The near Houston Texas Representative seat with the greatest liklihood of flipping this time is Southeast Harris County 144. The incubent candidate of that seat, the homosexual-hating, multiple award winner for worst Texas legislator, theocrat Robert Talton has gone off to try for his chance to lose against Nick Lampson.
Janette Sexton with little money or support, bad health which prevented her from campaigning, and being outspent 10-1 by Talton managed to get 41% of the vote last time. The very active support of area Democratic clubs and a vigorous campaign managed to get a 10% swing in Matula's favor in a neighboring district at the same time. A candidate with similar support can win district 144 this time.
And we have the candidate. Bob Sonnier for District 144.
Bob should be familar to Democrats as former North Brazoria County Democrats President and previous Vice President. He was very active in the Morrison campaign against Tom DeLay. He is a member of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and is a current member of the Area 5 Democrats and the Bay Area New Democrats (BAND) clubs. His wife is a school teacher and his primary focus in the campaign will be healthcare and education.
His campaign will be announced later today in the Pasadena Citizen and he is having a kickoff BBQ fundraiser in October.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
What Petraeus didn't tell you about the surge
Residents seeing their neighbours being driven out are too afraid to do anything. At Huriya, which has lost all its Sunni households, Hakim al-Karim, a 42-year-old computer software designer, said "We know a man who was killed because he was a Sunni and they wanted his house. No one did anything, but do not blame us, there is nothing we could do. If they find out they will kill you. Who are you going to go to? The Americans? They are not going to stay in my street to protect my family. The police? You don't even know who they really work for."
The purge of the neighbourhoods have helped bring down the number of violent deaths, driving people out means there are fewer sectarian targets left for the militias to kill.
Monday, September 10, 2007
The astute right wing blogger is typically astute
By that I mean he is absolutely clueless and can't read. I have noticed this before in rightie bloggers.
His comment on the scientific research of the brain differences between conservatives and liberals is another example of rightie ignorance. The research does not say there is more emotional activity in the brain of left-wing bloggers. That was completely made up or misread by the RWA blogger.
What the article really says, for those who can read and interpret and have rudimentary cognition and interpretation skills, is that those who describe themselves as more liberal had better judgement and were more discerning in a simple computer test of reactions.
As I often do, I seemed to have wandered away from the start of this blog which was another post about the inability of right wing bloggers to read or reason.
His comment on the scientific research of the brain differences between conservatives and liberals is another example of rightie ignorance. The research does not say there is more emotional activity in the brain of left-wing bloggers. That was completely made up or misread by the RWA blogger.
What the article really says, for those who can read and interpret and have rudimentary cognition and interpretation skills, is that those who describe themselves as more liberal had better judgement and were more discerning in a simple computer test of reactions.
Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.Previous research had shown the difficulty that conservatives have with ambiguity and the tendency to stick with what they know. Other research has defined the conservative mindset. It is still not clear how much of this is genetic and how much of this is upbringing - the authoritarian versus nurturing parent debate. BTW, current child rearing theory is neither, parents should be authoritative. I am leaning towards the political psychopathology of infants reared without affection. The parenting style debate spread to politics and framing via Lakoff who is half-right. Ezra is right, Lakoff is a genius about framing but an idiot at framing.
The results show "there are two cognitive styles -- a liberal style and a conservative style," said UCLA neurologist Dr. Marco Iacoboni, who was not connected to the latest research.
Participants were college students whose politics ranged from "very liberal" to "very conservative." They were instructed to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W.
M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter.
Each participant was wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key). Liberals had more brain activity and made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw a W, researchers said. Liberals and conservatives were equally accurate in recognizing M.
As I often do, I seemed to have wandered away from the start of this blog which was another post about the inability of right wing bloggers to read or reason.
Paul Krugman: Where’s My Trickle?
Mark Thomas at The Economist's View brings you the Krugman:
Yet the overall economy has grown at a reasonable pace over the past four years. Where did the economic growth go? The answer is that it went to the same economic elite that received the lion’s share of those tax cuts. ...Meanwhile, Busted - the housing market implodes is in Newsweek:
The absence of any gains for workers in the years since the 2003 tax cut is a pretty convincing refutation of trickle-down theory. So is the fact that the economy had a much more convincing boom after Bill Clinton raised taxes on top brackets. It turns out that when you cut taxes on the rich, the rich pay less taxes; when you raise taxes on the rich, they pay more taxes — end of story. ...
