Happy New Year

Fred and Ginger. Who else?

A Year in the Tenth--3d Quarter

By October, Mark Kirk was again championing rights, but not for Americans. He refused to support our soldiers under attack by the right wing fringe and ignored the increasing problem with affordable housing that would soon turn into a general housing crisis for both rich and poor. On the Democratic side, Jay Footlik, bereft of local support, hired some goof who tried to pass off Footlik petitions as Seals petitions to the North Shore Women for Peace. Jay remains unapologetic to this day. Bush decides to sell arms to Saudi Arabia and Kirk decides its ok, but covers his own interest with a letter. Kirk is protested in Waukegan for his immigrant hatred campaign. republicans weather a storm for their lack of support for children's health care. Aaron Freeman helps us laugh it off for at least a short while. Kirk finally meets constituents in a real townhall meeting, tries to fill the agenda with bugs and a Bangladeshi journalist who probably has no idea that Kirk stands for everything he fights against, but is eventually forced to tell us that he in fact will require us to give up our constitutional rights for the sake of fear under threat of another 9/11 against the Sears Tower. Whatever happened to "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself?" During the meeting, Kirk has a racist outburst accusing his constituents of being from Chicago, and hence not having Winnetka manners reminding me of why New Trier High was split into East and West in the late 1960s (scroll down to comment August 31, 2007 at 12:59 am). Kirk finished out October perpetuating lies to keep us in Iraq.

November was our 18th mildest since 1870, and Bush administration backed General Musharraf of Pakistan decided his re-election was the most important national security issue in that country, so he gutted their constitution as guys like Bush and Kirk watched. The AG scandal widened to blend with the torture and illegal spying scandals and Bush administration officials jumped like rats from the sinking ship. Kirk had nothing much to say about any of it, but did find the time to lie about import statistics. By Veterans' Day, it started to look like there was a real purpose for Kirk's anti-veteran health care votes, forced privatization and American teens were being told that they don't need to go to college after all because their education represents pork, while Kirk votes against a tax break for their parents and against mortgage reform. Kirk was worried about earmarks, but not his own. I asked Kirk to stand for something other than his own re-election, but he decided to stick with John McCain in his disgusting comment equating the American peace movement with Hitler.

Along with December came the news that although guys like Mark Kirk scare people with 9/11--Sears Tower to get them to give up their constitutional rights, Bush is not worried and cut security funding. Then we learned that Iran didn't have an active WMD program after all. It was suspended in 2003. Nonetheless, Kirk and his followers remain itching for an Iran War. I wonder if any of them will volunteer to go. Free speech no longer has much to do with political discussion, but it does protect companies trying to sell you salty chickens as natural. republican candidates work in overdrive to establish religion in our country and sadly a local Democrat follows suit leading one of my commenters to say "Lucky us Jesus (Huckabee) for president and Moses (Footlik) for congress. Didn't the bible warn against false prophets?" Two of my friends got caught up in the national health care mess and now, I'm sad to report, it's now three friends. The economy went to heck in a handbasket, but not to worry as the Iraq War is just a big jobs program. Kirk defended obstruction of justice in the destruction of the CIA torture tapes and my post on the subject went semi-viral nationally getting about 500 hits. Turns out Obama was the only one with the pulse of Pakistan and Mark Kirk decided to use Bhutto's death as an opportunity to get press.

2007 wasn't so hot for this country. We are stuck in an economic crisis caused by greedy lenders and greedier politicians that is likely to push down our property values significantly over the next 2 years (and you Kirk folks thought it was the immigrants) and bring down the rest of the economy. Our rights in our rights are tenuous and we are at risk of being forced to observe religions in which we do not believe. I sure hope 2008 is better. To get there, Americans have to start paying attention and doing something about the perverse actions of their failed leaders.

Strolling Down 2007 Memory Lane With Mark Kirk, July to December

Continuing with the retrospective:

In July, most of the country was going to see Michael Moore's documentary on the state of health care in the US, SiCko (see here and here too) and finding out that their employers were going to be moving them into high deductible plans. A huge crowd marched with Dan Seals on July 4th and Mark Kirk was confronted with a new sign of the times. The Iraq Campaign had come to town. Kirk makes a decision about just how he'll respond--by running away. Bob Emerson told us the story of what really went on at Kirk's church in Kenilworth earlier in the year. It turns out Kirk was not so very connected to the intelligence when he reported that the CIA had misrepresented Iraq's nuclear intentions to Bush. Kirk's spokesman Eric Elk handles the poor folks on food stamps by telling them that their food is an earmark, like the infamous bridge to nowhere. Kirk entered mid-July by voting for the Iraq war again and Jay Footlik showed up on the scene and immediately gets himself in hot water with a Herald reporter. Democat turned 15 on July 15! The folks in Kirks office hide from an invitation while their leader gets a security detail to protect himself from district puppies. Kirk rounds out July pretending to care about unsafe imports and finally, I'm joined by The Lake County News-Sun which asks the question I've been asking for years: Why is Mark Kirk so chatty on local issues, but mum on the major national issue of the day? The Tribune follows suit.

The dog days of summer (sorry Democat), brought us YearlKos and Kirk supporters try to make attendance another battle in the war on Christmas (see here too). Dan's named a future leader and Kirk made his August debut by voting against health care for kids. Obama seems to be the only one with his eye on Pakistan and gets criticized for his forward thinking. Kirk's worried about the lake, but not enough to care about renewable energy. Kirk's worried about rights in Thailand, but not here as Congress works to amend FISA to allow unconstitutional spying. We figured out who calls the shots in Mark's office, learned about white house officials making partisan meetings on Kirk's behalf on the taxpayers' dollar, and saw some of Kirk's more extreme supporters. Oy it's only August and the robocalls have begun. My mom had surgery. The hospital was grossly understaffed, but she did great despite the problems and is walking well now. Oy, it's only August and Kirk's racism campaign has already begun. He was invited to talk to almost 1000 district folks about Iraq, but decides not to show up and we have the event without him. (See here too.) All discussion about important isses stops when republicans drag us into the bathroom.

September starts right off with Mark Kirk lying about the Iraq War Townhall to make up for his nonsensical snub of the event. It must have been the huge crowd of attendees that got to him. Kirk decides to make some cosmetic hay over Chinese imports while Dick Durbin does the heavy lifting and lies about his environmental record. He would of made us laugh, if it wasn't so sad. Mark Kirk claims to care about labor issues...in Iran. A cartoon cat knows more about the Iraq war than our congressman. Kirk has a new idea for Iraq...well...er...not new...and not his idea, but he's hoping no one is paying too much attention. We could have redeployed to Afghanistan, but no, we need to delay moving out of Iraq so the Bush administration can regroup and make up a new story. (See here and here too.) Kirk's not too interested in wounded soldiers and ill veterans, but Tammy Duckworth is. Kirk makes more extremist friends. Kirk and friends decide that your kid's life is a small price to pay for their oil war. It's my party and I got a chocolate cake!

More later.....

Mark Kirk's Year in Review

2007 was Mark Kirk's first minority year in Congress. Let's take a look at how he managed:

Kirk started 2007 in his usual role as chief apologist and water carrier for Bush Administration wars when in January he began the sale of the Iran War. Kirk wanted to keep funding the Iraq war, but still didn't want to discuss it with his constituents, so I suggested maybe he should take up Chuck Hagel's suggestion that "If you wanted a safe job, go sell shoes."

