Terror v. Incompetence

Greetings, gentle readers. My apologies for the relatively long dearth of posts; the post-election season has been, at turns, depressing, frightening, and incredibly busy. I'm hard at work (well, maybe not too hard at work ;-) coming up with a strategy/ideological framework for our local think tank, dealing with the holidays, and trying to get my professional writing done. Still, there's always a bit of time to ruminate on the current crises, particularly when there are so many to choose from.

For now, there's the issue of terrorism -- particularly Bush's incompetence and the liberal/progressive response -- as currently being discussed in a pissing contest of sorts between Kevin Drum and Atrios, all started by a truly asinine piece of work in The New Republic, which my favorite local politician would call a "Vichy Democrat" magazine. Essentially, the article espouses a purge of people like Michael Moore and organizations such as MoveOn for being "soft" on terrorism. They are to be replaced with a grassroots Democratic force, which is interesting as almost all of the grassroots energy in the Democratic party is coming from groups like MoveOn.

The article is fundamentally McCarthyesque, particularly in its attempts to dismiss charges of McCarthyism. Yet it specifically refers to 50s purges of insufficiently hard-line liberals -- within liberal organizations of the time. It is the old song of "tougher than thou," a game no sane liberal will ever win against rabid "kill 'em all" pseudo-conservatives. Kevin, as usual, is more balanced:

Let's take first things first: it's pretty clear that a lot of liberals really don't like being told they need to "get serious" about terrorism. And I don't blame them — especially since regular readers know that I think Republicans are the ones who have trivialized terrorism by treating it more like a partisan wedge issue than a serious danger.

So let's be more precise: the charge isn't so much that liberals don't have a serious approach to terrorism, it's that liberals tend to think that terrorism and national security just aren't very important in the first place.

...

Rather, he criticizes MoveOn because they even opposed the Afghanistan war (and he criticizes Moore for flatly denying that terrorism is a real threat). This is quite a different thing, and a distinction that strikes me as pretty well justified.

The problem is, Beinart's criticism is, um, well, let's be generous and call it a generalization. There's also the issue that many who opposed the Afghanistan war did so because they saw the Bush administration's incompetence clearly and didn't trust them to run a boxing match, let alone the most important American military conflict since V-J day. (I supported the war initially, and boy, I had to eat some serious helpings of crow, let me tell you.)

Meanwhile, Atrios' response is largely on target:

The consequence of marginalizing all such sentiments, or reducing them to caricatures, is that we never have a decent conversation about what we're doing. Acknowledging that there are almost always other options than war is one way to ensure that we understand more fully the consequences of those wars. War should be the last option, not the first one, almost no matter what. I don't say this because I'm a peacenik, but because war is fucking expensive in blood and treasure and has a lot of unintended consequences.

...

Final thought: who should be considered more worthy of marginalization? Those who cautioned against a just war, or those who supported an unjust and increasingly catastrophic one. Whatever the ultimate outcome of our Afghanistan conflict (which, by the way, is still going on), I submit it's quite likely a decision to not go to war there would have had far fewer negative consequences than our decision to go to war in Iraq.

...but I'll submit that the above paragraph goes a bit far. Our problem, IMO, is not the "hards" or the "softs" but the left's tradition of self-immolation. The circular firing squad is in fine form just now, and while I sympathize greatly with the Atrioses and MoveOns here, I do believe there is a strong case to be made for a robust, nuanced, multifaceted engagement on terrorism in all its forms.

As usual, Orcinus nails it:

Over the past 15 years and more, the great generator of terrorist acts around the world has been the phenomenon that embodies the commingling of all these traits: radical religious fundamentalism. The forms this takes range from the right-wing domestic terrorists of the Patriot movement to the Al Qaeda fanatics who struck on 9/11. (A variant on this is Tim McVeigh, who was closer to a neo-Nazi than a fundamentalist; but he clearly shared their apocalyptic worldview and urge to defend "traditional" values.) All of them have one key trait in common: an abiding hatred of modernity and progressive values.

So progressives indeed have a clear and compelling interest in opposing terrorism. Central to their support, indeed, is confronting the core of what is driving the phenomenon. The left naturally will readily confront radical fundamentalism, as long as it's made clear that's what we're dealing with.

What's been missing, however, is either a recognition or at least acknowledgement of this aspect of the problem from the right and its toadies on the left. Since American fundamentalism is primarily associated with the mainstream right, it probably shouldn't surprise anyone that the Bush administration has assiduously refused to frame the modern terrorist threat (including, notably, Al Qaeda) as primarily a right-wing phenomenon -- even though that is clearly what it is. And the ever-timid "moderate" leadership of the Democratic Party has been too polite to point it out.

I highly recommend the entire post, which (like many of Orcinus' posts) is too long to quote in its entirety here. Still, none of this answers the one big question, which Kevin sums up nicely (IMO, he's better at coming up with the questions than the answers):

Maybe Islamic totalitarianism is as big a threat as fascism and communism were in their day. Maybe it's not. I'm not sure. But I would like to see liberals address the issue head on. It would be good for liberalism and it would be instructive for me.

Excuse me while I indulge in a bit of hubris here, and tackle this head-on.

The short answer to this is yes, though I'd recast the question as "fundamentalist terrorism." If we don't count the strongmen who basically serve American interests, the "Islamofascist" governments can be counted thusly: Iran and the remaining portions of Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban. They're not going to be landing platoons in Arlington any time soon. Terrorists, however, might turn it into glass someday. And therein lies the problem.

Imagine if one of the planes that hit the World Trade Center had a nuclear device on board. What would the political, social and economic consequences of wiping Manhattan off the face of the Earth have been? Chemical weapons could be even more insidious, and a stupid terrorist with the right virus could wipe out the human race. Yes, religious fanatics with WMDs are a a real and unspeakable threat, and many on the left must indeed face this danger realistically.

At the same time, the disgust many liberals and progressive feel about the war on terror can be explained very simply: the Bush administration isn't taking it seriously. They use it as an excuse to conquer nations with oil and then implement various ideological theories of warfare and economics. They crack down on peaceful activists while botching enormous swathes of the battle against Islamic extremism and completely ignoring domestic terrorism. Unless you count nude environmentalists on bicycles.

But hey, it's good for beating Democrats with. Even Vietnam vets who lost three limbs in service to their country. That's what the War on Terror amounts to for Bush, Cheney and Rove -- a political advantage over their rivals. If no terrorists hit America, they've protected Our Country. If terrorists do hit America, we have to vote Republican because it's too dangerous to change horsemen in the middle of an apocalypse. And all the while, it makes a convenient tool for silencing criticism and shredding the Constitution.

It is time for an articulate progressive position on fighting terrorism. Bush's nonsense about the "failed policy of law enforcement" is laughable, and one of the most toxic effects he's had on the whole debate. The only administration that's ever failed against large-scale extra-national terrorism is his. Clinton's administration could be said to have failed in the Oklahoma City bombing, but is anyone arguing that we have to declare martial law in areas with large militia movements? The simple truth is, we need to use every tool in our arsenal to battle what is in every real sense a criminal empire. You fight al-Qaeda the way you fight the mob -- you go after their assets, you infiltrate their ranks, you raid their bases when you can, and you make being a member unpalatable by making life as a decent citizen more attractive. Given that terrorists do occasionally acquire "state sponsors," military intervention is one tool -- but it is arguably the least efficient tool, because any mistake made when using it exacerbates all the other facets of the conflict rather than relieving them.

It is vital for Democrats and progressives to come up with an alternate strategy in the battle against fundamentalist terrorism, not only because it is an essential political job, but because Bush's horribly incompetent ego-driven policy is endangering the entire world.

(/) Roland X
Getting Serious Today

A Tale of Two Memes

Inspired by Oliver Willis' brilliant Brand Democrat line:



Two great memes that meme great together? We can only hope. *G*

(/) Roland X
"It wasn't about me. It's way bigger. It was about the issues I believed in, it was about Democratic candidates in the future." -- Barbara Boxer

Mrs. Roland X Is Always Right, Part One

Rice Has Surgery for Noncancerous Growths.

Yeah. She's having the last remaining vestiges of her conscience surgically removed.

Stolen shamelessly from my brilliant, beautiful, wonderful wife. (No, it's not on her blog. Call it a perk. ;-)

(/) Roland X
Expecting a visit from the Secret Service any day now...

Beyond Outrage

...is simply grief.

Certainly, the assault on Falluja has given the Iraqi people a lot to look at, and a lot to think about. Some 200,000 people -- the great majority of Falluja's population of some 300,000 -- were driven out of their city by news of the imminent attack and the US bombardment. No agency of government, US or Iraqi, which turned off the city's water and electricity in preparation for the assault, offered assistance. Nor did the United Nations Refugee Agency or any other representative of the international community appear. And where are the people now? And what stories are the expelled 200,000 telling the millions of Iraqis among whom they are now mixing? We don't know. No one seems to be interested.

