Hasan Diwan

Weblog's moving...

2003-06-30T22:33:00Z

I've set up movable type at HQ. I now have an RSS/RDF feed available and categories for entries, so now people like Phoenix won't be complaining regarding the pervasiveness of news comments. I'll try to move over the entries from this blog to the other one soon.

Mad Dog in the Fog

2003-06-27T22:29:05Z

Priscilla feels well enough to go out again! So tonight, I'm taking her to The Mad Dog in the Fog. Will try to remember to post feedback. Also, have dressed up a little as a surprise for her (pictures to be posted later tonight), so let's hope she notices and appreciates it. Well, here's to hoping Priscilla's a lady of her word. Cheers!

MoveOn.org Primary

2003-06-24T20:52:41Z

The first primary competition is being held on the internet! The group MoveOn (http://www.moveon.org) is holding a primary competition to determine who their organization and PAC will support. If a single candidate gets 50% or more of the vote, that candidate will receive the "nomination".

It's a interesting example of the internet as a political tool.

Blurb : http://www.moveonpac.org/moveonpac/062203_pr2.phtml
Register to vote : http://www.moveon.org/pac/reg/

Complete with allegations about "vote rigging" by Gephardt, at http://www.moveonpac.org/moveonpac/062203_pr.phtml.

NOTE : registration is only allowed through midnight tonight.

Remember to vote!!!
Vote for Dean!!!

FinanceX

2003-06-24T17:35:28Z

FinanceX 1.3 has just been uploaded. Drag and drop now works both to and from the tableview. There is an entry in the code for a Service, which isn't working yet. I'll try to get that working for 1.4. Also, there's a simple Dock Menu (just accounts and transactions -- nothing fancy). Let me know about bugs, feature requests, etc. I know there's a request to port it to Linux, and I would do that, save for I don't have a PC.

Tonight

2003-06-24T05:38:01Z

This evening, I took off work early, got home at 4, went to get my hair cut and a new Cell # (my Swisscom balance FINALLY expired). Now I'm wondering what is my phone's email address? Didn't go out with Priscilla, but she's not feeling well. I love her.

Social Calendar

2003-06-22T08:09:27Z

My social calendar next week:-

Monday- Howard Dean's candidacy reception at the Hyatt Regency San Francisco... Perhaps will go with Priscilla, take her to dinner at the Equinox on top of the Hyatt.
Tuesday- the Electronic Frontier Foundation volunteer meeting.

Work owes me a day off for all the overtime I put the other week, so I've told Priscilla I'd be spending it with her. So, will see if I can squeeze it in, which will be great.

Innocent came up this evening! It was the first time I'd seen him in a while. Oh... and my father may be coming to town mid-July.

Third time's a charm!

2003-06-22T06:54:37Z

Priscilla and I are on good terms again! I told her that I can't deal with someone so flakey that she can't tell me that she's busy 15 minutes before I'm to pick her up and she said she was sorry and that it wouldn't happen again.

The damn corkscrew

2003-06-22T06:52:07Z

I just bought a bottle of wine last night as I finished the Black Swan shiraz the night before. I pulled out the corkscrew, poured the wine, and had some trouble getting the corkscrew back on. So I ended up reshaping the corkscrew into a pointed cylinder to the halfway mark. That way, it goes into the wine bottle easily and is guided in by the shape, once it hits the full diameter of the hole, it may be pushed in. This system works remarkably well. I may try to get a patent on it . Thanks Lester!

What happened to Gary Hart's blog?

2003-06-20T20:07:07Z

One of my favourite politicians, Gary Hart, seems to have dropped off the face of the Earth. His blog, at garyhartnews.com, hasn't been updated since May 16th. Now, I know what happened in 1984, and Hart has lots of baggage, but he's a prolific thinker with lots of interesting ideas.

[from the Financial Times] Intolerable Secrecy Intolerable secrecy

2003-06-19T16:21:43Z

Normally, I don't blanket-mirror editorials from papers. It strikes me as funny that the United States is supposed to have the freest press, yet journalists are afraid to criticise the Bush administration.

Intolerable Secrecy

Case by case, week by week, a complaisant US judiciary is gradually abdicating its responsibility to uphold basic freedoms guaranteed by the constitution and the law.

The latest egregious example came on Tuesday when the US Court of Appeals overturned a lower court ruling that the government must release the names of people it detained in the months after the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001.

More than 900 suspects were arrested and held on immigration violation investigations as law enforcement worked feverishly in the wake of the attacks to head off the risk of further terrorist plots. While it released the names of those eventually charged with criminal offences, the government declined to give basic details - names, places of arrest - of more than 700 who were not criminally charged but merely found in breach of immigration laws. The government argued that making such information public could give al-Qaeda and other terrorist operatives valuable knowledge about the scope of the investigations.

But such a blanket refusal to provide information, as a lower court judge ruled last year, impeded the ability of the public to know whether the government was operating within "the statutory and constitutional constraints that distinguish a democracy from a dictatorship."

This week's reversal by a split three-judge appeals panel in effect handed over all judgments in such cases to the government on the old cold war grounds that only the authorities could determine whether the threat to national security was so grave as to warrant secrecy.

But while there might indeed be a case for making specific exemptions to the well-established principle of open disclosure, the burden should be on the government to demonstrate that releasing information about individual detainees would be harmful to its investigation. The idea that the authorities should simply arrest people and keep all their identities secret on a catch-all defence of national security undermines the most basic principles of accountable law enforcement.

Worse, we know - thanks to a report this month by the Justice Department's own inspector-general - that many of the detainees were indeed mistreated by the government: some were physically abused. Many have since been deported.

The very idea of secret arrests conjures up images of the police state; democracies should only ever use them in the most extreme of cases. They should not be a routine exercise justified by some general and vague assertion of national security interests. The only protection against such abuse is judicial scrutiny. As David Tatel, the dissenting judge in the case, said, by its decision this week the court "has converted deference into acquiescence". It is not too late for the Supreme Court to overturn this latest erosion of American liberties.

FinanceX 1.2

2003-06-19T07:47:10Z

FinanceX 1.2 is out. New features include:

Balance check - Just select a row and click on the amount to drop a sheet stating the total in the account.
Help menu - two options, one opens the homepage for the program and the other opens your email reader to send the author an email.
About menu item - the about menu item has been refactored into its own Nib
Plug-in API - there's a simple plug-in API and a protocol. This is yet to be documented, preferably by a better writer than myself.

Download it, work with it, figure out how to make it better, let me know. This was originally designed by me for myself, but I have no reason not to make it work for others.

This is a tool to learn Cocoa for me, and I'll add features as I figure them out.

[Via Khalifah] WeaponsGate: The Coming Downfall of Lying Regimes

2003-06-19T02:29:37Z

I don't quite know how to react to this piece from Khalifah. On one hand, I'm happy the Neocons are in trouble in the US. On the other, I'm concerned with the long-term level of honesty in the United States and Europe. Anyone who knows me knows I have a great deal of respect for certain politicians, even if they aren't entirely good for human rights (Laloo Yadav in India, Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore, General Park Hwee-Chung in South Korea, Mikhail Gorbachev, Deng Xiaoping, Nelson Mandela in South Africa, and a few others). With regards to the Bush regime, this outright lie may mobilise voters in 2004 to throw him out of power, which I'd welcome with open arms.

