GAO Rules Bush Propaganda Illegal

Things just seem to get worse and worse for the Bush Administration. Public opinion of them is low, and most believe that their domestic agenda is virtually dead. Now they can’t even legally continue one of their methods of increasing support. The New York Times reports that Buying of News by Bush’s Aides Is Ruled Illegal:

Federal auditors said on Friday that the Bush administration violated the law by buying favorable news coverage of President Bush’s education policies, by making payments to the conservative commentator Armstrong Williams and by hiring a public relations company to analyze media perceptions of the Republican Party.

In a blistering report, the investigators, from the Government Accountability Office, said the administration had disseminated “covert propaganda” in the United States, in violation of a statutory ban.

Maybe they’ll take a look at Fox News next.

Inside The Bubble Says Little About Campaign

As we suspected from the initial clips, Inside the Bubble was more hype than anything which would provide any meaningful insight into the 2004 campaign Slate was not very impressed with the movie:

Unfortunately, Inside the Bubble, which premiered at the New York Television Festival Thursday, doesn’t do much to answer those questions. The movie overpromises the way sham politicians do. There are some amusing and entertaining moments, but there is little in it to explain why Kerry lost—no inside scoop from his senior advisers or much insight into the man himself. . .

Because the Steve Rosenbaum wasn’t given much access to the real strategists, he tries to make the subjects he gets sound more important than they are. When not doing that, the film tries to suggest that the confusion you’re watching represents the chaos afflicting the Kerry campaign. It doesn’t. It’s garden-variety chaos that hits all campaigns.

Early media coverage suggested that the film might be harmful to a future run by Kerry, but aspects might actually be helpful. Slate observes, “As for the candidate himself, we don’t see much of him that we haven’t seen already. But there are a few surprises. Kerry the candidate seems tantalizingly less stiff than we remember.” Kerry picks up a few points for some of the issues he discussed which might have seemed boring at the time but now indicate his foresight: “flood protection, coastal zone protection …” Just the kind of ideas which might be appealing to voters in 2008–and they might not even mind that he goofed off and interviewed himself off camera.

John Kerry’s Floor Statement on the Introduction of the Small Business Hurricane Relief and Reconstruction Act

The following is the text of John Kerry’s Floor Statement on the Introduction of the Small Business Hurricane Relief and Reconstruction Act from today, Friday, September 30, 2005.

Mr. KERRY: Mr. President, today I join with Senator Snowe, the chair of our Committee, and our colleagues, Senators Landrieu and Vitter, to introduce a bill to help small businesses that have been damaged, physically and economically, by one or both of the Hurricanes that have destroyed the Gulf region over the past four or five weeks.

Our colleagues should feel very comfortable voting for this bill. The need is undeniable, based not only on what we see on television everyday and read in the papers, but also based on the testimony of small businesses and governors at hearings held in the Senate, in our Committee last week, and this week before the Finance Committee. Further, 96 Senators voted for very similar legislation two weeks ago.

This bill is very similar to the amendment (S.A. 1695) that Senator Landrieu and I offered to the fiscal year 2006 appropriations bill for the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and Science, and that passed the Senate by a vote of 96-0 on September 15th as part of the compromise amendment (S.A. 1717) put I put forth with Senators Snowe, Landrieu, Vitter. We offered those amendments to the appropriations bill because relief for small businesses had not been provided for in the two emergency supplementals. Two bills, worth some $63 billion, and nothing designated for small businesses.

It is through the Small Business Administration that disaster loan assistance is available, not just for businesses, but for homeowners and renters, and it is through the Small Business Administration that the Federal government provides the full complement of assistance to the small businesses in our nation. The SBA is indispensable to the recovery of the Gulf region after Hurricane Katrina. If the Administration is not going to provide small business relief in the emergency spending bills it sends to Congress, this is absolutely appropriate.

We have got to get into law, and to fund, relief for small businesses before Senators go home for a week break in October. These folks have waited too long. We have got to get people back to work.

Since Hurricane Katrina hit, the Gulf has had the extreme misfortunate of being hit by Hurricane Rita. And this bill reflects the damage caused by going a bit further to take care of those small businesses too. It also incorporates provisions requested by the Administration. For example, at the request of the Administration, the bill authorizes the Small Business Administration to make economic injury disaster loans nationwide to any small business directly and adversely impacted by Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Rita. The bill limits eligibility of economic injury disaster loans to those small businesses suffering economic losses because of the spikes in gasoline and natural gas and heating oil related to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. That is consistent with all other provisions in this bill. We also increased the amount of funding for grants to the states from $400 million to $450 million, to reflect the increased damage and delays in recovery caused by Hurricane Rita. We also repeal some contracting provisions enacted as part of the second supplemental that were anti-small business and would have resulted in millions of contracting dollars lost for small businesses that should be getting federal contracts to rebuild the area. The small businesses don’t just need loans; they need work to get revenue flowing again and to hire again, creating local jobs.

Mr. President, I extend great thanks to my colleagues, Senators Snowe, Landrieu, and Vitter for their work on this bill. I think we have demonstrated to a weary public that we can work together, and I hope that our colleagues in the Senate, and in the House, and the President, will join us and vote to make this law, and to fund it.

Wading Through the River of Republican Corruption

Every day the river gets deeper, and I'm not talking about the Mississippi. It's the river of Republican corruption, that I am referring to -- and the river Denial that keeps some in the media still spouting GOP talking points.

Earlier this week Ron and I both pointed out a recent example of this from the Boston Herald as they leveled yet another baseless attack on John Kerry and took his words out of context. Our posts on the latest from the Boston Herald can be found here, here and here.

