Friday, January 30, 2004
Oh my gosh; Budget Trouble; Better Freeze Spending! (Shhh; Never mind taxes!)
Social Policy 101 teaches, hopefully, about the importance of “framing the issue.” The Republicans have long mastered the concept, repetitively and consistently describing an issue on their terms. The opposition too often then responds / protests in disagreement, and the fight is thus waged on conservative terms.
Now, once again, the Republicans are warning that the Bush budget is out of balance, necessitating a freeze on spending. No mention, of course, is made of the decline of revenues due to the massive tax giveaways, primarily bestowed on the very, very wealthy. From the NY Times (Edmund Andrews)
A senior House Republican warned on Thursday that President Bush was on a collision course with Congress over his plans to reduce the deficit by almost freezing the growth of discretionary programs aside from military and domestic security items.
A briefing paper distributed to Republican lawmakers by the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Representative C. W. Bill Young of Florida, estimated that a complete freeze on the discretionary programs — excluding military and domestic security proposals — would save only $3 billion next year. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/politics/30SPEN.html?pagewanted=all
Washington Post Shrugs at Jobless Recovery:
Their editorial shows great faith in the system!
But the bigger question is whether jobless recoveries are a bad thing….
If a U.S. firm shifts employment abroad, the savings flow back to the United States in the form of lower prices for consumers and higher dividends for shareholders; the consumers and shareholders will direct their new spending power at things that create employment. Meanwhile, the fall in prices will allow the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates lower, boosting the job-creation engine. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50822-2004Jan26.html
Accountability / Standards: Still a free pass for Bush
We know that Gore never said that he invented the internet, and he was not a chronic liar/exaggerator. We know that Dean was giving a pep talk to thousands of noisy volunteers the night of the Iowa caucus and did not sound “insane,” as some asserted. Yet, no label was attached to Bush when he said on Tuesday that Saddam “did not let us in” to inspect his country. As I cited in a July blog, Bush had noted, “And we gave Saddam a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn’t let them in.” Kofi Annan, in the background, raised his eyebrows.
So, what are we to make of this? Does this scenario shows the UN Secretary General to be rude, and Bush’s weird depiction of reality to be not worthy of a comment? What’s wrong (yet familiar) about this picture?
Similarly, headlines as to Bush’s comments re wmd merited ‘Bush stubbornly holds to belief’ or similar wording, yet invariably they are along the lines of the Boston Globe’s Bush steady on belief in Iraq threat. Steady. Resolve. Strong. Leadership.
Please.
Paul Krugman addressed the issue today in his NY Times column.
In any case, the point is that a grave mistake was made, and America's credibility has been badly damaged — and nobody is being held accountable. But that's standard operating procedure. As far as I can tell, nobody in the Bush administration has ever paid a price for being wrong. Instead, people are severely punished for telling inconvenient truths…
These people politicize everything, from military planning to scientific assessments. If you're with them, you pay no penalty for being wrong. If you don't tell them what they want to hear, you're an enemy, and being right is no excuse.
Still, the big story isn't about Mr. Bush; it's about what's happening to America. Other presidents would have liked to bully the C.I.A., stonewall investigations and give huge contracts to their friends without oversight. They knew, however, that they couldn't. What has gone wrong with our country that allows this president to get away with such things? http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/opinion/30KRUG.html
Cheney --> Guiliani?
Political Gossip: There are rumors that Cheney will truly shift to the background and allow a new VP candidate such as Rudy Giuliani to replace him.
9/11: Extension for Commission?
I mention it again, as the decision time for the needed extension is at hand. The Republicans are currently saying there is “no way” that it will be granted. They (understandably) fear a report coming out just prior to their convention. Fittingly, an aide to a Republican Senator is cited in a news report as declaring that the White House strategy is to "just kick the can down the road."
Yesterday, John McCain and Joe Lieberman pushed for a compromise of sorts, to extend the deadline to January, thus allowing enough time for the Commission to finish its work and NOT reveal its conclusions until after the election. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/politics/30TERR.html?pagewanted=print&position=
Health Care: Doctors Cancelling Malpractice insurance
A Wall Street Journal report (Rachel Emma Silverman)
With medical malpractice insurance premiums climbing steeply, a growing number of physicians are taking a radical step: They're canceling their coverage altogether.
