Saturday, February 26, 2005
The Implications of Negroponte
Make no mistake about it: Mr. Negroponte represents the use of force, of violence, to cower opponents to the philosophies he subscribes to, and, there are many more like him influencing and controlling the direction of this nation at this time.
The huge silence emanating form the blogosphere on Negroponte is like a vast, left-wing conspiracy of denial, conscious or unconscious. Is it that we don't want to see where we are headed?
People are being positioned in various roles in this administration, with something in mind, folks. Negroponte represents the values of this administration. Chief of Intelligence, and the kind of intelligence that represents the reasons for everything this administration does. And it doesn't have much to do with intelligence.
It has everything to do with the use of coercion, torture, lies, deceit, slander, violence to the body and violence to the soul.
We must oppose Negroponte.
Wake up, blogosphere!
According to a 1997 CIA inspector general's report, U.S. officials in Honduras were aware of serious violations of human rights by the Honduran military during the 1980s but did not adequately report this to Congress. A heavily redacted version of the report notes particularly that the U.S. Embassy suppressed sensitive data during Negroponte's time there.
I am especially concerned about the disappearance of two U.S. citizens--Father James "Guadalupe" Carney and David Arturo Baez Cruz--during Negroponte's tenure. Carney had come to Honduras in 1983 as a chaplain to a revolutionary group, which included Baez Cruz, a Nicaraguan American who had served in the U.S. special forces. The group was captured by the Honduran army, and Carney "disappeared" along with nearly all of the 96 members of the group.
The huge silence emanating form the blogosphere on Negroponte is like a vast, left-wing conspiracy of denial, conscious or unconscious. Is it that we don't want to see where we are headed?
People are being positioned in various roles in this administration, with something in mind, folks. Negroponte represents the values of this administration. Chief of Intelligence, and the kind of intelligence that represents the reasons for everything this administration does. And it doesn't have much to do with intelligence.
It has everything to do with the use of coercion, torture, lies, deceit, slander, violence to the body and violence to the soul.
We must oppose Negroponte.
Wake up, blogosphere!
According to a 1997 CIA inspector general's report, U.S. officials in Honduras were aware of serious violations of human rights by the Honduran military during the 1980s but did not adequately report this to Congress. A heavily redacted version of the report notes particularly that the U.S. Embassy suppressed sensitive data during Negroponte's time there.
I am especially concerned about the disappearance of two U.S. citizens--Father James "Guadalupe" Carney and David Arturo Baez Cruz--during Negroponte's tenure. Carney had come to Honduras in 1983 as a chaplain to a revolutionary group, which included Baez Cruz, a Nicaraguan American who had served in the U.S. special forces. The group was captured by the Honduran army, and Carney "disappeared" along with nearly all of the 96 members of the group.
# posted by scorpiorising : 7:17 AM |
Meet Mr. Negroponte, our next, and first U.S. Director of National Intelligence?
From Wikipedia:
From 1981 to 1985 Negroponte was the U.S. ambassador to Honduras. During his tenure, he oversaw the growth of military aid to Honduras from $4 million to $77.4 million a year. At the time, Honduras was ruled by an elected but heavily militarily-influenced government. According to The New York Times, Negroponte was allegedly involved in "carrying out the covert strategy of the Reagan administration to crush the Sandinistas government in Nicaragua." Critics say that during his ambassadorship, human rights violations in Honduras became systematic.
Negroponte supervised the construction of the El Aguacate air base where Nicaraguan Contras were trained by the U.S., and which some critics say was used as a secret detention and torture center during the 1980s. In August 2001, excavations at the base discovered 185 corpses, including two Americans, who are thought to have been killed and buried at the site.
Records also show that a special intelligence unit (commonly referred to as a "death squad") of the Honduran armed forces, Battalion 3-16, trained by the CIA and the Argentine military, kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of people, including U.S. missionaries. Critics charge that Negroponte knew about these human rights violations and yet continued to collaborate with the Honduran military while lying to Congress.
In May 1982, a nun, Sister Laetitia Bordes, who had worked for ten years in El Salvador, went on a fact-finding delegation to Honduras to investigate the whereabouts of thirty Salvadoran nuns and women of faith who fled to Honduras in 1981 after Archbishop Óscar Romero's assassination. Negroponte claimed the embassy knew nothing. However, in a 1996 interview with the Baltimore Sun, Negroponte's predecessor, Jack Binns, said that a group of Salvadorans, among whom were the women Bordes had been looking for, were captured on April 22, 1981, and savagely tortured by the DNI, the Honduran Secret Police, and then later thrown out of helicopters alive.
From 1981 to 1985 Negroponte was the U.S. ambassador to Honduras. During his tenure, he oversaw the growth of military aid to Honduras from $4 million to $77.4 million a year. At the time, Honduras was ruled by an elected but heavily militarily-influenced government. According to The New York Times, Negroponte was allegedly involved in "carrying out the covert strategy of the Reagan administration to crush the Sandinistas government in Nicaragua." Critics say that during his ambassadorship, human rights violations in Honduras became systematic.
Negroponte supervised the construction of the El Aguacate air base where Nicaraguan Contras were trained by the U.S., and which some critics say was used as a secret detention and torture center during the 1980s. In August 2001, excavations at the base discovered 185 corpses, including two Americans, who are thought to have been killed and buried at the site.
Records also show that a special intelligence unit (commonly referred to as a "death squad") of the Honduran armed forces, Battalion 3-16, trained by the CIA and the Argentine military, kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of people, including U.S. missionaries. Critics charge that Negroponte knew about these human rights violations and yet continued to collaborate with the Honduran military while lying to Congress.
In May 1982, a nun, Sister Laetitia Bordes, who had worked for ten years in El Salvador, went on a fact-finding delegation to Honduras to investigate the whereabouts of thirty Salvadoran nuns and women of faith who fled to Honduras in 1981 after Archbishop Óscar Romero's assassination. Negroponte claimed the embassy knew nothing. However, in a 1996 interview with the Baltimore Sun, Negroponte's predecessor, Jack Binns, said that a group of Salvadorans, among whom were the women Bordes had been looking for, were captured on April 22, 1981, and savagely tortured by the DNI, the Honduran Secret Police, and then later thrown out of helicopters alive.
# posted by scorpiorising : 7:12 AM |
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Is this a terrorist organization?
This came to me via this diary on Dailykos, from the organization Americans United for Seperation of Church and State. This has all the makings of conspiracy theory, and it involves members of Congress. I wasn't going to do this, but the diary does such a good job of referencing, that I copied the whole damn thing, in the interest of preserving our republic. You must visit the diary, by the way, to use all of the excellent links he provided :
Sith Lords of the Ultra-Right
by Steven D
Tue Feb 22nd, 2005 at 12:55:24 PST
"We are no longer working to preserve the status quo. We are radicals, working to overturn the present power structure in this country." Paul Weyrich
Got your attention? Good, because this is important.
More below the fold . . .
Update: In the interest of moving the conversation off the title, and so people can send this as a link without worrying about being labeled anti-semetic, I've changed the title. I appreciate all those who defended my original title, but I'd like the focus kept on the information presented and what we can do to counter the influence of this group.
Diaries :: Steven D's diary ::
Ever wonder how the right always seems so coordinated in the strategy. How all the multitude of organizations they've created all seem to use the same playbook? How they all manage to focus on the same talking points each day, day after day, year after year. Well it's no accident. But how do they do it?
The answer my friends lies in a little known organization with the innocuous sounding name The Council for National Policy. Don't go looking for an official website because you won't find one. In fact this "think tank" goes out of its way to avoid publicity:
When a top U.S. senator receives a major award from a national advocacy organization, it's standard procedure for both the politician and the group to eagerly tell as many people about it as possible.
Press releases spew from fax machines and e-mails clog reporters' in-boxes. The news media are summoned in the hope that favorable stories will appear in the newspapers, on radio and on television.
It was odd, therefore, that when U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) accepted a "Thomas Jefferson Award" from a national group at the Plaza Hotel in New York City in August, the media weren't notified. In fact, they weren't welcome to attend.
"The media should not know when or where we meet or who takes part in our programs, before or after a meeting," reads one of the cardinal rules of the organization that honored Frist. The membership list of this group is "strictly confidential." Guests can attend only with the unanimous approval of the organization's executive committee. The group's leadership is so secretive that members are told not to refer to it by name in e-mail messages. Anyone who breaks the rules can be tossed out.
What is this group, and why is it so determined to avoid the public spotlight?
That answer is the Council for National Policy (CNP). And if the name isn't familiar to you, don't be surprised. That's just what the Council wants.
The CNP was founded in 1981 as an umbrella organization of right-wing leaders who would gather regularly to plot strategy, share ideas and fund causes and candidates to advance the far-right agenda. Twenty-three years later, it is still secretly pursuing those goals with amazing success.
Since its founding, the tax-exempt organization has been meeting three times a year. Members have come and gone, but all share something in common: They are powerful figures, drawn from both the Religious Right and the anti-government, anti-tax wing of the ultra-conservative movement.
It may sound like a far-left conspiracy theory, but the CNP is all too real and, its critics would argue, all too influential.
What amazes most CNP opponents is the group's ability to avoid widespread public scrutiny. Despite nearly a quarter century of existence and involvement by wealthy and influential political figures, the CNP remains unknown to most Americans. Operating out of a non-descript office building in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Fairfax, Va., the organization has managed to keep an extremely low profile an amazing feat when one considers the people the CNP courts.
Sounds a little tin foil hattish to you? Trust me it gets worse. Founded in 1981, its first president was Tim LaHaye famed millenialist preacher and writer of the Left Behind series of popular books about the "end-times" and the Second Coming of Christ. He was also a co-founder of the Moral Majority. In the 1980s he headed the American Coalition for Traditional Values. While heading that group, LaHaye said, "If every Bible-believing, Christ-loving church would trust God to raise up an average of just one person over the next 10 years who would get elected, we would have more Christian candidates than there are offices."
A list of former and past members reads like a who's who of conservative Christian Right activists, anti-tax and anti-government activists, billionaire right wing philanthropists and GOP office holders, past and present: Here's a partial list (as of 1998) assembled from this website:
Right Wing Religious Leaders:
Dr. Tim LaHaye, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Dobson (Focus on the Family), Howard Ahmanson (Christian Reconstructionist), Rev. Donald Wildmon (American Family Association), David W. Breese (Christian Identity), William R. Bright (International Christian Leadership University), Robert P. Dugan Jr. (National Association of Evangelicals), Robert Grant (Christian Voice), Haldeman "Hal" W. Guffey (International Ministries Fellowship), Sara DiVito Hardman (Christian Coalition of California), Seamus Hasson (Becket Fund for Religious Liberty), Donald Paul Hodel (Christian Coalition), James B. Jacobson (Christian Solidarity International), Bob Jones III (Bob Jones University), Ed McAteer (Religious Roundtable, Inc.), Dal Shealy (Fellowship of Christian Athletes), John A. Stormer (I Chronicles 12:32 Ministries and authour of None Dare Call it Treason famous McCarthyite anti-communist screed), Jay Strack (Christian motivational speaker, former appointee to "Just say no" drug task force).
Right Wing Media and Communications:
L. Brent Bozell III (Media Research Center), Stuart W. Epperson (Salem Communications Corporation), Tracy Freeny (AmeriVision Communications, Inc.),Reed Irvine (Accuracy in Media), Mark Maddoux (USA Radio Network), Pat Matrisciana (Jeremiah Films), James D. McCotter (Media Management Group, Inc.), Liz McCotter (Channel 26 Orlando), Patrick B. McGuigan (The Daily Oklahoman), Sam Moore (Thomas Nelson Publishers), Thomas L. Phillips (Phillips Publishing International), Larry W. Poland (Mastermedia International, Inc.) , Gerry Snyder (member of editorial board, Valley Views, a conservative weekly newspaper), Bill Tierney (Capital Communications, Inc.), George Uribe II (Uribe Communications and former political director of Alan Keyes for President).
