Diogenes' Hot Tub

AIG's continued Bailouts... ..time for an innovative response & an END to Wall Street's rampant and delusional Corporate Hubris

2009-03-15T11:21:00.014-04:00

Currently, the American taxpayers hold 80% of AIG, a corporation whose actions have been critical in creating the sub-prime financial quicksand that has led world financial markets to a complete collapse at their foundations.

At the same time as AIG admits they will now be paying exorbitant and unfounded bonuses to its financial products unit - the very unit responsible for AIG's current financial debacle - as well as taking delivery on expensive corporate jets, we hear from the White House and Timothy Geithner that AIG cannot be allowed to enter bankruptcy given the international implications. We are being told as taxpayers that bankruptcy for AIG, the one remedy which would allow the erasure of the repugnant contractual provisions AIG is asserting they are bound by, is simply not an option.

Obviously, AIG executives knew of these potential bonus payments LONG before they appeared on Capitol Hill to speak with Congress, yet, at a time when such bonuses were a key concern of: lawmakers, the White House, investors, the world financial community, and the public, they studiously avoided any mention of these contractual provisions.

Given the asserted international financial implications of an AIG failure, and the fact that even Congress cannot identify AIG officials with actual day-to-day corporate responsibility, much less accountability, at AIG I would suggest the White House needs to move completely outside the traditional "box"

I would therefore offer the following for consideration:

1) The White House immediately appoint a special AIG working group chaired by Robert Reich and composed of representatives from each of the following: a former Treasury official, a former Commerce official, a senior former member of the Senate and a senior former member of the House, and a former senior diplomat. That this working group also include representatives from G-20 member states of the EU and a member from Japan.

2) That this working group be tasked with immediately developing an international buyout fund, to be financed by US and other governments, for the remaining 20% of AIG still not currently held by US taxpayers. This buyout plan to be invoked should AIG enter bankruptcy.

3) That AIG be refused further bailout funds, and instead be allowed to enter Chapter 11 receivership, at which point simultaneously: the buyout of the remaining 20% of AIG would go into effect and the contemptuously repulsive contractual provisions would be rendered an effective legal nullity.

4) Direct the Attorney General and Department of Justice to immediately begin investigating whether these bonuses being paid to AIG financial products unit executives was indeed not performance based, but given the timing of the drawing of said contractual provisions (just as the sub-prime meltdown began in earnest), was instead "illegal hush money" designed to prevent full and open disclosure/discussion of AIG's true financial status and the full extent of their exposure as the direct result of that unit's actions.

Leveraging at the ratios AIG's financial products unit engaged in is effectively little different than the kind of ponzi scheme Bernie Madoff created. In neither case could one rationally believe the income existed to ever payoff the extreme leveraging engaged in. It is high time for us to protect the 80% of AIG assets held by we taxpayers and to hold those accountable for this financial meltdown fully responsible at the public bar.

Torn Calf Muscle

2008-04-29T15:54:00.005-04:00

Ok, this is really boring for most of you, but I've had to cut my nightly 3 mile run to a 1.5 mile run and 1.5 mile fast walk. Why? Well, according to my MD, I tore a calf muscle when I tripped on one of those horizontal street-level cellar doors that many small businesses in the NYC area use for product deliveries. This pisses me off...

Beyond that, I now know that the first of my two diplomas from Rutgers is already printed (YAY!): a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Philosophy from Cook College of Rutgers University - commencement is 23 May. The second diploma comes next year and will be a Bachelor of Science degree in Environmental Policy, Institutions, and Behavior.

The next big step is my sojourn in Morocco this summer, where I'll be studying Arabic intensively, via immersion, for six weeks, beginning in late June.

Not even Guilty of a Misdemeanor after more than 50 shots kill an innocent man without warning...

2008-04-25T11:23:00.009-04:00

3 Detectives Acquitted in Bell Shooting - New York Times
The detectives were found not guilty on all felony and misdemeanor charges in the November 2006 death of Sean Bell, who died in a hail of 50 police bullets outside a club in Queens...

All I can say is it's simply incredible. But it highlights two sobering facts.

Proof, as if we didn't have enough that:

1) America has been, since 9/11, a shadow of what it once was and represented. Today we are a Police State, where: illegal wiretaps, falsifying evidence, torture, and shooting without warning are endorsed by the highest ranks of government. That "shining city upon the hill" has gone dark, while the echoes of air raid sirens and combat boots are the only sounds to punctuate the oppressive silence.

2) racism is still alive and well in America. Sadly, one everyday black man's life just isn't worth anything in the eyes of many in this society.

"This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy... ..Now is the time to lift our nation from the quick sands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children." MLK (1963)

For those of you in New Jersey, here are two New York Times pieces collectively demonstrating that racism has been and remains prevalent in our own New Jersey State Police (yes, I am saying that many NJ State Troopers are racist a**holes - the TRUTH HURTS):

A Troubling Encounter With the State Police

U.S. WILL MONITOR NEW JERSEY POLICE ON RACE PROFILING

.

A New Petrarchan Sonnet

2008-04-24T18:35:00.025-04:00

The Night Swan Bed & Breakfast

Well, THAT'S a subject heading one doesn't see everyday!

Ok, so when I'm REALLY stressed out to the max, I generally have only two options that work:

1) I go jogging. Which, for reasons that are irrelevant here, I began doing again for the first time in six years, this past weekend. I'm running 3 miles every other day. I was doing it every day until a persistent cramp in one calf made clear I was overdoing it after the long hiatus.

2) I write something REALLY structured - like a Petrarchan Sonnet. Two weeks ago a friend was stressing out and, given my ridiculous tendency toward empathy, my friend's emotional state impacted with mine.

The point of all this is that I ended up writing a new piece which several people are pushing me to publish, so I'm tossing it in the proverbial bottle and letting it float on the waves of the internet.

The octet's a bit of a combination of the kind of disconnected visual imagery, written in a stream of consciousness style, one might find in an Alan Ginsburg poem, like those found in The Fall of America (I was fortunate to attend a reading by Alan, speak with him, and get him to autograph a copy of that very volume a few years prior to his death). While the turn and the sestet adhere to more traditional Petrarchan elements and rules.

For those who might wonder, the octet imagery is drawn from actual events in the State of Florida, related to one another, over a short time period.

Hopefully, I'll get some feedback on this piece and perhaps the photos as well (if you click on any of the images, you will get a much larger version).

-------------------

The Night Swan B&B in Black & White InfraRed

Cantus Catalina

Lithe spirited Muse proves moonlight so pale,
Viridian eyes shame gold lighthouse beams,
Feline its essence, with Lorelei themes,
Beckons the Venti to billow white sail.

Gold morning sunshine adorns porpoise tails,
Open top driving in Florida’s gleams,
Sapphire twilight revives polka-dot dreams,
Night’s clingy black dress calls soddening gales.

One word from her lips brings life to dry earth,
Giggles unbidden melt ice from cold stone,
Odysseus’ Siren kindles new art.

Brief moments shared are a priceless rebirth,
de Leon’s fount midst fair Venus’ mons,
Love unexpected has purloined this heart.

© Copyright, Keith Krebs, 2008, All Rights Reserved

Polka Dot Dreams in Sapphire

Captain Gary of SunDial Sailing & Charters

The Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse
(tallest in Florida)

Wind in our Sail

The Gin Hammock Beach Resort vista from an Ocean View Suite

Ridiculous Pakistani Government Assertions!!!

2007-12-28T16:07:00.000-05:00

How stupid do they assume we all are?!!

From the Associated Press:
"Authorities on Thursday said Bhutto died from bullet wounds fired by a young man who then blew himself up, killing 20 other people. A surgeon who treated her said Friday she died from the impact of shrapnel on her skull.

But later Friday, Interior Ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema said all three shots missed her as she greeted supporters through the sunroof of her vehicle, which was bulletproof and bombproof.

He also denied that shrapnel caused her death, saying Bhutto was killed when she tried to duck back into the vehicle, and the shock waves from the blast knocked her head into a lever attached to the sunroof, fracturing her skull.."

The clear implication by Pakistani government officials is that Benazir Bhutto is somehow the cause of her own death, that she wasn't murdered.

Imagine the following on an episode of CSI:

"I'm sorry the Department will have to release him (the suspect). Apparently, she (the victim) was killed when she ducked to avoid his bullets and a bomb went off. Her head smacked against the wall when the bomb went off. He obviously isn't the killer. There was no murder here, just a horrible accidental death..."

Um, yeah... ..about as 'accidental' as me dying if someone tossed a plugged in toaster into my bathwater!

'It wasn't the electricity that killed him, it was his heart stopping'

This IS the VERY SAME Pakistani government that repeatedly turned down specific security requests by Bhutto and her team!

First, she died of spinal cord damage resulting from gunshot wounds to her chest and head:
"Bhutto was rushed into surgery. A doctor on the surgical team said a bullet in the back of her neck damaged her spinal cord before exiting from the side of her head. Another bullet pierced the back of her shoulder and came out through her chest, he said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. She was given an open-heart massage, but the spinal cord damage was too great, he said."

Then the same Interior Ministry, now saying she died from her 'fall', blamed it on just a gunshot wound to her neck:
"Pakistan Peoples Party Chairperson Benazir Bhutto died of bullet wound in neck by a suicide bomber, Interior Ministry Spokesman said here Thursday. He said the suicide bomber fired at the PPP chairperson when she was waving to the crowd from the sun-roof of her vehicle minutes after addressing the public gathering at Liaquat Bagh. Later, the killer blew himself up at the spot killing over 20 people and injuring more than 50 persons."

Now, she basically 'accidentally' killed herself!?

To steal a line from 'Apocalypse Now!':

"Oh man, the shit piled up so fast in [Pakistan] you needed wings to stay above it."

Give us a F_in break!

---

For an interesting side note on this, read Bhutto Sent Blitzer Security E-Mail"

The CIA Tapes Saga Gets More Interesting....

2007-12-16T02:30:00.000-05:00

The Huffington Post is reporting that part of the reason for the destruction of the CIA tapes was the people Abu Zubaydah named at the top levels of the Pakistani and Saudi governments who were involved with the 9/11 plot. No surprise they've all died since then.

The Saddam Tapes - VP Cheney now argues Iraq Is not part of War on Terror

2007-12-09T11:17:00.001-05:00

Just in case you've been living in a cave, I'll remind you that the CIA destroyed video tapes of the interrogations of Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.

Well, I have been told, by a government source I trust, that similar tapes of interrogations of Iraq War detainees have been in the hands of: the Defense Intelligence Agency, the CIA, the Army Office of the Inspector General (as a result of Abu Ghraib investigations), and most importantly, the Office of the Vice President and the White House. Journalist Seymour Hersh has, in the past, reported the existence of some of these tapes.

