Thieves in the Temple.

crack that whip!

I have more health care alerts! NETWORK provides an email tool that makes a list of quite reasonable demands. They also advocate a "strong" public option, since our Congressfolk may well expend considerable time and energy creating a public option that really isn't very public or very much an option. FireDogLake also provides a "whip count" tool, with which you call your member of Congress and try to get them to commit to a strong public option. As always, if (like me) you prefer the Canadian-style, single-payer option, Public Citizen still stands with you. But only pedants see hypocrisy in demanding both. And speaking of pedants, watch Rep. Kucinich (D-OH) rip a free-market pedant apart. Don't be fooled by said pedant's "hurt" and "anger" at Mr. Kucinich's "aggressiveness," because said pedant does not seem to have an actual human heart.

In other news, NETWORK also helps you tell your Congressfolk to stop building F-22 Raptor fighter planes. The President and the Secretary of Defense both agree that we don't need any more F-22s, which were developed to fight the Soviets, have never flown a combat mission, and have cost over $350 million each. And yet the Senate Armed Services Committee has proposed authorizing seven more F-22s at a cost of $1.75 billion. Since seven F-22s would normally cost around $2.45 billion, I guess Congress calls that "compromise" -- or "getting tough on defense contractors." I say they're not tough enough, and they should cut the F-22 entirely. You may well reasonably ask: why fight so hard over less than $2 billion out of a defense budget that's almost half a trillion? First, because spending any money on the F-22 is wasteful. Second, and more important, you can get more bang for your buck out of $2 billion if you spend it on something else -- job training for the underemployed, for example, or green small business start-up assistance. You might even get more bang for your buck out of it if you just hand it out as welfare to poor people, though I wouldn't advise doing that.

Finally, Rumproast bills Mark Steyn's latest flatublaster for National Review Online as "the stupidest argument against health care reform ever." I'll confine my remarks to Mr. Steyn's rhetorical errors, which he apparently hopes will glide by you because he doesn't shout or resort to sarcasm. Early on, he commits the one-example-equals-all-trends error by moving almost imperceptibly from talking about preventive care to preventing cancer (and then just breast cancer, for women over 60) -- as if cancer (or, more appropriately, breast cancer for women over 60) is the only malady in the world! Then he commits the lies-damn-lies-and-statistics error by stating that preventive care only protects 3 in 1,000 women from breast cancer over 10 years, when (as Rumproast points out) there are more than 1,000 women in the United States and thus, by Mr. Steyn's own logic, preventive cancer screening would save almost half a million lives over a decade. Finally, he commits the extreme-example-equals-all-other-examples error by citing Michael Jackson's legendary paranoia about his own health (and his recent death) as if it should mean a damn thing to anyone who doesn't own a hyperbaric chamber. Oh, I almost forgot: before that, he wrenches one of his main supporting arguments almost completely out of context -- or, as Gregg Easterbrook might say, he tortures the argument so it tells him what he wants to hear. Come to think of it, Mr. Steyn's entire post does that.

UPDATE. Winslow Wheeler has more on the F-22 folly.

poorboy shuffle.

In a not terribly surprising development, I've been getting a bunch of health care-related alerts in my inbox lately. I'll share two: one from Unionvoice and the other from Public Citizen. The former alert argues for a public option, while the latter alert argues for a single-payer system, so of course I prefer the latter. I include the former alert mainly because I haven't gotten around to mentioning taxation of employee-provided health benefits somehow being "on the table." That's the second-dumbest solution to the health care mess I've heard (Mr. McCain's anti-health insurance Health Savings Accounts plan being the dumbest). Your Reps and Senators need to hear from you -- over the phone, preferably -- that taxing health insurance benefits is a non-starter with the American people, no matter what Republicans think of it.

The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network has had trouble pressuring Mr. Obama to change don't-ask-don't-tell -- even though, you know, Mr. Obama could just order the Armed Forces to accept openly gay soldiers, just as Harry Truman ordered the Armed Forces to desegregate. So now they're targeting Nancy Pelosi, who could make action on the Military Readiness Enhancement Act (H.R. 1283) a priority if she so chooses. Thus SLDN provides a petition demanding action on H.R. 1283. Apparently over 120,000 folks have signed it already. Maybe it'll move the legislation, maybe it won't. But at least we'll be on record as having said something about it. That's more important than it seems sometimes. Karl Rove was right about one thing -- politics is a ground game. And we need to think of ourselves as John Riggins.

Meanwhile, in another not terribly surprising development, Fox News let Stephen Moore say this about Mr. Obama's plans to fix the economy: "The one thing this administration won't do is cut taxes." Except that, like, it already has. And I don't even mean the annual Alternative Minimum Tax patch that somehow got thrown into the stimulus bill; I mean an actual tax cut, targeted to lower-income earners for once. I also remember Mr. Obama wanting it to be much larger, but Congress balking because it was, you know, fiscally irresponsible or something. I also remember that none of Mr. Bush's tax cuts worked, and that Mr. Reagan's 1981 tax cuts didn't do nearly as much for the economy as his 1984 tax hikes did. Sigh. Stephen Moore is kinda like the late Jack Kemp, just without the heart or the brain. Probably without the throwing arm, too.

light posting notice, qu'est-ce que c'est?

Because when I have nothin' to say, my lips are sealed. Say something once, why say it again?

I should be back Thursday. In the meantime, please patronize the excellent blogs on my blogroll.

in which we fight the moneyed interests, and, in addition, fight the moneyed interests.

Mr. Obama supports a Consumer Financial Protection Agency, and your Reps and Senators are coming around to support a Consumer Financial Protection Agency -- so it's a done deal, right? Wrong -- the banksters don't like it and are willing to spend the money to defeat it, rather than, you know, spending the money to, I don't know, hire people to do actual work. They're even willing to spend money they got from us, the taxpayers, in that $700-billion-because-it's-a-big-number bailout. The House Financial Services Committee plans to vote on the new agency before the end of the month, so Public Citizen helps you turn up the heat.

Meanwhile, Keystone Progress gives Pennsylvania residents the opportunity to balance the Pennsylvania state budget, which currently faces a $5.6 billion deficit. After you're done, you can submit your solution to your lawmakers. Frankly, I thought it was pretty easy, mainly because I did all kinds of things -- stop the phase-out of certain corporate taxes, for example -- that the Pennsylvania legislature doesn't have the will to do. But then that's the point, isn't it? They're supposed to represent their constituents, after all, so if we have the will, then they should have the will. Things I'm proud of doing? Balancing the state budget without raising either income taxes or sales taxes (which latter item wouldn't exist in my ideal society anyway). Things I regretted doing? Cutting pre-kindergarten spending to the max, shaving a few million bucks from a few other services, and raising taxes slightly on cigarettes (not because I love cigarettes but because, really, it's not nice to tax addicts). Things I wish I could have done? Overhaul the state income tax. Pennsylvania's flat income tax mostly benefits its wealthiest citizens. If I could have introduced, say, 1, 3, 5 and 7 percent brackets to replace the flat 3 percent bracket, I think I could have balanced the budget entirely with raised revenues. And what would rich Pennsylvanians do about it? Move to New Jersey?

no words, more words, and "exact words."

FAIR sounds a bit fed up in asking us to demand more media coverage of single-payer health care -- but who can blame them? Single-payer polls well with everyone but big corporations, who the media obviously consider their real constituency. And they wonder why they get no respect. Wow, this paragraph is starting to read like "'Thieves in the Temple''s Greatest Hits." Now, the media has started to mention single-payer a little more, and Congress has included more single-payer advocates in their hearings. But that could be the Big Liars throwing us a bone. We deserve better.

Consumers Union also helps you oppose "exclusive" contracts for cell phones. We'd be a lot better off if we could choose our own phone service and choose our own phone, rather than get stuck with whatever applications our service provider wants us to have. Stunningly, Consumers Union reports that four out of five cell phone users in Asia get to choose their own providers when they get a phone. Plus they have their pick of over a thousand different cell phones, when Nokia can't even get a wi-fi phone into the U.S. because the big telecoms don't like it. It's like these big telecoms think "the free market" should only serve them. I'm so old-fashioned I think "the free market" should only serve the consumer.

Meanwhile, Media Matters provides an instructive overview of Howard Kurtz's generally lame media criticism. In fact, I think their overview instructs even more than they intend -- by which I mean it instructs us, as folks who would critique the critics. Mr. Kurtz shows quite an impressive ability to use the questioner's words against them. One questioner, asking about Mr. Kurtz's Joe Scarborough-sized blind spot when he writes about MSNBC's "liberal hosts," asks, "why do you keep pretending Joe Scarborough's three hours a day don't exist?" I feel the questioner's frustration, but Mr. Kurtz uses it against him/her: "My pretense hasn't been very consistent, since I've written lengthy pieces on both Joe and Mika." The lesson we should learn from this article isn't so much that Mr. Kurtz isn't a very good media critic, though he's not -- the lesson we should learn is that we should be more verbally precise in our interrogation of folks like Mr. Kurtz. Maybe, then, he'll get frustrated for once.

the Honduras coup, health care for legal immigrants, and errata regarding food safety.

Just Foreign Policy urges us to demand that our government vigorously oppose the coup in Honduras, which occurred on Sunday. Both President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton have condemned the coup, and the U.S. co-sponsored a U.N. resolution calling for "the immediate and unconditional restoration" of Mr. Zelaya as President, but neither have used the U.S.'s immense leverage to take strong action against the coup -- Mrs. Clinton has resisted calling what happened in Honduras a "coup," because doing so would require our government to cut off foreign aid to Honduras. They can't be afraid of that twittering machine, Newt Gingrich, can they? Mr. Gingrich twittered over the weekend that Honduras was "on the edge of a leftist dictatorship" and that "the obama administration has joined castro and chavez attacking honduran supreme court and congress for defending their constitution (all failures to capitalize proper nouns in the original)." In other words, military coups are all right with Mr. Gingrich if they prevent a "leftist dictatorship" (which conclusion must have been so obvious Mr. Gingrich didn't feel the need to defend it!), and they're even more all right if they go against the express will of Messrs. Castro and Chavez -- and, er, not incidentally, the rest of the world. Because the U.N. passed that resolution opposing the coup unanimously. Mrs. Clinton's phone number is 202.647.4000.

Meanwhile, at home, Congress has been slow to -- well, they've been slow to reform health care in any meaningful way, but they've also been slow to include reform for health care for legal immigrants. Currently, legal immigrants (including children of said immigrants) must endure a five-year waiting period to get Medicaid. Undoubtedly our government hopes that legal immigrants will do well enough to place out of Medicaid's parameters within five years, but that's not a given, especially in a corporate economy that fires workers whenever the CEOs need to gild their plumbing. You may well be asking, shouldn't we take care of our own citizens first? And I may well answer: a) we can do both; b) if we're going to bring immigrants in to work for dung pellets, it's cruel to deny them access to our health care -- especially when legal immigrants pay the same taxes we do. You can call your Congressfolk using the tools in the upper left-hand corner, or download the Coalition for Human Needs's contact info for House and Senate leaders.

