Monday, December 12, 2005

Clemency bid denied for gang killer. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger denied clemency today for convicted killer Stanley Tookie Williams, saying the facts of the case do not justify blocking his scheduled execution. Williams, a convicted killer and co-founder of the Crips gang, is due to die by injection shortly after midnight local time. His death sentence sparked a debate over capital punishment, with his supporters claiming he is a changed man who writes books leading children away from gang life. [CNN.com] 2:10:43 PM    comment []

Taliban, drug trade form alliance. Taliban, drug trade form alliance [The Raw Story | A rational voice - Alternative news] 2:10:06 PM    comment []

With Miers Nomination Buried, Frist Resurrects Up or Down Vote Principle. A day before President Bush accepted Harriet Miers’ withdrawal from her nomination to the Supreme Court, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) gave White House chief of staff Andy Card a 'frank assessment of the situation in the committee and in the full Senate.' Frist's 'frank assessment' represented the culmination of the right-wing’s efforts to stop Miers from receiving a single hearing, let alone an up or down vote in the full Senate. After Miers’ nomination was pulled, the Washington Post's David Broder said that "there is no plausible way the White House can insist that every major judicial nominee deserves such a vote." Frist seems to have found a way - just forget the Miers debacle ever happened. On Fox News Sunday, Frist trotted out the pre-Miers talking points: So I think it would be unconscionable - I think it would be wrong - I think it would be against the intent of the founding fathers and our Constitution to deny Sam Alito an up or down vote on the floor of the United States Senate. I have stood from day one on principle that these Supreme Court justices, nominees, deserve an up or down vote, and it would be absolutely wrong to deny him that. Our video diagnosis of Frist: selective amnesia. [Think Progress] 11:58:01 AM    comment []

Iraqi officials find more abused prisoners. Almost all the prisons are run by Shiites, and almost all the prisoners are Sunnis. [Terrorism and Security | csmonitor.com] 11:54:25 AM    comment []

Taliban, drug trade form Afghan alliance. Taliban, drug trade form Afghan alliance [The Raw Story | A rational voice - Alternative news] 11:53:12 AM    comment []

'The 14 Worst Corporate Evildoers,' and their evil deeds, and who's monitoring them, are all identified in a new Global Exchange report. [Cursor.org] 11:51:57 AM    comment []

Alexander Cockburn salutes "the resourcefulness of those Iraqi editors [who] managed to get paid to print the Pentagon's handouts. Here in the Homeland, editors pride themselves in performing the same service, without remuneration." [Cursor.org] 11:50:37 AM    comment []

The Washington Post quotes an Iraqi official as describing "severe torture" at a newly-raided Interior Ministry detention center, citing "breaking of bones, torture with electric shock, extraction of fingernails and cigarette burns to the neck and back." [Cursor.org] 11:50:02 AM    comment []

A New York Times article on the raid reports "growing evidence" that Shiite militia forces are "abducting, torturing and killing Sunni Arabs," and Maureen Dowd suffers an "acid flashback." [Cursor.org] 11:48:59 AM    comment []

Bush: 30,000 Iraqis dead in war. A fledgling democracy in Iraq will take time to grow but will make the world safer from terrorists, President Bush said today while acknowledging more than 30,000 Iraqis have been killed since the U.S.-led invasion nearly three years ago. In a rare move, Bush took questions from the audience and said he would invade Iraq knowing what he knows today. "I'd make the decision again. Removing Saddam Hussein makes this world a better place and America a safer country." [CNN.com] 11:46:24 AM    comment []

An op-ed by Craig Crawford acknowledges that "today's media are as bullied as ever. Politicians don't have to dodge the tough questions anymore. They seldom even get them." [Cursor.org] 11:44:50 AM    comment []

