There’s no reason to be jolly; fa la la la la, la la la la

Congress Isn’t Stopping the War

(To the tune of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town”)

You better shape up,

You better get tough.

Or this next election

Is gonna be rough

If Congress doesn’t stop the war

We’re watching your votes

We’re taking good notes

Gonna insist on more than good quotes  

Congress isn’t stopping the war

We see you when you’re voting

We know when you sell out

We know when you don’t have the guts

To get our troops right out

So you better shape up,

You better get tough

Or this next election

Is gonna be rough

If Congress doesn’t stop the war.

(VARIATION: Substitute Democrats for Congress, with a few word adjustments)

Think that’s bad?  You ain’t heard nothin’ yet.  Read on …

There’s No Reason To Be Jolly

(To the tune of you know what)

There’s no reason to be jolly

Fa la la la la, la la la la

The Iraq war is Bush’s folly,

Fa la la la la, la la la la

It’s past time to bring the troops home

Fa la la la la, la la la la

Tell the Dems to get some backbone

Fa la la la la, la la la la

No more bloodshed, stop the killing,

End the war and bring them home.

Think you can do better? I hope you’ll try.  This is your invitation. Submit some lyrics in the comment section.  We’ll collect and distribute them through the Iraq Moratorium website.

This is inspired — if you can use that word — by the fact that Iraq Moratorium #4, observed on the Third Friday of every month, falls on December 21.

That’s a mere four days before Christmas, and the day before the shortest day of the year.  It is likely to be dark and cold in much of the country.  And most college campuses, a likely spot for some activity, will already be closed.

That all calls for some creativity to spice things up for Moratorium #4. That’s where the carols come in.

It may be a time to wear Santa hats or suits to the vigil or demonstration.

Maybe it’s a good time to take the Moratorium where the people are — like leafleting busy shopping districts thronged with last-minute buyers.

Malls would be a likely target, but there are legal implications to being on private property, even in their parking lots.  It’s much safer to find a busy shopping area where you can be on a public sidewalk, greeting and leafleting people as they enter or exit. (Although we might finally get some mainstream media coverage if Santa were arrested for leafleting for peace in the mall.)

In Indiana, one group organized a “mall walk” for the Iraq Moratorium in October.  

Here’s their report:

 

Peace activists from Northwest Indiana took a walk through the mall on Friday, October 19. Sponsored by NW Indiana Code Pink and NW Indiana Veterans For Peace. the walk went through Southlake Mall in Hobart, IN.

6 people wore our matching white tee shirts with “Out of Iraq” in bold red letters. We also had two children in strollers and 3 other walkers with different anti-war tee shirts. Taking part were Kathy Sturm (Merrillville), Nina Klooster (Lake Village), Karen Kroczek (Munster), Mike Ploski (Mattson, IL), Jim Roseen (Munster), Anita Skomac and her mother Myrna (Hobart), Mark Lesniewski (Crown Point) and Nick Egnatz (Munster).

We strolled around the mall. Karen bought a Swiss army knife to replace one confiscated from her during our meeting with Indiana Senator Evan Bayh in August (Security was taking no chances with a baby boomer armed with a Swiss army knife within sight of a future Vice Presidential candidate). We dined in the food court and went through some other stores.

We had our best luck when we were not moving and people would come up to us and ask us where had we been for the last 6 years of the Bush Regime. We didn’t leaflet, but had a flier with info about our events, the Iraq Moratorium and the October 27 Mobilization in Chicago, etc. for those who approached us with an interest.

We feel the action was a great success and plan on repeating it, especially during the winter. Our thanks go out to Cathy McGuire of Terre Haute, Indiana who suggested it to us last month!

 

If you have other creative ideas for Moratorium Day #4, or more lyrics, or whatever, share them here or on the Iraq Moratorium website.

And one more thing:  The Iraq Moratorium is facing a bleak holiday season, with scarcely a lump of coal.  If you can put a little something in their stocking, please do so here. .  God bless us, every one.

 

Dharmapedia – Temporary spot for graphics

This is not a diary, just a way to get graphics to Buhdy and OnTheBus.

Please click on the image to access copies (2 versions).