In February, Kirk spoke on his home turf in Kenilworth and discussed Iraq in a limited way taking pre-approved questions from friends. He explained why he was against the surge, but forgot to mention why he voted to fund it or why he really has no opinion of his own on the war. He did ask us our opinion on the surge, but alas well after the vote. He was still repeating the whole bringing democracy to Iraq, but not really argument, blah blah blah and trashed Barack Obama to delight his minions with a racist moment, but failed to mention that Obama was actually right on the Iraq war from the beginning. No was challenged him during the meeting, but we found out later in the year what went on behind the scenes. My favorite Kirk moment in February was when he lifted an old English story to make a point about U.S. military logistics.

March brought a whole lot of silence from Mark Kirk on the mistreatment of wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Hospital. Lucky for Illinois soldiers and veterans that Dick Dubin put Tammy Duckworth on the job. We found out that Kirk doesn't like his vegetables and he was named on a national blog for always voting for the war and against the soldiers and then he proved their point voting againt H R 1591. But don't blame him for Iraq, he was only following the crowd. Kirk soon learned that having no opinion doesn't help his political career anyway.

In April, it became clear that Mark Kirk's U.S. China working groups biggest failure was to allow China to export dangerous products to our pets and children. Kirk went on to ignore the issues surrounding cheap products from China and gave a distorted history lesson claiming George Washington believed he was a general-king arguing for power over Congress. Away from the spotlight, Kirk was working to weaken the law meant to protect investors after the Enron scandal. Luckily, the bill never went the way of most of Kirk's sponsored legislation because it would have loosened requirements that companies and their auditors assess company practices and systems for keeping records and preventing abuse or fraud. Kirk held a meeting with to bash Democrats under the guise of helping them people with their taxes but more people were educated when my Mom explained how Kirk's favorite, Medicare D, really works and a man in Deerfield asked why he couldn't get dental surgery.

April showers brought May flowers and another blank check for Bush on the war and Mark Kirk was right there to vote for it. Then, the poll numbers showed that the American people were fed up with the Iraq war, so Kirk went running to Rove and Bush to ask them to make the war more party friendly. No problem with the actual war, just a problem how it was making him look here at home, as just days thereafter Kirk voted against redeployment out of Iraq and to Afghanistan where we hear the real terrorists live. I picked up and went to Italy.

In June, we saw that all year Kirk's voting was all over the place so he could pander to this group and that. We learned more about Bush's illegal spying program and a court said we still had some shred of rights left. Gaza was taken over by Hamas despite all of Kirk's great protection for Israel. Bloggers from Kirk's own party went after him, not to mention librarians sick of his attacks on them and ignoring real child safety issues. Kirk outdid himself when he determined to solve the immigration problem by distributing free condoms in Mexico, a stunning combination of racism and ignorance of which even I did not think he was capable. I ended the month with an analysis of Kirk's votes against veterans.

More later....

Mark Kirk Grandstands Over Dead Bhutto, Knew About Problems in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Remained Steadfast on the Iraq War and Has Eye on Iran

It's looking like there's a cover up in the assassanation of Benazir Bhutto. The crime scene was hosed down with a high-pressure hose within an hour of the murder and there was no autopsy although Pakistani law requires one. Despite the latest story that she died when she fell and hit her head, witnesses are saying that they heard three to five shots fired, and that Bhutto was hit in the neck and slumped back into the vehicle. Witnesses have also reported that government security agents assigned to protect Bhutto had abandoned their post just before the attack.

Bhutto's own people are saying that she was shot twice, once in the head and another time in the abdomen.

The resulting riots are likely to delay the election. However, this might be the end of Musharraf's reign anyway. He now has riots to contend with and his illegal politically motivated "emergency" last month probably makes it much harder for him to do anything about the riots. However, some are saying Musharraf played the US perfectly since now he's the only one left to rule Pakistan.

Lot's of people are getting hurt in Pakistan and the government is in disarray no matter whose story you believe, so what does our congressman Mark Kirk do? Grandstand. He's using it for election fodder having his press folks get him in the paper and on the radio claiming to have known Bhutto since the 1980s. Of course, I don't know, but I do find that hard to believe given his bio and the dates. I have a feeling he wasn't on her Ramadan card list. Maybe it would be safer to say he met her or saw her from a distance once or twice.

In his Bhutto press junket, Kirk didn't say too much about his contribution to our abandonment of the problems in Pakistan and Afghanistan. He did discuss it in at some length in testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committeeon back in February. Interestingly, in that testimony, Kirk quoted U.S. officials in commending Musharraf as "fully committed to combating regional terrorism." However, he also painted a disturbing picture of not only drugs, but increased support for the Taliban and terrorist activity.

So, Kirk knew the situation had deteriorated in Afghanistan and Pakistan in February 2007, but voted against redeployment from Iraq to Afghanistan back in May 2007, and never mentioned what he knew about the problems in the region to consitutents who beseached him this past summer to vote us out of Iraq, keep us out of Iran and finish the job in Afghanistan. I would guess that he didn't seek much press on his February testimony or support redeployment because it probably would not have well with his supporters who, as you can see from the comments on this blog, love the Iraq war and are itching for war with Iran. They fight to keep Kirk in office because he has always voted in favor of staying in and funding the war in Iraq and has been carrying water in the effort to sanction Iran and bring us to war with them as he carried water to get us into Iraq in the first place.

I think constituents need to ask Kirk why, if he knew how bad it was in Afghanistan and Pakistan, has he never supported redeployment from Iraq to the area that needed our attention more.

Manipulations and Maneuvers

I think Benazir Bhutto's assassination is one more example of the major problem with US foreign policy. Rather than working to heal the hundreds of years of imperialism that we did not start, but refused to end as our power grew, we work to out manipulate and out maneuver world events with a trail of wars, proxy wars, arms sales, dictators and clandestine operations. Failure after failure after failure after failure and our leaders still hold out the notion to us that we can treat the world as our play toy and oil field and all will be well if we back just the right dictator or repressive regime, arm enemies in just the right balance and maybe with a few verbal assurances, we are in control.

In our manipulations and maneuverings, we are at war with Iraq and many feel we will be at war with Iran by spring despite the NIE report indicating a suspension of Iran's nuclear program. We have abandoned Afghanistan and Pakistan to bin Laden and reduced Middle East peace to an afterthought and photo session, and the small glimmer of hope died quickly.

Any candidate who wants to pursue the same course, touting his or her great DC experience in foreign policy, should be looked upon with the same suspicion that all manipulations and maneuverings should attract.

It is what it is in Pakistan.

What do you expect when martial law is declared and the constitution is suspended to protect the country from extremists, but the only one's arrested are the lawyers and civil libertarians?

Meaning, while the Taliban and al-Qaeda are a threat to him (they have, after all, openly made numerous attempts at assassination), they do not as yet have the ability to inspire over 100,000-strong street protests across Pakistani cities beyond the Wild West tribal regions they control. This – from the more civilized and largely Anglicized liberal areas of Pakistan - is a greater immediate threat to his rule.

Police confronted and reportedly beat with batons some who were part of what was said to be thousands of protesters led by lawyers on the streets in Lahore, home of the Supreme Court. Police also confronted and beat back protesters in other cities. But the protests are not yet epic in size. That's still to come. And it's the police forces, the most loyal to Musharraf, and not the Army. That is also coming....