When the attack came, the first target was Falluja General Hospital. The New York Times explained why: "The offensive also shut down what officers said was a propaganda weapon for the militants: Falluja General Hospital, with its stream of reports of civilian casualties." If there were no hospital, there would be no visible casualties; if there were no visible casualties, there would be no international outrage, and all would be well. What of those civilians who remained? No men of military age were permitted to leave during the attack. Remaining civilians were trapped in their apartments with no electricity or water. No one knows how many of them have been killed, and no official group has any plans to find out. The city itself is a ruin. "A drive through the city revealed a picture of utter destruction," the Independent of Britain reports, "with concrete houses flattened, mosques in ruins, telegraph poles down, power and phone lines hanging slack and rubble and human remains littering the empty streets."

And America is supposed to be the good guy. Right.

On one side, slaughtering Western women who spend their entire lives helping Iraqis, because that, you know, makes a point. On the other, closing hospitals because they might, you know, help people, then word gets out about all the people who needed help and then you've got (gasp) a PR problem.

Hey, who can tell all those white/brown/(insert skin color here) people apart, anyway?

The point of the article quoted above -- titled "What Happened to Hearts?" -- is that we're just trying to convince them to stop fighting with fear. When someone does that to Americans, we call it terrorism. On the other side, you've got guys like bin Laden using and excusing terrorism because, well heck, everybody does it. It almost makes me nostalgic for the days when a terrorist could make a splash by having a dozen or so athletes killed. Almost. Arafat died just in time; he was too soft for the new world chaos.

Forget leaving the country -- I want a new planet. A higher plane of existence would be even better, but I'll settle for a place to settle away from all these fanatics. Still, pretty much all thoughts of leaving have fled my mind -- if people like me don't stand and fight this madness, who will?

(On the other hand, I've got a growing boy on my hands. If there's a draft, and it lasts several years...)

(/) Roland X
This is not my America

Why Terrorists Are Still Our Worst Enemies

For all Bush and his cronies have done, no horror they have yet committed competes with this travesty:

A video apparently showing the murder of aid worker Margaret Hassan seems to be genuine, says the Foreign Office.

...

"She had no prejudice against any creed. She dedicated her whole life to working for the poor and vulnerable, helping those who had no-one else."

Margaret Hassan, for those who may not know, spent her entire adult life helping the Iraqi people, and probably saved countless thousands from starvation during the sanctions. If she is dead, as it appears, these terrorists killed a genuine hero of the Iraqi people.

It is certainly relevant that by creating the "jihadi woodstock" in Iraq, our government is partly responsible for this atrocity. Nevertheless, the overwhelming majority of the weight of guilt for her murder belongs squarely on the evil fanatics who kidnapped and executed her. While there are certainly Iraqi rebels who are genuinely fighting for their homes, there are equally certainly monsters exploiting the ongoing tragedy to shock the world with their acts of hatred.

(/) Roland X
Beyond outrage, today

OUTRAGE OVERLOAD

I thought I knew what outrage overload was, until today when the sheer righteous fury literally made my head hurt.

I am crossposting this to my LiveJournal account. Today's events have taught me that there is no more neutral ground, and no excuse for remaining silent. Never again.

First, the bad news: they're using tanks to intimidate peaceful anti-war protestors.

LOS ANGELES, November 9, 2004 - At 7:50 PM two armored tanks showed up at an anti-war protest in front of the federal building in Westwood. The tanks circled the block twice, the second time parking themselves in the street and directly in front of the area where most of the protesters were gathered.

Remember 2000, when the talking heads proclaimed our democracy superior to places like China, where they use tanks against protestors? Um...

Now, the worse news: Remember the glee most of us felt when we heard Ashcroft was out? How could they find someone worse, right? Well, how about the guy who defended Enron and Abu Ghraib? I kid you not:

Because it was Gonzales that wrote the widely-disputed legal opinion that justified Bush's rejection of the Geneva Convention protocols in the treatment of Afghan and Taliban prisoners, and he crafted an argument aimed at shielding Bush and the military command from war crimes prosecutions.

...

It also doesn't help Bush's cause that Gonzales was counsel for Enron as well. My, my, what moral values are on display now?

...

Second, what would Gonzales' confirmation as AG do to the Plame investigation, given that he has already been dragged in to testify?

Third, while serving as a justice of the Texas Supreme Court, Gonzales took money from firms with litigation pending before his court, including Halliburton.

Read the whole thing. It's not that bad -- it's worse.

Canada's starting to look good again.

(/) Roland X
Tilt...tilt...tilt...

Liberty and Justice For All: A Frame for Democrats

So the early conclusion on the election is this: We Need A Coherent Message. I couldn't agree more. Now the big question is, "what is our message?"

Simple. Liberals, progressives, and Democrats as a whole can differ on various aspects of the philosophy, but the basic meme is fair play. Republicans and the conservatives who enable them (not to be confused with classic conservatives) like to say "life is not fair." We need to respond "we can make it fair." The package for this is simple: the classic phrase "liberty and justice for all." How does that fit? Again, simple.

Liberty is, hopefully, self-explanatory. Civil rights, equal rights, and most especially the basic freedoms granted by the Bill of Rights. You can say what you want, write what you want, believe what you want, and get together with any willing group you want, as long as you don't hurt anyone doing it. The modern Republican party is, basically, against this now. We need to point out the large freedom gap.

Meanwhile, justice covers the rest of our policies: there is more to justice than arresting muggers. Economic justice means those who benefit from society the most pay their fair share, and those who might otherwise be left behind by society are given help. Social justice is working to end discrimination, and goes hand in hand with civil rights. Ecological justice means protecting our basic needs -- air, water and food -- from polluters. Dumping tons of poison into the air is at least as bad as dumping your garbage into your neighbor's yard, only it's everyone's yard. Global justice means helping the weak when we can, and using military force when we must, but being humble enough to realize that using violence unnecessarily is inherently unjust.

"All" is the final, important piece of the frame. Liberty for only some is unAmerican, as the long, hard fight for equality in our great nation proves. There is no such thing as "justice for some" -- such a state is inherently unjust. The best thing is, when you say "all," you can't say "all, but," and this is where we can nail them. How just is it to throw the GLBT community into a political firefight for short-term electoral gain? How fair is it to fight minorities' right to vote? How free is a Muslim-American held in Guantanamo Bay without being charged with a crime? It also conveniently unites all the "special interests" under one unified whole: Americans who stand for every citizen's rights.

They want to make the (50s revision of the) Pledge of Allegiance sacred, word-for-word? Fine. Let's beat 'em into the ground with it. It's a simple phrase that will resonate with the vast majority of Americans, particularly those "heartlanders" so many Democrats want voting for them, and if the Republicans are foolish enough to demand we explain ourselves...we can. They say "one nation under God." We need to tell them to finish the sentence.

Their battlecry is "God, Guns, and Gays!" (It's really Greed, Guns and [hating] Gays, but we can start defining them better once we're on more solid rhetorical ground.) If ours is "Liberty and Justice For All!", who sounds more American? It recreates the frame almost entirely, helping take back patriotism, letting us fight back in a clearly principled way across the entire spectrum of Democratic causes, and allows us to talk about values in an inherently inclusive and undeniably American way. If we can succeed with this frame, I believe it will be a powerful first step in taking back our country.

(/) Roland X
"We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America." -- Barack Obama, July 27, 2004

The Long Twilight Struggle

I may not be a member of the "reality-based community," but I do know how to face facts. Even if a miracle happens in Ohio or Florida, we (that is, sane Americans) must now take stock.

Let's assume, for the moment, that Ohio was stolen. (I do.) Let's even assume, for the moment, that after the mountain of Florida ballots are counted, Kerry closes significantly -- still losing, but making it a lot closer. (Obviously, if he wins Florida, everything changes.) Which would mean that Florida, too, was stolen...again.

This does not change the fact that it would take a lot of voter theft for the popular vote to go the other way. More than even I am willing to swallow. It was close, sure. It was a lot closer than George "Mandate" Bush wants to admit, and that's with the advantages of incumbency, war, a huge base of rabid religious fanatics, the Osama surprise, the most powerful spin machine the world has ever known, a compliant media, and enough lies to choke a horse.

He still won.

So America voted for pointless wars and tax cuts for the rich. It voted for gay bashing and Abu Ghraib. It voted for "moral values" when the President has shown all the morality of Machiavelli's Prince. It voted for incompetence in the war on terror and a smoothly-run war on the environment. It voted for crony capitalism and naked greed. It voted for temporary security over essential liberty and got neither. R.I.P. America, 1776 - 2004, it might seem at first glance.

Well, I won't deny it's bad. Our ability to fight back, barring a nightmare like civil war, is dependent on our ability to exercise our basic freedoms, an ability I am seriously dubious about. Nevertheless, there is reason to hope. (I wrote the linked article yesterday. What a difference a day makes.)

First of all, the greatest measure of triumphalism is coming from the theocons, those borderline-psychotics who claim to be the only true Christians while espousing the sort of beliefs that had their Savior throwing tables around in the temple. Let them. I was going to write an article on this, but the Kossacks did such a good job, why repeat the labor?

Reed, you see, wanted to not merely deliver the social conservatives' "values" votes this year, but to ensure that their pivotal role be made noted and respected -- broadcast and trumpeted, loudly and quite publicly. They didn't want to just win; they want credit and plaudits for scoring the decisive touchdown.