Buhdy needs a graphic for Dharmapedia. Your ideas, comments and suggestions are most welcome. These are “blue lotus” drafts. I could try something with Lennon and the reclining Buddha. In this sample, the eyes will need a lighter red in the lower lid.

docudharma_lotus2000sqdraft

Pony Party…..yep, monkeys again….

Here is my favorite Yahoo!News story du jour….titled ” Young chimp beats college students”

Short-term memory tests were conducted by showing sets of numbered (arabic numerals 1-9) ‘cards’ on a computer screen for seven tenths of a second.  After that short interval, the numerals disappeared, and participants were asked to touch the ‘cards’ in numerical order by remembering the arrangement.  Young chimps and college students were pretty equally matched in correctly reproducing the correct order.

However, as the test progressed, the amount of time for which the numbers were shown was progressively reduced, first to four tenths, and then to two tenths of a second. The chimp was still correct about 80% of the time (which is consistent with the longer version) while the college students proficiency dropped to about 40%.

I looked for a similar type of memory game to embed into the pony party, but couldnt find one…  🙁  Instead, I’ll be sitting at my computer acting like a monkey (a coffee-drinking, doctor’s-office-calling monkey).  I’d be much obliged if one of you would c’mon over and pick some nits off me  😉

…but don’t rec the pony party…

~73v

An Annie Hall Moment: Krauthammer Contradicted By Groundbreaking Stem Cell Scientist

From Annie Hall:

. . .  MAN: Now, Marshall McLuhan–

WOODY ALLEN: You don't know anything about Marshall McLuhan's work–

MAN: Really? Really? I happen to teach a class at Columbia called TV, Media and Culture, so I think that my insights into Mr. McLuhan, well, have a great deal of validity.

WOODY ALLEN: Oh, do you? . . . Oh, that's funny, because I happen to have Mr. McLuhan right here. Come over here for a second?

WOODY ALLEN: Tell him.

MARSHALL McLUHAN: — I heard, I heard what you were saying. You, you know nothing of my work. How you ever got to teach a course in anything is totally amazing.

WOODY ALLEN: Boy, if life were only like this.

Sometimes it is. Via Josh Marshall, Charles Krauthammer gets his comeuppance on some nonsense he wrote on stem cell research. Groundbreaking stem cell researcher James Thomson delivers it:

Krauthammer's central argument — that the president's misgivings about embryonic stem cell research inspired innovative alternatives — is fundamentally flawed, too. Yamanaka was of course working in Japan, and scientists around the world are pursuing the full spectrum of options, in many cases faster than researchers in the United States.

Ah, sometimes life IS like this.

You cannot stop the coming of spring

(This didn’t get quite the attention it deserved. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

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Malalai Joya has been called “the bravest woman in Afghanistan” by many in the media. When you hear her story and read her words, you’ll know why.

Born in Afghanistan in 1978, Joya’s family escaped to the refugee camps in Iran and Pakistan in 1982 during the Soviet invasion. When she was 20 years old, her family returned to Afghanistan, where she became a vocal opponent of the Taliban and worked to establish an orphanage and health clinic.

In 2003, Joya was elected delegate to the Loya Jirga convened to ratify the Afghan Constitution, where she spoke out publicly against the involvement of warlords and was summarily dismissed.

Here’s how World Pulse Magazine reported the incident:

When her time came to make her 3-minute statement, she tugged her black headscarf over her hair, stepped up to the microphone, and with emotional electricity made the speech that would alter her life.

After she spoke, there was a moment of stunned silence. Then there was an uproar. Male mujahideen, some who literally had guns at their feet, rushed towards her, shouting. She was brought under the protection of UN security forces.

In a nation where few dare to say the word “warlord” aloud, Joya had spoken fiercely against a proposal to appoint high clergy members and fundamentalist leaders to guide planning groups. She objected that several of those religious leaders were war criminals who should be tried for their actions-not national heroes to influence the new government.

Despite the commands of Assembly Chairman, Joya refused to apologize.

Since then, she has survived four assassination attempts, and travels in Afghanistan under a burqa and with armed guards.

But all that didn’t stop Ms. Joya. In September 2005, she was elected to the 249-seat National Assembly, or Wolesi Jirga, as a representative of Farah Province, winning the second highest number of votes in the province.

