Who's in charge? Oh yeah, them

What's been accomplished in the last five years? Let's make a list, shall we?

• Bungled invasion and occupation of a Middle Eastern country which did not attack us, with losses of life estimated in the tens of thousands


• Terrorist mastermind and mass-murderer still free and planning attacks


• Major American city destroyed, poor left to fend for themselves or die


• Thousands of elderly Americans losing access to vital medication thanks to Medicare D

We could go on and on with the tales of corruption and incompetence, but first, let's take a second and figure out who's in charge:

The change in the Medicare provision underscores a practice that growing numbers of lawmakers from both parties want addressed. More than ever, Republican congressional lawmakers and leaders are making vital decisions, involving far-reaching policies and billions of dollars, without the public -- or even congressional Democrats -- present[emphasis mine].

The corruption scandal involving Republican former lobbyist Jack Abramoff and the bribery plea of former congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.) have prompted calls for a restructuring of lobbying rules and congressional practices that make lobbying easier.

A prime target for changes are the closed-door negotiations known as conference committees, where members of the House and Senate hash out their differences over competing versions of legislation. House and Senate Democrats last week proposed that all such conference committees meet in the open and that any changes be made by a vote of all conferees.

"It happens in the dead of night when lobbyists get a [Republican lawmaker] in the corner and say, 'We've got to have this,' " said Rep. Fortney "Pete" Stark (Calif.), the Democrats' point man on Medicare issues. "It's a pattern that just goes on and on, and at some point the public's going to rise up."

Considering the results, it's no wonder the Republicans don't want anyone to see what occurs in the darkened conference rooms of the Capitol in the wee hours of the morning.

Ford Motors plays "Grinch" to Detroit's Super Sunday

Coming less than 24 hours after the Seattle Seahawks (go 'Hawks!) and Pittsburgh Steelers confirm their reservations to Detroit, the city gets this news:

Ford Motor Co. announced today that it will cut as many as 30,000 jobs and shut down 14 factories to help reverse losses in its troubled North American automotive division.

The restructuring announcement came shortly after Ford reported a higher than anticipated 19 percent increase in earnings for 2005. The results included a pre-tax loss of $1.6 billion in its North American automotive division in the fourth quarter, a decline of $3 billion from 2004.

Ford, which employs about 123,000 workers in North America, lost about $5.5 billion in those North America operations in 2005. The restructuring will eliminate about a quarter of those jobs between now and 2012.

With the job cuts announced today, salary-related costs are being reduced 10 percent in North America with the previously announced reduction of the equivalent of 4,000 salaried positions by the end of the first quarter. The company's officer ranks also will be trimmed 12 percent by the end of the first quarter.

Detroit has been hyping the February 5 Super Bowl as an economic boon for the city. However, any jobs that are created as a result of a successful Super Bowl weekend translating into increased tourism (a big what-if, in my book) are likely to be in the relatively low-wage service sector jobs. This is hardly going to resurrect a city that is still bleeding the good-paying, blue-collar, middle-class factory jobs that the auto industry, and more significantly, the United Auto Workers created during the mid-20th Century.

The Super Bowl was supposed to be a bright spot for Detroit. However, it'll be hard for me to enjoy a game being played at Ford Field knowing that the livelihoods of 30,000 people are about to be cruelly taken in the name of profit.

Tom Cruise: Effing Tool

Wow - if I didn't know better, I'd think hollywood.com really hated Tom Cruise. Check it out: voted the "coldest" (as in opposite of "hottest"), the most irritating, and the tackiest star in Hollywood.

On top of this, he's certifiably batshit insane. Consider his cultish cure for the respiratory ailments of 9/11 rescue workers:

The Scientology devotee has urged emergency services victims to give up their medication and inhalers as part of a 'purification rundown,’ which favors sauna sessions, ingestion of cooking oil and large doses of niacin as cures instead...

But the unorthodox therapy has been slammed as ridiculous and potentially harmful by members of the medical profession, as well as sufferers themselves.

And, taboot, he's a complete asshole:

Tom Cruise has reportedly stopped an episode of South Park that mocks him from being aired in Britain...

According to TheRegister.co.uk, Paramount has agreed not to show the episode again, after Cruise complained.

A source tells the site, "Tom is famously very litigious and will go to great lengths to protect his reputation. Tom was said not to like the episode and Paramount just didn't dare risk showing it again. It's a shame that UK audiences will never see it because it's very funny."

Most irritating? Coldest? Tackiest? That's mild. Countless resources are wasted keeping Tom Cruise in the public eye. Fuels to fly him coast-to-coast. Vast amounts of cooking oil for his snake-oil medicine biz. Precious oxygen. He's made a career out of smarminess. Right now, I'm trying to recall that one movie he was in that I really liked...

Oh wait. I've never enjoyed a Tom Cruise movie. Not one. Name one that I might have enjoyed. I don't think you can. But I digress.

Tom Cruise is a fucking tool.

The American Taliban

In response to Chris Matthews of MSNBC's Hardball and others saying that Osama and the American left espouse the same goals, Darksyde shows that what's good for the goose is good for the gander:

Strangely, when I visited a blog frequented by GOP apologists this evening, all merrily playing the "Democrats are like bin Laden" sweepstakes, they were shocked, shocked I tell you, when the tables were so easily turned on them. They were outraged :::Gasp:: can you imagine? They were almost speechless when I pointed out the eerie parallels between Osama bin Laden and fundamentalist Islam, and the stated social policy goals of the extremist religious right currently running the so called Republican Party. Nope, they didn't like it one bit.