Finally, I apologize for passing along the People's Email Network alert about H.R. 2749 the other day, and I direct you to this Consumers Union alert supporting it. I've supported many Congressional efforts to reform food safety this term after reading the bills in question, and I've avoided alerts I've received opposing food safety bills because I couldn't verify their information, and I wish I'd done the same this time. Consumers Union addresses the concerns raised by the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Network (to which I linked the other day) and, long story short, finds them largely inaccurate. I sure hope I didn't get taken in by some astroturf right-wing "farmers' rights" group -- or worse (since they have a larger audience), that the People's Email Network didn't get taken in.

starring, once again, health care, indefinite detention, and consumer protection.

The "liberal" media finally (finally!) reports polls showing majorities favoring Mr. Obama's "public option" health plan, and even Arlen Specter (NK-PA) suddenly supports it -- so now's the perfect time to push for Canadian-style, single-payer, privately-delivered health care! H.R. 676, the U.S. National Health Insurance Act, has 83 co-sponsors; S. 703, the American Health Security Act of 2009, has only one sponsor, Bernie Sanders of Vermont (its House companion, H.R. 1200, has eight). But either bill will do. Tools for contacting your Congressfolk are, as always, in the upper left-hand corner of this page. Both H.R. 676 and S. 703 would create a publicly-financed but privately-delivered health care system. I doubt it would cause doctors to make only twenty dollars an hour, either -- not if it wants to compete with the private HMOs that will still exist under any circumstances.

In other news, the Obama Administration seems no less eager than Tha Bush Mobb to detain folks indefinitely without charge or trial. After all, indefinite detention worked out so well for Mr. Bush -- most of those folks in Guantánamo got out after years of detention because Mr. Bush couldn't charge them with anything, and it's a wonder they haven't all gone to work for al-Qaeda since then, let alone some indeterminate few. Perhaps that's on Mr. Obama's mind: Mr. Bush created some 750-plus walking time bombs and he'll need some way to keep them from blowing up American buildings. No matter. We're either a nation of values or we're not; if we detain people indefinitely, without charge, without trial, then we're not. The ACLU helps you keep the country you love from becoming a value-free zone.

Sadly, we have two more occasions to fight for the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency -- one, Wall Street's co-ordinated push against "populist overreaction" (!), and two, the stated opposition of U.S. Chamber of Commerce CEO Tom Donohue, who has pledged $100 million to strangle the CFPA in its crib. Where did he find $100 million in this economy? And why isn't he spending it on, I don't know, hiring good folks to work for the Chamber of Commerce? After all, we're just about at 10 percent unemployment (officially) -- don't we all have to make sacrifices? Mr. Obama (after prompting by good folks like you) has proposed a Consumer Financial Protection Agency, but Congress will have to create it; USPIRG helps you get them on the stick.

I got yr uniform financial product right here!

The Coalition for Human Needs helps you tell Congress to pay for health care reform with responsible tax increases. And by "responsible" we mean "not on the backs of poor people." CHN makes only two suggestions -- making the Medicare tax more progressive, and extending the Medicare tax to investment income (excluding the first $50,000, or $100,000 for married couples) -- but you can probably think of others. And I don't believe that we need to raise taxes to pay for health care improvements, even a single-payer system. But in order to avoid raising any taxes, we'd need to a) cut wasteful defense spending and b) cut corporate welfare. Given the chances of getting a) and/or b) done, we might as well make sure taxes get raised responsibly -- meaning the folks who've benefited the most from Tha Bush Mobb's tax policies ought to cough it up.

The People's Email Network, not known for pulling punches, calls H.R. 2749 "the Gestapo Food Act." The bill itself makes Finnegans Wake look like bathroom reading, but the scuttlebutt isn't good -- the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund tells us that the bill would use a one-size-fits-all approach to policing food safety, with fees and fines that would break most small farmers, and wouldn't address the real problem with food safety -- large corporations and their animal mills. The FDA will also be able to search any and all farmers' records without a warrant; I guess Congress thinks the FISA Amendments Act sets all kinds of precedents. Here's the action page.

Meanwhile, from the "if you live long enough" file: the Supreme Court rules 5 to 4 that states can enforce their own financial regulations even if they conflict with federal ones. And the 5 in that 5-to-4 consisted of the Court's four nominally liberal justices and the court's most conservative justice, Antonin Scalia, who wrote the majority opinion. (No, Justices Roberts, Alito, and Thomas are not conservatives, but reactionaries.) Justice Scalia probably wishes he'd been able to write that decision about a state that had more lax financial laws than the federal government, but at least he's honest enough to write the opinion he actually holds. Besides, what state has more lax financial regulations than the feds at this point in history? You'll find the usual whining from financial "titans," including the one who says the decision "will have a significant, negative impact on the ability of a national bank to offer a financial product uniformly throughout the country." Which is, for those of us who believe banks should serve communities rather than impose their will on them, kind of the idea.

gay marriage, California budget follies, and right-wing smut.

CREDO helps you demand the repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which prevents federal recognition of gay marriage. What's the occasion, you ask? Why, the recent infidelity confessions of Sen. Ensign and Gov. Sanford -- both Republicans, both pushers of Mr. Clinton's impeachment, both "staunch" "defenders" of marriage "between one man and one woman" except, apparently, when another alluring woman comes along. Does this seem like piling on -- especially in the case of Mr. Sanford, whose emails suggest he's got a little Dante Rossetti in him? Nah. It's not piling on. It's just using a news hook to do what's right.

California residents, I'm sorry about your troubles. CALPIRG has identified nine corporations receiving $30 million each -- each! -- in corporate tax loopholes, while public services get slashed grim-reaper style. Also, the California government will start issuing IOUs to its workers on Thursday if they don't get a budget passed -- which seems likely, since Gov. Schwarzenegger will likely veto the budget the Legislature has finally put together. I guess it's because Apple, Genentech, and Disney (three recipients of California tax breaks) are just too big to fail. See? Always the hostage situation with these clowns! But what are they gonna do? Crash the economy again? CALPIRG provides the contact tool.

Meanwhile, Markos Moulitsas shares a piece of hate mail with us, a screed "so brilliant, I almost wept at its beauty," in his words. I would advise not clicking the above link at work or in front of your children, since it contains, like, a bajillion curse words -- unless, of course, you want to show your kids how not to be. To add to the fun, you can, if you like, vote on your favorite part of the email! I honestly can't decide among "you, sir, are a illegal immigrant. i dont give two (expletive) whether you are an american citizen or not:," "go back to guatemala or whatever (expletive) middleeastern (incorrect expletive) you came from," or "no proof, just science and that makes it true for you liberals." I will not vote for "This email can't possible be real," though. I know these people exist. (For even more fun, compare the above missive with this passionate and articulate anti-Obama screed from a liberal. I don't assert that liberals write better conservatives -- but then I don't hear from many conservatives these days, only "conservatives.")

blowback.

Today, believe or not, Public Citizen advises us to call our House Reps and demand that they vote against H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act. Why? Because it's little more than welfare for oil, coal, and nuclear corporations. The bill gives away 85 percent of its pollution credits, rather than auctioning them off -- which, you know, would have raised revenues to complete actual renewable-energy projects. That's damn insulting. Also, the bill doesn't cut carbon emissions nearly enough, establishes a weak renewable energy standard, and generally protects corporations at the expense of consumers. But the pollution credit giveaway is what sticks in my craw. The Democrats seem to be willing to do anything to give the appearance of getting something done -- you're seeing that in health care reform efforts, too, as first the abominable Tom Daschle abandoned his support for a public health care option, and now Mr. Obama won't commit to vetoing health care reform that excludes said public option. But we are the people. We don't have to commit to "getting something done." We need only to commit to doing the right thing. H.R. 2454 is the wrong thing.

And now, for some good news: the House approved the defense authorization amendment that would force the Pentagon to release names of WHINSEC graduates and instructors. And now, for some bad news: the Senate also must approve the amendment, and we all know the Senate as "that place where good House bills go to die." Occasionally we also know the Senate as "that place where bad House bills go to die," but not in this instance. Maybe our esteemed Senators will claim national security concerns or state secrets or something when they hold it up. Folks, if releasing the names of possible foreign and domestic torturers compromises our own national security, then we deserve whatever happens to us afterward. I'm tempted to ask how a government with unparalleled military power can be afraid of every little sliver of sunlight -- but I know that question answers itself. SOA Watch helps you hand out the beatdowns to your Senators.

Meanwhile, MediaChannel (an outstanding resource I've underutilized for several years) informs me that CNN provides a "timeline" of events in Iran, ostensibly to help us poor schumcks understand why things are the way they are there, but starts said timeline in 1979. 1979! Why not, say, 559 B.C., when Cyrus the Great unified the Medean and Persian Empires, or 1501 A.D., when the Safavid Dynasty established the Shi'a Islamic state? Or even 1935, when the world stopped calling the country Persia? Or 1941, when the U.K. and the U.S.S.R. invaded Iran to commandeer its railroad lines? Or 1953, when the U.S. conspired to overthrow their democratically-elected Prime Minister, Dr. Mossadegh, because he nationalized Iran's oil reserves -- thus opening the door for that tyrant, the Shah, who got tossed out on merit even if we don't agree with the beliefs of those who tossed him out? And this profound amnesia about Dr. Mossadegh after Ron Paul brought him up during every single Republican Presidential debate in 2007 and 2008? Like I said before: the newspapers are dying, but they don't deserve death nearly as much as cable news does. Give us a la carte cable packaging, and cable news will finally suffer the blowback it deserves.

crazy not in a Patsy Cline or Gnarls Barkley sort of way.

Public Citizen continues calling for stricter oversight of the financial sector. Mr. Obama proposed an overhaul recently, but, as CNN Money said on Monday, Mr. Obama's plan "appears designed to avoid some big battles" with lawmakers and financial titans. Sigh. Mr. Obama's health care plan also seemed design to "avoid big battles." As long as Republicans continue to act crazy, there will always be big battles over the most trifling crap. And, ideally, the only battle that matters is the battle with the people. So let's make that a fight, especially since it is the fight of our lives -- these lawmakers and financial titans destroyed our economy.

Meanwhile, the Israeli government has just authorized construction of 300 new homes in an "illegal outpost" in the West Bank. "Illegal," in this case, means illegal according to Israeli law. Would it be too much to ask that Israel abide by its own laws when it takes $3 billion a year in U.S. funds? Hell, would it be too much to ask that Israel not act so damn crazy all the time? Has lashing out in fear bought Israel all that much security? I say all these things, as I'm sure you know by now, as a friend of Israel. And, as I'm sure you know by now, friends need to be slapped to their senses every once in a while. Or often. And I'm not the only friend of Israel to speak to Israel in this manner: the Central Conference of American Rabbis also opposes new settlements. So Jewish Voice for Peace helps you demand that the U.S. withhold funding for Israel until they actually freeze new settlements in the West Bank. It's not that much to ask.

