Why are so many bloggers upset with the New York Times?
In the Salon article "Silence of the blogs", the question is asked: "Why did the New York Times ignore Baghdad blogger announcements and accounts of a big pro-democracy demonstration?"

Zeyad, the "gamer of Baghdad"....is famous in the international gaming community for his reports on gamer culture in Iraq. But he was also recently responsible for a furious stir online regarding the way news from Iraq is covered by the Western media....On Dec. 10, 2003, pro-democracy, anti-terrorist demonstrators peacefully flooded the streets of Baghdad. A coalition of Iraqis of many political parties and religious affiliations, tribes and ethnicities, young and old (including many students), demanded an end to attacks on civilians. They also demanded that Arab media stop depicting the Baathist and foreign jihadi culprits as members of some kind of just "resistance." Even the Al Jazeera network estimated them at over 10,000 strong. We know all this, not from reading any significant coverage of the event by the mainstream Western press (There was little to none). Rather I know it because an Iraqi who's been a computer user since childhood went out and reported on it himself. Zeyad's entry was linked to throughout the Web. But the so-called "paper of record," the New York Times, gave the event scarce coverage, and that enraged many leading lights of the blogosphere, especially those on the conservative or liberal hawkish end of the spectrum.

After 9-11, Americans woke up to foreign policy and international news. We realized it was far more important than tales of killer sharks and Gary Condit. If there is anything that will unite Americans across party-lines, it is the awakening to the media-problem in this country. Cable news is hopelessly ignorant. I had hoped the print-media was better, but I observe them degrading as well.
Overall, the problem with the New York Times and other major print-news outlets is not a case of the tired "liberal media" myth...nor is the mainstream print-media paticularly conservative. (Papers such as N.Y. Post and Washington Times not included in this discussion..they're very right-wing..we know it). It is primarily what Paul Krugman likes to call "the curse of even-handedness"...journalists try so hard to be "balanced" on every story that they wind up skewing anything close to the truth. Opinion and truth are getting to be inseparable bedmates...and the children they produce are the ugliest creatures I think I shall ever lay eyes upon. Ideological incest produces a retarded child of journalistic truth.
Many times, journalists are smug, arrogant, egotistical, condescending toward (or, negligently, not keeping up with the new, modern tradition of) internet bloggers. (*The salon article states that Baghdad bureau chief Susan Sachs and/or her staff are possibly not even aware of Iraq's postwar blogs*).
In some cases, journalists look non-democratic through professional negligence. Today's "big media" is most certainly corporate-agenda-driven. Sometimes it seems today's print journalists are simply not smart or intuitive enough to "score' the ever-evasive truth. That's the scariest thing to imagine. Is the American media truly hiring the best minds? I would think it would be healthy for American democracy to see federally-funded citizen-commissions (people like you and me) on media review, criticism, recommendations for change.

See Instapundit (Glenn Reynolds') take on the matter here.

Letter From Decorated CIA Vets to Dennis Hastert:
"Intelligence officers must never be turned into political punching bags"
Demand for Congress to hold Bush White House accountable
Go here to see the full text of a letter sent by former CIA officers to House Speaker Dennis Hastert and other key House leaders on Tuesday, calling for a congressional inquiry into the Valerie Plame case. (Subscription or one-day pass required)

Our fallen troops had no place in Bush's SOTU speech
I still can't get over this fact. I posted about it directly after hearing the speech. Colbert I. King talks about it here in his Washington Post column. The troops put their trust in their Commander-in-Chief. Some gave all. None got a moment of silence or respect last Tuesday in the State-of-the-Union speech watched by millions of Americans. What have we become?

"Last Tuesday night was an opportunity for George W. Bush to eulogize the fallen, a chance for him to tell their families what their sacrifices mean to the nation -- a time for the president to help heal broken hearts. That didn't happen....He delivered a line about "sorrow when one is lost," and shared a self-serving recollection of himself landing on the deck of a carrier in the Pacific Ocean and his Thanksgiving Day fly-in to Baghdad. There was also a pledge to supply the troops with all the resources they need to fight and win. But victims of the Iraq war, as well as their moms, dads, spouses, children, neighbors and friends, deserved more than what they got from the president. Instead of a moment of silence for those who have paid the ultimate price, they heard presidential pitches......
Tuesday was the time to tell U.S. families whose sons and daughters are losing their lives and limbs that their brave sacrifices still make sense....Instead, we got a Bush speech laying the groundwork for his quest for reelection.....A president who has been down in the trenches and seen people die would never have gone up to Capitol Hill in the midst of war and delivered the kind of State of the Union speech that the nation heard Tuesday night."

Wesley Clark rightfully criticizes Brit Hume for Debate's GOP agenda
I didn't think Peter Jennings was much better with those 'waste-of-time' Bush deserter/Michael Moore questions.
Since when is Bush not an equal target for criticism in a free country? Does Peter Jennings consider Bush his King?
I thought Hume and Jennings looked like death-warmed-over last night. The bad lighting exposed the worst skin I've seen since the last Michael Jackson-trial clip on CNN. The warts on Hume's face would turn off a toad.

David Kay (on WMDs):
"I don't think they existed"
Scott Ritter may have made a date with a 16-year-old, but hot damn, the man was right all along.

BIN LADEN-
CAPTURED?
Why isn't it all over FOX News?

A spoof newsflash by a TV station in Lebanon saying that Osama Bin Laden had been captured in the northern city of Tripoli was taken more seriously than the programme-makers had expected.

Maureen Dowd has lost it

Letter to Editor: First things first

-I appreciate the fact that The Tribune occasionally carries New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd. I usually enjoy her acerbic wit and her ability to hit the nail on the head.
-However, in "What's Up, Doc" (Jan. 18), she has gone too far in pillorying Dr. Judy Dean for her desire to "to stay focused on her own life, healing the sick." It seems to me, and I am a political animal, that Dr. Dean has her priorities straight. Her first obligation is to her patients.
-I am sure that if Howard Dean becomes the nominee of the Democratic Party, she will make the appropriate appearances, but not before finding another doctor to cover her patients for her. With the current shortages in our health care system, it is refreshing to find a doctor who puts her patients before her personal and family agenda.
-I don't think Laura Bush or any of the other candidates' wives Dowd mentions went through the rigorous training of medical school to put on a white coat and take the Hippocratic Oath. Dr. Judy Dean is putting first things first.

Esther R. Landa
Salt Lake City

Food for thought: Ask yourselves why this "bold career-woman", Maureen Dowd, would put Taliban-like social pressure on a fellow career-woman to "chuck it all"..responsibility to patients, a professional career, and closeness to her son...in order to be turned into a pin-cushion by the likes of people exactly like Maureen Dowd? SHould Judy Dean cover her head with a burka, too?

Judy Dean, in Maureen Dowd's fantasies
Is Dowd promoting the "Stepford-wife" culture? Is this a woman we want representing us American women in the opinion columns of the N.Y. Times? Isn't she promoting more "Stand-by-your-man" than American freedom and progress for women?

Diane Sawyer didn't have a 21st century-attitude toward American women during her interview with Judy Dean last night on Primetime, either. She had a decidedly arrogant and hypocritical attitude toward a woman who would choose to maintain a sane lifestyle and responsible career while her husband was on the road.
(Where was Diane's husband, by the way? Why wasn't she with him? Why wasn't he with her?)

Why do so many women hate Diane Sawyer's hair, by the way? Don't you think she's been looking awfully dragged out lately? Do you think everything's okay with her on the homefront? What's making her look so haggard lately?

At Salon.com, Rebecca Traister writes:

"Steinberg Dean is toothy; she doesn't seem to use much hair product; her face shows her age. It was both fun and horrifying to imagine her dismay at being set on by a team of eager ABC makeup artists, dying to go where only Noxzema has been before. It was also sad to watch her being forced to look at a photo -- the only photo? -- of Laura Bush in evening wear. Sawyer, who didn't even bother to disguise her doubts, wondered aloud how the doctor might feel about having to dress up or look pretty in public...But when Steinberg Dean opened her mouth to reassure Mrs. Mike Nichols, who was pretending to be confused about that crazy "feminist who uses her maiden name professionally and her married name personally" thing, "I'm Judy Dean," it was clear that Judy was going to be just fine......Journalists like me and Jodi Wilgoren and Maureen Dowd -- people who obviously like attention and are fascinated by power -- cannot fathom why a woman wouldn't be thrilled to be in the center of a political lightning storm. We try to cast her and re-cast her, chew on this mystery meat until we can name her. But that exercise apparently reveals more about us than it does about our subject... As Howard Dean said last night: Who would want to give up her life and career to join a campaign and "get poked at by everybody?" Maybe that sounds appealing to those of us who write about him, and who have forced his partner onto the examining table. But the Judy Dean we saw on TV plainly has more sense."

