Friday, January 16, 2004
The Democratic primaries so dominate both the news and the ‘conversation’ that ‘issues’ are getting short shrift. I’ll play along and get it over with.
Democrats: It Ain’t Over till It’s …
Dean, Dean, Dean… Well, he’s now basically tied in Iowa and peaked in N.H.. Clark is gaining and pulling in the dough; Edwards is getting stronger, even Kerry, despite his organizational problems, has picked up in Iowa. So, perhaps Dean has peaked, and thus Clark and, in descending order, Edwards and Kerry are still competitive.
Which brings us back to Gore: His latest MoveOn-sponsored speech was another blunt, impassioned attack on the Bushies. So, if no candidate triumphs in the primary season…
While President Bush likes to project an image of strength and courage, the truth is that in the presence of his large financial contributors he is a moral coward – so weak that he seldom if ever says “No” to them on anything – no matter what the public interest might mandate. http://www.moveon.org/gore3/webcast.html
Media Coverage: Yes, Dean’s been shafted--
A study finds that perceptions check-out, that Dean has been more criticized than his opponents. From the AP story in the San Francisco Chronicle:
Howard Dean received significantly more criticism on network newscasts than the other Democratic presidential contenders, who were the subjects of more favorable coverage, according to a study released Thursday.
More than three-quarters of the coverage of Dean's foes by the nightly news programs was favorable, while a majority of attention to Dean was negative, the Center for Media and Public Affairs found. sfgate.com/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2004/01/15/politics2012EST0795.DTL
The Bush Legacy:
So many awful policies have resulted in numerous lists of the policies or the lies told to further them. The latest comes from tompaine.com which has anticipated the State of the Union speech with its own scorecard which you can get at http://i.tompaine.com/scorecard/scorecard.cfm
I’ve provided an almost-digestible condensed version:
Health Care: An estimated 44 million Americans, 15 percent of population, including 8.5 million children, don't have health insurance, costs escalating, increasing numbers of workers and retirees being cut off by employers.
Jobs and Economic Recovery: No attempt to aid economy other than to temporarily infuse some money pre-election. Over two million fewer jobs than when Bush took office. Recovery with “promised” 300,000 new jobs a month have instead been averaging well under 100,000 per month- e.g. in December 2003, only 1,000 new jobs created. New jobs pay less than those lost, with fewer benefits. Wide variety of jobs heading overseas.
Funding Education: So-called education reform ‘No Child Left Behind’ mandates testing, is underfunded by $7 billion.
Environment: Industry triumphs: Landmark environmental laws weakened. Allowable levels of mercury from power plants tripled. Superfund clean-up costs shifted from polluters to public. Clean Air Act rules for dirtiest power plants relaxed …
State & Federal Spending: States face largest budget crises in decades. Federal deficit has hit a new high. $87 billion spent on Irag as U.S. non-defense domestic spending plummets. Attempting to be optimistic and visionary (and to change the subject), White House pushes for new space program, costing estimated hundreds of billions ...
War on Terror: Went to Iraq, instead; Didn’t find WMD (Surprise!). No link between Iraq and Al Qaeda found. (Shocking!) Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden still at large, Taliban re-invigorated, homeland security a joke.
Iraq: Deception followed by Incompetence, resulting in hundreds of unnecessary deaths to Americans, thousands wounded, tens of thousands of Iraqis killed. Now, rebuilding Iraq marred by terrorism, corporate profiteering and failure to restore basic services.
Theft / Corporate Corruption/ Tax Policy- The theft by the super-rich escalates, part by tax cuts that will especially cripple the country when they’re fully fazed in and the Boomers start retiring. A full piece on the ongoing theft at http://www.fairnessintaxes.org/pages/howthemegarich.html
There’s more, of course, but I’ll be humane…
Bush and ML King:
Lots of upset with his visit to Atlanta to place a wreath on King’s grave on what would have been King’s 75th birthday. Minimal television coverage, for some reason, but ample coverage elsewhere of the hundreds of protesters, e.g. the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Jeffry Scott, Bill Montgomery, Ernie Suggs, Charles Yoo) http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/0104/15kingvisit.html#
Health Care:
The National Academy of Sciences has recommended that the U.S. guarantee health insurance for every citizen by 2010. Good to have their voice, as there’s more concern for future retirees who expected coverage. The LA Times (Debora Vrana, Vicki Kemper) reports that 10% of large companies surveyed had eliminated subsidized health benefits for future retirees and another 20% said they would do so in the next 3 years. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-retire15jan15,1,1434862.story?coll=la-home-headlines
What’s Happening, Iraq: Workers Unhappy
Now there’s an understatement. Apparently, massive unemployment, so it’s hardly surprising that there are demonstrations. From the LA Times: (David Enders)
If employers follow that path, more Americans who retire could join the growing ranks of the underinsured Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs estimates that 3 million of those out of work are living below the poverty line. There are plans to create a six-month unemployment benefit, but no start date has been set, said Eman
Still, people hold out hope. "Many people have hope the situation will improve," said Qasim Hadi, secretary general of the Union of the Unemployed, which claims to represent 300,000 people. "But I think this will dissipate. The temporarily unemployed will turn into the permanently unemployed. Then it is impossible to predict what people in the streets will do." http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FA16Ak05.html
Kurdish Deal?
Rumors persists that not only did the Kurds find Saddam, but that in exchange for allowing U.S. soldiers to stage a dramatic capture of Saddam on video, the Kurds would be given considerations in the formation of a new Iraq. Details at http://www.turks.us/article.php?story=20040114192327166
-R
Democrats: It Ain’t Over till It’s …
Dean, Dean, Dean… Well, he’s now basically tied in Iowa and peaked in N.H.. Clark is gaining and pulling in the dough; Edwards is getting stronger, even Kerry, despite his organizational problems, has picked up in Iowa. So, perhaps Dean has peaked, and thus Clark and, in descending order, Edwards and Kerry are still competitive.
Which brings us back to Gore: His latest MoveOn-sponsored speech was another blunt, impassioned attack on the Bushies. So, if no candidate triumphs in the primary season…
While President Bush likes to project an image of strength and courage, the truth is that in the presence of his large financial contributors he is a moral coward – so weak that he seldom if ever says “No” to them on anything – no matter what the public interest might mandate. http://www.moveon.org/gore3/webcast.html
Media Coverage: Yes, Dean’s been shafted--
A study finds that perceptions check-out, that Dean has been more criticized than his opponents. From the AP story in the San Francisco Chronicle:
Howard Dean received significantly more criticism on network newscasts than the other Democratic presidential contenders, who were the subjects of more favorable coverage, according to a study released Thursday.
