Tuesday, February 22, 2005


Panelists Decry Bush Science Policies

Student Kicks NCLB's Texan Ass!

February 22, 2005 OP-ED COLUMNIST Wag-the-Dog Protection By PAUL KRUGMAN

he campaign against Social Security is going so badly that longtime critics of President Bush, accustomed to seeing their efforts to point out flaws in administration initiatives brushed aside, are pinching themselves. But they shouldn't relax: if the past is any guide, the Bush administration will soon change the subject back to national security. The political landscape today reminds me of the spring of 2002, after the big revelations of corporate fraud. Then, as now, the administration was on the defensive, and Democrats expected to do well in midterm elections. Then, suddenly, it was all Iraq, all the time, and Harken Energy and Halliburton vanished from the headlines. I don't know which foreign threat the administration will start playing up this time, but Bush critics should be prepared for the shift. They must curb their natural inclination to focus almost exclusively on domestic issues, and challenge the administration on national security policy, too. I say this even though many critics, myself included, would prefer to stick with the domestic issues. After all, domestic issues, particularly Social Security, are very comfortable ground for moderates and liberals. The relevant facts are all in the public domain, voters clearly oppose the administration's hard-right agenda, and Mr. Bush's attack on Social Security stumbled badly out of the gate. It's understandable, then, that critiques of the administration's national security policy have faded into the background in recent months. But a president can always change the subject to national security if he wants to - and Mr. Bush has repeatedly shown himself willing to play the terrorism card when he is losing the debate on other issues. So it's important to point out that Mr. Bush, for all his posturing, has done a very bad job of protecting the nation - and to make that point now, rather than in the heat of the next foreign crisis. The fact is that Mr. Bush, while willing to go to war on weak evidence, hasn't taken the task of protecting America from terrorists at all seriously. Consider, for example, the case of chemical plants. Just days after 9/11, many analysts identified sites that store toxic chemicals as a major terror risk, and called for new safety rules. But as The New York Times reported last fall, "after the oil and chemical industries met with Karl Rove ... the White House quietly blocked those efforts." Nearly three and a half years after 9/11, those chemical plants are still unprotected. Other major risks identified within days of the attack included the possibility of terrorist attacks on major ports or nuclear plants. But in the months after 9/11, the administration flatly refused to allocate the sums that members of the House and Senate from both parties thought necessary to secure these sites. And when the administration does spend money protecting possible terrorist targets, politics, not national security, dictates where the money goes. Remember the "first responders" program that ended up spending seven times as much protecting each resident of Wyoming as it spent protecting each resident of New York? Well, it's still happening. An audit of the Homeland Security Department's (greatly inadequate) program to protect ports found that much of the money went to unlikely locations, including six sites in landlocked Arkansas, where the department's recently resigned chief of border and transportation security is reported to be considering a run for governor. Nor are Mr. Bush's national security failures limited to nonmilitary policy. The administration appears to be in a state of denial over the effects of the endless war in Iraq on U.S. military readiness, particularly the strains on the reserves and the National Guard. The ultimate demonstration of Mr. Bush's true priorities was his attempt to appoint Bernard Kerik as homeland security director. Either the administration didn't bother to do even the most basic background checks, or it regarded protecting the nation from terrorists as a matter of so little importance that it didn't matter who was in charge. My point is that Mr. Bush's critics are falling unnecessarily into a trap if they focus only on domestic policies and allow Mr. Bush to keep his undeserved reputation as someone who keeps Americans safe. National security policy should not be a refuge to which Mr. Bush can flee when his domestic agenda falls apart. E-mail: krugman@nytimes.com David Brooks is on vacation. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company | Home | Privacy Policy | Search | Corrections | RSS | Help | Back to Top


BROOKLYN'S ABU GHRAIB

According to a Government Accountability Office report, hundreds of injured Army reservists and National Guard members -- including many wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan -- have lost medical care and pay because they were dropped from active duty status.

The Common Ills sounds like "The Rude Pundit" Today: The New York Times at its worst: Elisabeth Bumiller, Jodi Wilgoren and Juan Forero make the front page on the same day

George W Bush’s language of freedom is not benevolent idealism but ideological weapon

Take some time and carefully examine this.

February 22, 2005
Israel Killed al-Hariri to Set the Stage for a Confrontation with Hezbollah

OKC Bombshell Implicates Feds In Murrah Blast

Police Sergeant Suicided To Keep Truth Hidden

Day 6 Sept. 16

Bin Laden denies any role in the attacks.
``The U.S. government has consistently blamed me for being behind every occasion its enemies attack it,'' he says in a statement released to Arabic television.
``I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons.''

Judge Walton, who is responsible for this ruling, was the same judge who refused the to consider the appeal of Sibel Edmonds!

To be Referenced in Next Blog Entry

Click on the link to view the presentation. Requires high speed link. Consider the WTC controlled demolition. Consider the cover up. Consider the propaganda. Consider the heinous acts that have been undertaken as part of the War on Terror. Consider that the Patriot Act was sitting in the wings and passed within a few days of 911. Consider the Osama audios and videos. Consider Bush in the Florida School room. Consider that the coup of 9/11/2001 has suceeded and we in the US are living in the times of two stolen elections, and a 911 Commission, at first delayed, then headed by Kissinger, and then supperbly used cover up any true account of the events and their cause.

Amnesty: Iraqi Women No Better Off Post-Saddam

Long before the current obsession with "Citizen Journalism" one man stood tall and rejected the ludicrous and self-serving myth of "journalistic objectivity". His name was Hunter Thompson and he called his approach to writing about the world "Gonzo Journalism."

My Hunter Thompson Story
At the software company, Software Ventures,

Shotgun Golf with Bill Murray-By Hunter S. Thompson
Page 2

The 48 Laws of Power


I wandered over to the Rolling Stone website to see if they had anything on Hunter (they didn't), but found this story about the passing of another icon - one which many of us unknowingly grew up with.

Ouch!

Quantum physics points to innumerable different views on what the underlying reality could be, whether as shaped by our perceptions, an infinity of possible worlds, as a hologram, or colliding waves of energy.

Ok, I'm still trying to figure out where there are any racist epithets in our post?

Jeff Gerth lied and lied and lied. His reporting was horrible. And let me tell you, if you actually went back and read his reporting on Whitewater, you would find out in talking with the people involved, he lied

David Cole on the Lynne Stewart verdict: "Perhaps more than any other, this case illustrates how out of hand things have gotten

Katrina vanden Heuvel: "This is an object lesson in why our kids should read books and not take drugs."

What kind of God lets Hunter S. Thompson shoot himself

Philadelphia Inquirer: Dentist, 84, Gets An Offer To Reenlist

On February 14, 2005, another bloody event marred life in Lebanon claiming the life of Prime Minister Rafic Hariri along with 14 other innocent human lives and injuring over 100.

Truck in Tucson