It’s a pleasure to watch Obama’s mastery of the technique. And Clinton — and I didn’t say “even Clinton” — uses it much better than McCain does. And just about everybody does it better than the capering loon who does soft-shoe in the White House while young Americans are dismembered and splattered in Iraq. Sometimes when he speaks I can forget who he is momentarily and find myself actually pulling for him; probably from misplaced performer empathy. His speechifying has a strong odor of remedial reading about it, combined with an apparent fear that there might be some hard words ahead.

— from a New York Times commentary by Dick Cavett discussing President Bush’s public speaking skills; March 28.
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I’ve been hearing some ads lately on sports talk for the Fly Clear program, which allows you to speed through airport security. Seductive message, that - those security lines are a bitch, even now that the TSA has apparently concluded that I’m not a terrorist. It would damned sure be nice to be able to scoot through a special line and be on my way, especially when I’m running late.

Of course, it’s not an uncomplicated issue, is it? These days convenience comes at a price, and the price here is almost certainly even more loss of privacy. So let’s see - how does this work? Ah, here it is, in Step 2: Full Story »

The upcoming presidential election and the economy are pretty poor excuses for our inability to focus on Iraq. Especially since we’ve not only passed the 4,000 mark of American dead, but 25 were killed in a recent two-week span.

It’s frightening how comfortable we’ve learned to live with the war since the “surge” supposedly turned things around. The continuing carnage among those who were supposed to enjoy some of the fruits of our liberation isn’t even on our radar screens.

Not only aren’t most of us following Iraq in the news, we turn our backs on books and movies that dramatize it. Yet our veterans aren’t just returning with problems, but with a whole lore. You can’t help but conclude that their experiences need to be watered down to be made palatable. Full Story »

The accessing of private passport-based travel data of all three Presidential candidates by contractors working for the State Department has finally galvanized Capitol Hill to address the issue of privacy–something we’ve been begging them to do for years. Ron Wyden sums it up succinctly:

“The Government Accountability Office has been warning about this problem for a decade. And it seems to me in this administration, there’s been pretty much a culture of disregard for privacy, and that’s part of the problem,” he said.

Wyden may have been referring to a 2006 report from the GAO documenting the lack of oversight in sharing Social Security Numbers with contractors working for various federal agencies, including the IRS and the FBI, as well as within the private sector. It is but one of many reports the investigative agency has issued documenting the serious vulnerabilities our government’s mad drive to outsource its functions to the private sector has wrought–but it’s only the tip of the iceberg. Full Story »

After the debacle of last September’s murder of Iraqi civilians, many Americans held out hope that Blackwater, former Navy Seal and right wing evangelical Erik Prince’s guns-for-hire to the Busheviks operation located in the Great Dismal Swamp of eastern North Carolina had been exposed and might be forced into decline and eventual disenfranchisement.

A new article in Mother Jones warns us not to be sanguine - or naive about such a happy possibility occurring. Like Phillip Morris, Blackwater has simply devised another name and plans to continue business - and, like Altria (not to be confused with nutria, although such plagues abound all around us, it seems), that business will be same as it ever was. Full Story »

These accommodations should in no way be taken as a commentary on the quality of our media coverage.

— Doug Hattaway, campaign spokesman for Sen. Hillary Clinton, on placing press accommodations in the men’s locker room of the Berger Activity Center in Austin, Texas; March 3.
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President Bush yesterday took as harsh a one-two beatdown as he has endured in the entire seven cynical, corrupt years of his doomed presidency.

First Silvestre Reyes, Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, sent him a damning letter on his stubborn and hypocritical position on FISA. The letter not only outlines the facts of the law and the circumstances surrounding it for those who might only be familiar with the overt lie that Bush has been pandering to the American public, it concludes with a statement of intent that every single Member of Congress would do well to adopt: Full Story »

Liability protection is critical to securing the private sector’s cooperation with our intelligence efforts. … The Senate has passed a good bill and it has shown that protecting our nation is not a partisan issue.

— President Bush, Feb. 13.

In a presidency of hypocrisy — an administration of exploitation — a labyrinth of leadership — in which every vital fact is a puzzle inside a riddle wrapped in an enigma hidden under a claim of executive privilege supervised by an idiot — this one … is surprisingly easy. President Bush has put protecting the telecom giants from the laws … ahead of protecting you from the terrorists. He has demanded an extension of the FISA law — the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — but only an extension that includes retroactive immunity for the telecoms who helped him spy on you.

— MSNBC commentator Keith Olbermann, Jan. 31.
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Following up on my post from a little while back discussing Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell’s desire to police the Internet, the Washington Post’s Ellen Nakashima confirmed last weekend that the Decider had signed a classified directive authorizing the NSA to more expansively monitor intrusions on federal networks for signs of cyberattacks:

Until now, the government’s efforts to protect itself from cyber-attacks — which run the gamut from hackers to organized crime to foreign governments trying to steal sensitive data — have been piecemeal. Under the new initiative, a task force headed by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) will coordinate efforts to identify the source of cyber-attacks against government computer systems. As part of that effort, the Department of Homeland Security will work to protect the systems and the Pentagon will devise strategies for counterattacks against the intruders. Full Story »

Since the launch of the “global war on terror,” a large majority of Americans have been encouraged to cower under the pseudo-protective umbrella of a permanent Nation Security State. Last year I wrote several posts about the current prison-industrial complex and the increasing number of privatized prisons being used to house thousands of detained immigrants. The rise of the prison-industrial complex is one the most disturbing things going on in this country. According to a recent report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics - released on June 30, 2006 and revised in July 2007 - there are over 2 million people behind bars in the United States.