Awesome. The fact that this election - the first post-9/11 election, with a war in Iraq abroad and a changing economic situation at home - will be remembered by the we-need-it-simplified media as the "values" election, is Reed's great gift to us.

They've been slow, steady and patient, but sooner or later, the would-be theocrats have to make their move. Though I was wrong on November 2nd, thinking Kerry had the election, it still seems to me that these madmen have finally taken one step too far. They want this election to be their victory, fine. Time to rub the neocons' noses in it. (Is that your daughter they want to burn at the stake, Mr. Cheney? Why, I believe it is.) Time to rub the tax hawks' noses in it. (So what do you do in your spare time, Mr. Norquist?) Time to rub, especially, the (Republican) libertarians' noses in it. They've bordered on irrelevancy in the Republican party for some time now, and they need to see the devil they've sold their souls to.

Another reason to hope is that Democrats, along with the rest of the left, is taking a long, deep look at this loss to determine what must be done next. The circular firing squad seems to have come and gone with lightning speed (though I must admit to some schadenfreude at the calls for the heads of Terry MacAuliffe and Bob Shrum) and a "reality-based" attitude prevails. My take: message, message, message. We need a coherent, simple pitch. I'll blog on this soon, since I'm pretty sure I have a winner on this. As a community, however, we have to ditch our fear of oversimplifying and KISS (keep it simple, silly).

Put the two together, and we can say "The Democratic party stands for (fill in the blank). The Republican party stands for theocracy. Which do you want?" Simplistic? Yes. We're talking about one wing of the Republican party, and even many of the religious conservatives are not the Christian equivalent of jihadists. Make them explain it. Make them get into details. Then we can get into serious dialogues and kill 'em with the truth.

The truth is, however overly distilled this formula may be, it is essentially accurate: the real leaders of the Republican Party are either radical religious crusaders themselves, or tremendously beholden to them.

This is a tremendous strength for them in one way, as it provides the party with a fanatically devoted grassroots base that will work its butt off for them. It is a weakness for them as well, however. The thing is, and yes I'm simplifying, there are two types of Bush voters: the ones who know exactly what they're voting for and the ones who don't have a clue.

Bush supporters were, almost across the board, less knowledgeable about their own candidate's stands than we were. In short, they had to lie occasionally and hide constantly to win. This is why Republicans like Bush, Delay, Santorum and their ilk have to fight their battles on the dubious ground of "values," translated as (their vision of) God, Guns, and (hating) Gays. They talk in code to reach their base without scaring away moderates -- and this time, it worked. If we can come up with as basic a formula to express our views, we win -- because all we have to do is get most people to understand what we stand for.

Which brings us back, for the moment, to our basic problem -- these lunatics control all the levers of government for now. The last thing they want us to do is get our message out. Which means we are all in a lot of trouble. It's going to be a long, hard fight. If we can get fair elections and make ourselves clear, however, I firmly believe we can win.

If I hear the echo of jackboots in the streets, yeah, I'm taking my family to Canada. Until then, roll up your sleeves, fellow freedom-lovers. It's going to be a long, hard, ugly fight. This election loss will haunt our country for a generation. Still, the reason our foes are so afraid is that they know time and history are against them. The world is becoming more progressive and tolerant, and those who need hate and fear know their time is almost up. This is their last chance to consolidate what power they have left, and they're grabbing it for all they're worth.

(/) Roland X
"The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers." --Leia Organa, princess, Senator, rebel

BELIEVE

It is easy to feel lost in the storm of political rhetoric, especially in the last days of a political season as charged as this one. It is easy, all too easy, to feel irrelevant in the face of Osama bin Laden's coming out as the world's pre-eminent supervillain, in the wake of 380 tons of deadly explosives that simply vanished, in the din of multi-million dollar ad campaigns and talking points e-mailed to millions.

Don't you believe it.

I have three subscribers: two more-or-less local friends, and someone I have never met, and never known until now. She wrote to me recently. I asked for and received permission to post parts of her letter.

I am an independent Conservative who has not once seriously considered voting for Kerry. My eldest Son, a college student in Texas, recently cast his first vote ever - for Kerry. That wasn't enough to persuade me to vote for Kerry. Moore's movie had no impact on my vote, either.

...

I desperately want that "hope" realized for AMERICA. Perhaps you're right and this JFK may be the one to do this. I don't know...all I know is that Bush43 is the opposite of everything bright and beautiful that AMERICA once stood for and could be in the future.

...

I am willing to give Kerry a try.

I include these excerpts, not out of some self-congratulatory feeling of triumph, but because recently I had been feeling futile. This blog seemed like a way to feel like I was doing something without actually making a real difference. In showing me how I had touched her, helped her see hope, she gave me that gift in turn.

Never believe -- never believe -- that you cannot make a difference, reach another heart, change another mind, touch another soul. This is the fundamental gift of vision and passion and creation that is the greatest part of the human experience, the light shining in us all. That is what our enemies want to extinguish. This is not about Bush, or Cheney, or Rumsfeld, or even Ashcroft or Rove. They are only symptoms of a greater disease -- fear of our ability to connect to each other and exalt one another. If we ever truly achieve that glorious potential, those who need to have power over others to feel important fear they will have nothing. Ironically, that is the true tragedy, because if they open themselves to that same glory they can leave their fears behind with the rest of us.

This is the time. Our moment has arrived. John Kerry is merely one of many representatives. He is a starting point. If he fails, another will take his place, and another, on and on, until we can finally rise above our fears and grievances and differences.

For now, this is a holding battle, a fight to stop those who would take us backwards into ignorance and terror. But know this forever: all you have to do is reach out and persevere. Try. Use your gifts -- writing, speaking, art, song, organization, technology, it doesn't matter. Connect to your allies. Connect to the undecided. Connect to those who disagree with you. Never give up. Never surrender. And you will make a difference.

Believe.

(/) Roland X
Hope is a phoenix

The Last Days of the Rovan Empire

Voter Suppression.

Found the following links which all seem to point to the same company that is suspected of tearing up Democratic voter registration forms in Las Vegas. It has set up registration drives in Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia, Florida and Nevada and is accused of the same things in most if not all of these states. Sproul & Associates is a Republican consulting firm run by Nathan Sproul, former head of the Arizona Republican party and Arizona Christian Coalition.

Pledging Allegiance...to Bush.

"I want you to stand, raise your right hands," and recite "the Bush Pledge," said Florida state Sen. Ken Pruitt. The assembled mass of about 2,000 in this Treasure Coast town about an hour north of West Palm Beach dutifully rose, arms aloft, and repeated after Pruitt: "I care about freedom and liberty. I care about my family. I care about my country. Because I care, I promise to work hard to re-elect, re-elect George W. Bush as president of the United States."

Shamelessly exploiting the attacks on the Twin Towers.

On the front side, the ad asks in red print, "How Can John Kerry Lead America In A Time of War?" It adds three subsequent lines, "Kerry: Changing Positions," "Kerry: Cutting Defense" and "Kerry: Slashing Intelligence."

Following that, there are nine images of the front pages of Sept. 12, 2001 newspapers (shown below), all of which display the smoking towers of the World Trade Center before they collapsed, killing some 2,600 people. One includes the approach of the plane.

Desperation is thick in the air. With all the momentum on the side of liberty, justice and Kerry, expect every dirty trick in the book. There is no low to which they will not stoop, no ploy they will not attempt. The loyalty oaths are disturbing, the destruction of registrations outrageous, and the fliers revolting, but they all show just how terrified of losing they are right now.

The next four days will be very interesting indeed.

(/) Roland X
Kerry/Edwards 2004: Vote While You Still Can

Whatever It Takes

This is the Bush campaign in a nutshell. Lying. Cheating. Stealing.

Whatever it takes, indeed.

They have a problem, you see. Facts are partisan this year. Kerry says "look at the evidence." Bush says "trust me." Problem is, Bush's record when it comes to trusting him is, um, less than ideal. So Rove has one tactic left: the Big Lie. Demonize a true American hero while pretending his miserable failure of a candidate is a strong leader -- when they have to deny responsibility for everything.

So the leaders of "God's Own Party" spin and obfuscate and deceive. They shamelessly attack the rights of likely Democratic voters, particularly minorities, invoking the long shadow of Jim Crow. They cling to power the way a drowning man clings to a life preserver. And given what they have already done, they have good reason to fear justice. And so, to win this election and avoid true responsibility for their perfidy, they will do...whatever it takes.

(/) Roland X
Kerry/Edwards 2004: Vote While You Still Can

The Once and Future President

Once Upon A Time...

...there was a divided country choosing between a charismatic Democratic Senator and a powerful, divisive Republican. The Republican was known for his cunning and bag of tricks. The Democrat was known for his courage commanding a boat in combat and his Massachusetts heritage. It was the closest election since 1888.

Some guy with the initials JFK won.

Today, that brief shining moment in history is known as Camelot -- the time when American greatness seemed right around the corner, as if we had almost reached the gateway to a future undreamt of, and all we needed to do was open the door.

Instead of Camlann and Mordred, however, we had Dallas and Oswald. Vietnam, riots, a brother murdered, a nation in tailspin. The deceased president's great rival wins the White House, and ends up synonymous with political corruption. A future undreamt of becomes a half-forgotten dream from a brief shining moment.

