Gregg's Soap Box
This How Security Works, Then and Now...
I wish we could find some English language translations of "Der Stürmer" as they try to explain the security risk that forced the "relocation" of the Jewish folks next door or perhaps the SF Chronicle from sometime in early '42, I'm sure that the newspaper had a coherent explanation for the Internment of the Japanese, must have sounded something like this...
See Story
You know that terrorists often pose as journalists, don'tcha...?
I mean, is that a mini cam or a...? And that is just the First Amendment...we could go on...and on...
This has to stop...
But I fear the irrationalism is just getting up some steam, ask David Nelson, any David Nelson, who has flown in the last 2 years (including Ozzie's boy...), about accuracy of the TSA database...and the crack staff they have, same crew, new uniforms, more paranoia...
On a lighter note...
You heard it first, right here...Dean-Clark 2004...
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We will see on 9/19...I'm bettin' we have a ticket...one with what the Paid Press likes to call "foreign policy credentials" and one that I feel will have wide appeal.
I also like the idea of a complete "Shadow Government", appoint a whole cabinet, present the Nation with a viable alternative, commit to a plan of action and show us who and how...and show the "moneychangers" the door...this is our Nation, our Government, by and for the People...not just for the plutocrats of the K Street Elite. "Corporation America" as represented by Team Bush has overplayed it's hand and it is time to fold or call.
And what a mess they will inherit...
But at least a Free People can begin to pick up the pieces, repair the damage that this aberrant Administration has done to our reputation and our self respect. We are not a fearful people, but we have been misled by those who wield fear as a political tool, corrupting the real feelings of patriotism to turn it against our Basic Law and our blood bought civil rights. Sounds familiar, eh?
'nuf fer now...
Gregg
"Arnold Quote of the Day"
"My relationship to power and authority is that I'm all for it. People need somebody to watch over them. Ninety-five percent of the people in the world need to be told what to do and how to behave."
U.S. News, November 1990
More on Smut....the dog that is, the one they fixed down at the Crawford Ranch...
See 9/2/03 Post, below
Hmmm....
Lifted this from "CBS Washington Wrap"...
You probably had to be there...but that would require being in Texas...
Quote of the Day: "That old boy lost everything because he wouldn't stay off the president's place." - Bill Westerfield, Bush neighbor in Crawford, Texas, on the castration of his dog Smut (Dallas Morning News).
Much is asked of Americans these days....
Gregg
Dean 2004...the Doc is in...Sunday in fact..right here in river city...
To which a dear reader responded....
Hmmm....
Lifted from the "Naglee Wrapper"
Quote of the Evening: I guess yawl know what will happen to Dean if he tries to campaign
in Texas. But he will be here Sunday ... if his participles are still dangling.
"Much is asked of Americans these days".... how long do we have to wait for repayment?
Bob on San Carlos
To which your host responded....
Texas is another country"....I finally believe that old tag line from the tourism dept ad.
And I think I have discovered why the lapdogs of the media are a steppin' around so careful...wouldn't want to go like 'ol Smut did...I mean, jus' fer sniffin' around!
I did a Google search on 'ol Smut and he was pretty big on the Internet, but without his...well...he'll just have to be a watch dog...
As for Gov. Dean he can more than handle himself, he is a fighter. And he will be elected. Americans are waking up to the Administration and the lies about literally everything, from the Clear Sky legislation that allows the dirtiest plants in the country to be "grandfathered" past the Clean Air Act, to the Healthy Forest plan that will cut down the danger from burning forests by cutting down the trees, to the spurious War on Iraq (to prevent Armageddon at the hands of a WMD armed later day Hitler, who could be in league with the other great "boogeyman" Osama bin Forgotten). Oh, and don't forget the Tax Cut that is fueling the Recovery, you know the Recovery...the one where capital is covered and jobs are still disappearing. This "jobless" recovery is election year BS, no economy can grow without consumption, which is what is done by people with jobs, not by investors, I mean even the rich can only consume what they can hold and each of us has only two hands...Even Arnie only has a couple of Hummers...ok, three... But you need the little guy, the small businessman to start hiring and investing in equipment etc, in order to sustain a true Recovery.
Speaking as one of those people, I see no reason to risk my capital in this environment. I have no more faith in the "Borrow and Spend Republicans" than I had in the old tax and spend democrats. Gov. Dean says that a balanced budget is essential to progress and social justice. I agree, the Tax Cuts were a gross social injustice, these people have every intention of bankrupting the Federal Govt, so as to force the sale of our nation's public lands and resources and make govt "small enough to drown in a bathtub" (G. Norquist).
And the lies...and the lives they have cost.
It got so deep up at the White House that Ari's boots got stuck and he had to call it a day...Poor Colin Powell, his reputation will never recover, and Condi and Rummy, well it is good thing they have a bunch of money over at the Hoover Institute, 'cause come Jan. 2005, they will have lots of their Fellows lookin' for work. As for the Shrub, well...in the immortal words of Country Joe and the Fish...were gonna "send you back to Texas, make you work on your ranch..."
RGJ
http://rgjsoapboxblog.blogspot.com/
What would we do without Paul Krugman?