You wouldn't know if from listening to the leading Democratic candidates for President, but "Weaponsgate" may ultimately bring about the downfall of the Bush regime and its allies in London, Canberra, and elsewhere. The neo-conservatives may have also finally stirred something in the Fourth Estate, which has suddenly begun challenging the lying echo chambers in the White House and Number 10 Downing Street.

The arrogance displayed by the Bush regime, somewhat surprising since it gained power through a fraudulent election process, is what may result in its eventual undoing. Bush may or may not ever realize how he was ill served by the neo-con blight that took root within his administration, particularly within the Department of Defense. But the historians and scholars, who will look back on what turned the tide for a supposedly "popular" war president, will point to the self-described "cabal" whose lies brought about a credibility gap unseen in the United States since the days of Watergate. In fact, Bush's "Weaponsgate" will be viewed as a more serious scandal than Watergate because 1) U.S. and allied military personnel were killed and injured as a result of the caper; 2) Innocent Iraqi civilians, including women and children, died in a needless military adventure; and 3) the political effects of the scandal extended far beyond U.S. shores to the United Kingdom, Australia, Spain, and other countries.

Other effects of Weaponsgate are already apparent. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, the majordomo of the neo-cons within the Pentagon, cannot find anyone to take the place of outgoing Army Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki. Generals Tommy Franks and Shinseki's vice chief, General John "Jack" Keane, want no part of the job. After winning a lightning war against Iraq, Franks suddenly announced his retirement. He and Keane witnessed how Rumsfeld and his coterie of advisers and consultants, who never once lifted a weapon in the defense of their country, constantly ignored and publicly abused Shinseki. Army Secretar y and retired General Tom White resigned after a number of clashes with Rumsfeld and his cabal. The Commander of the First Marine Expeditionary Force in Iraq, Lt. Gen. James Conway, said he was surprised that he encountered no chemical weapons in Iraq.

Perhaps Conway was surprised because that is what the neo-cons wanted him and his fellow Marines to believe. Conway and his troops were merely additional victims of "Weaponsgate." Paul Wolfowitz, a chief neo-con cabalist, let the cat out of the bag in Singapore when he said that everyone could agree on a cause of war being Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. That would be the common denominator in justifying an attack, whether or not such weapons could ever be found. Wolfowitz also stated that Iraq's swimming on a "sea of oil" was the reason it had to be attacked and not, for example, North Korea. The fact that weapons of mass destruction are actually possessed by North Korea, a country lacking any significant natural resources, is of no concern to the neo-cons. Oil was and is the bottom line in Iraq. Sometimes, even the liars trip up and actually tell the truth. But only in a world where the neo-cons have enjoyed a stranglehold on the corporate media can Wolfowitz's supporters claim he was misquoted and the UK's Guardian be forced to print a clarification, one step short of a retraction. Congenital liars like Wolfowitz should never be given the benefit of the doubt on any issue..

Bush's Press Secretary, Ari Fleischer, who has had his own problem with recognizing the truth, was obviously concerned how the history books will treat him. He decided to leave his post mid-term rather than face the music over his repeated distortions about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction as a casus belli. Other Bush administration officials, political and career, have also jumped off what appears to be a rapidly sinking ship of state. They include Richard Haass, who as the director for policy planning, was number three at the State Department; Christine Todd Whitman, Environmental Protection Agency administrator; Rand Beers, the senior National Security Council director for counter-terrorism; Charlotte Beers, the State Department chief for International Public Diplomacy (who was said to have resigned for -- get this bit of Soviet-style spin -- "health reasons"), and State Department career Foreign Service officers John H. Brown, John Brady Kiesling, and Mary A. Wright.

Then there was the sudden firing of retired General Jay Garner as U.S. viceroy of Iraq. He was "outed" as having past associations with the neo-cons, especially the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA). But when Garner started to show some independence in Baghdad, especially with regard to handing over some power to Iraqis, he was quickly sacked and replaced by Paul Bremer, a former Heritage Foundation flunky and Kissinger Associates director who was obviously more in tune with the ideological bent of the neo-cons. In a Pentagon where the civilian neo-cons don't trust the uniformed flag rank officers, Garner likely became a threat, a potential Trojan horse who had to be replaced by someone whose loyalty was beyond question.

The most dramatic revolt against George W. Bush and Tony Blair can be seen from the high-level leaks of classified information from the top levels of American and British intelligence. Just consider that the United States has never experienced such repeated leaks of classified information since the years of the spies in the 1980s, a time when a number of intelligence employees were caught selling U.S. secrets to the Russians and Israelis. Yet, the current leaks are not acts of treason, but acts of unbridled patriotism.

The leaks from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), CIA, State Department, and other agencies are testimony to the deep divisions within the Bush administration over the phony war on Iraq. Intelligence agencies that are often at odds with one another over policy have united like never before in blowing the whistle on the neo-con agenda. The Bush administration lied flat out over the Iraqi WMDs and Iraq's links to Al Qaeda. It's just that simple. Career intelligence officers, who know the penalties for the unauthorized disclosure of classified information, are showing more courage than most of the Democrats in Congress who seem more fearful of the neo-cons and their supporters than in exposing "Weaponsgate."

The most recent classified disclosure was a DIA report on chemical weapons that concluded that there "was no reliable information on whether Iraq is producing or stockpiling chemical weapons or whether Iraq has or will establish its chemical agent production facilities."

On June 8, the Bush administration paraded its usual shills, Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell, before the Sunday talking head shows. Rice and Powell said they based their claims that Iraq had WMDs on an October 1, 2002 national intelligence "white paper." But that paper stated that Iraq had a capability to produce chemical weapons within its chemical industry, not that it was producing such weapons. Hans Blix recently said the so-called intelligence passed to him by the Bush regime was useless for his own UN weapons inspection team in its search for WMDs in Iraq. It now appears that all the so-called U.S. and British "intelligence" was nothing more than a collection of neo-con propaganda and disinformation. In the face of incessantly probing questions on CBS's "Face the Nation," Rice, in her school marm-like best, could only keep repeating that "there are still bad people in Iraq." Bad people? Is this the best terminology we can get from a PhD in International Studies? Or is that the phraseology she uses in explaining foreign policy matters to Bush? The latter explanation seems more likely.

Last March, a classified State Department report, prepared by the Bureau of Intelligence and Research and titled "Iraq, the Middle East and Change: No Dominoes," countered neo-con claims that a democracy in Iraq would foster democracy throughout the Middle East. The report, dated February 26, 2003, concluded that democracy would be difficult to achieve in Iraq, electoral democracy in Iraq would be exploited by anti-American elements, and that the idea that other Middle East nations would be transformed into democracies is not credible. So far, all those predictions have come true. Iraq is currently an American protectorate lacking even fundamental human services, anti-American Shi'as in the south are increasingly venting their anger at U.S. occupiers, and far from extending democracy throughout the Middle East, Mauritania's Arab pro-American government barely survived a military coup attempt by Islamist and pro-Iraqi elements in the counry's armed forces. So much for the Middle East "domino theory" concocted by Richard Perle and his American Enterprise Institute clones and parroted by Bush in a speech before the right-wing "think tank" the same day the State Department prepared its opposite report.