And now, once again, America is on a cusp. Instead of a grand future, we stand on the brink of the abyss. Instead of eight years of prosperity, there have been four years of madness, hubris and folly. Instead of a war building in the background and a dream of a Great Society nearing its apex, we have a violent nexus of greed and incompetence and a nightmare of a New American Century.

In the legend of Arthur, it is said that he will return in Britain's darkest hour. Has our own leader from Camelot returned in ours?

John F. Kerry, the senator from Massachusetts, has had a much longer career in Washington than President Kennedy did. His own naval career at the command of a small attack boat was strikingly different from the other JFK's, as was the aftermath. Where Kennedy lived in a time when the wink-and-nod was acceptable, we live in an age of hyper-intense scrutiny -- at least regarding Democrats.

And yet the parallels are undeniable. Kerry has been a crusader his entire life, whether in Vietnam or after it, as a prosecutor or Lieutenant Governor in his home state, or through nearly twenty years of fighting corruption in the Senate. He is attacked routinely from the right as a flip-flopping extreme liberal, in spite of the cognitive dissonance that position should cause, and as a spineless centrist by the left, in spite of his long, dedicated service to liberal and progressive causes. Yet anything resembling a thoughtful study of his life reveals a man dedicated to principle, to honor, to duty, and to the right thing. His whole life has been an example of how to cautiously study a situation until the right moment comes, then strike boldly. Turning his boat into the fire is the perfect metaphor of his life, whether in the rivers of the Mekong Delta, the streets of Washington DC, the courts of Massachusetts, or the halls of the Senate, where he helped expose Iran-Contra, CIA drug dealing, Manuel Noriega's betrayals, and the "terrorists' bank" BCCI.

Suffice to say he compares well to his predecessor.

Today, the Red Sox swept the World Series, winning for the first time since 1918. Just as a lunar eclipse -- a red moon -- came out of totality. In Busch Stadium. Against a team owned by Bush's old friends from his Texas Ranger days.

Has the sword been pulled from the stone? Only time will tell. But that's one heck of a good vibe out there. The portents look good and the momentum is all on Kerry's side. Remember, this is the man known as "Kerry the closer."

Arthur wasn't perfect either. He was a war leader who relied on his queen to handle peacetime logistics, he had a blind spot when it came to family, and man oh man, did he have a temper. Yet his courage, vision and moral code gave us the dream of "right makes might" rather than the reverse, a Round Table where all are equals (even the king himself), and a land of freedom, justice, peace and bounty, where all are protected and cared for.

The original dream of Camelot fell to tragedy and untimely death. The promise of its renewal always holds the hope that in its return, things will be different. I believe that the JFK of our generation, the man who steps forward to lead us in a time of darkness rather than light, has come just when history and America need him most.

Sir Thomas Mallory couldn't have written it better himself.

(/) Roland X
Kerry/Edwards 2004: Vote While You Still Can

Bushymandias

I have commented previously on Bush's staggering hubris. Today a parallel occurred to me.

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said -- "two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert ... near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lips, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."

I thought of bringing up the Bush who cried wolf issue, but it's been done.

Win or lose on November 2nd, this is Dubya's fate. Feet of clay, a "sneer of cold command," and his deluded certainty etched into the record of history. Nothing more.

Well, okay, Cheney's the guy with the sneer. But still.

(/) Roland X
Kerry/Edwards 2004: Vote While You Still Can

Reality, Subjectivity & Hubris

Regular readers (all three of you) may have noticed that I briefly included the spreading meme "proud member of the reality-based community" in my blog title. I heartily agree that the Bush cabal is delusional to the point of being a global menace. Likewise, I have no doubt that a thoughtful, nuanced approach based on facts and evidence is desperately needed in the White House and other halls of power. I was happy to join the "Reality-Based Community" so casually disparaged in Ron Suskind's now-famous article detailing the administration's staggering hubris.

And yet...and yet...

All my life, I have felt that my relationship with reality was casual at best and antagonistic at worst. I'm the kind of guy who wears buttons that say "reality is for people who lack imagination" and "subvert the dominant paradigm." Between my (layman's) interest in quantum mechanics and continuing quest along the mystical path, I too believe that reality is a matter of perception and can be altered by force of will.

To a point.

Herein lies the rub. In the cause-and-effect world of Newtonian reality, some things just are, and getting around them (when possible at all) takes cleverness, hard work, and actual study of the facts. Further, even in the more "fungible" world of sociology, imposing one's will only goes so far when the subject says "no you won't either," even in the face of propaganda, threats, guns and bombs.

In other words, altering reality, whether through science or mysticism, is something to be done mindfully, with respect and deference to the vast powers around us. Simply put, I have a nuanced view of reality.

This is one of the many reasons I consider John Kerry to be endlessly superior to the madmen pulling Bush's strings. From all the evidence, their reality is a black and white world, and the world is an Othello board -- when they take enemy forces or territory, black flips to white. Our troops are greeted with flowers and candy, the "liberated" willingly allow their nations to be turned into market-based utopias, and "average" Americans can stop thinking about "them furriners" and go back to NASCAR.

Um, no.

Still, the point is, I have never been a member of the "reality-based community," particularly as many of its current defenders describe it. Hearing talk about the evils of faith, "occultism," "magical thinking" et. al. depresses me, even in the context of Bush delusionism.

I could go on at length on this topic, but I have other places to write about esoterica. So, in short, count me as a proud supporter of the reality-based community -- but not a member.

(/) Roland X
"We need a renaissance of wonder. We need to renew, in our hearts and in our
souls, the deathless dream, the eternal poetry, the perennial sense that
life is miracle and magic." --E. Merrill Root

Roland X on DMY

A three-parter, and the art they got for "Damsels in Distress" is wonderful.

Why You Should Vote Kerry, 2004-10-07

Damsels in Distress, 2004-10-18

The Betrayal, 2004-10-21

This last one is one he's been writing in his head for months, but wanted to save it for the final stretch.

Essential Liberty

The authorship is in doubt, but the sentiment is rarely challenged:

Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

The faith vs. reason battle between Bush and Kerry has been overtly exposed of late, in a swath of articles ranging from Ellen Goodman's easily overlooked but brilliant summation of the denial-based foreign policy to Ron Suskind's now-famous demolition of their empire-based community, which can supposedly change reality on a whim. (I, too, believe in the power of will to change reality, but understand that it's "hard work," as our President puts it.)

In my fiction writing, however, I try to keep in mind the difference between theme and plot, and I see more and more evidence that the war between denial and sanity is more of a theme for this election than the meat of it. And while Bush throws lots of coded red meat to his base, ranging from cultures of life to Dred Scott (code for overturning Roe v. Wade), his entire appeal to the center is "Kerry can't save you."

Ignoring the total deceit of that conceit for the moment, let us pretend for a moment that George W. Bush would actually keep us marginally safer than John F. Kerry. (I know, it's a really big stretch, but some people believe this.) For these people, the vote is between the guy who will keep Americans "safe from terra" and the guy who will recognize basic truths and the limits of Constitutional law. Even then, they're still on the wrong side of the debate -- because they're advocating the temporary security candidate over the essential liberty candidate:

The largest and most important [reason to elect Kerry] is the protection of American democracy. It is always difficult while enjoying the comforts and privileges of taken-for-granted liberties to imagine that they could be lost; but the elements of Bush's misrule have plainly converged to form this threat.

...

The Democratic Party generally wants to defend civil liberties and does so when it dares; the Republicans, with honorable exceptions, apparently would sweep them aside. The Democrats prefer social justice, however weakly they fight for it; the Republicans would give every dollar they can find to the rich. The Democrats are inclined to limit corporate power; the Republicans are corporate power.

I believe that this is the fundamental plot of the election. Kerry is finally, at last, out in front, but even in the most wildly optimistic landslide scenario for our side, we're not likely to win more than 55% of the popular vote. Think about that.

Forty-five percent of the people who will vote are willing to give up essential liberty for temporary security. At least. And at least forty percent are so disconnected that they don't see the danger, or the difference between the candidates, or just don't care. Either way, they won't bother to get involved.

Ben would be so proud.

(/) Roland X
Kerry/Edwards 2004: Vote While You Still Can

Too Radical For PAT FREAKIN' ROBERTSON!

First, a blast from the past:

• "Feminism encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians."


• "You say you're supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists and this, that, and the other thing. Nonsense. I don't have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist. I can love the people who hold false opinions but I don't have to be nice to them."


• "Many of those people involved with Adolph Hitler were Satanists, many of them were homosexuals -- the two things seem to go together."


• "There is no such thing as separation of church and state in the Constitution. It is a lie of the Left and we are not going to take it anymore."

This cornucopia of wingnuttery is brought to you courtesy of Pat Robertson, the televangelist's televangelist, the grand high poobah of the Religious Right, the Dark Lord of American Radical Fundamentalism himself. There are few names more respected by the lockstep brigade or feared by the reality-based community. And here's what he has to say about Bush's detachment from reality:

Robertson, in an interview with CNN that aired Tuesday night, said God had told him the war would be messy and a disaster. When he met with Bush in Nashville, Tenn., before the war Bush did not listen to his advice, Robertson said, and believed Saddam Hussein was an evil tyrant who needed to be removed.

