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Wednesday, January 28, 2004
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[AP Politics] By HOPE YEN
WASHINGTON - The Federal Aviation Administration (news - web sites) focused on the danger of explosives aboard planes rather than a suicide hijacking before the Sept. 11 attacks even though its own security officers warned terrorists might try to crash an airliner, a federal panel said Tuesday.
12:37:33 AM Google It!
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Education Chief Rod Paige, former superintendent of schools in Houston, speaks out on Bush law and the Texas model. By Diana Jean Schemo. [New York Times: Education]
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The president declined to repeat claims that evidence of illicit weapons would eventually be found, but he insisted that the war was nonetheless justified. By David E. Sanger. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
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[AP Politics] By KATHERINE PFLEGER
WASHINGTON - The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee said Tuesday that resigned U.S. weapons inspector David Kay is doing the nation's intelligence system a favor with his harsh criticism of the CIA (news - web sites)'s flawed prewar estimates on Iraq (news - web sites)'s weapons capabilities.
"If you really want to get into our national security, Dr. Kay has done some valuable work that has told me, as person with responsibility, that I have got to find a way to get more capabilities in the hands of the intelligence community to deal with these hard targets," Rep. Porter Goss, R-Fla., said in an interview with The Associated Press.
12:04:26 AM Google It!
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Tuesday, January 27, 2004
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[AP Politics]By TOM CHORNEAU, Associated Press Writer
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites) broke a state law during the closing weeks of the recall race when he took out $4.5 million in bank loans to help his cash-starved campaign, according to a preliminary ruling from a superior court judge.
If Monday's decision is upheld, the governor could be forced to pay back the loans out of personal funds.
8:55:52 AM Google It!
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George Soros: "... we have been deceived. When he stood for election in 2000, President Bush promised a humble foreign policy. I contend that the Bush administration has deliberately exploited September 11 to pursue policies that the American public would not have otherwise tolerated. The US can lose its dominance only as a result of its own mistakes. At present the country is in the process of committing such mistakes because it is in the hands of a group of extremists whose strong sense of mission is matched only by their false sense of certitude." [Heli's Heaven and Hell Radio]
8:35:02 AM Google It!
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Carl Rising-Moore is an American who wants to set up a 'Freedom Underground' to help American soldiers.
Vancouver Courier: "The American activist's appearance in Vancouver is part of a cross-country effort to petition Canada for safe refuge for U.S. military deserters across the border. The 'Freedom Underground' he's pitching would be an underground railroad, similar to the extensive formal and informal network that helped draft dodgers and deserters in B.C. in the '60s."
It is reported that already 1,700 U.S. soldiers have deserted their posts in Iraq. Desertion is an option. Bush himself has been AWOL for about two years during his military service. So, why not follow the example of the great leader? [Heli's Heaven and Hell Radio]
8:33:33 AM Google It!
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President Bush's signature education law has already put more than a quarter of the nation's public schools on academic probation, according to a study. By Sam Dillon. [New York Times: Education]
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Vice President Dick Cheney is stepping out of his self-imposed seclusion in a calculated election-year makeover to temper his hard-line image. By Eric Schmitt. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
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The White House began to back away from its assertions that Iraq had illegal weapons, saying it now wants to compare prewar intelligence with what may be actually found. By James Risen. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
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[AP Politics] President Bush (news - web sites) blamed trial lawyers and Senate Democrats Monday for blocking his proposal to limit medical malpractice awards, kicking off a week that will take him to three states important to his re-election chances.
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In a forceful preview of the Bush administration's expansionist military policies in this election year, Vice President Dick Cheney Wednesday painted a grim picture of what he said was the growing threat of a catastrophic terrorist attack in the United States and warned that the battle, like the Cold War, could last generations. ...
He also said the administration was planning to expand the military into even more overseas bases so the United States could wage war quickly around the globe.
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Monday, January 26, 2004
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Posted by David R. Remer Political News & Analysis
On WatchBlog, an extremely well managed political opinion and debate site, Thomas Leavitt has produced an outstanding 'state of the party' address of the Green Party's strategies and directions toward the 2004 Presidential Elections. An excellent read and review of The Green Party's decision making process as we move toward November of 2004 and beyond.
