Text-based AI Systems
Collection
Assets related to our research in text-based AI Systems. See <connorjerzak.com/text-overview> for more information.
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4 items
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The dataset generation failed
Error code: DatasetGenerationError
Exception: UnicodeDecodeError
Message: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xa9 in position 175: invalid start byte
Traceback: Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1855, in _prepare_split_single
for _, table in generator:
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/packaged_modules/csv/csv.py", line 188, in _generate_tables
csv_file_reader = pd.read_csv(file, iterator=True, dtype=dtype, **self.config.pd_read_csv_kwargs)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/streaming.py", line 75, in wrapper
return function(*args, download_config=download_config, **kwargs)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/utils/file_utils.py", line 1213, in xpandas_read_csv
return pd.read_csv(xopen(filepath_or_buffer, "rb", download_config=download_config), **kwargs)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/parsers/readers.py", line 1026, in read_csv
return _read(filepath_or_buffer, kwds)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/parsers/readers.py", line 620, in _read
parser = TextFileReader(filepath_or_buffer, **kwds)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/parsers/readers.py", line 1620, in __init__
self._engine = self._make_engine(f, self.engine)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/parsers/readers.py", line 1898, in _make_engine
return mapping[engine](f, **self.options)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/pandas/io/parsers/c_parser_wrapper.py", line 93, in __init__
self._reader = parsers.TextReader(src, **kwds)
File "parsers.pyx", line 574, in pandas._libs.parsers.TextReader.__cinit__
File "parsers.pyx", line 663, in pandas._libs.parsers.TextReader._get_header
File "parsers.pyx", line 874, in pandas._libs.parsers.TextReader._tokenize_rows
File "parsers.pyx", line 891, in pandas._libs.parsers.TextReader._check_tokenize_status
File "parsers.pyx", line 2053, in pandas._libs.parsers.raise_parser_error
UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xa9 in position 175: invalid start byte
The above exception was the direct cause of the following exception:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/src/services/worker/src/worker/job_runners/config/parquet_and_info.py", line 1436, in compute_config_parquet_and_info_response
parquet_operations = convert_to_parquet(builder)
File "/src/services/worker/src/worker/job_runners/config/parquet_and_info.py", line 1053, in convert_to_parquet
builder.download_and_prepare(
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 925, in download_and_prepare
self._download_and_prepare(
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1001, in _download_and_prepare
self._prepare_split(split_generator, **prepare_split_kwargs)
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1742, in _prepare_split
for job_id, done, content in self._prepare_split_single(
File "/src/services/worker/.venv/lib/python3.9/site-packages/datasets/builder.py", line 1898, in _prepare_split_single
raise DatasetGenerationError("An error occurred while generating the dataset") from e
datasets.exceptions.DatasetGenerationError: An error occurred while generating the datasetNeed help to make the dataset viewer work? Make sure to review how to configure the dataset viewer, and open a discussion for direct support.
CATEGORY
int64 | RAWTEXT
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4 | "I just remind everybody," Feingold said in New Hampshire this weekend, "Democrats were in the majority in the United States Senate when we voted for the Iraq war and we passed the USA Patriot Act. It's not enough to be just in the majority. You have to stand for something."<br /><br /><a href="http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20051121&s=crowley112105" target="_blank">The New Republic's Michael Crowley says</a>, "Feingold may emerge as the only 2008 Democratic candidate who voted against the Iraq war: Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, John Edwards, Joe Biden, and Evan Bayh all supported the 2002 war resolution, while governors Tom Vilsack of Iowa and Mark Warner of Virginia are hawkish-sounding centrists."<br /><br />This weekend Feingold said what so many Americans are waiting to hear... "Why are so many Democrats too timid to say what everyone in America knows? It's time to redeploy the troops. It's time to bring the troops out of Iraq. I say bring them home by the end of the year."<br /><br />Crowley explains why... "Feingold has not called for the United States to get out of Iraq "right now." But he is the only major congressional Democrat to set a specific withdrawal timetable. The impetus for his proposal was a trip he took to Iraq in February with a small Senate delegation that included, of all people, Hillary Clinton. Feingold had never visited Iraq before, and he was appalled by what he saw there. "We couldn't stay overnight in Iraq," he said recently. "We couldn't drive from the airport to the Green Zone. When we went to the Green Zone, the helicopters had to go just over the palm trees so they wouldn't get shot down. We never got to go out to see the rest of Baghdad, because they couldn't take us out safely. We wore flak jackets and helmets in the Green Zone. And people are worried about chaos if we leave?" |
4 | "Senators Hillary Clinton and Joe Lieberman promised in November to introduce federal legislation on violent video games when congress reconvenes. Today, they and Senator Evan Bayh unveiled the bill known as the Family Entertainment Protection Act." - <a href="http://gamedaily.com/maddennfl06/article.asp?article_id=9813&game_id=4211&source=00001§ion=news">GameDAILY report</a> |
4 | "This victory is in large part due to the Internet... For the first time, a coalition of NGOs has had an influence on the security of the entire world without being a superpower." Jody Williams, Nobel Peace Prize Winner <br /> <br />"Politicians used to put out leaflets with pictures of their family and pet dog and copies of their lousy speeches and it would be enough. Unfortunately many politicians now just create a web site with pictures of their family and pet dog and their lousy speeches but it is not good enough," Stephen Coleman, Oxford Internet Institute <br /> <br />"A lot of the Internet traffic may represent an echo chamber of virtual activism rather than meaningful protest. The web allows people who agree with each other to talk to each other and gives them the impression of being part of a much larger network than is necessarily the case." Barbara Epstein, University of California Professor <br /> <br />"The newest computer can merely compound, at speed, the oldest problem in the relations between human beings, and in the end the communicator will be confronted with the old problem, of what to say and how to say it." Bill Gates <br /> <br />"There is a connection waiting to be made between the decline in democratic participation and the explosion in new ways of communicating. We need not accept the paradox that gives us more ways than ever to speak, and leaves the public with a wider feeling than ever before that their voices are not being heard. The new technologies can strengthen our democracy, by giving us greater opportunities than ever before for better transparency and a more responsive relationship between government and electors" The Honourable Robin Cook <br /> <br />"The Internet makes it far easier for us to restrict ourselves, much of the same, to groups of like-minded people -- to live in echo chambers of our own devising. In this way, the Internet is creating an increase, in many places, of social fragmentation, and hence an increase in both tolerance and incivility, as people end up seeing their fellow citizens as stupid, or malicious, or despicable. This problem is increased by the fact that much of the Internet is intolerant and far from civil. The culture of (some) television -- with liberals simply attacking conservatives, and vice-versa -- isn't healthy for democracy or tolerance, because it encourages people to choose teams, rather than to think issues through. For many people the Internet is aggravating this problem." Cass Sunstein, Professor of Law and Political Science at the University of Chicago and author of Republic.com <br /> <br />"With email, a person can get his questions answered. You can bring people up to different levels of engagement with the campaign. You can't do that with any other medium." Joe Rothstein, Washington, DC consultant <br /> <br />"At its best, the Internet can educate more people faster than any media tool. At its worst, it can make people dumber faster than any media tool. Because the Internet has an aura of "technology" surrounding it, the uneducated believe information from it even more. They don't realize that the Internet, at its ugliest, is just an open sewer: an electronic conduit for untreated, unfiltered information. Just when you might have thought you were all alone with your extreme views, the Internet puts you together with a community of people from around the world who hate all the things and people you do. You can scrap the BBC and just get your news from those Websites that reinforce your own stereotypes." Thomas Friedman, New York Times <br /> <br />"Overall, the work of rebuilding and transforming government for the digital age is only just beginning. Governments remain organized according to political and bureaucratic imperatives, not according to what makes the most sense to citizens." Andrew Leigh and Robert Atkinson in "Breaking down bureaucratic barriers: the next phase of digital government" <br /> <br />"Imagine a school with children that can read or write, but with teachers who can not, and you have a metaphor of the Information Age in which we live." Peter Cochrane <br /> <br />"Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage, and those who manage what they do not understand." author unknown <br /> <br />"What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it." Nobel laureate economist Herbert A. Simon <br /> <br />"The positive claims for the value of the Internet offered by our contemporaries are mostly hype. Whatever the long-range value of the Net turns out to be, it won't be the quality of information it offers, the democratic distance learning it makes possible, the presence of the Net user to all of reality, and the possibility of a new life full of meaning." Hubert Dreyfus, Philosopher University of California <br /> <br />"Overall, the work of rebuilding and transforming government for the digital age is only just beginning....Governments remain organized according to political and bureaucratic imperatives, not according to what makes the most sense to citizens." Andrew Leigh and Robert Atkinson in "Breaking down bureaucratic barriers: the next phase of digital government" <br /> <br />"A candidate who can master the Internet will not only level the playing field; he will level the opposition." RightClick Strategies' Larry Purpuro <br /> <br />"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Arthur C. Clarke <br /> <br />"The Internet has become the main strategic communications tool behind the scenes in politics. It is not a medium to sway undecided voters. It is a medium to organize your supporters, feed them your message and get out your core vote. It may have an impact on new and less frequent voters some day, but that seems a long way off. No candidate that I am aware of has ever won because of the Internet." Steve Clift, Democracy Online <br /> <br />"The Web is trivially simple - massively successful and its like Karaoke - anybody can do it." Ted Nelson, Computer Visionary & Founder of Hyper Text <br /> <br />"Encouraging e-democracy is less desirable to elected officials. On the contrary, most of what they do while in office is try to increase their chances for re-election. Consider a politician who has the opportunity to create easily accessible public records of public meetings, including his own roll call votes. The person most motivated to use such records would likely be an opponent who wants to embarrass the incumbent." New America Foundation fellow James Snider <br /> <br />"The net is more than an organizing tool - it has become an organizing model, a blueprint for decentralized but cooperative decision-making. It facilitates the process of information sharing to such an extent that many groups can work in concert with one another without the need to achieve monolithic consensus." Naomi Klein, No Logo <br /> <br />"Many key decisions are complex, and there is considerable uncertainty about the consequences of alternative measures. The policy-making bureaux in most governments are limited in size, and are typically overloaded. The new technologies hold out the promise of drawing upon far wider expertise. The challenge is how to do this in the most effective way. I suspect that the more structured the questions that are posed in the Internet dialogue the more meaningful will be the responses. Participants in the dialogue could be required to provide evidence backing up their arguments. One advantage of this approach is that it would widen the circle of expertise which the government could draw upon, which all too often is limited by circles of personal acquaintance." Joseph Stiglitz, former Chief Economist of the World Bank <br /> <br />"The net, by its very nature, is inclusive. It reduces the barriers to human interaction. That said, for the Internet to . . .transform and not to perpetuate our political circumstances, three further conditions must be met. The first, most obviously, is universal Internet access. The second is a citizen body . . . willing and able to use the net to become connected and re-engaged. And the third, perhaps most importantly, is a formal political class with some predisposition to take Internet politics seriously. Of these, there is evidence to suggest that the big problem lies with the formal political class." Ian Kearns and Nick Hardy, Institute for Public Policy Research, UK <br /> <br />"Each new generation of nerds thinks it has the answer, only to run into the same brick wall of human behaviour. We must understand people and organizations before we can determine how to meld them with technology." Frank Bannister, a senior lecturer at Trinity College Dublin and e-democracy expert <br /> <br />"While the major political parties have struggled to use the Internet to their advantage, grassroots groups with enthusiasm beyond their budgets are finding that electronic politics can be a powerful force. The old and inefficient telephone tree is giving way to e-mail lists and computers that can send a letter or news alert to thousands of people in seconds. It is a trend that might reshape politics, bringing more people into a newly decentralized - - and democratized - - process just when many experts have concluded that the nation suffers from a near-terminal case of apathy." Daniel Weintraub, Sacramento Bee <br /> <br />"Computers are so deeply stupid. What bother me most when they talk about technology is they don't realize how much more exciting their minds are. That machine is stupid. And boring. It does just a few things and then it'll crash. People think, 'I am on the Net, I am in touch with the world'. Wrong! The point is how we work, not how machines work." Laurie Anderson, Artist and technology pioneer <br /> <br />"One must be wary of the view that these loose and diverse coalitions represent a new form of globalized participatory democracy. The dissent industry is largely a product of the Internet revolution. Inexpensive, borderless, real-time networking provides advocacy non-governmental organizations [NGOs] with economies of scale and also of scope by linking widely disparate groups with one common theme." Sylvia Ostry <br /> <br />"I can't think of anything except kissing babies that you can't do online." Michael Cornfield, political scientist at George Washington University. <br /> <br />The modern campaign headquarters...has an annex open any hour of the day or night, at an address starting with www. New York Times, 10/19/99. <br /> <br />The Internet is rapidly taking its place as a full-fledged component of the political campaign media mix. As it does, it will open more opportunities of leveraging the most valuable currency in the modern world of political campaigns: information. Ron Faucheaux, editor-in-chief, Campaigns & Elections. <br /> <br />"The technology that's out there is going to change the country; therefore, it's going to change our politics." Doug Bailey, publisher, Hotline. <br /> <br />"Technology is a way of organizing the universe so that man doesn't have to experience it.â Max Frisch <br /> <br />"I was not only the first woman to become secretary of state, I was the first [U.S.] secretary of state of the 21st century. I was the first secretary of state to own a Web site, to visit Internet cafes, and to make Internet access a part of policy." Madeleine Albright, Former U.S. Secretary of State <br /> <br />"By and large, people are sort of technologically averse in the political space." Mike McCurry, Press secretary to President Clinton. <br /> <br />"Today there are 400 million people around the world who have access to the Internet. By 2005, there will be more than 1 billion. We can all imagine the expectations and demands this will impose on government, but also the possibilities it will bring for improving services and revitalizing democracy." Graham Stringer, UK Minister <br /> <br />"Creating the foundation for dramatic change, the Internet has had a profound impact-in part by enabling organizers to quickly and easily arrange demonstrations and protests, worldwide if necessary. Individuals and groups now are able to establish dates, share experiences, accept responsibilities, arrange logistics, and initiate a myriad of other taskings that would have been impossible to manage readily and rapidly in the past. International protests and demonstrations can be organized for the same date and time, so that a series of protests take place in concert. The Internet has breathed new life into the anarchist philosophy, permitting communication and coordination without the need for a central source of command, and facilitating coordinated actions with minimal resources and bureaucracy. It has allowed groups and individuals to cement bonds, file e-mail reports of perceived successes, and recruit members." Canadian Security Intelligence Report, Anti-globalization: Spreading Phenomenon <br /> <br />"The Internet is becoming the âpre-digestionâ chamber for public policy discussion. Public policy ideas are being introduced, accessed, advocated, promoted, and debated on-line and then flow into the formal channels of official policymaking. As issues move through these channels, a parallel debate occurs on-line. When decisions are taken, the issues are re-fought on-line. Cyber debate and discussion is becoming the background soundtrack of government policy-making, both reflecting and influencing the process." Scott Proudfoot, Hillwatch <br /> <br />"Men have become the tools of their tools." Henry David Thoreau <br /> <br />"There is more to life than increasing its speed." Mahatma Gandhi <br /> <br />"Technology is a queer thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand and stabs you in the back with the other.