It appears that when in dire need of a Democrat to scapegoat or demonize, conservatives in the media look no further than the circus freak show Web site put out by right-wing gossipmonger Matt Drudge. But times have been tough for conservatives looking to portray someone -- anyone! -- as the epitome of what’s wrong with Democrats and the Democratic Party. Unfortunately for this breathless lot, when looking for such a Democrat (better yet a liberal, or as a last resort a “squishy” Republican) the selection has been limited.
Patriotic stupor: White House junta is undermining democracy
In the months following Sept. 11 the debate about waging war on terrorism has been understandably mute. With rare exceptions, the question boiling out of the nation's anger hasn't been whether to fight a war or where to fight it, but how quickly. Once it began, President Bush's strangely paradoxical promise that the war would certainly be won but that its duration would be open-ended should have been the first warning that such a colossal national commitment deserves less vagueness and clearer strategy, if not accountability. Nothing of the sort has happened.
WASHINGTON — In a banner headline on Friday, The Washington Post blared: "Shadow Government Is at Work in Secret." The article said President Bush had assembled a cadre of officials to operate under the radar, out of the sunlight.
This is news?
The president did that on Jan. 20, 2001.
But it turns out that after Sept. 11, wanting to make sure that everything wouldn't collapse if there was a nuclear attack on Washington, he did it again. He formed a secret government within a secret government. A shadow of a shadow.
It suits this administration to a T- ball, reflecting its twin obsessions with secrecy and self-perpetuation.
The president realized that Dick Cheney couldn't govern all by himself after an Armageddon, so he set up a pre-post-apocalyptic staff, sending about 100 midlevel officials to two subterranean locations outside the capital.
YOU CAN always tell a Republican, to paraphrase an old wisecrack, but you can't tell him much. Republicans, at least the ones in Washington, get too angry if you try.
Just the other day, for example, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle caused a stir by noting temperately that, while the war on terrorism has been successful to date, the Bush administration seems to be expanding the war without clearly explaining its aims.
Well. The Senate's Republican leader, Trent Lott, was sent into paroxysms of rage. "How dare Sen. Daschle criticize President Bush" while there's a war going on, Sen. Lott demanded to know. "Disgusting" was all House Majority Whip Tom DeLay could think of to say.
Never mind that this is the same crowd that undercut President Bill Clinton repeatedly -- even when he ordered a strike that nearly killed Osama bin Laden -- with the charge that he was diverting attention from the really important issue of the day: the Monica Lewinsky case. And never mind that Congress, which has authorized only the Afghan campaign, has every right to insist that it be consulted.
The Enron-Cheney-Taliban Connection?
Enron is a scandal so enormous that it's hard to wrap your mind around it. Not just a single financial disaster, it's actually a jigsaw of interlocking scandals, each outrageous in its own right.
There's Enron the Wall St. con game, where company bookkeepers used slight of hand to turn four years of steady losses into stunning profits. There's Enron the reverse Robin Hood, which stole from its own employees even as its executives were hauling millions of dollars out the backdoor. There's Enron's Ken Lay the Kingmaker, who used the corporation's fraudulent wealth to broker elections and skew public policy to his liking. And then there are the Enron coverups, as documents are shredded and the White House seeks to conceal details about meetings between Enron and Vice President Cheney.
The coverups are still very much a mystery. What were the documents that were fed into the shredder -- even after the corporation declared bankruptcy? What is the White House fighting to keep secret, even going to the length of redefining executive privilege and inviting the first Congressional lawsuit ever filed against a president? Were the consequences of releasing these documents more damaging than the consequences of destroying them?
Political Donors Get Private Briefings
WASHINGTON –– For $1,000, a Republican donor can get a private briefing on homeland security from the House intelligence committee chairman and a spot in the "Speaker's Circle."
Being in the circle, however, does not guarantee a meeting with House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. Instead, circle members will get to meet with House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, R-Texas, during a gathering March 13-14.
Democrats have their own perks for political donors heading into the crucial midterm elections where control of Congress is at stake.
Supporters who contribute $115,000 or more are promised two dinners with the top House Democrat, Richard Gephardt of Missouri, and two exclusive retreats with Gephardt and Rep. Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., who is leading the fund raising for House Democrats.
"If they were smart, they would have ignored the site altogether."
--Kelly Fero, creator of EnronOwnsTheGOP.com, on the GOP's reaction to the site.
