Clinton Did It

They're still out there, making up ways to blame the disasters produced by right wing ideology on US. Yes, we fought against them, voted against, and demonstrated less often than we should have against, the Eat the Poor policies that now your wingers want to blame on us.

From my comments on the post about abstinence-only education increasing pregnancies and disease;

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

This old fake fact seems to work it's way around the web over and over. It's interesting that no one ever sites data sources unless it comes from Planned Parenthood which itself does not site any scientific facts either. And let us stop blaming Bush, the Abstinence only Sex Ed was a Clinton era program that also ran through the Bush administrations time. They did not start it Clinton did
2:34 PM
Blogger Ruth said...

SAdly it had to be the kids that took the brunt of the research conducted by the wingnuts, as shown in Dallas not long ago, and now nationally. We don't need to show the birth certificate in this one.
2:50 PM
Blogger Ruth said...

sorry, forgot to put in the info;
'Abstinence-only policies go back to the early years of Ronald Reagan and intensified while Bill Clinton was in office, when Republicans slipped a provision into welfare reform legislation. Bush began his crusade from the mid-Nineties when he was governor of Texas.'

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/jan/02/usa.joannawalters
2:55 PM

They're still out there, trying to keep the public interest from being represented, then blaming us when they defeat what would be best for everyone, including themselves.

Those of you who work, visit or live with the crazies know, the arguments are put out to right wing groups, and disaster results while the wingers keep on insisting that if only you give them their way everything will be ideal. The proof that they have procided that this just is totally wrong does not work on the crazies. Newest mantra, the H1N1 virus is made of baby juices and something from monkeys.

The only way to counter craziness is treatment. As you have heard from me if you've read these posts for awhile, treatment isn't always effective to do more than drive the crazies into hiding what they really think, as a close family member of mine shows me often. Those freeper posts and commenters, and callers to CSpan who inform sometimes educated and informed hosts that the Jews are running the country and hold secret ceremonies which include xtian blood, that the president was born in Kenya, that the Secretary of State is in a lesbian collusion against straight education and besides, President Clinton is responsible for 911 and the economy tanking - it goes on and on - are real and they walk among us.

The only way I know to counter them is to repeat, and publish, facts. By doing that here, I hope that I've helped you and thinking intelligent life forms somewhat. I will be posted on future afternoons, on Saturdays and Sundays, at http://seminal.firedoglake.com/ where I hope that you will visit, as I will continue offering some help for us to perpetuate sane policies and thought.

And, yes, my glance does cause milk to spoil ... if you leave it out of the refrigerator long enough.

Wingers Getting It Wrong For the Kids

Our founding fathers would be dismayed at many things that the wingers have done to their concept of independence, but teaching that God made them do it would not pass muster. These intellectuals who were dismissive of the fundamentalist teachings of colonial days were not about to carry water for any church. Now present day fundies - who want their church to tell you what your body ought to be required to do - are trying to teach your children their own version of history.

That the enemies of our country envy our freedoms is actually true among these screwy revisionists.

The Christian right is making a fresh push to force religion onto the school curriculum in Texas with the state's education board about to consider recommendations that children be taught that there would be no United States if it had not been for God.

Members of a panel of experts appointed by the board to revise the state's history curriculum, who include a Christian fundamentalist preacher who says he is fighting a war for America's moral soul, want lessons to emphasise the part played by Christianity in the founding of the US and that religion is a civic virtue.

Opponents have decried the move as an attempt to insert religious teachings in to the classroom by stealth, similar to the Christian right's partially successful attempt to limit the teaching of evolution in biology lessons in Texas.

One of the panel, David Barton, founder of a Christian heritage group called WallBuilders, argues that the curriculum should reflect the fact that the US Constitution was written with God in mind including that "there is a fixed moral law derived from God and nature", that "there is a creator" and "government exists primarily to protect God-given rights to every individual".

Barton says children should be taught that Christianity is the key to "American exceptionalism" because the structure of its democratic system is a recognition that human beings are fallible, and that religion is at the heart of being a virtuous citizen.

Another of the experts is Reverend Peter Marshall, who heads his own Christian ministry and preaches that Hurricane Katrina and defeat in the Vietnam war were God's punishment for sexual promiscuity and tolerance of homosexuals. Marshall recommended that children be taught about the "motivational role" of the Bible and Christianity in establishing the original colonies that later became the US.
(snip)
Social studies teachers will meet shortly to consider the panel's views and make their own recommendations to the board of education which has the final say. The board is dominated by conservatives who appointed Barton and Marshall to the panel.

These revisionists ought to be given no say at all in school curriculum. It's doubtful that most churches would allow such drivel to be taught in their bible schools and most parents I know would snatch their children out of any school where such nonsense was taught.

The right wing has been working its way into posts of responsibility to spread their poison, and our negligence of our own citizenship has allowed it to happen by not being involved in our own government locally. I'm guilty, too, since I found out that wingnuts had sought and gotten positions in our city government several years back but thought they'd learn something which might be to everyone's good.

Nothing positive happens when the ignorant get into positions of authority. In Dallas, the Health Department has been allowed once again to distribute condoms - after prohibiting the practice resulted in increased occurrences of HIV, and unwanted pregnancies.

Our founding fathers were men of amazing intellect, and despoiling the great country we've been fortunate to inherit is not to be allowed. Separation of church and state may not be written into the constitution, but our freedoms are spelled out quite definitively, even when it did take many years to extend them to most of our citizens.

We need to protect this country from those who want to deprive us of our freedom. Our children are at risk once again, in Texas.

Feed the Soul - Garden

Today, at Monkeyfister, June 9 entry, I got a very good idea. And I do have oyster mushroom spores in limbo, since I did all the drilling I could get through to plant them in my oak log mushroom farm. I pass on to you gardeners an excellent way to keep your garden soil rich.

Get a batch of mushroom spores. Then do as Monkeyfister says, and has done, and as I am about to go do.

In the meantime, they are really working wonders under the surface in my beds. I've not seen such vigorous plant health ever in my many days of gardening. Everything is doing great. The only real new addition to my usual soil mixture is the Mushrooms. I think it's obvious what a difference beneficial Mushrooms can make in your garden.

As MadSat reminds us-- Worms were IMPORTED to North America. Before worms, there were only the Fungi. But, speaking of worms...

