January 10, 2005

Suckered into Going For Broke?

While Bush administration Neocons like to remind us regularly that the US won the Cold War, they seem to have forgotten why and how we won it. They do remember – and like to remind us – that it was Ronald Reagan who finally crushed the Evil Empire (AKA, Soviet Union.)

But how did he do it? Did he bomb them? No. Did he occupy them? No. Did he scare them into surrendering? Nope.

Answer: He broke them, not militarily, but financially.

Reagan convinced the Soviets that he was going to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to build a missile defense shield over the US, effectively defanging the Soviets and making them vulnerable to a US first strike to which they could not respond.

The Russians bit and spent themselves into national bankruptcy trying to figure out how to counter a threat that did not, and a quarter century later still has not, materialized.

The reason I offer this little memory jogger is because that’s exactly how al Qaida intends to defeat the West – by convincing us that we have to spend larger and larger hunks of our national treasures protecting ourselves against every imaginable terrorist threat.

And, it’s working. Just listen to all the hand wringing these days from public officials and major media every time something bad happens.

When I say “bad” I don’t mean just the occasional terrorist incident. A train jumped the tracks last week in South Carolina releasing chlorine gas. Nine people died. It was an accident. Not a terrorist within two thousand miles of the place. The train jumped the track, as so many US trains do, because US rail companies refuse to spend the kind of money required to keep their roadbeds up to European standards. US rails are an international joke. Nevertheless, within a day of the S.C. accident talking heads on CNN and other news channels were not talking about the disgraceful condition of the US rail infrastructure, but obsessing over “what if” terrorists start targeting trains. Within hours those thumb-sucking media speculations had smoked out members of Congress to pompously declare more money needs to be spent – not on new tracks – but on additional rail security.

There now seems there is no natural disasters, accident or Act of God that cannot be spun into a terrorist threat for which we are unprepared. A flood? What if terrorists bombed Hoover Dam? Two-dozen homes under construction in Maryland burn to the ground and the first suspects are “eco-terrorists.” (Turns out it was a local redneck with a screw loose.) Customers of a hamburger joint come down with e-coli poisoning and the US Secretary of Heath and Human Services gets on TV and rambles on about how easy it would be for terrorists to poison our food supply.

So, just what the fig is going on?'

Three things:

1. The attacks on 9/11 shocked Americans accustomed to watching (and causing) that kind of trouble from a safe distance. Mainland US had never been attacked before that. So, seeing 3000 people killed in a major US city like that was quite the little wake up call for Americans. And like all newcomers to an idea, we are still trying to size it – is it a big deal, a really big deal or the end of civilization as we know it? This process would be easier if it were not for the next two phenomena.
2. Public officials at all levels of government – from the White House all the way down to the 2-person fire district in Dog Patch, Nebraska, are playing the terrorism card for all it’s worth. After almost years of budget cuts the nation’s “first responders” suddenly became America’s unsung and under-funded heroes after 9/11. All they had to do to get new fire trucks, more personnel, more money was to get on the evening news and mention that they were unprepared to respond to a terrorist attack if one should occur in their town, city, hospital, school, daycare facility, even public sewer districts. The next morning a few million bucks would show up in the mail. Four years have passed since 9/11 and the gambit still works. But, without a real terrorist attack to point to, they glom onto everyday catastrophes turning them into “but what if” terrorist incidents. For the White House terrorism has become the Swiss Army knife of excuses, from explaining the crappy economy to the budget deficit. For Congress terrorist funding has replaced pork barrel dam and highway projects. (Kha-ching)
3. None of the above would be possible if it were not for the media, which has become the handmaiden of the fear mongers, by helping create and maintain this national terrorism hysteria. Before the media had terrorism to chew on they boosted ratings with “if it bleeds it leads,” crime stories, live auto chases and celebrity trials. But post-9/11 Americans now had attention calluses so thick nothing less than death and destruction on a mass scale – or at least the threat of it – could capture an audience. So, any public official willing to get in front of a CNN or FOX camera and say something scary became “the” get for the industry. And, the scarier the better. (Kha-ching)

The above compound; a scared public, cunning and self-serving public officialdom and a pathetically needy and increasingly shallow media – has created a self-perpetuating national hysteria.

Is terrorism a real problem? Of course it is. It’s just not as big and all consuming, do-or-die problem that we are making it. All kinds of things kill humans around the world every day and terrorism is one of the least deadly among them. Just ask the people of coastal Southeast Asia these days.

Bin Reagan ?
Now, back to how we won the Cold War. Their leaders convinced the people of the Soviet Union that the US, under Ronald Reagan, was out to get them. So, they had to spend whatever it took on their national security or risk losing the Cold War. So, the country diverted already scarce national treasure to defenses against the myth of Reagan’s Star Wars system. And that was that for the Soviet Union.

Now we risk a similar fate, unless we get a grip and put terrorism into a bigger and more realistic perspective.

For example, if you really want trains to stop falling off the tracks, fix the friggin tracks. Maybe with a solid rail infrastructure Amtrak trains would actually reach their destinations more often, and on schedule too boot. If a terrorist should blow the occasional train off its tracks we will deal with it. But the other 99.9999999% of trains out there will never be attacked by anyone will go about their business in their full and upright position.

Bin Laden is al Qaida’s Ronald Reagan. He has figured out how to scare the powerful US into wasting billions – eventually trillions -- of dollars chasing terrorist shadows while our education, healthcare and national infrastructure crumble. Just by getting us to chase his terrorist’s minion into briar patch Iraq, he succeeded in getting us to throw another $200 billion a year down a rat hole. (A rat hole that has always been a rat hole and will remain a rat hole no matter how many US dollars and US lives are throw into it.)

In this regard Bin Laden is a crafty rascal -- which is more than we can say for the Elmer Fudd President chasing him from hole to hole.

January 7, 2005

Come hell or high water, President Bush is determined Iraq’s elections go on as scheduled on January 30. Yesterday he said that even if insurgents carry out their promise to kill Iraqis who show up to vote, it will be worth it.

(Note: There are no known Iraqi members of the Bush family, of course, which is why he figures the death of a few hundred more Iraqis is “worth it,” just as the death of nearly 1500 US soldiers – all also unrelated to the Bush clan n – has been “worth it.” I have to wonder if one or both of his daughters died fighting over there if he would still consider their deaths “worth it?” – not that we will ever know since the Doublemint twins clearly do not think it is “worth” volunteering for.)

Ah, but I digress.

If the election goes on as President Bush has ruled it must, what then? The Sunnis are not going to take part in an election they have no chance of winning. So, rather than turning the corner towards a representative democracy by legitimizing the central government, the election will instead finally legitimize the insurgency. What had been a fuzzy conflict between the US-installed interim government and a rag-tag Sunni guerilla war will become something we all understand when we see it: Confederates v. Unionists, the Gray v. Blue, a house divided -- a civil war.

Even though they are a minority in Iraq, the Sunnis have run things for over a century, and they are not about to become hand-servants to the bitterly hated majority Shiites. It is important that everyone understand how these two parties see each other. The Sunnis consider themselves Iraq’s aristocracy and view the Shiites the very same way Afrikaners saw the black majority in old South Africa – and visa versa. There is no love lost here, because there was never any love in the first place. These two groups lay awake nights thinking up ways to make each other miserable.

So after the election the lines will be drawn and a good old fashioned civil war will rage.

Then what?

Well the first thing that will happen is the Kurds will pull up the drawbridge. Even during the final years of Saddam Hussein’s rule the Kurds had carved out a peaceful, well-run, democratic enclave for themselves in the north. And they intend to keep it that way. The Kurds are armed to the teeth and are the most skilled and ferocious fighters in the region. When the Sunnis and Shiites start going at each other’s throats the Kurds do what they have always done when the Shiites hit the fan – they will immediately secure their own territory – including lucrative northern oil fields.

