Virginia Metze Reading List for Wednesday, April 6, 2005

[Guest guest]

" Virginia Metze " <vmetze

 

 

Thu, 7 Apr 2005 23:17:21 -0500

 

 

Reading List for Wednesday, April 6, 2005

There is so much information out there roaming around looking for

verification and a home. For example, articles about relationship

between Moonies and the Republicans are starting to surface. And

there is more coming out about the Carlyle group, which Father Bush

belongs to along with a bunch of other rich guys. There appears to be

a lot happening on campuses ... our kids are being heroes again. Not

much of this seems to be seeing the light of day, but I have

discovered if one looks far enough, one is likely to find more than

one realizes; it just never gets on big-time TV or cable news.

 

Martinez admits his staffer wrote Schiavo talking points memo

RAW STORY

 

STORY EXCERPTS LEAKED:

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — A one-page unsigned memo that became part of the

debate preceding Congress' vote ordering a federal court review of the

Terri Schiavo case originated in Florida Republican Sen. Mel Martinez'

office, Martinez said Wednesday.

 

The memo — first reported by ABC News on March 18 and by The

Washington Post and The Associated Press two days later — said the

fight over removing Schiavo's feeding tube " is a great political issue

.... and a tough issue for Democrats. "

 

" This is an important moral issue and the pro-life base will be

excited that the Senate is debating this important issue, " said the

memo, which was described at the time as being circulated among Senate

Republicans. [...] Read more at

http://rawstory.com/martinez_memo_406.htm Where Are The Good Christians?

The fanatics and nutjobs now running the show sure give honest

believers a bad name

 

By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist

Wednesday, April 6, 2005

 

I know they're out there.

 

I forget, often, too often, just how many there are but I know they

exist in much larger numbers than you might be led to believe by

current spiritually embarrassing headlines and I know they are just

as, if not more, passionate and healthy and deeply felt in their

beliefs than the overpublicized sects of angry and frothing " true

believers " screeching into the megaphone of the culture, the ones

yanking BushCo's chain and pounding their Bibles and hiding their

warped porn fetishes and forcing their way into our lives and laws and

bedrooms right now.

 

They are the decent Christians. They are the calm, morally

progressive, compassionate, open-hearted Jesus-loving folk who don't

really give a damn for archaic church dogma or pious noise or

sanctimonious candlelight vigils, for repressing women or bashing gays

or slamming Islam and. in fact, turned to Christianity precisely

because they believe these things are abhorrent and wrong and, well,

anti-Christian. [...] Read the rest at the San Francisco Gate web

site: http://tinyurl.com/6mgx3 Democrats Are Lost in the Shuffle

While GOP Holds All the Cards

 

Ronald Brownstein:

Washington Outlook

April 4, 2005

Los Angeles Times

 

On almost every major question in Washington today, the choice isn't

whether to move in a Republican or Democratic direction, but how far

in a Republican direction to move.

This is the grim reality of political life for Democrats at a time

when the GOP controls the White House and both chambers of Congress.

[...]

The Democrats' biggest problem is that they don't have a viable means

to spotlight or forge a party consensus behind these ideas. Unless

they can recruit Republican defectors, Democrats can't force the

serious legislative debate on their initiatives that would attract

news coverage and public attention. [...] Read the whole editorial

at:

http://www.latimes.com/news/columnists/la-na-outlook4apr04,1,2807996.column?coll\

=la-news-columns

 

Connecticut Prepares to Sue U.S. Over Bush Education Law

By SAM DILLON

The New York Times

Published: April 5, 2005

 

Connecticut's attorney general said today that he was preparing to sue

the federal government over President Bush's signature

education-reform law, arguing that it forces Connecticut to administer

new standardized tests at a cost of millions of dollars and that

Washington refuses to pay for them.

 

Although a handful of local school districts, in Illinois, Texas and

other states have filed legal challenges to the law, known as No Child

Left Behind, Connecticut would be the first state to do so. [...]