Presstitutes.com has a must read post today, "The Media's Role In The Maligning Of John Kerry."

How telling about the state of our media that there are still Pre$$titutes willing to play the 'bash Kerry' game. So let's call a spade a spade: if Kerry were president today, America would be on the road to recovery, recovery of our dignity, recovery of our integrity, recovery of our reputation as the world's moral leader.

As we wade through a river of Republican corruption, and as the sham of "Bush the protector" drowns in the murky waters of Katrina, it would serve us well to remind ourselves how we got here, and to recognize the central role played by the media.

I'll take Presstitutes points a step or two further and suggest that when left-wing bloggers echo the talking points of the Pre$$titutes, they're not helping the situation at all, as I pointed out here. As the river of Republican corruption gets deeper daily, we need to get on board the unity train. It's one thing to disagree with our own leaders, but it's another to use GOP talking points when we do.

The golden opportunity is here for Democrats to band together and draw strength from the wake of the river of corruption. "We don’t have to agree on every little thing our Democratic leaders say or do, but standing behind them in unity can go a long way, at time when we need to do what they have done so well for so long, shore up our bases."

Kudos to Presstitutes.com for speaking up and catching on to what Ron and I have been saying here on The Democratic Daily.

You enjoyed reading about Tom DeLay’s legal problems. Now you can wait for the movie from Mark Birnbaum Productions:

You enjoyed reading about Tom DeLay’s legal problems. Now you can wait for the movie from Mark Birnbaum Productions:

The Big Buy

Raymond Chandler meets Willie Nelson on the corner of Wall Street and Pennsylvania Avenue in The Big Buy, a Texas noir political detective story that chronicles what some are calling a “bloodless coup with corporate cash.” It follows maverick Austin DA Ronnie Earle’s investigation into what really happened when corporate money joined forces with relentless political ambitions to help swing the pivotal 2002 Texas elections, cementing Republican control from Austin to Washington D.C.

Sounds far more interesting than that other political movie we were talking about earlier in the week.

America’s Right Doomed by Incompetence

The Economist looks at "What's gone wrong for America's right." This conservative (but not neocon or supporter of the religious right) magazine doesn't like Bush's big government conservatism, but finds that the biggest problem is one of incompetence:

The Economist has always had all sorts of ideological disagreements with Mr Bush, but our main problem with his administration has increasingly become incompetence. Katrina now stands besides the shambles overseas in Iraq and Guantánamo Bay as supporting evidence. Mr Bush is a bold decision-maker, but he is also a delegator who too often picks the wrong people and seldom fires them. Both “Rummy” and “Brownie” (ie, Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, and Michael Brown, the erstwhile Arabian-horse man whom Mr Bush belatedly removed from the Federal Emergency Management Agency) are symptoms of the same problem.

"Forgive Me While I Tear My Hair Out"

In her blog post yesterday about John Kerry's speech on Monday in Boston, Arianna Huffington says, "Forgive me while I tear my hair out." Her witty comment is in reference to Kerry's comments about Iraq as quoted from the Boston Herald. As Ron pointed out earlier today, the Boston Herald took Kerry's comments out of context.

I must say that in reading Arianna's post, I had the same reaction, I wanted to tear my hair out. Not for what John Kerry may or may not have said but, for her wanton quoting of the Noise Machine, with no, that's right, no space given to the facts.

I'm shocked to see so much credence given by Arianna to what is said by the Right Wing Noise Machine. Maybe it's just me, but I expect better from the big tent party than outward slams on our own.

Arianna quotes the Boston Herald's account of Kerry's Boston speech which contradicts the Boston Globe's account. You'll find quips from the Globe here about Kerry speaking about Iraq to the press and you can compare those to the Boston Herald's insinuation that Kerry spoke about Iraq during his speech. He didn't.

Arianna needs to read John Kerry's speech from Monday because there is nothing about Iraq in that speech.

Finally, that Arianna parroted the right wing spin on Inside the Bubble is astounding to say the least. Inside the Bubble should be aptly named "The Snore Room". I'm sure if Arianna tried she could have gotten the take on Inside the Bubble from some of those who were actually "inside the bubble" rather than rely on the word of a republican rag.

My sources "inside the bubble" tell me there is nothing in that flick that even hints at "what went wrong" in the Kerry campaign. It's a poor excuse of a documentary from a democrat who sold out as a shill to the republicans to recoup his investment in the film.

Arianna may take issue with John Kerry's position on Iraq, or anything else for that matter. That's her business, but when she uses up her blog space to bash a Democratic leader who's actually out there every day working hard for a change, it's part and parcel of what is wrong with the Democratic Party.

I know the whiners and the bashers won't agree with this, but guess what, it's true. While the Democratic Party has been busy eating it's own, the Republicans shored up their bases and we've caught snoozing, time and again.

So, please forgive me, while I tear my hair out. The future of our country is important to me. The future of the Democratic Party is important to me. We need unity and we won't get it as long as the whining and the bashing continues.

It's time for unity within the Democratic Party. It's time for the whiners and the bashers to get on board, because the train is coming... DeLay was indicted today, Frist is under investigation, Rove is under investigation, FEMA fumbled not once but twice, the Republican Party is unraveling. The lame duck president is swiftly becoming a cooked goose. We don't have to agree on every little thing our Democratic leaders say or do, but standing behind them in unity can go a long way, at time when we need to do what they have done so well for so long, shore up our bases.

And while I'm at it here, I'll throw in this, our leaders also need to step up to the plate and stay on message. Can we get a little cooperation going all the way around. 2006 is around the corner and the Republicans are starting to resemble suicide bombers. This is our chance to regain our footing. Let's take it because we have a lot of work to do cleaning up the colossal mess BushCo has made.