Meanwhile, the crazy happy budget fun continues in California! Gov. Schwarzenegger has threatened to veto the budget the Legislature has finally put together because of -- are you sitting comfortably? -- taxes on oil and tobacco companies. Not impressed? California currently collects fewer taxes on oil at the wellhead than anyone in the Union. Collecting more in taxes from rich oil companies might well prevent schools and hospitals from closing, might well prevent the expulsion of 900,000 children from the state health insurance program, and might well prevent public transportation services from falling apart. Worse, Mr. Schwarzenegger himself proposed new oil taxes in November. We had such high hopes for Arnold, despite the scarlet R next to his name; now it's clear he's just like the rest of them, willing to sacrifice services people might actually use so rich folks can gild their plumbing. Barbara Boxer has nothing to worry about from Arnold in 2010. CALPIRG, again, helps you hand out the beatdowns.

In other news, Sen. Max Baucus (slave to mammon-MT) has, after much thought, decided that ruling out a single-payer plan from the beginning of the health care debate was, in retrospect, a mistake -- because it made Mr. Obama's middle-of-the-road proposal look like the "liberal" alternative to private insurance. All I can say to Senator Baucus is: well, duh. Seems like I've been saying for years now that you don't negotiate by starting with your fall-back position, and you certainly don't negotiate with madmen that way. And sometimes I wish Matthew Yglesias himself wouldn't be so restrained in the face of such madness -- he says things like "(f)raming effects are important in politics," which we all know in our gut even if we don't throw words like "framing effects" around at the water cooler. But, as usual, he still has much to say -- like that "single-payer" isn't "government-run" but government-insured, which difference at least one New York Times reporter apparently doesn't get.

UPDATE. I forgot to mention that only California residents can sign the petition to which I link in paragraph 3. I'm sorry about that. Also, did you know Willie Nelson wrote Patsy Cline's "Crazy"? I didn't. Willie Nelson is the cat's pajamas. He had no discernible involvement in Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy," however.

all-defense Wednesday!

As the House considers its annual defense authorization bill, missile defense shield proponents aim to reverse Pentagon-requested cuts in said missile defense shield. The Pentagon really shouldn't be spending any money on missile defense, but certainly House members shouldn't be asking for more. Why my animus against missile defense shields? Roll call! It could take a dozen or more missiles, at $50 million (or more) a pop, to take down one incoming! Missiles can be easily and (relatively) cheaply defended against using mylar and/or reflective paint! Tha Bush Mobb rigged its own missile defense shield tests to succeed, and the tests still failed! But I'm not all about negativity here; I'm also about solutions. If you're that worried about "rogue states," you can park your aircraft carrier outside their border and arm that with missiles that'll have a better chance of taking down their missiles. Of course one can always offer inducements to "rogue" states to permit you to park your carriers at their doorstep. Basically, the "missile defense shield" is a way of funneling taxpayer money to undeserving defense contracting corporations, and no "deficit hawk" worth the title should tolerate that. Council for a Livable World helps you hand out the beatdowns.

Both Peace Action West and True Majority help you oppose funding for F-22 fighter planes, which were born of the cauldron of the Cold War and yet have never flown a single combat mission. It gets better. The House Armed Services Committee funded almost $370 million (out of a long-term commitment of $2 billion) toward the F-22 by taking it from a fund to clean up hazardous nuclear waste. I can't imagine proponents of nuclear power standing for that kind of madness. Unless, of course, they're dishonest. The F-22 has suppliers and plants in 44 states, so a lot of Reps and Senators will have to vote against their naked self-interest in restoring the funding to nuclear waste cleanup. Funny how often it comes down to that. But I, for one, will not yield. Reps and Senators must come to understand that the people's interest is their self-interest. You'd think that Republicans, at least, would get that, having been hemorrhaging Congressional seats lately.

Meanwhile, the House also plans to vote on an amendment to the same defense authorization bill that would force WHINSEC (the Artist Formerly Known as the School of the Americas) to release names of graduates and instructors. Widely known as the place torturers go to learn the trade, Tha Bush Mobb has denied Freedom of Information Act requests to learn those names since 2005, and I wouldn't expect better from the Obama Administration, certainly not right away. Would releasing the names of graduates and instructors violate their privacy rights? Not when you consider that you can find names of graduates and instructors of any other school -- or that many of WHINSEC's graduates and instructors might be guilty of war crimes. SOA Watch provides the contact tool.

Finally, I offer two readings regarding recent events in Iran that, taken together, suggest that Andrew Sullivan, God bless him, is wrong to suggest that "the revolution will be televised." According to Wired, Nokia Siemens seems to have installed deep-packet inspection technology on Iran's national telecom network, which has permitted the Iranian government to read everything happening over its wires (and which has also slowed down the national network to about a tenth of its speed). Meanwhile, the BBC reports that Nokia Siemens has confirmed that it's supplied the Iranian government with technology that could monitor and control cell phone calls. Spooky, eh? In any case, the death of an Iranian street protestor captured on a cell phone camera suggests that the system of repression only needs one crack for light to pass through -- and systems of repression always have cracks. It may not topple a government. But the world will hate the mullahs more than they hate us for the indefinite future, which is almost certainly to the greater good.

UPDATE. I replaced the word "Iran" with the word "mullahs" in the last sentence of the above -- it's true that folks will see Iran when they think of its government, but it's not true that "hating Iran" is "to the greater good." I apologize profoundly for suggesting as much. Error now corrected.

health care and nuke policy, plus bonus bad lawyering.

The Interfaith Week of Prayer for Healthcare is underway! The United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries provides a toll-free number, 1.888.797.8917, with which you may express-yourself-not-repress-yourself on real health care reform -- which would (if you're still reading this blog) likely be either a) a Canadian-style single-payer national health insurance system or b) a public health insurance system option (and that's my way-backup choice). Think Progress provides a handy graphic demonstrating that the CBS/NYT poll you heard about the other day did actually demonstrate widespread public support for (at the very least) a public option. NETWORK helps you think of what to say to your Reps and Senators, if you get stuck. (If you're not Catholic, just adapt their points to your faith; morality is a universal language.) And if you want to get your anger on, USPIRG helps you watch HMO execs refuse to say they'll stop using pre-existing conditions as a reason to deny coverage, even if said pre-existing condition is minor and/or irrelevant, and even if said denial results in death. I mean, you know you're doing badly when you provoke Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) to join the side of the angels. (He is pretty glorious in the video; he doesn't come in until near the end.)

You know Tha Bush Mobb pushed odious official nuclear policies, including pre-emptive strikes, bunker-busters, and pulling out of long-standing agreements; you probably also know that even a Republican Congress couldn't stomach most of that policy. So Peace Action West helps you push the Obama Administration toward a nuclear weapons policy that makes a bit of sense. The Obama Administration will soon officially review U.S. nuclear policy, so now's the time for them to hear from government's owners, the people. And no, spelling out a desire for a nuke-free world (or a plan to get there) will not make the terrorists stronger. We have approximately eight bajillion more nuclear weapons than all the terrorists in the world put together; cutting down to four bajillion isn't a show of weakness. And if al-Qaeda somehow provokes the U.S. into unleashing nuclear horror on some part of the world, then, frankly, the terrorists have already won. That's kind of how power works.

Finally, we come to the monstrous legal opinion described here. An Obama Justice Department lawyer suggested to a federal judge that Mr. Cheney's remarks in the Scooter Libby probe ought to be kept secret not just because future executives would otherwise be reluctant to cooperate with probes, but because if they say anything idiotic, The Daily Show might make fun of them. In other news, politicians shouldn't have to listen to their constituents because their feelings might get hurt, shouldn't have to lift packages weighing more than two pounds because they might get a boo-boo, and shouldn't have to walk anywhere because their tootsies might ache. The good news? The judge rejected the argument. But I'm annoyed that the Justice Department still reeks of Bushian boldness.

world town.

Pennsylvania residents, take note: we've got dueling gay-marriage bills in the Senate. One, SB 935, would make Pennsylvania the 7th state to recognize gay marriages, while the other, a John Eichelberger bill, would ban them. Mr. Eichelberger recently stated that our society "allows" gays to exist; I guess in 1900 he'd have said we "allow" Jews to exist. Sadly, a lot of folks are like Mr. Eichelberger, and even still think folks get "turned" gay. The science tells us folks are born gay, and I believe a God that would create souls just to damn them would be a cruel God indeed. And my God ain't cruel. So Keystone Progress provides the relevant petition.

Free Press provides a petition demanding more freedom for consumers using their cell phones to access the internet. You probably already know about all this if you have an iPhone -- which I'd love to have, but won't get, because I'd only be able to use AT&T's network, would only be able to use applications that AT&T deems unthreatening, and wouldn't be able to access any website I'd like. (That's before we get to AT&T's willingness to give everyone's phone records to Mr. Bush as part of his warrantless wiretapping program.) I shouldn't have to add that more people have cell phones than have broadband-at-home, and thus cell phones have a lot more power to give fast internet services to poor people. Long story short: we demand freedom for consumers, not corporations.

H.R. 1618/S. 779, the Safe Highways and Infrastructure Preservation Act, would expand the number of trucks for which government can set size and weight limits, and it would hold down said limits. This is the kind of thing only wonks care about, right? It shouldn't be -- trucks take a disproportionate toll on our roads, cause a disproportionate number of crashes and deaths, and pump out a disproportionate amount of greenhouse gases. Bigger, heavier trucks are also bad for already-overworked truck drivers. So Public Citizen helps you support the bill.

Meanwhile, American Rights at Work helps Pennsylvania residents hold Arlen Specter's feet to the fire in re the Employee Free Choice Act. As you recall, Sen. Specter co-sponsored the EFCA in 2005 and 2007 when it had no chance of overcoming a Republican filibuster -- then abandoned his support earlier this year when it looked like he'd be the deciding vote on, you know, bringing the EFCA to an actual Senate vote. Since then he's changed parties, but he hasn't changed positions. I didn't expect him to flip-flop back right away, of course, because that would look opportunistic. But how he looks doesn't matter. The will of the people he represents matters.

Finally, let me state for the record that I think Mr. Obama handled the official American reaction to the Iranian election protests just fine. Only an idiot would put pressure on a foreign government to rush its own process for verifying election results -- until that government starts killing its own citizens as they peacefully protest, which is exactly the point at which Mr. Obama spoke out against the Iranian government's abuses. That all might sound callous, but this ain't a one-world government. And Mr. McCain needs reminding that the American people put his opponent in office partly because they grew sick of a government that constantly told everyone else what to do.

starring the usual suspects: Free Press, NETWORK, FactCheck.