Businessmen, Lobbyists, Lawyers and Political Consultants:
Gary Jarmin (Jar-Mon Consultants), David Keene (American Conservative Union), Larry Klayman (Judicial Watch), Mark R. Levin (Landmark Legal Foundation), Christopher Long (Friess Assoc.), Edward A. Lozick (Nerts, Inc.), Edith D. Hakola (National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation), Carolyn Malenick (Triad Management Services, Inc.), Thomas E. McCabe (Killion McCabe & Associates), Dana Meese (Deloitte & Tousche Consulting Group), Eugene Meyer(Federalist Society), Ralph Reed (Century Strategies), William Bradford Reynolds, Jay A. Sekulow (American Center for Law and Justice), Kyle Stallings (Permian Basin Acquisition Fund), Allen Stevens (Capital Insurance Services of Mississippi), Christine Vollmer (Aragua Services - K Street lobbyist), Jack Webb (Jack Webb & Assoc.), Somers White (Somers White Co.).
Funders of Conservative Causes:
Nelson Bunker Hunt (of the famed Texas based family of oil tycoons), Various members of the Coors' family (Beer Barons), Richard DeVos (Amway founder), Pierre S. duPont IV.
GOP Politicos:
Former Sen. Jesse Helms; Dick Armey and Tom Delay (GOP Congressional leaders); Gary Bauer, Ed Meese, William G. Batchelder III (Congressman), Dan Burton (Congressman), John Doolittle (Congressman), Robert K. Dornan, Sen. D. M. "Lauch" Faircloth, Ernest J. Istook (Congressman), Sen. Jon Kyl, Sen. Trent Lott, Sen. Don Nickles, Tom Patterson (AZ State Sen.), Tony Perkins (La. State Rep.), H. L. Richardson (CA State Sen.), Tom Riner Jr. (KY State Sen.), David C. Schultheis (CO State Rep.), Gov. John H. Sununu, Gov. Tommy G. Thompson.
Conservative apparatchiks:
Paul Weyrich (Free Congress Foundation, etc.), Howard Phillip (Conservative Caucus), Larry Pratt (Gun Owners of America ); Oliver North; Richard Viguerie (direct mail wizard), Morton C. Blackwell (Leadership Institute), Henry F. Cooper (High Frontier), Edwin J. Feulner Jr. (Heritage Foundation), Peter Flaherty (National Legal and Policy Center), Stephen Goodrick (National Right to Work Committee), Lon Mabon (U.S. Citizen's Alliance), Raymond Moore (Moore Foundation), Henry M. Morris (Institute for Creation Science), Grover Norquist, Phillip Olsen (Family Research Council), Phyllis Schlafly (Eagle Forum), John K. Singlaub, LaNeil Wright Spivy (Eagle Forum), Lt. General Gordon Sumner Jr. (Connected to various org. associated with Rev. Moon).
And what was the ultimate goals of this organization? Well, they stated them pretty clearly early on:
In the summer of 1981, Woody Jenkins, a former Louisiana state lawmaker who served as the group's first executive director, told Newsweek bluntly, "One day before the end of this century, the Council will be so influential that no president, regardless of party or philosophy, will be able to ignore us or our concerns or shut us out of the highest levels of government."
From the beginning, the CNP sought to merge two strains of far-right thought: the theocratic Religious Right with the low-tax, anti-government wing of the GOP. The theory was that the Religious Right would provide the grassroots activism and the muscle. The other faction would put up the money.
The CNP has always reflected this two-barreled approach. The group's first president was LaHaye, then president of Family Life Seminars in El Cajon Calif. LaHaye, a fundamentalist Baptist preacher who went on in the 1990s to launch the popular "Left Behind" series of apocalyptic potboilers, was an early anti-gay crusader and frequent basher of public education and he still is today.
* * *
Bringing together the two strains of the far right gave the CNP enormous leverage. The group, for example, could pick a candidate for public office and ply him or her with individual donations and PAC money from its well-endowed, business wing.
The goals of the CNP, then, are similarly two-pronged. Activists like Norquist, who once said he wanted to shrink the federal government to a size where it could be drowned in a bathtub, are drawn to the group for its exaltation of unfettered capitalism, hostility toward social-service spending and low (or no) tax ideology.
Dramatically scaling back the size of the federal government and abolishing the last remnants of the New Deal may be one goal of the CNP, but many of the foot soldiers of the Religious Right sign on for a different crusade: a desire to remake America in a Christian fundamentalist image.
Since 1981, CNP members have worked assiduously to pack government bodies with ultra-conservative lawmakers who agree that the nation needs a major shift to the right economically and socially. They rail against popular culture and progressive lawmakers, calling them the culprits of the nation's moral decay. Laws must be passed and enforced, the group argues, that will bring organized prayer back to the public schools, outlaw abortion, prevent gays from achieving full civil rights and fund private religious schools with tax funds.
And what kind of conservatives are these? Run of the mill, regular folks? Or something else?
Alongside figures like LaHaye and leaders of the anti-abortion movement, the nascent CNP also included Joseph Coors, the wealthy beer magnate; Herbert and Nelson Bunker Hunt, two billionaire investors and energy company executives known for their advocacy of right-wing causes, and William Cies, another wealthy businessman.
Interestingly, the Hunts, Cies and LaHaye all were affiliated with the John Birch Society, the conspiracy-obsessed anti-communist group founded in 1959. LaHaye had lectured and conducted training seminars frequently for the Society during the 1960s and '70s a time when the group was known for its campaign against the civil rights movement.
* * *
In 1988, writer Russ Bellant noted in his book The Coors Connection . . . that many CNP members have been associated with the outer reaches of the conservative movement.
* * *
Tom Ellis, a top political operative of the ultra-conservative Jesse Helms, followed LaHaye as the CNP president in 1982. Ellis had a checkered past, having served as a director of a foundation called the Pioneer Fund, which has a long history of subsidizing efforts to prove blacks are genetically inferior to whites.
* * *
In addition to obsessing over communist threats and buttressing white supremacist ideology, the CNP has included many members bent on replacing American democracy with theocracy.
LaHaye, like the whole of the nation's Religious Right leaders, nurtures a strong contempt for the First Amendment principle of church-state separation, because it seriously complicates their goal of installing fundamentalist Christianity as the nation's officially recognized religion. LaHaye has worked within the CNP and other groups to replace American law with "biblical law."
* * *
For many years, the late leader of the Christian Reconstructionist movement, Rousas J. Rushdoony, was a member. Reconstructionists espouse a radical theology that calls for trashing the U.S. Constitution and replacing it with the harsh legal code of the Old Testament. They advocate the death penalty for adulterers, blasphemers, incorrigible teenagers, gay people, "witches" and those who worship "false gods."
Another CNP-Reconstructionist tie comes through Howard Phillips, the Constitution Party leader. Phillips, a longtime CNP member, is a disciple of Rushdoony and uses rhetoric that strikes a distinctly Reconstructionist tone. In a 2003 Constitution Party gathering in Clackamas, Oregon, Phillips told party members and guests, "We've got to be ready when God chooses to let us restore our once-great Republic." A report by the Southern Poverty Law Center said that Phillips proclaimed that his party was "raising up an army" to "take back this nation!"
* * *
The CNP's current executive director, a former California lawmaker named Steve Baldwin, has tried to downplay the organization's influence on powerful state and national lawmakers. He has remained cagey about the CNP's goals, insisting it is merely a group that counters liberal policy arguments.
In many ways, Baldwin himself exemplifies the CNP's operate-in-secret strategy. As a political strategist in California in the early 1990s, Baldwin was one of the key architects of the "stealth strategy" that led to Religious Right activists being elected to school boards and other local offices.
"Stealth candidates" were trained to emphasize pocketbook issues such as taxes and spending. But once elected, they would pursue a Religious Right agenda, such as demanding creationism in public schools.
* * *
In the spring of 2002, while working at the CNP, he penned a controversial article for the law review at TV preacher Pat Robertson's Regent University. The piece, "Child Molestation and the Homosexual Movement," linked pedophilia to homosexuality.
The article went on to become a staple in the Religious Right's anti-gay canon, despite the fact that its claims were challenged by legitimate researchers.
"It is difficult to convey the dark side of the homosexual culture without appearing harsh," wrote Baldwin. "However, it is time to acknowledge that homosexual behavior threatens the foundation of Western civilization the nuclear family."
And who do these folks honor with their most prestigious awards (even though they don't publicize them? Why the most conservative leaders, judges and politicians, of course. Here are some of their honorees:
Thomas Jefferson Award
for Servant Leadership
2004 Bill Frist
1997 Ward Connelly
1996 Paul Weyrich
1995 Edwin J. Feulner Jr.
1994 Phyllis Schlafly
1993 Daniel O. Graham
1992 Clarence Thomas
1991 Robert H. Krieble
1990 James Dobson
1989 Ellen St. John Garwood
1988 William Armstrong
1987 Fred Schwarz
1986 Edwin Meese III
1985 William J. Bennett
1984 John F. Lehman
1983 Jesse Helms
1982 Jeane J. Kirkpatrick
The New York Times in a 2004 article (link) reported that Bush attended a 1999 CNP function, and Rumsfeld and Cheney have both been speakers since the Iraq war was initiated. So clearly the Bush administration takes these folks very seriously. Other speakers at the August 2004 event included Arnold Schwartzenegger and Rudy Guiliani, two supposedly "moderate" Republicans.
Fellow Kossacks, these are the people who should go on our enemies list. I urge you to read the full article at the American United for Separation of Church and State website. It's daunting but well worth the time and effort. We're way behind, but better late than never.
Otherwise:
"The destiny of our nation is on the shoulders of the conservative movement," the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee, told the gathering as he accepted its Thomas Jefferson award . . . according to an attendee's notes"
It's past time to relieve Senator Frist and these other conservative nut jobs of that burden, don't you agree? Other good links for information about CNP are:
http://www.buildingequality.us/ifas/cnp/index.html
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/org/cnp.php
http://newsletters.cephasministry.com/ncp8.html
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/groupwatch/cnp.php
http://www.blessedquietness.com/journal/prophecy/cnp-1.htm
http://www.dkosopedia.com/index.php/Council_for_National_Policy
http://prosocs.tripod.com/cnp.html
http://www.politicalfriendster.com/showPerson.php?id=1006
http://www.publiceye.org/conspire/clinton/Clintonculwar8-27.html
Sith Lords of the Ultra-Right
by Steven D
Tue Feb 22nd, 2005 at 12:55:24 PST
"We are no longer working to preserve the status quo. We are radicals, working to overturn the present power structure in this country." Paul Weyrich
Got your attention? Good, because this is important.
More below the fold . . .
Update: In the interest of moving the conversation off the title, and so people can send this as a link without worrying about being labeled anti-semetic, I've changed the title. I appreciate all those who defended my original title, but I'd like the focus kept on the information presented and what we can do to counter the influence of this group.
Diaries :: Steven D's diary ::
Ever wonder how the right always seems so coordinated in the strategy. How all the multitude of organizations they've created all seem to use the same playbook? How they all manage to focus on the same talking points each day, day after day, year after year. Well it's no accident. But how do they do it?
The answer my friends lies in a little known organization with the innocuous sounding name The Council for National Policy. Don't go looking for an official website because you won't find one. In fact this "think tank" goes out of its way to avoid publicity:
When a top U.S. senator receives a major award from a national advocacy organization, it's standard procedure for both the politician and the group to eagerly tell as many people about it as possible.
Press releases spew from fax machines and e-mails clog reporters' in-boxes. The news media are summoned in the hope that favorable stories will appear in the newspapers, on radio and on television.
It was odd, therefore, that when U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) accepted a "Thomas Jefferson Award" from a national group at the Plaza Hotel in New York City in August, the media weren't notified. In fact, they weren't welcome to attend.
"The media should not know when or where we meet or who takes part in our programs, before or after a meeting," reads one of the cardinal rules of the organization that honored Frist. The membership list of this group is "strictly confidential." Guests can attend only with the unanimous approval of the organization's executive committee. The group's leadership is so secretive that members are told not to refer to it by name in e-mail messages. Anyone who breaks the rules can be tossed out.
