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Posts in the category Effective & Ethical Government - August 2004

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By Alan Franklin - Aug 31st, 2004 at 11:28 pm EDT

Reports of a worsening situation on the streets of New York:

A series of demonstrations rippled across Manhattan last night when protesters tried to converge on the Republican National Convention, as a day of planned civil disobedience erupted into clashes with police officers and led to the arrest of hundreds of people. The protesters gathered at various locations, many with the goal of descending on the convention site at Madison Square Garden. But at the various staging areas - near ground zero, in Union Square, in Herald Square near Macy's, and outside the New York Public Library - the police began making arrests, sending the crowds into a frenzy. These confrontations followed several other events, some of which went off without incident with the police taking aggressive action to prevent disruptions...

Reports of police luring protesters into arrest --

"It's an example of the police suckering the protesters," said Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, referring to the arrest of some 200 protesters who said they thought they were abiding by an agreement they had negotiated with the police as they marched from ground zero on Fulton Street. "It was a bait-and-switch tactic," she added, "where they approved a demonstration and the protesters kept up their end of the bargain. They undermined people's confidence in the police and that's a serious problem as we go forward." The day, loosely organized by an anarchist collective called the A31 Action Coalition, began slowly, with highly anticipated events proving less than fractious. Indeed, the cat-and-mouse between the protesters and the police started early in the morning. Responding to word that anarchists planned to somehow disrupt the morning's trading, hundreds of police officers flooded the blocks surrounding the New York Stock Exchange before 8 a.m. Roughly an hour later, dozens of officers responded to an obscure corner near the exchange at South Williams Street and Mill Lane, where protesters had stretched a ball of yarn across the street. Within minutes, 14 young people sat handcuffed and seated with their backs to a wall near the short pedestrian mall, surrounded by three or four times as many police officers...

We're somewhat anxiously waiting for our convention bloggers to check in, as you can imagine.

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Visions of 9/11

By Alan Franklin - Aug 31st, 2004 at 11:18 pm EDT

You can call it what you will, but this is what NYC residents think:

On the eve of a Republican National Convention invoking 9/11 symbols, sound bytes and imagery, half (49.3%) of New York City residents and 41% of New York citizens overall say that some of our leaders "knew in advance that attacks were planned on or around September 11, 2001, and that they consciously failed to act," according to the poll conducted by Zogby International. The poll is the first of its kind conducted in America that surveys attitudes regarding US government complicity in the 9/11 tragedy. Despite the acute legal and political implications of this accusation, nearly 30% of registered Republicans and over 38% of those who described themselves as "very conservative" supported the claim...

'Acute' is the word they use to describe the implications. Of course, 'mindblowing' is not a term credible journalists can get away with --

W. David Kubiak, executive director of 911truth.org, the group that commissioned the poll, expressed genuine surprise that New Yorkers' belief in the administration's complicity is as high or higher than that seen overseas. "We're familiar with high levels of 9/11 skepticism abroad where there has been open debate of the evidence for US government complicity. On May 26th the Toronto Star reported a national poll showing that 63% of Canadians are also convinced US leaders had 'prior knowledge' of the attacks yet declined to act. There was no US coverage of this startling poll or the facts supporting the Canadians' conclusions, and there has been virtually no debate on the victim families' scores of still unanswered questions. I think these numbers show that most New Yorkers are now fed up with the silence, and that politicians trying to exploit 9/11 do so at their peril. The 9/11 case is not closed and New York's questions are not going away."

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Nader's keen sense of timing

By Alan Franklin - Aug 31st, 2004 at 11:09 pm EDT

So...CNN wants to interview Nader, and they just happened to do it at at Madison Square Garden, today, without a trace of irony:

Nader, who was at the convention to do an interview with CNN, said the network got him into the building. He reserved most of his ire for Republicans...

sure he did. and a number of them smiled back with satisfaction, remembering how they helped get him on the ballot...

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On the subject of purple heart band-aids --

By Alan Franklin - Aug 31st, 2004 at 11:05 pm EDT

This is just deplorable beyond words, and even the friendly covering media agree:

Just before 9pm EDT, CNN's Candy Crowley confronted one woman: "This is a man who went and served his country. Do you feel as though you're making fun of him?" She reminded the delegate of those serving in Iraq and asked: "Is this defaming of them?" A couple of hours later, Dan Lothian identified the culprit who created the band-aids, Virginian Morton Blackwell who, he emphasized, "is not a veteran." In between, Stephanopoulos lectured a veteran about how John McCain has called the attacks on Kerry "â€˜dishonest and dishonorable.' Why do you think it's okay to wear a bandage like that?"