[T]he whole idea that a rising tide raises all boats, that growth in the economy necessarily translates into gains for the great majority of Americans, is belied by the Bush-era experience. As far as I can tell, America has never before experienced a disconnect between overall economic performance and the fortunes of workers as complete as that of the last four years.
Walking through the gated community of Black Mountain Vista on a hill in Henderson, Nev., Thomas Blanchard offers a guided tour of real-estate woe. A row of stucco duplexes that recently sold for as much as $500,000 sit empty. "That's a repo," the real-estate agent says as he stands in front of 678 Solitude Point Avenue. Then he points to the adjacent houses, where yellow patches blot the spartan lawns and phone books lie on front porches, their covers bleached from weeks under the desert sun. "No. 680, repo; 684, repo. Those two at the end, repo."....I turned to the internet after listening to the PR general and then the droning ambassador. If I had listened to the ambassador drone on more, his monotone reading inspiration seemed to be Soviet farm reports, I would have started pounding nails into my ears.
No sooner did the housing market peak last summer than pundits and home builders assured the public the bottom had been reached. But with each passing month, the shoes continue to drop. First, dozens of subprime lenders were forced to close their doors. Then in July the nation's largest mortgage lender, Countrywide Financial, reported that mortgages held by borrowers with better credit were starting to curdle. Nearly 180,000 homes fell into foreclosure in July, up 93 percent from a year ago....
The decline in housing construction and sales has had an immediate economic impact. From the perspective of job creation, real estate was the best sector in which to have a boom, providing jobs at every rung of the ladder: real-estate agents and mortgage brokers, architects and lawyers, investment bankers and decorators, movers and painters, contractors and landscapers. Between November 2001 and April 2005, housing and housing-related industries created 788,300 jobs, or 40 percent of the total created in the United States, according to Asha Bangalore, an economist at Northern Trust in Chicago. The demand for mortgage brokers in Las Vegas was so strong that "every stripper, waiter and bartender on the Strip had a broker's license," says Boyd Nyborg, a former mortgage broker who now tends bar at the Tao Las Vegas.
But since August 2006, employment in housing-related industries has declined 119,400, according to Bangalore....
The collateral damage is spreading. Because home sales and moves stimulate purchases of appliances, electronics and furniture, the giant chains that catered to house flippers and renovators have reported recessionlike results. In the second quarter, same-store sales were down 5.2 percent at Home Depot and 4.3 percent at Sears.
The nation's biggest retailing sector—automobiles—is likewise feeling the effects. In July, auto sales were down 12 percent from the year before. When CNW Research asked consumers who were putting off plans to buy new cars why they were doing so, 17.6 percent cited housing issues like falling home equity or rising mortgage payments. That compares with just 2.3 percent in 2005. John Crane, general sales manager at Ron Smith Buick Pontiac GMC Jeep in Merced, Calif., a farming community of 80,000 that has experienced an influx of Bay Area refugees, has seen a tremendous slowdown in the past six to eight months. "People don't have the money to look at cars," he says. "They're having a hard time paying house payments. Now their second mortgages and 1 percent loans are coming up."
Which brings up another problem. Roughly $370 billion in adjustable-rate mortgages will reset this year, according to First American CoreLogic, and millions of Americans will have to pay significantly more per month just to stay in the same home. Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's Economy.com, says that in the peak month of October 2007, some $50 billion worth of mortgages will reset at higher rates. Meanwhile, new mortgages are getting harder to come by, and not just for borrowers with subprime credit. Freaked-out lenders are ratcheting up requirements for minimum-credit scores and down payments. Kim Dicce, a Realtor in Tampa, where housing inventory is piling up, notes that lenders now seem to be requiring buyers in her area to put 15 to 20 percent down and have a credit score above 700. "Now we only have one third of the eligible buyers that we had before, and five times as many houses." Higher-income earners with good credit haven't been spared, as chastened lenders focus on making loans that they can quickly sell to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which buy mortgages only up to $417,000.
Sloppy Reporting Rears its Ugly Head in TX-Senate Race
I saw where the favorite Texas netroots candidate was dissing bloggers in the paper. That couldn't be right and it wasn't. This link above seems the most well-informed post about it.