Cindy Sheehan Meets with John Kerry

MeetWithCindy.org reports that Cindy Sheehan has met with John Kerry...

Answers to Cindy's Questions

1. What noble cause? “This is an artsy question that is hard to answer. However I can tell you that a war based on lies is not noble, but a war based on bringing freedom to people is noble.”

2. How many more lives? “If we can not achieve the goal of bring freedom, I do not want to see any more lives lost in this war.”

3. How many lives are you personally willing to risk? “I will say the same thing. If this war will not bring freedom to the Iraqi people I am not willing to personally risk any lives.”

4. What are you doing to bring our troops home? “I believe that we are in a critical two month stage right now. The Iraqi people are supposed to have an election in December.”

Other comments made to Cindy during the meeting:

- He told Cindy “What you are doing is saving lives.”
- “I can not tell you how much I hate what he (Bush) has done.”
- “Rumsfeld is a disgrace.”
- “There are countries that will not become involved with Bush.”
- “What we are doing now has hurt the strength of our military.”

The "Snore Room"

The rightwing blogosphere is attempting to make a big deal about the documentary Inside the Bubble, a behind-the-scenes look at the Kerry campaign. After viewing the clips available online, I think the working title should be 'The Snore Room.' Beyond Kerry staffers and volunteers, I doubt anyone would want to watch the recycled footage of the sleep-deprived existence of a few members of Kerry's campaign staff.

We all remember the documentary on the Clinton campaign, The War Room. The War Room was popular because it starred James Carville, Paul Begala, and George Stephanopoulos. 'The Snore Room' stars mid level Kerry campaign staff, primarily advance team and logistical support staff. Insinuating "what went wrong" revolved around this select group of staff, is absurd. If this is Steve Rosenbaum best attempt at getting "inside the bubble," someone needs to burst his bubble.

One can certainly can sympathize with the film producer because he is obviously struggling to peddle this white elephant, to recoup the expense of making the film. From the looks of one clip Rosenbaum has taken his flop and sold it as a shill to the infamous Swift Liars and the red elephants (or rejoicing republicans, as the promo says).

My sources tell me that the Inside the Bubble crew traveled very sporadically with the Kerry campaign as members of the Traveling Press. The film crew was granted no inside access to senior staff members, no access to the top decision-makers or the decision-making process, and virtually no access to John Kerry, himself. One former campaign staffer notes never seeing the film crew at HQ. Most of the footage has already ended up on the failed TV show, "Staffers" and no doubt the cutting room floor.

Laughable among the clips is a staffer attempting to set up a practical joke for another staffer's birthday. Rosenbaum attempts to make the innuendo that the scene is about the campaign in his pre-release video clip, but watching the clip, it's clear that it is nothing more than a practical joke amongst campaign staffers who were on the road, working long arduous hours. Retaining a sense of humor is a must even in the heat of presidential campaign.

One has to wonder what the film would have played like, if things had turned out differently. Anyone with an inkling into the film business knows that a film such as this is skewed to the view of the producer. While Rosenbaum may have started the film process with one vision, clearly his focus changed for some feeble attempt of personal gain.

At this point, Inside the Bubble has no distribution deal, no network interested in it, and no viable film critics particularly care about it. The only hope Steve Rosenbaum and crew have is to turn this mundane flop into something controversial, which it's clear he's attempting to do by marketing it to a republican audience, as the only coverage it's gotten has been from inside the Noise Machine.

What might have been Rosenbaum and crew's 15 minutes of fame has fizzled... the best they can expect is 15 seconds! Perhaps, Rosenbaum should have tried to get inside access to Michael Brown's team at FEMA, then he might very well have a blockbuster. CUT.

Related post: Reports on Kerry Campaign Film Exaggerates Damages

Tunnel Vision

This week we are seeing two more examples of political perception versus reality in comments in the blogosphere about John Kerry. We are seeing an excellent example of tunnel vision in the use of the Boston Herald’s recent story which takes Kerry’s views on Iraq out of context. It is interesting that the usual Kerry bashers are well aware of a single story in a newspaper long known for its biased reporting, but appear totally unaware of Kerry’s actual statements on the war. They appear totally unaware of the warnings against going to war in Kerry’s Senate floor speech, Georgetown speech, and other public statements. They have also forgotten Kerry’s call for regime change in Washington after Bush ignored Kerry’s advice and went to war.

Inside the Bubble is also an interesting litmus test. We know that if a movie unfavorable to Bush, or even to a previous losing candidate such as Bob Dole was coming out, the Republcans noise machine would be defending the Republican and attacking the film’s producers. Will liberal bloggers debunk the criticism of Kerry, or will the usual Kerry bashers see this as another chance to pile on? The tendency of many Democratic writers to spread such criticism of other Democrats is one reason the Republicans have been so successful.

DeLay May Face Indictment

Who will be indicted first? Will it be Karl Rove or Scooter Libby (Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff) over Plamegate? Will it be Bill Frist for insider trading? Maybe it will be Tom DeLay according to the Austin American-Statesman:

U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s leadership post is on the line today as a Travis County grand jury is expected to consider indicting DeLay on conspiracy charges, several lawyers familiar with the investigation said.

Broadening the investigation to include such conspiracy charges increases the chances of a DeLay indictment and ultimate conviction. Under House rules DeLay could keep his seat in Congress if indicted, but would have to step down as Majority Leader. The Republicans backed off on rules changes which would have allowed him to keep his post.

