|
|
Thursday, May 12, 2005
|
|
| |
Mark Green: Bush, Practice What You Export Earlier
this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested that America look
at its own democracy before lecturing others -- and several of my
fellow bloggers wondered how Democrats can fight back. Okay, here's how
to combine these two opening week themes: in the run-up to the '06
elections, Democrats should a) challenge W to practice what he preaches
and b) propose a "Contract with Democracy" to show how it can be done.
The religious far (f)right, big business, and Bush & Co. have
become profoundly authoritarian -- waving the flag even as they betray
its principles. From voter suppression in Ohio and Florida to shutting
off access to courts to legislative tyranny in D.C. to religious
tyranny in the public square to the system of money-shouts in D.C. (and
state capitals), our democracy is under a slow siege.
Time to connect these and other dots and establish a new definition
of radical -- it's no longer long-haired anti-war protestors in the 60s
but short-haired guys in suits in the 00's who, from James Dobson to
John Bolton to Tom DeLay to Antonin Scalia, are extremists who practice
the politics of intolerance. So when they don't like the rules, they
want to change the rules -- whether it involves torture, House ethics,
living wills, the filibuster, or Bush v. Gore.
These guys are worse than McCarthy. Tailgunner Joe may have been a
more ugly drunk, BUT he couldn't invade the wrong country or appoint
legal cranks to lifetime appointments or deny women the right to choose.
Senators Clinton and Kerry, among others, are making a good start to
fight back on the democracy front with their "Count Every Vote" Act.
National and local progressive groups should build on that to make sure
that average Americans understand that Democrats are in the mainstream
and Bush-DeLay Republicans are in the extreme when it comes to those
democratic values that distinguish our American experiment.
In the next election, a dividing line should not be simply stale
left-right distinctions but who's pro-democracy and who's
anti-democracy. Time to get back on offense. - Mark Green (Markgreen02@aol.com)
[The Huffington Post | Full Blog Feed]
6:10:00 PM 
|
|
Assault This. Is the military run by secular liberals? Apparently.
Describing some sort of "assault on Christians", Stones Cry Out
embodies the hysterical persecution complex of the Christian right in a
citation from from a former Air Force officer:
"I totally disagree with what they're saying. I
applaud any chaplain that would encourage students to know the Lord.
This is a free country, even in the military. If I did experience a
bias in the Air Force, it was against Christians. Now, while we do have
Christians at the Academy and in the Air Force, it's definitely a
minority."
Here is the accomodation code for religion in the U.S. Military. It doesn't allow for proselytizing. It is, however, highly accomodating to any personal
expressions of worship, which is why it's so awful for conservative
Christians (I'd assume in a nation of 80% Christians, the Air Force
isn't the second home to atheists that Clemmons makes it out to be,
which means he's simply denying the Christianity of a significant
portion of his fellow recruits). It treats personal faith as something personal to be respected both by the administration and your fellow soldiers - it doesn't treat it as one big evangelical clusterfuck.
There is no assault on Christians. None. It's a ridiculous and ignorant statement to make, particularly as this blogger sums up his piece with a description of the large chapel
in the middle of the Air Force Academy. The purpose of the military's
position on religion is to provide a space where you are free to
practice whatever faith you adhere to - it's only an "assault" if you
possess the unique egotism of the Christian Right that they deserve
rights above and beyond what any other adherent possesses. [Pandagon]
12:08:28 PM
|
|
What Is Wrong With Republicans?. Sen. Voinovich says this:
All things being equal, it is my proclivity to support
the president's nominee. However, in this case, all things are not
equal. It's a different world today than it was four years ago. Our
enemies are Muslim extremists and religious fanatics who have hijacked
the Koran and have convinced people that the way to get to Heaven is
through jihad against the world, particularly the U.S. We must
recognize that to be successful in this war, one of our most important
tools is public diplomacy.
After hours of deliberation, telephone calls, personal
conversations, reading hundreds of pages of transcripts and asking for
guidance from above, I have come to the determination that the United
States can do better than John Bolton.
... and then he's going to vote for him. Spineless. Simply, absolutely, spineless. [Oliver Willis - Like Kryptonite To Stupid]
12:07:26 PM
|
|
Cheers and Jeers: Thursday.
From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE... Hell hath no fury like a Mainer scorned...