â C.P. Snow <br /> <br />"I'm addicted to the Internet. I admit it. It has transformed the way I work as a senator, communicate with my children, and keep tabs on news and cultural developments.... The Internet is a more direct communications link between legislators and their constituents....I constantly work at fusing my Senate work into my office home page to make it as useful, timely, and user-friendly as possible for Vermonters and others who may visit.....I look at my Web site, as my 24-hour virtual office, where visitors can send me an e-mail or search for the information they need anytime, day or night.â Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont <br /> <br />"New information technologiesâincluding email, the web, and computerized blast-faxes and phone callsâhave fundamentally changed the landscape of political competition in modern democracies. Theyâve done so in three ways: by dramatically boosting the access of individuals and special interests to politically potent information, by making it easier for such people to coordinate their activities and exert political power, and by greatly increasing the pace of events within our political systems.â Thomas Homer-Dixon, director of the Peace and Conflict Studies Program at the University of Toronto <br /> <br />"A computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any other invention in human history, with the possible exception of handguns and tequila." Mitch Radcliffe <br /> <br />"The electronic town hall allows for speedy communications and bad decision-making." David Shenk <br /> <br />"Our democracy, our constitutional framework is really a kind of software for harnessing the creativity and political imagination for all of our people....The American democratic system was an early political version of Napster." Al Gore <br /> <br />"From far left to far right - and almost every point in between - advocacy groups are leading the charge into cyberpolitics. Itâs essentially impossible to find an activist group of any significance that does not have an internet presence today. Advocacy groups, having gained experience from constant campaigning, tend to engage in more sophisticated online activism than candidates and corporations do. And they're constantly getting better at it..... It is not a medium for mass persuasion; if you want to run for president, you'd better buy lots of television advertising. But, if you want to move individuals to meet, march, and mail public officials, you'd best be online..... It levels the playing field and lowers barriers to participation by placing powerful information and communications tools in the hands of even small nd cash-strapped organizations. With an ever-increasing number of government documents available online, key information is no longer restricted to organizations with sophisticated Washington-based lobbyists who know on which Capital Hill doors to knock. One e-mail alert can do the world of countless phone trees and in infinitely faster than mailings. Organizations can afford to communicate with non-members and to build rosters of activists who are not dues-paying members.â Tom Price, ZDNet <br /> <br />"Wealth and speed are what the world admires, what each pursues. Railways, express mails, steamships and every possible facility for communications are the achievement in which the civilized world view and revels, only to languish in mediocrity by that very fact. Indeed, the effect of this diffusion is to spread the culture of the mediocre." Goethe <br /> <br />"Information and images bump against each other every day in massive quantities, and the resonance of this interfacing is like the babble of a village or tavern gossip session." Marshall McLuhan <br /> <br />"It has provided more access to more information and political activity than anyone has in the history of the world to a sliver of the population â for instance junkies like me. But most others have been largely oblivious to the information cyber-revolution." Norman Ornstein <br /> <br />"The Internet is many things simultaneously â¦a new broadcast mediumâ¦interactive bulletin board â¦enormous collaboration toolâ¦a huge post office.. The Internet is a venue for one-to-many communications, one-to-one communications, and many-to-many communications." Kevin Hill & John Hughes <br /> <br />"A survey by Holm Group in 1998 found that 88% of staff members in congressional offices check the Internet for information every day." Rebecca Fairley Raney <br /> <br />"Our marvelous new information technologies boost our power and opportunities for political engagement, but they can also disempower us by contributing to extreme political mobilization that sometimes overwhelms our institutions. These institutions were designed for rural societies operation at a tiny fraction of todayâs speed and with a citizenry vastly less capable that todayâs. Itâs unclear how they will change to adapt to the new reality, but change they must." Thomas Homer-Dixon, director of the Peace and Conflict Studies Program at the University of Toronto <br /> <br />"The political technology of the Industrial age is no longer appropriate technology for the new civilization taking form around us. Our politics are obsolete." Alvin Toffler <br /> <br />"Keep your web pages up to date. 'The first thing I do with a witness is go to their web site.'" notes a parliamentary researcher. David McInnes <br /> <br />"High-powered politicians had reams of statistics and analysis why a set of international investing rules would make the world a better place. They were no match, however, for a global ban of grass roots organizations, which, with little more than computers and access to the Internet, helped derail a deal.â <br />Madelaine Drohan <br /> <br />"Who killed the MAI â the Multilateral agreement on Investment? According to many accounts, civil society deserves the credit â or blame â and its weapon of choice was the Internet. The Internet with its revolutionary ability to connect millions and share information and strategies across time and space, allowed for an unprecedented global mobilization of opposition to the Agreement." Horizons <br /> <br />"From gas prices to cultural jamming and on-line concerts, the Internet is a hotbed of activity. On-line activism is everywhere and while this kind of Internet usage might not get the attention that dot.com startups and broadband battles do, the innovative uses of the Internet are reminders that real people are using technology to incite actions and maker their voices heard." Emma Smith <br /> <br />"The Internet, unlike television, is not universally available, and online information reaches only highly interested voters." Rebecca Fairley Raney <br /> <br />"In the ever accelerating world of the Internet, e-campaigning has gone from a novelty to a necessity in less than a year. With increasing sophistication and urgency, campaigns are using the Web as a bulletin board, advertising medium and organizing tool." Howard Fineman <br /> <br />"The potential of any technology is always dissipated by its users involvement in its predecessorsâ¦Computer are still serving mainly to sustain precomputer effects." Marshall McLuahn <br /> <br />"Unless the digital divide is narrowed soon, the United States may be headed to the class warfare of a century ago, the last time the economy changed so fundamentally. It wonât be pleasant." Jonathan Alter <br /> <br />"The net is emerging as mainstream, multipurpose political tool." Amy Borrus <br /> <br />"The Information Revolution is likely to democratize politics by weakening the elitesâ grip on information." Richard Dunham <br /> <br />"Without question, the mass gathering of peaceful protestors and a small number of violent critics of the WTO would not have been possible without a wired world. With thousands of web sites featuring sophisticated analysis of the complex 134 country organization and urging the world to come to Seattle, it was the Internet that made this protest the loudest and largest in decades." Bill Tieleman <br /> <br />"As a two way mass communications medium that allows users to receive news and information, as well as participate in information transmission and public discussion, the Internet potentially diffuses power over information and public debate. That ability even extends to overt lobbying by individuals in behalf of their own political interests." Richard Davis <br /> <br />"The new electronic independence recreates the world in the image of a global village." Marshall McLuhan <br /> <br />"Advancements in electoral politics have almost always come from marketing, advertising, and communications techniques which were developed and refined for the consumer marketplaceâ¦.As new marketing and communications techniques are developed to respond to the e-commerce boom, it will likely be from these areas that crossover applications to the electoral arena will originate." Grant Kippen <br /> <br />"The communications revolution is changing how people interact with one another, how organizations engage their constituencies, how we access information. It also makes possible a collective I.Q. where thousands of people can be connected to focus on an issue." Morino Institute <br /> <br />"In 1994, if a political party or interest group had even a rudimentary web site, it was a pioneer in the Information Age. In 1995, if a party or organization had a flashy series of web pages that included graphics, audio, video or text, it was hip. In 1996, if a Candidate for president has a web site, he would likely give out the address for during televised appearancesâ¦By 1997, if a party or interest group still did not have a web site, it was run by a bunch of idiotsâ¦.Any political party or interest group â¦that does not take advantage of the Internet for lobbying, member recruitment and retention, and information dissemination, is cheating itself of one of the biggest boons to organized political activity in the twentieth centuryâ¦The web is potentially the greatest thing since the postal system and the telephone for political interest groups." Kevin Hill & John Hughes <br /> <br /> |
4 | Originally <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/08/politics/08dems.html?ei=5090&en=9562f5f4718a9fb2&ex=1297054800&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print">here</a>.<br />_________________________________<br /><br /><strong>February 8, 2006</strong><br /><h2>Some Democrats Are Sensing Missed Opportunities</h2><br />By <a href="http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=ADAM NAGOURNEY&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=ADAM NAGOURNEY&inline=nyt-per">ADAM NAGOURNEY</a><br />and <a href="http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=SHERYL GAY STOLBERG&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=SHERYL GAY STOLBERG&inline=nyt-per">SHERYL GAY STOLBERG</a><br /><br /> WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 â Democrats are heading into this year’s elections in a position weaker than they had hoped for, party leaders say, stirring concern that they are letting pass an opportunity to exploit what they see as widespread Republican vulnerabilities.<br /><br /> In interviews, senior Democrats said they were optimistic about significant gains in Congressional elections this fall, calling this the best political environment they have faced since President Bush took office.<br /><br /> But Democrats described a growing sense that they had failed to take full advantage of the troubles that have plagued Mr. Bush and his party since the middle of last year, driving down the president’s approval ratings, opening divisions among Republicans in Congress over policy and potentially putting control of the House and Senate into play in November.<br /><br /> Asked to describe the health of the Democratic Party, Senator Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said: “A lot worse than it should be. This has not been a very good two months.”<br /><br /> “We seem to be losing our voice when it comes to the basic things people worry about,” Mr. Dodd said.<br /><br /> Democrats said they had not yet figured out how to counter the White House’s long assault on their national security credentials. And they said their opportunities to break through to voters with a coherent message on domestic and foreign policy â should they settle on one â were restricted by the lack of an established, nationally known leader to carry their message this fall.<br /><br /> As a result, some Democrats said, their party could lose its chance to do to Republicans this year what the Republicans did to them in 1994: make the midterm election, normally dominated by regional and local concerns, a national referendum on the party in power.<br /><br /> “I think that two-thirds of the American people think the country is going in the wrong direction,” said Senator Barack Obama, the first-term Illinois Democrat who is widely viewed as one of the party’s promising stars. “They’re not sure yet whether Democrats can move it in the right direction.”<br /><br /> Mr. Obama said the Democratic Party had not seized the moment, adding: “We have been in a reactive posture for too long. I think we have been very good at saying no, but not good enough at saying yes.”<br /><br /> Some Democrats said they favored remaining largely on the sidelines while Republicans struggled under the glare of a corruption inquiry. And some said there was still time for the party to get its act together. But many others said the party needed to move quickly to offer a comprehensive governing agenda, even as they expressed concern about who could make the case.<br /><br /> Their concern was aggravated by the image of high-profile Democrats, including Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, challenging the legality of Mr. Bush’s secret surveillance program this week at a time when the White House has sought to portray Democrats as weak on security.<br /><br /> “We’re selling our party short; you’ve got to stand for a lot more than just blasting the other side,” said Gov. Phil Bredesen of Tennessee. “The country is wide open to hear some alternatives, but I don’t think it’s wide open to all these criticisms. I am sitting here and getting all my e-mail about the things we are supposed to say about the president’s speech, but it’s extremely light on ideas. It’s like, ‘We’re for jobs and we’re for America.’ ”<br /><br /> To a certain extent, the frustrations afflicting Democrats are typical for a party out of power. In Congress, the Democrats have become largely marginalized by the Republican majority, depriving them of a ready platform either to make attacks or offer their own ideas. Presidential campaigns typically produce prominent party leaders, followed around the country by a cluster of reporters and television crews, but that is at least two years away.<br /><br /> Yet in many ways, the Democratic Party’s problems seem particularly tangled today, a source of frustration to Democratic leaders as they have watched opinion polls indicating that the public is souring on the Republican Party and receptive to Democratic leadership.<br /><br /> And the problems are besetting Democrats at a pivotal moment, as they struggle to adapt to a shifting American political landscape, and a concerted effort by this White House to make permanent inroads among once traditional Democratic voters.<br /><br /> Since Mr. Bush’s re-election, Democrats have been divided over whether to take on the Republicans in a more confrontational manner, ideologically and politically, or to move more forcefully to stake out the center on social and national security issues. They are being pushed, from the left wing of the party, to stand for what they say are the party’s historical liberal values.<br /><br /> But among more establishment Democrats, there is concern that many of the party’s most visible leaders â among them, Howard Dean, the Democratic chairman; Senator John Kerry, the party’s 2004 presidential candidate; Mr. Kennedy; Representative Nancy Pelosi, the House minority leader; and Al Gore, who has assumed a higher profile as the party heads toward the 2008 presidential primaries â may be flawed messengers.<br /><br /> In this view, the most visible Democrats are vulnerable to Republican attacks portraying them as out of the mainstream on issues including security and budget-cutting.<br /><br /> One of the party’s most prominent members, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, has been relatively absent for much of this debate, a characteristic display of public caution that her aides say reflects her concern for keeping focused on her re-election bid. Mrs. Clinton, who has only nominal opposition, declined requests for an interview to discuss her views of the party.<br /><br /> Mr. Kerry said the party’s authority had been diluted because of the absence of one or two obvious leaders, though he expressed confidence that would change.<br /><br /> “We are fighting to find a voice under difficult circumstances, and I’m confident, over the next few months, you are going to see that happen,” Mr. Kerry said in an interview. “Our megaphone is just not as large as their megaphone, and we have a harder time getting that message out, even when people are on the same page.”<br /><br /> Beyond that, while there is a surfeit of issues for Democrats to use against Republicans â including corruption, the war in Iraq, energy prices and health care â party leaders are divided about what Democrats should be talking about and about how soon they should engage in the debate.<br /><br /> In a speech last week in Washington and in an interview, Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana, who is considering a run for president in 2008, sharply criticized fellow Democrats who were arguing that the party should focus only on domestic issues and turn away from national security, since that has been the strong suit for this White House since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.<br /><br /> “I think the Republicans are ripe for the taking on this issue,” Mr. Bayh said in the interview, “but not until we rehabilitate our own image. I think there’s a certain element of denial about how we are viewed, perhaps incorrectly but viewed nonetheless, by many Americans as being deficient on national security.”<br /><br /> In his speech, to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Mr. Bayh said: “As Democrats, we have a patriotic duty and political imperative to lay out our ideas for protecting America. Frankly, our fellow citizens have doubts about us. We have work to do.”<br /><br /> Some Democrats argued that the party had time to put up its ideas, and that it would be smarter to wait until later, when voters would be paying attention.<br /><br /> “When you bring it out early, you are going to leave it open for the spinmeisters in Rove’s machine, the Republican side, to tear it to pieces,” said Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois.<br /><br /> But former Senator John Edwards of North Carolina, the party’s 2004 vice-presidential nominee and a prospective presidential candidate for 2008, said he thought Americans were eager to hear the contrasting case.<br /><br /> “What the American people are hungry to hear from us is, ‘what is the difference?’ ” Mr. Edwards said in an interview. “What will we do? How will we deal with the corruption issue in Washington? How will we deal with the huge moral issues that we have at home? This is a huge opportunity for our party to show what we are made of.”<br /><br /> Historically at least, Democrats should be in a strong position. The out-of-power party typically gains seats in the midterm elections of a president’s second term. And Democrats said they had a particularly compelling case for voting out the party in power this year because of investigations centered on the White House and Congress, including the influence-peddling case involving the lobbyist Jack Abramoff.<br /><br /> “We’re going to keep hammering this,” said Mr. Dean, the party chairman, referring to the scandals. “One thing the Republicans have taught us is that values and character matter.”<br /><br /> Yet some Democrats warned that it would be a mistake to talk only about ethics.<br /><br /> “It’s absolutely required that the party talk about things in addition to the Abramoff scandal,” said Martin Frost, former leader of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. “I think the climate is absolutely right to take back the House or the Senate or both. But you can’t do it without a program.”<br /><br /> And Mr. Bayh said, “I don’t believe we will win by just not being them.”<br /><br /> Ms. Pelosi of California, the House Democratic leader, did not dispute that argument. But, pointing to the Democratic strategy in defeating Mr. Bush’s Social Security proposal last year, she said there was no rush.<br /><br /> “People said, ‘You can’t beat something with nothing,’ ” she said, arguing that the Democrats had in fact accomplished precisely that this year. “I feel very confident about where we are.”<br /><br /> And Senator Barbara Boxer, also a California Democrat, said: “We have a strategy. First is to convince the American people that what’s happening in Washington is not working. We have achieved that. Now we have to, at this stage, convince people that we are the ones to bring positive change.”<br /><br />_________________________________<br /> End of Archived Material <br /><br /> And always remember Steve's words of political wisdom: <br /><i><u><b>THE HOUSE OF SAUD MUST BE DESTROYED!</b></u></i> |
