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Thursday, June 30, 2005
 

One Hand Clapping; Recovered: Clueless CounterTerror

The Sound of One Hand Clapping

Did you notice how quiet that crowd was at Fort Bragg for President Bush's speech on Iraq Tuesday? Barely a sound. It took his own entourage to finally prompt the dubious servicemen into any kind of supportive noise. As the New York Times' David Sanger noticed, "after two presidential campaigns, Mr. Bush has finely tuned his sense of timing for cueing applause, especially when it comes to his most oft-expressed declarations of resolve to face down terrorists. But when the crowd did not respond on Tuesday, he seemed to speed up his delivery a bit."

Even the soldiers, usually the president's most enthusiastic supporters, have their strong and growing concerns about the meatgrinder that Bush thinks they should only be glad to sacrifice themselves to. As someone with a lifelong eagerness for others to do combat, he can hardly be surprised that the applause, too, is dying.

Recovered: Clueless CounterTerror

So often seems like the most intriguing stories go nowhere. It's been 10 days now since I read David Johnston's New York Times piece headlined F.B.I. Counterterror Officials Lack Experience, Lawyer Says. Ran on Page A13 and never got any bounce, that I can see. Here's the story in shorthand: An attorney who has represented FBI whistleblowers in the past, interviewed a few top bureau folks and found them utterly clueless on terrorism matters. FBI director Mueller didn't know of a link between Osama bin Laden and the so-called "blind sheikh," Omar Abdel Rahman, who is serving something like a billion years for terrorism-related activities in the New York City area. Maybe you didn't know about the link, but I did, and I am not a terrorism specialist. So do many journalists, many newspaper readers and, one hopes, a few FBI officials. Top ranking G-Men admit to not knowing much on the subject, but if terrorism is, as the Bush administration claims, overwhelmingly the top priority, what's the point of having things run by people who know mostly about bank robberies, forgers and such? The head of the counterterrorism unit is best known for running the investigation of those crazy sniper killings in the DC area a few years back. How many times is that likely to repeat itself, and in what way could that possibly prepare this man to run such an important section?

The gap between the administration's overheated rhetoric and its programmatic sloth and incompetence is a marvel.

 

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Wednesday, June 29, 2005
 

Earth to Base; Scrushy-Feely

Earth to Base

So Karl Rove and company have their next consequential issue to sell to their base: the Ten Commandments! GOP strategists are already deciding to whip the most clueless of voters into a frenzy over the Supreme Court's split decisions Monday, allowing display of the Commandments in some buildings but not others.

Do these GOP tacticians really so disrespect their supporters? They practically never try to mobilize them over something that actually impacts their lives. Using all these hot button issues -- the Bible, Terri Schiavo, gay marriage -- instead of real economic issues that affect people, is as thoughtful as advising students that reading US Weekly is imperative for success in life. It's one ongoing scam, but somehow the Democrats never figure out how to make people see what is going on.

Scrushy-Feely

Sure seems like Richard Scrushy, the founder of HealthSouth Corp, was guilty as heck of fraud at his chain of rehabilitation and outpatient-surgery clinics. One had the impression that everyone who worked for the man testified against him and in support of the 36 criminal counts he faced. There was even a surreptitiously recorded conversation in which he told a top financial exec, "If you want to go public with this...then everybody goes down."  But the jury appears to have liked the fellow. And no wonder -- as the Wall Street Journal has recounted, Scrushy pulled out all the stops to influence the process. Scrushy, who gets to keep the bulk of $300 million the government was after, including the gated estate, the 92-foot yacht, the Lamborghini, the Rolls-Royce, went all religious during the trial, and actually started preaching at  black churches while black jurors were pondering the fate of this white man who had so little in common with them. He also inexplicably had a black entourage around him in the courtroom, which seems to have further enhanced his stature with those who held his fate in their hands. Meanwhile, Scrushy hired and fired tons of the country's foremost lawyers.  It was one impressive show. The $20 million he spent seemed worth every penny. Who says a guy can't get a fair trial in this country?

 

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Tuesday, June 28, 2005
 

Where's King Solomon; Trapped by Flying Cell

Where's King Solomon?

