On Reflections of 9-11: Why We Are In This Mess

Greg Palast is a journalist in the grand tradition of the muckrakers of old: he's not afraid to publish things that "fall into his lap" on background. Naturally, this makes him anathema to the Main Stream Media and the conservatives it panders to. So Greg is a reporter for the BBC :)

Greg's special assignment for the Beeb is to investigate and report on the Bush family. If there is anyone who knows these people more intimately than Palast, it would be Dumbya's therapist.

A couple of years ago, Palast wrote a book, "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy." In this book, Palast explores the links between the Bushes, the Saudis (including members of the bin Laden family, AND Osama himself).

I detailed some of these in an earlier post on this blog regarding Kofi Annan and his son.

Fascinating book, and I urge you all to read it.

But wait, there's more!

Last night, I was watching Free Speech TV (available on Dish Network and worth signing up for Dish alone, but also on some 140 cable systems as a local access channel), when I come across a televised documentary, originally aired on the BBC in 2003, but updated shortly before the 2004 election, by Palast, based on his book.

So I had the chance in an hour to reflect on what led up to 9-11, and why our President was clearly the wrong man to be leading this country at this precise moment.

Why? Well, for one thing, Bush's connections to the Saudis and in particular, the bin Ladens. Why were Saudis allowed to leave the US without being questioned regarding possible information in connection to 9-11? Why did these include bin Laden's own family members?

Palast talks about Bush's connections to one James R. Bath, who was the American investment manager for the bin Laden's and happens to have been in the Texas Air National Guard at the same time Dumbya was.

In fact, he was drummed out the same day as Bush.

“Bath, 55, acknowledges a friendship with George W. Bush that stems from their service together in the Texas Air National Guard.” Jonathan Beaty, “A Mysterious Mover of Money and Planes,” Time Magazine, October 28, 1991.
“In a copy of the record released by the National Guard in 2000, the man in question, James R. Bath, was listed as being suspended from flying for the National Guard in 1972 for failing to take a medical exam next to a similar listing for Mr. Bush. It has been widely reported that the two were friends and that Mr. Bath invested in Mr. Bush's first major business venture, Arbusto Energy, in the late 1970's after Mr. Bath began working for Salem bin Laden.” Jim Rutenberg, “A Film to Polarize Along Party Lines,” New York Times, May 17, 2004.

For another, how about the money he received from Saudis for his failed oil businesses?

Or how about how Harken Energy was given an exclusive drilling contract by the Bahrainian government while Bush was on the board of directors? No problem, you say, happens all the time? Harken Energy had never done off-shore drilling before in its existence, was not the low bidder and beat out such heavyweights as Sun Oil, Texaco, Exxon, and BP.

Of course, given Bush's track record in business, it was only a matter of time before Harken would go belly up. After all they bought Bush's own business, Arbusto Oil, after it went bust.

In fact, in 1990, despite lawyers' warnings not to do so, Bush sold all of his Harken shares...just before it went out of business. The SEC investigated, and while they cleared Bush of any wrongdoing, a copy of the letter from the lawyers advising him not to sell because it was a conflict of his fiduciary duty as a director, was not made available to the SEC until the day after they announced their decision.

And the payback for all this? Well...

For example, in 2003, meetings were held with the Bush and Blair administrations in which a plan was devised and actually written down to divvy up Iraq's oil fields.

So why isn't this happening? Good question. Turns out Cheney decided to intervene after Rob McKee, a former executive vice-president of ConocoPhillips, designated by the Bush Administration to advise the Iraqi oil ministry, raised serious objections about how much money the private oil companies would lose if the oil industry was privatized along the lines of how the neo-cons wanted it.

So we've been fighting, and losing, this war, our "war on terror", for the benefit of the oil companies that are making $3+ per gallon on us now.

Watch more here:

Iraq's Oil

Bush-Bin Laden

Oh! And how can we forget how Bush Stole the 2000 ELECTION!

tags technorati : Top 50

Why Your Conservative Friends Have Been Losing A LOT of Sleep...

Bush Approval Ratings Lower Than Any President Since Nixon

This is the most telling paragraph in the whole thing, and why I believe we're about to have a Democratic dynasty, where we could run a dinner plate...much like the Republicans ran in the two Bushes, and still rule the nation:

The public's view of the nation's direction has grown increasingly negative as well, with nearly two-thirds now saying the country is heading down the wrong track.

Two thirds. 66%. All Dean has to do now is start articulating a vision for America. Starting with helping the poor, again.

More bad news for conservatives....

WASHINGTON - Even before the cost of Hurricane Katrina is added to the federal ledger, a Congressional Budget Office study commissioned by Democrats predicts President Bush will fail to keep his promise to cut the deficit in half by the time he leaves office.

The study by the nonpartisan CBO assumes that Congress will heed Bush's call for new tax cuts and for making those passed in 2001 and 2003 permanent. It also assumes a big slowdown in spending on the Iraq war, tight caps on domestic agency budgets and new individual Social Security accounts.

BEFORE the costs of Katrina are added to the budget...before....but to quote further to the glaring statistic...

By 2015, the deficit would hit $640 billion under CBO's study.

That would make the budget deficit at about 6.5% of the GDP, which no nation in the Western world has ever had to contend with. Look out folks, this is going to be really nasty, and people will die from the neglect this administration has foisted upon us.

Thoughts? The pool is open....

Better Move To Canada...

Apparently, our civil liberties really are not what they once were....

A federal appeals court ruled today that the president can indefinitely detain a U.S. citizen captured on U.S. soil in the absence of criminal charges, holding that such authority is vital to protect the nation from terrorist attacks.

The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit came in the case of Jose Padilla, a former Chicago gang member who was arrested in Chicago in 2002 and designated an "enemy combatant" by President Bush. The government contends that Padilla trained at al Qaeda camps and was planning to blow up apartment buildings in the United States.


Padilla, a U.S. citizen, has been held without trial in a U.S. naval brig for more than three years, and his case triggered a legal battle with vast implications for civil liberties and the fight against terrorism.

The Fourth Circuit decision was written by Judge J. Michael Luttig. Note where he was born. Note who appointed him to the Circuit.

Guess where I'm going with this?

If Bush's approval ratings were significantly higher, I'd say this decision nails down Luttig's seat on the high bench. But Bush is crippled, and the Dems know it. This has fillibuster written all over it.

The President Has No Sense Of Shame

Where's the "shared sacrifice" that a tragedy of this magnitude, ESPECIALLY during a time of war, demands? Can't Halliburton hew to Federal law of long-standing in order rather than make a few more bucks an hour?

Bush Suspends Pay Act In Areas Hit by Storm

By Thomas B. Edsall
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 9, 2005; Page D03

President Bush yesterday suspended application of the federal law governing workers' pay on federal contracts in the Hurricane Katrina-damaged areas of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi. The action infuriated labor leaders and their Democratic supporters in Congress, who said it will lower wages and make it harder for union contractors to win bids.

The Davis-Bacon Act, passed in 1931 during the Great Depression, sets a minimum pay scale for workers on federal contracts by requiring contractors to pay the prevailing or average pay in the region. Suspension of the act will allow contractors to pay lower wages. Many Republicans have opposed Davis-Bacon, charging that it amounts to a taxpayer subsidy to unions.

AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney sharply criticized the president's suspension of the Davis-Bacon Act.

In a letter to Congress, Bush said he has the power to suspend the law because of the national emergency caused by the hurricane: "I have found that the conditions caused by Hurricane Katrina constitute a 'national emergency.' "

Bush wrote that his decision is justified because Davis-Bacon increases construction costs, and suspension "will result in greater assistance to these devastated communities and will permit the employment of thousands of additional individuals."

Nonsense. Louisiana is a "right-to-work" state, and so union wages are not out of line with the local prevailing wage.

An electrician in New Orleans would receive a wage of $22 an hour, a plumber $17 an hour, to rebuild residences.

Under this act, Bush is allowing wages of $9 an hour! Walmart pays more ($10.35 per hour) to its clerks!

Write Your Own Caption

Anybody Notice Anything Odd About This Graph?

Poverty Levels In America

It only really goes down when a Democrat is president....and spiked really high after Bush's tax cuts.

Full Course Fuck Up

Bob Harris makes an amazing discovery of the level of incompetence in the White House.

