MotherJones.com | MoJoBlog - Social Issues and Political Commentary: March 18, 2007

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March 24, 2007

"...You Have To Trust Us, It's Not About Transgenderism"

That's what the city commissioners of Largo, Florida said after they finalized the dismissal of City Manager Steve Stanton today in a six-hour meeting. After Stanton announced he was planning to live his life as a woman, the commission voted to dismiss him last month. The mayor and one commissioner voted to keep Stanton, but the other five members of the commission voted to fire him.

"I think we're pretty well convinced," said Commissioner Gay Gentry. "You have to believe us, you have to trust us, it is not about transgenderism."

What, then, you might ask, is it about? According to the commissioners, they "lost confidence in him." There was some talk about his having "bullied" employees, but the commission had not only given Stanton good reviews--they had given him a very large raise. The real reason for the lost confidence is best expressed by commissioner Jimmy Dean: "This little thing has made Largo the laughingstock of the whole country. It's a disgrace." Now that the city has been "cast in a negative light," the commission can no longer feel confident about Stanton's performance.

Got it? Stanton can no longer perform his duties acceptably because the city is embarrassed.

Stanton's contract says he can be fired without cause, and he hasn't decided whether to file a lawsuit against the commission.

March 23, 2007

Good News for Ravers: Ecstasy Isn't So Bad

Earlier today researchers at Bristol University published "a landmark paper" that finds that alcohol and cigarettes are more dangerous than many illegal drugs, including ecstasy and pot.

To anyone who didn’t already know that ecstasy doesn’t give standers-by second-hand cancer or cause people to start fights, the study breaks the shocking news that while (illegal) coke and heroin are ranked most harmful, they’re followed closely by (not illegal) barbiturates, alcohol, and tobacco. Pot comes later, and ecstasy way after that.

The real news here is that all the experts agreed that current substance classification is wack. BU's David Nutt hopes that the study will lead to a change in the prevailing "ill thought-out and arbitrary" system by knocking some sense into those on the losing side of the war on drugs.

—Nicole McClelland

Yet Another Reason for Universal Health Insurance

California's Department of Managed Health Care randomly selected 90 (of more than 1,000) cancelled individual Blue Cross plans and investigated whether the company had cause to cancel them. Score: 0 for 90. Blue Cross broke the rules in every single case.

The policies were individually purchased plans in which policy holders had become pregnant or sick, apparently triggering Blue Cross to rescind the policy. Retroactively—leaving individuals, hospitals and doctors holding the bag for care already provided. Policies can only be legally rescinded if the applicant lies on the application to conceal pre-existing conditions.

Individuals pay exorbitant premiums for coverage purchased outside of employer group plans, and are also more vulnerable to such cancellations in California law. But this is bad news for everyone, not just those who have to buy individual plans. Who pays when hospitals and doctors aren't reimbursed? The taxpayers do, one way or the other. The taxpayers also paid for the state's investigation, whose end result is a measly $1-million suit against Blue Cross, whose annual profit is more than three times that. Blue Cross policy holders funded an entire department of the company devoted to finding reasons to cancel the policies of sick or pregnant people.

About 6.5 million California residents, or about 18 percent of the population, lack health insurance.

Optimistic Report on the Surge All Talk

Time has a report card on the effectiveness of the surge, which makes it sound like things are looking up. I'm a skeptic. Not because I hate America, but because this administration and its uniform-wearing parrots have cried wolf once (or thrice) too many times.

The Time report doesn't do much to change my mind.

First, like other reports, it touts the fact that some Iraqi families are returning to their Baghdad homes. But look closer. The numbers given are miniscule, and all they indicate is that those people hope the surge will work—not that it is working.

Second, they caught a few terrorists. Cool. Moving on…

Time repeatedly quotes Petraeus saying things like, "They're really quaking in their boots." These assessments are more meaningless than a coach's halftime interview.

I'll give them this point: "Violence in the city has dropped by about a third since the surge began in mid-February," but (a) one month is not long enough to predict a trend, and (b) it seems some of the new tactical ideas should have been implemented long, long ago:

The tactic of sprinkling U.S. and Iraqi troops like salt across the city — instead of keeping them concentrated in a handful of bases — seems to be paying off so far…Operation Safe Markets — where the U.S. military encircles bazaars with concrete barriers — have kept car bombs away from crowds.

They only just thought of this now?

And for those of you meticulous readers who need me to respond to every bit in the article—or those right-wing bloggers among you waiting for an easy way to prove me wrong (obviously the thing I didn't mention destroys my whole point, right?): The report also mentions helicopters. It's true, I mentioned rise in helicopter shoot-downs as a bad sign, and they have subsided. But:

U.S. military helicopters are flying increasingly under cover of darkness and at 2,000 feet, four times higher than normal, beyond the reach of the crude weapons used by the insurgents to take potshots at airborne targets… Army chopper pilots have long been taught to hug the terrain…to limit their exposure to any individual on the ground seeking to shoot them down. But increasingly, U.S. pilots are trading the protection offered by lack of height for the masking offered by lack of light.

Overall response: C-.

"Hillary 1984" is like Bob Corker's Ad against Harold Ford, Jr.

Have you seen Hillary 1984? You've got to. It's brilliant. About 1.3 million people have already seen it. It's the advent of a new political era. The minute-and-a-half-long clip, spliced from an Apple commercial from Super Bowl, shows hundreds of men as just ashen drones marching in line and then sitting down before a screen under Hillary's head talking, detached from her body. Everything is gray and lifeless. The only dash of color at all is when a busty blonde wearing only a white tank and orange shorts—a Hooters girls outfit but with only one "O" in the logo over her chest—runs through the crowd of men and hurls a javelin at Hillary's head, shattering the screen, spreading light everywhere.

Yep, it's brilliant. And lefty bloggers are cheering it as the advent of "open-source politics" because it's on YouTube. What none of them have mentioned is the reason why it's so effective: It exploits subconscious bigotry, just like the ad for now-U.S. Senator Bob Corker in October. Since blacks weren't recognized as fully human, this country used to have special laws for them. Black men could not sleep with white women, but it was fine the other way around (even the president did). Black men with white women is still taboo—that's why broadcasting a blonde actress crooning, "I met Harold at the Playboy party…. Harry [wink], call me!!" was enough to derail Harold Ford, Jr.'s, campaign. The racism operated subtly and subconsciously enough to change the minds of people who would never admit to being racist. Lefties pointed that out, but not as loudly as they should have. Ford lost.