For the record, I have not endorsed Noriega for Senate and have remained pretty neutral in this Democratic primary race and cautioned against premature blogger endorsements. I dislike Watts letter to an opposing attorney saying he had bought the judges with political contributions and the attorney should settle but while distasteful I think it illustrates our Texas justice system. I also am not supportive on Watt's apparent stance on women's issues.
I had hoped, similar to my hopes in the Texas Supreme Court primary, the Democrats would sort themselves out and avoid running against each other. An all-Republican Texas Supreme Court is bad for the citizens of Texas. So is Senator John Cornyn.
In more local news, we have a Democratic candidate for Talton's vacant seat. More about that later.
For the record, I have not endorsed Noriega for Senate and have remained pretty neutral in this Democratic primary race and cautioned against premature blogger endorsements. I dislike Watts letter to an opposing attorney saying he had bought the judges with political contributions and the attorney should settle but while distasteful I think it illustrates our Texas justice system. I also am not supportive on Watt's apparent stance on women's issues.
I had hoped, similar to my hopes in the Texas Supreme Court primary, the Democrats would sort themselves out and avoid running against each other. An all-Republican Texas Supreme Court is bad for the citizens of Texas. So is Senator John Cornyn.
In more local news, we have a Democratic candidate for Talton's vacant seat. More about that later.
Author under gag order assails producer, ABC for 'Path to 9/11'
The Path to 9/11 distorted book, history to praise Bush and FBI and attack Clinton charges author.
Edwards Wins Texas Democrat eStraw Poll
Boyd Richie, chairman Texas Democratic Party:
Congratulations to Senator John Edwards, who won the ePrimary Poll with 37.65% of the vote. Senator Edwards impressed Texas Democrats with his authenticity, dedication to progressive principles, and commitment to working for all Americans. Here's what some of Senator Edwards' Texas supporters had to say:Complete results."Senator Edwards articulates a plan to help all Americans achieve a better standard of living. He sees clearly that we must craft a strong foreign policy and rebuild the United States' image abroad. He will move our nation forward."Congratulations also to Senator Barack Obama, who came in second with 21.37% of the vote. Sue in Waco speaks for a lot of Texans when she says "I've watched Senator Obama since his speech at the Democratic Convention. That night I decided that this was a man that could make a difference. I heard him speak again in Austin and I was further impressed that he was a man of vision and someone that could heal this country and put us back on the right track."
B.J. in Hillsboro
"John Edwards is not a divider. His words are uplifting. His wife is a solid person and will be a strong first lady. He has the best solution for the health care crisis in the US, and I believe that he will settle the horrific mess the Republicans brought us in Iraq. He has a great record, and I trust him."
Danna in Lubbock
Senator Hillary Clinton came in a strong third, with 20.43% of the vote. Marissa in Edinburg summed up why she and so many other Texans are supporting Senator Clinton: "I think we are in desperate need for a change and I think she is the right person for the job. The country needs a descisive person to help clean up the mess the United States is in and it's going to take some one with a plan and a vision for the future. Hilary Clinton is that person."
Dennis Kucinich had 11.88% of the vote.
Texas Round-Up 9
It's Monday, do you know where your Texas liberal blogs were? It's time for another edition of the Texas Progressive Alliance's Blog Round Up. This week's round-up is brought to you by Vince from Capitol Annex.
Do You Ever Feel Like Cassandra?Gary Denton at Easter Lemming Liberal News is beginning to feel like Cassandra again over Iran. Condemned to know the future but unable to convince others to prevent it.
Port Arthur gets shipped several hundred thousand gallons of a waste byproduct of the chemical nerve agent VX or incineration, and PDiddie at Brains and Eggs reveals that neither a federal judge nor the TCEQ nor Rick Perry did anything to stop it.
Over at Three Wise Men, Nat-Wu notes that, whether or homosexuality is a choice or not, everyone deserves the same rights.
Blogging at the University of North Texas Democrats' site, Adam Silva of Three Wise Men notes that pundits are over-analyzing polls in the 2008 presidential race.
Hal at Half Empty blogs about some hot water Senate Candidate Mikal Watts got into over a letter he wrote to another attorney talking about contributions to judges.