4 | (Rotters News) February 2, 2005 -- WASHINGTON -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said yesterday a fainting spell she suffered might have come from food poisoning that she may have picked up at an expensive Westchester County hotel. <br /> <br />"It was either a 24-hour virus or something we ate," said Clinton, when Rotters Press asked her yesterday what caused her to pass out Monday morning in Buffalo. <br /> <br />"We were celebrating the election in <a href="http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/01/31/081358.php" target="_blank">Iraq</a> -- and toasting our victorious President Bush. Everybody ate the same salad," noted Clinton, âbut as far as the meat serving, I opted to eat crow -- and had humble pie for dessert.â <br /> <br />Clinton attending a meeting at the Hilton with Newt Gingrich and Jeb Bush on Sunday. The subject of the discussion was to be a compromise on Social Security reform measures. <br /> <br />She declined to blame the hotel or her Republican hosts. <br /> <br />"It was just one of these 24-hour 'bang' events where you just get really, really sick," Clinton said. "I donât know if I should be suspicious, but I did notice a waiter who looked a lot like Zell Miller. Heâs retired now, so I know he can use the work. And the waiter could barely speak English, so the resemblance to Miller was remarkable." <br /> <br />"I decided to get up yesterday morning and keep my schedule, which was probably not the smartest thing to do," Clinton said. <br /> <br />Yesterday, Clinton startled an audience at the Buffalo Saturn Club when she announced Monday morning that she could not continue. Secret Service agents, who accompany her everywhere, slowly ârushedâ to her side. <br /> <br />After she was taken to a nearby hospital, tests reveal the level of dioxin in the blood of the Democratic Senator from New York is more than 6,000 times higher than normal. <br /> <br />A normal level of dioxin is between 15 and 45 units. Almost everyone has some level of dioxins because the toxic chemical is widespread in the environment -- mainly from its industrial usages -- and accumulates in the food chain. <br /> <br />In the case of Clinton, doctors at the hospital narrowed the search from more than 400 dioxins to about 29 -- and are confident they will identify the poison by week's end. That, in turn, could provide clues for the investigation of the alleged poisoning. <br /> <br />"From a (chemical) fingerprint, at least you can deduce what kind of sources might have been involved," a police investigator told The Rotters News. "The labs will try to find out whether it matches any of the batches of dioxins that are around, so that maybe you can trace it back to where it was ordered or where it came from. Weâre not sure if Zell Miller had anything to do with it, but we did find traces of hominy grits mixed in with the samples." <br /> <br />Newt Gingrich and Zell Miller both denied having anything to do with the poisoning, and added that they are reaching out to all leading Democrats in a series of luncheons and dinners between now and 2008. <br /> <br />"We want to end the bi-partisan bickering," Gingrich said, "---as a matter of fact, this weekend, we're hosting a special Superbowl Party and we've invited Barack Obama to share in some bean dip." <br /> <br />Experts say Clinton, whose face has been pockmarked and disfigured, has probably experienced the worst effects already and should gradually recover, with no impairment to her skills or ability to attract men. <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /><center><img src="http://home.earthlink.net/~fwbull/hillary_dioxin.jpg" /></center> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> |
-2 | ....so today, in a rainy mess so symbolic of his reign, President Bill Clinton opens the most personally-supervised, "tweaked by himself" Presidential Library in the history of such institutions in Little Rock, Ak. Putting politics aside (something the library's exhibits NEVER do) let's talk about the building first. Have you seen it? Have you really SEEN it? It looks, being charitable, like an airport in a Soviet republic. Ugly, boxy, pseudo-modern and about to fall down. Horrible! <br /> <br />But that's nothing compared to the propaganda within. According to published reports, while the museum has a "whitewater alcove" regarding the impeachment scandals of the Clintons, it plays fast and loose with the truth, for example saying that the whole thing was a powergrab by evil Republicans, that NOBODY was convicted (ignoring the 14 people who were, of course, and the President's plea bargain deal to agree to disbarrment to avoid indictment) and painting Newt Gingrich as the evil one and Ken Starr as his loyal servant. OF course, the ex-Clintonistas like Begala & co say it is "Fair and Balanced" and say that it is in keeping with all other Presidential Libraries, scoffingly quipping "I don' t think there's a Contragate niche at the Reagan Library! Hahaahhah!" <br /> <br />Except, of course, that there IS just that. The Reagan Library, housed in a BEAUTIFUL and tasteful building, btw, features the entire Iran-Contra scandal INCLUDING the video of the President admitting wrongdoing. Furthermore, the exhibits having to do with Watergate are the BIGGEST section of the Nixon Library, and pull no punches and present the facts. The attitudes of the librarians and designers of these and other libraries, which serve the nation not merely as museums or memorials, after all, but as research locations for scholars and repositories of presidential papers and history, is that presidents are human, they make mistakes, and the facts should be presented, not shaded and played with for political purposes. NO doubt, all the libraries are tributes to the Presidents they memorialize, but still, the new Clinton place is a showplace not for history but for politics--and there's no doubt where the responsibility lies (pun very much intended) since everyone agrees that Bill Clinton either personally wrote or "tweaked" the text throughout the ugly chunk of steel in Little Rock. <br /> <br />The good news? At least the delusions haven't extended to anticipations of crowds after this weeks' ceremonial post-election Democrat pity-party is over. Take a look on the Clinton library site at the overhead photos of the site plan and you'll see that even by Little Rock standards, let alone those of Southern California and the Nixon and Reagan libraries, they haven't really planned for much on-site parking. Maybe they know something about the crowd count--or lack of it--this place will attract once it settles into the riverside mud and all the dubious dignitaries go home. <br /> <br />The ultimate irony is, of course, that nobody's learned a thing. Just as the exhibits about Clinton ignore the truth---that his presidency and leadership of the Democrat party led to a loss of the House, the Senate, Statehouses, and, finally, of the Presidency itself and the seemingly-inescapable decline to permanent minority status of the Party--so the many Dems congregating in Little Rock today refuse to see that their addiction to outmoded, rejected, dangerously naieve, and generally abhorrent ultra-liberal ultra-leftist policies on economics, social, and foreign policy are the tickets to continual electoral failure as most recently demonstrated by John Kerry...even while they seriously contemplate making Howard Dean their chair and drool over the next installment in the oevre of Michael Moore. <br /> <br />Let me reiterate something: I sincerely and honestly wish the Democrats were vibrant, strong, and offering real alternatives to the policies of my side---it would make us tougher, better, and make us think about our own positions more effectively and create even better policies. Mediocrity in one's opposition leads to mediocrity and flabbyness in one's self. A strong America should have two strong, forward-looking, thinking, creativity-applying parties full of patriots working at odds to each other perhaps but in concert for the nation. But as long as the Dems misunderstand or refuse to see the truth about their past, their present, and their future as they clearly continue to do at the Clinton Library, that time of maximum benefit for America with two strong, open-eyed, warts-and-all-seeing parties will continue to be a dream, not a reality. <br /> <br />Meanwhile? They'll celebrate in a dump in Little Rock, continue to hate, keep threatening to decamp to France or Canada, nominate Hillary, and lose even bigger next time.....and someday add another wing--a Left Wing?--for Hillary's memorabilia and self-delusional statements of blame and shame, too. <br /> |
2 | ...and <a href="http://www.themoderatevoice.com/posts/1132978202.shtml/">here</a> it is. <a href="http://www.justhillary.com">Just Hillary</a> is covering Hillary Clinton in what looks to be an honest and complete way. I especially like the <a href="http://www.justhillary.com/hillarytracker.php">Hillary Tracker</a> feature. <br /><br />I still hope Hillary will run for President, and if she does, I'll probably do some more political blogging. I'll be back if a vacuum of truth about Hillary re-appears, and if there are any more especially <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200506230001">horrifying</a> <a href="http://newyorkmetro.com/nymetro/news/people/columns/intelligencer/11028/">attacks</a> against her. But for now, I'm going anonymous to blog on an utterly different subject more relevant to my career, and less <a href="http://cache.boston.com/images/bostondirtdogs//Headline_Archives/KR_12.8.jpg">toxic</a> <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Grover_Norquist">to</a> <a href="http://www.spiegel.de/img/0,1020,206707,00.jpg">my</a> faith <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Arthur_Finkelstein">in</a> <a href="http://homepage.mac.com/jholbo/nutwork/images/Scaife,%20Richard%20Mellon.jpg">the</a> essential goodness <a href="http://www.salon.com/politics/red/2001/06/22/blue/">of</a> mankind.<br /><br />Thanks to all my readers, and I'll still be reading my favorite blogs. Take care. |
4 | ...the '60s! Or so an AP item from Tuesday can lead one to hope.<blockquote>Vice President Dick Cheney was <a href="http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp?floc=ne-main-9-l3&flok=FF-APO-1151&idq=/ff/story/0001%2F20051115%2F1948261238.htm&sc=1151">heckled by peace protesters</a> Tuesday as he spoke at the groundbreaking for a public policy center honoring former Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker.<br /><br />During Cheney's remarks, about a half-dozen people protesting the war in Iraq yelled, "<a href="http://www.geocities.com/dreadshot/lyrics/edwinstarr-war.html">War, what is it good for?</a>" and held up a large banner saying, "<a href="http://www.lyrics007.com/The%20Beatles%20Lyrics/Give%20Peace%20A%20Chance%20Lyrics.html">Peace Now</a>."</blockquote>One of the things that marked the strength of the anti-Vietnam War movement was the fact that administration officials couldn't go anywhere without facing protestors. Lyndon Johnson got to the point where his public appearances were limited to helicoptering into a military base, making a speech, and flying back to Washington.<br /><br />We're still a good ways from that, but I have to admit that some recent events have made me more hopeful, given me a sense that people are at long last starting to get sick of the BS they've been getting force-fed. There's nothing big or singularly persuasive that I can point to, just a feeling born of some little things - but over the years I've learned to trust my instincts.<br /><br />One thing, of course, is Shrub's falling popularity, with an approval rating running around 35-37% depending on the poll and the day. And once that solid base of support starts to give, one thing leads to another. AFP reported on Tuesday that<blockquote>USA Today noted that "for the first time - albeit by a narrow 49 percent to 48 percent - a plurality <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20051115/en_afp/usbushpoll_051115161041">disapprove</a> of the way Bush is handling the issue of terrorism."<br /><br />Six in 10 also objected to his handling of Iraq, the economy and immigration. And a whopping 71 percent disapprove of his efforts on controlling federal spending, the poll showed.</blockquote>What's driving this? Two things are primary, I'd say: One, of course, is Iraq, on which issue discontent is growing right along with the casualty count and the sense that the government has no idea of how to put an end to it, that it just stretches into the future. The other is the fact that, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/29/AR2005102901223.html">according to a recent poll</a>, a majority of Americans say the indictment of Lewis Libby is a serious issue that "indicates wider problems 'with ethical wrongdoing' in the White House."<blockquote>And by a 3 to 1 ratio, 46 percent to 15 percent, Americans say the level of honesty and ethics in the government has declined rather than risen under Bush.</blockquote>The war has sent hairline fractures through the Bushites' base of public support, fractures which the Libby case have opened. Once the Shrub gang is seen as just another group of crooked, selfish politicians, the resistance to questioning them on all fronts is seriously weakened, even to the point of collapse. Now, this may not do the Dummycrats much good since they're not polling a whole lot better, but that doesn't concern me. The shift in attitude it represents does. <br /><br />Or try this: An AOL online poll asked people to compare Shrub and Bill Clinton. Now, of course, online polls don't mean a whole lot; the participants are self-selected and may well not reflect the public as a whole (or even AOL users as a whole). At the same time, the greater the number of votes, the greater significance can be attached to the numbers - and since AOL only allows one vote per screen name, the ability of anyone to use bots to distort the results is limited. With all that in mind, take this for what it's worth: With 584,000 votes cast, respondents have said Clinton was "more trustworthy" than Bush by a margin of 63%-37%. Asked who was the "better president," a total of 590,000 people have gone for Clinton by 67%-33%. (I don't know if people who don't subscribe to AOL can get to the relevant link, but in any event <a href="http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20051116095509990001&ncid=NWS00010000000001">here it is</a>.)<br /><br />Again, such polls have great weaknesses - but imagine that same poll being taken four or even two years ago. Do you seriously think the results would have been the same? One more time: It's not the particular numbers and it's not whether or not things are working to the benefit of the Dums. It's the sense of movement.<br /><br />Along with that is the fact that Shrub's numbers have continued to slip over time: The White House/rightwing talking head talking points aimed at reversing that trend don't seem to be getting traction outside that probably 30-something percent who would respond to Bush dropping a nuke on Iowa by believing it will bring democracy to Iraq or some other country beginning with an "I" somewhere. Or something. But it was a good thing!<br /><br />I'm hardly the only one to notice it; the bigwigs certainly are smelling something about Iraq:<blockquote>Senior Bush adviser Dan Bartlett said Thursday that the White House had made a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/16/AR2005111601853.html?nav=hcmodule">strategic decision</a> to launch a "sustained" campaign to vigorously combat the notion that the administration misled the nation.</blockquote>As part of that, three times in the last two days Bush and "The Big" Dick Cheney have given speeches attacking Congressional criticism, with Cheney playing the Spiro Agnew role minus the alliteration, calling opponents "dishonest and reprehensible ... opportunists" who are "losing ... their backbone" and are, he said, undermining the morale of US forces. More <a href="http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2005/11/plus-change.html">déjà vu</a>.<br /><br />They're in trouble and they know it. So do the Dims, who replied in language rather less cautious than they had used before; for example, John Kerry said of "The Big" that "it is hard to name a government official <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051117/ap_on_go_pr_wh/cheney_iraq_11">with less credibility</a> on Iraq" than Cheney. Not really soul-stirring, but again, the issue is to compare this with what they might have said, with what they were saying, say, two years ago.<br /><br />And then there was Senator Chuck Hagel (R-NE), who told the Council on Foreign Relations on Tuesday that<blockquote>"[s]uggesting that to challenge or criticize policy is undermining and hurting our troops <a href="http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Hagel_blasts_Bush_for_attacking_war_1115.html">is not democracy</a> nor what this country has stood for, for over 200 years. ...<br /><br />Vietnam was a national tragedy partly because Members of Congress failed their country, remained silent and lacked the courage to challenge the Administrations in power until it was too late. Some of us who went through that nightmare have an obligation to the 58,000 Americans who died in Vietnam to not let that happen again. To question your government is not unpatriotic - to not question your government is unpatriotic."</blockquote>Let's be clear: Hagel is <a href="http://www.vote-smart.org/issue_rating_category.php?can_id=BC031069">no liberal</a>. What's significant here is that with his eye on the GOPper presidential nod for 2008, Hagel feels free to - even feels it advisable to - put some daylight between himself and the White House on Iraq.<br /><br />What good all this will lead to, if any, is still an unknown. But the signs are there, the signs of, again, a shift, a shift in awareness, in if you will sensibility. The signs that, yes, people are finally - finally - getting fed up with being lied to and manipulated. Just remember that a wise political tactician will not attack opponents that can be safely ignored because by doing so you draw more attention to them and risk giving them legitimacy in the public eye that they otherwise would not have. So am I disturbed by Shrub and "The Big" lashing out at critics? No way - I'm delighted because it means the criticisms are drawing blood.<br /><br />One last thing about the protest at Cheney's speech:<blockquote>About 50 protesters, most of them appearing to be college age, demonstrated outside. Several carried signs, including one that read "Honor Baker, Impeach Cheney."</blockquote>"College age?" I don't know if that was meant to be merely descriptive or a sly putdown - "ah, just a bunch of kids." Either way, it again carries echoes of Vietnam for me. Could it be? Could it be the naiveté, the passion and idealism, of youth unsullied by the cynical, world-weary "maturity" shown by so many of us, married to political action? If so, I say <i>damn straight!</i><br /><br />During the '80s, there was a movie which had a line something like "Once we get out of the '80s, the '90s are going to make the '60s look like the '50s." Obviously, it didn't work out that way. But wouldn't it be cool if the character was just off by 10 years?<br /><br /><b>Footnote</b>: I suspect that Howard Baker (Yes, there's a connection: Remember it was at a groundbreaking for a center in Baker's honor at which Cheney was speaking.) doesn't deserve the reputation he obtained during the <a href="http://watergate.info/">Watergate</a> hearings by his repetitive asking of the question "What did the president know and when did he know it?" I've thought all along that he wasn't trying to advance the investigation but to undermine it.<br /><br />Since the hearings were about Republican campaign tactics in the 1972 election, trying to focus solely on Richard Nixon was frankly inappropriate. It seemed (and seems) to me that Baker's actual intent was to direct the inquiry away from the obvious criminality of the GOPper mean machine and toward what he thought was safer ground for the party: the question of Nixon's direct personal involvement, for which, early on, there was little evidence. Little did he know.... |