Time to get out to a golf course, and harvest some Night-Crawlers from the greens. A public service to the greens keepers. Worms wreak havok on golf greens. After the evening watering, the Night-Crawlers tunnel up, leaving little piles on the greens, and then they crawl freely across that short, tender grass, leaving little grooves for a golf ball to pick up...

Need worms for your garden, or fishing bait? Go to the golf course-- to the greens. Be nice, and wear some golfing shoes, and try not to really walk into the greens-- the worms are coming out from the longer grass anyway... Oh, and put something red over your flashlight. Worms can't see red. If you walk slowly, and it's late enough, around 11pm or later, you should be able to just scoop them up off the grass. Otherwise, you have to sneak up on them, quickly, but gently grab them, and slowly pull, and coax them to let go of their hole. If you break one, don't keep it. Let it go. With this advice, you'll figure it out. Latex surgical gloves are good for the squeamish.

Worms and Mushrooms-- put them in your raised-bed gardens. For you row and tiller gardeners-- this isn't really for you. It'll be a waste of money and effort. You'll just grind the worms up, and kill the fungi. I'm not judging, that's just what happens when tiller meets dirt.

My fingers are itching for some dirt grubbing now. Be sure to follow the link, where you'll find great pictures as well.

You Write the Book of Life

Am I the only one who thinks of all of you readers/commenters when I see that the public is being informed they are needed to compile a Book of Life? The observations we get here are so observant, and give such an informed view of our world, I think most of you should take part.

Based at the Smithsonian Institute, for the U.S. portion of the effort, this study will have a perfect source. I had such a privilege being able to visit there with my kids when we lived in the D.C. suburbs, and am excited to think the study will make it more a part of all of our lives. Our weekly birds, critters, and general familiarity with the natural world, will be enhanced. Yes, plantsman and monkeyfister, War On War Off and shrimplate, and many many other natural world observers, I'm looking at you! and linking the address. The ecosphere conference e-Biosphere '09 is going on in London right now! Go to the link and you can twitter with that event's participants.

A virtual book of all life on Earth is being created by UK and US scientists.

The online reference work will create a detailed world map of flora and fauna and track changes in biodiversity.

The database, dubbed a "macroscopic observatory', will be populated with data about local species gathered by members of the public.

Early elements of the giant database, such as automatic species identification systems, are already under construction.

Field guide

Over time the database will log shifts in species and other data such as changes in the density of forests and when plants first flower.

As you know, things are moving up on the schedule of blooming here in N.TX., while the dry line is moving eastward toward my little plot of earth. I was sending you pictures of daffodils and tulips in February. I know all of you see things changing in your window on the world as well.

I'm hearing baby birds being fed near my window now, and will happily report on it. Kites have moved into the southern area of town, birds I hadn't seen there before this spring. Last year, we had a dismal acorn crop.

These are things that each of us can report on, and I know you will want to help out and contribute to the body of knowledge about our world.

Those Beginnings

Today I visited the oldest structures made by man that still exist in Europe, the Temples of Tarxien and Hagar Qim on Malta. These are still somewhat crude, and deteriorated, constructions, but the feeling of standing where men began to build, to make something of their own conception, is quite heartening.

To quarry the limestone here on the island of Malta isn't as difficult as some places, it's a soft limestone that carves easily. The color is lemony, and many of the blocks that otherwise would just have been stone are pitted with regular, round holes all over the surface like measles. Or, more like, bubbles. The places seem to have been places of worship, and a few predictably pregnant carvings of women are placed where they seem to have been the objects of the worship. Large, skirted remains are still left at Tarzien, though the actual statues have been replaced with replicas so the originals can be preserved.

We were on the sea coast at Hagar Qim, with a glorious view that must have inspired many yearnings for the original Maltese, and there is an alignment with the sun at Spring and Fall solstices. From the inside of the temple, the sun will come up over the land just inside the door from the altar. Our guide has been there for the event, and says she was disappointed not to be there alone, but have hundreds of other aspiring sun advocates around her.

Our guide also maintained that the temples on Malta are the earliest structures in the world, but I'd be surprised if there aren't structures out in the wilds of China, maybe even in S. America, with histories as old. These are dated back 5,000 years - although of course the world isn't that old according to some of our degenerated religious sects.

There is no written record to tell us about the temples on Malta, so everything we know is learned from the structures, and the carvings, themselves. They advance from the early, crude, first temple to groupings of three, each progressively more skilled in its form. Our ancestors improving on themselves seems endearing to me.

As we sailed back out of the harbor, I was enthralled to see that solar panels were powering the lighthouse at the outer realm of the bay where we'd been harboring. That solar observation we began with is proving to have a lot to offer, indeed. Improving on our ancesters as always.

Payback Time

The record of Dallas in incarcerating the innocent led to embarrassment that probably was a large part of the reason a decent District Attorney, Craig Watkins, was elected. This is a subject I've covered several times before. Blogging and other forms of publicity about the crimes of the city has had several epochal results.

DA Watkins opened DNA records to Project Innocence. In turn the records research led to exonerations of 19 prisoners who had been imprisoned although they were innocent. The releases of those innocents brought attention from a whole nation, most especially those of good conscience. In the ultimately idyllic Rube Goldberg effect, that has led now to such a revulsion against the crimes officialdom had committed, that new legislation is working in the Texas legislature toward correcting those wrongs. Some even goes so far as to redeem the state to some extent by attempting to return some of their destroyed lives to the victims.

The cause of criminal justice reform made important headway in Austin last week, evidence that lawmakers are sobered by Texas' distinction as the leading state for DNA exonerations.

It was striking that key bills that would strengthen the justice system cleared a Senate committee with no votes cast against them. We encourage lawmakers to keep up the momentum.

One of the bills, by Sen. Royce West of Dallas, confronts the cruel reality that innocent men have been freed after years – even decades – in prison with no preparation for a radically changed free world.

The legislation sees to it that these men receive medical, psychological and rehabilitative help to reestablish themselves. They currently receive compensation money, but that doesn't fully repay the debt to these men robbed of their freedom and dignity. The state should provide a hand up as well.

That debt is especially acute in Dallas County, which leads the nation with 19 exonerations proven up by DNA tests.