When the neocons say that Liberals or moderate Republicans are against America and for the terrorists, they could not have it more backwards. The extreme religious rightwing of the GOP is the closest thing to Islamo-fascism we have in our country, and no one is worried that Al Qaeda will be storming ashore on our beaches en masse, invasion style, anytime soon.

I'd savor the irony if it weren't for the fact that the rest of us are in the crossfire.

Music to plug

I was lucky enough to get out to see a show last night (a rare occurence these days, what with the little wobs and all). I headed down to John Henry's and witnessed the purifying rock of Dan Jones and the Squids, a fantastic local band (who happen to feature my friend Patty Joe on guitar), and the Dept. of Energy out of Seattle. Both bands deserve your look-see. The Squids are a Crazy Horse powered outfit that add a glorious buzz to Dan's literate vocals, and the Dept. of Energy has a California pop sound that straddles the border between Brian Wilson's most inspired work and the dark brooding of the Doors. Good stuff, to be sure.

Next up for me and mrs. wobs, Jeff Tweedy on February 4th - and we all know how good that's going to be.

Dems take one step forward, two steps back

First, the good news out of Chicago is that the Dems are edging towards using the f-bomb:

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) announced Thursday he will vote against Judge Sam Alito for the U.S. Supreme Court. And he said so many other senators intensely oppose Alito that they may have enough votes to sustain a filibuster against the conservative jurist.

Good on 'em! Enough html code has been spilled on the dangers represented by Alito's extremist views. I'm heartened to see the minority whip moving the Dems away from the roll-over-and-play-dead strategy that a few had floated in the previous week.

But then, I had to go and read this:

Typical was my lunch discussion earlier this week with a ranking Democratic Party official. Midway through the meal, I innocently asked how the "Big Brother is listening" issue would play in November. Judging from his pained reaction, I might as well have announced that Barack Obama was resigning from the Senate to sell vacuum cleaners door-to-door. With exasperation dripping from his voice, my companion said, "The whole thing plays to the Republican caricature of Democrats -- that we're weak on defense and weak on security." To underscore his concerns about shrill attacks on Bush, the Democratic operative forwarded to me later that afternoon an e-mail petition from MoveOn.org, which had been inspired by Al Gore's fire-breathing Martin Luther King Day speech excoriating the president's contempt for legal procedures.

First of all, let's not pretend this is about national security. The NSA has the authority to eavesdrop without a warrant, so long as they obtain court approval within 72 hours of the intelligence gathering operation. This about the president being able to do what he wants, when he wants, with no one to tell him otherwise.

And now the Justice Department wants Google to turn over their search records (Yahoo, apparently, has already caved)?

This is a Big. Fucking. Deal. One upon which our democratic rights balance. And the Dems don't want to touch it because it makes them look "soft on security."

Democratic pols are intimidated by corrupt, criminal little shits like Karl Rove preening around saying "We're going to make the War on Terror a central campaign issue." You know what? Let them, because it's been almost four and a half years since the terrorists struck American soil. And their record ain't looking to good, is it? Osama and his lieutenants keep releasing videotapes thumbing their noses at us. We're creating a huge terrorist camp in Iraq. Our policies in the Middle East are radicalizing whole generations of young men and women. And who's been running the show? Republicans. Republicans in the White House. Republicans in the House of Representatives. Republicans in the Senate.

If the Dems don't think they can beat this, we're in a lot more trouble that we previously thought.

RIP: Wilson Pickett

Hard living took its toll, but not before he left us with the gift of soul.

Ride, Sally, ride.

Words of wisdom from the wayback machine

On this date in 1961, President Eisenhower delivered his farewell address to the American people with his famous warning:

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

If only the citizenry had been wise enough to listen.

I'm getting to like George Clooney more and more

The missus and I got out to see Good Night and Good Luck last evening, and we both enjoyed it immensely.

Now, I see that George Clooney had some choice words upon accepting his Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor in Syriana:

Clooney: I want to thank Jack Abramoff, you know, just because-I--I'm the first one out- lets get this thing rolling. I don't know why. Who would name their kid Jack with the last words "off" at the end of your last name? No wonder that guy is screwed up. Ahh-alright I just got bleeped. Thank you very much...

This is getting to be like shootin' fish in a barrel.

Finally, someone who's not afraid to call Bush a criminal

I've been saying it for awhile (here, most recently), and finally someone with some clout is saying it loud and proud:

At present, we still have much to learn about the NSA's domestic surveillance. What we do know about this pervasive wiretapping virtually compels the conclusion that the President of the United States has been breaking the law repeatedly and persistently.

Can it be true that any president really has such powers under our Constitution? If the answer is "yes" then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited? If the President has the inherent authority to eavesdrop, imprison citizens on his own declaration, kidnap and torture, then what can't he do?

I can understand it when people don't jump up and salute when I say that Bush and his cronies are criminals, but this is coming straight from the lips of former Vice President Al Gore. As he makes perfectly clear, this ain't sour grapes. This is a naked power grab; the consequences for our nation are immense.

We've seen George W. Bush's incompetence: a bloody war with unattainable goals, catastrophic indifference to a city inundated by floodwaters, and an economy that could slip into another recession should Osama so much as say "boo!" And now we've seen his self-confessed criminality.

Can we please have our country back now?

