In The Days of Our Lives, Digby points out the facts that the American public are NOT seeing on their television screens today:
1. ". . . George W. Bush signed a law in Texas that expressly gave hospitals the right to remove life support if the patient could not pay and there was no hope of revival, regardless of the patient's family's wishes. It is called the Texas Futile Care Law. Under this law, a baby was removed from life support against his mother's wishes in Texas just this week. A 68 year old man was given a temporary reprieve by the Texas courts just yesterday. "
2. ". . . republicans have voted en masse to pull the plug . . . on medicaid funding that pays for the kind of care that someone like Terry Schiavo and many others who are not so severely brain damaged need all across this country."
3. ". . . the tort reform that is being contemplated by the Republican congress would preclude malpractice claims like that which has paid for Terry Schiavo's care thus far. "
4. ". . . the bankruptcy bill will make it even more difficult for families who suffer a catastrophic illness like Terry Schiavo's because they will not be able to declare chapter 7 bankruptcy and get a fresh start when the gargantuan medical bills become overwhelming."
5. '. . . this grandstanding by the congress is a purely political move designed to appease the religious right and that the legal maneuverings being employed would be anathema to any true small government conservative. "
Sunday, March 20, 2005
Don't believe what they say
MSNBC - U.S. misled allies about nuclear export
This is a huge story.
When meeting with China, Japan and South Korea five or six weeks ago, the Bush administration tried to bolster their demonization of North Korea and scare everyone by accusing North Korea of having sold nuclear materials to that rogue state Libya.
They lied. On purpose.
Actually, North Korea had sold the materials to US ally Pakistan. It was Pakistan's Abdel Qadeer Khan who then sold the materials to Libya, without North Korea's knowledge.
US intelligence showed all along that it was Pakistan that made the sale. But the Bush administration wanted to scare everyone, so they lied about what their intelligence said.
"The Bush administration's approach, intended to isolate North Korea, instead left allies increasingly doubtful as they began to learn that the briefings omitted essential details about the transaction, U.S. officials and foreign diplomats said in interviews. North Korea responded to public reports last month about the briefings by withdrawing from talks with its neighbors and the United States. In an effort to repair the damage, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is traveling through East Asia this weekend trying to get the six-nation talks back on track. The impasse was expected to dominate talks today in Seoul and then Beijing, which wields the greatest influence with North Korea."
As the story points out, this is just the latest of several lies about US intelligence findings -- "The new details follow a string of controversies concerning the Bush administration's use of intelligence on weapons of mass destruction. In the run-up to the Iraq invasion in March 2003, the White House offered a public case against Iraq that concealed dissent on nearly every element of intelligence and included interpretations unsupported by the evidence."
In fact, the world will realize now that there's a pattern of lying here, using inflated intelligence to promote political agendas. And no one will believe the Bush administration anymore.
This is a huge story.
When meeting with China, Japan and South Korea five or six weeks ago, the Bush administration tried to bolster their demonization of North Korea and scare everyone by accusing North Korea of having sold nuclear materials to that rogue state Libya.
They lied. On purpose.
Actually, North Korea had sold the materials to US ally Pakistan. It was Pakistan's Abdel Qadeer Khan who then sold the materials to Libya, without North Korea's knowledge.
US intelligence showed all along that it was Pakistan that made the sale. But the Bush administration wanted to scare everyone, so they lied about what their intelligence said.
"The Bush administration's approach, intended to isolate North Korea, instead left allies increasingly doubtful as they began to learn that the briefings omitted essential details about the transaction, U.S. officials and foreign diplomats said in interviews. North Korea responded to public reports last month about the briefings by withdrawing from talks with its neighbors and the United States. In an effort to repair the damage, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is traveling through East Asia this weekend trying to get the six-nation talks back on track. The impasse was expected to dominate talks today in Seoul and then Beijing, which wields the greatest influence with North Korea."
As the story points out, this is just the latest of several lies about US intelligence findings -- "The new details follow a string of controversies concerning the Bush administration's use of intelligence on weapons of mass destruction. In the run-up to the Iraq invasion in March 2003, the White House offered a public case against Iraq that concealed dissent on nearly every element of intelligence and included interpretations unsupported by the evidence."
In fact, the world will realize now that there's a pattern of lying here, using inflated intelligence to promote political agendas. And no one will believe the Bush administration anymore.