"Computer glitch" allows GOP committee to spy on and exploit Democrats--Robert Novak is once again at the center of impropriety
Glitch facilitated GOP access to restricted Democratic communications without a password

"The office of Senate Sergeant-at-Arms William Pickle has already launched an investigation into how excerpts from 15 Democratic memos showed up in the pages of the conservative-leaning newspapers and were posted to a website last November.
With the help of forensic computer experts from General Dynamics and the US Secret Service, his office has interviewed about 120 people to date and seized more than half a dozen computers -- including four Judiciary servers, one server from the office of Senate majority leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, and several desktop hard drives.
But the scope of both the intrusions and the likely disclosures is now known to have been far more extensive than the November incident, staffers and others familiar with the investigation say.
...Democrats now claim their private memos formed the basis for a February 2003 column by conservative pundit Robert Novak that revealed plans pushed by Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, to filibuster certain judicial nominees. Novak is also at the center of an investigation into who leaked the identity of a CIA agent whose husband contradicted a Bush administration claim about Iraqi nuclear programs.
....."There appears to have been no hacking, no stealing, and no violation of any Senate rule," Miranda said. "Stealing assumes a property right and there is no property right to a government document. . . . These documents are not covered under the Senate disclosure rule because they are not official business and, to the extent they were disclosed, they were disclosed inadvertently by negligent [Democratic] staff."

God is like GOP butter to grease the Christian right:
Bush talks to Right-to-life Group Over Phone from New Mexico

This is not to mock the good intentions of Christians..it is to point out the pandering hypocrisy of WHITE Republican male Representatives of America.

The March for Life Education & Defense Fund, which took place today in Washington, D.C. received a special phonecall from the President.

Let's start at the beginning.
The group's representative Nellie Gray began the rally by claiming that "homegrown terrorism" started with Roe vs. Wade.
(My! What a sweet, unifying, and loving message).

President Bush called and spoke about abstinence education, adoption, faith-based programs, he talked about the Unborn Victims of Violence bill just approved by the Judiary Committee yesterday. He demanded that the Congress approve and sign it into law. He spoke of banning human cloning, he invoked the Declaration of Independence, he said that he hoped for a compassionate society where every child would be born into loving family (uh-how can government handle THAT one?). He spread the word "God" around like butter.
After he spread the word of "God" like butter,the rest of the guest speakers (mostly male Republican representatives) followed suit.

Rep Steve Chabot(R)- spoke to the crowd and talked about pro-choice Americans as perpetrators of slaughter. He ragged on the Clintons and the crowd went wild. He called Bush a friend and the crowd went wild.
He touted the "Born Alive act"..he invoked Tom Daschle's name..the crowd booed loudly, but cheered upon hearing about the day Tom became "minority leader". Chabot invoked Ronald Reagan's name..and got wild cheers.

Chris Smith-(R)-NJ: Within three minutes, he used words such as "terror", "dismember", "mutilate" "decapitate" "holocaust", "destruction", "violence","slaughter", "killed", "expoliting women", "breast cancer", "hurting", "deleterious", "devastation","tragedies", "regret", "big lie,"wounded", "heart-wrenching", "predators","anguish", "dramatic", "agony"..all in less than three minutes.

Rep Todd Tiahrt(R)Kansas-spoke briefly...only to push a Republican candidate named Toomey from his state.

Rep Roscoe Bartlett(R)MD--a very old man who said he's the only MD. representative who's a pro-lifer. He downed the issue of RU 486.

Scott Garrett(R)-NJ--prayed and harped on scripture. Downed cloning. Downed the chosen "lifestyle" of a woman who chooses abortion. Prayed again. He said might and right is on the Republican's side, (really-this is what he said).

Rick Renzi (R )-AZ- he yelled a lot..whew. He said that true sons of America march for life. He ragged on American men..calling them cowards if they don't fight against abortion. He called young men of America "cowardly", "spineless", "soft", "pushers", "pressurers of death", "non-patriotic" (I'm not lying)..he yelled again...and again. Why yell? Sheesh.

Mike Ferguson(R)- NJ- He said that every Democratic Presidential candidate supports a woman's right to choose, so it's important to re-elect Bush.He said that baby turtles are protected..why not humans? He mentioned "Lacy + Conner's Law"(Unborn Violence Act)...crowd cheered. He credited prayer..spreading the God-butter again. The crowd licked the butter enthusiastically.

A woman..whoa!!! I'm shocked..she is Melissa Hart(R)-PA- She talked about being on the bus with her religious parish. More God-butter.

Mike Pence(R)-IN-invoked the name of Martin Luther King whose niece was in the crowd. He said Roe v. Wade is a "lie"..suggested an amendment to the Constitution to end Roe v. Wade. He said 2004 will be a divided election..so be sure to re-elect Bush!
He criticized Clinton... praised Bush. Clinton bad/Bush good. He pointed out the Jefferson memorial...invoked the statement "God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever." (He failed to say the next line, which is: "Commerce between master and slave is despotism." Is a woman chained to unwanted pregnancy not a slave? Is slavery not a sin?)

Todd Aiken(R)-MO-He claimed Right-to-life is a "calling" and a "cross to bear". He asked" Tell me.. in one sentence..the basic principle of what America's about?" He answered with the Declaration of Independence statement: "We hold these truths to be self evident...etc. Life' liberty, pursuit of happiness...( ...). He compared terrorists to women who have a right to choose.( He is a miserable and hypocritical louse, in my humble opinion. A poster child for what is wrong with keeping a woman a slave on behalf of the God-butter.)

Jim Ryan (R)KS- He brought his teenage sons (I said sons..not daughters) to talk. One said the GOP I guess a woman made miserable and ruined by being forced to bear a pregnancy to completion will make her very free..very happyis the party of "life"..Democrats are the party of "death". He said America was at cultural war. (How unifying). Another son came up to get younger folks in the audience to register Republican.

Steve King(R)IA--He was determined to overthrow Roe v. Wade. He talked about a homily at church..the crowd went wild. (More spreading of the word "God"... just like butter.) He called Roe v. Wade the "Dred Scott of our time."He said we must not infringe on another's liberty. (HELLO?) He invoked the word SIN. (Geez-where's that in the Constitution?)

Sam Brownback(R)KS-He stated all human life at any stage is "sacred" (which has what to do with law, again?) He asked: "If any of you were researched on as an embryo, how many of you would be alive today?(DUH!!) He said: "PRAY PRAY PRAY!!" (God-butter). He invoked a Jesus-prayer. Invoked the word of SIN again. Last words were: "God Bless America".(Whose America?)

Norm Coleman(r)MN- He said there was "a lot of love there" in the crowd (love for whom?)..the phrase "better angels" was invoked. (Where?) Congress needs the crowd, so he said. He used the quote of Jewish Rambam (He changed the words so Rightwing American Christians might understand)..the original went like this: "A person must constantly view the entire world as if it is half meritorious and half guilty. If the individual performs one sin, he tips the balance for the entire world toward the side of guilt and brings destruction to the world. If he performs one mitzvah, he tips the balance to the side of merit and brings salvation."
He strongly encouraged marches on clinics. Last words: God Bless America. God-butter.

They wrapped up the rally with a resounding rendition of the Lee Greenwood song: "God Bless The USA".
Just like buttah.........God buttah.

I got bored with all these Republican WHITE MALE representatives. As a woman, I was appalled and shocked to understand that even Sam Brownback is a panderer. I was not surprised that so few women would attest. Only ONE woman spoke. They obviously couldn't get any others, or they surely would have. This is very "telling".

You know, it's mostly White Republican men I see speaking at this rally. Where are all the women? Their absence speaks louder than any man using negative words while invoking God like butter and sin like stop-signs at every turn could ever say.

Grover Norquist Melts Down--Invokes Holocaust Images of the AMERICAN LEFT

A top anti-tax activist and White House ally is standing by his comparison of proponents of the estate tax to the perpetrators of the Holocaust, while taking the analogy further and dismissing his critics as "socialists."