And the newly elected Iraqi government will not be able to do a damn thing about it. They will be too busy trying not to get martyrs, blown out of office by Sunni forces supported by fellow Baathist in Syria. In response Iran will pump trouble in from their end in support of their brother Shiites. Since Allah is on both sides, this will last a while.

Meanwhile the Kurds will go their merry way. The Iraqi government will complain bitterly about the Kurdish land-grab, but that’s all they will be able to do, complain. After all, how will they explain why they need to impose Iraqi government control over a peaceful and orderly Kurdish region while chaos reigns in the areas they do control?

And just guess who is going to be caught right in the middle of this big-ass hate-triangle? Uncle Sap. The US will find itself caught between the Kurds – to whom we are beholden (BIG time,) and the “freely elected” Shiites and will still be trying to woo Sunnis into the central government.

Any cop will tell you that the most dangerous and thankless part of their job is breaking up family fights. The same goes here. What will end up happening is, after losing several thousand more US lives and wasting several more hundreds billions of US dollars, all three parties in Iraq will end up hating our guts and we will pull out leaving them to sort matters out on their own. And, they will.

Now, we may not like the way things sort out, but once it does we will at least have a definable set of circumstances to which to respond to or adapt to -- which is not the case now. Right now we are like a beekeeper trying to round up three hives of swarming killer bees. Let the little bastards settled this themselves.

(BTW -- my money is on the Kurds.)

January 5, 2005

Litigation "Reform"

Democrats will have a chance in coming weeks to do well by doing good. President Bush is just about handing it to them if -- IF – they can shake loose of their old ways and show they can still think for themselves.

The President has been beating the “frivolous lawsuit” drums for years now. And he is now about to play that card. It’s Karl Rove’s latest Trojan Horse/wedge issue. The ground has been carefully prepared during the last two campaigns with tales of “good Docs” being forced to scale back their services for fear of being sued by patients.

(Poor Karl. He has to depend on a George to deliver such messages. So Karl must have poured a double scotch when he heard Bush flub his lines when he claimed that frivolous medical lawsuits are “forcing OBGYN docs from sharing their love with women.”)

Nevertheless the propaganda blitz has had its desired affect. When average Americans hear the term “frivolous lawsuit,” they immediate recall the woman who won a huge award against McDonald’s because her hot coffee was hot, or the burglar who sues the family he burgled because they hit him with a baseball bat when they caught him prowling in the house.

What this administration means when it uses the term is something else entirely. To figure out what they mean all you need to do is look at the list of corporations and trade groups supporting the President’s vision of litigation reform.

The last time Congress “reformed” the nation’s civil litigation laws was when they passed the “Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.” Those changes made it harder for small shareholders to band together to file class action suits against those engaged in stock fraud. Those changes directly contributed to first the dot-com bubble and crash and then the wave of corporate accounting scandals.. Enron, WorldCom, Global Crossing.. et al. The PSLRA “reforms” had made it nearly impossible for would be class action litigants to force the kind of legal discovery needed to unmask the frauds that were rampant within those and many other companies. And, it still does.

Now the GOP, fresh from an corporate-financed election victory sweep is about to thank their contributors by giving them more of the same kind of litigation “reform.” This time they want it make it harder and – even impossible -- for consumers to sue companies that knowingly injure or even kill their customers with their services or products. To see why business wants these changes you need look no further than the recent spat of cases of highly profitable prescription drugs that were kept on the market months or even years after their pharmaceutical company producers learned they were killing people.

So, what Democrats need to do is come back with a reasonable and hard to argue against counter-offer to the President’s phony reforms. John Edwards started that process two years ago when he proposed a national “three strikes” law for lawyers. If a lawyer or law firm files three lawsuits that are proved to have been frivolous they would lose the right to ever file a civil damages action again.

But taking such a stand would be a big step for Dems who have become increasingly beholding (financially) to powerful and well-heeled trial lawyers. But wait .. what would pissing a few trail off really mean? Think about it. First, what has that love affair done for Democrats? Nothing. People don’t like politicians and don’t like lawyers. Put the two together and voter dislike becomes greater than the sum of the two parts.

But what about the money? Reframe the question: “What has that money bought Dems? Even as trial lawyers poured more money into DNC coffers, Democrats have lost, lost, lost.

Finally Democrats need to acknowledge that there really are such things as frivolous lawsuits. And they need to prove they understand that such suits are both a drag on the economy and form of legal terrorism. While the problem is no where as bad as President likes to portray, it is real and like physical terrorism, it only takes one or two parasitical law suits near you or your business to make everyone else nervous and defensive.

(As a reporter I lived in constant terror of being sued, so I know of what I speak. Did it affect my stories? I like to think not. But there were times I left tasty tidbits out of a story, some of which would have helped readers understand the big picture better. I did so consciously because I figured it was just not worth the hassles it would cause me the next day. So, self-censorship is one way lawsuit terrorism takes its silent toll.)

In Great Britain if someone brings a civil action and loses their case, they pay the court costs. Americas trial lawyers warn that instituting such a rule here would mean no one would sue a big company again and they would run wild. Well, no one who has spent any time in England can say that that country is any less clean and safe as any place in the US. What such a rule does is to require would-be litigants ante into the pot before the cards are dealt. Here we have no such rule. What we have here is what economists call a “moral hazard,” a “heads I win, tails you lose,” situation for lawyers and litigants. Instituting a loser pays rule here would go a long way to getting the seedy lawyers and their equally seedy clients out of the courts and out of our hair.

So listen up Dems. Don’t let Rove’s Rangers roll the Litigation Reform Trojan to victory -- again. Grab this issue by the neck and make it your own. By embracing commonsense litigation reforms, (like those above and others circulating,) you will short circuit the long-planned corporate-sponsored gutting of consumer protections the GOP is talking about.

Or, don’t. Instead go to lunch with your favorite triall lawyer. He’s buying – at least while you remain in office.


DeLaying Justice
Tom DeLay. So far this former bug killer from Sugarland, Texas has been Congress’ very own Artful Dodger. But his winning streak may be coming to an end. Like the scum jettisoned by the system before him -- Jim Wright and Newt Gingrich -- Tom Delay’s grip on power is slipping on its own slime.

Earlier this week House Republicans tried to build a dike around their embattled Majority Leader. But that attempt to change House rules failed when even Republican voters could not gag it down. The rule change would have let DeLay keep his leadership post if he were indicted for a crime. Funny thing about that, seems he may just be. Texas prosecutors are slowly unraveling DeLay’s vast fundraising scams back home. (See David Donnelly’s story HERE )

An indication of how far the worm has turned in recent months, even DeLay’s fierce reputation for retribution can no longer keep his co-conspirators in quiet. Sources say that a least two companies have cut deals and turned state's witness against DeLay. One of them is national retailer, Sears.
The other company is Diversified Collection Services. Diversified made a $50,000 contribution to a DeLay controlled PAC as part of scheme prosecutors say laundered illegal corporate contributions for the Majority Leader. Diversified and Sears are two of eight corporations accused of giving a total of $190,000 to Texans for a Republican Majority during the 2002 legislative campaign. The use of corporate money for political purposes is illegal in Texas.

Three close DeLay associates have also been indicted in the ongoing investigation and are reportedly ratting on their powerful friend.

Texas grand juries have spent two years investigating contributions in the 2002 legislative campaigns. Thanks to a DeLay-engineered gerrymandering of Texas districts, the election resulted in the first Republican majority in the Texas Legislature in modern times.

But the things DeLay had to do to win that majority may cost him his leadership -- and his freedom.

We can hope.

January 4, 2004

Hey Muslims: Who’s Your Daddy?