Long story short, had Musharraf made even a modest attempt at packaging the State of Emergency as necessary for confronting the threat of extremist Taliban and al-Qaeda elements inside Pakistan's own borders, he could have at least a moral leg to stand on. But he hasn't even made an attempt to veil the declaration as such. This means he alienates the Pakistani public and Washington, which would be willing to stomach much in exchange for a Taliban-al-Qaeda alliance put on the defensive and into survival mode.

No constitutional protections and no security. All you Mark Kirk fans who cheer his 9/11 -- Sears Tower -- forget the 4th Amendment rhetoric... take note. There is no security without representation for and rights in the people.

Fortunate Son

Creedence Clearwater Revival

Forever young

The Bob Dylan version.

Simple Song of Freedom

One of my Mom's favorites: Bobby Darin.

Chimes of Freedom

One of Democat's favorites: The Byrds

Is it Safe to rely on SAFE for our energy issues?

There has been some discussion on this blog about SAFE, Securing America's Future Energy, as membership therein comprises Jay Footlik's energy and envirnomental policy, so I thought I 'd do a bit of research about the organization and report back.

SAFE should be distinguished from the 2001 Bush Energy Bill called Securing America's Future Energy Act of 2001, although I wonder why they'd choose as the name of their organization an energy policy touted by the Bush White House, incorporating many of the goals of the now infamous National Energy Policy Development Group under Vice President Richard Cheney, lifting the oil drilling ban on an ecologically vital section of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), and even unacceptable to long time Bush and Cheney supporter, Mark Kirk.

SAFE's self-description is a:

nonpartisan, not-for-profit organization committed to reducing America's dependence on oil and improving U.S. energy security in order to bolster our national security and strengthen the economy.

SAFE was created and is led by Robbie Diamond. It ties national security and oil dependence and is famous for two intitiatives, its Oil ShockWave simulation and its Energy Security Leadership Council. The Energy Security Leadership Council is made up of corporate and military leaders including Co-Chairmen Frederick W. Smith, Chairman, President, and CEO of FedEx Corporation, and General P.X. Kelley (Ret.), former Marine Corps Commandant and member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The names and backgrounds of other members can be viewed here.

Here is some information on their lobbying firms and here is some information about its expenditures from the OpenSecrets lobbying database. This relationship map shows the various relationships between SAFE members and other organizations. Note Mr. Smith's relationship to the 2004 Bush campaign and the 2008 McCain campaign.

The Leadership Council issued a report in December 2006 that can be found here. A summary of its basic recommendations are:

1. Reduce oil consumption with different (SAFE recommends an attribute-based system that takes into account differences in vehicles, larger vehicles given a less stringent standard), but gradually more stringent CAFE standards (a goal of 4% for annual increases in fuel efficiency) encourged using corporate tax incentives.

2. Provide alternative with tax credits for ethanol fuel pumps and Flexible Fuel Vehicles (FFVs) and several federal assistance vehicles to encourage more biorefineries.

3. Expand supply by increasing access to OCS oil and natural gas reserves.

4. Manage risks including more global defense of oil fields, security arrangements, diplomatic support, counter-terrorism training, make producing countries more attractive for investment.

Corollary Recommendations include:

Increase access to Alaskan reserves with appropriate third-party monitoring, increased surety bond requirements, clear penalties for environmental damages to avoid protracted litigation, and stronger administration of the current leasing program. (page 11 of the report, 13 of the .pdf)

A discussion of ANWR drilling is on page 50 of the Report, page 52 of the .pdf. Here is a bit of the discussion:

Political symbolism and the ideological battle surrounding the issue of ANWR have unfortunately blocked the advancement of a sound national production policy that could reduce our oil dependence and improve our energy security. This impasse is not acceptable given the size and nature of the energy threat facing the country.

The Council is convinced of the merit of its corollary recommendation to increase environmentally responsible production in Alaska. For a limited period of time, this incremental output would improve U.S. energy security. Nevertheless, the value of this recommendation must be measured against the greater and more enduring benefi ts that can be achieved through implementation of our primary recommendations, including signifi cantly reforming and strengthening fuel effi ciency of passenger cars and light-duty trucks (projected to save 4.3 mbd by 2030 and trending upward thereafter) and increasing access to U.S. reserves on the OCS (projected to supply an additional 1.0 to 2.0 million mbd over an extended period).

The Oil Shockwave is a half day simulation of oil supply disruption scenerios. Here is an account of a 2005 exercise by the Washington Post. It's basically a role play exercise requiring players to handle unrest and terrorism in an oil producing nations. The oil prices they were handling were about $58, so I guess they didn't think this group was advanced enough to handle what the Bush administration could do all on its own, without terrorist interference. The underlying themes of the event were that even small disruptions in energy distribution can increase prices dramatically and how little influence the US government really has. If you google "Oil Shockwave", you can see several different takes on the event. Here is Mr. Diamond's testimony
Before the House Committee on International Relations Subcommittee on International Terrorism and Nonproliferation on the Oil Shockwave. Watch their YouTube ads for Oil Shockwave here and here.

In January 2007, Bush met with SAFE members Mike Jackson, chairman and CEO of Auto Nation; Herb Kelleher, executive chairman of Southwest Airlines Company and General P.X. Kelley, USMC (Ret). White House photo by Eric Draper. Bush extolled the similarities in their plan with his. SAFE is also supported by The American Council On Renewable Energy--ACORE. Read about ACORE here. ACORE's president Michael Eckhart is semi-famous for going after CEI on global warming denial.

For some more recent information on SAFE here is an October 2007 interview with Mr. Diamond. This is what he had to say about SAFE's makeup and mission:

And really, Securing America's Future Energy was founded by looking and saying this debate on oil had really been dominated by car companies, oil companies, environmentalists. And really we were coming to deadlock for longtime. What we wanted to do was expand the pool of participants to be CEOs of major corporations who are principally consumers, who understand why oil matters to our everyday life and sort of speak for us at large. And also generals and admirals who could speak about securing the supply lines around the world and going into these unstable regions and really coming from a broader perspective. And that's really been the mission of the organization.

SAFE praised recent passage of paired-down energy bill that industry lobbyists stripped of a $13 billion tax increase on oil companies and a requirement that utilities nationwide produce 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources. Despite its shortcomings, others in the environmentalist community also praised the bill as at least a start including the Union of Concerned Scientists, LCV and The Sierra Club. However it has been noted that the bill looks so good because what came before it was so bad.

From what I've seen and shared with you here, it seems to me SAFE is a mixed bag. On the one hand, it's good to see these issues being discussed and good to see industry interested in renewable energy, and some progress being made through pressure on the previously unmovable Cheney interests. However, if organizations with such corporate and military ties appropriate the energy and conservation movement, we are going to see laws like the one we got, watered down for corporate consumption and national security policy focused on safeguarding and expanding our oil reach.

Steinberg Comments on Footlik Mailer

Columnist Neil Steinberg had something to say about the Footlik vote for me because I'm a nice Jewish boy from Skokie mailer. Here's a bit. Click on the link to read his entire article:

Any Jew with half a brain is as worried about our country descending into theocracy as he is worried about maintaining lock-step support for Israel. I would rather support a Methodist who talks about the issues than a guy who sends out photos of himself in a tallis or who names his daughter after a kosher wine.

Click here to read what Pioneer Press heard from district residents about the mailer.

For those of you who missed it, here's the mailer and my take on it. This is an important issues as we are finding religious establishment creeping into our government. See here too and click on my church and state tag for more posts on the topic on this blog.