Bush Approval Falling Further in Red States

In August I noted Bush’s decreased approval when Survey USA looked state by state. The current numbers continue to look bad for Bush.

Disapproval of Bush compared to August has increased slightly from 60% to 61% in Ohio, with 37% approving in both polls. Bush’s approval dropped from 44% to only 39% in Florida. Disapproval increased in Virginia from 52% to 58%, with approval falling from 42% to 40%.

Currently Bush has an approval of over 50% in only ten states (Utah, Idaho, Mississippi, Nebraska, Wyoming, Texas, Louisiana, North Dakota, and Oklahoma). I bet that many people from Lousiana who would rank Bush unfavorably were either unavailable to pollsters or relocated out of the state.

Dowd: Bush Descended Into Slapstick

Maureen Doud reports that the “once disciplined and swaggering Bush administration has descended into slapstick” as she makes fun of both their suggestions for energy conservation, and of Karen Hughes:

Air Force One costs $83,200 to fill up and more than $6,000 per hour to fly. Then there’s the cost of helicopters and a 2006 Cadillac DTS limo that gets less than 22 miles per gallon.

Karen Hughes, the Bush nanny who knows nothing about the Muslim world and yet is charged with selling the U.S. to it, wasted even more fuel this week flying to Saudi Arabia to tell women covered from head to toe in black how much she likes driving even though they can’t.

She knows so little about the Middle East that she looked taken aback when some Saudi women told her that just because they could not vote or drive did not mean that they felt they were treated unfairly.

One thing Saudi women like even less than not having certain rights is to have hypocritical Americans patronize them.

Dowd provides several other examples to demonstrate her final line: ” W. doesn’t really need to worry about turning down the lights in the White House. The place is already totally in the dark.”

Reports on Kerry Campaign Film Exaggerates Damages

The latest attacks on John Kerry appear to be as lacking in substance as all the previous attacks. The buzz in the blogosphere this week comes from a report in the New York Daily News on an upcoming movie on the campaign. The Daily News claims the film “could end up being the silver bullet that kills Kerry’s presidential chances for 2008.” From what I’ve seen so far, I doubt this film will have any meaningful impact. Here’s among the worst that the Daily News reports from the movie:

It features, among other not-ready-for-prime-time moments, Clinton scowling and rolling her eyes over an apparent Kerry gaffe during a presidential debate; Kerry pretending to interview himself and babbling in Italian while waiting for a real interview to begin; Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) cursing at reporters during a campaign stop, and Kerry message guru Robert Shrum confidently declaring a few days before the 2004 election: “Zogby [a prominent pollster] just announced who’s gonna win. Us!”

None of this sounds very meaningful. The Kerry bashers in the Democratic blogosphere were just as confident that the polls predicted a Kerry victory (and if the momentum wasn’t stopped by Bin Laden’s pre-election statement they might have been correct). A candidate playing around before the start of an interview is hardly even worth mentioning. Perhaps the claim which appears most significant is that Hillary Clinton scowled in response to a “Kerry gaffe” in a debate. Now that I’ve had the opportunity to review this portion of the film I’ve found that there was no gaffe.

The Hillary scowl occurred as Kerry was noting that, “The president got $84 from a timber company that owns, and he’s counted as a small business. Dick Cheney’s counted as a small business. That’s how they do things. That’s just not right.” Bush denied any knowledge of owning a timber company, but Factcheck.org demonstrated that John Kerry was right, reporting that “according to his 2003 financial disclosure form, Bush does own part interest in ‘LSTF, LLC’, a limited-liability company organized ‘for the purpose of the production of trees for commercial sales.’

So we have Hillary scowling following a true statement made by Kerry during the debates , hardly a gaffe, and several other trivial events. Hillary's scowl very well may have been in response to Bush's tree response rather than to Kerry's true accusation. Give me a video camera and access to a campaign, and I bet I could find hours of material which would make the same campaign appear either brilliant or incompetent, depending upon how the material was presented. Of course we could never do this with the Bush campaign as they would never dare allow such access by the media.

This is not to say I believe the Kerry campaign was perfect. There are things I would have done different, but there is also no guarantee they would have done any better if they did what I would have preferred. It also must be remembered that Kerry came far closer than most Democratic candidates in recent years, despite facing an incumbent during a war, and despite facing an unprecedented smear campaign. In considering the competence of the political campaigns, we cannot deny the considerable expertise of the Bush campaign in distorting the facts. It is a shame that such competence is not seen when they attempt to govern.

Evolution Provides Predictive Powers Lacked By Intelligent Design

The Washington Post reports on a suit by parents in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to prevent the teaching of intelligent design as science. They argue (correctly) that intelligent design is not science, but a form of creationism, the teaching of which has been found by the Supreme Court to violate separation of church and state.

The Washington Post also has a lengthy discussion of the science of evolution, and the lack of a scientific basis for intelligent design. They review the ramifications of the recent study we mentioned here a few weeks ago on the mapping of chimpanzee DNA. While intelligent design cannot be studied by scientific experimentation, the mapping of chipmpanzee DNA allowed further tests which could either verify or refute the validity of evolution:

If Darwin was right, for example, then scientists should be able to perform a neat trick. Using a mathematical formula that emerges from evolutionary theory, they should be able to predict the number of harmful mutations in chimpanzee DNA by knowing the number of mutations in a different species’ DNA and the two animals’ population sizes.

“That’s a very specific prediction,” said Eric Lander, a geneticist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard in Cambridge, Mass., and a leader in the chimp project.

Sure enough, when Lander and his colleagues tallied the harmful mutations in the chimp genome, the number fit perfectly into the range that evolutionary theory had predicted.