If you are looking for Muslims outside the Middle East you will find most of them in areas of Indonesia devastated by last week’s tsunami. So one would think that all those “Allah ackbar-ing” Iranians, Syrians, and richer-than-Allah Saudis would be shelling out big time to help out their Muslim brothers and sisters in Indonesia.

F o r g e t a b o u t i t

The Saudis have donated a paltry $10 million -- this from a sand pile of a nation that banked a cool $10 BILLION budget surplus in 2004.

Even worse are the holier than thou-infidels Iranian mullahs who have been conspicuous by their silence and a level of stinginess that would have made Shylock blush.

In fact the most generous and active country in the Middle East is not Islamic at all, but Jewish. Israel was Johnny-on-the-spot. They immediately dispatched medical and other logistic relief long before the UN or US got their acts together. But even here religious nonsense managed to survive catastrophe and banish common sense. Indonesia’s Muslim leaders, while happily taking all the free stuff little Israel sent, refused to allow Israeli medical teams on their “holy” soil. What fools -- superstitious fools – the worst kind.

Anyway, the next time you hear the Saudis, Iranians and Syrians shooting off their mouths about how Muslims have to band together against Western infidels, consider it time for a history lesson. Remind them that during the last half century it’s been Western (and Westernized) nations that have repeatedly had to come the aid of Muslims whenever the shit hits the fan. From Bosnia, to the Philippians, to Southeast Asia, we are there with helping hands and billions upon billions of dollars.

When Arab nations do show up in a trouble spot it's usually only to make more trouble.

Example: While the Saudis were only able to cough up $10 million to help Muslim tsunami victims, they raised over $150 million for the families of Palestinian suicide bombers. Nice. Maybe it’s just as well they stay out of Southeast Asia.

BTW- Kudos to Japan -- another non-Muslim nation -- which has pledged half a billion dollars to tsunami relief operations

Goose Stepping - Back

Well lookie here, Republicans DO still have the capacity to feel shame – or maybe it was the heat.

"House Republican leaders last night abandoned a proposal to loosen rules governing members' ethical conduct, as they yielded to pressure from rank-and-file lawmakers concerned that the party was sending the wrong message. The proposal would have made it more difficult for lawmakers to discipline a colleague for unethical behavior and would have allowed Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) to keep his post if he is indicted by a Texas grand jury that is looking into his campaign finance practices. The sudden reversal came amid growing indications of dissension within the GOP. Just before House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert's office announced that the measures were being dropped, the chairman of the House ethics committee issued an unusual statement denouncing the leadership's plan.”

I know several staunch Bush-voting ordinary Republicans and they were squirming over the proposed change -- especially to protect one of the meanest, conniving and corrupt members of the GOP, Tom DeLay.

So I suspect what happened here is that House Republicans got a snoot full of email and calls from the people who just put them in office for two years begging them not to pull such an obvious, self-serving and politically cynical stunt.

Now let’s hope prosecutors in Texas have finally got the goods on this guy and indict him soon. The sooner the better. (For details on DeLay’s crimes against humanity, common decency and common sense, click HERE ) The man belongs in jail, not Congress

But they are not entirely done trying to protect their less than ethical members. GOP representatives decided to go ahead with a controversial ethics proposal to ask the full House to approve a change that could curtail ethics committee investigations. Under the change, a Republican vote would be required before an inquiry can begin. It would be like changing the law so that prosecutors could only investigate someone for a crime – say Michael Jackson -- if the suspect’s attorney’s agreed to allow him to be investigated. Nice.

The Middle Beast

I have said it here often and been proven right just as often; there is something in the water that turns everyone who lives in the “Holy Land” mad as hatters. More proof arrived in my morning press:

“Mahmoud Abbas, the leading candidate in next week's presidential election, on Monday promised Palestinian refugees they'll be able to return home one day — his most explicit comment yet on an explosive issue that has derailed peace talks in the past.”

Now it’s not as though Abbas – a veteran of all former failed peace deals – does not know that the “right to return” issue is not just a deal-killer, but every time ordinary Israelis hear a Palestinian leader proclaim it they move further to the right. It would be as though 100 million descendants of American Indians were living in Mexico and wanted the right to be given back the land stolen from their great grandparents. Past injustices aside, social and business interests, demographics and finite landmass preclude it. Israel has already said it will consider financial claims from displaced Palestinian families. That makes sense. The right of return makes no sense, no way, no how.

So why did Abbas make such a destructive and un-keepable promise? Because Abbas’ opponents are not in Israel but among his own electorate. And those guys vote with bullets, not ballots.

It’s crunch time for Abbas. Does he want to be Palestine’s Thomas Jefferson or Arafat-lite? He better make up his mind pretty soon. Maybe we should send him bottled water?

Quote of the Day

"Chairman Michael Powell of the FCC and his little band of commissioners -- the Blind Leading the Stupid. The Reckless Leading the Feckless. And so on. Yes, sex, violence, bad taste and bad language are problems in television, but unlike Powell, they aren't involved in making mincemeat of the First Amendment."

- TOM SHALES, in his year-end column in The Washington Post

January 3, 2005

First
You Need to Know ..
The number of people who died in the tsunami is roughly the same
as the number of Iraqis who have died as a result of the US invasion.

Now, this...
Stuck, In the Middle
With You

I am still too hung over to write anything that even pretends to resemble a thoughtful essay on pressing matters. But, I am awake enough to recognize what is annoying or just plain-ass crazy when I see it.

Crazy AND Annoying
It turns out that the Bush administration has decided that when it comes to the war on terrorism we must destroy freedom in order to protect it. The administration has been faced with mounting pressure from US courts (you know, those “activist judges”) over the continued non-judicial incarceration of terrorist suspects. One by one courts are ruling that the administration cannot suspend the U.S. constitution's due process rights just because it makes life easier for them.

In response the administration has hatched a plan to build and operate terrorist prisoner camps outside the US where detainees against whom they have little or no evidence, but lots of suspicion, can be held indefinitely, even for life, without trail. These “camps” would be built in Afghanistan. Saudi Arabia and Yemen.

How terribly American of you Mr. Bush. Is this one of the “traditional American values” you talk so much about? If so I must have been sick the day in school they covered that part of our history.

Maybe this one of your signs that “democracy is on the march around the world?” Is this how you plan to mentor repressive nations in the Middle East towards the “rule of law,” by building U.S.-run concentration camps on their soil? “Do as we say, not as we do,” is that your democracy marching chant?


Imprisonment without representation, without trial, without the right to confront your accusers, is just about as un-frigging-American as it gets, George. If you get to do this can summary executions be far behind? I know you don’t read much, George, but please, curl up one night soon with our Bill of Rights. You will find it a revelation.


(PS: By the way, you might want to take a flashlight to bed and read them under the covers after Karl Rove goes to sleep – you know, so he does not roll over and catch you.)


Speaking of Annoying
There is nothing quite as intoxicating as victory. And House Republicans are drunk as skunks on the stuff right now. Sweeping the November elections has handed them control of both the Executive and Legislative branches of government and they are so close to it they can taste control of the judiciary as well.

Of course, as in all coups, some laws had to be broken along the way to victory, and now its time to reward and protect those who took the risks. Chief among lawbreaking GOP patriots is House Majority Leader, Tom Delay of Texas. It seems a Texas prosecutor is hot on DeLay’s tail and close to indicting him for gross violations of the state’s campaign finance laws. The problem is that current House rules would not allow DeLay to continue to serve if indicted. So what to do? Change the rules, of course.

In the aftermath of ethics rebukes of their popular but controversial majority leader, Tom DeLay of Texas, House Republicans today are expected to consider rule changes that would make it harder to bring ethics complaints against lawmakers. One proposal would require that a majority of House ethics committee members approve any investigation of a House member. Currently, an inquiry can move ahead even if the ethics committee, which has five Republicans and five Democrats, is deadlocked. Another proposal, its critics argue, would make it more difficult to enforce ethics rules unless the improper conduct is clearly spelled out in the rules.