As this fascinating pre-recess flurry of Supreme Court decisions come down, with their intriguing splits, I've gotten to thinking about how far away we seem from the notion of jurisprudence that is truly Solomonic. Justice Stephen Breyer was the only member of the court who thought that the Ten Commandments could remain in the Texas Capitol while not on the walls of two Kentucky courthouses -- he made some interesting distinctions. I don't necessarily agree with him, but I appreciate his attempt to both grasp for subtlety and to take into account a broad range of factors. Four other justices voted in a bloc, either for the Ten Commandments or against them, in both cases. And with the notable exception of Sandra Day O'Connor, whose opposition to displaying the Ten Commandments was a surprise given her track record, it was awfully predictable.

In all likelihood, the rulings expected tomorrow will continue this pattern. Which is pretty unfortunate. Judges really should be in a world of their own. They should have somehow managed to check their own partisan instincts, preferences and prejudices at the door and become something more profound. Instead, what we have is a formula for more -- not less -- politics as the Bush administration ramps up their next choice for the Supreme Court (to replace Chief Justice Rehnquist at his anticipated imminent retirement). The most satisfying development, really, is when a justice starts evolving, and surprising us, and becomes willing to show originality and vision that transcends his or her roots.

The decline of judicial independence is really the fault of both left and right. We truly live in an increasingly bifurcated society, and that's not a good thing. We've got to do better at finding things we share in common.

Trapped By Flying Cell

As Joe Sharkey notes in his New York Times travel column today, the feds seem to be moving toward allowing cell phone use on airplanes. As he also notes, that's an appalling idea. He cites a recent survey showing that 82 percent would be bothered by people making and taking voice calls near them during a flight, while 64 percent were okay with people using them for text-messaging.

This subject may seem obscure or trivial, but it isn't. I've mentioned this before, but there's a growing problem with the pollution of our personal spaces, our havens for introspection, quiet, rest, sanity. If you live in a city, you can feel the constant increase in such factors. Advertising posters for liquor and against communicable diseases are becoming ubiquitous in public bathrooms, eliminating yet another safe harbor. Health clubs now sometimes bombard exercisers with annoying ads for fitness magazines on their public address system. But the cell phone creep is perhaps the most problematical of all. And nowhere is it worse than when you are trapped in close proximity with people who have no respect for others.

We've all suffered the torment of having to listen to interminable conversations about the logistics of getting a car repaired, negotiations over what movie to see, repeated instructions on pickup points to the hard of hearing. On a plane it would drive anyone to distraction. So, yes, quiet, text-messaging is a reasonable compromise. So is the notion of putting in some kind of enclosed 'phone booth' where passengers can chatter away to their heart's content. I'm guessing that the feds will take into account the concerns of the public -- if they hear from enough of them. That probably means members of Congress, and perhaps the Department of Transportation.  Let a thousand cell phones bloom -- but not in my friendly skies.

 

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Monday, June 27, 2005
 

TALKING WITH THE ENEMY; FRYING FACTS

 

TALKING WITH THE ENEMY

Yesterday, on Meet the Press, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld confirmed a report from the London Sunday Times that US diplomats have had a series of direct meetings with commanders and members of Iraqi insurgent groups, including one with links to Al Qaeda. "Meetings take place all the time," he said. For some reason, the New York Times downplayed what should have been a headline, though the Washington Post correctly made a big deal of it.

And correctly so. This is a watershed. Because the admission calls into question the mission. If the Bush administration considers it fine to negotiate with former top officials of Saddam's regime, to engage with Al Qaeda, then what was the point of the Iraq invasion in the first place? Please clarify. 

FRYING FACTS

On June 12, the New York Times ran an article on the cover of the Sunday Business section, called "Striking Back at the Food Police." It was about a group called the Center for Consumer Freedom, which advocates for "sanity" in the public discussion over obesity. The Center is funded by the food and restaurant industries, and its main mission seems to be to do battle with the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a longstanding DC fixture that was an offshoot of the old Ralph Nader organization and that has long led the fight for full disclosure about the nutritional benefits (and harm) of foods. The article was a must-read, but, in part because it was in the business section, a lot of people who should have read it missed it.

The article noted how Consumer Freedom had taken out full-page ads in top newspapers, trumpeting a new study that appeared to cast doubt on some assumptions about obesity. As the Times put it, "(Consumer Freedom declared) that obesity was not an 'epidemic' but rather a lot of hype." The ad asserted: "Americans have been force-fed a steady diet of obesity myths by the 'food police', trial lawyers, and even our own government."