On May 7, 2006, Malalai Joya was physically and verbally attacked by fellow members of parliament after accusing several colleagues of being “warlords” and unfit for service in the new Afghan government. After shouting death threats, fellow lawmakers suspended her for three years.

Joya explains her views of the Afghan government and the role of the US in its corruption in an email interview with the PBS show NOW:

It seems that the U.S. government and its allies want to rely on them (the warlords) and install them to the most important posts in the executive, legislation and judicial bodies. Today the whole country is in their hands and they can do anything using their power, money and guns. They grab billions of dollars from foreign aid, drugs and precious stones smuggling.

The U.S. wants a group or band in Afghanistan to obey its directions accurately and act according to the U.S. policies, and these fundamentalists’ bands of the Northern Alliance have proved throughout their life that they are ready to sacrifice Afghanistan’s national interests for their lust for power and money. The U.S. has no interest in the prosperity of our people as long as its regional and strategic interests are met.

Parliament is just a showpiece for the West to say that there is democracy in Afghanistan, but our people don’t need this donated B52 democracy. I am very fed up with the parliament and have no hope for it to do anything for our people. It is a parliament of killers, murderer, drug-lords and traitors to the motherland.

In 2006, Danish filmaker Eva Mulvad made a documentary film titled Enemies of Happiness that chronicled Joya’s campaign in the country’s first democratic parliamentary elections in 35 years. Here’s a short clip from the movie. Remember that at the time of the first scene, Joya is 25 years old.

Listen to the voice of this beautiful brave young woman and take heart from her courage:

Never again will I whisper in the shadows of intimidation. I am but a symbol of my people’s struggle and a servant to their cause. And if I were to be killed for what I believe in, then let my blood be the beacon for emancipation and my words a revolutionary paradigm for generations to come.

They will kill me but they will not kill my voice, because it will be the voice of all Afghan women. You can cut the flower, but you cannot stop the coming of spring.

Docudharma Times Tuesday Dec.4

This is an Open Thread: For the Curious

Headlines for Tuesday December 4: Editorial
Evolution and Texas: On Thrill Rides, Safety Is Optional: For Congress, election imperils balanced budget: Bay Area counties toughest on black drug offenders: S African miners strike on safety

USA

Editorial

Evolution and Texas

Published: December 4, 2007

Is Texas about to become the next state to undermine the teaching of evolution? That is the scary implication of the abrupt ousting of Christine Comer, the state’s top expert on science education. Her transgression: forwarding an e-mail message about a talk by a distinguished professor who debunks “intelligent design” and creationism as legitimate alternatives to evolution in the science curriculum.

In most states, we hope, the state department of education would take the lead in ensuring that students receive a sound scientific education. But it was the Texas Education Agency that pushed out Ms. Comer after 27 years as a science teacher and 9 years as the agency’s director of science.

On Thrill Rides, Safety Is Optional

No Federal Oversight of Theme Parks

By Elizabeth Williamson

Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, December 4, 2007; Page A01

In December 2005, 9-year-old Fatima Cervantes and her 8-year-old brother boarded a Sizzler ride at a carnival in Austin, thrilled to climb into one of the candy-colored cars on rotating arms. But shortly after their blue car started whirling, Fatima slipped beneath the lap bar and was thrown onto the platform, where a metal arm crushed her head.

Since 1997, Sizzlers have been involved in at least four other deaths and dozens of injuries in the United States. Noting similarities in several accidents, a group of 25 state inspection chiefs requested in June that the ride’s manufacturer, Wisdom Industries, take immediate measures to prevent “an unacceptable level of ejection risk.”

For Congress, election imperils balanced budget

By Noam N. Levey, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

December 4, 2007

WASHINGTON — Facing an out-of-whack federal budget and a ballooning debt, congressional Democrats made a simple pledge when they took power in January: If lawmakers increased spending or cut the taxes needed to pay bills, they would find money elsewhere to balance the national checkbook.

But less than a year later, the plans for what was portrayed as a more responsible fiscal future — enshrined in stringent new budgeting rules — have collapsed amid a politically explosive debate over taxes.

Bay Area counties toughest on black drug offenders

Leslie Fulbright, Chronicle Staff Writer

San Francisco imprisons African Americans for drug offenses at a much higher rate than whites, according to a report to be released today by a nonprofit research institute.