Bit of a dust-up

The original article that I cited in this post has been scrutinized as needing some work by emptywheel. Near as I can tell, the gist of the original article is right, but the evidence and logic do not necessarily lead to Leopold's exact conclusion. Expect the story to develop further as sources go on record.

Stop Alito

Twelve good reasons to oppose Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court. What k/o says.

War on terror is a fig leaf

If you haven't already, stop buying the canard that 9/11 "changed everything." It didn't. But it sure as hell provided a convenient justification for some activities that were already occuring, like, I don't know, illegally peeking in on the communications of American citizens without a warrant:

The National Security Agency advised President Bush in early 2001 that it had been eavesdropping on Americans during the course of its work monitoring suspected terrorists and foreigners believed to have ties to terrorist groups, according to a declassified document (.pdf).

The NSA's vast data-mining activities began shortly after Bush was sworn in as president and the document contradicts his assertion that the 9/11 attacks prompted him to take the unprecedented step of signing a secret executive order authorizing the NSA to monitor a select number of American citizens thought to have ties to terrorist groups.

In its "Transition 2001" report, the NSA said that the ever-changing world of global communication means that "American communication and targeted adversary communication will coexist."

"Make no mistake, NSA can and will perform its missions consistent with the Fourth Amendment and all applicable laws," the document says.

However, it adds that "senior leadership must understand that the NSA's mission will demand a 'powerful, permanent presence' on global telecommunications networks that host both 'protected' communications of Americans and the communications of adversaries the agency wants to target."

What had long been understood to be protocol in the event that the NSA spied on average Americans was that the agency would black out the identities of those individuals or immediately destroy the information.

But according to people who worked at the NSA as encryption specialists during this time, that's not what happened. On orders from Defense Department officials and President Bush, the agency kept a running list of the names of Americans in its system and made it readily available to a number of senior officials in the Bush administration, these sources said, which in essence meant the NSA was conducting a covert domestic surveillance operation in violation of the law.

George W. Bush is a criminal. He has violated his oath to defend the Constitution from all enemies foreign and domestic. He is a domestic enemy to the Constitution. The acts of his administration are high crimes against our nation. He should be impeached.

(and a tip of the old cranial covering to Pope Guilty for spreading the word and having a very sweet username)

At last, the WaPo exposes arrogance and criminality!

At last! The Washington Post is finally running a story on how this man has failed upwards, how he has brazenly and repeatedly broken the law, with not even a shred of guilt on his conscience. And it was all published on Wednesday in... the sports pages?

So let's all pile on [Marcus] Vick. His response to being thrown off the team was to drop out of school and announce he'd follow his older brother, Michael, the Atlanta Falcons' Pro Bowl quarterback, to the National Football League. His comment on his dismissal from the team put him near the top of the list of athletes sounding arrogant beyond belief: "It's not a big deal. . . . I'll just move to the next level, baby."

And the truth is that if he can play, he'll be welcome at the next level. Professional sports teams don't care if you've been to jail, been stopped a hundred times for traffic violations, stomped on 10 opponents' legs or made profane gestures at opposing fans (which Vick did at least once this season). They care if you can play. Period.

All of which brings us to an issue that goes well beyond the troubles of Marcus Vick. His story reflects a much larger problem at all levels of sports: the existence of a place that we might call, for want of a better term, "The Land of Never Wrong."

Funny if how you change just the names and details, it could be the story of George W. Bush.

George W. Bush's education disaster

Greg Palast blasts No Child Left Behind as the hollow shell of feel-good babble and band-aid measures that it actually is:

New York -- Today and tomorrow every 8-year-old in the state of New York will take a test. It's part of George Bush's No Child Left Behind program. The losers will be left behind to repeat the third grade.

Try it yourself. This is from the state's actual practice test. Ready, class?

"The year 1999 was a big one for the Williams sisters. In February, Serena won her first pro singles championship. In March, the sisters met for the first time in a tournament final. Venus won. And at doubles tennis, the Williams girls could not seem to lose that year." And here's one of the four questions:

"The story says that in 1999, the sisters could not seem to lose at doubles tennis. This probably means when they played

"A two matches in one day
"B against each other
"C with two balls at once
"D as partners"

OK, class, do you know the answer? (By the way, I didn't cheat: there's nothing else about "doubles" in the text.)

My kids go to a New York City school in which more than half the students live below the poverty line. There is no tennis court.

There are no tennis courts in the elementary schools of Bed-Stuy or East Harlem. But out in the Hamptons, every school has a tennis court. In Forest Hills, Westchester and Long Island's North Shore, the schools have nearly as many tennis courts as the school kids have live-in maids.

Now, you tell me, class, which kids are best prepared to answer the question about "doubles tennis"? The 8-year-olds in Harlem who've never played a set of doubles or the kids whose mommies disappear for two hours every Wednesday with Enrique the tennis pro?

This is what happens when you let a president with the intellectual curiousity of a brain-dead rock claim the mantle of "education reformer."

Abramoff scandal for dummies

From OrangeClouds 115 (give his website a look-see too):

So simple.

Why should Alito and D.C. Republicans be ashamed?

kos asks the right question:

While conservatives like to pretend that the country is with them, their actions speak louder than words.

If the country is truly with them, why do they have to spin, lie, and frame away the things they truly stand for? Scalito is just the latest in a long history of efforts to hide what they really stand for.

Why indeed?