Remember a few months back when Time Warner wanted to overcharge folks for internet usage? They abandoned that plan because, get this, nobody who uses the internet liked it. But that doesn't mean they won't try again. So H.R. 2902, the Broadband Internet Fairness Act, would give the Federal Trade Commission (in consultation with the FCC) the authority to review volume usage service plans, and would require internet providers to justify such plans based on cost, and not on, you know, whatever said internet providers feel like charging. Or what they say the "free market" will bear -- the free market ought to be providing freedom for consumers, not corporations, and (at the risk of sounding self-interested) a file-neutral internet provided at reasonable rates gives consumers more freedom than a system that lets corporations gouge them. Free Press has the contact tool.

The Healthy Families Act (H.R. 2460/S.1152), which we've discussed here before, would allow workers to earn seven paid sick days per year, in a country where, for example, almost 80% of food service workers don't get any paid sick days. The bill is now officially "stuck in committee," both House and Senate versions having been referred to committee in mid- to late-May. Some deal-making could go on, I suppose, that would dislodge these bills from committee hell -- or we could keep telling our Congressfolk, again and again, that we want this dang bill passed already. Imagine, citizens demanding that their Congressfolk actually represent their interests! Call me dreamer if you like, but I've consecrated a big chuck of my life to the whole idea. NETWORK provides one contact tool for your House Reps, and another for your Senators.

Meanwhile, factcheck.org, true to its name, fact-checks claims President Obama made in June 11 and June 15 addresses about the cost of health care, and Mr. Obama largely comes out clean. Factcheck has some qualms about Mr. Obama's claim that "the average family pays a thousand dollars in extra premiums to pay for people going to the emergency room who don't have health care," but admits that the figure could be that high. Hell, anyone who thinks about the cost of an E.R. visit versus a cost to your primary care physician knows all these E.R. visits have to be a huge drag on costs -- whether it's a grand per family or $200, that's a lot of families and therefore a lot of money that could be better spent. And nobody doubts that we could all be a lot healthier for all that money we're spending. I can't see all of Frank Luntz's "framing" stacking up well against this particular wall of data. Well, unless the "liberal" media helps him (and the Republicans) out, and when does that ever happen, besides always?

I got yr too-big-to-fail right here!

The Obama Justice Department filed a brief supporting the Defense (sic) of Marriage Act against a gay California couple's challenge thereof -- and suggested that when states refuse to recognize incestuous marriages, they set precedent for refusing to recognize gay marriages. How many times must I tell these pimps! Gay marriage has nothing whatsoever to do with incest, nor, for that matter, bestiality or polygamy. They're on entirely different slopes -- gay marriages would happen between consenting gay adults, but the family dog can't consent to sex with its owner, younger relatives can't consent to sex with older relatives who have power over them, and brothers and sisters (and cousins) can't consent to sex with each other, given all the familial power struggles they endure. I'd even argue that polygamous relationships aren't consensual -- three or more adults could theoretically agree to be married, but they'd have a prohibitively difficult time making decisions within the relationship so that every partner has an equal say. So CREDO helps you hand out the smack to the Obama Justice Department.

S. 990, the AFTERSchool Meals Act, would expand the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act to help provide meals for children enrolled in after-school programs in low-income areas. The bill's sponsors include the usual suspects (Sanders, Brown), but they also include The Artist Formerly Known as Nixon's Mayor, Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana. If Sen. Lugar thinks it's good enough to bear his name, then I guess only a Scrooge McSmallgovernment would oppose it, especially since similar programs already work in ten states. On the other hand, S. 990 is also the kind of bill that could die from lack of attention. So NETWORK (told you I'd stop) helps you remind your Senators to support S. 990.

California residents, take note: your state's economy might be collapsing thanks to cowardly Democrats and insane Republicans (I mean, isn't that whole set-up so 2008 already?), but CALPIRG provides a way into the debate. Apparently California's highly-esteemed government will let schools close, let hospitals close, let parks close, and let public transportation systems wither and die, but are perfectly happy to let nine big corporations (plus the film industry) take home billions in tax loopholes. Let me guess: these corporations are just too big to fail. It's always a damn hostage situation, isn't it? First they pick your pocket and then they tell you that you can't live without them. Enough already! CALPIRG helps you hand out the beatdowns.

on wage theft, health care theft, and election theft.

How do corporations get through hard economic times? Well, they lay off workers, or stop hiring workers, but they also might try just not paying the workers they already have, which we know as "wage theft." Wage theft can take many forms -- companies might pay you less than minimum wage, pay you with a bad check, withhold wages for hours you've already worked, forget to pay your final paycheck when they let you go, or (even) forget to pay you for all that overtime you did. All of these can very easily look like mistakes -- or could be a company's way of needling its workers until they stop fighting. NETWORK, the National Catholic Social Justice Lobby (I'll stop soon), helps you urge your Reps and Senators to increase funding to the Department of Labor and add another 250 investigators to the Wage and Hour Division. See? Big government does create jobs. Absolutely necessary jobs, in fact.

The Senate apparently will start "working" on health care "reform" today, and Consumers Union helps you support a strong public health care option. You can change the text in the contact tool if (like me) you want to assert a preference for a Canadian style, single-payer national health care program. But this contact tool does a number of things quite well; for one, it demands that a public health option must have affordability, choice of doctors, and security if you lose your job or get sick. For another, well, I'll just quote these two paragraphs in their entirety: "I pay more today for health care because doctors and hospitals must cover the costs of the 46 million people without insurance. People without insurance usually delay getting early treatment for an illness or put off preventive care, and as a result, they get sicker and are harder to treat, and we all end up paying more. This is a terrible cycle we have to break, which is why we need meaningful reform that gets everyone covered, with financial help on a sliding-fee basis for those who can't afford health insurance." I've long made this point, and I'm glad to see someone else make it.

Finally, this may already be old news, but folks-in-the-know haven't been following the Iranian election mess via mainstream media outlets, but via the internet. Apparently you find out more about Iran from blogs and (especially) from twitter than you do from CNN these days, and the conservative blogger Andrew Sullivan, in particular, has been covering events in Iran just about non-stop. His work provides a good primer, though I think he's a little too hopeful about what's happening -- it's no sure bet that from now on "the revolution will be televised," not just since the Revolutionary Guard has been cracking down on internet use within Iran, but because the "tools" of "televised revolution" (the cell phone, the laptop, etc.) are just as available to Ahmadinejad's mob as any other. Indeed, I saw a twitter report yesterday warning that the Iranian state has been posting false twitter reports. Police states, we must remember, are always run by people, and that's cause for both hope (because people are basically good) and despair (because people do so much evil in spite of -- or even in service of -- their good nature).

good good soldiers and bad good soldiers.

Common Cause asks you to sign a "letter of commendation" celebrating five stalwart soldiers who stood up to Bush Mobb abuses of power. When I look at Tha Bush Mobb, I see only torturers and thugs, but I will never look at our Armed Forces that way -- certainly not when so many good Americans in our Armed Forces have shown the courage and the decency to protect our values, even at risk of their own careers. I'm glad that Common Cause has reminded us of these good folk, and I'll continue to remind my readers of good folk like these every chance I get.

Meanwhile, I understand that only 36 Senators support a public health insurance option, which is, as you know, Mr. Obama's fall-back position. CREDO helps you tell your Senator to support a public option, but I'm not sure I'm going to do that. I see no hypocrisy in supporting both a single-payer system and a public health insurance option as long as I'm clear about which one I prefer, and of course if it's a choice between having a public health insurance option and the pile of dung Max Baucus will likely call "reform," I'll take the option. But I don't think that should be our choice. And I think the citizen's job is to communicate his or her will, not play the political games Senators play. So you'd probably be better off calling your Senator (using the tools in the upper left-hand corner) and communicating your preference for a Canadian-style single-payer health insurance system, if that is a preference you share. I think you'd know how to argue for it -- as I've said repeatedly over the last few weeks-if-not-months, the other side's arguments are weak, and all we need to do is call that weakness out.

readings for Monday, June 15, 2009.

America's Last Reporter, Greg Palast, explains that the Peruvian government's seizure of indigenous lands -- a seizure made easier by our "free"-trade agreement with that nation, which we unsuccessfully fought in this space in 2007 -- is part of a long tradition of finding oil beneath Indians and then getting rid of the Indians. We travel from 1980s Oklahoma to 1969 Alaska to modern-day Ecuador, but we don't get much hope: even when Shell Oil pays out a $15 million settlement to the Ogoni people, it's only a drop in the bucket, as they say, for them. One hopes that Noam Chomsky is right: that world public opinion has emerged as a world superpower. If so, corporations will have to be cagier, if nothing else.

The Institute for Southern Studies provides evidence suggesting that exposure to arsenic makes you more vulnerable to swine flu. Regulating arsenic has been a federal bone of contention for some time; remember the glory days of 2001, when Mr. Bush very reluctantly accepted a Clinton-era EPA mandate to reduce arsenic from 50 ppm to 10 ppm in drinking water? Well, many, many areas of the country (especially in the South) still have much higher levels of arsenic in their water than that, and many areas of Mexico (where the H1N1 strain was first reported) also have very high levels of arsenic in their water. Of course (as the article's expansive second section demonstrates), arsenic is a fairly common emission of coal-burning power plants. "Clean" coal plants, too, I'll bet.

If you need more evidence that the right-wing's push-back against public health insurance is a complete failure on the merits, check out this factcheck.org analysis of a Conservatives (sic) for Patients Rights (sic) ad. OMFG the public health option would move 119 million people off their health insurance...onto, er, public health insurance, and that's only the most unlikely scenario. The ad also quotes something someone said in the New York Times as if the New York Times itself said it. And, er, "hundreds of choices in health care today"? That is to laugh. Allowing HMOs to buy out and gut other HMOs gives us fewer choices, and, ah, 47 million folks have only one "choice" for health care: the ER -- which in turn means we have no "choice" but to pay charity care bills through higher premiums on our own health care. Of course, though the right-wing's case is a complete failure on the merits (don't get me started about "rationing" -- hello? The "free market" has already "rationed" 47 million Americans out!), that doesn't mean they won't win -- former single-payer advocate Barack Obama is out there now campaigning for his fall-back position, and you can't count on the "liberal" media or the cowardly Congress to see what's in front of their nose.

penny rants for Friday, June 12, 2009: special "hatorade drinkers of the world unite!" edition.

So "conservatives" are ripping into Fox News (sic) anchor Shepard Smith for linking the Holocaust Museum shooting on Wednesday to that DHS report on right-wing extremism that "conservatives" didn't like. What sayeth FNC braintrust to this development? I think they're saying, everything's going according to plan. I want to like Shepard Smith, since he's likely the only Fox News talking head to say we shouldn't torture even if it works. But what if Mr. Smith's good-guy persona is part of Pravda TV's calculus for not just surviving the Obama era, but thriving in it? Even as Mr. Smith rips into Fox News viewers who buy into "hate that's not based in fact", plenty of his Pravda TV co-workers and contributors deal in, well, hate that's not based in fact -- they just don't shoot up museums, probably because (as rich men and women) they don't feel like they have to. Again, I really want to believe Shepard Smith is as good a guy as he seems. But the folks at FNC are nothing if not cunning. And he could be in on the scam.