In a study of nearly 200 counties nationwide, the Justice Policy Institute found that 97 percent of large-population counties have racial disparities between the number of black people and white people sent to prison on drug convictions.

The institute, which is based in Washington, D.C., and researches public policy and promotes alternatives to incarceration, says whites and African Americans use illicit drugs at similar rates. But black people account for more than 50 percent of sentenced drug offenders, though they make up only 13 percent of the nation’s population.

Africa

S African miners strike on safety

South African mine workers have begun a one-day strike in protest at poor safety in the country’s mines.

About 240,000 workers are taking part in the stoppage – the first countrywide strike by miners over safety issues.

Mineworkers are gathering in central Johannesburg for a protest march expected to draw up to 40,000 people.

British teacher arrives home from Sudan

LONDON – A British teacher jailed in Sudan for letting her students name a teddy bear Muhammad as part of a writing project arrived home Tuesday after being pardoned and said she was “very upset to think that I might have caused offense to people.”

Gillian Gibbons told reporters after arriving at London’s Heathrow Airport that she was looking forward to seeing her family and friends.

“I’m just an ordinary middle-aged primary school teacher. I went out there to have an adventure, and got a bit more than I bargained for,” Gibbons said at a brief news conference.

Middle East

Israeli prisoner release derided by Palestinians

By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem

Published: 04 December 2007

Israel has released 429 Palestinian prisoners in a gesture welcomed by their families but described as a “joke” by the jailed Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti because of the severely limited numbers freed.

At the same time officials of the Ramallah-based emergency government established by the Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, said it had shut down a total of 92 charities linked to Hamas in the West Bank in a fresh crackdown on the Islamic faction.

The numbers of mainly Fatah prisoners freed in a release originally approved in the approach to the Annapolis conference fell well short of the 2,000 reportedly urged by the US and Mr Abbas. Mr Barghouti complained to a group of Israeli Knesset members at the weekend that the sentences of most of the freed detainees would have been served in a matter of months anyway.

Iran’s nuclear ambitions on hold, U.S. agencies conclude

WASHINGTON — U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that international pressure has compelled the Islamic Republic to back away from its pursuit of the bomb.

The new findings represent a retreat from a fundamental U.S. assumption about one of its main adversaries, and an admission that a central component of previous intelligence estimates on Tehran’s nuclear program was wrong. But the report makes it clear that Iran could decide at any point to resume its efforts to develop a nuclear weapon.

Europe

Poverty and exclusion blight Roma

The European Commission is set for an unprecedented meeting with Roma (Gypsy) people from all over Europe.

It is a response to the challenge posed by what has become the biggest ethnic minority in the enlarged European Union.

Europe’s roughly 10 million Roma remain the poorest of the poor, often migrating abroad in search of work.

Anti-war protest replica wins Turner Prize

LONDON (AFP) – An exact replica of a 40-metre long anti-war protest outside the Houses of Parliament has won this year’s Turner Prize.

Mark Wallinger’s painstaking recreation, “State Britain”, which is now featured inside the Tate Britain gallery in Liverpool, was praised by the award panel for its “immediacy, visceral intensity and historic importance.”

The 48-year-old artist initially made headlines for his film “Sleeper” in which he dressed up as a bear and wandered around a Berlin art gallery for 10 nights.

But it was his detailed replica of protestor Brian Haw’s encampment in Westminster that scooped up the 25,000-pound prize.

Asia

Japan elderly abuse much more than disclosed: media

TOKYO (Reuters) – Nearly 500 elderly people were abused at Japan’s nursing homes in the space of nine months last year — 10 times the number of cases reported by the government for a whole year, Japanese media reported on Tuesday.

A survey conducted by experts on elderly care earlier this year revealed 498 cases of nursing facilities employees abusing the elderly between April and December last year, the Yomiuri newspaper reported.

Of the 498 cases, 190 involved psychological abuse, such as cursing and ignoring the elderly. More than 130 cases involved physical abuse and 110 involved tying elderly people to a bed or otherwise restraining them, the paper reported.