What is this group, and why is it so determined to avoid the public spotlight?
That answer is the Council for National Policy (CNP). And if the name isn't familiar to you, don't be surprised. That's just what the Council wants.
The CNP was founded in 1981 as an umbrella organization of right-wing leaders who would gather regularly to plot strategy, share ideas and fund causes and candidates to advance the far-right agenda. Twenty-three years later, it is still secretly pursuing those goals with amazing success.
Since its founding, the tax-exempt organization has been meeting three times a year. Members have come and gone, but all share something in common: They are powerful figures, drawn from both the Religious Right and the anti-government, anti-tax wing of the ultra-conservative movement.
It may sound like a far-left conspiracy theory, but the CNP is all too real and, its critics would argue, all too influential.
What amazes most CNP opponents is the group's ability to avoid widespread public scrutiny. Despite nearly a quarter century of existence and involvement by wealthy and influential political figures, the CNP remains unknown to most Americans. Operating out of a non-descript office building in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Fairfax, Va., the organization has managed to keep an extremely low profile an amazing feat when one considers the people the CNP courts.
Sounds a little tin foil hattish to you? Trust me it gets worse. Founded in 1981, its first president was Tim LaHaye famed millenialist preacher and writer of the Left Behind series of popular books about the "end-times" and the Second Coming of Christ. He was also a co-founder of the Moral Majority. In the 1980s he headed the American Coalition for Traditional Values. While heading that group, LaHaye said, "If every Bible-believing, Christ-loving church would trust God to raise up an average of just one person over the next 10 years who would get elected, we would have more Christian candidates than there are offices."
A list of former and past members reads like a who's who of conservative Christian Right activists, anti-tax and anti-government activists, billionaire right wing philanthropists and GOP office holders, past and present: Here's a partial list (as of 1998) assembled from this website:
Right Wing Religious Leaders:
Dr. Tim LaHaye, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Dobson (Focus on the Family), Howard Ahmanson (Christian Reconstructionist), Rev. Donald Wildmon (American Family Association), David W. Breese (Christian Identity), William R. Bright (International Christian Leadership University), Robert P. Dugan Jr. (National Association of Evangelicals), Robert Grant (Christian Voice), Haldeman "Hal" W. Guffey (International Ministries Fellowship), Sara DiVito Hardman (Christian Coalition of California), Seamus Hasson (Becket Fund for Religious Liberty), Donald Paul Hodel (Christian Coalition), James B. Jacobson (Christian Solidarity International), Bob Jones III (Bob Jones University), Ed McAteer (Religious Roundtable, Inc.), Dal Shealy (Fellowship of Christian Athletes), John A. Stormer (I Chronicles 12:32 Ministries and authour of None Dare Call it Treason famous McCarthyite anti-communist screed), Jay Strack (Christian motivational speaker, former appointee to "Just say no" drug task force).
Right Wing Media and Communications:
L. Brent Bozell III (Media Research Center), Stuart W. Epperson (Salem Communications Corporation), Tracy Freeny (AmeriVision Communications, Inc.),Reed Irvine (Accuracy in Media), Mark Maddoux (USA Radio Network), Pat Matrisciana (Jeremiah Films), James D. McCotter (Media Management Group, Inc.), Liz McCotter (Channel 26 Orlando), Patrick B. McGuigan (The Daily Oklahoman), Sam Moore (Thomas Nelson Publishers), Thomas L. Phillips (Phillips Publishing International), Larry W. Poland (Mastermedia International, Inc.) , Gerry Snyder (member of editorial board, Valley Views, a conservative weekly newspaper), Bill Tierney (Capital Communications, Inc.), George Uribe II (Uribe Communications and former political director of Alan Keyes for President).
Businessmen, Lobbyists, Lawyers and Political Consultants:
Gary Jarmin (Jar-Mon Consultants), David Keene (American Conservative Union), Larry Klayman (Judicial Watch), Mark R. Levin (Landmark Legal Foundation), Christopher Long (Friess Assoc.), Edward A. Lozick (Nerts, Inc.), Edith D. Hakola (National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation), Carolyn Malenick (Triad Management Services, Inc.), Thomas E. McCabe (Killion McCabe & Associates), Dana Meese (Deloitte & Tousche Consulting Group), Eugene Meyer(Federalist Society), Ralph Reed (Century Strategies), William Bradford Reynolds, Jay A. Sekulow (American Center for Law and Justice), Kyle Stallings (Permian Basin Acquisition Fund), Allen Stevens (Capital Insurance Services of Mississippi), Christine Vollmer (Aragua Services - K Street lobbyist), Jack Webb (Jack Webb & Assoc.), Somers White (Somers White Co.).
Funders of Conservative Causes:
Nelson Bunker Hunt (of the famed Texas based family of oil tycoons), Various members of the Coors' family (Beer Barons), Richard DeVos (Amway founder), Pierre S. duPont IV.
GOP Politicos:
Former Sen. Jesse Helms; Dick Armey and Tom Delay (GOP Congressional leaders); Gary Bauer, Ed Meese, William G. Batchelder III (Congressman), Dan Burton (Congressman), John Doolittle (Congressman), Robert K. Dornan, Sen. D. M. "Lauch" Faircloth, Ernest J. Istook (Congressman), Sen. Jon Kyl, Sen. Trent Lott, Sen. Don Nickles, Tom Patterson (AZ State Sen.), Tony Perkins (La. State Rep.), H. L. Richardson (CA State Sen.), Tom Riner Jr. (KY State Sen.), David C. Schultheis (CO State Rep.), Gov. John H. Sununu, Gov. Tommy G. Thompson.
Conservative apparatchiks:
Paul Weyrich (Free Congress Foundation, etc.), Howard Phillip (Conservative Caucus), Larry Pratt (Gun Owners of America ); Oliver North; Richard Viguerie (direct mail wizard), Morton C. Blackwell (Leadership Institute), Henry F. Cooper (High Frontier), Edwin J. Feulner Jr. (Heritage Foundation), Peter Flaherty (National Legal and Policy Center), Stephen Goodrick (National Right to Work Committee), Lon Mabon (U.S. Citizen's Alliance), Raymond Moore (Moore Foundation), Henry M. Morris (Institute for Creation Science), Grover Norquist, Phillip Olsen (Family Research Council), Phyllis Schlafly (Eagle Forum), John K. Singlaub, LaNeil Wright Spivy (Eagle Forum), Lt. General Gordon Sumner Jr. (Connected to various org. associated with Rev. Moon).
And what was the ultimate goals of this organization? Well, they stated them pretty clearly early on:
In the summer of 1981, Woody Jenkins, a former Louisiana state lawmaker who served as the group's first executive director, told Newsweek bluntly, "One day before the end of this century, the Council will be so influential that no president, regardless of party or philosophy, will be able to ignore us or our concerns or shut us out of the highest levels of government."
From the beginning, the CNP sought to merge two strains of far-right thought: the theocratic Religious Right with the low-tax, anti-government wing of the GOP. The theory was that the Religious Right would provide the grassroots activism and the muscle. The other faction would put up the money.
The CNP has always reflected this two-barreled approach. The group's first president was LaHaye, then president of Family Life Seminars in El Cajon Calif. LaHaye, a fundamentalist Baptist preacher who went on in the 1990s to launch the popular "Left Behind" series of apocalyptic potboilers, was an early anti-gay crusader and frequent basher of public education and he still is today.
* * *
Bringing together the two strains of the far right gave the CNP enormous leverage. The group, for example, could pick a candidate for public office and ply him or her with individual donations and PAC money from its well-endowed, business wing.
The goals of the CNP, then, are similarly two-pronged. Activists like Norquist, who once said he wanted to shrink the federal government to a size where it could be drowned in a bathtub, are drawn to the group for its exaltation of unfettered capitalism, hostility toward social-service spending and low (or no) tax ideology.
Dramatically scaling back the size of the federal government and abolishing the last remnants of the New Deal may be one goal of the CNP, but many of the foot soldiers of the Religious Right sign on for a different crusade: a desire to remake America in a Christian fundamentalist image.
Since 1981, CNP members have worked assiduously to pack government bodies with ultra-conservative lawmakers who agree that the nation needs a major shift to the right economically and socially. They rail against popular culture and progressive lawmakers, calling them the culprits of the nation's moral decay. Laws must be passed and enforced, the group argues, that will bring organized prayer back to the public schools, outlaw abortion, prevent gays from achieving full civil rights and fund private religious schools with tax funds.
And what kind of conservatives are these? Run of the mill, regular folks? Or something else?
Alongside figures like LaHaye and leaders of the anti-abortion movement, the nascent CNP also included Joseph Coors, the wealthy beer magnate; Herbert and Nelson Bunker Hunt, two billionaire investors and energy company executives known for their advocacy of right-wing causes, and William Cies, another wealthy businessman.
Interestingly, the Hunts, Cies and LaHaye all were affiliated with the John Birch Society, the conspiracy-obsessed anti-communist group founded in 1959. LaHaye had lectured and conducted training seminars frequently for the Society during the 1960s and '70s a time when the group was known for its campaign against the civil rights movement.
* * *
In 1988, writer Russ Bellant noted in his book The Coors Connection . . . that many CNP members have been associated with the outer reaches of the conservative movement.
* * *
Tom Ellis, a top political operative of the ultra-conservative Jesse Helms, followed LaHaye as the CNP president in 1982. Ellis had a checkered past, having served as a director of a foundation called the Pioneer Fund, which has a long history of subsidizing efforts to prove blacks are genetically inferior to whites.
* * *
In addition to obsessing over communist threats and buttressing white supremacist ideology, the CNP has included many members bent on replacing American democracy with theocracy.
LaHaye, like the whole of the nation's Religious Right leaders, nurtures a strong contempt for the First Amendment principle of church-state separation, because it seriously complicates their goal of installing fundamentalist Christianity as the nation's officially recognized religion. LaHaye has worked within the CNP and other groups to replace American law with "biblical law."
* * *
For many years, the late leader of the Christian Reconstructionist movement, Rousas J. Rushdoony, was a member. Reconstructionists espouse a radical theology that calls for trashing the U.S. Constitution and replacing it with the harsh legal code of the Old Testament. They advocate the death penalty for adulterers, blasphemers, incorrigible teenagers, gay people, "witches" and those who worship "false gods."
Another CNP-Reconstructionist tie comes through Howard Phillips, the Constitution Party leader. Phillips, a longtime CNP member, is a disciple of Rushdoony and uses rhetoric that strikes a distinctly Reconstructionist tone. In a 2003 Constitution Party gathering in Clackamas, Oregon, Phillips told party members and guests, "We've got to be ready when God chooses to let us restore our once-great Republic." A report by the Southern Poverty Law Center said that Phillips proclaimed that his party was "raising up an army" to "take back this nation!"
* * *
The CNP's current executive director, a former California lawmaker named Steve Baldwin, has tried to downplay the organization's influence on powerful state and national lawmakers. He has remained cagey about the CNP's goals, insisting it is merely a group that counters liberal policy arguments.
In many ways, Baldwin himself exemplifies the CNP's operate-in-secret strategy. As a political strategist in California in the early 1990s, Baldwin was one of the key architects of the "stealth strategy" that led to Religious Right activists being elected to school boards and other local offices.
"Stealth candidates" were trained to emphasize pocketbook issues such as taxes and spending. But once elected, they would pursue a Religious Right agenda, such as demanding creationism in public schools.
* * *
In the spring of 2002, while working at the CNP, he penned a controversial article for the law review at TV preacher Pat Robertson's Regent University. The piece, "Child Molestation and the Homosexual Movement," linked pedophilia to homosexuality.
The article went on to become a staple in the Religious Right's anti-gay canon, despite the fact that its claims were challenged by legitimate researchers.
"It is difficult to convey the dark side of the homosexual culture without appearing harsh," wrote Baldwin. "However, it is time to acknowledge that homosexual behavior threatens the foundation of Western civilization the nuclear family."