Do we see a pattern here? Me thinketh so. In the first story we have the GOP’s CEO, George Bush, changing the judicial rules for those accused of terrorism when there is not enough evidence to prosecute them under current US laws. And, in Congress we see the GOP’s junior executives changing the rules when there IS enough evidence to prosecute one of their members under current US law.

I know it’s trite. I know it’s a cliché and invoking it surely diminishes me. But when I read this kind of stuff in my morning paper I feel like one of the barnyard animals in Orwell reading the daily piggy rule changes on the barn wall.

I’d make a break for the borders but I was raised in California and it’s just too damn cold in Canada. And going south has it’s own disadvantages. The Mexicans don’t cotton much to illegal immigrants and refuse to change all their signs into English or give me a driver’s license if I sneak into their country.


So I’m stuck - here - in the middle with you -- fools to the left of me, clowns to the right.

December 31, 2004

Predictions
2005 & Beyond

The New Year is upon us and I feel moved to make predictions. Move over Nostradamus, there’s a new kid in town.

DISCLAIMER: My past performance as a prognosticator is no measure of future performance -- for which we can all be thankful. DO NOT use any of the following predictions as guidance for personal investing – (unless you would like to purchase my Global Crossing, WorldCom and Enron shares. )

Okay, now on to predictin’

THE MIDDLE EAST
Let’s start with Saudi Arabia, because that’s where a lot of the trouble will start. The Saudi “Royal” Family will not survive Bush’s second term. If they don’t leave peacefully, they will leave piece-fully.

They will be replaced by a coalition of conservative Islamic clerics who will serve behind a cadre of compliant/intimidated civil bureaucrats. Leaders of radical Islamic groups currently working to overthrow the Royal family will be given posts in the nation’s defense, police and intelligence agencies.

What Saudi Arabia’s new owners will not do is cut off the West’s oil supply. They know we are hooked on the stuff and would probably attack them if we withheld the oil from the markets. Instead sell us all we want and use our own money to build towards their dream of a Middle East free of Western influences. (Lenin once noted, “When we hang the capitalists they will sell us the rope.”)

The desert kingdom’s vast oil revenues will be redistributed. Hundreds of millions of dollars a year will flow into public works, services and charities in order to build public support for the new regime. Millions more will be used to buy political support from tribal leaders and Saudi companies.

With funding and support from Saudi Arabia flowing to insurgents in Iraq, Bush can kiss his vision of a “free and democratic Iraq” goodbye. Saudi petro dollars will also be used to invigorate terrorist/insurgent activities in Afghanistan and to destabilize western-friendly Arab countries like Egypt and Jordan.

Of most concern is Pakistan. As this well-financed radical Saudi juggernaut gets rolling it will not take more than one warning phone call to Pakistan’s adroit leader, General-President, Pervez Musharraf, to get him to change sides – again. Overnight the world will have the first nuclear-armed radical Muslim state on its hands. India will not be amused. Just how worried India becomes will determine whether or not the world also sees its first use of nuclear weapons since 1945.

Once Pakistan jumps back to the Axis of Evil camp, Iran will quickly reconnect with its Pakistani nuclear mentor, Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan and rush work to finish its own nuclear weapons.

Syria will be emboldened by all this and will demand Israel return the Golan Heights – now! With Iran now outfitted with both nuclear weapons and missiles that can reach Israel we will see a Middle Eastern version of the Cuban Missile Crisis develop. It's be white-knuckle time all around once again as each side refuses to back down. How will it end? Well, considering that almost everyone who lives in that part of the world is certifiably crazy… , you do the math.


EUROPE
The French may be annoying – (okay, the French ARE annoying.) But, they have also been right when deciding where and how to get mixed up in Bush’s ill-defined war on terrorism. Jumping into the tar pit Iraq was not the French’s idea of a successful strategy. Instead the French are working within the European Union to create a second world superpower.

While the US wastes its blood and treasure on a war that cannot be won in Iraq, the Europeans are making hay. With US budget deficits soaring the dollar becomes weaker by the day and the Euro stronger and stronger. Steadily the long-held dream of a United States of Europe is taking form. And, just as the US grew by adding states over time, so too is the EU. Turkey – a Muslim country – is in line for membership and a host of former Eastern Block nations are filling out the forms for membership.

By the end of Bush’s second term the EU will emerge as the superpower with a voice of reason. At the UN the unified EU will increasingly vote as a block. That will only further infuriate the knuckle-dragging US Neocons who will demand the US quit the UN.

THE UNITED STATES
Here at home it will be four years of chickens coming home to roost. Big-ass chickens. Mean-ass chickens. Hungry chickens.

Thanks to Bush’s numbskull supply side economic theories, tax cuts targeted at big business and the rich will not have trickled down to create jobs and prosperity for the rest of us. Instead mounting deficits due to reduced tax revenues will boost interest rates and increased government borrowing that will in turn starve capital markets of the very kind of private investments that do create jobs.

If you lived through Carter presidency the term “stagflation” will send shivers up your spine. Stagflation happens when, despite a flat and sluggish business climate, inflation ignites and prices begin an upward spiral. Raw material prices will soar, driven by demand from a more prosperous and rapidly growing Asia and E.U. Oil, coal, steel, copper, tin, you name it. If you can make something out of it or burn it to produce power, demand will drive the price up – even for us, despite our own slow economic growth.

It’s an economists’ worst nightmare because once this process begins it takes on a life of its own and none of the Federal Reserve’s traditional tricks work any longer. As prices go up people start to buy stuff, even stuff they don’t need, simply because they know it will cost more later when they might need it. That, in turn, drives prices higher yet.

People and businesses begin to stockpile stuff. Such overhanging stockpiles later become a hindrance on any attempt at stopping the slide in business activity. After all, what widget maker is about to hire workers to make more widgets if they know millions of widgets are stockpiled already and that those widgets will be dumped on the market the minute the widget shortage ends?

SOCIAL SECURITY
You will hear a lot of talk about out of the Neocons during the first year of Bush’s second term about how Social Security is in crisis and MUST be fixed. When you hear them say that you need to remember the following phrase form the Bush first term:

“Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction.”

You get the point? They were lying then and they will be lying again to convince you Social Security is in crisis. The current trust fund can support all retiree needs at current levels through 2052. After that, if nothing changes, Social Security would still be able to fund 82% of its commitments. Is that a crisis? If so then the entire US government is in crisis right now since at current tax and spending levels we can only fund 70% of our annual budgetary needs. We borrow the rest.

So, if the Neocons wanted to fix something they could fix that first, one would think. But that’s not what they are up to. What they want to do is trim back all federal programs they believe are socialistic. The biggest would be Social Security, followed by Medicare. That’s what they are up to and, though they will not get what they want in one bill they will begin the process of chipping away at those two programs until they provide so little in benefits and coverage people are eventually forced into the uncaring arms of the private sector.

DEMOCRATS
Democrats will spend the first two years of the Bush second term in a tug of war between Democrats on the right and Democrats on the left. So-called “moderate” democrats have been playing political Monopoly for so long they have have become tacticians only and have long forgotten the principles and values that made a Democrat a Democrat. Joe Liberman is the worst example of that.

After they lose more seats in the midterm elections the leftwing of the party will finally mount a purge of the corrupt and valueless moderates and begin channeling party money and decision making towards state and grassroots organizations. The party will return to its roots focusing on assuring a living wage for working families, basic healthcare for everyone and affordable drugs and secure retirement for the elderly. And not a moment too soon.

EVANGELICALS
The evangelicals are on a holy roll. They like to remind us that fundamentalist Christians founded this country. What they choose to ignore is that the Puritans did not come to to America voluntarily. They were kicked out of Europe because they were getting up everyone's noses all the time. People just get tired of other people telling them what they can and can't do all the time, so they got 86'd. Of course the evangelicals have framed that exodus as a flight from “persecution,” because nothing fires up a religious nut more than the notion that sinners are out to get them. In reality it is a condition they create themselves – but it takes a while.