Look at the utter hypocrisy from these a*swipes:
*Wah! Unfair! Wah! Wah! Leave my Republican friend alone! So sayeth the lobbyist.*

Jack Abramoff, a close friend of Norquist's and a prominent Republican lobbyist, said that Norquist is being unfairly lampooned and argued that it's unreasonable to completely limit discussion of the Holocaust. Asked where he would draw the line between "reasonable" and "unreasonable" Holocaust analogies, Abramoff said it was very much subjective and imprecise."If it's mentioned every time your opponent disagrees with you, that's inappropriate," Abramoff said. "On the other hand, is it reasonable to say no one can ever discuss the evil of Nazis and learn lessons from it in the current political climate? It takes a reasonable balance and that's always going to be subjective."

Lampoon Grover Norquist? Bah...hang him out for all to see. He's an anti-community
wretch...a greedy slob..not at all American.
If Thomas Jefferson was alive today, he'd either be:
1.scratching madly at the lid of his coffin
or
2.kicking Grover Norquist's a*s.

Concord Monitor: In New Hampshire, no one Democrat is guaranteed the lead

This is hilarious.
Under the Washington Times headline reading "Republicans train sights on Clark", it says:

"....Sen. Joe Lieberman maintains a list of Mr. Clark's various statements and positions on the war. After sending out a press release chronicling six different stances, the Lieberman camp issued a correction, saying: "We screwed up. Clark has taken seven war positions, not six."

Who said Senator Lieberman is Republican?! Did I miss something?
*I think the Lieberman attack on General Clark is a cheap political move. I am disappointed that the Senator, who I believe is a good man, has run such a dismal campaign.*

I've been watching CSPAN and I have observed Wesley Clark getting a tremendous response from New Hampshire crowds. It may be the fact that he is laying out a clear state-of-the-union-style agenda (including raising the minimum wage to $7/hr) and at the same time, strongly appealing to the crowds emotionally with personal stories. He stresses a higher standard of leadership in America. I'm trying to get a "feel" for the New Hampshire Democrats...I happen to think Clark will do better than Kerry in the upcoming NH primary. The debates tonight will be very important. I think that any candidate who tries to attack Wes Clark on his stance on the Iraq war will fall flat on their faces when he has a chance to respond. He's ready for them...it's apparent. With all this concentration on candidates remaining positive, Clark is at a distinct advantage. One begins to wonder if Iowa was relevant or not. Obviously, it was relevant to Dick Gephardt...yet I have to say that I'm awfully sorry he had to drop out of the race, for this particular year it seems the race has not yet begun! I hope Dennis Kucinich will have a chance to speak..and speak often in tonight's debate. However, I hope he does not go off frothing-at-the-mouth at Howard Dean...especially after throwing his supporters to Edwards (in who-knows-what deal was made in Iowa last week). Remember, today's revelation that the John Edwards campaign was not an angelic bounty of optimistic positivity will be in the minds of anyone who's been keeping track.
Clark is coming in with a lot of advantages. It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out.


Republicans have lost a lot of ground in New Hampshire
There was a very "telling" article in the Providence Journal Wednesday about the GOP being a "house divided against itself". Link is here (reg. required)

There's no love of taxes in New Hampshire, but even Republicans here regard Washington-style tax cutting with contempt. Last spring, anti-tax activist Grover Norquist pestered New Hampshire state legislators as they debated plans to raise revenue. Dick Green, the Republican chairman of the state Senate Finance Committee, got into a shouting match with Norquist and told him to go back to Washington.New Hampshire has been called a Northern outpost of Sunbelt conservatism. In truth, it is no longer reliably Republican, and not particularly conservative.

This fact will bode well for candidates like Howard Dean and Wesley Clark in November.

Now they're looking for WMDs in cubbyholes!

The jury is still out,'' Vice President Dick Cheney said on the failure so far to find any weapons of mass destruction since Saddam was toppled last April.
It's going to take some additional considerable period of time to look at all of the cubby holes and...dumps and all the places in Iraq where you might expect to find something like that,'' Cheney told U.S. National Public Radio.

Blame Syria
Senator Pat Roberts raises (shady) public fear about Syria (neocons and other assorted insane sorts need to turn up the heat in the Syrian region..it's a re-election campaign season).

Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Pat Roberts said there was some concern Iraqi weapons of mass destruction had gone to Syria, and Washington vowed to carry on searching for such arms in Iraq.
Roberts, a leading member of President Bush's Republican Party, said in Washington on Wednesday: ``I think that there is some concern that shipments of WMD (weapons of mass destruction) went to Syria.'' He did not elaborate.

*Oh Please! When is the last time you heard Pat Roberts elaborate? OK--maybe once when he melodramatically played the whining victim of the Democrats in the pathetic Intelligence Committee-politics spat last fall designed to halt WMD investigation altogether.)

And we shall continue to pay through the nose
for Bush's War
*but we won't technically "know about it" until after the November elections.*

U.S. Congress sources and budget analysts said Bush may seek an additional $40 billion or more for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan next year -- on top of the $400 billion military budget he will send to Congress next month.
But Bush was unlikely to send the request to Congress until after the November presidential election to minimize any political damage, the sources said.

HAPPY 1st BLOGIVERSARY, IDDYBUD!!

Gee--thanks! One year ago today I started her up.....
It's been quite a year. I'll highlight some entries from the past year all through this Blogiversary week!

Gore Vidal on the "United States of Amnesia," 9/11, the 2000 Election and the War in Iraq

"...we have a global empire and nobody knows where anything is, nobody knows any languages, so our statesmen go abroad and people laugh at them, because they are so dumb, or seem to be so dumb."

"....In the U.S., everybody listens to 19th Century Fox TV News. In which a bunch of loons just scream and scream and scream. And with each scream they tell another lie. How are we ever going to have an informed citizenry? Which means then how can we have an informed election?"

At Daily Kos, here are some comments from readers about the Democrats:
*Take the poll while you're there.*

"My wild guess: I think a Clark-Dean ticket is going to beat a Bush-[fill in the blank] ticket in '04. (It's the economy, stupid!) (Iraq will probably implode this year, but, sad to say, the corporate media has succeeded in making the death, pain, starvation and misery of ragheads unreal to most Americans, just as they are trying with some success to label Dean as "angry" and therefore "not electable." It was John Lennon who said, "Nothing is real." That's the reality and the tragedy of our democracy.)
by PeacePatriot on Thu Jan 22nd, 2004 at 02:03:33 GMT"

DON'T MISS THIS ONE, READERS:
I was sent this link to Michael Moore's comments to Dean supporters. I thought it deserved the largest audience possible. Michael Moore is supporting Clark--but he gets it. I hope I can link on this site. http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?messageDate=2004-01-20
by Razzled on Wed Jan 21st, 2004 at 21:23:05 GMT

"The Beauty of Dean" by Outlandish Josh
"..It wasn't fun there for 24 hours, but I'm seeing the light. That clip that made us all so sick? In context it's a goddamn moment of triumph, and it's already been put to great humerous use in many a remix online. It's outplayed Bush's state of the Union speech. I'm lovin' it..."

The Democratic Campaign in
New Hampshire
Josh Marshall says:

"--My sense of this campaign is that there are really two and a half dynamics at work now here in New Hampshire.
--The big fight is between Clark and Kerry. They’re after the same voters. And their pitch to the voters here is similar. Those voters are moderate-ish Democrats, people for whom the electability pitch is an important one, people who warm, for various reasons, to the candidates’ military credentials. So that’s the big fight.
--Dean is in another category. His main issue is himself. If he can hold on to who he has right now and get back some of the people who’ve left him then he can probably win. And at this point I don’t think he needs to win big. He just needs to win. To show he can take a punch and that Iowa wasn’t a fatal blow. (Remember a number of guys who became president lost Iowa and even came in third.) But I don’t have the sense --- and this is just a gut sense --- that the folks Kerry and Clark will be fighting over are the ones Dean’s after or really can get, at least not for the most part.
--The half dynamic is Edwards, who might slip through to a high showing if Kerry, Clark and Dean bloody each other sufficiently in the next week. I’m going to an Edwards event this evening so maybe then I’ll know more.

See Josh's interview with George Soros here.
Mr. Soros claims the Bush Doctrine is reminiscent of George Orwell's Animal Farm. He says: "You know, all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. And this is in contradiction of the values that have made America great."

