Turning a Corner - as Republicans Fall, Democrats need to Rise

Crossposted on Dailykos:

Politicians love to say say that Polls don't matter but then again, maybe they do. Polls and approval ratings of Congress are currently abysmal.

From Survey USA: Is the country headed in the Right Direction or the Wrong Direction?

Right 29% - Wrong 66%

Polling Report.com: Approve or Disapprove of the way Congress is handling it's job?

Approve 32% - Disapprove 64%

This happened at the same time when Republicans were crushed in this years mid-term elections.

With President Bush facing his lowest job approval ratings and polls showing widespread dissatisfaction over the country's direction, the GOP suffered a series of bruising blows — from decisive losses in the New Jersey and Virginia governor's races to the clean-sweep rejection of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's ballot initiatives and even the resounding defeat of Randy Kelly, a Democratic mayor in St. Paul, Minn., who was hurt politically because he campaigned last year for the president.

It might just be me, but I think this may have something to do with the way Congress seems to have lost it's nerve to dropping the budget cutting axe on poor children, women and the elderly.

House Republican leaders were forced to abruptly pull their $54 billion budget-cutting bill off the House floor yesterday

There is growing dissension in Republican ranks over spending priorities, taxes, oil exploration and the reach of government

A battle between House Republican conservatives and moderates over energy policy and federal anti-poverty and education programs left GOP leaders without enough votes to pass the $54 billion budget-cutting bill

The budget measure had been framed by GOP leaders as one of the most important pieces of legislation in years

...

GOP Plans Failed
The House budget vote was supposed to reestablish the Republican commitment to a smaller government

Moderate Republicans made it clear that was not the way they wanted the party defined

The GOP leadership had already abandoned a provision in the budget that would have opened the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling

But it was not enough to secure the votes of moderates who said remaining policy changes were hitting the nation's most vulnerable citizens just as the party was preparing another round of tax cuts that would benefit the most affluent

...

Rep. Pelosi Comments
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, said, "I think that the Republicans are feeling the impact of the election and feeling the heat of our arguments about why this budget is a bad one."

Pelosi said, "Democrats were united and made those issues too hot to handle for Republicans."

Pelosi called the cuts "anti-family, anti-taxpayer and anti-American."

Pelosi said, "By having to pull it today, it is a failure on the part of the Republicans."

The trick of course will be for Democrats to articulate a vision that will protect the most vulnerable in our nation, maintain national security and eliminate the deficit without sounding like "tax and spend liberals". One way to address this is to simply let the current Bush Tax-Cuts expire, but that IMO isn't enough. Dems also need to offer offsetting tax credits for private investment into public projects. Republicans and Conservatives are fond of saying that the private making can find more efficient ways to solve problems - well, then I say let them.

Rather than simply giving resource rich persons and companies tax cuts for doing nothing other than existing, we should tie those cuts directly to how they take responsibility in their community.

• Hire more American workers rather than persons from overseas - get a tax credit for it (Which was a Kerry Campaign Proposal).
• Provide quality healthcare for all your workers, get a tax credit for it. Protect their pensions, get a credit.
• Invest in environment-friendly materials, tools and products - get a credit.

Each and every time that a private company or person spends his own dollars in a way that prevents the government from having to do it - each time they take public responsibility in some way - they should get a credit to be applied against the Bush cuts after they expire. It's possibly they might come out with even lower taxes than they have now -- but more importantly, the need for government expenditures to help the helpless would decrease as well because more people will have better jobs with better benefits - rather than the continue Wal-martizing of America with increasingly diminishing expectations and higher corporate profits.

Vyan

GOP to Veterans : FU

On this Veterans Day - it may be a good time to take good look at exactly how our Congressional leaders in the GOP have been supporting our troops as we fight two simultaneous Wars overseas.

Republicans Voted Against Veterans' Health Care FIVE TIMES This Year, Despite Warnings of Budget Shortfall.