Likewise, women weren't recognized as fully human in this country until recently, and modern society still has a taboo against women holding power. Lefty bloggers who don't think Hillary has the charisma to win the general election may be happy that this ad will derail her in the primary. But they look like hypocrites unless they stop cheering for a moment to mention that the ad exploits subconscious fears. That goes for you too, Arianna Huffington—author of On Becoming Fearless. "Hillary 1984" is as un-Democratic as the ad against Harold Ford was.

Iraqi Refugees Now Top Asylum Seekers In The World

How much longer can the U.S. deny the refugee crisis in Iraq? According to a new U.N. report, Iraqi refugees are now the top asylum seekers anywhere.

Asylum applications by Iraqis in industrialized countries rose 77 percent last year, from 12,500 in 2005 to 22,200 in 2006. UNHCR spokesman Peter Kessler said "There has been an abject denial of the impact, the humanitarian impact, of the war, the huge displacement within Iraq of up to 1.9 million people who are homeless because of the war."

As Leigh wrote earlier this week, Syria has taken a huge portion of Iraqi refugees (some 1.2 million in a country of 19 million) while the United States has so far taken in less than 500 with promises of allowing 7,000 this year. Many of these refugees are Iraqi’s who worked for the United States and are now under death threat, as David Case writes in our current issue.

Over at Foreign Policy in Focus, Kristele Younes of Refugees International outlines a number of proposals to help Iraqi refugees, including more funding for the UNHCR (whose budget for dealing with Iraqi refugees is 22 million, less than $7 per refugee) and more international cooperation to address the crisis.

Yet the crux of her argument is this:

The United States must begin by acknowledging that violence in Iraq has made civilian life untenable, creating a refugee crisis that is essentially exporting the nation’s instability to neighboring countries.

"Exporting the nation's instability." So in four years the US has managed a war that has not only led to more terrorist attacks worldwide, but has also made for a more volatile region overall.

No one, and I mean no one, is shouting 'four more years' now.

—Amaya Rivera

Iraq's Deputy PM Injured in Attack

I think it's fair to say that one of the main barometers for the effectiveness of the surge and Baghdad security crackdown Bush has imposed on the nation is the safety of government officials in Baghdad. For the second day in a row, an attack in Baghdad has targeted a government official. Today, the target was the highest ranking Sunni Muslim in the government, the Deputy Prime Minister Salam al-Zubai. Mr. Zubai was among 15 wounded in the attack, in which 9 people died. Not only does the attack cast doubt on the American troops' ability to control Baghdad, it also deals a major blow to the Iraqi government's legitimacy to lose one of its precious few Sunnis.

Learn more on Mother Jones' Sunni/Shiite cheat sheet and primer on Iraqi political parties (including Zubai's Accord Front).

March 22, 2007

Grenade in Green Zone Just Misses al-Maliki and U.N. Secretary General

A rocket just missed a building in Baghdad's Green Zone that houses both the U.S. embassy and the Iraqi Prime Minister's office. Both al-Maliki and the U.N.'s new Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon were in the building at the time. Both were uninjured, but, tellingly, Ban was frightened where al-Malike appeared unfazed, saying, "Nothing's wrong." Perhaps for obvious reasons, a Secretary-General (in that case Kofi Annan) last visited Baghdad nearly a year and a half ago. And, if you're wondering why the media insists on making Baghdad sound so bad, it's because the folks at the AP office heard whoosh of the rocket launch. That surge is really working, eh?

SC Passes Mandatory Ultrasound-Viewing Bill, Sees Through Shady Abortion-Getters’ Tricks

In yet another scheme to guilt-trip women out of having abortions, the South Carolina House passed a bill yesterday that requires women to view their own ultrasounds before having the procedure.

Yelling and crying ensued as several representatives begged for inclusion of an amendment waiving the requirement for victims of rape and incest. It failed. So did one that would exempt women in cases in which a judge had found probable cause or issued a warrant for sexual assault charges.

Supporters of the bill, whose churches are evidently not-so-separate from the state building in which they were standing, combatted the pleas for compassion with such infallible arguments as "Are you saying God creates mistakes with the lives he creates?" Others rejected the amendments because women [who want abortions are a bunch of lying, manipulative sluts who] "would make up sexual assaults" in order to get around the bill.

In 2005, Focus on the Family announced plans to spend $4.2 million equipping pregnancy centers nationwide with ultrasound machines. Their ministry is becoming law: Seventeen other states have or are considering some kind of ultrasound-before-abortion legislation. (Mississippi has a "listen to your fetus' heartbeat" offer on the table.)

But South Carolina is the first to require that women actually look at the ultrasound. No one in the House would answer Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter (D-Orangeburg) when she asked whether the women would have to be held down and forced to view the images.

—Nicole McClelland

Creator of Hillary 1984 Owns Up, Proves Me Right

The creator of the Hillary 1984 ad has owned up, and I firmly believe that the back story proves correct the theory I blogged earlier: this was the creation of a web-savvy person working on their own, and only a response in kind will effectively combat its popularity and power. (See Hillary's response here.)

The Huffington Post did the digging, and got the creator ("ParkRidge47") to fess up in a blog post. His name is Phil de Vellis and he works (well, worked) for Blue State Digital, an internet consulting company with roots in the Dean campaign and a long track record of working for high profile candidates. Thing is, Blue State Digital now works for Obama. Was Hillary 1984 a premeditated and conventionally-conceived campaign ad? Nope -- de Vellis did the work on the weekend, with his own time, equipment, and creative direction. But surely he was doing the work for BSD in a nudge-nudge sort of way, right? Just because he did the work on his personal computer on a Sunday doesn't mean he wasn't working for the company, and indirectly, Obama. Well, de Vellis has resigned upon being outed, which makes a pretty solid case that he was acting on his own, and in a way that the company wouldn't approve of. The ad, after all, is not in the style of the high-minded campaign Obama is trying to run.

So the facts support my theory. This campaign ad was created by someone working on their own -- an insurgent if you will. If it had been created within the official framework of a presidential campaign, it would have been more careful, more respectful of convention and boundaries, and thus far less interesting.

And FYI - the ad in its various forms has now been viewed almost three millions times on YouTube.

Update: Howard Fineman of Newsweek sees this as part of the "New Uncontrollable Campaign." The old, controllable campaign was controlled by the candidates, their staffs, and prominent members of the major media. Wonder who that would include...

March 21, 2007

UK National Security Priorities Similar To Ours--Oh Baby!

A terrorist can look like this. Or this. Or maybe even this.

Four-month-old Eden Lurie of Manchester tried to get a passport, but her photo was rejected because her hair was judged "too spiky." The rules require that hair and eyes are clearly defined and that the face take up at least 65% of the photo. The British Passport Service says it makes allowances for children in that they may be facing away or have their mouths open, but no spiky hair. Eden was given a really bad "virtual haircut" for her photo.