4 | .flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; }<div class="flickr-frame"> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/62915970@N00/134852092/" title="photo sharing"><img src="http://static.flickr.com/49/134852092_74047dd5f4.jpg" class="flickr-photo" alt="" /></a><br /> <span class="flickr-caption"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/62915970@N00/134852092/">"Trying On The New Method of Speechmaking"</a>, originally uploaded by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/62915970@N00/">Wazdat!</a>.</span></div> <p class="flickr-yourcomment"> </p><br /><br />I would like to tell you about a little Town Hall type meeting we had up in Syracuse, New York last week with our candidates for Congress. We wanted to know what they intended to do about the situation in Iraq. It went pretty much as anyone would expect, the incumbents didnât show up, and that includes you Chuck and Hilary. As always, Representative James T. Walsh (R) couldnât be bothered. Itâs only the 25th District Jimmie. But all the Democratic candidates did show up. <br /><br />I was impressed with the caliber of the individuals that attended the meeting on what to do with Iraq. Impressed yet at the same time not surprised by many of the statements made by many of the speakers. There were simply repetitions of many opinions that I had heard throughout the Iraq fiasco. <br /><br />The presuppositions of both sides were very present. <br /><br />There were even a few people from the other side. <br /><br />A Major Scott Taylor got up and said that we must stay in Iraq, because we<br /><br />A: Thought Saddam had WMD's.<br /><br />B: The infrastructure there is improving<br /><br />C: Saddam was a bad man, who committed many atrocities. The presuppositions of both sides were very present. <br /><br />The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressives">Progressives</a> spoke about how we should leave Iraq as soon as possible. <br /><br />Dr. John Burdick wanted an international solution to the problem.<br /><br />Mr. Ken Howland wanted immediate pullout.<br /><br />This reinforces my opinion that no solution for peace in Iraq from the Left or the Right will be a cakewalk. In general, my sympathies are for the Progressives' solutions to the war, but as to specifics, I have a few questions.<br /><br />I agree with Dr. Burdick that we are the target in Iraq, and we do inevitably cause innocent lives to suffer and die. I also agree that civilians suffer the worst casualties, and even politically sympathetic factions want us to leave. <br /><br />Dr. Burdick was right to mention that sectarian hatred makes creating an army and police force from both Shia and Sunni sects nearly impossible. I would even add that the experience of being expelled from their neighborhoods for belonging to a particular sect and being ghettoized for it, creates vast reservoirs of angry youth ready ripe for recruiting by violent groups. This will be exacerbated by the fact that our troops have had to depend on one faction to help them fight the other.<br /><br />My problem deals with Burdick's solution to the problem.<br /><br />He wants America to out of the friendly king installment business. Next we need international participation.<br /><br />First of all Mr. Jaafari has already caved. America is already tarred and feathered as the installer and deposer of kings.<br /><br />Secondly, International cooperation requires nothing less than having to gain the cooperation of French mothers, German fathers, Italian brothers and sisters to send their family members to a war in a place where few people like them.<br /><br />We may expect that in 3 years time though we may have achieved the ability to enjoin other nations to form a new coalition, it may by then be too late for an international coalition. After 3 more years of Dubya's inept bungling, the civil war in country, will be so bad that no country will send any troops into this worsening problem. <br /><br />Does Dr. Burdick understand that we'd be asking somebody's French kid, or German brother to lay their lives on the line. Germany and France are democracies, like we are. It may be impossible to get them back into a coalition. <br /><br />A more realistic solution? The regional approach. An occupation by Arab or Moslem armies partnered with the U.S. and Britain for cohesion is far for realistic and preferable. And for good measure let the troops be from Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Qatar, the U.A.E. and Algeria. <br /><br />Now to Major Taylor:<br /><br />So what if everyone thought there were WMDs. Not only was the Intel lousy, but it was cooked when the leadership knew it was lousy. And sir, I've got some terrible news for you. The most terrible thing that could happen to our boys has already happened. The guys were betrayed by the leadership. To be sent to war on a lie, and to be the victims of a basic miscalculation due to "war on the cheap" is nothing more than an abuse of public trust and a waste of lives.<br /><br />Yes, as you say Saddam was a Stalinist monster. At Dujail and Halabja he murdered civilians. But are we attacking the Sudanese because of their atrocities? What about North Korea? Uzbekistan? Byelorussia? Lukashenko's a bastard you know. Let's go! We don't like someone's government? Attack them! And if the Chicoms don't like the Philippines' government, or Taiwan, they can attack it too! SAME RULE APPLIES! <br /><br />Yes, Saddam blocked inspections, bad move. But let's look at it from what might've been Saddam's point of view. He sees how we handled Kim Jong Il with kid gloves. Now Kim admitted to having nukes. Now Saddam wants to have it both ways. He wants to protect his position, yet have perks from the West, so he acts like has WMDs, but doesn't admit to it. Sound credible? Anyway, Saddam in the end gave in after every bomb strike, and did so right before hostilities.<br /><br />And what about Kosovo? Much is made about how Clinton went in there over the U.N.'s objection. But the U.N. had learned a bitter lesson in Bosnia, and wasn't about to repeat it in Kosovo. Clinton never went anywhere without N.A.T.O. He turned Kosovo into a N.A.T.O. operation. When he did so, the U.N. compromised and followed suit. Non-interventionism was out of style.<br /><br />And what did Bush do? He went on a pre-emptive war with no coalition worth mentioning! He went with too few troops, and no exit plan!<br /><br />And given that sectarian violence is on the rise, what makes the Major think that the army will be any more effective than it is now?<br /><br />As for the media, whom the Major so dutifully derides as per the Republican talking points dictum, they didn't start the war, nor did they make the colossal mistakes (or miscalculations if you will) that set up the situation. Once again, the guys were betrayed. By the way sir, where are the WMDs?<br /><br />Ken Howland was former military. A veteran of the Vietnam Era if not the war itself. He hates imperialism. I agree with him on many things. We installed the Shah in Iran. Then they had a revolution. When Iran & Iraq went to war we supported Iraq with arms. I also believe that if we have a preponderance of power and can't win, something is wrong.<br /><br />However I have a problem with Mr. Howland's solution - "Get out now!" We can't simply do that. We've already had a long history of doing that, leaving without moral accountability for the consequences, and without taking responsibility for the geopolitical aftermath. In Vietnam we simply pulled out, and left the South Vietnamese to the Communists. We were responsible for the millions of Vietnamese boat people. In Somalia we obsessed over capturing Muhammad Eideed, and lost our nerve after the Black Hawk Down incident. We left. Isn't that the example that bin Laden took for American weakness? It wasn't long thereafter when he began the terror campaign that culminated in 3000 dead at 9/11. If we just pull up stakes and leave lraq, won't that thug with a nuclear suitcase be more likely to come?<br /><br />And then there is the moral .imperative. We went in, caused death and destruction to untold thousands, bombed them into the Stone Age. Doesn't it follow that if we have a moral bone left in our bodies that we take responsibility and at least re-establish the security that we deprived the civilians of? I think it does. And forget all that moral relativism about whether or not they want democracy in the Middle East. We worked with Conrad Adenauer to rebuild Germany, we can work with Iraqis to rebuild Iraq. In Iran an entire generation is clamoring for democratic reform. And anyway, 10,000 Iranian kids can't be wrong.<br /><br />Jonathan Tassini as represented by Daryl Marcy had a few good ideas. <br /><br />The war is illegal. We need the $24 million that the war sucked out here at home. We have to end the jingoistic patriotism. We have to march, write, get mad, get organized. <br /><br />The only problem I have with any of the candidates other than Dan Maffei is this lingering political simplism that amateur candidates seem to have. <br /><br />One attitude shared by Tassini and Anyone who voted for it was wrong. I've a problem with that in that it doesn't presuppose the assumption that the representative's angry constituents may have pressured them into voting for the war. <br /><br />I know l felt angry in 2001. <br /><br />What if I told l that I thought it was my fault that Hilary Clinton was for the war? I watched 3000 people die on my TV. I wanted revenge. All these accusations were being made about Iraq, and the U.N. was sounding to me (at the time) like a broken record. There was nothing to reign in the anger that the Bush lie machine inspired in me. Like many others I called my Congressman and my Senators, and told them how I felt. Our leadership at the time was blindsided, caught in the headlights. Last week I stood up at the meeting and apologized for my enormous part in this grievous error. What if I we could swing politicians over by giving them permission to admit their mistake and turn against the war?<br /><br />Paloma Capana was a little too utopian for me. She asked what a poet could do for America. A poet wouldn't last very long in the Capitol bear pit.<br /><br />Dan Maffei at least sounds like someone who has a firm grasp on how to handle the situation. He cut through the bull by saying that we already agreed on why we were there. To end the war. We can't continue the course we are on for empty honor. And he agrees with me that we can't simply attack countries simply because we hate their ideology. Anyway he states, using Saddam as straw man for justifying the war is a non-sequitur. Saddam was no threat, now he is no threat. <br /><br />All in all, I'd say that the symposium went pretty much as expected. At least we know who the challengers are.<br /><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressives">Wikipedia - Progressivism</a> |
4 | 3rd Place Cable Host Uses âWorst in the World!â Segment to Savage Conservatives & His Competitors<br /><br />The âWorstâ of MSNBCâs Keith Olbermann<br /><br />"Believe it or not, MSNBC's Keith Olbermann says he's not biased. In March he told C-SPAN his philosophy was to 'go after power. You don't go after a Republican or a Democrat.' Last June he told the Houston Chronicle that while his world view included elements from the 'liberal play book,' his on-air approach is strictly even-handed. 'My point of view is about delivering information and context,' Olbermann claimed. 'It has nothing to do with a political point of view.'<br /><br />But those who watch Olbermann's weekday Countdown program know he regularly seeks to please the far left with liberal agenda segments, ranging from whether George W. Bush is the 'worst President ever' to promoting loopy theories that the Republicans stole the 2004 election.<br /><br />Olbermann has now helped the Media Research Center quantify his anti-conservative bent. Beginning one year ago this week, Olbermann has picked his choice for the 'Worse,' 'Worser,' and 'Worst Person in the World!' As he told a TV writer last December, 'It's a euphemism for somebody who's wrong and egregiously stupid and abusing their own position.'<br /><br />To find out what irks Olbermann, MRC researchers examined every one of his 'Worst' segments from their debut on June 30, 2005 to this past Friday, June 23. While many of his targets weren't political (last week he scolded a Chinese restaurant that served meatballs made from cats), about a third of the time (33%), Olbermann's wrath was aimed at a notable liberal or a conservative, or someone flailed for an ideological stance, such as on March 15 when he castigated 'doubters of global warming' because yellow sand was falling from the sky in South Korea.<br /><br />For someone who claims his editorial decisions have "nothing to do with a political point of view," Olbermann has thrown nearly all of his punches at conservatives. Of the 197 politically-salient designees, nearly nine out of ten (174, or 88%) attacked conservative targets or ideas, compared with 23 nominees (12%) in which liberals were on the receiving end of Olbermannâs ire. Among those attacked by Olbermann: Bill Frist, Donald Rumsfeld, Antonin Scalia, Rick Santorum, Tom DeLay and Pat Robertson (four times). Never targeted: Hillary Clinton, Howard Dean, Michael Moore, or even William Jefferson, the Congressman alleged to have stuffed tens of thousands of dollars in bribe money into his freezer. (See the complete listing of <a href="http://www.mrc.org/realitycheck/2006/fax20060627worstperson.asp" target="_blank">Olbermann's liberal and conservative targets.</a>)<br /><br />Among the few liberals he did criticize: Representative Cynthia McKinney, for slugging a police officer, and New York comptroller Alan Hevesi, for telling graduates that Senator Charles Schumer would like to "put a bullet between the Presidentâs eyes." But Hevesi was just the runner-up that night; Olbermann decided his Bush hate wasnât as bad as the Filipino cab driver who accidentally rammed a hearse, sending a corpse flying out of its coffin and into traffic.<br /><br />Olbermann uses his podium to attack his non-liberal media competitors, especially FNC host Bill OâReilly, whom Olbermann disparages as "the big giant head" or "Ted Baxter," the dim anchor from The Mary Tyler Moore Show. OâReilly has been a target 42 times; in contrast, Olbermann has only badmouthed Saddam Hussein twice, most recently on Friday after learning that the ex-dictatorâs "hunger strike" actually amounted to skipping only a single meal.<br /><br />Olbermannâs other media targets: Rush Limbaugh (11 times), Ann Coulter (9), Brit Hume (4), Neal Boortz (3), Glenn Beck (3), the New York Post (2) and columnist Michelle Malkin (2), whom Olbermann rudely called "crazier and dumber than we all thought" and a "nitwit." Sneering at conservatives may make Olbermann popular among left-wing bloggers, but his bias makes him the obvious choice for "Worst Anchorman in the World."<br />â Brad Wilmouth and <a href="http://www.mrc.org/bios/noyes/noyesbio.asp" target="_blank">Rich Noyes</a>" |