Before the Department of Veterans Affairs announced a $1 billion budget shortfall earlier this year, Senate Republicans voted twice against $1.98 billion for veterans' health care, while also opposing a proposal to increase veterans' health care funding by $2.8 billion. And last month, Republicans said "no" to keeping veterans' health care funding in line with inflation and population growth. These votes all came despite at least five warnings from Sen. Patty Murray that the proposed federal funding for veterans' programs would not be enough to cover costs. [Vote #89, 4/12/05; Vote #90, 4/12/05; Vote #55, 3/16/05; Vote #251, 10/5/05; CQ Today, 10/5/05; U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs Press Release, 6/23/05; Office of Sen. Patty Murray; Tacoma News Tribune, 6/29/05]

Tall-tales and Hiding the Truth

According to Newsweek a new set of documents indicates that before his UN Speech, the truth about terrorist detainee al-Libi's Tall-tales about Al-Qaeda cooperation with Saddam Hussein was withheld from Colin Powell.

The new documents also raise the possibility that caveats raised by intelligence analysts about al-Libi’s claims were withheld from Powell when he was preparing his Security Council speech. Larry Wilkerson, who served as Powell’s chief of staff and oversaw the vetting of Powell’s speech, responded to an e-mail from NEWSWEEK Wednesday stating that he was unaware of the DIA doubts about al-Libi at the time the speech was being prepared. “We never got any dissent with respect to those lines you cite … indeed the entire section that now we know came from [al-Libi],” Wilkerson wrote.

On the issue of whether these doubt were passed on to the President:

Michele Davis, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said that President Bush's remarks were "based on what was put forward to him as the views of the intelligence community" and that those views came from "an aggregation" of sources. She added, however, that it was impossible at this point to determine whether the dissent from the DIA and questions raised by the CIA were seen by officials at the White House prior to the president's remarks. A counter-terrorism official said that while CIA reports on al-Libi were distributed widely around U.S. intelligence agencies and policy-making offices, many such routine reports are not regularly read by senior policy-making officials.

And what exactly was it they didn't tell Powell and claim the President couldn't have known?

But according to the newly declassified DIA and CIA documents provided to Levin, the credibility of those statements by Bush and Powell were already in doubt within the U.S. intelligence community. While the DIA was the first to raise red flags in its February 2002 report, the CIA itself in January 2003 produced an updated version of a classified internal report called “Iraqi Support for Terrorism.” The previous version of this CIA report in September 2002 had simply included al-Libi’s claims, according to the newly declassified agency document provided to Levin in response to his inquiries about al-Libi. But the updated January 2003 version, while including al-Libi’s claims that Al Qaeda sent operatives to Iraq to acquire chemical and biological weapons and training, added an important new caveat: It “noted that the detainee was not in a position to know if any training had taken place,” according to the copy of the document obtained by NEWSWEEK. It was not until January 2004—nine months after the war was launched—that al-Libi recanted “a number of the claims he made while in detention for the previous two years, including the claim that Al Qaeda sent operatives to Iraq to obtain chemical and biological weapons and related training,” the CIA document says.

Sounds to me like the intelligence was Stovepiped directly to policy makers without being properly vetted and verified.

Vyan

IRS bullies Church for political commentary

Ok, when you want to talk about Truth 2 Power (the subtitle of this blog), saying something that needs to be said to someone who doesn't want to hear it - I can't think of a better recent example than this story about All Saints Church in Pasadena.

Two days before George W. Bush's re-election in 2004, the Rev. George F. Regas, a retired rector, denounced the Iraq war from the pulpit of Pasadena's All Saints Episcopal Church.

While cautioning that he wasn't telling people how to vote, Regas delivered a scathing indictment of the war. ``Mr. President, your doctrine of pre-emptive war is a failed doctrine,'' Regas said, summarizing how Jesus would have seen it. ``Forcibly changing the regime of an enemy that posed no imminent threat has led to disaster.''

The Internal Revenue Service didn't like the sermon. The IRS is now threatening to take away the church's tax-exempt status, saying there's a ``reasonable belief'' that All Saints violated the rules against intervening in political campaigns.

Ok, so he didn't make a comment about how anyone should vote - he just gave his opinion on the War, which it seems to me the late Pope John Paul has also opposed the War.