One Stop Shopping on FEMA's fuck-ups. Doesn't the buck stop with Bush on a Federal disaster screw up? (NOTE: Some of the links may be dead due to archiving. A quick Google search using the box at the bottom of this page will bring up the correct locations)

I thought we were electing the "adults" in 2000?

Oil-For-Food: Coming Soon To A Media Outlet Near You

So the Volcker Report on the UN Oil-For-Food scandal will be released soon, and in it is a pretty sticky situation for Kofi Annan

Adam Zagorin writes:

As Paul Volcker put the finishing touches last week on his final report on the U.N.'s role in the oil-for-food scandal, investigators continue to uncover details about Kojo Annan's links with Cotecna, the company at the center of the influence-peddling inquiry. In late 1998, U.N. sources say, Kojo, son of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, got a $3,000 loan from a friend for a down payment on a sporty green Mercedes ML 320 in Geneva, Switzerland. The friend was Michael Wilson, then a vice president of Cotecna, the firm that not only employed Kojo but also won millions of dollars in U.N. contracts, including one, signed within two months after the down payment was made, to monitor the oil-for-food program in Iraq. About the same time Wilson's wife bought a car from the Swiss dealer, Kojo Annan wound up paying $39,000 for his Mercedes, getting $15,000 in help from his dad plus a $6,000 "diplomatic" discount by falsely claiming that his father was the car's owner. He later shipped the vehicle to his native Ghana, again using his father's diplomatic status to avoid paying $14,000 in customs duties.

The report, from the independent committee appointed by Kofi Annan and chaired by Volcker, a former U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman, will criticize the Secretary-General's failure to stop corruption inside the oil-for-food scheme, as well as his responsibility for U.N. mismanagement, the sources tell TIME. But the report does not find that he influenced U.N. contracts in favor of Cotecna--or knew the precise details of his son's car deal. A lawyer for Kojo Annan told TIME that Kojo reimbursed Wilson, who could not be reached for comment. --By Adam Zagorin

Hm. Rich kid, powerful dad, connections to help the kid raise money from Middle Eastern oil interests that ultimately we end up declaring war on....why does this all sound familiar?

The worst part of it all is, the United States was complicit in the scandal and private companies based here benefitted from some 52% of the corruption that will be uncovered in the Volcker Report.

The report also found that individuals and companies in the United States accounted for 52% of all oil-voucher kickbacks paid to Saddam Hussein. The largest of theses recipients, Houston based Bayoil and its CEO, Bay Chalmers have been indicted by the US Department of Justice for their actions.

And yet, a $39,000 car is all Time magazine will report on...

Finally, the Rabid Right Wing Shows Up in White Sheets

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Dear Mr. President....

Dear Mr. Bush:

Any idea where all our helicopters are! ? It's Day 5 of Hurricane Katrina and thousands remain stranded in New Orleans and need to be airlifted. Where on earth could you have misplaced all our military choppers? Do you need help
finding them? I once lost my car in a Sears parking lot. Man, was that a drag.

Also, any idea where all our national guard soldiers are? We could really use them right now for the type of thing they signed up to do like helping with national disasters. How come they weren't there to begin with?

Last Thursday I was in south Florida and sat outside while the eye of Hurricane Katrina passed over my head. It was only a Category 1 then but it was pretty nasty. Eleven people died and, as of today, there were still homes without power. That night the weatherman said this storm was on its way to New Orleans. That was Thursday! Did anybody tell you? I know you didn't want to interrupt your vacation and I know how you don't like to get bad news. Plus, you had fundraisers to go to and mothers of dead soldiers to ignore and smear. You sure showed her!

I especially like how, the day after the hurricane, instead of flying to Louisiana, you flew to San Diego to party with your business peeps. Don't let people criticize you for this -- after all, the hurricane was over and what the heck could you do, put your finger in the dike?

And don't listen to those who, in the coming days, will reveal how you specifically reduced the Army Corps of Engineers' budget for New Orleans this summer for the third year in a row. You just tell them that even if you hadn't cut the money to fix those levees, there weren't going to be any Army engineers to fix them anyway because you had a much more important construction job for them -- BUILDING DEMOCRACY IN IRAQ!

On Day 3, when you finally left your vacation home, I have to say I was moved by how you had your Air Force One pilot descend from the clouds as you flew over New Orleans so you could catch a quick look of the disaster. Hey, I know you couldn't stop and grab a bullhorn and stand on some rubble and act like a commander in chief. Been there done that.

There will be those who will try to politicize this tragedy and try to use it against you. Just have your people keep pointing that out. Respond to nothing. Even those pesky scientists who predicted this would happen because the water in the Gulf of Mexico is getting hotter and hotter making a storm like this inevitable. Ignore them and all their global warming Chicken Littles. There is nothing unusual about a hurricane that was so wide it would be like having one F-4 tornado that stretched from New York to Cleveland.

No, Mr. Bush, you just stay the course. It's not your fault that 30 percent of New Orleans lives in poverty or that tens of thousands had no transportation to get out of town. C'mon, they're black! I mean, it's not like this happened to Kennebunkport. Can you imagine leaving white people on their roofs for five days? Don't make me laugh! Race has nothing -- NOTHING -- to do with this!

You hang in there, Mr. Bush. Just try to find a few of our Army helicopters and send them there. Pretend the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are near Tikrit.

Yours,

Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
www.MichaelMoore.com

P.S. That annoying mother, Cindy Sheehan, is no longer at your ranch. She and dozens of other relatives of the Iraqi War dead are now driving across the country, stopping in many cities along the way ( http://bringthemhomenowtour.org/ ). Maybe you can catch up with them before they get to DC on September 21st.

Sweet NeoCon

Today's the release date of the new Stones' album, so I thought I'd do a round up of what we've got:

A snippet of the song: http://stonesnews.com/tmp/mysweetneocon.mp3

The lyrics:

Sweet Neo Con A Bigger Bang, Rolling Stones, to be released Sept. 6 2005

You ride around your white castle,
On your little white horse
You lie to your people,
and blame it on your war of course

You call yourself a Christian,
I call you a hypocrite
You call yourself a patriot,
well I think you’re full of shit

Oh, sweet Neo Con,
What path have you led them on?
Oh, sweet Neo Con,
Is it time for the atom bomb?

You parade around in costume,
Expecting to be believed
But as the body bags stack up,
We believe we’ve been deceived

The horror you’ve unleashed,
Will backfire with more grief
When will you ever learn,
Sweet Neo Con, as the world burns?

Oh, sweet Neo Con
What path have you led them on?
Oh, sweet Neo Con,
Is it time for the atom bomb?

How come you’re so wrong?
My sweet neo-con,
where’s the money gone,
in the Pentagon.

It’s liberty for all,
democracy’s our style,
unless you are against us,
then it’s prison without trial.

Oh, sweet Neo Con,
What path have you led them on?
Oh, sweet Neo Con,
Is it time to drop the bomb?

A Live Report, OnScene....

....from Foamy the Squirrel

(tip o' the hat to Stew)

In honor of Labor Day, Where Has Your Money Gone?

What was the number one New Year's resolution in 2004?

Let's ask Dr. Elizabeth Warren of the Harvard Law School, who said last year:

WARREN: For the first time ever, overtaking "Lose weight," it was "Pay off some debt. I've got too much debt. I'm in trouble. I'm worried whether or not I can make my basic payments."

Alan Greenspan, our national economic leader, has stood up for the last four years and told Americans, "Borrow against your house. If you can't close the gap at the end of the month, just borrow against your house." Now, he never called it borrow against your house.

He said fancy things like, "Tap your home equity." Which sounds like some kind of dance, or, you know, some clever financial thing to do. But what it really was is borrow more money against your house.

And bet your house that you can continue to make all those payments. Do all that just as a way to make it to the end of the month. To put groceries on the table. To make that house payment. To keep the lights on.

That's really scary financial advice for someone to be giving American families. And what frightens me is millions of American families have taken that advice.

Why? Why has debt become such a major issue in this country well-known for it's obesity health crisis (they're related, obliquely, by the way)?

According to her book, "The Two Income Trap", Dr. Warren argues that middle American income has so drastically changed over the past thirty years, and that basic supply and demand has effectively priced Americans out of the market in terms of "socking away for a rainy day".

Real median income for men since 1970 has risen by less than one percent, while for women, almost a third . Sounds like good news, right? I mean, a second income, more money coming in for all, should be a good thing?

