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> Thu, 12 Aug 2004 08:52:33 -0700

 

> Progress Report: More Administration Scare

> Tactics

 

> " American Progress Action Fund "

> <progress

 

Center for American Progress - Progress Report

 

by David Sirota, Christy Harvey, Judd Legum and Jonathan Baskin

 

August 12, 2004

IRAQ Major Combat Operations Have Begun

HEALTH CARE Warning #8211; More Administration Scare Tactics

Under the Radar

 

 

CORRECTION: In yesterday's Progress Report, we erroneously stated Gov.

Tom Vilsack had sweeping new education proposals for Illinois.

Vilsack's plan was actually for his home state of Iowa. Our apologies.

 

IRAQ Major Combat Operations Continue

More than 15 months after President Bush triumphantly declared that

" major combat operations in Iraq have ended, " the U.S. is leading

" major operations " in Najaf.

 

It#160; is part of an effort led by U.S. troops " to crush an uprising

led by cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose fighters have been battling U.S.

troops in Shiite strongholds across Iraq for a week. "

 

The operation is particularly sensitive it is centered in the city of

Najaf, home of the " revered Imam Ali shrine and its vast cemetery. "

The new offensive risks " enraging Iraq's Shiite majority #8211;

including those who do not support the uprising #8211; if it targets

the shrine, where many of the insurgents have taken refuge. "

 

Already, operations by U.S. forces in Najaf have " ignit[ed] mass

street protests in at least two other cities. " For those concerned

about the administration's failure to locate WMD, obtain more

assistance from international troops or stabilize Iraq, Bush offered

this assurance: " I know what I'm doing when it comes to winning this war. "

 

NO EASY VICTORY IN NAJAF: There are no clear solutions to resolve the

revolt in Najaf led by al-Sadr. The Christian Science Monitor explains

if al-Sadr " is killed while fighting in such a holy site, he would

become a martyr, drawing thousands of Shiites to his cause. If

American and Iraqi forces pull back from a final assault on Najaf -

and indeed, intense negotiations have been conducted since the

beginning - and create another truce with Sadr, Sadr may be seen by

many as a man who stood up to the Americans. "

 

TEXAS NATIONAL GUARD SHIPPING OUT: The San Antonio Express News

reports that in " the largest combat mobilization of Texas Army

National Guard troops since World War II, about 3,000 soldiers are

bound for Iraq. " The soldiers will be required to remain in Iraq for

up to two years. Across the country, " about 102,000 reservists, or 29

percent of all guard troops, are now mobilized. " While the call-up has

been expected in recent weeks, " the advance notice didn't keep tears

from flowing over the prospect of loved ones being separated by the

17-month-old war that continues to claim lives long after major combat

operations were deemed over. "

 

MEDIA LOSES INTEREST IN IRAQ: Distressingly, " until the recent

flare-up in Najaf, Iraq had faded from the front pages. " The paucity

of coverage in the six weeks since sovereignty was handed over to Iraq

has occurred even as " the country has been gripped in escalating

violence, forcing some coalition countries and private contractors to

flee for safety. " As a result of the instability, " Iraq's national

conference #8211; critical to the eventual implementation of free

elections #8211; has been postponed. " Nevertheless, there has been far

more attention to Martha Stewart, Laci Peterson and Kobe Bryant.

 

THE POST'S MEA CULPA: The Washington Post prints a long self-critique

today of its coverage leading up to the Iraq war that acknowledges the

paper was hesitant to print pieces that didn't mesh with the Bush

administration's message or agenda.

 

According to Post Pentagon correspondent Thomas Ricks, " Administration

assertions were on the front page. Things that challenged the

administration were on A18 on Sunday or A24 on Monday. There was an

attitude among editors: Look, we're going to war, why even worry about

all this contrary stuff. " The Post's Executive Editor Leonard Downie

said the failure to give more prominence to articles questioning the

administration's rationale " was a mistake on my part. " Read the full

article HERE.

 

 

HEALTH CAREWarning #8211; More Administration Scare Tactics

 

Once again, when faced with a serious political challenge, the White

House has resorted to invoking the fear of terrorism to justify its

behavior. Yesterday, Sen. John Kerry demanded the Bush administration

approve a bipartisan plan allowing seniors to purchase lower priced

medicines from Canada.

 

Also, Vermont's Republican Governor announced he was suing the

administration to allow his state to initiate its own reimportation plan.

 

In response, the White House deployed the commissioner of the Food and

Drug Administration Lester Crawford to claim that imported

prescription drugs are now the top weapon that al Qaeda plans to use

in an attack on America.

 

The FDA announcement was so cynical, baseless and transparent that the

Department of Homeland Security immediately issued a statement saying,

" we have no specific information now about any al-Qaida threats to our

food or drug supply. "

 

In fact, the move appears specifically designed to hide the Bush

administration's adamant desire to protect the same pharmaceutical

industry profits that #160;fund its campaign.