Going bare, as it is known, or "self-insuring," means that doctors, rather than insurance companies, are responsible for legal fees and any judgments or settlements if they're sued. For patients it means potentially less money if their doctor botches the job.
Many of the physicians going bare so far practice in Florida, which consistently has some of the highest malpractice insurance rates in the nation and is known for its activist doctors. More than 5% of Florida's roughly 47,700 active medical doctors don't have malpractice insurance coverage, up from 4% of doctors a year ago, according to the Florida Department of Health statistics. In Miami-Dade County, in South Florida, nearly 20% of the county's 6,360 active medical doctors are bare. The phenomenon is most common in high-risk specialties such as neurosurgery and obstetrics, but even primary-care physicians are forgoing insurance.
As premiums edge beyond the reach of physicians in other states, doctors elsewhere are studying, and in some cases adopting, the option. As a result, some in the medical profession expect the phenomenon to continue to spread.
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107524226412113275,00.html?mod=todays%5Fus%5Fpersonaljnl%5Fhs
BBC Chastised, Blair “cleared”
In what many would consider a whitewash, Tony Blair is cleared of fudging the case for war. Not a good development, but hardly surprising.
Plenty of commentary in the British media along the lines of “After going through the motions of a full and fair inquiry…” or, as one caller to the BBC noted, ‘So, the judge who Blair appointed blamed the BBC and absolved Blair. What a surprise!’ Polls indicate a majority of Brits don’t agree with the judgment.
Danny Schechter at mediachannel.org noted that “The Hutton Report takes ONE BBC journalist, Andrew Gilligan to task for ONE report which included TWO disputed words as in an opinion attributed to David Kelly that that the government had “sexed” up its claims about Iraq’s presumed ability to unleash WMD’s in 45 minutes is the pretext here. It does not examine BBC journalism or BBC practices although it is being read—deliberately—as an informed verdict on both.”
The Guardian (Maggie Brown) notes that a more cautious BBC may be the result.
There is no doubting the sense of anxiety within the BBC about the future of its journalism, as the shock waves of the Hutton report reverberate through the corporation.
"It's a terrible day for BBC news. I am profoundly depressed," a key editorial adviser said.
One journalist said staff were "absolutely livid" about Lord Hutton's "catastrophic" findings, which they said played directly into the hands of perennial critics of the corporation. Last night there was speculation that it will result in a much more nervous journalism, with the surviving governors taking far more detailed control over and interest in what is broadcast.
"It will be more tentative. There will be a step backwards, a more cautious BBC and that could go on for years. It will hit the confidence of everyone," said the adviser. "They will be much more careful. Managers will look at everything, strike out phrases; there will be the inevitable double-checking. http://media.guardian.co.uk/huttoninquiry/story/0,13812,1134001,00.html
WMD: one more time!
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post summarized on NPR that since “acknowledging isn’t possible for them, “ we’ve gotten to the point that the Administration is, in effect,’ the only one left to claim that the world isn’t round.’
Earlier, his report (with Walter Pincus) noted David Kay’s admission that there was no threat from Iraq.
U.S. weapons inspectors in Iraq found new evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime quietly destroyed some stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons in the mid-1990s, former chief inspector David Kay said yesterday.
The discovery means that inspectors have not only failed to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq but also have found exculpatory information -- contemporaneous documents and confirmations from interviews with Iraqis -- demonstrating that Hussein did make efforts to disarm well before President Bush began making the case for war. http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A54353-2004Jan27?language=printer
Deaths: At least 18 Palestinians/Israelis, 7 Americans in Afghanistan, several in Iraq, plus numerous Iraqis. But, more importantly, the polls in Oklahoma and Arizona…
[The Zogby poll has Kerry with a 34-point lead in Missouri, a 21-point lead in Arizona, and trailing John Edwards by only 1 point in South Carolina and Wesley Clark by 8 points in Oklahoma in a three-day tracking poll of the four states. Dean registers in double-digits in only one state, and is out of money.]
March 20 Mobilization in New York There isn’t much p.r. yet, but buses have been reserved.