History will repeat itself here now, because there is no pleasing these people. No matter how many concessions a society makes to one fundamentalist there are ten behind him who are even holier. Bit by bit every aspect of secular life becomes a matter of religious concern; how your kid dresses, what foods you eat, how you eat it and when you eat it. Do you pray once a day, or five times a day? Do you drink liquor? Dance? Swear? Scratch your ass with your left or right hand? There’s no end to religious obsession. And concessions only feed that fire.

Evangelicals are relentless in their religious values engineering. Sooner or later, everyone will realize that granting them one concession only leads to a dozen more – like paying ransom to blackmailers. When it reaches this point everyone's ox is getting gored in one way or another and society cuts the holy reformers off -- or as they will describe it, begin "persecuting" them -- again.

But I fear we are at the earliest stages of the process. We have a long way to go before those who describe themselves as “values voters,” figure out what happens when you mix religious beliefs/superstitions with politics.

So, buckle up. Abortion, prayer in school, gay marriage, teaching sex and evolution in schools.. it's all up for grabs over the next four years. And, we will lose some of these battles, at least in part. Leading Dems are already considering softening their position on a woman’s right to choose an abortion. They are figuring that selling a few poor women down the river of political expediency is a price worth paying for getting reelected.

So, we have way to go before secularism stops meaning Satanism to Red State voters.

Footnote: Speaking of Satanism, did you know that 1.2 million Americans describe themselves as worshipers of Satan? Evangelicals don’t seem to understand that once you let religion into public schools it means all religions.. even Satanism. It will come as a shock to them when it happens.. and it will. At that point they will become born again secularists, at least when it comes to prayer in public schools.

TERRORISM (and a million other things that can kill you)
Over 125,000 humans died in single natural disaster this week in Southeast Asia, Another 35,000 will die in auto accidents just in the US this year. Breast, lung and other cancers will claim millions more. Shit happens - and that includes terrorist attacks. Deal with it and stop over-reacting to it. Chasing terrorists into the briar patch is just what they want. Homeland security is fine. Do as much as you can to protect against the obvious threats and go on with life. Because no matter how right we get it, none of us is getting out of this alive anyway.


Those are my predictions for the Bush second term. If they all prove right it will be a first for me and I will move on to bending spoons, levitating, and discovering images of the Virgin Mary on every imaginable earthly object.

Oh yeah,
Happy New Year

Readers can predict too... and do. Read their predictions HERE

December 20, 2004

As a journalist I am used to criticism. Some is deserved, some not. But, any reporter soon learns that criticism comes with the territory. No matter how good a job you do getting a story right, you know you are going to piss someone, somewhere off for some reason, real or imagined. So, reporters get used to it.

Maybe too used to it. And, nowhere will you find this more so than among the White House Press Corps. They are always getting bashed from the right and the left complaining they are too hard or too easy on the administration in power. In reality they are neither, and they are both. Above all, they are too comfortable. Let me explain.

Among the White House Press Corps we have a group of reporters who have reached the pinnacle of their profession. Covering the White House is the most important beat they will ever have. And the professional stakes just don’t get any higher. Screw up on this beat and you are toast – back to covering PTA meetings, or worse.

White House handlers know that and use that fear to remind anyone who rocks the boat that there’s a price to pay. A friend of mine who covered the Papa Bush White said he was punished for weeks after crossing the line by writing a story critical of the administration at a particularly sensitive time. The next day he found he was no longer getting the usual heads up on newsworthy events and meetings. And, while his colleagues got juicy background briefings on important developments, he was not invited. Suddenly, a job that was easy got hard. He missed some stories and even the ones he got lacked the depth and quotes others had. His editors were not pleased.

That’s how it works. They don’t kill you with poison or bullets, but with neglect. You are ignored to death.

Does it work? You betchya it works.

Just look at how well behaved the WH Press Corps was at today’s Presidential press conference? Bush has a new press conference rule – no follow up questions. Reporters are told they can ask just one question, no follow-ups. This allows the President to reel off his boilerplate position on an issue and move on to the next reporter, unchallenged. Never mind how nonsensical his answer might have been, or that it might contradict earlier positions – no follow up. Now, you might think that there would be at least one old fashioned, maverick reporter in the crowd who would break that rule in the face of such Orwellian crapola.

Nope. Not one.

"Good reporters.. Sit. Stay. Good reporters… here’s a treat. Barney, show them the Christmas decorations..."

Fear is not the only factor dumbing down the WHPC. There is one other. The men and women who make up this group of journalists are the quintessential media insiders. On paper they appear to be competitors. But where rubber hits the road each day they are co-workers and friends. They each got where they are by working long hours on dull stories for what – a ten-foot cubicle in a grimy, noisy newsroom. Now at the White House these reporters have become one big emotional/professional support group in which they share one key goal – to never (NEVER) have to return to that world.

So, good old-fashioned cutthroat, get-the-story-first-at-any-cost competition has been replaced by something far tamer and, for us on the outside, less illuminating. These reporters respect and empathize with each other. They meet around the water cooler, they go out together for coffee, dinners, parties. The lucky ones get to dish political gossip for a few extra bucks on the cable talk shows. And once a year they get into tuxedos and gowns for the annual White House press dinner where they congratulate one another for the wonderful job they do, mug at the cameras like movie stars and yuk it up as the President delivers scripted jokes poking fun at them.

It’s quite the life.

So, how do we get a White House press corps that cares more about ferreting out what an administration wants to keep secret, than staying in this cozy, high profile job? There is only one way -- treat the White House beat the same way they nuclear workers treat working in a hot zone – when their radiation badges turn red it’s time to leave.

In the case of the White House media outlets should rotate reporters out of that hot zone every 13 months.

Why 13 months?
The argument they use now for keeping reporters on that beat is that it takes time to they learn the lay of the land and develop inside sources. Well, as for learning the lay of the land, unless the reporter has a learning disability, that shouldn’t take more than a month. So I propose that each departing reporter spend a month showing the new guy or gal the lay of the land before leaving.

As for needing time to “develop White House sources,” whose kidding whom? There are only a handful of people in any administration – and especially this one – authorized to talk, on or off the record, with reporters. The quickest way to lose a White House job is to get caught talking to a reporter out of school. Those who are authorized to talk to reporters are not sources… they are political PR people. And, over time, they become friends with the reporters they like. Even when friendships do not bloom White House reporters get to see just what grueling jobs White House staffers have and develop a degree of sympathy for them.

So 13-months in, then out. Such a rule would solve most of the problems noted above and provide an added benefit; it would also give young, eager, hungry reporters a crack at making a name for themselves. If they screw up, they would still be toast, but chances are such reporters would hit pay dirt more often than not. My best reporting was done when I was young and had nothing to lose. The older I got, the more cautious I got. It’s human nature.

Memo to Major Media: When it comes to your White House correspondents do what any farmer knows must be done to get the most out of your herd:

Turn your fat hogs out and let the lean hogs in.


Same Goes Here
Pentagon and State Department reporters should probably also have a 13-month rule as well. Reporters at both those departments also become too entrenched and too chummy with the people they are supposed to be watching for us. Rumsfeld has gotten away with murder – literally and figuratively – as the Pentagon press corps has twiddled.

I listened to President this morning answering a question about Rummy and he said something about how he knew Rummy’s heart and saw how misty-eyed he got when he talked about our young kids (none related in any way to either Rummy or Bush) getting killed in Iraq. Well, not misty-eyed enough to hand-sign letters of condolence to their parents. He left that to a machine. Rummy, it would seem, was just too busy to hand-sign five or ten letters a day to the parents of kids (none of whom are related in anyway to Rummy or Bush – but I repeat myself) who died for his mistakes in Iraq.

