crucial for allies in Northern Louisiana, Jackson, and Memphis, where it appears most of the evacuees are going to be stationed. We hope to have identified the rest of the specific cities by this evening.
3. Serve as a media liaison for the support network and the forces staying in New Orleans.

It's Labor Day for great expectations

American unions are celebrating Labor Day this year with greater expectations for a resurgence than they’ve had in many years, thanks to their political allies.

Labor is aiming for a sharp reversal of what has been a steady decline in union membership and influence, and expects to get it with the active support of influential Democrats led by presidential candidate Barack Obama and key members of Congress.

What unions want most from the Democrats is the proposed Employee Free Choice Act, which would knock down the barriers that have stunted union growth for most of the past half-century, so that today only about 12 percent of the nation’s workers belong to unions.

Obama and many other Democrats have already lined up behind the proposed law, and unions are mounting major campaigns aimed at turning out more than 13 million union-oriented voters to help elect them and any other Democrats who will join them.

Many employers, aided and abetted by the notoriously anti-labor Bush administration, have been able to make union membership meaningless, if not impossible, by illegally interfering in unionization drives.

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