Well, let's take a look at that.

In 1970, that single median income ($10,478) for a family of four paid all the bills-- food, clothing, rent/mortgage, appliances, cars, entertainment-- and managed to put away 11% for a rainy day. That same income has grown by one percent in the intervening 30-odd years.

Now take the second income, the one that should be nearly doubling the median income, and it does, pretty much, get to that ballpark.

So why is it, in 2002, the median income ($62,732) of an American family of four, double income earners, two kids, couldn't even save a single dollar? What's changed?

Some conservatives point to $200 sneakers, the wide-screen TV, needing to eat out as Mom works now, and scoff at our spendthrift ways.

Trouble is, according to Dr. Warren, that's not the case.

Adjusted for inflation, clothing as a percentage of income has dropped. Food declined 44% (all those meals in restaurants are now take out from McDonald's), and appliances, including Gameboys and flat screen TVs have dropped 21% in the past 35 years.

Well, what has gone up? What has us now spending ALL of our income and adding debt on at a furious rate?

Five areas were identified by Dr. Warren. The first among these, car payments, can be explained as necessary to the commute of the second wage earner. Hardly frivolous there, is it?

Next, mortgages. As Greenspan indicates in his comments quoted earlier, more and more people are drawing deeper against the mortgages and lines of credit on their larger-than-necessary mortgages to pay for houses that are more house than needed. In roughly the past thiry years, inflation has been about 125%, cumulative. Housing prices have inflated by more than double that figure.

So if housing prices had kept in line with the rest of the economy, we'd all be living like kings. OK, so housing costs have had a major impact on why Americans owe more and save less. After all, real wages have remained basically flat to going up a third (so let's split the difference and say 20% higher), while housing costs have risen ten times that rate. Meaning people are borrowing more for housing, speculating that housing will continue to rise. Bubble, anyone?

What else?

Health insurance and hand in hand with that, health care coverage, or rather lack thereof. Things a union used to get employers to pick up the tab for.

Only 60% of Americans now get health insurance from their employer. An overwhelming percentage now pay some portion of their insurance premium. Just between 2000 and 2003, families paid 49% more in premiums. In addition, most HMO co-payments have risen, especially the prescription drug "benefit", deductibles have soared as companies seek to rein in costs, and the caps for cumulative medical coverage paid for an individual or family over the lifetime of the employee's relationship have remained frozen.

Insurance premiums now stand at 21% of the median family income (the employees paid about a third of that in payroll deductions). They are expected to rise to over 40% by the end of this decade. With a $500 deductible on average, a further 10% of family income goes towards out-of-pocket medical costs.

Another 20% are covered by government programs, (which adds to the tax burden. I'll get to that in a minute), so 20% of Americans, over 45 million, are uncovered by any insurance whatsoever.

The costs to cover those people (remember, a hospital HAS to treat anyone who walks in the doors, which means that someone picks up that cost) are added onto your insurance premium, mine, and our tax bill.

As implied above, the overall costs of medical care have skyrocketed as well, going up nearly fifty percent this decade alone.

So there's another huge bite out of your paycheck.

What else?

Taxes.

In the 1970s, corporations paid 15% of the US income tax receipts. In 2003, as Bush "made the pie higher", corporations only paid 7.4% of the US tax receipts. During the Clinton years, this rate was raised to nearly 12% after reductions during the Bush I and Reagan presidencies.

That's bad enough, but now look at what happens to personal income taxes as well as payroll taxes like Social Security and Medicare.

People, individuals like you and I, paid 10% of the US tax receipts in 1970.

Today, we pay 40%. Of a much "higher pie".

Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but our population, roughly 200 million in 1970, is not 800 million now, is it? And in fact, the baby boomers are starting to retire, meaning shortly, we'll have fewer workers paying taxes into the system than we do now.

We're all working harder for our employers to make enormous sums of money, not thru revenue growth and reinvestment, but from cost cutting.

If I'm an investor, I want to buy a company that's growing its business, not reconsolidating its expense base, that's opening new markets, not contracting continually.

So as you crack open that beer at the picnic this afternoon, pray it doesn't cause a heart attack. On average, we're all one illness away from bankruptcy.

tags technorati : Top 50

The Elitist Who Would Be President

"Let them eat cake" - Marie Antoinette

Blaming the Victim

An awful lot of right wing foks (sic pronounce it out loud) I've encountered this week have been mewling, "For heaven's sake, why didn't they just evacuate like everyone else????"

I think I have the answer. I put myself in the head of one of these refugees (there really is no other way to describe them now).

Here's what I think goes thru the mind of an indigent person ahead of Katrina.

"I've got two babies and a wife to try to move. Ain't got no car. Ain't got no busfare, cuz I live day-to-day on my small paychecks from two or three jobs, and besides, no hurricane ever destroyed a city (ed note: that's assuming he bothers to watch the news with his "ample" free time). So what am I goin' to do?

I guess I'll ride out the storm in my house, cuz I got food and water here and if I try to walk out of the city, what if the hurricane follows me? I'll be on the road with no food or water, nothing. And besides, the gubmint will be able to get food and water and stuff into New Orleans (or Biloxi or wherever). They did it for Florida. I remember seeing that President in the papers handing out bottles of water to them shiny white faces."

This blaming the victim crap has got to stop. You can spin spin spin all you want, but the simple fact is, the governments at all levels failed miserably, but most of all, the Bush administration is guilty of the murder of thousands of innocent poor people. It's genocidal what happened here.

You see, a mayor can order the evacuation of a city (which Mayor Nagin did). A governor can declare a state of emergency (which governor Blanco did). But only the Federal government can deploy the necessary resources to both enforce and facilitate an evacuation of a half million people and to protect those few who simply cannot or will not move.

See, I figure there's about a one percent "crackpot and deathly ill" factor in any population, who simply can't or won't be moved. So if more than 5,000 (in New Orleans case) are stranded, then that's who's left. Anything above that, and you've got a serious breakdown in governance.

It's no wonder guns were the first thing stolen from Walmart. As abhorrent as I find them, I would have grabbed me about five or six and protected myself, my house, and used them to get food and water for those I care about.

It's very easy for a civilized man to degenerate into savagery, far harder for the savage to discover civil behavior.

Let's do a comparison of the various responses to major hurricanes in the past century:

In September 1999, Hurricane Floyd -- a category 3 -- was bearing down the Carolinas and Virginia.

President Clinton was in Christchurch, New Zealand - meeting with President Jiang of China (you know, actually working). He made the proclamation that only Presidents can make and declared the areas affected by Floyd "Federal Disaster Areas" so the National Guard and Military can begin to mobilize. Then he cut short his meetings overseas and flew home to coordinate the rescue efforts. This all one day BEFORE a Cat-3 hit the coast. That is how you do it.

How about this dope's own father during Hurricane Andrew?

Once again, President Bush (41) -- August, 1992 -- was in the midst of a brutal campaign for re-election. Yet, he cut off his campaigning the day before and went to Washington where he martialed the largest military operation on US soil in history. He sent in 7,000 National Guard and 22,000 regular military personnel, and all the gear to begin the clean up within hours after Andrew passed through Florida. 'Cause, you know, those people and their stuff was actually where it belonged, rather than being used for insurgent target-practice halfway around the world in a vain effort to make Iraq safe for Iranian takeover.


In August of 1969 when Cat-5 Hurricane Camille hit roughly the same area as Katrina, President Nixon had already readied the National Guard and ordered all Gulf rescue vessels and equipment from Tampa and Houston to follow the Hurricane in. There were over 1,000 regular military with two dozen helicopters to assist the Coast Guard and National Guard within hours after the skies cleared.

Bush 43 - August 2005 - Cat-5 Hurricane Katrina bears down on New Orleans and the Mississippi gulf. Both states are down nearly 8,000 National Guard troops because they are in Iraq -- with most of the rescue gear needed. Bush is on vacation.

The day before Katrina makes landfall, Bush rides his bike for two hours.

The day she hits, he goes to Johnnie McCain's birthday party; and lies to old people about the multi-billion-dollar pharmaceutical company welfare boondoggle. People are dying, the largest port of entry in the United States (and fifth largest in the World) is under attack. Troops and supplies are desperately needed. The levees are cracking and the emergency 1-1/2 ton sandbags are ready, but there aren't enough helicopters or pilots to set them before the levees fail. The mayor of New Orleans begs for Federal coordination, but there is none, and the sandbagging never gets done.