Sorry, Jay the mailer was just a bad idea, and rather than attacking those standing up for long time, traditional American principle, I ask the Footlik campaign along with all religious communities of our district to reflect on what separation of church and state means for our peaceful co-existence and our security and success as a nation. Our founding fathers lived through theocracy and their ancestors lived through inquisitions and wars over religion. Trust them. They knew what they were doing when they took religion out of government and government out of religion.

Government being, among other purposes, instituted to protect the consciences of men from oppression, it is certainly the duty of Rulers, not only to abstain from it themselves, but according to their stations, to prevent it in others.~~George Washington's letter to the Quakers, September 28, 1789. From Gorton Carruth and Eugene Ehrlich, eds., The Harper Book of American Quotations, New York: Harper & Row, 1988, p. 500.

Anyone to Trust in DC Anymore? Maybe We the People are all We the People Have Left.

Last time I was in DC in September 2005, I thought the place looked awful, just physically awful. The mall was torn up with security barricades and tire ruts from their placement (Chicago proved you can have security without ruining the city) and even the reflecting pool looked filthy and it smelled bad. They are simply bad stewards of our city and our country, but even then, I thought they'd at least keep the place from burning down. Apparently not.

Fire near Cheney's office notwithstanding, the burning question remains: who should investigate the destruction of the CIA torture tapes? Mukasey told DC District Court Judge Kennedy to stay out of it because DOJ was investigating. Kennedy responded by ordering a hearing. Mukasey told Congress to buzz off too, and Rep. Conyers responded with another letter reiterating the request for testimony by a DOJ representative. Conyer's letter points out that we still have checks and balances and that the Judiciary Committee still has jurisdiction for oversight of DOJ. Even a republic on the Intelligence Committee, Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, called for an investigation and advised that subpoenas would follow. (Remember our own congressman, Mark Kirk, defends the tapes destruction.) House Intelligence Committee chair Silvestre Reyes said Wednesday that the subpoenas had been prepared and the CIA says it will hand over documents to avoid live testimony of two of its officials, acting CIA general counsel John Rizzo and Jose Rodriguez, the former head of the National Clandestine Service.

The White House response has been to argue with the New York Times over the semantics of a subheadline. They aren't liars, just hiders of the facts, spokesperson Perino argued with more vigor than she's ever argued on behalf of the American people. She made it clear, however, that the facts of the article were not in contention. So, apparently four White House attorneys were involved in discussions relative to the tapes destruction. Previously, the White House had claimed that only Miers knew and had advised against the destruction, now the NYT reports that accounts of who was in and who was out are conflicting. They only know who was there, Miers, Gonzales, Addington and Bellinger and that one or more with them ok'd the destruction.

Mukasey, getting the message that no one trusts DOJ to investigate, issued a new departmental policy about communication with the White House on pending criminal or civil enforcement matters. The White House will be advised "only where it is important for the performance of the President's duties and where appropriate from a law enforcement perspective." The policy lists "limitations" which are mostly specific offices to be contacted and excepts from the limitations national security matters. Mukasey even mentioned 9/11 in the memo. Since they seem to believe everything involving the election of republicans is a matter of national security and that the President's duties are all and exclusively political, not too many people are trusting this change.

So, who should investigate possible obstruction of justice and destruction of evidence claims?

The White House? Surely you jest.
DOJ? Uncertain after it's longtime politicization under Bush.
The Courts? How far will this go with the new politicized Supreme Court
Congress? Lots of investigation, not a whole lot of action so far.

I'm leaning toward the ACLU call for an independent prosecutor. See here too. However, that is no guarantee that justice will be served. Pat Fitzgerald for all his good will and hard work didn't get too far in the investigation of the outing of CIA agent Plame with Cheney unaccountable and Libby barely accountable. Waxman is still trying to investigate this one.

I was recently told by a Footlik supporter that no one cares about these sort of issues or what Mark Kirk does, it's all about getting his candidate elected. I disagree because the bottom line is that the American people have to care enough to demand accountability from all our elected officials. Without pressure from us, it's too easy for all government officials to let this sort of thing slide as being too hard on a political career. Mark Kirk thinks we don't care, so he defends the CIA destroying evidence of criminal acts to get in good with the people who presided over it. If you don't care, if you never care about anything but getting good press for and preventing unflattering facts from coming to light on your primary candidate, what do you expect your elected officials will do next, and do you think your candidate, if elected, will take care in his actions knowing that there is no accountability demanded from the people? This is how we got where we are now.

It's No Time To Give the President or His Attorney General More Power. Time For Them To Give Us More Information

Now that Reid has at least temporarily pulled the FISA changes including telecom immunity (S. 2248), Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake is reporting via The Hill that he's considering extending The Protect America [out of everything it owns] Act (PAA). PAA had a sunset provision that is up on February 1, 2008 and the FISA changes on the Senate floor Monday were supposed to be the extension of PAA which basically allows spying on Americans without constitutional or traditional FISA protections. The changes were also supposed to put some limits on the broad powers granted in the PAA. CDT has a great background sheet on the changes. Scroll down to page 2 for the issues. The FISA revision bill Reid brought up for debate would have given the Attorney General a lot more power including "sole discretion about whether current cases against telecommunications carriers will proceed."

I think they need to throw out PAA and start all over again because it's no time to be giving the President and his Attorney General more power. They aren't working to protect us. They are working to protect themselves. We know this because of the manner in which they are handling the investigation of the destruction of the CIA torture tapes. Both the White House and DOJ have made efforts to block investigation and Attorney General Michael Mukasey rejected demands for information on the DOJ's investigation by Senators Leahy and Specter saying that he was trying to avoid "any perception that our law enforcement decisions are subject to political influence." How about avoiding the reality and not just the perception.

Notwithstanding justice obstructing members of the Bush Administration, today DC federal district judge Henry H. Kennedy, Jr. ordered a hearing of the matter as it relates to one of the Guantanamo detainee cases, Abhah v. Bush. The hearing will be on the issue of whether the tape destruction violated an earlier order to "preserve and maintain all evidence and information regarding the torture, mistreatment, and abuse of detainees" held at Guantanamo. While the plaintiffs are not arguing that the tapes showed their own mistreatment, they claim that information obtained during these sessions of "harsh interrogation" may have been used to identify them as "unlawful combatants" allowing them to be held for 6 years.

If Bush and Mukasey were trying to protect Americans they would want stronger evidence against real terrorists than the "dubious" evidence obtained by torture and they'd protect our constitutional rights in intelligence collection instead of trying to sweep them under the same carpet as their torture. To protect ourselves, we need to make it clear we stand by Congress in its request for an investigation and ask Congress to go back and draft a new law specifically intended to do what is necessary to protect Americans and not specifically intended to give Bush and his ilk more power at our expense.

HTML Lesson

I encourage commenters to cite sources, so I'll teach you how to do it more effectively by linking rather than just pasting in your link as text.

To add a link, type in this:

less than sign <
a
space
href =
"Link URL in quotes"
greater than sign >
The word or words you want to contain the link
less than sign<
/
a
greater than sign>

Would you believe... not only do they spy, but they contract our intelligence gathering out to... whoever?

The Bush administration and its supporters like Mark Kirk are always telling us that they must have certain unconstitutional powers and secrets to obtain needed intelligence to protect us. We are seeing this play out in the FISA and torture debates. So, one might ask, if intelligence is the primary concern, why do they farm so much of it out to contractors?

