Another black eye for Colorado by Mr. Tancredo:

“At some point, state and local officials and individuals have got to step up to the plate and take some initiative,” said Tancredo. “The mentality that people can wait around indefinitely for the federal taxpayer to solve all their worldly problems has got to come to an end.”

 Read the rest here.

 Just like the three Republican state representatives who went to the Mexican border to show "solidarity" with the racist Minutemen.

On the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's August 29, 2005, landfall, the media have largely ignored reports that Mississippi Republican Gov. Haley Barbour, leading the recovery effort in the state, has repeatedly sought, and obtained, waivers from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) allowing the state to spend federal funds that would normally be reserved for low- to moderate-income residents on other projects. As a consequence, just 20 percent of the $5.4 billion in Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) awarded to the state has been earmarked for programs designed to benefit Mississippi's low- to moderate-income Katrina victims -- less than half of the 50 percent requirement mandated by Congress, according to a recent report by the Steps Coalition, an organization that monitors the Mississippi Homeowners Assistance Program. Moreover, the $1.1 billion in federal funds that have been earmarked for programs benefiting lower income residents have been distributed very slowly. As the Biloxi Sun-Herald reported on August 26, the Steps Coalition said the program has been deficient in "helping people of low-to-moderate incomes." Furthermore, investigative journalist Tim Shorrock wrote in an August 29 Salon.com article that the distribution of federal funding in Mississippi under Barbour "has been badly skewed toward wealthy homeowners."

Posted Aug 23, 2007 8:51 AM

You start off as a well-connected bureaucrat: in this case, as an Air Force civil engineer, a post from which Robbins was responsible for overseeing 70,000 servicemen and contractors, with an annual budget of $8 billion. You serve with distinction for thirty-four years, becoming such a military all-star that the Air Force frequently sends you to the Hill to testify before Congress -- until one day in the summer of 2003, when you retire to take a job as an executive for Parsons, a private construction company looking to do work in Iraq.

Talking to people and this is the feeling that our elected representatives are not listening to us.  I mean, DeGette is in one of the safest CD's in the nation but there is NO leadership from her on this issue of Iraq.  If there is no leadership then there will be a day of reckoning for DeGette on the fact that she has not taken a public leadership stance and have let at least her constituents know that there voices are heard and taken seriously.  From DailyKos.com, McJoan writes:

The Brian Baird experience should provide a warning note for Congressional Dems. Randy Stapilus at Ridenbaugh Press has an excellent first-hand account of the extremely tense town meeting Baird held in Vancouver on Monday.

One man seemed to place his finger on the feeling here when he compared protests about Iraq and other Bush Administration policy to a 9-1-1 call: The people have been calling 9-1-1 to report an emergency, but no one ever responds, including Congress. They have felt ignored, and now they’re furious about it. Many, clearly, had hoped for more change when a new majority was seated in Congress in January, only to find much less than they’d hoped for.

This was an unusual town hall meeting for Baird; one woman who had attended several of his meetings previously said the turnout for this one was much larger, and the tenor always had been a lot different.

The ground is shifting. Depending on how Iraq and Baird’s responses to it develop in the rest of this year, the congressman easily could wind up with a primary challenger - a serious one, backed by some of his own former supporters. Or maybe the play-out is something else. But we do know this: We’ve never seen a congressional town hall meeting so bitter and angry at the member of Congress, and that has to mean something.

Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden wrote about that the same anger, the same frustration, that he experienced at a town meetings he held earlier in the month. Every Democratic member of Congress who held town meetings this August heard this message. Are they listening?

Make them hear you. Call, fax, and e-mail your representative in Congress. If they are one of the 70 who signed on to that letter, tell them to hold strong and keep their promise. If their name is not on that letter, ask them to join with those 70 representatives and stop funding this occupation.

Another reason to drop AOL membership.

AOL logs on 'Dissent'
Website streams Moore-bashing documentary
By JOHN DEMPSEY

Moore

Some serious Michael Moore bashing will turn up this week on AOL's True Stories website thanks to 40 minutes of excerpts from the documentary "Manufacturing Dissent."

Web users will be able to stream the digital video at no extra cost.