Britain to consider going with Iraqi request for direct elections--expresses hope that UN will send in team
You will observe how important it is for us to entreat the U.N. to help facilitate resolutions to such crises. Kofi Annan is concerned with the safety of any U.N. staff who would head to Iraq. He may reserve judgement on sending any election team until a separate U.N. mission of security experts returns and gives its assessment about whether it's safe to return U.N. staff to Iraq. Bush wants to be re-elected. He' doesn't want you to notice, but he's on his knees..begging 'please'.
At Informed Comment, Professor Cole comments that the 100,000 demonstrators who marched on Bagdhad Monday and the political situation reminds him more and more of Algeria; where mass protests played a similar role in involving the UN.
Excerpt:

"..A Shiite official who spoke to al-Sistani said Wednesday that if a proposed team of U.N. experts tells the cleric it isn't possible to organize direct elections by July 1, he would accept the verdict.
The British government, the strongest U.S. coalition partner, meanwhile will consider al-Sistani's call for direct elections if a U.N. team determines they're practical, officials told The Associated Press.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, attending an international forum in Davos, Switzerland, defended the coalition process, but expressed hope that Annan will send a team to assess election prospects.
"A large part of this comes down to ... technical issues," Straw said, noting security problems in parts of Iraq and the lack of voter registration. "This needs to be discussed through."
The comments put more pressure on U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to sign off on a request by the Bush administration and the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council to send a U.N. election assessment team to Iraq.
U.N. officials were in contact with coalition and Iraqi leaders over the possibility of sending the election team, but no decision had been made, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Wednesday...."

Please see this photo-
These are some of the faces of the children orphaned by the Bam Earthquake in Iran
Here are some facts. Here is something you can do...

Why it would be a stroke of genius to run Clark and Dean together


credit: AP photos
It would shock folks like William Safire, who said today:
"You know that the Dean-Clinton battle for the Democratic soul is at the heart of this primary campaign."
Why battle?
Put 'em together-Dean and Clark- and you've got just about everbody's vote! See how simple?
Dopey Karl Rove would need an instant change of underpants when he got the news that the 'dream team' was coming to stomp all over Dubs.
Dean may be "too old to cry", but William Safire's getting "too old to lie"...he's a rightwing screechmonkey hiding behind his fragile little cloak of intellectualism.

Boston Globe:
The new discrimination against the not-particularly religious

This article is actually titled "The new discimination against the nonreligious", but I like my title better.
There are a lot more Americans who are not particularly devout religionists than there are non-religious Americans.
The level at which we individually and privately believe is entirely personal and while it's fine to talk about one's religion if one so desires, it should not be the required benchmark of a just and effective American President, Senator, House Representative, Justice, American actor, plumber, airplane pilot, floor sweeper, or true American friend.
There are dogs that, while born in the same litter, will bite you while others will lick you lovingly.
Curiously, none are religious. Perhaps some were fed properly while the others were starved..perhaps some of the lucky ones received love while the others were abused. Religion had absolutely nothing to do with the decision to bite or to lick.
See how simple this is? Responsibility, empathy, kindness and caring will never be exclusive to those practicing a religion.(Although religion has the corner on guilt-infliction, I must say!).
Witch-hunting should not be tolerated in this day and age.
Matter of fact, it should be pointed out... and scorned.

bone phone

Heh. bone phone.

"I may look weird if I'm talking with the phone pressed between my eyebrows.."
Uh...no....really...ya think so?

Around the League of Liberals

Clarified ruminates on how she was once "conned" by Alex B. Keaton ;)

Mad Kane has created the first State of the Union interactive crossword puzzle!

Ayn Clouter steps out of the pen to analyze what happened in the hog wallow the other night.

Hammerdown shows us that "mean-Dean" ain't the only game in town! Also see this puppet show pic posted on January 14th ( I like to call it "The Vince and Toot-ie show" )..it's a corker!

See Mahablog's comments about last night's SOTU speech.

Should you get a biology PhD? See the definitive (and hilarious) quiz. It's PZ Myers' Advanced Biology Aptitude Test.

America has such power--such great wealth. Anonymoses asks us to think about who it should serve...and how.

This is where Bush will lead us while pandering to the rightwing screechmonkey base

TRAPPED!

"The best—perhaps the only--way President Bush can make a meaningful difference is to make it harder for parents to get a divorce. Period. I know this sounds barbaric. Some will answer that you can't force people to stay married anymore than you force to get married in the first place."

Tom Paine.com:
Re: IOWA'S LESSONS by Doug Ireland

Why do we trust politicians more than we'd trust ourselves?

If what writer Doug Ireland says is true, if "the Dean movement has proven more interesting than the candidate", I'd like us all to really meditate upon what all the "interest" was all about to begin with. The movement and Dean are inseparable, you see. They are one and the same. To those in the movement, Dean is "the People". Granted, it seems that a tremendously large group of Americans striving to become active in their own democracy was not the important focus for Iowans last Monday. I am detached enough from my own political favoritism to realize this is true. Other than their willingness to participate in their caucus, Iowans apparently did not trust their fellow American citizens to take part in the eventual effect their own government would have upon their lives. Iowans showed they are not ready to work..and work hard... for their own country. It is apparent that they'd feel more comfortable in leaving their fate in the hands of the Washington establishment. Please do not take me wrong. I'm not saying they're bad, dumb, or lazy people. They are good Americans...average Americans.
But---I ask this:
Why do we trust politicians more than we'd trust ourselves?

The Dean movement, along with their leader Howard Dean, represent those who want to take their country back

I do not agree with Mr. Ireland when he says "Dean was always unworthy of the movement he'd sparked."
I am still very supportive of Governor Dean. If he shows great emotion, he's showing it for this movement...not for himself alone. We are passionate Americans. We want to take our country back.
After Mr. Ireland tells us that he thinks Dean isn't worthy, his article melts into a base attack upon the sanity of Dr. Dean. I lose trust in Mr. Ireland at this point in the article. He becomes quite vicious. I believe, rather than chipping nastily away at the sanity of Governor Dean, Mr. Ireland had best start questioning the "sanity" of the movement itself. Is it sane to want a change in Washington? Is it sane to want to participate in your own governing? If Mr. Ireland can
tell me it's insane to want what the Founding Fathers laid out for us all, then I'll possibly begin to see his point.
Until then...I'm sorry..I just don't see his point.

I really would like to understand....why did Dennis Kucinich betray so many on the left?

When Mr. Ireland says that "Dennis Kucinich, who ran as the "principled" candidate of a "new politics" similarly betrayed those idealists who had given his protest candidacy unexpected millions of dollars when he cut an "old politics" last-minute caucus deal asking his supporters to vote for John Edwards", I'm afraid he does strike an all-too-familiar chord.
Dennis Kucinich, whom I had fully believed was one of the the most principled and decent persons amongst the candidates, has greatly disappointed me. Mr. Ireland quotes a message he received from a Labor pol:
"If Kucinich thinks so little of progressive ideals that he throws his lot behind a pro-war, pro-Patriot Act candidate, then why waste my vote to send a message, when voting for Kucinich no longer sends a message?"
I could not agree more with Doug Ireland's keen observation that (quote) "Kucinich's decision can only be explained as a venting of spleen against Dean for having "stolen" the anti-war constituency the Ohioan imagined was his."

Wesley Clark is coming up and will surprise many

I don't necessarily agree that Kerry will become the strongest 'anti-Dean' Democratic candidate.
Iowa can only teach us the lesson of a primarily-White rural state. One caucus does not the truth make.
New Hampshire will not be the best gauge, either. I think we'll need to get past Super-Tuesday on March 2nd before we can know how all this is to play out in such a different type of Democratic race with so many brilliant candidates from which to choose.
I believe that Wesley Clark will emerge as the strong "anti-Dean" candidate. He outranks Kerry by a busload, he's conducted a war (while Kerry has been a mere grunt), he packs the strength of the left while appealing mightily to the right. I believe firmly, if Dean should not prevail (and I'm surely trusting and hoping he will), that many of his supporters would flock to General Wesley Clark.
I am sticking with Howard Dean, because I believe in the man and the greatness of the movement he has sparked. I can't wait to see Thursday night's debate. Time and truth marches on.

N.Y.Times:
Jack Pritchard* asks:
"How many nuclear weapons does North Korea have to make before this administration gets serious about its policy in East Asia?"
*Pritchard is a visiting fellow of the Brookings Institution

"American intelligence believed that most if not all the rods remained in storage, giving policymakers a false sense that time was on their side

..the Bush administration has relied on intelligence that dismissed North Korean claims that it restarted its nuclear
program..