Just as important for lawmakers is guarding against future miscarriage of justice. Two bills that cleared committee unanimously address core weaknesses revealed by DNA exonerations. One would require police agencies to adopt written policies for photo lineups that conform to best practices set out by a panel of experts. The other pushes investigators to record interviews with eyewitnesses.

The power of public opinion has been successfully unleashed and should continue to be brought to bear on people's elected representatives to overturn these injustices.

It would appear from recent events with respect to this injustice by the system, and overreaching CEO's in the financial industry, that public opinion can be an increasingly great force for good. There is absolutely no excuse for failing to condemn injustices that cry out to be corrected, and crimes that should be punished. Yes, you will hear more from this blog about the need to punish war crimes, too.

I suspect that the right wing in mobilizing its grassroots may have led to its own overthrow, as it seems that having come into the public realm those common folks are no longer able to avoid seeing the crimes of those they supported. I suspect they increasingly are offended by, and beginning to mobilize against, The Base.

Avedon's proposed logo of crossed pitchfork and torch may be the sign of these times.

Going on All Fours

An electorate that prefers feudalism often tends to give Texas education a slant back into the dark ages. Yesterday, the state narrowly avoided becoming more of a joke than it already is. By a margin of nothing, a tie vote from our state's School Board kept evolution from being hounded out of science curricula.

That may sound like an item from the early nineteenth century, but you see in our state we have a huge number of voters who are afraid of anything rational. It contradicts the foundations of their entire system. If we go rational it injures their sense of worth.

In a decision watched by science educators across the nation, the State Board of Education on Thursday narrowly turned aside a last-ditch effort by social conservatives to require that "weaknesses" in the theory of evolution be taught in science classes in Texas.

Board members deadlocked 7-7 on a motion to restore a longtime curriculum rule that "strengths and weaknesses" of all scientific theories – notably Charles Darwin's theory of evolution – be covered in science classes and textbooks for those subjects.

The tie vote upheld a preliminary decision by the board in January to delete the strengths-and-weaknesses rule in the new curriculum standards for science classes that will be in force for the next decade. That decision, if finalized in a last vote today, changes 20 years of Texas education policy.

Because the standards spell out what must be covered in textbooks, science educators and publishers have been monitoring the Texas debate closely. As one of the largest textbook purchasers in the nation, Texas influences what is sold in other states.

The science standards adopted by the board also will figure into questions used on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills.

Voting for the requirement were the seven Republican board members aligned with social conservative groups. Against the proposal were three other Republicans and four Democrats. Critics of evolution managed to add a few small caveats to the curriculum, but none as sweeping as the strengths-and-weaknesses rule.

Board member Ken Mercer, R-San Antonio, proposed that the rule be put back into the standards, arguing that evolution advocates were trying to stifle classroom discussion of Darwin's theory that humans gradually developed from lower life forms.

"I don't see how we can say there is no disagreement about evolution. There is disagreement," said Mercer, taking issue with science teachers and academics who told the board that the theory of evolution is universally accepted in the scientific community. He cited a document by hundreds of scientists questioning some of Darwin's tenets.

He also charged that evolution advocates have a history of falsifying evidence and drawing erroneous conclusions to support their position.
(snip)
The language adopted by board members on evolution and other scientific theories states that students shall "analyze and evaluate scientific explanations using empirical evidence, logical reasoning and experimental and observational testing."

Action on the science standards caps several months of debate. The issue last flared up when the board adopted new biology textbooks in 2003, when social conservatives tried to reject books that were deemed too pro-evolution but failed.

This being a new century really threatens those elements that prefer faith, because it's comfortable, to functional. Sadly, the same elements who proclaim their faith sustains them insist that we have to act on its basis too.

The right wing likes to think if they just had the rest of us under control, it would make the world work out better for them. The shame of it all is that we have to keep combating rampant ignorance to keep their kids, as well as ours, from being denied their rights to education.

P.Z. Myers had a rant worth sharing this morning on the occasion of a winger who waxed self-righteous over the death of children on their way to a ski trip in Montana.

Once again, I am confirmed in my opinion that Christianity is a breeder of evil, a cesspit in which the most hateful and inhuman commitment to lies and delusions can ferment. Don't ever preach at me about Christian morality: I've seen it, and it is empty of love for humanity, replaced with sanctimonious idolatry and commitment to dead, dumb superstition.

While I think there are exceptions, it is always a source of amazement that so many base a belief system devoid of acceptance for their fellow men on teachings that emphasize love and tolerance.

Decriminalization of Islamic Community

Something I discovered to my dismay while attending the Holy Land Foundation trial in Dallas Federal Court was the extent to which the past occupied White House demonized the entire Islamic world. The entire community is served by 'zakat' committees in Palestine, yet our government made a case for judging as criminal the character of those charitable operations.

As we learn new offenses against humanity daily in the unraveling of Gitmo, we are learning the effect of our government's prejudices against Islam as a whole. Our government which represented us to the world for eight years was criminal in its conduct.

There are some rational beings who have continued to behave humanely through the eight years of criminal conduct just past.

No task is greater than educating children and teaching them compassion and philanthropy. Greg Mortenson, a unique humanitarian, is doing all this and more. So it's fitting that he is this year's winner of the prestigious Austin College Leadership Award, with its $100,000 prize; caring and learning about the world are an integral part of Austin College education.

Mortenson shows what an ordinary person can do to change our idea about attaining peace: Peace is achieved through education and friendship, not through violence and war. The Pentagon, too, understands his philosophy. His international bestseller, Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace ... One School at a Time, is required reading for military intelligence training.

For Mortenson, a mountaineer, it all started in 1993, when in memory of his younger sister Christa, he began climbing the K2, the world's second-highest mountain. But he failed miserably and almost died. All this happened because a team member got sick, and they had to turn around. On the way back, he got lost. He walked 58 miles in those desolate, harsh mountains, with little food and stumbled into a poor village, Korphe, in northeast Pakistan – near Afghanistan and in the Taliban's back yard.

At Korphe, he was welcomed by Haji Ali, the village chief, and his family. They saved his life, and later, the chief became his mentor. Moved by the villagers' generosity, he wanted to do something in return. Then he saw the village children writing with sticks on sand, out in the elements, for they had no school building or paper. Mortenson promised to build a school at Korphe. Educating children, he felt, would be a more meaningful memorial to his departed sister.