Two Ohio activists have discovered that e-voting machines made by Election Systems and Software and used across the country produce time-stamped paper trails that permit the reconstruction of an election's results--including allowing voter names to be matched to their actual votes. ... Ohio law permits anyone to walk into a county election office and obtain two crucial documents: a list of voters in the order they voted, and a time-stamped list of the actual votes. "We simply take the two pieces of paper together, merge them, and then we have which voter voted and in which way," said James Moyer, a longtime privacy activist and poll worker who lives in Columbus, Ohio. ...

Moyer and fellow activist Jim Cropcho tested this by dropping by the election office of Delaware County, about 20 miles north of Columbus, and reviewing the results for a May 2006 vote to extend a property tax to fund mental retardation services (PDF). Their results indicate who voted "yes" and who voted "no"--and show that local couples (the Bennets, for instance) didn't always see eye-to-eye on the tax.

The UC study detailed a "Failure to protect ballot secrecy" in Diebold's touchscreen AccuVote TSx voting machine. They report that "Both the electronic and paper records of the Diebold AV-TSX contain enough information to compromise the secrecy of the ballot. The AV-TSX records votes in the order in which they are cast, and it records the time that each vote is cast. As a result, it is possible for election workers who have access to the electronic or paper records and who have observed the order in which individuals have cast their ballots to discover how those individuals voted."

"Not only did ES&S sell machines to California counties that weren’t state certified, it’s clear the machines weren’t even federally certified when the company delivered them to California,” Bowen continued in the no-holds-barred statement. "While ES&S may not like California law, I expect the company to follow the law and not trample over it by selling uncertified voting equipment in this state."

She went on to add that she intends "to go after the company for the full $9.72 million in penalties allowable by law, along with the original $5 million the company took from counties’ pockets."

"This is a craven right-wing power grab by the Republicans to hijack the presidency on June 3, 2008. The measure, if passed, would dictate that California divide up its electoral college votes by congressional district -- resulting in the Republican theft of at least 20 electoral votes in November's general election, the equivalent of Ohio.

A powerful New York Times editorial titled "Stacking the Electoral Deck" explains that this cynical scheme by a "shadowy group" of California Republicans will "do serious damage to our democracy":
If voters understand that the initiative is essentially an elaborate dirty trick posing as reform, they are likely to vote against it. But judging by the misleading name of their organization, the initiative’s backers want to fool the public into thinking the change would make elections more fair. They are planning on putting it to a vote in June 2008, an election when there will be few other things on the ballot, and turnout is expected to be extremely low.
While reform of the electoral system is certainly needed, it must be a national process -- not an "elaborate dirty trick" to hand over the White House to the Republican presidential nominee."

Colorado’s Democratic Representatives, Udall, Perlmutter, Salazar, and DeGette are either for protecting the Constitution or they are not. If we cannot trust Democrats to honor their Oath to protect the Constitution how can we trust them to get us Single Payer Healthcare and the other changes they pledge to be able to provide us in 2009? MoveOn.org in an email dated 08-20-07 from Nita Chaudhary to members regarding the War said “We’ve given every member of Congess a clear choice: Vote to end the war or face political extinction”. If the Democrats don’t pay attention to the rest of us perhaps they will to MoveOn’s three million members. Watch the Dems leap to attention when MoveOn finally begins to support Impeachment. This article by Dave Lindorff at Buzzflash.org and the many Comments posted there discuss the possibility of Pelosi causing the Democrats to lose big in 2008 , and this at Democrats.Com , and this at Afterdownstreet.org.   Read More »

"DesmoinesDem's post about John Edwards below highlighted his rural strategy, which includes something that most people's eyes would slide right over: A ban on meat packer ownership of livestock."

"The packer ban is a very important issues to rural districts where agriculture predominates, and his championing of it has been cited as one of the reasons why the very progressive Wellstone was able to draw on such a broad base of support. This year, Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) is expected to reintroduce a version of the 2002 competition reform and packer ban as one of several supporting Senators, and in concert with Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA)."

"Lea Anne McBride, a Cheney spokeswoman, said only that "the vice president is right where the president is" on Iran policy.

Bush left no doubt at his news conference that he intended to get tough with Iran."