Monday, The Washington Post reported on the House-Senate conference report on the fiscal 2008 intelligence authorization. The operative portion of the Report is the part discussing Section 307. This is what the committee is concerned about:

Intelligence Community leaders continue to lack an adequate factual and policy basis for controlling the size and use of its large contractor workforce. Among other things, the Intelligence Community lacks a clear definition of the functions that may be appropriately performed by contractors and, as a result, whether contractors are performing functions that should be performed by government employees. Generally, the conferees are concerned that the Intelligence Community does not have procedures for overseeing contractors and ensuring the identification of criminal violations or the prevention and redress of financial waste, fraud, or other abuses by contractors. The report is intended to help both the Intelligence Community and the congressional intelligence committees identify the facts and chart solutions. The report should also address the DNI’s plans for conversion of contractors into employees under the authority provided in Section 103 of this Act.

According to the Post article, Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell has been mostly concerned with reducing the number of reports to Congress.

According to an earlier Post article, the jobs being contracted out used to be done by "service personnel and civil service employees." Here's an article from Mother Jones from back in 2005 on a job fair for contracted spies.

With all the abuses we've seen from defense contractors from bad food and tainted water provided to our soldiers to the recent revelation of an previously uninvestigated rape charge against KBR, this is just another seriously important area of government that is being farmed out to bottom line concerned corporations. So, they are not only asking us to give up our constitutional rights to spy on us, but give them up to companies with no allegiance to the American people and about as much accountability as those Chinese toy makers.

Wow

Wow, I was going to direct you to a bunch of blog posts about telecom immunity and move on to my topic for tommorrow, but I just saw this: Filibusted!

Be that as it may, you really should read Ted Kennedy's terrific speech and this almost equally as wonderful blog post that does a great job explaining how the Senate works.

Sometimes we get a good day. Kudos to Chris Dodd who led the charge just when we really needed to see a charge.

Reports of a Footlik Push Poll

A friend just told me about a push poll he received from the Footlik campaign. Your basic smear job of Dan and complementary questions regarding Jay. The questions centered on the 2 blocks Dan is outside the district failing to mention Jay never really lived in our district until he flew himself in to run. It seems to me from the description of the call that Jay is finding it hard to find anything really wrong with Dan if all he can focus on are the couple of blocks out of the district.

Footlik is using more and more republican tactics including inserting religion into the campaign and now push polls reminicient of the days when George W. Bush smeared John McCain in S. Carolina on race.

Footlik claims to be a Democrat, but acts like a republican. He's not the guy I want representing me.

Have you received the push poll?

Jay Footlik's Mail Piece, Will It Get the Jewish Vote? Is It Just Silly? or Does It Call On Jews To Give Up An Important Principle?

The mail piece reminds me of a certain genre of Jewish humor that peaked in the mid 1960s. I remember playing the Jewish version of the game of Life at a friend's house during that era that used this form of humor. They don't seem to have that version of the game now, so maybe this type of humor isn't so popular anymore? It also reminds me of the type of humor in an old record my grandmother had when I was a small child called When You're In Love, the Whole World is Jewish. (Do you remember from that record, Irving, the 142d fastest gun in the west?) Both were sort of cute for a Jewish audience, but then again we were Jewish and no one was using any of this to seek a license to run the country.

The mail piece is devoid of issues, so presumably Jay thinks the Jewish community does not care about the issues, but only his Jewish connections. I've heard the Tenth is about 20% Jewish, so even if this piece is successful in the Jewish community, 20% does not make a victory. Jay might want to speak to everyone in the District about real issues if he really wants to win.

Then again, my friend Melissa, not knowing I was writing about this mailpiece today, caused me to think about this further. She took me back to the Sept. 12, 1960 speech of John F. Kennedy by sending me this blog post. I also wrote about Kennedy's speech last week. The writer of the post sent by Melissa says:

If you listen to the media, it was forty-seven years ago that John Kennedy gave a speech to reassure majority Protestants about his Catholic faith. That's completely untrue. Kennedy never made such a speech.

Instead, John Kennedy stepped in front of a suspicious, openly hostile audience of protestant religious leaders and delivered a speech in which he adamantly maintained that faith of any sort should not be in an issue. His speech was not an apology for being Catholic. It was a bold demand to hold fast to an "absolute separation of church and state."

As I said last week after Mitt Romney's frighteningly divisive speech, it was Kennedy's words that inspired and reassured the Jewish community that they could live undisturbed in this country just 15 years after the holocaust. Kennedy told us that he believed in an America:

where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind; and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of disdain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.

As a Jewish-American, I find Kennedy's vision of an American ideal of brotherhood of religions one that has served us well for many years and hope it will be allowed to survive to serve us well in the future. I find Jay Footlik's vision of pandering to one particular community with old inside jokes to be the same one being sold to us by the likes of Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee and George W. Bush, divide by religion, conquer and care not about the consequences.

Rescue Fraud

When someone tells you that they are going to rescue you, they aren't always telling the truth. Often they find you in a vulnerable spot and are taking advantage of it to scare you into doing something you might not do otherwise.

Case in Point#1: Mortgage Rescue Fraud. Did you know that Illinois is one of the top ten mortgage fraud hot spots? The chart to the right comes from the FBI's 2006 Mortgage Fraud Report issued this past May. The same report named mortgage rescue fraud an emerging scheme. Here is a good explanation of various mortgage rescue fraud schemes, but basically, the perpetrator seeks homeowners in or on the verge of foreclosure and/or bankruptcy, promises to pay off their mortgage and obtain a new mortgage with better terms on their credit and make the payments until the homeowner is on their feet. They usually charge fees, rush the homeowner through the paperwork, ask the homeowner to sign papers without reading them, become hostile to questions, urging trust because they only seek good as their financial advisor, and end up owning the house because one of those papers just happens to be a deed. They might make mortgage payment for a while, or not, and then skip out, or they sell the house to someone else. The keys to this fraud are a vulnerable and scared homeowner, the element of time sensitivity, including no time to read the documents and hostility to questions, legal representation and discussion.

Case in Point #2: Legalizing spying on Americans including telecom immunity. We Americans are being told by our leaders that the 9/11 attacks mean we have to give up our constitutional rights. Our founders, after living with monarchy for years, felt it wise to give us rights in our person and privacy, but after well over 200 years of these rights serving us well, we are now told that those rights are dangerous. The original Patriot Act, over 300 pages of it, was passed in a big rush, just 45 days after the attack (begging the question how such a long document could have been written so quickly), and the reauthorization was also pushed through quickly. Then, that was not enough, so FISA bill revisions were also rushed through Congress. No time to read the small print here, there was a nation to rescue. On Monday, the Senate, acting on pressure from the White House, is poised to pass through further revisions to FISA that might include telecom immunity, retroactive immunity to telecom companies for breaking the law and spying on people like you and me. Telecom immunity is being sought to require the dismissal of pending lawsuits against telecoms for breaking of the law. There is no question that the law has been broken. The question is will Congress allow the White House to pressure it into changing the law retroactively to end these lawsuits.

Case in Point #3: Torture. Mark Kirk thinks torture is just dandy. Most recently he voted against banning waterboarding and defended the CIA destruction of torture tapes against two court orders and the advice of several counsel. The same fear and rescuer tactics are being used to turn us into a thug nation of torturers, breaking our own laws against torture and risking our own soldiers. republicans are calling waterboarding necessary to save lives even though most interrogation experts say it results in unreliable information. The real effect of torture is discipline to quash free speech and dissent. As this nation sinks deeper into the use of torture, we may very well find ourselves as silenced and quashed as the enemies who are supposed to be the real targets of our tactics.