However, the big news is that the Office of the Vice President and the White House also had possession of some VERY INTERESTING tapes of the interrogation of Saddam Hussein. The mental image of Dick Cheney and Dubya eating popcorn, laughing, and playing with Saddam's pistol, while sitting in the White House theater watching the tapes, is something I can't get out of my mind. Is this what America is about?

Related to that and the other tapes from Iraq is the reported other-worldliness of internal government discussion (both in the Executive Branch and in the Senate Intelligence Committee) on whether or not these tapes are subject to the order of Judge Brinkema to produce videotapes of government interrogations of Al Qaeda terrorism suspects.

The Office of the Vice President has explicitly and specifically argued over and over again that Iraq is part of the War on Terror. Well, in more proof of VP Dick Cheney's residence in Bizarro World, comes news that his office has been arguing that any tapes from detainees captured in Iraq are not subject to Judge Brinkema's order...

..why?

Well, of course, because "the War in Iraq is not part of War on Terror operations against Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda Iraq is not proven to be a part of its namesake parent organization Al Qaeda." That's right friends, after nearly six years of telling us that operations against Iraq are part of the War on Terror, the VP is arguing internally that they legally are not part of that war.

Gerald Ford was right, Cheney has lost his mind with paranoia over terrorism. I'm willing to bet that Cheney personally approved Jose Rodriguez's decision to destroy the CIA videotapes after White House Counsel Harriet Miers apparently told the CIA not to destroy them. That would allow the White House to plausibly avoid direct responsibility and still ensure the disappearance of the tapes. At the very least, given Cheney's past refusal to cooperate with Judicial Branch orders, it would keep any inquiry from reaching a conclusion before Bush/Cheney Co. leave office.

Note to Judges Brinkema & Kennedy: you need to explicitly add videotapes of interrogations of terrorism suspects detained in Iraq and interrogated by the CIA, DIA, US Military, and/or US contractors (my reports are that Blackwater, and other contractors have participated in some of these interrogations - however Blackwater may have passed its responsibility for such operations to its new intelligence subsidiary Total Intelligence Solutions. The same sources say that part of the inspiration for setting up the new subsidiary was to legally shield Blackwater's principles and huge earnings from direct liability for such actions) to your order.

Welcome to the newspeak of 1984, where war is peace.

Time for the United States to Invade Dick Cheney!

2007-06-22T15:12:00.001-04:00

Props for this idea from Keith Olbermann:
Cheney Above the Law?

It's time for President Bush to invade Dick 'It's Vice President Skeletor to You' Cheney and democratize him to create: A FREE, PEACEFUL, AND DEMOCRATIC DICK CHENEY!

According to the latest assertion by Dick 'Skeletor' Cheney, he's not: an Executive Branch official, a legislator, or a judge... Hmmm... What is he?..

I know! A "Rogue Nation!!"

..And since, just like Iraq he: refused to grant the inspectors access, kicked them out, and even tried to destroy them (in this instance, by abolishing their office) - remember how the UN Weapons Inspectors & Scott Ritter were treated similarly by Saddam Hussein? - in this case, officials of the Information Security & Oversight Office (ISOO), of the National Archives, sent there under an Executive Order from the President regarding proper accounting for and the preservation of secret Documents - it's time for the President to send troops to Cheney's "undisclosed location" (obviously somewhere in Snake Mountain), invade Dick Cheney and democratize him to create: A FREE, PEACE-LOVING, AND DEMOCRATIC DICK CHENEY!

Note to the troops: Unlike the first Gulf War, I wouldn't risk starting the campaign to FREE CHENEY with a rapid end-run to an entrance from the rear!

It's reportedly filled with BioHazard horrors beyond the nightmares of the most fevered member of Al Qaeda...

It's high time to form an international coalition and invade Dick Cheney, to make the free world safe for democracy once again!

Now we just need to get Bill O'Reilly onboard with the idea!

Besame Mucho - Hasan & Danny Aiello craft a hit hip-hop remake of a true classic Latin standard!

2007-06-21T21:55:00.000-04:00

Earlier this month, at an exclusive video premiere during the Hoboken International Film Festival, I viewed Hasan & Danny Aiello's rap remake of Consuelo Velázquez's classic Latin torch song standard Besame Mucho.

In the vid, Danny Aiello at times looks slicker and more dangerous, as a crooning lounge lizard, than Al Pacino seemed in The Devil's Advocate. Let's just say I'd rather not run into his character, some night, on a dimly lit Brooklyn street...

For those of us who have worked in Lower Manhattan's Flatiron (Photo) District and DUMBO, the location shots, on cobblestone streets, hit a special chord.

I was skeptical, I mean, c'mon, this song is OLDER than a SugarHill Gang stepshow! ..and I've never been a real big fan of Latin ballads... ..BUT... ..I gotta admit...

..I LOVE THIS REMAKE!!

Mad Props to my bro Hasan and to Danny as well!!!

BTW: Watch for Hasan's producer's skillz coming to the task, via C.R.E., on JLo's new album.

Dick Cheney is above the Law of Man - Does that Make Him God?

2007-06-21T17:28:00.000-04:00

Dick Cheney apparently thinks he's God!

Dick 'Skeletor' Cheney and his allies are the single biggest danger to the history and values the United States, both at home and abroad...

While George W. Bush may well be the single worst American President in history, 'Cheney and friends represent the single gravest threat to the American Constitution and the 'American experiment' since the Civil War. At the same time, 'Cheney and friends' may very well be the single greatest threat to world peace since the end of the Second World War...

Doubt me? Scooter Libby & Valerie Plame, Cheney's assertion that he can declassify information whenever it suits him politically, his sending 'Torture Tsar' Alberto Gonzales on a nocturnal mission to Ashcroft's hospital-bed for some arm-twisting to try to maintain apparent justification for an unconstitutional spying program, lastly his recent refusal to even allow Congress know who he has met with (while instructing the Secret Service to destroy the visitor logs) aren't enough?..

Now, he's once again making up his own rules on secret documents and even the very basis of Constitutional American government. Witness Dan Froomkin's - Cheney: Neither Here Nor There?, in today's Washington Post.

It seems Dick Cheney is not just ABOVE-THE-LAW, now his office is asserting that it is ABOVE EXECUTIVE ORDERS FROM THE PRESIDENT as well!!

The only explanation I can fathom is that when Bush says he "speaks to God," he really means he speaks to Cheney...

Moreover Cheney's completely delusional. Since he entered office, he's been using any excuse, including claims of "Executive Privilege" to give the once-Republican-controlled Congress a facial excuse to avoid pressure to investigate his doings. Now that a Democratic Congress isn't buying that, he's asserting he's not part of the Executive Branch, but the President is!!! (Apparently he failed Schoolhouse Rock - he was probably out torturing wild animals for fun)

HELLLLLOOOO Skeletor, earth to Cheney: you cannot avail yourself of claims of "Executive Privilege" if you AREN'T part of the Executive Branch!

This man is an outright crook. I don't care WHAT his intentions are. The fact is that evil means to achieve even the best ends are simply E V I L !

If ANY HUMAN BEING BELONGS at Guantanamo Bay, it is the man President Ford said had "terrorism fever" since 9/11: Dick Cheney. Let him share a room with Osama bin-Laden, they already share the same respect for: the most basic human rights, democracy, and just rule flowing only from the consent of those governed.

Note to Cheney: try reading Article 2, Section 1 of the US Constitution- it establishes the Office of Vice President in the Executive Branch... Oh yeah, that's right, who needs to adhere to an old and cumbersome Constitution when we have the theory of the Unitary Executive? Yup, as George W. Bush once said: If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator.

In Annie Hall a young Woody Allen said it best about people like Cheney: "What an asshole...."

My Speech at the March 20 Great Rutgers Walkout Against the War

2007-03-24T17:29:00.000-04:00

Good afternoon friends.

As the organizers of this protest know, I did not immediately, nor blithely, agree to speak here today. I come to you not as a lifelong Republican who, in 2003, while publicly voicing his opposition to this war, ran in the General Election for NJ State Assembly. I come not as a devoted Christian dedicated to human rights. I come not as a military veteran against this war and member of Veterans for Peace. Neither do I come to you as a writer or student of: philosophy, environmental policy, political science, law, or ethics. Nor do I come before you as a former campus activist. No, I stand here before you, most importantly, and most simply, as a fellow Rutgers student and part-time lecturer at Cook College… ..as just another fellow member of the Rutgers community.

While I have publicly opposed the Iraq war since before it began, I have always differentiated that opposition, and my opposition to the Bush Administration, from my support for the brave women and men who serve as Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, & Marines.

When I first came to Rutgers University, as a University Scholar and on an ROTC scholarship, I participated in both Army and Air Force ROTC and eventually served my country proudly as a US Air Force combat weatherman. I served attached to Army combat infantry units, providing Army infantry troops with weather observations and forecasts on the front lines. The bonds I developed to my fellow servicepeople and my country were strong, and remain as strong today as they did then.

Because I supported both our fellow Americans in uniform and the War in Afghanistan, I chose, until today, not to participate in anti-recruiting protests. But, I was wrong. Yes, I was ignorant of truths so important, so central to the world we live in that it defined the very reality we all share. Like a smoker not REALLY ready to quit the habit, I was willfully ignorant of the real truths at play.

Sadly, at times, we live in the real world, not the world we would wish. Today that real world is a place where servicepeople don’t have the training or equipment they need to perform their jobs to the best of their abilities, or even safely.

We’ve all heard the stories of Humvees without armor, or soldiers and marines without body armor, but do you know that today, as a result of this war’s toll, stateside military units are reporting that they have 40% less equipment than they need – it’s been worn out and broken by the excessive tours in Iraq.

These numbers are joined by the nightmarish reality of the stark human toll from this needless, optional and immoral war – yes, immoral; as philosophers and theologians going back to the middle ages have deemed OPTIONAL wars unjust and ungodly, war is, if ever justified, only justified as a means of LAST resort – and this is an optional war I publicly and repeatedly called misguided and foolhardy when it was first suggested.

We can all recite the tragic statistics:

Today more Americans have died in combat since 9/11 than died on that horrible day. Modern combat medicine has saved many who would died in earlier conflicts, so the numbers of wounded today are truly untolled.

Our government spends millions of dollars on propaganda for the war in Iraq and at home, while cutting research money for traumatic brain injury (a leading injury in this conflict) by millions of dollars.

The scandal at Walter Reed Army hospital tells us all in terms we cannot ignore, how overloaded our military and veteran’s medical system is.