More than three-quarters of the coverage of Dean's foes by the nightly news programs was favorable, while a majority of attention to Dean was negative, the Center for Media and Public Affairs found. sfgate.com/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2004/01/15/politics2012EST0795.DTL
The Bush Legacy:
So many awful policies have resulted in numerous lists of the policies or the lies told to further them. The latest comes from tompaine.com which has anticipated the State of the Union speech with its own scorecard which you can get at http://i.tompaine.com/scorecard/scorecard.cfm
I’ve provided an almost-digestible condensed version:
Health Care: An estimated 44 million Americans, 15 percent of population, including 8.5 million children, don't have health insurance, costs escalating, increasing numbers of workers and retirees being cut off by employers.
Jobs and Economic Recovery: No attempt to aid economy other than to temporarily infuse some money pre-election. Over two million fewer jobs than when Bush took office. Recovery with “promised” 300,000 new jobs a month have instead been averaging well under 100,000 per month- e.g. in December 2003, only 1,000 new jobs created. New jobs pay less than those lost, with fewer benefits. Wide variety of jobs heading overseas.
Funding Education: So-called education reform ‘No Child Left Behind’ mandates testing, is underfunded by $7 billion.
Environment: Industry triumphs: Landmark environmental laws weakened. Allowable levels of mercury from power plants tripled. Superfund clean-up costs shifted from polluters to public. Clean Air Act rules for dirtiest power plants relaxed …
State & Federal Spending: States face largest budget crises in decades. Federal deficit has hit a new high. $87 billion spent on Irag as U.S. non-defense domestic spending plummets. Attempting to be optimistic and visionary (and to change the subject), White House pushes for new space program, costing estimated hundreds of billions ...
War on Terror: Went to Iraq, instead; Didn’t find WMD (Surprise!). No link between Iraq and Al Qaeda found. (Shocking!) Meanwhile, Osama bin Laden still at large, Taliban re-invigorated, homeland security a joke.
Iraq: Deception followed by Incompetence, resulting in hundreds of unnecessary deaths to Americans, thousands wounded, tens of thousands of Iraqis killed. Now, rebuilding Iraq marred by terrorism, corporate profiteering and failure to restore basic services.
Theft / Corporate Corruption/ Tax Policy- The theft by the super-rich escalates, part by tax cuts that will especially cripple the country when they’re fully fazed in and the Boomers start retiring. A full piece on the ongoing theft at http://www.fairnessintaxes.org/pages/howthemegarich.html
There’s more, of course, but I’ll be humane…
Bush and ML King:
Lots of upset with his visit to Atlanta to place a wreath on King’s grave on what would have been King’s 75th birthday. Minimal television coverage, for some reason, but ample coverage elsewhere of the hundreds of protesters, e.g. the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Jeffry Scott, Bill Montgomery, Ernie Suggs, Charles Yoo) http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/0104/15kingvisit.html#
Health Care:
The National Academy of Sciences has recommended that the U.S. guarantee health insurance for every citizen by 2010. Good to have their voice, as there’s more concern for future retirees who expected coverage. The LA Times (Debora Vrana, Vicki Kemper) reports that 10% of large companies surveyed had eliminated subsidized health benefits for future retirees and another 20% said they would do so in the next 3 years. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-retire15jan15,1,1434862.story?coll=la-home-headlines
What’s Happening, Iraq: Workers Unhappy
Now there’s an understatement. Apparently, massive unemployment, so it’s hardly surprising that there are demonstrations. From the LA Times: (David Enders)
If employers follow that path, more Americans who retire could join the growing ranks of the underinsured Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs estimates that 3 million of those out of work are living below the poverty line. There are plans to create a six-month unemployment benefit, but no start date has been set, said Eman
Still, people hold out hope. "Many people have hope the situation will improve," said Qasim Hadi, secretary general of the Union of the Unemployed, which claims to represent 300,000 people. "But I think this will dissipate. The temporarily unemployed will turn into the permanently unemployed. Then it is impossible to predict what people in the streets will do." http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FA16Ak05.html
Kurdish Deal?
Rumors persists that not only did the Kurds find Saddam, but that in exchange for allowing U.S. soldiers to stage a dramatic capture of Saddam on video, the Kurds would be given considerations in the formation of a new Iraq. Details at http://www.turks.us/article.php?story=20040114192327166
-R
Wednesday, January 14, 2004
"No President has ever done more for human rights than I have."- Bush, New Yorker, current issue
The Bush Family.
I noted Kevin Phillips’ new book on the Family. [“This is not a family that has a particularly strong commitment to American democracy. Its sense of how to win elections comes out of a CIA manual, not out of the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution.”]
Now the Washington Post's Jonathan Yardley, in his review of the Phillips book, writes: "Other than accumulating a certain amount of money and achieving a measure of what passes for aristocratic social position in this country, the Bushes have achieved nothing of distinction and appear to believe in nothing except their own interests http://www.node707.com/archives/000284.html
Army War College Report:
Hopefully most have seen, are hearing about this report. It needs to become a fixture in the public consciousness.
A scathing new report published by the Army War College broadly criticizes the Bush administration's handling of the war on terrorism, accusing it of taking a detour into an "unnecessary" war in Iraq and pursuing an "unrealistic" quest against terrorism that may lead to U.S. wars with states that pose no serious threat.
The report, by Jeffrey Record, a visiting professor at the Air War College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama, warns that as a result of those mistakes, the Army is "near the breaking point." http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8435-2004Jan11?language=printer
Space Idea: Minimal Interest.