Before the war, Pope John Paul II warned Bush that an invasion of Iraq would be viewed by the Vatican as a “criminal act.”

It seems clear that if All Saints Church is being investigated by the IRS for making political comments, then what about...

Pat Roberts calling for the Assasination of a Foreign Head of State by U.S. Forces?

Or his lying about comments that Sen Barbara Boxer never made about Judge John Roberts?

Or his comments that Democratic Judges are a greater threat to the U.S. than Al Qaeda, Nazi Germany of the Civil War.

And then there's Jerry Falwell whose said that the "Liberal" 9th Circuit Court of Appeals is the "most overtuned" of all Federal Appellate Courts - which it is not.

Not that I'm accusing the IRS of a malicious and biased abused of power.

Ok, wait - yes I am. It's seem to me that Rev. Regas has a First Amendment Right to shout Water in the middle of a Fire and share his feeling that our course of action at that time was deeply misguided and dangerous, just as numerous Biblical passages can be used as referrence to back up this assertion. It has to be recalled that Jesus is known as the "Prince of Peace".

But, if Regas and his Church have to face the possibility of losing their tax exempt status for criticizing the War, I don't see any justification for Roberts, Falwell or many other Radical Evangelical preachers keeping their's considering the highly political comments they make on a regular basis.

Not that I have any hope of that ever happening, but one can always dream.

Vyan

Melting the Skin Off Children

In response to a recent Italian Documentary about the assault on Falluah last year which featured some rather graphic images, the issue of both White Phosporous Munitions and Napalm (500 lbs MK77 Firebombs) has suddenly become a very - hot - topic. To borrow a line from a band I used to like until this year- "It aint pretty".

From The Independant.

In a documentary to be broadcast by RAI, the Italian state broadcaster, this morning, a former American soldier who fought at Fallujah says: "I heard the order to pay attention because they were going to use white phosphorus on Fallujah. In military jargon it's known as Willy Pete.

"Phosphorus burns bodies, in fact it melts the flesh all the way down to the bone ... I saw the burned bodies of women and children. Phosphorus explodes and forms a cloud. Anyone within a radius of 150 metres is done for."

Rather than being just another Liberal attack on the Military, the use of White Phosphorous has been confirmed by the Military itself.

From an article on the attack on Fallujah featured in the March Edition of Field Artillery Magazine.

"WP [i.e., white phosphorus rounds] proved to be an effective and versatile munition. We used it for screening missions at two breeches and, later in the fight, as a potent psychological weapon against the insurgents in trench lines and spider holes when we could not get effects on them with HE. We fired 'shake and bake' missions at the insurgents, using WP to flush them out and HE to take them out."

Needess to say, this has cause a bit of a stir --- here's a sample from Hunter on dailykos

First, I think it should be a stated goal of United States policy to not melt the skin off of children.

As a natural corollary to this goal, I think the United States should avoid dropping munitions on civilian neighborhoods which, as a side effect, melt the skin off of children. You can call them "chemical weapons" if you must, or far more preferably by the more proper name of "incendiaries". The munitions may or may not precisely melt the skin off of children by setting them on fire; they do melt the skin off of children, however, through robust oxidation of said skin on said children, which is indeed colloquially known as "burning". But let's try to avoid, for now, the debate over the scientific phenomenon of exactly how the skin is melted, burned, or caramelized off of the aforementioned children. I feel quite confident that others have put more thought into the matter of how to melt the skin off of children than I have, and will trust their judgment on the matter.

Now, I know that we may be melting the skin off of children in order to give them freedom, or to prevent Saddam Hussein from possibly melting the skins off of those children at some future date. These are good and noble things to bring children, especially the ones who have not been killed by melting their skin.

I know, as well, that we do not drop "chemical weapons" on Iraq. We may, in the course of fighting insurgents in civilian neighborhoods, drop "incendiaries" or other airborne weaponry which may melt the skins off of children as an accidental side effect of illuminating their neighborhoods or melting the skins off their neighbors. In that this still can be classified as melting the skins off of children, I feel comfortable in stating that the United States should not condone the practice. (This may mean, when fighting in civilian neighborhoods, we take nuanced steps to avoid melting the skin off of children, such as not dropping munitions that melt the skin off of children.)