So Bush -- naturally -- goes to San Diego to play guitar with country singer and lie to the military about how Iraq is just exactly like WWII.

The levees give way, filling New Orleans with water, sewage, oil and chemicals. Ten percent of all US exports, and 50% of all agricultural exports ordinarly go through this port. It is totally destroyed.

Bush decides he'll end his vacation a couple of days early -- TOMORROW --BECAUSE HE HAS TICKETS TO A
PADRES GAME! He goes back to the Fake Farm in Crawford, with every intention of doing something on WEDNESDAY about this disaster that happened starting last Sunday night.

And this guy is a neo-con!

Tip o the hat to owlbear1

tags technorati : Top 50

Paul Krugman Says It Better Than I Could

September 2, 2005
A Can't-Do Government
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Before 9/11 the Federal Emergency Management Agency listed the three most likely catastrophic disasters facing America: a terrorist attack on New York, a major earthquake in San Francisco and a hurricane strike on New Orleans. "The New Orleans hurricane scenario," The Houston Chronicle wrote in December 2001, "may be the deadliest of all." It described a potential catastrophe very much like the one now happening.

So why were New Orleans and the nation so unprepared? After 9/11, hard questions were deferred in the name of national unity, then buried under a thick coat of whitewash. This time, we need accountability.

First question: Why have aid and security taken so long to arrive?

Second question: Why wasn't more preventive action taken?

Third question: Did the Bush administration destroy FEMA's effectiveness?

A Shining Example of Our Republican Youth

I really ought to make a permanent link between Jesus' General and this blog....

Harass Cindy Sheehan

A Little Levity

Butt paste

Scrotum Scrub

Two Sides of the Intelligent Design Question From Religious Folks

There was an interesting exchange of letters in this week's Time Magazine regarding the debate over teaching evolution v. intelligent design on a parity basis in science. Personally I oppose that, altho I think it makes for a good framework for an examination of the role faith has in society, and therefore is better suited for a civics class.

But here, let me let two avowed Christians point out the distinctions:

Evolution is being taught as unquestionable scientific dogma. As a high school student, I have repeatedly observed that any attempt to debate Darwin's theory is immediately shot down by the teacher and quickly followed with the accusation, direct or implied, that the student who dares to think outside the evolutionary box is an anti-intellectual idiot. That approach hampers science, for it is a field that thrives on the testing of theories and on the questioning and seeking of more accurate knowledge. How will science ever be able to progress if students are told there is only one way to think?

BRITTANY KEETON

Olathe, Kans.

Admittedly, an interesting point, and perfectly designed to subvert the claim that ID is not science, thus also introducing the teleological argument that God exists by default. So what's nearly the next letter?

As an evangelical Christian, I reject intelligent design because it is not science but bad theology. Within science, it is no crime to admit that we don't have all the answers. Within theology, however, it is a crime to use God as an excuse for our ignorance. If we don't understand how something came about in nature, then we ought to use the brains that God gave us to think about and work on the problem. Otherwise we turn God into a magic word to use whenever we can't figure things out.

DAVID P. GRAF

(Have to love the Letters editor of Time. Kudos, because this type of contrast happens all too frequently for it to be coincidence)

Precisely the point, Mr. Graf, and this letter should become the rallying cry of science teachers nationwide. Folks, I cannot stress this enough: We are in danger of turning our schools into madrassahs where only religion is taught, and asking our kids to become whatever the democratic equivalent of suicide bombers is!

The Arabic world was once a bastion of enlightenment and intellectual curiousity. We got algebra, astronomy, rudimentary geometry, medicine, even our alphabet from Arabian peoples. And now look at it.

Is this what we want America to become?

It's easy to say it'll never happen, but you know what? It has once in human history at least, and that alone ought to scare the beejeezus out of you.

tags technorati : Top 50

Amazing video of Katrina

A pair of storm chasers purposely put themselves in harm's way, and courtesy of the Today Show, this is what they filmed.

Note: Sorry about the advertisement at the beginning. I was hoping I could skip around it but they figured a way around my hack...

From My Good Friends At CrooksAndLiars.com

Write your own caption




The Redneck Version of Nero.

Would that be "Nirra feddled whul Rome boined"?

Gas Prices

One of the most useful sites I've ever found on the Web is Gas Buddy.

So after Katrina, I thought I'd check out NYC gasoline prices, which, while not the highest in the country, tend towards the high end.

In the New York area, the most expensive gas (regular grade, not premium) is $3.49 on Long Island. And climbing.

Meanwhile, Bush, who has been asked by Senator Charles Schumer (a hero of mine) numerous times to alleviate the price crisis in this country, is only "thinking" about releasing parts of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Schumer made this same request back in 2000. Then-President Clinton released 30 million gallons and gas prices tumbled.

What did Bush do when Schumer asked him last year?

He went out and drove oil prices higher by shoring up the SPR.

UPDATE: Grudingly, the White House announced today they would tap the SPR.

Bet you it's nowhere near enough to help and not even close to what Clinton did, which actually *saved* the US a lot of money, as he was able to resupply the SPR at greatly reduced prices.

I meant to comment on Lawrence Greenfield's Firing Yesterday....

This is another example of the Machiavellian "Deus Ex Machina" that has bureaucrats failing upwards, while good people like Colin Powell are embarassed out of town...

From Maureen Dowd's Op-Ed piece in Sunday's NY Times.

Eric Lichtblau reported in The Times this week that the administration was dumping the highly respected Lawrence Greenfeld, appointed by President Bush in 2001 to head the Bureau of Justice Statistics, because he refused superiors' orders to delete from a press release an account of how black and Hispanic drivers were treated more aggressively by the police after traffic stops. The Justice Department study showed markedly higher rates of searches and use of force for black and Hispanic drivers, compared with white drivers.

Fearing that the survey would give ammunition to members of Congress who object to using racial and ethnic data in terrorism and law enforcement investigations, Mr. Greenfeld's supervisors buried it online with no press release or briefing for Congress.

Mr. Lichtblau wrote that when Mr. Greenfeld sent the planned press release to the office of his supervisor, Tracy Henke, then an acting assistant attorney general, the section on the treatment of black and Hispanic drivers was crossed out with a notation: "Do we need this?" Ms. Henke herself had added a note: "Make the changes."

Like Condi Rice, Stephen Hadley, John Bolton and others who helped spin reality to suit political ends, Ms. Henke was rewarded by the president. She has been nominated for a senior post in the Homeland Security Department.

I feel safer already.

But read the rest of the column as well. Bush has not only lost touch with reality, he's jumped the couch

News You Aren't Reading In America

Iraqis fear new draft constitution will lead to country's disintegration
30/08/2005 17:01

BAGHDAD, August 30 (RIA Novosti, Pavel Davydov) - Iraq fears that a constitution that does not meet the interests of the whole society may lead to the disintegration of the state.

"The Sunnis, which represent one of the key groups in Iraqi society, refused to sign the draft constitution," an Iraqi writer, Shiite Diya al-Khalidi, said. "This means the constitution does not meet the aspirations and hopes of the whole Iraqi nation, which might lead to the country's disintegration."

Many people said they believed that if the constitution did not take into account the interests of all major communities within Iraqi society - Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds - conflict and tension would grow between them.

"Federalism in Iraq, which Kurds and some Shiite leaders are insisting upon," Shiite Adnan al-Mayahi, a worker from Baghdad, said, "will lead to escalation of hatred between different communities, as the balance will be distorted between them."

Shiite lawyer Ali Mahmoud said the idea of federalism was absolutely unacceptable for Iraq. "Federalism would be possible in Iraq if Iraqis first of all felt that they were the country's citizens, and then, that they were members of a community, faith, or tribe, if all Iraqis could live in any part of the country regardless of its ethnic composition." This would not be possible either now or in the near future, the lawyer said. He explained that Kurds, for example, did not associate themselves with Iraq and wanted to separate from it.

So what does this mean?

Basically, it means the chances of a civil war will not go away any time soon, despite our best efforts to build as effective a coalition government as we have in building a coalition to prosecute this war and occupation.

(Meaning, for the lurking FReepers out there, no chance at all)

See, Federalism speaks to a strong, centralized government, which favors a majority (except in the United States, where tyranny of the minority is the order of the day, but you can read all about that in my book-in-progress when it comes out). Regionalist government would at least give the Sunnis a safe haven in their own country to have some form of autonomy and self-determination, kind of like a local town can ignore some state mandates on their own volition.