An AP Poll finds “tepid” support for the Moon-Mars idea. As the report noted, (Will Lester) “You can't have a war, cut taxes, have the economy in a garbage pail and spend billions going into space," said Dallas Hodgins, a 76-year-old retired University of Michigan researcher from Flint, Mich. "How are they going to pay for all this? I don't see how it's morally justifiable. In Flint, there isn't a school roof that doesn't leak." http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A10334-2004Jan12?language=printer
O’Neill Charges:
He’s back-tracked to a degree on his charge that the Administration was planning the Iraq invasion early in 2001. [Rummy, Cheney and Wolfowitz had sketched out the idea long before, but deferred it till the Taliban were overthrown.] It’s ‘interesting’ to note that it took all of one day after O’Neill’s 60 Minutes interview for the Administration to announce that it was investigating whether he took classified documents with him. Yet it took 74 days after the Robert Novak column for there to be an investigation of the Valerie Plame outing.
And, this from Time's article (John Dickerson) on O'Neill ...
"The biggest difference between then and now," O'Neill tells Suskind about his two previous tours in Washington, "is that our group was mostly about evidence and analysis, and Karl (Rove), Dick (Cheney), Karen (Hughes) and the gang seemed to be mostly about politics. It's a huge distinction." http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101040119-574809,00.html
Truthtelling: Those of us who see ourselves as truth-tellers have a “field day” now that fake events and fraudulent operations are so common. Our phony president with the faux accent, b.s. resume and the pretend ranch is but a symptom.
Naomi Klein has a time with it in the current Nation:
This was the year when fakeness ruled: fake rationales for war, a fake President dressed as a fake soldier declaring a fake end to combat and then holding up a fake turkey. An action movie star became governor and the government started making its own action movies, casting real soldiers like Jessica Lynch as fake combat heroes and dressing up embedded journalists as fake soldiers. Saddam Hussein even got a part in the big show: He played himself being captured by American troops. This is the fake of the year, if you believe the Sunday Herald in Scotland, as well as several other news agencies, which reported that he was actually captured by a Kurdish special forces unit. http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040126&s=klein
Paul Krugman deals with this as well
The point is that the credentials of the critics just keep getting better. How can Howard Dean's assertion that the capture of Saddam hasn't made us safer be dismissed as bizarre, when a report published by the Army War College says that the war in Iraq was a "detour" that undermined the fight against terror? How can charges by Wesley Clark and others that the administration was looking for an excuse to invade Iraq be dismissed as paranoid in the light of Mr. O'Neill's revelations?
So far administration officials have attacked Mr. O'Neill's character but haven't refuted any of his facts. They have, however, already opened an investigation into how a picture of a possibly classified document appeared during Mr. O'Neill's TV interview. This alacrity stands in sharp contrast with their evident lack of concern when a senior administration official, still unknown, blew the cover of a C.I.A. operative because her husband had revealed some politically inconvenient facts.
Some will say that none of this matters because Saddam is in custody, and the economy is growing. Even in the short run, however, these successes may not be all they're cracked up to be. More Americans were killed and wounded in the four weeks after Saddam's capture than in the four weeks before. The drop in the unemployment rate since its peak last summer doesn't reflect a greater availability of jobs, but rather a decline in the share of the population that is even looking for work.
More important, having a few months of good news doesn't excuse a consistent pattern of dishonest, irresponsible leadership. And that pattern keeps getting harder to deny. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/13/opinion/13KRUG.html?pagewanted=print&position=
9/11 Update: Administration Fears Report Release
Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff on the politics of 9/11.
A new political battle is brewing over the federal panel investigating the 9/11 terror attacks, NEWSWEEK has learned. Facing a May deadline that many members no longer think they can meet, the panel is weighing asking Congress for more time to prepare its report. Some members want a few extra months—which would push back its release into the summer. But the prospect of unleashing the report in the middle of the election season is creating anxiety inside the White House. Some aides fear that the document will contain fresh ammo for Democrats eager to prove Bush was inattentive to terrorism warnings prior to 9/11. As a result, Bush officials recently floated a surprise strategic switch: they might OK a delay, but only if the report were put off until December, thereby "taking it out of the election," said a commission source. Late last week, though, the White House told the commission it was sticking with its longstanding position of no give on the May deadline. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3926713/
Dean and the Media, Eric Boehler (Salon.com)
Six months later, an extended version of that campaign narrative, polished by Republican talking-points memos and echoed day after day by the mainstream media, remains a constant of the campaign trail: Dean is a sarcastic smart aleck with foot-in-the mouth disease, a political ticking time bomb. The former Vermont governor remains the front-runner among Democratic voters, but he's gotten increasingly caustic treatment from the media, which has dwelled on three big themes -- that Dean's angry, gaffe-prone and probably not electable -- while giving comparatively far less ink to the doctor's policy and political prescriptions that have catapulted him ahead of the Democratic field. Newsweek's critical Jan. 12 cover story, "All the Rage: Dean's Shoot-From-the-Hip Style and Shifting Views Might Doom Him in November," achieved a nifty trifecta that covered anger, gaffes and electability, all three of the main media raps against Dean. http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/01/13/dean_media/index_np.html
Dean, II: The Daily Show on Dean’s Anger
Stephen Colbert: It’s one thing to believe that President Bush’s policies are leading his country to a bleak future of massive debt, increased terrorism and environmental catastrophe, but does Dean have to be so mad about it? …
Jon Stewart: Specifically how does he manifest this anger?
Colbert:…It’s well documented, Jon…The point is, Dean’s anger has been widely reported.
Stewart: But, what incidents have you yourself seen?
Colbert: Doesn’t matter what I’ve seen, Jon, it’s been widely reported. And that makes it fact-esque. http://www.comedycentral.com/mp/play.php?reposid=/multimedia/tds/colb/colbert_8077.html
Minneapolis-St. Paul Star-Tribune on the War: Well-said!
That reality [Saddam being ousted, captured; (questionable) progress] is truly gratifying, and it leads some Americans to conclude that the invasion of Iraq has proven itself both justified and worth the price. That conclusion, however, requires a logical leap that is itself unjustified. The outcome of the invasion and the reasons for it have always been separable questions. They need to remain that way…
Over the past few months, we have been insistent on keeping that reality in front of our readers. Frequently, that has brought accusations that we're making these points only because of "liberal" or "Democratic" bias. Despite our thick skins, these accusations are worrying, for they go to the question of our credibility with readers. The accusations also are false; consider those who share our view on the war:
The Cato Institute, a conservative Washington think tank best known for pushing the privatization of Social Security, says the war in Iraq was "the wrong war" because "the enemy at the gates was, and continues to be, Al-Qaida. Not only was Iraq not a direct military threat to the United States (even if it possessed WMD, which was a fair assumption), but there is no good evidence to support the claim that Saddam Hussein was in league with Al-Qaida and would have given the group WMD to be used against the United States."