I know what I will do...bust my ass to elect Howard Dean to the Presidency and return some sanity to our Nation, before we do something we can't weather as a united nation. The faultlines of our politics, the reality of Federal Power and the misuse of that power since 9-11, both in this country and abroad, have put our basic rights at risk. Since the Y2Coup we have witnessed so many outrages, endured so many two faced, hypocritical actions that to list them here would take hundreds of lines of text.
Our way of life is at stake, the War on Terror has become a rout and our freedoms are in quick retreat.
Our increasing isolation on the world stage, with two unfinished land wars still to be won and two Moslem nations to "rebuild", has left us badly overextended, with a "burnrate" (Rumsfeld's term, not mine...) of a billion dollars weekly just in Iraq...
Insane economic and tax policies are driving jobs and money to European and Asian markets and have created record 500 billion dollar deficits for the foreseeable future. Our economy "recovers" in an amazing jobless recovery fueled by "greater productivity", which is really all of us working harder for less. This could be the beginning of a massive deflation. The only bubble still holding air is the "Real Estate" bubble and it in turn props up the huge level of consumer debt, if the value of our homes begins to fall, with interest rates rising...Bush may have another "trifecta" on his hands.
Mr. Krugman is our bloguest columnist today...he is probably a better writer than your humble host but then he gets paid for it...and so without further ado, from the Paid Press Gallery and the offices of the NYT, Mr. Krugman....circa June '03
"Toward One-Party Rule
By PAUL KRUGMAN/New York Times
In principle, Mexico's 1917 Constitution established a democratic political system. In practice, until very recently Mexico was a one-party state. While the ruling party employed intimidation and electoral fraud when necessary, mainly it kept control through patronage, cronyism and corruption. All powerful interest groups, including the media, were effectively part of the party's political machine.
Such systems aren't unknown here — think of Richard J. Daley's Chicago. But can it happen to the United States as a whole? A forthcoming article in The Washington Monthly shows that the foundations for one-party rule are being laid right now.
In "Welcome to the Machine," Nicholas Confessore draws together stories usually reported in isolation — from the drive to privatize Medicare, to the pro-tax-cut fliers General Motors and Verizon recently included with the dividend checks mailed to shareholders, to the pro-war rallies organized by Clear Channel radio stations. As he points out, these are symptoms of the emergence of an unprecedented national political machine, one that is well on track to establishing one-party rule in America.
Mr. Confessore starts by describing the weekly meetings in which Senator Rick Santorum vets the hiring decisions of major lobbyists. These meetings are the culmination of Grover Norquist's "K Street Project," which places Republican activists in high-level corporate and industry lobbyist jobs — and excludes Democrats. According to yesterday's Washington Post, a Republican National Committee official recently boasted that "33 of 36 top-level Washington positions he is monitoring went to Republicans."
Of course, interest groups want to curry favor with the party that controls Congress and the White House; but as The Washington Post explains, Mr. Santorum's colleagues have also used "intimidation and private threats" to bully lobbyists who try to maintain good relations with both parties. "If you want to play in our revolution," Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, once declared, "you have to live by our rules."
Lobbying jobs are a major source of patronage — a reward for the loyal. More important, however, many lobbyists now owe their primary loyalty to the party, rather than to the industries they represent. So corporate cash, once split more or less evenly between the parties, increasingly flows in only one direction.
And corporations themselves are also increasingly part of the party machine. They are rewarded with policies that increase their profits: deregulation, privatization of government services, elimination of environmental rules. In return, like G.M. and Verizon, they use their influence to support the ruling party's agenda.
As a result, campaign finance is only the tip of the iceberg. Next year, George W. Bush will spend two or three times as much money as his opponent; but he will also benefit hugely from the indirect support that corporate interests — very much including media companies — will provide for his political message.
Naturally, Republican politicians deny the existence of their burgeoning machine. "It never ceases to amaze me that people are so cynical they want to tie money to issues, money to bills, money to amendments," says Mr. DeLay. And Ari Fleischer says that "I think that the amount of money that candidates raise in our democracy is a reflection of the amount of support they have around the country." Enough said.
Mr. Confessore suggests that we may be heading for a replay of the McKinley era, in which the nation was governed by and for big business. I think he's actually understating his case: like Mr. DeLay, Republican leaders often talk of "revolution," and we should take them at their word.
Why isn't the ongoing transformation of U.S. politics — which may well put an end to serious two-party competition — getting more attention? Most pundits, to the extent they acknowledge that anything is happening, downplay its importance. For example, last year an article in Business Week titled "The GOP's Wacky War on Dem Lobbyists" dismissed the K Street Project as "silly — and downright futile." In fact, the project is well on the way to achieving its goals.
Whatever the reason, there's a strange disconnect between most political commentary and the reality of the 2004 election. As in 2000, pundits focus mainly on images — John Kerry's furrowed brow, Mr. Bush in a flight suit — or on supposed personality traits. But it's the nexus of money and patronage that may well make the election a foregone conclusion."
Hmmm....
Lifted this from "CBS Washington Wrap"...
You probably had to be there...but that would require being in Texas...
Quote of the Day: "That old boy lost everything because he wouldn't stay off the president's place." - Bill Westerfield, Bush neighbor in Crawford, Texas, on the castration of his dog Smut (Dallas Morning News).
Google, how did anybody find anything before Google???
Go Zoe!