But he had no money. His story, however, inspired the students of his mother's elementary school in Wisconsin. They collected 62,340 pennies to help him. In the process, Mortenson launched the children's philanthropic program, Pennies for Peace, in which children collect pennies to aid the needy. With financial help from Jean Hoerni, a scientist, he co-founded the Central Asia Institute. With local support, the institute has built 78 schools in the remote mountains of Pakistan and Afghanistan to teach more than 28,000 children, 18,000 of whom are girls. A young readers' edition of Three Cups Tea, with a subtitle, "One Man's Journey to Change the World ...One Child at a Time," says a lot about shaping minds. Ignorance, poverty and isolation make a fertile ground for the Taliban.

Once ignored and maligned, Mortenson is now mentioned for the Nobel Peace Prize. But why has he succeeded where others have failed? Because he disregarded the prevailing notion that Muslims as a group are a violent lot. He strived to learn about the people and their faith, Islam. "The true core tenets of Islam are justice, tolerance and charity," he wrote from experience.

But his success did not come easily. When he started his project, he was vilified and threatened by both the Taliban and Americans. The Taliban was angry about the education of girls. (Talibanists are blind to the Prophet's teaching: Learning is a duty of every Muslim, male or female.) And Americans were angry about the education of the "enemies." Yet, despite the risks, Moretenson and his family persevered.

In the quest for peace, we can't be bystanders. Jane Goodall, the primatologist and humanitarian, put it best for us: "When we truly understand about people and their lives in other countries ... when we become friends, then the world becomes a happier and a safer place."

The representation of our essential decency has been left to committed humane people like Mortenson while war criminals were in power. Now that that dark time is over, hopefully more can be done to return our country to a place among civilized nations.

Thanks to all those who kept the faith during the years of criminal control of the U.S. executive branch.

P.U. Awards

This has so many gems for readers, I just had to post it here for you.

Announcing: P.U.-litzer Prizes for 2008

By Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon

Now in their 17th year, the P.U.-litzer Prizes recognize some of the nation’s stinkiest media performances. As the judges for these annual awards, we do our best to identify the most deserving recipients of this unwelcome plaudit.

Announcing the P.U.-litzers Prizes for 2008:

HOT FOR OBAMA PRIZE -- MSNBC’s Chris Matthews
This award sparked fierce competition, but the cinch came on the day Obama swept the Potomac Primary in February -- when Chris Matthews spoke of “the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama’s speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg. I mean, I don’t have that too often.”

BEYOND PARODY PRIZE -- Fox News
In August, a FoxNews.com teaser for the “O’Reilly Factor” program
said: “Obama bombarded by personal attacks. Are they legit? Ann Coulter comments.”

UPSIDE DOWN “ELITIST” AWARD -- New York Times columnist David Brooks
For months, high-paid Beltway journalists competed with each other in advising candidate Obama on how to mingle with working class folks. Ubiquitous pundit Brooks won the prize for his wisdom on reaching “less educated people, downscale people,” offered on MSNBC in June: “Obama’s problem is he doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who could go into an Applebee’s salad bar and people think he fits in naturally there. And so he’s had to change to try to be more like that Applebee’s guy.” It would indeed be hard for Obama to fit in naturally at an Applebee’s salad bar. Applebee’s restaurants don’t have salad bars.

GUTTER BALL PUNDITRY AWARD -- Chris Matthews of MSNBC’s “Hardball”
In program after program during the spring, Matthews repeatedly questioned whether Obama could connect with “regular” voters -- “regular” meaning voters who are white or “who actually do know how to bowl.” He once said of Obama: “This gets very ethnic, but the fact that he’s good at basketball doesn’t surprise anybody. But the fact that he’s that terrible at bowling does make you wonder.”

STRAIGHT SKINNY PRIZE -- Wall Street Journal reporter Amy Chozick
In August, the Journal’s Chozick went beyond the standard elitist charge to offer yet another reason that average voters might be wary of Obama. Below the headline “Too Fit to Be President?” she wrote of
Obama: “Despite his visits to waffle houses, ice-cream parlors and greasy-spoon diners around the country, his slim physique might have some Americans wondering whether he is truly like them.” Chozick
asked: “In a nation in which 66 percent of the voting-age population is overweight and 32 percent is obese, could Sen. Obama’s skinniness be a liability?” To support her argument, she quoted Hillary Clinton supporters. One said: “He needs to put some meat on his bones.” Another, prodded by Chozick, wrote on a Yahoo bulletin board: “I won’t vote for any beanpole guy.”

“OUR CENTER-RIGHT NATION” AWARD -- Newsweek editor Jon Meacham
With Democrats in the process of winning big in 2008 as they had in 2006, a media chorus erupted warning Democratic politicians away from their promises of change. Behind the warnings was the repeated claim that America is essentially a conservative country. In an election-eve Newsweek cover story with the sub-headline “America remains a center-right nation -- a fact that a President Obama would forget at his peril,” Meacham argued that the liberalism of even repeatedly re-elected FDR offended voters. And the editor claimed that a leftward trend in election results and issues polling means little -- as would Obama’s victory after months of charges that he stood for radical change. Evidence seemed to lose out to journalists’ fears that campaign promises might actually be kept.

BAILOUT BLUSTER AWARD -- Pundit David Brooks
On Sept. 30, just after the House defeated the $700 billion Wall Street bailout measure, Brooks’ column in the New York Times denounced the balking House members for their failure to heed “the collected expertise of the Treasury and Fed.” But a week later, after the House approved a bailout -- and with the credit crunch unabated and stock market still plunging -- Brooks wrote: “At these moments, central bankers and Treasury officials leap in to try to make the traders feel better. Officials pretend they’re coming up with policy responses, but much of what they do is political theater.” Now he tells us.

“STATUS QUO CENTRISTS CAN’T BE IDEOLOGUES” AWARD -- Too many to name
In late November, corporate media outlets began to credit Barack Obama with making supposedly non-ideological Cabinet picks. The New York Times front page reported that his choices “suggest that Mr. Obama is planning to govern from the center-right of his party, surrounding himself with pragmatists rather than ideologues.” Conservative Times columnist David Brooks praised the picks as “not ideological” and the economic nominees as “moderate and thoughtful Democrats.” USA Today reported that Obama’s selections had “records that display more pragmatism than ideology.” In mediaspeak, if you thought invading Iraq and signing the NAFTA trade pact were good ideas, you’re a pragmatist. If not, you’re an ideologue.