Momentum is building across the globe for the Global Day of Action against War and Occupation on March 20, 2004—the one-year anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. On that day people all around the globe will take to the streets to say YES to peace and NO to pre-emptive war and occupation. Joining with growing numbers of military families and soldiers, we will call for an end to the occupation of Iraq and Bush's militaristic foreign policies. http://www.unitedforpeace.org/
-R
Social Policy 101 teaches, hopefully, about the importance of “framing the issue.” The Republicans have long mastered the concept, repetitively and consistently describing an issue on their terms. The opposition too often then responds / protests in disagreement, and the fight is thus waged on conservative terms.
Now, once again, the Republicans are warning that the Bush budget is out of balance, necessitating a freeze on spending. No mention, of course, is made of the decline of revenues due to the massive tax giveaways, primarily bestowed on the very, very wealthy. From the NY Times (Edmund Andrews)
A senior House Republican warned on Thursday that President Bush was on a collision course with Congress over his plans to reduce the deficit by almost freezing the growth of discretionary programs aside from military and domestic security items.
A briefing paper distributed to Republican lawmakers by the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Representative C. W. Bill Young of Florida, estimated that a complete freeze on the discretionary programs — excluding military and domestic security proposals — would save only $3 billion next year. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/politics/30SPEN.html?pagewanted=all
Washington Post Shrugs at Jobless Recovery:
Their editorial shows great faith in the system!
But the bigger question is whether jobless recoveries are a bad thing….
If a U.S. firm shifts employment abroad, the savings flow back to the United States in the form of lower prices for consumers and higher dividends for shareholders; the consumers and shareholders will direct their new spending power at things that create employment. Meanwhile, the fall in prices will allow the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates lower, boosting the job-creation engine. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50822-2004Jan26.html
Accountability / Standards: Still a free pass for Bush
We know that Gore never said that he invented the internet, and he was not a chronic liar/exaggerator. We know that Dean was giving a pep talk to thousands of noisy volunteers the night of the Iowa caucus and did not sound “insane,” as some asserted. Yet, no label was attached to Bush when he said on Tuesday that Saddam “did not let us in” to inspect his country. As I cited in a July blog, Bush had noted, “And we gave Saddam a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn’t let them in.” Kofi Annan, in the background, raised his eyebrows.
So, what are we to make of this? Does this scenario shows the UN Secretary General to be rude, and Bush’s weird depiction of reality to be not worthy of a comment? What’s wrong (yet familiar) about this picture?
Similarly, headlines as to Bush’s comments re wmd merited ‘Bush stubbornly holds to belief’ or similar wording, yet invariably they are along the lines of the Boston Globe’s Bush steady on belief in Iraq threat. Steady. Resolve. Strong. Leadership.
Please.
Paul Krugman addressed the issue today in his NY Times column.
In any case, the point is that a grave mistake was made, and America's credibility has been badly damaged — and nobody is being held accountable. But that's standard operating procedure. As far as I can tell, nobody in the Bush administration has ever paid a price for being wrong. Instead, people are severely punished for telling inconvenient truths…
These people politicize everything, from military planning to scientific assessments. If you're with them, you pay no penalty for being wrong. If you don't tell them what they want to hear, you're an enemy, and being right is no excuse.
Still, the big story isn't about Mr. Bush; it's about what's happening to America. Other presidents would have liked to bully the C.I.A., stonewall investigations and give huge contracts to their friends without oversight. They knew, however, that they couldn't. What has gone wrong with our country that allows this president to get away with such things? http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/opinion/30KRUG.html
Cheney --> Guiliani?
Political Gossip: There are rumors that Cheney will truly shift to the background and allow a new VP candidate such as Rudy Giuliani to replace him.
9/11: Extension for Commission?
I mention it again, as the decision time for the needed extension is at hand. The Republicans are currently saying there is “no way” that it will be granted. They (understandably) fear a report coming out just prior to their convention. Fittingly, an aide to a Republican Senator is cited in a news report as declaring that the White House strategy is to "just kick the can down the road."
Yesterday, John McCain and Joe Lieberman pushed for a compromise of sorts, to extend the deadline to January, thus allowing enough time for the Commission to finish its work and NOT reveal its conclusions until after the election. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/politics/30TERR.html?pagewanted=print&position=
Health Care: Doctors Cancelling Malpractice insurance
A Wall Street Journal report (Rachel Emma Silverman)
With medical malpractice insurance premiums climbing steeply, a growing number of physicians are taking a radical step: They're canceling their coverage altogether.
Going bare, as it is known, or "self-insuring," means that doctors, rather than insurance companies, are responsible for legal fees and any judgments or settlements if they're sued. For patients it means potentially less money if their doctor botches the job.