Read the rest at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/05/nyregion/05cnd-child.html? or

http://tinyurl.com/6schg also at:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/040605M.shtml GOP Pounces on Byrd

Link to Liberal Group

 

Republicans say they plan to make MoveOn's fundraising for the veteran

Democratic senator an issue in his reelection effort

By Ronald Brownstein, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

April 6, 2005

 

WASHINGTON — With an early fundraising blitz, the online liberal

advocacy group MoveOn.org has shown both its potential as a Democratic

asset and a Republican target in the 2006 elections.

 

In less than three days last week, the group's political action

committee raised from its members nearly $833,000 for Sen. Robert C.

Byrd (D-W.Va.), who next year could face his first competitive race in

decades. [...] Read the rest at: http://tinyurl.com/5wlmv or

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/040605L.shtml TruthOut's Steve

Weissman has started a five part serious on " America's Religious Right

- Saints or Subversives? " The first one is at:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/040605B.shtml

Oil prices pinch other spending

By Ron Scherer | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

from the April 07, 2005 edition, released April 6, 2005

NEW YORK – The price of gasoline has begun a springtime surge that

experts believe will push it to a national average of $2.50 a gallon

by Memorial Day.

 

At that level, many Americans will find it costs about $65 - or more -

to tank up the Sequoia or Suburban. In California, which usually has

some of the highest prices in the nation, forget about expensive

self-indulgences because gasoline could average close to $3 a gallon.

[...] Read the rest at:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0407/p01s01-usec.html?s=hns or

http://tinyurl.com/3qobf

Another illusion lost:

 

Is Britain still home of mannerly charm? Don't be daft! By Mark

Rice-Oxley | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor. Read it

at: http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0407/p01s03-woeu.html?s=hns World

Bank Warns U.S. to Cut Deficits

Wed Apr 6, 2005 03:00 PM ET Reuters

 

PARIS (Reuters) - Accumulation of dollar reserves by some Asian

countries could spark a systemic foreign exchange crisis, the chief

economist of the World Bank said in an interview to be published on

Thursday.

 

Francois Bourguignon told the Les Echos newspaper it was too early to

talk of a speculative bubble but that the United States had to cut its

deficits to head off a crisis. The paper released the text of the

interview ahead of publication. [...] Read at:

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews & storyID=8105679

or http://tinyurl.com/63jf4 Raw Story web site claims to have the

exclusive transcript of:

 

Lautenberg issues sharp speech about attacks on judges

http://rawstory.com/exclusives/byrne/lautenberg_judges_406.htm

MoveOn is promoting a petition to urge Congress to fire Tom Delay as

Majority Leader. I would rather see him indicted and in jail, as he

would be if he were a Democrat, but at least that is something ... To

sign, go to

http://www.moveonpac.org/delay/?id=5322-479989-mOR6mLHpgL0KNv37l3dgGQ & t=3

or http://tinyurl.com/6fm4w

Stop the Abuse of Power:

 

Senate Republicans are going for the ultimate power grab. They're

planning to give themselves absolute power, silencing Senate Democrats

(and the millions of Americans they represent) by changing the rules

and traditions of the Senate and eliminating the filibuster, a

two-century Senate tradition that has preserved the voice of the

minority. [...] Read more at the Democratic Party website,

http://www.democrats.org/specialreports/nuclear_option/index.html

House GOP backs DeLay amid ethics scandals

 

By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent

Last Updated 7:32 am PDT Thursday, April 7, 2005

WASHINGTON (AP) - House Republicans coupled expressions of concern

with a public show of support for Rep. Tom DeLay on Wednesday as the

embattled majority leader brushed aside fresh questions about his record.

 

Venting anger over attacks against DeLay and other targets, some

members of the GOP rank and file criticized Democrats in unusually

sharp terms. One, Rep. Bob Ney of Ohio, was quoted by fellow

Republicans at a closed-door meeting as calling the head of the House

Democratic campaign committee a snake.

 

Ney disputed that. " I said he was a sneak, " he said, referring to Rep.

Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill.