4 | <a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://www.cannabisculture.com/forums/uploads/1071293-war_criminal-st.jpg" border="0" /></a></div><strong><span>Bush challenges hundreds of laws<br /><span>President cites powers of his office</span></span><br />By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff<br /><br />WASHINGTON -- President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.<br /><br />Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ''whistle-blower" protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research.<br /><br />Legal scholars say the scope and aggression of Bush's assertions that he can bypass laws represent a concerted effort to expand his power at the expense of Congress, upsetting the balance between the branches of government. The Constitution is clear in assigning to Congress the power to write the laws and to the president a duty ''to take care that the laws be faithfully executed." Bush, however, has repeatedly declared that he does not need to ''execute" a law he believes is unconstitutional.<br /><br />Former administration officials contend that just because Bush reserves the right to disobey a law does not mean he is not enforcing it: In many cases, he is simply asserting his belief that a certain requirement encroaches on presidential power.<br /><br />But with the disclosure of Bush's domestic spying program, in which he ignored a law requiring warrants to tap the phones of Americans, many legal specialists say Bush is hardly reluctant to bypass laws he believes he has the constitutional authority to override.<br /><br />Far more than any predecessor, Bush has been aggressive about declaring his right to ignore vast swaths of laws -- many of which he says infringe on power he believes the Constitution assigns to him alone as the head of the executive branch or the commander in chief of the military.<br /><br />Many legal scholars say they believe that Bush's theory about his own powers goes too far and that he is seizing for himself some of the law-making role of Congress and the Constitution-interpreting role of the courts.<br /><br />Phillip Cooper, a Portland State University law professor who has studied the executive power claims Bush made during his first term, said Bush and his legal team have spent the past five years quietly working to concentrate ever more governmental power into the White House.<br /><br />''There is no question that this administration has been involved in a very carefully thought-out, systematic process of expanding presidential power at the expense of the other branches of government," Cooper said. ''This is really big, very expansive, and very significant."<br /><br />For the first five years of Bush's presidency, his legal claims attracted little attention in Congress or the media. Then, twice in recent months, Bush drew scrutiny after challenging new laws: a torture ban and a requirement that he give detailed reports to Congress about how he is using the Patriot Act.<br /><br />Bush administration spokesmen declined to make White House or Justice Department attorneys available to discuss any of Bush's challenges to the laws he has signed.<br /><br />Instead, they referred a Globe reporter to their response to questions about Bush's position that he could ignore provisions of the Patriot Act. They said at the time that Bush was following a practice that has ''been used for several administrations" and that ''the president will faithfully execute the law in a manner that is consistent with the Constitution."<br /><br />But the words ''in a manner that is consistent with the Constitution" are the catch, legal scholars say, because Bush is according himself the ultimate interpretation of the Constitution. And he is quietly exercising that authority to a degree that is unprecedented in US history.<br /><br />Bush is the first president in modern history who has never vetoed a bill, giving Congress no chance to override his judgments. Instead, he has signed every bill that reached his desk, often inviting the legislation's sponsors to signing ceremonies at which he lavishes praise upon their work.<br /><br />Then, after the media and the lawmakers have left the White House, Bush quietly files ''signing statements" -- official documents in which a president lays out his legal interpretation of a bill for the federal bureaucracy to follow when implementing the new law. The statements are recorded in the federal register.<br /><br />In his signing statements, Bush has repeatedly asserted that the Constitution gives him the right to ignore numerous sections of the bills -- sometimes including provisions that were the subject of negotiations with Congress in order to get lawmakers to pass the bill. He has appended such statements to more than one of every 10 bills he has signed.<br /><br />''He agrees to a compromise with members of Congress, and all of them are there for a public bill-signing ceremony, but then he takes back those compromises -- and more often than not, without the Congress or the press or the public knowing what has happened," said Christopher Kelley, a Miami University of Ohio political science professor who studies executive power.<br /><br /><span>Military link </span></strong><span><br /></span><span><div align="left"><br /></span></div><strong>Many of the laws Bush said he can bypass -- including the torture ban -- involve the military.<br /><br />The Constitution grants Congress the power to create armies, to declare war, to make rules for captured enemies, and ''to make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces." But, citing his role as commander in chief, Bush says he can ignore any act of Congress that seeks to regulate the military.<br /><br />On at least four occasions while Bush has been president, Congress has passed laws forbidding US troops from engaging in combat in Colombia, where the US military is advising the government in its struggle against narcotics-funded Marxist rebels.<br /><br />After signing each bill, Bush declared in his signing statement that he did not have to obey any of the Colombia restrictions because he is commander in chief.<br /><br />Bush has also said he can bypass laws requiring him to tell Congress before diverting money from an authorized program in order to start a secret operation, such as the ''black sites" where suspected terrorists are secretly imprisoned.<br /><br />Congress has also twice passed laws forbidding the military from using intelligence that was not ''lawfully collected," including any information on Americans that was gathered in violation of the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable searches.<br /><br />Congress first passed this provision in August 2004, when Bush's warrantless domestic spying program was still a secret, and passed it again after the program's existence was disclosed in December 2005.<br /><br />On both occasions, Bush declared in signing statements that only he, as commander in chief, could decide whether such intelligence can be used by the military.<br /><br />In October 2004, five months after the Abu Ghraib torture scandal in Iraq came to light, Congress passed a series of new rules and regulations for military prisons. Bush signed the provisions into law, then said he could ignore them all. One provision made clear that military lawyers can give their commanders independent advice on such issues as what would constitute torture. But Bush declared that military lawyers could not contradict his administration's lawyers.<br /><br />Other provisions required the Pentagon to retrain military prison guards on the requirements for humane treatment of detainees under the Geneva Conventions, to perform background checks on civilian contractors in Iraq, and to ban such contractors from performing ''security, intelligence, law enforcement, and criminal justice functions." Bush reserved the right to ignore any of the requirements.<br /><br />The new law also created the position of inspector general for Iraq. But Bush wrote in his signing statement that the inspector ''shall refrain" from investigating any intelligence or national security matter, or any crime the Pentagon says it prefers to investigate for itself.<br /><br />Bush had placed similar limits on an inspector general position created by Congress in November 2003 for the initial stage of the US occupation of Iraq. The earlier law also empowered the inspector to notify Congress if a US official refused to cooperate. Bush said the inspector could not give any information to Congress without permission from the administration.<br /><br /><span>Oversight questioned</span> </strong><br /><div align="left"><br /><strong>Many laws Bush has asserted he can bypass involve requirements to give information about government activity to congressional oversight committees.<br /><br />In December 2004, Congress passed an intelligence bill requiring the Justice Department to tell them how often, and in what situations, the FBI was using special national security wiretaps on US soil. The law also required the Justice Department to give oversight committees copies of administration memos outlining any new interpretations of domestic-spying laws. And it contained 11 other requirements for reports about such issues as civil liberties, security clearances, border security, and counternarcotics efforts.<br /><br />After signing the bill, Bush issued a signing statement saying he could withhold all the information sought by Congress.<br /><br />Likewise, when Congress passed the law creating the Department of Homeland Security in 2002, it said oversight committees must be given information about vulnerabilities at chemical plants and the screening of checked bags at airports.<br /><br />It also said Congress must be shown unaltered reports about problems with visa services prepared by a new immigration ombudsman. Bush asserted the right to withhold the information and alter the reports.<br /><br />On several other occasions, Bush contended he could nullify laws creating ''whistle-blower" job protections for federal employees that would stop any attempt to fire them as punishment for telling a member of Congress about possible government wrongdoing.<br /><br />When Congress passed a massive energy package in August, for example, it strengthened whistle-blower protections for employees at the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.<br /><br />The provision was included because lawmakers feared that Bush appointees were intimidating nuclear specialists so they would not testify about safety issues related to a planned nuclear-waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada -- a facility the administration supported, but both Republicans and Democrats from Nevada opposed.<br /><br />When Bush signed the energy bill, he issued a signing statement declaring that the executive branch could ignore the whistle-blower protections.<br /><br />Bush's statement did more than send a threatening message to federal energy specialists inclined to raise concerns with Congress; it also raised the possibility that Bush would not feel bound to obey similar whistle-blower laws that were on the books before he became president. His domestic spying program, for example, violated a surveillance law enacted 23 years before he took office.<br /><br />David Golove, a New York University law professor who specializes in executive-power issues, said Bush has cast a cloud over ''the whole idea that there is a rule of law," because no one can be certain of which laws Bush thinks are valid and which he thinks he can ignore.<br /><br />''Where you have a president who is willing to declare vast quantities of the legislation that is passed during his term unconstitutional, it implies that he also thinks a very significant amount of the other laws that were already on the books before he became president are also unconstitutional," Golove said.<br /><br /></strong><strong><span>Defying Supreme Court </span></strong></div><span><div align="left"><br /></span></div><strong>Bush has also challenged statutes in which Congress gave certain executive branch officials the power to act independently of the president. The Supreme Court has repeatedly endorsed the power of Congress to make such arrangements. For example, the court has upheld laws creating special prosecutors free of Justice Department oversight and insulating the board of the Federal Trade Commission from political interference.<br /><br />Nonetheless, Bush has said in his signing statements that the Constitution lets him control any executive official, no matter what a statute passed by Congress might say.<br /><br />In November 2002, for example, Congress, seeking to generate independent statistics about student performance, passed a law setting up an educational research institute to conduct studies and publish reports ''without the approval" of the Secretary of Education. Bush, however, decreed that the institute's director would be ''subject to the supervision and direction of the secretary of education."<br /><br />Similarly, the Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld affirmative-action programs, as long as they do not include quotas. Most recently, in 2003, the court upheld a race-conscious university admissions program over the strong objections of Bush, who argued that such programs should be struck down as unconstitutional.<br /><br />Yet despite the court's rulings, Bush has taken exception at least nine times to provisions that seek to ensure that minorities are represented among recipients of government jobs, contracts, and grants. Each time, he singled out the provisions, declaring that he would construe them ''in a manner consistent with" the Constitution's guarantee of ''equal protection" to all -- which some legal scholars say amounts to an argument that the affirmative-action provisions represent reverse discrimination against whites.<br /><br />Golove said that to the extent Bush is interpreting the Constitution in defiance of the Supreme Court's precedents, he threatens to ''overturn the existing structures of constitutional law."<br /><br />A president who ignores the court, backed by a Congress that is unwilling to challenge him, Golove said, can make the Constitution simply ''disappear."<br /><br /><span>Common practice in '80s</span></strong><br /><div align="left"><br /><strong>Though Bush has gone further than any previous president, his actions are not unprecedented.<br /><br />Since the early 19th century, American presidents have occasionally signed a large bill while declaring that they would not enforce a specific provision they believed was unconstitutional. On rare occasions, historians say, presidents also issued signing statements interpreting a law and explaining any concerns about it.<br /><br />But it was not until the mid-1980s, midway through the tenure of President Reagan, that it became common for the president to issue signing statements. The change came about after then-Attorney General Edwin Meese decided that signing statements could be used to increase the power of the president.<br /><br />When interpreting an ambiguous law, courts often look at the statute's legislative history, debate and testimony, to see what Congress intended it to mean. Meese realized that recording what the president thought the law meant in a signing statement might increase a president's influence over future court rulings.<br /><br />Under Meese's direction in 1986, a young Justice Department lawyer named Samuel A. Alito Jr. wrote a strategy memo about signing statements. It came to light in late 2005, after Bush named Alito to the Supreme Court.<br /><br />In the memo, Alito predicted that Congress would resent the president's attempt to grab some of its power by seizing ''the last word on questions of interpretation." He suggested that Reagan's legal team should ''concentrate on points of true ambiguity, rather than issuing interpretations that may seem to conflict with those of Congress."<br /><br />Reagan's successors continued this practice. George H.W. Bush challenged 232 statutes over four years in office, and Bill Clinton objected to 140 laws over his eight years, according to Kelley, the Miami University of Ohio professor.<br /><br />Many of the challenges involved longstanding legal ambiguities and points of conflict between the president and Congress.<br /><br />Throughout the past two decades, for example, each president -- including the current one -- has objected to provisions requiring him to get permission from a congressional committee before taking action. The Supreme Court made clear in 1983 that only the full Congress can direct the executive branch to do things, but lawmakers have continued writing laws giving congressional committees such a role.<br /><br />Still, Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton used the presidential veto instead of the signing statement if they had a serious problem with a bill, giving Congress a chance to override their decisions.<br /><br />But the current President Bush has abandoned the veto entirely, as well as any semblance of the political caution that Alito counseled back in 1986. In just five years, Bush has challenged more than 750 new laws, by far a record for any president, while becoming the first president since Thomas Jefferson to stay so long in office without issuing a veto.<br /><br />''What we haven't seen until this administration is the sheer number of objections that are being raised on every bill passed through the White House," said Kelley, who has studied presidential signing statements through history. ''That is what is staggering. The numbers are well out of the norm from any previous administration."<br /><br />Exaggerated fears?<br />Some administration defenders say that concerns about Bush's signing statements are overblown. Bush's signing statements, they say, should be seen as little more than political chest-thumping by administration lawyers who are dedicated to protecting presidential prerogatives.<br /><br />Defenders say the fact that Bush is reserving the right to disobey the laws does not necessarily mean he has gone on to disobey them.<br /><br />Indeed, in some cases, the administration has ended up following laws that Bush said he could bypass. For example, citing his power to ''withhold information" in September 2002, Bush declared that he could ignore a law requiring the State Department to list the number of overseas deaths of US citizens in foreign countries. Nevertheless, the department has still put the list on its website.<br /><br />Jack Goldsmith, a Harvard Law School professor who until last year oversaw the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel for the administration, said the statements do not change the law; they just let people know how the president is interpreting it.<br /><br />''Nobody reads them," said Goldsmith. ''They have no significance. Nothing in the world changes by the publication of a signing statement. The statements merely serve as public notice about how the administration is interpreting the law. Criticism of this practice is surprising, since the usual complaint is that the administration is too secretive in its legal interpretations."<br /><br />But Cooper, the Portland State University professor who has studied Bush's first-term signing statements, said the documents are being read closely by one key group of people: the bureaucrats who are charged with implementing new laws.<br /><br />Lower-level officials will follow the president's instructions even when his understanding of a law conflicts with the clear intent of Congress, crafting policies that may endure long after Bush leaves office, Cooper said.<br /><br />''Years down the road, people will not understand why the policy doesn't look like the legislation," he said.<br /><br />And in many cases, critics contend, there is no way to know whether the administration is violating laws -- or merely preserving the right to do so.<br /><br />Many of the laws Bush has challenged involve national security, where it is almost impossible to verify what the government is doing. And since the disclosure of Bush's domestic spying program, many people have expressed alarm about his sweeping claims of the authority to violate laws.<br /><br />In January, after the Globe first wrote about Bush's contention that he could disobey the torture ban, three Republicans who were the bill's principal sponsors in the Senate -- John McCain of Arizona, John W. Warner of Virginia, and Lindsey O. Graham of South Carolina -- all publicly rebuked the president.<br /><br />''We believe the president understands Congress's intent in passing, by very large majorities, legislation governing the treatment of detainees," McCain and Warner said in a joint statement. ''The Congress declined when asked by administration officials to include a presidential waiver of the restrictions included in our legislation."<br /><br />Added Graham: ''I do not believe that any political figure in the country has the ability to set aside any . . . law of armed conflict that we have adopted or treaties that we have ratified."<br /><br />And in March, when the Globe first wrote about Bush's contention that he could ignore the oversight provisions of the Patriot Act, several Democrats lodged complaints.