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Daddy weighs in

By Alan Franklin - Aug 31st, 2004 at 9:36 am EDT

If you don't want to be connected personally to a given statement (in this case smear campaign), it's really handy to have operatives to do it for you. Or your wife. Or your daddy, and it really helps when he's a former President himself --

In an interview with CNN, Mr. Bush did not directly challenge Mr. Kerry's record but rather, with the subtlety of a seasoned pro, parried questions in a way to gently bat the controversy aloft. Pressed about advertisements by a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, Mr. Bush [Sr.] called "rather compelling" the claims of some veterans who have attacked Mr. Kerry's service...

The seasoned (dirty) pro -- the man who brought you Willie Horton...

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By JB - Aug 30th, 2004 at 5:17 pm EDT

Update on the platform;

The platform also calls for constitutional amendments to ban gay marriages and abortions, and it upholds the administrationâ€™s policy limiting federal funding for embryonic stem cell research to lines that were in existence as of three years ago. It endorses doubling federal funding to promote abstinence as a family planning method.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the GOP platform is hard, hard right -- which they're attempting to hide behind 'moderate' faces like McCain, Guiliani, and Schwarzenegger. Ambitious boys being used;

...the 38th quadrennial Republican convention is dominated by conservatives. The platform mirrored President Bush's record and wishes; some right-wing objections were brushed aside, but mostly it was the dwindling band of party moderates who were shut out of the process. ...What was adopted is a decidedly conservative document in every area; Sunday, on "Meet the Press," Rudy Giuliani was on the defensive answering his disagreements with major parts of this document. One example: it not only supports a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriages but opposes civil unions, and the benefits given by many localities and corporations to such partners. ...(why Guiliani, McCain, and Schwarzenegger?)...HERE'S WHY: Sen. McCain and former Mayor Giuliani are off the charts. In last week's Journal/NBC News poll, they were ranked the most popular political figures in America. They bring almost no downsides....George W. Bush has a net negative rating with these swing voters.

Meanwhile, the tilt right will worsen;

In the tight 2004 race, no group is more important to Bush than evangelicals and Christian conservatives. These voters are at the heart of a campaign strategy of maximizing turnout among constituencies already disposed to back the president.

As Brad deLong puts it, they're even calling themselves America's Hezbollah, or "God's Official Party"...

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By JB - Aug 30th, 2004 at 4:25 pm EDT

Luis thoughtfully takes us to task for supporting Amendment 36. Worth reading. But why shouldn't Colorado lead the charge in innovating vote-counting, so that the electoral allocation reflects the popular will? Sure, it'd be great if the national system were reformed so that states didn't have to lead, and other states may have better solutions.. But why is waiting for Godot any sort of solution at all?

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Jesus and Indian casinos

By Alan Franklin - Aug 30th, 2004 at 10:19 am EDT

The right wing functions today like 'six degress of Kevin Bacon': everybody knows everybody, and people you thought were single-issue show up in the darndest places:

Ralph Reed, Southeast regional chairman of the Bush-Cheney '04 campaign and former executive director of the Christian Coalition, confirmed on Sunday that he accepted more than $1 million in fees from a lobbyist and a public relations specialist whose work on behalf of American Indian casinos prompted a federal investigation.

But wait, isn't Jesus opposed to gambling?

In addition to his role running the campaign in the Southeast, Reed is a liaison to the Christian evangelical community, and many of its leaders are adamantly opposed to gambling. Reed has been widely credited with leading the political mobilization of the Christian right since the late 1980s. Lobbyist Jack Abramoff and public relations executive Michael Scanlon -- the two men who paid the fees to Reed -- are subjects of a wide-ranging federal probe with political ramifications in Congress and within the Republican Party. The Reed-Scanlon-Abramoff connections were first reported by Shawn Martin of the American Press in Lake Charles, La., in recent coverage of a struggle for power within the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana, one of Abramoff's and Scanlon's clients...

I guess He works in mysterious ways. Or maybe this is just another shining example of the subversion of Christians by the amoral, plutocratic political right, whom Ralph Reed is more a creature of now than any church group?

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By Alan Franklin - Aug 30th, 2004 at 10:02 am EDT

"We're not going to exploit 9/11!" they said.

No sooner had Vice President Dick Cheney stepped onto Ellis Island yesterday from Liberty IV, a tugboat assigned to the National Park Service, than he gestured to the shimmering skyline of Lower Manhattan and urged several hundred supporters to remember the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the precarious state of the nation's security now.