Best line of the day . . .
. . . from Steve Gilliard, speaking about people who think abstinence education is working: "Is there ANY area of science besides ballistics that these people pay any attention to?"
From Steve Gilliard's News Blog : Yet another study shows abstinance fails:
From Steve Gilliard's News Blog : Yet another study shows abstinance fails:
Saturday, March 19, 2005
Iraq war protests worldwide
Here, for my American readers, are photos of the Iraq war protests around the world today -- just in case the American media doesn't cover this story, I can't imagine why not:
New York
Chicago
San Francisco
Mexico City
Rome
Sao Paulo
Madrid
Copenhagen
Athens
Glasgow
Istanbul
Lahore, Pakistan
Sophia, Bulgaria
Tokyo
Manila
Seoul
and two stories, from The Globe and Mail and from Yahoo.
New York
Chicago
San Francisco
Mexico City
Rome
Sao Paulo
Madrid
Copenhagen
Athens
Glasgow
Istanbul
Lahore, Pakistan
Sophia, Bulgaria
Tokyo
Manila
Seoul
and two stories, from The Globe and Mail and from Yahoo.
And I hate it when reporters don't do their jobs
Read this CP story Former Winnipeg mayor named to head round table on economy and environment. Or see this one in the Star Phoenix, entitled in a more inflammatory way PM's Patronage appointment outrages opposition MPs, and beginning with "Despite promising to end political "cronyism", Prime Minister Paul Martin announced Friday he will ignore the conclusion of a parliamentary committee and proceed with one of his most controversial patronage appointments by naming defeated Liberal candidate Glen Murray to a federal advisory agency on the environment."
What you will not find in either story is an elementary fact which the reporter who wrote it or the editor who edited it could easily have found out: the Commons Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development has five (5) Liberal members, including the chair, and seven (7) opposition members (4 conservative, two bloc and one NDP).
Excuse me folks, but is it any surprise that a majority of the committee tried to play a political game by voting against Murray? And that Martin ignored both the game and the vote?
What you will not find in either story is an elementary fact which the reporter who wrote it or the editor who edited it could easily have found out: the Commons Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development has five (5) Liberal members, including the chair, and seven (7) opposition members (4 conservative, two bloc and one NDP).
Excuse me folks, but is it any surprise that a majority of the committee tried to play a political game by voting against Murray? And that Martin ignored both the game and the vote?
Media circus du jour
The Medical Becomes Political for Congress
One aspect of the Schiavo case that I haven't read about yet is how it basically makes the case for medicare. I hope the republicans remember. This NYT story says "Many Congressional Democrats were biting their tongues Friday as they witnessed what they considered an egregious misuse of power by Republicans. They pointed to public opinion polls that show support for Mr. Schiavo's right to decide his wife's fate, but they also fear the power of the mobilized right. Plus, lawmakers of both parties say they have been moved by the videotapes they have seen of Ms. Schiavo, viewing themselves as the last barrier between her and a death sentence. Yet, as Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, warned her colleagues this week as they considered a bill that would move the case to federal court, the mix of politics and mortality can be volatile. "We change the nature of all these things to put this in the political arena," she said."
That's for sure.
If they are going to force the Florida hospital to keep her alive, well, maybe they should be paying for her care for the next 40 years.
And how many other braindamaged people are there who the US government should also be caring for? And, come to think of it, how many other people are there in the US who need medical care of all kinds, but who cannot get it? Maybe their government should care enough about them, all of them, to put its money where its mouth is, and introduce decent medicare for every american.
Oh, fat chance. I'm just being sarcastic as usual.
Like all the other "right to life" cases, the proponents don't really give a damn about Schaivo or her family or medicare issues or anything other than "winning". This all reminds me of the media frenzy over the Elian Gonzales case. But unlike that case, this one cannot be solved by an early morning raid. Because it will take weeks for her to die, some judge or politician somewhere will always find some way to continue Mrs. Shaivo's life.
At some point, her husband will give up and divorce her, leaving her to her parents. And then all her newfound friends will move on to pray on the streets about something else, like, say, the Roy Moore Ten Commendments case coming up at the Supreme Court. They will leave Mrs. Shiavo to live on and on in her vegetative state, breaking her parents' hearts as she continues to not recover from her unrecoverable brain damage. In a few years, we will see a couple of plaintive news stories from the parents wondering why all their friends have disappeared.