In another slap at the neo-cons, who have supported the Iraqi National Congress of Ahmad Chalabi, the CIA leaked a classified report about their favorite Iraqi. The report, which surfaced in April 2003, concluded that Chalabi had little popular support among the Iraqi people. No wonder then that it is Chalabi who appears to be the source for all the bogus intelligence about Iraqi WMDs, Saddam Hussein's links to Al Qaeda, Iraqi purchases of uranium from Niger, and other false flag intelligence. Chalabi, who is as big a liar as his neo-con friends, hoped to lull American intelligence into believing him over seasoned Middle East intelligence hands. No one but Rumsfeld; former CIA Director James Woolsey (who has taken hundreds of thousands of consulting dollars from Chalabi over the years); Wolfowitz; Doug Feith; America's new monitor for the Middle East peace road map, John Wolf; and their comrades were taken in by Chalabi, a wanted scofflaw from justice in Jordan.

One day the names Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, Woolsey, and Chalabi will become as familiar to students of "Weaponsgate" as the names Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Liddy, Mitchell, and Stans are familiar to those who study Watergate. And in a very interesting nexus between the two scandals, Richard Nixon's former counselor John W. Dean has written that Bush's lying about the reasons for the United States to go to war is an impeachable offense.

For those who are looking for the straw that broke the camel's back in "Weaponsgate" they need not look any farther than Number 10 Downing Street. The troubles that Tony Blair are now experiencing may be a harbinger for things to come in Washington. Blair is in deep trouble and he knows it. After returning from the G-8 summit in Evian, France, Blair was reported by The Obsever to be running around Number 10 in a pathetic panic. In a moment of temporary insanity, which must have been precious to people who loathe Blair, the toothy Prime Minister was pacing about his residence and yelling that people needed to get a grip on what was happening. One of Blair's aides had to comfort Blair and convince him that his advisers were on his side. Blair must have had thoughts of John Major getting ready stick it to Margaret Thatcher or of Brutus getting ready to plunge a knife into the back of Julius Caesar. Blair's political opponents within his own Labor party had seized on his government's use of a "dodgy dossier" on Iraqi WMDs to support the attack on Iraq as an example of Blair's deceit. The dossier, titled "Iraq: Its Infrastructure of Concealment, Deception and Intimidation," was based on a 12-year-old PhD thesis culled from the Internet and the bogus Chalabi documents about Nigerien uranium.

The revolt against Blair should serve as a warning for Bush. Just consider what is happening in Britain. Blair has been abandoned by some of his most senior government officials, including former Leader of the House of Commons Foreign Secretary Robin Cook and former International Development Minister Clare Short, in addition to a number of lesser Cabinet officials. Over 70 of Blair's Labor members of the House of Commons are in open revolt against his duplicity. No wonder Godric Smith, Blair's official spokesman, announced his resignation the same day that Ari Fleischer was announcing his departure in Washington. The wheels are coming off the transatlantic neo-con wagon. New Labor and the "Compassionate Conservative" Republican Party have been shown to be total ruses. Their war policies and global domination goals have been thoroughly exposed as neo-fascist manifestations of the teachings of neo-con philosopher Leo Strauss.

But Blair faces an even more serious revolt from his intelligence officials. Blair's use of bogus intelligence to claim that Britain had only a 45-minute warning prior to an Iraqi chem-bio attack reportedly resulted in the threatened resignations of the heads of MI-6 and MI-5, Sir Richard Dearlove and Eliza Manningham-Buller, respectively, And there was the leak of a January 31, 2003 Top Secret memo from the National Security Agency to its Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) counterpart, which asked for British help in electronically snooping on members and non-members of the UN Security Council to determine their stance on America's anti-Iraq UN resolution. That memo was reportedly leaked with a wink and an nod from the highest levels of British intelligence.

The public row in Britain has forced Alastair Campbell, Blair's own Karl Rove-like spinmeister, to apologize to the British Security Services for combining their intelligence material with the bogus material it used in developing the Iraqi WMDs dossier. However, some of Blair's advisers seem willing to go down with their Prime Minister faster than the deck hands on the Titanic. Blair's new House of Commons leader John Reid, a former member of the British Communist Party, ranted that "rogue elements" within the intelligence services were leaking classified information to bring down the government. Reid also stated that for all anyone knew, the leaks were coming from some "man in a pub." Such are the cynical words from a government on the brink of collapse.

Blair is not the only "Coalition of the Willing" partner beginning to get nervous. Australian Prime Minister John Howard is distancing himself from the forged and phony intelligence on Iraqi WMDs, claiming his intelligence services took at face value what was presented by the Americans and British. Denmark, which has very little tolerance for lying Prime Ministers, is opening up an parliamentary investigation of why Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen lied about the Iraqi WMDs. Bush's allies in Spain and Italy face similar inquiries. Blair, who appears to be heading for an ignoble British-style heave-ho, is sticking to the lie but with an interesting caveat. At a June 10 news conference, Blair restated the canard, "There is not a shred of evidence that we have doctored or manipulated intelligence." But then he added, "that would be absolutely gross if we did so." Blair may be entering the typical "let's look for a scapegoat" phase. He won't be successful. The intelligence services won't let him get away with it. He and his supporters will have to pay the price for lying to the British people. Barring a miracle, Blair's days in office appear to be numbered.

And what of Bush saying the United States will help its friends and punish its foes? Well, it seems that Mr. Bush cannot be trusted to take care of his friends. Iceland was one of the country's that signed up to Bush's so-called "coalition." How has Bush repaid the North Atlantic nation? By writing a letter to Iceland's Prime Minister stating that the United States will, after 46 years of providing for the NATO nation's defense, pull its military forces from the soon-to-be defenseless island state.

The Icelandic Prime Minister, like his colleagues in Denmark, Australia, Spain, Italy, Portugal, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom, has found out the hard way of what price is paid for aligning with a dishonest and illegal regime. They will suffer the consequences. However, the leaders of France, Germany, Canada, Chile, Mexico, New Zealand, Ireland, Belgium, South Africa, Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, and the other countries who withstood constant berating from Washington and the American ambassadors accredited to them, can take heart in the fact that they were correct all along. They will reap the electoral benefits of their stance while they see their pro-American colleagues take the consequential and inevitable electoral fall.

Where's Priscilla?

2003-06-18T17:52:55Z

No one's answering at home, she isn't answering her cell. Last night, her mother said she was out, so I tried her cell. No answer. I'm thinking it's out of battery power. We're supposed to go out tonight to Kennedy's with Urban Diversion. Monday, she says she was free tonight. Yesterday and today, I didn't hear anything, so I'm not sure anymore. :( I'm probably gonna go home relatively early today (1700). So I'll call her when I get back.

Now I'm mad!!

2003-06-17T00:26:14Z

You all probably noticed that the last entry was practically identical to the two before it, I don't know, I hit submit on iJournal, it says "post failed". Confused, I enter it through the web, lo and behold, I realise that Livejournal isn't on drugs, but iJournal seems to have a bug. Oh, and to top it off, when I go to edit an entry, it doesn't retrieve it in iJournal and the web interface says "Database unavailable" or some garbage. Oh, well, let's see if this entry gets through. Oh, yes, I am probably moving my blog (yes, again, I'm sorry) cause I'm sick and tired of having no way to search for previous entries.