“WHO WOULD HAVE PREDICTED?” AWARD -- New York Times
The Times op-ed page marked the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion in March by choosing “nine experts on military and foreign affairs” to write on “the one aspect of the war that most surprised them or that they wish they had considered in the prewar debate.” None of the experts selected had opposed the invasion. That kind of exclusion made possible a bizarre claim by Times correspondent John Burns in the same day’s paper: “Only the most prescient could have guessed ... that the toll would include tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians killed, as well as nearly 4,000 American troops; or that America’s financial costs by some recent estimates, would rise above $650 billion by 2008.” Those who’d warned of such disastrous results were not only prescient, but were routinely excluded from mainstream coverage.

IMPERIALLY EMBEDDED PRIZE -- John Burns, New York Times
Described as “the longest-serving foreign correspondent in New York Times history,” Burns seemed less a skeptical reporter than a channeler of Henry Kissinger when he offered his world view to PBS’ Charlie Rose in April: “The United States and its predominant economic, political and military power in the world have been the single greatest force for stability in the world, such as it is now, certainly since the Second World War. If the outcome in Iraq were to destroy the credibility of American power, to destroy America’s willingness to use its power in the world to achieve good, to fight back against totalitarianism, authoritarianism, gross human rights abuses, it would be a very dark day.”

______________________________________________

Jeff Cohen, author of “Cable News Confidential,” is director of the Park Center for Independent Media at Ithaca College and the founder of the media watch group FAIR. Norman Solomon, author of “War Made Easy,” is a columnist on media and politics.

Applause is called for, and delivered.

Credit Where Due

When I have commented at this and some other sites, I have mentioned my belief that left leaning bloggers have kept the faith, and that while I am sure history will have a low view of the element that kept the war criminals in power, I think we need at least a chapter. Those of us who refused to accept, and have kept giving the lie to, the right wing, should get our due.

This morning, Avedon and Molly Ivors were saying that as well. So I thought I would go ahead and make a demand. You who are writing about this disgraceful period in American history, you can't throw us into that stew that created and perpetuated it.

The pressures we've been under just jumped out at me here, at the CNN Quick Vote:

Do you think the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, should be closed?
Yes 57% 155334
No 43% 117041
Total Votes: 272375

Who are these 43% who have no moral compass? Some of them occupy the executive branch of government, some of them couldn't make it through the PBS documentary I posted about earlier this week, "Torturing Democracy", and some of them are deluded by the Bill Kristol's of the press. But 57% of us know better, and some of us speak out against the atrocities, constantly.

There is another chilling item to explain the sympathizers. That is a report on a study conducted recently, that shows once again that subjects would consciously torture other human beings if they were given directions to do so, in a good cause. This replicated Milgram's earlier study that shocked the world. I think all of us just put it aside thinking it had been a peculiarity, and probably conducted by a much too convincing professor. Not so.

His study's design imitated Milgram's, even using the same scripts for the experimenter and suffering learner, but the key difference was that this experiment stopped at 150 volts -- when the learner starts asking to leave. In Milgram's experiment, 79 percent of participants who got to that point went all the way to the maximum shock, he said.

To eliminate bias from the fame of Milgram's experiment, Burger ruled out anyone who had taken two or more college-level psychology classes, and anyone who expressed familiarity with it in the debriefing. The "teachers" in this recent experiment, conducted in 2006, also received several reminders that they could quit whenever they wanted, unlike in Milgram's study.

The new results correlate well with Milgram's: 70 percent of the 40 participants were willing to continue after 150 volts, compared with 82.5 percent in Milgram's study -- a difference that is not statistically significant, Burger said. (Emphasis added.)

There are your 43%. If they are told something is right, they will break basic rules of conduct even to the point of inflicting pain, for that which they are told is right.

My footnote in history is that of the left wing. We will not commit crimes because the forces in charge say it's okay, it's for the right cause. We will dig in our heels and say NO. And as Diane said in her previous post, we may be very busy for awhile yet.

A Little Background

The takeover of Citi is so ludicrous a use of taxpayer moneys that it has been greeted with contempt by just about everyone. I have seen so much excellent skewering of it that I just recommend to you that you look around, it's pervasive. That myth of being 'too big to fail' has become laughable as increasingly the absence of consumers for supporting the economy testifies to the real weakness in present economic 'policies'.

As background, I liked a post at Walled-In Pond, and will give it to you here.


The jig is, as they say, up.
This piece, copied here from the Guardian, appeared in the Observer of London in September. It's been reproduced in this month's Harper's. It should be read by everyone with the brain function of an amoeba.

The global financial crisis will see the US falter in the same way the Soviet Union did when the Berlin Wall came down. The era of American dominance is over.

Our gaze might be on the markets melting down, but the upheaval we are experiencing is more than a financial crisis, however large. Here is a historic geopolitical shift, in which the balance of power in the world is being altered irrevocably. The era of American global leadership, reaching back to the Second World War, is over.

You can see it in the way America's dominion has slipped away in its own backyard, with Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez taunting and ridiculing the superpower with impunity. Yet the setback of America's standing at the global level is even more striking. With the nationalisation of crucial parts of the financial system, the American free-market creed has self-destructed while countries that retained overall control of markets have been vindicated. In a change as far-reaching in its implications as the fall of the Soviet Union, an entire model of government and the economy has collapsed.

Ever since the end of the Cold War, successive American administrations have lectured other countries on the necessity of sound finance. Indonesia, Thailand, Argentina and several African states endured severe cuts in spending and deep recessions as the price of aid from the International Monetary Fund, which enforced the American orthodoxy. China in particular was hectored relentlessly on the weakness of its banking system. But China's success has been based on its consistent contempt for Western advice and it is not Chinese banks that are currently going bust. How symbolic yesterday that Chinese astronauts take a spacewalk while the US Treasury Secretary is on his knees.