UPFATE: So now the whole thing will be moved to federal court, where the husband can start all over again, though the Supreme Court has already refused to hear the case. Will a federal judge decide the case differently from innumerable Florida judges? And how many more years will the circus continue now?
One aspect of the Schiavo case that I haven't read about yet is how it basically makes the case for medicare. I hope the republicans remember. This NYT story says "Many Congressional Democrats were biting their tongues Friday as they witnessed what they considered an egregious misuse of power by Republicans. They pointed to public opinion polls that show support for Mr. Schiavo's right to decide his wife's fate, but they also fear the power of the mobilized right. Plus, lawmakers of both parties say they have been moved by the videotapes they have seen of Ms. Schiavo, viewing themselves as the last barrier between her and a death sentence. Yet, as Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, warned her colleagues this week as they considered a bill that would move the case to federal court, the mix of politics and mortality can be volatile. "We change the nature of all these things to put this in the political arena," she said."
That's for sure.
If they are going to force the Florida hospital to keep her alive, well, maybe they should be paying for her care for the next 40 years.
And how many other braindamaged people are there who the US government should also be caring for? And, come to think of it, how many other people are there in the US who need medical care of all kinds, but who cannot get it? Maybe their government should care enough about them, all of them, to put its money where its mouth is, and introduce decent medicare for every american.
Oh, fat chance. I'm just being sarcastic as usual.
Like all the other "right to life" cases, the proponents don't really give a damn about Schaivo or her family or medicare issues or anything other than "winning". This all reminds me of the media frenzy over the Elian Gonzales case. But unlike that case, this one cannot be solved by an early morning raid. Because it will take weeks for her to die, some judge or politician somewhere will always find some way to continue Mrs. Shaivo's life.
At some point, her husband will give up and divorce her, leaving her to her parents. And then all her newfound friends will move on to pray on the streets about something else, like, say, the Roy Moore Ten Commendments case coming up at the Supreme Court. They will leave Mrs. Shiavo to live on and on in her vegetative state, breaking her parents' hearts as she continues to not recover from her unrecoverable brain damage. In a few years, we will see a couple of plaintive news stories from the parents wondering why all their friends have disappeared.
UPFATE: So now the whole thing will be moved to federal court, where the husband can start all over again, though the Supreme Court has already refused to hear the case. Will a federal judge decide the case differently from innumerable Florida judges? And how many more years will the circus continue now?
Becoming soulless people
Un-Volunteering: Troops Improvise to Find Way Out
One soldier's journey to a conscientious-objector application: " Here's what happened: I spent six months over there, and I came back and thought about it. What I know is that it's inhumane. It's turning 18-year-old men and women into soulless people."
One of the horrible things about this war is the horrible things that the American military has done in Iraq -- shooting families whose only crime was to be driving in the wrong place, crashing into people's homes and arresting them on rumour and hearsay, destroying towns street by street like the city of Fallujah, throwing men and women and children into prison and not letting them out again even when their innocence is proven, arresting wives to make their husbands surrender -- acting, in other words, just the way the Nazis did in France and Holland and Czechoslovakia.
The Iraq Veterans Against the War are marching this weekend at Fort Bragg. I hope they realize how many others are with them in spirit.
Also on the IVAW website I came across a reference to Codepink's coverage of the conviction and imprisonment of Iraq war resistor Camilo Mejia. In his writings from prison, Camilo quoted this poem, written by a Nazi war resistor Albrecht Hanshofer as he awaited execution:
GUILT
The burden of my guilt before the law
weighs light upon my shoulders; to plot
and to conspire was my duty to the people;
I would have been a criminal had I not.
I am guilty, though not the way you think,
I should have done my duty sooner, I was wrong,
I should have called evil more clearly by its name
I hesitated to condemn it for far too long.
I now accuse myself within my heart:
I have betrayed my conscience far too long
I have deceived myself and fellow man.
I knew the course of evil from the start
My warning was not loud nor clear enough!
Today I know what I was guilty of…
One soldier's journey to a conscientious-objector application: " Here's what happened: I spent six months over there, and I came back and thought about it. What I know is that it's inhumane. It's turning 18-year-old men and women into soulless people."