"He was just sitting there, like, 'I'm on top of the world,' and I warned him about this war," Robertson said.

"I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, 'Mr. President, you better prepare the American people for casualties.' 'Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties.' 'Well,' I said, 'it's the way it's going to be.' And so, it was messy. The Lord told me it was going to be, A, a disaster and, B, messy."

The White House is calling Pat Robertson a liar. Let me repeat that for emphasis: The White House is calling the most famous and prominent fundamentalist televangelist in the world a liar:

• White House and campaign advisers denied Bush made the comment, with adviser Karen Hughes saying, "I don't believe that happened. He must have misunderstood or misheard it."


• "Obviously, we already had casualties in Afghanistan at the time. If you look at that, that (the comment) was not consistent with what was going on," [Hughes] said.


• White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, "Of course, the president never made such a comment."

All from the article quoted above.

Now, it would neither shock nor dismay me that one of these vile, despicable leaders is a liar. Still, it is, IMNSHO, deeply telling that a) Pat Robertson would feel a need to create potential distance between himself and Bush's Folly, and b) the White House is so scared and desperate regarding any blowback on said Folly that they're willing to risk alienating Robertson's legions of fundie sheeple by directly contradicting him.

Then again, things are already looking touchy between the political and religious lovebirds.

Influential American evangelist Pat Robertson said Monday that Evangelical Christians feel so deeply about Jerusalem, that if President George W. Bush were to "touch" Jerusalem, Evangelicals would abandon their traditional Republican leanings and form a third party.

Maybe there's some payback going on here. Maybe a rat's hearing "Nearer My God To Thee." Maybe someone's eager to try out his political muscle on his own. Regardless of the reasons, Robertson looks willing to ditch God's Own Party, or at least God's Bush...because this bunch is too whacked even for him. Bush, meanwhile, is poised to make his biggest mistake of the election season: alienating his base.

Feel the love.

(/) Roland X
Kerry/Edwards 2004: Vote While You Still Can

Why You Should Vote Kerry

The latest on DemocracyMeansYou.com from Roland X:

Why You Should Vote Kerry
(Hint: He's more than just Not Bush)
(First of a three-part final push into Election Day)

It is heartening for me to see progressives -- former Nader supporters in particular -- line up behind John Kerry. No matter how much they might like Nader, Cobb, or other great leaders on our side, they see the danger of a Bush administration and want to help take our country back. And certainly, the complaining has subsided somewhat after the way Kerry demolished Dubya in the first debate.

Read the rest...

The Purity Brigade

Thus Endeth Ralph Nader:

His candidacy, he argues, should be measured by the purity of his ideas and ideals, not his chances of winning.

Purity.

Pat Robertson and Ayatollah Khamenei believe in religious "purity." The Chinese government believes in ideological "purity." The KKK believes in racial "purity."

Holy Mother, haven't we had enough of purity for one species' lifespan?

(/) Roland X
Member, Non-Idiots for Kerry

The John-John Win-Win

A quick look at the debates.

There's not much to say about the Kerry vs. Bush showdown. It was the Hero vs. the Chimp, and it showed. Bush got in a couple of shots, sure, and Kerry missed a couple of chances to refute a gross distortion. Overall, however, Big John obliterated the Naked Emperor.

Captain Sunshine vs. Dick Luthor was somewhat more interesting. I thought Edwards won on style but Cheney on, um, "substance" isn't the right word when so much of his defense was outright lying, but I had to admit that he did it well, and with so many lies to refute, Edwards had to pass on a lot of them. I figured Cheney would look okay.

Poll after poll has Edwards winning big time, however -- not all of them, certainly, and many of them are non-scientific blog polls -- but damn, did I see a different debate? Even not-so-crazy Andy thought Darth Cheney stank up the joint, and he punted on the Hate Amendment (the one thing I'll give Cheney props for; even the comic-book Lex loves his daughter).

On almost everything else, of course, Dick lied through his Lex Luthor sneer. But he also messed up big time on something important: fact checking.

He told viewers to check out factcheck.com for the straight dope on the bad things that mean ol' Edwards was saying about him and his old company Halliburton. Problem is, he probably meant factcheck.ORG, a site dedicated exactly to what you'd think from its name.

The people who own factcheck.com, as it happens, are not fans of the
Bush/Luthor ticket. So they redirected the link to...wait for
it...georgesoros.com.

Meanwhile, factcheck.org posted a response saying that Cheney was full of it.

At the same time, Captain Sunshine was just beaming. He was the nicest pit bull you'll ever meet. I thought he let Cheney get away with too many falsehoods at the time, but with style meaning so much he just rode his charm to victory. I now think it was a deliberate strategy to let the post-debate debate handle the lies, a strategy that seems to have worked magnificently.

So did Cheney learn not to mess with the Internet? Probably not. This is a
man who continues to push a Saddam/al-Qaida connection, mind you (while
hilariously arguing that he never made an Iraq-9/11 connection). Still, it's
nice to see someone get what they ask for. Especially when it's exactly what
they deserve.

(/) Roland X
Personally, I prefer to go straight to Daily Kos. But that's just me. *G*

Why We Must Win

I turned 35 today.

Now, my birthday has nothing to do with why we have to win. It's going to take me a bit to get there, so please bear with me.

I went to work this morning fully expecting my co-workers to spring something on me, but I was totally unprepared for the outpouring I received. Several nice presents, a delicious double-chocolate birthday cake, a wonderful lunch, and decorations all around my cubicle. From the moment I arrived, my team -- my friends -- went to considerable efforts to make sure I enjoyed my day, especially with several painful changes taking place.

Unfortunately, none of us, except for our supervisor, knew just how painful one of those changes would turn out to be.

A couple of hours into the morning, we were called in to a meeting, all of us but one. We learned there that she was being laid off due to a "lack of work," as part of a mini "right-sizing" going on. No one's fault. Just business. The people upstairs felt it "had to be done."

The last time someone was laid off from our department, it was almost a blessing. She really wanted to leave. This time, though...this time, the victim was a sweet, hard-working woman who really struggled to get and keep this job. I like to think I helped her get it, but ultimately I don't know how much influence I had.

One of the others who was fired is a newlywed. Wonderful in a completely different way from my immediate co-worker, sassier but always had a smile. She wished me a happy birthday while she was literally walking out the door. Damn near broke my heart.

In spite of this very depressing period, everyone who came by was supportive and polite, and we all used the celebration to try and lift our spirits. While the day was good for me personally, melancholy and happiness switched places all day.

So, what does this have to do with November 2, 2004? Simple: our votes matter. Our choices matter. Elections matter, both in abstract terms like "chilling effects" and in the so-called real world of life in the trenches of the daily grind.

I'm not going to say that this couldn't have happened in a Democratic administration. All economies ebb and flow, and this was just a particularly odd current. Beautiful waves on the surface with a nasty undertow. Still, it was far more likely under Bush. He promotes "personal responsibility" while cutting taxes like a madman and throwing billions into corporate welfare. Exactly what "personal responsibility" does one of the hardest working women I've ever known have when she's downsized -- f*ck it, let's be honest and call it being fired -- because the company wants to run as lean and mean as possible?

Sure, if we were in serious financial trouble, I can understand the need as a last resort, but I haven't seen any indications of trouble in a while. And if our government were operating by the ideals of the Democratic party, I wouldn't be worried about her being able to pay her bills. But in Bush's world, CEOs and stockholders get a bigger bonus and people who make their livings doing the grunt work get axed. Then those same bigwigs get a tax break while the poor have less and less to scrape by with. That's the way of the modern robber barons running our country.

This is not to say that all Republicans are like that. One of the co-workers who did the most for me today is a deeply religious person who will undoubtedly be voting Republican this year for all the reasons you'd expect (though maybe not for Bush; she's made the occasional noise indicating that she sees what an incompetent fool he is). While I mourn what happened to others, I take comfort in what was given to me today, not because of the physical gifts I received but in the much more ephemeral and precious gift of friendship. There was an empathy among us today that was powerless against the grey, clanking machine of business but not in the quiet hours we were given.

Nevertheless, there is a point here. The point is, one party wants to make sure these people won't die financial deaths of a thousand cuts because of one hardship, and the other wants to give massive tax cuts to billionaires. One party will use intelligence and discretion in waging war, and the other will use invasion and death as a political tool. One party wants to protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat, while the other wants to protect businesses from inconvenient regulations. One party wants to give our children a future, and one party wants to mortgage it. And one party works (imperfectly but consistently) to guarantee our Constitutional rights, while the other wants to use it to light the fire that burns our democracy to the ground.

In short, one party wants to help and lift up everyone, and one party wants to turn America into a theocratic plutocracy. Empathy and balance, however flawed, are pitted against power-hungry radical greed.

Now, I'm sure that some people will protest that there are more than two political parties in this country. That is true but irrelevant at this moment in history. Only the Big Two wield any real power in this country; members of the others are either busy trying to build the strength to play in the big leagues, or busy tearing their alliances apart in idiotic purity tests that would have given a Communist the willies. Anyone who can look at the enormous, substantive differences between the Democrats' positions and the Republicans' and say there is no difference between the two is simply beyond the reach of logic and sense. It is certainly excusable to disagree on whether or not that gap is wide enough to suit we progressives, but it is inexcusable to do Rove's work in spreading the obscene lie -- yes, lie -- that there is none.