So, what do we have here: 1) a nation still feeling vulnerable, 2) pressure to rush bills through Congress, 3) few if any reading the fine print and understanding what is really being sought from them. 4) an echo chamber of republicans telling us that anyone who disagrees with Bush's so-called security measures is trying to compromise our security and must be silenced and 5) Democrats afraid to challenge republicans on the issue because for some reason the common wisdom is that most Americans do not care about their rights or the law and 6) a White House hiding information, responding to questions with mixed silence, denial and hostility and a Justice Department unwilling to investigate.

If you feel these changes to our laws, taking away our privacy rights and granting immunity to telecoms who broke the law and making us torturers, are required and the sooner the better for our own protection, you might want to think about what happened in recent mortgage rescue frauds: a vulnerable victim is sought and found by a purported rescuer. The rescuer urges time sensitivity and trust and becomes hostile when asked for details and reasons.

I think we'd be better off to buck up, stop being such cowards and protect ourselves by keeping informed, reading the fine print, taking the time for discussion and debate and standing for something greater than fear and vulnerability. Anyone who tells you that you should be afraid and discussion of the various points of view must be silenced is probably trying to defraud you. Courage got us through since our beginnings. Why would you think fear will do better for us now?

Friends Don't Let Friends Look Stupid on their Wiki

Mark Kirk's Wikipedia site looks so very scrubbed and complimentary these days leaving out many of the boneheaded things he's said and done, so I decided to take a look at who has been editing. You can do that with Wikiscanner or just by going to the history page tab on top and going to whois.

One frequent editor was this IP address:

Your WHOIS Search Results
199.208.239.140
Record Type: IP Address

OrgName: DoD Network Information Center
OrgID: DNIC
Address: 3990 E. Broad Street
City: Columbus
StateProv: OH
PostalCode: 43218
Country: US

NetRange: 199.208.0.0 - 199.211.255.255
CIDR: 199.208.0.0/14
NetName: DDN-NIC4
NetHandle: NET-199-208-0-0-1
Parent: NET-199-0-0-0-0
NetType: Direct Allocation
NameServer: CON1R.NIPR.MIL
NameServer: CON2R.NIPR.MIL
NameServer: EUR1R.NIPR.MIL
NameServer: EUR2R.NIPR.MIL
NameServer: PAC1R.NIPR.MIL
NameServer: PAC2R.NIPR.MIL
Comment:
RegDate: 1994-03-15
Updated: 2006-04-11

OrgTechHandle: MIL-HSTMST-ARIN
OrgTechName: Network DoD
OrgTechPhone: +1-800-365-3642
OrgTechEmail: HOSTMASTER@nic.mil

See here about who that might be and here about what they are doing. They've been really busy this month on Kirk's Wikipedia entry making what were called "dubious claims" (e.g. he saved a hospital) without a source, and deleting sourced information such as Kirk's comment that he is OK with discriminating against young Arab males. They also scrubbed their own posts about Kirk's participation in a May 2007 meeting with Bush wherein it was reported Bush was told that the Iraq war was bad for republican re-election chances. Earlier that same IP scrubbed a description of Kirk's racist and sort of stupid immigration plan of giving condoms to Mexicans. To see all this you can play around at this link going backward and forward from older edits to newer edits.

A few problems with Mark Kirk's defense of the destruction of the CIA torture tapes

Here is the link to WGN Radio's report on Mark Kirk's defense of the destruction of the CIA torture tapes. Kirk's point is that the tape destruction was a good idea at the time "to wrap up the al Qaida cells, that had just attacked the United States."

Kirk claims that the tapes were destroyed to protect us from more 9/11-type attacks and to protect the interrogators from retaliation. That is not what the facts bear out or even what the CIA is saying. It is what the Bush administration is now saying, when they say anything at all or even care enough to "remember".

First, the timing is wrong. If you listen to Kirk's words linked from that WGN page, it seems that his reference to an attack is the September 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center. The tapes in question were made in 2002, but destroyed in 2005, not right after the 9/11 attacks. If the CIA was genuinely worried about the 9/11 attacks, why would they wait 3 years?

As stated in this CBS.com article, the tapes were destroyed not after the 9/11 attacks, but after "a Washington Post expose focused attention on the CIA’s secret prisons." The article also reports that retired CIA officer John Brennan claims that Jose Rodriguez, the former head of the national clandestine service of the CIA, who ordered the tapes' destruction, was "worried the Justice Department was backing away from its earlier support of harsh interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding." The article then quotes Brennan:

And that therefore agency officers who participated in those interrogation sessions may be subject to some type of prosecution.

If Brennan is correct, they were thinking about saving themselves from prosecution, not protecting agents or the country.

Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, has a point about Kirk's agent safety argument: "You'd have to burn every document at the CIA that has the identity of an agent on it under that theory." It's also hard to imagine the Bush administration caring about the safety of CIA agents since the cavalier outing of active WMD investigator and agent Valerie Plame and their protection, not of Plame, but of outing participants Scooter Libby and Dick Cheney.

Kirk also fails to address the legal issues with the tapes destruction despite being a lawyer himself. The tapes were destroyed against the 2003 advice of the CIA's general counsel and several other White House lawyers, and Congressional lawmakers, and without telling Porter Goss who was CIA director at the time of the destruction, but chairman of the House Intelligence Committee in 2003 when he advised against their destruction. The tapes were not provided to the 9/11 Commission or the Zacarias Moussaoui court even after a requests that should have been interpreted to include same. See here too. Even Harriett Miers "urged the CIA not to destroy the tapes" when she heard of the plan in 2005.

Then, there is that pesky preservation of evidence court order issued four months before the tapes' destruction. Pay special attention at that link to the attorney's letter advising the CIA of the judge's order, scroll all the way down because a copy of the court's order is attached. Here is the current motion seeking the CIAs explanation of the destruction in light of the order. The Petitioners claim that the destruction of the tapes took place after a court order in Rasul v. Bush that Guantanamo prisoners could pursue habeas corpus claims and after commencement of congressional debate of the Detainee Treatment Act providing for judicial review of enemy combatant determinations by the white house and that it was therefore foreseeable that the tapes would be properly part of the record in such cases.

This is just one more example of Mark Kirk defending the Bush administration's illegal and immoral activity for politics. Is enough ever enough?

Rent Receipts for Jay Footlik

Jay Footlik has not been paying attention to the nation's economic advisors who always say it's better to buy and not rent so you aren't throwing your money away on rent receipts and losign the tax credit for mortgage interest. He finally admitted that he's renting in the Tenth, but apparently didn't reveal the length of his lease, annual, month to month or announcement to primary.

Well, maybe that bit part in Teen Wolf didn't pay all that much and I do understand our nation's affordable housing crisis to which I wish he'd speak at least once or twice, but Jay always seems to forget there is a nation of people right here that needs some good governing and leadership too. Oh well, maybe now that the real estate market and interest rates are down, Jay will find something to buy, and as a land owner, he will find some renewed affinity for the good old USA.

I have a feeling Jay's housing decision is based more on the results of the Illinois primary than the real estate market and interest rate. Jay, why don't you stop attacking Dan Seals for his couple of blocks, and be honest with us? You came here from DC to claim a congressional seat to which you feel entitled, basically any congressional seat, no real matter the district. After 8 years of Mark Kirk, the district is looking for a little honesty, but all you've brought us so far are hired petition signature gatherers who lie about the candidate for whom they petition to well known and respected women's peace group members. You still have not apologized to the North Shore Women for Peace for the deception, have you?