"I am writing to express my outrage at the current state of politics in
this country. Conservative Republicans are pandering so hard to the
religious right that they are now framing all opposition to their
policies as an attack on `people of faith.' "The current battle
over the use of the filibuster in the judicial confirmation process is
an example of this. What happened to the concept of the loyal
opposition? Opponents of Bush and his right-wing supporters love this
country just as much as the radical right professes to do. No political
party or religious group has the right to claim that God is exclusively
on its side! "The founding fathers must be rolling in their graves with this recent turn in American politics..." (David L.---Portland)
"These right-wing religious extremists ... would have us believe that
those who favor the filibuster (against ultra-conservative judicial
nominees) are opposed to religion. "I want to remind them of
what Maine Sen. George Mitchell said to Oliver North during the
Iran-Contra hearings back in 1987: "Remember that it is possible for an
American to disagree with you on aid to the Contras and still love God
and still love this country just as much as you do." "People who
disagree with conservatives on the issues of the filibuster and ending
discrimination against Maine's citizens should not be denounced as
unpatriotic, un-Christian or anti-religious. We are people of faith who believe in God and love our country deeply. Please remember that." (Haven J.---Pownal) From today's Portland Press Herald Cheers and Jeers prays for sanity in There's Moreville... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
[Daily Kos]
9:25:11 AM
|
|
Oh, That Again?
Bush's plan to spread
freedom and democracy has evidently convinced these beneficiaries of
it:
"Four protesters were killed and more than 60 injured Wednesday in the
eastern city of Jalalabad as the police and troops struggled to contain
the worst anti-American demonstrations in Afghanistan in the more than
three years since the fall of the Taliban.
Government officials said the violence appeared...
- Riggsveda [corrente]
6:44:15 AM
|
|
Jim Lampley: To Byron York and Other Ostriches
Byron York has treated me fairly and without rancor, and I am grateful
for that. Certainly I am more in his wheelhouse than mine, and I'm
honored that he saw fit to engage me in this little set-to we've
conducted since Monday. I fired a lead right, Rep. John Conyers shouted
encouragement from my corner, then York delivered a hook to the body. I
shot back an uppercut, then he loaded up a right hand and attempted to
bring an end to the discussion.
Byron York's most recent refutation of my charge that
irregularities in the 2004 Presidential election demand criminal
investigation cites quotes from the report of Edison/Mitofsky, the
two-company partnership which provided exit polls to the major
television networks, on the vast discrepancies between those polls and
the official results of the election. The report, which Mr. York has
helpfully highlighted in his second post and which runs to about eighty
pages, essentially offered the conclusion that an five-and-a-half point
gap between final poll numbers and the national popular vote
tabulation-- a variance more than four times the statistical margin for
error of 1.3%-- can be attributed to shy Republicans. The Washington
Post summarized the conclusion: "procedural problems compounded by the
refusal of large numbers of Republican voters to be surveyed led to
inflated estimates of support for John Kerry." With this, in effect,
York dismisses the exit poll variance argument.
I could go on at length here about the curious disconnect between
the actual data in the report and its guesswork conclusion, how
Edison/Mitofsky systematically validate all their sampling choices and
their methodology, in effect eliminating any logical underpinnings for
their ultimate summation, all the while selectively ignoring the
lopsided skewing of pro-Bush discrepancies in the most critical swing
states. I could spend some time dissecting what I believe is an obvious
whitewash, a delicate sidestep away from the potential public relations
disaster of being tied forever to the most notorious election theft in
history.
But none of that is necessary, because the entire Edison/Mitofsky
report is irrelevant to the argument, given that it is based on the
assumption the final official vote tally is accurate. Make no mistake:
my argument is that the final official vote tally is anything but
accurate, that it is the product of massive vote fraud carried out
through the programing of Diebold voting machines and various other
machinations aimed at suppressing, destroying or losing Kerry votes. My
argument is that what were accurate were the exit polls. As one Ivy League research methodologist
has noted, "Apparently the pollsters at Mitofsky and Edison have found
it more expedient to provide an explanation unsupported by theory, data
or precedent than to impugn the machinery of American democracy."
Various statisticians
have reported that the odds on the occurrence of variances from exit
polls to actual results as were produced in this election range up to
959 000 to 1. As US Count Votes notes in a statistical abstract, "No
matter how one calculates it, the discrepancy cannot be attributed to
chance."
So let me put it in Foxspeak. If all the circumstantial evidence
related to potential vote fraud in this election were gathered up into
one big file for the Scott Peterson jury, they'd convict. The jury that
might look at all this and acquit? O.J. Simpson. Politics make strange
bedfellows.
- Jim Lampley
[The Huffington Post | Full Blog Feed]
6:08:50 AM
|
|
|
|
© Copyright
2005
Michael Mussington.
Last update:
6/1/2005; 1:34:12 AM.
|
|
|