Their analysis was just the latest of many in such disparate fields as genetics, biochemistry, geology and paleontology that in recent years have added new credence to the central tenet of evolutionary theory: That a smidgeon of cells 3.5 billion years ago could — through mechanisms no more extraordinary than random mutation and natural selection — give rise to the astonishing tapestry of biological diversity that today thrives on Earth.

While this is just one of many examples of evolution being subject to experimentation to verify its predictions, intelligent design lacks any similar evidence of its validity.

Republicans Use Katrina to Promote Right Wing Agenda

The Republican Taliban continues to try to break down the separation of church and state. Last week we reported on the House approving hiring of workers based upon religion. Today the Washington Post reports on a plan for FEMA to reimburse religious groups for assistance they provided to Katrina and Rita survivors.

According to the Washington Post, “FEMA officials said it would mark the first time that the government has made large-scale payments to religious groups for helping to cope with a domestic natural disaster.” Civil liberties groups see this as both violation of the separation of church and state and as an act of pandering to the religious right to attempt to gain support for FEMA.

Just as after 9/11 the Bush Administration used the terrorist attacks for partisan gain and to promote pre-9/11 goals such as the invasion of Iraq, the Republicans are attempting to use the hurricanes to promote the right wing agenda. Fortunately this time a majority is seeing through their tactics and questioning their competence to govern.

John Kerry Addresses American Competitiveness

BOSTON -- In remarks today to business leaders at the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, Senator John Kerry addressed America's ability to compete in the global economy. In his remarks, Senator Kerry emphasized that the current approach is only making the U.S. more beholden to countries like China and Saudi Arabia without giving American businesses any advantage in the global race to success. Kerry laid out a national strategy that offers Americans building blocks -- skills in science and math, affordable college education and a national research and development strategy -- while removing road blocks to competitiveness like soaring energy and high health care costs.

Senator Kerry’s remarks as prepared for delivery follow:

In the last weeks America has experienced the consequences of the failure to heed warning signs of impending or potential disaster. The nation has been painfully reminded of the price we pay - all of us - in lives and in dollars - for waiting too long to address critical challenges that are right before our eyes if we bother to look.

Sometimes these warning signs are so big and bright and alarming that they just can’t be ignored. I’ll never forget as a teenager standing in a field in October of 1957 watching the first man made spacecraft streak across the night sky. The conquest, of course, was Soviet - and while not everyone got to see that unmanned craft pass overhead at 18,000 miles per hour that night - before long every American knew the name Sputnik. We knew we weren’t competing hard enough. We knew we had been caught unprepared. And we knew that failure to maintain our supremacy in science and technology was not simply a blow to our pride and prosperity; it was a blow to our strength and security as a nation in a dangerous world.

Read the entire speech here - http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=688

Pro-War Demonstration a Flop

Never let it be said we don’t report the activities of those who hold opposing viewpoints. Yesterday we reported on the anti-war demonstrations. It’s only fair that we now report that the supporters of the war were out to demonstrate in Washington, D.C. today. Four hundred turned out for the pro-war demonstration. That’s right–four hundred.

Frist Updated on Investments in "Blind Trust"

Every story on Bill Frist’s alleged insider trading seems to make it look worse and worse for Frist. Now AP reports that “Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., was updated several times about his investments in blind trusts during 2002, the last time two weeks before he publicly denied any knowledge of what was in the accounts, documents show.”

It might not be all bad for Bill Frist. Look how well Martha is doing after her prison time for insider trading.

Frist Insider Trader Investigation Widens

The investigations of Bill Frist for insider trading are appearing more serious per this report from Reuters. “A federal investigation into Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s sale of HCA Inc. stock widened on Friday when the largest U.S. hospital chain said federal prosecutors had subpoenaed the company for related documents.”

LostKosKidzKomedyKlub

Andrew Sullivan has a post entitled HOW DUMB IS ARMANDO? Measuring that is quite a task. The post is most notable for quoting a comment which sums up Daily Kos perfectly:

Have you ever read one ounce of analysis over at the LostKosKidzKomedyKlub? It’s all based on the theory that, if our side screams real loud, we’ll win the argument. And the site gets so many hits because it has a comments section the commenters tries to outscream each other.

House Approves Hiring Based Upon Religion

One more step towards undermining the separation of church and state: “The House voted Thursday to let Head Start centers consider religion when hiring workers, overshadowing its moves to strengthen the preschool program’s academics and finances.”

First Read on Kerry's Criticism of the War

First Read recognizes Kerry for being one of the few Democrats to be speaking out against the war (contrary to the claims of the Kerry bashers in the blogosphere):

The ease with which Bush rhetorically links Katrina, the WOT (war on terror) and Iraq to bolster public support stands in marked contrast with Democrats’ efforts to do the same in criticizing him. The focus on the GOP split over government spending on hurricane relief has temporarily obscured Democrats’ ongoing conundrum over Iraq. A few Democrats, like John Kerry, have tried to weave the war into a broader critique of Bush. But the louder and more harshly party lawmakers attack Bush on his response to Katrina, on gas prices, on ethics, and on alleged cronyism and incompetence, the more noticeable their collective silence on the war becomes.

Thomas Oliphant: Kerry’s Roads Not Taken

We've said it here many times, Kerry was right. While the right wing spin doctors try to paint a dark picture of John Kerry's speech on Monday, Thomas Oliphant reminds us of the roads not taken - Kerry's Roads Not Taken. Thomas Oliphant is right... Kerry "happens to be correct."

WASHINGTON
SUPPOSE WE had a president, with barely seven months in office, pushing Congress to confront the energy crisis and stop the insane importing of oil from the Middle East.

