Wednesday, May 7, 2003

Top AWOL Gun QUOTE OF THE DAY "Disproportionate among the ranks of nonvoters are "minorities" and blue-collar and low-income citizens. It is the Democrats' natural constituency, if we are willing to speak to the concerns and circumstances of their lives and include them. If you don't say anything important to them and hardly ever show up in the community, people don't vote. Why should they?" - - Senator Paul Wellstone (1944-2002) MAY 7th IN HISTORY: 1975 -- The Vietnam War officially ends. 1984 -- American Vets of Vietnam War reach an out-of-court settlement with 7 chemical companies in their class-action suit concerning U.S. use of "Agent Orange." 15,000 vets & families get $180 million. RHINO HERE: America seems to have pretty well lost one of its most important balance of power entities; a critical media. In Rhino's opinion, anyone who talks about liberals controlling the media is either a hear & say sheep, or is outright lying for political gain. If anyone needs proof, ponder the statistics of news coverage from the 2000 presidential election: - There were exactly 704 stories in the campaign about the flap of Gore inventing the Internet. - There were only 13 stories about Bush failing to show up for his National Guard duty for a year. - There were well over 1,000 stories -- Nexus stopped at 1,000 -- about Gore and the Buddhist temple. - Only 12 about Bush being accused of insider trading at Harken Energy. - There were 347 about Al Gore wearing earth tones, but only 10 about Dick Cheney having done business with Iran & Iraq & Libya Did you know that neither Dwight Eisenhower, the victorious WW2 general, nor John Kennedy, a genuine war hero a la PT 109, ever wore anything that resembled military garb while President of the U.S.? There's a reason, but it seems our president select (selected by the supreme court that is) who went AWOL for 1 year during his "stint" in the National Guard, must have been partying when his political science class covered that part of our American heritage. Man on Horseback By PAUL KRUGMAN, NY Times, 5/6/03 " ... the Constitution declares the president commander in chief of the armed forces to make it clear that civilians, not the military, hold ultimate authority. That's why American presidents traditionally make a point of avoiding military affectations... Given that history, George Bush's "Top Gun" act aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln - c'mon, guys, it wasn't about honoring the troops, it was about showing the president in a flight suit - was as scary as it was funny... There was a time when patriotic Americans from both parties would have denounced any president who tried to take political advantage of his role as commander in chief. But that, it seems, was another country." http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/06/opinion/06KRUG.html?th And while shrub and his puppeteers prance around victorious like a housecat with a freshly killed field mouse hanging from its mouth, few of the corporate owned media outlets and none of the tri letter broadcasters (thieves of the people's airwaves) are telling the stories of the shrub gang's defeats. No it takes an independent like Harvey Wasserman of the Free Press in Columbus, Ohio to count the ways. Bush's Military Defeat: The SuperPower of Peace is our only hope by Harvey Wasserman, Free Press, May 2, 2003 "George W. Bush has fittingly stopped short of declaring victory in Iraq. He doesn't want to claim a definitive triumph because it would legally obligate the US to begin cleaning the place up and enforcing human rights obligations. But in fact, the US attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan have been shattering defeats. Let's count the ways:..." Bush's Military Defeat For continuing insights on last Saturday's Democratic Presidential debate in South Carolina, check out: Rhino's Blog reader and recently proclaimed blogger, Eric Predoehl's "EP RANTS" May 5th entry: The Democratic Horse Race Comments on the First Democratic Debate of 2004 http://ep-rants.blogspot.com/ The Nation's "Capitol Games" columnist, David Corn's: No Dems Break out in First 2004 Debate by David Corn, The Nation, 5/05/03 http://www.thenation.com/capitalgames/index.mhtml?bid=3&;pid=643 In the debate & elsewhere from the likes of George Will & other conservative pundits, Dennis Kucinich has faced attacks over his tenure as Mayor of Cleveland. The truth is that the stand he took was a profile in political courage, and his stand has been fully vindicated by events & even by those who opposed him at the time. Typically, George Will & those who dominate American punditry haven't gotten the news or have chosen to ignore it. To help set the record straight, RHINO'S BOTTOM LINE today is a short history of the events in question put out by the Kucinich campaign. 7:27:27 AM    comment

RHINO'S BOTTOM LINE - Kucinich's Fight To Save Public Power AS CLEVELAND MAYOR, KUCINICH'S FIGHT TO SAVE PUBLIC POWER Dennis Kucinich was elected Mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, in 1977 at age 31, the youngest person to lead a major U.S. city. He was elected on a promise that he would not sell off or privatize the beloved and trusted city-owned power system, though Cleveland was deeply in debt. Cleveland Magazine offered this summary: "Kucinich refused to yield to bankers who gave him a choice -- Sell the Municipal Light System to the Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co. or the city will go into default. The mayor said no." When Kucinich refused to sell Muny Light, the banks took the unprecedented step of refusing to roll over the city's debt, as is customary. Instead, they pushed the city into default. It turned out the banks were thoroughly interlocked with the private utility, CEI, which would have acquired monopoly status by taking over Muny Light. Five of the six banks held almost 1.8 million shares of CEI stock; of the 11 directors of CEI, eight were also directors of four of the six banks involved. By holding to his campaign promise and putting principle above politics, he lost his re-election bid and his political career was derailed. But today Kucinich stands vindicated for having confronted the Enron of his day, and for saving the municipal power company. "There is little debate," wrote Cleveland Magazine in May 1996, "over the value of Muny Light today. Now Cleveland Public Power, it is a proven asset to the city that between 1985 and 1995 saved its customers $195,148,520 over what they would have paid CEI." When Kucinich re-launched his political career in the mid-1990s, it was on the strength of having saved public power. His campaign symbol was a light bulb. "Because he was right!" was his campaign slogan when he won his seat in the state senate in 1994. The slogan that sent him to Washington two years later was "Light Up Congress." In 1998, the Cleveland City Council issued a commendation to Dennis Kucinich for "having the courage and foresight to refuse to sell the city's municipal electric system." Our country needs a President who will stand up against -- and not with -- today's Enrons. A President who puts the public interest before private profit. Such a candidate is Dennis Kucinich, a rare elected official whose political career has been devoted to winning victories against corporate power on behalf of workers, consumers, the poor and the environment. He battles for the people, and he wins. Help spread the word about the Kucinich for President Campaign by making a donation: https://www.kucinich.us/contribute.php For background on the campaign: http://www.kucinich.us "RHINO'S BLOG" is the responsibility of Gary Rhine. (rhino@kifaru.com) Feedback, and requests to be added or deleted from the list are encouraged. SEARCH BLOG ARCHIVES / SURF RHINO'S LINKS, AT: http://www.rhinosblog.info RHINO'S OTHER WEB SITES: http://www.dreamcatchers.org (INDIGENOUS ASSISTANCE & INTERCULTURAL DIALOG) http://www.kifaru.com (NATIVE AMERICAN RELATIONS VIDEO DOCUMENTARIES) Articles are reprinted under Fair Use Doctrine of international copyright law. http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html All copyrights belong to original publisher. 6:55:32 AM    comment

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