State of the Union B

Some things to keep in mind after watching the State of the Union. Number 4 especially stands out to me and I think it is completely overlooked by most people. Via Juan Cole:

1. US economic growth during the last quarter was an anemic 1.1%, the worst in 3 years.

2. The US inflation rate has jumped to 3.4 percent, the highest rate in 5 years.

3. The number of daily attacks in Iraq rose from 52 in December, 2004 to 77 in December, 2005.

4. A third of US veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, some 40,000 persons, exhibit at least some signs of mental health disorders. Some 14,000 were treated for drug dependencies, and 11,000 for depression.

5. Increases in American consumer spending come from borrowing.


6. The $320 - $400 bilion deficits run by the Bush administration may push up the cost of mortgages and loans.


7. 58% of Americans think Bush is painting Iraq as rosier than it is. A majority thinks we should never have invaded the country.

8. The US military is at a breaking point.

9. In fact, The US and Iran are tacit allies in Iraq.

10. More money would be needed to finish the US reconstruction projects begun in Iraq.

StarDust

With the successful return of the StarDust spacecraft, a lot of scientists are gearing up to see what story can be told from the cometary dust that was absorbed in StarDust's aerogel collector. StarDust was initially sent to Houston so that roughly 1.6 million digital images could be taken with a microscope. The field of view for each picture is smaller than a grain of salt! Next, samples are being sent out to 180 scientists worldwide to conduct their own research about our solar systems origins. Some really interesting analysis should come out of this mission.


However, scientists alone cannot get the job done. Due to the enormous number of images to analyze for interstellar dust impacts (see picture), the StarDust team is enlisting the help of volunteers. Similar to SETI@home or other projects found on BOINC (including this one), StarDust@Home will train volunteers to examine these images for impacts. You will have to pass a test based on an online tutorial. Should you make it that far, you will then download a virtual microscope to begin searching.

What's the scientific importance of all of this, you might ask? I'll let the StarDust team explain it in their own words:

The scientific importance of these first solid samples from our Galaxy can't be overstated. Interstellar dust and gas were the building blocks of our solar system, the Earth, and all living things, including people. We are truly made of stardust. But we don't know what the typical interstellar dust grain looks like. Not even one contemporary interstellar dust grain has ever been studied in the laboratory! In January 2006, the Stardust spacecraft will return to Earth, for the first time, a few dozen precious contemporary interstellar dust grains. We are extremely excited about the prospect of directly studying contemporary interstellar dust for the first time.

Volunteers will be recognized for their contribution. This is a great opportunity to be a part of something unique.

Ricky Gervais

If you're looking for something funny to download to your iPod, I recommend giving the Ricky Gervais Show a try. He, and his co-creator of the Office, Steve Merchant, along with their target of ridicule, Karl Pilkington, discuss anything that happens to interest them over the course of 35 minutes or so. Very funny stuff (especially if you're a fan of British humor).

Zoo Diaries

Ever wondered what a day in the life of a zoo gorilla is like? Now you can hear about it from the source; Gongogo the Zoo Gorilla has a story to tell. Click here to read about it.

Administration Errors

This is a lengthy, and excellent, article by Juan Cole regarding the mistakes President Bush and company have made regarding their prosecution of the war on al-Qaeda and Muslim extremists.

Top Ten Mistakes of the Bush Administration in Reacting to Al-Qaeda

Usamah Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri murdered 3,000 Americans, and they both issued tapes in the past week, blustering and threatening us with more of the same. Most of us aren't wild about paying for the Bush administration with our taxes, but one thing we have a right to expect is that our government would protect us from mass murderers and would chase them down and arrest them. It has not done that. When asked why he hasn't caught Bin Laden, Bush replies, "Because he's hidin'." Is Bush laughing at us?

On September 11, 2001, the question was whether we had underestimated al-Qaeda. It appeared to be a Muslim version of the radical seventies groups like the Baader Meinhoff gang or the Japanese Red Army. It was small, only a few hundred really committed members who had sworn fealty to Bin Laden and would actually kill themselves in suicide attacks. There were a few thousand close sympathizers, who had passed through the Afghanistan training camps or otherwise been inducted into the world view. But could a small terrorist group commit mayhem on that scale? Might there be something more to it? Was this the beginning of a new political force in the Middle East that could hope to roll in and take over, the way the Taliban had taken over Afghanistan in the 1990s? People asked such questions.

Over four years later, there is no doubt. Al-Qaeda is a small terrorist network that has spawned a few copy-cats and wannabes. Its breakthrough was to recruit some high-powered engineers in Hamburg, which it immediately used up. Most al-Qaeda recruits are marginal people, people like Zacarias Moussawi and Richard Reid, who would be mere cranks if they hadn't been manipulated into trying something dangerous. Muhammad al-Amir (a.k.a Atta) and Ziad Jarrah were highly competent scientists, who could figure the kinetic energy of a jet plane loaded with fuel. There don't seem to be significant numbers of such people in the organization. They are left mostly with cranks, petty thieves, drug smugglers, bored bank tellers, shopkeepers, and so forth, persons who could pull off a bombing of trains in Madrid or London, but who could not for the life of them do a really big operation.

The Bush administration and the American Right generally has refused to acknowledge what we now know. Al-Qaeda is dangerous. All small terrorist groups can do damage. But it is not an epochal threat to the United States or its allies of the sort the Soviet Union was (and that threat was consistently exaggerated, as well).

In fact, the United States invaded a major Muslim country, occupied it militarily, tortured its citizens, killed tens of thousands, tinkered with the economy-- did all those things that Muslim nationalists had feared and warned against, and there hasn't even been much of a reaction from the Muslim world. Only a few thousand volunteers went to fight. Most people just seem worried that the US will destabilize their region and leave a lot of trouble behind them. People are used to seeing Great Powers do as they will. A Syrian official before the war told a journalist friend of mine that people in the Middle East had been seeing these sorts of invasions since Napoleon took Egypt in 1798. "Well," he shrugged, "usually they leave behind a few good things when they finally leave."

Because they exaggerate the scale of the conflict, and because they use it cynically, Bush and Cheney have grossly mismanaged the struggle against al-Qaeda and Muslim radicalism after September 11. Here are their chief errors:

1. Bush vastly exaggerates al-Qaeda's size, sweep and importance, while failing to invest in genuine counterterrorist measures such as port security or security for US nuclear plants.

2. Bush could have eradicated the core al-Qaeda group by putting resources into the effort in 2002. He did not, leaving al-Zawahiri and Bin Laden to taunt us, inspire our enemies and organize for years after the Taliban were defeated. It would be as though Truman had allowed Hitler to broadcast calls for terrorism against the US from some hiding place as late as 1949.

3. Bush opened a second front against Iraq before he had put Afghanistan on a sound footing.

4. Bush gutted the US constitution, tossing out the Fourth Amendment, by assiduously spying on Americans without warrants. None of those spying efforts has been shown to have resulted in any security benefits for the United States. Bush says that he wants to watch anyone who calls the phone numbers associated with al-Qaeda. But some of those phone numbers were for food delivery or laundry. We want a judge to sign off on a wire tap so that innocent Americans are not spied on by the government.

5. Bush attempted to associate the threat from al-Qaeda with Iran and Syria. Iran is a fundamentalist Shiite country that hates al-Qaeda. Syria is a secular Arab nationalist country that hates al-Qaeda. Indeed, Syria tortured al-Qaeda operatives for Bush, until Bush decided to get Syria itself. Bush and Cheney have cynically used a national tragedy to further their aggressive policies of Great Power domination.