We are facing a stark choice this year. We can choose to elect the current President for the first time, allowing him to do incalculable damage to the Republic. We can choose to elect a good man, a hero twice over in our worst war -- once as a soldier and once as an activist, fighting for his country both times -- who will be at least a good president, and maybe a great one.

Or we can choose to waste our opportunity by voting for ideological purity, or worse, not voting out of personal ideological purity.

Our choices matter, our votes matter, in the lives of real people struggling to survive, in the battles real people wage to preserve liberty and justice, in the quiet hours that define the pursuit of happiness. It is easy to turn one's nose up at a choice between the "lesser of two evils." It is much harder to admit that maybe, just maybe, we use the word "evil" too lightly, that personal purity is less important than doing what's right, that one choice isn't evil at all, merely distasteful to some.

I used to be a Green. I wanted to believe that we could make a difference, that we could break in without selling out. Well, maybe I'll rejoin the Greens again, but not today. Today, my color is blue. Blue for sadness, blue for working people, blue for my party. Blue for the "vigilance, perseverance, and justice" it represents in our flag. Blue for the only color that can return us to liberty and justice for all.

I've made my choice. Will you?

(/) Roland X
"The penalty good men pay for not being interested in politics is to be governed by men worse than themselves." --Plato

Big John's Grand Slam

Senator John F. Kerry had to make the speech of his life tonight. He was following Barack Obama, who became the party's rising superstar in one night. He was following Howard Dean, whose energy gave Kerry the party he needs to win this fight. He was following General Wesley Clark, Al Sharpton, and John Edwards, all of whom electrified the crowd. Senator Kerry didn't just have one hell of an act to follow -- he had several speeches of a lifetime to live up to, especially Obama's, which raised the bar for everyone.

He took a hard, inside fastball and knocked it out of the park. Hell, he shattered the Green Monster -- and sent that blast flying to New York, a gauntlet delivered. Somewhere, Cheney's robotic heart is beating just a bit faster. Somewhere, Rove's shrunken soul shivers, sending him into a cold sweat. And somewhere, George W. Bush sleeps blissfully, as usual unaware of what he's about to face -- a stirring voice ringing out from a united Democratic party. Who knows when his advisors will deign to tell him that this race is now Kerry's to lose?

What has me gushing so rapturously? The "stiff, wooden" Democratic nominee, the "Brahmin" chosen for his "gravitas," the "candidate that no one likes," rocked the house even more than the brilliant and eloquent Obama. There was a genuine and undeniable energy at the convention, all the more real for the script it exploded free of. Kerry's speech was pure genius, blending a powerful progressive message with eloquent centrist language. speaking from the heart while hitting all the highlights of his stump speech. Even the wonks got their time in an hour that he had to spend making himself likeable, when he told those looking for more in-depth policy info to go to johnkerry.com, and he managed to do it in a funny, clever way. The speech, however, was aimed at convincing the fence sitters -- progressives looking for someone to stand up for them, ambivalent voters who want someone "likeable," fence-sitters who want to know if he can really protect the country, or if he's "too liberal." Kerry's aim was dead-on.

Unapologetically, he picked up the populist theme and defended it in stirring patriotic terms. Unabashedly, he stole Obama's best line -- and improved it, calling for One America, "Red, White, and Blue!" Unreservedly, he took on the mantle of an American champion, assuring viewers that he would take concrete steps to defend the nation -- and explaining them. Unashamedly, he spoke of faith on his own terms, albeit with a little legendary help:

"I don't want to claim that God is on our side. As Abraham Lincoln told us, I want to pray humbly that we are on God's side."

And then -- I can't believe he had the guts to do this -- he threw a bone to Earth-based faiths with the "cathedrals of nature" line on trees and the environment. Sure, it's ecumenical, but I have to imagine that with the diverse bunch supporting the Real Deal, something filtered along.

Indeed, there was a great deal of "coded" appeal -- red meat for we partisans that wouldn't give the undecided centrists indigestion. His defense of all minorities and treating people with respect (translation: the FMA is evil). Tying "honor thy mother and father" to protecting Social Security (translation: Bush doesn't care about your parents). Insisting that families won't have to pay for servicemen's body armor when he is president (translation: the corrupt SOBs running this war are more interested in their profits than our soldiers). All of it sheer genius.

Not that his speech was without good, solid blows. "It's time for those who talk about family values to start valuing families" was one of the best lines of the convention. Perhaps his most effective tactic, however, was calling out the Repugs' politics of division. Senator Kerry reminded us of how united we were after 9/11 without coming across as exploitative, then showed how the Bush Gang cynically leveraged that good will and unity for their own foul purposes. His language was always carefully chosen not to go too far, striking the right tenor between condemning the sins while reaching out to the sinners -- and those who believed them.

In short, one beautiful, beautiful speech. Faced with his own legendary question -- "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" -- he came up with a brilliant answer. You don't. You ask men to help correct that mistake, to redeem it, to make right what others have made wrong.

I truly believe that we could have the first unquestionably great Democratic president since that other JFK. I can't do it justice in this short space. For the full text, read the BBC's coverage -- yep, the Beeb's already on the case. Read the acceptance speech of the 44th President of the United States.

(/) Roland
"Our world is unconquerable because the human spirit is unconquerable." --Al Gore

Destroying the Spineless Dems Meme

It's dead, Jim.

Pelosi stood her ground, telling reporters that "the emperor has no clothes." With the violence in Iraq threatening to overshadow all other issues in the coming election season, each party claimed to possess the moral high ground in setting the rules for debate.

"She apparently is so caught up in the partisan hatred for President Bush that her words are putting American lives at risk," said House Majority leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas. "This nation cannot afford the luxury of her dangerous rhetoric."

Countered one Democratic leader: "Frankly, that's McCarthyism."

...

"Understand that when our kids are in harm's way, we are united -- it is one team, one fight. But they cannot say that anybody who criticizes their failures to be not supportive of our troops. It is the very support of the troops that provokes the candor that we must have about what's happening with this war, the cost in lives ... the cost in dollars to the taxpayer, and the cost in reputation to our country."

Now, say what you want regarding the rightness or wrongness of Pelosi's full-court press.

But can we please stop pretending that the Democrats are still the party of Clinton-esque jellyfish?

I still believe very firmly that no goal is more important in November than President Kerry. Nevertheless, the best thing we could do for our country is back Kerry up with Speaker Pelosi. We have genuinely progressive, outspoken voices in the party, and Pelosi is their leader either in name (for those in the House) or by example (for the rest of us).

Democrats. They're not just for flip-floppers any more.

(/) Roland X
And FYI, Kerry is winning.

Yep, we're still here :-)

This is partly to let anyone who's still reading this know that we're still alive and well, and to test posting-by-email. If you're reading this, it worked :-).

Meanwhile, Roland has new stuff up at Democracy Means You, including his first satire article. I made my DMY debut as well, with an article on the issue of marriage.

That's it for now. Time will tell how often this blog sees further updates :-).

Update: Despite the fact that it says "posted by Roland," this post was by Morgan. I need to remember to log in under my own name when I'm going to post ;-).

Man Of Principle

Everything you need to know about John Kerry's relationship with lobbyists:

"There was a certain comfort level there" meeting with the Massachusetts crowd, Kip O'Neill said. Kerry was a hard lawmaker to persuade, lobbyists said, and therefore he was not as beseeched as much as other lawmakers. "If your interests coincided he'd be a great advocate," Kip O'Neill said. "But he wouldn't carry anybody's water because he knew them or had a meeting with them."

In other words, if you're on his side, he's on yours (that's called intelligence, for those of you who might be wondering). But he's not for sale and never has been.

John F. Kerry. The Real Deal.

(/) Roland X
Deal me in.

The Sting

We open to the music of "The Entertainer," by Scott Joplin.

Let's recap.

On Meet the Press, John Kerry promises to release all of his military records -- and that, in fact, they are all available through his office.

Soon after, a reporter has trouble getting said records through said office.

The blogosphere goes bananas. Radicon pundits crow about the terrible things that "must" be in his record, and defy liberal blogs to complain the way they did about Dubya's non-service. Leftie blogs, while not pleased, wonder why Kerry is doing this. There are a few hopeful mutterings about the canny Kerry campaign, but mostly "nah, they couldn't be this clever."

Just as the press starts to pay serious attention to the story, Kerry's campaign staff releases the whole shebang. Results: everyone who's paying attention knows that Kerry received glowing reviews, and was reminded of his three Purple Hearts and his Silver and Bronze Stars. The best conservatives can manage in response is "that first Purple Heart looks kinda iffy."

Gee, maybe they are that clever. Heh.

Thanks, radicons! We couldn't have done better ourselves! *VBG*

Fade out to same music.

(/) Roland X
The greedy are the easiest to con out of their money. I wonder if there's a political corollary for wingnuts...