" A snake, a sneak, sounds like Mr. Ney is in a snit, " countered Bill

Burton, Emanuel's spokesman. [...] Read the rest at

http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/politics/story/2288839p-10480976c.html

or http://tinyurl.com/5xqe2

Textile industry seeks re-imposed quotas

By MARTIN CRUTSINGER, AP Economics Writer

Last Updated 12:00 pm PDT Wednesday, April 6, 2005

 

WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. textile and clothing industry asked the

government Wednesday to re-impose quotas on 14 categories of clothing

to protect American manufacturers from a flood of Chinese imports.

 

The cases covered such products as knit shirts, sweaters, brassieres,

dressing gowns and trousers made with man-made fibers and came two

days after the Bush administration brought its own cases on different

clothing products. [...] Read more at:

http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/politics/story/2288978p-10480977c.html or

http://tinyurl.com/5ogp9 I heard that all of those American flags we

have seen on American cars were made in China ... Wes Clark's Iraq

testimony before House Armed Services Committee Click on the link to

the left of this, on http://www.securingamerica.com/ or on

http://tinyurl.com/6el9t to read his testimony. BUSHES IN THE HOOD: W

FIGHTS GANGS WITH BUDGET CUTS AND PHOTO OPS

 

By Arianna Huffington, April 6, 2005

 

Over the next week or so, House and Senate negotiators will try to

hammer out the differences in their competing budgets. Among the major

bones of contention: disagreements over how deeply to cut Medicaid;

whether to make President Bush's expiring first-term tax cuts

permanent; and whether to go along with the president's proposal to

slash funding for a wide range of programs related to homeland security.

 

No, President Bush is not gutting the Department of Homeland Security.

The problem is Bush's definition of homeland security. Apparently, it

doesn't include things like the safety of our streets. Especially the

streets of our inner cities, which have become war zones. [...] Read

the rest at: http://www.ariannaonline.com/columns/column.php?id=766

or http://tinyurl.com/478yr Yet another interesting blog someone

linked to from an email today.

http://www.newsdissector.org/blog/2005/04/06/#1182 I won't quote

anything, but I do love the title: Danny Schechter, News Dissector.

Is that great or what? Talking Points Memo by joshua micah marshall

was quoted today.

 

So how much debt has President Bush run up on his watch?

 

This page on the Bureau of Public Debt website gives some month by

month and year by year benchmarks. [...] Read the rest at

http://tinyurl.com/5wc9l or

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/005352.php and check out

that page he refers to:

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpdodt.htm What, you say you

are not masochistic enough to read those figures. Shame! You May Owe

More Money Soon

 

By Selena Maranjian (TMF Selena)

March 30, 2005

 

Here's a new development in the credit card world that many may see as

a bad thing: Some card issuers, such as Bank of America (NYSE: BAC)

and Wachovia (NYSE: WB), are hiking the minimum monthly payments they

charge their customers. The increases are generally from 2% to 4%.

Those might not look like big numbers, but consider that:

It's essentially a doubling of the amount owed. If you normally owe

$100, you'll suddenly owe $200.

 

If, like a typical household that carries revolving credit card debt,

you owe $8,000, a 2% minimum means $160, and a 4% one means $320. If

you're paying around $300 per month, that's about $3,600 annually --

not an insignificant sum. There are plenty of people who owe (gasp!)

$25,000 -- for them, the monthly minimum will rise from $500 to

$1,000. Scary stuff! [...] Read the rest at:

http://www.fool.com/News/mft/2005/mft05033001.htm

Political Groups Paid Two Relatives of House Leader

By PHILIP SHENON

The New York Times

April 6, 2005

 

WASHINGTON, April 5 - The wife and daughter of Tom DeLay, the House

majority leader, have been paid more than $500,000 since 2001 by Mr.

DeLay's political action and campaign committees, according to a

detailed review of disclosure statements filed with the Federal

Election Commission and separate fund-raising records in Mr. DeLay's

home state, Texas.