Opposition leader Sharif barred from fighting Pakistan election

· Criminal charges rule him out, officials declare

· Former PM fails to recruit Bhutto for poll boycott

Declan Walsh in Islamabad

Tuesday December 4, 2007

The Guardian

The Pakistani opposition leader Nawaz Sharif was barred yesterday from contesting the forthcoming election, sparking fresh allegations that President Pervez Musharraf intends to rig the poll. Barely a week after Sharif’s dramatic return from exile, officials in Lahore declared the former prime minister ineligible to stand for election, due to criminal charges going back to the 1999 coup which brought Musharraf to power.

Latin America

Venezuela Vote Sets Roadblocks on Chávez Path

CARACAS, Venezuela, Dec. 3 – The surprising defeat of a referendum over the weekend to accelerate President Hugo Chávez’s socialist-inspired revolution has given new energy to his long-suffering opposition.

But just how long that momentum lasts will depend on whether his opponents can keep within their ranks the Venezuelans who defected from Mr. Chávez to vote no on the proposals.

For nine years, a combination of populist politics and rising oil prices have propelled Mr. Chávez’s socialist program for Venezuela with an almost inexorable momentum. On Sunday, his country put on the brakes.

Muse in the Morning

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Muse in the Morning

The muses are ancient.  The inspirations for our stories were said to be born from them.  Muses of song and dance, or poetry and prose, of comedy and tragedy, of the inward and the outward.  In one version they are Calliope, Euterpe and Terpsichore, Erato and Clio, Thalia and Melpomene, Polyhymnia and Urania.

It has also been traditional to name a tenth muse.  Plato declared Sappho to be the tenth muse, the muse of women poets.  Others have been suggested throughout the centuries.  I don’t have a name for one, but I do think there should be a muse for the graphical arts.  And maybe there should be many more.

Please join us inside to celebrate our various muses…

In 1992 I learned to speak my truths.  They were tentative at first, hardly more than notes about the reality of my life.  Later some of them became poems.  Still later, more poems were added to add the view of hindsight.  I’ve tried to arrange them into a cohesive whole.  Maybe it works.  Maybe it has more meaning this way.

My partner’s cousin lives in Hesperia, CA, out in the desert.  She’s a certified desert tortoise rescuer.  She is also an abuse survivor and now has had another recurrence of her breast cancer.  I created the poem and the graphic for her, as a birthday gift.

But it’s also for me…and for whomever else it reaches.

A Transition through Poetry XXXII

Art Link
Desert Tortoise

Survivor

When I was a small child

and life seemed so very hard

I was positive I could not survive

When things happened to me

that should happen to no child

I doubted I would survive

When the sins of my parents

were visited upon their children

I questioned whether I might survive

When I grew older, I somehow learned

to think of myself as a worthwhile person

I thought, I can survive

Faced with the cruelty of not living

in a world of my own making

I decided, I shall survive

I endured the harshest challenges

that I can imagine a life having to offer

As excruciatingly hard as it was, I survived

When life itself, cruel cellular biology

Seemed to conspire against me

Even then I did survive

Even age, that most viscious mistress

tries to slowly grind me into giving up

but I have still survived

I don’t care what life brings my way now

no matter what or who may come or go

I know that some way I will survive

–Robyn Elaine Serven

–April 28, 2006

I know you have talent.  What sometimes is forgotten is that being practical is a talent.  I have a paucity for that sort of talent in many situations, though it turns out that I’m a pretty darn good cook.  🙂  

Let your talent bloom.  You can share it here.  Encourage others to let it bloom inside them as well.

Won’t you share your words or art, your sounds or visions, your thoughts scientific or philosophic, the comedy or tragedy of your days, the stories of doing and making?  And be excellent to one another!

An Interview with commonscribe Before Heading for Mississippi to Help Rebuild

Recently commonscribe posted a simple plea entitled: 14,000 in FEMA trailers on the Gulf. Finish The Job. That post sparked some ideas that are worthy of discussion for the entire group,  it also sparked the following interview:

(discussion follows interview)

This will be commonscribe’s third visit to help rebuild homes in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina so who better to ask about what is needed than one of our own?

NLOB:   Why did you get involved?

commonscribe:   It was more productive than screaming at the TV. Seriously.