And who do these folks honor with their most prestigious awards (even though they don't publicize them? Why the most conservative leaders, judges and politicians, of course. Here are some of their honorees:
Thomas Jefferson Award
for Servant Leadership
2004 Bill Frist
1997 Ward Connelly
1996 Paul Weyrich
1995 Edwin J. Feulner Jr.
1994 Phyllis Schlafly
1993 Daniel O. Graham
1992 Clarence Thomas
1991 Robert H. Krieble
1990 James Dobson
1989 Ellen St. John Garwood
1988 William Armstrong
1987 Fred Schwarz
1986 Edwin Meese III
1985 William J. Bennett
1984 John F. Lehman
1983 Jesse Helms
1982 Jeane J. Kirkpatrick
The New York Times in a 2004 article (link) reported that Bush attended a 1999 CNP function, and Rumsfeld and Cheney have both been speakers since the Iraq war was initiated. So clearly the Bush administration takes these folks very seriously. Other speakers at the August 2004 event included Arnold Schwartzenegger and Rudy Guiliani, two supposedly "moderate" Republicans.
Fellow Kossacks, these are the people who should go on our enemies list. I urge you to read the full article at the American United for Separation of Church and State website. It's daunting but well worth the time and effort. We're way behind, but better late than never.
Otherwise:
"The destiny of our nation is on the shoulders of the conservative movement," the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee, told the gathering as he accepted its Thomas Jefferson award . . . according to an attendee's notes"
It's past time to relieve Senator Frist and these other conservative nut jobs of that burden, don't you agree? Other good links for information about CNP are:
http://www.buildingequality.us/ifas/cnp/index.html
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/org/cnp.php
http://newsletters.cephasministry.com/ncp8.html
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/groupwatch/cnp.php
http://www.blessedquietness.com/journal/prophecy/cnp-1.htm
http://www.dkosopedia.com/index.php/Council_for_National_Policy
http://prosocs.tripod.com/cnp.html
http://www.politicalfriendster.com/showPerson.php?id=1006
http://www.publiceye.org/conspire/clinton/Clintonculwar8-27.html
# posted by scorpiorising : 8:17 AM |
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
My diary on Dailykos was worthwhile for this comment alone:
This should be the Dems central message:
Democrats need to strengthen their already strong(er) record on
environment. And one frame is the immorality of destroying God's creation.
As the Dem Party rightly disposes of corporate
influence that has so decayed the Party's support for the interests of working class people, we need to bring the Party into alignment with many of the principles of the Greens: leaving a healthy, livable world for our
descendents.
Democrats should currently demand an explanation
from our plunderbund administration for their wanton dismantling of environmental laws at a time when tougher measures are required.
Ask that they explain to children why they must grow up in a world where these animals are
literally being extinguished by their lack of concern.
Amphibians are the canary's in the coal mine.
What we do to them we do to ourselves.
Republican children will grow up in a polluted,
diseased and biologically impoverished world
because of Bush and the leaders of their party who are nearly totally illiterate when it comes to science, especially ecology. Do they not care about their own children? Are they so sure that they will be raptured away ? A small number might --
the one's who are actually in that kind of
cult, but the majority I assume expect to have
a livable world for their children and grandchildren.
To my dying day, I will hold these bastards
accountable.
This should be the Dems central message:
Democrats need to strengthen their already strong(er) record on
environment. And one frame is the immorality of destroying God's creation.
As the Dem Party rightly disposes of corporate
influence that has so decayed the Party's support for the interests of working class people, we need to bring the Party into alignment with many of the principles of the Greens: leaving a healthy, livable world for our
descendents.
Democrats should currently demand an explanation
from our plunderbund administration for their wanton dismantling of environmental laws at a time when tougher measures are required.
Ask that they explain to children why they must grow up in a world where these animals are
literally being extinguished by their lack of concern.
Amphibians are the canary's in the coal mine.
What we do to them we do to ourselves.
Republican children will grow up in a polluted,
diseased and biologically impoverished world
because of Bush and the leaders of their party who are nearly totally illiterate when it comes to science, especially ecology. Do they not care about their own children? Are they so sure that they will be raptured away ? A small number might --
the one's who are actually in that kind of
cult, but the majority I assume expect to have
a livable world for their children and grandchildren.
To my dying day, I will hold these bastards
accountable.
# posted by scorpiorising : 7:02 AM |
Activism.
The most difficult aspect of activism is to realize number one: that all politics is local. Number two: prodding the people who share your city, town, village, etc. into caring about an issue, is fucking scary. Number three: realizing that the only way to "win" on your said, adopted issue, is to prod the people in your city, town village, etc., into caring. Now that's scary.
# posted by scorpiorising : 6:08 AM |
A third of World's Amphibians threatened: White House reptilians thriving.
Here is yet another exercise in futility in the form of what will be a completely ignored diary on DailyKos. You'll have to go to DailyKos to access all of the links in the article. Some of them might surprise you:
This news is not suprising. The ultimate hubris, arrogance of man is to assume our first place importance, over and above all other species on the planet. We do this every day, in the way that we live, and it is up to each of us to change this.
Don't hold your collective breaths waiting for the democrats to launch the environmental movement sorely needed in this country. This will be a grass roots effort.
Diaries :: scorpiorising's diary ::
From Agence France Press (through Common Dreams):
A Third of World's Amphibian Species Threatened with Extinction: UN
Nearly one-third of the world's known amphibian species are threatened with extinction due to climate change and pollution, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said in a report released here.
The report said at least nine species of amphibians had died out since 1980 and that another 113 species have not been reported in the wild and are now considered extinct.
Just under 33 percent of the remaining 5,743 known amphibian species are now at risk as global warming heats the earth and deforestation exacerbates pollution and the loss of wetland habitats, UNEP said.
"Amphibians are declining at an unprecedented rate," it said, noting that their extinction rates are "considerably higher" than those for birds and mammals.
Amphibians, like frogs and salamanders have "permeable skin (that) makes them particularly vulnerable to climate change, so they serve as a good indicator of environmental health," said the report, released at the opening of the UNEP governing board's annual meeting.
I'm going to put forth my definition of grass roots: grass roots defines a change in consciousness of a large group of people, regarding commonly held assumptions that are no longer backed by defined reality. This said group of people take physical action within their shared environments to reflect the change in their consciousness.
And now I will put forth commonly held assumption no longer backed by defined reality:
It's not that I don't care, it's that I don't have the time; besides I know someone will pick up the ball on this one.
The earth will always renew herself. We threaten our own existence much more than the long-term ecological health of the earth.
It is up to each one of us to recognize that our limited participation on the subject of environmentalism is hastening the end for many species on the planet, and threatening the health of the earth as a sustainable ecological system.
So what is next?
Other environmental news:
Lawsuit filed by Sierra Club against new national forest rules, rules that were designed by the Bush administration to grant greater access to timber.
EPA making illegal, seperate agreements with pesticide makers.
This news is not suprising. The ultimate hubris, arrogance of man is to assume our first place importance, over and above all other species on the planet. We do this every day, in the way that we live, and it is up to each of us to change this.
Don't hold your collective breaths waiting for the democrats to launch the environmental movement sorely needed in this country. This will be a grass roots effort.
Diaries :: scorpiorising's diary ::
From Agence France Press (through Common Dreams):
A Third of World's Amphibian Species Threatened with Extinction: UN
Nearly one-third of the world's known amphibian species are threatened with extinction due to climate change and pollution, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said in a report released here.
The report said at least nine species of amphibians had died out since 1980 and that another 113 species have not been reported in the wild and are now considered extinct.
Just under 33 percent of the remaining 5,743 known amphibian species are now at risk as global warming heats the earth and deforestation exacerbates pollution and the loss of wetland habitats, UNEP said.
"Amphibians are declining at an unprecedented rate," it said, noting that their extinction rates are "considerably higher" than those for birds and mammals.
Amphibians, like frogs and salamanders have "permeable skin (that) makes them particularly vulnerable to climate change, so they serve as a good indicator of environmental health," said the report, released at the opening of the UNEP governing board's annual meeting.
I'm going to put forth my definition of grass roots: grass roots defines a change in consciousness of a large group of people, regarding commonly held assumptions that are no longer backed by defined reality. This said group of people take physical action within their shared environments to reflect the change in their consciousness.
And now I will put forth commonly held assumption no longer backed by defined reality:
It's not that I don't care, it's that I don't have the time; besides I know someone will pick up the ball on this one.
The earth will always renew herself. We threaten our own existence much more than the long-term ecological health of the earth.
It is up to each one of us to recognize that our limited participation on the subject of environmentalism is hastening the end for many species on the planet, and threatening the health of the earth as a sustainable ecological system.
So what is next?
Other environmental news:
Lawsuit filed by Sierra Club against new national forest rules, rules that were designed by the Bush administration to grant greater access to timber.
EPA making illegal, seperate agreements with pesticide makers.
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:59 AM |
Monday, February 21, 2005
Bronchial infections and How to Save the World
I've been down for several days with a bronchial infection. Left me time to contemplate my recent activism with the Iberville Housing Project. Been keeping tabs on the pushing of the envelope daily by this administration. Dream last night that I was telling someone that one day the Bush minions are going to come and slit our throats. I do expect civil war in this country if things continue as they are.
The death of Hunter Thompson couldn't come at a worse time, depending upon your point of view, I suppose. He might be very happy to be out of this shit hole; we'll have to be the voice of outrage, of gonzo journalism now; the voice that refuses to deny what the senses perceive. We all know how he loved to indulge the senses. I hear he was in New Orleans recently at the Maple Leaf, indulging. He never vanquished his passion for extremes, and it probably finally vanquished him.
Iberville. To save or destroy. We heard from the residents at our last meeting just how awful it is to live there. And still, they want to save it. It is home. It is a neighborhood, and some of the most prime real estate in New Orleans. Those that tore down St. Thomas are aching to get their hands on this prime piece of real estate and turn it into condos and God knows what else.
200 of 800 units are unoccupied due to neglect by the federal government. There is a 7000 family waiting list to get into Iberville. 7000. 600 of its 800 apartment are occupied, despite its mildew infested walls, no heat because no one wants to run the dangerous space heaters, crime and poor lighting, despite that the city prevents the residents there from putting any piece of furniture, or plants or anything on their small porches attached to each apartment. The humiliation and stripping the residents of their dignity isn't enough to drive them away. Through this suffering alone, they have earned the right to keep this neighborhood.
I'm in it for the long haul, and I expect heartache. I can either watch and read about the dismantling of our democracy on the blogs, or I can do something in my home town. Blessed be.
The death of Hunter Thompson couldn't come at a worse time, depending upon your point of view, I suppose. He might be very happy to be out of this shit hole; we'll have to be the voice of outrage, of gonzo journalism now; the voice that refuses to deny what the senses perceive. We all know how he loved to indulge the senses. I hear he was in New Orleans recently at the Maple Leaf, indulging. He never vanquished his passion for extremes, and it probably finally vanquished him.
Iberville. To save or destroy. We heard from the residents at our last meeting just how awful it is to live there. And still, they want to save it. It is home. It is a neighborhood, and some of the most prime real estate in New Orleans. Those that tore down St. Thomas are aching to get their hands on this prime piece of real estate and turn it into condos and God knows what else.
200 of 800 units are unoccupied due to neglect by the federal government. There is a 7000 family waiting list to get into Iberville. 7000. 600 of its 800 apartment are occupied, despite its mildew infested walls, no heat because no one wants to run the dangerous space heaters, crime and poor lighting, despite that the city prevents the residents there from putting any piece of furniture, or plants or anything on their small porches attached to each apartment. The humiliation and stripping the residents of their dignity isn't enough to drive them away. Through this suffering alone, they have earned the right to keep this neighborhood.
I'm in it for the long haul, and I expect heartache. I can either watch and read about the dismantling of our democracy on the blogs, or I can do something in my home town. Blessed be.
# posted by scorpiorising : 7:24 PM |
Monday, February 14, 2005
Trade gap threatening economic future of America
Lou Dobbs has this right:
"The ballooning trade deficit is also dragging down economic growth. Rising imports and falling exports in the latest quarter combined to shave more than 1.7 percentage points off the gross domestic product, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
The trade deficit hindered economic growth in 13 of the 16 quarters in the president's first term in office, and in four of those quarters, the deficit cut more than a full point off growth.