 

Most of the payments to his wife, Christine A. DeLay, and his only

child, Dani DeLay Ferro, were described in the disclosure forms as

" fund-raising fees, " " campaign management " or " payroll, " with no

additional details about how they earned the money. The payments

appear to reflect what Mr. DeLay's aides say is the central role

played by the majority leader's wife and daughter in his political

career. [...] Read the rest at the New York Times:

http://tinyurl.com/48cmy

Wal-Mart Woos Media as It Tries to Polish Image

 

Tue Apr 5, 2005 01:49 PM ET

By Mark Weinraub, Reuters

 

ROGERS, Ark. (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest

retailer, on Tuesday brought journalists to its Arkansas headquarters

in a first-ever media event, stepping up efforts to repair an image

tarnished by claims of worker discrimination and anti-union practices.

 

But a labor union and other groups used the event as an opportunity to

publicize their complaints against the company, holding meetings of

their own in Wal-Mart's hometown of Bentonville in northwest Arkansas.

 

Wal-Mart was tight-lipped about the message it wanted to deliver over

the two-day event, but scheduled speakers included Chief Executive Lee

Scott and Chief Financial Officer Tom Schoewe.

 

Wal-Mart, whose annual sales of $256 billion accounted for about 5

percent of all U.S. retail sales in 2004, also planned to give

reporters a rare look at some of its operations. [...] Read it all

at:

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews & storyID=8092618

or http://tinyurl.com/4hjcr Mondo Washington

The Courting of Bill

GOP dream plot: shut out Hillary by appointing hubby to supreme court

by James Ridgeway

April 5th, 2005 10:41 AM The Village Voice

 

WASHINGTON, D.C.—The right-wing political community remains haunted by

the specter of a " President Hillary Clinton " turning the Patriot Act

on their own leaders, marching them off to jail, and throwing the key

away.

 

How to stop her? Condi might do the trick, but she's a little

lightweight. Rather than oppose Senator Clinton, some Republican

politicians are trying to cozy up. In Texas, The Hotline reports, two

Republicans, Rick Perry running for re-election as governor and Kay

Bailey Hutchison for the Senate, are beginning to deliberately point

out how they have worked with Hillary.

 

Last weekend Bob Novak described a novel scheme, supposedly emanating

from the fevered brain of Karl Rove: Stop Hillary by putting Bill on

the Supreme Court.

[...] Read the rest at:

http://villagevoice.com/news/0514,mondo,62701,6.html

Wake Up!

Washington's alarming foreign policy

By Chalmers Johnson

March 31, 2005

In These Times

 

[...] I believe that on November 2, 2004, the United States crossed

its own Rubicon. Until last year's presidential election, ordinary

citizens could claim that our foreign policy, including the invasion

of Iraq, was George Bush's doing and that we had not voted for him. In

2000, Bush lost the popular vote and was appointed president by the

Supreme Court. In 2004, he garnered 3.5 million more votes than John

Kerry. The result is that Bush's war changed into America's war and

his conduct of international relations became our own.

 

This is important because it raises the question of whether restoring

sanity and prudence to American foreign policy is still possible.

During the Watergate scandal of the early '70s, the president's chief

of staff, H. R. Haldeman, once reproved White House counsel John Dean

for speaking too frankly to Congress about the felonies President

Nixon had ordered. " John, " he said, " once the toothpaste is out of the

tube, it's very hard to get it back in. " This homely warning by a

former advertising executive who was to spend 18 months in prison for

his own role in Watergate fairly accurately describes the situation of

the United States after the reelection of George W. Bush. [...]

Read the whole article at:

http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2042/ Want to send

emails to your Congressman about John Bolton as ambassador to the UN?

You can send a letter at http://www.usalone.com/bolton.htm You can

also send an email about the bankruptcy law at

http://www.usalone.com/bankruptcy.htm from ABC News Investigations:

 

DeLay's Lavish Island Getaway

Embattled Lobbyist Arranged DeLay Trip

By BRIAN ROSS

abc NEWS

 

April 6, 2005 — A Washington lobbyist under federal investigation for

his lobbying activities arranged a lavish overseas trip to the island

of Saipan for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, over the New

Year's holiday in 1997.