NLOB:   How can others get involved in your particular project?

commonscribe:    It’s fairly easy. If you go alone, they will place you on a work crew. If you bring down a crew, they will give you a house to work on. If you can’t go at all, they can use your web skills as a “virtual caseworker” for displaced residents.

NLOB:   Is your project fully funded or do you need more donations or supplies?

commonscribe:    Our particular project is fully funded, but the outfit we are working with, Katrina Relief Volunteers has a half- dozen such projects going at any one time. Like most charities down there, they are underfunded, short handed, and post a regular needs list on their website.

Keep in mind that 12,000 houses were destroyed in Hancock County alone. Maybe 200 have been built back, largely by volunteers.

NLOB:   Have you been in contact with the people you are going to help?  If so can you tell us a bit about the troubles they have and continue to face?

commonscribe:    This is my third trip down, and the place seems to be caught in a time warp; there’s just not enough money from insurance or federal funds to really get the rebuilding jumpstarted. I’ve written about some of these folks, and you might get a better sense of their problems by reading those essays.

Ashton’s Woodpiles

The Go-To Guy

NLOB:    In addition to housing-related needs what other volunteers are needed?



commonscribe:    I am hearing lots of anecdotal stories on shortages of mental health workers, social workers and paralegals.

Katrina Volunteers or Congressman Gene Taylor’s office can probably provide better guidance on that front.  

NLOB:    Where will you be staying when you go?  Are other groups joining you or meeting you there?  

commonscribe:    Katrina Volunteers has three sites for volunteers, but

because we have 10 high school juniors and seniors in our group, we’ll be staying at “Mission on the Bay,” a youth volunteer camp that’s run by

Lutheran-Episcopal Services of Mississippi. It’s dorm-style housing in bunks and quonset huts donated by the Alaska National Guard. I’m hearing there will be 100 volunteers in the camp that week, all working on various rebuilding projects. Here’s a link.

Please re-post or link to this interview on your own blogs and newsgroups.


Thank you commonscribe for your efforts on the ground and the blogosphere, there is no replacement for first hand accounts.  Many of us would like to help in the greater effort of Katrina Relief and this is where the group discussion can begin.  

Tigana floated the idea of creating a Katrina Fund Raising Initiative.   This could be as simple as a link from the Wiki to a reputable relief group or it could be as involved as setting monthly fund raising goals and holding on-line/on-ground fund raiser events.  We could have a Katrina Krew that writes about important developments and seeks to keep a strong positive focus on the issue.  Members that live in the area or are volunteers pitching in to help can provide us with photos for posters, screen savers, t-shirts, coffee mugs, etc. etc.  

Pico warns against picking just any group and suggests we select those with very good track records.  Pico offers ThinkNOLA as a good resource.

My personal opinion is that a Katrina Relief Effort would be a great way to bring us together as a group.  Using a Katrina Relief Effort as a political billy club should not be the goal, doing good work for people in Mississippi and Louisiana should be the goal.  It will also  help us to learn what works and what does not work in the way of raising money.  We can branch out and do some local collections for the groups selected to receive donations.  And we can help share the story of Katrina survivors with the world.

To our members please weigh in on this issue by providing personal experiences with various charities, first-hand knowledge from previous relief efforts, targeting donors, including more blogs and media, and your own ideas on getting this thing off the ground.  Once the feedback has been posted I can boil it all down and post a follow-up.

Side notes:

Interviews start actions.  Most people will be up for an interview and honored that you think enough of them to share their thoughts.  You don’t need to be a reporter.  You are a blogger, that’s better than being a reporter.  Take advantage of it.  

There has been a change on the site this weekend and I’d like to thank everyone for working hard and coming up with new ideas and solutions.  For the first time ever, I feel a certain buzz about the site.  

Thank you!

The Stars Hollow Gazette

I remember the best sliding day ever.

The Episcopal Church next to the library had three parking lots connected with driveways that sloped fairly steeply.

Conditions were perfect, ice storm following a light snow.  When you came to the piles at the bottom of the last lot it was easy enough to crunch through the crust and slow down.  You were headed up slope anyway weinie.

Had perfect equipment too.  Runner polished and waxed Flexible Flyers.  Belly skates.

It was just my sister and I on this particular occasion and after the obligatory high speed suicide runs that day’s particular pleasure was how many 360s you could throw before the end.