Veterans are returning home with psychological and physical wounds that are remaining poorly treated or completely untreated because the Veteran’s administration can’t handle the influx.

..And, now comes news that helped me make my decision to speak here today. .. Our military is so strapped for trained troops, that the press reported last week, still-injured soldiers are being ordered to return to Iraq.

I won’t recount the details here, but 74 still recovering soldiers assigned to the 3^rd Infantry Division at Fort Benning, Georgia have been ordered to redeploy to Iraq.

During this nation’s wars we have admired those who voluntarily chose to ignore their injuries and return to the fight, however, since the Civil War, we have not ordered injured men and women back into combat when they are unable to defend themselves fully as the result of their injuries. This is simply immoral in the most basic sense.

Otto Bismarck once said that government is like making sausages, people don’t want to see what goes into making them. Well friends, I can tell you one thing our government is doing in making those sausages… Bluntly and inexcusably, they are allowing these brave injured individuals to be used as filler for the sausages being made by that human meat-grinder we call Iraq.

I cannot and will not support recruiting people who won’t get: the equipment, training, medical care and veteran’s benefits this nation promises them and owes them. I won’t, any longer, remain blind to the false promises and lies told to get them to join.

The second thing that changed my mind about participating in anti-recruiting protests was meeting John Fenton of Little Ferry, NJ last year. John’s son, Matthew Fenton was a proud 24 year old Marine, killed, last year, by shrapnel from a suicide bomber in Anbar Province.

When I met Matthew’s father, he was proudly holding a framed photo of his son in Marine dress blues. I don’t believe anyone could look into his eyes, feel this father’s loss, and not know a troubling sorrow. But, in a nation where our President and Vice President have refused to attend the funerals of any of our fallen soldiers, it was John Fenton’s innocently simple words at an anti-war protest that pierced me to my core. This father, who buried his son, said, simply, “I wish I had come to the anti-war protests sooner.”

The final reason I chose to speak today is much more personal and one, with no thanks to the Targum, that has never been told to the University community. You see, we all know the Rutgers connection to the World Trade Center attack of 1993. The Targum ran stories on the two former Rutgers students: Nidal Ayyad and Ramzi Yousef, involved in that bombing. Even if you don’t remember their names, would be hard to call yourself a Rutgers student and not know that our School of Engineering produced two of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers.

Yet, the Targum has conspicuously forgotten or ignored Rutgers’ own special connection to the brutality, torture, and human rights violations that have become part of the Occupation of Iraq and the farcically named War on Terror.

I mentioned at the start of my remarks that I served in Army ROTC when I first came to the banks of the Raritan. Well, there was another young man serving with me, a young man who would one day, in the name of this country and its people, burn his name with ugly brutality across the souls of prisoners held in American military jails during this unjust war.

The young man of whom I speak is a proud Rutgers alumnus, a graduate of Rutgers Army ROTC and was a decorated US Army officer. When I knew this young man as a fellow cadet and student, he was also a brutal sadist and racist, who once purposely fired an M16 next to my roommate’s ear, injuring his hearing, simply to make a petty point while “playing soldier.”

This man, who the Targum has consciously ignored the story of, is former US Army Colonel Thomas “Tony” Pappas… ..pictured on the center of this poster. Tony was a distinguished Military Intelligence officer sent to Iraq by an Army who could not fail to know of his racist and violent tendencies. He was sent there to do a dirty little job for this country and lead a military intelligence unit in doing it. We have all heard the names of two other soldiers who took part in Tony’s little game of torture in Iraq: Lynndie England and Scott Graner. Yes, two of the Army personnel convicted for prisoner abuse, and two of those who served under Colonel Pappas at that very dungeon first drawn by Saddam Hussein from the bowels of hell itself… ..that place called Abu Ghraib prison.

Yet, at Rutgers, we have never heard the name of Tony Pappas, the man who stood at the very center of this wretched and disgusting moment in American history. For commanding the troops directly responsible for the worst abuses at Abu Ghraib, this man, the senior officer present at the homicide during interrogation, of an Iraqi prisoner; this man who courtroom testimony about that death states, said “I’m not going down for this alone”; this man was in the end fined only $8000 in pay.

At Rutgers, we know the names of Ramzi Yousef and Lynndie England, the 21^st Century’s poster children for hate. But, we should also know and never, ever forget, the very special connection of Rutgers University to a hellish place called Abu Ghraib. We should always remember and revile the name of Tony Pappas, a Rutgers alumnus we should be sickened and repulsed by. Surely, Tony Pappas has made certain that some in Iraq will never forget the name of Rutgers University, thanks to a proud Rutgers’ alumnus named Colonel Thomas Pappas.

Finally, in the shadow of the Bloustein school, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention a former professor of mine, one who kindled and inspired my love of philosophy and rekindled my love for things intellectual. That professor was Edward Bloustein. I was fortunate to sadly have Ed as a professor and friend during the very semester he passed from this earth. I mention him today, not for the Bloustein School building who’s shadow we stand beneath, but for his innate and unswerving moral courage and conviction. When this University and universities across the nation were arguing about possibly divesting from South Africa, to oppose the human evil that was Apartheid, when Rutgers’ own Board of Governors failed to join the cause, President Bloustein personally joined the protests. Not only did he write editorials in opposition to Apartheid, but he choose to personally march with the students. Holding a sign like any other student, he chose to be arrested with them during a sit-down strike meant to push the university Board of Governors to change its pro-racist policies.

Today, in the fight against the Occupation of Iraq and the immoral Bush War, we are again engaged in a similar moral cause, a cause where morality falls only on one side. In the spirit of President Bloustein, I call upon President McCormick to cross the line, follow the morality of your heart and join with your students in the struggle for what is good and moral. President McCormick, heed what Abraham Lincoln called the “better angels human nature” and lend your imprimatur to this righteous effort. Join us today so that you do not one day look back and wish you had chosen the only truly moral path.

At the beginning of my remarks, I mentioned my ignorance of truth that had kept me away in the past. Ironically, perhaps, I might best explain it by paraphrasing a statement Ronald Reagan once made. You see, President Reagan was originally a staunch union member and Democrat. In answering a friend’s question as to why he chose to become a Republican he said: “I didn’t leave my party, they left me.”

Similarly, I stand here today as the result of realizing an essential truth. I stand here not because I have stopped supporting the US military, I am here because the Bush Administration has left the military and its veterans. I pray that my friends at Rutgers and across the nation will not abandon them as well. I pray that they will continue the fight against: this unjust war, the untolled pain, and needless deaths it brings.

Thank you.

Bush is returning unrecovered Wounded Soldiers to Iraq!!!

2007-03-12T19:16:00.000-04:00

As a veteran, the revelations at Walter Reed Army Hospital, and elsewhere, of how poorly we are treating our wounded from Iraq and Afghanistan were bad enough. If anyone deserves the very best our nation can offer, it is our military wounded, who have voluntarily sacrificed so much.

The fact that we are now returning the unrecovered wounded to Iraq... That's too much.

Apparently, to be able to provide the "troop surge" Bush has committed the Army to, they are generically downgrading the injuries of soldiers, without physicals, so they can have the bodies to send to the human meat grinder known as Iraq.

It's not bad enough that we don't take the care of our wounded that they deserve and which this Administration promised. It's not enough that we are fiscally bankrupting this nation's future. It's not enough that this is all for an unnecessary war.

No, now we're returning our own wounded back to Iraq before they recover. But, at the same time, Dick Cheney, who was a Vietnam draft-dodger, gets time off from his tough schedule for a pain in his leg?

Iraq isn't a war for the survival of the US, where we might justify the necessity of returning the wounded early, it's a war for the survival of a broken NeoCon ideology. The lives of young Americans are worth far more than that.

This IS Unforgiveable.

Judge who sentenced Saddam Hussein to Death Flees Iraq, Asks for Asylum

2007-03-11T06:57:00.000-04:00

The Iraqi trial judge who sentenced former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein to death has asked for asylum in Britain, Arab television reported.

[They] said that Raouf Abdel Rahman had asked for asylum after going to Britain with his family in mid-December on a visitor's visa.

"The information we have is that the judge sought asylum for reasons including that he fears for his own life and the lives of family members ... The application is being considered by the Home Office" [according to a London correspondent.]

Well it didn't take long for that mercenary judge to hightail it out of Iraq. He sentenced Saddam Hussein to death barely 4 months ago and ALREADY he's fled Iraq and seeking asylum in the UK. What a brave and loyal Iraqi he is, NOT!

Just like Joe Stalin's kangaroo court judges during the purges, he feared for his own life in the end. (..and yes, some of those judges met their own ends in the purges).

I predicted the judge would be out of Iraq within a year. It was too easy a call to miss. He went to London on a visitor's visa less than 45 days after handing down the sentence, did anyone NOT expect him to play the political asylum card?

As they did in Vietnam with Thieu, the US got, in Iraq, exactly the Quisling and the justice it paid for.

The judge should be denied asylum and told to go back to Iraq. Really...

Cheney says Iraq's a safe place and will be a flourishing peaceful democracy soon.. ' The insurgency is simply in its death throes...'

Yeah sure, tell that to Judge 'Dudes You're on Your Own, I'm Outta Here to Save My Own Pathetic Hide' Rahman...

George W. Bush prepares for Military Invasion of Texas, while Pentagon logic argues for US Military coup in DC to protect our troops!

2007-02-26T04:35:00.000-05:00

If you accept the Bush Administration's current LOGIC (or what I prefer to see as its illogic) RadioShack and the US are partly responsible for the roadside bombings of Americans in Iraq.

According to the Bush Administration, the fact that some roadside bomb components appear to be made in Iran makes a strong circumstantial case for holding the Iranian Government responsible. They argue that the most dangerous type of bombs were only seen in Lebanon before this, and that some components may have been made in Iran.

HOWEVER, in the very same briefing asserting this, the US Army's expert spokesperson said of the infrared triggers: "Every [one of these very dangerous roadside bombs]. in Iraq has been RadioShack, Digigard or Everspring. But in southern Lebanon I never saw them use RadioShack."

Hello MacBush!! RadioShack is a US owned and operated corporation, headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, with NO stores in Iran!

Ok, so when is the Pentagon going to: blame the White House for these bombings, begin contingency planning for a military coup in Washington, DC, and start recalling troops for the armed invasion of Texas?

Dick Cheney's "undisclosed location" is in Superman's "Bizarro World," and Cheney spends FAR TOO MUCH time there...

2007-01-26T22:26:00.000-05:00

It's the only logical/rational explanation anymore.