And I know it is true, there is some confusion over whether the United States was a signatory to the Do Not Melt The Skin Off Of Children part of the Geneva conventions, and whether or not that means we are permitted to melt the skin off of children, or merely are silent on the whole issue of melting the skin off of children.

But all that aside, there are very good reasons, even in a time of war, not to melt the skin off of children.

• First, because the insurgency will inevitably be hardened by tales of American forces melting the skin off of children.

• Second, because the civilian population will harbor considerable resentment towards Americans for melting the skin off of their children.

• Third, BECAUSE IT FUCKING MELTS THE SKIN OFF OF CHILDREN.

And, unless Saddam Hussein had a brigade or two consisting of six year olds, we can presume that children, like perhaps nine tenths or more of their immediate families, are civilians.

More...

Now some like to call Liberals, who generally oppose this sort of thing - bleeding hearts. As if to imply that caring and compassion for non-combatants who've been burned alive is simply the result of misplaced guilt. If that's so, then exactly what - I wonder - would you call those who advocate charcoal children as a genuine method of achieve peace and democracy?

How could such a thing happen? Is it merely a by-product of "doing everything you can" to protect the people of America, or is it something else? Right now we have a President who claims "We do not torture" while his Vice President is beating every bush in Congress to ensure that - just in case - the CIA can use Torture if it needs too. Cognative Dissonance much?

"Last month, the Senate voted for a ban on torture 90-9. You heard me correctly: Nine United States Senators refused to vote against torture. Those senators included Illinois Democrat Thumbscrews McGee, Iowa's Cattleprod von Analpair and, of course, Ted Stevens [of] Alaska."
---Jon Stewart

Look, it's not like a few Ethics Refresher classes are going to replace what's clearly missing in these people. There's something fundamentally wrong with people who can rationalize means such as these, no matter what the ends might be.

Thirty five years ago it was pictures such as these that finally made the American public realize the wrongness of the Vietnam War -- how many more Abu Ghraib's, how many more detainee who've been murdered while in custody, how many more burned and charred children is it going to take?

Is this who we are? Is this how we fight terrorism and bring "justice" to the world? I'd like to scream "NO", but in truth can only shake my head and quietly whisper...

'"yes".

But then again, why bother being shocked. This is who we've been for a long time - don't you know that Napalm sticks to Kids?

Vyan

There is a Diebold - uh, I mean God!

From Bradblog: This is story that just has to be read to be believed....

Due to a problem with Electronic Voting Machines in Los Angeles County, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was told he had already voted when he showed up at the polls today to cast his ballot in the Special Election that he himself declared for California today!

He was told he'd have to use a provisional ballot, but unlike most American voters, he was eventually allowed to use a regular ballot anyway.

Los Angeles County Registrar, Conny McCormack (a huge fan of Diebold machines, and a very good friend of their sales rep here in Southern California) is trying to mitigate the damage...big time...Though she admits that someone "breached protocol in advance of the election"

It should be further noted, that the Governator was attempting to vote in Brentwood (in Los Angeles County), but the "breach" -- which would have kept a normal non-Gubernatorial citizen from voting on anything but a provisional ballot -- occurred in Pasadena, about a 30 to 45 minute drive from Brentwood. Early voting, on paperless Diebold Touch-Screen Voting Machines, has been occurring in Los Angles County for the last several weeks.

From Los Angeles Times... [emphasis added]

Schwarzenegger Hits Snag at Polling Place

SACRAMENTO -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger showed up to his Brentwood neighborhood polling station today to cast his ballot in the special election — and was told he had already voted.

Elections officials said a Los Angeles County poll worker had entered Schwarzenegger's name into an electronic voting touch screen station in Pasadena on Oct. 25. The worker, who was not identified, was testing the voting machine in preparation for early voting that began the next day.
...
Schwarzenegger's aides were informed of the problem when they arrived this morning to survey the governor's polling station. The poll worker told the governor's staff he would have to use a "provisional" ballot that allows elections workers to verify if two votes were made by the same person. McCormack said the poll worker did the correct thing.