That article appeared June 12. Here's USA Today from June 27: (I'm including this short article in its entirety, because I think its important that the distortions put out by outfits like Consumer Freedom not go unchallenged. To my mind, this group is just one in a long string of mercenary outfits that will advocate for any untruth if there's profit to be had. Anyway.....)

 

Health spending soars for obesity By Nanci Hellmich, USA TODAY Private health insurance spending on illnesses related to obesity has increased more than tenfold since 1987, according to the first research to quantify the trend. The growth in obesity has fueled a dramatic increase in the amount spent treating diabetes, heart disease, high cholesterol and other weight-related illnesses, says the study, which is published today in Health Affairs, an online journal of health policy and research. Overall, employers and privately insured families spent $36.5 billion on obesity-linked illnesses in 2002, up from an inflation-adjusted $3.6 billion in 1987. That's up from 2% of total health care spending on obesity in 1987 to 11.6% in 2002, the latest year for which data are available. On average, treating an obese person cost $1,244 more in 2002 than treating a healthy-weight person did. In 1987, the gap was $272. And the obesity problem is "only going to get worse," says lead author Kenneth Thorpe, chairman of the department of health policy and management at Emory University in Atlanta. "The costs are up because so many more Americans are obese and because they're being more aggressively treated for weight-related illnesses." About 31% of U.S. adults are obese — 30 or more pounds over a healthy weight. That's up from 23% in the late 1980s and 15% in the late 1970s. The study comes as businesses, the government and consumers are struggling with soaring health care costs. "Most of what is going on now to try to control health care spending is missing the target," Thorpe says. "Companies are tweaking co-pays and talking about health care savings accounts when really they need to redirect their focus to reduce the prevalence of obesity among children and workers." Thorpe and his colleagues analyzed national surveys of about 14,000 people from 1987 and 2002. The data included health care spending, medical conditions and trips to the doctor, hospital and pharmacy. Findings: • The percentage of obese people being treated for high cholesterol, mental disorders and upper gastrointestinal disorders increased 10 percentage points. • The increase in adult-onset diabetes contributed to a 64% rise in diabetes treatment from 1987 to 2002. • About 25% of the extremely obese (80 or more pounds overweight) were being treated for six or more conditions in 2002, compared with 14% in 1987. Thorpe's findings add to growing evidence that extra pounds increase medical costs. A study last year by RTI International in Raleigh, N.C., and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that obese and overweight Americans racked up about $75 billion in weight-related medical bills in 2003. Because much of this is covered by Medicare and Medicaid, taxpayers pay about half the total, the study found.

 

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Friday, June 24, 2005
 

P.R.OVOCATEUR ROVE; CRUISIN FOR CONVERTS

 

P.R.OVOCATEUR ROVE

The news today is full of Democratic attacks on Karl Rove for his remarks that Bush's political opponents responded to the 9/11 attacks with a desire to "offer therapy and understanding for our attackers." Of course, Rove's remarks, which portray conservatives as wanting to defeat terrorists and liberals as wishing to coddle them, were no accident. He carefully calculates how these things will play out.

Indeed, one has to even ask why Rove, who often stays out of sight entirely, would go to a public event (a New York Conservative Party gathering) and make such incendiary remarks. My guess is that he's decided that this will take a little heat off his boss and distract from growing revelations about Bush's desire to attack Iraq regardless of justification, and growing sentiment that the Iraq situation is rapidly imploding.

His approach seems to have worked. There's a press conference criticizing Rove, featuring liberals Frank Lautenberg (a Jew), Jon Corzine (a rich liberal with glasses and a beard), and Hillary (see the photo in today's New York Times.) This will guarantee that certain Americans will immediately shut down on the question of what Rove should and should not have said, fire up the political "base" and generally mix things up.

Good work, Karl!