I guess it shouldn't surprise me that the right wing paints Holocaust Museum shooter James von Brunn as a "leftist" -- especially since Roy Edroso had their number the day of the shooting. He finds a right-winger who harrumphs that Mr. von Brunn is a "nut job" (congratulations on your moral compass!) but then goes on to actually sympathize with a hypothetical "hard working stiff" (sic) who might act similarly tomorrow. Are "American's" (sic) really being "crush(ed)" under such "fascist" policies as a three-percentage point increase in income taxes for the very richest Americans that won't even go into effect for another 18 months? Were we not worse off under actual Bush Mobb fascist policies like the PATRIOT Act, warrantless wiretapping, and "voluntary" corporate regulation? I've long said that the last eight years should have put a Coxey's Army on the steps of the White House every week. Now we're more likely to get armies of sick bastards. Rick Santelli will call them "populists."

In other news, American Rights at Work points me to Business Leaders for a Fair Economy, which boasts of bringing together 1,000 business leaders who support the Employee Free Choice Act, because, strange as it may sound, they believe in a functioning middle class. But the haters are ready for it -- Investor's Business Daily's anaylsis of BLFE is light on facts, heavy on non-facts, and, interestingly, heavy on personal attacks. IBD disses leaders it's never heard of, as if they didn't get the memo that you're supposed to be nice to small businesses -- or as if they didn't check to see if these leaders they've never heard of have websites that might have helped them hear of them, as more than half of the ones I checked do. But IBD also disses leaders it has heard of -- it finds the involvement of investment firm Trillium Asset Management sinister, though it doesn't seem to find the involvement of, oh, just about every large corporation and business magazine in the country against EFCA at all sinister. For added flavor, IBD also notes "a distinct countercultural tinge" to the moving slide-show of EFCA supporters! How dare those pinkocommieterrorist construction companies, printing services, and independent bookstores join BLFE -- not to mention that bastion of dirty hippiedom, the Pizza Boli's chain. Really, IBD takes ignorance to a whole new level. It's as if they've been taking a bath in the Great Depression of 2008 or something.

Finally, I'd like to wish the good citizens of Iran luck today as they vote for President. Sadly, they'll be voting for whether they want a far-right President or a somewhat less far-right President -- hey! That sounds kind of familiar! -- but nonetheless count me in the "Anybody but Ahmedinejad" camp.

you don't need to be in who's who to know what's what.

Mr. Obama's supplemental war funding request (H.R. 2346) now has the yoke of an unpopular $100 billion giveaway to the IMF attached -- Sen. Brown (D-OH) managed to ameliorate that giveaway a good bit with some conditions about social spending and workers' rights, but regardless of my stated support for said conditions, a bailout is still a bailout, and immoral war is still immoral war. So the People's Email Network provides an email contact tool and several toll-free numbers (800.828.0498, 866.338.1015 and 866.220.0044) with which you may oppose the war supplemental. Apparently the Democratic leadership wants to pass the supplemental with only Democratic votes, so that they won't have to debate the inclusion of IMF funds with Republicans, many of whom would be (understandably!) upset at the inclusion. So Firedoglake provides contact information for some six dozen Democratic Reps who might vote against the supplemental. The House leadership might wind up failing to fund the wars this way; then they'll either have to ditch the IMF funding or fund the wars' end -- either, certainly, a desirable aim.

Meanwhile, we haven't heard enough about financial re-regulation lately, so Consumers Union provides a contact tool demanding an overhaul of our financial regulation system. Specifically, CU calls for a Financial Product Safety Commission, which sounds kind of odd if, like me, you think the word "product" should apply to things that actually exist in space-time, versus "products" that only exist in the minds of financial "wizards." But if a Financial Product Safety Commission actually helps regulate the financial industry, if it actually helps put consumers first when they need to borrow or invest money, then I'll submit to the fiction a bit. Key words in that previous sentence: "a bit."

Two Senate committees will jointly hold a hearing on their federal whistleblower protection legislation today (S. 372), so now's the time to tell them that the House federal whistleblower protection bill -- H.R. 1507, which may pass the House for the third time very shortly -- is the better idea. The House bill gives federal employees and contractors access to jury trials for claims of retaliation -- which right many private-sector employees already have -- and would also provide safe channels of disclosure for intelligence and national security workers. The Senate will no doubt claim that government workers shouldn't have the ability to wreak so much havoc on the government in these difficult times, but if our values aren't good enough for troubled times, they're not good enough at all, and I refuse to believe our values aren't good enough. Public Citizen helps you tell your Senators what's what.

Finally, we again address the canard that higher state tax rates cause millionaires to move out of the state. The media jumped on Maryland Treasury Comptroller Peter Franchot's statement that the number of millionaires filing tax returns had dropped significantly in 2008 -- see, they said, high state tax rates really do cause millionaires to move out! Not so fast, says the Institution on Taxation and Economic Policy -- they note that, while the preliminary number of tax returns from millionaires dropped between 2007 and 2008, the preliminary number of tax returns from folks making between $250,000 and $999,999 rose rather dramatically, which suggests that maybe the Great Depression of 2008 changed a lot of millionaires into sub-millionaires. Of course, absent actual address change figures, final-versus-preliminary tax return numbers, et cetera, we don't actually know the whole story. Strange how that doesn't stop the media from acting like they know the whole story, though.

I got yr Green Dam right here!

The government of China has announced that, beginning July 1, all PCs sold in China will have to include "Green Dam" software. They say the software will help keep pornography off computers, but we can't take their word for it -- China already restricts internet usage more than just about anyone on Earth, forbidding its citizens from viewing sites relating to Tianenmen Square or the Falun Gong or the Dalai Lama. It gets better: American computer-makers Dell and Hewlett-Packard will have to comply with the rules if they want to sell computers in China. The corporations seem, happily, rather upset with the rules, but will likely need more steel in their spine to defy the Chinese government; CREDO helps you supply that steel.

H.R. 2404, a Jim McGovern (D-MA) production, would force the Secretary of Defense to outline an exit strategy for U.S. forces in Afghanistan by the end of this calendar year. That is, actually, all the bill says; I guess you can't fault Jim McGovern for overstaying his welcome. But Peace Action West's contact tool lets you go on about supporting H.R. 2404 as long as you like -- up to 5,000 characters, though of course your House Rep is more likely to read something shorter. You may want to mention, if this is your view, that one possible exit strategy might be "get bin Laden and get out." That's mine, anyway -- I mean, we could do plenty of noble things in Afghanistan if we were willing to run their country for them, but we're not. Nor should we be.

for the want of a nail.

Robert Reich may be right -- we're losing the battle against the big health insurers for health care reform. So USPIRG helps you tell your health care horror story. Feeling underwhelmed by that idea? As I pointed out many weeks ago, the big insurers' fight against reform depends on the American voters completely forgetting what health care is already like -- the other side talks about dem big-govmint bureaucrats getting between you and your health care when private health insurers already get between you and health care. Remind your Congressfolk of what health care is really like -- they get government health care, you know, so they don't really understand -- and we'll be showing them that we're not falling for their tricks.

Sen. Webb (D-VA), who's still my homey despite all the times he's disappointed me over the last two years, has introduced S. 714, which would establish the National Criminal Justice Commission. The National Criminal Justice Commission would review, well, the entire criminal justice system, both at federal and state levels, and a perusal of the bill's findings (sec. 2) reveals that S. 714 is pretty mad that our incarceration level is five times the world's average, that minorities suffer disproportionately at the hands of the justice system, that corrections expenditures eat up money that could be spent on education and public safety, that high incarceration rates for drug offenses haven't made drugs less available, that the number of ex-offenders returning to prison has doubled over the last two decades -- well, the list goes on and on. I think some good could come out of this, and so does NETWORK, the (wait for it) National Catholic Social Justice Lobby, which helps you support the bill. (You might want to ask that the bill shows more awareness of women's issues in incarceration.)

Pennsylvania residents, take note: the Pennsylvania state Senate Communications and Technology Committee will take up S.B. 621, which would end Real ID in the state. We all know the problems with Real ID, right? That it would force the state database to synchronize with national databases, which would actually make it easier for some unscrupulous individual to steal your ID? That it would force the state to keep more copies of your important documents around, which increases the number of documents that could be stolen? That it would put (you guessed it) an easily-stolen machine-readable zone on the back of your ID? That all of this would cost gobs of money we could be spending on something more worthwhile, like health care or putting actual boots on the ground to find bin Laden? The ACLU of Pennsylvania helps you oppose Real ID, which has already been successfully resisted by 13 states.

Meanwhile, Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) has apparently discovered twitter, but, unfortunately, uses it like a twit. Really, look at that link. Done looking? Good. This is, seriously now, one of the most embarrassing things I've ever seen -- I'm shocked and saddened to witness a not-so-bad Republican Senator write like a just-jilted high school boy. Plus, he has to work weekends (or, rather, WKENDS)! I figured Sen. Grassley would cruise to re-election in 2010, and I was OK with living with that, but now I can think of at least two Iowa Democratic Congressmen who might think they have a shot at him. They wouldn't show that message in their ad, of course -- Iowa voters wouldn't like that -- but Mr. Grassley has sixteen months to crack up further.

UPDATE. I'm thrilled to report that both my Senators (Casey and Specter) are co-sponsors of S. 714 (see second paragraph above). Mr. Casey often impresses me with his compassion, but I should also have expected Mr. Specter's support, as he has long taken a keen (and not rightist) interest in crime and punishment. I guess sometimes I ought to cut Mr. Specter a little slack. Key word: sometimes.

this used to be the future.

Sen. Feingold has introduced S. 1173, the Community-Based Health Care Retraining Act, which would create a "demonstration project" retraining laid-off workers as health-care workers in communities which have unusually low employment rates. That's right, low employment rates -- Russ Feingold knows as well as you and I that the meaning of the word "unemployment" has been jerked around so much in recent years that it now tells you about half the story. The "demonstration project" would give grants to partnerships consisting of local workplace investment boards and institutions of higher learning (not excluding tech schools, of course). You may want to give your Senator a call (using the tools in the upper left-hand corner) expressing your support for this legislation. They'll never see it coming.

Public Citizen helps you demand better climate change legislation from Congress. As I've said, I prefer good old-fashioned regulation over cap-and-trade, but the contact tool, at least, helps us get a better cap-and-trade law. There's no hypocrisy in advocating for both -- and you can edit this particular message to suit your views. Meanwhile, the Union for Concerned Scientists helps you encourage Obama Administration officials to advocate for better climate-change legislation. You'll be talking to two separate branches of government, so you can go ahead and use both contact tools without muddying the data.