6. Bush by invading Iraq pushed the Iraqi Sunni Arabs to desert secular Arab nationalism. Four fifths of the Sunni Arab vote in the recent election went to hard line Sunni fundamentalist parties. This development is unprecedented in Iraqi history. Iraqi Sunni Arabs are nationalists, whether secular or religious, and there is no real danger of most of them joining al-Qaeda. But Bush has spread political Islam and has strengthened its influence.

7. Bush diverted at least one trillion dollars in US security spending from the counter-terrorism struggle against al-Qaeda to the Iraq debacle, at the same time that he has run up half a trillion dollar annual deficits, contributing to a spike in inflation, harming the US economy, and making the US less effective in counterterrorism.

8. Counterterrorism requires friendly allies and close cooperation. The Bush administration alienated France, Germany and Spain, along with many Middle Eastern nations that had long waged struggles of their own against terrorist groups. Bush is widely despised and has left America isolated in the world. Virtually all the publics of all major nations hate US policy. One poll showed that in secular Turkey where Muslim extremism is widely reviled and Bin Laden is generally disliked, the public preferred Bin Laden to Bush. Bush is widely seen as more dangerous than al-Qaeda. This image is bad for US counterterrorism efforts.

9. Bush transported detainees to torture sites in Eastern Europe. Under European Union laws, both torture and involvement in torture are illegal,and European officials can be tried for these crimes. HOw many European counterterrorism officials will want to work closely with the Americans if, for all they know, this association could end in jail time? Indeed, in Washington it is said that a lot of our best CIA officers are leaving, afraid that they are being ordered to do things that are illegal, and for which they could be tried once another administration comes to power in Washington.

10. Bush's failure to capture Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri allows them to continue to grandstand, to continue to frighten the public, to continue to affect financial markets, and to continue to plot. Al-Zawahiri almost certainly plotted the 7/7 London subway bombings himself, and gloated about it when he issued Muhammad Siddique Khan's suicide statement. Misplaced Bush priorities are getting our allies hit. The CIA is reduced to firing predators at villages because our counterterrorism efforts have been starved for funds by the Iraq quagmire. If al-Qaeda does pull off another American operation, it may well give Bush and Cheney an opportunity to destroy the US constitution altogether, finally giving Bin Laden his long-sought revenge on Americans for the way he believes they have forced Palestinians and other Muslims to live under lawless foreign domination or local tyranny.

Whoops

From Bob Geiger. This is why we need more unscripted town hall meetings. Politicians can't just make stuff up (although Bush is trying hard here).

Boy, is somebody on the White House advance team in trouble today…

President Bush was at Kansas State University yesterday to give a speech and, in the question-answer period, a K-State sophomore somehow slipped through the careful filters typically used to select questions from Bush’s live, “spontaneous” audiences.

Here’s student Tiffany Cooper playing “Stump the President.”

Q: Hi, I just want to get your comments about education. Recently, $12.7 billion was cut from education, and I was just wondering how that's supposed to help our futures? (Applause.)

Bush: Education budget was cut -- say it again. What was cut?

Q: Twelve point seven billion dollars was cut from education, and I was just wondering how is that supposed to help our --

Bush: At the federal level?

Q: Yes.

Bush: I don't think that -- I don't think we've actually -- for higher education? Student loans?

Q: Yes, student loans.

Bush: Actually, I think what we did was reform the student loan program. We're not cutting money out of it. In other words, people aren't going to be cut off the program. We're just making sure it works better. Part of the reconciliation package, I think she's talking about. Yes, it's a reform of the program to make sure it functions better. It is -- in other words, we're not taking people off student loans, we're saving money in the student loan program because it's inefficient. And so I think the thing to look at is whether or not there will be fewer people getting student loans. I don't think so. And, secondly, on Pell grants, we're actually expanding the number of Pell grants through our budget.

But, great question. I think that the key on education is to make sure that we stay focused on how do we stay competitive into the 21st century. And I plan on doing some talking about math and science and engineering programs, so that people who graduate out of college will have the skills necessary to compete in this competitive world.

But I'm -- I think I'm right on this. I'll check when I get back to Washington. But thank you for your question. (Applause.)

I’m sure those “reforms” will be a big comfort to the non-rich rabble who used to attend Kansas State, as they wait their tables and flip burgers in the coming years.

For the record, the president's budget reconciliation at the end of 2005, did indeed cut $12.7 billion from education programs and also fixed the interest rate on student loans at 6.8 percent, whether or not the prevailing market rates go lower.

In addition, Senate Republicans in October killed a measure by Ted Kennedy (D-MA) -- S.AMDT.2213 -- that would have raised Pell grants by a measly $200.

And all the presidential stuttering and stammering in the world won’t change that.

Some More to Chew On

Via Daily Kos:

Am I the only one blowing a gasket here?

From AP today:

SAN FRANCISCO, California (AP) -- President Bush told abortion opponents Monday that they are pursuing "a noble cause" and making a real difference in the campaign to recruit more Americans to stand on their side.
...
"This is a cause that appeals to the conscience of our citizens and is rooted in America's deepest principle," the president said. "And history tells us that with such a cause we will prevail."
...
"You believe, as I do, that every human life has value, that the strong have a duty to protect the weak, and that the self-evident truths of the Declaration of Independence apply to everyone, not just to those considered healthy or wanted or convenient," Bush told the abortion foes.

"These principles call us to defend the sick and the dying, persons with disabilities and birth defects, all who are weak and vulnerable, especially unborn children," the president said.

Blown Gasket Point #1: "We" (the royal "we," I have to assume, or the "we" encompassed by the 36 percent of Americans who currently choose Bush over reality) defend the sick and dying, the weak and vulnerable? Arrrrrgggghhhhh! By cutting heating subsidies, screwing up Medicare so that the retired don't get their meds, de-funding Pell grants and other student aid to the poor, kicking wounded veterans to the curb, slashing Head Start and executing the mentally disabled and/or mentally ill? That's how we defend the weak and vulnerable? Words ... fail ... me.

Blown Gasket Point #2: History tells us that with such a cause (rolling back abortion rights), we will prevail.. Really? It does? Too bad I don't have a Yale history degree like the little emperor, because my education pretty much taught me that since the beginning of the republic, rights have been expanding and not contracting. What started out with a franchise and rights for a limited few - property owners of the right color of skin and of the right gender - have fairly consistently been extended to property-less everymen and everywomen. Prohibition and the 18th amendment was the one major exception of taking away existing rights. How'd that work out, little emperor? (Hint: May require reading current Bill of Rights. Proceed with caution. Lots of scary stuff in there.)

Blown Gasket Point #3:...especially unborn children. Really? Especially? Why?

I'm just trying to tune in to the logic here of this fetishization of the fetus, this cult of the blastula. As far as I can tell, the "reasoning" must go something like this: Embryos are innocent and sinless, unlike the rest of humankind, therefore God commands that they are somehow deserving of treatment as a special class (although it's hard to justify the God-induced early miscarriage rate under this argument ... but never mind). But watch out, kiddo. Once you draw that first lungful of breath, sin must get sucked into your lungs like a couple gallons of evil in sick building syndrome, because ... Baby, you are on your own. Yeah, you and your mama too, if she's not of the right economic class. No child care, crappy and undersubsidized health care, no Head Start, no school lunches, no student aid to dig your sorry ass out of the mess you were born into, no federal job training if the conservatives continue their slash and burn budget cuts (but you can join the military, babe). Once you draw that first fateful breath, you're just as worthless as the rest of us ... and part of the growing legion of the discarded, shamed, blamed and forgotten, tossed into the dark corners of our "free" society. Crawl your own way out of the ditch the compassionate conservatives dug for you. Little infants who respirate, be on notice: You are the embarrassing debris left over from the American dream. Get used to it.

After all, we only have so much of an attention span, and there are many, many other embryos out there clamoring for God-blissed attention - and a hell of a lot more than we've become accustomed to if Roe is overturned.