We were adventurous sliders on our block.  The regular run took you through 6 hedges in 5 back yards before it dumped you spark shedding and grinding out in the street.  Special favorites got to use the popular kids’ ‘Devils Drop’, but I was never that popular and I didn’t like it so much as you usually ended up with your head next to a tree.

Paging Nightprowlkitty

This is not an actual post.  This is me requesting that NPK shoot me an email when she has a chance.  This will self-destruct shortly.

Nadler on FISA

U.S. Representative Jerrold Nadler of New York’s 8th Congressional District published an interesting piece on FISA reformation today-

The RESTORE Act Does What is Needed to Protect America

Jerrold Nadler, Huffington Post

Posted December 3, 2007  07:17 PM (EST)

The Conyers-Reyes bill restores and enhances the role of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in monitoring electronic surveillance programs, clarifies that monitoring communications among people in foreign countries does not require court approval, requires FISA warrants when targeting domestic communications, and strengthens protections against “inadvertent” warrantless surveillance of Americans ostensibly aimed at foreigners abroad. The bill also requires periodic audits of surveillance activities by the Justice Department’s Inspector General. Additionally, the bill provides resources to the National Security Agency and the Justice Department for processing FISA applications and other submissions to the FISA court in a timely and efficient manner, and to comply with the audit, reporting and record-keeping requirements.

We have refused to accept a key administration demand that telecom companies that cooperated with allegedly illegal government spying be immunized from any legal accountability. This is an outrageous demand, and has nothing to do with national security. The administration has never disclosed to Congress, even on a classified basis, what actions they believe need to receive legal immunity. What information we do have has been made public only through the press, and those reports are troubling. If they broke the law, it is not clear why the telecom companies should receive immunity; if they did not break the law, it is not clear why they would need immunity. In either case, questions of guilt or innocence are more appropriately decided by the courts than by the political process.

The House has passed a good bill. But the White House and its allies have made diversionary and untruthful allegations to oppose the bill. Earlier this year, it was reported that U.S. intelligence officials delayed wiretapping al Qaeda terrorists suspected of kidnapping an American soldier in Iraq, with terrible consequences. The administration and its supporters have argued that the legal requirements of FISA are to blame. The timeline of events released by the Director of National Intelligence, however, clearly shows that it was the Administration’s failure to act swiftly, not any lack of legal authority or flaw in the law, that led to disaster.

One thing that the RESTORE Act does not include is unchecked, blanket authority to conduct surveillance. While some have argued that the bill would allow for the wholesale collection of the communications of Americans, the bill is designed to do just the opposite. It requires the government to have court approved procedures for determining when it begins to target an American and must, therefore, get a warrant from the FISA Court. It would maintain the longstanding requirement that a warrant is needed to listen to a person in the United States or to a U.S. person abroad, and that a warrant is not needed to listen to communications from one person to another outside the United States. The act also contains minimization procedures to protect any U.S. person whose conversation may have been inadvertently monitored.

Indeed, to address the “concerns” laid out by the Republicans, the bill we adopted clarifies that the act will not stop lawful surveillance necessary to prevent Osama Bin Laden, al Qaeda, or any other terrorist organization from attacking America or its allies. And, and in a move to strengthen privacy protections, the RESTORE Act also prohibits the NSA and other agencies from sharing personal information about a U.S. person unless a Senior Executive determines that such action is necessary to protect national security.

Adam B has previously published 5 paragraphs and said that up to 5 paragraphs of direct quotation are acceptable without permission.  I’ll admit I’m pushing the limit.

Is this the bill we want?  The best we can expect?

Are we going to see midnight action in response to an administration with 25% approval whose leader pokes his head in the Rose Garden while the puppetmaster hides in the bushes pulling the string on lie after lie after lie.

Have you heard the one about Iran’s nuclear weapons program?  They haven’t had one since 2003.

Today, tomorrow, yesterday, the day before that into the dim mists of 2000 when they stole the people’s house through fraud and lies this gang of common criminals and thieves have been joining with their ‘Village’ enablers to loot and pillage.

This far and no farther say I.

I’ve carried this shield a long way and the ax is sharp enough.

Updated with added emphasis and this comment from the dK version

FISA, Hoover, and COINTELPRO (3+ / 0-)

We need to tell (and keep retelling) the backstory to the FISA law.