In his latest interview with Wolf Blitzer, he asserts:

1) that "the US has made great progress AND had great successes in Iraq" since the fall of Saddam,

2) that the Maliki government has taken on its foes directly. (This was his answer to Blitzer's question about whether Maliki would take on Moqtada al'Sadar and the Mahdi Militia directly.)

"Bizarro World."

It's the only explanation. Other explanations are far too scary.

BREAKING NEWS: US State Department LIES in its 10 January 2007 "Weekly Iraq Status Report"

2007-01-12T08:06:00.000-05:00

OK, here's where I scoop the traditional media!

Friends, you can't make this stuff up. But I am proud to say, that I am PERSONALLY breaking the news on this one, since I seem to be the first person to notice.

The State Department is actually blatantly lying in its most recent Weekly Iraq Status Report. Did they actually think no-one would notice?

Just follow this link to the January 10 Iraq Status Report. (In case they change the link or page #25, I've placed the ORIGINAL file on my website.)

Then head to page 25 of that report for a list of troops they say are serving there.

They list:
"25 Countries with forces in Iraq (in addition to US)
TOTAL ~ 14,138 Forces
Data as of December 22, 2006

Albania
Armenia
Australia
Azerbaijan
Bosnia-Herzegovina
Bulgaria
Czech Republic
Slovakia
South Korea
Ukraine
UK
Denmark
El Salvador
Estonia
Georgia
Japan
Kazakhstan
Latvia
Lithuania
Macedonia
Moldova
Mongolia
Poland
Romania
Singapore"

Um.... Small problem... as far as I know Singapore and the Ukraine withdrew in 2005! Japan was out in July of last year!

According to GlobalSecurity.org (a leading military monitoring organization):

"Countries which had troops in or supported operations in Iraq at one point but have pulled out since: Nicaragua (Feb. 2004); Spain (late-Apr. 2004); Dominican Republic (early-May 2004); Honduras (late-May 2004); Philippines (~Jul. 19, 2004); Thailand (late-Aug. 2004); New Zealand (late Sep. 2004); Tonga (mid-Dec. 2004) Portugal (mid-Feb. 2005); The Netherlands (Mar. 2005); Hungary (Mar. 2005); Singapore (Mar. 2005); Norway (Oct. 2005); Ukraine (Dec. 2005); Japan (July 17, 2006); Italy (Nov. 2006)"

So, what's that lying, social-climbing, cold fish of a golddigger for Big Oil, Condie Rice gonna tell us now? That the State Department, the DAY OF THE President's major policy speech on Iraq, accidentally included an OLD slide? Yup, sure. I believe that. Hmmmm... Somehow, it seems more likely they purposely pulled this hoping no-one would notice, and the local press outlets across the US would refer to this document, which makes it look like we have much more International support than we have.

OK, now, just for the record. The State Department's report lists a bit over 14,000 troops Non-American troops in Iraq supporting the operations. Once you subtract the troops from countries that aren't there, and the UK troops slated to leave, we'll soon have less than 6,000 Non-US/Non-Iraqi troops
in Iraq. It sure makes that 21,500 troop surge seem even smaller and more unlikely to accomplish a damn thing, except making targets of more Americans, once you realize that.

..and for anyone who thinks this latest piece of disinformation was just an honest oversight... Do you really think we should be handing over care for ANOTHER 21,500 American lives in a war zone, to management that can't even get straight who the current members of its own team are?

Is Bush Intent on World War Three?

2007-01-12T04:16:00.000-05:00

I'm done with doubt. The latest actions by American troops in the Kurdish part of Iraq prove that this Administration is dead set, that if they can't win on their terms in Iraq, on creating the conditions for World War Three.

So, here's the reality. Bush is still irrevocably addicted to the Neo-Con KoolAid. I have come to the conclusion that he is intent on sabotaging the situation in Iraq in such a manner as to provide a pretext for a general war with Iran and/or Syria. Why have I finally, and reluctantly, come to that position?

Maliki and the Iraqi leadership have made clear that 2/3 of the troops Iraq has promised to send to support the US troops in Baghdad will have to come from the Kurds in the north. Already, Kurdish leaders were saying they couldn't find enough troops willing to go. So, what does the Bush regime do?

They attack an Iranian diplomatic office in the Kurdish portion of Iraq. An action guaranteed to create a rift between the US and the Kurds (formerly the one major Iraqi ethnic group who supported the US and its goals there.)

We have LEGALLY invaded Iranian sovereign soil. That's the rule that applies to consular and diplomatic land.

This all happens within 24 hours of the President giving a primetime national speech in which, while apologizing to Americans for the mistakes in Iraq, he threatens Iran and Syria, instead of taking the suggestions of the Iraq study group and engaging them.

Ladies and gentlemen. Be very afraid. I believe, that this Administration intentionally has us on the FAST TRACK for a war with Iran and possibly Syria. I simply cannot believe in my heart of hearts that any diplomat or political leader could be ignorant of the cumulative effects of such policies.

I'm not alone in this fear either. Even conservatives like: Pat Buchanan, Joe Klein (of Time Magazine), William Kristol (of Neo-Con fame) and Joe Scarborough are now voicing the same fears. Pat Buchanan has even explicitly said he thinks Bush intends to invade Iran. He noted that the President said in his speech that that we are sending Patriot missiles and a Carrier Task Group into Iraq. (As Buchanan notes, you don't need fighter jets, naval power, and Patriot missiles to fight insurgents in Iraq!)

During the Cold War, we constantly worried about what would happen if a delusional Soviet leader had his fingers on the button, should the Soviet Union disintegrate. We feared that he would "push the button." Fortunately for us, Mikhail Gorbachev, proved, in the words of Sting, that the Russians loved their children too.

However, for the first time in my life I am truly afraid about an occupant of the White House in exactly the same way we all once worried about the fall of the Soviet Empire. I am now convinced that George Bush would actually prefer a nuclear war with Iran & Syria in the Middle East, a war which could only lead to World War 3, to simply accepting the loss in Iraq, withdrawing our troops from there and working to stabilize the region and Afghanistan.

President Bush has clearly adopted a "bunker mentality." Although I do not believe Bush is cut from the same general moral cloth as Adolf Hitler, this kid of bunker mentality and its concomitant denial of reality is all too reminiscent of Adolf Hitler as the Russian front began to collapse completely in the wake of Stalingrad.

I am beginning to think we may have no choice but to impeach Bush/Cheney to prevent World War Three.

Where's Niccolo Machiavelli when you NEED him?

2007-01-12T00:49:00.000-05:00

As proven by Bush's current Iraq initiative, Niccolo Machiavelli explained, centuries ago, people like George W, Bush. For him, they fell into "Group Three."

"There are three classes of intellects: one which comprehends by itself; another which appreciates what others comprehend; and a third which neither comprehends by itself nor by the showing of others; the first is the most excellent, the second is good, and the third is useless." - Niccolo Machiavelli

And remember, he risks not only HIS legacy, but the very future of our entire nation with his ignorance.

He also might want to try a few more Machiavelli quotes (Karl Rove: If you're reading this, I know you keep a copy of "The Prince" in your desk, get the Commander in Chief of Denial to READ it):

"He who blinded by ambition, raises himself to a position whence he cannot mount higher, must thereafter fall with the greatest loss."

"He who has not first laid his foundations may be able with great ability to lay them afterwards, but they will be laid with trouble to the architect and danger to the building."

"The best fortress which a prince can possess is the affection of his people; for even if he has fortresses, and is hated by his people, the fortresses will not save him; for when a people have once risen in arms against their prince, there will be no lack of strangers who will aid them."

"One should never risk one's whole fortune unless supported by one's entire forces."

Bush says: "Really, It's my VERY LAST drink. You can believe me"

2007-01-10T22:08:00.000-05:00

Saying that sending 21,000 MORE troops to Iraq is "the way to ensure that our troops come home," is like a rapist saying that letting him sleep over with you till morning is a way to get him to stop raping you...

"Funny," how much it also sounds like a confirmed alcoholic promising that this is their "VERY last drink." Some leopards never change their spots.

This, like Bush's delusions on the non-existence of "global warming" is all about "preserving his legacy" and "protecting Big Oil."

Let's be honest:

The President's speech appealing for more troops in Iraq was a complete failure from the moment it was conceived. Even Right Wing Republican Senator Sam Brownback has JUST returned from Iraq to say the Bush plan to increase troops won't help.

Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas is one of THE MOST CONSERVATIVE members of the entire Congress. When he, two other conservative Republican Senators, Pat Buchanan, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the American People all oppose this plan, it's DOA. 72% of Americans oppose the War and 61% oppose the troop increase - in a current Gallup poll. Brownback is among a handful of GOP Senators to reject Bush's plan even before he made his speech. Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman and Maine Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe also oppose an escalation of U.S. forces.

The fact is, we've been hearing these "new plans" since the day Dubya declared "mission accomplished" on the Aircraft Carrier, USS Abraham Lincoln.

But SCARILY, many top officers in the Pentagon have privately said that they sincerely believe this wrongheaded plan will "break the US Army." Having personally served with the US Army and Air Force in the 1980s and having seen the real world results of an Army similarly broken by the Vietnam War (as did General Colin Powell), I simply cannot, under any conceivable circumstances, support such a plan.

What amazes me is that he still can't even understand the difference between Al Qaeda and the Mahdi Militia.

Anyone who thinks Al Qaeda in Iraq wants a Shi'ia government there is wholly ignorant of reality in the MidEast.

Sadly, in one sense, a wholly Shi'ia government resulting from a US withdrawal would only lead to MORE violence in Iraq, but in a sadly and horribly ironic way. It would, in part, pit Al Qaeda in Iraq directly, AGAINST the Shi'ia government.

Face it President Bush, YOU SIR are ultimately and personally responsible to the loved ones of over 3000 Americans who have died for nothing. I pray to God you can face the personal feelings of guilt that can only engender in the years of life you have ahead (another Texan President, Lyndon Johnson couldn't).

Oh well, Mr President, you can always take comfort in the fact that, unlike those 3000+ American heroes, you sir, are still alive. You still, even as a failed President, have a personal future. May God forgive you for the many human lives you have destroyed.

Dubya 4 President!......... of Iraq!

2007-01-08T18:01:00.000-05:00

Only George W. Bush and his sycophants are stupid, hypocritical, AND delusional enough to think pushing a jobs program that consists of 20,000 fun jobs in the military for Americans (in sun-filled Iraq) and $1 Billion in job aid to Iraqis is a good idea in any sense.

I find it amazing that a President who consistently opposes Job Programs and raises student loan rates in the US, is now promoting yet another $1 Billion jobs program for Iraqis to be paid out of the US Treasury.

At the same time, what jobs program is he promoting for Americans?