CRUISIN FOR CONVERTS

Jack Shafer at Slate has a pretty good piece about the contrived Tom Cruise-Katie Holmes romance, and how the complicity of the tabloids merely destroys what little credibility those media have. The elephant in the room here is Scientology -- virtually every journalist knows about the facts of that outfit, including years of allegations from former members and ranking Scientology officials about how celebrities are essentially blackmailed into doing its bidding. Do you doubt that the tabloid editors know this? Of course they do. So participating in this charade is inexcusable. In a sense, one would have to consider those editors to be enabling Scientology's efforts, and to have some culpability for what happens to innocent members of the public who join as a result of this publicity. For more on Scientology, see my pieces in George magazine and the Village Voice, published years ago but no less relevant now.

 

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Thursday, June 23, 2005
 

NO RECRUIT LEFT BEHIND; AFGHAN OFF DEEP END; NoFI?; AMOUNTS TO JACK

NO RECRUIT LEFT BEHIND

Well, this is fairly ominous: According to today's Washington Post, the Pentagon has signed up a private company to create a database with the names of every American student, ages 16-18. The idea is to improve military recruiting. The military is already allowed to collect some data, thanks to the ironically named No Child Left Behind Act. Now, however, the war machine will be gathering, says the Post, student Social Security numbers and even info on subjects the teens study. There's clearly a chilling Big Brother element here, making this just one in a series of disturbing developments. As I've said in a prior blog, maybe if they weren't so eager to use American youth as cannon fodder in avoidable conflicts, they wouldn't need to resort to such desperate measures.

AFGHAN OFF THE DEEP END?

  It's not easy to report two wars simultaneously, which is presumably just fine with the Administration. While (at least some of us) focus on the

Iraqi spiral into anarchy, the situation in Afghanistan continues to unravel. It wasn't that long ago that hawks were pronouncing that country pacified, but there's a rapidly growing insurgency there, too. The other day, some kind of huge battle took place, although not many details have emerged yet. But news reports indicate that dozens of insurgents may have been killed, as well as maybe 10 Afghan soldiers, while a bunch of US troops were wounded. It's absolutely imperative that news organizations make a better effort to get a handle on the spread of combat fronts worldwide -- something is going on, and we don't know what.

WiFi? NoFi.

Large telecom companies are persuading lawmakers to pass bills preventing local governments from installing high-speed wireless internet access for the public. Incredible. The towns are often ones where NO COMMERCIAL SERVICE is yet available, but the companies are still determined to stop them. The full story can be read on the front page of today's Wall Street Journal. One hopes that the growing ranks of media democracy activists will see this as the outrage that it is. Once companies can prevent the public, through its own government, from finding solutions to its own problems, we are really into the permanent corporate welfare state.

AMOUNTS TO JACK

Those who have been following the antics of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's wackily corrupt friends will enjoy the latest revelations about DeLay's close buddy, the lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who seems to be in big trouble for all manner of impropriety, but shows that phony piousness is not limited to hypocrites on the Christian Right. Here an excerpt from an Abramoff e-mail that has come out as part of an ongoing investigation (via Dana Milbank of the Post/Via Slate):

It's a letter to a prominent extreme right rabbi, Daniel Lapin (Google him for some more eye-opening material)

 

Down Down Down

The other day, I heard or read about Bush actually saying how, since Iraq is now the focal point of global terrorism, it's that much more important that American troops remain. Pretty amazing. He is tacitly admitting now that his invasion actually caused the whole mess, but no matter -- what counts is that the mess exists, and continues to grow. The way in which he is allowed to constantly revise his rhetoric, his rationales, is something to behold. Why is this not, in and of itself, a topic of media coverage? First, Iraq was a threat and a terror sponsor. Then it seemed like maybe it was. Then it wasn't really, but it was still a bad influence. Then the invasion became about positive things -- about introducing democracy. Now, with sectarian strife growing, it isn't really about that anymore. Now, it is that Iraq has become a global rallying point for every would-be insurgent, and hence where we must take our stand.

Meanwhile, the tragedy multiplies. The New York Times today front-pages the insurgents' constantly improving bomb-making abilities, which include armor-penetrating explosives. Last month, US troops were on the receiving end of 700 bombings. 700 bombings. It would be interesting to study how quickly people who supported the invasion have shunted it entirely out of their minds. What percentage of them talk about that rather than the win-loss record of their favorite baseball team? Just wondering.

Also, Newsweek has a classified CIA report on how Iraq is becoming the place for amateur jihadists from the world over to get their high-level training in destruction. 