Stupid neo-cons missed the lessons of the early Articles of Confederation...

*Sigh*

Oh, for a President Gore....

Best Take on the "Hunt" for WMDs ever....

Rapping World Leaders

I particularly liked "Imagine This"

World's Shortest Personality Test

This is how I did. Pretty damned accurate. Water has always held a special place in my life, first as a world-class swimmer, and now as a scuba diver:

You are elegant, withdrawn, and brilliant. Your mind is a weapon, able to solve any puzzle. You are also great at poking holes in arguments and common beliefs. For you, comfort and calm are very important. You tend to thrive on your own and shrug off most affection. You prefer to protect your emotions and stay strong.

The World's Shortest Personality Test

Honey! I'm hoooome!

Just got back in about midnight last night, so I'm whipped, seven hours later. I will write more at some point today (more likely tomorrow), but I found this and wanted to share it.

Looks like they are eating their young again....

As I write this....

I have about fifteen hours left until I am wheels up on my vacation.

Ergo, since I have not drummed up a substitute author of my wit, intelligence and charm (Bill Clinton being pre-occupied), I will sadly suspend posts as of this moment until my return, the following week (probably August 29, altho I might find the strength that Sunday to scribble a bit).

Enjoy your week, folks, and I shall speak to you soon...

Roberts is a RACIST!

This just in....

Weld To Run For Governor

I'm not sure this is a good idea, Bill.

See, New York is a curious state. We don't mind carpetbaggers.

When they run for Senate.

Like Hillary Clinton. Or Robert F. Kennedy. Or James Buckley (who was born in New York, but moved to Connecticut).

We figure that at the Federal level, a foreigner can represent our interests as well as a native-born person (although to be honest, we have better luck with Charles Schumer than we've had with James Buckley).

But for governor? We want someone who is on top of the local issues, who's actually BEEN to Onteora for more than a whistlestop on a campaign tour. We want someone who understands that our state is rural AND urban AND suburban. We aren't New Jersey. You can't rule over one demographic and ignore the other two. You'll get killed by the press.

Nelson Rockefeller understood this state better than any governor I've seen since (albeit a Republican, he certainly has to be classified a liberal), and while some of his decisions were god-awful (the Rockefeller Drug laws, as an example: Equating possession of two ounces of cocaine to second degree murder is a pretty odious penalty), he was in tune with the people of the state.

Not bad for a Rockefeller, I thought. I mean, he could have been Bush, completely out of touch with people and insulated and elitist, but he chose not to. I actually have his autograph from a campaign stop he made in 1998 (I think) at Jones Beach. The man was vital and vibrant, which probably explains why he died of a heart attack while having sex with his secretary.

But Bill? I have to be honest: Massachussetts is not New York, and so governing the one does not qualify you to govern the other.

Maybe you can take Hillary's place after she's sworn in in 2009....

Today's Weird Story

Minor League Team To Host 'Hairiest Back' Contest

POSTED: 11:23 pm EDT August 17, 2005
WOODBRIDGE, Va. -- The Potomac Nationals of the Carolina League are ready to let the fur fly later this month.
The Class-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals will hold its first-ever "Hairiest Back at the Ballpark" contest before their game against a team from Salem, Va., on Aug. 25.
According to the team's press release, the winner will receive a complimentary laser hair removal service valued at $2,500.
In addition, there will be a drawing for a complimentary laser removal service worth $1,200 for those fans who do not want to participate in the contest.
Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press.

On Elitism, Sacrifice, and War

Earlier this month, I wrote a piece about the sacrifices of war and why it's only the poor and middle class that are paying the price for this conflict.

I guess Bob Herbert reads this blog.... ;)

For the most part, the only people sacrificing for this war are the troops and their families, and very few of them are coming from the privileged economic classes. That's why it's so easy to keep the troops out of sight and out of mind. And it's why, in the third year of a war started by the richest nation on earth, we still get stories like the one in Sunday's Times that began:

"For the second time since the Iraq war began, the Pentagon is struggling to replace body armor that is failing to protect American troops from the most lethal attacks by insurgents."

Scandalous incompetence? Appalling indifference? Try both. Who cares? This is a war fought mostly by other people's children. The loudest of the hawks are the least likely to send their sons or daughters off to Iraq.

He goes on to point out that not only aren't people sacrificing for this war (I mean, c'mon, Prez...a FIVE week vacation? The longest any president has ever taken? In the middle of a war? The first war we've ever unilaterally declared on a sovereign nation? And it's going so badly????), but no one even really cares!

I was in Jacksonville, Fla., a few days ago and watched in amusement as a young woman emerged from a restaurant into 95-degree heat and gleefully exclaimed, "All right, let's go shopping!" The war was the furthest thing from her mind.

tags technorati : Top 50

File this under "DUH!"

The NSA has finally coughed up documents that said that if we went to war in Iraq, we ought to be prepared for an exit strategy.

How nice of them to state the obvious...wasn't it Colin Powell who said something about the "Pottery Barn" policy?

But this telling passage indicates something more sinister afoot:

The new documents, released this month to the National Security Archive under the Freedom of Information Act, also provide more evidence on when the Bush administration began planning for regime change in Iraq -- as early as October 2001.

The declassified records relate mainly to the so-called "Future of Iraq Project," an effort, initially run by the State Department then by the Pentagon, to plan for the transition to a new regime after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003. They provide detail on each of the working groups and give the starting date for planning as October 2001.

Maybe that header should read "File this under D-huh?????"

Uncle Sam Needs You

By Mark Tran / Guardian 01:35pm

July proved to a good month for the US army's recruitment target. This branch of the US armed forces has struggled to meet its recruitment targets but last month it signed up 8,085 new recruits, beating its target of 7,450.

Still, when the army finishes its financial year on 30 September it is expected to be 7,000 short of its 80,000 recruiting goal. With public support for the war in Iraq steadily dropping, the army chief of staff, General Peter Schoomaker, tells the San Francisco Chronicle that next year "may be the toughest recruiting environment ever."

That's no surprise when the army is up against the likes of Cindy Sheehan, who is camped outside George Bush's Texas ranch in protest at the death of her son in Iraq. Media coverage of returning casualties from Iraq, such as this powerful piece in the Washington Post does the US army no favours either.

Given this unpromising context, Business Week reports that the army will spend more money on recruitment ads next year, about $320m up from $240m this year. As it helpfully points out this amounts to $4,000 per recruit if the army signs up 80,000 next year - more than twice what Toyota spends to woo a new customer.

Because of my avocation and my hopes to shortly kick back the rat race to someone else's lap and start living the high life off commercial voiceover revenues, this article caught my eye.

Toyota ads are all over the place and they sell millions of cars nationwide each year. The Army is going to spend more than Toyota for a few measly dozen thousands? Will the recruits get that cool "employee pricing" on hospital beds and coffins? How about body armor? Any chance that will be thrown in as an option? Can a recruit lease, rather than buy? You know, trade it in for a brand new war in two years, maybe in Iran? What's the warranty? Can they haggle, you know, maybe get free undercoating, or at least an extra M-16? I mean, if I'm going to sign up for a war, I want to get all the candy!

I thought we were in a fiscal crisis? Maybe if they stopped, you know, fighting in Iraq, they could save some money on recruitment?

Question about Michelle Malkin...

Why does Jane L. Monhart live with Michelle and her "husband", Jesse?

She's not the cook, the cleaning woman, or the nanny. Think there might be some nookie-nookie going on, despite the supposed conservative family values that they all espouse? Maybe ol' "Mr. Mom" Jesse isn't the, um, man he should be?

Ol' Jane do get around....

I Want to Have Maureen Dowd's Baby

Maureen Dowd's column in today's NY Times has this:

Biking Toward Nowhere
By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: August 17, 2005
How could President Bush be cavorting around on a long vacation with American troops struggling with a spiraling crisis in Iraq?

Wasn't he worried that his vacation activities might send a frivolous signal at a time when he had put so many young Americans in harm's way?

"I'm determined that life goes on," Mr. Bush said stubbornly.

That wasn't the son, believe it or not. It was the father - 15 years ago. I was in Kennebunkport then to cover the first President Bush's frenetic attempts to relax while reporters were pressing him about how he could be taking a month to play around when he had started sending American troops to the Persian Gulf only three days before.