From the U.S. Army War College comes a new study warning that the U.S. war on terrorism is unfocused and may have set the nation "on a course of open-ended and gratuitous conflict with states and non-state entities that pose no serious threat to the United States." The war in Iraq, the report says, was "an unnecessary preventative war" which "diverted attention and resources away from securing the American homeland against further assault by an undeterrable Al-Qaida."
The most detailed critique comes from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Carnegie's scholars think deeply and well about the reasonable application of power to preserve peace. The war in Iraq was not one of those reasonable applications, they conclude. Findings from the study include:
• "There was and is no solid evidence of a cooperative relationship between Saddam's government and Al-Qaida."
• "There was no evidence to support the claim that Iraq would have transferred WMD to Al-Qaida and much evidence to counter it."
• In 2002, a dramatic shift occurred in U.S. intelligence estimates of Iraq's WMD capabilities, suggesting "that the intelligence community began to be unduly influenced by policymakers' views sometime in 2002."
• "Administration officials systematically misrepresented the threat from Iraq's WMD and ballistic missile programs . . . ."
• "Considering all the costs and benefits, there were at least two options clearly preferable to a war undertaken without international support: allowing the [U.N.] inspections to continue until obstructed or completed, or imposing a tougher program of 'coercive inspections' backed by a specially designed international force."
We thought of those costs and benefits a week ago, when news came of the death of Capt. Kimberly Hampton, the first woman pilot killed in Iraq.
A photo taken of the South Carolina native as she sat in the cockpit of her helicopter communicated a good-natured openness and self-assurance. Her father said she "enjoyed the fact she was making a difference over there trying to help the Iraqi people and protect our freedoms in this country. She was very much a patriot."
Hampton undoubtedly was a patriot, and she was making a difference for the Iraqi people. Americans should be very proud of her and all the troops in Iraq. No doubt she truly believed she was protecting "our freedoms in this country." She believed that and answered the call because that is what her commander in chief told her.
But the most sacred duty civilians have to their armed forces is to ensure they are never called to sacrifice their lives unless this nation faces a real threat. Bush must be held accountable for Hampton's death. Iraq was the wrong war -- for conservatives, for liberals, for all Americans. http://www.startribune.com/viewers/story.php?template=print_a&story=4315251
-R
The Bush Family.
I noted Kevin Phillips’ new book on the Family. [“This is not a family that has a particularly strong commitment to American democracy. Its sense of how to win elections comes out of a CIA manual, not out of the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution.”]
Now the Washington Post's Jonathan Yardley, in his review of the Phillips book, writes: "Other than accumulating a certain amount of money and achieving a measure of what passes for aristocratic social position in this country, the Bushes have achieved nothing of distinction and appear to believe in nothing except their own interests http://www.node707.com/archives/000284.html
Army War College Report:
Hopefully most have seen, are hearing about this report. It needs to become a fixture in the public consciousness.
A scathing new report published by the Army War College broadly criticizes the Bush administration's handling of the war on terrorism, accusing it of taking a detour into an "unnecessary" war in Iraq and pursuing an "unrealistic" quest against terrorism that may lead to U.S. wars with states that pose no serious threat.
The report, by Jeffrey Record, a visiting professor at the Air War College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama, warns that as a result of those mistakes, the Army is "near the breaking point." http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8435-2004Jan11?language=printer
Space Idea: Minimal Interest.
An AP Poll finds “tepid” support for the Moon-Mars idea. As the report noted, (Will Lester) “You can't have a war, cut taxes, have the economy in a garbage pail and spend billions going into space," said Dallas Hodgins, a 76-year-old retired University of Michigan researcher from Flint, Mich. "How are they going to pay for all this? I don't see how it's morally justifiable. In Flint, there isn't a school roof that doesn't leak." http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A10334-2004Jan12?language=printer
O’Neill Charges:
He’s back-tracked to a degree on his charge that the Administration was planning the Iraq invasion early in 2001. [Rummy, Cheney and Wolfowitz had sketched out the idea long before, but deferred it till the Taliban were overthrown.] It’s ‘interesting’ to note that it took all of one day after O’Neill’s 60 Minutes interview for the Administration to announce that it was investigating whether he took classified documents with him. Yet it took 74 days after the Robert Novak column for there to be an investigation of the Valerie Plame outing.
And, this from Time's article (John Dickerson) on O'Neill ...
"The biggest difference between then and now," O'Neill tells Suskind about his two previous tours in Washington, "is that our group was mostly about evidence and analysis, and Karl (Rove), Dick (Cheney), Karen (Hughes) and the gang seemed to be mostly about politics. It's a huge distinction." http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101040119-574809,00.html
Truthtelling: Those of us who see ourselves as truth-tellers have a “field day” now that fake events and fraudulent operations are so common. Our phony president with the faux accent, b.s. resume and the pretend ranch is but a symptom.
Naomi Klein has a time with it in the current Nation:
This was the year when fakeness ruled: fake rationales for war, a fake President dressed as a fake soldier declaring a fake end to combat and then holding up a fake turkey. An action movie star became governor and the government started making its own action movies, casting real soldiers like Jessica Lynch as fake combat heroes and dressing up embedded journalists as fake soldiers. Saddam Hussein even got a part in the big show: He played himself being captured by American troops. This is the fake of the year, if you believe the Sunday Herald in Scotland, as well as several other news agencies, which reported that he was actually captured by a Kurdish special forces unit. http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040126&s=klein
Paul Krugman deals with this as well
The point is that the credentials of the critics just keep getting better. How can Howard Dean's assertion that the capture of Saddam hasn't made us safer be dismissed as bizarre, when a report published by the Army War College says that the war in Iraq was a "detour" that undermined the fight against terror? How can charges by Wesley Clark and others that the administration was looking for an excuse to invade Iraq be dismissed as paranoid in the light of Mr. O'Neill's revelations?
So far administration officials have attacked Mr. O'Neill's character but haven't refuted any of his facts. They have, however, already opened an investigation into how a picture of a possibly classified document appeared during Mr. O'Neill's TV interview. This alacrity stands in sharp contrast with their evident lack of concern when a senior administration official, still unknown, blew the cover of a C.I.A. operative because her husband had revealed some politically inconvenient facts.