Stace Medellin at Dos Centavos reports on a recent Democratic event held in a Houston suburb (Kingwood). Along with several locals running in the 2007 Houston city council election, the event attracted several more judicial candidates running in 2008, including Texas Supreme Court Place 8 candidate Judge Susan Criss.
In one of his information packed open threads on Texas Kaos, lightseeker notes that T Boone Pickens is stacking the deck in Roberts County to suck up water rights.
McBlogger at McBlogger has an update on the toll roads in the Austin area and urges those on CAMPO to think about what they are doing carefully and advises them to not burden taxpayers with the most expensive method of financing road construction.
WCNews at Eye on Williamson wonders if the "conservative" WCGOP and Craddick are going soft and will they let Rep. Mike Krusee go without a primary challenge from the right, in Will Craddick Let Krusee Go Unpunished?
Bradley Bowen of North Texas Liberal tells us about the excitement at a Hillary Clinton event in DC -- the crowd was moved and motivated, and Sen. Clinton is in it to win it.
Could Be True at South Texas Chisme notes that a polluting refiner gets only a teeny, teeny, tiny slap on wrist. Oh, why did they even bother. Just taking the time of a minimum wage clerk to file the darn thing would cost more than the fine does.
Vince at Capitol Annex discusses the race of a "Craddick D" down in House District 40 (Aaron Pena) and offers his opinions on the blogging legislator's chances in a contested primary.
At Bluedaze, TXsharon tell us about yet Another Republican Sexual Pervert.
Well, that's all I see. The TPA should expand by a few members this week.
Do You Ever Feel Like Cassandra?
Port Arthur gets shipped several hundred thousand gallons of a waste byproduct of the chemical nerve agent VX or incineration, and PDiddie at Brains and Eggs reveals that neither a federal judge nor the TCEQ nor Rick Perry did anything to stop it.
Over at Three Wise Men, Nat-Wu notes that, whether or homosexuality is a choice or not, everyone deserves the same rights.
Blogging at the University of North Texas Democrats' site, Adam Silva of Three Wise Men notes that pundits are over-analyzing polls in the 2008 presidential race.
Hal at Half Empty blogs about some hot water Senate Candidate Mikal Watts got into over a letter he wrote to another attorney talking about contributions to judges.
Stace Medellin at Dos Centavos reports on a recent Democratic event held in a Houston suburb (Kingwood). Along with several locals running in the 2007 Houston city council election, the event attracted several more judicial candidates running in 2008, including Texas Supreme Court Place 8 candidate Judge Susan Criss.
In one of his information packed open threads on Texas Kaos, lightseeker notes that T Boone Pickens is stacking the deck in Roberts County to suck up water rights.
McBlogger at McBlogger has an update on the toll roads in the Austin area and urges those on CAMPO to think about what they are doing carefully and advises them to not burden taxpayers with the most expensive method of financing road construction.
WCNews at Eye on Williamson wonders if the "conservative" WCGOP and Craddick are going soft and will they let Rep. Mike Krusee go without a primary challenge from the right, in Will Craddick Let Krusee Go Unpunished?
Bradley Bowen of North Texas Liberal tells us about the excitement at a Hillary Clinton event in DC -- the crowd was moved and motivated, and Sen. Clinton is in it to win it.
Could Be True at South Texas Chisme notes that a polluting refiner gets only a teeny, teeny, tiny slap on wrist. Oh, why did they even bother. Just taking the time of a minimum wage clerk to file the darn thing would cost more than the fine does.
Vince at Capitol Annex discusses the race of a "Craddick D" down in House District 40 (Aaron Pena) and offers his opinions on the blogging legislator's chances in a contested primary.
At Bluedaze, TXsharon tell us about yet Another Republican Sexual Pervert.
Well, that's all I see. The TPA should expand by a few members this week.
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Ignorance
I was at a smart Houston board gamer's house recently but while intelligent he is awfully ignorant about political matters. Like most politically ignorant he is fervently convinced he knows it all.
Things I might want to tell him next time if I want to argue instead of play board games.
1. While nearly all politicians are liars Democrats are not worse. Your example of Bill White lying to get elected by supporting METRO rail and then being forced to cut union retirement benefits to fund it is totally wrong in just about every way. METRO rail makes sense in some areas, not yours. Everyone admits there was a problem with the police retirement benefits. Cutting the benefits that had soared recently had nothing to do with METRO.