On Saturday, the current President Bush was pressed about how he could be taking five weeks to ride bikes and nap and fish and clear brush even though his occupation of Iraq had become a fiasco. "I think it's also important for me to go on with my life," W. said, "to keep a balanced life."

Pressed about how he could ride his bike while refusing to see a grieving mom of a dead soldier who's camped outside his ranch, he added: "So I'm mindful of what goes on around me. On the other hand, I'm also mindful that I've got a life to live and will do so."

Ah, the insensitivity of reporters who ask the President Bushes how they can expect to deal with Middle East fighting while they're off fishing.

The first President Bush told us that he kept a telephone in his golf cart and his cigarette boat so he could easily stay on top of Saddam's invasion of Kuwait. But at least he seemed worried that he was sending the wrong signal, as his boating and golfing was juxtaposed on the news with footage of the frightened families of troops leaving for the Middle East.

"I just don't like taking questions on serious matters on my vacation," the usually good-natured Bush senior barked at reporters on the golf course. "So I hope you'll understand if I, when I'm recreating, will recreate." His hot-tempered oldest son, who was golfing with his father that day, was even more irritated. "Hey! Hey!" W. snapped at reporters asking questions on the first tee. "Can't you wait until we finish hitting, at least?"

Junior always had his priorities straight.

Not the Sharpest Crayon in the Box

I mentioned below in a post here that I really enjoy my high school alumni(ae) e-mail list, because I'm simply not the brightest kid in the room.

I was all set to write an impassioned defense of Cindy Sheehan today, noting that exploitation of the dead, when done by Republicans, is A-OK, but when a simple housewife from California does it, suddenly the right-wing chuckleheads (yea, MMalkin, this means you. I know you've been alerted!) get their knickers in a twist.

When along comes a good friend named Ira to say this:

Circus or not, it is about time the media focused on what a farce the "war" -- no, this renamed armed exercise against extremism -- has become. The Washington Post ran an article saying the insider pros in the administration are backing off their aspirations for "transforming" Iraq into a democracy, the outstanding constitutional issues of federalism, role of religion, division of oil revenue seem intractable, and what Sheehan has done, which somehow the 2004 election failed to do, is force us to realize we have committed our troops and treasure for Bush lies. It is more than unfortunate that America's attention span is so short, fleeting, and seemingly apt to follow the travails of the likes of Paula Abdul or Terry Schiavo or Martha Stewart or OJ or Michael Jackson, when we are killing people and being killed for no good reason, and this administration thinks nothing of political retaliation (a la Rove) when someone speaks truth to power. (And not just Wilson, but Clark and O'Neill as well)

So, as simple and perhaps artificial as the Sheehan media event is, at least the focus is on the right thing for once. It seems the only way to get our lazy administration stenographers (that is, the mainstream media) interested in anything that should be serious is to introduce a "circus" -- that is, entertainment -- component into it. So, if that's what it takes, so be it. If the game has to be played to get people to realize America has been disgracefully astray in Iraq for the last 30+ months, let's play.

Cud nae said it better meself...

Food For Thought

This is from a 2005 report by the GAO (yes, a government agency that actually has it's head screwed on!). Read it and think about what we've done to this country, and why I'm so angry at Bush.

George W. Bush's Greatest Hits

It's a Flash animation to make you laugh, make you cry and make you count down to Jan. 21, 2009....

Republican Hypocrisy

So the right wing was all a fluffer about the purported investigation into the adoption records of John Roberts, the Supreme Court nominee.

Wonder how they'll handle this?

Can you say "hypocrite", anyone? You wonder what kind of little secrets are in Ms. Malkin's past?

I'm looking into it. Believe me, the temptation to post her personal information is enormous, but I know I wouldn't want it to happen to me, so I'm keeping my finger off the trigger. Until I find something criminal, like say she or her dad have been arrested, something like that... *hint*

Sweet Neo Con

These may (and I stress, may) be the lyrics to the controversial new Stones' song, Sweet Neo Con. Got them from a correspondent who says he found them on a Stones' fan site. Obviously, they are not complete, and the italics emphasize phrases and lines either missed or interpreted...

You call yourself a Christian
I think that you're a hypocrite
You say you are a patriot
I think that you are a crock of shit

And listen about the price of gasoline (not sure about this...)
I drink it every day
But its getting very pricey
And who is goin' to pay

Oh oh you're so wrong
My sweet Neocon

It's liberty for all
'cause democracy's our style
unless you are against us
Then it's prison without trial

But one thing that is certain
Like this girl in Haliburton
If you're really so astute
You should invest in ???

How come you're so wrong
My Sweet Neocon
If you turn out right
I'll eat my hat tonight

It's gettin' very scary
Yeah, I'm frightened out of my wits
There's police in my bedroom
Yeah, and it's giving me the shits

We must have looked for reasons
To protect us from our (own?)
???
We're doing it alone

How come your so wrong
my sweet neocon
Where's the money gone
In the Pentagon

Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah.... Neocon!

What's Behind Bush's Back?

Maybe you recall the flapdoodle during the Kerry-Bush debates last year over whether our President was wearing some sort of hidden device, with an earpiece, feeding him answers.

Turns out, an analysis by the fellow at Jet Propulsion Labatories who analyzes the Saturn photos sent back by probes, had a story on this topic killed, not once, but twice!

Still Hiding the Bush Bulge
Spiking of story an “internal matter,” Pasadena paper says

Extra! July/August 2005

Dave Lindorff


Pasadena residents didn’t get to read about the exploits of local celebrity Dr. Robert Nelson, who, besides being a Jet Propulsion Lab photo analyst who helped present those dramatic photos of Saturn’s rings and moons, also gave the lie to White House claims that the bulge seen on Bush’s back during the presidential debates was “just a wrinkle.”

They didn’t get to read Nelson’s account of how his photo analysis of Bush’s jacket—a story that would have increased speculation that the president was wearing a hearing device during the debates—almost made it into the New York Times before being killed by top editor Bill Keller (Extra!, 1–2/05).

They didn’t read all this in their local daily, the Pasadena Star-News, because senior editors at that paper killed the story on Saturday, April 30, right before publication in the Sunday edition—apparently for political, not journalistic, reasons.

The Star-News is the oldest holding of MediaNews Group, a newspaper and television station chain owned and run by William Dean Singleton, one of the U.S.’s more conservative media moguls. Singleton was singled out by Editor & Publisher (1/26/04) as one of several newspaper chain owners who contributed money to the Bush/Cheney re-election campaign last year. MediaNews Group also owns the Denver Post and the L.A. Daily News.

What role, if any, Singleton and his politics had in the killing of Star-News reporter Gary Scott’s story on Nelson and the Bush bulge is unclear. What is known is that the story was filed, edited and set to run, that a photographer had been assigned and had taken pictures of Nelson at home with his photo analysis equipment, and that it was killed at the last minute.

Several sources confirm that the story was axed—and immediately wiped from the paper’s computer system—on orders of Star-News executive editor Talmadge Campbell, who oversees the operations of the Star-News and two other papers, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune and the Whittier Daily News, from an office in San Gabriel. Sources say that Campbell, a former Texan and outspoken Bush supporter, does not normally get involved in day-to-day decisions like what features run—or don’t run—in the Pasadena paper...

Click on the link in the header to read the whole story.

Carl's Theory of Political Evolution and General Relativity

OK, this is bare-bones stuff, but today's as good a time as any to plant the flag and then flesh it out over the next several months....

I have a theory about politics.

The Republican party runs about thirty years behind the Democrats in terms of development. Where we had the 70s for turmoil and unrest and splintering into factions, the Republicans are only just now coming into their own in this regard.

Think about how they are forcing people into Atwater's "big tent". You have former marxist neo-cons who applaud big government squaring off against smaller government paleo-cons. You have social conservatives with liberal fiscal policies (damn evangelical Christians!) against fiscal conservatives with liberal social policies (damn heathens!).

I think the only thing holding this coalition together is their deep fear that the Democrats have been right all along (as evidenced by the unparalleled peace and prosperity of the Clinton administrations), that and fixing elections to maintain a cling on power.

tags technorati : Top 50

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Finns and Communication

As a dual citizen of the US and Finland, oftentimes I'm struck by how hard it is for many Finns I know to fit into American society. Also, I'm struck sometimes by how much of an outsider I appear to be.