Now there are about 8,000 spent fuel rods missing — evidence that work on such a deterrent may have begun. It is just the most recent failure in a string of serious North Korea-related intelligence failures.

American policy in North Korea is hardly better than American intelligence. At best it can be described only as amateurish. At worst, it is a failed attempt to lure American allies down a path that is not designed to resolve the crisis diplomatically but to lead to the failure and ultimate isolation of North Korea in hopes that its government will collapse.

Note: Mr. Pritchard resigned as special envoy for negotiations with North Korea last August.

Buzzflash: Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky on Bush's State of the Union Address

"The Emperor has no clothes. President Bush is describing a very different world and a very different America than the one I see and that most people live in."

"American families have experienced job losses, rising health care costs, increased poverty and homelessness. Huge surpluses have become record deficits. And because of his policies, America's standing in the world has greatly diminished, and, as a nation, we are less safe today than we could and should be."

"The President is enthusiastic about a 'strong' economy, and so are his rich friends."

"Iraq is a mess. Who can't see that?"

Bush Came Not to Praise King but ...
"King's philosophies could not be more different from Bush's."

"....it was on King's birthday last year that this same president, on national television, launched his attack against affirmative action by directing his administration to join the legal case against the University of Michigan's admissions policy. To follow that action by laying a wreath on King's tomb this year represented the height of hypocrisy for many of us in the civil rights community. It was obviously nothing more than a photo opportunity designed to woo black voters to the Republican Party. Coming in an election year, it was a blatant attempt to use King's image for political gain.
And here's the most offensive part: After a brief "official business" visit to the grave site — read: taxpayers foot the bill — Bush rushed off to a $2,000-a-plate fundraiser that same evening, picking up a cool $1.3 million in Atlanta for his reelection campaign..."

Perle and Frum Op-Ed In New York Times

Richard Perle and David Frum are beating their war drums on behalf of their favorite candidate Bush--and the New York Times is more than happy to give them space to do so. In a nutshell, they spread a hopeless message, telling us Saudi Arabia has us literally over a barrel (no pun intended) and there's nothing we can do about it except send our beloved sons and daughters to fight their bloody battles for them. Frum and Perle are telling you, my fine American friends, that you are slaves to the Saudis. I think we should send Dick and Dave over to Iraq, suit them up for war, and let them walk the real streets of Fallujah and Bagdhad. Their hopeless message tells us that Howard Dean's ideas about alternative energy are useless without an accompanying war; that John Edwards' talk of international good will is cowardly; that John Kerry will not drive more Middle Eastern leaders into spiderholes; that Wes Clark is a sucker for the Saudis. My opinion? Get the hook!! Get these two filthy cowards off the stage! Let's elect a leader who is both SANE and INDEPENDENT-THINKING.
While I agree we must prevail on the Saudis to stop financing the extremism that breeds terror, Perle and Frum prove they are clueless as to HOW to do that..besides sending our own men and women to die and alienating the international community by calling the UN an adversary. That's a recipe for an endless war on a gray entity named terrorism.
This is campaigning for Bush at its best, people. The NeoCons prove they still have Bush in their pocket. I can't wait to vote for any one of these fine Democratic candidates and send these warpigs back into their corner. They've killed enough of our men and women with their fantasy.
At least they mentioned the name Bin Laden in the article. Bush never uttered the name once in the SOTU speech last night....nor did he honor the soldiers who died for him. We need to unload this character and his
go-to-war-traveling show this November.

SOTU Speech Shame:

NOT A MENTION NOR ONE MOMENT OF SILENCE FOR
THE 502 TROOPS

NOT A WORD OF THANKS TO
THE WOUNDED

NOT A MENTION OF THE NAME
BIN-LADEN


"Hey you sports dudes- Stop takin' 'em steeroids!!"

Let Judy be Judith
I would never want to see Judith as a Judy-doll Stepford wife.
What the hell's wrong with America,anyhow?

Send idiots like Maureen Dowd back to 1950-- when men were men and women were barefoot and pregnant (yet somehow always kept the beehive coif perfect).
Leave her there.

Israel Planes Attack Hezbollah in Lebanon
While I understand Israel's right to defend herself, what implications will this have for her ally..the U.S.? Did Sharon think before acting...really? We'd best not get bogged down with Syria. We cannot afford it, nor is it an appropriate fight for us to enter. I hope this does not wind up smelling of NeoCon.

Israel rapped in UN probe

BEIRUT: Lebanese President Emile Lahoud said yesterday that a UN investigation had found that an Israeli military bulldozer hit by a Hizbollah rocket attack was in Lebanese territory at the time of the strike.
"The investigation carried out by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) command has shown that the Israeli bulldozer was inside Lebanese territory," Lahoud said in a statement.
"And this constitutes a clear violation of the Blue Line," said Lahoud, referring to the demarcation line marked out by Unifil when Israel ended its 22-year occupation of south Lebanon in May 2000.

Republicans convert for Kerry?
Hmmmmmmm......

"...East Middle School precinct chairwoman Jan Olson said a few Republicans had converted just to participate for the day. "We are really glad you want to be a Democrat," Olson said, "as long as that day is in November," drawing a big laugh. Sturgeon said one site had eight typical Republicans taking part..."

I wonder if they were sincere converts. You see, in Iowa, even registered Republicans can switch parties - if only for the day - to participate in the caucus.

The Union Leader, New Hampshire's only statewide daily newspaper, has endorsed Joe Lieberman in the Democratic presidential primary.

HERE'S THE ACTUAL ENDORSEMENT.

One word- UGH.
~~~~~~~

Clinton agrees to be Middle East Envoy?
Did you know this?

"In a question-and-answer period, he [John Kerry] reminded a voter that he had already asked Clinton to be his Middle East envoy—and that Clinton had accepted."

~~~~~~~

Paul O'Neill: A Republican Rip Van Winkle

Think of O'Neill as some centrist Republican Rip Van Winkle, who came back to a GOP White House after 25 years only to find that his pragmatic approach to public problem-solving made him an alien to be ignored or a prop to be used for "cover" by zealots.."

Bruce Reed of the DLC is trying hard to crush Howard Dean by "going negative" on him

Last night on Charlie Rose, I saw Bruce Reed of the DLC ripping away at Howard Dean..attacking his viability, his electability, his style, his campaign...practically everything about the man. At the same time, Reed went on and on about the glory of being positive. What a hypocrite! Kerry attacked Dean in the debates at nearly every turn.
The DLC is lining up a disaster for November if they are falling for the old "must stay positive".
The GOP is going to use that against them...and yet they submit. We are going to need a tiger to stand up against Bush.This playing nicey-nice is not going to make the big cut.
Here's an example (from the bitterly partisan Washington Dispatch) of how the GOP will turn it around to bite a DLC candidate in the nice little a*s:

"The reason is that the DLC could wind up the real loser in Clark’s latest attempt to go ultra-negative in his attacks against the president and desert any positive tone in his campaign. The DLC bailed on its original candidate, John Edwards once his campaign seemed to stall early on. But Edwards stayed positive in Iowa despite early poll numbers that were in the single digits and is now polling well. Edwards now has an outside shot at winning in Iowa and can spin any close finish in Iowa into a victory as he came from way back to become competitive by staying above the fray. He will then use that in an attempt to bolster his positive campaign as the way to compete against the president. John Edwards has stayed positive while Wesley Clark has come unhinged with his accusations and negativity.
And that leaves the DLC with a dilemma.
Back an ex-General who was so uncontrollable in his last gig as the Supreme Commander of NATO that the Pentagon had to fire him over the phone, or throw everything behind the only positive campaigner in the entire Democratic field, John Edwards."

Wesley Clark unhinged? Do you see what's going on here? Any candidate coming out against Bush in an assertive and aggressive manner will be categorized as "unhinged...angry" by the Bushies. Will the DLC abandon Wes Clark for a "gentler, kinder" candidate? If there's one thing the Democrats don't need , it's more wimps.


In today's N.Y. Times column, Paul Krugman writes:

"...some Americans will respond to upbeat messages, no matter how unrealistic. And that may be enough for Mr. Bush, because while he poses as someone above the fray, he is continuing to solidify his base...the lying has already begun, with the Republican National Committee's willful misrepresentation of Wesley Clark's prewar statements. (Why are news organizations letting them get away with this?)"