Mondays suck

2003-06-17T00:18:58Z

Looking at my schedule, there's nothing to do Mondays. There's something to do every other evening after work and all day on weekends. What is this aversion to scheduling things on Monday? There's nothing happening with either of the campaigns I'm involved in (the Dean (those meetings are on Wednesdays) and Clark campaigns), the EFF meetings are Tuesdays, hell, even Urban Diversion's not doing anything tonight. Of course, my team at work don't have lives (or have families, which amounts to the same thing from my perspective). I guess Kumi was right, not being married in a married world truly does limit your options for a social life. Especially on bloody Mondays!

No, I'm not going to ask anyone to marry me or do anything quite so spontaneous. I will, however, get my haircut and call some people, see what they're up to, I should be able to get together with Susanne, even though, I did so last night.

To make matters worse, livejournal isn't accepting this post from iJournal, so I can't even rant!!! Grrr...

Urban Diversion

2003-06-16T09:21:01Z

I took Susanne here tonight. Had lots of fun. Met a bunch of interesting people (read drinking buddies :) ) and a few nice girls (Xixi, Linda, Toby). Xixi is a web programmer at a development shop in San Francisco proper. Linda teaches French to little kids and is from Montreal. Toby's studying Biotechnology while working at a consultant group for Biotechnology products (read Priscilla's job!). Also, a Briton who designs "Go" lights at traffic intersections. Kumiko was dressed wonderfully as usual. Was so busy meeting people that I couldn't take pictures of anyone. Oh well, hopefully Wednesday, Priscilla and I will go to Kennedy's with this bunch. I did, however, get the feeling that they were a single's club where everyone was sizing each other up. Oh well, we'll see... =)

Town's End Cafe

2003-06-14T23:16:52Z

Priscilla wanted to go here, so I obliged. The place closes at 1430 for lunch (we arrived at 1428, talk about excellent timing per usual!). We talked a little. I met her brother's dog, Ginger. She seemed disappointed in the food and especially the coffee! *sigh* We have tentative plans to go to Kennedy's Pub on Wednesday. We'll see, if it works out.

[from AlterNet] a 12 step Program for Regime Change

2003-06-13T20:23:54Z

BY DON HAZEN

Each day, millions of frustrated Americans engage in discussions about how our country has gone off course and how ultraconservatives have taken over our government. As we put our hearts and souls into figuring out how to achieve regime change at home in November 2004, these conversations are growing in volume.

How we engage this election will speak volumes about the future of our country. Our passion in this political moment feels unprecedented. Yet, because we feel a lot of anxiety about all that's happened to our country since 9/11, we don't yet know our strength. We forget, for example, that the things we believe in -- equality, fairness, justice, dignity, and ultimately kindness and love -- inspired the greatest moral and political achievements of the 20th century: civil rights, women's equality, the right to organize, and the growth of the environmental movement. These values make our society strong and appealing to the rest of the world. We must protect and promote them in the 21st century as well.

Some of us have been discouraged by the increasingly conservative corporate media, which try to marginalize us. We become alarmed as our government ratchets up the fear quotient and we watch the irrational effect the scare tactics have. At these moments, we can forget to turn to each other for support.

But we must claim our power and overcome our doubts and fears -- as well as our bad habits. We need to feel proud and joyful, not just angry and defensive. We must work together, as one huge family, knowing that if we don't, we cannot win.

We must be united to fight for regime change at home, not just to prevent more bloodshed, empire building and cruel policies, but to protect virtually all the progress we've made over the past 40 years. Environmentalists alone cannot ensure clean air and water; union members alone cannot protect the right to organize; civil libertarians alone cannot defend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights; seniors on their own cannot protect Social Security; feminists alone cannot defend Roe v. Wade; and African-Americans and Latinos alone are not going to ensure fairness and equality and stop a wide range of cruel budget cuts.

But, by focusing on what we have in common -- the clear-cut goal of defeating Bush in 2004 -- we can all succeed. How important is this? It feels more important than anything we will do for a very long time.

To help us chart our course, what follows is a 12-step program to achieve regime change. As in all such efforts for change, we need to take an inventory of our strengths and our weaknesses, confront our bad habits and addictions, reach out to others, and recover our power.

Step #1: Recognize Our Strengths

Let's start with traditions that serve as our foundation. Social critic Colin Greer reminds us that Martin Luther King Jr.'s work evolved from his initial civil rights struggles into protecting poor people of all colors and then to insisting on peace in Vietnam. An overriding framework of concern linked all of these causes into one "Beloved Community." Greer notes how the values of progressive America inspire millions of people every day: health care advocates; members of environmental, civil rights and civil liberties groups; volunteers at food banks and women's shelters; people working for their children's education, and many more. As he says, "We have to communicate our history and our strength."

Progressives are potentially stronger now than at any time in the past 30 years. Breakthrough efforts like the fast-growing True Majority, and Move On, with its 1.3 million members, have significant capacity to reach and motivate new people. The MoveOn.org PAC can also raise large amounts of money. Millions of unaffiliated middle-class progressives are ripe for organizing. The Win Without War coalition, made up of 40 national membership groups, has committed itself to regime change with a major investment in media. Many increasingly sophisticated national organizations are already gathering and dedicating themselves to the work ahead, focusing on voter registration and education and Get Out the Vote (GOTV) strategies in key states.

In the battle ahead, we are unified. From progressive to moderate, virtually all of us agree that regime change is our common goal. Support for third party politics is invisible, even among those who voted for Nader in 2000.

We were part of a tremendous effort to halt the invasion of Iraq, supported by many tens of millions of people across the globe. Most of the world is with us, and for much more than a peace movement; for a movement for sanity, human values and the future.

We also need to tap into our deepest, most magnanimous courage to help us give up old habits and narrow agendas, and sacrifice more for the whole. One woman with a lot of courage is Doris "Granny D" Haddock, who at age 95 is still raising hell; just a few years ago she walked across the country to promote campaign finance reform. She recently reminded us of something profound. During the recent peace marches, despite the angry speeches and the losses to be suffered by so many, she said: "The people in the marches were joyful. Did you notice that? Did you feel it yourself? The best smiles I've seen in years." She went on to state that this time can also be "about something far deeper than the Bush attack du jour... Did you not hope, as a child, that one day it would be in your hands to save the world? Is it not indeed joyful to embark on a life of great meaning? Aren't we joyful for this moment, when all is at stake? We are, we are. And do not stand in the way of our joy."

Step #2: Acknowledge What We Are Powerless to Change

We can't change the fact that September 11 happened and fundamentally transformed the nature of American politics. We need to face the reality of our defeat in trying to stop the attack on Iraq. We never stood a chance. The rules have changed. We were playing by the old rules, advocating for inspections and multilateralism, thinking that politics is about negotiation and listening to constituencies. Now it's about raw power, and we need to exercise our own power in the campaign to defeat Bush. The conservatives effectively established new rules of engagement: Anything goes; be as radical and as unreasonable as you can get away with; play the fear card; and count on the corporate media to carry the message. Conservatives got away with invading Iraq, and the only way to stop them is to defeat them in the election of 2004.

The conservatives have invested enough money particularly by wealthy right-wingers in think tanks and communications over the past 40 years to reach the point where, according to the New York Times, they believe that they have initiated "an era of dominance" -- despite the fact that significant majorities oppose their positions. We can't change the fact that the conservatives are likely to raise half a billion dollars to support the Bush candidacy; or that the corporate media, especially radio networks and television networks like Fox and NBC/General Electric, will work hard to get Bush reelected.