 

DeLay, his wife and daughter, and several aides, stayed for free at a

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The DeLay trip to the South Pacific island, originally reported by a

" 20/20 " investigation, was part of an effort by former aide Jack

Abramoff to stop legislation aimed at cracking down on sweatshops and

sex shops in the American territory, which is known as the

Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. [...] Read the rest

at: http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/story?id=647725 & page=1

or http://tinyurl.com/7ycbg Yet another Delay scandal, this one

involves a baby shower given for his daughter by a Texas energy firm.

http://rawstory.com/exclusives/byrne/delay_baby_shower_reliant_abramoff_406.htm

or http://tinyurl.com/3j8uj

 

Stop painting us as bad guys, says Wal-Mart chief

By David Litterick in New York (Filed: 07/04/2005) Telegraph.co.uk

 

The world's largest retailer has gone on the offensive as it attempts

to shrug off its image as an uncaring employer that exploits its workers.

 

During its first media conference, Wal-Mart chief executive Lee Scott

admitted the retailer's critics were " sometimes right " but complained

that a lot of the brickbats hurled at the company were " unfair and

inaccurate " .

 

Wal-Mart has recently suffered a spate of adverse publicity as it

attempts to fend off a class action lawsuit from thousands of female

workers alleging sexual discrimination. It is also accused of

practices that short-change its employees by offering low pay and few

healthcare benefits. It recently paid $11m to settle a lawsuit

alleging it contracted illegal immigrant workers.

 

Two weeks ago the company forced former vice-chairman Tom Coughlin to

resign from the board after an investigation into the misuse of

company gift cards and fraudulent expense accounts. [...] Read the

rest at: http://tinyurl.com/4uypj Tom Dispatch.com has a good

article on an exchange between former White House Counsel Alberto

Gonzales, now Attorney General, and Senator Arlen Specter (R., PA).

To read it, go here:

http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?emx=x & pid=2306 Tom Engelhardt

makes some good points, as always. Tom Dispatch.com is a project of

the Nation Institute. Why media ownership matters

 

By Amy Goodman and David Goodman

Guest columnists

Special to The Seattle Times

Sunday, April 3, 2005

 

George Bush must have been delighted to learn from a recent Washington

Post-ABC News poll that 56 percent of Americans still think Iraq had

weapons of mass destruction before the start of the war, while six in

10 said they believe Iraq provided direct support to the al-Qaida

terrorist network — notions that have long since been thoroughly

debunked by everyone from the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee to

both of Bush's handpicked weapons inspectors, Charles Duelfer and

David Kay.

 

Americans believe these lies not because they are stupid, but because

they are good media consumers. Our media have become an echo chamber

for those in power. Rather than challenge the fraudulent claims of the

Bush administration, we've had a media acting as a conveyor belt for

the government's lies. [...] Read the rest at the Seattle Times web

site: http://tinyurl.com/5d2rx

from KESQ News Channel 3

Poll: Two-thirds of Dean activists don't want Kerry or Gore to run in 2008

 

WASHINGTON -- A poll of Howard Dean's online activists from his 2004

presidential campaign contains few surprises.

Two-thirds of them say they don't want Al Gore or John Kerry, the

Democratic Party's nominees from 2000 and 2004, to run for president

in 2008.

 

Their top choice is Dean, who's currently chairman of the Democratic

National Committee.

 

Illinois Senator Barack Obama (buh-RAHK' oh-BAH'-muh), former North

Carolina Senator John Edwards and New York Senator Hillary Rodham

Clinton got the most other support for a 2008 run, with Kerry and Gore

far behind. Read the rest at:

http://www.kesq.com/Global/story.asp?S=3176464

Soldier disabled by anthrax vaccine is recalled to serve

He served his country as an ideal soldier and became a disabled

veteran along the way. So what is the Army doing calling him back –

just days before his term of service expires?