Today marks the first day of the Senate hearings on confirming Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court. We'll give the honors to today's must read post to ask the big question:

The far right wants us to believe that Supreme Court nominee Alito is similar to Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Even though everyone knew Ginsburg was a liberal, she was passed by a vast majority in the Senate. They are both in the mainstream of judicial philosophy, the far right says. So Alito deserves the same treatment because he's "qualified."

So why is Alito so ashamed of his entire career?

Ginsburg IS in the mainstream of judicial philosophy, even though she's clearly a strong liberal. But she never pretended to be anything else. And everything on Ginsburg's resume was something she was proud of. Every group she belonged to, every organization she worked for, every position she staked out on the issues of the day and every promise she made reflected who Ruth Bader Ginsburg was, what she stood for and what she believed in.

Did she insist you shouldn't read anything into her work for the ACLU? Of course not; she was proud of that work. Did she insist you shouldn't read anything into her activism over the years, her push for equality among the sexes? Don't be absurd. Did she break her word on solemn pledges made before the Senate? Never.

Nothing could be further from the truth for Alito. He is apparently ashamed of everything he's ever done. Alito boasted on an application for promotion in the Reagan administration about belonging to the racist, Neanderthal-ish Concerned Alumni For Princeton. Now he pretends he can't remember ever belonging to them at all.

Be sure to read the entire post at the link above, and pass it on. These are important questions to ask the swing vote for SCOTUS, the person who will be writing decisions affecting a woman's right to choose, presidential power, and any number of issues that affect our republic and freedoms. Do we want someone on the bench who has had to qualify a loooooooong paper trail of right wing judicial views to make it appear less extreme?

Union-busting asshole

Not only was this prick a top executive for the sociopaths down at Wal-Mart - you know, the ones who'd rather close a store than accept a union; or the ones who, instead of offering their employees decent benefits (or the full-time schedule necessary to access them), encourage them to seek help from the government - he was also using his anti-union zeal as a cover for bilking his buddies in Bentonville to the tune of hundreds of thousands.

As they say, couldn't happen to a nicer guy or corporation.

Cry me a fucking river: D.C. mulls smoking ban, WaPo gets all sentimental

This little rant might be due to the fact that I'm an ex-smoker. Or maybe it's because I live in a city that banned smoking in public establishments well over five years ago. Or maybe it's because I watched New York City go smokeless and incredibly, life continued in the drab basement dives.

However, after getting to the end of the Washington Post's fellating of Big Tobacco, I realized that this rant was going to be rocket-fueled by my complete loathing of the up-and-coming pricks who tend to congregate around centers of power like junkies around a dealer. These assholes are made, they got all the right connections after going to all the right schools and have the disposable income to hang out in high end bars in an expensive city. And here's what they think of you:

A patron speaks dismissively (between puffs) of the sort of people who hang out in airport smoking lounges. Rednecks, he calls them. Whatever that means.

Yup, if you can't get your free cocktail while you enjoy a puff in the medallion club before catching your first-class trip over flyover country, you must be a redneck.

Fuck this guy.

And fuck the WaPo for printing this putrid romantic dribble. What's news is that the myth of the sexy smoker was manufactured by Big Tobacco as a ploy to get people hooked. The human interest story isn't that some elitist Beltway prick is going to have to shiver his ass off on a cold D.C. sidewalk in order to feed his habit, it's that thousands upon thousands of lives have been ruined by the greed of tobacco executives.

Early favorite for 2006 Asshole of the Year

Pat Robertson wastes no time in establishing himself as a formidable adversary in the competition for 2006's biggest asshole.

(AP) Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson suggested Thursday that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's stroke was divine punishment for "dividing God's land."

"God considers this land to be his," Robertson said on his TV program "The 700 Club." "You read the Bible and he says `This is my land,' and for any prime minister of Israel who decides he is going to carve it up and give it away, God says, `No, this is mine.'"

Sharon, who ordered Israel's withdrawal from Gaza last year, suffered a severe stroke on Wednesday.

It's nothing personal, adds Robertson:

In Robertson's broadcast from his Christian Broadcasting Network in Virginia Beach, the evangelist said he had personally prayed about a year ago with Sharon, whom he called "a very tender-hearted man and a good friend." He said he was sad to see Sharon in this condition.

So, God is punishing this traitorous jew for giving away what you need to fulfill your wacked-out prophecy, but you're going to miss the lovable scoundrel.

What a load of horseshit. Pat Robertson has cynically exploited millions of decent and sincere Americans to enhance his own power and wealth. His lack of compassion and sympathy for the victims of tragedy, his deigning to claim to know the mind of God - these traits and behaviors reveal him as a hypocritical farce of a real Christian.

A Fresh Start

I know I promised a music review for last night, so I'll have to ask your indulgence for one more week - I had to re-format my hard drive, so I've spent a good 5 or 6 hours getting everything back to just so.

And now, on with the show.

Abramoff Viewing Guide

Someone was bound to sum up all of the latest Abramoff developments and place them in their historical context, all in a nice neat narrative, and that someone is BriVT.

Funny how this reads like a traditional morality play.

Abramoff Round-Up

First off, does this lobbyist not look like a mobster?

Gerald Herbert - AP

Here are analyses from the WaPo, the NYT, and the Guardian.

Hell hath no fury...

The snowball continues to roll downhill.

Meet Emily Miller, press handler for Republican big dogs like Tom DeLay and Colin Powell. She was also engaged to one Michael Scanlon, Jack Abramoff's lobbying partner. They apparently kept no secrets from each other. And Scanlon was stupid enough to run off with his manicurist.