Many of the physicians going bare so far practice in Florida, which consistently has some of the highest malpractice insurance rates in the nation and is known for its activist doctors. More than 5% of Florida's roughly 47,700 active medical doctors don't have malpractice insurance coverage, up from 4% of doctors a year ago, according to the Florida Department of Health statistics. In Miami-Dade County, in South Florida, nearly 20% of the county's 6,360 active medical doctors are bare. The phenomenon is most common in high-risk specialties such as neurosurgery and obstetrics, but even primary-care physicians are forgoing insurance.
As premiums edge beyond the reach of physicians in other states, doctors elsewhere are studying, and in some cases adopting, the option. As a result, some in the medical profession expect the phenomenon to continue to spread.
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107524226412113275,00.html?mod=todays%5Fus%5Fpersonaljnl%5Fhs
BBC Chastised, Blair “cleared”
In what many would consider a whitewash, Tony Blair is cleared of fudging the case for war. Not a good development, but hardly surprising.
Plenty of commentary in the British media along the lines of “After going through the motions of a full and fair inquiry…” or, as one caller to the BBC noted, ‘So, the judge who Blair appointed blamed the BBC and absolved Blair. What a surprise!’ Polls indicate a majority of Brits don’t agree with the judgment.
Danny Schechter at mediachannel.org noted that “The Hutton Report takes ONE BBC journalist, Andrew Gilligan to task for ONE report which included TWO disputed words as in an opinion attributed to David Kelly that that the government had “sexed” up its claims about Iraq’s presumed ability to unleash WMD’s in 45 minutes is the pretext here. It does not examine BBC journalism or BBC practices although it is being read—deliberately—as an informed verdict on both.”
The Guardian (Maggie Brown) notes that a more cautious BBC may be the result.
There is no doubting the sense of anxiety within the BBC about the future of its journalism, as the shock waves of the Hutton report reverberate through the corporation.
"It's a terrible day for BBC news. I am profoundly depressed," a key editorial adviser said.
One journalist said staff were "absolutely livid" about Lord Hutton's "catastrophic" findings, which they said played directly into the hands of perennial critics of the corporation. Last night there was speculation that it will result in a much more nervous journalism, with the surviving governors taking far more detailed control over and interest in what is broadcast.
"It will be more tentative. There will be a step backwards, a more cautious BBC and that could go on for years. It will hit the confidence of everyone," said the adviser. "They will be much more careful. Managers will look at everything, strike out phrases; there will be the inevitable double-checking. http://media.guardian.co.uk/huttoninquiry/story/0,13812,1134001,00.html
WMD: one more time!
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post summarized on NPR that since “acknowledging isn’t possible for them, “ we’ve gotten to the point that the Administration is, in effect,’ the only one left to claim that the world isn’t round.’
Earlier, his report (with Walter Pincus) noted David Kay’s admission that there was no threat from Iraq.
U.S. weapons inspectors in Iraq found new evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime quietly destroyed some stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons in the mid-1990s, former chief inspector David Kay said yesterday.
The discovery means that inspectors have not only failed to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq but also have found exculpatory information -- contemporaneous documents and confirmations from interviews with Iraqis -- demonstrating that Hussein did make efforts to disarm well before President Bush began making the case for war. http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A54353-2004Jan27?language=printer
Deaths: At least 18 Palestinians/Israelis, 7 Americans in Afghanistan, several in Iraq, plus numerous Iraqis. But, more importantly, the polls in Oklahoma and Arizona…
[The Zogby poll has Kerry with a 34-point lead in Missouri, a 21-point lead in Arizona, and trailing John Edwards by only 1 point in South Carolina and Wesley Clark by 8 points in Oklahoma in a three-day tracking poll of the four states. Dean registers in double-digits in only one state, and is out of money.]
March 20 Mobilization in New York There isn’t much p.r. yet, but buses have been reserved.
Momentum is building across the globe for the Global Day of Action against War and Occupation on March 20, 2004—the one-year anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. On that day people all around the globe will take to the streets to say YES to peace and NO to pre-emptive war and occupation. Joining with growing numbers of military families and soldiers, we will call for an end to the occupation of Iraq and Bush's militaristic foreign policies. http://www.unitedforpeace.org/
-R