2. All Europeans are not lying scum who do not believe in the rule of law. Despite your claim of having read the European Union constitution that does not mean I should believe your claims that it demonstrates they willfully ignore the laws and the principle of the rule of law by willy-nilly redefining what words mean. Executions and the death penalty are not the same as abortion and doctor assisted termination of life for the incurably ill. For an example of a bad constitution similar to the European Union's see Texas. Does this mean that Texans do not support the rule of law? Wait, maybe I should rephrase that or give a better example.
Sadly No comments on other appalling ignorance from the men with little green balls and their screw loose leader. Having a new wacky tape of Osama commenting on recent events, sounding like a religious GOP flat-taxer if you change very few words, should do more than cause a slight decline in your 97.33% certainty that Osama is dead.
Why all ignorant right radio clowns sound alike:
Things I might want to tell him next time if I want to argue instead of play board games.
1. While nearly all politicians are liars Democrats are not worse. Your example of Bill White lying to get elected by supporting METRO rail and then being forced to cut union retirement benefits to fund it is totally wrong in just about every way. METRO rail makes sense in some areas, not yours. Everyone admits there was a problem with the police retirement benefits. Cutting the benefits that had soared recently had nothing to do with METRO.
2. All Europeans are not lying scum who do not believe in the rule of law. Despite your claim of having read the European Union constitution that does not mean I should believe your claims that it demonstrates they willfully ignore the laws and the principle of the rule of law by willy-nilly redefining what words mean. Executions and the death penalty are not the same as abortion and doctor assisted termination of life for the incurably ill. For an example of a bad constitution similar to the European Union's see Texas. Does this mean that Texans do not support the rule of law? Wait, maybe I should rephrase that or give a better example.
Sadly No comments on other appalling ignorance from the men with little green balls and their screw loose leader. Having a new wacky tape of Osama commenting on recent events, sounding like a religious GOP flat-taxer if you change very few words, should do more than cause a slight decline in your 97.33% certainty that Osama is dead.
Why all ignorant right radio clowns sound alike:
From the start of the Bush plan, the White House communications office had been blitzing an e-mail list of as many as 5,000 journalists, lawmakers, lobbyists, conservative bloggers, military groups and others with talking points or rebuttals of criticism. Between Jan. 10 and last week, the office put out 94 such documents in various categories -- "Myths/Facts" or "Setting the Record Straight" to take issue with negative news articles, and "In Case You Missed It" to distribute positive articles or speeches.Open Left points out institutional DC think tank ignorance today with the "So-Called-Liberal Brookings Institute" being the key example. They are having a wide-ranging panel on Iraq staffed from hawkish to hawkish Thursday. Forty years ago the Brookings Institute was liberal, maybe the media was too. Not today.
Economics: 600,000 American jobs disappeared this summer
You know, of course, that this administration spins all the news it puts out and that our compliant media simply repeats what they are told. Here is an example from the latest Labor Department jobs report.
While we are told that 4,000 jobs were lost in August, much higher than the expected 110,000 gain which still would not have met the 150,000 jobs needed to keep up with population growth, it is not mentioned on the news wires that job loss was actually 600,000 over the summer. At least the AP didn't keep with the original PR release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics:
In other economic news, none of it good, U.S. Home Foreclosures, Delinquencies at Record High.
Furman's testimony (PDF) was that you either have to cut services or later raise taxes to pay for tax cuts and the economic models of the impact by income bracket show the top 1% receiving benefits while other income classes not benefiting. If you cut services to pay for tax cuts 99% of the top 1% income bracket benefit and if you later raise taxes to pay for the previous tax cuts still 43% of them benefit.
It has been pointed out there are three ways for speculative bubbles to end - a crash, a slow decline, or a slow decline followed by a crash. Most of the time it is the third. This housing and credit bubble seems header for the third.
While we are told that 4,000 jobs were lost in August, much higher than the expected 110,000 gain which still would not have met the 150,000 jobs needed to keep up with population growth, it is not mentioned on the news wires that job loss was actually 600,000 over the summer. At least the AP didn't keep with the original PR release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics:
Nonfarm payroll employment was essentially unchanged in August (-4,000), and the unemployment rate held at 4.6 percent.Total employment is now 145,794,000 - the number of people not in the work force has gone up by two million in the last year. The labor force participation rate of 65.8% appears to be the lowest since the Great Depression. With the number of people not looking for work the highest ever this is why officially the employment rate is one of the best ever - 4.6%.