In other news, it turns out that the British Home Office issued nine passports to Dhiren Barot, Osama bin Laden's "U.K. General." Barot was planning to murder thousands of people in a series of terrorist attacks. Barot, you can see, had a good passport photo, but because of his passports, Baby Eden looks like a wind-blown Marine.

Global Warming Saps Halliburton Profits

Halliburton reported yesterday that lower natural gas prices and less drilling in North America due to a late winter affected their first-quarter profits. In fact, Halliburton shares took their steepest dive in 8 months, dropping nearly 10%. The company is the "world's second-largest oilfield services company" and issues affecting them often herald industry-wide trends.

The slump in profits was caused, analyst James Halloran told Bloomberg, by a late winter (quite possibly global warming related). A late winter meant that the ground froze later, so heavy drilling rigs could not move across Canadian and northern US oilfields until later in the season. That translated into fewer completed drilling projects. Not to mention, with the warmest winter on record this year, people may be using less gas and oil to heat their homes.

"Last fall, there's no question there was a weather issue," Halloran said. "And prices have not been exactly booming for people. My guess is there's been some ongoing reluctance to get large drilling projects going again."

One of Halliburton's "large drilling projects" affected by the weather is in Alaska's North Slope, a place heralded by National Geographic as "largest remaining piece of US wilderness" Drilling in valuable wilderness areas is just one of the reasons Halliburton shareholder meetings are regularly protested. No wonder they moved their HQ to Dubai.

--Jen Phillips

Tom DeLay, Revealed in His Tell-All, Tattle-Tale Book

All this time, we've thought Tom "The Hammer" DeLay was a vicious partisan. Well, turns out he might just be vicious. As CNN reports, DeLay's new book attacks even his conservative peers, and "[o]nly DeLay's wife and daughter escape unscathed." Gingrich is vain and "an ineffective speaker of the House." Armey is "so blinded by ambition as to be useless to the cause."

On the other hand, anyone who calls W. "compassionate, but ... certainly no conservative," lies far to the right of anything but crazed partisanship, so maybe it's more accurate to say DeLay is a vicious partisan and just a dick.

Stoning Deaths Continue In Sudan

Two allegedy adulterous women were recently sentenced to stoning deaths in North Sudan. The defendants had neither lawyers nor interpreters in a capital crimes trial that wasn't even conducted in their first language.

The man charged in one of the women's cases got off due to a lack of evidence that was for some reason sufficient enough to condemn the woman, who currently has her child with her in prison.

Reuters reports that Sudan’s penal code mandates execution by stoning for convicted adulterers. Single people caught having sex out of wedlock are subject to lashing.

Two years ago, a woman’s stoning sentence in western Darfur was "reduced" to lashing after activists launched a campaign on her behalf. Since the country seems unlikely to voluntarily clean up its human rights act anytime soon, here’s hoping Oprah, or Jesus, will intervene.

--Nicole McClelland

Stricter Enforcement along Border Effective—Or is it Wishful Thinking?

"It's as if Mexico and the United States are at war," said one migrant who couldn't make it across for all the National Guardsmen stationed along the border. Border Patrol offices along popular pathways into the United States are reporting significant drops in the number of (failed) migrations, according to the Los Angeles Times. In addition to more patrols, new strategies include jailing everyone, even first timers, for up to 2 weeks. Writing for Mother Jones, Vince Beiser argued that the so-called border fence would be a fiasco. Charles Bowden also rejects worker permits and an open border.

The Border Patrol says with the increased punishments and patrols, apprehensions are down by as much as two-thirds. But Bowden, who has spent his life reporting on the border (and shares some of his sun-baked wisdom in his MoJo piece), writes, "On the line, all numbers are fictions. The exportation of human beings by Mexico now reaches, officially, a half million souls a year. Or double that. Or triple that."

Seasonal declines notwithstanding, one of two facts will have to change before migrants stop coming: There are no jobs in Mexico. There are jobs for Mexicans in the United States. Even the optimistic Times piece acknowledges that. It quotes Wayne Cornelius, director of the Center for Comparative Immigration Studies at UC San Diego, who says "The modes of entry do change. Location of entries change. But the basic dynamics of the process don't change, because the economic factors and family ties that drive the movement haven't changed."

Hillary Responds to 1984-style YouTube Ad, Code Pink Sings to Her

Hillary Clinton has finally responded to the pro-Obama 1984-style ad on YouTube characterizing her as "Big Brother," TPMcafe reports. The amateur video has caused quite the stir. As Jonathan wrote yesterday, the three versions of the ad "have had a combined viewership of more than 1,300,000, and have an average rating of more than four stars." And some were wondering if this would mean trouble for the New York senator. But from me to Hillary, I have to say, nicely played.

"I haven't seen it but I'm pleased that it seems to be taking attention away from what used to be on YouTube and getting a lot of hits, namely me singing 'The Star Spangled Banner.' Everybody in the world now knows I can't carry a tune,” said Clinton. “I thank heavens for small favors and the attention has shifted, and now maybe people won't have to tune in and hear me screeching about 'The Star Spangled Banner.'"

This interview was posted just hours before a big fundraising event for her campaign here in Washington, which brought in $2.7 million and a bunch of Code Pink women. Reps from the anti-war group were there to remind Hillary that America wants her to take a stronger stance on the war. (Hillary's refusal to apologize for voting to authorize the war has caused concern among Democrats.) And they were singing. Yup. I still have Frere Jaques in my head.

"Are you listening, are you listening? Hillary, Hillary. Boys and girls are dying, politicians lying. Bring them home, bring them home."

March 20, 2007

Gore Challenged to Debate "Foofaraw of Pseudo-Science"

Okay, I know this doesn't look for reals, but Lord Monckton, a former policy adviser to Margaret Thatcher, has challenged Al Gore to a Climate Change Challenge (for the fancy cursive you'll have to click on the link). Here's what Monckton recently sent to Gore's Tennessee home:

The Viscount Monckton of Brenchley presents his compliments to Vice-President Albert Gore and by these presents challenges the said former Vice-President to a head-to-head, internationally-televised debate upon the question “That our effect on climate is not dangerous,” to be held in the Library of the Oxford University Museum of Natural History at a date of the Vice-President’s choosing.

Forasmuch as it is His Lordship who now flings down the gauntlet to the Vice-President, it shall be the Vice-President’s prerogative and right to choose his weapons by specifying the form of the Great Debate. May the Truth win! Magna est veritas, et praevalet.