 

ANOTHER PERFECTLY TIMED TERRORISM ANNOUNCEMENT: Yesterday's perfectly

timed terror announcement by the FDA comes on the heels of other

examples of the Bush administration using the fear of terrorism for

its own political gain.

 

Last week, the administration raised the terror alert in three states

just after the Democratic National Convention, even though it later

revealed it was basing the move on old information and had outed its

own al Qaeda intelligence source in the process.

 

A week before, the administration announced the capture of a top al

Qaeda suspect hours before Kerry's keynote address to the Democratic

National Convention. Pakistani intelligence sources had previously

asserted the administration was pressuring them to come up with an

arrest during the convention, and it soon came out that the

administration specifically delayed the announcement of the capture

for five days.

 

In May, the very same week the president's approval ratings hit an all

time low, Attorney General John Ashcroft held a dramatic press

conference warning Americans about the general threat of terrorism,

but administration officials quickly admitted, " There's no real new

intelligence. "

 

IN DESPERATION, FDA CITES UNRELATED ISSUES: Desperate to defend the

administration's opposition to reimportation, the FDA chairman

yesterday actually invoked wholly unrelated examples when pressed to

substantiate his terrorism warning.

 

The Associated Press reports that, as proof of his claims, " Crawford

noted the 1982 Tylenol case, in which packages of the extra-strength

variety of the leading painkiller were removed from store shelves on

Chicago's west side, filled with cyanide and returned to stores for

purchase. "

 

Of course, that incident was wholly confined to the domestic economy

and thus has absolutely nothing to do with a the highly regulated

reimportation system being proposed in Congress.

 

Crawford himself has admitted that it would cost just $58 million a

year to establish a safe reimportation system that would then save

seniors billions a year on medicine.

 

GOP GOVERNOR IGNORES WHITE HOUSE'S BOGUS FEAR TACTICS: Vermont's

Republican Gov. Jim Douglas yesterday announced he is taking the Bush

administration to court in a fight to force the White House to give

seniors access to lower-priced FDA-approved medicines from Canada.

 

Along with invoking the fear of terrorism, the administration has

parroted the pharmaceutical industry line that reimportation by states

and city governments is supposedly unsafe.

 

Bush's own FDA officials have been unable to provide any evidence to

support that assertion. As Douglas said yesterday, " The claims on

which they've based this [denial of the Vermont reimportation program]

are, in our view, unsubstantiated, and we have no choice but to pursue

any and all legal remedies.''

 

COMPANIES FIGHTING REIMPORTATION GAVE BIG TO BUSH: The Kansas City

Star reports that Eli Lilly, Glaxo SmithKline and Pfizer are at the

forefront of the fight against reimportation, taking the ethically

questionable step of restricting supplies of medicine to keep prices

high.

 

Pfizer, for instance, has restricted supplies of the cholesterol drug

Lipitor because, as one industry spokesman said, the industry must

" protect the huge investment they make developing new drugs. "

 

What he didn't say was that Lipitor and many other medicines now being

held hostage were originally developed with billions of dollars of

taxpayer money.

 

The Bush administration, meanwhile, has done nothing, instead

pocketing huge campaign contributions from these three companies.

Pfizer's CEO is a Bush Pioneer (someone who has raised over $100,000),

Pfizer executives have given the Bush campaign more than $110,000, and

the company has given the RNC more than $2.5 million in soft money

since 2000.

 

Eli Lilly executives have given the Bush campaign more than $53,000,

and the company has given the RNC more than $1.4 million in soft money

since 2000. And Glaxo executives have given the Bush campaign more

than $23,000, while the company has given the RNC more than $1.4

million in soft money since 2000.

 

MORE BUSH OFFICIALS HEAD TO DRUG INDUSTRY: The Sydney Morning Herald

reports two top U.S. trade negotiators are going to work for the same

health care/drug industries that they went to bat for in finalizing

the newly minted U.S.-Australia trade agreement.

 

Ralph Ives, assistant U.S. trade representative for pharmaceutical

policy, next month " becomes vice-president for global strategy at

AdvaMed, " a medical products industry group. Simiarly, negotiator

Claude Burcky " is now director of global government affairs at the

pharmaceutical company Abbott Laboratories. "

 

These two officials spearheaded the Bush administration's demands that

the trade deal include provisions that " would allow pharmaceutical

companies to prevent imports of drugs to the United States. " The deal

also " watered down " the Australian government's ability to negotiate

lower medicine prices from drug companies #8211; an ability the Bush

administration barred the U.S. government from having when it wrote

its new Medicare bill.

 

The Bush administration-drug industry revolving door is not new #8211;

Bush Medicare chief Tom Scully immediately went to work for the health

care/drug industry after passage of the new Medicare bill, which gave

away billions of dollars to the health care/drug industry.

 

See more from American Progress on how Bush administration policy is

bought and sold by the drug industry.