In other economic news, none of it good, U.S. Home Foreclosures, Delinquencies at Record High.
Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd unveiled legislation yesterday to strengthen protection for mortgage borrowers, including banning lenders from steering borrowers into subprime loans when they qualify for prime loans.The other item is that with our economy in bad shape the dollar is falling. In this case Bloomberg reported that the dollar value against the euro was "the lowest in a month" when they could have said the lowest since the euro was created. Buried in the article was
"People are losing their homes because of the lending practices that are out there that are indefensible in my view," Dodd said today in a conference call with reporters.
About half of U.S. banks have raised their standards for subprime borrowers and 14 percent have made it more difficult for the most credit-worthy customers to get financing, the Federal Reserve said in July.
The U.S. dollar index comparing the currency with its six primary peers fell to as low as 79.841 yesterday, the weakest in 15 years, from 80.791 on Aug. 31.What is the Republican solution to this? Why more tax cuts, of course. That is their solution to everything. The reason is that while tax cuts harm the majority of American taxpayers, as Jason Furman testified to Congress about recently, they further enrich the richest and many Republicans believe the fact the rich aren't richer is deeply immoral to repeat Matthew Yglesias's observation.
Furman's testimony (PDF) was that you either have to cut services or later raise taxes to pay for tax cuts and the economic models of the impact by income bracket show the top 1% receiving benefits while other income classes not benefiting. If you cut services to pay for tax cuts 99% of the top 1% income bracket benefit and if you later raise taxes to pay for the previous tax cuts still 43% of them benefit.
It has been pointed out there are three ways for speculative bubbles to end - a crash, a slow decline, or a slow decline followed by a crash. Most of the time it is the third. This housing and credit bubble seems header for the third.
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Do you ever feel like Cassandra?
Harpers has an email from a former CIA analyst who initially didn't believe Bush would attack:
Fox News is preparing the ill-informed and deluded people who watch it for the war.
It looks like a military strike is in the works and I base that on two things: observable fact and the rhetoric emanating from the White House. There’s a lot of movement of troops and material into the region–it’s stuff the United States can’t hide. It’s a huge expense to put Navy battle groups in the Gulf and we’ve got three of them there. We’ve also moved new fighter planes to Guam amidst much public fanfare. You can plainly see the upturn in US Naval activity in and around the Norfolk Naval installations. The movement of ships, re-supply, ammunition loading and general level of activity is high.The last sentence is stupid. Even I would rally around Bush if Iran attacked our country. Iran, which has progressive elements, will unfortunately rally around their rulers under US attack.
The Naval facilities and the ammunition loading areas are well known, and the activity is readily visible, especially at night. There’s a stream of ships coming in to load up and when they take off new ones come in. There’s only one part of the world where all that stuff is heading. Also, everyone I know who would be involved in an attack on Iran–pilots and other air assets–is gone. Normally some of them are around but now all of them are away at the same time.
The other evidence of a likely strike is all the harsh talk from the White House. President Bush has been talking about Iran a lot more recently, and he put the Revolutionary Guard on the list of terrorist groups. Whatever you think of the president, he has said he won’t let Iran move forward with its nuclear program. I’d take him at his word.
And it’s doable. The only part of the military that’s not stretched to the limits in Iraq is the Air Force. It will be a multi-day, multi-target air campaign–not ‘Shock and Awe,’ which wasn’t shocking and didn’t awe anyone, but a savage blow struck against President Ahmadinejad. We shouldn’t hit Iran’s Navy or Air Force but target the nuclear sites and the Revolutionary Guard. A measured response helps Ahmadinejad because he’s saying the Americans won’t attack, or can’t hurt, Iran. A disproportionate response will be hard for him to explain to the Iranian public.
Fox News is preparing the ill-informed and deluded people who watch it for the war.
It is deja vu circa 2003. A war weary American public has been lulled into complacency and like the proverbial rattle snake waiting in the weeds with one eye open just looking for the right time to strike, President Bush and FOX News are coiled and ready to unleash an attack on Iran. It is no longer a question of will Bush and the U.S. attack Iran, but when will the Iran attack be launched.How is Iran reacting? Iran's leader is convinced Bush will not attack because A - it would be incredibly stupid, and B - God told him so.