That was the road not taken before Katrina, remember?

Suppose we had a president who had challenged the lobbyist-run Congress long before Katrina produced gargantuan costs that cannot be paid honestly: His veto would block the extension of those juicy tax cuts for wealthy investors that expire in a few years in order to force a reestablishment of the best Social Security reform of all -- fiscal sanity.

That was another road not taken, remember?

And imagine a restoration of Bill Clinton's simple proposition that recovery from disasters, natural or terrorist, is too important to be left to incompetent political cronies, and is led by a guy who is delightfully ignorant of patronage politics.

Still another road not taken.

As John Kerry had the temerity to say this week in Rhode Island: ''Today more than ever, when the path taken last year and four years earlier takes us into a wilderness of missed opportunities, we need to keep defining the critical choices over and over, offering a direction not taken but still open in the future."

MORE - http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=637

Bill Frist Suspected of Insider Trading

The New York Times looks at possible insider trading by Bill Frist, who sold his “stake in HCA, the giant hospital company that his family founded, as its shares reached a peak and began a steep slide.” They also report that “the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights of Santa Monica, Calif., said it sent a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission asking for an investigation of the sale.”

New York Times Columnists on Bush and Kerry

Bob Herbert ties all the Bush problems into a matter of competence in writing about Voters’ Remorse on Bush:

Reality is caving in on a president who was held aloft for so long by a combination of ideological mumbo-jumbo, the public relations legerdemain of Karl Rove and the buoyant patriotism that followed the Sept. 11 attacks. The Bush people were never big on reality, so sooner or later they were bound to be blindsided by it.

Remember, there was already a war going on when Katrina came to call. I’ve always believed that war is a serious matter. But the president was on vacation. Dick Cheney was on vacation. And Condi Rice was here in New York taking in the sights and shopping for shoes. That Americans were fighting and dying on foreign soil was not enough to demand their full attention. They were busy having fun. So it’s no wonder it took a good long while before they noticed that a whole section of America had been wiped out in a calamity of biblical proportions.

What Americans are finally catching onto is the utter incompetence of this crowd. And if we didn’t know before, we’re learning now, in the harshest possible ways, that incompetence has bitter consequences. The body count of Americans killed in Iraq has now passed 1,900, with many more deaths to come. But there’s still no strategy, no plan. The White House hasn’t the slightest clue about what to do. So the dying will continue.

While Herbert notes that even many loyal Republicans are starting to question Bush, there are some who stick by him. David Brooks comments on Kerry’s attacks on Bush not by refuting any of the criticism but by complaining that Kerry attacks Bush too much. “Doesn’t this guy ever get bored? If Kerry ever makes an anti-Bush jab, he makes it again.” He puts Kerry in the camp of Democrats who will not (as he wishes) “snap back to Clintonite centrism after the polarizing Bush leaves town.”

Ironically, although he intended to attack Kerry, Brooks does us a service. He points out the degree to which Kerry has been attacking Bush and other conservatives, and how Kerry is sticking to principles rather than trying to move to the center. If only the Kerry-bashers among the Democratic bloggers also realized this.

Response to Kerry Bashing From The Democratic Daily

This post started as a reply to a comment at The Democratic Daily which repeated the usual Kerry bashing after we posted one of Kerry's recent statements. Earlier today I promoted it to a full blog post at The Democratic Daily. Even though it refers to a discussion in the comments there, the ideas apply to many of the attitudes in the blogosphere. As it pertains so strongly to Kerry I will repost it here also. In addition to the attacks on Kerry, the commenter complains that The Democratic Daily is an open forum and the moderators should not inject our opinions and take sides in the discussions. Following is my response:

This is not an open forum. This is a blog to present our views. It is our full intention to inject our opinions and take sides on issues.

Expressing differing opinions here is fine, but expect to hear a response if we disagree. Especially expect a response to weakly reasoned and factually incorrect comments such as your comments regarding Kerry above.

The party does not benefit by routinely trashing its last candidate. This is especially true when done based upon bogus claims such as those common in the blogosphere (such as that Kerry didn’t attack Bush, Kerry supported the war, or that Kerry conceded the election when he could have won).

The truth of the matter is that Kerry was one of the earliest Democrats to attack Bush and the war, while most Democrats were afraid to take on Bush in the post 9/11 era. For more on this, see my recent blog entry here.

Most of the trashing of Kerry is based upon the Dean campaign’s need to differentiate Dean from the other northeastern liberal who started out well ahead of Dean. Dean ran an initially successful smear campaign against Kerry (and hopefully can do the same against the Republican, this time more honestly as he has the facts on his side). Fortunately most Democrats ultimately saw through the campaign arguments and voted for Kerry over Dean in the primaries, but the old ideas continued in the blogosphere. Those who already had a distorted view of Kerry were subsequently open to all the nonsense arguments regarding Kerry’s concession.

The party would be much stronger if Democrats took advantage of the leadership of former candidates. Not only did Kerry strongly criticize Bush both before and during the 2004 election, he continued post-election. It has been John Kerry who has argued that we must stick to our liberal principles, while many other Democrats wanted to move to the center.

The Republicans are stronger due to waging such continuous campaigns. You never see Republicans attack their former candidates. In Europe, opposition parties are often successful by sticking with an opposition leader to allow him to gradually gain support and change the minds of those with earlier disagreements and misconceptions. Democrats appear doomed starting late with a new leader before each election. Such new candidates are successfully defined by the Republican noise machine as they are not yet well known, and then attacked by Democrats as well as Republicans should they lose.