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Tuesday, June 21, 2005
 

JAIL MADE USEFUL; HEAL THYSELF

JAIL MADE USEFUL

Some think it is unfair to make 80-year-old John Rigas, the Adelphia cable tycoon, go to jail on a 15-year sentence. Even though he did steal hundreds of millions from his company, one could argue that his sentence ought to be mitigated because of his age, since it is tantamount to a life sentence.

But rather than worry too much about poor Mr. Rigas, or about the other, younger high-rollers who are now being made to pay a price for their prodigious greed, I suggest we find a way to get more out of them. How about taking Rigas and other perpetrators of high corporate crimes and assigning them responsibility for building a system that prevents this kind of thing from happening in the future? How about making them do somewhat shorter jail time in return for real, useful public service stints? I'd love to see Rigas also put to work on fashioning more equitable laws concerning the rights of workers such as his -- finding ways of safeguarding and stabilizing retirement benefits, for example. I'd like to see him have to work with poor people, and be made to find ways to redress the growing wealth gap in this country -- a wealth gap built in part by the corruption of the political process by people like him, and by the theft, explicit and implicit, that is such a big part of the game for so many titans. Maybe he could even be assigned to work on media democracy -- how to ensure that all Americans get full access to the Internet and to news programming at a modest price. Bet a cable guy like him could work wonders if he wanted.  

HEAL THYSELF

Here's an ingenious solution to the rapidly spiraling cost of malpractice insurance: get doctors to commit fewer mistakes. Sounds simple, no?   Sounds almost ridiculously so, right? Well, today's Wall Street Journal leads with the story of one category of doctors who have actually lowered the cost of their insurance, in real dollars, from what they paid 20 years ago. How? They concentrated diligently on improving patient safety. As the paper notes, "over the past two decades, patient deaths due to anesthesia have declined to one death per 200,000 to 300,000 cases from one for every 5,000 cases." That is breathtaking. The anesthesiologists pulled off this feat by use of devices that warn doctors of potentially fatal problems in the operating room, by developing computerized mannequins for practice in handling real-life crises, and more. It's fine to complain about the insurance companies, who are absolutely a huge part of the problem. But the sooner we all start taking better care of our customers, the sooner this country can get back to some kind of sanity and proportionality. You want fewer tort suits? Don't prevent the suits by statute. Make them irrelevant by practice.   

 

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Monday, June 20, 2005
 

BUSH MOTIVES; TIMES JUDY OOPS; PINSTRIPES FOR POLITICOS

BUSH MOTIVES

If you haven't yet seen my exclusive on the real reasons Bush wanted to invade Iraq, may I refer you to the story itself, on TomPaine.com ? 

TIMES JUDY OOPS

Yes, I have been ranting a bit about Judith Miller's loopy reporting as she continues to try to knock UN secretary general Kofi Annan (and the entire institution, while she's at it) out of the box. If you read Friday and Wednesday's blogs (still can, just below) you know that she's been making all kinds of mistakes, and sort of quietly correcting herself or being quietly corrected. Today, however, the New York Times had only four formal Corrections items, and ONE was about Judy (for some reason, the electronic edition is quite different, though it has the same Miller item). Of course, it didn't name her. The paper would take a big leap forward if it would simply say, "an article on Friday by Judith Miller incorrectly......" since, when it is NOT the reporter's fault, they say it was caused by "an editing error." This one is all Judy. 

Let's compare what Judy got wrong with another correction that appeared in the print edition, just ahead of her spanking. A picture caption misspelled the given name for a nurse who testified in an Australian case -- we learn that her first name is Toni, not Tony. Well, great. Now, let's see what Judy Miller did incorrectly. Was it a smaller mistake than misspelling a first name? If it was, then of course it would come second.. But if it were a whopper, which it was, it properly should have been the first correction. 

Feedback from Times folks? Any of my good friends there? russ@russbaker.com .  Please tell me what's going on. It is just too bizarre.

PINSTRIPES FOR POLITICOS

Well, the latest bunch of greedmongers have gone down for the count. Tyco's CEO and chief financial officer could face up to 30 years in jail after a jury in New York found them guilty of grand larceny, conspiracy and fraud. So now, they join a growing line of other country club types who were only too glad to rob those who actually believe in the free market system. Adelphia, WorldCom, and we've still got Enron, HealthSouth and others to be addressed by juries.