This administration is not alone, though: The trade gap has dragged down annual GDP growth in every year but one since 1992.
Our swelling trade deficit with China alone reached a record high of $148 billion through the first 11 months of 2004, already a 30 percent increase over 2003's record gap with another month to be reported.
And while this has mostly led to lower prices for consumers, increased and unbalanced trade with China has resulted in the loss of 1.5 million American factory jobs over the past 15 years, according to the Economic Policy Institute. The job losses have accelerated as the trade deficit with China has grown.
"The American consumer is also the American worker," Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told me, "and if we don't do something to protect our manufacturing base here at home, it is going to be hard to buy any retail goods."
We've lost more than 2.5 million manufacturing jobs since the beginning of 2001, and not surprisingly, our annual trade deficit has risen by nearly 70 percent over that time. At this rate, we can expect our trade gap to grow to $1 trillion within just the next few years.
This trend will only increase as we continue to outsource American jobs and import low-priced goods from countries with which we willingly enter into free trade agreements.
The so-called crisis in Social Security is the top priority of the president's domestic agenda, but that problem may be decades away from inflicting any pain on Americans.
Our nation's trade deficit, however, represents nearly 6 percent of our nation's GDP, and historically that will lead to tough choices: Either we must make a change in policy now or there will be a difficult adjustment on the part of markets, which can lead to an economic future none of us want to experience.
Talk about a crisis we need to solve immediately."
"The ballooning trade deficit is also dragging down economic growth. Rising imports and falling exports in the latest quarter combined to shave more than 1.7 percentage points off the gross domestic product, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
The trade deficit hindered economic growth in 13 of the 16 quarters in the president's first term in office, and in four of those quarters, the deficit cut more than a full point off growth.
This administration is not alone, though: The trade gap has dragged down annual GDP growth in every year but one since 1992.
Our swelling trade deficit with China alone reached a record high of $148 billion through the first 11 months of 2004, already a 30 percent increase over 2003's record gap with another month to be reported.
And while this has mostly led to lower prices for consumers, increased and unbalanced trade with China has resulted in the loss of 1.5 million American factory jobs over the past 15 years, according to the Economic Policy Institute. The job losses have accelerated as the trade deficit with China has grown.
"The American consumer is also the American worker," Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told me, "and if we don't do something to protect our manufacturing base here at home, it is going to be hard to buy any retail goods."
We've lost more than 2.5 million manufacturing jobs since the beginning of 2001, and not surprisingly, our annual trade deficit has risen by nearly 70 percent over that time. At this rate, we can expect our trade gap to grow to $1 trillion within just the next few years.
This trend will only increase as we continue to outsource American jobs and import low-priced goods from countries with which we willingly enter into free trade agreements.
The so-called crisis in Social Security is the top priority of the president's domestic agenda, but that problem may be decades away from inflicting any pain on Americans.
Our nation's trade deficit, however, represents nearly 6 percent of our nation's GDP, and historically that will lead to tough choices: Either we must make a change in policy now or there will be a difficult adjustment on the part of markets, which can lead to an economic future none of us want to experience.
Talk about a crisis we need to solve immediately."
# posted by scorpiorising : 3:38 PM |
The House that the New Deal built, and the Man Who Turned the Lights Out
Social Security is the house that the New Deal built. It's under attack and we want to save it, because it means so much to so many Americans. This is also the house that the New Deal built: Iberville Housing Project in New Orleans:
When the New Deal began in the 1930's, a group of self-professed socialist academics proposed a series of subsided government housing across the country as a first step to government ownership of residential property. The idea was quickly seize upon by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) as a means to employ the workers in the field and build affordable housing for "displaced persons."
This phrase implies that there existed a shortage of inexpensive shelter then (and to some extent now). John Norquist, the Democratic mayor of Milwaukee and an expert on the development of cities in the twentieth century, states that no city had a shortage of cheap housing prior to the 1930's. What happened is far more subtle.
Up until that time, many poor people had lived in apartments on the second or third floor over storefronts. They filled a need for a consistent secondary stream of income for the businesses, and usually, they enjoy a much lower rent because of their supplemental status than a family could have found elsewhere in the market. In the late 1920's, the first, true mass zoning efforts began. To appease the urban philosophy of the time, residential and business properties were zoned separate preventing people from living in the same complex as an active enterprise. (The urban planners believed that homes and businesses should exist in different parts of a city.)
This action created an artificial shortage of housing; thus, temporarily driving up rental rates. So, the first housing projects came to completion.
The ease at which Pres Kabacoff accomplished the demolition of St. Thomas Housing Project, with virtually no guaruntee to the residents for housing placement, perhaps has led to the rise of the man's hubris.
Kabacoff wants to build a huge, glass towering fleur de lis on Canal St. not far from the Iberville Housing Project. A monument, perhaps, to the destruction of low income housing in New Orleans that he and his cohorts have accomplished.
Kabacoff brought Wal Mart to the lower garden district, once called one of the "hippest" neighborhoods in New Orleans. He displaced over 600 families to accomplish this.
No one really knows what happened to the families of the St. Thomas Housing Project, where they are living today, and are they struggling to keep the lights on. No studies have been conducted. They simply melted into the stew. There is anecdotal evidence though, from the mouths of Iberville Housing residents.
Residents who participated in the speakout held this past Saturday in front of the project on Basin Street, said families who are moved into private housing with vouchers struggle to make ends meet, because of the cost of having to pay utilities, they said.
Kabacoff wants to reduce the number of units to 200 in Iberville. The complex has over 500 units, but over 150 of them are neglected and uninhabitable. There are 350 families there now.
Kabacoff is a man that likes to do things ass backwards, witness his use of the "best" materials for luxury units on top of the St. Thomas Housing Project, and choosing to 200 build low-income units using the same material. Activist Brod Bagert, at the time, said over 500 low income units could be built using far less money.
The City Council of New Orleans didn't vote for that idea though. The City Council voted for Pres Kabacoff's notion that the city needs "more rich people here".
Kabacoff agrees wholeheartedly that he is spending more than the average at St. Thomas. He says it's warranted, since New Orleans needs to attract wealthy people to the city.
"Bagert thinks what the cities ought to be doing is putting all their money into affordable housing. I think he's wrong," Kabacoff says. "I'm suggesting that if this city doesn't get some market rate back in here, it's not going to have any money to take care of the poor. ...
Too often this type of language is code for the displacement of lower income residents: tear down low income housing so that we can attract more rich people to our city.
It's prime real estate located in prime areas of the city, inhabited by the most unempowered of our citizens. It is vulnerable because of the high crime in the project; it is undesirable to everyone but the residents.
In the housing project, utilities are not billed to the residents. The residents I spoke to said they simply did not want to leave because they know their living costs are going to go up. "At least the lights are on here," one woman said.
Kabacoff is going to be known as the man who turned the lights off in the city of New Orleans for hundreds of low income residents who lived in St. Thomas Housing Project. Will he accomplish the same for Iberville?
When the New Deal began in the 1930's, a group of self-professed socialist academics proposed a series of subsided government housing across the country as a first step to government ownership of residential property. The idea was quickly seize upon by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) as a means to employ the workers in the field and build affordable housing for "displaced persons."
This phrase implies that there existed a shortage of inexpensive shelter then (and to some extent now). John Norquist, the Democratic mayor of Milwaukee and an expert on the development of cities in the twentieth century, states that no city had a shortage of cheap housing prior to the 1930's. What happened is far more subtle.
Up until that time, many poor people had lived in apartments on the second or third floor over storefronts. They filled a need for a consistent secondary stream of income for the businesses, and usually, they enjoy a much lower rent because of their supplemental status than a family could have found elsewhere in the market. In the late 1920's, the first, true mass zoning efforts began. To appease the urban philosophy of the time, residential and business properties were zoned separate preventing people from living in the same complex as an active enterprise. (The urban planners believed that homes and businesses should exist in different parts of a city.)
This action created an artificial shortage of housing; thus, temporarily driving up rental rates. So, the first housing projects came to completion.
The ease at which Pres Kabacoff accomplished the demolition of St. Thomas Housing Project, with virtually no guaruntee to the residents for housing placement, perhaps has led to the rise of the man's hubris.
Kabacoff wants to build a huge, glass towering fleur de lis on Canal St. not far from the Iberville Housing Project. A monument, perhaps, to the destruction of low income housing in New Orleans that he and his cohorts have accomplished.
Kabacoff brought Wal Mart to the lower garden district, once called one of the "hippest" neighborhoods in New Orleans. He displaced over 600 families to accomplish this.
No one really knows what happened to the families of the St. Thomas Housing Project, where they are living today, and are they struggling to keep the lights on. No studies have been conducted. They simply melted into the stew. There is anecdotal evidence though, from the mouths of Iberville Housing residents.
Residents who participated in the speakout held this past Saturday in front of the project on Basin Street, said families who are moved into private housing with vouchers struggle to make ends meet, because of the cost of having to pay utilities, they said.
Kabacoff wants to reduce the number of units to 200 in Iberville. The complex has over 500 units, but over 150 of them are neglected and uninhabitable. There are 350 families there now.
Kabacoff is a man that likes to do things ass backwards, witness his use of the "best" materials for luxury units on top of the St. Thomas Housing Project, and choosing to 200 build low-income units using the same material. Activist Brod Bagert, at the time, said over 500 low income units could be built using far less money.
The City Council of New Orleans didn't vote for that idea though. The City Council voted for Pres Kabacoff's notion that the city needs "more rich people here".
Kabacoff agrees wholeheartedly that he is spending more than the average at St. Thomas. He says it's warranted, since New Orleans needs to attract wealthy people to the city.
"Bagert thinks what the cities ought to be doing is putting all their money into affordable housing. I think he's wrong," Kabacoff says. "I'm suggesting that if this city doesn't get some market rate back in here, it's not going to have any money to take care of the poor. ...
Too often this type of language is code for the displacement of lower income residents: tear down low income housing so that we can attract more rich people to our city.
It's prime real estate located in prime areas of the city, inhabited by the most unempowered of our citizens. It is vulnerable because of the high crime in the project; it is undesirable to everyone but the residents.
In the housing project, utilities are not billed to the residents. The residents I spoke to said they simply did not want to leave because they know their living costs are going to go up. "At least the lights are on here," one woman said.
Kabacoff is going to be known as the man who turned the lights off in the city of New Orleans for hundreds of low income residents who lived in St. Thomas Housing Project. Will he accomplish the same for Iberville?
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:11 AM |
Saturday, February 12, 2005
The true reformers
William Greider, in this article, highlights true reform activities within our own party, and no, he's not talking about Howard Dean. Ever heard of California Treasurer Phil Angelides? Corporate ceos are quaking in their shoes in California, because Angelides is proposing a radical concept: Corporate responsibility for the pensions promised to their workers.
I don't agree with him by the way, that democrats are dispirited, largely. I think some of us are dispirited, some of the time, including myself. I also see great energy on this around the blogosphere. There is much activity in my hometown on the activist front. That said, Greider is highlighting an important aspect of reforming the financial structure of our country.
In my view, you are not a true reform democrat unlenss you believe that our economic system, slanted to the rich in a most drastic fashion, is in need of reform. Here's a portion of the article:
While dispirited Democrats stew over their party's uncertain future, they might check out an unusual cluster of progressive "activists" forming within their ranks. Some politicians with real muscle are pursuing far-ranging possibilities for reforming the economic system. Their potential for driving important change is not widely recognized, perhaps because the reformers are drawn from unglamorous backbenches of state government--treasurers, comptrollers, pension-fund trustees. Yet these state officials, unlike the minority Democrats in Congress, have decision-making power and control over enormous pools of investment capital. They are fiduciaries who manage the vast wealth stored by state governments in public-employee pension funds, invested in behalf of working people--civil servants, teachers and other types of public workers--who as future retirees are "beneficial owners" of the capital.