6:10:17 AM Google It!
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[Washington Post: Editorial] By Fred Hiatt
To appreciate the Democrats' evolving case against the war in Iraq, there is no better place to look than Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's impassioned denunciation. The senator's case, laid out in a recent speech and an article on this page Jan. 18, is comprehensive and angry. It says the war may prove to be "one of the worst blunders in more than two centuries of American foreign policy." It accuses the Bush administration of being dishonest as well as wrong.
And, in what it does not contain, it points to a gap in the Democratic message that whoever emerges as presidential nominee eventually will have to fill.
5:32:16 AM Google It!
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[Washington Post: Editorial]
PERHAPS THE MOST carefully worded section of President Bush's State of the Union speech this year was his not-so-artful dodge on the subject of gay marriage. "Activist judges . . . have begun redefining marriage by court order, without regard for the will of the people and their elected representatives," he lamented, thus seeming to set up a presidential endorsement of the noxious proposal to amend the federal Constitution to ban same-sex unions. But Mr. Bush then went on to support the amendment only in the conditional tense: "If judges insist on forcing their arbitrary will upon the people, the only alternative left to the people would be the constitutional process" (emphasis added). Mr. Bush then muddied the waters further by adding his usual plea for tolerance of gays, insisting that "each individual has dignity and value in God's sight." The idea, in an election year, is not subtle. Mr. Bush wants to keep the Republican base at bay with verbal Pablum about the "sanctity of marriage" and a promise to support an amendment if this gay-marriage thing gets out of hand. But at the same time, he wants to avoid energizing Democrats and alienating centrists by actually calling for one now.
5:27:41 AM Google It!
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Democratic Presidential Candidate Dennis Kucinich said that based on the public record five of his fellow candidates promoted the idea that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction.
"Senators Kerry, Lieberman and Edwards, Dr. Dean, and General Clark, all claimed that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, and, therefore, contributed to the political climate which falsely justified a war."
Kucinich was one of the few who stood by the fact that there was no proof of WMD. He is the only democratic candidate with the insight required for a president. [Heli's Heaven and Hell Radio]
4:56:33 AM Google It!
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[Washington Post: Nation and Politics]
...That tally matches the number that Davis allowed to be paroled in the five years he spent as governor before being recalled from office last fall. It is also one among several emerging signs that for all the tough Terminator talk the former movie star is bringing to the politics of the Golden State, Schwarzenegger may not be a hard-liner on crime and punishment -- even if that politically risky stance angers his conservative supporters.
4:55:05 AM Google It!
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Sunday, January 25, 2004
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[Washington Post: Editorial]
FOR AN INSIGHT into the inadequacy of the president's health care proposals put forward in his State of the Union speech last Tuesday, look closely at a strike by supermarket workers in Southern California. For more than three months, 70,000 people have been on strike, protesting proposed dramatic reductions in their health care benefits. Their employers, three large supermarket chains, say they need the changes because they must compete with discount, nonunion chains such as Wal-Mart, whose health-care packages are famously stingy.
7:11:49 PM Google It!
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You don't have to be a conspiracy theorist to believe the White House doesn't want the nation to hear the full story on the September 11 attacks. We know the Bush administration tried to prevent Congress from creating the commission in the first place.... [Kicking Ass]
6:58:31 PM Google It!
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By a vote of 98-1, the Republican-controlled Virginia House of Delegates passed a resolution calling on Congress to exempt the state from the No Child Left Behind Act. According to the resolution, the law will cost "literally millions of dollars that V... [Kicking Ass]
6:57:43 PM Google It!
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Spacewar: "George W. Bush is requesting a seven percent increase in US military spending next year, which if approved by Congress would boost the defense budget to over 400 billion dollars in 2005."
It's not his money anyway, it's yours he will be spending. [Heli's Heaven and Hell Radio]
6:16:32 PM Google It!
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Saturday, January 24, 2004
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(WatchBlog) One under-discussed point from the State of the Union Address was Bush’s proposed increase in for abstinence only sex education. Here is a utilitarian analysis of this program’s history, future implications and alternative forms of sex education.