Now that the courts are starting to clean up the Warren Harding-era style corruption, maybe I can make a small suggestion? How about the politicians who worked so well and so closely with them, and who received so much campaign assistance in return? I can't say that anything they did is technically illegal, but it might certainly bear examining by some smart, energetic prosecutor. 

 

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Friday, June 17, 2005

MORE JUDY MADNESS
 

(Before considering this item, check out Wednesday’s blog item regarding Judith Miller of the New York Times, below. Then, read on here. )

If my favorite newspaper is serious about eliminating its reputation for intrigue and opacity, now would be a great time to start. Wednesday I noted Judith Miller's continued use of innuendo and piecemeal introduction of dubious "evidence" to keep the UN pot boiling, and, perhaps more importantly, asked about the penultimate paragraph of a solo-bylined piece in which she at least appeared to slip in the caution note that perhaps everything she had reported before might turn out to be wrong.

Today, more weirdness. Miller has been apparently force-paired, as sometimes happens (mostly, it seems, when she is in trouble) with UN bureau chief Warren Hoge, with whose methods I have no beef. Their joint-bylined article is headlined "Contractor Now Denies He Talked With Annan on Oil-for-Food Bid." What does that mean? It means that the very source in Miller's earlier piece is now changing his story. It also means that Times editors are sufficiently concerned to include this as an entirely separate article in a paper very short of space for important stories.

Today's article notes that this is the second time that the source, a one-time business partner of UN chief Kofi Annan's son, has revised his claims concerning what his partner's father might have known about UN contract favoritism. Well, if his claims are known to be fungible, why even write an article every time he's quoted saying something harmful to Kofi Annan, and, by extension, helpful to Miller's good friends in the neocon community who are so eager to discredit the United Nations and multilateral solutions to global problems? Well, why indeed?

Remarkably, today's Times piece actually quotes the secretary general himself, chastising reporters (read Miller specifically):

>He urged reporters "to resist the temptation to substitute yourself for the Volcker (UN investigative) commission." <

Would Judy Miller have put that obvious slap at her into her own article if she weren't forced? I'd be glad to hear from UN or NYT folks who have some inside knowledge. Try me at russ@russbaker.com .

 

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Wednesday, June 15, 2005

JUDY, JUDY, JUDY; IRAQI INFLUX; BUSH'S QUIET MELT

Some of you may know my past reporting about Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter who keeps on trucking despite huge errors and biases. She was probably the leading journalistic purveyor of the fallacy that Saddam had WMD and was tied to Al-Qaeda. More recently, she has relentlessly attacked the United Nations, prematurely trying to tie Secretary General Kofi Annan to any and every potential scandal relating to the vast global institution.

So far this week, she's come back with new material that may -- just may -- be more damning. But then again, it might not. It's more of her Chinese Water-Torture technique: dribs and drabs of innuendo, much of which must be later corrected. Today, she published an article headlined "Investigators To Review Hint of Annan Role in Iraq Oil Sales," about a memo that seems to suggest that Kofi Annan may have had more contact with a UN contractor for whom his son worked than he has previously admitted. It remains to be seen where this will all lead. But these articles continue to take murky "evidence" and create in readers' minds the sense that there's something deeply wrong at the UN helm, when in fact, there may not be -- and certainly whatever it is absolutely pales by comparison to what goes on in Washington on any given day, yet gets far less scrutiny from The Times.

In any case, let me draw your eye to the penultimate paragraph of her piece, quoting the contractor firm in question. Earlier in her article, she suggests that the company, Cotecna, is being forthcoming with information related to understanding how it got UN contracts. And in this paragraph, she says that "a new internal audit showed that Cotecna had not made the $306,305 in payments that [a UN investigative] panel said might have gone to Kojo Annan."

Let me translate that. She's saying that the entire basis for her many stories -- about the implied corruption found in Kofi Annan's son doing consulting work for a firm that got a UN contract -- MAY BE WRONG. If that's so, why is that in the penultimate paragraph? And what do her editors have to say about this?