More Nuggets:

The populist rant about greedy banks that is being loudly ventilated in Congress is a distraction from the true causes of the crisis. The dire condition of America's financial markets is the result of American banks operating in a free-for-all environment that these same American legislators created. It is America's political class that, by embracing the dangerously simplistic ideology of deregulation, has responsibility for the present mess
....
The Iraq War and the credit bubble have fatally undermined America's economic primacy. The US will continue to be the world's largest economy for a while longer, but it will be the new rising powers that, once the crisis is over, buy up what remains intact in the wreckage of America's financial system.
...
The irony of the post-Cold War period is that the fall of communism was followed by the rise of another utopian ideology. In American and Britain, and to a lesser extent other Western countries, a type of market fundamentalism became the guiding philosophy. The collapse of American power that is underway is the predictable upshot. Like the Soviet collapse, it will have large geopolitical repercussions. An enfeebled economy cannot support America's over-extended military commitments for much longer. Retrenchment is inevitable and it is unlikely to be gradual or well planned. (Emphasis added.)


The article continues, rich (if you will) with insight and interpretation, and it seems to me damn near irrebuttable.

I have long believed that we middle-class Murkins alive today lived more luxuriously, and better--no matter our individual status--than any members of our class since it emerged in the 16th century. However, the middle class has always been target of the elites and oligarchs who rightly recognized it as a far greater threat to their own perqs and prerogatives than the groaning, oppressed peasants. As such, they have sought the myriad ways to bring down the middle-class, to weaken it and to strip it of its economic power. Economic depression has been just about infallible in that regard.

If you don't go over to Woody's post and take a look at the cartoon he used, you will be missing out on a treat.

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And there is going to be no end to it until January 20, 2009. We are in deep, deep doodoo, folks. President Bush said Monday that the first step toward economic recovery is to stabilize the financial system - and that the government may step in to help financial institutions again the way it did with Citigroup. An appropriate label for this news would be Highway Robbery.

Had Enough?

The meeting of the American-Pacific Economic Conference in Peru yesterday was not pushed into action by the financial crisis. Waiting for the next administration in the U.S. became the order of the day.

Worldwide action to stop the continuing disaster shows sound fundamentals, at last. The IMF, and World Bank, will be reformed because with other economic policy theaters they have acted to divert funds intended to shore up weaker countries into over-arching financial industries rather than fight poverty and hunger. The results are more than disgrace, they are fatal to the financial community as well. Proof has been irrevocably supplied, that robbing the poor to give to the rich makes everyone poorer. Starvation has trickled up, rather than wealth trickling down.

This at last is wisdom free from political posturing. A statement by Canada's PM Harper and Mexico's President Calderon indicates that the group refuses to be pushed into action that would carry out the continuing maladministration's failed economic ideology.

...Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada and President Felipe Calderón of Mexico blamed the United States for starting the crisis and called for better banking regulations.

"Our closest neighbor and largest trading partner is the epicenter of the financial earthquake and global slowdown," Harper said in a speech to business leaders.

Calderon said structural problems in the global economy were allowed to fester before spiraling out of control.

"This wasn't caused by developing countries," he said.

APEC members said they strongly supported recommendations made last week in Washington by the Group of 20 nations. Nine of APEC's members belong to the Group of 20.

The Group of 20 agreed to strive for a deal on key farm and manufactured goods trade issues in the Doha round by the end of the year. It also pushed for government spending or tax incentives to spur economies and tougher oversight of the financial industry.

Pascal Lamy, the World Trade Organization's director general, will chair a meeting of senior trade officials in Geneva on Sunday to assess the chances of reaching a deal.

But even if progress were made in Geneva on nagging disputes, Bush is a lame-duck president and Obama's stamp would be needed on any final pact.

Like all financial reporters, this writer prefers to coddle the criminals' whose misappropriation of funds has brought on the disaster we are muddling through until they are out of office. Lame duck status is not the main reason the APEC ministers refuse to self-destruct further by carrying out failed directives. The occupied White House's blind insistence on throwing the world's money into the financial sector having failed is the reason for putting off action until the adults are control.

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At The Sideshow, Avedon has a collection of reality-based posts titled All That Glitters that detail the crimes that have brought disaster to the entire world's economic status.

Biblical Hate Group

While I'm not Episcopalian, what I see happening near here is sad to me. Because the church has opened up to women and gays in its clergy, some of its Ft. Worth members are leaving. How anyone can use the Bible to justify prejudice is beyond me.

The hating division of any church doesn't seem to me like a group you'd want to join.

...the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth, including St. Stephen's, is to break officially from the Episcopal Church today, becoming the fourth diocese in the nation to leave since last year over such issues as the ordination of female priests and the acceptance of an openly gay bishop.

Though Ms. Carpenter doesn't agree with everything the Episcopal Church does, she loves it, and doesn't want to leave.

So on Sunday, she and other Episcopal Church loyalists from St. Stephen's plan to hold services at a local women's club.

"It's like a man and woman getting a divorce, and now they have to have two households," she said. "It saddens me greatly."

The 2.2 million-member Episcopal Church and other mainline denominations have long struggled over what is the true Christian approach on social issues. The fight has come to a head among Fort Worth Episcopalians, dividing congregations and setting up a legal showdown.

At the urging of Bishop Jack Iker, delegates to the Fort Worth Diocese's annual convention today are to take the final vote for realigning with a conservative, Argentina-based province of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

Fort Worth clergy and lay delegates overwhelmingly approved the break in a first vote at last year's diocesan convention, and Bishop Iker expects that margin to hold today.

"We no longer see a secure future in the Episcopal Church as traditional believers," he said.

Women as priests

Evidence of the conflict is perhaps best seen in the issue of female priests.

The Episcopal Church officially permitted female priests in 1976, and the Diocese of Dallas had its first in 1985. But the Fort Worth Diocese still hasn't had one.

"It's a departure from the biblical witness," Bishop Iker said, noting that Jesus chose 12 male apostles, "and from the historical practice of the church."

The Episcopal Church decided in 1997 that dioceses must allow female priests. Though that hasn't been enforced in Fort Worth, Bishop Iker is sure the Episcopal Church would eventually force the diocese to comply.

As more evidence of a church galloping down a liberal, nonbiblical path, Bishop Iker points to the 2003 decision by top church leaders to allow an openly gay bishop (the Rev. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire) and the 2006 election of a woman as presiding bishop (the Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori).

"We're not leaving the Episcopal Church," he said, echoing Ronald Reagan's quip about the Democratic Party. "The Episcopal Church has left us."