Quoth the Bard: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

And there you have it. If you're going to be committing crimes against the Republic, you shouldn't be a dick. And Scanlon sounds like a real fucking gem:

Scanlon's former colleagues did not speak warmly of him, saying he was not a very likable person because of the way he treated others, and that he later became flamboyant with his newfound wealth.

It's funny how large historical events have extraordinarily inane proximate causes, the matches that light the fuse. Buffoons.

Ain't got no soul

My god, the man cannot even remotely begin to feel one tiny iota of sympathy. Even when facing the brave souls who put their bodies and lives on the lines on the basis of his decisions, the only way he can relate is with some sort of lame joke.

I almost feel pity for the man. He's a rich, spoiled brat who was never allowed to fail (indeed, he failed upwards!), was never made to feel hurt. He's lived inside a bubble filled with sycophants who have grubbed their way upward on his coattails and are fleeing as the ship begins to sink.

George W. Bush is unable to feel. He's unable to share in our common humanity. And he covers this up with incredibly lame and insensitive jokes.

How lonely it must be for him. How incredibly terrifying it is for the rest of us.

Our government, as run by the Bush Crime Syndicate

More and more, Bush is looking less presidential and more Gambino. Sherlock Google lays it all out on Abramoff's links to Bush himself - including Bush firing a federal prosecutor who was supervising a grand jury investigating Abramoff's activities in Guam.

With the Justice Department apparently investigating, this could be explosive.

Rats fleeing the ship

Try this on for a mixed metaphor: that sweet, sweet odor you smell wafting down from D.C. is the shit hitting the fan. Jack Abramoff copped a plea deal today (registration required user/password=dailykos/dailykos). Abramoff is a D.C. lobbyist who made millions greasing the legislative wheels for gambling:

Mr. Abramoff, 46, pleaded guilty to conspiracy, fraud, and tax evasion, setting the stage for prosecutors to begin using him as a cooperating witness against his former business and political colleagues. In exchange, Mr. Abramoff faces a maximum of about 10 years in prison in the Washington case.

The conspiracy charge included Mr. Abramoff's effort to influence at least one member of Congress and a Congressional staff member.

The one member of Congress mentioned so far is Bob Ney from Ohio, but Abramoff is also connected with former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.

The revelations of the corrupt and illegal behaviors of D.C. Republicans are only beginning. 2006 looks to be an ugly year.

Hayduke Lives!... in a caricature-y kinda way

In Earth Defense news, two marine wildlife defense organizations are playing Keystone Kops in the icy South Seas. From the Guardian:

A battle for what is being called "the high moral wave" was last night being fought off the wild coast of Antarctica as the world's two leading international marine protection groups fought each other over which would stop the Japanese whaling fleet.

With an international crew of volunteers, a helicopter and a deep warchest, Greenpeace International has sent two boats, the Arctic Sunrise and the faster Esperanza, to the Southern Ocean to stop the Japanese whaling fleet as it tries to catch 900 minke, blue and other whales for "scientific research".

Last night the group, which located and gave chase to the Japanese fleet before Christmas, claimed to have the whalers on the run in mountainous seas peppered with icebergs. "The fleet seems to be running in circles, stopping and going in different directions. It's the sixth day in a row that we have seen no whales transferred to the factory ship. It's unlikely that whaling is being undertaken," said a spokesman.

The animal rights protector Captain Paul Watson, who co-founded Greenpeace in the 1970s and later set up the more radical Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, was also in pursuit of the fleet yesterday in his ship, the Farley Mowat. Capt Watson, who accuses Greenpeace of being "the Avon ladies of the environment" and of being more interested in publicity than in enforcing international law, intercepted the Nisshin Maru factory ship on Christmas Day. Each environmental group now accuses the other of endangering lives by trying to ram its vessels.

There's a very intriguing narrative running through this story concerning the tensions between activists who advocate non-violence and those who seek confrontations. However, this inability to work together to achieve commonly held goals demonstrates yet another instance of the Left expending its energy on internecine spats.

R.I.P. - Harry Magdoff

Via The Monthly Review:

Harry Magdoff died in Vermont on Janury 1, 2006.
We will miss him.

“I never expected a socialist America in my lifetime. That doesn't mean that I was smarter than anyone else, but it just wasn't my temperament.

Every summer the Marxist School has a picnic at our place, and after they go swimming and have their food, we sit for several hours and talk under a tree. It's very nice. One person at the end this last time said, “What do you expect, and how can you be the way you are without expecting socialism?”

I said, “I don't know. I don't expect anything particular. But this is the way I am. I can't be any other way. I have to believe that there can be a better world.”

Magdoff has been one of my personal intellectual heroes for his work on the logic of empire, particularly The Age of Imperialism. His voice and scholarship will be missed by those of us on the Left.

Remember

The Independent (UK) reports on the new year in New Orleans, mentioning the unfortunate long-term legacy of Katrina - the NOLA diaspora:

You need not visit the French Quarter tarot card readers to know this much: New Orleans will emerge a far smaller city than before. Pre-Katrina, about 480,000 people called the Big Easy their home. Some predict that a miracle will be needed to get its rolls back even to 150,000 by the end of this year...

Smaller is one thing, but what about whiter as well? It was the US Secretary of Housing, Alphonso Jackson, who said it first back in September. "New Orleans is not going to be as black as it was for a long time, if ever again."

