Catching Up…

A few links I thought were worth sharing:

• Why is it that foreign news outlets do an infinitely better job of reporting on items that are actually newsworthy than US news outlets? Case in point: this article in the Toronto Star which reports on the first “Terrorism Index” put out by the journal Foriegn Policy. Key quotes from the Star article:
  • Some 86 per cent of them said the world has grown more, not less, dangerous, despite President George W. Bush’s claims that the U.S. is winning the war on terror.
    The main reasons for the decline in security, they said, were the war in Iraq, the detention of terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay, U.S. policy towards Iran and U.S. energy policy.
  • “When you strip away the politics, the experts, almost to a person, are very worried about the administration,” says Joe Cirincione, vice-president of the Center for American Progress, the Washington think-tank which co-sponsored the survey.
    “They think none of our front-line institutions is doing a good job and that Iraq has made the terror situation much worse.”

• So the Republicans want a debate on Iraq (well, not really). But if they do, georgia10 at DailyKos is ready for it.

• Were voting machines that were decertified by California used in the highly contested CA-50 election to replace jailed Republican Congressman Duke Cunningham? It appears so, and the Registrar for San Diego County and the (Republican) Secretary of State don’t seem to care. Did any hanky-panky go on which might have swung a close election in one direction? Wouldn’t anyone who cares about democracy want to know. Apparently not the Registrar of a Republican County and the Republican Secretary of State.

• Republican Senators prevent an up-or-down vote on an increase to the minimum wage, which
  • has been $5.15 an hour for almost 10 years, and is worth less now that at almost anytime in the last 50 years. Adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage in 1968 would be worth $9.09 today, 75% more than the current wage.

• At the same time, Republican House of Representative members remove a Democratic amendment increasing the minimum wage from the Labor-HHS bill, while reviving the effort to repeal the estate tax. Classic Republican focus: ignore those who are slaving to make ends meet at minimum-wage jobs while protecting that tiny fraction of the population (0.3%) lucky enough to inherit more wealth than they know what to do with. Quite a set of values, huh?

• For those out there who fail to see the real world impact of Republican pro-business and anti-consumer policies, you may want to watch the latest edition of HBO’s Real Sports (the basic gist is diaried here in this diary at DailyKos). It is somewhat sad, though, that it takes a program on sports to really convey news.

• Finally, The University of California gave men’s basketball coach Ben Braun a two-year extension. I certainly don’t agree with the extension, but if it was given primarily to ensure that recruiting wasn’t affected, it might be ok. The key thing to know about the extension is if/how much the university is on the hook for if they decide to let Braun go (say, after next season if the Bears don’t make the tournament).

“The One Percent Doctrine”…

is the name of a new book by Ron Suskind (amazon.com link here), which details the administrations actions and policies in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. A good insight into the book is given in a review by the Washington Post, which explains in detail what Suskind learned about the man George W. Bush called "one of the top operatives plotting and planning death and destruction on the United States," Abu Zubaydah. However, according to the review,

Abu Zubaydah, his captors discovered, turned out to be mentally ill and nothing like the pivotal figure they supposed him to be. CIA and FBI analysts, poring over a diary he kept for more than a decade, found entries "in the voice of three people: Hani 1, Hani 2, and Hani 3" — a boy, a young man and a middle-aged alter ego. All three recorded in numbing detail "what people ate, or wore, or trifling things they said." Dan Coleman, then the FBI's top al-Qaeda analyst, told a senior bureau official, "This guy is insane, certifiable, split personality."

Hmm… so a man thought to be a major adversary in the War on Terror turns out to be mentally disturbed. Could it get worse? Only if one was to then torture this man and then use information obtained in the torture of an insane man in the run-up to war:

Abu Zubaydah also appeared to know nothing about terrorist operations; rather, he was al-Qaeda's go-to guy for minor logistics — travel for wives and children and the like. That judgment was "echoed at the top of CIA and was, of course, briefed to the President and Vice President," Suskind writes. And yet somehow, in a speech delivered two weeks later, President Bush portrayed Abu Zubaydah as "one of the top operatives plotting and planning death and destruction on the United States." And over the months to come, under White House and Justice Department direction, the CIA would make him its first test subject for harsh interrogation techniques.

…

Which brings us back to the unbalanced Abu Zubaydah. "I said he was important," Bush reportedly told Tenet at one of their daily meetings. "You're not going to let me lose face on this, are you?" "No sir, Mr. President," Tenet replied. Bush "was fixated on how to get Zubaydah to tell us the truth," Suskind writes, and he asked one briefer, "Do some of these harsh methods really work?" Interrogators did their best to find out, Suskind reports. They strapped Abu Zubaydah to a water-board, which reproduces the agony of drowning. They threatened him with certain death. They withheld medication. They bombarded him with deafening noise and harsh lights, depriving him of sleep. Under that duress, he began to speak of plots of every variety — against shopping malls, banks, supermarkets, water systems, nuclear plants, apartment buildings, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Statue of Liberty. With each new tale, "thousands of uniformed men and women raced in a panic to each . . . target."

A quote from Suskind summarizes things nicely:

the United States would torture a mentally disturbed man and then leap, screaming, at every word he uttered.

Gotta get this book and read it.