In the wake of Enron-style corporate scandals, in which public pension funds lost more than $300 billion, some of the leading funds have restyled themselves as more aggressive reformers. They are picking fights with Wall Street orthodoxy they long accepted, like the obsessive maximizing of short-term gains. More important, they are broadening their definition of fiduciary obligations to retirees by trying to enforce corporate responsibilities to serve society's long-term prospects. Instead of adhering passively to market dogma, the activist funds now regularly accuse corporate managements and major financial houses of negligently or willfully injuring the long-term interests of pension-fund investors, therefore injuring the economy and society, too. Pension-fund wealth is thus being mobilized as financial leverage to break up the narrow-minded thinking of finance capital and to confront the antisocial behavior of corporations.
The core players in this struggle are the largest and most progressive pension funds in the nation--anchored by blue-state constituencies in California and New York. The heavyweights are occasionally joined by a handful of smaller states like Connecticut, North Carolina, Iowa and a few others where pension officials are kindred spirits. Together and individually, their efforts are possibly the only reform impulse ascendant among Democrats. Party leaders trying to rethink strategies could learn a lot from these state-level officials (and come to their political defense, if they had the nerve). "We're thirty-year investors and we have to take the long view," California Treasurer Phil Angelides explains. "I believe one of the things that led to the corruption of recent years was this notion that infected America that wealth is somehow created in six to nine months and all that matters is whether this quarter's returns are better than last quarter's--not whether you are building companies and products and an economy that will have enduring value."
I don't agree with him by the way, that democrats are dispirited, largely. I think some of us are dispirited, some of the time, including myself. I also see great energy on this around the blogosphere. There is much activity in my hometown on the activist front. That said, Greider is highlighting an important aspect of reforming the financial structure of our country.
In my view, you are not a true reform democrat unlenss you believe that our economic system, slanted to the rich in a most drastic fashion, is in need of reform. Here's a portion of the article:
While dispirited Democrats stew over their party's uncertain future, they might check out an unusual cluster of progressive "activists" forming within their ranks. Some politicians with real muscle are pursuing far-ranging possibilities for reforming the economic system. Their potential for driving important change is not widely recognized, perhaps because the reformers are drawn from unglamorous backbenches of state government--treasurers, comptrollers, pension-fund trustees. Yet these state officials, unlike the minority Democrats in Congress, have decision-making power and control over enormous pools of investment capital. They are fiduciaries who manage the vast wealth stored by state governments in public-employee pension funds, invested in behalf of working people--civil servants, teachers and other types of public workers--who as future retirees are "beneficial owners" of the capital.
In the wake of Enron-style corporate scandals, in which public pension funds lost more than $300 billion, some of the leading funds have restyled themselves as more aggressive reformers. They are picking fights with Wall Street orthodoxy they long accepted, like the obsessive maximizing of short-term gains. More important, they are broadening their definition of fiduciary obligations to retirees by trying to enforce corporate responsibilities to serve society's long-term prospects. Instead of adhering passively to market dogma, the activist funds now regularly accuse corporate managements and major financial houses of negligently or willfully injuring the long-term interests of pension-fund investors, therefore injuring the economy and society, too. Pension-fund wealth is thus being mobilized as financial leverage to break up the narrow-minded thinking of finance capital and to confront the antisocial behavior of corporations.
The core players in this struggle are the largest and most progressive pension funds in the nation--anchored by blue-state constituencies in California and New York. The heavyweights are occasionally joined by a handful of smaller states like Connecticut, North Carolina, Iowa and a few others where pension officials are kindred spirits. Together and individually, their efforts are possibly the only reform impulse ascendant among Democrats. Party leaders trying to rethink strategies could learn a lot from these state-level officials (and come to their political defense, if they had the nerve). "We're thirty-year investors and we have to take the long view," California Treasurer Phil Angelides explains. "I believe one of the things that led to the corruption of recent years was this notion that infected America that wealth is somehow created in six to nine months and all that matters is whether this quarter's returns are better than last quarter's--not whether you are building companies and products and an economy that will have enduring value."
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:46 AM |
Friday, February 11, 2005
Bush Budget: Screw America
My most recent diary on Dailykos:
Bush Budget: Screw America
Feb 11th, 2005 at 06:20:40 PST
While you expose the Gannons, be careful to keep your eye on the real Bush prize: the elimination of the middle class, and the devastation of the working poor.
A dumbed down, financially struggling class, versus the rich, is what their battle cry is, secretly.
It is my belief that this administration has written off huge portions of our population, in the name of enriching a few, private coffers.
If, and I say if, they stole the election in 2004, they need not count on support from anyone, necessarily. They can steal more elections, though obviously, the risk for exposure rises.
They can propose what they want to propose, throw it out there, and see what sticks. We have to be extremely vigilant and on top of their every move.
What they are practicing with the current budget proposals is a form of social darwinism practiced to the extreme, laced with religious fervor.
They are the chosen ones because they are rich. They are the chosen ones because God chose them.
They have annointed themselves.
What kind of nation do we want? Are they stupidly pushing us to the brink of civil war with most of the budget earmarked for war, and the devastation of social programs?
Why haven't the democrats, in good conscience, signed up to repeal the tax cuts, and made this a cornerstone of good, economic policy?
Why isn't there a national movement to repeal the tax cuts?
What is the alternative to the huge outlays for war in Afghanistan and Iraq?
Bring the troops home.
Here is Ruth Coniff's blog in the Progressive on the budget:
All of this domestic cutting is supposed to calm the deficit hawks in the Republican Party and on Wall Street, who are alarmed at how this Administration has taken the federal government from surplus to record deficits in the space of four years.
But the budget leaves out all the big-ticket items, ignoring altogether the future cost of the war in Iraq and continued military operations in Afghanistan. (The White House is preparing to make another $80 billion request to fund these operations in the next few days.)
The President's budget doesn't even touch on Bush's biggest domestic-policy initiative for this term: the privatization of Social Security, and the massive borrowing necessary to get his plan for private accounts off the ground.
And Bush's budget is particularly galling given that he still plans on giving $1.8 trillion in tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.
"We calculate that 257,000 American millionaires are scheduled to receive an average of $123,592 each in federal tax breaks this year," says Dr. Elizabeth A. Letzler of the group Responsible Wealth, an organization of affluent Americans who reject Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy (www.responsiblewealth.org). Letzler spoke to a group gathered at the National Press Club today. "That alone totals $32 billion," she said.
But why scale back tax cuts for millionaires when you can take the money out of Medicaid, the major health-care program for the poor?
What does Bush mean when he says our society can be measured by how we treat the weak and vulnerable?
That slapping the weak, the elderly, and the poor, while coddling the rich shows what big bullies we are?
The context for Bush's line about the weak and vulnerable was abortion and medical research. "We must strive to build a culture of life," he said in the same breath, and then thanked Congress for increasing funding for the National Institutes of Health.
It was a way of waving at his anti-abortion base, alluding to his opposition to stem-cell research, and suggesting that he supports treatments and cures for people with illnesses and disabilities--as long as the research doesn't involve human embryos.
Bush Budget: Screw America
Feb 11th, 2005 at 06:20:40 PST
While you expose the Gannons, be careful to keep your eye on the real Bush prize: the elimination of the middle class, and the devastation of the working poor.
A dumbed down, financially struggling class, versus the rich, is what their battle cry is, secretly.
It is my belief that this administration has written off huge portions of our population, in the name of enriching a few, private coffers.
If, and I say if, they stole the election in 2004, they need not count on support from anyone, necessarily. They can steal more elections, though obviously, the risk for exposure rises.
They can propose what they want to propose, throw it out there, and see what sticks. We have to be extremely vigilant and on top of their every move.
What they are practicing with the current budget proposals is a form of social darwinism practiced to the extreme, laced with religious fervor.
They are the chosen ones because they are rich. They are the chosen ones because God chose them.
They have annointed themselves.
What kind of nation do we want? Are they stupidly pushing us to the brink of civil war with most of the budget earmarked for war, and the devastation of social programs?
Why haven't the democrats, in good conscience, signed up to repeal the tax cuts, and made this a cornerstone of good, economic policy?
Why isn't there a national movement to repeal the tax cuts?
What is the alternative to the huge outlays for war in Afghanistan and Iraq?
Bring the troops home.
Here is Ruth Coniff's blog in the Progressive on the budget:
All of this domestic cutting is supposed to calm the deficit hawks in the Republican Party and on Wall Street, who are alarmed at how this Administration has taken the federal government from surplus to record deficits in the space of four years.
But the budget leaves out all the big-ticket items, ignoring altogether the future cost of the war in Iraq and continued military operations in Afghanistan. (The White House is preparing to make another $80 billion request to fund these operations in the next few days.)
The President's budget doesn't even touch on Bush's biggest domestic-policy initiative for this term: the privatization of Social Security, and the massive borrowing necessary to get his plan for private accounts off the ground.
And Bush's budget is particularly galling given that he still plans on giving $1.8 trillion in tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.
"We calculate that 257,000 American millionaires are scheduled to receive an average of $123,592 each in federal tax breaks this year," says Dr. Elizabeth A. Letzler of the group Responsible Wealth, an organization of affluent Americans who reject Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy (www.responsiblewealth.org). Letzler spoke to a group gathered at the National Press Club today. "That alone totals $32 billion," she said.
But why scale back tax cuts for millionaires when you can take the money out of Medicaid, the major health-care program for the poor?
What does Bush mean when he says our society can be measured by how we treat the weak and vulnerable?
That slapping the weak, the elderly, and the poor, while coddling the rich shows what big bullies we are?
The context for Bush's line about the weak and vulnerable was abortion and medical research. "We must strive to build a culture of life," he said in the same breath, and then thanked Congress for increasing funding for the National Institutes of Health.
It was a way of waving at his anti-abortion base, alluding to his opposition to stem-cell research, and suggesting that he supports treatments and cures for people with illnesses and disabilities--as long as the research doesn't involve human embryos.
# posted by scorpiorising : 7:05 AM |
Gannon is the ruse; the budget is the reward.
Gannon is front page headlines on the Dailykos while the Bush Budget that slashes social programs gets short shrift. Now if you could say that without getting tongue twisted, I'll give you this gem: Gannon may have been a deliberately planted ruse that diverts from the real issues. That's my opinion, by the way, not fact. Either way, the issue of Gannon is doing more than mastermind Rove could have possibly dreamed, to divert attention away from the budget.
I ask also, why haven't the democrats in Congress, in good conscience, signed up to repeal the tax cut?
From Ruth Coniff's blog in the Progressive:
Today is the day the President puts his money where his mouth is. In his State of the Union address last Wednesday, Bush said, "a society is measured by how it treats the weak and vulnerable."
In his $2.5 trillion budget proposal, unveiled to Congress today, he proposed slashing domestic programs that benefit the poor.
Bush's budget cuts $45 billion out of Medicaid. It cuts community development funds by 4.5 percent, and reduces the budget for the Department of Housing and Urban Development by 11.5 percent overall. It increases veterans' co-pays for prescription drugs to more than double what they pay now, and, according to The New York Times today, would ask some veterans "to pay a new fee of $250 for the privilege of using government health care."
Incredibly, in the wake of September 11, Bush also calls for a 30 percent cut in funding for the federal program that provides equipment, training, and staff to local fire departments, as well as cuts for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including a 64 percent cut to a program for training nurses and other health professionals, and a 12.6 percent to cut in bioterrorism preparedness funding.
All of this domestic cutting is supposed to calm the deficit hawks in the Republican Party and on Wall Street, who are alarmed at how this Administration has taken the federal government from surplus to record deficits in the space of four years.
But the budget leaves out all the big-ticket items, ignoring altogether the future cost of the war in Iraq and continued military operations in Afghanistan. (The White House is preparing to make another $80 billion request to fund these operations in the next few days.)
The President's budget doesn't even touch on Bush's biggest domestic-policy initiative for this term: the privatization of Social Security, and the massive borrowing necessary to get his plan for private accounts off the ground.
And Bush's budget is particularly galling given that he still plans on giving $1.8 trillion in tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.