Unless we break this cycle, we will have an endless number of Dukakis, Gore, and Kerry loses. There are not many Bill Clintons out there, and it is even questionable if a Bill Clinton could still win today. Republicans benefit from presenting their arguments for years, and having leaders in the spot light with the full support of the party. When the general election campaign comes around, the media only follows the horse race and everything else is left to sound bites. The Republicans can get by by just presenting their sound bites as people have heard their arguments for years, and the sound bite is enough for them to recall the rest.

After the election, John Kerry studied the successes of European opposition parties, and is attempting do what some of them have done to gradually overturn the ruling party. All Democrats benefit from this, regardless of whether John Kerry ultimately winds up the 2008 candidate. Whenever Kerry’s opposition to the Bush Administration receives criticism from Democrats as well as Republicans, we are just helping the Republicans remain in power.

John Kerry Opposes Roberts’ Nomination for Chief Justice

Breaking news: John Kerry Opposes Roberts’ Nomination for Chief Justice

Below is a statement by Senator John Kerry on the upcoming vote on Judge John Roberts to be Chief Justice of the United States:

“I can’t in good conscience vote to confirm Judge Roberts to a lifetime leading our third and co-equal branch of government when his confirmation hearings contained no genuine legal engagement, no real exchange of information, and no substantive discussion. The confirmation exercise has become little more than an empty shell. I cannot vote to confirm someone to lead the very branch of government responsible for ensuring equal opportunity and justice when he refuses to say where he stands on things as fundamental as how he would interpret our Constitution.

“The White House’s refusal to release documents presented a significant obstacle to getting the facts, but the biggest roadblock has been Judge Roberts himself. He has evaded serious and legitimate questions and forced the Senate to exercise its Constitutional responsibility of advice and consent virtually in the dark.

“What little we do know about Judge Roberts’ record gives me real concern. We need a Chief Justice who respects our Constitution and also considers the real-life implications of his decisions. Whether it’s voting rights, Title IX, affirmative action, the Geneva Conventions or choice, Judge Roberts has consistently worked to put such high legal hurdles in place that they are virtually impossible for even the most worthy cases to overcome. America deserves a Chief Justice who will ensure that every single one of us - man or woman, rich or poor, black or white - will be treated with dignity, respect and fairness under the law.”

John Kerry on ANWR: The Republican Party is Mortgaging America’s Future

Earlier today I posted two threads with photos from Arctic Refuge Action Day in Washington. The rally was hosted by the Wilderness Society and other conservation groups and was held on Capitol Hill. John Kerry was one of the featured speakers at the event. The photo threads can be found here and here.

Republicans want us to believe that drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge will be of benefit to the economy and reduce oil dependence. It's simply not true. What it is, is more of the same old, same old, Bush Corporate Cronyism. (Kerry talked about this briefly yesterday, in his speech at Brown University.)

Here is the text of John Kerry’s remarks today, as prepared for delivery:

I would like to start this afternoon by thanking all of you for making the journey to Washington and for having the dedication to come all the way to Congress with your message about the importance of protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil drilling -- a policy we should not be pursuing through backdoor efforts. In fact, we shouldn’t be doing this at all.

There’s been a lot said about the Arctic Refuge during this debate. We’ve heard that drilling in the Refuge can be done in an environmentally-friendly manner. We’ve heard that drilling in the Refuge will reduce our dependence on foreign oil. We’ve heard that drilling in the Refuge will bring gas prices down at the pump. And we’ve even heard that drilling in the Refuge belongs in the national budget because of the revenues from the lease sales.

Now I’m going to tell you why each one of these arguments is false.

ENVIRONMENT
By definition, an industrial zone and wilderness cannot occupy the same space. In 1960, the Eisenhower administration first recognized the extraordinary wilderness value of the area, and the Arctic Refuge was established to protect its unique wildlife and landscape. Building a massive oil field in the Refuge would clearly violate this fundamental purpose.

Drilling proponents claim they would open only 2,000 acres to the oil corporations, but in fact the entire 1.5 million acre “1002 area” would be opened to leasing and exploration.

Oil companies want you to think that whatever oil may be found in the Refuge is in one compact area. But, as with the North Slope oil fields west of the Arctic Refuge, development would sprawl over a very large area and stretch across the coastal plain.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, potential oil under the coastal plain is not concentrated in one large reservoir, but is spread across the coastal plain in many small deposits. To produce oil from this vast area, networks of pipelines and roads will be built and will the habitat of the entire coastal plain.

It is true that new drilling technology is more efficient and less harmful to the environment, but its advantages have been exaggerated. Even new technology, like directional drilling, will do irrevocable damage to the Refuge. Permanent gravel roads and busy airports are still used for access, and production wells scattered across more than a million acres of coastal plain must be connected by pipelines. And the entire complex would produce more air pollution than the City of Washington.

No matter how well done, oil development has significant and lasting impacts on the environment. The industry itself has admitted as much. None other than BP has said, “We can’t develop fields and keep wilderness.”

And if the facts and the frank admission of an oil company isn’t enough, my colleagues should know that the National Academy of Sciences, the Department of Interior and many others have all made the same conclusion.

MORE - http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=622

Dan Rather: “There is a Climate of Fear running Through Newsrooms”

Reuters covered Dan Rather speaking at the Fordham University School of Law in Manhattan, stating that, “Former CBS News anchor Dan Rather said Monday that there is a climate of fear running through newsrooms stronger than he has ever seen in his more than four-decade career.”

They also quote him as saying:

in the intervening years [since Watergate], politicians “of every persuasion” had gotten better at applying pressure on the conglomerates that own the broadcast networks. He called it a “new journalism order.”