U.S. Soldier Killed in Afghan Ground Offensive
WASHINGTON/GARDEZ, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Regrouping Taliban and al Qaeda fighters killed a U.S. soldier and wounded others on Saturday in repelling an offensive that involved more Western coalition ground troops than any operation of the Afghan war.
The fatality, the second U.S. serviceman killed by enemy fire in the war, came as up to 5,000 die-hard al Qaeda and Taliban fighters fired rockets and artillery to beat back outnumbered Afghan troops, who were aided by U.S. bombing and Western troops.
At least two Afghan soldiers were also killed in the offensive on snowy mountains in eastern Afghanistan (news - web sites) that started late on Friday and continued -- after the retreat -- with bombing that included rarely used "thermobaric" munitions.
George W. Bush has lately become accustomed to a certain amount of deference. Since Sept. 11 it is politically incorrect to speak to or about him without a glowing tribute to his war leadership. But he got none of that from Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, who steamed into the Oval Office on Feb. 7 and delivered "the unvarnished truth" that Vice President Dick Cheney craved for his secret energy huddles.
The president, Reid told him, had lied to the people of Nevada about the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, which the state vehemently opposes. He and Cheney campaigned on a promise that science would determine whether the resting place for 77,000 tons of nuclear waste would be in a mountain 90 miles from Las Vegas. Reid charges that the standards applied in the recommendation offered by Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham were, according to experts,"weak to moderate" and inadequate for radioactive storage.
Sunday, March 03, 2002 - A century ago, the U.S. government could treat American Indians shabbily and get away with it. The situation hasn't improved in the 21st century.
Since December, the U.S. Department of the Interior has withheld payments owed to Indians for rents and royalties from grazing leases, timber contracts and, most importantly, oil and gas rights. The Boulder-based Native American Rights Funds estimates that, in three months, Uncle Sam has fallen behind on $15 million in payments owed to 43,000 Indians nationwide.
Why has Interior withheld the payments? Well, the Indians had the nerve to demand a proper accounting of the trust money the feds owe them and to insist that government computer records be kept safe from hackers. Although the Indians sought what anyone deserves from a financial trustee, the government responded with an indefensible abuse of power.
The Supreme Court yesterday turned down an emergency appeal of a Mississippi congressional redistricting plan that has provoked a bitter dispute involving accusations of personal and political favoritism on the part of federal judges and the Justice Department.
The dispute involves the creation of a new congressional district that would pit two incumbents, Reps. Charles W. "Chip" Pickering Jr. (R) and Ronnie Shows (D), against each other because the Mississippi delegation must be cut from five to four House members as a result of a decade of slow population growth.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) has begun an inquiry into what role GOP political appointees at the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division had in determining Mississippi's redistricting plan, and Democrats are challenging the ethics of federal judges who ruled on the case.
GOP overtakes Democrats locally
Republicans have overtaken Democrats as the majority party in Merced County, although the county's registrar of voters wants an investigation into possible voter registration fraud by the GOP.
As of Feb. 19, the last date to register for the March 5 primary, Merced County Republicans number 39,285, while Democrats number 37,992, leaving the GOP with an advantage of 1,293 voters.
Deanna Brown, deputy registrar of voters, said Wednesday that her office has received about 50 complaints from people complaining that Republicans "were doing a bait-and-switch like thing. They'll ask them to sign a petition, and after they sign the petition they'll ask them to sign a voter registration card."
Stephen Jones, assistant county auditor, confirmed Wednesday that the county has asked the California Secretary of State to conduct a formal investigation into the Republican registration drive.
An update on the Ken Lay/Lincoln Bedroom myth
that Ken Lay stayed in the Lincoln Bedroom of the Clinton White House may be on its way to extinction. The Washington Times' correction last Friday has been followed by a number of others.
Here's a full chronology of the progression of the myth - note that the Los Angeles Daily News and Denver Post have published letters to the editor promoting this falsehood since my piece was published:
Nixon, Graham anti-Semitism on tape
Rev. Billy Graham openly voiced a belief that Jews control the American media, calling it a "stranglehold" during a 1972 conversation with President Richard Nixon, according to a tape of the Oval Office meeting released Thursday by the National Archives.
"This stranglehold has got to be broken or the country's going down the drain," the nation's best-known preacher declared as he agreed with a stream of bigoted Nixon comments about Jews and their perceived influence in American life.
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