Here's the deal with that: When your decisions result in the death of hundreds, even thousands, of people everyday, you either learn not to give shit, or you go mad. Kissinger, McNamara, Stalin.. they didn't sign condolence letters either.. because they didn't give a shit either.

Class Warfare: Housing Front
Working Americans, many who must rely on a full-time job earning the federal minimum wage, increasingly cannot afford the rent and utilities on a one- or two-bedroom apartment in many American cities or large towns. A report released today by a private housing group reported that to afford a two-bedroom rental the typical worker must earn at least $15.37 an hour — nearly three times the federal minimum wage. In only four of the nation's 3,066 counties could a full-time worker making the federal minimum wage afford a typical one-bedroom apartment.

At the other end of the income scale life is only getting sweeter.. and bigger. Bill and Melinda Gates are not having any trouble with housing costs. The Gates $97 million waterfront home outside Seattle features an artificial stream that runs through the property and into the pool.

Credit Card Crack
I have been warning for some time now that the so-called “Bush recovery” is nothing more than a credit generated mirage. That consumers have been keeping the economy from tanking by milking equity from their homes and/or running up unsustainable credit card debt.

So here we are on the eve of Christmas and those consumers are out shooting up one last line of credit crack. The total amount of credit card debt was just over $600 billion five years ago. Today it stands at $800 billion, according to the Federal Reserve.

As credit card balances rise – the average household now with $16,000 in such debt – so too have minimum monthly payments. And, with interest rates going up, payments will get only larger after the holidays. Already 10 percent of those with credit cards say they have missed making their minimum payment during the past six months. Economists say more would be missing payments except that they have figured out how to create their own credit Ponzi by using different cards to cover late payments on other cards, a process that requires them getting more and more new credit cards. (You’ve heard all about “Democracy on the March,” Well, this is “Bankruptcy on the March.”)

The highest levels of stress from debts are concentrated among those who have already reached their credit card limit, those who are unmarried and have children, those without jobs and minorities.

The Fed study showed that those with the lowest levels of stress from debt were Republicans, married people, college graduates and people between age 30 and 49.

December 18, 2004

Stupid Is As Stupid Does

This morning President Bush signed the intelligence reform bill into law. It was the kind of ceremony bureaucrats live for. When I watch these kind of dog and pony show ceremonies it always congers up the image of Mel Brooks as the old west governor in the movie, “Blazing Saddles,” as he signed anything put in front of him by his aides chanting, “work, work, work, work…we gotta do something to keep our phony-baloney jobs.”

And so it was this morning as the President signed a phony-baloney bill he assures us will provide America with phony-baloney security against very real terrorists.

Why do I say it’s phony? Because, at the very moment Bush was creating a new law his administration was blocking the release of a report that really could make a difference.

As Thomas Friedman reported in a recent column, the Bushites are blocking the release of the third in a series of United Nation’s sponsored reports on reform in the Arab world. The first two reports, produced by a group of courageous Arab economists, social scientists, scholars and Arab economists and sociologists, was devastating in their criticism of the backward, undemocratic, repressive, religiously intolerant Arab regimes that currently dominate the Arab world.

So, one would think that this next report, due out last month, would have been eagerly awaited and encouraged by the Bush folks. After all, at every opportunity Bush will wax inelegantly on the importance of democratizing the Arab world. The invasion of Iraq and our ongoing occupation of that country are now framed entirely in those terms.

The third U.N. analysis deals directly with the issue of democracy and even tackles the thorny issue of blending Islam and democracy. But the Bushites refuse to let the U.N. release this report. Why? Because there are ten pages in the forward critical of US policies in Iraq and Palestine. The report cannot be released, the Bushites demand, until those offending pages are removed.

So let’s see if I get this straight. When the U.N. refuses to "say it like it is" in cases such as the Sudan, the Bushites claim the U.N. is shirking its responsibilities and caving into special interests. But when the U.N. does try to say it like it is – as in this case – the US insists the U.N. shirk its responsibilities and cave into the U.N.’s biggest special interest.

If democratizing the Arab world is really this administration’s goal then they should get the hell out of the way and let these “good Arabs” – the ones who really do want democracy and economic development in their part of the world – release their third report.

It boggles the mind unless you understand that, just as their Clear Skies Imitative has nothing to do with clearing the skies, and Leave No Child Behind imitative does nothing but leave children behind, their stated desire to spread democracy to the Middle East has nothing to do with spreading democracy to the Middle East. In fact this administration’s policies on the Middle East are the same as every administration preceding them – maintain just enough stability in that region so as not to jeopardize the flow of oil from the region.

Need fresh proof? How about those massive pro-democracy demonstrations in Saudi Arabia yesterday? Oh, you missed them. So did the demonstrators. Because the repressive Saudi police state swept in and arrested every person who showed up to join the march. Instead of marching for democracy they were marched off to jail and a good rubber hosing.

What did the White House have to say about that? Nada. Zippo. Nothing. If the ruling clerics in neighboring Iran had pulled a stunt like that the White House spin misters would have been on FOX suggesting it was time for regime change in Iran now too. But not a whisper. As for the Saudis themselves? The demonstrators were not pro-democracy forces at all, the silk robed ones claims, they were Bin Laden-inspired terrorists.

``This is an Islamic country which does not permit protests. There is no need for it,'' said a middle-aged Saudi man outside a Riyadh mosque. ``Everything is provided for these people. They are just outlaws with strange ideology. We do not agree with them.''

Is that the sound of "democracy on the march" to you?

The Bushites are not on the Saudi’s backs about it because their biggest fear right now is that the Saudi Royal Family will lose control over their own people and all hell will break loose.

Well, NEWS FLASH FOR UN-CURIOUS GEORGE: The Saudi Royal Family IS losing control over their people and all hell IS breaking loose. Continuing to support these corrupt, self-indulgent, pretend princes, will only delay the inevitable by a few more months. What it will do though is assure that when the Royal Family members are being chased through the streets and strung up on lampposts the U.S. will once again be on the wrong side of Arab public sentiment.

The U.S. got sideways with the Arab street originally because we backed repressive regimes in their countries because it suited our own interests to do so. After half a century of that, guess what, some of them came to hate us. What a surprise. “Gee… what did we do to deserve that?” was the question asked by too many people after 9/11.

Of course there is no excuse for killing innocent people and I do not mean to “blame the victim” here. But, when we are looking for solutions – real solutions – to mounting anger directed at us from the Middle East, just signing a new intelligence bill into law ain’t gonna do it. Not even close.

The real solutions to stemming the tide of Middle Eastern terrorism lay within the pages of that U.N. report the Luddites in the Bush administration are blocking. Stupid is as stupid does.

Class Warfare Sighting
I like to keep an eye open for whenever some of those Bush tax cuts trickle down out of the bank accounts of their wealthiest recipients. Well it seems that Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire CEO of News Corp., finally decided how to spend his Bush Bucks. Rupert is buying a three-story penthouse in New York. The price: $44 million.

The joint used to be owned by Larry Rockefeller. The 20-room apartment spans the 14th, 15th and 16th floors of the building. It has 8,000 square feet of floor space and spacious terraces on each floor. The monthly maintenance fee alone is $21,469.07.

Of course, there are restrictions. Owners are not allowed to have cars up on blocks in the yard or hang laundry outside their windows.

I read that story then opened my email to read the following from a reader about my piece yesterday on Social Security reform:

“As a pizza man making $9.00 hour, I would like to thank-you for your defense of Social Security. Keep up the good work.

Dave Goldberg

Well Dave, you can bet Murdoch is all for Bush’s Social Security privatization idea. Not that he has to worry about his retirement. Which of course is why he’s all for it.