Uh, yeah, truth is surely his endgame. Monckton had this to say about An Inconvenient Truth:

"A careful study of the substantial corpus of peer-reviewed science reveals that Mr. Gore's film, An Inconvenient Truth, is a foofaraw of pseudo-science, exaggerations, and errors, now being peddled to innocent schoolchildren worldwide."

That science is based on a solid corpus of scientific evidence backed by thousands of scientists, including those involved in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, for starters, and there is documentation aplenty of the truths laid out in Gore's film on Exxon's involvement in climate policy for the U.S. government. How do we know? Because science writer Chris Mooney was the one to unearth the documents and write about the series of events detailed in the movie, for Mother Jones in May 2005. I factchecked the article myself and have a foot-thick file of government documents backing up all of the ways ExxonMobil and the US govt have way-laid climate science. (Oh, and for those of you who want to use "foofaraw" in your next Scrabble game, find the definition here).

Monckton's is merely an effort to distract us into thinking that there is actually anything to debate (his challenge is a hot discussion topic at the official-sounding, Exxon-funded Center for Science and Public Policy.

His Lordship says,

"If Mr. Gore really believes global warming is the defining issue of our time, the greatest threat human civilization has ever faced, then he should welcome the opportunity to raise the profile of the issue before a worldwide audience of billions by defining and defending his claims against a serious, science-based challenge."

Al, tell him yes, as soon as "a serious, science based challenge" materializes, you're there.

Citizen Journalists In a Wired World

In response to the likes of Wikipedia, MySpace and YouTube, Wired has launched its own brave new media world. It’s called Assignment Zero, and is the latest in "new, new journalism" crowd sourcing experiments.

Wired's idea for radical transparency is simple: put a ton of citizen journalists to work by asking them not just to comment on the news, but have them report it. It's a blogger’s paradise. But their idea isn't new. Spin.com offers a similar program for music enthusiasts, allowing them to cover live music events as "Spin Correspondents and get a website byline."

Rolling Stone's in the the game, too. Their I'm From Rolling Stone reality show was essentially televised crowd sourcing for hipsters hungry for a gig with the magazine. Remember Gannett a year ago announced its big crowd sourcing plans to turn its newsroom into an "information center" that asks local residents to help with stories?

Crowd sourcing engages people by putting them right into the action. It has the power to improve content and encourage a broader dialogue from the ground up.

Widespread civic participation in newsgathering is exciting for journalism and content creation. That said, crowd sourcing is also chaotic, unorganized and a little shady. Media organizations can rake in tons of free content while continuing to merge and purge unchecked. And, general public trust in the media is still riding a little low on the hips. Maybe this will help, maybe not.

One 2005 study found that only 45% of the public thinks news organizations generally get their facts straight, a 2007 study says that less than half of Americans have a favorable view of the press, and a 2004 Gallup Poll suggests that people don’t particularly trust journalists and haven’t since at least the 70s.

So, when pollsters start evaluating citizen journalists about the quality of the new, new journalism they've helped create, what will the people think then?

—Gary Moskowitz

Blanco Decides Not To Run Again--Leaves With A Reputation Somewhat Worse Than She Deserves

Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco announced this evening that she does not intend to seek a second term as governor. Only a few days ago, she announced her intention to run, but had a change of heart. She will be remembered as the governor who bungled both Katrina and post-Katrina, and that is not an accurate picture of her governorship.

Let me start by saying I have never been a very enthusiastic supporter of Blanco, who holds two types of views--conservative views, and non-conservative views she feels she has to hide from the public. But it was important to me that in the last election, she defeat Bush-boy Bobby Jindal, a fast-talking ex-White House bureaucrat whose views are rigidly right-wing and extreme Christian right. One of the things that helped Blanco win, in fact, was her campaign's emphasis on Jindal's belief that all abortions--with no exceptions of any kind--should be illegal.

Since she has been governor of Louisiana, Blanco's activities have fallen into three areas: 1. stupid things she is said to have done which she did not do; 2. stupid things she did do; and 3. good things she did for which she received no credit.

A victim of an especially vicious Rovian campaign during Hurricane Katrina, Governor Blanco was simply not guilty of most of the accusations of incompetence hurled at her. The record bears this out, but many Louisianians, looking for a scapegoat and refusing to believe that George W. Bush would abandon them, were quick to jump on the "blame Blanco" bandwagon. She never recovered from the smear campaign.

Later, she put her name on the "Road Home" program created by the Louisiana Recovery Authority, and that name has stuck. The Road Home--better known as the Road to Nowhere-- has to be one of the most mishandled, user-unfriendly, ghastly government programs to come around in a long time. People who had no houses and had to live out of state in order to make money were told that they would not get Road Home funds, even though they wanted to return to Louisiana. Thousands of people who signed up for the program were asked to jump through so many bureaucratic hoops, it was like dealing with FEMA all over again.

Applicants waited and waited, but no money came. Finally, after months, most of them received letters telling them they had been turned down, or giving them checks for a very small amount. Some were turned down for not having houses, though their houses were standing, plain as day. When the frustrated, enraged citizens placed calls to find out what had gone wrong, they were repeatedly told "I don't know," "I can't answer that," and "I have no idea" by contract employees whose company, hired by Blanco, botched the entire program.

The final blow came last week when HUD's federal office declared that Louisiana was wrongly requiring homeowners to wait for a series of small reimbursements rather than giving them the option of taking a lump sum. According to HUD, the state's method of distributing the money would trigger long delays for environmental and other regulations.

Finally, on to the good things. Blanco is the first governor in Louisiana history to stand up to the federal government and demand that Louisiana receive its fair share of oil and gas revenues. Blanco threatened to not permit any leases until the state receives its rightful share (which would, by the way, turn Louisiana's fate around dramatically).

Blanco also stood up to the federal government over the issue of Louisiana's environment, something else Louisianians do not see from their governors (the governor who proceeded Blanco became famous for helping to trash the environment). She was successful in halting a scheduled offshore lease sale because the federal government's assessment of the sale failed to include environmental damage done by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. She also vetoed a proposed natural gas port because whose construction would have hurt Gulf fisheries, and forced the energy company to change its design to a closed loop system port.

Rep. Jindal is again running for governor of Louisiana, and the Democratic candidate may be former Sen. John Breaux, who is now a lobbyist, and who periodically loves to tease the state with talk that he may run for governor. This time, he may really do it, Breaux is very popular in Louisiana and he already has a state health plan ready to present.

For her part, Blanco made a total mess of Louisiana's post-Katrina efforts. But she is not the completely incompetent, clueless governor that Karl Rove and the news media would have us believe.