The Judge Alito Confirmation

Not being a legal expert, it is sometimes difficult to make an informed opinion on things like the Samuel Alito confirmation. I've read a variety of opinions concerning him, from a number of sources, both liberal and conservative. Being on the more moderate liberal side, there are many things I do not agree with him in terms of world view. It is safe to say he is qualified and intelligent, but I've always had a company-man impression from him (the company in this case being the Bush administration). Chief Justice Roberts, though a conservative, also seemed independent. This is not the feeling I get with Judge Alito.

Geoffrey Stone, a the UC Law Blog, makes a simple and straightforward case as to why Judge Alito should not be confirmed, and it is based on one set of criteria. Whether you agree with him or not, it will make you think, and that is never a bad thing.

Real Climate

Over at Daily Kos is an interview with three of the climate scientists who run RealClimate.org. It's an excellent interview with some interesting and relevant info regarding climate change. Click here to head over.

Scott McClellan Spin Zone

Scotty's been watching Bill O'Reilly. Unfortunately, the press is paying attention. Via Daily Kos:

Associated Press:

McClellan said the Clinton-Gore administration had engaged in warrantless physical searches, and he cited an FBI search of the home of CIA turncoat Aldrich Ames without permission from a judge. He said Clinton's deputy attorney general, Jamie Gorelick, had testified before Congress that the president had the inherent authority to engage in physical searches without warrants.

"I think his hypocrisy knows no bounds," McClellan said of Gore.

But at the time of the Ames search in 1993 and when Gorelick testified a year later, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act required warrants for electronic surveillance for intelligence purposes, but did not cover physical searches. The law was changed to cover physical searches in 1995 under legislation that Clinton supported and signed.

Bush's attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, made the same arguments as McClellan during interviews Monday on CNN's "Larry King Live" and Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes."

Hydrothermal Podcasts

If you're interested in hydrothermal vents, Deep Sea News has links to a couple of podcasts by Dr. Cindy Lee van Dover. She is a professor at the College of William and Mary, and an expert on hydrothermal vents. Just click the link above.

Some Democratic Backbone

Some words from Al Gore via Daily Kos:

Fear drives out reason. Fear suppresses the politics of discourse and opens the door to the politics of destruction. Justice Brandeis once wrote: "Men feared witches and burnt women."

The founders of our country faced dire threats. If they failed in their endeavors, they would have been hung as traitors. The very existence of our country was at risk.

Yet, in the teeth of those dangers, they insisted on establishing the Bill of Rights.

Is our Congress today in more danger than were their predecessors when the British army was marching on the Capitol? Is the world more dangerous than when we faced an ideological enemy with tens of thousands of missiles poised to be launched against us and annihilate our country at a moment's notice? Is America in more danger now than when we faced worldwide fascism on the march-when our fathers fought and won two World Wars?

It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it is up to us to do the same.

New Horizons

On Tuesday NASA will launch its Pluto-Kuiper Belt mission. After a successful return of the StarDust spacecraft, I'm sure morale is very high for this launch. Pluto has never received its own space probe and there remains a considerable aura of mystique around the planet (or Kuiper-object, if you prefer). The trip will take nine years (Pluto is 4.4-7.3 billion km away, depending on its orbit). In February 2007 it will get a gravity assist from Jupiter and then cruise straight on towards Pluto and Pluto's moon Charon. Why visit Pluto, you might ask? Our Solar System has three zones: the inner rocky planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars); the middle gas giants (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune); and then some icy rocks in the farthest reaches before you get to the Kuiper Belt. Not much is known about these "Icy dwarfs"; New Horizon's will help scientists figure out where Pluto, Charon and other Kuiper objects fit in with the rest of our solar system. In particular, the scientific objectives are:

• Map surface composition of Pluto and Charon
• Characterize geology and morphology ("the look") of Pluto and Charon
• Characterize the neutral atmosphere of Pluto and its escape rate
• Search for an atmosphere around Charon
• Map surface temperatures on Pluto and Charon
• Search for rings and additional satellites around Pluto
• PLUS... conduct similar investigations of one or more Kuiper Belt Object

Once New Horizon's is finished with Pluto and Charon, it will venture further out into the Kuiper Belt to examine some of the larger objects out there. This will give us an unprecidented look into the workings or our solar system, and its development.

Deluge

We're on day 26 of rain here in the Puget Sound area. I'm finally seeing the rain I was told about before we moved here. It really is pretty amazing, although I can understand why it depresses some people. If you absolutely have to have sunshine all of the time, this isn't the place for you! My students are desperately hoping that we break the current Washington state record of 33 straight days of rain.

Religious Stampede

Approximately 345 people were killed today during the yearly Hajj in Mecca. Does anyone else find it absolutely absurd that every single year people are killed during this part of their ritual? Why exactly doesn't the Saudi Arabian government enact measures to prevent this from happening? Why don't the pilgrims who are there demonstrate some common sense when they know what has occured in the past? I just can't fathom this type of behavior.

Update:

Not surprisingly, the pilgrims and Saudi government blame each other. Police officials say that many pilgrims ignored the warnings and notices posted all over the area, as well as advice to visit the sacred sites throughout the day, rather than all at once after the noon service. Pilgrims say that while there was plenty of security, they were poorly organized and seemed to ignore many of the problems as they were occuring.

While there must be some logistical strategies that the government could employ to help prevent this (although I'm sure it woudn't please the pilgrims), its clear that the biggest problem is trying to squeeze 2 million pilgrims into a space where each of them is only concerned with fulfilling their part of tradition. Fanaticism is trumping common sense. As one official said, it only takes two people to start one of these stampedes. So, although I think the government isn't doing enough (and this is coming from someone thousands of miles away, so my view probably isn't worth much), I'm not sure how you convince a mob of people to start thinking of others a little more. Let's hope next year's Hajj isn't as deadly.

Radio Travesty

My favorite radio station in Seattle, 107.7 The End, apparently dropped the best program they had going, The Morning Alternative. In its place they've gone with Adam Corolla. So, they replaced two locals who actually talk about things that those of us in the area can appreciate, plus, they no longer play music in the morning. It's a joke. If you live in or around Seattle and would like to complain, click here.

Cat Evolution

If you're a cat lover, head over to the Loom for a nice piece on cat evolution by Carl Zimmer. Find out where your favorite tabby came from.

The Truth in Iraq

Juan Cole is one of the most widely read bloggers on the web, focusing on the Middle East, which is his specialty. He is a history professor at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. He speaks with some authority on events in Iraq (for his creditials, click here). As such, he has listed the top ten myths about Iraq. They are worth reading to get a better understanding of what is (and isn't) happening over there.

A Comedic Loss

I just found out today that a comedian I really like, Mitch Hedberg, died back in March (how observant am I?). Here's some favorite lines by him:

The depressing thing about tennis is that no matter how much you play, you'll never be as good as a wall. I played a wall once, they're f**cking relentless.

You know, people think I'm into sports just because I'm a man. I'm not into sports. I mean, I like Gatorade, but that's about as far as it goes. By the way, you don't have to be sweaty and holding a basketball to enjoy a Gatorade. You could just be a thirsty dude. Gatorade forgets about this demographic. I'm thirsty for absolutely no reason. Other than the fact that liquid has not touched my lips for some time. Can I have a Gatorade too, or does that lightning bolt mean "No"?

Swiss cheese is the only cheese you can bite and miss. "Hey Mitch - does that sandwich have cheese on it?" "Every now and then!" I got some swiss air on that bite.

I think Pringles' initial intention was to make tennis balls. But on the day that the rubber was supposed to show up, a big truckload of potatoes arrived. But Pringles was a laid-back company. They said "F**k it. Cut 'em up!"

I recently took up ice sculpting. Last night I made an ice cube. This morning I made 12, I was prolific.