IRAQI INFLUX  

 For some time, I've been thinking and saying that a huge potential issue is going to be whether the invasion of Iraq did anything at all to make the world safer -- or opened a Pandora's Box. The Administration constantly puts out word that matters are going swimmingly (with occasional reality-checks peppered in so as to retain the slightest amount of credibility.) But I keep wondering: Who's blowing themselves up? Iraqis have never seemed to go for that practice. And the number of suicide bombings is way up from several months ago. (30 per week now, according to USA Today, a huge spike from just one a week back in January 2004). USAT says that many commanders and others think the bombers are largely foreigners, especially Saudis. Think about that. Who were the WTC perpetrators? Saudis. And where is Osama, the Saudi? Wonder what Saddam will have to say about all this at his upcoming trial.

BUSH'S QUIET MELT

I blogged last week about the Bush administration official who came straight from helping oil companies avoid culpability for global warming to the White House, where he got busy removing damning material from government climate reports (as first reported by The Times).  The administration must have realized that this could be a disaster. So the man resigned -- FRIDAY NIGHT -- which means virtually no media scrutiny. End of story. Oh--and he has now been hired by ExxonMobil -- where, presumably, he gets a big fat raise. Anybody care to keep this subject on the front burner? These travesties should not be allowed to vanish without trace.  

 

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Tuesday, June 14, 2005

MADRASSA HEAD-SMACKER; NEXT WAVE GOPERS?;  NEWS FROM SCIENTOLLYWOOD

MADRASSA HEAD-SMACKER

An op-ed in today's New York Times (cited by Slate) really makes one smack oneself in the forehead. It challenges the common assumption that the madrassas, the Islamic schools, are singular factors in the rise of extremism and terror. But according to Peter Bergen and Swati Pandey, the vast majority of terrorists they studied are college-educated, and few attended madrassas. Of course, you can't conclude therefore that madrasses don't also contribute to hatred and narrow-mindedness, but this does raise an intriguing question about the evolution and motivation of people who are inclined to attack westerners. We need to see more research done on this, and we need to see our leaders begin to acknowledge the complexity of the matter. Here's key text....

We examined the educational backgrounds of 75 terrorists behind some of the most significant recent terrorist attacks against Westerners. We found that a majority of them are college-educated. Of the 75, only nine had attended madrassas, and all of those played a role in one attack—the Bali bombing. Even in this instance, however, five college-educated "masterminds"—including two university lecturers—helped to shape the Bali plot.

Like the view that poverty drives terrorism—a notion that countless studies have debunked—the idea that madrassas are incubating the next generation of terrorists offers the soothing illusion that desperate, ignorant automatons are attacking us rather than college graduates, as is often the case. While madrassas are an important issue in education and development in the Muslim world, they are not and should not be considered a threat to the United States.

NEXT WAVE GOPERS?

My friend and fellow blogger Steve Pizzo has an interesting scenario for how Republicans will retool to continue beating Democrats. He thinks the GOP, recognizing that the blatant pandering to the extremes, and to the corporations, can't continue, will start fielding moderates whom most voters like personally. That means Rudy Giuliani and, of course, governor Arnold whatzizname in California. They'll propose changes that sound reasonable, will continue to do the corporate bidding on the quiet, and will beat Democrats of the rather precious ilk (Hillary, Kerry, Gore) simply because they seem more like somebody you'd rather hang out with. It sounds audacious enough to work. Which means the only thing the Democrats can probably do is to actually field candidates with personalities, convictions, and a kind of fearlessness. .

NEWS FROM SCIENTOLLYWOOD

Scientology just can't help itself. It keeps on manipulating the celebrities on its short rope to bring in other stars, an essential part of founder L. Ron Hubbard's master plan for global domination. They haven't succeeded yet, but not for trying. They don't always manage to get every star onto the reservation (Lisa Marie Presley failed with Michael Jackson, something the Scientologists are probably not displeased with in restrospect). But they do what they can, and whoever is in a film at the moment with Tom Cruise, aside from allegedly being in love with him, has to embrace the bizarre cosmology and emotionally manipulative rituals. (See previous articles I've written on the topic, in the late, great George magazine and the Village Voice). Anyway, here's an excerpt from today's NY Daily News' Lowdown column:

 

Talk about a war of the worlds!

I hear that Katie Holmes is driving Warner Bros. Pictures absolutely batty with her insistence - or maybe it's boyfriend Tom Cruise's insistence - that a Church of Scientology official accompany the starlet every step of the way on her "Batman Begins" press tour.