Two Americas indeed. Rupert and George live in one, Dave and a growing number of the rest of us, in the other.

More Other America News
Rupert and other Bush tax cut recipients not only do not have to worry about housing costs but health costs either. But the rest of us sure do. And, as the failed Bush presidency begins its second term in office, things only get worse. Now companies are requiring retirees, already on fixed incomes, to pay a larger and larger share of premiums and other health costs. The trend-line says to anyone paying attention that they will eventually they will cut them off entirely.

"Prospects for retiree health coverage are slowly disappearing for America's workers, and retirees who have it will be paying more," said Drew E. Altman, the president of the Kaiser Family Foundation, which conducted the study with Hewitt, a benefits consulting firm. Asked about Mr. Altman's assessment, Kate Sullivan Hare, executive director of health care policy at the United States Chamber of Commerce, said: "That's absolutely true. I can't disagree." The chamber represents businesses of all sizes.

For a typical worker 65 or older who retired this year, the annual premium for health benefits was $1,212, a 24 percent jump from 2003. According to a Kaiser study, back in 1988 two-thirds of all employers provided their retirees health coverage. Today only a third do.

The message to workers: Die young or stay well. Anything in between and you are screwed.

Army of the Bribed
As enlistment in the National Guard drops like a rock, the administration is laying out cold hard cash to lure fresh young blood to fill the dwindling Guard ranks.

“Pssst.. hey, kid… out of work? Tired of flipping burgers at McDonald’s? Want to buy your girlfriend a nice engagement ring? Well, here’s a check .. made out to you.. for 15,000 buckaroos.. All you have to do is sign here and it’s yours. Who knows, you might even live to spend it.”

• $15,000 for new Guard recruits who have served in the military, triple the previous figure.
• $15,000 for Guard soldiers who will re-enlist for six years, also three times the previous amount.
• $10,000 bonus for recruits who have never served in the military, up from $6,000 and now the largest bonus the Guard has offered such recruits.

"These are big incentives. We're putting our money where our mouth is," said a National Guard recruiter.

About 40% of the 148,000 U.S. troops in Iraq are Guard and reserve soldiers."

But it may take more than big buck bribes to get even poor kids to bite. Especially when the ones who have already been to Iraq are willing doing almost anything not to return. It was reported yesterday that a 23-year old Philadelphia Army combat veteran on leave from a unit headed back to Iraq had a buddy shoot him in the leg to avoid returning to the war zone.

In my mind I hear a low sorrowful moan emanating from Vietnam Memorial Wall when I read stories like that.

December 16, 2004

The Shoot Ducks, Don't They?

Social Security – Republicans never liked it, but they were never in a position to do anything about it, until now. Even when it was passed into law, a time when the nation was in deep depression, millions of Americans were standing in breadlines, beggars in tattered Brooks Bros suits panhandling on city streets, even then Republicans didn't like it. Social Security was not a safety net they said, it was socialism. Government had no business taking care of people. Government’s only job was to defend the country and maintain social order. Taking care of the poor and unfortunate, Republicans huffed, was a job for churches and charities, not government.

Of course, that was before George W. Bush introduced “compassionate conservatism.” What is it? Well, you can think of compassionate conservatism as a kind of political duck blind -- a way to avoid scaring the ducks off -- until it’s too late.

The duck hunters are gathering today for day-two of the President’s two-day choreographed economic conference. It was billed as a “dialog on the economy,” but it was really just a monolog. Old Soviet politicians would have been swept into fits of nostalgia watching yesterday’s proceedings. Speaker after speaker lauded the administration’s tax cuts and plans to privatize social security. Not a single opponent spoke because none were asked to speak. All that was missing yesterday were the little red cards Soviet legislators used to raise in machine-like unison when it came time to vote the straight party line.

Here's what's really going on. After nearly three quarters of a century Republicans have finally snuck into positions where they can begin a stealthy dismantling FDR's Social Security. It begins with Bush’s partial privatization, but it will not end there. Diverting a portion of worker’s Social Security taxes to private accounts will begin the process of starving the already stressed S.S. trust fund. Already saddled with nearly $11 trillion in unfunded liabilities, bleeding another $2 trillion (the cost of private accounts) will only weaken it further -- and that’s the whole idea.

Since Bush has already pissed away the Clinton $5.6 trillion surplus, we will have to borrow the $2 trillion. That will add to the deficit. Understand the deficit is plays a key role in all this. Think of the deficit as a ravenous tumor. As it spreads throughout the economy the deficit will eventually force yet another reappraisal of both Social Security and Medicare. Both programs will be deemed far too expensive for a nation mired in debt, debt that by that time will have re-ignited inflation and ruinously high interest rates. At that point the now free-borrowing, free-spending Republicans will suddenly become deficit hawks. The country is broke, in debt up to our eyeballs. Cuts in government spending will the required.

And, that’s right where the neo-cons want us, with a national treasury so short of funds that all government can afford are only the handful of things they believe government should pay for. Social programs, they says, will be taken care of by the private sector as more and more government operations are privatized. Faith-based charities, they assure us, will fill the gaps by taking care of the elderly and poor.

And if you believe that... I guess you livc in a red state. The most charitable thing I can say about that theory is that it is a gamble. Not a gamble for the wealthy but the other 95% of Americans.

And, an unnecessary gamble. Despite what the Bushites claim, there is an easier, quicker and safer way to fix Social Security – simply do not make permanent the tax cuts on the top 1% of earners. That would do it. But he won’t for the very reason it would fix Social Security, and fix it is not the real goal here.

That is not to say that he will have an easy or risk-free job in this regard. Social Security remains the third rail of politics and, with the Baby Boomers out here, (myself included) representing a large and dangerous voting block, Republicans knolw they have to treat the dismantling of Social Security like defusing a bomb -- one sloppy move and it could all blow up in their faces.

That’s why we heard Bush “quip” yesterday that he was not going to send any specific proposals to The Hill, "We don't want to negotiate with ourselves," Bush said, “we want to dialog with Congress on ways to do this.”

Though delivered with a smirk and a chuckle, the sentences was pregnant with meaning to those who can translate it:

Translation: We know that this will inflict real pain on real people – benefit cuts, high retirement ages, etc - so we want those proposals to come out of the legislative sausage machine, not the White House. That way we can pretend to oppose them then “reluctantly” accept them as part of a large reform package that voters cannot figure out no matter how hard they try. That worked on Medicare reform so that’s what we want to do this time too.

So, the idea is to slowly strangle Social Security and Medicare as we know them, without leaving fingerprints on the bodies.

Does all that sound just too Machiavellian for you? Could Karl Rove and fellow neo-cons really be that skilled, sneaky, stealthy, cunning?

Hmmm. I wonder. Let me think…… WMD……. Dems snookered into voting for the tax cuts…. Dems snookered into voting for Iraq War…… Dems snookered into voting for No Child Left Behind…… Dems loose Nov election…..

Yep fellow ducks, they sure as hell are.


Ready Shoot, Aim
Is it just me or do I see a pattern here?

First we attack Iraq before weapons inspectors are done inspecting. Then we send troops into war before they are properly equipped. And now we are deploying a so-called missile defense system that does not work. Remember SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative, AKA “Star Wars?”) Reagan dreamed it up and over the past twenty years or so we have dumped billions of dollars into it. The program slowed during the Clinton years but GW Bush revived it, ordering that, ready or not, we would start deploying anti-ballistic missile missiles this year. And, so we did. Several are already all fueled up and in their silos somewhere in Alaska. By deploying the anti-missile missiles Bush hopes to make the crazy little bastard who runs North Korea think twice before launching a nuclear-tipped missile in our direction.

Well it turns out Weird Leader (N.Korea's, not ours) won’t have to think twice. In fact he may not have to think about it all. Because yet another test of the interceptor missile failed – big time – yesterday.