4:31:16 PM Google It!
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[AP World News] By DULUE MBACHU, Associated Press Writer
LAGOS, Nigeria - When British officials intercepted a Nigerian man with a briefcase stuffed with $200,000 at London's Heathrow airport, they thought they had stumbled upon a terrorist trail.
Instead, the cash-filled carry-on has led to the highest-profile corruption case yet in Nigeria, where bribery scandals have been reaching to the world's leading capitals, including Washington. ...
It's only one international Nigerian payoff probe: In Paris, a French judge has reportedly warned that Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) could be charged over allegations that his former company, Halliburton, paid $180 million in bribes to build a Nigerian gas plant. Halliburton has called the accusations untrue, and Cheney's spokesmen have refused to comment on the case.
5:37:29 AM Google It!
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The Boston Globe reports today that Senate Republicans hacked into computer files belonging to Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, accessing strategic memos and documents over an entire year. Republicans are scrambling for an excuse,... [Kicking Ass]
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Belleville: "U.S. Rep Jerry Costello has called for impeachment hearings against U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney.
Costello questioned the award of billions of dollars of contracts to Cheney's former corporation Haliburton to extinguish fires and rebuild Iraq's oil infrastructure after the war.
'Can you imagine what the Republicans would be doing to a Democratic president who was a CEO of a company that now has gotten billions of dollars worth of contracts - no-bid contracts - without competition?' Costello, D-Belleville, was quoted as saying." [Heli's Heaven and Hell Radio]
5:24:08 AM Google It!
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Gale Norton has been in the news a lot in the past couple of days, and we know that can't be good for our nation's public lands. Today, as the Los Angeles Times reports, Norton signed off on a plan to open an 8.8 million acre swath of land in Alaska's... [Kicking Ass]
Today, as the Los Angeles Times reports, Norton signed off on a plan to open an 8.8 million acre swath of land in Alaska's North Slope to oil and gas exploration. The area is just west of the of the 1.5 million-acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, an area the Bush administration wants to open to oil and gas drilling. The Senate has already blocked that plan twice.
5:17:50 AM Google It!
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[AP Politics] By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent
CONCORD, N.H. - John Kerry (news - web sites) accused the Bush administration on Friday of shortchanging veterans, focusing fire on Republicans while Democratic presidential rivals hoped his surge in the polls would soon subside.
"The first definition of patriotism is keeping faith with those who have worn the uniform of the country," said the Massachusetts senator, who served in Vietnam. He said some veterans must wait too long for health care, while others who are disabled receive a reduced pension.
4:52:55 AM Google It!
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By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff, 1/23/2004'
'Fact sheet' asserts no rules, laws broken
WASHINGTON -- Although Senate Sergeant-at-Arms William Pickle's investigation into GOP surveillance of Democratic Judiciary Committee communications from 2002 to 2003 is not yet complete, Republicans are preemptively trying to head off any criminal charges or even ethics complaints in the Senate or the D.C. Bar.
4:48:49 AM Google It!
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The Nation: "The MoveOn.org Voter Fund recently conducted a 'Bush in 30 Seconds' TV ad contest, in which it promised that the winning entry would be shown during the Super Bowl broadcast. MoveOn, the innovative internet-based activist community, was willing to pay the $2 million it would cost to air the ad. And no one suggests that the ad is inaccurate or inappropriate; indeed, Fox TV commentator Bill'Reilly, no fan of MoveOn, says: 'It's not offensive, (it) makes a legitimate point politically.'
Yet, CBS is refusing to run the MoveOn ad, claiming in the words of CBS spokesperson Dana McClintock, 'We have a policy against accepting advocacy advertising'. The reason? CBS told MoveOn that it does not want to trouble viewers with commercials that address 'controversial issues of public importance'." [Heli's Heaven and Hell Radio]
4:36:14 AM Google It!
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[Washington Post: Nation and Politics] By Carol D. Leonnig
A furious federal judge ordered Justice Department lawyers yesterday to explain why they should not be held in contempt of court for telling subpoenaed witnesses not to testify before him in a class-action discrimination lawsuit.