<br /><br />Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, accused Bush of trying to ''cherry-pick the laws he decides he wants to follow."<br /><br />And Representatives Jane Harman of California and John Conyers Jr. of Michigan -- the ranking Democrats on the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees, respectively -- sent a letter to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales demanding that Bush rescind his claim and abide by the law.<br /><br />''Many members who supported the final law did so based upon the guarantee of additional reporting and oversight," they wrote. ''The administration cannot, after the fact, unilaterally repeal provisions of the law implementing such oversight. . . . Once the president signs a bill, he and all of us are bound by it."<br /><br /><span>Lack of court review </span></strong></div><div align="left"><strong><span><br /></span>Such political fallout from Congress is likely to be the only check on Bush's claims, legal specialists said.<br /><br />The courts have little chance of reviewing Bush's assertions, especially in the secret realm of national security matters.<br /><br />''There can't be judicial review if nobody knows about it," said Neil Kinkopf, a Georgia State law professor who was a Justice Department official in the Clinton administration. ''And if they avoid judicial review, they avoid having their constitutional theories rebuked."<br /><br />Without court involvement, only Congress can check a president who goes too far. But Bush's fellow Republicans control both chambers, and they have shown limited interest in launching the kind of oversight that could damage their party.<br /><br />''The president is daring Congress to act against his positions, and they're not taking action because they don't want to appear to be too critical of the president, given that their own fortunes are tied to his because they are all Republicans," said Jack Beermann, a Boston University law professor. ''Oversight gets much reduced in a situation where the president and Congress are controlled by the same party."<br /><br />Said Golove, the New York University law professor: ''Bush has essentially said that 'We're the executive branch and we're going to carry this law out as we please, and if Congress wants to impeach us, go ahead and try it.' "<br /><br />Bruce Fein, a deputy attorney general in the Reagan administration, said the American system of government relies upon the leaders of each branch ''to exercise some self-restraint." But Bush has declared himself the sole judge of his own powers, he said, and then ruled for himself every time.<br /><br />''This is an attempt by the president to have the final word on his own constitutional powers, which eliminates the checks and balances that keep the country a democracy," Fein said. ''There is no way for an independent judiciary to check his assertions of power, and Congress isn't doing it, either. So this is moving us toward an unlimited executive power." </strong><br /><br /></div><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://cache.boston.com/bonzai-fba/Reuters_Photo/2006/05/01/1146456546_0953.jpg" border="0" /></a></div><strong><span><span>Cheney To Head Mafia</span><br /></span><br />Spoof.com / K.C. Bell<br /><br />"Say cheese?"<br /><br />Following the recent arrest of Bernardo Provenzano, former head of the Mafia, a vacuum was created soon to be filled by retiring Vice President Dick Cheney. Mr. Provenzano eluded the police (real thing, not old singing group) for the last 43 years, while successfully running the organization from a secret location. Following the arrest, a worldwide search was initiated by several headhunter agencies endeavoring to locate a replacement.<br /><br />Though the position was initially offered to Osama Ben Laden, who refused, being too busy with a killing agenda promoting love of god, the job was quickly snapped up by Vice President Dick Cheney, announcing he was best qualified to head the organization. Cheney's Curriculum Vitae included his extensive experience working in the corporate world while head of Halliburton, additional experience in politics, most recently serving as Vice President and having at least one hit under his belt.<br /><br />News leaked out to the BBC that Tony Blair was livid when discovering his name failed to make the short list of applicants. In protest, Blair withdrew three promised peerages, two knighthoods, contracts to rebuild the London bridge, both houses of Parliament, British side of the Chunnel, the controversial pickle building, and a partridge in a pear tree. Blair issued a formal complaint at the Hague.<br /><br />Told he was addressing the wrong body to review his plea, Mr. Blair insisted his qualifications to head the Mafia were substantially greater than those of Mr. Cheney, suggesting that his C. V. could prove he single-handedly managed to start the war in Iraq. He argued that without England, the United States would never have had a coalition. Hence, no war in Iraq or suicide bombers in London. He even sexed up fraudulent documents from Italy promoting the threat of WMD and lastly, boasted of being the god father of the phrase, The people's Princess. Ole.<br /><br />Back to Cheney ~<br /><br />Making an appearance on the Oprah show, final gateway for all career announcements and confessional of horrific personality disorders, Mr. and Mrs. Cheney briefed the hostess, and the world, of their plans to embark upon a new life at an undisclosed location in a cave somewhere below sea level in Sicily. Besides their new cave, they will take over the management of a Pecorino cheese factory. Made of sheep's milk, Cheney will take on the duties of a sheperd. Both promised to send Oprah a wheel of cheese dotted with tasty black pepper corns. Yummy.<br /><br />Always cheerful, Lynn Cheney also had a new children's book to promote about the Mafia which was titled, My Favorite Killing, 96 pages, $29.00, all proceeds going directly to her favorite charity.<br /><br />Written by K.C. Bell </strong><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://www.scribblesvermont.com/ezimagecatalogue/catalogue/variations/868482-300x300.jpg" border="0" /></a></div><br /><br /><div align="left"><strong><span>THE SPIES WHO SHAG US<br /></span>The Times and USA Today have Missed the Bigger Story -- Again<br />by Greg Palast </strong></div><strong><div align="left"><br />I know you're shocked -- SHOCKED! -- that George Bush is listening in on all your phone calls. Without a warrant. That's nothing. And it's not news.<br /><br />This is: the snooping into your phone bill is just the snout of the pig of a strange, lucrative link-up between the Administration's Homeland Security spy network and private companies operating beyond the reach of the laws meant to protect us from our government. You can call it the privatization of the FBI -- though it is better described as the creation of a private KGB.<br /><br />********************<br />For the full story, see "Double Cheese With Fear," in Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War." ********************<br /><br />The leader in the field of what is called "data mining," is a company, formed in 1997, called, "ChoicePoint, Inc," which has sucked up over a billion dollars in national security contracts.<br /><br />Worried about Dick Cheney listening in Sunday on your call to Mom? That ain't nothing. You should be more concerned that they are linking this info to your medical records, your bill purchases and your entire personal profile including, not incidentally, your voting registration. Five years ago, I discovered that ChoicePoint had already gathered 16 billion data files on Americans -- and I know they've expanded their ops at an explosive rate.<br /><br />They are paid to keep an eye on you -- because the FBI can't. For the government to collect this stuff is against the law unless you're suspected of a crime. (The law in question is the Constitution.) But ChoicePoint can collect if for "commercial" purchases -- and under the Bush Administration's suspect reading of the Patriot Act -- our domestic spying apparatchiks can then BUY the info from ChoicePoint.<br /><br />Who ARE these guys selling George Bush a piece of you?<br /><br />ChoicePoint's board has more Republicans than a Palm Beach country club. It was funded, and its board stocked, by such Republican sugar daddies as billionaires Bernie Marcus and Ken Langone -- even after Langone was charged by the Securities Exchange Commission with abuse of inside information.<br /><br />I first ran across these guys in 2000 in Florida when our Guardian/BBC team discovered the list of 94,000 "felons" that Katherine Harris had ordered removed from Florida's voter rolls before the election. Virtually every voter purged was innocent of any crime except, in most cases, Voting While Black. Who came up with this electoral hit list that gave Bush the White House? ChoicePoint, Inc.<br /><br />And worse, they KNEW the racially-tainted list of felons was bogus. And when we caught them, they lied about it. While they've since apologized to the NAACP, ChoicePoint's ethnic cleansing of voter rolls has been amply assuaged by the man the company elected.<br /><br />And now ChoicePoint and George Bush want your blood. Forget your phone bill. ChoicePoint, a sickened executive of the company told us in confidence, "hope[s] to build a database of DNA samples from every person in the United States ...linked to all the other information held by CP [ChoicePoint]" from medical to voting records.<br /><br />And ChoicePoint lied about that too. The company publicly denied they gave DNA to the Feds -- but then told our investigator, pretending to seek work, that ChoicePoint was "the number one" provider of DNA info to the FBI.<br /><br />"And that scares the hell out of me," said the executive (who has since left the company), because ChoicePoint gets it WRONG so often. We are not contracting out our Homeland Security to James Bond here. It's more like Austin Powers, Inc. Besides the 97% error rate in finding Florida "felons," Illinois State Police fired the company after discovering ChoicePoint had produced test "results" on rape case evidence ... that didn't exist. And ChoicePoint just got hit with the largest fine in Federal Trade Commission history for letting identity thieves purchase 145,000 credit card records.<br /><br />But it won't stop, despite Republican senators shedding big crocodile tears about "surveillance" of innocent Americans. That's because FEAR is a lucrative business -- not just for ChoicePoint, but for firms such as Syntech, Sybase and Lockheed-Martin -- each of which has provided lucrative posts or profits to connected Republicans including former Total Information Awareness chief John Poindexter (Syntech), Marvin Bush (Sybase) and Lynn Cheney (Lockheed-Martin).<br /><br />But how can they get Americans to give up our personal files, our phone logs, our DNA and our rights? Easy. Fear sells better than sex -- and they want you to be afraid. Back to today's New York Times, page 28: "Wider Use of DNA Lists is Urged in Fighting Crime." And who is providing the technology? It comes, says the Times, from the work done on using DNA fragments to identity victims of the September 11 attack. And who did that job (for $12 million, no bid)? ChoicePoint, Inc. Which is NOT mentioned by the Times.<br /><br />"Genetic surveillance would thus shift from the individual [the alleged criminal] to the family," says the Times -- which will require, of course, a national DNA database of NON-criminals.<br /><br />It doesn't end there. Turn to the same newspaper, page 23, with a story about a weird new law passed by the state of Georgia to fight illegal immigration. Every single employer and government agency will be required to match citizen or worker data against national databases to affirm citizenship. It won't stop illegal border crossing, but hey, someone's going to make big bucks on selling data. And guess what local boy owns the data mine? ChoicePoint, Inc., of Alpharetta, Georgia.<br /><br />The knuckleheads at the Times don't put the three stories together because the real players aren't in the press releases their reporters re-write.<br /><br />But that's the Fear Industry for you. You aren't safer from terrorists or criminals or "felon" voters. But the national wallet is several billion dollars lighter and the Bill of Rights is a couple amendments shorter.<br /><br />And that's their program. They get the data mine -- and we get the shaft.<br /><br />Greg Palast is author of Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China Floats Bush Sinks, The Scheme to Steal '08, No Child's Behind Left and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War, out June 6. You can order it now.<br /><br />For more horror and humor from the War on Terror, listen to an excerpt from Chapter 1 of Armed Madhouse, "Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?<br /></strong></div><br /><br /><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://www.bumperart.com/ProductImages/2004091121_Display-35.gif" border="0" /></a></div><div align="left"><br /><strong><span>See Dick (Cheney, KBR-Halliburton) Loot Iraq<br /></span>by DAHR JAMAIL<br /><br />Halliburton and its subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root (KBR) have been making hay in the burning Iraqi sun for years now.<br /><br />It is, of course, no coincidence that the man sitting as vice president played a key role with his influence in obtaining the lion's share of contracts in Iraq for the company he was CEO of prior to his self-appointed position. Yet none of this is news.<br /><br />What is news, however, is that the ties that bind Cheney to Halliburton also link him to groups with even broader interests in the Middle East, which are causing civilians on the ground there, as well as in the US, to pay the price.<br /><br />Cheney had much more at stake than pure altruism in making sure Halliburton/KBR obtained so many no-bid contracts in occupied Iraq. Despite his claims of not having any financial ties to Halliburton, the fact is that in both 2001 and 2002 he earned twice as much from a deferred salary from his "old" company as when he was CEO.<br /><br />But that wasn't the beginning. When Cheney was US Secretary of Defense in the early 1990's under Big Bush, Halliburton was awarded the job of studying, then implementing, the privatization of routine army functions such as cleaning and cooking meals.<br /></div></strong><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/images/cheneyhallibur.jpg" border="0" /></a></div><br /><strong><span>Cheney's Halliburton Stock Options Rise 3,281%<br /></span>by CONSPIRACY PLANET<br /><br />You can't beat the combination of War Profiteering and Crony Capitalism in the Bush-Cheney Cabal.<br /><br />Vice President Dick Cheney, the former head of Halliburton, who has steered numerous no-bid no-compete contracts for the War on Iraq to his former company holds Halliburton stock options which have risen 3,281% since 2004, says New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg, in a report published by Raw Story<br /><br />Lautenberg claims that Cheney's stock options, which were worth $241,498 a year ago are now valued at more than $8 million.<br /><br />âHalliburton has already raked in more than $10 billion from the Bush-Cheney Administration for work in Iraq, and they were awarded some of the first Katrina contracts," Lautenberg said in a statement. "It is unseemly for the Vice President to continue to benefit from this company at the same time his Administration funnels billions of dollars to it. The Vice President should sever his financial ties to Halliburton once and for all.</strong><br /><br /><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/images/ACF17B.jpg" border="0" /></a></div><div align="left"><strong><span>Cheney's shady charitable contributions net $2 million refund</span><br />by clammyc<br /><br />Once again, Cheney lies about not benefiting financially from Halliburton.<br /><br />So, to bring this all back and to summarize, we have this:<br /><br />By exploiting a law that was meant for people to donate to Katrina relief, Cheney was able to net a $2,000,000 tax refund.<br /><br />At least half, if not more if this refund was solely due to their exploiting of this law.<br /><br />In order to do this, they had to write a personal check for over $2,000,000 at the end of 2005.<br /><br />None of the donations were to any Katrina relief organizations.<br /><br />The donations were from income related to Halliburton, which Cheney supposedly had no financial ties to.<br /><br />In any other year, they still would have received a few hundred thousand in tax refunds from this "non-financial tie" to Halliburton, if they donated the proceeds to charity.<br /><br />In each of the prior three years, their donations were never more than 4%-5% of their 2005 totals, the only year that this law applies to.<br /><br />Once again, they flat out lie in their press release by obscuring the million or so that they personally benefited from this transaction.<br /><br />The timing, while not illegal, is extremely self serving and shady, especially in light of the fact that they should not be benefiting financially from any ties to Halliburton.<br /><br />I just fucking hate him. Scheming, selfish, arrogant, lying, smug, law breaking, law exploiting war criminal.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/4/18/115445/192">http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/4/18/115445/192</a></strong><strong> </strong><br /></div><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://lmno4p.org/images/10.25.03/war_profiteer_game.jpg" width="450" border="0" /></a></div><div align="left"><br /><strong><span>The Halliburton crime cartel</span><br /><br />Let's take a look at Halliburton for a moment.<br /><br />1) $292 million in taxpayer money will go to Halliburton to pay for goods & services it will provide to Tyumen Oil Co., and company controlled by the Aplfa Group, which has ties to the Russian Mob.<br /><br />2) Halliburton continues to do business with Burma despite that government's ruthless repression of its own citizens. Security gurards hired by Burmese companies involved with Halliburton have been accused of rape and torture of local villagers opposed to the project. Halliburton has fought all attempts to bring sanctions against Burma for its conduct.<br /><br />3) Halliburton has done business with Libya, Iran, and Iraq in contravention of the law. It has repeatedly lobbied to have sanctions against these countries removed.<br /><br />4) Halliburton has apparently cooked the books to the tune of $100 million.<br /><br />5) Between 1995 & 1999 Halliburton created 44 shell companies in the Caymans to evade US Taxes, cheating the American people out of $302 million. While it was doing this, it also had its snout in the public trough, scarfing down $2.3 billion in government contracts, and $1.5 billion in loan gurantees.<br /><br />6) Halliburton was fined $2 million for overcharging the Pentagon.<br /><br />So, what kind of person works at Halliburton? Since I'm Irish, let me answer a question with a question. Who, but a criminal, would work for Halliburton? </strong><br /><br /></div><a href="http://bombshelter.org" target="_blank"><div align="left"><img alt="Impeach the Bush Regime!" src="http://www.cannabisculture.com/forums/uploads/1071255-642377-punk-arrest.jpg" width="450" border="0" /></a></div><br /><strong><span>Are Bush & Co. War Criminals?