“Fatal Inaction”

The sheer incompetence and gall of our current administration is highlighted in this amazing article from the Washington Post (I think it’s from the Sunday Magazine; h/t Christy Hardin Smith at firedoglake). The article details the inability of our government to provide even the most basic equipment for the men and women of our Armed Forces. And it’s not just the inability to provide these basics from the start; it’s the inability to adequately provide these basics even months and years after the shortfalls are known. Further, it’s really makes clear the gall and callousness of the administration in the planning of this illegal war: any viewpoints or intelligence which indicated anything that the administration didn’t want to hear (such as how there were no WMD, or how we might not be greeted as liberators, etc.) was summarily rejected and ignored. All of us are paying the price for those decisions now.

The article is an incredible one, and is a must read for everyone.

Retired Major General slams Rummy; Iraq Casualty Map

Retired Army major general Paul D. Eaton wrote a scathing op-ed for the NY Times yesterday, in which he thoroughly takes our Secretary of Defense to task for, well his handling of the mess in Iraq as well as his destructive impact on the Pentagon. While I would disagree that Joe "Joe-mentum" Lieberman is a "true democrat", I'd agree with everything else he has said, especially the part about how Congress needs to re-assert itself and actually provide a check to our fearful leader (another reason why glenn's book is so important).

Also, Newsweek has an extremely sobering interactive map which lists the casualty numbers for Iraq since the US invasion. So sad and depressing to say the least.

Links Galore (or, catching up on the news from the past week)

Posts Galore today… missed a chance to post some stuff I thought was pretty important… gonna post it all now.

• One of the more pressing issues around right now… health-care, and making sure everyone is covered. Here's a post at dailykos.com explaining why single-payer health care is a good thing.

• Avian bird flu continues to spread… Is the US prepared, and are you?

• Ahh, those republicans… When one of your own is under indictment for money laundering and has been admonished for using the department of Homeland Security to track political enemies, why not put him on the House Appropriations committee? I mean, I'm sure he's learned his lesson, right?

• A retired top CIA official states that the "administration used intelligence not to inform decision-making, but to justify a decision already made."

• Now that Samuel Alito will be our next Supreme Court Justice, South Dakota moves to ban ALL abortions. I'm sure they don't know anything that Arlen Specter, Lincoln Chafee, or any of the other Republicans who vowed to reject anyone who wouldn't uphold Roe v. Wade doesn't know. In fact, I'm sure they don't know anything more than anyone who voted against Cloture on Alito knows, do they?

• Dick Cheney is called out on both his misstatements about the economy as well as his statements on the power of the executive. More on his having shot someone over the weekend in a later post.

• We also now know that Scooter Libby is saying that his superiors (remember, he worked for Dick Cheney; who might his superiors be?) "authorized" him to reveal classified information in order to discredit political opponents and prop up the case for invading Iraq.

• More nonsense from the preznit on the so-called "War on Terror". A key quote from the article (by Larry Johnson), something you'll never hear from dubya:
  

  The facts are indisputable. Since the U.S. invaded Iraq in March of 2003, international terrorist attacks in which people have been killed and injured have almost quadrupled. The number of countries hit by lethal attacks has also increased to unprecedented levels.

• Brownie Strikes Back! Former Fema chief Michael "Brownie" Brown lets the administration have it.

• One take on the Muslim Cartoon Controversy in Europe, and what it says about the acceptance of outsiders in Europe.

• A fantastic article about "scandal fatigue", and the failure of the opposition to hammer home any of the scandals that the current administration is party to.

What’s on my mind today 01/24/06

One of the best words to define the current administration, and dubya in general, is "truthiness". This administration spouts an incredible number of half-truths and no-truths that they want to force you to believe that it is quite disheartening. A great example is in regards to the current illegal wiretapping scandal. The administration wants to believe (and wants you to believe) that their wiretapping was legal. Forget for the moment that even after authorizing warrantless wiretaps (in violation of FISA *and* the Fourth Amedment of the Constitution), our fearful leader stated that court orders were still required for wiretaps. Glenn Greenwald points out today that the current administration in 2002 refused to support legislation by Senator Mike Dewine (R-OH) that would have eliminated the very requirements of FISA that the administration violated. In other words, the administration went against a bill that would have legitimized the very tactics they ended up using. And why did they do this? Because, among other things, the Department of Justice was concerned that the legislation would have violated the constitution! Read Glenn Greenwald's article; it's well worth it.

Another great read: Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid's (D-NV) speech today at the Center for American Progress. His points are all dead on, including the question of what is going on with Osama Bin Laden. For all of this current administrations posturing on "national security", four years after 9/11, Osama bin Laden is still running around free and making threats against our country. Reid hits all the big points on the administrations current failures.

Armando at dailykos brings up an excellent article by E.J. Dionne providing a bit of a framework for what Democrats need to do to stand up to Republicans on the Nat'l Security issue.

Finally, on a somewhat lighter note, my California Golden Bears (men's basketball) return home after a road split last week at the Arizona schools in the Pac-10. While winning on the road is always tough, Cal blew a golden opportunity to defeat the weakest Arizona team in years. After many blowout losses to UA in Tucson, it certainly was encouraging that the bears kept it close and had a chance to win at the end. However, in my opinion, after watching the game, the bears offensive flow was pretty poor, and even an average offensive outing would've led to an important win. As it is, Cal needs a big win over visiting Washington this thursday (as well as a win over Washington State on Saturday) if they want to improve their resume for an at-large bid for the NCAA tournament. If they continue to play like they have, however, my guess is that they'll need to win the Pac-10 tournament to get an NCAA bid. With such a weak Pac-10, and the bears' strongest team for a while, that would certainly be a disappointing season.