The Bush revenge brigade hits the SCLM

While we found a better permalink to this article on the Guardian, a UK paper, it showed up on our Excite feed. In Newsview: Cross Bush, Face Payback:

But Bush and his chief political adviser, Karl Rove, are essentially following the same game plan that the late Lee Atwater - an early political mentor of Rove's - used to get the first President Bush elected in 1988: define and undercut an opponent early with a fusillade of negative attacks.

"This team is tough. You cross them and they go after you and raise questions about you and your credibility rather than what you have to say," said Thomas Mann, a scholar with the Brookings Institution.

It's a really excellent article from a long time AP writer, who not only sums up their tactics, but provides a nice, fairly complete list of those brave souls who have come out against Dear Leader's miserable failures. All, naturally, have gotten the slime treatment.

These guys really don't have any shame. It's nice to see Powell backing up Clarke (as covered in other diaries). Let us hope that this marks the beginning of the end for ShrubCo. Just tell the truth and they think it's hell...
--
(/) Roland X
aka Captain ABBA

Exhibit A

Quick note: this blog will now be a mirror for my diary at Daily Kos. While I am grateful to my readership sticking with my sporadic posting, you're a pretty small group, and the goal of the Justice Log is to make a difference. On to the post...

The difference between Bush and Kerry in a nutshell.

QUINCY, Ill. (AP) - In the city that saw a historic 19th century debate, John Kerry called for monthly debates with President Bush to elevate the tenor of a campaign that's opened with a relentlessly negative tone.

"Surely, if the attack ads can start now, at least we can agree to start a real discussion about America's future," said Kerry, speaking Saturday to about 500 people packed into a school gymnasium.

"America shouldn't have to put up with eight months of sniping," said Kerry. "We need to get off that detour and back into the true path of democracy."

...

"Today campaigns too often generate more heat than light, firing up partisans while leaving increasing numbers out in the cold," said Kerry. "Everyone in politics shares the blame, but I have come here today because I believe this campaign should be different."

...

"After calling Republicans crooks and liars, running 17 negative ads over 15,000 times and spending $6.3 million attacking the president, John Kerry is calling for a civil debate on the issues," said Schmidt. "John Kerry should finish the debate with himself."

Emphasis mine.

Now let's see. One of these campaigns has admitted that both sides engage in negative advertising. One campaign has attempted to change the tone. One campaign has made an effort to engage the country in real issues. One campaign was represented by its candidate.

The other campaign enumerated its opponent's negativity without even referring to its own vast slate of attacks. The other refused to even consider debate. The other campaign desperately wants to avoid issues and record because it can run on neither. The other was represented by a flunky -- not its candidate, not its chairman, not its brain, not even one of its better-known representatives.

I recognize that, to a certain point, reality is subjective. But understanding that subjectivity requires also accepting that others' realities continue to affect them no matter what one's own personal beliefs are. Facts, regardless of these subjective beliefs, remain stubborn things, and form the basis of what we call "truth."

One campaign cares about truth and reason. One cares about dogma and power. I leave it to the reader to determine which is which.

(/) Roland X
Captain ABBA

Campaign Jiujitsu

It seems that some Freepers have been complaining that Dubya's AWOL problems are getting all the press, while charges that Kerry had an affair are not being investigated equally. (Strangely, some of them are levelling such charges on Calpundit, who -- to the best of my knowledge -- never claimed to be a non-partisan observer.)

Well, if they want to go into the "inconsistencies" of the right-wing slime attack, I say -- bring it on!

In a separate statement in the US, her parents, Terry and Donna Polier, dismissed the "completely false and unsubstantiated" allegations about their daughter.

The statement did not address purported quotes by Ms Polier's parents in the British tabloid The Sun that were harshly critical of Senator Kerry. But in a later statement, Terry Polier said he was misquoted by the newspaper and that his wife never talked to the reporter.

So much for the "sleazeball" quote.

Please, Freepers, do keep this story going. All of us on the left are truly eager to follow it to its actual source. Thanks muchly.

Kudos to Counterspin for keeping a spotlight on the story behind the non-story.

(/) Roland X
Look! Out in the blogosphere! It's a pundit! It's a columnist! It's...
CAPTAIN ABBA!

Intelligence Inquiry Explodes

Bush is now officially in for a world of hurt:

WASHINGTON - In a blow to the Bush administration, the Senate Intelligence Committee said Thursday that it planned to investigate whether White House officials exaggerated the Iraq threat or pressured analysts to tailor their assessments of Baghdad's weapons programs to bolster the case for war.

The move puts claims made by President Bush and other senior officials in his administration squarely in the sights of the committee's investigation, and could add to the White House's political troubles as it tries to keep questions about the war from becoming a drag on Bush's reelection campaign.

Bombshell. There is simply no other word.

But Dean screamed, and Drudge said Kerry had an affair, and Gillespie went crying to mommy that the Democrats are being mean...

Oh yeah, and Edwards is a lawyer. Gasp.

This is more than blood in the water. The Rove/Cheney administration is being dismembered.

Expect indictments by the Plame grand jury soon. Is Dick Cheney Dubya's Spiro? Only time will tell. *EG*

(/) Roland X
Ah, it's good to have a press that does its job...

Drubbed Drudge

Conason annihilates Drudge sludge peddling (note: Salon articles require either subscription or ad view for day pass):

"The comments attributed to me [Craig Crawford -- R.X.] are from a private email to television news associates based on conversations with Democratic campaign operatives. I did not consider any of it confirmed enough to report or publish. I can only verify that Chris Lehane's rivals in other Democratic campaigns made these claims and I have found no independent source to confirm it. Which is why we did not go with the story. But then someone sent my email to others, which is the only reason it got into the public domain." In other words, there is no proof that Lehane circulated the rumor, let alone that the rumor has any basis in reality.

...

Journalists must ask themselves why the rumor of a private peccadillo deserves their attention and resources in the 2004 campaign. The press faces a more important issue: learning from its own failure to report the false rationale and abused intelligence that drove the nation to war.

Poor Sludge. I mean Drudge. Peddling sleaze used to be so much easier. A pity for him the left woke up.

Now, about those National Guard documents...

(/) Roland X
Back to the real scandals, 'kay?

More defending Kerry

Via Counterspin, this is the sort of activity the right-wing is trying to smear Senator kerry for:

I would like to talk on behalf of all those veterans and say that several months ago in Detroit we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged, and many very highly decorated, veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia. These were not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command. It is impossible to describe to you exactly what did happen in Detroit - the emotions in the room and the feelings of the men who were reliving their experiences in Vietnam. They relived the absolute horror of what this country, in a sense, made them do.

They told stories that at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Ghengis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.

We call this investigation the Winter Soldier Investigation. The term Winter Soldier is a play on words of Thomas Paine's in 1776 when he spoke of the Sunshine Patriots and summertime soldiers who deserted at Valley Forge because the going was rough.

We who have come here to Washington have come here because we feel we have to be winter soldiers now. We could come back to this country, we could be quiet, we could hold our silence, we could not tell what went on in Vietnam, but we feel because of what threatens this country, not the reds, but the crimes which we are committing that threaten it, that we have to speak out.

...

We found also that all too often American men were dying in those rice paddies for want of support from their allies. We saw first hand how monies from American taxes were used for a corrupt dictatorial regime. We saw that many people in this country had a one-sided idea of who was kept free by the flag, and blacks provided the highest percentage of casualties. We saw Vietnam ravaged equally by American bombs and search and destroy missions, as well as by Viet Cong terrorism - and yet we listened while this country tried to blame all of the havoc on the Viet Cong.

...

Now we are told that the men who fought there must watch quietly while American lives are lost so that we can exercise the incredible arrogance of Vietnamizing the Vietnamese.

Each day to facilitate the process by which the United States washes her hands of Vietnam someone has to give up his life so that the United States doesn't have to admit something that the entire world already knows, so that we can't say that we have made a mistake. Someone has to die so that President Nixon won't be, and these are his words, "the first President to lose a war."

We are asking Americans to think about that because how do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?

This is what the right-wing slime machine is calling an "attack" on his fellow veterans -- forces he was trying to save from a horrific meat grinder he knew all too well (three Purple Hearts). Senator Kerry's courageous stand is being spun into deluded undermining of freedom in Vietnam, as if South Vietnam hadn't been ruled by one of our pet dictators. This is the man who they're trying to accuse of being a flip-flopping coward -- a man who faced not only bullets and shrapnel but the full might of the Nixon political machine. He fought for what he believed in.

You know what? He's still at it. If the Republicans try to make an issue out of his anti-war activism, my hope is for a simple answer: "Bring it on!"

(/) Roland X
Though we do still have this primary thing to run...go Dean go!

Defending Kerry

Hopefully, this will help persuade my fellow Deanies to stop throwing fits about Kerry. I'd rather spend my time promoting Dr. Dean than defending Senator Kerry's reputation.

Nevertheless, as long as our front-runner is being attacked by our own -- and let's be honest, he is under attack -- I am going to defend him. Let's start with the basics: Kerry is a moderate liberal (yes, Virginia, there is such a thing) with a firm grounding in social justice and the importance of civil rights, as well as a stellar record on abortion, the environment, and education.