"We calculate that 257,000 American millionaires are scheduled to receive an average of $123,592 each in federal tax breaks this year," says Dr. Elizabeth A. Letzler of the group Responsible Wealth, an organization of affluent Americans who reject Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy (www.responsiblewealth.org). Letzler spoke to a group gathered at the National Press Club today. "That alone totals $32 billion," she said.
But why scale back tax cuts for millionaires when you can take the money out of Medicaid, the major health-care program for the poor?
What does Bush mean when he says our society can be measured by how we treat the weak and vulnerable?
That slapping the weak, the elderly, and the poor, while coddling the rich shows what big bullies we are?
The context for Bush's line about the weak and vulnerable was abortion and medical research. "We must strive to build a culture of life," he said in the same breath, and then thanked Congress for increasing funding for the National Institutes of Health.
I ask also, why haven't the democrats in Congress, in good conscience, signed up to repeal the tax cut?
From Ruth Coniff's blog in the Progressive:
Today is the day the President puts his money where his mouth is. In his State of the Union address last Wednesday, Bush said, "a society is measured by how it treats the weak and vulnerable."
In his $2.5 trillion budget proposal, unveiled to Congress today, he proposed slashing domestic programs that benefit the poor.
Bush's budget cuts $45 billion out of Medicaid. It cuts community development funds by 4.5 percent, and reduces the budget for the Department of Housing and Urban Development by 11.5 percent overall. It increases veterans' co-pays for prescription drugs to more than double what they pay now, and, according to The New York Times today, would ask some veterans "to pay a new fee of $250 for the privilege of using government health care."
Incredibly, in the wake of September 11, Bush also calls for a 30 percent cut in funding for the federal program that provides equipment, training, and staff to local fire departments, as well as cuts for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including a 64 percent cut to a program for training nurses and other health professionals, and a 12.6 percent to cut in bioterrorism preparedness funding.
All of this domestic cutting is supposed to calm the deficit hawks in the Republican Party and on Wall Street, who are alarmed at how this Administration has taken the federal government from surplus to record deficits in the space of four years.
But the budget leaves out all the big-ticket items, ignoring altogether the future cost of the war in Iraq and continued military operations in Afghanistan. (The White House is preparing to make another $80 billion request to fund these operations in the next few days.)
The President's budget doesn't even touch on Bush's biggest domestic-policy initiative for this term: the privatization of Social Security, and the massive borrowing necessary to get his plan for private accounts off the ground.
And Bush's budget is particularly galling given that he still plans on giving $1.8 trillion in tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans.
"We calculate that 257,000 American millionaires are scheduled to receive an average of $123,592 each in federal tax breaks this year," says Dr. Elizabeth A. Letzler of the group Responsible Wealth, an organization of affluent Americans who reject Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy (www.responsiblewealth.org). Letzler spoke to a group gathered at the National Press Club today. "That alone totals $32 billion," she said.
But why scale back tax cuts for millionaires when you can take the money out of Medicaid, the major health-care program for the poor?
What does Bush mean when he says our society can be measured by how we treat the weak and vulnerable?
That slapping the weak, the elderly, and the poor, while coddling the rich shows what big bullies we are?
The context for Bush's line about the weak and vulnerable was abortion and medical research. "We must strive to build a culture of life," he said in the same breath, and then thanked Congress for increasing funding for the National Institutes of Health.
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:29 AM |
Thursday, February 10, 2005
Billmon has outlined the anatomy of a scam.
Anatomy of a Scam
After Social Security numbers were assigned, the first Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) taxes were collected, beginning in January 1937. Special Trust Funds were created for these dedicated revenues. Benefits were then paid from the money in the Social Security Trust Funds. Over the years, more than $4.5 trillion has been paid into the Trust Funds, and more than $4.1 trillion has been paid out in benefits. The remainder is currently on reserve in the Trust Funds and will be used to pay future benefits.
Social Security Administration
A Brief History of Social Security
March 2003
In the early years, the OASI program was funded on a modified-reserve basis. It was intended that a sizable fund would be built up, so that interest earnings could help to finance the outgo . . . Over the years, the original emphasis on building up and maintaining a large fund was reduced. Gradually, the funding basis shifted, in practice, to what might be called a current-cost or pay-as-you-go basis.
Report of the Greenspan Commission
Appendix J: Financial Status of the Social Security Program
January 20, 1983
The National Commission has agreed that there is a financing problem for [Social Security] both the short run, 1983-89 (as measured using pessimistic economic assumptions) and the long range, 1983-2056 (as measured by an intermediate cost estimate) and that action should be taken to strengthen the financial status of the program.
Report of the Greenspan Commission
Findings and Recommendations
January 20, 1983
We believe we express the views of all members of the commission when we say that it is our hope that the economy will perform better than we assumed when we made our estimates and that a larger reserve cushion will accumulate.
Greenspan Commission Report
Statement of Sen. Robert Dole and Rep. Barber Conable
January 20, 1983
Social Security tax rates for employers and employees will increase to 7.0 percent in 1984, 7.05 percent in 1985, 7.15 percent in 1986-87, 7.51 percent in 1988-89 and 7.65 percent in 1990 and thereafter . . . Raises the age of eligibility for unreduced retirement benefits in two stages to 67 by the year 2027. Benefits will still be available at age 62, but with greater reduction.
Social Security Administration
Summary of the 1983 Amendments
November 26, 1984
This bill demonstrates for all time our nation's ironclad commitment to Social Security. It assures the elderly that America will always keep the promises made in troubled times a half a century ago. It assures those who are still working that they, too, have a pact with the future. From this day forward, they have one pledge: That they will get their fair share of benefits when they retire.
Ronald Reagan
Remarks on Signing Social Security Amendments of 1983
April 20, 1983
Actual short-term experience has generally been more favorable than estimated at the time of the 1983 amendments, with income exceeding outgo by more than had been projected.
Report of the Advisory Council on Social Security
Appendix I: Developments since 1983
January, 1997
Total benefits paid in 2003 were $471 billion. Income was $632 billion, and assets held in special issue U.S. Treasury securities grew to $1.5 trillion.
Board of Trustees of the Social Security Trust Funds
2004 Report
March, 2004
Benefit payments and program administrative costs are the only purposes for which disbursements from the funds can be made. Program revenues not needed in the current year to pay benefits and administrative costs are invested in special non-negotiable securities of the U.S. Government on which a market rate of interest is credited. Thus, the trust funds represent the accumulated value, including interest, of all prior program annual surpluses, and provide automatic authority to pay benefits.
Board of Trustees of the Social Security Trust Funds
2004 Report
March, 2004
Some in our country think that Social Security is a trust fund -- in other words, there's a pile of money being accumulated. That's just simply not true. The money -- payroll taxes going into the Social Security are spent. They're spent on benefits and they're spent on government programs. There is no trust. We're on the ultimate pay-as-you-go system -- what goes in comes out. And so, starting in 2018, what's going in -- what's coming out is greater than what's going in. It says we've got a problem.
George W. Bush
Remarks at the Department of Commerce
February 9, 2005
After Social Security numbers were assigned, the first Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) taxes were collected, beginning in January 1937. Special Trust Funds were created for these dedicated revenues. Benefits were then paid from the money in the Social Security Trust Funds. Over the years, more than $4.5 trillion has been paid into the Trust Funds, and more than $4.1 trillion has been paid out in benefits. The remainder is currently on reserve in the Trust Funds and will be used to pay future benefits.
Social Security Administration
A Brief History of Social Security
March 2003
In the early years, the OASI program was funded on a modified-reserve basis. It was intended that a sizable fund would be built up, so that interest earnings could help to finance the outgo . . . Over the years, the original emphasis on building up and maintaining a large fund was reduced. Gradually, the funding basis shifted, in practice, to what might be called a current-cost or pay-as-you-go basis.
Report of the Greenspan Commission
Appendix J: Financial Status of the Social Security Program
January 20, 1983
The National Commission has agreed that there is a financing problem for [Social Security] both the short run, 1983-89 (as measured using pessimistic economic assumptions) and the long range, 1983-2056 (as measured by an intermediate cost estimate) and that action should be taken to strengthen the financial status of the program.
Report of the Greenspan Commission
Findings and Recommendations
January 20, 1983
We believe we express the views of all members of the commission when we say that it is our hope that the economy will perform better than we assumed when we made our estimates and that a larger reserve cushion will accumulate.
Greenspan Commission Report
Statement of Sen. Robert Dole and Rep. Barber Conable
January 20, 1983
Social Security tax rates for employers and employees will increase to 7.0 percent in 1984, 7.05 percent in 1985, 7.15 percent in 1986-87, 7.51 percent in 1988-89 and 7.65 percent in 1990 and thereafter . . . Raises the age of eligibility for unreduced retirement benefits in two stages to 67 by the year 2027. Benefits will still be available at age 62, but with greater reduction.
Social Security Administration
Summary of the 1983 Amendments
November 26, 1984
This bill demonstrates for all time our nation's ironclad commitment to Social Security. It assures the elderly that America will always keep the promises made in troubled times a half a century ago. It assures those who are still working that they, too, have a pact with the future. From this day forward, they have one pledge: That they will get their fair share of benefits when they retire.
Ronald Reagan
Remarks on Signing Social Security Amendments of 1983
April 20, 1983
Actual short-term experience has generally been more favorable than estimated at the time of the 1983 amendments, with income exceeding outgo by more than had been projected.
Report of the Advisory Council on Social Security
Appendix I: Developments since 1983
January, 1997
Total benefits paid in 2003 were $471 billion. Income was $632 billion, and assets held in special issue U.S. Treasury securities grew to $1.5 trillion.
Board of Trustees of the Social Security Trust Funds
2004 Report
March, 2004
Benefit payments and program administrative costs are the only purposes for which disbursements from the funds can be made. Program revenues not needed in the current year to pay benefits and administrative costs are invested in special non-negotiable securities of the U.S. Government on which a market rate of interest is credited. Thus, the trust funds represent the accumulated value, including interest, of all prior program annual surpluses, and provide automatic authority to pay benefits.
Board of Trustees of the Social Security Trust Funds
2004 Report
March, 2004
Some in our country think that Social Security is a trust fund -- in other words, there's a pile of money being accumulated. That's just simply not true. The money -- payroll taxes going into the Social Security are spent. They're spent on benefits and they're spent on government programs. There is no trust. We're on the ultimate pay-as-you-go system -- what goes in comes out. And so, starting in 2018, what's going in -- what's coming out is greater than what's going in. It says we've got a problem.
George W. Bush
Remarks at the Department of Commerce
February 9, 2005
# posted by scorpiorising : 2:04 PM |
Scientists Told to Change Findings
This article speaks for itself, and underlines a belief that I have that we desperately need an environmental movement in this country:
U.S. Scientists Say They Are Told to Alter Findings
More than 200 Fish and Wildlife researchers cite cases where conclusions were reversed to weaken protections and favor business, a survey finds
by Julie Cart
More than 200 scientists employed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service say they have been directed to alter official findings to lessen protections for plants and animals, a survey released Wednesday says.
The survey of the agency's scientific staff of 1,400 had a 30% response rate and was conducted jointly by the Union of Concerned Scientists and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.
A division of the Department of the Interior, the Fish and Wildlife Service is charged with determining which animals and plants should be placed on the endangered species list and designating areas where such species need to be protected.
More than half of the biologists and other researchers who responded to the survey said they knew of cases in which commercial interests, including timber, grazing, development and energy companies, had applied political pressure to reverse scientific conclusions deemed harmful to their business.
Bush administration officials, including Craig Manson, an assistant secretary of the Interior who oversees the Fish and Wildlife Service, have been critical of the 1973 Endangered Species Act, contending that its implementation has imposed hardships on developers and others while failing to restore healthy populations of wildlife.
Along with Republican leaders in Congress, the administration is pushing to revamp the act. The president's proposed budget calls for a $3-million reduction in funding of Fish and Wildlife's endangered species programs.
"The pressure to alter scientific reports for political reasons has become pervasive at Fish and Wildlife offices around the country," said Lexi Shultz of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
U.S. Scientists Say They Are Told to Alter Findings
More than 200 Fish and Wildlife researchers cite cases where conclusions were reversed to weaken protections and favor business, a survey finds
by Julie Cart
More than 200 scientists employed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service say they have been directed to alter official findings to lessen protections for plants and animals, a survey released Wednesday says.