Trey Ellis: W.W.S.D. (What Will Schwarzenegger Do?). Back in May, the first thing I ever wrote for the Huffington Post was on the fate of Stanley "Tookie" Williams. I'm hoping that what I write here tonight will not be one of my last posts on him. Back in May I had no idea that so much global attention would shine on the fate of one man. I also had no idea that capital punishment would still be such a divisive issue in a civilized, Western democracy. The right-wing hate radio yahoos just don't seem to get it. They claim that only out-of-touch limousine liberals, Hollywood (read gay, Jewish, commie) and the NAACP-Amnesty-ACLU cabal care to keep Mr. Williams alive. What they don't get is that those protesters in front of San Quentin, overwhelmingly black, come from the very neighborhoods poisoned by the evil that Mr. Williams is responsible for. They understand that he serves them better alive, preaching to all who will listen that gang life destroys. If you live in a gang-infested neighborhood you already know death well. About a murder a day occurs in South Central LA every day of the year. Nobody needs to see another dead black man to know that gang life leads to death, either by the police, the state, or, more likely, by a rival gangmember. Mr. Williams' conversion, as the general, not just a soldier, is a powerful tool in a desperate war. His own community realizes that and asks the Governor to let him keep working behind bars. All the evidence in the case against Mr. Williams is circumstantial and all of the witnesses against him suspect (and felons themselves, the key witness currently in jail in Canada for armed robbery). Robert Clark, a black man convicted of rape in Georgia was released only last week after twenty-three years in jail for a crime that DNA evidence proved he didn't commit. Even if Mr. Williams had not turned his life around in prison there is still enough reasonable doubt surrounding his case to lock him up forever instead of killing him. Though the Williams case has been much in the news, one group has been noticeably silent. Conservative evangelical Christians and their much touted "Culture of Life" have said hardly a word about him. There might be great debate at whether life begins at conception or several weeks after but there is absolutely no debate whatsoever that life ends after a 50 ccs of potassium chloride are injected into your veins, stopping your heart. The Vatican, at least, is consistently pro-life, both anti-abortion and anti-capital punishment. Some right-wing American Evangelicals, however, like to torture the crystal clear teachings of the New Testament to somehow make it all right for the state to kill. I guess they skip over passages like this: Matthew 5:38-41 -- You have heard it was said, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Luke 6:27, 37 -- Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.... Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. W.W.J.D.? You don't even have to ask. Though I have not been a fan of Governor Schwarzenegger I have been encouraged by the thoroughness and the seriousness with which he seems to be deliberating this case. Another governor, this one from Texas, was asked on a right-wing radio program what were the last words of a woman, Karla Faye Tucker, before his state executed her. That governor sadistically affected a woman's voice to mock the 23-year-old born-again and whined, "Please don't kill me!" Now he's our President. And by the way, here are Ms. Tucker's real final words: "I would like to say to all of you, the Thornton family and Jerry Dean's family that I am so sorry. I hope God will give you peace with this. Baby, I love you. Ron, give Peggy a hug for me. Everybody has been so good to me. I love all of you very much. I'm going to be face-to-face with Jesus now. Warden Baggett, thank all of you so much. You have been so good to me. I love all of you very much. I will see you all when you get there. I will wait for you." 10:20:21 AM    comment []

EXCLUSIVE: Washington Times Provides Press Credentials to Right-Wing Lobbyist. Chris Horner is counsel at the right-wing Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), which has received more than $1.3 million in funding from oil giant ExxonMobil. Horner “is also part of the Cooler Heads Coalition, “a group set up ‘to dispel the myth of global warming.’” But when Horner attended last week’s U.N. Climate Change conference, he appeared not as a lobbyist, but as a journalist. Horner attended the State Department’s Dec. 7 briefing with press credentials from the right-wing Washington Times. ThinkProgress spoke with Andrew Buncombe of London’s Independent, who confirmed that Horner was at the press-only briefing without even a notebook in hand. In a Jeff Gannon-style presentation, Horner promoted the Bush administration position, suggesting the U.S. position be portrayed as leading a “new consensus.” In fact, the United States position is neither new, nor does it resemble anything like a consensus. More than 150 countries, including nearly every industrialized nation except the United States and Australia, agreed “to engage in talks aimed at producing a new set of binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions that would take effect beginning in 2012.” Horner is not a journalist. He has published just a single op-ed in the Washington Times since 2003, and has never written a hard news article for the paper, according to a database search. But he is quite experienced at underhanded tactics. He drew up plans, funded by ExxonMobil, to destroy Europe’s support for the Kyoto treaty on climate change.” The plan hoped to emulate the White Houses’s “success” in stalling progress on climate change: “In the US an informal coalition has helped successfully to avert adoption of a Kyoto-style program. This model should be emulated, as appropriate, to guide similar efforts in Europe.” [Think Progress] 10:14:10 AM    comment []

© Copyright 2006 Patricia Thurston.