"Cheney, who's long been skeptical of diplomacy with Iran, argued for military action if hard new evidence emerges of Iran's complicity in supporting anti-American forces in Iraq; for example, catching a truckload of fighters or weapons crossing into Iraq from Iran, one official said."

"The Bush administration has launched what appears to be a coordinated campaign to pin more of Iraq's security troubles on Iran."

The unilateral, go it alone policies of the current occupant of the White House are visibly crumbling.  First, there was an out-of-the box opinion by Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel to get the US away from negotiating with the Iraqi factions, and now we learn that the “decider” is passing the buck back to the UN.

Senator Hagel’s piece was published in the Financial Times – “A less American face for mediation in Iraq” FT.com site, Jul 02, 2007 (My home delivery subscription doesn’t include online access to the archive.  I saved it the old-fashioned way, paper - scissors.) 

Here’s the Washington Post coverage of the upcoming plea for rescue from the UN - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/07/AR2007080701076.html?wpisrc=newsletter 

The nation is in dire straights on the world stage.  The US military colleges teach young officers that one of the measures/means of national power is Diplomacy.  The early arrogance of the current occupant has arguably been replaced by silent despiration. 

Ban Ki-Moon has paid a high price for US acceptance of his taking the office of UN Secretaty-General.  He now faces the task of rescuing the current occupant form his debacle in Iraq.  Too bad that means the current mis-administration is likley to borrow the $130-million to extend the “Green-Zone” to the UN Mission in Baghdad.  The Federal Deficit “Children’s Tax” debt to the People’s Republic of China continues to grow. 

The next Democratic President of the United States of America has a huge and daunting task ahead of him/her.  It starts in 511 days.

Surprise, surpise…After taking a call-in opportunity to a Faux Noise (Fox News) radio show to reassure the Right WingNuts that all is well in Iraq, General David Petraeus is taking a beating in the Washington Post. The text of his radio comments were reported in detail and those knowledgeable of military realities have “taken-off the gloves.”

Read the article -

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/07/AR2007080701726.html

Then read how thousands are b****-slapping a 4-star -

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/07/AR2007080701726_Comments.html

The weapons fiasco is a serious blow to the credibility of the entire military mission. It comes on the heals of the “…take yer guns home boys…” disbanding of the Iraqi Army, the failure to secure Saddam’s conventional weapons stockpiles, and the dumb-founded do-nothing policies during the rise of the insurgency.

It was just 1,560 days ago that the current occupant of the White House joyfully declared the end of combat in Iraq under the glowing “Mission Accomplished” banner. The war was won, but it is becoming more and more evident that the peace is descending rapidly into catastrophe.

There is no truthful “clerical error” that could have allowed 190,000 weapons to flow unchecked into Iraq. It was definitely a loss of accountability, a compromise of integrity, and an abandoning of professionalism on the part of General Patraeus.

The head of a liberal advocacy group is accusing Republican Senate candidate Bob Schaffer of hypocrisy for advice he gave his fellow members of the state Board of Education on disclosing contributions.

ProgressNowAction executive director Michael Huttner said Schaffer told board members they should disclose donations from people doing business with the board. Huttner said Schaffer then accepted contributions to his Senate campaign from a board consultant.

Schaffer did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

Huttner said Schaffer cast the deciding vote to award a contract to a company owned by David Brennan, which provides programs for charter schools, and accepted $3,600 in contributions from Brennan for his Senate campaign.

"One part of the Justice Department mess that requires more scrutiny is the growing evidence that the department may have singled out people for criminal prosecution to help Republicans win elections...

Putting political opponents in jail is the sort of thing that happens in third-world dictatorships. In the United States, prosecutions are supposed to be scrupulously nonpartisan...."

" If Americans are being put in jail for political reasons, Congress must put a stop to it."

The offenses and failures of the mis-administration just continue to grow. Today's Washington Post story, "Weapons Given to Iraq Are Missing: GAO Estimates 30% of Arms Are Unaccounted For" is yet more damning evidence of how badly the current occupant of the White House has bungled his adventure in Iraq.

Here's the story - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/05/AR2007080501299.html?wpisrc=newsletter

The GAO Report - http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d07711.pdf