Marketing Israel, Soft and Hard

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is in the headlines once again for its quasi- mythical abilities to get Congress to toe its hawkish Zionist line. Some say that AIPAC and other pro-Israel lobbies are effectively steering U.S. foreign policy, while others argue that Congress and a wave of administrations are simply receptive to pro-Israel lobbies because their agenda fit neatly into U.S. foreign policy objectives. Whatever the case, the AIPAC has an impressive record in wielding its power to advance positions that are arguably politically extremist.

Last week, AIPAC successfully purged any language from the military appropriations bill that would have required the President to get congressional authorization before using force against Iran—despite the fact that the administration's current unilateral war has seen plummeting public approval. This move, and a series of other AIPAC initiatives, has caused American Jews to begin to speak out.

As AIPAC brings on board unsavory characters to tout its neocon platform, such as the evangelical fundamentalist John Hagee, more and more Jews are speaking out to underline the fact that views like the AIPAC's are not the views of all Jews (across the pond, a similar move is being undertaken by the Independent Jewish Voices to counteract the misleading notion that Jews all over the world are uncritical supporters of Israel.)

These dissenting voices have more than just congressional battles to contend with. While AIPAC and other pro-Israel lobbies such as the American Jewish Committee are working overtime on Capitol Hill, there's a softer force working on the ground to capture the minds and hearts of Americans who are critical of Israeli state policies. BlueStarPR, a public relations firm is advertising the "Real Israel." Recently, the firm concluded a two-month, $17,000 billboard and public transit campaign in the San Francisco area. Some images include a blonde girl standing in a short dress with an Orthodox Jew walking in the background, or Israelis enjoying Happy Hour, "Israel-style." In response to the campaign, Paul Larudee of the International Solidarity Movement says, "The problem is what you're doing, not how you present yourself."

—Neha Inamdar

New Torture Allegations From David Hicks Revealed

I've written about David Hicks before: he's an Australian man, captured in Afghanistan shortly after 9/11, who recently became the first Guantanamo detainee to be charged with a crime in the Bush Administration's system of military tribunals.

Hicks' mother is English, and Hicks has been applying for British citizenship because the British government does more than the Australian on behalf of citizens detained by the United States. As part of his application, Hicks filed a document that detailed his treatment at the hands of his American captors. Among Hicks' claims, which cannot be substantiated:

- The bulk of the abuse occurred before Hicks was deposited at Guantanamo, during a several month period when he was held in Afghanistan or being shuttled between naval ships and unknown buildings.

- When Hicks was interrogated, it was sometimes by as many as five men at a time, who slapped him in the head after every response and told him he was lying.

- At one point, Hicks was made to sit on a window ledge where he could see several American soldiers standing outside pointing their weapons at him.

- Hicks was fed only a handful of rice or fruit three times a day.

- Hicks was forced to kneel for ten hours at a time.

- Hicks was hit by a rifle butt in the back of the head hard enough to make him fall over, "slapped in the back of the head, kicked, stepped on, and spat on."

- While in Kandahar, Hicks and other detainees were forced to lie face down in the mud while solders walked across their backs.

- Hicks was stripped naked, his body hair shaved, and a piece of plastic forcibly inserted into his rectum.

- Hicks was shown pictures of other prisoners who had been beaten black and blue, and promised the same fate if he did not cooperate.

- At Guantanamo, Hicks witnessed other detainees being mistreated. A one-legged detainee was attacked by dogs in his cell, and was later dragged out with blood dripping down his face and across the floor. Hicks says the episode "put me in such fear that I just knew I would 'cooperate' in any way with the U.S."

If all this is true, it seems Hicks suffered the sort of wanton and unguided abuse that we saw in Abu Ghraib. Prison guards and low-level interrogators, drunk with power, uninformed on proper interrogation practices, and either untrained or unsupervised (or both), did whatever they pleased with the helpless people in their command. It doesn't appear that Hicks got the organized forms of torture (waterboarding, etc.) that were the subject of DoJ memos (Al Gonzales' previous scandal) and were generally reserved for high-level captures like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Sorry Karl, Clinton Did Not Purge Prosecutors

Karl Rove and Bush Administration allies have been pushing the talking point that Clinton and most every other president undertook the very normal step of firing U.S. Attorneys.

That's right and wrong. It's correct that most presidents bring in a new crop of U.S. Attorneys when they take office -- the nation's top prosecutors are like any political appointees in that respect. But once U.S. Attorneys are appointed, they serve their four (or eight) years with the comfort of knowing that they are independent of the administration that put them in place -- that justice has nothing to do with politics. Said a former U.S. Attorney who served almost ten years, "Throughout modern history, my understanding is, you did not change the U.S. attorney during an administration, unless there was some evidence of misconduct or other really quite significant cause to do so." She went on to note that attorneys need to serve "without fear or favor and in an absolutely apolitical way."

It's perfectly indicative of the Bush Administration's desire to reshape the entire federal government into a partisan machine (The first czar of Bush's Office of Faith-Based Initiatives resigned in anger, saying, "There is no precedent in any modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of a policy apparatus. What you’ve got is everything — and I mean everything — being run by the political arm.") that they would corrupt the nation's justice system in order to oust individuals making trouble and appoint more docile or even completely acquiescent replacements. Moreover, it's perfectly indicative of the Bush Administration's record of dishonesty to try and displace blame by smearing the Clinton Administration.

But the Congressional Research Service isn't letting them get away with it. They looked at all U.S. Attorneys between 1981 and 2006 and found that "Of the 468 confirmations made by the Senate over the 25-year period, only 10 left office involuntarily for reasons other than a change in administration." In those 10 instances, serious lapses in personal or professional conduct can explain eight of them. In the other two, the CRS was unable to determine cause.

Thus, in the past quarter century, somewhere from zero to two U.S. Attorneys have been fired for political reasons. The Bush Administration fired seven in one day, and eight total. Just another example of how power has corrupted the Bush Administration, making it greedy and dismissive of custom, good practice, and the principles of good governance.

McDonald's Rewrites Definition of Chutzpah

I'm lovin' it. McDonalds has asked the Oxford English Dictionary to change its definition of "McJob." Since 2003, the OED has defined it as "an unstimulating, low-paid job with few prospects, esp. one created by the expansion of the service sector.” Mickey D's house lexicographer claims that such a definition "is out of date, out of touch with reality and most importantly it is insulting to those talented, committed, hard-working people who serve the public every day." Actually, the two definitions don't conflict at all; the OED just bothers to mention that service sector jobs are poorly paid. Maybe it should redefine "minimum wage" while it's at it; something like, "An artificially high, mandated wage that prevents the creation of exciting opportunities for talented, committed, hard-working people who want to make people smile." Hopefully, OED will stick to its guns. Otherwise, they may have to redefine "chutzpah," too.