While many earlier tests at least flew but failed to hit their targets, this one did not even get off the ground. Like an old Chevy pickup on a winter morning, the thing wouldn’t start when they turned the key. GRRRRRRRRrrrr….. GRRRRRRRRrrrr……. The only glow at that launch pad was from the red faces of the generals and defense contractors standing around staring blankly at their shinny, 100 foot tall, $85 million lawn ornament.

Yesterday’s test was the first full test of the system in nearly two years. So many of the earlier tests had embarassed the program's supporters they stopped testing. The Missile Defense Agency attempted to test the new/improved system several times this month, but scrubbed each one for a variety of reasons.

But never mind that the system can’t hit incoming missiles, or even get off the ground sometimes… Bush continues deploying them.

White House to Fearless Leader Kim: “If you are planning to toss a nuclear missile our way could you call first?”

Updates:

Remember the soldier who asked Rummy why his unit heading for Iraq had to dig around in the Kuwaiti trash to find steel to bold to the Humvees? Well guess what. After that embarrassing little moment the unit’s entire fleet of Humvees were fitted with armor within 24 hours.

But before you rejoice for the soliders hear this. Humvees were never designed to carry all the weight the armor adds. Therefore they are breaking down in record numbers. Axles, drivetrains and suspension system are simly collapsing under the added weight. During a normal year the military sends 300 Humvees to the factory for major overhauls. Right now there are over 8700 Humvees on the list for rebuilds. So, while the Pentagon just authorized another $4 billion to armor up vehicles in Iraq, that will be just the beginning.

It would be cheaper to just melt them all down and use the metal to build a whole new fleet of vehicles.

On the Twin Watch -- Jenna Bush announced yesterday that she’s getting a job. She will teach at a Washington, D.C. charter school. No need for armor there. That leaves just one Bush daughter to decide if she will support her father’s war by joining the Army and fighting for her country. So far 150,000 other people’s kids have, 1200 of whom died for their dad. Wonder what sister Barbara will do. Stay tuned.

.

December 15, 2004

Whenever a Democrat even mentions the growing gap between top-tier earners and working stiffs, Republicans slap them down with the charge that they are trying to sow resentment and engaging in “class warfare.”

Well, there has indeed been a class war raging. The only trouble is the Dems didn’t show up for the battles.

Remember when the Bushites scoffed at the idea that the President’s nearly $2 trillion in tax cuts would largely benefit the rich while providing crumbs for the rest of us? A lot of Dems not only did not fight back but also defected to the other side, voting for those tax cuts. I remember almost three years ago talking to people in Dashcle’s office trying to convince them after the tax cuts passed to try to roll them back. I was told then, in essence, to shut up and go away. They said they couldn't do that because many of their own people had voted for them.

But the Bushite troops reported for duty on The Hill, and fought. They declared that since the rich pay more in taxes they deserve more in tax cuts and that anyone who said otherwise was just trying to appeal to petty jealousy of the rich and were just pathetic class warfare inciters. And, they asured us there would be a payback. They said the rich would not just hoard their tax savings, but reinvest them, creating jobs for the rest of us. Right?

Well, not exactly. Jobs remain scarce and wages low. But those tax savings have shown up – in the form of lifestyle excess only a Pharaoh could appreciate.

According to the Wall Street Journal the super yacht business is booming. Rich boaters are engaged in a “mine is bigger than yours’ race to see who can buy or build the biggest and most ostentatious floating castle. Boaters once satisfied with a 150-footer are now racing to build 250 and 300 footers. So far Microsoft co-founder, Paul Allen, is winning. He replaced his old 350 footer with a shiny new 414-foot mega yacht. The boat carries its own 75-foot sailboat tucked away in the cargo hold has two helicopter pads and its own submarine. His tax dollars at work.

Mega yachts are not the only doodads the Bush-bucks are funding. Orders are way up for super cars too. The Maybach (German built) ultra-luxury sedan goes for $450,000. Nevertheless the company says it cannot keep up with orders. Bugatti is introducing a $1 million carriage this year and the orders are pouring in. And no, Bugatti’s are not made in Detroit. But Italy. (By the way, how is your heap running?)

Rolex is selling its $200,000 watches as fast as they can make them and will introduce a million dollar version next year.

And when was the last time you stayed at a Five Star hotel? (Okay, walked by one without getting arrested?) Well five stars are not enough for the newly flush wealthy. All those extra Bush Bucks have sparked star inflation. Plush hotels are adding a sixth star level for the super-picky super-rich. A night’s stay average’s a cool grand. Nevertheless the mangers of these Six Star mangers report 80% occupancy year round. For all that money guests get a room the size of a small house, a butler (of course) and personal chefs are on call 24 hours a day.

So, that’s the picture from the winning side of the Class War. How are things going for the losers?

Not so good.

The papers today report that more and more companies are dropping pension plans that include medical benefits for retired workers. With private health insurance far too expensive for anyone living on Social Security retirees will either have to rely on the failing Medicare system or continue working for as long as they can drag their geriatric bones out of bed in the morning.

Speaking of work, competition from cheap offshore labor continues driving wages down for US workers. Middleclass Americans (soon to be former middleclass Americans) have been using credit cards and home equity to maintain lifestyles once funded by their salaries with some left over. Personal bankruptcies are up -- way up. The end is near.

The Return of Serfdom
So, there you are. There really was class warfare. The only trouble is our side was not fighting. Instead we let the Republicans snooker us again by shaming us into silence. We didn't want to look jealous or resentful of the wealthy. And we certainly did not want to appear like we were itching for class warfare. So we shut up about it. And, with us cowering in our trenches Bushites marched right in without firing a shot, pillaging our futures and the futures of our children and grand kids.

So, welcome to the 21st century version of serfdom boys and girls. Can’t find work? Well maybe you can offer to swab the deck of a nearby mega-yacht or change the satin sheets at a local Six Star hotel. Who knows, maybe there’ll be a little something left over from dinner in the kitchen the nice rich people will let you take home. (They hate leftovers.)

But no Bush-Bucks for G.I.s

Oh, and if you think the Bush tax cuts screwed you, look at what they have done to our troops in Iraq. While Gov. Arnold’s houseboys wax his 8 Hummers, our troops in Iraq are getting their asses blown up every day in poorly armored Hummers.

Why is that? Well because the government does not have the money to pay the cost of armoring up all the vehicles there that need it. It’s not, as Rummy likes to say, a matter of “physics,” but money. He assured the un-curious George that he could fight that war on the cheap, so it would be okay to blow $1.6 trillion on tax cuts.

George, say hello to reality. The war is now costing us nearly $4 billion A WEEK, with no end in sight. Next year alone the war will cost us nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars, and that’s if things get better, not worse.

And where will we get that money? Borrow it, of course.

Oh and then there are those old folks who will now have no medical insurance.. Medicare will have to be funded to make sure our city sidewalks don’t start looking like Calcutta. And of course we all know Social Security needs to be fixed too. Cost – around $2 trillion. Borrow it, of course. Borrow and spend, borrow and spend.

God forbid we should ask the Paul Allen’s of America to chip in – especially since they now have those big (European built) yachts to maintain. (Paul’s yacht costs him $10 million a year just to keep the toilets clean and the engines running.)

Class warfare indeed! They won. We lost. Simple as that folks. Better start training your kids how to survive and act in the post class warfare world.

• "Yes, ma’am, I’ll tell the chef.”
• “I’m sorry sir, it won’t happen again.”
• “You look stunning today, my lady.”

Oh, and of course the old standby in times like these:

• “Hey, buddy, can you spare a dime?”

Maybe, just maybe it’s not too late. That is of course, if the Democrats start shooting back.

Class warfare is real.

So, what say you guys and gals find your backbones and get real too? We're dying out here.

New letters from you guys out there are posted daily HERE.