Of course, any church will be better off without people in its congregation who are determined to oppose other folks' way of life. Maybe they can name the new, split, congregation something that will tell prospective members that they are expected to be intolerant. May I suggest Episcopal Church of the Damned?

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As Avedon Carol points out at The Sideshow;
A letter to The Salt Lake Weekly suggests that there's something wrong with a church that can spend $20m to counter gay rights while many Utah families are living in shelters.

Doing The Job

Reports that the cretin in chief intends to blackmail rational public representatives with Columbia 'free trade' agreement, before he will do the job he took an oath to do, is no surprise. The public interest has been held ransom to get corporate welfare throughout this maladministration. The highest office in the land has been used to move policies that are a disgrace to the country.

Serving their country isn't something the new administration under President Obama have any disinclination toward.

In an appearance Sunday on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Emanuel offered a signal that he intends to carry the Obama program forward -- as opposed to the Emanuel program.

The chief-of-staff told his fellow Clinton-White House alumnus that the Obama transition team will oppose any effort by the Bush administration to attach the Colombia Free Trade Agreement to an economic stimulus package in order to get the approval of the Bush Administration.

In his final debate last month with Republican John McCain, Obama made it clear that he opposes a deal with Colombia, a country with a tragic human rights and labor rights record. But, since the election, President Bush and his aides have been suggesting that their "price" for advancing a new stimulus package might be inclusion in that package of the Columbia FTA.

Emanuel was blunt and specific in expressing opposition to the Bush blackmail, arguing that it was essential to avoid creating policy conflicts that might slow the work of extending unemployment insurance and providing healthcare assistance to economically-embattled states.

"You don't link those essential needs to some other trade deal," explained Emanuel. "What you have to deal with is what's immediate here, and the lame duck is for immediate things that are important. That's what should be the focus, right now. There's an economic recovery package in front of the Congress. Washington should get it done."

The hope for our future this gives me is just an incredible relief. Having our country in good and ethical hands again just can't be overrated.

Kudos to the new administration. The next 70 days will be rough, but the future looks just wonderful for America.

Ownership

Listening to all our pundits and the cretin in chief taking on about the election results as if they hadn't fought tooth and toenail against being dragged out of the swamp they created makes me want to bite off something vital that would be missed.

There, that's my spurt of violence. We who have struggled and endured and watched total idiocy touted as wisdom by our media commentators, now we have achieved the great joy of recognizing an enlightened public. The enlightenment has been fought against with lies, dirty politics, and general smarm for more than eight years. The right wing has been so destructive though, that with constant rational comment from our side, the public has seen through its actual character. The intention of the right wing is to overthrow public interests, and if possible permanently weight it down with debt and corporate entitlements.

I like a lot of comments today, some because they so obviously contradict the lies the commenter has peddled for the past years. Hearing Bobo on NewsHour last night saying that President Obama needed to 'go slow' (integration was greeted with that same advice) on social programs so that he could gain trust, this kind of palaver ignores the kind of trust that those votes entailed. You lost, members of the right wing. You have been proved wrong, wrong, wrong, over and over.

I will choose Froma Harrop for fun.

This amazing election is being called a liberal landslide, but it doesn't feel liberal. It's at bottom a reaction against the radical philosophy that called itself conservative but ran up deficits, blustered on the world stage, denigrated science, served the rich and ignored the working class.

To many older voters, the middle-class paradise of their youth had turned into an economic purgatory in which workers dodge the falling shards of free markets running amok. They remember when America, if not always loved, was respected for its economic as well as military might. They now see other countries taking care of business as America drains its Treasury to fight two wars, one of which it didn't have to get into.

The overthrow of 2008 was a cry for old-fashioned order. This election has been likened to Democrats' devastating losses in 1968 and 1972 presidential races. While the losing party back then was liberal and the one in 2008 allegedly conservative, the reason for their defeats is similar: The parties in power didn't keep order.
(snip)
In a stroke of brilliance, Mr. Obama balanced his liberal voting record and exotic background with a conservative manner. His middle-American cadences and controlled rhetoric spoke of a balanced politics and comforted many older doubters.

And he had help from the left, which managed to not scare the public. In this election, the right had to resort to fringe figures for inflammatory leftist remarks. Or it dredged up a formerly violent '60s radical, Bill Ayers, now an educator in Chicago.

The pendulum doesn't care whether it's on the left or right. When it spends too much time on one side, it returns to the other.

Some jewels, some dreck. I won't analyze any further, I need to go to Dallas where I will be watching twelve jurors represent the U.S. in the maladministration's attempt to show that if you're Muslim your charitable organizations are a mask for terrorism.

I wish wisdom and good observations to all making the decisions today, with the interests of this world riding on them.

That Religiosity Factor

The deadly combination of right wing religiosity with libertarian economics seems to have produced a real killer for America's right wing. Righteous greed has become the core of something that mercifully has brought about its own end. I guess it being Sunday, I can be allowed a little sermon.

The element of righteousness brought into greed by (Ayn) Randian ideology manifests itself in the attitude that it's right to prevent easy access to comfort. Making it a struggle to support your family was supposed to increase effort, to goad on the worker to greater effort, to increase the national well-being.

That cutoff of any individual from making a living without clawing his/her way up has achieved a real boost from the occupied White House, with its use of the national trough to reward only the richest. At the same time, salaries and benefits have been cut off. The whole attitude that the everyday person is faulty and needs to be incentivized by deprivation has been a real sop to the very rich. It gives a religious quality to wealth acquisition. By limiting the number who can achieve comfort, the superachiever gets increasingly great profits, and by making this society's goad, simple humanity gets kicked out the door to those profits.

Supposedly, this was good for our society. Wrong.

Over eight years of the religion of greed the nation has been put back into the kind of feudal relationships that kept the middle ages in darkness. When a very few can dictate their place, and essentially enslave, the majority of workers, achievement can be denied to those who can only give their hard work. When the justice system is brought into the service of power brokers, any opposition to that essential injustice can be very hazardous.

The 'moral hazard' resulting from what should be seen on its surface as wrong, that I am amused to hear now used as accusation against bad stewardship of public monies, was there all along. It is libertarian ideology that postulates greed is good, because adding to wealth of the few makes jobs and wealth for all. That has been shown to be totally wrong, but if the religious worship of wealth hadn't been generated by our government in all its policies, that moral hazard would have been obvious from the beginning.