If we are to succeed, we must recognize some important truths. Politically, the "facts" will not set us free, and issues alone will not win us elections. The other side thinks very differently than we do. Forty percent of the U.S. population will accept virtually anything that Bush and Co. say. Most of these people get all their news from television. This 40 percent of the population will never agree with us, and there is nothing we can do about it. They will not change, nor will they see the light. They are the fundamentalists of America, the religious shock troops, the millions of fearful, and the conservative wealthy who fund and fuel the current conservative efforts at hegemony.

It's not easy to write off 100 million people. In our own stubborn way, we liberals and progressives think everyone can change.

If you don't accept the depth of this conservative hold on 40 percent of the population, read "Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think," by University of California linguistics professor George Lakoff. The book explains how conservatives think profoundly differently than progressives and why white males vote against their economic interests. It also offers insights into how we might frame our own issues.

Still, none of the things we can't change matter as much as what we can do, by educating, mobilizing, motivating, sacrificing, sharing and setting good examples. We will use plain old people power to rise up and regain balance in our country. We have the numbers, we have the truth, and we have the vision for a better world. We need the confidence, the discipline, and the smarts to pull it off.

Step #3: Communicate Our Vision

To be successful in American politics, we need undecided voters to come over to our side. We must communicate a positive vision of the future. Most Americans like to be on the winning team, so we need winning ideas and stars who can carry the message forward. Going negative doesn't help. When we attack the conservative frame, we actually reinforce their messages. We need our message.

A strong vision would draw on the deep history and powerful metaphor of people working together to make this country strong, to protect ourselves and one another, to care about the health and safety of all our people.

Giving one example of a big picture vision is Granny D: "We are the people who believe in a world of environmental beauty, of happiness and not exploitation, of justice and not oppression and torture. A world safe for children. Government budgets that invest in our smart babies, not smart bombs. We believe in international law and cooperative action."

Step #4: Confront Our Weaknesses

To be honest with ourselves, we have to confront our seeming compulsion to repeat the same strategies, no matter how many times they fail. We specialize in large single-issue membership organizations. We pride ourselves on our unswerving dedication to myriad idealistic issues. Our organizations at times become little more than self-perpetuating efforts to secure funding dollars.

This may sound harsh. Many of these issues are important in their own way, but now, with so much at stake, the many do not add up to the whole.

Moving forward requires acknowledging what's not serving us. Single-issue politics is the Achilles' heel of progressive Democrats. Conservatives understand that individual issues need to be linked to an overall moral and ethical perspective. As George Lakoff explains, "They fit the issues together, develop conservative value-based language, and then highjack American virtues like freedom and compassion and give them conservative definitions...Progressives in contrast are hampered by the plethora of issues, rather than the overarching value perspective that rationalizes the polices."

The longstanding approach of "letting a thousands flowers bloom" has not added up. Battles on hundreds of fronts, competing for attention and funding, will not bring us political power. Too many voices often cancel each other out, and the confusing cacophony can send people away. We have to rethink change and appreciate that by gaining political clout our issues have a better chance of winning.

Step #5: Practice Being Realistic

A big behavioral change for many will be diving into electoral politics. Many of us have viewed elections as tainted, trivial or hopelessly uncool. We may have preferred the detachment of the cynical or the purity of issue advocacy. After decades of attacking the political system as hopelessly corrupted by campaign financing, we regard politics as dirty and impervious to change. But alas, despite its enormous flaws, it is the only system we've got.

Author Jonathan Schell says, "Elections are a fabulous tool for bringing about change -- if you use them! You have to infuse them with your energy. There's something tautological about rejecting elections. It's like an admission of defeat. It's very bad to admit defeat when you're in a movement. It's a big mistake. You should try to win. You may fail; there's no victory guaranteed in this world, in life. But you should aim to win and really change things."

When we opt out of campaigns, the political consultants and media buyers take over. These guys just add to the nasty image of politics, particularly with their multi-million dollar hit ads, often designed to turn people off voting altogether and leave them confused, discouraged and disgusted.

We'll also need to sacrifice some of our purity. As Granny D put it, "Politics is about winning. For us, it is about winning to save lives and raise people up from poverty and illness and loneliness and injustice."

Finally, we need to shake our frequent paralysis regarding public educational activity of non-profits. The outrageously partisan behavior of Pat Robertson's and other conservative groups operating as tax exempt ultimately prevailed in the courts. Still, many liberal foundations and their grantees remain gun-shy about aggressive public education.

Some estimate that just a top group of the largest liberal non-profit organizations has as much as $2 billion dollars in operating budgets. Although tax laws prohibit organizations from advocating for specific candidates, they can still do a lot of public education offering workable models and far different approaches to current domestic and foreign policies. And staff are free to be partisan on their own time.

Step #6: Stop Squabbling and Make Amends

You may have heard the joke: What's a progressive firing squad? Answer: A circle.

Enough! Or, as progressive leader and communications guy Dan Carol says: "Kumbaya dammit. There are ways to stand for principles without fighting over crumbs. Start with everyone sharing their vision of what they want and need ... and check your passive aggressiveness at the door. Let's not forget that the perfect is the enemy of the good."

It is time to declare an amnesty. If South Africa can have a reconciliation, why not progressives? Let us join our competitors and our former enemies in new collaborations toward victory.

Step #7: Think Strategically

If you have read this far, you are probably part of the core Democratic vote. Not enough of us have been active in Democratic Party politics or elections. Let's make that history.

Make no mistake; we are not a majority. Clinton won the '92 presidential race with 43 percent of the vote (with Perot in the race against Bob Dole). We hover around 40 percent of the electorate. The conservatives and Republicans are also close to 40 percent. To become a majority, we need to reach swing voters. Electoral College rules mean that the Democratic candidate could win the popular vote by a million votes in 2004 and still lose the election. We need to win a couple of red states while hanging on to the blue states Gore won in 2000.

Do you know which states are red? Which are swing states? Which voters are swing voters? It's time to get strategic! Below is a list. If you live in a swing state, get to work; if you don't live in a swing state, start visiting and finding all your friends and relatives who are in one.

Swing State Line Up:

The Blues: In 2000, Al Gore really won 10 states by less than 6%: Florida (which was given to the Republicans by the Supreme Court); New Mexico, Wisconsin, Iowa and Oregon (by less than 1%); Minnesota (by 2.5%); and Pennsylvania, Michigan, Maine and Washington (by about 5%). The Reds: George W. Bush won eight states by less than 6.5% (not counting Florida), five of those by less than 5%: New Hampshire (which he won by only 7,200 votes, or 1.3%); Ohio, Nevada and Missouri (by about 3.5%); Tennessee (4%); Arkansas (5.5%); Arizona and West Virginia (about 6.5%). </p>

Step #8: Deal With the Politics of Fear

Fear is the subtext of American politics. The Republicans know that fearful people tend to vote conservative, so generating and exploiting fear will be high on their agenda. Expect every kind of Republican surprise: Code Reds, new acts of terrorism, invasions of other countries, the sudden capture of Osama bin Laden or Saddam Hussein. There may be dirty tricks in this election.

Even though some of us don't feel it acutely, fear is a fundamental issue in America. It's no accident that we have more than 11,000 gun deaths a year while neighboring Canada has far fewer with as many guns per capita. America just passed the 2 million mark in the number of people incarcerated in prisons. While violent crime goes down, the presentation of violent crime in the media escalates.