Some will say that none of this matters because Saddam is in custody, and the economy is growing. Even in the short run, however, these successes may not be all they're cracked up to be. More Americans were killed and wounded in the four weeks after Saddam's capture than in the four weeks before. The drop in the unemployment rate since its peak last summer doesn't reflect a greater availability of jobs, but rather a decline in the share of the population that is even looking for work.
More important, having a few months of good news doesn't excuse a consistent pattern of dishonest, irresponsible leadership. And that pattern keeps getting harder to deny. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/13/opinion/13KRUG.html?pagewanted=print&position=
9/11 Update: Administration Fears Report Release
Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff on the politics of 9/11.
A new political battle is brewing over the federal panel investigating the 9/11 terror attacks, NEWSWEEK has learned. Facing a May deadline that many members no longer think they can meet, the panel is weighing asking Congress for more time to prepare its report. Some members want a few extra months—which would push back its release into the summer. But the prospect of unleashing the report in the middle of the election season is creating anxiety inside the White House. Some aides fear that the document will contain fresh ammo for Democrats eager to prove Bush was inattentive to terrorism warnings prior to 9/11. As a result, Bush officials recently floated a surprise strategic switch: they might OK a delay, but only if the report were put off until December, thereby "taking it out of the election," said a commission source. Late last week, though, the White House told the commission it was sticking with its longstanding position of no give on the May deadline. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3926713/
Dean and the Media, Eric Boehler (Salon.com)
Six months later, an extended version of that campaign narrative, polished by Republican talking-points memos and echoed day after day by the mainstream media, remains a constant of the campaign trail: Dean is a sarcastic smart aleck with foot-in-the mouth disease, a political ticking time bomb. The former Vermont governor remains the front-runner among Democratic voters, but he's gotten increasingly caustic treatment from the media, which has dwelled on three big themes -- that Dean's angry, gaffe-prone and probably not electable -- while giving comparatively far less ink to the doctor's policy and political prescriptions that have catapulted him ahead of the Democratic field. Newsweek's critical Jan. 12 cover story, "All the Rage: Dean's Shoot-From-the-Hip Style and Shifting Views Might Doom Him in November," achieved a nifty trifecta that covered anger, gaffes and electability, all three of the main media raps against Dean. http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/01/13/dean_media/index_np.html
Dean, II: The Daily Show on Dean’s Anger
Stephen Colbert: It’s one thing to believe that President Bush’s policies are leading his country to a bleak future of massive debt, increased terrorism and environmental catastrophe, but does Dean have to be so mad about it? …
Jon Stewart: Specifically how does he manifest this anger?
Colbert:…It’s well documented, Jon…The point is, Dean’s anger has been widely reported.
Stewart: But, what incidents have you yourself seen?
Colbert: Doesn’t matter what I’ve seen, Jon, it’s been widely reported. And that makes it fact-esque. http://www.comedycentral.com/mp/play.php?reposid=/multimedia/tds/colb/colbert_8077.html
Minneapolis-St. Paul Star-Tribune on the War: Well-said!
That reality [Saddam being ousted, captured; (questionable) progress] is truly gratifying, and it leads some Americans to conclude that the invasion of Iraq has proven itself both justified and worth the price. That conclusion, however, requires a logical leap that is itself unjustified. The outcome of the invasion and the reasons for it have always been separable questions. They need to remain that way…
Over the past few months, we have been insistent on keeping that reality in front of our readers. Frequently, that has brought accusations that we're making these points only because of "liberal" or "Democratic" bias. Despite our thick skins, these accusations are worrying, for they go to the question of our credibility with readers. The accusations also are false; consider those who share our view on the war:
The Cato Institute, a conservative Washington think tank best known for pushing the privatization of Social Security, says the war in Iraq was "the wrong war" because "the enemy at the gates was, and continues to be, Al-Qaida. Not only was Iraq not a direct military threat to the United States (even if it possessed WMD, which was a fair assumption), but there is no good evidence to support the claim that Saddam Hussein was in league with Al-Qaida and would have given the group WMD to be used against the United States."
From the U.S. Army War College comes a new study warning that the U.S. war on terrorism is unfocused and may have set the nation "on a course of open-ended and gratuitous conflict with states and non-state entities that pose no serious threat to the United States." The war in Iraq, the report says, was "an unnecessary preventative war" which "diverted attention and resources away from securing the American homeland against further assault by an undeterrable Al-Qaida."
The most detailed critique comes from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Carnegie's scholars think deeply and well about the reasonable application of power to preserve peace. The war in Iraq was not one of those reasonable applications, they conclude. Findings from the study include:
• "There was and is no solid evidence of a cooperative relationship between Saddam's government and Al-Qaida."
• "There was no evidence to support the claim that Iraq would have transferred WMD to Al-Qaida and much evidence to counter it."
• In 2002, a dramatic shift occurred in U.S. intelligence estimates of Iraq's WMD capabilities, suggesting "that the intelligence community began to be unduly influenced by policymakers' views sometime in 2002."
• "Administration officials systematically misrepresented the threat from Iraq's WMD and ballistic missile programs . . . ."
• "Considering all the costs and benefits, there were at least two options clearly preferable to a war undertaken without international support: allowing the [U.N.] inspections to continue until obstructed or completed, or imposing a tougher program of 'coercive inspections' backed by a specially designed international force."
We thought of those costs and benefits a week ago, when news came of the death of Capt. Kimberly Hampton, the first woman pilot killed in Iraq.
A photo taken of the South Carolina native as she sat in the cockpit of her helicopter communicated a good-natured openness and self-assurance. Her father said she "enjoyed the fact she was making a difference over there trying to help the Iraqi people and protect our freedoms in this country. She was very much a patriot."
Hampton undoubtedly was a patriot, and she was making a difference for the Iraqi people. Americans should be very proud of her and all the troops in Iraq. No doubt she truly believed she was protecting "our freedoms in this country." She believed that and answered the call because that is what her commander in chief told her.