The fear vote. It's been a long time coming. A week of new lows awaits --

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Chicka chicka wow wow

By Alan Franklin - Aug 30th, 2004 at 9:51 am EDT

Y'all wanna get this 'family values and war' party started right?

Barbara and Jenna Bush, the president's 22-year-old twin daughters, arrived like rock 'n' roll stars at a Republican convention party Sunday, complete with red carpet, cameras and paparazzi shouting for a smile. Inside, the guest list included actress Angie Harmon, formerly of NBC's "Law and Order," and her husband, the NFL's Jason Sehorn. Also inside was W.W.E. wrestler Chris Nowinski, who said that if he had the chance, he would tell the president's daughters there are better ways they could use their position if they really want to encourage young people to vote... Their more public, and grown-up, role has not dampened the women's high spirits. Jenna was photographed sticking her tongue out at the media during a campaign stop in Missouri, and gossip pages in New York and Washington have chronicled late-night antics including a ribald table dance (Barbara) and a lengthy public makeout session (Jenna.)

Don't get me wrong -- I love these girls. They put the 'Party' in 'Grand Old', for sure...

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Abolish the electoral college

By JB - Aug 29th, 2004 at 10:30 pm EDT

... so sayeth the New York Times;

...It's a ridiculous setup, which thwarts the will of the majority, distorts presidential campaigning and has the potential to produce a true constitutional crisis. There should be a bipartisan movement for direct election of the president.

Think about it. In this technological era, why in the world don't we have direct elections?? Even as luddites remain opposed to the Amendment for proportional voting in Colorado...

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Hundreds of Thousands

By JB - Aug 29th, 2004 at 7:18 pm EDT

ny rally.jpg

ny protests.jpg

The demonstrations were New York City's biggest in decades, and the most emphatic at any national political convention since Democrats and demonstrators turned against each other in fury over Vietnam in Chicago in 1968. But the first day was overwhelmingly peaceful, and the demonstrators doused a good bit of Mr. Bush's intended message with television images of dissent.

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By Alan Franklin - Aug 29th, 2004 at 10:32 am EDT

The great part is how the Post uses a file photo of Invisibill in front of a Colorado flag...as if he'd seen one recently... Note the New York City dateline --

Gov. Bill Owens said he will make a personal appearance before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee early next month to fight an Indian casino being proposed for the outskirts of Denver. Owens had been invited to the Sept. 8 briefing in Washington on the Indian casino proposal, but until Saturday he'd been noncommittal about whether he would attend...

It's not like he's often accused of being a big commitment guy...but good for him, for once. We don't need this casino. But if you see him, please remind him that there are some other things that need his attention, if he ever resurfaces west of the Mississippi...

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By Alan Franklin - Aug 29th, 2004 at 10:21 am EDT

Proving the old rule that turnabout is fair play:

Supporters of Senator John Kerry yesterday warned of "blowback" against President George W Bush for the political "attack ads" by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth which have damaged Mr Kerry's election campaign...

Which, I suppose, also proves the age-old rule about not chucking stones when one lives in a glass house:

As polls showed that Mr Bush had edged ahead of Mr Kerry for the first time, a pro-Kerry organisation labelled the President an "impostor" over [a] photograph, taken in 1970 and discovered in his father's Presidential Library in Houston, Texas. The ribbon is an Air Force Outstanding Unit Award - which was not awarded to the 111th Fighter Intercept Squadron in which Mr Bush served until 1975, five years after the photograph was taken, according to the group US War Report. "Why is this fraud important? Because it betrays the Honour Code that every officer learns and carries throughout his or her career," said Walt Starr who investigated the medals for the group...

Ouch. We told you it would get dirty...but didn't this particular line of rightwing attack seem, given the players, a little...ah, hypocritical? Aren't you supposed to hit 'em where you're strongest?

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Pissing off your own

By Alan Franklin - Aug 28th, 2004 at 10:13 am EDT

Those Salazar-Summitville smear ads are pretty vicious, aren't they? Seems a fair number of people and Colorado economic interests think so -- here's Stuart A. Sanderson, President of the Colorado Mining Association:

If you've seen a sleazy TV ad attacking Ken Salazar for his alleged role in the debacle at the Summitville gold mine near Wolf Creek Pass, you've been lied to. You've been lied to about what happened at Summitville, and you've been lied to about who was responsible. And, just as offensive to the 5,500 miners who work today in Colorado's mining industry, you've been lied to about their commitment to safe operations. What makes it worse is that no one - other than the Salazar campaign - wants to take responsibility for setting the record straight. Not the shadowy Virginia-based group responsible for the ad, Americans for Job Security, and not the Colorado TV stations that stand to reap nearly $700,000 from this tawdry campaign - all of whom refuse to take it off the air. (And none of whom bothered to verify with any industry source, to my knowledge, the allegations contained therein).