I received this from a friend on my high school mailing list (told you, we're an eclectic group!), who shared an email he received from yet another group. As I read it, it seemed eerily familiar:

This comes from an Australian newsletter:

Finland correspondent, Therese Catanzariti, writes:

Finns don't talk much.

Finns are sparse and sparing in conversation. If they have to speak they use the minimum amount of words. Long sentences in English language movies are reduced to two or three words in the Finnish subtitles.

This gets more extreme the further north you go. A friend in Oulu describes morning coffee at his office. Ten men sitting silently drinking coffee. Perhaps someone will flick through a newspaper. Every now and then, someone might say “sokkeri” (sugar). Not “can you please pass the sugar.” Too many words. He says sokkeri. Someone passes him the sugar. And then it's back to silence.

There is no word for please. Think about that.

There is no small talk. One of my husband's colleagues met him near the photocopier one afternoon. “Hello, how are you today?” she said. “Fine,” he replied. He was a little surprised since he had already said hello to her that morning. “And how was your weekend?” she continued. “Great,” he said, although it was Thursday afternoon. “And how is your wife?” she asked. She had never met me and had never asked about me before. Then there was an awkward silence. “I'm studying small talk” she said.

The inanity, the empty politeness of small talk is revealed by its absence. You get into a taxi. The taxi driver asks you where you want to go. And then doesn't talk again. Shop assistants and waiters don't want to be your friend. No noise, no clutter.

Still, stripped down interaction can be challenging, particularly at work. There's no water cooler, and every individual is a silo. A Brazilian postdoc at the University of Oulu shares an office with a very northern Finn. Every morning the Finn comes in at 8am. He says “huomenta” (good morning). He sits down. He goes for lunch at 11am and leaves the office at 4pm. And he doesn't say one more word all day. For the first few weeks, the Brazilian thought huomenta was the Finnish word for eight.

Finns answer the exact question asked. They will not volunteer information. We have moved to Tapiola, a suburb of Espoo, which is a commuter city just outside Helsinki. The swimming pool in Tapiola is closed for renovations. I asked at the library next door how long it would be closed. “Two months,” they said. Silence. “Where is the next closest swimming pool,” I asked. “Leppavara,” they said. Silence. “Do you know what time it opens?” I asked. “It is not open,” they said, “it is closed for the whole of July.” Silence. “Are there any open swimming pools in Espoo?” I asked. “No,” they said. Silence. “Are there any open swimming pools in Helsinki?” I asked. “I think so,” they said. “But you'll have to check in Helsinki.”

If Finns don't have to speak, they don't. Finns are comfortable with silence. They don't need to fill up the space.

Finns can go out for dinner in silence. Watch them in the restaurants  entrée, main meal, dessert, silence. Metros, buses,
trains, silence.

Silences are an important part of Finnish conversations. Sometimes you ask a Finn a question. And there's silence. And even more silence. This is especially disconcerting when you are on the phone. Did they hear the question? You ask the question again. The Finn will reply, a little annoyed “I heard you the first time. I'm just thinking.”

Finns don't ask questions. At seminars, lectures, presentations. The presentation ends and there's silence. Any questions? No hands.

In Australia, I used to lecture on the Solicitors Admission Board and at UTS law school. The classes were at night and most of the students worked full-time and came to class after a very demanding day. And yet the classes were lively and spirited with lots of debate. Last year, I lectured in entertainment law at the University of Oulu. It's an interesting subject. And the students were film-makers, people who want to tell stories. I talked. The students listened. No comments. No questions.

Because Finns rarely talk, when they do talk, they choose their words very carefully, and what they do say is incredibly loaded. They mean absolutely every word they say. A different word here and there is significant. Finns are also understated. If they say someone is sick, they are probably dying.

Finns also listen very carefully and easily pick up subtleties and nuances. Finns put everything you say under the microscope. There's no such thing as the throwaway line, enthusiastic exaggeration or poetic licence. I once casually mentioned I was annoyed with my husband and wanted to wring his neck. A work colleague said I had only been married a short time and I should give it a chance and think seriously before separating. I said that wasn't what I meant. They asked if I didn't mean it, why did I say it. Clinical Finnish logic. Gets you every time.

Finns don't trust big talkers. Finns are suspicious of extra words and wary of passion and emotion. Finnish conversation is even and measured. Finns don't raise their voice. This suggests Finns are gentle people. Finns are not gentle. Gentle people don't play ice hockey. In Australia and many other countries, just-contained anger is an effective tactic in hostile negotiations. In Finland, anger, passion and emotion suggest you're not in control. If you raise your voice, you immediately lose authority and credibility. Finns lose respect and you lose the argument.

Cultural differences are not just amusing anecdotes, but can have a real impact with real consequences. A colleague once said if you send an email and the Americans don't reply, there's something wrong, but if the Finns don't reply, everything's OK and often implies agreement.

Minor detail can become dangerous minefields. Once I was busy at work and had to reprioritise some tasks. I sent an email to some internal clients saying I was sorry I couldn't complete their work at the moment, but I hoped to get back to them soon. This surprised some of my colleagues. Why was I sorry? Why did I hope to get back to them? Didn't I like the other work that I had to do?

Another asked why I sent the email. I said it was to explain that I was busy. They replied that I didn't need to explain I was busy. If I didn't get back to them, they would guess I was busy, and if this caused problems because they needed help more quickly, they would let me know.

I sent the email instinctively. The Sydney legal market is a tough market. The partners drummed client service into junior lawyers  we had to keep the client informed, structure the client's expectations. But does sending such emails inform, explain, add, structure client's expectations? Or merely seek absolution?

What are the client's expectations? The exercise exposed a fundamental element of the Finnish psyche that underpins the Finnish workplace. Trust. Your colleagues trust that you are doing your job properly and thoroughly, expect you to do your job properly and thoroughly. People don't check up on you, don't look over your shoulder. The result of this is not rampant fraud. The result is accepting responsibility and trying desperately to live up to the expectation  you are scared witless that everyone is relying on you and no-one is checking that you check everything twice.

Your colleagues don't send emails chasing you up because they trust, they expect, that if you have not replied there must be a good reason. And you don't clutter up inboxes explaining that there is a good reason.

Italian conversation is an elaborate baroque church  full of flourish, colour, and passion. English conversation is a stately
home  formal and elegant, but with many hidden rooms. Australian conversation is a simple beach shack  casual, honest and laid back. And Finnish conversation is an elegant glass/steel high rise spare, stylish and minimal.

I offer no comment on this. :)

Weird link of the day

hats of meat/

The Words "Took Them Long Enough"...

...don't cover the half of it. For some bizarre national security reason, these tapes were delayed in release.

Download actual audio of firefighters from the World Trade Center at the site linked above.

So sad.

I knew a guy in high school who was a firefighter in the WTC, and died there. His twin brother is a good friend from the mailing list I mentioned elsewhere on the blog. I can only imagine how he feels, some of the anger and frustration and loss he must be going through, to hear these tapes and see the transcripts, as well as the oral histories of the men who survived.

I Want To Move To Australia....

This is the sort of thing we should be talking about, not rats in the White House....

Gotta Love George Bush....

...hope history is as kind to him as the annual reports of Halliburton and the big oil companies are....

From today's New York Times by Alan J. Kuperman, : (note: after Aug. 12th, this link will be invalid. On Aug. 12th, you'll need to set up an account at the Times website (free) to view this article in it's entirety)

Despite widespread opposition - from the Bush administration, a majority of the Senate, leaders of the House Energy Committee, and nuclear regulators from the five preceding presidential administrations - Senator Pete Domenici, Republican of New Mexico and chairman of the Energy Committee, included an amendment that guts restrictions on the export of highly enriched uranium, the same material used in the Hiroshima atomic bomb.
If terrorists obtained enough such uranium they could fashion a full-fledged nuclear weapon, not merely a "dirty bomb" that would scatter radioactive waste. As the late Manhattan Project physicist Luis Alvarez noted in his memoirs: "With modern weapons-grade uranium, the background neutron rate is so low that terrorists, if they had such material, would have a good chance of setting off a high-yield explosion simply by dropping one half of the material onto the other half. . . . Even a high school kid could make a bomb in short order."
The new law increases the likelihood of that nightmare scenario by allowing exports of bomb-grade uranium to foreign companies to rise to more than 100 pounds annually, thereby multiplying the odds that terrorists could steal enough for a bomb while the uranium is in transit to, or in storage at, foreign facilities.