But the most sacred duty civilians have to their armed forces is to ensure they are never called to sacrifice their lives unless this nation faces a real threat. Bush must be held accountable for Hampton's death. Iraq was the wrong war -- for conservatives, for liberals, for all Americans. http://www.startribune.com/viewers/story.php?template=print_a&story=4315251
-R
Sunday, January 11, 2004
The Bush Family and the Middle East
Kevin Phillips wants us to understand the connections that the four generations of Bush have had in the Middle East, via their “CIA connections, arms shipments, rogue banks, inherited war policies and personal financial links.”
When the U.S. launched a second war against Iraq in 2003 but failed to find weapons of mass destruction that Hussein was purported to have, international polls, especially those by the Washington-based Pew Center, charted a massive growth in anti-Bush and anti-American sentiment in Muslim parts of the world — an obvious boon to terrorist recruitment. Even before the war, some cynics had argued that Iraq was targeted to divert attention from the administration's failure to catch Osama bin Laden and stop Al Qaeda terrorism.
Bolder critics hinted that George W. Bush had sought to shift attention away from how his family's ties to the Bin Ladens and to rogue elements in the Middle East had crippled U.S. investigations in the months leading up to 9/11. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) complained that even when Congress released the mid-2003 intelligence reports on the origins of the 9/11 attack, the Bush administration heavily redacted a 28-page section dealing with the Saudis and other foreign governments, leading him to conclude, "There seems to be a systematic strategy of coddling and cover-up when it comes to the Saudis." But there is certainly enough to suggest that the Bush dynasty's many decades of entanglement and money-hunting in the Middle East have created a major conflict of interest that deserves to be part of the 2004 political debate. No previous presidency has had anything remotely similar. Not one. http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/sunday/commentary/la-op-phillips11jan11,1,59027.story
What’s happening, Iraq
The Troops:
There are many stories in the media about the morale of the troops and the unlikelihood of their staying on for another tour. There’s an increasing reliance on National Guard and Reservists, and compared with the army/marine regulars, they are under-equipped. From the Houston Chronicle (Michael HedgesI)
National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers are fighting alongside active-duty troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, but with Vietnam-era rifles, fewer bullet-proof vests, outdated radios and Humvees that lack armor plating, some officials said.
"You would expect the government to give you the best if you were going in harm's way, but the fact is the Guard is not getting the same equipment and training as the active-duty forces," said Mike Cline, executive director of the Enlisted Association of the National Guard. "The Guard and Reserve get what trickles down."
By late spring, nearly 40 percent of the combat forces in Iraq and Afghanistan will be drawn from the reserves and National Guard as the Pentagon spreads the burden from an active-duty military that has shrunk over the past two decades http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.hts/topstory/2345677
From Yahoo (Matthew Rosenberg)
"Man, they can't pay me enough to stay here," said a 23-year-old specialist from the Army's 4th Infantry Division as he manned the checkpoint with Iraqi police outside this city 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.
His comments reflect a sentiment not uncommon among the nearly two dozen soldiers in Iraq who have spoken with The Associated Press since the Army announced the increased re-enlistment bonuses for soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kuwait on Monday. Other soldiers at home were divided about the offer.
The soldiers in Iraq who spoke about the bonuses were serving in a range of assignments, from training the new Iraqi army at a base east of Baqouba to patrolling some of the most dangerous roads in the country, like those leading north from Baghdad.
Some cited the monotonous routine of a lonely life spent thousands of miles from loved ones. Others offered simpler reasons — such as the fear of an early death. http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20040107/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_paid_to_stay_1
So, what’s to come? Well, with manpower needs constant and reenlistments down, don’t bet the house against the return of the draft in 2005. A dispatch from the Asia Times (Erich Marquardt)
As a result of the extra strain imposed on US forces due to the length of their deployments, it is becoming harder for the Pentagon to rely on an all-volunteer military force to handle the White House's foreign policy initiatives. Many soldiers in the military originally enlisted during times of relative peace and did not expect to be deployed for months at a time in the Middle East, let alone being placed in a country that is sending body bags and stretchers home on a daily basis.
This current reality has concerned Washington policymakers as there is a justified fear that troop retention rates will decline and that less individuals will sign up for military service. The idea of an all-volunteer military is now being tested in a manner not experienced before. If Washington continues to fail in the pacification of Iraq, and therefore cannot reduce its current troop levels there, it will have to seriously consider how to resolve the present strain on US forces. Two primary options, such as pulling troops out of Iraq prematurely, or reintroducing conscription, are not at all desirable to the administration since the former could result in a dramatic blow to US interests, while the latter would open up a political hornet's nest.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FA10Ak02.html
Iraqi Morale: Also, N.G.
Violent protests about the lack of jobs, shootings by the British and the new Iraqi police. The AP story (Nadia Abou El-Magd)
Waves of protesting Iraqis marched against British soldiers, hurling stones and setting off homemade explosives in the southeastern city of Amarah on Sunday, a day after clashes killed six protesters and wounded at least 11.
think of Hoover's response to the stock market crash in 1929. As awful as the crash was for the economy, it was Hoover's obstinate refusal to do anything that might have limited the economic bleeding that helped accelerate the collapse into the depression. Like the U.S. in 1929, in Iraq you have a catastrophic shock to the economic system (the war and the collapse of the Saddam's Baathist regime) followed by a deliberate policy of governmental non-intervention in the economy.
The military had used cash seized from Baathist offices to employ local workers and distribute to religious and charitable organizations, but that cash dried up in the Fall and hasn't been replaced. (The end of cash payments to local residents coincides, of course,
WMD: Found? No.
The media did their part in providing another “found” report on some old chemical weapons shells. This time the report was of Danish troops finding mortar rounds that contained “blister gas”, vintage 1990 or earlier. Even if the Administration doesn’t seize on it, some of the “public” may latch onto it as further “proof “ of Iraq’s arsenal.
Hunger and homelessness:
The U.S. Conference of Mayors yearly survey found that hunger and homelessness were on the rise in American cities. Requests for emergency food assistance increased by 17% over the past year and requests for emergency helter assistance were up by 13%. http://www.usmayors.org/uscm/news/press_releases/documents/hunger_121803.asp
Jobs: With the anemic 1000 added jobs for the month, many economists were quoted as being “stunned” by the statistic. Also, jobs added in the past months have averaged 13% less than those lost during the recession.
Bill Moyers’ NOW: Snippets from an interview with Chuck Lewis of the Center for Public Integrity:
* Candidate Wesley Clark, when he announced, was a lobbyist for airline and homeland security contracts
* Candidate Edwards attended 175 fundraisers in his first 3 months ‘on the campaign trail.’