My belt holds my pants up, but the belt loops hold my belt up. I don't really know what's happening down there. Who is the real hero?

When I was a kid, I used to lie awake in my twin-sized bed wonderin' where my brother was...

A snake bite emergency repair kit is a body bag.

I went to the park and saw this kid flying a kite. The kid was really excited. I don't know why; that's what they're supposed to do. Now if he had had a chair on the other end of that string, I would have been impressed. Imagine trying to fly a chair. You'd have to run like a motherf**ker.

I don't own a cell phone or a pager. I just hang around everyone I know, all the time. If someone needs to get a hold of me, they just say, "Mitch," and I say, "What?" and turn my head slightly.

I hate turtlenecks. I have such a weak neck. Plus if you wear a turtleneck it's like being strangled by a really weak guy ... all day. And if you wear a turtleneck and a backpack it's like a weak midget trying to bring you down.

I bought myself a parrot. The parrot talked. But it did not say, "I'm hungry,"... so it died.

In England, Smokey the Bear is not the forest fire prevention representative. They have Smackie the Frog. It's just like a bear, but it's a frog. I think it's a better system; I think we should adopt it. Because bears can be mean, but frogs are always cool. Never has there been a frog hopping toward me, and I thought, "Man, I'd better play dead. Here comes that frog..." You never say, "Here comes that frog" in a nervous manner. It's always optimistic, like, "Hey, here comes that frog, all right. Maybe he will settle near me so I can pet him, and stick him in a mayonnaise jar, with a stick and a leaf, to recreate what he's used to. And I'd certainly have to punch some holes in the lid, because he's damn sure used to air. Then I can observe him, and he won't be doing much in his 16-ounce world."

Republican Economics

Via Brad DeLong:

The Tax-Cut Zombies - New York Times : Since the 1970's, conservatives have used two theories to justify cutting taxes. One theory, supply-side economics, has always been hokum for the yokels. Conservative insiders adopted the supply-siders as mascots because they were useful to the cause, but never took them seriously.

The insiders' theory - what we might call the true tax-cut theory - was memorably described by David Stockman, Ronald Reagan's budget director, as "starving the beast." Proponents of this theory argue that conservatives should seek tax cuts not because they won't create budget deficits, but because they will. Starve-the-beasters believe that budget deficits will lead to spending cuts that will eventually achieve their true aim: shrinking the government's role back to what it was under Calvin Coolidge.

True to form, the insiders aren't buying the supply-siders' claim that a partial recovery in federal tax receipts from their plunge between 2000 and 2003 shows that all's well on the fiscal front. (Revenue remains lower, and the federal budget deeper in deficit, than anyone expected a few years ago.) Instead, conservative heavyweights are using the budget deficit to call for cuts in key government programs. For example, in 2001 Alan Greenspan urged Congress to cut taxes to avoid running an excessively large budget surplus. Now he issues dire warnings about "fiscal instability." But rather than urging Congress to reverse the tax cuts he helped sell, he talks of the need to cut future Social Security and Medicare benefits.

Yet at this point starve-the-beast theory looks as silly as supply-side economics. Although a disciplined conservative movement has controlled Congress and the White House for five years - and presided over record deficits - public opposition has prevented any significant cuts in the big social-insurance programs that dominate domestic spending.

In fact, two years ago the Bush administration actually pushed through a major expansion in Medicare. True, the prescription drug bill clearly wasn't written by liberals. To a significant extent it's a giveaway to drug companies rather than a benefit for retirees. But all that corporate welfare makes the program more expensive, not less.

Conservative intellectuals had high hopes that this year President Bush would make up for this betrayal of their doctrine by dealing a death blow to Social Security as we know it. Indeed, he tried. His proposed "reform" would, over time, have essentially phased out the program. And he seemed to have everything going for him: momentum from an election victory, control of Congress and a highly sympathetic punditocracy. Yet the drive for privatization quickly degenerated from a juggernaut into a farce.

Medicaid, whose recipients are less likely to vote than the average person getting Social Security or Medicare, is the softest target among major federal social-insurance programs. But even members of Congress, it seems, have consciences. (Well, some of them.) It took intense arm-twisting from the Republican leadership, and that tie-breaking vote by Mr. Cheney, to ram through even modest cuts in aid to the neediest.

In other words, the starve-the-beast theory - like missile defense - has been tested under the most favorable possible circumstances, and failed. So there is no longer any coherent justification for further tax cuts. Yet... even as Congressional leaders struggled to pass a tiny package of mean-spirited spending cuts, they pushed forward with a much larger package of tax cuts. The benefits of those cuts, as always, will go disproportionately to the wealthy.

Here's how I see it: Republicans have turned into tax-cut zombies. They can't remember why they originally wanted to cut taxes, they can't explain how they plan to make up for the lost revenue, and they don't care. Instead, they just keep shambling forward, always hungry for more.

Need a Gift Suggestion?

I just received my copy of the movie Serenity in the mail. It was a fantastic film and a worthy sequel to the tv show, Firefly. My great hope is that enough DVD's will sell to prompt Universal to make another one. Joss Whedon has indicated he has more to tell, and dammit! I want to see it! So, go get yourself a copy and one for a friend. You won't be dissapointed.

Science Breakthrough of the Year 2005

The journal Science has given the honor this year to: Evolution in Action. This seems timely considering the recent Dover decision, but it is in fact based on considerable strides made in understanding mechanisms of evolution. In particular, the complete sequence of the chimpanzee genome yielded insights into the molecular changes important to evolution, and field studies have expanded our knowledge in the processes of speciation, which are generally hard to come buy. This of course doesn't count the hundredes of other papers published this year, further advancing our understanding of evolution and the diversity of life. To read through the paper, click here. They also have a video that talks with the major scientists involved with this year's studies; very interesting. Click here to watch it.

Wave Power

Slowly and quietly there has been a movement toward alternative energy sources besides solar and wind. It hasn't received a lot of attention yet, but that may change soon. Discover magazine had a short article about a device that uses the motion of the ocean to generate electricity. Called Pelamis (after a type of sea snake), it is showing much promise.

Bright red and roughly 450 feet long, this sinuous piece of hardware lets the heaves and sways of the ocean drive pistons which in turn power generators. The electricy flows via cables (which also help anchor it) to the shore. Pelamis is made by Ocean Power Delivery of Scotland and already has trial runs operating off Portugal, and soon off Oregon, Washington, Maine, and Hawaii. The long term feasibility of Pelamis looks very good.

Daily Humor

Great Floor Speech

Here's an excellent speech by Rep. James McGovern (D-MA) today on the House floor concerning Republican tactics:

As we gather here today, the Sunday before Christmas and Chanukah, it is the process and the way the Republican leadership are running this House that I strongly object to. These last few days, in fact the entire year, I think is a great example of how not to run a government.

Sometime today we expect to consider and vote on the Defense appropriations bill. No one will have time to read and examine the final product. We will not know what last-minute goodies are tucked into the bill. Mr. Speaker, we read news reports that drilling in the Arctic will be in the bill, but we do not know if ANWR is included because we have not yet seen it. And what drilling in Alaska's wilderness has to do with the Pentagon is beyond my comprehension, but there are some in the Republican leadership who do not care about the regular process and want to tuck this in the Defense bill because they know it cannot be enacted on its own. [...]

Mr. Speaker, whether you are a liberal, a conservative, or whether you want more government or less, I think most of us would agree that whatever government we have must be competent and responsive to the people. Now, the Republicans control all of government. They control the House of Representatives, they control the Senate, and they control the White House. It is clear that they are unable to be effective stewards of our government.