Oh yeah, we'll need 20,000 more of the bravest Americans willing to serve as meat for the futile human meat grinder Bush/Cheney/Halliburton Associates is operating in Iraq. Try your local recruiting station if you need a job or want education.

Word is that during his speech this week he will ask Americans to "sacrifice" - this is the SAME guy who has given unparalleled tax cuts to the wealthy, and who signed a secret agreement with Mexican President Vincente Fox to give undocumented Mexican laborers in the US Social Security benefits in 60 days - benefits that American citizens need to wait a minimum of 10 years for!

Apparently, for Mr Bush and friends, only the Middle Class and Students should sacrifice. He's got the backs of the rich and undocumented workers covered.

Given that Islamic radicals are essentially fighting against a Western secularized money-driven approach to life, does anyone think it would be a good idea for an Iraqi who values their existence to take these kind of US military provided jobs and handouts?

Anyone happen to recall what happened to French, Jewish, Russian, and Ukrainian collaborators AFTER World War II? ..or Vietnamese and Laotians who supported the US side during the Vietnam war? ..or perhaps what happened to Romanian collaborateurs after the fall of Ceaucescu?

If you were an Iraqi would you be signing up for one of these "job opportunities?"

Handing out packets of money to Iraqis underscores EXACTLY the message Islamic fundamentalists keep repeating.

Succinctly put: it corrupts US Military Officers, supposedly bound by The Honor Code, by turning them into nothing more than soulless "bagmen," flush with far more than "walkin' around money," and other far less benign kinds of "street money" to disburse. Although, they are a page taken directly from Karl Rove's everyday playbook, such initiatives can only serve to encourage and incubate the growth of a noisome fungal rot of dishonor within our military culture. It's something we cannot afford. Hasn't this Administration already done enough to tarnish the reputations and honor of the many good men and women who serve proudly in our US Military?

I don't make this stuff up friends, although, sometimes I would prefer I did:

Such are the early details of the Bush plan for not officially losing in Iraq until after he leaves office.

..ergo, after due consideration, I believe that, since he's promoting better new Jobs and Education Programs there than in the US, George W. Bush should resign as President of the US and become President of Iraq.

Bush cares more about his personal legacy than he does about this country or Americans. Besides, this is the President who said just after election in 2000: "if this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." He should feel right at home with the apparent sentiments of many in Iraq.

It IS that simple.

So let's hear it friends.

I think it's high time for Karl Rove and friends to learn how to chant "Four more years" in Arabic!

..and Dubya, please take Dick Cheney with you. Heck, he'd make a GREAT replacement for Baghdad Bob (Cheney's already got the: lying, Machiavellian manipulation, and complete denial of reality squared away). I'm sorry, but a potential Cheney Presidency of the United States is one of the few things far scarier to contemplate than an actual George W. Bush Presidency...

In closing, please allow me to invite you to join with former four-star General Wesley Clark, me, and many others: Can you please take just one moment out of your busy life to sign: a petition to President Bush, and/or a similar petition by MoveOn.org addressed to the US Congress, expressing our opposition to this terribly ill-advised plan?

---------

My apologies for leaving this blog unattended for the last year or so. Returning to the life of a 21 credit per semester student took a huge block of my time. I'm back.

Faulty Memory and the 'Clinton Blame Game'

2005-12-28T09:19:00.000-05:00

"Our leaders attempt to blame their failures on circumstances beyond their control, on false estimates by unknown, unidentifiable experts who rewrite modern history in an attempt to convince us..." - Ronald Reagan - Announcement of his Candidacy, at the New York Hilton, for 1980's Presidential Election

"Our friends in the other party will never forgive us for our success, and are doing everything in their power to rewrite history." - Ronald Reagan - Gala for His 83rd Birthday, 1994

Well, we are about to enter the 6th year of the Bush Presidency and it seems the 'Clinton Blame Game' continues apace...

Whenever some difficulty arises, it seems the most rabid supporters of the current Administration feel it important to blame it on Clinton. Of course, anyone with sense begins to wonder about that logic, if the Administration's pundits are right that 9/11 changed everything, and if it's been over 4 years since that event? I have to begin to wonder what Bill Clinton ISN'T responsible for and moreover how all these things he did are now impossible to change in what they assert is now a supposedly completely altered post-9/11 world. It's as if somehow the attack on 9/11 both made us more aware of threats we ignored and created a post 9/11 political world akin to a petrified forest, where initatives and reality were constrained by a wholly solidified reality.

It's just impossible for all those assertions to logically hold. In fact, it's logically and intellectually dishonest to continue this way. It's time for this Administration and its supporters to accept responsibility for their own screwups.

In one trenchant example, many are now blogging, in defense of the current President Bush ordering warrantless NSA wiretaps, about how the Carter and Clinton Administrations claimed to have the same legal authority for warrantless wiretaps (funny how they tend to skip the Reagan and Bush 41 Administrations who asserted the same authority - has politics become so partisan that simple intellectual honesty and logical wholeness are impossible? - never mind, I digress) the Bush 43 Administration is exercising. Let's be real. NO Administration ever gives an inch on the issue of Executive Authority (very different from Executive Privilege). They assert the rights to do all kinds of things they know that if they di, would, in practice, get them pilloried.

However, in practice, the distinction between a conroversial and/or questionable authority an Executive asserts, on the one hand, and one on the other, which they actually use, is the difference between the existence of a case or controversy and pure legal theory. In fact, ironically, when the Clinton Administration asked for broader wiretap authority and easier ways to effectuate wiretaps of computer networks, many Republican political leaders were amongst those who fought most adamantly against those attempts. In some instances, the very same Republican leaders are now willing to make George W. Bush an absolute Caesar on anything even tangentially related to the war powers, during the balance of, what they say is, an indeterminate and indefinite War on Terror. How convenient... ..and how hypocritical...

I will herein simply note that, John Yoo, the same individual at the Department of Justice who drafted these assertions of unlimited Presidential authority, is one of only two serious legal scholars of any note who take such an extreme position, the other is Robert Bork, who, no surprise there, wrote a glowing blurb for Yoo's recently published book on Executive Power, nuff said!

If any of the excesses of this Administration or the troops engaged in the fight against terror are ever prosecuted, I suggest strongly that John Yoo should be prosecuted for the most serious of war crimes: for providing those who violated the law with the belief that their actions were not only acceptable but completely legitimate and justified. The President may have signed the orders, the troops may have gone over the edge, but even Colin Powell said that would happen if we accepted John Yoo's arguments as even facially valid. John Yoo is as guilty of conspiracy, violating the law himself, and ethical violations of the Bar's Code of Professional Reponsibility, as ANY attorney who knowingly gives counsel meant to provide legall cover, to a client seeking to break the law. It matters not whether that counsel is simply meant to provide arguable legal cover for the actions of ENRON executives, a common street criminal, or the President. If Dick Cheney is George W. Bush's Alexei Kosygin, and Don Rumsfeld is Bush's Andrei Gromyko, and Paul Wolfowitz is his Andrei Kirilenko, then John Yoo is his Mikhail Suslov (or more darkly, his Hans Fritzsche, to Wolfowitz's Alfred Rosenberg).

How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin. - Ronald Reagan

(note to John Yoo - your book is being DEEPLY discounted by booksellers - guess it will be in the discount bin at bookstores soon)

But, back to our story in chief...

I think it is well nigh time that we factually clarify the record on electronic spying by the Clinton Administration, as many of the current occupant of the White House's online supporters say that Clinton was engaging in the same activities and no-one ever complained. As they say in sports, "let's go to the video tape."

I went back to the archives for some relevant articles, showing EXACTLY the opposite, about opposition to the Clinton White House & DOJ on these matters, from what the Bush sycophants have. People WERE yelling and screaming then, but computer networks simply weren't yet considered by everyone as ubiquitous enough for it to be mainstream news (the vast majority of people in the US were still on dial-up, if on the 'Net at all).

However, you can see in these articles, that various organizations like: the ACLU, EPIC, EFF, the House and Senate Republican leadership, CPSR, and other groups were fighting the Clinton Administration in it's policies and attempts to expand and make easier government wiretapping (I should probably point out that, in addition to serving on a State Cabinet-level interagency task force on information privacy, and the NSA review group I mentioned in an earlier blogpost, I was a very early member of EFF, as well as a charter member of EPIC and CPSR).

But, I won't tell you what to think, please take a few moments to read the articles for yourself and come to your own conclusions about history. That's what is nice about having primary sources available. Every reader can make up their own minds. As I now invite you to do...

March 1998
Telcos Tussle with Feds over Surveillance
Janet Reno threatened Telephone Carriers with court action if they do not build surveillance features the FBI wants into their systems. Senator Pat Leahy and EPIC were arguing the FBI was going to far.

May 1998
Senators Introduce E-Privacy Bill
Please note that then-Senator John Ashcroft (later the Bush Administration Attorney General) was a prime sponsor and is quoted in the article. Republicans and others fought the Clinton Administration on e-snooping.

January 2000
Clinton Aides fight for Cybersecurity Bill
A bill, I shall note, Dick Armey and Republican House leadership opposed because of privacy and commerce concerns.

July 2000
White House Submits Wiretap Law Revisions

ACLU Wants Congress to Block FBI e-snoops

FBI Demos Carnivore
I should point out that many in the press and blogs (especially supporters of the White House on this NSA mess) are confusing Echelon with Carnivore. Carnivore was the domestic program. Echelon is operated with the United Kingdom and other European Union member/partners. Echelon is much more intrusive, given the lack of warrant oversight exercised upon its operation when compared to Carnivore.

Let's get history right before we start attacking or defending people based upon our independent recollection of it.

Just to round out the day, here's a few more links on these topics which may be of interest.