Obama and the Reds

"How well can Obama really do in the Southern, Red States?": It's what Democrats, unsure of how to cast their primary vote, have been saying under their breath.

Yesterday, those Dems got at least part of their answer when Obama charmed a rally full of people in Oklahoma, one of the reddest states in America. 1,000 people came out to support Obama in Oklahoma City, the state's capitol, a city that boasts a population of just over 500,000—the state’s largest.

Just as surprising, Obama's biggest selling point for Oklahomans was his stance against the war.

Historically very Republican, at least in National elections, Oklahoma's electorate voted for Bush in a landslide in 2000. And again in 2004. Even in 1996, while the country was voting for Clinton as an incumbent, 48 percent of Oklahomans voted for Bob Dole. Clinton trailed at 40 percent.

Obama did better yesterday than any might have predicted—perhaps even Obama's own campaign. The Obama camp, possibly trying to forecast their own draw in this reddest of red states, may have billed themselves accordingly. The afternoon rally/fundraiser cost a paltry $25 to attend as compared to the previous afternoon's fundraiser in Colorado where attendees forked over $100 to catch a glimpse of the Senator. Still, Obama’s campaign was able to raise $25,000 in Oklahoma yesterday.

"I have never seen a man in politics that had that much sincerity, purpose, vision," Gregory Shields of Collinsville, Oklahoma said.

Many rally attendees went looking to be inspired and many left fulfilled, according to NewsOK's Jennifer Mock, the local reporter covering the story.

Obama told the crowd in Oklahoma that the days of divisive politics are numbered. He could have said, however, the days of Democrats doubting his legitimacy as a presidential candidate are numbered. And we would have known exactly who he was talking to.

Watch and read local news coverage of last night's rally here.

--Jessica Savage

Hillary YouTube Attack Needs a YouTube Response

Joe Klein has an awed response to the famous YouTube ad that attacks Hillary Clinton, and wonders out loud how Hillary's paid staff will respond.

That misses the point. Word is out that the the ad was created not by members of any campaign staff, but by ordinary folks who like Obama and dislike Clinton. Here, I think, is the web's real power over politics. It's not in the candidates' ability to create viral videos and post them on YouTube, MySpace, etc. -- those always feel disingenuous, affected, and smarmy. We know who posted them, so we know why they make the arguments they do. They're not spontaneous, they're not true expressions, they're not labors of love. Besides, they're almost never edgy, funny, or entertaining. The only way Hillary is going to have an effective response to the pro-Obama ad created by everyday folks from the web community is if everyday folks from the web community create a pro-Hillary ad.

You see? Hillary can't respond to this because Obama didn't create it. The central test of YouTube politics is whether or not a candidate can inspire web-savvy users to create content on their own, with no prompting or support from the campaign.

Evidence: Multiple versions of the video of Hillary Clinton announcing her presidency (stilted, stiff, conventional) have been viewed a combined total of 20,000 times on YouTube, and currently have an average rating of three stars. Three versions of the Hillary/1984 video (creative, edgy, cool) have had a combined viewership of more than 1,300,000, and have an average rating of more than four stars. These are inexact, unscientific numbers, but you get the point.

DOJ Doc Dump, Gonzales Under Fire Still

Last night, as anyone who has been following the prosecutor purge knows, the DOJ released a massive amount of documents (3,000 pages of internal emails) that many hoped would shed further light on the recent mass firing of eight U.S. Attorneys. As US News and World Report reported last night, the email causing the biggest stir is one that DOJ spokesman Brian Roehrkasse sent to AG Alberto Gonzales' chief of staff Kyle Sampson regarding Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty's testimony before Congress in February. McNulty testified about the firing of former USA Bud Cummins who was forced to resign to make room for Karl Rove's former aid and protege Timothy Griffin. McNulty, under questioning from Senator Chuck Schumer, one of the Dems spearheading the investigation into the purge of the eight USAs, did not deny that making room for Griffin was why Cummins had been fired. In fact, he made clear that Cummins had done nothing wrong and his firing was not performance related. Roehrkasse was traveling with the attorney general at the time, who was very unhappy with McNulty's honesty, er...depiction of the firing. Roehkrasse's email "said the attorney general disagreed with his characterization of Cummins's firing, because Gonzales believed that it was at least in part performance related."

As US News and World Report points out, this email highlights an "internal rift" within the department and really, makes Gonzales look a little sneaky. It appears the AG just can't catch a break, not even from the GOP. As was reported by Washington-based Politico, "Republican officials operating at the behest of the White House have begun seeking a possible successor to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, whose support among GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill has collapsed."

Update: Bush calls Gonzales to reaffirm his strong support and backing for the AG to stay in the job. Officials say that reports that the WH is looking for a successor were overblown.

March 19, 2007

Troops Say: Don't Ask, Don't Care

A reader of my post yesterday on the cost of DADT on the military points out an interesting Zogby poll from December that suggests troops on the ground are much more accepting of homosexuality in the military than the higher ups who have questioned whether gays should serve at all.

The poll found that nearly one in four U.S. troops (23%) say they know for sure that someone in their unit is gay or lesbian, and 59% of those folks said they learned about the person's sexual orientation directly from the individual. Further, the poll of 545 soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan found that more than half of troops who know a gay soldier in their unit say that the person's sexual orientation is well known by others.

So maybe, once you are out in the field it's more "don't ask, don't care." Or maybe it's just the kind of situation where, in the downtime and comraderie that exists a war zone, details about your lives and loved ones just come out.

And that's just fine by most. The survey found that 3 out of 4 troops say they are personally comfortable in the presence of gays and lesbians. Of the 20% who said they are uncomfortable around gays and lesbians, only 5% are "very" uncomfortable, while 15% are "somewhat" uncomfortable. Just 2% of troops said knowing that gays are not allowed to serve openly was an important reason in their decision to join the military.

One discouraging note from the poll was the fact that only half of the troops surveyed say they have received training on the prevention of anti-gay harassment in the past three years. And fully 40% say they have not received this type of training, which is mandated by Defense Department policy.

Brit Hume, Right Wing Warrior, Strikes Again

Brit Hume's true colors show on Sundays, when he appears on Fox News Sundays. Previously, Hume had declared that it was "unlikely" that Valerie Plame Wilson carried out covert missions for the CIA. (How he could presume to know such a thing is beyond me.) The evidence is mounting that Plame was in fact a covert operative, including statements by the CIA director and Ms. Plame herself, in her sworn congressional testimony on Friday. But Brit knows best: He's accusing Plame of lying under oath.