*Moyers: Are we becoming a nation of cynical bystanders” in which increasingly small economic groups dominate our government?
Chuck Lewis: Yes; “we have to take back their government.” http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript302_full.html
Moon and Mars: Nuts, yet predictable. Last I heard, some sanity was ruling at NASA, as they talked of developing a lower cost alternative to the p.r. stunt that was the shuttle. Now, with an election year comes the weak imitation of JFK’s pledge to go to the moon. So this was the Inspirational Bush which followed the Compassionate Bush seeking immigration reform.
Still, the announcement, combined with Mr. Bush's call this week to revamp laws regarding immigration, would signal the second major policy initiative put forward by the White House at the beginning of an election year. Both new policy directives would allow the president to be portrayed as an inspirational leader whose vision goes beyond terrorism and tax cuts.
They also would have the added political benefit of diverting attention from the Democratic presidential candidates trudging through the retail politics of the Iowa caucuses.
Paul O'Neill, who was pushed out of the administration as treasury secretary because it was felt he was not a team player, says President Bush was so disengaged during Cabinet meetings that he was like a "blind man in a roomful of deaf people." http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/10/politics/10ONEI.html
Bush in the Media: Elisabeth Bumiller’s portrait of Condi Rice coupled with former Treasury secretary O’Neill’s description of Bush brings us back to Bush as pathetic. Condi has at least somewhat replaced Barbara Bush as a more gentle scold.
"I can't do it with Schröder," Mr. Bush told Ms. Rice, according to a senior administration official who witnessed the exchange. Ms. Rice, who had not directly suggested that Mr. Bush meet with Mr. Schröder, rushed to reassure. "No, no, no, we won't make you do it with Schröder," she said. But Mr. Bush seemed to know what Ms. Rice had in mind. "Wait a minute, you'll get me back with Schröder, I know what you're trying to do," the president said, the official recounted.
Soon enough, a meeting to begin defrosting relations was set up between Mr. Bush and Mr. Schröder at the session last September of the United Nations General Assembly. " `I knew that was going to happen,' " Mr. Bush laughingly told Ms. Rice after the meeting was scheduled, the senior administration official said. Ms. Rice gently bantered back, the official said, but then concluded, " `Now, look, it's the right time to do it.' " http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/07/politics/07COND.html?pagewanted=print&position=
More importantly, the O’Neill interview on 60 Minutes had another illustration of Saddam being targeted from the outset of the Administration, further confirming the stories post 9/11 when Rumseld and Cheney were quoted as saying that this was an opportunity to go after Saddam, then delayed till the all-powerful Taliban were dispatched.
Corporate Corruption- China
A report from China (The Standard, Olivia Chung)
A random inspection of 152 mainland enterprises by the Ministry of Finance has found that every one of them falsified their accounts.
Some of the worst abuses were reported at a dozen privately run companies.
The probe, conducted last year on reporting for the 2002 fiscal year as part of a crackdown, had revealed falsified assets totalling 8.58 billion yuan on the companies' books, the finance ministry said. http://www.thestandard.com.hk/thestandard/news_detail_frame.cfm?articleid=44545&intcatid=2
-R
Kevin Phillips wants us to understand the connections that the four generations of Bush have had in the Middle East, via their “CIA connections, arms shipments, rogue banks, inherited war policies and personal financial links.”
When the U.S. launched a second war against Iraq in 2003 but failed to find weapons of mass destruction that Hussein was purported to have, international polls, especially those by the Washington-based Pew Center, charted a massive growth in anti-Bush and anti-American sentiment in Muslim parts of the world — an obvious boon to terrorist recruitment. Even before the war, some cynics had argued that Iraq was targeted to divert attention from the administration's failure to catch Osama bin Laden and stop Al Qaeda terrorism.
Bolder critics hinted that George W. Bush had sought to shift attention away from how his family's ties to the Bin Ladens and to rogue elements in the Middle East had crippled U.S. investigations in the months leading up to 9/11. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) complained that even when Congress released the mid-2003 intelligence reports on the origins of the 9/11 attack, the Bush administration heavily redacted a 28-page section dealing with the Saudis and other foreign governments, leading him to conclude, "There seems to be a systematic strategy of coddling and cover-up when it comes to the Saudis." But there is certainly enough to suggest that the Bush dynasty's many decades of entanglement and money-hunting in the Middle East have created a major conflict of interest that deserves to be part of the 2004 political debate. No previous presidency has had anything remotely similar. Not one. http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/sunday/commentary/la-op-phillips11jan11,1,59027.story
What’s happening, Iraq
The Troops:
There are many stories in the media about the morale of the troops and the unlikelihood of their staying on for another tour. There’s an increasing reliance on National Guard and Reservists, and compared with the army/marine regulars, they are under-equipped. From the Houston Chronicle (Michael HedgesI)
National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers are fighting alongside active-duty troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, but with Vietnam-era rifles, fewer bullet-proof vests, outdated radios and Humvees that lack armor plating, some officials said.
"You would expect the government to give you the best if you were going in harm's way, but the fact is the Guard is not getting the same equipment and training as the active-duty forces," said Mike Cline, executive director of the Enlisted Association of the National Guard. "The Guard and Reserve get what trickles down."
By late spring, nearly 40 percent of the combat forces in Iraq and Afghanistan will be drawn from the reserves and National Guard as the Pentagon spreads the burden from an active-duty military that has shrunk over the past two decades http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.hts/topstory/2345677
From Yahoo (Matthew Rosenberg)
"Man, they can't pay me enough to stay here," said a 23-year-old specialist from the Army's 4th Infantry Division as he manned the checkpoint with Iraqi police outside this city 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.
His comments reflect a sentiment not uncommon among the nearly two dozen soldiers in Iraq who have spoken with The Associated Press since the Army announced the increased re-enlistment bonuses for soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kuwait on Monday. Other soldiers at home were divided about the offer.
The soldiers in Iraq who spoke about the bonuses were serving in a range of assignments, from training the new Iraqi army at a base east of Baqouba to patrolling some of the most dangerous roads in the country, like those leading north from Baghdad.