Now, putting aside the corruption scandals that hang like a dark cloud over the Congress and the White House, what we see is an inability to govern. When Hurricane Katrina hit the gulf coast, the Federal Government responded miserably. The President put a political appointee in charge of FEMA who was incompetent. The President took responsibility, but ultimately the incompetence and cronyism of his administration led to a disaster that included the loss of many lives.

On the war in Iraq: no weapons of mass destruction, no ties between the Iraqi government and al Qaeda, and no imminent threat to the security of the United States of America; yet we rushed into war. Whether the intelligence was manipulated or not, clearly this government did not do its job. It failed, and over 2,100 Americans are now dead.

But now we are in Iraq, Mr. Speaker. We were there with no post-invasion plan, we are there with no-bid contracts that have led to massive corruption and fraud, our soldiers lack the most basic protective equipment, and with a chain of command that resulted in grave abuses of human rights by some of our own uniformed men and women and some of our Iraqi allies. Ultimately, the President again took responsibility. But, Mr. Speaker, with all due respect, I am tired of the speeches. I, like so many others, want genuine reform and change. I want accountability.

This all brings me to this Congress. There is a reason why this Congress has only a 25 percent approval rating. It is because you are doing a lousy job. You are trashing the rules and regular order. The selling of legislation to the highest bidder, the hard-ball tactics against your own Members to win votes, your lack of oversight and demand for accountability from this administration, all that and more is catching up to you. People are watching. People do care. They believe that you cannot competently run this government, and they want the government back.

The mess that we have before us cannot be blamed on Democrats. After all, as I have said, Republicans control everything. You cannot blame this on Bill Clinton, even though some of you try, because he has been gone now for a full 5 years. This is your fault. The battles going on behind closed doors are between your right wing and your far right wing. For those of us in the minority, and many on your side who want good government, this is a frustrating period.

Mr. Speaker, nobody denies that leadership of Congress is a hard task, but either you live up to the responsibilities or you acknowledge it is time for a change. After this sorry year, it is time for a change.

What Did They Really Know?

Via Daily Kos:

Seems like it was just yesterday, Bush was saying:

Some of the most irresponsible comments - about manipulating intelligence - have come from politicians who saw the same intelligence I saw and then voted to authorize the use of force against Saddam Hussein, These charges are pure politics."

Whoops! It was yesterday! Ha ha ha ha ha!

What a difference a day makes, eh? Because today from Knight Ridder, we have:

WASHINGTON - President Bush and top administration officials have access to a much broader range of intelligence reports than members of Congress do, a nonpartisan congressional research agency said in a report Thursday, raising questions about recent assertions by the president.
...
The Congressional Research Service, by contrast, said: "The president, and a small number of presidentially designated Cabinet-level officials, including the vice president ... have access to a far greater overall volume of intelligence and to more sensitive intelligence information, including information regarding intelligence sources and methods."
...
The CRS report identified nine key U.S. intelligence "products" that aren't generally shared with Congress. These include the President's Daily Brief, a compilation of analyses that's given only to the president and a handful of top aides, and a daily digest on terrorism-related matters.

Surprisingly, the White House refused to comment on the issue.

We can only hope some fightin' Dems come out tomorrow with plenty to say.

It's Not All Bad News

Tired of the cynisism and angst in the news. Check out this site for a pick-me-up. It only reports the good news out there.

Education

Following up my last post, I'd be interested to hear other people's opinions on the state of education. What's wrong, possible solutions, or just random thoughts.

Why I'm Not a Businessman

Once in while I'll see my students playing a computer game called RuneScape. It's a virtual world where they can play against there friends, battling fantastic beasts and collecting treasure. There are many other online games such as this and apparently some enterprising people are profiting from it. As Lior Strahilevitz states at the UC Law School Blog:

"Essentially, large numbers of Chinese workers are employed playing video games in virtual worlds for twelve hours a day, earning gold, weapons, and armor, which they then sell to Westerners who want virtual gold, weapons, and armor but have more real-world income than time or skill for gaming. If the Times has it right, then this has become a major industry in China."

In case this isn't clear, let me explain. Part of these games is having your online characters accumulate money, weapons, items etc.... So the Chinese, in this case, are setting up online characters who have all of these things in abundance and then selling them to Americans who don't have enough time in the day to find it all themselves.

This type of business would never have occurred to me. I'm always amazed at the means people will use to make money and it is one of the concerns I have for my students now and in the future. Many students want to be lawyers or business executives or athletes because they think it will earn them enormous sums of money. A major challenge is to convince students that the joys in life are not necessarily related to how much money you make. Good family and friends, intellectual challenges and lifelong education, fun and spontaneous hobbies, and contributions to your community are much more fulfilling. In a world dominated by economics, this will be a difficult obstacle to overcome.

More Opinions

If anyone who reads this knows me personally and would like to contribute to this blog, let me know. I don't get to post as often as I would like so more perspectives would be welcome. Just fire me an email if you are interested.

A Call to Action

President Bill Clinton is making a surprise appearance at the world climate conference in Montreal. This is causing some consternation among the Bush crowd, since he will undoubtedly call for more progressive action on the US's part to curb emissions. So far, the Bush administration is refusing to even discuss possible strategies for curbing our carbon output. Despite the overwhelming evidence and scientific consensus, they don't believe there is anything to worry about. I've said it before and I'm repeat myself now: the long-term historical opinion of the Bush presidency is going to be very low.

Flag Burning

A ban on flag burning ammendment is making its way into the Senate (co-sponsored by Hillary Clinton). Personally, I think this rates in importance with banning gay marriage. Surely we have greater issues to deal with. Sean Carroll of Cosmic Variance points towards an excellent quote from Justice William Brennan:

We can imagine no more appropriate response to burning a flag than waving one’s own, no better way to counter a flag burner’s message than by saluting the flag that burns, no surer means of preserving the dignity even of the flag that burned than by — as one witness here did — according its remains a respectful burial. We do not consecrate the flag by punishing its desecration, for in doing so we dilute the freedom that this cherished emblem represents.

Hillary is making some ridiculous decisions to look like more of a moderate. In the end, she's losing credibility as someone who we'd really want to vote for in a presidential election. I want someone who sticks with their beliefs, regardless of whether it's popular or not.

Potential New Mammal

What might be a new mammal species was caught in a couple of images by the WWF in Borneo.



Another reason why forest conservation is a serious issue. We still don't know everything that is out there.

Why Citizen's Must Stay Informed

Via Daily Kos:

The remarkable Dana Priest delivers this horrifying story of the war on terror gone wrong:

In May 2004, the White House dispatched the U.S. ambassador in Germany to pay an unusual visit to that country's interior minister. Ambassador Daniel R. Coats carried instructions from the State Department transmitted via the CIA's Berlin station because they were too sensitive and highly classified for regular diplomatic channels, according to several people with knowledge of the conversation.

Coats informed the German minister that the CIA had wrongfully imprisoned one of its citizens, Khaled Masri, for five months, and would soon release him, the sources said. There was also a request: that the German government not disclose what it had been told even if Masri went public. The U.S. officials feared exposure of a covert action program designed to capture terrorism suspects abroad and transfer them among countries, and possible legal challenges to the CIA from Masri and others with similar allegations.

The Masri case, with new details gleaned from interviews with current and former intelligence and diplomatic officials, offers a rare study of how pressure on the CIA to apprehend al Qaeda members after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks has led in some instances to detention based on thin or speculative evidence. The case also shows how complicated it can be to correct errors in a system built and operated in secret.

There is a very strong reason why the Founding Fathers were so adamant about the need for due process and the inclusion of the writ of habeas corpus in the Constitution. A state apparatus with no check or review will do things that are beyond the pale. As Justice Brandeis stated in his famous dissent in Olmstead:

Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent . . . The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.