Don't they say be careful what you wish for?

1. You brought religion into politics. Now you live with it. republican candidates are quickly finding that their infusion of religion into politics works both ways. If Mitt Romney did not desert his earlier liberal leanings and attempt to insert himself into the church/corporation alliance of what has become the mainstream republican party, he would not have had to make that embarrassingly terrible speech in which he asked, no begged, religious right voters, who call his religion a cult, to discriminate, but not against him. Now, Mike Huckabee gets his dose of reality as his earlier words dog his campaign. Huckabee won't release prior sermons and is seeinq the consequences of his remarks about quarantying AIDs victims and his signature on a statement asking women to submit themselves "to the servant leadership of her husband." It all illustrates the disingenuousness of these fake holy rollers who uses religion for political gain and have no really deeply held beliefs while faulting others for same.

2. When hate fights hate. In 2000, Bush spewed racial hatred against McCain and his family, McCain allowed it, failing to defend his own family, and ended up hugging Bush to remain a player in republican hate politics becoming the republican party's sell out poster child. Now hate spewing is the republican norm and in this non-incumbent presidential election year, they are going after each other and this time it's not hate v. confused folding, but hate vs. hate. Yikes!

3. With the American middle class turning on its own, with what will it be left? Not long after I posted the story of a friend facing foreclosure because the illness of a love one, a commenter turned it around on him and me comparing this poor hardworking guy as a sloth who bought a home he couldn't afford deserving of the consequences. In reality, he's just a former member of an increasingly shrinking middle class. I responded by asking why Americans so readily turn on those who are in need, but give every benefit of the doubt to our wealthy, lying, cheating, stealing, torturing leaders. The middle class seems oblivious to the class war it is losing and still ready to turn on its own with ideas that are fostered by the right wing media: "that guy who got forclosed out was bad and deserved it." If you have not read Robert Reich's article for the American Prospect, do so here. Reich briefly describes the three coping mechanisms no longer available to the working middle class fighting for survival on stagnant wages: women entering the workforce, more jobs and/or longer hours and use of home equity. I had a discussion with a friend last week. She was opining that many people think they are middle class, but really aren't any more. Reich's three coping mechanisms allowed people to remain, or at least seem to remain, in the middle class, but once mom is already in the job market, the number of hours in a day are exhausted, and the home equity is gone, where does that leave the middle class?

4. Can a community out-exclusive itself? Barbara Ehrenreich's recent blog post about gated communities asks what happens when the American dream gated community fails? Once popular for security and perhaps racist reasons, some exclusive gated communities are falling victim to the mortgage crisis. What's creepier than a gated ghost town of foreclosed homes? Maybe a declining fortress of people who were trying to hide from the realities of the world when the world finally creeps up on them. Ehrenreich should also ask what happens when the community is not completed by the developer leaving empty and uncared for vacant lots, the association is not created and the common areas are not completed, maintained or insured? A long time ago, another friend of mine opined that these communities would become the next slums because they contain no business activity, have little pedestrian traffic, and consequently, are sort of deserted. Once the money and glamour is stripped away, owners are left with a decaying, deserted, crime-attractive area, a slum. She said she'd take a busy city street over an exclusive suburban community any day and she may just have be proven correct one day soon.

5. I'll leave you with the classic Mark Kirk. Kirk touted his CIA connections in previous elections, his connections to the intelligence, his knowledge of WMD in Iraq, in Iran. I wonder what the latest with the NIE scandal and CIA tape destruction scandal will bring to his campaign. I'll take a guess that it will change nothing. He'll keep reciting the mantra: 9/11-Sears Tower-Israel and there will be some people who believe him. In the end if he wins again, they won't get the protection he promises, but they will get the bad behavior we are seeing in government, the hateful and divisive consequences of bad leadership, including fake religion controlling real policy, and the economy that is eliminating the middle class.

Two Friends Caught In The Nations' Health Care Mess

I have been reluctant to write about this, but keeping quiet isn't going to help either of them anyway.

Friend 1: Has had the same job for over 30 years and lived in the same house for as long. Works late hours. He's being foreclosed out of his home. Not because he bought a mcmansion he couldn't afford. Not because he's lazy and doesn't work. It's all because his wife is very ill and requires lots of medications and therapy.

Friend 2: She has non-Hodgkin lymphoma. She's been in remission for years, but felt tired and sick lately. They told her it was just her medications and she got a lot of run arounds from her doctors. Last night they found a malignant tumor the size of a softball in her abdomen. HMO.

Bush's New Jobs Program

This is a new one, even for Bush.

Now he tells us. The Iraq War is just one big jobs program.

He's accusing Democrats who want to tie war funding to some eventual and reasonable withdrawal of being Ebenezer Scrooges to all the Bob Cratchets at Halliburton.

In the meantime, there is excitement in the House Appropriations Committee where Wisconsin Democrat David Obey has finally grown sick of Bush's strong arm tactics and threatened to scrap the compromise bill he was crafting with republican moderates (Kirk?) if there is such a thing as a republican moderate.

If Bush is really worried about jobs, maybe he'd take notice of the bleak jobs outlook rather than cherry picking data to brag otherwise.

Here's a bit about a previous jobs program Bush championed.

Bush' Mortgage Rate Freeze Satisfies Few, Begs a Few Questions Too. Durbin's Plan Could Help, But When Do We Regulate the Industry?

Homeowners facing foreclosure are drowning 20 feet offshore and the administration just threw out a 10-foot rope.~~Dick Durbin

Sen. Durbin doesn't think much of Bush's subprime 5-year adjustable mortgage interest rate freeze. The program helps only a limited number of people and its voluntary on the lenders side too, so if an investor does not agree to the rate freeze, the borrower is out of luck. The investor does not have to be the same mortgagee the borrower chose to do business with because these loans are sold on a secondary market.

republicans in a tiz that regular home owning, play by the rules people might actually get some relief, can take the bees out of their bonnets. The program is not designed to help people (God forbid). It's designed to help the industry faced with not only expensive foreclosures and the prospect of getting stuck with forclosed properties they might be unable to sell, but potential lawsuits from the ultimate purchasers of these loan packaged as investments. The plan could help prop up home values, but that is a mixed bag as it keeps people out of the market. That is supposed to weed out speculators, but it also weeds out young families and people like, well...your children unable to buy anything in the neighborhoods in which they grew up. Bloomberg reports that it could also cause investors to drop out of the market and increase interest rates further chilling the market.

Another feature of Bush' package is that it ignores the obvious for many of these loans. As business reporter Dean Calbreath for The San Diego Union-Tribune points out, while Bush's rate freeze helps those with subprime loans with credit scores (FICO) below 660, many of these people really belonged in prime market loans to begin with. Those who did could simply be transferred into the loan programs appropriate for them. It sort of begs the question why were some of these people in subprime loans to begin with.

Durbin points out that primary residence loans are the only form of personal debt not subject to restructuring in bankruptcy. His plan involves loan modifications for those in bankruptcy lowering interest rates and increasing the time allowed for repayment. Durbin's bill also preserves borrowers' claims against lenders for predatory lending and other consumer protection claims. As with Bush's plan, Durbin's does not require taxpayer funding.