Some cited the monotonous routine of a lonely life spent thousands of miles from loved ones. Others offered simpler reasons — such as the fear of an early death. http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20040107/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_paid_to_stay_1
So, what’s to come? Well, with manpower needs constant and reenlistments down, don’t bet the house against the return of the draft in 2005. A dispatch from the Asia Times (Erich Marquardt)
As a result of the extra strain imposed on US forces due to the length of their deployments, it is becoming harder for the Pentagon to rely on an all-volunteer military force to handle the White House's foreign policy initiatives. Many soldiers in the military originally enlisted during times of relative peace and did not expect to be deployed for months at a time in the Middle East, let alone being placed in a country that is sending body bags and stretchers home on a daily basis.
This current reality has concerned Washington policymakers as there is a justified fear that troop retention rates will decline and that less individuals will sign up for military service. The idea of an all-volunteer military is now being tested in a manner not experienced before. If Washington continues to fail in the pacification of Iraq, and therefore cannot reduce its current troop levels there, it will have to seriously consider how to resolve the present strain on US forces. Two primary options, such as pulling troops out of Iraq prematurely, or reintroducing conscription, are not at all desirable to the administration since the former could result in a dramatic blow to US interests, while the latter would open up a political hornet's nest.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FA10Ak02.html
Iraqi Morale: Also, N.G.
Violent protests about the lack of jobs, shootings by the British and the new Iraqi police. The AP story (Nadia Abou El-Magd)
Waves of protesting Iraqis marched against British soldiers, hurling stones and setting off homemade explosives in the southeastern city of Amarah on Sunday, a day after clashes killed six protesters and wounded at least 11.
think of Hoover's response to the stock market crash in 1929. As awful as the crash was for the economy, it was Hoover's obstinate refusal to do anything that might have limited the economic bleeding that helped accelerate the collapse into the depression. Like the U.S. in 1929, in Iraq you have a catastrophic shock to the economic system (the war and the collapse of the Saddam's Baathist regime) followed by a deliberate policy of governmental non-intervention in the economy.
The military had used cash seized from Baathist offices to employ local workers and distribute to religious and charitable organizations, but that cash dried up in the Fall and hasn't been replaced. (The end of cash payments to local residents coincides, of course,
WMD: Found? No.
The media did their part in providing another “found” report on some old chemical weapons shells. This time the report was of Danish troops finding mortar rounds that contained “blister gas”, vintage 1990 or earlier. Even if the Administration doesn’t seize on it, some of the “public” may latch onto it as further “proof “ of Iraq’s arsenal.
Hunger and homelessness:
The U.S. Conference of Mayors yearly survey found that hunger and homelessness were on the rise in American cities. Requests for emergency food assistance increased by 17% over the past year and requests for emergency helter assistance were up by 13%. http://www.usmayors.org/uscm/news/press_releases/documents/hunger_121803.asp
Jobs: With the anemic 1000 added jobs for the month, many economists were quoted as being “stunned” by the statistic. Also, jobs added in the past months have averaged 13% less than those lost during the recession.
Bill Moyers’ NOW: Snippets from an interview with Chuck Lewis of the Center for Public Integrity:
* Candidate Wesley Clark, when he announced, was a lobbyist for airline and homeland security contracts
* Candidate Edwards attended 175 fundraisers in his first 3 months ‘on the campaign trail.’
*Moyers: Are we becoming a nation of cynical bystanders” in which increasingly small economic groups dominate our government?
Chuck Lewis: Yes; “we have to take back their government.” http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript302_full.html
Moon and Mars: Nuts, yet predictable. Last I heard, some sanity was ruling at NASA, as they talked of developing a lower cost alternative to the p.r. stunt that was the shuttle. Now, with an election year comes the weak imitation of JFK’s pledge to go to the moon. So this was the Inspirational Bush which followed the Compassionate Bush seeking immigration reform.
Still, the announcement, combined with Mr. Bush's call this week to revamp laws regarding immigration, would signal the second major policy initiative put forward by the White House at the beginning of an election year. Both new policy directives would allow the president to be portrayed as an inspirational leader whose vision goes beyond terrorism and tax cuts.
They also would have the added political benefit of diverting attention from the Democratic presidential candidates trudging through the retail politics of the Iowa caucuses.
Paul O'Neill, who was pushed out of the administration as treasury secretary because it was felt he was not a team player, says President Bush was so disengaged during Cabinet meetings that he was like a "blind man in a roomful of deaf people." http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/10/politics/10ONEI.html
Bush in the Media: Elisabeth Bumiller’s portrait of Condi Rice coupled with former Treasury secretary O’Neill’s description of Bush brings us back to Bush as pathetic. Condi has at least somewhat replaced Barbara Bush as a more gentle scold.
"I can't do it with Schröder," Mr. Bush told Ms. Rice, according to a senior administration official who witnessed the exchange. Ms. Rice, who had not directly suggested that Mr. Bush meet with Mr. Schröder, rushed to reassure. "No, no, no, we won't make you do it with Schröder," she said. But Mr. Bush seemed to know what Ms. Rice had in mind. "Wait a minute, you'll get me back with Schröder, I know what you're trying to do," the president said, the official recounted.
Soon enough, a meeting to begin defrosting relations was set up between Mr. Bush and Mr. Schröder at the session last September of the United Nations General Assembly. " `I knew that was going to happen,' " Mr. Bush laughingly told Ms. Rice after the meeting was scheduled, the senior administration official said. Ms. Rice gently bantered back, the official said, but then concluded, " `Now, look, it's the right time to do it.' " http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/07/politics/07COND.html?pagewanted=print&position=
More importantly, the O’Neill interview on 60 Minutes had another illustration of Saddam being targeted from the outset of the Administration, further confirming the stories post 9/11 when Rumseld and Cheney were quoted as saying that this was an opportunity to go after Saddam, then delayed till the all-powerful Taliban were dispatched.
Corporate Corruption- China
A report from China (The Standard, Olivia Chung)
A random inspection of 152 mainland enterprises by the Ministry of Finance has found that every one of them falsified their accounts.
Some of the worst abuses were reported at a dozen privately run companies.
The probe, conducted last year on reporting for the 2002 fiscal year as part of a crackdown, had revealed falsified assets totalling 8.58 billion yuan on the companies' books, the finance ministry said. http://www.thestandard.com.hk/thestandard/news_detail_frame.cfm?articleid=44545&intcatid=2
-R