He said this pressure — along with the “dumbed-down, tarted-up” coverage, the advent of 24-hour cable competition and the chase for ratings and demographics — has taken its toll on the news business. “All of this creates a bigger atmosphere of fear in newsrooms,” Rather said.

American Astronomical Society Statement Supporting Teaching of Evolution

AAS Statement on the Teaching of Evolution

Adopted 20 September 2005

The American Astronomical Society supports teaching evolution in our nation’s K-12 science classes. Evolution is a valid scientific theory for the origin of species that has been repeatedly tested and verified through observation, formulation of testable statements to explain those observations, and controlled experiments or additional observations to find out whether these ideas are right or wrong. A scientific theory is not speculation or a guess — scientific theories are unifying concepts that explain the physical universe.

Astronomical observations show that the Universe is many billions of years old (see the AAS publication, An Ancient Universe), that nuclear reactions in stars have produced the chemical elements over time, and recent observations show that gravity has led to the formation of many planets in our Galaxy. The early history of the solar system is being explored by astronomical observation and by direct visits to solar system objects. Fossils, radiological measurements, and changes in DNA trace the growth of the tree of life on Earth. The theory of evolution, like the theories of gravity, plate tectonics, and Big Bang cosmology, explains, unifies, and predicts natural phenomena. Scientific theories provide a proven framework for improving our understanding of the world.

In recent years, advocates of “Intelligent Design,” have proposed teaching “Intelligent Design” as a valid alternative theory for the history of life. Although scientists have vigorous discussions on interpretations for some aspects of evolution, there is widespread agreement on the power of natural selection to shape the emergence of new species. Even if there were no such agreement, “Intelligent Design” fails to meet the basic definition of a scientific idea: its proponents do not present testable hypotheses and do not provide evidence for their views that can be verified or duplicated by subsequent researchers.

Since “Intelligent Design” is not science, it does not belong in the science curriculum of the nation’s primary and secondary schools.

The AAS supports the positions taken by the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Science Teachers’ Association, the American Geophysical Union, the American Chemical Society, and the American Association of Physics Teachers on the teaching of evolution. The AAS also supports the National Science Education Standards: they emphasize the importance of scientific methods as well as articulating well-established scientific theories.

Triumph of the Puritans (GOP Style)

The War on Porn is “one of the top priorities” of Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales according to the Washington Post. Perhaps the Bush Administration thinks that if they keep trying they will find a war they can actually win. Many FBI agents are making fun of this:

“I guess this means we’ve won the war on terror,” said one exasperated FBI agent, speaking on the condition of anonymity because poking fun at headquarters is not regarded as career-enhancing. “We must not need any more resources for espionage.”

They shouldn’t be surprised. This comes from an administration which was reelected by convincing enough people that keeping two guys or girls from marrying each other is a higher priority than providing affordable health care, reducing the amount we owe to China and Japan, or working to reduce outsourcing of jobs.

FEC Sues Club for Growth

The FEC has filed suit against the conservative Club for Growth to force them to comply with limits on political contributions. The New York Times reports that, "The case stems from a complaint filed against the group by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in connection with a television advertisement broadcast last year."

Stem Cells Repair Damage in Spinal Cord Injury

More evidence of the benefits of stem cell research:

Injections of human stem cells seem to directly repair some of the damage caused by spinal cord injury, according to research that helped partially paralyzed mice walk again.
The experiment, reported Monday, isn’t the first to show that stem cells offer tantalizing hope for spinal cord injury — other scientists have helped mice recover, too.

But the new work went an extra step, suggesting the connections that the stem cells form to help bridge the damaged spinal cord are key to recovery.

Surprisingly, they didn’t just form new nerve cells. They also formed cells that create the biological insulation that nerve fibers need to communicate. A number of neurological diseases, such as multiple sclerosis, involve loss of that insulation, called myelin.

This Administration Is Done For

The conservativeAmerican Spectator reports that “this Administration is done for.” The atmosphere sure has changed since last November, when the Republicans felt like they had the “political capital” to pursue their policies (despite the opposition of a majority of voters to virtually all specific GOP policy positions). From The American Spectator:

Publicly, the White House will tell you that it intends to push ahead with two of its big legislative issues throughout the fall: making permanent the first term tax cuts and Social Security reform.

Even privately, with the political and policy debacle that the White House created with its Clintonian response to Hurricane Katrina, policy and political types at 1600 Pennsylvania insist what’s left of an agenda is still viable.

But at this stage of the game, barring some imaginative political moves that bear some resemblance to the Bush Administration circa 2002, Republicans on Capitol Hill and even some longtime Bush team members in various Cabinet level departments say this Administration is done for.

“You run down the list of things we thought we could accomplish and you have to wonder what we thought we were thinking,” says a Bush Administration member who joined on in 2001. “You get the impression that we’re more than listless. We’re sunk.”

Too pessimistic? Maybe not. Rumors are flying through various departments of longtime senior Bush loyalists looking to jump, but with few opportunities in the private sector to make the jump look like anything more than desperation. Almost daily, complaints from Cabinet level Departments come in to the White House about lack of communication coordination on even basic policy matters.

“What happened was that some of the best people who were working in the Administration during the first term, but who weren’t necessarily Bush campaign members or weren’t particularly close to the White House, jumped when they saw opportunities being filled by under-qualified but more politically connected people,” says a current Administration senior staffer in a Cabinet department. “In this department we lost three quarters of the people who should have been encouraged to stay, and most of them left simply because they had received no indication they would be considered for better or different opportunities. And many of these folks would have stayed.”

Election Reforms Recommended by Commission

The private