The governor, however, was allowed to use a regular ballot.
...
"This is someone who breached our protocol and was playing around in advance of the election," she said.

Tom Hiltachk, the governor's attorney, said: "I have no reason to believe anything nefarious occurred.

But Kim Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation, said the problem highlights the need for better verification of electronic voting.

"If the governor is going to have a mix-up on his ballot," she said, "it will make other voters wonder what is going to happen with their ballots."

Vyan

Partying Democrats

Well, they're pretty jubilant over at Dailykos about last nights election results.

by kos

Wed Nov 09, 2005 at 12:10:42 AM PST

Intelligent designers on Dover school board were swept out en masse by the city's voters. Eight sane Dems swept out eight crazy fundamentalists.

In Tucson Arizona, Dems took out two Republicans and reverted the city council to Democratic control. In Washington State, a measure closely watched by anti-tax zealots to repeal Washington's fuel tax was narrowly defeated.

In Maine (as noted already), an anti-gay ballot initiative actually failed. That's something you don't see every day. An anti-gay marriage amendment in Texas passed easily (even though it may hilariously invalidate every marriage).

In both New Jersey and Virginia Democrats gained seats in the state legislatures. Bush actually lent some of that "political capital" to Virginia's Kilgore, for all the good (and probable harm) it did. Let's hope more and more Republicans decide to let Bush campaign for them. Heck, the Democratic Party should pay Bush's political travel expenses, since they will clearly help us more than their own guys. California is a disaster of epic proportions for Arnold (The One-Term-inator). How long before rumors about Arnold's retirement crop up? (And no, I haven't heard any. Yet.)

From Dailykos

This special election result has the feel of every teen movie from the 80s where some strutting bully, someone who would be a golden boy if it weren't for his overblown ego and petty cruelty... is handed his ass by a rag-tag group of misfits that he wouldn't deign to spit on.

In this case, the bully was taken out by a group of cops, nurses, teachers, and firefighters - people who eke out a living in service to their communities... and who are living rebukes to the Republican notion that a person's worth can be computed as a direct function of the magnitude of their investment portfolio.

After setting aside the election of Gray Davis in 2002 by a capricious and well financed attack on the principles of democratic process, Arnold probably thought he could once again pee on California and call it rosewater...

We showed that we can mobilize and win. The Alliance for a Better California was a truly unprecedented joint effort of the state's many unions, the Democratic party, and activists in groups like DfA and PDA all working together.

Progressives putting differences aside to work together? Who'd have thunk it?

It worked.

More from Dailykos:

Message Sent:

AHNULD: I vill go strate to du peepo uf Col-ee-for-nee-uh.

PEOPLE: Fuck you!

Republicans have very little to cheer about this election. They soundly defeated reform efforts in Ohio and they held on to the NYC mayorship. Retaking NYC would've been the "cherry on top" of this election, but whatever. No one ever wins them all.

But I have to say, while this beats the losing we've experiened the last couple of years, this is still quite unsatisfying. Let's call it the appetizer.

2006 is the real target. We've got the momentum and a Republican Party reeling from its inability to govern. We can't let them regain their balance. We've got to keep them on the defensive, take advantage of every opening they provide to score additional points.

Off-year elections are rarely harbingers of future performance. Dems actually did quite well in 2003, to little effect in 2004. Let's work to make this year an exception to that rule.

In the end, I agree here -- the last thing we can do is get complacent. The news is bad for the Republicans and Bush on every front and its looks likely to get nothing but worse. The only positive lining I see between now and next November is the likelyhood of Iraq ratifying their Constitution and the beginning of troop withdrawals from the region. John McCain stated last night on the Daily Show that "we should have our forces reduced by 1/3 - a year from now".

Will such good news be enough to feather the wind at the back the anti-war movement? Possibly. But then again, if there are more indictments of senior White House staff (Rove) and Officials (Cheney) in addition to the current indictments of Libby, Frist, DeLay and Abramov - even news that good may not be enough.

Keep the corks in the Champagne - the real party will be in 06, and then again in 08. Or not.