The survey of the agency's scientific staff of 1,400 had a 30% response rate and was conducted jointly by the Union of Concerned Scientists and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.
A division of the Department of the Interior, the Fish and Wildlife Service is charged with determining which animals and plants should be placed on the endangered species list and designating areas where such species need to be protected.
More than half of the biologists and other researchers who responded to the survey said they knew of cases in which commercial interests, including timber, grazing, development and energy companies, had applied political pressure to reverse scientific conclusions deemed harmful to their business.
Bush administration officials, including Craig Manson, an assistant secretary of the Interior who oversees the Fish and Wildlife Service, have been critical of the 1973 Endangered Species Act, contending that its implementation has imposed hardships on developers and others while failing to restore healthy populations of wildlife.
Along with Republican leaders in Congress, the administration is pushing to revamp the act. The president's proposed budget calls for a $3-million reduction in funding of Fish and Wildlife's endangered species programs.
"The pressure to alter scientific reports for political reasons has become pervasive at Fish and Wildlife offices around the country," said Lexi Shultz of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
# posted by scorpiorising : 1:09 PM |
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
More on HR 418
More on HR 418, expected to pass the house tomorrow. It's going to have trouble in the senate, thanks to those senators who still give a rat's ass about the constitution. From Raw Story:
The House Democratic staff of the Judiciary Committee is preparing an extensive rebuke to a Republican immigration bill which would allow the Homeland Security Secretary to waive all laws in the construction of immigration barriers, RAW STORY has learned.
Among other provisions, the bill put forth by Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner would give the Homeland Security Secretary “the authority to waive… all laws such Secretary, in such Secretary’s sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section.”
The bill also seeks to strip courts from being able to challenge any of the Secretary’s decisions.
“Notwithstanding any other provision of law… no court shall have jurisdiction,” the Republican bill asserts.
The immigration bill would allow Homeland Security to construct barriers along American borders and inside the United States. It would also give the Secretary the authority to ignore labor and environmental laws, as well as refuse compensation for property seized in the construction of such barriers.
The bill also denies immigrants habeas corpus rights and makes it harder for immigrants to achieve asylum. Senior aides in the House expect the bill to pass without significant amendments Thursday.
Democrats find these provisions troubling.
In their report, the Democratic Judiciary staff say the bill is a draconian overreaction to immigration concerns.
The House Democratic staff of the Judiciary Committee is preparing an extensive rebuke to a Republican immigration bill which would allow the Homeland Security Secretary to waive all laws in the construction of immigration barriers, RAW STORY has learned.
Among other provisions, the bill put forth by Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner would give the Homeland Security Secretary “the authority to waive… all laws such Secretary, in such Secretary’s sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section.”
The bill also seeks to strip courts from being able to challenge any of the Secretary’s decisions.
“Notwithstanding any other provision of law… no court shall have jurisdiction,” the Republican bill asserts.
The immigration bill would allow Homeland Security to construct barriers along American borders and inside the United States. It would also give the Secretary the authority to ignore labor and environmental laws, as well as refuse compensation for property seized in the construction of such barriers.
The bill also denies immigrants habeas corpus rights and makes it harder for immigrants to achieve asylum. Senior aides in the House expect the bill to pass without significant amendments Thursday.
Democrats find these provisions troubling.
In their report, the Democratic Judiciary staff say the bill is a draconian overreaction to immigration concerns.
# posted by scorpiorising : 6:49 PM |
Outsourcing Torture
Outsourcing Torture
The Secret History of America’s “Extraordinary Rendition” Program
by Jane Mayer
During the flight, Arar said, he heard the pilots and crew identify themselves in radio communications as members of “the Special Removal Unit.” The Americans, he learned, planned to take him next to Syria. Having been told by his parents about the barbaric practices of the police in Syria, Arar begged crew members not to send him there, arguing that he would surely be tortured. His captors did not respond to his request; instead, they invited him to watch a spy thriller that was aired on board.
Ten hours after landing in Jordan, Arar said, he was driven to Syria, where interrogators, after a day of threats, “just began beating on me.” They whipped his hands repeatedly with two-inch-thick electrical cables, and kept him in a windowless underground cell that he likened to a grave. “Not even animals could withstand it,” he said. Although he initially tried to assert his innocence, he eventually confessed to anything his tormentors wanted him to say. “You just give up,” he said. “You become like an animal.”
The Secret History of America’s “Extraordinary Rendition” Program
by Jane Mayer
During the flight, Arar said, he heard the pilots and crew identify themselves in radio communications as members of “the Special Removal Unit.” The Americans, he learned, planned to take him next to Syria. Having been told by his parents about the barbaric practices of the police in Syria, Arar begged crew members not to send him there, arguing that he would surely be tortured. His captors did not respond to his request; instead, they invited him to watch a spy thriller that was aired on board.
Ten hours after landing in Jordan, Arar said, he was driven to Syria, where interrogators, after a day of threats, “just began beating on me.” They whipped his hands repeatedly with two-inch-thick electrical cables, and kept him in a windowless underground cell that he likened to a grave. “Not even animals could withstand it,” he said. Although he initially tried to assert his innocence, he eventually confessed to anything his tormentors wanted him to say. “You just give up,” he said. “You become like an animal.”
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:38 PM |
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
The Navy supports the development of cold fusion.
You must read the Navy report, links provided on this site.
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:26 PM |
So the United States knew...
about the illicit sale of oil by Iraq to Turkey and Jordon, according to this Guardian.co.uk report, and did nothing to stop it, because we believed it to be in our best interests to do nothing to stop it.
This sounds familiar.
This sounds familiar.
# posted by scorpiorising : 4:41 PM |
Who are we?
Who are we as a nation, a people?
Do we value the sanctity of life, all of life?
If so, why do we declare that some wars are just?
If so, why have we condoned torture?
Do we value the quality of life?
If so, why do we sacrifice the environment for our convenient way of life?
Do we value self-knowledge and awareness?
If so, why do we choose to delude ourselves, and live in denial on very important issues, such as the environment, torture and war?
I was telling a new aquaintance the other day, we have the resources, inner and outer resources, to solve our problems.
We choose not to solve our problems.
Why is this?
We have blinded ourselves to the full value of our imagination. Imagine clean energy for everyone, and it can happen. Imagine enough food for everyone and it can happen.
Imagine that we stop using up the world's resources, and learn to recycle everything, and it can happen.
John Lennon was right, that's why he was shot.
I didn't mean for his name to come up, but there it is, it did.
Do we value the sanctity of life, all of life?
If so, why do we declare that some wars are just?
If so, why have we condoned torture?
Do we value the quality of life?
If so, why do we sacrifice the environment for our convenient way of life?
Do we value self-knowledge and awareness?
If so, why do we choose to delude ourselves, and live in denial on very important issues, such as the environment, torture and war?
I was telling a new aquaintance the other day, we have the resources, inner and outer resources, to solve our problems.
We choose not to solve our problems.
Why is this?
We have blinded ourselves to the full value of our imagination. Imagine clean energy for everyone, and it can happen. Imagine enough food for everyone and it can happen.
Imagine that we stop using up the world's resources, and learn to recycle everything, and it can happen.
John Lennon was right, that's why he was shot.
I didn't mean for his name to come up, but there it is, it did.
# posted by scorpiorising : 3:52 PM |
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Our climate.
Global warming...is metaphorical, as well as physical.
The g7 meeting was just held, and the subject of poverty came up. Yea, THAT SUBJECT.
Yes, there are people without enough to eat, without a place to sleep. But...I would say the world suffers from a paucity of imagination as opposed to a poverty of resources. Yes, even with dwindling resources and the desecration of the environment, we could still turn this thing around. If we focus our imagination on the creation of solutions, and their practical application, and our abilities on the best available protection and use of resources. And there can be no use of resources without it's cooresponding protection, if we are to renew our resources.
Wanted: U.S. Environmental Movement
Wanted: Movement to develop and implement clean energy
Needed: U.S. citizens to join the Make Poverty History British groups.
THE GLOBALIZATION OF AMERICAN CONSCIENCE is much more important, and will possibly conteract the dangers of the globalization of the economy.
What is the saying??? We need to think globally and act locally.
I say that again.
WE NEED TO THINK GLOBALLY AND ACT LOCALLY.
Recomendation for myself in the next few weeks: Attend the next meeting of a particular group regarding the preservation of low-income housing.
Contact some people I have in mind about getting involved with me in election reform in my home state.
Keep informed on global isses and lend my voice whenever possible.
Plant a spring garden.
Get the word out on the development of clean forms of energy. Part of the problem here is not that the technologies don't exist. The problem is that the desire to implement these technologies, on a mass scale, has not yet permeated the consciousness of the American, or even, the world citizen.
It could though, quickly. The issue has to do with what we allow to dominate our thoughts and efforts. The republicans are still winning on this one, despite recent successes, such as the muting of the "social security is in crisis" mantra.
They are winning because they have set the tone, temper and subject matter of the debate we are currently engaged in.
How often do you read about, in the mass media and popular blogs, the development and implementation of alternative forms of energy?
The most dangerous people to the neocons, are the ones who dare us to change, and to hope. What if we all became aware of the need for changes, and took steps, and offered each other hope? Participation, would drown out danger.
The g7 meeting was just held, and the subject of poverty came up. Yea, THAT SUBJECT.
Yes, there are people without enough to eat, without a place to sleep. But...I would say the world suffers from a paucity of imagination as opposed to a poverty of resources. Yes, even with dwindling resources and the desecration of the environment, we could still turn this thing around. If we focus our imagination on the creation of solutions, and their practical application, and our abilities on the best available protection and use of resources. And there can be no use of resources without it's cooresponding protection, if we are to renew our resources.
Wanted: U.S. Environmental Movement
Wanted: Movement to develop and implement clean energy
Needed: U.S. citizens to join the Make Poverty History British groups.
THE GLOBALIZATION OF AMERICAN CONSCIENCE is much more important, and will possibly conteract the dangers of the globalization of the economy.
What is the saying??? We need to think globally and act locally.
I say that again.
WE NEED TO THINK GLOBALLY AND ACT LOCALLY.
Recomendation for myself in the next few weeks: Attend the next meeting of a particular group regarding the preservation of low-income housing.
Contact some people I have in mind about getting involved with me in election reform in my home state.
Keep informed on global isses and lend my voice whenever possible.
Plant a spring garden.
Get the word out on the development of clean forms of energy. Part of the problem here is not that the technologies don't exist. The problem is that the desire to implement these technologies, on a mass scale, has not yet permeated the consciousness of the American, or even, the world citizen.
It could though, quickly. The issue has to do with what we allow to dominate our thoughts and efforts. The republicans are still winning on this one, despite recent successes, such as the muting of the "social security is in crisis" mantra.
They are winning because they have set the tone, temper and subject matter of the debate we are currently engaged in.
How often do you read about, in the mass media and popular blogs, the development and implementation of alternative forms of energy?
The most dangerous people to the neocons, are the ones who dare us to change, and to hope. What if we all became aware of the need for changes, and took steps, and offered each other hope? Participation, would drown out danger.
# posted by scorpiorising : 5:02 AM |
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
blood and money
I couldn't resist sharing this gem from an Atrios thread:
We are seeing over five soldiers a day dying, many wounded. This is going on and on and on. Even as the headlines celebrate "democracy" in action, the dead bodies pile up and the money flows like blood out of our budget and into the sand.
This makes no headlines and America, just like in Nam, will sleep on. The main topic: what shall we buy and can we be happy? continues to be touted by the various whores.
We are seeing over five soldiers a day dying, many wounded. This is going on and on and on. Even as the headlines celebrate "democracy" in action, the dead bodies pile up and the money flows like blood out of our budget and into the sand.
This makes no headlines and America, just like in Nam, will sleep on. The main topic: what shall we buy and can we be happy? continues to be touted by the various whores.
# posted by scorpiorising : 6:45 AM |
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