Trading Votes: This is how it happens in the Iowa Caucus

"...Five minutes later, after a plea from Lyle Canceco, a 27-year-old political operative from Seattle who came to Iowa to be a precinct captain for Mr. Edwards, Mr. Kucinich's supporters joined the Edwards group.
Meanwhile, most of the Gephardt supporters joined Mr. Kerry's supporters...."

I'll be looking forward to see what New Hampshire, a non-caucus state, has to say. I want to see what happens when you have people going into the booth and deciding as individuals...without changing candidates because their preferred (weaker) candidate told them to go to a particular alternate candidate.

HERE'S A GREAT ARTICLE ABOUT THE IOWA CAUCUS


Springfield News-Sun:
OHIO: One thing's sure, nothing's certain

"..If Democrats and Republicans agree on anything, it's this: The winner of Monday's Democratic caucus in Iowa will not have a free ride to the party's presidential nomination."

..and I believe that Howard Dean will stand a good chance of winning Ohio.

Zogby: How Arab Americans will vote in Presidential race

"In the 2000 presidential election, Bush won 44.5 per cent of the community's vote. In a poll conducted in July 2003, Bush's support had dropped to 34 per cent, while in this January 2004 poll, his totals have further declined to 28 per cent. ...On the Democratic side, thirty-six per cent of Arab Americans indicated their preference for Dean in the Democratic primary. No other Democrat received a double-digit response. Retired General Wesley Clark received the support of nine per cent of Arab Americans, followed by Senator John Kerry with six per cent.

New Hampshire Primary Trivia:

Two tiny villages in northern New Hampshire -- Dixville Notch and Hart's Location (Population-37) -- will be the first to vote in next Tuesday's primary, as they do in presidential elections. Both have a tradition in which all citizens vote at midnight after which the votes are counted. In Dixville Notch, there are 23 voters: 12 Republicans, 11 independents and no Democrats. The 11 independents are eligible to vote in the Democratic primary.
Wow--Have you seen the Wentworth?


Now I've Heard Everything
Too many cannabinoids-
A guy ODs on Pot?!

"A man of 36 is believed to have become the first person in Britain to die directly from cannabis poisoning."

Well, there's one rare instance of which the drug czars will grab hold while they push the
"REPEAT AD NAUSEUM" button.

Lawrence Journal-World:
Young Republicans Crash Dean concert--Young Republicans get violent

"...Weinberg saw dozens of college-age supporters of President George W. Bush crash Saturday night's Dean bash at Drake University, which featured rock singer Joan Jett and comedian Janeane Garafalo.
Weinberg was close to the stage with a video camera and taped some of the Republicans who came in with signs, banners and chanted Bush's name. They grabbed signs from Dean supporters and one of them bumped Jett, Weinberg said. "She said, ‘You can hit me, but don't mess with my guitar,'" Weinberg said. "It was absolutely incredible."
Dean supporters started singing the national anthem to drown out the Bush people, who were finally ushered out by security, Weinberg said..."

COMPANION STORY HERE

Something tells me this is only the beginning. These Republican kids are a pretty angry lot.

Right now it looks like Kerry, Edwards, then Dean....Gephardt a surprising loser
As you might suspect, I'm surprised and disappointed in Dean's poor showing in Iowa thus far.
I will be curious to see why Iowans decided upon Kerry. I think they swallowed the "electability" Koolaid and lost their guts..their initial intuition about Dean. My intuition tells me that Kerry isn't all that intuitive of a leader. He wound up emulating Dean like a chameleon. That gives me the creeps. Eeewwww.
This bugs me about Kerry, too. Not only his wife's money vs. a lot of individual American donations to candidates such as Dean, but this:
Kerry Carries Water for Top Donor
"Sen. John F. Kerry, D-Mass., whose largest campaign contributor lobbies on behalf of telecommunication interests, pushed the legislative priorities of its clients in the wireless industry on several occasions, a Center for Public Integrity analysis of campaign, lobbying and congressional records has found."
Double eewwww.

Rep. Dick Gephardt dropping out
Rep. Dick Gephardt intends to drop out of the Democratic presidential race after a poor, fourth-place finish in the Iowa caucuses, a party official said Monday night.

Here comes New Hampshire, folks!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Debt Relief--
Nobel Prize-Winning Economist Asks, "Why Only Iraq?"

U.S. Imposes Flatly Wrong Tax on Iraq
The Bigshots in Iraq, without democracy, have imposed a new tax system on that country. Halliburton and other campaign contributors to the Bush administration have been declared exempt from the taxes. Senior editor Fred Foldvary analyzes the new scheme and finds it a poor choice in every way.

"....Imagine a tenant farmer in Iraq who has to struggle with contaminated water, insects, and theft of his equipment. On the way to market he has to pass through U.S. checkpoints, where he is delayed, quizzed and groped for guns. After paying for rent and supplies, he manages to make a profit just enough to feed his family and buy seeds and gasoline, but now, down comes the U.S. tax collector to take way some of his gains. The tax is 15 percent of his income, but what is the profit?
-..The Iraqi tax collector working for the military occupation has to guess at what the right income is and whether the farmer is telling the truth...maybe this farmer is unpopular, and tax evasion would be a good excuse to lock him up in prison......
-..Can you see the implications? Do we really want to sow more corruption and oppression? Just because a flat tax works OK in Estonia does not imply it will go smoothly in Iraq. This tax will be a nightmare and another excuse for U.S.-hating terrorists to do violence. This is just one more example of the incredibly inept and incomprehensively foolish U.S. policy in Iraq..."

N.Y.C. Benefit Concert for Bam Earthquake Victims to be held January 23

art by one of featured artists, Arita Shahrzad

To my friends and readers in NYC, there will be a gathering to celebrate and remember the lives of those lost in the earthquake, and to provide help and support to the survivors of Bam to recuperate and rebuild their city.
It will take place at St. John the Divine Cathedral this Friday, January 23, at 7:00PM.
Artwork on auction by artists including:
Shirin Neshat, Abbas Seyed Alavi,
Kamrooz Aram, Amir Fallah, (Amir Fallah also here) Y.Z. Kami, Sheila Karbassian, Pali Kashi, Laleh Khorramian, Nicky Nodjoumi, Behrooz Nournia, Kasra Paydavousi, (Paydavousi also here) Arita Shahrzad
and Sadegh Tirafkan

Performers will be:
Sussan Deyhim (Composer, Vocalist)
(She will perform excerpts from poetry by Rumi & Hafez)
Richard Horowitz & Alan Kushan
Composer Richard Horowitz and Iranian master musician
Alan Kushan will perform solos and duos on Ney and Santur
Haale (Singer/Song Writer)
Darya Dadvar (Vocalist)
Shahrokh Meshkin Ghalam (Choreographer and Dancer)

DISTINGUISHED SPEAKERS
--Sussan Lari (Architect, Urban Designer, Ex-President of American Institute of Architects - Long Island Chapter) will be speaking on the ancient city of Bam.
--Dr. Asghar Rastegar (Yale University Associate Chair for Academic Affairs, Philanthropist) will be presenting the humanitarian aspects of the disaster.
--Layla Diba (Persian Art Expert, Former curator at Brooklyn Museum of Art, Professor in Bard Graduate Center, New York) will present the donated works by Iranian Artists for auction.

SEE THE "BAM DIARY"

On This Iowa Caucus Day, Remember Howard Dean, "THE ORIGINAL"
As Charley Reese put it last October:

"....An honest man with sincere convictions will get angry when he hears lies. Some of our greatest presidents had ferocious tempers. George Washington, Andy Jackson and Harry Truman are three examples.
You don't see other candidates getting angry because they are all phonies..."
"...Whether you agree with him or not, Howard Dean actually believes in his convictions. He is a genuine man.
An honest, genuine man will not suffer fools lightly, nor will he stand around like a dummy with a phony smile on his face while he hears himself lied about..."

Remember who led the charge...and remember how every other candidate turned left and followed Dean's intuitive lead. Dean is "the original"..the intuitive..the consensus-bulider...the leader. Accept no substitutes.
Follow the leader...but first ELECT the leader.

Informed Comment:
"US and UN: Caught between Shiites and Sunnis"
This is a great summary of status of Iraqi politics and current US/UN efforts.