Olmstead v. U.S., 277 U.S. 438, 479 (Brandeis dissenting (1928)

And so it is in the War on Terror. Extraordinary rendition. Torture. Prohibition of due process and judicial review. Avoidance of the Geneva Conventions. Declaration of a heretofore unknown status - unlawful combatants. All these things have been done by and continue to be done by the Bush Administration.

Priest writes:

Unlike the military's prison for terrorist suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- where 180 prisoners have been freed after a review of their cases -- there is no tribunal or judge to check the evidence against those picked up by the CIA. The same bureaucracy that decides to capture and transfer a suspect for interrogation-- a process called "rendition" -- is also responsible for policing itself for errors.

The CIA inspector general is investigating a growing number of what it calls "erroneous renditions," according to several former and current intelligence officials. One official said about three dozen names fall in that category; others believe it is fewer. The list includes several people whose identities were offered by al Qaeda figures during CIA interrogations, officials said. One turned out to be an innocent college professor who had given the al Qaeda member a bad grade, one official said.

"They picked up the wrong people, who had no information. In many, many cases there was only some vague association" with terrorism, one CIA officer said.

And how many of these "wrong people" were or will be tortured? If Dick Cheney has his way, many of them.

Mixed Messages

Blogging has been sporadic due to work, grad school, parent-teacher conferences, workshops etc.... Things have calmed down and I hope to blog about some things that I find of interest. However, something I read today caught my eye. As the U.S.'s 1000th execution is about to take place in North Carolina, President Bush reinterated his strong support of the death penalty. This is the same man (and party, and also includes many Democrats) who support a culture of life (i.e. anti-abortion). Does there seem to be some inconsistency here?

Batteries

If you want to find out where you can recycle rechargeable batteries from cell phones and other devices, check out www.call2recycle.org. A much better alternative than tossing them in the local landfill.

Accountability?

Why are officials in the U.S. Government so afraid of being responsible? Via 1115.org:

Jordan suffers a brutal terrorist attack and what happens?

Eleven top Jordanian officials, including the kingdom’s national security adviser, resigned Tuesday in the wake of last week’s triple hotel bombings, state-run TV announced.

The United States suffers a brutal terrorist attack and intelligence failures on a massive scale and what happens?

Presidential Medal of Freedom to former CIA Director George Tenet

Presidential Medal of Freedom to former CPA head Paul Bremer

Presidential Medal of Freedom to former CENTCOM commander Tommy Franks

Promotion to Secretary of State for former National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice

Promotion to National Security Advisor for former deputy National Security AdvisorStephen Hadley

School Levy

Feel free to ignore this post unless you live in the North Kitsap School District. An election is being held on February 7th to renew the School Support levy. The key term here is "renew"; it is not a new tax. This levy is responsible for 19% of the district's annual revenue. It is used to support teacher/staff salaries, instructional support programs, student transportation, maintenance, and clubs/activities. I cannot begin to tell you what a blow it will be to the district if this does not pass. On a personal level, my wife's meager salary will drop several thousand dollars. I'm post updates over the next couple of months. If you know people who live in the area, point this out to them. You can get more info at http://www.nksd.wednet.edu.

Mars

Astronomy Picture of the Day has a wonderful panoramic shot of Mars from the rover Spirit. Click here to check it out.

I also picked up a book called Roving Mars: Spirit, Opportunity, and the Exploration of the Red Planet by Steve Squyres. He is the principal scientific investigator from the mission. Dr. Squyres is the perfect example of a passionate scientist. He practically exudes excitement about the study of Mars. I'm hoping to get to listen to him personally in February when he gives a presentation at the University of Washington. Anyway, check both out; they're excellent.

How the Senate Voted

A couple of votes last week by the Senate irked me. Both were amendments to S 1042, a military spending bill. The first concerned the Armed Forces Network, the radio station heard by troops worldwide. The amendment would have required the network to provide balanced political coverage. Currently, all troops hear are Rush Limbaugh and James Dobson. They should also get a chance to hear from the other side, from people like Al Franken (who's also a hell of lot funnier than the other two). The vote was 44-54.

The second amendment of S 1042 would have transferred 50 million from National Missile Defense to the Cooperative Threat Reduction program, which secures loose nuclear weapons and material. This one I can't fathom(actually I can; economic interests won out). What are the greater odds: terrorists get their hands on an intercontinental ballistic missile or weapons grade material that they can create a small bomb with? This vote lost 37-60.

I can at least say that my two Senators from Washington voted appropriately (from my position) on both ammendments. The Republicans (and certain Democrats) are increasingly making me ill.

Stephen Hawking

If you live in the Seattle area, Stephen Hawking is giving a presentation called New Perspectives on the Origin of the Universe. Starts at 8 pm at the Paramount Theatre. Tickets can be purchased at TicketMaster.

Gravitational Tractor

Imagine, if you will, a fairly large asteroid (>200 m) on a collision course with Earth. What do we do? Scientists could try to land a space tug on the surface and push the asteroid out if its devastating trajectory (assuming we have enough forewarning). We could launch an armada of nuclear warheads and hope that they are enough to break the asteroid into many small pieces, to burn up in re-entry. We could pull an Armageddon and land some crazy astronaut on the surface to drill and drop in a nuke to split the asteroid from the inside. Or, we could just curl up in a ball and weep. Edward Lu and Stanley Love have another idea: the gravitational tractor.

The idea is to have a space vehicle that hovers over the asteroid and uses gravity as a tow line to drag the asteroid to a safer orbit. No nukes, just a nuclear-electric propulsion system. The drawback? You need enough advance warning to launch and place the tractor in position. Still, a very cool idea and likely to see some advancement in the near future. I can even imagine using them to pull asteroids into a safe orbit to mine for various metals. If I get some time, I'll post about the Space Elevator or Australia's Solar Tower.

Obama Taking the Lead

Via Daily Kos:

Sen. Barack Obama introduced a bill on Election Day which all here should take notice of and applaud.

Here's part of his remarks introducing the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act of 2005:

It might surprise some of you to know, but even in this awesome age of technological advancement and easy access to information, there are folks who will stop at nothing to try to deceive people and keep them away from the polls. These deceptive practices all too often target and exploit vulnerable populations, like minorities, the disabled, or the poor.

Think about the story of the 2004 presidential election when voters in Milwaukee received fliers from the non- existent ``Milwaukee Black Voters League,'' warning that voters risk imprisonment for voting if they were ever found guilty of any offense--even a traffic violation. In that same election, in a county in Ohio, some voters received mailings misinforming voters that anyone registered to vote by the Kerry Campaign or the NAACP would be barred from voting. Deceptive practices often rely on a few tried and true tricks. Voters are often warned that an unpaid parking ticket will lead to their arrest or that folks with family members who have been convicted of a crime are ineligible to vote. Of course, these warnings have no basis in fact, and they are made with one goal and one goal only to keep Americans away from the polls.

I hope voters who go to the polls today are not victims of such malicious campaigns, but I know hoping is not enough. That is why I am introducing the Deceptive Election Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act of 2005 to provide voters with real protection from deceptive practices that aim to keep them away from the polls on Election Day.

The bill I am introducing today provides the clear statutory language and authority needed to get allegations of deceptive practices investigated. It establishes harsh penalties for those found to have perpetrated them. And the bill seeks to address the real harm of these crimes --voters who are discouraged from voting by misinformation -- by establishing a process for reaching out to these misinformed and intimidated voters with accurate and full information so they can cast their votes in time. Perhaps just as important, this bill creates strong penalties for deceptive election acts, so people who commit these crimes suffer more than just a slap on the hand.

Email or call you Senators and ask them about their support for this bill.

Um.....Uh.....Er......Torture?

President today reaffirmed that the U.S. doesn't do torture. On the other hand, Cheney has been lobbying to give the CIA a torture exemption. How does Scott McClennan handle questions about this? In typical fashion: he doesn't.