You'll note, however, that our esteemed President SIGNED THE FUCKING BILL! Despite his own staff's opposition to this very key national security provision in it. Despite the fact that the House Energy Committee, in a rare show of bipartisan unity, asked Sen. Domenici to withdraw this provision.

Despite the fact that the amendment was voted down on a straight up or down vote in June of this year! I'll let Kuperman explain what happened next:

This is where Mr. Domenici abused his power as Senate committee chair. He successfully pushed all of the Republicans he appointed to the House-Senate conference on the bill to vote for his provision - against the expressed will of the Senate. He then rejected the House's offer to eliminate the provision, thereby strong-arming the provision into law over the bipartisan opposition of executive and legislative branch officials.

Also sprach Zarathustra...turns out Sen. Domenici rammed this through, not for an American company (in fact, a company in his own state, TCI Medical was attempting to start producing isotopes domestically using safer low-enriched uranium, but for a consortium of companies in the Netherlands, Canada, and Belgium, which couldn't be bothered ramping up isotope production using the safer uranium that our export contracts call for, opting instead to maintain their equipment to use weapons-grade uranium.

Nice going, shithead...

More on the Stones Tour

Think this is getting icky yet? This is going to be a bit more interesting than I thought. A former Democrat-turned-major-Bush-fundraiser is the CEO of the company, Ameriquest, that is sponsoring the Stones tour...you know, the one supporting the album with Sweet Neo Con on it, about the Bush administration?

I may have to give Mick and the boys more credit than I originally thought. This is a level of irony I neveer imagined they were capable of. Talking about biting the hand that feeds you...

From the New York Daily News:

New Stones tune may have
honcho turning a deaf ear

President Bush's controversial nominee for ambassador to the Netherlands, Ameriquest Capital founder Roland Arnall, might be regretting his company's high-profile sponsorship of the Rolling Stones' U.S. concert tour.

Arnall's mortgage company is spending millions of dollars to tout the Stones tour and Ameriquest's sweepstakes for travel, lodging and concert seats - never mind that Mick Jagger is releasing a tune apparently attacking Arnall's patrons in the Bush administration.

The lyrics of "Sweet Neo Con" include such broadsides as: "Democracy's our style/ Unless you are against us/ Then it's prison without trial./ But one thing that is certain/ Life is good at Halliburton."

The billionaire mortgage mogul - a former bigtime Democratic donor who, with wife Dawn, changed parties and has raised and given more than $12 million to Bush - is already coping with enough trouble. He's facing Senate scrutiny over Ameriquest's allegedly deceptive sales tactics to low-income, credit-risky customers, and trying to settle lawsuits in 30 states for more than $300 million.

A Democratic Senate aide gloated yesterday: "The same day the White House announced billionaire Arnall's nomination, his company announced it would set aside millions to settle with 30 states for predatory lending. Either this was the Bernie Kerik vetting team or Bush's 'ownership society' run amok. Either way, it shows how this President will do anything to put his corrupt friends in high places."

The aide added: "The one redeeming factor in this whole mess is that Arnall will be paying for 10 lucky winners to hear Jagger sing 'Sweet Neo Con' in person."

The Sacrifices of War

From CNN.com, comes this column by Mark Shields, which I have excerpted:

Moral logic tells us that when the nation legally goes to war, it is everybody's war and it must be everybody's risk. But the elite of the country seeks to make war little more than a spectator sport.

Citizens on the home front who do not have loved ones in the service are asked to pay no price, to bear no burden. The Bush administration does not even ask us to pick up the cost of the war, already in the hundreds of billions. That burden will be borne instead by our children. We, patriots, will keep our tax cuts. Do our leaders think so little of us that they are afraid to ask us to make any real sacrifice?

This is a topic of conversation on a mailing list to which I belong from my alma mater (high school division...it's nice to be on a mailing list where I'm not the smartest person in the room...). We're a feisty bunch, and sometimes we will pick a topic to its very bones.

A point one of the participants (he graduated from high school in my class and is a conservative in all but label...go fig) made is that there's no logic to asking the elite of this nation to make sacrifices, to ask their children, to fight in this war.

Naturally, Shields makes the point far more eloquently than I could have. It's not about logic (war is never logical), it's about morality. We pass this war onto our children, a war against a nation that had never attacked us, and never possessed the means to attack us. A nation that had nothing to do with the attacks against us.

And yet this war was justified as a defense of our homeland. Well? In wars where we really were attacked, we sacrificed and strove as a nation to build a war machine while simultaneously dragging our country out of an economic mess (yes, I'm versed enough in economics to understand these are not unrelated events).

So where's the sacrifice now?

Non-existent, from what I can see, save for oil prices being slightly higher than they would have been without a war in Iraq. The rich get richer, and the poor fight for them.

People have hopes, people have dreams. Our children want to be better off than we are, yet this truly is the first generation where that outcome is in doubt. And that's sad.

No, I take it back. We did sacrifice. We sacrificed our future as a free and democratic society. We sacrificed our children at the altar of tax cuts for the wealthy and connected. We may even have sacrificed our planet, if the news from Iran is any marker. And so I'm not sad, I'm angry.

Bunch of chickens running this country, without the nerve to face the music about what they've done to my country...

tags technorati : Top 50

UPDATE: When you piss off the Rolling Stones....

I mean, really. Perhaps the biggest sell-out act in the history of rock-n-roll (and before you slam me, I like their music, and love the guys, but c'mon, Ameriquest is sponsoring their US leg of the tour????) has set its sights on the right wing in America. Says a lot that they're willing to risk future corporate sponsorship of any tie-ins or tours to say this.

A clip from the article:

But the most searing moment, on a song called "Sweet Neo Con," isn't personal but political. "You call yourself a Christian, I call you a hypocrite/You call yourself a patriot, well I think you're full of s—t." "It is direct," Jagger says with a laugh. "Keith said [he breaks into a dead-on Keith imitation], 'It's not really metaphorical.' I think he's a bit worried because he lives in the U.S." Jagger smiles. "But I don't."

Naturally, there will be reprisals against the Stones, I'm sure, and I'm sure a) they don't care and b) they probably wouldn't care even if they were planning another album in the future.
It's nice to see that artists are finally getting political again after decades of trying to earn the almighty dollar on our backs.

More here from Katrina van den Heuvel of The Nation. Turns out, Fran Curtis, the Stones publicist, was forced to rush a press release out disavowing the link between the song and anybody in the Bush administration, meaning there's more in the lyrics than have been released. Anybody wanna guess if this gets cut from the US release?

Wouldn't want to piss off Clear Channel, which has greatly benefitted from the Bush laissez-faire FCC appointments...also, I wonder if Mick will be gutsy enough to grab some of his tarnised street cred back by performing the song live on an NFL broadcast

UPDATE

NEW YORK (AP) -- The Rolling Stones' upcoming album contains a song seemingly critical of President Bush, but Mick Jagger denies it's directed at him, according to the syndicated TV show "Extra."

"It is not really aimed at anyone," Jagger said on the entertainment-news show's Wednesday edition. "It's not aimed, personally aimed, at President Bush. It wouldn't be called 'Sweet Neo Con' if it was."

The song is from the new album, "A Bigger Bang," set for release September 6.

There is no mention of Bush or Iraq. But it does refer to military contractor Halliburton, which was formerly run by Vice President Cheney and has been awarded key Iraq contracts, and the rising price of gasoline.

"How come you're so wrong? My sweet neo-con, where's the money gone, in the Pentagon," goes one refrain.

The song also includes the line: "It's liberty for all, democracy's our style, unless you are against us, then it's prison without trial." (ed: emphasis added)

"It is certainly very critical of certain policies of the administration, but so what! Lots of people are critical," Jagger told "Extra."

A representative for the Stones said the group had no further comment about the song.

Draw your own conclusions on who this song is about. Clear Channel calling? Mick was very clear that, while it's not aimed personally at Bush (the man), it is aimed squarely at Bush the President. Mick is being coy, naturally, but he's not denying the song's intent. There are some who think he shouldn't even back this far off, but hell, it's his life and I suspect at some point in the future (say next year) he'll admit it was about Bush. After the album's slipped off the charts again.