One of the horrible things about this war is the horrible things that the American military has done in Iraq -- shooting families whose only crime was to be driving in the wrong place, crashing into people's homes and arresting them on rumour and hearsay, destroying towns street by street like the city of Fallujah, throwing men and women and children into prison and not letting them out again even when their innocence is proven, arresting wives to make their husbands surrender -- acting, in other words, just the way the Nazis did in France and Holland and Czechoslovakia.
The Iraq Veterans Against the War are marching this weekend at Fort Bragg. I hope they realize how many others are with them in spirit.
Also on the IVAW website I came across a reference to Codepink's coverage of the conviction and imprisonment of Iraq war resistor Camilo Mejia. In his writings from prison, Camilo quoted this poem, written by a Nazi war resistor Albrecht Hanshofer as he awaited execution:
GUILT
The burden of my guilt before the law
weighs light upon my shoulders; to plot
and to conspire was my duty to the people;
I would have been a criminal had I not.
I am guilty, though not the way you think,
I should have done my duty sooner, I was wrong,
I should have called evil more clearly by its name
I hesitated to condemn it for far too long.
I now accuse myself within my heart:
I have betrayed my conscience far too long
I have deceived myself and fellow man.
I knew the course of evil from the start
My warning was not loud nor clear enough!
Today I know what I was guilty of…
Friday, March 18, 2005
How do you spell...
G-R-A-N-D-S-T-A-N-D-I-N-G.
If they had actually been serious, the congress would have passed these bills a week ago.Yahoo! News - House GOPs Want Feeding Tube Reinserted
Its not as though they had other things to do -- oh, no, wait, they had to interview Mark McQuire about steroids and vote to drill for oil in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge!
Never mind.
If they had actually been serious, the congress would have passed these bills a week ago.Yahoo! News - House GOPs Want Feeding Tube Reinserted
Its not as though they had other things to do -- oh, no, wait, they had to interview Mark McQuire about steroids and vote to drill for oil in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge!
Never mind.
Don't you just hate it
When you do a "blog this" post, and get it all written, with bunches of extra links. Then, when you go to hit "publish" you hit the "x" box by mistake -- and poof! its gone!
I just did a brilliant post pointing to a brilliant My Blahg post about the war on terror and including various great links to the New York reaction to the republican convention and... oh well, I guess the world will just have to suffer the loss. Go see My Blahg anyway.
I just did a brilliant post pointing to a brilliant My Blahg post about the war on terror and including various great links to the New York reaction to the republican convention and... oh well, I guess the world will just have to suffer the loss. Go see My Blahg anyway.
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
Mencken quotes
TBRNews.org has this great H.L. Mencken quote: As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.Here's some more of the things that H.L. Mencken said:
A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.
A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers.
All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.
All successful newspapers are ceaselessly querulous and bellicose. They never defend anyone or anything if they can help it; if the job is forced on them, they tackle it by denouncing someone or something else.
Any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood.
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.
Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats.
Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable.
Giving every man a vote has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good.
I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.
In the United States, doing good has come to be, like patriotism, a favorite device of persons with something to sell.
It is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has descended from man.
It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place.
It is impossible to imagine Goethe or Beethoven being good at billiards or golf.
It is inaccurate to say that I hate everything. I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty, and common decency. This makes me forever ineligible for public office.
Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.
A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.
A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers.
All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.
All successful newspapers are ceaselessly querulous and bellicose. They never defend anyone or anything if they can help it; if the job is forced on them, they tackle it by denouncing someone or something else.
Any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood.
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.
Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats.
Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable.
Giving every man a vote has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good.
I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.
In the United States, doing good has come to be, like patriotism, a favorite device of persons with something to sell.
It is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has descended from man.
It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place.
It is impossible to imagine Goethe or Beethoven being good at billiards or golf.
It is inaccurate to say that I hate everything. I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty, and common decency. This makes me forever ineligible for public office.
Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.
And speaking of the right wing . . .
POGGE posts So much for the big tent quoting the CEO of Concerned Christians Canada Inc. Pogge notes that "This guy[Craig Chandler] wants to bring the same culture war into Canada that's polarizing the U.S. . . . There's the same triumphalism the religious right displayed following Bush's re-election". Chandler has the same bland assumption that Canadians are basically conservative.
Well, no, actually, I would argue that Canada is NOT a conservative country.