Meanwhile, close to home, the Pennsylvania state Senate's budget proposal has gutted funding for state parks and forestlands, which could shut down one in four state parks across the state. Why would Republicans gut park funding? Perhaps they're gunning (so to speak) to lose the fishing-and-hunting vote, or the folks-who-are-vacationing-within-Pennsylvania-because-hello-there's-a-depression-on vote. Sen. Scarpati can stop playing stupid, too -- you close a state park by selling it off to your cronies for "development." If you're a Pennsylvania resident, you can email your State Senator and begin the backlash.

it's super-gay Friday!

Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach is the latest gay airman to get the axe under don't-ask-don't-tell; he has served 18 years in the Air Force, has logged 400 combat hours, and has nine air medals. I mention these just so you don't think it's only about gay Arabic linguists around here. Anyway, the Servicemembers' Legal Defense Network provides a petition to Air Force Secretary Michael Donley asking Sec. Donley to continue to let Lt. Col. Fehrenbach serve. I know that don't-ask-don't-tell is the law of the land, but I also know that Rosa Parks broke the law when she wouldn't move to the back of the bus, and I don't regret that, either. Mr. Obama has kept putting don't-ask-don't-tell on the back burner, despite having two wars to fight; maybe, just maybe, an Air Force Secretary's defiance will convince him to do better.

Now that New Hampshire has embraced gay marriage (is that why Mitt Romney won't move there now?), we turn our attention to New York, where the state Assembly has passed a marriage equality bill and Gov. Paterson has promised to sign it. Who are we forgetting? Ah, of course -- the New York state Senate, which also must pass the bill. So the ACLU helps you contact all your New York friends and remind them to contact their state Senators. Better hurry, because the innocuously-named National Organization for Marriage has spent a boatload of bucks in New York trying to defeat the bill -- just so that gays can't visit their beloved in the hospital or make important medical decisions or inherit estates, among so many other things. Why would anyone do such a thing? Because they drink hatorade for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It's that simple.

for the people who work and play/doin' it everyday/this is how it need to be.

The FCC seeks comments on America's national broadband plan, and Free Press helps you leave said comments on said plan. Basic theme? Up with people, down with corporations. Good news? This theme resonates across the political spectrum -- organizations like the Christian Coalition and the NRA have been just as steadfast in their defense of freedom-for-people media issues as the rest of us have. Bad news? The big telecoms are the biggest dogs on the block right now -- I mean, big agriculture and big pharma don't care about big media, we didn't regrow our manufacturing sector this week, and the auto manufacturers and financial kingpins aren't doing so hot right now. So who does that leave between us and freedom? That's right, the big telecoms, with their high prices, their favoring of "partners," their limits on usage and content, their blocking of actual innovative products, and their snooping on our private communications. What are they good for? Good records and TV shows? That only comes down to cases, and in any case you and I can do that on our own, and use a free, net-neutral internet to share it. So keep fighting.

NETWORK, the Catholic Social Justice Lobby (yes in fact I do love writing that), will join an Interfaith Service of Witness and Prayer (I love writing that too) for universal health care in D.C. on June 24. NETWORK will also sponsor "echo" events during the June 19-26 Week of Prayer for Health Care for All; there may be some echo events in July as well. The Senate can throw out all the advocates of single-payer health care they want, but truth is the wheels of the Senate grind slower than those of God, so the more we fight, the better chance we have of winning. You can find more information about these events here. The D.C. event takes place at Freedom Plaza, on Pennsylvania Ave and 13th St. NW, near the Metro Center stop, it should run from 4 pm to 7 pm. I'll have more details, of course, as they arrive.

the usual -- good Catholics, bad Republicans.

S. 1085, the Reuniting Families Act, aims to cut down immigration visa backlogs, mainly by raising per-country immigration limits, utilizing unused visas, and permitting widows, widowers, and orphans to remain eligible for visas after the death of their beloved. Since a lot of relatives have to wait decades to be reunited with parents and/or siblings, these all seem like awfully compassionate moves. No doubt the far right (some of whom, as you know, are either immigrants themselves or the offspring of immigrants) will call S. 1085 just another way to let terrorists flood our country. What's the big deal? Find the trouble, get the warrants, make the arrests, stop bad things from happening. I guess it's understandable that they would go bat-guano at any liberalization of immigration laws, given that their Personal Lord and Savior, George W. Bush, did the worst job of using the legal tools he had to stop terrorists than any President I can remember. NETWORK has the contact tool.

Meanwhile, factcheck.org weighs in on Republican claims that the Obama cap-and-trade proposal would cost households an average of $3,100 per year. Long story short: the MIT study Republicans cite actually puts the figure at around $800, and the study actually predates Mr. Obama's plan by almost two years. But here's what never gets challenged in all the hullabaloo: Republicans constantly insist that government should never force businesses to incur any sort of extra cost because businesses will always pass that cost onto their consumers. I have a few questions for Republicans: one, is that moral, and if not, why do Republicans tolerate it? Two, how come their beloved "free market" never seems to answer their nightmare scenarios? It couldn't be because their "free market" only benefits corporations, and never benefits consumers, could it?

there is beauty in the bellow of the blast.

S. 1152, the Healthy Families Act, would require employers to permit employees to accrue one hour of paid sick time for every thirty hours worked, up to 56 hours of paid sick time per year (unless the employer permits more hours). Not everybody's as lucky as me, you know -- some employers don't give their employees any sick time, and everyone gets sick sooner or later. I'm guessing the right-wing response to S. 1152 would be that, since some employers give sick time and others don't, the employee should be responsible enough to get a job that gives him or her sick time. I think such people forget how hard it is to get a job, period -- particularly in a rural or depressed area. NETWORK, the National Catholic Social Justice Lobby (see? We're not all like Bill Donohue!) provides the contact tool.

Secretary Vilsack has requested that the USDA update its 50-year-old regulations on importing invasive plant species. That's a good thing, and Union for Concerned Scientists helps you support this effort. You'll specifically ask that Mr. Vilsack approve stricter plant-importations standards more quickly. A lot has happened in the last 50 years, you know -- for example, the Plant Protection Act of 2000 mandated that the USDA's Animal Plant Health and Inspection Service (or APHIS) update its regulations concerning weeds. But then, you probably remembered what happened in the intervening eight years -- or, should I say, who happened.

H.R. 1507, the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2009, would, well, enhance protections for whistleblowers, mainly by eliminating time limits for disclosure. No doubt the right would have us believe that the bill would protect employees who make frivolous claims of waste or fraud, but they would need to show me where the bill does that, because I don't see it. Perhaps the right will even invoke the specter of national security in keeping whistleblowers in line. Folks, if we have to choose between our security and protecting good citizens who put an awful lot on the line in order to do the right thing, then we don't deserve any security. The road of liberty is not an easy road, nor should it be. The National Whistleblowers Center provides the contact tool.

As anticipated, Bill O'Reilly had a little something to say last night about the murder of Dr. George Tiller, a.k.a. "Tiller the Baby-Killer," with whom Mr. O'Reilly has been a bit obsessed over the years. I don't blame Bill O'Reilly for George Tiller's murder -- I blame him for his fake independence, his fake compassion, and his fake rage, all of which are, I believe, more damaging to our society than a single murder, or even a single act of domestic terrorism. How do I know he's such a fake? Because he spends about 15 seconds condemning the death of Dr. Tiller -- forgetting, even, to offer condolences to friends and family -- but spends two full minutes responding to critics of Fox News and the Factor. In short, for Bill O'Reilly, George Tiller's death is mainly all about how persecuted Bill O'Reilly is. That's exactly the kind of sickness, immorality, and decadence I keep talking about here.

thieves!/thieves and liars!/murderers, hypocrites, and bastards!

With the exoneration of two more death row inmates in the last week, the ACLU reminds us that Troy Davis, of whom we've spoken before, remains on death row in Georgia although no physical evidence backs his murder conviction, and though seven of the nine non-police witnesses in the trial have recanted or contradicted their testimony. I suspect Georgia won't reopen the investigation at least partly because the murder victim was a cop -- but if one must care more about cop murders than other murders, shouldn't one be even more adamant about getting the right perp? The ACLU helps you write Chatham County D.A. Larry Chisholm asking to reopen the Troy Davis investigation. You may want to remind Mr. Chisholm that even staunch death penalty advocates William Sessions and Bob Barr are on Mr. Davis's side in this matter.

Meanwhile, America's Last Investigative Reporter, Greg Palast, exposes the GM bankruptcy scheme for what it is -- an illegal attempt to grab GM's worker pension fund and give it to GM's lenders so they can be repaid. America's Last Conservative, Paul Craig Roberts, has been warning for months about the coming pension fund raids, and apparently he was reading the mind of Obama Administration "Car Czar" Steven Rattner. Whatever happened to everybody's gotta make sacrifices in These Difficult Times, you wonder? Apparently our sick, immoral, and decadent government believes that banksters don't have to make sacrifices -- or, more precisely, that we must sacrifice so that they don't have to. But the actual pension raid hasn't quite happened yet, and you know where Mr. Obama's contact page is; now go tell him what's what. Feel free to use the words "sick, immoral, and decadent" if you like. He really doesn't deserve better right at this moment.

anyone could be a terrorist! Anyone!

The Center for Constitutional Rights sent me an alert calling for the repeal of the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, and it rang a bell -- I advocated against it in December 2006 (second paragraph). While the law states that "(n)othing in this section shall be construed...to prohibit any expressive conduct (including peaceful picketing or other peaceful demonstration) protected from legal prohibition by the First Amendment to the Constitution," the law also demands punishment for anyone who "intentionally damages or causes the loss of any real or personal property (including animals or records) used by an animal enterprise." Well, anyone who peacefully pickets an animal enterprise does "intentionally damage or cause the loss of any real of personal property," don't they? The "animal enterprise" in question is supposed to lose money in the short term due to the bad publicity, isn't it? The AETA implicitly suggests that even, say, the folks who advocated for divestment in South Africa in the late '80s could be counted as "terrorists" because they caused, intentionally, some corporations to lose money -- and you can just see John Roberts noting the inherent contradiction in the law and siding with the corporations against the First Amendment here, can't you? And n.b. the definition of "animal enterprise" is vague enough that it could encompass almost any enterprise, including a supermarket. CCR helps you demand repeal of AETA.

Meanwhile, the New York Times "reported" that, according to the Pentagon, 1 in 7 Guantánamo detainees "returned to the battlefield." Look what they were able to accomplish in just four words! First, they want you to think those folks in Guantánamo were all "on the battlefield" to begin with -- versus being sold there by bounty hunters or neighbors with grievances -- when most of them couldn't be charged with anything after being held all those years. Then you're supposed to be afraid that a full 14% of them are going "back," when any reasonable person would wonder why that figure isn't much higher, given the mere fact of their years-long detainment. And that's before we get to the numerous folks who've long questioned the Pentagon's figures, whom the NYT either ignored or cited in passing. The NYT did a tiny bit of mopping up on the story in its online incarnation, but not much; FAIR still encourages you to contact Times public editor Clark Hoyt (either 212.556.7652 or public at nytimes dot com) and ask him to examine the way the Times handled the story.