Generating fear of "the other" is a staple of Republican politics. Only united can we can fight it. But this isn't simple and requires a lot of discussion, thought and creative ideas. The main point is to acknowledge that fear is on people's minds and not trivialize or deny it. The antidote to fear is joy and courage. It is mutual support and protection and a clear, forthright policy on national security. Progressive values are about protecting our families, our communities, making our lives safe and fulfilling. But we're not interested, as the Bush administration insists is necessary, in trading freedom for security. As Move On's Wes Boyd notes: "Luckily, Americans are made of sterner stuff and we'll continue to protect freedom and it will make us strong."

Step #9: Examine Our Privilege and Embrace Diversity

This step is particularly aimed at those of us in the social change business. Are we too aloof from the grittiness of electoral politics and face-to-face organizing and talking with people who don't agree with us? Most of the millions of people who make up the leadership and rank and file of non-profits and foundations are highly educated, have health insurance and many have family support. Even when we have risen from the working class, we have the privilege of networks and access to mentors and support.

When the economy gets worse, when Medicare and Medicaid are cut, when the minimum wage is stuck way below the living wage, when tax breaks go to the rich, most of us remain untouched. In some cases, we actually benefit from political crises; our organizations can raise more money. But poor people and many people of color have no such luxuries. They can't criticize elections as a distraction on the road to political change, as a prominent peace leader did recently. They have to deal with the political reality.

Diversity is a fundamental progressive value, just like fairness and protection of families. Our hybridness is a strength. The mix of our skills, talents, experiences, histories and colors makes us much more than the sum of our parts and imbues us with the power to defeat the more homogeneous and rigid conservatives.

We also need to keep in mind that many of our brilliant and exciting current efforts are white and middle class. We learned from the 2002 primary elections that ignoring the base and running to the middle will lose elections, as minority voters stayed home in droves and resources didn't make it into their communities. Hopefully 2002 was the aberration, and the powerful voter registering and organizing work that was done in Florida (e.g., that won that state for Gore, until the Supreme Court decided otherwise) will be the model across the country. African Americans were far ahead of other groups in opposing the invasion of Iraq, and the rapidly growing Latino population is very concerned about the impact of war budgets and tax cuts on services their communities desperately need. Minority communities represent the strongest element in the quest for regime change. It is crucial that diversity issues be addressed at the beginning of any broad-based planning for 2004, and not as an afterthought.

Step #10: Create an Independent Power, Not Reliant on Parties or Candidates

To help us win in 2004, how about organizing a progressive electoral movement that becomes a force in the election by not picking one of the candidates in the primaries? Instead we'll raise money, develop an active base nationwide and effectively target key swing states. We earn our credibility by working while the primaries are underway, building an infrastructure that is ready to roll the last four months of the campaign on behalf of whomever the Democrats nominate.

All the Democratic candidates are superior to George W. Bush; even Joe Lieberman, the guy progressives love to hate. Domestically, all these candidates believe in fundamental values and issues that if framed effectively can appeal to a wide cross-section of Democrats and swing voters. These are themes, values and positions that Bush clearly does not support. In addition, a forceful progressive presence will help keep candidates on message, give them backbone on issues, and balance the inevitable challenges from the media and the conservative Democrats when candidates take strong populist positions. Of course many progressives will support candidates closest to them on key issues. But no matter who gets nominated, we need to get the nominee elected.

It would be a bold move to quickly organize and grow a large-scale independent campaign for regime change at home. Let's call it the "Independent Force." It would counter the stereotypes that progressives can't work together and that partnerships don't travel well across race, class and issue lines. If key leadership groups bought in, such a formation could, by effectively using the Internet, number five million and be well funded with $10 million by next summer. No, that wouldn't be enough. Yet, big organizations and coalitions of insiders wielding large amounts of money may not be the best way to engage the rank and file.

A regime change movement would: a) ensure an organizational infrastructure, especially in swing states, to help elect the Democratic nominee; b) coordinate and articulate a clear vision of the values and principles generally shared by all the Democratic candidates and strongly desired by millions of independent and progressive Democrats; and c) create a way for the progressive and activist universe to exercise political influence after the election. It would hold the Democratic nominee accountable during the election (and hopefully afterward). It would create effective new ways to work together in the event of Bush's reelection.

Progressives need to be a vigilant counterweight to the bad habits of Beltway thinking, potential big organization in-fighting, and the influence of some of the Democratic Party's wealthy donors. Ingrained attitudes that take the base of voters for granted, depend on negative campaigning, run to the middle, instead of standing for issues clearly and firmly, have led to failure in the past, but not this time if we succeed.

Step #11: Use and Trust Independent Media

The Republican-controlled FCC has decided to make media more conservative, more corporate and more concentrated. Given the media system we have already, that's hard to swallow. Now we'll have more nightmares like Clear Channel, which owns more than 1,200 stations and is infamous for dumbing down radio and organizing pro-war rallies.

But even before this latest stage, the "Fox effect" pushed news coverage to the right. Rupert Murdoch's pending purchase of Direct TV exponentially increases the power of conservative TV. This is all wrong and unacceptable, but by everyone's estimation, changing the media system is a long-term struggle. The corporate media system is likely to get worse as far as the eye can see.

We don't have time to wait. Yes, we should work the contradictions in corporate media as best we can, since the media system needs a semblance of objectivity to be credible enough to make their profits. But also we need to use our own independent media system, which, with the help of the Internet, has grown tremendously, risen in quality and reaches many more people than ever before. AlterNet.org, where I work, Common Dreams, Tom Paine.com, the Nation, Salon, Pacific News Service and many more (including WireTapmag.org, the feisty youth site), are powerful daily information sources. When added up, the independent media often do much more than the corporate media in presenting details and diversity of voices.

It is important to have alternative perspectives and viable options in play. Michael Moore, progressive media's superstar, has shown that it's possible to reach millions with a very strong populist message. (Moore's next film is in the works and will calculate the tremendous loss of political freedom since 9/11 while tracing the relationship of the bin Laden and Bush families, all in time for the 2004 election.) But there are dozens of other voices also reaching millions, because the Internet makes it possible to amplify radio shows, columns, speeches and great journalism every day.

Many of us have become "connectors," zipping the best ideas, analysis and personal voices around the web so we all know what Robert Scheer, Arianna Huffington, Molly Ivins, Arundhati Roy, Amy Goodman and numerous others are writing, thinking and saying. Worldlink TV and FreeSpeech TV, our only progressive TV networks, are improving everyday. (Sure, you have to get a satellite dish to watch them, but you'll also get "The Sopranos," so why not?)

When Greg Palast was asked how his current "alternative ' book became a bestseller, he told the interviewer the alternative press needs to change its name: "It reaches more people than the mainstream."

Step #12: Make a Commitment

Activist Harriet Barlow has started talking to friends about the "5 percent" plan. If you are really serious about defeating Bush, she says, commit 5 percent of your income and 5 percent of your time to the cause; more if you can afford it. And start now. Many others are in tune with Barlow. If you can, why not vacation or even temporarily relocate to key swing states like Ohio, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Florida and Nevada, especially if you are from there or have family or friends there? Dedicate a portion of your time to what will be the most important election of our lives. If idealistic young people can travel to Iraq and Palestine, why not to Kansas City, Cleveland, Pittsburg or Jacksonville?