We support government involvement in the Canadian economy - grants, loans, investments of all kinds.
We support medicare - we demand universal access.
We support old age pensions - in the States, there have been politicians for the last 60 years who have argued against Social Security, but there has never been, in Canada, a politician of any party who has argued against the OAP.
We support equalization payments between the have and the have-not provinces - we argue about the amount and the formula, but not against the principle.
We support orderly marketing of our products, through the wheat board, the commodity boards, etc. We don't believe in "every man for himself".
Basically, we support peace, order and good government -- that's what POGGE is all about!
Well, no, actually, I would argue that Canada is NOT a conservative country.
We support government involvement in the Canadian economy - grants, loans, investments of all kinds.
We support medicare - we demand universal access.
We support old age pensions - in the States, there have been politicians for the last 60 years who have argued against Social Security, but there has never been, in Canada, a politician of any party who has argued against the OAP.
We support equalization payments between the have and the have-not provinces - we argue about the amount and the formula, but not against the principle.
We support orderly marketing of our products, through the wheat board, the commodity boards, etc. We don't believe in "every man for himself".
Basically, we support peace, order and good government -- that's what POGGE is all about!
With friends like these . . .
Hill plans to fight gay marriage Poor Harper -- every time he turns around, his Conservatives are demonstrating yet again why Canada doesn't want them to run the country.
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
A 20-year wait for justice
CBC News Indepth: Air India - Bombing of Air India Flight 182
All of Canada is waiting for this verdict -- almost 20 years after the bomb exploded, causing the deaths of 329 people, mostly Canadians.
I remember, the week after this happened, that Maclean's magazine didn't even make this their cover story -- they just ran a banner at the top "Air India disaster" -- you wouldn't even have known that Canadians died.
Twenty years ago, the fact that the people on this plane were East Indians was more important than the fact that they were Canadians.
Ten years ago, a lot of people seemed to have forgotten that no one had ever been prosecuted for this crime.
Finally, people got angry enough to demand action. I think the failure to prosecute was likely not because they didn't know who did it, but rather because prosecutors were concerned that the screwups with the evidence jeopardized a successful prosecution. So we'll see tomorrow whether the Crown's case was good enough -- but at least they tried.
UPDATE - Well the verdict is in, and it is as I feared. Perhaps the Scottish "not proven" would fit the case the best. And see this excellent post by Ross No Guantanamos Allowed I hadn't thought of this point, but he is absolutely right.
All of Canada is waiting for this verdict -- almost 20 years after the bomb exploded, causing the deaths of 329 people, mostly Canadians.
I remember, the week after this happened, that Maclean's magazine didn't even make this their cover story -- they just ran a banner at the top "Air India disaster" -- you wouldn't even have known that Canadians died.
Twenty years ago, the fact that the people on this plane were East Indians was more important than the fact that they were Canadians.
Ten years ago, a lot of people seemed to have forgotten that no one had ever been prosecuted for this crime.
Finally, people got angry enough to demand action. I think the failure to prosecute was likely not because they didn't know who did it, but rather because prosecutors were concerned that the screwups with the evidence jeopardized a successful prosecution. So we'll see tomorrow whether the Crown's case was good enough -- but at least they tried.
UPDATE - Well the verdict is in, and it is as I feared. Perhaps the Scottish "not proven" would fit the case the best. And see this excellent post by Ross No Guantanamos Allowed I hadn't thought of this point, but he is absolutely right.
Monday, March 14, 2005
Lysenko rides again
This is nuts -- Battle on Teaching Evolution Sharpens They seem to think that teaching creationism is going to be the magic bullet that turns the US into a Christian Right country and destroys those dastardly librrulls once and for all.
"To fundamentalist Christians, [Baptist minister] Fox said, the fight to teach God's role in creation is becoming the essential front in America's culture war. The issue is on the agenda at every meeting of pastors he attends. If evolution's boosters can be forced to back down, he said, the Christian right's agenda will advance. "If you believe God created that baby, it makes it a whole lot harder to get rid of that baby," Fox said. "If you can cause enough doubt on evolution, liberalism will die." . . . "Creationism's going to be our big battle. We're hoping that Kansas will be the model, and we're in it for the long haul," Fox said."