The LA Times has an informative article from 1-18. LINK (reg. required)
Excerpt:
".."If the United States brings in the United Nations, that would be a strong signal from Washington, and if there could be some certification that elections were not possible in such a short time, then Sistani might accept that," said Joost Hiltermann, head of the International Crisis Group's Jordan office, which tracks developments in Iraq. ICG is a Washington- and Brussels-based research organization that closely follows democracy development in troubled countries.
-"He only has to give one nod and he can turn off this stuff," Hiltermann said.
-With the U.N. certifying the difficulty of organizing free and fair elections, perhaps a compromise that called for caucuses with a broader membership, including some locally elected figures, might be palatable, he suggested.
-Others are less sanguine. They see Sistani as an unstoppable force who will refuse to back down from his demands.
-"They have to find an accommodation, and if they don't, when the transitional government is put in place, it will be broadly viewed as lacking legitimacy [by the Shiite majority], and that is a big problem," said Juan Cole, a professor of modern Arab history at the University of Michigan.
-Harder still is that whatever government is put in place will inherit the Sunni insurgency that has racked the center of the country, as well as the terrorist assaults — a long way from the stable democracy the United States has envisioned.

Guardian:"100,000 demand Iraqi elections"

Novak is wearing his twisted little heart on his scuzzy little sleeve
-Bob Novak outed Valerie Plame in his column last summer- knowing the criminally-secretive Bush White House would never allow his source to be "outed" themselves. Novak's safe from prosecution because of what he does for a living...but he knew what he was doing. He knew he could be risking the woman's life and safety. He knew it was a felonious and treasonous crime for someone within the White House to release that information. Ask yourself why a decent journalist would do something like that. Personally, I think he's a bit of a scum for doing what he KNEW he was doing to the Wilson family.
-Now--ask yourself why he wishes so badly for Howard Dean not to snare the Democratic nomination.
He's hawking Kerry here in this latest column..and doing all within his power as a journalist to pound and ground Dean.
We all know where Novak stands on the ideological scale. The very fact that he is fighting the idea of Dean tooth-and-nail leads me to believe Dean is a much bigger threat to these Bush-leaners than the confused mainstream press would have you believe.
-Novak is pining away about the fact that Dean told a disruptive Freeper heckler to sit down and shut up and give him a chance to speak in front of those who came to hear him.
I love it! Howard Dean shows the American people to take the power back and tell these Freeper-types to sit down and shut the hell up...someone should have proposed that idea long ago. Power to the People!
Novak..sit down and shut up, you're killin' me here. Bwahaha!

Martin Luther King Jr. Day-
Why we celebrate
"...[The Civil Rights movement]: King was never its only leader, but without his belief in nonviolence – "we must learn to meet hate with love," he told an angry black mob bent on revenge outside his bombed house – it might have failed.
King steered the mob's seething energies into passive resistance, which, as Gandhi had shown in India, is a formidable tool for the underdog.
King was not a popular figure for most Americans when he died – seen as an enemy of the established order, even a revolutionary. It took a quarter century for the nation to create a holiday for him.."

Out of the mouths of babes:
Celebrating the gift of Martin Luther King Jr.-


"I want everybody to be friends. I want the world to be better than the one I'm in now."
-- Jonathan, grade 2

"I had a dream about people being nice to people."
-- Tianna, grade 2

"To me, Martin Luther King Jr. means truth. He wanted little white boys and white girls to be friends with little black boys and black girls. The truth was that all people should be kind to other people. I can be like Martin Luther King Jr. I can tell people to be kind."
-- Marisol, grade 2


See I HAVE A DREAM speech here.

Could it be?
Bush planning to use Hispanic immigrants for a new draft?
"....The masses rarely catch-on until it is way too late in the game to go back. Every alien, illegal or not, denoted immediately above, that registers for the new three year immigration status will be simultaneously (though likely without knowledge of it) be registering to be selected for service in the United States Army or Marines. They will, along with other Americans chosen, be selected by a lottery system most are familiar with. Their tour of two years minimum will lighten the load on America’s Reserves and National Guard forces deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan presently, and it seems likely in Syria and Iran (but anywhere U.S. forces are deployed) later on in 2004-2008. It hasn’t helped any that there has been some 1,700 deserters from the Iraq war alone. Bush is having trouble convincing the youth of America that to enlist in the Armed Forces is the patriotic thing to do; enlistments is all branches of the military are off drastically. So reinstitution of the draft is a necessity if Bush and Pentagon are to continue their plans for an extended Pentagon “footprint” throughout the world. While there are some 12 million aliens in the United States presently (illegal and legal) Mr. Bush isn’t likely to overlook this unregistered pool of draftees for long..."

"...One can already hear Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity squealing: “If they want the benefits of the American dream they have to accept the obligations which come with these freedoms.” Of course nearly every single talk show host in America has never served their country either and will not be subject to the new draft as they will fall over the 25 year age limit (initially at least)..."

Toronto Star/Tom Harpur:
NASA photo captures sacred
"...One icon, one transcending image towers above all others at this hour--not the cross, not the steeple, not the minaret, not the dome, nor all the sacred books of all the faiths. It is the image of the Earth itself as portrayed by the NASA photo of the planet taken from outer space a few short years ago. A huge reproduction of it should hang prominently in every place of worship, of every creed, denomination, faith, sect, or "ism."



-There are no borders in that world. There are no divisions. Meditating on it leaves all claims by this group or that to have a monopoly on God's truth exposed as absolutely silly; or, even worse, perverse. It speaks transformingly of one God, one world, one brotherhood and sisterhood of all humanity. It trumpets both the beauty and the fragility of our sacred trust in being given stewardship of such a miracle. It convicts the sins of arrogance, avariciousness, indifference, and injustice wherever they are rampant. It evokes a reverence and awe beyond that contained in any temple or shrine. By it, the Great Spirit speaks..."

Universal fascism, freedom betrayed: What is Mr. Bush doing?
".....Bush may be neither a Christian nor a conservative. He is something all-together different; something the world hasn’t seen for many decades, but all-together dangerous and maybe worse than history portends. Yes, for the true believers of the Left, there are much worse things than your skewed view of a Christian conservative. And for Christians on the Right, your views are not held in esteem at this White House. There is a not-so-new breed in charge these days..."

"[Michael] Ledeen has gained notoriety in recent months for the following paragraph in his latest book, The War Against the Terror Masters. In what reads like a prophetic approval of the policy of chaos now being visited on Iraq, Ledeen wrote,

'Creative destruction is our middle name, both within our own society and abroad. We tear down the old order every day, from business to science, literature, art, architecture, and cinema to politics and the law. Our enemies have always hated this whirlwind of energy and creativity, which menaces their traditions (whatever they may be) and shames them for their inability to keep pace. Seeing America undo traditional societies, they fear us, for they do not wish to be undone. They cannot feel secure so long as we are there, for our very existence-our existence, not our politics-threatens their legitimacy. They must attack us in order to survive, just as we must destroy them to advance our historic mission'..."

"...What are we to make of all this? Is this just the isolated mad ramblings of an overwrought mind, an intellectual masturbatory rant the likes we would expect from Michael Savage rather than an American Enterprise Institute intellectual? I fear we must take this all-too-seriously...."

"..There is much to ponder from authors like Detlev J.K. Puekert, Zeev Sternhell, Sebastian Haffner, and the masterwork of Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, who, each in their own way, their own research or memoirs, finds the German people of the inter-war years, like the American people today post 9/11, seemingly, willingly prepared to throw away liberty, the U.S. Constitution, be harangued by a president whose language increasingly fills {mine if not
yours) my ears with a Towering Babel of rant, obfuscation and mediocrity; language better suited to a lower ranking non-commissioned officer. Come-on? “Bring ‘em on!”
-This is not the language of a statesman but a tyrant; language of “you’re either with us or against us.” This is language not befitting a free republic based upon democratic principles and liberty; a nation founded upon dissent and discourse not defamation and vitriol. But like it or not, left or right, free or bond this is the language of the new world order..."

SF Gate runs article about fellow blogger Kos
"...The city that Markos Moulitsas Zuniga runs isn't named Berkeley. It's called Daily Kos...and it's a city in the metaphorical sense, reached by mouse and keyboard...According to the Truth Laid Bear, a blog that tracks blogs, Daily Kos is the second most popular political blog, with about 70,000 visitors a day, trailing only the conservative Instapundit.