Since some of the President's supporters on this issue have alleged a conspiracy by the NY Times to ruin passage of the Patriot Act, by releasing info on the NSA's warrantless wiretapping, how about some potential conspiratorial motives on the side of the WH in nominating Alito? Alito Urged Wiretap Immunity

How about a little exposé on the Pentagon spying on peace groups, including Quakers "for Chrissake" (no pun intended), in actions that may have violated specific law prohibiting such domestic spying by the Pentagon? Pentagon to review spy files after NBC report

Then there's news from NBC News that the NSA has not only been gathering info from wiretaps, but that they have been actively breaking into the computers of US persons (basically US citizens, legal residents, and corporations operating or domiciled in the US) without warrants. Not Your Father's NSA

But, I'll close with the NY Times again, who I know many neo-cons and members of the religious right-wing will once again accuse of treason, for a new article showing that the NSA's warrantless operations are MUCH broader than the White House has admitted. In other words the White House explicitly downplayed the scope of these efforts. That's called "lying" (whether a particular lie is justified or not does not change it to something other than a lie).
Spy Agency Mined Vast Data Trove, Officials Report

"It's time we asked ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by the Founding Fathers. James Madison said, 'We base all our experiments on the capacity of mankind for self-government.' This idea that government was beholden to the people, that it had no other source of power, is still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man... .. The Founding Fathers knew a government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. So we have come to a time for choosing." - Ronald Reagan - A Time for Choosing

Warrantless Wiretaps on Americans: Weak Legal Authority

2005-12-24T05:52:00.000-05:00

"I hope we have once again reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: as government expands, liberty contracts." Ronald Reagan - Presidential Farewell Speech from the Oval Office

The Department of Justice has tendered a letter to the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, which defends the President's authority to order warrantless wiretaps of US persons on US soil. The timing of this affair is certainly terrible for the neo-cons. Given the case law they are citing, a lot of this will turn on how Rumsfeld v. Padilla is interpreted. Even though the Department of Justice (DOJ) has just recently won a civilian indictment against Padilla in Florida, the courts have not allowed the DOJ to thereby effectively moot the Padilla appeal to the Supreme Court, and take it out of the Court's hands.

My bet? If Padilla is ruled on by the US Supreme Court, the White House will lose. If they lose Padilla, they almost certainly lose any hope of the NSA's warrantless wiretaps being held as constitutional. The Court will know that too (which actually bodes poorly for the White House, as the Court is not going to be looking to effectively cede a review authority, they have held since Marbury v. Madison, for until they rule, if ever, on the NSA wiretaps, or, alternatively, until the end of the War on Terror). Of course, the Supreme Court might take a tack from Marbury v. Madison, and avoid the controversy for now, by ruling that the Appeals Court erred in not transferring Padilla to civilian custody and binding him over for civil trial. They would thereby moot the case themselves, before being forced to rule on it. But I wouldn't bet on it. You might have seen such a move in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, but I sincerely doubt the Court will do so now, some four years later.

No wonder the Administration is blowing a collective cork over the fact that the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to transfer Padilla to civil custody. The result means that Padilla's case remains in the hands of the Supreme Court. Of course, it's interesting that the Court of Apeals, in their opinion, scathingly attacked the Administration for using different evidence to convince them that Padilla should stay in custody than they used to indict him in civilian criminal proceedings in Florida. It seems Gonzales and Rumsfeld believe playing Three Card Monte on cases with the Supreme Court is ok.

The letter from DOJ to the Intelligence Comittees reads well enough on its face, but it's a bad joke when you start checking the cites. They cite The Prize Cases, an Admiralty case that deals with property rights of the owners of belligerent vessels in the short period following the attack upon Fort Sumter and BEFORE Congress declared war - about all the cases might do was provide more latitude in Presidential response for a short time after 9/11, they never established that the President can simply make up the rules as he goes along. Even worse, the letter cites Hamdi v. Rumsfeld a case they lost on exactly the scope of Constitutional safeguards for US citizens as they relate to the availability of civilian judicial review. It cites Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. V. Sawyer too, a case that explicitly said the President can't make up the rules.

As they are using quotes that support the opposite of the Court's holding in those cases, what the letter cites from those cases is therefore obiter dicta - commentary by a court, that sounds nice, but is irrelevant to the core case or has no practical legal effect in each instance. Lawyers cite obiter dicta when they have little else to throw around, not when they have a strong case. (Of course there is one famous incidence where apparent obiter dicta has later become seminally controlling: the famous Footnote 4 in Justice Stone's opinion in the Carolene Products case. But it's famous as the exception that proves the rule.) I mean, the Department of Justice might as well play Russian Roulette with 5 bullets chambered.

Given all the supposed legal opinions the President had supporting his authority to order warrantless wiretaps by the NSA, I would have expected much more in the DOJ letter. I would expect a student on the law review of a third tier law school would do better. But, perhaps the Washington Post was right in saying the DOJ just couldn't come up for arguments justifying these wiretaps at all. One government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the administration complained bitterly that the FISA process demanded too much: to name a target and give a reason to spy on it.

'For FISA, they had to put down a written justification for the wiretap,' said the official. 'They couldn't dream one up.'"

The Administration, in the DOJ letter, makes much of the Authorization of Use of Military Force' (AUMF) passed by Congress after 9/11 authorizing the President to use military force in the struggle against Al Qaeda. However, Congress can easily FIX the problem, of the supposed loophole big enough to drive Rush Limbaugh through, that Congress created in FISA, by explicitly making wiretaps of American persons, where the White House does not apply for a FISA warrant within 72 hours after the execution of the wiretap, illegal. The easiest way? Amend the Patriot Act next month, when it comes up for passage and debate, to close the loophole and watch the President turn blue.

There are those now making the point that the Carter and Clinton Administrations, as well as earlier Administrations, were monitoring phone and data communications. They miss the proverbial forest for the trees. To begin with, unfortunately, even the current White House makes a significant distinction between actually wiretapping an individual's communications, and simple network or radiowave monitoring. There are significant distinctions between monitoring: for traffic going to specific individuals, or for foreign traffic, all electronic communications, on the one hand, and scanning for code words and targeting an individual or phone number for ongoing wiretaps, on the other:

1) When a number or individual is specifically targeted for a wiretap, records are kept of all the indiviual's or number's conversations.

2) Legislation, Federal Regulations/Administrative Code, and Executive Orders required (until this Administration secretly changed some of those rules) that materials scanned randomly were purged from the system unless they identified something of explicit value. In the cases of targeted US persons/numbers, in the US, that meant a warrant existed covering: that person, the other person involved, or one of the numbers involved.

3) There is also a serious technological issue. To scan the emails and phone conversations of foreigners, given the way these networks work, we HAVE to scan everything. Otherwise you cannot identify, from the data headers, whether the data is from or to an American person, for whom we require a warrant, and communications solely between non-US persons, for whom we do not require a warrant. It's not as if foreign electronic communications go through different networks than purely domestic ones. (In fact, as one of the articles I cite today points out, the NSA pressured communications carriers to route foreign communications through switches in the US to make tapping into said communications easier.) You MUST monitor simply to find the foreign commo amidst all the domestic stuff.

To analogize, and sum up the difference between monitoring and wiretapping, it equates roughly to the difference between my setting up videotaping of you exiting and leaving your house and scanning those tapes in the hope that I eventually see a particular person leave, keeping one I find that on, destroying the tapes if I don't find any, and on the other hand, aiming video cameras into every window of your house and keeping the resulting tapes forever, just in case someone in Government may find them of use later.

I'm sorry, the former is legitimate surveillance. The latter is simply Big Brother, especially when, without having to apply for a warrant, the Government can take action based on pure hunch or conjecture, without any shred of supportive evidence.

We live in a nation that operates on the premise that government shall not invade our homes and violate our Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights UNTIL and UNLESS they have reasonable evidence that justifies it. That is why FISA Court oversight is essential.

However much we may disagree, I wish all of my readers Merry Christmas and/or Happy Holidays!!

Secrets & Lies: "No Such Agency"

2005-12-18T20:44:00.000-05:00

"The people who make wars, the people who reduce their fellows to slavery, the people who kill and torture and tell lies in the name of their sacred causes, the really evil people in a word—these are never the publicans and the sinners. No, they’re the virtuous, respectable men, who have the finest feelings, the best brains, the noblest ideals." - Aldous Huxley

It has certainly been another strange week through the looking glass. I attended the final class sessions for my "Philosophy of Criminal Law" and "Advanced Topics in Ethics" graduate courses this past week. Perhaps age has softened me somewhat, but I have to honestly say that I enjoyed the two courses more than any I have ever taken. With all due deference to the stature of Professors like Derek Parfit (being able to take a course taught by him was I must say, without any hesitation or equivocation, in my estimation, a singular opportunity), Douglas Husak, and Larry Temkin (and I should here thank Larry and Doug sincerely for their support regarding a student-status which hung in the balance almost the entire term - an uncertain status which placed me under significant additional pressures), a great deal of the success of a seminar course axiomatically depends upon the quality, interest, and participation of the students sitting for the course.

On that note, during my 13 year absence from the halls of academe, Rutgers University has improved the quality of the Graduate Philosophy program immeasurably. Having gone from a barely remarked program all the way up to the #1 ranked program in the United States (this year Rutgers currently sits a close #2 to NYU's program - a pairing which has prompted some to call this geographical centering of philosophical talent "Edinburgh [or Athens] on the Hudson). Nothing can make a graduate level course more enjoyable than the kind of student body this ranking has attracted. They are easily on a par with the best and brightest students I knew at Stanford and the University of California, Berkeley and a real joy to study with. I frankly wasn't sure I could hold my own with this new crop of brilliant students. I can only thank them all for their tolerance, patience, and forebearance. I learned a great deal from each of them this term. I may only hope that I acquitted myself intellectually and personally by the end of the term, and that my presence added, instead of detracted, from the overall course value. But, as I so often do, I digress. Back to the main topic at hand of today's blog.

When I arrived home from class on Wednesday I realized I had lost, from my suit jacket, a lapel pin that I rarely even wore. It was a National Security Agency pin that always reminded me of when I had served as the only state government employee in the US on one of the NSA's review groups. (If you haven't gone to an NSA convention and watched them feed sharks during the cocktail hour - I'm not making this up - you haven't lived.) How strange, I thought, a few days later, when news from that agency reached headlines across the globe.

I was enraged to learn that the NSA (an agency so cloaked in secrecy, that for many years it was sardonically referred to simply by the cryptic - pun intended - moniker "No Such Agency") had broken from past practices under which spying was conducted only against foreign nationals and foreign targets, to now actively spy without: warrant, subpoena, judicial review, or Congressional oversight, upon American citizens. In my preceding column, I spoke of Secret Laws, Secret Warrants, Secret Trials, and Secret Prisons. Well, it's now clear that not only were the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the US Constitution being violated but the explicit terms of a 1978 law intended to prohibit domestic spying by the CIA and NSA was purposely violated. I will note, for the record, that I am pleased that some of my old colleagues at NSA refused to have anything to do with this program.

The Bush Administration argues that the law is irrelevant in this case, that the President's wartime authority trumps the law, yet, I would hasten to point out the following quote from the Supreme Court decision in a case where the President's wartime powers were squarely at issue: "The Founders of this Nation entrusted the lawmaking power to the Congress alone in both good and bad times. It would do no good to recall the historical events, the fears of power and the hopes for freedom that lay behind their choice. Such a review would but confirm our holding that this seizure order cannot stand." Youngstown Sheet & Tube v. Sawyer .