None of the plans being looked at seem to deal with tighter industry regulation. Many would argue that is where we should begin. Mark Kirk votes against the The Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act of 2007. Here's a good section by section explanation. That bill passed the house without his vote and is sitting in the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. It deals with bad industry practices such as steering borrowers into subprimes when they qualify for better and cheaper loans, better regulates high-cost loans and sets minimum standards for a borrowers ability to pay before qualifying. It also attaches some liability to the secondary market securitizers who package loans that do not meet the minimum standars. The bill provides protection for the good guys in the industry and borrowers, controls on and penalties for the bad guys, and it's sitting in committee. Mortgage originators hate it.

If you stop your inquiry on the notion that the people in trouble on their mortgages are at fault, what do you say to your leaders who got your family in $120,000 of debt to pay for tax cuts to the wealthiest of Americans?

Unable to Unite Even When Trying, republicans Move Toward Established Religion on the Sneak

From about twenty years of divisive rule, it's pretty clear that republicans are unable to unite the country even when trying. Mitt Romney's speech was as divisive as they come and the sad part is that it doesn't even occur to him and there's the rub for those of us in the non-Christian communities of the Illinois Tenth.

First, Romney's speech was directed toward an audience segment, evangelicals moving toward Huckabee. He was not even trying to talk to the nation, but a group many of the members of which believe in religious exclusion. That was the whole reason for the speech, so it was not the Kennedyesq unity speech as touted, but a plea by Romney to be included among the exclusive.

Second, Romney spoke of God, God with a capital G and God in the singular, so he already excluded Atheists, Buddhist, Hindus and others who do not worship a single god or any god. He said " I believe that every faith I have encountered draws its adherents closer to God." I guess he's never met a Zoroastrian. They are among the people we are supposed to be defending by beating the war drums against Iran. There are about 15,000 in the United States. There are about 1,081,051 Hindus and 1,527,019 Buddhists in the United States.

Then, he excludes some more:

We should acknowledge the Creator as did the Founders in ceremony and word. He should remain on our currency, in our pledge, in the teaching of our history, and during the holiday season, nativity scenes and menorahs should be welcome in our public places. Our greatness would not long endure without judges who respect the foundation of faith upon which our constitution rests. I will take care to separate the affairs of government from any religion, but I will not separate us from 'the God who gave us liberty.'

You should acknowledge the Creator. What about those whose religions or lack thereof do not have a Creator with a capital C or have a Creator, but not Mitt's. His sticking in the word menorah gave me no comfort as an American Jew because when people are excluded for religion, Jews are usually among the first to be excluded. Also, he seems to be saying no one can be a judge who does not share at least the foundation of his faith. So, there should be no consideration of religion for people deciding whether or not to vote for him, but he would not choose a judge who is not a Christian. We get it.

Third, in the above quote, Romney doesn't get it quite right. His reference to the Founders is incorrect history. Romnyy also referred to the famous slogans "under God" and "in God, we do indeed trust (sic)". Those who have never read the Constitution might think these are principles of our government from our Founders, Romney likely wants them to, but he is and they'd be incorrect. The phrase "In God We Trust" came about after the Civil War. The Treasury Department sought its adoption after Secretary Salmon P. Chase revieved after an empassioned plea written to him by Rev. M. R. Watkinson, Minister of the Gospel from Ridleyville, Pennsylvania. Congress passed approval legislation on April 22, 1864. The motto on currency was made mandatory on July 11, 1955 when Eisenhower signed Public Law 140. It is unconsitutional, but politicians fear challenging it. A Fifth Circuit Court allowed the motto to continue because they said it had a "secular purpose." Yeah, right. Oh, and I would guess most of you already know that the "under God" part of the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954 well after our founders were long dead and if they weren't, it might have killed them.

Romeny argued for a church and state separated only to the extent that no particular sect of Christianity is established as the state religion. He argued that a general form of Christianity be applied to law and ceremony. Romney's speech is no comparison to Kennedy's Sept. 12, 1960 speech in which he made the longstanding American argument for separation of church and state started by the likes of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Here are Kennedy's words:

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote; where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference; and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish; where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source; where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials; and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.

For while this year it may be a Catholic against whom the finger of suspicion is pointed, in other years it has been, and may someday be again, a Jew— or a Quaker or a Unitarian or a Baptist. It was Virginia's harassment of Baptist preachers, for example, that helped lead to Jefferson's statute of religious freedom. Today I may be the victim, but tomorrow it may be you — until the whole fabric of our harmonious society is ripped at a time of great national peril.

Finally, I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end; where all men and all churches are treated as equal; where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice; where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind; and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of disdain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.

That is the kind of America in which I believe. And it represents the kind of presidency in which I believe — a great office that must neither be humbled by making it the instrument of any one religious group, nor tarnished by arbitrarily withholding its occupancy from the members of any one religious group. I believe in a president whose religious views are his own private affair, neither imposed by him upon the nation, or imposed by the nation upon him as a condition to holding that office.

I would not look with favor upon a president working to subvert the First Amendment's guarantees of religious liberty. Nor would our system of checks and balances permit him to do so. And neither do I look with favor upon those who would work to subvert Article VI of the Constitution by requiring a religious test — even by indirection — for it. If they disagree with that safeguard, they should be out openly working to repeal it.

I want a chief executive whose public acts are responsible to all groups and obligated to none; who can attend any ceremony, service or dinner his office may appropriately require of him; and whose fulfillment of his presidential oath is not limited or conditioned by any religious oath, ritual or obligation.

This is the kind of America I believe in, and this is the kind I fought for in the South Pacific, and the kind my brother died for in Europe. No one suggested then that we may have a "divided loyalty," that we did "not believe in liberty," or that we belonged to a disloyal group that threatened the "freedoms for which our forefathers died."

And in fact ,this is the kind of America for which our forefathers died, when they fled here to escape religious test oaths that denied office to members of less favored churches; when they fought for the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom; and when they fought at the shrine I visited today, the Alamo. For side by side with Bowie and Crockett died McCafferty and Bailey and Carey. But no one knows whether they were Catholic or not, for there was no religious test at the Alamo.

I was less than one year old when Kennedy made his speech, but I remember growing up, it was part of what comforted the Jewish community, which at the time was less than twenty years past the holocaust. The security of American separation of church and state allowed American Jews to grow and succeed in this country. So, I cannot for the life of me understand why the American Jewish community would take lightly the growing idea that the United States of America is a Christian nation and we are simply a more favored group interlopers for the time being. I don't see how Israel can be secure if the American Jewish community is not.

If Romney's plea for inclusion for only his brand of Christianity gives you pause, note that Mike Huckabee believes his God is going to get him elected and sees himself as a Christian leader. Mark Kirk's buddy, John McCain, believes that the United States was founded as a Christian nation and Giuliani believes in religion, the religion of corporate profits and has no problem pandering to the Christians only community to get that done. Where they differ from Kennedy is that they are disingenuous about their push toward established religion while Kennedy came out and said if one wants a change from the tradition of separation, he should go out there and openly argue for an amendment to the Constitution. That way it would be clear what was being asked and the response could be made accordingly. republicans now just want to move their religions in on the sneak. Here's a rundown of all the candidates positions on separation of church and state.

republicans govern and profit through divisions and at best Romney's speech will go down in history as a national embarrassment, another attempt to move us away from our traditions that allowed our entire nation prosper and toward a past that didn't work out so well for the rest of the world. At worst, Americans will go for it or simply not care enough to stop it, and the nation will see consequent hard times to come.