Gates on Gays in the Military: I'm Too Busy for this Crap

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff declared that homosexuality, like adultery, is immoral and the Army shouldn't allow any immoral behavior. I have a few questions left about that. First of all, immoral according to what standard in a secular state? The Bible? Even the Bible takes adultery to be the bigger issue: It made the top 10; biblical pronouncements on homosexuality are tucked away in odd places and not especially clear. "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife" is pretty clear. And yet, there's no word from the DoD that a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy on adultery is forthcoming.

None of these obvious questions has been asked. The media has, however, tackled likely '08 Democratic candidates Obama and Clinton and asked for their opinion on the morality of homosexuality. They hedged. (Clinton had asked for the gay vote just days before at an under-the-radar speech at the Human Rights Campaign.)

Finally, someone has gotten around to asking the Secretary of Defense what he thinks.
Robert Gates veritably brimmed with substance and insight when he said, "I think we should just move on at this point." Asked whether he thought Pace should apologize, Gates said no. Gates went on to say that he was too busy to evaluate whether "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"—which less than half the nation supports and which costs a strapped military 4,000 soldiers a year—is an effective policy.

Which is Worse, Murder or Genocide?

This is not a moral invective but a scientific fact: We care more about one murder than a genocide.

It's a truth both Joseph Stalin and Mother Teresa lived by. He said, "One man's death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic." She said, "If I look at the mass, I will never act. If I look at one, I will."

The mental flaw responsible for the moral one is exposed in this psychology study: "Donations to aid a starving 7-year-old child in Africa declined sharply when her image was accompanied by a statistical summary of the millions of needy children like her in other African countries. The numbers appeared to interfere with people’s feelings of compassion toward the young victim," writes Paul Slovic.

So the more people dead or in danger, the less we care. It's the reason we've said, "Never again," over and over again after the Shoah, then Cambodia, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Kosovo, and Rwanda. But still so few Americans recognize the name, Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese president who has already orchestrated the killing of at least 200,000 people. That's at least 199,999 too many to grasp—are your eyes glazing over already?

For more on "psychic numbing" or "compassion fatigue," check out Slovic's slide presentation. Also watch our photo essay on Darfur.

From a previous Blue Marble post, another explanation for our blindness to injustice is system-justification theory. People want to see the world as fair and just, so they blame the victim to help themselves feel better about the status quo.

Nowhere To Run To...But Really This Time

Last week, Germany's Spiegel Online reported Iraqi refugees stand to have yet another door slammed in their faces. The Syrian government, which has absorbed the majority of the refugee burden since the beginning of the war -- and even more so since Jordan has closed its doors -- is bursting at the seams. Syria has taken in 1.2 million of the nearly 4 million Iraqis who have fled their homes in the past four years. (2 million have fled to other countries and 1.8 million have been displaced throughout Iraq.) Spiegel reminds us that for a country of 19 million (the pop. of Syria), that is quite a bit, six percent to be exact. The United States would have to take in nearly 18 million Iraqi refugees to bear a comparable burden (we have taken in less than 500 in the past four years). The article reads:

"Syria's economy is now groaning under the strain. The population suffers from water scarcity, electricity blackouts, increased competition for jobs and higher rent and food prices."

But regardless of this burden, a spokesperson for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) in Syria, Lauren Jolles, says, the country does not complain even though the international community has "abandoned [it]." Jolles acknowledged that things have to change and that a United Nations aid conference set to happen in April in Geneva will have to yield a very "large aid package."

As I have written many times before, Iraqi refugees face very few asylum options. If Syria can no longer be a haven for the country's citizens, the outcome will be devastating. The United States needs to pick up the slack as well. As Liz wrote last week, the Bush administration "has decided to let in 7,000 this year, which, with 2 million Iraqis already displaced, is next to nothing." As David Case writes in our current issue, on the newsstands now, "Refugees International labels this the world's fastest-growing humanitarian crisis." The international world seriously needs to get moving.

Hard Times at Pfizer

When Pfizer vice chair Karen Katen got passed over in her bid to become chair of the giant drug maker, she prepared to bail out and will leave the company at the end of this month. The Wall Street Journal's Health Blog rummaged through an SEC proxy statement to add up her compensation package: "Katen’s eligible for a pension accrued over a 32-year career that, if taken as a lump sum, would be worth about $40.7 million. Her 401(k) retirement savings plan and some deferred stock are worth another $21.8 million. Add in bonuses, previously disclosed severance of $5.5 million, some stock awards and the like and you come up with the balance of the $76.8 million." She will get an additional $178,000 for unused vacations.

Sounds like a lot, but as the Health Blog points out, Karen's pay out seems like small potatoes compared with former chair Henry "Hank" McKinnell, who got $200 million on his departure.

The Only Terrorist Attack KSM Didn't Confess to Has Now Been Solved

Plamegate continues, the surge in Iraq is tanking, U.S. attorneys say the administration bullied them to make political indictments. What to do?

Release information that terrorists have been caught, of course!

In addition to the absurd laundry list of confessions the government extracted (by questionable means) from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, today they've given word that Mohammed Bin Attash has confessed to planning the attack on the USS Cole. No word on when the confessions actually happened.

As SNL's 80s character the Church Lady would say, "Well, isn't that conveeeenient?"

My only question is, if we've got the guys who've planned every attack since the 70s, does that mean we no longer have anyone to take the fight to in Iraq?

We Continue to Jab Iran With a Sharp Stick, Iran Gets Upset

Three of Iran's top officials in the Revolutionary Guard have disappeared, and the Iranians are blaming the United States.

The first sign of a possible campaign against high-ranking Iranian officers emerged earlier this month with the discovery that Ali Reza Asgari, former commander of the Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Force in Lebanon and deputy defence minister, had vanished, apparently during a trip to Istanbul.

Asgari’s disappearance shocked the Iranian regime as he is believed to possess some of its most closely guarded secrets. The Quds Force is responsible for operations outside Iran.

Last week it was revealed that Colonel Amir Muhammed Shirazi, another high-ranking Revolutionary Guard officer, had disappeared, probably in Iraq.

A third Iranian general is also understood to be missing — the head of the Revolutionary Guard in the Persian Gulf.

Who knows if the United States is really kidnapping Iranian officials when the officials make foreign trips -- this could be an elaborate game orchestrated by the Iranians. Or someone else could be kidnapping these folks and relishing in the misplaced blame.

But hey, if the U.S. didn't actually kidnap these folks, you know what would enable us to convey that message? Diplomacy. Sorry, I mean more diplomacy.

Anti-War Protesters Arrested In Colorado Springs

Seven Iraq war protesters who had a permit to march in the St. Patrick's Day parade in Colorado Springs were arrested Saturday for refusing to cooperate with the police. The protesters wore green "peace" shirts and carried signs that said "Kids Not Bombs" and "End This War Now." Despite the possession of a permit, the marchers were halted by police when parade organizers saw their signs and asked the police to intervene.