"God says that those who walk in the path of righteousness will be victorious. What reason can you have for believing God will not keep this promise."Pat Buchanan, of all people, is exactly right in a short article, Has Bush Boxed Himself In?:
Washington has never ruled out taking military action against Tehran, and its tone has sharpened again over the past week with President George W. Bush warning that Iran's nuclear program could lead to a "nuclear holocaust."
Initially, Americans might cheer the bombing of Iran, and Congress would head for the tall grass. But as U.S. strikes would be an act of war, rallying the Iranians behind the failing regime of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and igniting a long war the end of which we cannot see and the troops for which we do not have, there are powerful arguments against a new war.Warnings that very few people are heeding, agreeing with the reactionary Buchanan, this so reminds me of what I was doing pre-invasion Iraq.
Iran and the United States would both pay a hellish price, and Iran at least seems to recognize it. Both the Iraqi and Afghan governments say Iran is behaving as a good neighbor. There is evidence Tehran's nuclear program is faltering, or being curbed. Iran is said to be making concessions to U.N. inspectors.
Iran has released an American seized in response to our seizure of five Iranian "diplomats" in Iraq. Iran's ambassador to the United Nations, in a letter to the Washington Post, denies Iran is aiding the Iraqi insurgency and calls on the U.S. government to "proffer evidence" and "provide the list of Iranian agents who it alleges are operating in Iraq."
If there is a rush to war here, it is not on the part of Iran.
As Bush is preparing for war on Iran, if he has not already decided on war, where is Congress, which alone has the constitutional power to authorize a war?
Or has it given Bush and Cheney another blank check?
Friday, September 07, 2007
Iraq debate - Democratic style
Matthew Yglesias notes Edward's strong statements on Iraq while DC Democrats dither. Then the comments start....
There Will Be No Petraeus Report
As Angry McAngus writes - this just makes Winston Smith's job easier. They are already lying about the violence going down when it hasn't and admitted last month, when there was going to be a report, that the White House would write it.
Wandering nukes
Something is going on. Six U.S. armed nuclear-tipped cruise missiles were "accidently" transported to the staging area for the Middle East on a B-52 bomber. It got leaked to the Military Times and officially the Air Force is investigating this mistake.
Commander disciplined for nuclear mistake - USATODAY
Staging nukes for Iran?
A huge number of things would have to go wrong with nuclear security procedures for this to happen by "accident." Most things would involve the nuclear cruise missiles being readied.
Commander disciplined for nuclear mistake - USATODAY
Staging nukes for Iran?
A huge number of things would have to go wrong with nuclear security procedures for this to happen by "accident." Most things would involve the nuclear cruise missiles being readied.
The Myth of al-Qaeda in Iraq
Andrew Tilghman examines the repeated lies that al-Qaeda is responsible, the biggest threat and in charge of the insurgency in Iraq.
How big, then, is AQI? The most persuasive estimate I've heard comes from Malcolm Nance, the author of The Terrorists of Iraq and a twenty-year intelligence veteran and Arabic speaker who has worked with military and intelligence units tracking al-Qaeda inside Iraq. He believes AQI includes about 850 full-time fighters, comprising 2 percent to 5 percent of the Sunni insurgency. "Al-Qaeda in Iraq," according to Nance, "is a microscopic terrorist organization."
....
This is not to say that al-Qaeda in Iraq doesn't pose a real danger, both to stability in Iraq and to security in the United States. Today multiple Iraqi insurgent groups target U.S. forces, with the aim of driving out the occupation. But once our troops withdraw, most Sunni resistance fighters will have no impetus to launch strikes on American soil. In that regard, al-Qaeda—and AQI, to the extent it is affiliated with bin Laden's network—is unique. The group's leadership consists largely of foreign fighters, and its ideology and ambitions are global. Al-Qaeda fighters trained in Baghdad may one day use those skills to plot strikes aimed at Boston.