Dropping everything and moving to a swing state may seem extreme, but there are many steps along the way. One thing we need to do is get together and talk about what's at stake and give each other encouragement. Regime Change house parties, salons and picnics can become the rage. Progressive leaders travel all the time and are aching for invitations -- give them a call, especially if you are in a swing state. Plan on facilitating an exchange of ideas and information, not just hosting a speech. We need more interaction and voices, fewer speeches.

Many organizations with people on the ground, such as ACORN, NAACP, Greenpeace, League of Conservation Voters, Rock The Vote and Win Without War and their affiliates will have local efforts going across the country. Check out their websites, volunteer, send them money if you can.

Don Hazen is the executive director of the Independent Media Institute (IMI). This article was written independently of AlterNet. The opinions expressed in this article in no way reflect the positions of IMI or AlterNet.

© 2003 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.

Tax Cuts

2003-06-13T18:30:24Z

Tax Cuts

BY HASAN DIWAN
Prevailing US economic theory states that tax cuts are good for the economy. But there is no mention of what time period the theory refers to. While, they'll stimulate the economy short-term, I believe they will lead to inflation long-term. I'll illustrate this using a mathematical example (using MathML), but first I'll explain the assumptions which must be made in order for this model to hold.</p>

We must first assume that a tax cut will lead to no increase in saving. While I realise this is not a realistic assumption, the only change one has to make is take a fraction of the total tax cut amount for individuals.

On to the model, assume the US government decides to give every taxpayer a $500 tax credit. Based on our assumption above, this means that an individual's disposable income goes up $500. This injects $500 x 300 million or 150 billion dollars into the economy. Savvy shopkeepers will quickly realise that they'll make more profit by increasing their prices next time they are updated (this is referred to as "menu cost"). This is what economists call inflation.

Most economists acknowledge that long-term inflation is not a good thing. So, long-term, the country will need a tax increase to keep the money supply constant.

So, why do Republicans scream about tax cuts? It's good politics. Take the 2002 tax cuts, for instance. They are only in effect till 2006. At which point, there will have to be a tax increase. Also, since Bush doesn't get to run for a third term as president, he won't care.

Please leave comments in the appropriate section of the blog

To-Do list

2003-06-11T18:38:09Z

There's a party at Moscone Centre as part of JavaONE from 1900~2300. I may go and get entertained (not pissed, I'm not quite that depressed). There's a basketball game starting at 1730 that I'd like to watch. Priscilla's got plans all week and I'm too in love with her to apply the three-strikes rule. As for travel plans, I need to pick a flight around mid-July and report it to Tracy at the travel office to book the flight so I can spend a month in Copenhagen, Denmark. It'll be an enjoyable trip. The remainder of my todo list is boring: close the Wells Fargo account, make sure Informatica deposits my paycheck into Netbank properly, stop mail delivery for the time I'm away, get plug converters for my devices (laptop, cell phone, iPod), give Priscilla the keys so she can come check on my apartment, give the apartment building managers the rent check for August, and look at my packing list to see if I have to buy anything from Wallgreen's before I leave. Any tips or requests for little gifts are welcome... No promises, but if I see them, I'll be happy to pick them up and bring them home.

Dumb Rich People

2003-06-11T18:17:53Z

Dumb Rich People ---------------- I recently read an article by an economist who said that poverty causes people to become terrorists. He used big words and was very convincing. Then I watched TV coverage of a high school hazing ritual in an upscale suburban neighborhood. Dozens of well-to-do Induhviduals paid for the privilege of sitting in a field and having mud, paint, garbage, eggs, pig guts, and excrement shoved up their nostrils while being beaten with blunt objects. I'm not an economist, but my theory is that you can convince a certain percentage of Induhviduals to do any dangerous thing, whether they happen to be poor or not. So let's stop picking on poor people. If peer pressure can convince 20% of rich kids to start smoking cigarettes -- and it does -- it isn't much of a leap to convince them to grow scraggly beards and drive exploding cars. It's mostly a difference in timing. Osama inherited half a billion dollars. So I rule out poverty as a cause of terror. I blame rich Induhviduals, and peer pressure. Peer pressure is the most powerful force on the planet, and we need to use it to our advantage. For example, I recommend that the Western media and politicians stop using the menacing-yet-cool phrase "Al-Qaeda" and start referring to the group as the "frickin' Induhviduals." Like the proverbial dog chasing a car, the Induhviduals haven't considered what would happen if they caught one. For example, let's say they (the Induhviduals, not the dogs) accomplish their stated goal of destroying the economies of the Western world. Is that really a good plan for people who live in a desert and import most of their food? Just for the record, if I'm down to my last potato, I'm not sharing it with a guy who wants to kill me so he can get a better supply of virgins in paradise. That lesson is a little thing I call Economics 101, infidel style. For the Induhviduals, it must look as if Americans are really dumb to have the most awesome arsenal in the history of the world and still be unable to stop terror attacks. They don't realize that the way Americans look at it is that, so far, we're "really mad," but not yet "REALLY, REALLY mad." Oh, there's a difference. Americans understand that somewhere between "inconvenient air travel" and "complete breakdown of Western civilization," the "REALLY, REALLY mad" part kicks in. I won't give away what happens then, but remember you first heard the phrase "New Iowa" in the Dilbert Newsletter. And let's stop calling the terrorist supporters "fundamentalists," because that sounds like it could be a good thing. I recommend a more descriptive label, such as "slow learners," to keep things in perspective. Then let's airdrop science and economics textbooks on their terrorist training camps with condescending notes, such as, "Maybe this will help. Call us if you have questions." This would be a small step, in the sense that reading books about economics is only slightly better than suicide. But you have to start somewhere. That's my plan. If you have a better one, be sure to include it in your next newsletter.

Strike 2

2003-06-10T01:38:26Z

I called up Priscilla and asked her to dinner Tuesday, she said no. Then I asked her if she was going to the party on Saturday with me to which she also said she was busy. Going back to my 3-strikes rule, she has to refuse me for the next date and I'll tell her to piss off. She's so sweet and cuddly though. :(

[from newsday.com] Spitzer says Dean can't Win

2003-06-09T23:01:32Z

[paraphrased from a letter I wrote to the Newsday editor]
In today's AP Wire, there is a story where New York Attorney General Spitzer alleged that Howard Dean could never win the Democratic primary as he came out against the war. I am of the firm belief that if Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction are NOT found, the anti-war candidates (Dean, Graham, etc.) will come out ahead. As for the comment "The American people will not elect somebody who opposed a war that they supported,". where is Mr. Spitzer referring to when he says that? Certainly, where I am in California, there is little support for a pre-emptive war that costs lives and puts fear into businesses that are meant to invest the economy out of its tailspin.
In order for the economy to recover, Americans must feel SAFE to invest in goods. Safety is a paramount concern for economic growth to take place. A country whose populace doesn't feel safe will never progress. I, for one, am disappointed that the Bush administration fails to realise this.

PLATTSBURGH, N.Y. -- Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean cannot win the presidential election because he opposed the war in Iraq, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer said Thursday.

"The American people will not elect somebody who opposed a war that they supported," Spitzer told the Press-Republican of Plattsburgh. Spitzer also said Dean won't win the Democratic nomination.