 

Under the Radar

 

MORE OBLIGATIONS FOR TROOPS MEANS MORE NO-BID CONTRACTS: Because the

military is stretched thin by continued obligations in Iraq,

Afghanistan and elsewhere " the Army has resorted to hiring private

security guards to help protect dozens of military bases. "

 

Alarmingly, much of the work is being performed by companies who " got

the contracts without having to bid competitively. " Those companies

figured out how " to abuse a law intended to aid impoverished Alaska

natives. "

 

The Army awarded contracts " worth as much as $1 billion...to two small

Alaska Native firms with little previous security experience...which

operate under special contracting laws enabling them to avoid

competitive bidding. "

 

Those firms, in turn, " subcontracted part of the work to two of the

country's largest security firms: Wackenhut Services Inc. and Vance

Federal Security Services. "

 

Wackenhut and Vance lost out on similar contracts when they faced open

competition against other companies. When Wackenhut provided security

guards for the Department of Energy, the company " manipulated the

results of drills by altering testing equipment and passing

information to low-ranking guards prior to simulated attacks. "

 

ELECTION #8211; RIGHT-WING PLAYS RACIAL POLITICS: The Washington Post

reports that a group financed by a major Republican contributor -- who

is raking in a windfall from President Bush's Medicare legislation --

has begun running ads in about a dozen cities attacking Sen. John F.

Kerry by playing the race card.

 

The ads attack Kerry as " rich, white and wishy-washy " and mock his

wife for talking about her African roots. The group running the ads

" has substantial financial backing from J. Patrick Rooney, the former

chairman of Golden Rule Insurance Co. and the founder of a new firm,

Medical Savings Insurance Co.

 

Both firms specialize in medical savings accounts, created by

Republican-backed 1996 legislation, and health savings accounts, which

were created by President Bush's 2003 Medicare prescription drug

legislation. " #160;

 

ENVIRO #8211; DRYING OUT THE WETLANDS: According to a new report, the

Bush administration " has allowed developers to drain thousands of

acres of wetlands under a policy adopted last year. "

 

The report, issued by four environmental groups, based its findings on

information gained from Freedom of Information Act requests, and

" represents the first accounting of how the administration's

interpretation of a 2001 Supreme Court decision affected isolated

wetlands in states from New Mexico to Delaware. "

 

The directive " put millions of acres of rivers, streams, lakes and

wetlands at risk, and the report identified more than a dozen cases in

which the Corps of Engineers subsequently approved development in

areas described as ecologically sensitive. "

 

ETHICS #8211; KERRY, THE LIFE SAVER: Sen. John Kerry didn't only save

the lives of troops in Vietnam; he also saved the life of one of his

colleagues in the Senate. Former U.S. Sen. Chic Hecht of Nevada -- a

staunch Republican #8211; " thanks his lucky stars for Democratic

presidential hopeful Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts. " The story: " On

July 12, 1988, Hecht was attending a weekly Republican luncheon when a

piece of apple lodged firmly in his throat. Hecht stumbled out of the

room, thinking he might vomit but not wanting to do it in front of his

colleagues. Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., thumped his back, but Hecht quickly

passed out in the hallway. Just then, Kerry stepped off an elevator,

rushed to Hecht's side and gave him the Heimlich maneuver -- four

times. The lifesaving incident made international news, and Dr. Henry

Heimlich, who invented the maneuver in 1974, called Hecht to say that

had Kerry intervened just 30 seconds later Hecht might have been in a

vegetative state for life. " Asked about the life-saving event, Hecht

said, " He knew exactly what to do. But a lot of people know what to

do. They just don't size up the situation immediately. "

 

 

Features DON'T MISS

DAILY TALKING POINTS: Major Najaf Offensive Signals Iraq War Far From Over

 

MEDICARE POLICY: Highlights from the Medicare Prescription Drug

Regulation: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

 

ECONOMY: The New York Times editorial page opines, " Policy makers have

run out of tools for stewarding an economy that -- nearly three years

into a recovery -- has yet to flourish and may even be downshifting to

neutral#8230; If Mr. Bush continues on the tax-cut path, continuing

high deficits will further threaten job creation and living standards. "

 

ECONOMY: President of Economic Future Group, Jonathan Tasini, explores

how the Wal-Martization of America leaves pensions in peril.

 

CONVENTION: Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor at Slate magazine,

criticizes the attempts to prevent protests at the Republican National

Convention, calling the use of the Secret Service to silence pacifist

protesters " an abuse of executive power. "

 

DAILY GRILL

" Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. "

 

- President George Bush, 5/1/03

 

VERSUS

 

" Major operations...have begun. "

 

- U.S. Marine Maj. David Holahan, 8/12/04

 

DAILY OUTRAGE

White House exploits terrorism concerns to frighten Americans about

safety surrounding reimportation of prescription drugs, despite

Homeland Security Department admission that " we have no specific

information now about any al-Qaida threats to our food or drug supply. "

 

Archives

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