But, this isn't just about hiding secrets. No, it is about an Administration in the White House that believes they have the right and even duty to lie outright to the US Congress (I already noted, in my last post, their refusal to accede to justifiable demands from the courts for copies of appropriate laws/regulations they created) as well. During Senate hearings last April concerning the renewal of the Patriot Act, Senator Barbara Mikulski asked Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and FBI Director Richard Mueller directly about the NSA spying on Americans, asking: "Can the National Security Agency, the great electronic snooper, spy on the American people?" "Generally," Mr. Mueller said, "I would say generally, they are not allowed to spy or to gather information on American citizens."

This is not the first time those speaking for the Administration have been caught lying to Congress outright. Clearly and demonstrably, those in this White House believe that they are above the Courts, above the Congress, and above the American people themselves, i.e. they believe they are above the Constitution. They obviously believe that, as long as they deem the matter vital enough, the President's War Powers make him a dictator of all matters foreign and domestic during wartime, simply by dearth of the fact that a war is in progress (although I doubt any Supreme Court would agree; see how President Truman faired, by going to the State Department's own site to check out the aforementioned Youngstown Sheet & Tube v. Sawyer or how the Supreme Court ruled on President Lincoln's illegal suspension of habeas corpus in Ex Parte Merryman). A war which they say is: everywhere, indeterminate, and indefinite. How convenient for them.

But this is hardly surprising, when one considers the pervasive and corrosive influence of unalloyed and unleavened Christian fundamentalism at play in this Administration. As former President Jimmy Carter has been quoted (and also makes clear in his newest book Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis) : "There is an element of fundamentalism involved, which involves the belief on the part of a human being that [his or her] own concept of God is the proper one. And since [he or she has] the proper concept of God, [he or she is] particularly blessed and singled out for special consideration above and beyond those who disagree with [him or her]. Secondly, anyone who does disagree with [him or her], since [he or she is] harnessed to God in a unique way, then, by definition, must be wrong." Crusades anyone? ..And you thought it was simply another Bush slip of the tongue when he called this War on Terror a Crusade (check out the original remarks on the White House's own site) or an understandable faux pas when the US Army General assigned to track down Usama Bin Laden, Lt. General Jeremy Boykin, called Islam evil and more? Silly you.

This turns a statement once made by Abraham Lincoln on its proverbial head. At a White House dinner, a minister from the North is said to have told the president, after the pre-dinner benediction, that he "hoped the Lord is on our side." Responded Lincoln, "I am not at all concerned about that," he replied, "for I know the Lord is always on the side of the right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord's side." That, my friends, as expressed by the Great Emancipator, is the true spirit of righteousness and introspection Christianity, and all just and true religions, asks of each person.

But, back to the legal playing field. If one accepts the Bush arguments, I guess the Judicial and Legislative branches should just wrap up shop until this White House declares the war is at an end? Oh, and you voters? If the war is still raging in 2008, perhaps it doesn't make any sense to vote in that year's Presidential Election either? Those voting provisions are also only Constitutional and the White House does, by their argument, make all the rules if we are engaged in a war.

I once took the commentary of former White House Plumber John Dean, that the Bush Administration was criminal, with a grain of salt. But today, I must agree with Dean that their pattern of abuses is far Worse than Watergate. They have reached a level of hubris and imperial disdain that makes the Nixon Administration's Watergate criminality look like cheating during a parlor game of Old Maid on The Waltons.

To add insult to injury, President Bush has now said that reporting the existence of this illegal spying operation is illegal. If that is so Mr. President, I hereby announce that I am intentionally revealing the existence of this program and calling it illegal. Feel free to file charges any time Mr Gonzales.

Well, the President began to learn some of the costs of violating the law while flouting the will and authority of Congress when his beloved Patriot Act provisions went down faster than his approval ratings, which is to say faster than a hooker on a Lake Minnetonka Vikings boat cruise.

What I really enjoy though is a President as Whiner in Chief. Bush signs a memorandum that violates US law, as well as Constitutional guarantees, and then complains about Congress not trusting him when his Administration says they will "respect the rights of Americans." Am I the only person who thinks that working in the White House these days must be akin to somehow falling into Superman's Bizarro World? The Administration argues that some members of Congress knew about the spying and therefore oversight was sufficient. This is the same Administration that is now prompting a Republican Senator to block legislation forcing the Administration to reveal to Congress where its secret prisons are? The depth of hypocrisy here is quite literally unfathomable.

To paraphrase Captain Willard from Apocalypse Now: "the shit pile(s) up so fast (from this White House) you need wings to stay above it."

"What! Would you make no distinction between hypocrisy and devotion? Would you give them the same names, and respect the mask as you do the face? Would you equate artifice and sincerity? Confound appearance with truth? Regard the phantom as the very person? Value counterfeit as cash?" - Molière, Tartuffe

Secret Wars, Secret Laws, Secret Warrants, Secret Courts, & Secret Prisons: The New America?

2005-12-13T14:21:00.000-05:00

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" - Benjamin Franklin, Pennsylvania Assembly: Reply to the Governor, November 11, 1755

It seems that, since 9/11, the Bush Administration has created laws and/or regulations to which the government says they may subject you, which at the same time they don't need to prove to you the existence of, or even show to the courts. This has come to light in the case of Gilmore v. Gonzalez (formerly, Gilmore v. Ashcroft), where the Government refused to show: an airline passenger, his defense attorney, or even a trial court, the regulation that required him to show identification. In other words, you could be held responsible for violating a secret law or regulation.

Secret laws..? 'How do I know if I might break one?' 'Oh, the police or other authorities tell me that there is such a law.' When I ask to see it, they say, "nope, it's secret"... If the government refuses to admit that a law exists, but reminds someone of some other non-secret public law, in a way or at a time that they know will likely lead that person to take actions that violate a secret law, that person is unaware of, how does one defend oneself? If the police lie to me during interrogation, as the Supreme Court says they may (see the section: Deceiving the Suspect), and cites a phony secret law to get me to confess to what I may believe is a lesser crime than is some secret law they say exists, what does that say about justice?

There goes the concept of notice (one example is the requirement of publishing a law before holding people to it) the courts have developed from the Fifth Amendment's due process clause and from the Fourth Amendment's implicit expectations of due process.. What happens if I violate a secret law that no-one could have known about UNTIL they actually violated it, if no officer told them they were about to violate it, for example?

Can you say "Spanish Inquisition?" (I only WISH this were simply a Monty Python skit instead of reality)

In the post 9/11 world, the US Government has created: secret warrants, secret subpoenas, secret courts & secret trials (reminiscent of the Star Chamber abolished by England in 1641), and secret jails. They've also tried to prevent access to attorneys to people that they hold prisoner (See also: US asks Judge to Deny Suspect Access to Lawyer).

The government has not won all these cases (See also: Judge tosses Detroit terror cases), so much for the idea that they would only use these mechanisms, procedures, and institutions against the assuredly guilty and the most dangerous of criminals. People have been held for years and been apologized to by judges in cases where supposed terrorists were found innocent. Now we need secret laws too? Is this justice? When do we stop being a truly democratic nation?

Does our Constitution no longer mean anything? Or is it simply what some Republican Congresspeople reportedly heard George W. Bush call it recently? "Simply a goddamn piece of paper?" (See also: Where There's Smoke... ).

The most basic provision of any JUST and civilized society is that the members of that society must be able to KNOW what the rules are and verify them. When the laws are secret, how does one do that? It sounds like "Double Secret Probation" from Animal House, or, on a more sinister note, The Trial by Franz Kafka.

Let me be clear, I have less problems than does Mr. Gilmore with the government making someone show ID to allow them to fly on an airliner. I find that a reasonable request given security concerns. I DO, though, have a HUGE problem with ANY government saying they have secret regulations that mandate something that the public is expected to adhere to, and that they then tell the very same public that they, for whatever reason, cannot be allowed to even see those regulations. In my mind, there is no logical reason not to simply establish a public rule/law to accomplish the goal of requiring one to show identification to take a commercial airline flight. That is, of course, unless one is PURPOSELY trying to set a precedent allowing the government to establish secret laws for the violation of which a citizen might: lose some right to liberty/property, be detained, fined, arrested, or even jailed. That's a VERY scary prospect.

Thomas Jefferson told us that: "Free government is founded in jealousy, not confidence. It is jealousy and not confidence which prescribes limited constitutions, to bind those we are obliged to trust with power.... In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in men, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."

As recognized by the Founding Fathers, in the Sixth Amendment, a public system of justice is one of the most axiomatic guarantees of our rights and freedoms. Limitations on secretive "justice" are a Constitutional constraint intended to ensure that government itself is just. A secret system of justice is simply unjust and inconsistent with any conceptualization of a free society.

But, perhaps the words of Jefferson are considered too distant, from a simpler time, and out of date? Therefore, I ask you to also consider the words of a more recent President, speaking amidst the dangers of the Cold War, who said: “You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man's age-old dream -- the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order -- or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path... ..The American people recognize that it is the denial of human rights, not their advocacy, that is the source of world tension." A Time for Choosing, Ronald Reagan

Have we already forsaken and forgotten all we once believed in and stood for? Have we covered and shuttered the beacon that once shone from this lighthouse for liberty and the rights of all humankind?

Yes, we are engaged in a war of sorts with those who would destroy the societies we cherish, but have there not always been those who would do so? Yes, we are right and just to defend our societies, but we must also temper that defense with the knowledge that, as Thomas Paine put it: "The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes."

Keith

"Just some guy," caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo Publications), at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSON_Printers/
and the Multiverse's largest Canon printer User Community at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Canon-printers
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together guys"

American Culture Wars: Christmas, the Holidays, and the "War on Tolerance and Diversity"

2005-12-11T07:35:00.000-05:00

Two weeks exactly till Christmas and I'm getting REALLY tired of DittoHeads, fans of The O'Reilly Factor, and their fellow travelers talking about a supposed "War on Christmas." They're worried about whether a store clerk says "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" when over 2000 American servicepeople have died in a REAL war in Iraq? They're kidding right? To extrapolate: whether the vendor calls a tree I drag into my house a "Christmas Tree" or a "Holiday Tree," is worthy of as much of their attention as Americans dying in combat half a world from home? To say I am dumbfounded is an understatement.

But, ok, let's discuss this shall we?

First out of the box, I should mention that FOX's own online store sells "Christmas Ornaments" strangely called "Holiday Ornaments." Until recently, even the "Christmas Balls" on O'Reilly's own portion of the site, and the FOX "Christmas Balls" were called "Holiday Balls." Do I smell the offensive scent of hypocrisy wafting off of the commercial offal heap that is FOX's so-called "News Operation?"