Dean has said the war did nothing to stop terrorism. He also voiced concerns that fighting a pre-emptive war without support from other nations may have rid the world of a dictator but will end up painting Americans as "occupiers rather than liberators."

Spitzer, a Democrat who did support the war, said that photos of mass graves in Iraq prove the conflict was justified.

"If we want to take on (President) Bush where he is absolutely, completely dead and maliciously wrong in every one of his domestic policies, from fiscal issues on down, we're not going to do it with Howard Dean, who will lose all of the swing states," Spitzer said.

Calls to Dean's campaign office Thursday night were not immediately returned.

Spitzer attended last week's Democratic Party Presidential Forum on Rural Issues in Lake Placid, where Dean, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich appeared. Other Democratic contenders include Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, Missouri Rep. Dick Gephardt, North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, former Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley Braun and the Rev. Al Sharpton of New York City.

Spitzer said he does not see a front runner for the nomination yet.

[from Washington Post] We're not out of the woods yet

2003-06-09T21:53:27Z

Alan Greenspan, the chairman of the DC Federal Reserve, sees "no major evidence" of a US economic recovery. He also states that deflation is now a definite possibility. This means more job losses, including very likely mine *sniff*. I'll start studying for the GREs now. Maybe by the time I finish graduate school, Priscilla and I will have decided if we want to be together long-term or not.

Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said today there is no "major evidence" that U.S. economic growth is accelerating and hinted again that the central bank may soon cut interest rates to boost growth and guard against a dangerous period of deflation.

Speaking via satellite to a meeting in Berlin of the world's leading private bankers, Greenspan said the Fed has no concerns that a pickup in growth would cause inflation to get worse. Instead, "we would be far more inclined, as we have been over the last couple of years, to be taking out insurance against economic weakness" that could cause what he termed a "corrosive deflation."

The Fed is concerned not about "the issue of deflation in the sense of falling prices per se, but the issue of corrosive deflation, that is, a deflation that essentially feeds on itself, creates falling asset prices, which in turn brings down levels of economic activity," the Fed chairman said.

A number of analysts interpreted Greenspan's remarks as an indication that he favors cutting the Fed's 1.25 percent target for overnight interest rates by at least a quarter-percentage point when central bank officials hold a policymaking session on June 24-25.

Many forecasters expect economic growth, which appears to be running at about 2 percent annual rate in the first half of this year, to accelerate to a 3.5 percent to 4 percent rate in coming quarters. But the Fed chairman said such predictions remain just forecasts, and as long as that's the case, a further rate cut could provide "insurance" that they become a reality, the analysts said.

Greenspan used similar language, but not quite so forcefully, in a hearing before Congress' Joint Economic Committee last month. Today he also said that the Fed knows so little about what would happen in a deflationary environment-which he stressed remains highly unlikely to occur-that monetary policy has to be "extraordinarily cautious."

"We're far more unclear on the issue of deflation [than inflation], and as a consequence, we need a wider firebreak, in logging and forestry terms, because we know so little about it. So we lean over backwards to make certain that we contain deflationary forces," Greenspan said.

Economic Robert V. DiClemente of Salomon Smith Barney in New York said "the increasing drumbeat of the insurance logic" and now the new notion of a "wider firebreak" has convinced him that Greenspan wants another rate cut. One point of such a cut would be to underscore the fact that the Fed would not be likely to begin to raise rates again as soon as growth begins to accelerate, he said.

"We have to get growth into the 4 percent range before the Fed will think they have" averted the deflation danger, DiClemente said. "We have got a long way to go to root out this risk."

One of Greenspan's policymaking colleagues, Robert T. Parry, president of the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank, said much the same thing as the Fed chairman in a speech in Los Angeles yesterday.

Interest rates already are very low, but "if it seemed appropriate, we still would have room to give a boost to the economy, even though it's possible the economy could pick up vigorously later in the year," Parry said. "Put another way, in the current low-inflation environment, downside surprises to growth -- and, as a result, to inflation -- would be more of a concern than upside surprises."

There is so much unused production capacity and so much slack in labor markets that even if growth does accelerate in the second half, "the already low inflation rate is likely to trend lower," which would leave "a small, but still worrisome, possibility of deflation going forward," Parry said.

Greenspan told the bankers in Berlin that the U.S. economy weakened in March and April around the period of the Iraq war, but he added, "The data for May to date suggests that it stabilized." However, to get growth up to the stronger pace economists are predicting "the monthly data, indeed the weekly data, have got to start to move in a positive direction fairly quickly. We haven't seen that yet," he said.

On the other hand, financial indicators, such as the recent strong rally in stock prices, are "suggestive" of faster growth, as is the continued gains in productivity despite sluggish growth, Greenspan said.

The large tax cut signed into law by President Bush last week should also give the economy a boost, he said. The tax cuts "will create a fairly marked increase in after-tax income in the third quarter and one must presume that a goodly part of that will filter into consumer markets" and lead to more hiring," he said.
© 2003 The Washington Post Company

[from TechTV] RIAA Wrath Hits Teen

2003-06-09T21:29:09Z

As an alumnus of RPI, I always beam with pride whenever I see my school mentioned in the media.

On April 3, 19-year-old Jesse Jordan received a call that changed his life.

The freshman at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., learned he was being sued by one of the most powerful trade groups in the United States, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

Jordan, an information technology major, created ChewPlastic.com, the second most popular search directory on the RPI campus.

"You go to the site, you type in a search term, and it finds files on the network," Jordan said. Jordan compares his site to Google, the popular Internet search engine.

But the RIAA likens Jordan's site to Napster, the now defunct song-swap service that revolutionized the distribution of music.

"The people who run these Napster networks know full well what they are doing: Operating a sophisticated network designed to enable widespread music thievery," Cary Sherman, the president of the RIAA, said in a statement issued April 3.

"The lawsuits we've filed represent an appropriate step given the seriousness of the offense," Sherman added.

Admits No Wrongdoing

"I didn't tell people what to share. I never promoted piracy," Jordan said.

"Basically, Napster set out to create its own network specifically for music. What I did was ran a search engine on a campus network [where] the network already existed," Jordan said.

But Jordan did agree to pony up $12,000, his entire savings account, to the RIAA. Jordan and his father, Andy Jordan, felt the settlement was their best option.

"They agreed to allow Jesse to deny their allegations. They agreed to dismiss the case and all allegations against him," Andy said. "Basically they agreed that he didn't do anything wrong, but [they're] taking his 12 grand."

Jesse knew students were sharing files on his network: pictures, PowerPoint presentations, physics notes, anime, and music. But he refutes the RIAA's claim he "hijacked an academic network" and "installed an emporium for music trading."

Ruining the Music Business?

Andy believes that the RIAA's intimidating tactics will undoubtedly hurt the music industry by alienating music buyers. An avid music fan for more than 40 years, he shudders at the impact this will have on the industry's most fervent fans.

"I don't know how strongly the music companies — the people who really run the music companies — I don't know if they realize what the impact of this misguided attempt at intimidation is going to be," Andy said.

While Andy questions the motives and actions of the RIAA, he basks in pride at his son's steadfast resolve.

"He has stood up to the schoolyard bullies that are pulling this and he's said, 'You are not going to make me say something that's not true,'" Andy said.

ChewPlastic.com is asking for donations (jordaj@rpi.edu) to help recover the $12,000 settlement. As of June 6, the site has collected more than $1,700.

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