Corporate mining interests aren't traditionally considered part of the progressive base, but Mr. Sanderson still scores a very salient point:

Some will say outrageous allegations are simply part of the rough-and-tumble Colorado political process - something to be expected. If that's the case, then we've lost something precious here. Our ability to make informed decisions about our elected leaders, our respect for the truth...

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No propaganda? No trip

By Alan Franklin - Aug 28th, 2004 at 9:19 am EDT

Remember all the hoopla about Bush visiting the Olympics to cheer on the surprise Iraqi soccer team? Well, Bush cancelled after the Iraqis told the world what they thought of him; and now that the Iraqis have finished merely fourth (still an amazing showing), there's no propaganda value left. So, predictably:

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell will not visit Athens to attend the Olympic Games closing ceremonies because of the "press of business" in Washington, the U.S. State Department says.

I'm telling you, Karl Rove is losing his fabled edge --

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By Alan Franklin - Aug 28th, 2004 at 9:15 am EDT

You know, I don't think I'd want to talk about it either at this point:

The White House is stonewalling a Freedom of Information Act request for records detailing Bush Administraton contacts with Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the GOP-backed anti-Kerry organization that is challenging the Democratic Presidential nominee's actions in Vietnam. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed the FOIA request on August 24 and received a letter from the Executive Office of the President Friday, denying the grounds that it is "exempt from having to disclose the information" under the law.

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The main attraction -- distraction!

By Alan Franklin - Aug 28th, 2004 at 9:01 am EDT

Seems reasonable enough if you're them:

Nervous Republicans are urging President Bush to unveil a robust second-term agenda at his convention next week to shift voters' focus from the unpopular war in Iraq and other issues that are a distraction to his re-election drive.

I thought his leadership in time of crisis was the reason to forget all the bad stuff? Besides, isn't Kerry a really bad guy who lied about his medals?

Some contend the party should ditch the GOP-fueled controversy over rival John Kerry's combat record in Vietnam.

Oh. So, the Iraq war is a 'distraction' from the 'real issues', and the smear campaign is backfiring, and the economy is stalling... What's this campaign really about, again?

-- Remind voters of Bush's performance after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, which produced the highest approval ratings of his presidency. -- Defend his first-term record, but not so much that it overshadows his vision for a second term. The good news for the White House is the convention script hits each of those marks. The bad news is that the advice reflects a concern among Republicans that Bush is more vulnerable than they would like -- certainly more exposed to a Nov. 2 defeat than they ever thought possible before the Iraq war...

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Bush liars working...

By JB - Aug 27th, 2004 at 9:31 am EDT

... pushing the negative perception numbers for Kerry way up... All part of the right-wing, power-at-any-cost (their only real philosophy -- they don't want you focussing on facts like these)plan, folks; say anything, and do anything, to keep control. (Note that Bush is using McCain as a stooge to pretend he's against this stuff today, while the smears amplify...) Legal, ethical, moral, honest ... machts nichts. Not the democracy you thought guided the country, people ... ...

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Bush 'miscalculated'

By Alan Franklin - Aug 27th, 2004 at 9:25 am EDT

Only in campaign season do you see revelations like this -- yesterday, the Bush people came out and explained how they were wrong about global warming(!). Today, they admit something else they never have up to this point:

President Bush acknowledged for the first time on Thursday that he had miscalculated post-war conditions in Iraq, The New York Times reported. But he insisted that the 17-month-long insurgency was the unintended by-product of a "swift victory" against Saddam Hussein's military, the Times reported. Bush said his strategy had been "flexible enough" to respond. "We're adjusting to our conditions" in places like Najaf, the paper quoted him as saying. The Times said Bush deflected further inquiries as to what had gone wrong with the occupation.

So that's the explanation we're given for this?

According to the Pentagon, 969 U.S. troops have died in Iraq since the invasion, 828 of them since April 30, 2003. An additional 6,690 service members have been wounded, most of them during the occupation. In an interview published on Friday in USA Today, Bush said that Americans will re-elect him to a second term even if they disagree with his decision to invade Iraq...

Who knows? But I have heard they are going to impeach the British PM over this same business --

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