Of course, what made the U.S. the most prosperous nation in history was the ability of anyone, everyone, to make the effort, attain comfort, and collectively raise the national prosperity. By cutting that off and insisting that only the obsessed could really get there, Randian philosophy denied access to the majority of the public.

It is good to watch the religion of greed fall, even though it has entailed a total collapse of our economy. What we see around us is the collapse that making greed into a religion has caused.

We are starting from pretty far back, but by proving greed is everything we knew by instinct and humanity it was, we are beyond a huge obstacle in the path to civilization.

A Toast To Brewing

Although the WSJ wannabe editorial staff usually disappoints, today is time for a toast to the Dallas Morning News. The lead editorial calls for an end to prohibition-era restrictions that keep small breweries from making a profit. Breweries, unlike wineries, are not allowed to sell to visitors to their site.

I am a great fan of the fine brews, and personally think it would be nice to encourage them.

Free beer in Texas!

Now, that would be one heck of a rallying cry to attract people – especially college students – to the Lone Star State. But we don't mean it that way. Rather, we call on the Legislature to break the shackles of outdated regulation on brewing in Texas and make it more feasible for our beer makers to join the microbrewery revolution sweeping the country.

As food critic Robb Walsh wrote recently in the Houston Press and Dallas Observer, Texas is home to more beer drinkers than just about any other state but only a tiny handful of small craft breweries. Michigan has 70. New York has 60.

Texas? We have six.

The reason, as Mr. Walsh explained, has to do with Prohibition-era laws making it illegal for breweries to sell their product on site. Unlike the state's wineries, which do a brisk business with visitors to their gift shops, Texas breweries are forbidden to vend directly to customers. If they don't sell their beer through distributors, they can't sell it.

Trouble is, most microbreweries don't make enough beer to engage the interest of distributors or retailers.

So why not change the law?

Bottoms up to that.

Thought it was so much opposed to the public interest that it editorially endorsed Sen. McCain for president, here the News has shown good taste for a change. Salud for the good stand on suds.

Early Stages - Habitat Build in Casablanca, In Pictures

Some early stages of building, putting together the frame that will make it possible to make a house. Cut and hammer, putting together something that will last and be home.



A bit of communal visiting, putting the frames for the walls to use for a lunch table, not yet together with the roof structure.



Frame is up, the basic house is ready for the siding and roofing, first build site in Casablanca.






The house is being built for these kids, and their families. Two houses are going up on a good-sized lot, that is owned by the father of the two ladies who are getting the houses. As mentioned, sweat and actual equity comes from the agreement with the families we are building for.

Oh, well, we didn't actually build Santiago, below.



This is the city of Santiago, Chile, from the top of the mountain in Santiago City Park.

Pictures from Chile

We were building houses, actually got the walls and roof structure up on six of them. A group will come in shortly, finish the outside shingling that we didn't get up, wall the inside of the house and put on the roofing. We were very productive, and you will see in the pictures of the worksites that some good solid frames were accomplished, some nice durable homes will be there for some families that wouldn't be able to get the materials and do the work without the help.

For those not familiar with Habitat for Humanity, the building group applies for the trip and is screened for ability/compatability with the building project. We pay our way, and by the fees we pay, some recreation is provided along with the work. Some are sponsored, any participant can raise the money at their own website that Habitat will help them put up. The Kid (my son, Jose) and I have always wanted to do something like this, paid our own way and count ourselves well repaid by learning, doing, learning.



Casablanca, Chile, scenery, this is from the hill at Indomita vineyards, a grape plant with the valley spread out below the winery which is on top a small hill. This is the main employment, growing grapes, and distilling the wine.



The family we are building for, there will be five children. To the right a house already houses a family, that is giving land to the homeowners-to-be. They help with the house, building and paying some off.



Putting the braces up on the roof. The house being worked on is pretty far along here, we built the walls and roof forms, nailed them together, and the braces on top will support the roofing.



The hardest to build, we had to tear down a concrete wall portion and then start on the frame. Juan, Master Builder, in green shirt.



Roses in Spring - October, Casablanca, Chile.

Other pics at Flickr site, http://www.flickr.com/photos/24541926@N08/

Building and Needs of A Destroyed Economy

It just occurred to me what great training Habitat for Humanity could have been for the FDR style of rebuilding the economy. When my parents got out of college in the '30's, they found jobs with a CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) dedicated to providing jobs while giving training and providing help in building communities. Bridges, roads, the Riverwalk in San Antonio, the Providence RI zoo, all owe their existence to that depression ending effort.

I just built my first houses, and it's a handy set of skills I didn't have before. There are improved communities in Casablanca, Chile, and throughout the U.S. as well, because of Habitat builds. Interestingly, I just found out that in early September, John McCain canceled a scheduled appearance at a Habitat event. Bad associations for the 'fundamentals of the economy are sound' candidate, I guess.

How could McCain maintain his sense of press victimization against the backdrop of people building homes for people who look forward to being able to one day say, "I know exactly how many homes I own! One! Just the one!"

But another part of the reason McCain canceled the outing is because last night, his campaign went out of its way to slag community organizers, defaming them for not having any "actual responsibilities." Habitat For Humanity, as it happens, is one of the biggest brand names in community organizing -- they maintain a massive network of individual donors, are capable of mobilizing an equally impressive volunteer base to contribute labor to the cause, and have a global reach. It's not a bad idea at all to associate one's own brand with Habitat's. But after last night, I have to imagine that McCain would have found it difficult to face the community organizers of Habitat For Humanity.

I am a proud member of the DangerousHFH, an institution that builds homes for people. I also can offer skills in growing your own veggies and some rather rusty sewing skills, things my mother taught to city dwellers 'relocated' to the countryside where they could live on a better standard than they had as unemployed cityfolks. This may be a promising situation for this country's future.

Later today I will have some pictures for you, and I am proud of them, too. No one asked after I got back, but all my thumbs survived. Ha.

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A note of caution for leaving cats while you go on a trip: happily, I filled the tub with some water and filled a few spare bowls. They had never done this before, but my cats turned over the cooler of water I always leave for them. The backup, which I felt silly about at the time, turned out to have been essential and possibly life-saving. They are happy to have a bowl filled regularly again, but might not have survived if I hadn't left all the extra water sources.