Katrina's winds have scattered on of the nation's oldest African-American communities, displacing tens of thousands of people who, despite their often quite low economic status, were connected with a certain pride of place. It is tremendous cultural loss, and it seems to increase the chances of the rebuilt New Orleans being a more humid Las Vegas, coasting on its lost history.

Subcommandante Marcos goes political

After little news from Chiapas (in Mexico) in major Western newspapers for some time, I run across this piece in The Guardian:

The pipe-smoking, balaclava-wearing, but no longer gun-toting leader of Mexico's Zapatista rebel group, subcomandante Marcos, emerged from his jungle hideout yesterday for a six-month nationwide tour to promote a new, non-violent political movement...

The aim of the tour is, according to a recent communique, to "build a national programme of anti-capitalist and leftwing struggle". By dubbing his caravan "The Other Campaign", Marcos made it clear that much of the strategy hinges on rubbishing the July presidential election.

An interesting history of the modern Zapatista movement in Chiapas is available here. It'll be interesting to see the impact of Marcos's re-emergence.

Apres moi, le deluge

The NSA domestic spying scandal is beginning to cascade, with new information coming in buckets today. Check out this excellent series of posts by Armando and georgia10 (both law-talkin' folk and grade A bloggers) over at dkos:

• Justice Refused To Sign Off On Bush's Domestic Surveillance Scheme


• Ashcroft, Domestic Spying, And Why This Scandal Won't Go Away


• Schumer: DOJ Investigation Should Focus On Whistleblower Status


• If Al Qaida Is Calling You...


• President Bush Tips Off Terrorists

Bushco awaits the fate of tyrants.

Happy New Year!

I hope hope you all have a happy, blessed, and prosperous new year. I actually have the feeling it's going to be a good one, on a number of different levels.

BTW - if you haven't already, check out the blogroll. Those links have, hands-down, some of the best writers on the internets, and they deserve a looksee by you. I'm always looking to expand my links, so if you know of other sites that deserve my seal of approval, please let me know.

Again, a very happy new year to you. I think it's time for me to sleep off the champagne.

How high's the water, mama?

Looking out my window, I can see the rain has finally stopped, after soaking us all morning. Pat Welch's river page shows that pretty much every significant watershed in Oregon is spiking at or above flood stage. You can see how fast the water's risen over the past couple of days here (click on image for better view):

The following pictures were taken of the Willamette River in Eugene (north of the Greenway footbridge) this morning, around 11 AM. This stretch of river is about 1/8 of a mile from our house. We're not in any danger from the river - to reach us, the river would have to rise another 8 or 9 feet within a basin that averages between 1/8 to 1/4 mile wide. If it rains that much, I'm thinking we'll be having other problems to worry about.

There's a large island here that usually divides the current, with the main flow on the far side of the island. All you can see now are the trees.


The forecast is calling for rain until Wednesday, slacking off after that to showers.

I've been desperately wanting to go boating for some time, but I looooooooove my new kayak too much to risk an unplanned swim as my boat floats to Portland:

Talk about the weather

When I first moved to Eugene in 1996, I had heard about the famous Pacific Northwest rains, but was unprepared when, in mid-November, the skies opened in a downpour that lasted (I shit you not) three whole days. For the rest of the year, the Willamette Valley was under a sheet of water - or mud, up in the hills.

Well, we're at it again. We went from barely a drop in the creeks to flood in a matter of a couple days -and me, with a brand spankin' new Kristmas Kayak waiting for a good soak, not even getting a chance to contemplate boating, it went to flood that fast. And it's still raining.

I'll be checking the Willamette in the morning (it's about 1/8 mile from my house) and will post some pictures (along with the vacation pics I promised earlier). Until then, I hope this post finds you both high and dry!

Bits & Pieces

We had a lovely visit to Newport over the last few days. I have to say, I love the Oregon Coast more in the winter than the summer. The moody skies, the frothing surf, the smells of sea and evergreen... the true magic of our fair stretch of ocean almost requires the calm curtains of gray and sun breaks that punctuate the storms that tear in from the Pacific.

No whales to be seen, though. Dramatic weather obscures flukes and blowspouts. We did get to go the aquarium, where we discovered that Eamon has a great appreciation for aquatic mammals like sea lions, seals, and sea otters. He doesn't see to be too impressed by the fish. I'll post some pictures a little later.

Here's a few odds and ends:

• susanhu at Booman Tribune has this infuriating story about energy politics between D.C., the Chicago Transit Authority, and Venezuela's state-run oil industry, Citgo. Citgo is offering to sell the CTA diesel fuel for its transit fleet at 40-50% savings, so long as the savings are passed on in the way of free or reduced-price fare for low-income transit riders. The CTA scotched the deal and opted to raise their fares after receiving $89 million in federal monies from D.C. Another of consequence of Bush's "get tough" policies against increasingly leftist governments in South American. Stupid, stupid, stupid.


• kos has this to say on new revelations on the methods used in the Global War on Terror. Turning a blind eye to the torture of children is the epitome of evil.


• The General's take on our "ally" in the GWOT, Uzbekistan, with links to the story breaking in the UK press:

Vacation

So I'm going to be taking a little break for a few days. The fam and I are heading over to Newport for a few days. We're renting a little apartment overlooking Nye Beach, so we'll be watching the gray whales migrate as the storms roll off the Pacific. It'll also be Eamon's first trip to the Aquarium - where I imagine I'll be hearing him practice saying "fish" a lot. He's gonna love it.

I'm sure Soviet Blogistan will be fine without me. I'll talk to you Thursday.