Three Department of Agriculture employees were subpoenaed and scheduled to answer questions yesterday in court about whether top USDA officials had acknowledged any discrimination against Native American farmers when providing loans and assistance. A group of Native American farmers sued the USDA in 1999, but the case has been bogged down as the Justice Department unsuccessfully sought to appeal U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan's rulings that the farmer group qualified to file the broader class-action case.
4:32:47 AM Google It!
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The Bush administration is hoping to use a combination of inspections and pointed political advice to persuade local officials to stop importing medicines from Canada. By Gardiner Harris and Monica Davey. [New York Times: Business]
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A special prosecutor has begun presenting evidence to a grand jury about the improper disclosure of an undercover C.I.A. officer's identity by the White House. By Eric Lichtblau and David Johnston. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
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-[AP Politics]
Safety board chairman Conway's letter did not make clear whether the explosive had been separated at the time from the softball-sized chunk of plutonium that forms the pit, or trigger, of a thermonuclear warhead. To prevent a thermonuclear blast, the pit would have to have been separated from the larger warhead.
If the explosive were still connected to the trigger, an explosion could have injured or killed workers and could have spread plutonium or other radioactive materials around the facility.
The taping and removal of the explosive did not go as planned, and only quick thinking by the technicians prevented them from dropping the explosive, Conway wrote.
4:20:41 AM Google It!
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[AP Politics] By KATHERINE PFLEGER, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - The CIA (news - web sites) named a new inspector to lead the search for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction Friday, choosing a veteran investigator who has expressed recent skepticism that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) possessed banned weapons that posed an immediate threat.
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Friday, January 23, 2004
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[Washington Post: Editorial]
The telling complaint about Mr. Bush's AIDS plan is that it is unilateralist. The administration has decided to create its own new initiative, rather than work through the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which the United States helped to create, and which is chaired by Tommy G. Thompson, Mr. Bush's secretary of health and human services. Perhaps this go-it-alone approach will pay off: The United States has a network of embassies and aid officials in poor countries that can oversee projects, something the Global Fund lacks. But as it augments its AIDS budget, the administration is likely to have difficulty increasing disbursements as quickly; in this transition phase, at least, it makes sense to give a large slice of the money to other agencies, including the Global Fund, that have a longer track record.
7:47:01 AM Google It!
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[Washington Post: Editorial]
ON PAPER, Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.'s budget for the coming fiscal year looks balanced -- if you disregard the gubernatorial thumb on the revenue side of the scale. Again as last year, the Republican governor has tatted up a flimsy doily of a budget, using what must be the last of the fiscal patches left: one-time windfalls, raids on various state accounts -- many of them meant for distribution to local governments for transportation projects and other services -- and a batch of fees that he won't call taxes. The idea is to scrape through one more time without facing up to the inevitability of tax increases to pay the bills and cover the debts that are adding up.
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Thursday, January 22, 2004
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President Bush withdrew the nomination of a derivatives expert, Mark Brickell, to lead the agency that oversees the finances of the nation's top mortgage finance companies. By Reuters. [New York Times: Business]
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A group of former intelligence officers is pressing Congressional leaders to open an immediate inquiry into the White House leak of the name of an undercover C.I.A. officer. By Douglas Jehl. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
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Fiscal conservatives stepped up their campaign to force the White House to do more to limit the growth of U.S. spending. By Richard W. Stevenson. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
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[Washington Post: Editorial]
HOW LONG DO you imagine drug dealing could take place in front of the White House or on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol? How about in front of the mayor's residence? Answer: About as long as it would take for authorities to arrive on the scene, make arrests and deploy sufficient officers to ensure that the dealers never returned. So why can't District residents be afforded the same degree of protection that is enjoyed by top public officials with downtown addresses? That's a burning question raised yesterday by D.C. Council members Jim Graham (D-Ward 1) and Adrian M. Fenty (D-Ward 4) in response to multiple shootings and fatalities in their communities. It is a question that Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D), who is responsible for public safety, cannot ignore.
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© Copyright 2004 David Remer.
Last update: 1/29/2004; 8:00:49 PM.
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