Vyan

The Swiftboating of Patrick Fitzgerald

The Right makes it's next move on Wilson and Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald with a page right out of the Swiftboating Manual...

MediaMatters.com has been reporting for some time that Fox Contributor Andrew Napolitano has claimed that "at least one" of his Fox colleagues has claimed that they were present at a party where former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV introduced Valerie Plame as "my CIA operative wife." This past Saturday on a WABC radio broadcast and tonight on Hannity & colmes "at least one" of these colleagues has come forward with the specifics of his claim.

His name is Maj Gen Paul Vallely (ret), a Fox Military Analyst, who proclaimed that he had met Wilson in the Fox Green Room in Washington and that during casual conversation Wilson mentioned that his Wife "worked at the CIA". During the segment colmes as for specific dates where the two men might have been in the same Green Room, but he Vallely couldn't provide specifics - although he did mention that this allegedly occured during the "Summer and early Fall of 2002" - over a year before the Novak column which publically announced Valerie's employement to the world.

colmes played a portion of the Fitzgerald Press Conference:

Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer. In July 2003, the fact that Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer was classified. Not only was it classified, but it was not widely known outside the intelligence community.

Valerie Wilson's friends, neighbors, college classmates had no idea she had another life.

The fact that she was a CIA officer was not well- known, for her protection or for the benefit of all us. It's important that a CIA officer's identity be protected, that it be protected not just for the officer, but for the nation's security.

Valerie Wilson's cover was blown in July 2003. The first sign of that cover being blown was when Mr. Novak published a column on July 14th, 2003.

Apparently Gen Vallely has never been called, or voluanteered any information directly to Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald - and while talking with Hannity went on to question the "depth" of Fitzgerald's investigation, claiming it was "incomplete" and "should be considered null and void".

According to Gen Vallely:

• Fitzgerald and the FBI never talked to anyone at CIA to confirm Valerie's status.
• Valeria Flame (he never called her Plame or Wilson) "we now know was an analyst, not a covert agent"
• Fitzgerald and the FBi didn't even talk to Joe Wilson under oath.
• It was common knowledge at State and CIA that Valerie Flame was an analyst, but not a covert agent.
• Wilson's didn't sign a confidentiality agreement with the CIA, and wasn't one of their employees.

Hannity went on to proclaim that Wilson's Op-Ed in the New York Times is what outed his wife...
"if keeping her identify secret was so important - why right the article and risk that"? Naturally, Gen. Vallely agreed with this completely ridiculous assertion.

Of all Vallely's and Hannity's claims the only correct one is that Joe Wilson is not an employee of the CIA.

Joe Wilson's full report to the CIA on his trip was classified and is still classified - common sense says you can't write a classified report without having a Security Clearance and signing a Classified Information Nondisclosure Agreement which is required for such a clearance, even for non-CIA employee. Even "Scooter" Libby signed one.

According to the Common Dreams website - Patrick Fitzgerald's FBI and Grand Jury witness list included:

Ex-CIA comm. dir. Bill Harlow
Ex-CIA dep. dir. John McLaughlin
CIA comm. dir. Jennifer Millerwise (did not go before grand jury)
Ex-CIA dir. George Tenet
Ex-Amb. Joseph Wilson

Joe Wilson has stated publically, once her cover was blown, that his wife Valerie Wilson was in fact - "a covert agent" as he did on "The Situation Room" with Wolf Blitzer on Oct 31, 2005.

Wilson: But nonetheless, there's now clear evidence that Mr. Rove was leaking classified information. Mr. Fitzgerald made it very clear. My wife was a covert officer at the time that these people were leaking her name.

This H&c Report begins the true Swiftboating of Patrick Fitzgeralds investigation which has been lurking in the wings for the past week or more now that claims that "Perjury isn't a real crime" have begun to sink under the weight of their own flatulence. Not that facts were ever in great supply on Faux News, I suspect it won't be long before a new set of Right-Wing talking point echoing Vallely and Hannity "They didn't even talk to the neighbor until two weeks before the indictment..." are going to be making the rounds.

But never fear - Crooks and Liars.com is already on the case.

UPDATE: Media Matters is now all over this one, as I knew they would be.

Vyan