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!

cross-posted from the Big Orange Site

I just finished reading COBear's excellent piece connecting the dots concerning the New York Times' shocking inability to report news vital to the healthy functioning of our democracy. In the comments, sara seattle chimes in with this comment decrying the influence of corporations on both or governmental and media institutions. Her comment got the hamster on the wheel in my head.

University of California - Santa Cruz sociologist Bill Domhoff writes of "corporate interlock" in his book Who Rules America? (a must read for any Kossack looking for a critical examination of the rich and powerful in the United States). Simply put, a cursory examination of the Times Board of Directors reveals the entry point into a web of networks that provide the context for the newspaper's editorial decisions.

Presented below is the bio info for 9 of the 14 people who comprise the Board of Directors for the New York Times - note the other institutions with which these directors are affiliated (warning: this is a long list - there is more analysis after the quoted material):

• John F. Akers

  Mr. Akers served as chairman of the board and CEO of International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) from 1986 until his retirement in 1993, completing a 33-year career at the company.
  
  Mr. Akers also serves on the boards of W.R. Grace & Co., Hallmark Cards, Inc., PepsiCo, Inc. and Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc.



• Brenda C. Barnes

  Ms. Barnes has served as president and chief executive officer of Sara Lee Corp. since February 2005, and a director since July 2004, when she joined Sara Lee Corp. as president and chief operating officer.
  
  Previously, Ms. Barnes was a consultant and an adjunct professor at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management and North Central College.
  
  She is also a director on the board of Staples, Inc. In addition, Ms. Barnes serves as a chairman of the board of trustees of Augustana College and is on the advisory board and steering committee for the Center for Executive Women, Northwestern University.
  
  Ms. Barnes served as president and chief executive officer of Pepsi-Cola North America from 1996 until she retired in 1997. During her more than 22 years with Pepsi-Cola and its parent company, PepsiCo, she held a wide range of senior executive positions in general management, manufacturing, sales, marketing, and corporate operations.
  
  She began her career with PepsiCo as a business manager for Wilson Sporting Goods in 1976; became vice president, marketing for Frito-Lay in 1981; group vice president, marketing for Pepsi-Cola in 1984; president of Pepsi-Cola South/West in the early 90s; chief operating officer of Pepsi-Cola North America in 1993, and chief executive officer in 1996.
  
  From November 1999 until March 2000, Ms. Barnes was Interim President and Chief Operating Officer of Starwood Hotels & Resorts.



• Raul E. Cesan

  Mr. Cesan is the founder and has served as the managing partner of the investment firm, Commercial Worldwide LLC since 2001.
  
  Previously, Mr. Cesan served as president and chief operating officer of the Schering-Plough Corporation from 1998 until 2001, culminating a 24-year career at the company.
  
  He joined Schering-Plough, which is engaged in the discovery, development, manufacturing and marketing of pharmaceutical and health care products worldwide, in 1977 as director of finance and administration for the company's Latin American region. He subsequently held positions of increasing responsibility, including president of operations in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and was appointed president of Schering-Plough International in 1988. In 1992, he became president of Schering Laboratories, the U.S. pharmaceutical marketing arm, and in 1994, became president of Schering-Plough Pharmaceuticals.
  
  Mr. Cesan also serves on the board of Flamel Technologies S.A., a French company.



• William E. Kennard

  Mr. Kennard joined The Carlyle Group, a private equity firm, in May 2001 as a managing director in the global telecommunications and media group. Before joining The Carlyle Group, Mr. Kennard served as Chairman of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission from November 1997 to January 2001.
  
  Mr. Kennard served as the FCC's general counsel from December 1993 to November 1997. Before serving in the government, Mr. Kennard was a partner and a member of the board of directors of the law firm of Verner, Liipfert, Bernhard, McPherson and Hand.
  
  Mr. Kennard is also a member of the board of directors of Nextel Communications, Inc. and Dex Media, Inc.



• James M. Kilts

  Mr. Kilts has served as president of The Gillette Company since 2003 and as chairman and chief executive officer since 2001.
  
  He is also a director on the boards of The May Department Store and MetLife, Inc. In addition, Mr. Kilts serves on the International Advisory Board of Citigroup.
  
  Previously, he served as president and chief executive officer of Nabisco Holdings Corporation from 1998 until 2000.
  
  Mr. Kilts served as Executive Vice President, Worldwide Food from 1995 until to 1997 and President of Kraft USA, Oscar Mayer from 1989 until 1995, culminating a 23-year career at Philip Morris Companies. During his tenure with Philip Morris, he held a wide range of executive positions in business development, consumer products and strategy development.



• David E. Liddle

  Since 2000, Dr. Liddle has been a partner at U.S. Venture Partners, a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm. Between 1992 and 1999, he served as president of Interval Research Corporation, a Silicon Valley-based laboratory and incubator for new businesses focusing on broadband, consumer devices, interaction design and advanced technologies.
  
  Previously, Dr. Liddle founded Metaphor Computer Systems in 1982 and served as its president and CEO. He has also held executive positions at Xerox Corporation and IBM.



• Ellen R. Marram

  Ms. Marram has served as a managing director of North Castle Partners, LLC. since 2000.
  
  From 1999 until 2000, Ms. Marram was president and chief executive officer of efdex Inc. (the Electronic Food & Drink Exchange), an Internet-based commodities exchange for the food and beverage industry.
  