In other news, I've read the speech by Judge Sotomayor that got Newt Gingrich's shorts in a bunch yesterday, and I agree with most lefties that he's taking That Sentence out of context, possibly even on purpose. And yet I also think Ms. Sotomayor could have said it better in the speech -- or, more to the point, written it better. I think her intended audience, a live group of listeners, would have understood the context (decisions involving race and sex discrimination, not all decisions) better than anyone who read the speech after-the-fact would. But people gotta be aware of what they say, and they also gotta be aware of how what they say is gonna look on the page. Just ask Joe Biden.

(I'll be out of town for a few days, so I won't post again until Tuesday, most likely. Please patronize the excellent blogs on my blogroll until then. Also, please patronize the excellent blogs not on my blogroll.)

almost not a new post.

I had a morning appointment, and I only have one action alert in my inbox (and it is a solid test of our devotion to the Constitution, I promise you), so I have little to say today.

Except this: I congratulate Sonya Sotomayor in becoming the first Hispanic-American ever nominated to the Supreme Court. I haven't yet read her opinions in very much detail, so I may still find her insufficiently liberal, but I do know that the "objections" I've heard so far are rubbish. Especially Greg Mankiw's (the second link). By Ford, she only had $30,000 in the bank at some points during the last four years! Yeah, that's going to resonate with a lot of people -- if I had $30,000 in the bank, I'd be halfway to Catholic sainthood. Plus, he thinks he's so much smarter than you -- his summary of his paper "The Savers/Spenders Theory of Fiscal Policy" makes me think a better title would have been "The Articulation of the Obvious Using Big Words as Weapons Against the Reader." I really hate that in a person.

Bush Mobb crony corporations still hate the troops, plus more Republican whining.

During 2007 and 2008, the Department of Defense gave $80 million in bonuses to Kellogg-Brown-Root -- a former subsidiary of Dick Cheney's old employer, Halliburton -- for electrical wiring contracts in Iraq. They must have done a great job to earn all that money, right? Well, not exactly -- the Senate found last week that at least 18 U.S. soldiers have died of electrocution in Iraq since 2003, including a decorated Green Beret who got fried taking a shower. So pretend you're Brit Hume and you don't think 18 deaths is all that impressive a number. Well, the Army hired a master electrician to review electrical work in Iraq during 2008, and he said he found bad wiring in "every" one of the thousands of buildings KBR wired in Iraq. KBR even rewired buildings with previously safe wiring and, guess what, made those buildings unsafe. It's a wonder more of our soldiers haven't died due to the negligence of Tha Bush Mobb's crony corporations. And, remember, they got $80 million in bonuses for screwing up! Last I looked, conservatism was not about rewarding bad work that kills people. CREDO helps you petition Secretary Gates to rescind the bonuses, initiate a criminal investigation, and suspend contracts with KBR or any Halliburton-related entities. It won't bring our dead loved ones back, but it'll save others.

Meanwhile, Gov. Jim Gibbons, Republican of Nevada, has refused to meet with President Obama during the latter's visit to Nevada because, get this, he's offended that Mr. Obama told corporations they couldn't "go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayer’s dime." Mr. Gibbons says Nevada has lost $100 million in convention and meeting-related revenue since Mr. Obama's remarks. He can't be serious, can he? He must realize that the recession-if-not-a-depression more likely causes folks to cancel their conventions in Sin City? No, he does not -- he blames Mr. Obama's criticisms of the unjustly rich who are living off taxpayer money, not the bad economic times, for the woes of his state. Why he thinks this is a winning strategy for his 2010 re-election run is beyond me. When are Republicans going to stop acting like little whiny brats? When they're down to 8 governorships and 12 Senate seats?

readings for Friday, May 22, 2009.

Citizens for Tax Justice's provides a short paper (only 11 pages!) describing ways to fund health care reform. I've long argued that the kind of "sacrifices" the pundit class always tries to push on us aren't necessary -- hell, I've argued that tax increases aren't necessary if we just have the will to stop handing out corporate welfare, and certainly when the pundits argue for a national sales tax (!) or a tax on benefits paid by employers (!!) or more "health" "savings" "accounts" (!!!) they're doing a bait-and-switch. But we could also, you know, start taxing the rich again. Raising the top rate on capital gains taxes, expanding the range of incomes taxed for Medicare and then creating a high-income rate for that, treating investment income like it's, you know, income and not something to which we hold the rest of the economy hostage -- those are just some of the things CTJ recommends, and that's before we get around to making the income tax more progressive again, which the CTJ report doesn't even include. Rick Santelli probably wouldn't like any of this, but Rick Santelli is so, like, February already.

Contrary to what I said yesterday, that Nancy Pelosi's story on her knowledge of Bush Mobb torture techniques hadn't "evolved," I now admit, after reviewing factcheck.org's article on the subject, that she has, at the very least, relied on a very lawyerly way of asserting that she didn't know about waterboarding in 2002. She heard about it a few months after a CIA briefing from "an aide," she said after the relevant CIA memos came out -- though these memos may not be entirely accurate, either, as Senator Rockefeller has raised objections and they've already been corrected in the face of some rather meticulous diary-keeping by former Senator Bob Graham. So Ms. Pelosi story has "evolved" slightly after all, and she sounds like she's lying, at the very least about not protesting torture even when it wouldn't have made a difference. With all that, I find that my main point from yesterday's third paragraph -- generally, that Old Media sucks, and specifically, that Howard Fineman sucks -- survives my incompetence.

Obviously, Congress is off for a few days, as are many-if-not-all of you, so I won't post again probably until after the holiday. "Thieves in the Temple" wishes all of you a happy Memorial Day weekend -- and remember, as I said a few years ago, that the Iraq/Afghanistan soldiers have not died in vain; their deaths remind us of the terrible price we pay as families and as citizens when we permit our leaders to lie and fearmonger us into war.

health care and IMF action, plus Howard Fineman sucks.

Progressive States Network is preparing a letter signed by state legislators to Mr. Obama and Congress urging them to pass comprehensive health care reform this year, and they can help you get your state legislators to sign, too. So what, you say? State legislators have been confronting serious health care problems for 15 years, whereas Max Baucus, for example, has confronted it for about six months. So they know the challenges a little better, and they're also considerably closer to their constituents than the Reps we send to Congress. Their word might be worth something, even to Max Baucus, who respects all viewpoints, even the ones expressed by the good folks the D.C. police summarily threw out of his roundtable meetings this month. Anyway, I think it's a good idea, and Progressive States is a good organization doing good work, so go ahead and use the link.

The Senate plans to give the International Monetary Fund (or IMF) $100 billion to spend any way it likes without any oversight or conditions attached by the U.S. The Senate seems to have a lot of practice at this, as evidenced by Mr. Bush's $700-billion-because-it's-a-big-number bailout for irresponsible banks playing a shell game economy. Sen. Brown (D-OH), at least, has authored an amendment (S.AMDT.1161, if you want to find it on thomas -- it'll be a few more clicks than usual) that would require the IMF to exempt "health care, education, food aid, and other critical safety net programs" from IMF policies that impose government spending limits or wage ceilings. That's a start, at least, and it's worth a phone call; the Capitol switchboard is 202.224.3121, or you can find your Senators' phone numbers using the tools in the upper left-hand corner of this page. You may also want to mention that $100 billion is a lot to be throwing around with so little debate -- especially to the IMF, which has a record of wrecking economies in developing nations. To the point where they're not really "developing" any longer, in fact.

And now, for the single stupidest piece of writing I've seen in months-if-not-years: Newsweek's Howard Fineman tells us that the Republicans are "begin(ning) to gain traction" on the Obama Administration with their national security-related attacks. Does he present one piece of evidence to back this claim? No, he does not -- not one poll on the issue, not even a conversation with Tom Friedman's cab driver. Just a "clever" lede ("OMFG! Rush-Newt-Cheney = RNC! ROTFLOL!!!!") and a lazy accounting of the week's events -- if Nancy Pelosi sticks to her story and the CIA sticks to theirs, then nobody's explanation has "evolv(ed)," let alone hers. Of course I know Mr. Fineman can't get good poll information this quickly -- that famous Democracy Corps poll, suggesting parity-at-least between Democrats and Republicans on national security issues, was taken well over a week ago, even if its results were released only two days ago. But that's the point: why write the story before you know anything? Why not, I don't know, go talk to somebody? About something else? Because he wants to be "first" with the story? Or because he wants to create the story? And to think Old Media wonders why it's dying.

UPDATE. The Progressive States contact tool (in the first paragraph) does take for-freakin'-ever to load, but it does eventually load. And by "eventually" I mean "within three or four minutes," which in the grand scheme of things isn't really that long. Also, a propos of nothing, the new Pet Shop Boys record is really great and all of you should buy it like right now if not sooner.

more alerts about corrupt corporations, plus bonus quagmire.

The Senate passed their watered-down version of the credit card reform bill yesterday; now the bill goes back to the House for what may be a difficult reconciliation process (since the House's bill was way better). The banks intend to make that process even more difficult, I'm told, by trumpeting how the new bill helps bad customers at the expense of good customers. That's the corporate way: divide worker against worker, citizen against citizen. Well, I'm happy to pay a little for the bad decisions of some of my fellow citizens just to get credit card corporations to do better by all of us. And, ah, these are the corporations who crashed our economy lecturing the rest of us about "responsibility" and "bad decisions." I'm all for creating a new circle of Hell for them. Consumers Union helps you contact your Rep. And the People's Email Network, which considers the Senate bill "totally phony," helps you argue for limits on interest rates, which current credit card reform legislation pointedly omits. Limiting interest rates is still a cause worth fighting for -- I've put plenty of anti-payday loan action alerts up over the years -- and Sen. Durbin says he'll bring the issue up again in separate legislation. I'll keep an eye out for that.

Meanwhile, climate change legislation has also been a huge disappointment. I was never a fan of cap-and-trade in the first place -- why not just regulate the damn emissions? That used to work, before corporate-owned legislators convinced everybody that the Easter Bunny, er, free market would do the job better. But now that Big Oil and Big Coal have had a chance to vet cap-and-trade legislation, it's gotten even worse. Cap-and-trade was supposed to raise revenues for the federal government, right? Then what's the point of giving away the pollution allowances to big corporations for nothing? Mr. Obama's budget, incidentally, did not give away pollution allowances; this is all on Congress's head. Public Citizen has the contact tool, which you can modify as necessary. Given all my feelings about cap-and-trade, I would have to modify it significantly. But we citizens are supposed to communicate our will to our Reps and Senators, not some watered-down version of our will that we think our Reps and Senators will accept. Otherwise Congress will keep pushing back against us.