Q I'd like you to clear up, once and for all, the ambiguity about torture. Can we get a straight answer? The President says we don't do torture, but Cheney --

MR. McCLELLAN: That's about as straight as it can be.

Q Yes, but Cheney has gone to the Senate and asked for an exemption on --

MR. McCLELLAN: No, he has not. Are you claiming he's asked for an exemption on torture? No, that's --

Q He did not ask for that?

MR. McCLELLAN: -- that is inaccurate.

Q Are you denying everything that came from the Hill, in terms of torture?

MR. McCLELLAN: No, you're mischaracterizing things. And I'm not going to get into discussions we have --

Q Can you give me a straight answer for once?

MR. McCLELLAN: Let me give it to you, just like the President has. We do not torture. He does not condone torture and he would never --

Q I'm asking about exemptions.

MR. McCLELLAN: Let me respond. And he would never authorize the use of torture. We have an obligation to do all that we can to protect the American people. We are engaged --

Q That's not the answer I'm asking for --

MR. McCLELLAN: It is an answer -- because the American people want to know that we are doing all within our power to prevent terrorist attacks from happening. There are people in this world who want to spread a hateful ideology that is based on killing innocent men, women and children. We saw what they can do on September 11th --

Q He didn't ask for an exemption --

MR. McCLELLAN: -- and we are going to --

Q -- answer that one question. I'm asking, is the administration asking for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: I am answering your question. The President has made it very clear that we are going to do --

Q You're not answering -- yes or no?

MR. McCLELLAN: No, you don't want the American people to hear what the facts are, Helen, and I'm going to tell them the facts.

Q -- the American people every day. I'm asking you, yes or no, did we ask for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: And let me respond. You've had your opportunity to ask the question. Now I'm going to respond to it.

Q If you could answer in a straight way.

MR. McCLELLAN: And I'm going to answer it, just like the President -- I just did, and the President has answered it numerous times.

Q -- yes or no --

MR. McCLELLAN: Our most important responsibility is to protect the American people. We are engaged in a global war against Islamic radicals who are intent on spreading a hateful ideology, and intent on killing innocent men, women and children.

Q Did we ask for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: We are going to do what is necessary to protect the American people.

Q Is that the answer?

MR. McCLELLAN: We are also going to do so in a way that adheres to our laws and to our values. We have made that very clear. The President directed everybody within this government that we do not engage in torture. We will not torture. He made that very clear.

Q Are you denying we asked for an exemption?

MR. McCLELLAN: Helen, we will continue to work with the Congress on the issue that you brought up. The way you characterize it, that we're asking for exemption from torture, is just flat-out false, because there are laws that are on the books that prohibit the use of torture. And we adhere to those laws.

Q We did ask for an exemption; is that right? I mean, be simple -- this is a very simple question.

MR. McCLELLAN: I just answered your question. The President answered it last week.

Q What are we asking for?

Q Would you characterize what we're asking for?

MR. McCLELLAN: We're asking to do what is necessary to protect the American people in a way that is consistent with our laws and our treaty obligations. And that's what we --

Q Why does the CIA need an exemption from the military?

MR. McCLELLAN: David, let's talk about people that you're talking about who have been brought to justice and captured. You're talking about people like Khalid Shaykh Muhammad; people like Abu Zubaydah.

Q I'm asking you --

MR. McCLELLAN: No, this is facts about what you're talking about.

Q Why does the CIA need an exemption from rules that would govern the conduct of our military in interrogation practices?

MR. McCLELLAN: There are already laws and rules that are on the books, and we follow those laws and rules. What we need to make sure is that we are able to carry out the war on terrorism as effectively as possible, not only --

Q What does that mean --

MR. McCLELLAN: What I'm telling you right now -- not only to protect Americans from an attack, but to prevent an attack from happening in the first place. And, you bet, when we capture terrorist leaders, we are going to seek to find out information that will protect -- that prevent attacks from happening in the first place. But we have an obligation to do so. Our military knows this; all people within the United States government know this. We have an obligation to do so in a way that is consistent with our laws and values.

Now, the people that you are bringing up -- you're talking about in the context, and I think it's important for the American people to know, are people like Khalid Shaykh Muhammad, Abu Zubaydah, Ramzi Binalshibh -- these are -- these are dangerous killers.

Q So they're all killers --

Q Did you ask for an exemption on torture? That's a simple question, yes or no.

MR. McCLELLAN: No. And we have not. That's what I told you at the beginning.

Q You want to reserve the ability to use tougher tactics with those individuals who you mentioned.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, obviously, you have a different view from the American people. I think the American people understand the importance of doing everything within our power and within our laws to protect the American people.

Q Scott, are you saying that Cheney did not ask --

Q What is it that you want the -- what is it that you want the CIA to be able to do that the U.S. Armed Forces are not allowed to do?

MR. McCLELLAN: I'm not going to get into talking about national security matters, Bill. I don't do that, because this involves --

Q This would be the exemption, in other words.

MR. McCLELLAN: This involves information that relates to doing all we can to protect the American people. And if you have a different view -- obviously, some of you on this room -- in this room have a different view, some of you on the front row have a different view.

Q We simply are asking a question.

Q What is the Vice President -- what is the Vice President asking for?

MR. McCLELLAN: It's spelled out in our statement of administration policy in terms of what our views are. That's very public information. In terms of our discussions with members of Congress --

Q -- no, it's not --

MR. McCLELLAN: In terms of our members -- like I said, there are already laws on the books that we have to adhere to and abide by, and we do. And we believe that those laws and those obligations address these issues.

Q So then why is the Vice President continuing to lobby on this issue? If you're very happy with the laws on the books, what needs change?

MR. McCLELLAN: Again, you asked me -- you want to ask questions of the Vice President's office, feel free to do that. We've made our position very clear, and it's spelled out on our website for everybody to see.

Q We don't need a website, we need you from the podium.

MR. McCLELLAN: And what I just told you is what our view is.

Q But Scott, do you see the contradiction --

Yup, he's a straight shooter.

Is Pat Robertson Completely Senile?

The scary thing is, people listen to this guy.

Via Washington Post:

Pat Robertson on Sunday said that the tornado in Indiana and Kentucky was God’s way of expressing His anger at the actor Warren Beatty and his wife, Annette Bening for trying to disrupt yesterday’s speech by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger at a campaign rally in San Diego. “By choosing to disrupt this national event, these Hollywood elites have clearly invited God’s wrath,” Robertson said on ‘The 700 Club’ on Sunday. “Is it any surprise that the Almighty chose to strike at a town on the opposite side of the country?”

And you wonder why Democrats and moderate Republicans don't want ideologues part of the governmental process.

Winter Wardrobe

I need to add this shirt to my collection:

Where's the Financial Responsibility?

Republicans have been patting themselves on the back for a measure that cuts spending by 35-50 billion over the next 5 years. That sounds like a lot of money until you consider that Bush's tax cuts result in the loss of 70 billion in revenue through 2010 and that the government spends 2.5 trillion a year. It's not all Bush's fault; the House and Senate have avoided dealing with these issues directly themselves (with exceptions).

Let's look at some facts. Unfunded liabilities (e.g. Social Security, Medicare) totaled 20.4 trillion in 2000. In 2004 they reached 43.3 trillion, largely due to tax cuts and Congress's increased spending (the number of pork projects in spending bills is up by the thousands under Bush. If I remember correctly, the Transportation Bill recently passed by Republicans had 13,000+ pork projects, including the infamous Bridge to Nowhere in Alaska). Spending has increased twice as much under Bush than it did under Clinton. Even if you remove defense and homeland security spending, it is still up 22%.

Our gross national debt is over 8 trillion. Who holds that debt? A considerable portion comes from Japan and China. I don't know about you, but that makes me uncomfortable.