  Ms. Marram, who left the Tropicana Beverage Group in 1998 after it was sold by The Seagram Company Ltd., had served as its president and chief executive officer from 1997 to 1998. She joined the company in 1993 as group president. Previously, she served as president and chief executive officer of the Nabisco Biscuit Company, the largest operating unit of Nabisco, Inc. Prior to joining Standard Brands Incorporated in 1977, which later merged with Nabisco, she worked with Johnson & Johnson and Lever Brothers.
  
  Ms. Marram also serves on the board of directors of the Ford Motor Company and Eli Lilly and Company.



• Henry B. Schacht

  Mr. Schacht has been a managing director and senior advisor at Warburg Pincus LLC since 1999 (on unpaid leave from 2000 to 2004).
  
  Previously, Mr. Schacht served as senior advisor of Lucent Technologies Inc. He was the first chairman and CEO of Lucent when it was spun-off from the AT&T Corporation in 1996 until his retirement from Lucent in 1998. He returned to Lucent in October 2000 and served as chairman until February 2003 and senior advisor unil 2004.
  
  Previously, Mr. Schacht served as chairman and CEO of Cummins Engine Company, Inc., retiring in 1995 after 31 years.
  
  Mr. Schacht also serves on the boards of Alcoa (Aluminum Company of America), Johnson & Johnson and Lucent Technologies Inc.



• Doreen A. Toben

  Ms. Toben has served as executive vice president and chief financial officer of Verizon Communications, Inc. since 2002 and is responsible for its finance and strategic planning efforts. Previously, she was senior vice president and chief financial officer with responsibility for finance and strategic planning for Verizon's Telecom Group.
  
  
  Ms. Toben is a 30-year telecommunications veteran. She began her career at AT&T Corp and over the years held various of positions of increasing responsibility primarily in treasury, strategic planning and finance both there, and beginning in 1984 at Bell Atlantic Inc. Her later positions at Bell Atlantic included vice president and chief financial officer, Bell Atlantic-New Jersey in 1993; vice president, finance and controller in 1995; vice president and chief financial officer, Telecom/Network in 1997, and vice president and controller in 1999.
  
  Ms. Toben joined the National Advisory Board of J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. on June 30, 2003. She is also a director on the boards of Citymeals-on-Wheels, Lincoln Center, and Verizon Wireless.

Okaaaay.

The Carlyle Group. Big Pharma. Insurance. Venture Capital. These people are THE rich and THE powerful. "The haves and the have-mores," as certain humble public servants would have it. Bush calls them "his base."

Returning to the work of Bill Domhoff: it's clear that the American elite - the upper-upper class, or top 1% of the population - work closely together at the top of the core economic institutions, with individuals holding positions in multiple corporate and/or governmental hierarchies. If we were to expand our examination beyond the NYT's Board of Directors and inspect their executive staff, as well as those of other corporate hierarchies, we'd soon come across familiar names. That keep re-occurring. Repeatedly. The amount of overlap in these corporate and governmental structures is truly staggering. "Corporate interlock" indeed.

Now, let me caution you against jumping to the conclusion that the NYT Board of Directors is putting direct pressure on the editorial staff to avoid stories that are detrimental to their interests. Without inside knowledge of the relationship between the boardroom and the newsroom we can make no claims, and with the exception of Arthur Sulzburger (who straddles the two worlds), I think you'd find little in the way of overt displays of power.

However, Domhoff points out that the people who sit on these elite Boards are not only business associates. They are also neighbors. They join the same yacht clubs. They sit in adjacent pews at the same church. Their kids attend the same elite prep schools. Their spouses sit together on the boards of local and national charities. They have standing tee times at the country's most exclusive golf clubs. They meet at policy boards to formulate proposals for legislation that will be beneficial for their respective industries. If we were to use Marxian language, we would say these people comprise a definite social class, a highly organized social class at that with concrete interests, and the ability to protect and maintain them.

It may be easy to dismiss this as some sort of conspiracy theory, where a small, insular part of the population is actively working to keep the rest of the population down. Let me debunk that in two ways.

First, a conspiracy implies some that it is a secret plan, that once exposed to the light of day, their nefarious plans would be foiled. The degree of interconnection between our government and corporate elites is done out in the open. It's in the list of corporate board members. Or in the NYT's society page. Or the Social Register. It's on the signature page of the pronouncements of industry policy boards. The back channels through which power in this country flows are readily visible for the looking.

Second, what Domhoff documents is a powerful synthesis between institutional and personal interests. A certain policy isn't just good for Citicorp, it's also good for Senator X's acquaintance Mr. Y, board member and large shareholder of Citicorp - their sons play football together at St. Albans.

Coming back around to COBear's original post, if you want to understand the editorial decisions of the Times, look who Sulzburger, the paper's publisher is hanging out with. Look at who's in his golfing foursome. Who is he lunching with. Whose party is he going to next week?

Chances are it'll just be with a few of his close friends - who just happen to be at the very center of power in the United States. The story concerning the Times isn't just about a plot to see Bush re-elected. It's about protecting the prerogatives of an insular class of society - the very top of the pyramid. And I think what we may now be seeing are signs that this top 1% of the population now believes that Bush may be detrimental to their prerogatives.

Merry Christmas!

Best wishes to you and yours from Medulla Noodle and our inspiration, his Noodly Diviness, the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Remember

Tools in Iraq: Rumsfeld

(Hat tip to caribmon at dkos)

From the AP wire:



My, someone does not look happy about playing Anonymous Grateful Grunt #1 to Rummy's bleeding... er, leading man.

Got your own caption?