Warner Bros. international marketing execs have been firing off agitated E-mails expressing severe frustration that the 26-year-old Holmes' Scientology adviser, a twentysomething brunette identified as Jessica Rodriguez, has been monitoring (and occasionally interrupting) every single press interview when not giving Holmes religious instruction.

This may seem minor, but remember that someone like Cruise has the ability to influence thousands of impressionable young people to try Scientology. And that's not pretty. Again, if you don't know why, read up a bit.

 

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Monday, June 13, 2005

DOWNING ST DOWNER? HOWARD “JAMES” DEAN

DOWNING STREET DOWNER

Yesterday, the Sunday Times of London posted a not-before-seen, leaked 2002 memorandum from Tony Blair’s staff about early White House planning for the Iraq war long before the invasion began. A previous memo, now widely known as the Downing Street Memo, from a top British intelligence figure, seemed to suggest that the Bush administration had decided to go to war very early on. The new memo makes things look a bit cloudier, because it says that “no political decisions” had been made yet, though military planning for an invasion was moving forward quickly.

The New York Times today runs a sober attempt to decipher the somewhat ambiguous memo, though the headline is truly horrendous: “Prewar British Memo Says War Decision Wasn’t Made.” What does THAT mean? Who would even read such an article, much less expect to understand it?

Personally, I read the memo a little differently than some others. I don’t think that this second memo necessarily contradicts the first. One has to remember that these memos are largely intended to establish policy, and a paper trail of defensible actions. So it has to do double duty: tell other people at Downing Street what is really going on without leaving some smoking gun that could prove disastrous later. Hence, it makes complete sense that the Blair people can interpret the documents differently than war critics. Last week in New York, Blair insisted that the language from the first memo--saying that the Bush administration was getting intelligence fixed to justify an invasion--did not really say that. Yet of course it did.

In any case, probably the most damning and authentic sentiments in both memos concern the clear impression that the Bush Administration wanted to invade Iraq no matter what, and that in its rush to prepare the troops, it gave little or no thought to what would follow the invasion. American planning, the memo said, was “virtually silent” on how to manage a postwar occupation. That in itself is a shocking revelation, and one that could prove highly problematical for Bush if coverage of that point grows. Because, as becomes more painfully evident by the day, these folks had absolutely no idea what they were getting into, and still don't know what to do about it.

HOWARD “JAMES” DEAN

That rebel with a cause, Howard Dean, is scaring the bluff out of Republican leaders. You know it by the constant barrage of criticism of Dean’s edgy comments about the GOP. In a Fox News Channel (where else?) interview to run today, Vice President Cheney goes after Dean, who has recently said, among other things, that Republicans "never made an honest living in their lives" and that the GOP is "pretty much a white, Christian party."

Cheney, and other top elephants, insist at the same time on condemning Dean and claiming that his remarks are actually good for the Republicans. But one senses a certain nervousness. Dean seems to be the only one of Democratic leaders who has read Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter With Kansas or any of the other good books that point out how Middle America has been tricked into voting against its interests, supporting policies that help the rich while devastating health care, financial security and other things that were once basic rights.

Although Dean is certainly Mr Hyperbole, there’s some truth in what he says, i.e. that a lot of the corporate types funding the GOP’s takeover of government run their companies on a less than ethical basis. The many corporate scandals of recent years confirm that, as do these companies’ constant efforts to get the upper hand by tipping the playing field in their favor through campaign contributions, lobbying, changing the judiciary, deceptive p.r. campaigns, legal harassment of critics, and much much more. Do they make an “honest living?” You be the judge.

Personally, I think there are lots of Republican-voting small business owners who are either reasonably or perfectly honest in their pursuit of a living, so Dean probably did overdo that line. But, if we’re judging people on the accuracy of their remarks, let’s remember that Dick Cheney, no great slave to the truth himself, continued to claim to sympathetic “heartland” audiences that Iraq had WMDs long after everyone else admitted it didn’t. Falsehoods and hyperbole are the coin of the realm. As for the GOP being largely white and Christian, that seems to be a fact. The vast majority of people of color still vote Democratic, and non-Christian denominations also appear to favor the Democrats. So what's shocking about Dean's remark? That he made it in public? Bit refreshing, a little candor now and then from the powerful.

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