Moreover, I question the reality perceived by these individuals whom I might describe as: "homophones of residents of the Isle of Crete." If one looks at recent court rulings, municipalities actually have MORE latitude to erect sectarian Christmas displays, as long as they also include things like a secular plastic Snowman and Tree as well, than they had during the 90s. Did I mention that Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, guarantor of the right to exercise negative racial bias in hiring and promotion, self-described opponent of Roe v. Wade, and defender of in school proselytizers of public grade school children, wrote one of these pro-Christmas rulings? (NJ v. Schundler) Is anyone surprised at how this issue of the "War on Christmas" is suddenly the right-wing cause celebré in advance of Alito's confirmation hearings? Does anyone doubt an increasingly marginalized Bush Administration with poll numbers in the 30's would try to use Christmas as political smokescreen, that no-one could seemingly in fairness oppose, to hide issues of real import that are pummeling the President's numbers; a position that, at the same time, seeks to also galvanize their core constituency into lock-step support of Judge Alito's nomination? Rememember, these are the same guys whose campaign brought us those requests for the mailing lists of 1600 Pennsylvania churches during the 2004 Presidential election.

Let's be honest about this, Alito is an unabashed apologist for whatever policy the majority happens to whim. He even wrote a dissenting opinion in one case that, if it had been the opinion, would have ostensibly allowed prayer in school if the students voted for it. He sees Constitutional limits on the power of government or the actions of individuals as extremely narrowly circumscribed.

But I see an 800 pound gorilla in all this discussion of the "War on Christmas," and it's a particularly OLD and UGLY 800 pound gorilla. What's really going on is not a "War on Christmas" but a "War Against Tolerance and Diversity" - a war against those who are different from ourselves, or more specifically different from the majority, and this hype over the holiday season eventuating an attack on Christmas is just another battle in that larger war. The fact is that no court or government has limited private individuals in their Christmas displays, no-one has been arrested or fined for saying "Merry Christmas," nor have the courts, or government more broadly, limited the rights of any church/congregation to hold Christmas services or put sectarian displays on their property. What the courts have said is that the majority cannot simply expect the government they elect to be able to display and endorse the religious beliefs of those who elect them. To do so, would infringe on the rights of the minority and make them outsiders. The courts have essentially said, you can't simply spend tax dollars or use government property for these displays because the tax dollars supporting this come from Christians and non-Christians alike.

The reality is that this is all simply another side-battle in the larger "culture wars." On one side, traditionalist white Christians predominate, whose concept of the United States is axiomatically that of a white, northern European descended, Christian nation. Those on that side believe that, instead of diversity and protecting the minority, we should be encouraging the minority to simply accept the same viewpoint and cultural values, even if that means using state power and money to do so. These are often the same people who see immigrants from non-European lands as alien and threatening to the jobs of "real Americans." On the other side of the issue, we see many of differing religions, a polyglot of cultural backgrounds, and even some atheists. They are those who believe that this nation's strength and future prosperity has always lay in its ability to: assimilate diversity, draw upon the strengths and uniqueness of varying cultures, incorporate new values/cultural traditions, and become stronger thereby. In the final analysis, it is a classic political rearguard action of a majoritarian coalition that is facing change protected by the Constitution. It is the cry of those looking for a pastoral utopian all-Christian-all-the-time America which never existed, as they see the status quo ante threatened by change they don't understand, dislike, and even fear. Reactionary political movements like this always threaten the freedom of the individual and must be opposed by anyone who truly supports the true core American values of tolerance and freedom.

Additionally, if FOX and its ilk TRULY believed in the meaning and spirit of Christmas, they would be opposing the utter commercialism of the Holiday/Christmas Season by refusing to be a part of the commercialization of Christmas. I wouldn't suggest anyone holding their breath. FOX's own website and shows send exactly the opposite message, endorsing and supporting that over-commercialisation, to the detriment of the real human and/or sectarian message of Christmas and Christ, in almost every conceivable sense.

Lastly, to be linguistically and philosophically whole, I must ask: "what is so offensive about the phrase 'Happy Holidays'"? Christmas IS a Holiday during the "Holiday Season." From a simply logical standpoint, if Christmas is a subset of the set of holidays, saying "Happy Holidays" during the season in which Christmas occurs, implicitly means, among other things: "Merry Christmas." Just don't expect the neanderthals wearing reactionary blinders, as they fight the cultural war of their generation, to understand that.

Merry Christmas AND Happy Holidays to all!

Keith

"Just some guy," caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo Publications), at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSON_Printers/
and the Multiverse's largest Canon printer User Community at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Canon-printers
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together guys"

UK Enforcing NeoCon Groupthink by Criminalizing Free Speech

2005-12-10T17:06:00.000-05:00

Our most basic democratic principle of government: the understanding that government and politics are merely constructs of the governed, is being sacrificed daily in pursuit of expediency in the name of victory. Freedom of speech and the principle of consent of the governed are more and more often being trammelled, and even trampled daily, as a matter of course.

In the latest dispatch from the front lines, we learn the following from the pages of Britain's Daily Mail newspaper:

"Maya Anne Evans, a 25-year-old cook, became the first person to be prosecuted under the law which bans unauthorised demonstrations within one kilometre of Westminster after reciting the names of British soldiers killed in Iraq outside the gates of Downing Street...

..She was found guilty of breaching Section 132 of the Act, given a conditional discharge and ordered to pay £100 towards costs.

The vegan cook from Hastings, Sussex, was arrested on October 25 as she stood next to the Cenotaph, outside Downing Street, reading out the names of 97 British soldiers killed in Iraq."

As a BBC NEWS documentary, concerning the NeoCons and Radical Islamists, still effectively banned in the United States, has put it: such is "The Power of Nightmares" in a world where we allow fear to dominate our civic lives, that those with the darkest imaginations become the most powerful.

I urge anyone with an open mind to view this documentary, and/or read the associated online content. The series may be downloaded at no cost from here: http://www.archive.org/details/ThePowerOfNightmares

Welcome to what was formerly Mr. Orwell's purely literary nightmare. Your clock has now been synchronized to read 1984.

Keith

"Just some guy," caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo Publications), at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSON_Printers/
and the Multiverse's largest Canon printer User Community at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Canon-printers
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together guys"

A sharp real world rejoinder...

2005-12-10T17:02:00.000-05:00

.. from the streets of Iraq, to those who might posit that philosophy, and particularly ethics, are marginal, near irrelevant, and/or cloistered pursuits.

I point to the following from a Los Angeles Times piece on the death of an American Military Ethicist, and West Point Professor, in Iraq - a death apparently brought on by an irresolvable collision between moral imperatives and the real world predominance of cold hard cash in unfettered capitalism.

"'Despite his intelligence, his ability to grasp the idea that profit is an important goal for people working in the private sector was surprisingly limited,' wrote Lt. Col. Lisa Breitenbach. 'He could not shift his mind-set from the military notion of completing a mission irrespective of cost, nor could he change his belief that doing the right thing because it was the right thing to do should be the sole motivator for businesses.'

One military officer said he felt Westhusing had trouble reconciling his ideals with Iraq's reality. Iraq 'isn't a black-and-white place,' the officer said. 'There's a lot of gray.'"

While some may see his suicide as driven by some psychological fault, his inability to sacrifice consistent ethics for economic or political expediency, I am heartened to some degree that, apparently, in the US Military I had once been proud to serve in, unlike the Israeli scholar who visited during Derek Parfit's portion of the syllabus of one of my current graduate courses in philosophy, some Americans, even when faced with the harsh realities of the MidEastern political and social landscape, cannot abide by a simple calculus whereby the ultimate or more immediate motivations of police officers are irrelevant, so long as they "get the bad guys off the streets."

Sometimes, the brutal force of economics, and reality, may ask us to sacrifice too much of the core values that make us ethically decent or laudable individuals, or even too much of our central moral tenets as a society. When Colin Powell, Wesley Clark, and others have argued against military and political policies (i.e.: pre-emptive war without imminent threat, prosecution of a war with reference to a real world jus ad bellum, and sacrificing elementary ethical principles in the pursuit of victory or profit) that run counter to our supposed core American principles, those of us who, when serving had internalized the ethical constructs or truly just behavior understood them as not simply speaking to a loss to the image of the United States and its military in the eyes of the world, nor simply to the dangers of retaliation by one's military adversaries such policies might bring about, some of us who had served, or whom serve today, understood the danger inherent to a post-Vietnam officer-corps steeped in a belief in the inviolability of honorable and ethical behavior when posited against empirical expediency. The toll extracted is not purely theoretical or academic. but an incoherence, a schizophrenia if you will, that threatens to rend the or unseat our firmest convictions and/or the very ethical underpinnings that make our society and/or our individual actions just.

What many who have not served in the post-Vietnam American military often fail to understand is that the spirit of ethical rightness and moral imperative, that drove John Kerry as a young veteran, and countless others who served, to oppose the tactics and prosecution of the war in Vietnam, so personally and vehemently that they felt incontrovertibly compelled to literally throw back their ribbons and medals at the Pentagon, had become, to a great extent part of the ethical fabric of the American Officer Corps. When placed in that context, the calls of Marine Veteran and conservative Democratic Congressman John Murtha, following a recent trip to Iraq where he met with senior military officers, to withdraw from Iraq or risk untold damage, was not simply the expression of marginal or peripheral qualms of a man worried about the obvious human and financial costs to our military of continuing along our current path in Iraq. No, his voice was that of the proverbial canary in the coal mine, warning of an ethical incoherence so deeply troubling that it threatens to: as began to happen during Vietnam, leave our military, both as individuals and communally, adrift upon a nihilistic existential and amoral sea, with no ethical rudder nor anchor. To accede to no greater guiding principle other than might IS right. Such a disjunction between beliefs we internalize as essential to our concept of self and membership in a just society, is far more destructive to our military than open public debate of the Iraq war might be to the morale of our military community, and will bear poisonous fruit, both within our military community and across our society more generally, for years to come.

As Albert Camus and the French nation learned so painfully in Algeria, and we should recall as part of the legacy of our own communal experience in IndoChina, philosophy, and more particularly ethics, is not simply some sheltered esoteric or academic pursuit practiced by geeks and gadflies, with time to waste, from the parapets of some "ivory tower." It is not simply some sort of disconnected debate over how many angels can stand upon the head of a pin. It is an imperative pursuit central to our very concept of who we are as individuals, a civilization, a race, or our planet.

Keith

"Just some guy," caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo Publications), at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSON_Printers/
and the Multiverse's largest Canon printer User Community at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Canon-printers
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together guys"