Unlike Bush, he's actually capable of admitting his mistakes:

Kerry has walked away from some of his 1984 campaign proposals to cancel weapons systems that have become central to the U.S. military arsenal unleashed on Afghanistan and Iraq while defending his overall record as a senator. Kerry told the Boston Globe earlier this year some of the proposed cancellations were "ill-advised" and "stupid," blaming his inexperience as a candidate and a campaign that drove him to the left politically.

Will the GOP try to use these votes against him in the general campaign? Obviously. Should we let them? You tell me.

Yes, he voted to give Bush his authority in the Iraq war. Yes, he shouldn't have done it. But do you really think that a President Kerry would do anything so dangerous, stupid, and immoral? Do you truthfully suspect that our freedoms, our environment, our justice system, and our alliances will be in nearly as much danger with President Kerry as they are now? Do you really believe that gigantic companies will be able to rape our land, endanger our armed forces, and run roughshod over our lives the way they do under this administration? Are you convinced that it's even plausible that a Kerry administration would appoint wild extremists like John Ashcroft, Donald Rumsfeld, Daniel Pipes, David Hager, or pretty much anyone Bush would send to the Supreme Court given half a chance?

If so, then I guess you're not going to be voting for Senator Kerry no matter what I write. Personally, I'm with Dean for as long as he's in this thing. I hope he wins Wisconsin, and if he does, I truly believe that he can turn this thing around on Super Tuesday. But he's said that if he doesn't win Wisconsin, he's withdrawing from the race. If he drops out, I'll have to take a long second look at all the candidates, and from what I've seen of him, Kerry just might get my vote.

(/) Roland X
ABBA, dammit!

Word of the Day

Demonstrably. Adverb. That which is capable of being demonstrated and/or proven.

Someone get RNC chair Gillespie a dictionary:

"This is a demonstrably false and malicious charge that would be slanderous under any ordinary circumstance."

For the record, Mr. Gillespie, you could clear this up in about five minutes by, you know, demonstrating that it's false, which you just said you could. [Edit: In case you missed it, the "malicious charge" refers to Bush's missing service time in the Air National Guard. During Vietnam. While Senator Kerry and General Clark were getting shot at -- and in Clark's case, actually getting shot.]

If he can't find attendance records, here are some other resources he can use to demonstrate how false this charge is.

Unless this isn't an ordinary circumstance because it's, you know, the truth. We certainly all understand how that would be considered extraordinary by someone with a position of authority in the Republican party.

Don't we?

(/) Roland X
Helping Republicans with their English lessons since 2003

Pass it on

Kos posts the following message:

Message to Blog Community from DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe

As we get closer to the day that our Democratic nominee for President emerges from the primaries, I wanted to give you an update of what we've been building, doing and creating at the DNC to help defeat the Republicans on November 2 and win back the White House for ordinary working families.

Since the day I became Chairman in February 2001, the Democratic National Committee has been preparing for the moment that our nominee emerges.. Our No. 1 job at the DNC is to ensure that our candidate has the support he needs as he comes out of the primary battle.

A lot of what we do to accomplish that goal occurs below the media radar. These activities don't make for a compelling news story, but they are absolutely vital to our success. Here are just a few examples of what we've built to prepare for our nominee:

• A Presidential Fund which will have raised $15.3 million in 441(a)d funds, which will be available to our nominee immediately. This is the earliest these funds have ever been available to the nominee.


• A 2 million-strong list of email activists and donors -- up from just 70,000 names in 2000. (And if you aren't receiving our action alerts, campaign updates, and Democratic news emails, click here to sign up.)


• A voter file containing 166 million voters -- Democrat, Republican, and Independent. Attached to the national voter file are powerful analytical tools that are helping us find new voters more cost-effectively than ever before. The voter file is also key to our mobilization, organization, communication and fundraising operations.


• A media and research operation focusing on targeted 2004 battleground states, organizing news conferences and building media operations in state parties.


• A radio operation that aggressively books Democratic surrogates (including me) on both talk radio and news stations nationwide, with an emphasis on targeted states.


• A detailed review and analysis of Bush's policies and record.


• Daily tracking operation that keeps comprehensive records of where he travels and everything he has said publicly, as well as the activities of the RNC and Bush campaign staff.

But the DNC is just part of the picture. Your grassroots activism will be the key to our victory in 2004. And the leadership of Kos and others like yourselves in the blogosphere has truly transformed our Party. I thank you all for helping make our Party better, stronger and more responsive to grassroots America.

The political machine may have some broken springs and loose gears, but they're the only one we've got -- unless, that is, you want to see four more years of Dubya. And they've gotten a lot better over the last several months (thanks to a house call from a doctor who shall remain nameless).

ABBA in '04. (Note: Shameless plug added by Mrs. Roland X. *g*)

(/) Roland X
Super Tuesday coverage to come

A Whitewash That Won't Wash?

Well, Lord Hutton has issued his report -- full excoriation of the BBC, and full exoneration of 10 Downing Street. Blair and the warfloggers are ecstatic, and the right is attacking the BBC all-out. The rank and file of Aunt Beeb, however, are up in arms, and a full half of the British people aren't buying it:

A poll found yesterday that a majority of people thought Lord Hutton's report was wrong to lay all the blame at the BBC's door. The poll, by NOP, showed 56 per cent thought the peer was wrong to blame only the BBC; 49 per cent said the report was a whitewash, with 40 per cent disagreeing.

A whitewash. Not just unfair, or imbalanced, or biased. A whitewash.

It's important to remember that we're talking about Britain here, not America, where our use of both language and rhetoric are more free-wheeling. This is nothing less than a stunning rebuke of both Hutton's inquiry and Blair's presumptuous crowing. And the fisking of the Hutton report has already begun (the irony of the term's origins -- right-wing bloggers dissecting British reporter Robert Fisk's articles -- are particularly epic in this case). While the Blair administration and BBC try to put an end to the mess, battle lines are already being drawn, and not just on line. News organizations around the world are rallying around vulnerable Aunt Beeb, while Alastair Campbell and News Corp. (owner of Fox and Sky News) go for the jugular.

The row over Dr. Kelly, Hutton, and the BBC isn't over. Not by a long shot. In fact, I'd argue that thanks to Lord Hutton's one-sided report, the battle has just begun.

(/) Roland X
Save Aunt Beeb!

You Never Can Tell

Whoa. First Iowa, and now this.

And I've gotta be honest. I'd mentally put Kerry in the coffin with Lieberman, who will (mercifully) soon lag with the other fringe candidates. How wrong I was. (Although I have to say that perhaps the best thing to come out of Iowa and New Hampshire is that maybe, finally, the Freepers will stop ranting about how Hillary is really honest-and-for-true going to run this year.)

Don't count anyone (other than Lieberman) out yet, though, Dean least of all. First of all, the Doctor's managed a neat bit of political jiujitsu with that "Dean scream" nonsense, and managed a solid second place showing. Remember, General Clark looked like he might nab that spot out from under Dean for a while there. Second, he's still got the money, the organization, and the support. This race is by no means over.

Clark and Edwards, meanwhile, both survive with their effective tie for third. Edwards may have to win South Carolina, but he just might manage it. Clark, for his part, can survive just by doing well through February, and has enough of the Dean equation -- money, organization, support -- to last through Super Tuesday.

In fact, this might prove to be one of the most exciting primaries in recent memory, resulting in the first brokered convention in decades. This could hurt the Democrats if they revert to mudslinging, but if the campaign stays relatively clean, there's nothing like a nice long primary to get that free press (as many bloggers more observant than myself have observed 8^).

Still, whatever anyone -- including Kerry, apparently -- may say, there's no question that we have a new front-runner. Against all odds, his initials are JFK. Personally, I think Edwards has more legitimate Kennedy-in-1960 mojo than Kerry does. Nevertheless, I have to say that Kerry has done what is almost certainly the most important thing a Democratic candidate can do right now: prove that he's up to the challenge of beating George Dubya Bush. He's the first named Democrat (as opposed to Bush vs. The Unknown Dem) to win outright in a "if you voted today" poll. (Ignore the article's gratuitous Dean-bashing.)

Overall, 52 percent of those polled by NEWSWEEK say they would not like to see Bush serve a second term, compared to 44 percent who want to see him win again in November. As a result, Kerry is enjoying a marginal advantage over Bush, a first for the poll. Forty-nine percent of registered voters chose Kerry, compared to 46 percent who re-elected Bush.

No matter how you slice it, that's some pretty potent mojo. And since the talking heads do have some influence left, expect them to begin blathering about how Kerry has been anointed, with the smarmy implication that they are doing the anointing. Which, for some strange reason, will probably help Kerry.

They can be safely ignored. While Kerry would unquestionably make for a tremendous improvement over the Resident, so would any of the others (even Kucinich and Lieberman). Most of Kerry's momentum comes from his ability to convince voters that he's the man to beat Bush in November. Dean, you're my guy, but here's a hint: the movement is important, but Beating Bush Comes First!!! Telling people that they can choose anyone to change presidents isn't going to get you the nomination. Once the Republicans are run by sane people instead of the Legion of Doom, then we can talk about Democrats running on changing America. Right now, changing presidents will demonstrably change America, and only the farthest fringes of the Green party (and Ralph Nader) say otherwise.

(/) Roland X
Go, ABBA, go!