At the time of the report, there were about 180,000 in federal custody, 1.2 million in state custody, and 760,000 in local jails. Full Story »

Radar towers with automatic video cameras for target identification. Seismic sensors to detect and differentiate human footfalls from cattle and smugglers from border patrol agents. Satellite phones to communicate outside of cell phone contact. Laptops in border patrol vehicles linked to a satellite comm system to integrate the automated sensors with agents ready to be dispatched. And software designed to integrate it all into a seamless, virtual border fence around the Sasabe, Arizona border crossing. This is the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) and Boeing’s Project 28, part of the Secure Border Initiative (SBI). And in December, 2007, DHS finally took possession of the prototype for 45 days of border patrol testing - months late and way over budget. Full Story »

There were periods when I didn’t think that. Are things ever going to settle down? When is some normalcy going to settle in in your life? It never really does.

— Vietnam War veteran Mike Kentes, who attended the Nov. 13, 1982, dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, says he believes he is better for his service although did not realize that until later in life.

I often wonder, if I hadn’t served, what would I have missed? I think my life became richer. You learn about yourself. . . . I know who I am.

— Vietnam War veteran Hugh M. Jordan, who attended the Nov. 13, 1982, dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will win.

— Ho Chi Minh, founder and president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, to the French in 1946.
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We’re open honest Americans trying to do a good job. If they don’t like what we’re doing then [snaps fingers ] cut off that revenue steam right now.

— Erik Prince, founder and owner of Blackwater Worldwide, which has seen its revenue from the federal government grow from $1 million to $600 million since 2001, defending his company’s reputation from critics who call it an “out-of-control, mercenary force”; Oct. 13.

In this administration, accountability goes by the boards. That goes equally for misconduct and for incompetence. If you get caught, they will get you immunity. If you get convicted, they will commute your sentence.

— Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), a member of two committees that oversee the State and Justice departments.
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“Why does Harry Reid hate America and freedom?”

That’s the question I was asking myself after S&R reader “Dee Loralei” pointed out in comments to my post yesterday that Senate Majority Leader Reid was planning to move ahead with a vote on the FISA update, even in the face of Dodd’s hold on the bill. Sure enough, that seems to be the case.

In response, Dodd is threatening to flat-out filibuster the bill if it comes to the floor. Full Story »

In defense of the indefensible.

If you go through life without making any enemies you’re doing something wrong. If you go through life making a lot of enemies you’re doing something worse.

For a long time, the US contented itself with one enemy, the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, the CIA conducted covert operations such as rigging elections for dictators and assassinating their opponents. But those thus tyrannized had neither the inclination nor the resources to retaliate against the US.

Then, operating under the illusion that the mujahideen in Afghanistan were “freedom fighters,” as Ronald Reagan called them, we armed and supported them to the tune of billions of dollars. After driving the Soviets out, though, they were feeling their oats and looked around for a new target. Full Story »

In response to an inquiry launched by House Democrats as to the role the major telecoms played in abetting the NSA surveillance program, Verizon came out yesterday and admitted that it had turned over customer data to federal authorities 720 times between 2005 and 2007–or once a day, every day, for the last two years:

The company said it does not determine the requests’ legality or necessity because to do so would slow efforts to save lives in criminal investigations… Verizon also disclosed that the FBI, using administrative subpoenas, sought information identifying not just a person making a call, but all the people that customer called, as well as the people those people called. Verizon does not keep data on this “two-generation community of interest” for customers, but the request highlights the broad reach of the government’s quest for data.

This is astonishing on two levels…first, that Verizon would be so cavalier with the idea that you can’t save lives without breaking the law, and that the government’s demands for data were so far-reaching that even Verizon couldn’t keep up. Full Story »

Not everything in life is a huge deal, but sometimes the small things provide a lot of insight into the big things.

I’m sitting in the Cleveland airport right now, waiting for my flight back to Denver to board. A few minutes ago I saw one of those things that make you go “hmmm.”

Imagine that you’re in the security line, and you realize - ohmygod, I have 3.2 ounces of shampoo in my shaving kit instead of the legally allowable three ounces. You’re way to far through the line to make a break for it, but you’d hate to go to Gitmo just because you wanted fuller, shinier hair. As panic begins to set in you notice something. Beside the line is a trash can with a small hole in the top and a makeshift sign reading:

AMNESTY BIN

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There’s a little remembered Bing Crosby film from 1960 called High Time. In it Crosby plays a restaurateur loosely based on Ray Croc, the entrepreneur who made McDonald’s the supreme restaurant franchise, who decides, in his fifties, to attend college with cornily amusing results. The college he attends is a small Southern school modeled on the Ivies (the school is also a basketball power, so that should be a hint). Of course that school has now become a rival to its Ivy League role models….

Fast forward to 2007. At Patrick Henry College in Purcellville, VA, (about 50 miles from DC) Michael Farris, one of the founders of the home schooling movement, has founded a new kind of evangelical/fundamentalist higher education institution. Modeled not on the “religion first, last and always” closed models of Bob Jones, Liberty, or Regent Universities, Patrick Henry seeks to model itself on the Ivies and on the “power goals,” particularly the political power goals, the Ivies aspire to….

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Welcome to the camp/I guess you all know why we’re here…. - Peter Townshend

KSLA-TV in Shreveport, LA, reports that Homeland Security has enlisted clergy to help quell unrest in case martial law is declared. Specifically, clergy would be asked to help convince their congregations to allow themselves to be disarmed and to go quietly to “camps” (this is called internment, friends) in case of a terrorist attack or other “national emergency.”

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