Current popular conventional wisdom seems to be that FISA was about Nixon and his abuses of Executive police and spying powers. But, while Tricy Dick’s bad behavior did offer the political nail to hang the effort on, FISA was mor about preventing another J. Edgar Hoover.

Hoover sat atop the FBI for 48 years. During that near-half century in charge of the Feds, he oversaw some of the worst civil liberties abuses in American history. Compared with Hoover, Nixon was a tiny piker. Perhaps the worst of Hoover’s abuses was a program called COINTELPRO.

COINTELPRO (short for “counterintelligence program”) used the foreign national security spy apparatus of the NSA to spy on and disrupt domestic political groups. The jaw-dropping details of the program were laid bare in one of the final appendices to the Church Committee report

There’s much to read in that document and I encourage everyone here to read it. But this small quote from the committe’s testimony captures the essence:

The risk was that you would get people who would be susceptible to political considerations as opposed to national security considerations, or would construe political considerations to be national security considerations, to move from the kid with a bomb to the kid with a picket sign, and from the kid with the picket sign to the kid with the bumper sticker of the opposing candidate. And you just keep going down the line.

FISA (the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) was the remedy created by the Church Committe to make sure that programs like COINTELPRO could never happen again. It was enacted precisely because spying on furriners was repeatedly used as the pretext for spying on Americans, often for no other reason than politial disagreement.

FISA was carefully crafted to ensure that the spy and police agencies could do what they needed to do within legal means, while ensuring that citizen’s rights were protected. FISA does little more-or-less besides making sure that the FBI and NSA have to get a warrant before spying on Americans on “national security” grounds.

With the politicization of the DOJ and other agencies– turning them into de facto enforcers for the Republican Party– there can be little doubt as to why this administration wants to gut FISA. They want to get their COINTELPRO on with 21st century technology and they are using the fear of terrorism to make it happen.

Its up to us to stop them.

Please read the above documents and write about them here and wherever else you may blog and comment. Understanding why FISA was created is crucial to ensuring that the American people are not sold a pig in a poke under the banner of “reform”. I plead for your help and assistance, good Kosmopolitans.

The opposite of ‘liberal’ isn’t ‘conservative’, its ‘authoritarian’.

by kingubu on Mon Dec 03, 2007 at 07:31:02 PM PST

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Defund

If you have somehow gotten the impression that I’d be giving up on defunding, you’ve obviously been reading the wrong newspaper. Today I suggest you take a look at the  Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s editorial page:

What the Congress must do now, if Mr. Bush continues to refuse the $50 billion with conditions, is simply to *pass no bill*, leaving the Pentagon to finance its activities with the $482 billion it has already been authorized. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates and the contractors behind the scenes will undoubtedly squawk, and the Republicans will posture politically, but the Democrats in the Congress, whom the electorate has counted on since November 2006 to bring the war to an end, will just have to take the heat. [Emphasis mine]

More.

Actually, the editorial is from Sunday, but I’m not a regular reader of the Pittsburgh press. Now it seems like I will have to become one.

Speaker Pelosi and Chairman Obey have promised that they will not fund the war this year unless the President accepts a timeline for withdrawal. They must now make that requirement indefinite. If they do not, they will most likely have to fund the war in early spring. If they do that, they will have absolutely no excuse not to do so again in the fall. You will not have to be reminded of the very important event happening next fall.

We cannot allow Congress to submit another blank check. If that happens, Congress will have funded the war several times with no meaningful concessions. Democrats will have done so.

The 2004 election was about Iraq, so was 2006; there is every reason to believe that 2008 will be again. And that’s the pragmatic reason for doing this: Pittsburgh is very Democratic, yes, but it is not, to my knowledge, a hotbed of antiwar activism. In fact, it is very much like Ohio, one of the two swing states in the northeast that’s a must win for us next year (the other is, of course, Pennsylvania). Democrats should be able to go back to the voters having fulfilled their mandate to end the war. If they do not, all bets about massive electoral gains in the House and the Senate will be off. Thus we have the nexus of good politics and good policy. Defund the war because it’s right to end it; defund the war because it’s politically smart; defund the war because it’s playing on swing state main street.  

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