Yet it's not clear that the best way to counter this threat is with military action in Iraq. AQI's presence is tolerated by the country's Sunni Arabs, historically among the most secular in the Middle East, because they have a common enemy in the United States. Absent this shared cause, it's not clear that native insurgents would still welcome AQI forces working to impose strict sharia. In Baghdad, any near-term functioning government will likely be an alliance of Shiites and Kurds, two groups unlikely to accept organized radical Sunni Arab militants within their borders. Yet while precisely predicting future political dynamics in Iraq is uncertain, one thing is clear now: the continued American occupation of Iraq is al-Qaeda's best recruitment tool, the lure to hook new recruits. As RAND's Ali said, "What inspires jihadis today is Iraq."
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Experts Doubt Drop In Violence in Iraq
Troop deaths this summer up over last summer. Bush supporters say the CIA, the DIA, the GAO, the AP, the state department and all the other experts are using the wrong figures which show no drop in Iraq violence.
Wow, big story. Too bad it is downplayed by the reporter and stuck on page A16 in the SCLM Washington Post.
Wow, big story. Too bad it is downplayed by the reporter and stuck on page A16 in the SCLM Washington Post.
Tags: Iraq, lies, SCLM, surge, Bush, so-called-liberal-media, Washington Post, military intelligence
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Edwards is leading in the Texas Democratic Party Straw Poll
The race is close and you can vote through Friday.
Chris Bell, who has endorsed Edwards, is not joining those who say a Hillary nomination will be bad for Texas Democrats. This was an email I can't find posted on the web.
Chris Bell, who has endorsed Edwards, is not joining those who say a Hillary nomination will be bad for Texas Democrats. This was an email I can't find posted on the web.
Polarizing HillaryTags: Chris Bell, John Edwards, Texas, straw poll, Democrats, Hillary Clinton
By Chris Bell
The Examiner, Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Isn't it great that Hillary Clinton is the only polarizing Democrat in the race for president? I'm extremely pleased that if Barack Obama, John Edwards or someone else is the nominee, the Republican Party plans to take a hands-off approach and not demonize them in the same way they have Hillary over the past 15 years. Therefore, it's only Hillary Clinton who could possibly be a drag on down ballot candidates in states like Texas in 2008 and not any of the other Democratic candidates.
If the above paragraph sounds absurd, it should. But according to the Associated Press, many leaders of the Democratic Party really do think that way. In a recent AP article, the chairman of a Midwest state party called Clinton "a nightmare for congressional and state legislative candidates."
I've heard similar comments from a number of Texas Democrats. The argument is that Senator Clinton is so polarizing that she'll "jeopardize the party's standing with independent voters and give Republicans who otherwise might stay home on Election Day a reason to vote."
....
Who has made her polarizing? Not Democrats; that's why she's leading in all Democratic polls. Instead, it has been a steady drumbeat from the right which has succeeded in turning so many against her. And to pretend that won't happen regardless of who wins the Democratic nomination is pure fantasy. That's what Republicans do. They are all about the politics of polarization and they have made it an art form. Look what they did to John Kerry, for crying out loud.
The Republicans haven't driven Obama's and Edwards's negative ratings up to the same level as Clinton's because those two haven't received nearly the same level of attention but there have already been signs of just how far they will be willing to go if necessary. Ann Coulter, that great paragon of conservative virtue who still thinks name-calling is cool, has called Edwards a "faggot" and Rush Limbaugh, still the leading right-wing radio windbag, played a little racist musical ditty on his show called "Barack, the Magic Negro."
So Democrats should expect the worst and stop pretending that someone other than Hillary will get a free pass. They also need to stop playing into the Republicans' polarization game and start standing up for what and whom they believe in. That's what majority parties do. It's time for the Democratic Party to start acting like one.
Comic Strips
Opus: The appeal of universalism.
The spiritual quest continues.
Dressing down Muslim women.
The 27%.
The answer.
Tom Tomorrow: Liberal obsession over GOP sex lives.
Republicans and Democrats.
Daydreams about Fox News and the Democrats.
I turn to comics to get away from the bad comic reality we are living in. "We are only one bomb away." NYT Magazine longer article. Also - Greenwald with more on a classic RWA.
Salon.org, worth paying for.
The spiritual quest continues.
Dressing down Muslim women.
The 27%.
The answer.
Tom Tomorrow: Liberal obsession over GOP sex lives.
Republicans and Democrats.
Daydreams about Fox News and the Democrats.
I turn to comics to get away from the bad comic reality we are living in. "We are only one bomb away." NYT Magazine longer article. Also - Greenwald with more on a classic RWA.
Salon.org, worth paying for.
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