</span><br />By charlie smith<br /><br />Gail Davidson laid criminal charges against U.S. President George W. Bush. A Provincial Court judge later declared them a "nullity". Mark Mushet photo.<br /><br />Some lawyers claim the U.S. is guilty of crimes against humanity<br /><br />Serving tea in her kitchen in her home on Vancouverâs West Side, Gail Davidson seems more like a friendly neighbour than a wild-eyed revolutionary. Davidson, a grandmother, laughs easily, enjoys gardening, and speaks with a remarkable absence of egotism. In this setting, itâs hard to comprehend that she is a key figure in an international campaign to hold U.S. President George W. Bush accountable for committing war crimes. But that has become her central preoccupation.<br /><br />Davidson, cochair of an international group called Lawyers Against the War (LAW), says she is the only person in the world who has ever laid criminal charges against Bush. On November 30, 2004, Davidson walked into Vancouver Provincial Court and convinced a justice of the peace to accept seven Criminal Code charges against Bush while he was visiting Canada. She brought evidence to support her contention that Bush should be held criminally responsible for counselling, aiding, and abetting torture at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and at a U.S. military jail at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Each offence carries a prison sentence of up to 14 years.<br /><br />On December 6, Provincial Court Judge William Kitchen ruled in an in-camera hearing that those charges were a ânullityâ. In law, this means they never occurred even though they had been approved. Kitchen permitted Davidson to reveal outside the courtroom that his decision was based on Bushâs âdiplomatic immunityâ.<br /><br />LAW cochair Michael Mandel, a law professor at Osgoode Hall law school at York University, claimed in a December 6 news release that Kitchenâs decision was âirregular in procedure and wrong in substanceâ. However, Michael Byers, a UBC expert in global politics and international law, told the Georgia Straight that a sitting head of state always has diplomatic immunity.<br /><br />Davidson told the Straight that she has a âpersonal commitmentâ to ensure that Bush, U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and others are eventually held accountable. âThey have obviously committed a wide range of international crimes of the most serious nature,â Davidson said. âSo I canât see how members of the United Nations such as Canada can avoid prosecution of those people and still maintain the integrity of their own legal systems.â<br /><br />Davidson is one of dozens of lawyers in different countries who are pursuing Bush and other top U.S. officials through the courts and at citizensâ tribunals. On the same day that Davidson filed her private prosecution against Bush in Vancouver, the New Yorkâbased Center for Constitutional Rights laid war-crimes charges in Germany against Rumsfeld and nine other U.S. military and civilian personnel. LAW joined this action.<br /><br />In February, a German court threw out the case, rejecting CCRâs contention that the U.S. is unwilling to prosecute its own senior officials.<br /><br />CCR president Michael Ratner described the ruling in a news release as âa purely political decisionâ to enable Rumsfeld to attend a security conference in Germany. Wolfgang Kaleck, a German human-rights lawyer who handled the case for CCR, e-mailed the Straight on April 5 saying he is appealing the ruling.<br /><br />In addition, CCR has launched civil suits for military detainees against Bush and other top officials in U.S. courts. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last June that U.S. courts may review detentions of foreigners at Guantanamo Bay. Last month, U.S. officials revealed that at least 108 people have died in U.S. custody in Iraq and Afghanistan; 26 are confirmed or suspected criminal homicides.<br /><br />CCR is also representing Maher Arar in his lawsuit against former U.S. attorney general John Ashcroft. Arar, a Syrian-Canadian, alleged that in September 2002, U.S. officials yanked him off a plane during a stopover at JFK Airport in New York. Arar claimed he was driven to Maine, put on a plane to Jordan in the Middle East, and driven to Syria, where he was tortured for a year in a tiny cell. Arar has denied any connection to al-Qaeda.<br /><br />U.S. journalist Seymour Hersh, author of Chain of Command: The Road From 9/11 to Abu Ghraib (HarperCollins, 2004), reported that Bush signed a decree creating an unacknowledged âspecial-access programâ. Over a three-year period, Hersh wrote, suspected terrorists were transported under this program to secret prisons in allied countries for harsh interrogations. Hershâs sources claimed that these interrogation techniques were introduced into the Abu Ghraib prison.<br /><br />Last month, the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights First, a New Yorkâbased group, filed a 77-page civil suit against Rumsfeld on behalf of eight military detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan. The plaintiffs allege that Rumsfeld âformulated, approved, directed or ratified the torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatmentâ¦as part of a policy, pattern or practiceâ.<br /><br />Hina Shamsi, a New York lawyer with Human Rights First, told the Straight that a great deal of work went into preparing this case. Lawyers worked with human-rights and humanitarian organizations in Iraq and Afghanistan to identify people who had been mistreated in U.S. detention centres. Then the clients had to be interviewed.<br /><br />The civil complaint alleges that, among others, Arkan M. Ali, a 26-year-old Iraqi, âsuffered severe beatings to the point of unconsciousness, stabbing and mutilation, isolation while naked and hooded in a coffin-like box, prolonged sleep deprivation enforced by beatings, deprivation of adequate food and water, mock execution and death threatsâ.<br /><br />The same lawsuit alleges that another Iraqi plaintiff, Sherzad Kamal Khalid, 34, was also subjected to torture, including sexual abuse involving assaults and threats of anal rape. A third, high-school student Ali H., was allegedly dragged from one location to another after surgery, forcefully ripping away the dressing and exposing him to infection. Mehboob Ahmad, a 35-year-old Afghanistan citizen, was allegedly beaten, suspended from the ceiling to cause pain, and intimidated by a vicious dog.<br /><br />The case centres on Rumsfeldâs decision to personally sign off on âunlawfulâ interrogation techniques in December 2002. According to the civil complaint, Rumsfeld âexpressly permitted cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment and tolerated or authorized tortureâ.<br /><br />The so-called December Rumsfeld Techniques included the use of âstress positionsâ, 20-hour interrogations, the removal of clothing, and playing upon a detaineeâs phobias to induce stressânone of which are permitted in U.S. army manuals.<br /><br />On January 15, 2003, Rumsfeld rescinded his blanket authorization. The following April, he personally approved 24 techniques, which included âsleep adjustmentâ, âdietary adjustmentâ, and the display of false flags during interrogation to trick detainees. Rumsfeld allegedly ensured that harsher techniques could be used with his personal authorization. The civil complaint doesnât mention the special-access program.<br /><br />âAlthough there has been other lawsuits filed on behalf of detainees for abuse suffered in U.S. detention facilities, none of those have focused on the policy-making role of a top U.S. official,â Shamsi said. âWhat we have done here is connect the dots. We connect the creation of interrogation policies and the beginning of abuse in Afghanistan with the migration of those policies to Iraq.â<br /><br />The plaintiffsâ 17-member legal team includes retired U.S. rear admiral John Huston and retired U.S. brigadier-general James Cullen, who are both lawyers. By press time, Rumsfeld had not filed a response. The ACLU also filed civil suits last month against three senior military officials beneath Rumsfeld, including Lieut.-Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, former commander of U.S. military forces in Iraq.<br /><br />The U.S. Department of Defense issued a news release last month âvigorouslyâ disputing the plaintiffsâ allegations in all four cases against U.S. officials: âNo policies or procedures approved by the Secretary of Defense were intended as, or could conceivably have been interpreted as, a policy of abuse or condoning abuse.â<br /><br />UBCâs Byers said that this type of human-rights litigation in national courts usually has little chance of success. âThis is a way of attracting media attention for the entirely noble purpose of informing the public, and achieving change as a result of public opinion,â he said.<br /><br />The recent lawsuits did not target Bush, who enjoys extra protection under the U.S. Constitution as that countryâs commander-in-chief. On December 21, 2004, the ACLU released a Federal Bureau of Investigation e-mail suggesting that Bush issued an executive order allowing interrogators to use military dogs and permit âsensory deprivation through the use of hoodsâ.<br /><br />Meanwhile, citizensâ tribunals have issued their own rulings, according to a recent LAW newsletter. Following two days of hearings at the London School of Economics in November 2003, a panel of eight international law professors decided there was âsufficient evidenceâ for the International Criminal Court prosecutor to investigate senior U.K. officials for crimes against humanity committed in Iraq.<br /><br />On December 12, 2004, a citizensâ tribunal comprising judges from Korea, Japan, and Indonesia concluded that British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Junâichiro, and Philippines President Gloria Arroyo âcould be appropriately prosecutedâ. The tribunal found Bush guilty of âtorture and maltreatment of Iraqi detaineesâ.<br /><br />âThey came to the conclusion that Bush and the other people indicted were guilty of a variety of crimes, number one, of course, waging a war of aggression against Afghanistan,â Davidson said. âAlso, they were guilty of using weapons that were prohibited by the laws of war. Some of the weapons that they cited in their judgment were the use of depleted uranium, use of fuel-air explosives such as daisy cutters, cluster bombs, and antipersonnel mines.â<br /><br />In a January 2005 article in Energy Bulletin, Dr. Chris Busby, the U.K. representative on the European Committee on Radiation Risk, claimed that thousands of children all over the world will die from the use of depleted uranium in modern weapons. He noted that radiation from the Chernobyl nuclear-reactor accident reached Wales.<br /><br />Last October, the prestigious British medical journal the Lancet published an epidemiological study that estimated anywhere between 8,000 and 194,000 Iraqis have died because of the war. The leader of the study, Dr. Les Roberts, made a âconservativeâ estimate of 100,000 war-related deaths, according to a BBC report. Iraq Body Count, a British nongovernmental group that tabulates media reports of civilian deaths in Iraq, stated that its number approached 20,000 on the second-year anniversary of the invasion.<br /><br />Iraqi lawyers have demanded that Bush and Blair be charged as war criminals. According to a March 23 story on www.islam-online.net/, Fallujah bar association chairman Kamal Hamdoun claimed that U.S. attacks on his city âare a blatant violation of the Geneva Conventions and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which ban the killing of the wounded, captives and civiliansâ.<br /><br />The Nuremburg Tribunal that prosecuted Nazi leaders described a war of aggression as the âsupreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the wholeâ. LAW cochair Mandel, author of How America Gets Away With Murder: Illegal Wars, Collateral Damage and Crimes Against Humanity (UBC Press, 2004), claimed in his book that the U.S. bore ultimate responsibility for all war-related deaths in Iraq, including those caused by suicide bombers.<br /><br />âEvery death was a crime for which the leaders of the invading coalition were personally, criminally responsible,â Mandel wrote. âWhen General [Vince] Brooks said the soldiers at the Karbala checkpoint were exercising their âinherent right to self-defenseâ he was talking nonsense: an aggressor has no right to self-defense. If you break into someoneâs house and hold them at gunpoint and they try to kill you but you kill them first, theyâre guilty of nothing and youâre guilty of murder.â<br /><br />Human Rights Watch alleged in a 2004 report, The Road to Abu Ghraib, that the Bush administration has âeffectively sought to re-write the Geneva Conventions of 1949 to eviscerate their most important protectionsâ. Those include freedom from humiliating and degrading treatment, as well as from torture. âThe Pentagon and the Justice Department developed the breathtaking legal argument that the president, as commander-in-chief of the armed forces, was not bound by U.S. or international laws prohibiting torture when acting to protect national security, and that such laws might even be unconstitutional if they hampered the war on terror,â it stated.<br /><br />U.S. law professor John Yoo, a former Bush ad?ministration Justice Department lawyer, wrote an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal last year claiming that the war with al-Qaeda is not governed by the Geneva Conventions for two reasons: al-Qaeda is not a state, and its members violate the laws of war by targeting civilians. âWhile Taliban fighters had an initial claim to protection under the conventions (since Afghanistan signed the treaties), they lost POW status by failing to obey the standards of combat for legal combatants: wearing uniforms, a responsible command structure, and obeying the laws of war,â Yoo wrote.<br /><br />Charles Gittings, a Washington state computer programmer, has filed three âamicus curaieâ (friend of the courts) briefs in U.S. courts opposing this legal interpretation. During a recent visit to Vancouver, Gittings told the Straight that he thinks the Bush administration deliberately set out to do an end run around the Geneva Conventions following the September 11 attacks. He cited a November 13, 2001, presidential military order, which gave Rumsfeld wide latitude in dealing with detainees.<br /><br />Gittings has alleged that the treatment of detainees violates a 1996 U.S. federal statute banning war crimes. The law carries the death penalty. When Gittings was asked what his goal is in pursuing these cases, he replied: âGeorge Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, John Ashcroft, and everybody down the line in prison, serving probably life sentences for their crimes, actually.â<br /><br />The ACLU and other groups have urged U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to appoint an outside special counsel to investigate. Gonzales, as the former White House counsel, wrote a memo in January 2002 advising Bush that the Geneva Conventions didnât apply to enemy combatants in Afghanistan.<br /><br />Gail Davidson isnât holding out much hope that Bush administration officials will ever be punished in the United States, but she doesnât rule out the possibility of it occurring elsewhere. She said there is certainly enough latitude under Canadaâs Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act to prosecute senior Bush administration officials if they visit Canada after leaving office. However, charges under this act must be approved by the attorney general of Canada, Irwin Cotler.<br /><br />âI think we still have a great reluctance to see our kings decrowned and prosecuted,â Davidson said. âHow many years after the Magna Carta are we? That was 1215. And we still arenât absolutely comfortable with somebody crying that the king is naked.â<br /><br />According to the Canadaâs War Crimes Program annual report, the policy is unequivocal: âCanada will not be a safe haven for persons involved in war crimes, crimes against humanity or other reprehensible acts.â<br /><br />The annual report states that 2,608 persons complicit in war crimes or crimes against humanity have been prevented from entering Canada. Another 325 were deported.<br /><br />So far, none of them have been high-ranking officials in the Bush administration.<br /><br /></strong><span><span><span><u><strong>The Revolution Will Be Televized</strong></u></span> </span></span><br /><div align="left"><span><strong>If you live on the Island of Hawai'i</strong></span><span></div><span></span></span><div align="left"><span><strong>Watch our FutureWorks FilmLabs<br />Cable Access Festival every week!</strong></span><span><br /></div><span></span></span><div align="left"><span><strong><span>Sundays 3-4 pm and Mondays 11pm to Midnight<br /></span></span><span><span>Channel 54</span></strong></span></div><span><div align="left"></span><span> </div><span></span></span><div align="left"><span><strong>If you live on the Island of Maui</strong></span><span><br /></div><span></span></span><a href="http://www.akaku.org/xtv_frames.shtml/" target="_blank"><div align="left"><span><img alt="XTV Revolutionizes TV user interface!" src="http://www.akaku.org/graphics/logos/x_tv_Logos.gif" border="0" /></span></div></a><span><div align="left"> </div><span></span></span><div align="left"><span><strong>Go to XTV<br />& program one of our shows yourself!<br />Then watch it on Channel 54 at your convenience!</strong></span><span></div><span></span></span><div align="left"><br /><a href="http://www.akaku.org/xtv_frames.shtml" target="_blank"><span><span>Maui XTV Interface!!!<br />Click Here for search & selection form!</span></a></span></div><div align="left"><br /></div><div align="left"><span><strong><span>Request a Bombshelter Broadcast Program:<br /></span></span><span><span>5115 Revolution Televized Pt. 1<br />5801 Earth Wrenches and Anarchy<br />5256 Orwell Rolls in His Grave 1<br />4941 Uncovered Pt2 - Behind Iraq<br />5763 Bush Family Fortunes </span></strong></span></div> |