We need some serious restrictions on spending in Congress. Senator Kent Conrad, D-N.D., is trying to reinstall Pay-Go (started under the first Bush), a program that caps discretionary spending and requires new spending to be offset with cuts elsewhere. We also need fiscally responsible policy/spending, like Jay Inslee's, D-WA, New Apollo Energy Bill.

This is not to say that a lot of pork and spending isn't done by Democrats. And not all Republicans are spending maniacs. But I do see many more Democrats trying to find solutions to these problems. Or, at the very least Republicans need to start standing up to the Administration and their irresponsible policies (which is starting to happen more frequently).

People need to start making noise about these issues before our country finds itself in a very difficult financial position.

U.S. and Torture

Via 1155.org:

"Fact: at least 4 prisoners have been killed (tortured to death?) by the CIA and/or its subcontractors in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Fact: the Justice Department has declared its intention of bringing no charges against any CIA employee for said deaths.

Fact: no one seemed to particularly care when this was announced. There was no outcry either in the blogosphere or in the traditional media.

Fact stranger than fiction: Now everyone is outraged and agitated because it seems that the U.S. has:

“been hiding and interrogating some of its most important al Qaeda captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement” , and because this “secret facility is part of a covert prison system set up by the CIA nearly four years ago that at various times has included sites in eight countries, including Thailand, Afghanistan and several democracies in Eastern Europe”.

Will someone other than Scott McClellan please explain to me why this is more outrageous than prisoners being killed by interrogators practicing interrogation techniques that are in gross violation of the Geneva convention? And the U.S. government deciding that there was no harm no foul. That no one even needs to get their knuckles rapped. Since when does torture trump murder on the moral outrage scale?

Question: Would anyone care to speculate on the correct answer to this one? If x is the number of prisoners who were tortured to death in non-secret detention facilities where the deaths would come to light and inquiries would have to be held, and y is the number of prisoners tortured to death in secret detention facilities where such deaths will never come to light, which is likely to be greater, x or y?

Fiction: The Bush administration will, in stark contrast to every previous action with respect to prisoner detention and interrogation, acknowledge what they did, and admit it was wrong, and apologize for bringing shame and dishonor to the American people. Everyone involved, including Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, will resign. One of these three will be unable to live with the guilt, and will commit suicide.

Fact: The foreign governments that are alleged to be the host countries for these secret detention facilities have vociferously denied their existence.

Fact or fiction: everyone concerned, except for Dana Priest of the Washington Post, is telling the truth."

How can the US claim any type of moral superiority in the world when we act no better than the worst 3rd world dictator?

Alito and Abortion

Seems like all I have time for these days is to link to interesting or informative articles. A lot of talk is flying around Alito and whether or not he would overturn Roe v. Wade. Paul Kemp (a lawyer and author) read the particular case in question (Casey v. Planned Parenthood) and offers his legal perspective.

"Abortion is a hot-button issue for many folks. So when the President nominated Alito to replace Sandra Day O'Conner on the Supreme Court, his written opinions relating to abortion naturally came under scrutiny. Since then, most of the left-leaning blogs/commentators I've heard/read, have prophesied in dire tones about how Alito would overturn Roe v. Wade (for those of you not in the U.S. -- Roe is the seminal case in abortion rights law) and thereby allow states to outlaw abortions altogether. To support this claim, they point to Alito's written dissent in Casey v. Planned Parenthood. I've read Alito's opinion in Casey and it doesn't support that claim. In fact, I find Alito's dissent persuasive, moreso than the majority opinion. I'll explain why.

At issue in Casey was a Pennsylvania statute that regulated access to abortion. The statute required that, before undergoing the procedure, a woman receive certain information relating to the procedure and its effects, that she not receive the abortion until 24 hours after receiving that information, that minors obtain parental consent before undergoing the procedure (with provision for a judicial bypass), and that a married woman sign a statement that she has informed her husband of her intent to proceed with the abortion (or meeet one of the statutory exemptions from this requirement, such as, a reasonable fear of physical abuse, husband is not the father, etc.).

In analyzing this issue, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals applied the standard applicable to abortion regulations as set down by the Supreme Court (Justice O'Conner, in fact)-- namely, whether the regulation at issue imposes an "undue burden" on a woman's freedom to decide whether to receive an abortion. The Third Circuit majority applied the undue burden test to each of the regulations set forth above and found that all of them were constitutional (i.e., they did NOT impose an undue burden) except the spousal notification requirement. Why? The majority reasoned that some subset of women who would otherwise obtain an abortion would not do so out of fear of various forms of retaliation (financial, physical, psychological, etc.) by their husbands if they, in fact, were forced to inform their husbands. Thus, the regulation imposed an undue burden on that subset of women. This focus on a subset of women was intentional by the court (in fact it was necessary if they were to reach their conclusion). In the majority's view, "where it is clear that a governmental regulation will restrict the ability of some women to choose an abortion, we believe that the issue of whether there is an undue burden turns on the degree of restriction that the affected women will experience."

Alito filed a dissent in the case. He agreed with the majority's holding on the rest of the regulations (namely, that each was constitutional) but disagreed with the majority's holding that the spousal notification requirement was unconstitutional. Why? His opinion gets at the problem with the undue burden test as applied by the majority -- namely, the unit of analysis. Alito pointed to evidence introduced at trial that tended to show that of all abortions performed, married women account for only about thirty-percent. And that of that thirty percent, about ninety-five percent do, in fact, inform their husbands. And that of the five percent remaining, some percentage would qualify for one of the statutory exemptions to the spousal notice provision. That means that of all married women who want abortions, some percentage less than five percent will be deterred from getting an abortion they otherwise would get but for the spousal notification requirement.

You see the unit of analysis problem here? The majority is applying the undue burden test not to all the women regulated by the statute (i.e., married women) but to a subset of those women, namely, those whose circumstances would make them want to avoid notifying their husbands. Alito, on the other hand, is analyzing the issue by looking at the universe of women regulated by the statute. In this case, I find Alito's reasoning much more persuasive. Why? Because if the analysis of undue burden focuses not on ALL those regulated by the statute (as Alito did in his opinion) but instead on a subset of those regulated by the statute (as the majority did), the outcome of the test is determined by the definition of the subset. Essentially, any judge that wanted a regulation to fail the undue burden test could say this: "Let's find a subset of the regulated persons for whom the regulation creates an undue burden, and then ask if the regulation creates an undue burden."

The problem with that kind of analysis is obvious: the logic has no limit. It will always be true that some subset of regulated persons is unduly burdened by a given regulation. In fact, that kind of analysis leaves LOTS of room for judges to predetermine results by carefully selecting the subset the judge will use as his or her unit of analysis. Alito's analysis has the virtue of taking that choice out of the judges' hands -- ALL of those regulated by the statute are to be the unit of analysis.

Anyway, this is not and is not meant to be an endorsement of Alito. I don't yet know enough about him. Nor is it an argument that Pennsylvania's law was good public policy. I merely wanted to vent a bit about the partisan misrepresentation that goes on all too frequently. I also wanted to point out that there was nothing in Alito's dissent in Casey that suggested to me an intent to overturn Roe or that otherwise indicated a judge run amok. Finally, I also wanted all of us to think about the appropriate role for a federal judge in a democracy.

A postscript: I've seen similar misrepresentations on Alito's views of the Family Leave Act. Democratic partisans shout that Alito is "against the FMLA." But I believe Alito's opinion on FMLA was limited to the question of whether or not the federal government, through Congress, could impose the requirements of FMLA on state employees (i.e., those workers who are direct employees of a state). If true, this does not show hostility to FMLA. It simply suggests a great deference for state's rights and federalism(whether rightly or wrongly). Even in Alito's world, the FMLA would continue to apply to all private employers."