There were about 45 people in the group--Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission--and, according to the Colorado Springs police, most of them left when they were told to. However, a small group sat in the road and were "escorted off." One woman sustained a minor leg injury as she was dragged off, a retired priest was taken in a chokehold, a taser gun was pointed at the protesters, a police officer broke one of the signs over his knee, and a good time was had by all.

The protesters say they marched with the parade last year without any trouble. The parade organizers, who say they have no memory of the protesters' having marched before, permit political candidates to march, but “It is our goal not to turn this into a confrontational political atmosphere."

Experts: We are NOT Fighting al Qaeda in Iraq to Avoid Fighting it Here

A good article in the Washington Post today debunking the idea that if we don't fight al Qaeda in Iraq, we'll be fighting al Qaeda in the United States.

You see this argument all the time. "If we fail there, the enemy will follow us here," says President Bush. "I am convinced that if we lose this conflict and leave, they will follow us home," says Papa McCain. It has always seemed unlikely to me that a bunch of young men with nothing but grenade launchers, IEDs, and the advantages of fighting guerrilla-style on their home turf would be able to launch a coordinated and sophisticated attack overseas -- much less on the most well-protected country in the world -- but now the experts have weighed in, and that instinct is correct.

What's the main reason we're unlikely to see al Qaeda in Iraq turn their attention to the United States? First, it's doing so damned well in its own country:

"In a year, AQI went from being a major insurgent group, but one of several, to basically being the dominant force in the Sunni insurgency," said terrorism consultant Evan F. Kohlmann. "It managed to convince a lot of large, influential Sunni groups to work together under its banner -- groups that I never would have imagined," Kohlmann said.

Second, al Qaeda's leadership in Iraq is Iraqi, and it cares much more about determining the fate of its home country than taking pot shots at the U.S.:

...al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) has undergone dramatic changes. Once believed to include thousands of "foreign fighters," it is now an overwhelmingly Iraqi organization whose aims are likely to remain focused on the struggle against the Shiite majority in Iraq, U.S. intelligence officials said.

...AQI's new membership and the allied insurgents care far more about what happens within Iraq than they do about bin Laden's plans for an Islamic empire, government and outside experts said. That is likely to remain the case whether U.S. forces stay or leave, they added.

Third, al Qaeda in Iraq is not on the best of terms with Osama bin Laden's worldwide al Qaeda operation, and likely won't take marching orders if they involve some kind of attack on the U.S.:

...under [former AQI leader Abu Musab Zarqawi's] leadership, AQI was frequently estranged from al-Qaeda, and its separation has increased since his death last year.

Fourth, it is much easier for al Qaeda to organize major attacks in the lawless region between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"As people around the world sign up to fight jihad," the intelligence official said, "before they were always going to Iraq. Now we see more winding up in Pakistan."

As al-Qaeda recoups its numbers and organizational structure in the lawless and inaccessible territory along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, it is seen as having little need for major bases in western Iraq, where the flat desert topography is ill-suited for concealment from U.S. aerial surveillance.

What this means is that while a threat to the United States does come from al Qaeda, it comes from operatives outside of Iraq. You know, the ones we could be chasing down if we weren't bogged down in Iraq trying not to get shot in the crossfire of a civil war. So preventing an attack on the United States has little or nothing to do with our success in Iraq -- in fact, it has more to do with disentangling ourselves from Iraq and turning to the War on Terror. So, Messrs. Bush and Mccain, let's put that twisted little piece of warmongering rhetoric to bed.

U.S. Attorney Firing May Be Connected to CIA Corruption Probe

Yesterday, McClatchy reported that new evidence indicates the firing of former San Diego U.S. Attorney Carol Lam could have been related to a CIA corruption probe. Dianne Feinstein, one of the Democrats spearheading the Senate investigation into the mass purge of eight U.S. Attorneys preoccupying Washington right now, said that Lam notified the Justice Department that she had "intended to execute search warrants on a high-ranking CIA official as part of a corruption probe the day before a Justice Department official sent an e-mail that said Lam needed to be fired." The motivation behind the firings of these federal prosecutors has been central to both the House and Senate investigations of the cases (the DOJ has flip-flopped numerous times over why exactly the prosecutors were forced to resign) and the motivation behind Lam's firing has been even more mystifying. As I wrote last week, new evidence revealed that Lam may not have been fired for her successful prosecution of Duke Cunningham, which was widely been believed to have been the reason she was forced to resign.

This week the DOJ is set to release more documents thought to have further information related to the firings and the Bush administration will announce whether it will assert its executive privilege and not allow Karl Rove, Harriet Miers and other officials to testify. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy has made clear that whether the administration asserts this privilege or not, the committee will subpoena them and that "he is 'sick and tired' of the administration's changing rationale for the firings."

March 18, 2007

"Don't Ask Don't Tell" Equals 4,000 Troops Lost Each Year

A new report out from UCLA's Williams Institute, finds that since DADT went into effect in 1994 the armed forces have missed out on 4,000 troops each year, in attrition and dismissals, and they continue to each year that the cryptic policy is in effect. And that doesn't even include the potential recruits lost because of Don't Ask Don't Tell.

So let's get this straight: One in five Americans think that gays shouldn't serve in the military. The chairman of the joint chiefs General Peter Pace, citing homosexuality as immoral, agrees with the DADT. And our potential presidential candidates, are cagey on the issue.

Frankly, gays in the military should be a place where everyone agrees, morality aside. The wholesale acceptance of gays in the military has nothing to do with morality or lifestyle acceptance; it's a practical no brainer. It is a matter of—as the Army has demonstrated as their recruitment numbers have floundered—national security.

The Army has decided that it's okay to allow convicted felons and neo-nazis to serve, and its been loosening recruitment standards for years in order to patch together a surgeable workforce. (The Army now allows clinically obese plebes to enlist and and for the first time ever recruits with recent asthma and ADD.) All in the name of Army Strong.

In fact, the military has granted a record number of "moral waivers," handed out to one in 10, 8,129, new recruits last year. In the past three years more than 125,000 moral waivers, for everything from vehicular manslaughter, to DUI, to robbery and assault, were granted throughout the four branches of military service. So having 125,000 new enlistees who have immoral conduct on their record is fine, but enlistees who say they are gay is not?

Finally, since when is the military and its warriors held up to any standard of morality anyway? If we are really going there, and morality is on the table when it comes to military actions, homosexuality should be the least of Pace's worries.

March 24, 2007

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