4 | <a href="http://captaincox.podomatic.com/enclosure/2006-06-06T22_16_36-07_00.mp3"><img src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2476/2598/320/SEXSELLSMAIN.png" alt="" border="0" /></a> <div><span><span>The Cox Cast: The Rise of the Beast</span></span><a href="http://captaincox.podomatic.com/enclosure/2006-06-06T22_16_36-07_00.mp3"><img src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2476/2598/320/play_button.7.png" alt="" border="0" /></a></div><div><div><ul><li>The End of the World; <span>This is 06/06/06</span></li></ul></div><ul><ul><li><a href="http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/06/05/060605122726.5i4vny6k.html"><span class="headline">Dutch Evangelicals calls for pray-in against the Devil</span></a></li><li>"Nervous pregnant women are hoping, praying and C-sectioning in an attempt to <em>avoid</em> giving birth on this ominous date," <a href="http://www.wnymedia.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1550&Itemid=35">reports <em>WNY Media Network</em></a>.</li><li>In New York, <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/422361p-356365c.html">the <em>Daily News</em> writes that</a> "while no sane parent believes they are about to spawn the Devil's own, some moms-to-be are admittedly 'creeped' about giving birth on June 6.</li><li>Tuesday could be "a hell of a day. Literally," <a href="http://www.milforddailynews.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=93152">quips the <em>Milford Daily News</em></a> </li></ul></ul><div><ul><li><span>A Word from our Sponsor: Smorga Bobs</span></li></ul><ul><li><span>IED: </span><a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060605/ap_on_sc/road_rage_disease_1"><span>Intermittent Explosive Disorder</span></a><a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2476/2598/1600/explosive2.gif"><img src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2476/2598/320/explosive2.png" alt="" border="0" /></a></li></ul></div><span></span><ul><li><span>The Bitch-Fest of the Anti-Terrorism Fund Cuts and Who's Bitchin'<span></span></span><span><span></span> </span></li></ul><a href="http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/6/5/94939.shtml?s=ic">NYC ANTI-TERRORISM FUNDING</a> <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/6/6/101105.shtml">Hillary Clinton, Charles Schumer Voted to Slash NYC Terror Funds</a> <span></span><ul><ul><li><span class="articleContent">Up to one-third of the $21.4 billion in 9/11 cash awarded to New York by the White House had been earmarked for major transportation projects that had no connection to the devastation caused on 9/11.</span></li><li><span class="articleContent">$150,000 was awarded to a securities firm that had gone out of business before the 9/11 attacks - plus millions more from the fund was earmarked for formerly self-supporting projects.</span></li><li><span class="articleContent">$10 million in 9/11 cash was embezzled by a senior member of the New York medical examiners office.</span></li><li><span class="articleContent">A whopping $154 million in grants and tax exempt Liberty Bonds was awarded to a single business - the Bank of New York. That small piece of the 9/11 jackpot represents nearly twice the amount of cuts in New York City's federal anti-terrorism budget.</span></li></ul></ul>Music by <a href="http://podsafeaudio.com">Devin Anderson</a> <blockquote>Speak out! Call The Cox Cast Listener Line and Speak OUT: <span>206-338-4-COX + <a href="mailto:capt.cox@gmail.com">Capt.Cox@gmail.com</a> Subscribe to The Cox Cast: </span><p><a href="itpc://captaincox.podOmatic.com/rss2.xml"><img src="http://captaincox.podomatic.com/images/subscribe_with_itunes.gif" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://fusion.google.com/add?feedurl=http://captaincox.podOmatic.com/rss2.xml"><img src="http://buttons.googlesyndication.com/fusion/add.gif" alt="Add to Google" height="17" width="104" /></a></p> <p><a href="http://add.my.yahoo.com/rss?url=http://captaincox.podOmatic.com/rss2.xml"><img alt="addtomyyahoo4" src="http://us.i1.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/us/my/addtomyyahoo4.gif" height="17" width="91" /></a></p> <a href="http://www.newsgator.com/ngs/subscriber/subext.aspx?url=http://captaincox.podOmatic.com/rss2.xml"><img alt="subscribe in newsgator online" src="http://www.newsgator.com/images/ngsub1.gif" /></a> <a href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2476/2598/1600/custom.six.jpg"><img src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/2476/2598/320/custom.six.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a></blockquote></div> |
4 | <a href="http://drudgereport.com/flash3hb.htm" target="new">Drudge reports</a> that some staffers at <a href="http://www.penguinputnam.com/static/html/aboutus/index.html" target="new">Penguin Books</a> are not happy that the publishing company that brought us John Kerry's <a href="http://www.penguinputnam.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,0_0143034987,00.html" target="new" rel="nofollow">plan for America</a> and <a href="http://www.penguinputnam.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,0_0452285216,00.html" target="new" rel="nofollow">Al Franken's screed</a> is set to publish a <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/external-search?search-type=ss&tag=jonmgraesq-20&keyword=truth%20about%20hillary%20klein&index=books" target="new">book</a> penned by liberal Ed Klein but highly critical of New York Senator and 2008 Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton. |
4 | <a href="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i60/munchkin_2/edwards_sue.jpg"><img alt="" src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i60/munchkin_2/edwards_sue.jpg" border="0" /></a><i>(All italics on this post are mine.)</i><br /><br />From <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,210694,00.html">Fox News</a>:<br /><br />*Lots of snips*<br /><br />Substantively speaking, Edwards, like Hillary, has to deal with his vote in favor of the war resolution. Positioning himself on the war is one challenge. (<i>I'ts a challenge for him to position himself on the war? How come?</i>) He also has to figure out how he positions himself with respect to his own 2004 running mate, John Kerry, who seems to have less residual popularity and organization in Iowa than Edwards does. <i>(Sounds to me like Edwards can't make up his mind on anything... why is it that doesn't surprise me?)</i><br /><br />*snip*<br />But Edwards definitely has advantages this time, in addition to experience. From now on, the presidential contest must be evaluated in light of the new rules adopted by the Democratic Party as a result of changes recommended by its Rules Committee earlier this month. Those changes moved Nevada and South Carolina to the first two weeks of the schedule, along with the traditional first in the nation Iowa caucus and the first in the nation New Hampshire primary. So now you have to think in terms of four states, instead of the usual two.<br /><br />Primary politics is all about expectations, and bettering them. One of the obvious beneficiaries of the move of South Carolina should be the man who used to represent the neighboring state in the United States Senate. The question this time around is whether he will be able to do a better job than he did the first time capitalizing on a better than expected Iowa showing in (Nevada and) New Hampshire before South Carolina. That will require going beyond the Two Americas theme, the challenge Edwards has yet to conquer. If he does, watch out.<br /><br /></i>From <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/26/politics/26poverty.html?ex=1156910400&en=3e012bf8faee2928&ei=5070">The New York Times</a>: <strong>"With an Eye on Politics, Edwards Makes Poverty His Cause"</strong><br /><br />*Snip*<br />Now Mr. Edwards, a former senator from North Carolina and a presumed contender for his party's 2008 presidential nomination, has made curbing poverty the centerpiece of his work and his political approach.<br /><br />This is his true passion, he said in an interview, and he thinks that voters may be more responsive in the coming years, both because the middle class is becoming less secure and because of a shared sense of fairness.<br /><br /><i>Hoo boy! I haven't got a clue as to what his solution to poverty is; I'm not sure he does, since he doesn't seem to know what his position is on anything else, but my guess would be throwing more of our taxpaying dollars at it. It seems to me that the solution to poverty would be education, a conclusion I have reached by watching people live from paycheck to paycheck. I personally know people who have no clue whatsoever as to how to manage their money. We have gotten them through the month where food is concerned when our gardens are going good. But I have seen these same people eat shrimp and buy fast food at the beginning of the month. Now I have the personal experience of having once been dirt poor, and I promise you during those years I never ate shrimp, nor did I eat out, period! You tighten up and deny yourself and try to set something aside for the last part of the month, otherwise you starve! Simply throwing money at such people does not educate them in how to go about managing their funds. Some of them need to be taught finances; how to write checks and balance a checkbook; etc. Without that knowledge you can throw all the money in the world at them and they will spend it like water and still not wind up with anything. I'm not saying that is true of all poor folks, but it is true of many of them, and I know because I've seen it!<br /><br />As for Edwards, if he is going to be their primary candidate for 2008, I don't think we conservatives have much to worry about. But who can really tell for certain? We still have an enormous amount of people in this country with their heads buried in the sand.</i><br /><br /><br /></i></i><i><i><center><a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img alt="Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting" src="http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i60/munchkin_2/tn_ostriches-Ostrich-Ostriches-1_03.gif" border="0" /></a></center></i></i> |
4 | <a href="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v237/Proxima720/HClintonBust.jpg"><img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v237/Proxima720/HClintonBust.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Hillary Clinton's bust will be unveiled at the Museum of Sex. There's two routes for a joke we can take. We can either 1) sarcastically question if the bust will be used for contraceptive purposes; or 2) point out the irony of Hillary being featured in the Museum of Sex before Bill. It's your choice on how you want to finish this segment. {<a href="http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlny/on/museum_of_sex_to_unveil_hillary_clintons_presidential_bust_40855.asp">Media Bistro}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Baby Shiloh will get her own wax statue at Madame Tussaud's in New York. Let's file this under "creepy". {<a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/detail?blogid=7&entry_id=7444">SF Chronicle}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Lindsay Lohan was rushed to the hospital after collapsing from the extreme heat in Los Angeles. See, people, summer's all fun and games until a starlet gets hurt. {<a href="http://defamer.com/hollywood/top/lohan-felled-by-heat-rushed-to-hospital-190078.php">Defamer}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Has John Mayer been hanging out at the gym? Somebody seems to think so. {<a href="http://gawker.com/news/celebs/gawker-stalker-chris-robinson-has-difficulty-mastering-whole-celebritydj-thing-190058.php">Gawker}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Ryan Seacrest apparently has a secret crush on Orlando Bloom. While talking to Kate Bosworth, Seacrest almost creams his pants when talking about his gym habits. We're sure he was about three seconds away from giving Bosworth the whole "Bitch, you don't deserve him!" tantrum. {<a href="http://www.queerty.com/queer/ryan-seacrest/ryan-seacrest-jealous-of-kate-bosworth-20060726.php">Queerty}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> There should be a 'Page Six' about <a href="http://www.pagesix.com/">Page Six. {<a href="http://socialitelife.com/2006/07/26/former_page_six_writer_seems_ready_to_spill_the_beans.php">A Socialite's Life}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> <strike>Christian Slater</strike> Adam Levine makes the list of <em>Star's</em> 11 Biggest Hollywood Playboys. {<a href="http://popbytes.com/archive/2006/07/star_on_the_playboys_of_hollywood.shtml">Pop Bytes}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Colin Ferrell's stalker has basically ruined any chance for a black woman to sleep with a hot white man. {<a href="http://www.celebrityscum.com/?p=280">Celebrity Scum}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> One of Madonna's stipulations for her "Confessions" tour? A new toilet seat every night of the tour. We're with you, Madge. We're neat freaks about our restrooms, as well. {<a href="http://www.towleroad.com/towleroad/2006/07/news_madonnas_t.html">Towleroad}<br /><br /><img src="http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a104/comgam/bullet.gif" /> Janet Jackson's boobs are for hire. Act quickly; advertising space may be limited. {<a href="http://www.hollywoodrag.com/index.php?/weblog/comments2/janet_jacksons_commerical_boobs/">Hollywood Rag} |
4 | <a href="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v76/machka/John%20Edwards/Bismarck3.jpg"><img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v76/machka/John%20Edwards/Bismarck3.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Greetings BW readers,<br /><br />I was away for a week caring for a friend who had same day surgery and needed a caregiver to be around. Thus, I have been remiss in posting more buzz about John Edwards for nearly a week, other than a snippet here or there.<br /><br /><span>(photo find: Machka, from <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/southern_hope/59634.html?view=28146#t28146">Southern Hope</a> ; original: Will Kincaid/AP)<br /><br />JRE in Bismarck on 8/9/2006; week ago. Wow, seems like enternity! :-)</span><br /><br />Michele Bair does a lot of good diaries about JRE on OAC blog, but also at Daily Kos, MyDD, and the <a href="http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2782562">DU</a>. I'm posting the link to the DU because there is time to still recommend the thread. She really enjoys being a citizen journalist.<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.mnpublius.com/2006/08/rally_for_change_a_tremendous.php">MN Publius </a>has some great photos of the rally Edwards attended for Amy Klobuchar last week. She sounds like she is a good speaker as he is and inspires the crowd. I liked though one of the photo captions, which was, "Edwards takes the stage and does what he does best, remind us of why we're Democrats." You got that right, babe.<br /><br /><a href="http://rightvoices.com/2006/08/16/rv-poll-15-who-would-be-your-best-pick-for-presidential-nominee-for-the-democratic-party/">Right Voices </a>has a poll going to pick fav Dem candidate for 2008. How odd since it is RWNB. I voted anyway for John Edwards.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.ratcliffeblog.com/mt-tb.cgi/851">Mitch Radcliffe</a>, the Gnomedex attendee who suggested that JRE have a citizen journalist/blogger follow him around his next campaign, posted a link to a straw poll being conducted by the New Republic, had this to say about JRE recently:<br /><br /><i>John Edwards for president? A straw poll of <a href="http://www.tnr.com/user/nregi.mhtml?i=w060814&s=strawpoll081406">TNR</a> readers:<br /><br />So the question to you is: Does John Edwards have a shot at the presidency in 2008?<br /><b>Yes. He does.</b> So do a lot of people.<br /><br />For those of you wondering, I have had follow-up contact from the Edwards team after I suggested at Gnomedex they open their campaign to the world. No definite direction yet, but these people are thinking about the right things.<br /><br />I haven't decided to support him over other Democrats, but Edwards certainly has some of the intellect and charisma that made Bill Clinton president.</i><br /><br />Takes time to get to know John Edwards, Mitch. Hope you will take him to task on your suggestion.<br /><br />Today's <a href="http://hotlineblog.nationaljournal.com/archives/2006/08/edwards_to_camp.html">Hotline</a> mentioned that JRE was going to campaign with Ned Lamont tomorrow. Good deal--both for mentioning it and for Ned. Be on the lookout for another citizen journalist post and vlog from Michele Bair as she will be attending the rally. Aldon Hynes, who is a technical consultant, has contacted Michele on vlogging the event. He also blogs on Greater Democracy, and had this to say about his candidate and about Edwards:"<br /><br /><blockquote>Now that Ned has won the primary, sending ripples across the country, the<br />Democratic 2008 Presidential candidates are lining up to find ways to help Ned and thereby help their Presidential aspirations. <b>John Edwards was the first to call Ned Lamont and offer his congratulations.</b> Hillary Clinton was the first to have her leadership PAC cut a check to Nedâs campaign. Wes Clark was the first to send out a mass mailing asking people to sign a petition requesting that Lieberman drop his third party bid. John Kerry has now sent out an email urging people to contribute to Nedâs campaign.<br /><br />Tomorrow, the next part of the game begins with John Edwards showing up in Connecticut to campaign for Ned Lamont. You can be sure that other 2008 hopefuls will soon follow suit. The Connecticut voters will get a special opportunity to meet and speak with these candidates.<br /></blockquote><br />JRE is campaigning with <a href="http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060815/NEWS01/60815012/1188">Heath Shuler</a>, a NC congressional candidate, next week. I expect reports from NCDem and Nan on that event.<br /><br /><a href="http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/060815/20060815005621.html?.v=1">United Steel Workers </a>reported yesterday that, "John Edwards, former U.S. Senator from North Carolina and vice presidential candidate, has written a letter to Alan Hippe, CEO and president of Continental Tire's North American subsidiary, to express his concern over the German company's alleged violations of U.S. labor laws and intent to gut health insurance for hundreds of retirees and their families at the Charlotte, North Carolina plant." Not surprised given JRE stands shoulder to shoulder with most of the unions. He's spot on this one, and sounds like CT's NA subsidiary, albeit it probably has problems paying their bills, needs to rethink a win-win strategy.<br /><br />I think that's the mid-week news for now.<br /><br /><span>More buzz l8tr...</span><br /><br />Tags: John Edwards, JRE, JRE Buzz (18), Ned Lamont, Heath Shuler, Hotline, MN Publius, Michele Bair, citizen journalism, vlogging, One America Committee, OAC blog, Democratic Underground, Greater Democracy, Radcliffe Blog, Gnomedex, Southern Hope |
End of preview.
Automated Nonparametric Content Analysis Datasets
This repository provides the four benchmark datasets used in:
Connor T. Jerzak, Gary King, and Anton Strezhnev. An Improved Method of Automated Nonparametric Content Analysis for Social Science. Political Analysis, 31(1): 42–58, 2023.
Each dataset is formatted for easy loading in Python and R (CSV). Labels are integer-coded from 1,...,K; text is provided as raw strings.
Datasets
| Name | Documents | Categories | Source & Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| enron.csv | 1,426 | 5 | Corporate emails from the Enron corpus, hand-coded into five thematic categories (e.g., business, personal, legal) |
| immigration.csv | 462 | 5 | Newspaper editorials on immigration policy, hand-coded into five sentiment/policy categories; originally used in Hopkins & King (2010) and Jerzak et al. (2023) |
| clinton.csv | 1,938 | 7 | Blog posts about Hillary Clinton from 2008, hand-coded into seven topical categories; feature space of ~3,623 word stems |
| stanford.csv | 11,855 | 5 | Sentences from the Stanford Sentiment Treebank, labeled on a five-point sentiment scale; commonly used in text quantification research |
Citation
Connor T. Jerzak, Gary King, Anton Strezhnev. An Improved Method of Automated Nonparametric Content Analysis for Social Science. Political Analysis, 31(1): 42–58, 2023. [PDF]
@article{JSK-readme2,
title={An Improved Method of Automated Nonparametric Content Analysis for Social Science},
author={Jerzak, Connor T. and Gary King and Anton Strezhnev},
journal={Political Analysis},
year={2023},
volume={31},
number={1},
pages={42-58}
}
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