By Jesse Kanson-Benanav | RAW STORY MANAGING EDITOR

 

Jason Cordova was an ideal military recruit. In 1993, the Buffalo, NY

native enrolled at Canisius College, a Jesuit institution with a

strong Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) program that feeds the

U.S. Army officers in the Buffalo area. He studied military

communications, and was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant. Upon his

graduation in 1997, Cordova was upgraded to a Communications Commander

with the Army Special Forces and sent to serve active duty at Fort

Campbell, Kentucky.

 

It was there that Cordova's military career took a turn for the worse.

After a two-year review in 1998, Defense Secretary William Cohen

announced the implementation of an Anthrax Vaccine Immunization

Program for all active duty military personnel. As an active duty

officer, Cordova was among the 455,000 soldiers who received the

inoculation. Yet despite assurances as to the safety of the anthrax

vaccine, these shots were anything but routine. [...] Read the

rest of this Raw Story Exclusive at:

http://rawstory.com/exclusives/kanson/cordova_ordered_back_anthrax_401.htm

or http://tinyurl.com/4q278

There is supposed to be a major story lurking behind the

non-appearance of " depleted uranium " in the news. This is an issue on

which Democrats ought to be helping to sort out the facts. There have

been a number of articles starting in the '90s, apparently. Here is a

story from a Canadian site: http://www.tv.cbc.ca/national/pgminfo/du/

This is old, but I don't think I had it on the list... Molly Ivins is

not to be missed!

Oil-For-Food is Small Potatoes

Some days, it's hard to pick the outrage du jour, but hypocrisy is

always an inviting target, and the United Nations oil-for-food scandal

provides a two-fer.

By Molly Ivins, AlterNet. Posted April 1, 2005.

 

We have been hearing much right-wing huffing over the dreadful,

terrible, awful, unprecedented, worst-ever scandal in all history. One

indignant winger was livid because The New York Times devoted more

coverage to the collapse of Enron than to the earth-shaking U.N. scandal.

 

Those throwing conniption fits over the United Nations' misdeeds

(failure of oversight, according to the Volcker Report) might want to

meditate a bit on the role of the U.S. government in all this before

they further embarrass themselves denouncing perfidious foreigners.

 

For one thing, part of the oversight responsibility was on the United

States, as a member of the 661 Committee, which monitored Iraq's

compliance with the sanctions. The United States had the power to veto

all sales of Iraqi oil and all purchases of goods bought with money

from the program. Further, The Washington Post reports, " Diplomats and

oil brokers have recently said that the U.S. had long turned a blind

eye to illicit shipments of Iraqi oil by its allies Jordan and Turkey.

The United States acknowledged this week that it had acquiesced in the

trade to ensure that crucial allies would not suffer economic

hardships. " Read the rest on the Alternet.org web site:

http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/21655/ The Dean Activists:

Their Profile and Prospects

 

An In-Depth Look

Released: April 6, 2005

 

Although former Vermont governor Howard Dean failed to win the

Democratic presidential nomination, his campaign left a strong imprint

on the political world. It assembled a network of over a half-million

active supporters and contributors, raised over $20 million in mostly

small donations online, and demonstrated the power of the internet as

a networking and mobilizing tool in politics.

Who are the internet activists ­ the people widely known as " Deaniacs "

­ who joined the Dean campaign as it slowly grew from asterisk status

in early 2003 polls to the frontrunner position at the beginning of

2004? A new Pew survey provides the first detailed look at the

cyber-soldiers of this pioneering campaign. An internet survey with a

random sample of 11,568 activists drawn from the online database of

those who had contributed money or otherwise worked on behalf of Gov.

Dean provides insight into who they are, why they joined, how they

reacted to Dean's loss and President Bush's reelection, and what they

think about the future of the Democratic Party. [...] Read the rest

at: http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=240

 

There will never be a charge for this reading list and I won't ask for

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It may be freely distributed as long as it is sent out in its entirety

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free to use the URLs in your own posts, etc.

 

© Virginia Metze

 

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