Speaking of fellow bloggers, my vote for the TTLB Showcase this week goes to American Amnesia

FYI:
2004 Primary Schedule- State by State
Alabama---June 1...................Nebraska- May 11
Alaska--- No Primary..............Nevada- None
Arkansas-- May 18.................N.H.- Jan 27
Arizona---- Feb 3....................N.J.- June 1
CA.--- Mar 2.................N.M.- June 1,Cauc-Feb 3
Colorado--- No Primary............N.Y.- Mar 2
Connecticut-- Mar 2................N.C.- May 4
Delaware--- Feb 3.........N.D. Caucus-Feb 3
Florida--- Mar 9..........................Ohio Mar 2
Georgia---Mar 2..........................OK.- Feb 3
Hawaii Cauc-Mar 2...........Oregon -May 18
Idaho-- May 25,Cauc-Feb 24.....PA. -Apr 27
Illinois--- Mar 16........................R.I.- Mar 2
Indiana- May 4..........................S.C.- Feb 3
Iowa Jan 19 (Caucus)..............S.D.- June 1
Kansas No Primary...................TN.- Feb 10
Kentucky May 18.....................Texas Mar 9
Louisiana Mar 9.................Utah No Primary
Maine Caucus-Feb 8..........Vermont Mar 2
MA.- Mar 2.........................Virginia Feb 10
MD.- Mar 2...........WA.-Caucus- Feb 7
MI. Caucus- Feb 7.......Wash D. C. Jan 13
MN.-Caucus- Mar 2...........W.V.- May 11
MS.- Mar 9..................Wisconsin Feb 17
MO.- Feb 3.............Wyoming No Primary
Montana- June 8

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Iowa is tomorrow!

The New Hampshire primary is January 27th.

On February 3, we'll see primaries in the "Super Seven" states: Arizona, Delaware, Missouri, Oklahoma,
South Carolina, and North Dakota, New Mexico (last two are caucus states).

Michigan Democratic Caucus comes on Feb 7.
Maine Democratic Caucus is slated for Feb 8.
February 10th bring the Tennessee and Virginia primaries.
Wisconsin wil be Feb 17.

Super Tuesday could indeed be super in 2004, with voting in ten states: California, Connecticut, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont. (Texas was also supposed to vote on March 2, but because of its redistricting brouhaha, it will be delayed until March 30.
Every campaign will find some hope in the March 2 list, with states West, East, North and South, large and small, not to mention liberal, moderate and conservative all up for grabs. It could be argued that a nominee will emerge on March 3 – or that the political world will wake up to a jumbled mess of several candidates with enough delegates to move on for another week.

March 9 is Southern Tuesday – Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi – and with Bob Graham no longer in the race, Florida, and its 228 delegates, is back in play. After the March 9 votes are counted, 82 percent of the delegates will have been determined and the nominee will most likely be known.

Slice of Grassroots Life-
A Dean Campaigner E-mails home from Iowa:

This is from an e-mail from a dedicated Central New York Dean grassroots campaigner. Currently in Iowa, Vicki writes "home" to the Syracuse For Dean group.

Excerpt:
"......Went out canvassing all day, same thing as petitioning in NYS, but you just have to also get the people to their local caucus site. As usual I had a blast. I feel somewhat disconnected because I haven't been able to read any net, or watch news, I just know how the people in Colfax, Iowa are feeling.


Colfax, IA

Louise gave me some of her homemade bread and then promised that she and her husband would caucus for Dean. The bread was out of this world.
Well I must really go and try to get some sleep....."
-Vicki from Syracuse for Dean

Maureen Dowd---Watch her degrade from a snotty sniper to a total b*tch
Howie dared to snub the kibbitzing mockery queen. I'd be upset if she wasn't so yesterday....don't get me wrong... I mean that in the most benign and corporate-journalistic way.

In case you missed what I said about "Her Lameness" on January 7th:
"Maureen Dowd is a sourpuss hiding behing her often-destructive line of humor."

I'll bet she's writing something nauseatingly rotten about Howard Dean as I post this blog entry.
It's anothing Gore-ing from Ms. Bore-ing.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Update: Here it is. Meow, b*tch.....Meow. ;)

...which leaves me five seconds to care about why Mo's career is sputtering.....

N.Y. Times Editorial:
Heartless Marriage Plans
This goes along perfectly well with my own comments from earlier this week.

Baltimore Sun: Sgt. 'Grandpa' Romero's lessons to a young soldier
by Michael Olesker
Simply, I think this is a wonderfully-written slice-of-life column about a couple of Americans serving in Iraq.
I wish we could know them all..the ones who serve. I wish we could hear all their tales and learn from them...their lessons would be so valuable.

My predictions for the Iowa Caucus
I know.
I shouldn't do this.
Judging from recent poll results, there's really no way of predicting how this will all turn out.
I'm going to use my intuition and try it, anyhow.

Here's my prediction for Top Four:

1. Howard Dean
2. Dick Gephardt
3. John Kerry
4. John Edwards

I think Dean will win by a fairly clean, healthy margin.
Dick Gephardt and John Kerry will be very close..perhaps even tie for second.

Hey-who knows? My guess is as good as yours.
We'll see!

Turkey's new diplomacy

Turkey's new diplomacy is an attempt by the current government to enhance its current relations with the United States by acting as a conduit to Syria and Iran. Let's hope the Bush administration (hopefully in its last year of power) does everything it can NOT to screw this up. We do not..I repeat..DO NOT need or want a war with Iran or Syria. We have enough trouble with Iraq (after being lied to about our reasons for being there). Let's hope Bush no longer relies upon Likud-like Americans such as Richard Perle. America needs hope for far more sane, peaceful, and positive resolutions.

Speaking of trouble with Iraq, I saw Professor Juan Cole last night on Jim Lehrer speaking about the situation with the Shiite ayatollah al-Sistani. Interesting. See this link for the interview.
One particular point Professor Cole drove home was that these Iraqi elections are not caucus elections as we Americans have come to understand them.
"....We're calling them caucus elections but they're not caucuses.
The base of the system has been largely appointed about it Americans and the British. They're hand picked, they're disproportionately Sunni; they're disproportionately ex-Baathists as many of them have been corrupt. There have been demonstrations against them in places recently. So the idea that the United States could have an election based upon its own hand picked constituency and then call that a sovereign Iraqi government was always a little chancy. And Sistani is now calling us on it."--Professor Juan Cole

Shiites are calling for elections, not caucuses, and this complicates U.S. plans for any handover of power.
We need to remember that when we ousted iron-fisted Saddam Hussein, we inherited a fractious nation. Bush hopes to hand over power by June, yet I can't see (in light of all the mistakes we've already made over there) how we WON'T be getting bogged down in a major ethnic power struggle.

The Democratic presidential candidates name their favorite vacation destinations:

Wesley Clark: Ski slopes
Howard Dean: Lake Champlain
Sen. John Edwards: The North Carolina beach
Rep. Dick Gephardt: Northern California
Sen. John Kerry: Cape Cod and the islands off of Massachusetts
Rep. Dennis Kucinich: A few days at home in Ohio
Sen. Joe Lieberman: South Florida
Al Sharpton: The Bahamas

Iddybud: Any place where it's not zero degrees (or lower). ;)

AP: State-By-State Breakdown of U.S. Deaths in the Iraqi Conflict

Breakdown of U.S. casualties in Iraq by state, according to Department of Defense records or family members:

Alabama - 13 Arizona - 13 Arkansas - 3 California - 55 Colorado - 8 Connecticut - 5 District of Columbia - 2 Delaware - 3 Florida - 16 Georgia - 15 Hawaii - 1 Idaho - 4 Illinois - 20 Indiana - 16 Iowa - 9 Kansas - 5 Kentucky - 4 Louisiana - 5 Maine - 2 Massachusetts - 9 Maryland - 5 Michigan - 20 Minnesota - 3 Mississippi - 10 Missouri - 10 Montana - 1 North Carolina - 13 North Dakota - 3 New Hampshire - 1 New Jersey - 10 New Mexico - 1 New York - 21 Nebraska - 6 Nevada - 3 Ohio - 15 Oklahoma - 7 Oregon - 8 Pennsylvania - 28 Rhode Island - 3 South Carolina - 12 South Dakota - 4 Tennessee - 12 Texas - 40 Utah - 4 Virginia - 13 Vermont - 5 West Virginia - 1 Washington - 7 Wisconsin - 9 Wyoming - 4 American Samoa - 2 Puerto Rico - 7