Yeah -- like Russia thought that so-called peasant genius Lysenko was going to solve all their agricultural problems because he was just SUCH a good communist.
"In December 1929, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin gave a famous speech elevating "practice" above "theory", elevating the judgment of the political bosses above that of the scientists and technical specialists. Though the Soviet government under Stalin gave much more support to genuine agricultural scientists in its early days, after 1935 the balance of power abruptly swung towards Lysenko and his followers. Lysenko was put in charge of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences of the Soviet Union and made responsible for ending the propagation of "harmful" ideas among Soviet scientists. Lysenko served this purpose faithfully, causing the expulsion, imprisonment, and death of hundreds of scientists and the demise of genetics throughout the Soviet Union. This period is known as Lysenkoism." It was 35 years before Lysenko was repudiated.
"To fundamentalist Christians, [Baptist minister] Fox said, the fight to teach God's role in creation is becoming the essential front in America's culture war. The issue is on the agenda at every meeting of pastors he attends. If evolution's boosters can be forced to back down, he said, the Christian right's agenda will advance. "If you believe God created that baby, it makes it a whole lot harder to get rid of that baby," Fox said. "If you can cause enough doubt on evolution, liberalism will die." . . . "Creationism's going to be our big battle. We're hoping that Kansas will be the model, and we're in it for the long haul," Fox said."
Yeah -- like Russia thought that so-called peasant genius Lysenko was going to solve all their agricultural problems because he was just SUCH a good communist.
"In December 1929, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin gave a famous speech elevating "practice" above "theory", elevating the judgment of the political bosses above that of the scientists and technical specialists. Though the Soviet government under Stalin gave much more support to genuine agricultural scientists in its early days, after 1935 the balance of power abruptly swung towards Lysenko and his followers. Lysenko was put in charge of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences of the Soviet Union and made responsible for ending the propagation of "harmful" ideas among Soviet scientists. Lysenko served this purpose faithfully, causing the expulsion, imprisonment, and death of hundreds of scientists and the demise of genetics throughout the Soviet Union. This period is known as Lysenkoism." It was 35 years before Lysenko was repudiated.
Sunday, March 13, 2005
Watch your backs!
MSNBC - Poll: 7 in 10 worried about government secrecy
This story reports on an issue about which I am increasingly concerned. The story indicates that only 6 per cent of the US public thinks there is now "too much" access to government records. But I'll bet among that 6 per cent is the Pentagon, the State Department, and the White House. Most of the prisoner abuse stories and Guantanamo revelations of the last several months would not have happened without the ACLU and the Freedom of Information Act, and I am convinced that the Bush Administration would love to trash this act if they possibly could.
So it gave me a chill to read in this news story: "A bipartisan bill now in the U.S. Senate seeks to revisit the federal Freedom of Information Act to address many of the open-government complaints." I couldn't find out what bill this might be, but I don't believe it - a "bipartisan" bill in today's Republican-lock-step let's-all-vote-for-Gonzales-the-Torturer Senate? A bill aimed at "improving" access to government records? Oh yeah, tell me another one. Given the pattern now followed in the Bush administration, what would happen is that a bunch of amendments would be shoehorned into the bill at the last minute which would actually result in slamming the door shut on FOIA requests. And the republicans would vote for this, Democrats need to watch their backs on this one.
This story reports on an issue about which I am increasingly concerned. The story indicates that only 6 per cent of the US public thinks there is now "too much" access to government records. But I'll bet among that 6 per cent is the Pentagon, the State Department, and the White House. Most of the prisoner abuse stories and Guantanamo revelations of the last several months would not have happened without the ACLU and the Freedom of Information Act, and I am convinced that the Bush Administration would love to trash this act if they possibly could.
So it gave me a chill to read in this news story: "A bipartisan bill now in the U.S. Senate seeks to revisit the federal Freedom of Information Act to address many of the open-government complaints." I couldn't find out what bill this might be, but I don't believe it - a "bipartisan" bill in today's Republican-lock-step let's-all-vote-for-Gonzales-the-Torturer Senate? A bill aimed at "improving" access to government records? Oh yeah, tell me another one. Given the pattern now followed in the Bush administration, what would happen is that a bunch of amendments would be shoehorned into the bill at the last minute which would actually result in slamming the door shut on FOIA requests. And the republicans would vote for this, Democrats need to watch their backs on this one.
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