Meanwhile, mechanical monsters continue to kill innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan -- I've made it sound like science fiction, but that's what unmanned drone planes do. The Senate will vote, possibly as early as today, to continue funding the Afghanistan war to the tune of $90 billion. I've avoided passing along any action alerts that would ameliorate this bill, because my stance is the same -- narrow the mission from "getting rid of the Taliban" to "get bin Laden," and do that with people on the ground who might have a chance at ingratiating themselves with the locals (and that means more intelligence agents and fewer soldiers). You would do best, in the absence of a perfect (or even pretty good) contact tool, to simply call your Senators using the tools in the upper left-hand corner and communicate your will to them as best you can. You may want to add that Mr. Obama has provided no exit strategy.

Finally, here's part 338 of "why newspapers are dying": the Washington Post, whose op-eds seem to get worse and worse, ran this monstrosity this past Saturday suggesting that newspapers can only survive if websites pay for indexing and linking to their work. And if Congress makes sharing "hot news" illegal unless ISPs pay for it. And if Congress eliminates media consolidation restrictions. And if Congress gives more tax cuts to big newspaper chains. And gives newspapers an antitrust exemption. Pimp, please. Guess what the Post forgot to tell you when they ran this piece of corporatist reactionary filth? Why, that its authors have represented large media firms like the Hearst Corporation, the Tribune Corporation, Clear Channel, the Fox Corporation, and the New York Times, all of whom would benefit from their suggestions more than newspaper consumers like you and I would. You'd think any reasonable person would call that bias, wouldn't you? I've named a bunch of ways newspapers can survive in this age, and here's another: stop being so damn corrupt.

UPDATE. I erred in saying the Public Citizen tool could be modified; I was unable to modify it in either Safari or Firefox. I've been able to modify past tools, so I don't understand the problem. Use your judgment in deciding whether to sign it -- opposing corporate efforts to gut the cap-and-trade bill is worthwhile, but is the cap-and-trade effort itself worthwhile? That's another matter.

ANOTHER UPDATE. In re paragraph 3: I got through to Sen. Casey (whose staffer was quite gracious), but couldn't get through to Sen. Specter (I was on hold for five minutes the first time, then got a busy signal after talking to Sen. Casey's office). Some things never change.

warning: contains actual similes and metaphors!

The ever-alert News Dissector, Danny Schechter, informs us that the Senate may vote on credit card reform legislation today -- and, as ever, Republican winged monkeys are trying to attach poison-pill legislation like barnacles to broadsides. Not that legislation permitting folks to carry weapons in public parks is a poison pill to me, but clearly the Republicans aim to destroy the bill with such an amendment, not help out gun owners. If Democrats were smart -- and I'm only convinced that their President is smart -- they would call the Republicans' bluff and pass the bill with the irrelevant anti-gun control amendment intact, and thus start eroding one of the Republicans' last bastions of irrational support. Seriously, though, as a citizen, I don't approve of attaching irrelevant amendments to legislation. Haters do that. You can use the tools in the upper left-hand corner to call your Senator and tell them that if you like -- and to pass the damn bill already, because it's better than what we've got.

Public Citizen helps you support the TRADE Act, a Sherrod Brown/Mike Michaud production which (as I suspected last week) has not yet been reintroduced in this Congress. The TRADE Act had 74 House co-sponsors (and six Senate co-sponsors) last year; seems to me we can do better than that, especially since "free" trade elicits disapproval from both liberals and conservatives (and, even, from both Democrats and Republicans). Unlike most "free" trade agreements, which protect corporations über alles, the TRADE Act would protect community health, workers' rights, and the environment -- all of which "free" trade wrecks faster than Godzilla wrecks Tokyo. (Actually, comparing "free" trade to Godzilla is insulting to Godzilla, especially during his heroic period from the mid-'60s to the early '70s, but you get my drift.)

Meanwhile, you may not have noticed that the United Auto Workers will likely own well over half of Chrysler very soon, a fairly unprecedented arrangement in American economic history. But Sean Safford at orgtheory.net advises us that this may not be as great a boon to workers as it sounds. You may already sense that the union might have some trouble adapting to a more top-down role -- any work-related issue could pit worker against worker in a far more urgent sense than we as workers currently grasp. But Mr. Safford also reminds us that if Chrysler goes down, the UAW will go down with it -- and that means the $80 billion-plus retiree-benefit program (which used to be the corporation's responsibility, but has been the UAW's since 2007) will also go down with it. It's at the very best a huge risk for the UAW, and at the very worst a secret effort by Mr. Obama to rid America of one of its most powerful unions. In other news, I'm less hopeful about the utility of so-called "soft power" than Mr. Safford, obviously, and even given the problems with card-check (mainly, that it won't solve every problem), I'll keep fighting for the Employee Free Choice Act. (By the way, the comments are exceptional -- I spotted just one uninformed comment, easily dispatched by the author, and the rest are jam-packed with actual legal expertise, historical analysis, good writing, even humility when called for. Dick Polman or Will Bunch should be so lucky.)

but he's gay!

The People's Email Network still helps you call for a special prosecutor for matters of Bush Mobb-era torture. Given that Mr. Obama has reversed himself on releasing "not particularly sensational" photos depicting detainee torture, and given that NBC hack David Gregory "believes" torture is trouble for both parties, versus the party that actually ruled America while the torture took place, I actually want a special prosecutor even more than I did this time last week. The "liberal" President and the "liberal" media have a habit of provoking me -- though not as much, admittedly, as the suspicious death of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, tortured specifically to reveal "evidence" of Hussein/al-Qaeda "ties."

The impending discharge of Army Lt. (and Arabic linguist) Dan Choi for his homosexuality has inspired a pair of hilarious Daily Show analyses, as well as this CREDO action alert demanding, for the umpteenth time, that the government repeal don't-ask-don't-tell and let gays serve in the damn armed forces already. The reactionaries that get "liberal" media attention whenever they stomp their feet are no doubt at the ready to ask why, if Lt. Choi believes "lies poison a unit," he waited ten years to come out. I would advise those fools to try walking a yard in a soldier's shoes, or a gay soldier's shoes -- or anyone's shoes other than their own, for that matter.

Speaking of reactionary attempts to make bigotry sound enlightened, the always-helpful RNC Chair Michael Steele now advises Republicans to oppose gay marriage on the grounds that it would hurt small businesses. "Now all of a sudden I've got someone who wasn't a spouse before, that I had no responsibility for, who is now getting claimed as a spouse that I now have financial responsibility for," Mr. Steele says. "So how do I pay for that? Who pays for that? You just cost me money." It must have sounded better live than it reads on the page. In any case, he seems to have no idea that we could just as easily say that heterosexual marriages hurt small businesses, and thus Republicans prove Noam Chomsky's axiom that corporations are innately anti-family. Seriously, who thinks this argument is a get-out-of-permanent-minority-status card for Republicans? Say gay marriage hurts small businesses to 100 live-and-let-live types and 99 will still think you're just a bigot. I just hope the number who'd also think you really don't care about small businesses either would come anywhere close to that.

detain this!

President Obama has decided not to release photos depicting American personnel abusing detainees -- perhaps not coincidentally after a firestorm of protest from reactionaries. Mind you, the 2nd Circuit Court ordered the release of these photos -- which are either relatively tame or especially repugnant, depending on the source -- so the Obama Administration really has no room to object. The ACLU helps you remind the Obama Administration of what it must do. I thought this was all about transparency and accountability, anyway. That's what Mr. Obama said, at least.

Mr. Obama has reversed himself in one other area as well -- "free" trade. He's promised to review NAFTA, and hasn't done that, and worse, he's been pushing "free" trade agreements with Panama and Columbia left over from the Bush Administration (sic). I've told you more than enough times that Panama is Destination One for setting up an offshore company in a filing cabinet so it doesn't have to pay its share of taxes. The defeat-thus-far of the Columbia agreement is one of the few things of which this Democratic Congress can be proud (though they couldn't do it without their fellow Republican anti-"free" traders). Anyway, NETWORK, a National Catholic Social Justice Lobby, helps you advocate not merely for the defeat of current "free"-trade agreements, but for the passage of a viable alternative, the TRADE Act, a production of Rep. Michaud (D-ME) and Sen. Brown (D-OH). (I've described the TRADE Act here before; Messrs. Brown and Michaud introduced the bill in the last Congress, but haven't in this one, as far as I can determine.)

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) seeks comments regarding the storage of nuclear waste, and the Union for Concerned Scientists helps you leave said comments. UCS recommends you ask that the NRC require more spent nuclear fuel rods be stored in "dry casks," which are made of steel and concrete, and also that the NRC require said dry casks to be tougher than they are now. Currently spent rods spend a significant amount of time in wet pools, which reduces radiation and heat in the rods, but also makes them a) more volatile and b) more easily available to any terrorist who can get to them, and the spent rods could migrate to the more secure dry casks faster than they currently do. Perhaps not incidentally, the NRC also expects that the U.S. will run out of wet pool capacity around 2015. But it's nice to know that some folks actually do care about actually reducing the threat of a terrorist attack, isn't it? Not like the reactionaries who've been spending all week trying to implicate Nancy Pelosi in Mr. Bush's torture program. Ha ha ha! They think that because I'm a liberal, I'll shut up about torture now that Ms. Pelosi has been linked to waterboarding! How many times must I tell these pimps! My team is America, not the Democrats. Their team is not America, but the Republicans. And that team could get whupped by the 9-and-73ers.

Pennsylvania residents, take note: American Rights at Work would like you to put the heat on Arlen Specter (D?R?-PA) to remember that he was once a co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act. You'll have to watch a 30-second ad which is, at best, a necessary evil, and I don't endorse the idea that "Obama and Biden" stand with "working families" necessarily, but the Employee Free Choice Act will still help workers do better for themselves, and Sen. Specter's support is, unfortunately, crucial to getting it passed. You might also mention that the economy's getting better, and thus he can "revisit" his position as he said he'd do when he turned against the EFCA. You don't have to mention that since he turned against the EFCA he became a Democrat, because that's not particularly important. Judging by his recent votes, it's certainly not particularly important to him.

UPDATE. Minor spelling errors corrected in the above.

Revenge of the Crusher!

Sit back: the Philadelphia Inquirer, whose owner recently declared bankruptcy, has hired former Bush Mobb legal counsel John Yoo -- who famously said in 2006 that "no treaty" could prevent a President from crushing a baby's testicles in an attempt to get actionable intelligence -- to write a monthly column. For Inquirer Editorial Page Editor Harold Jackson, the hiring represents yet another attempt to deflect charges of "liberal bias." But for Philadelphia Media Holdings CEO Brian Tierney, it's apparently all about The Crusher being a Philadelphian, going to the same Delaware County private K-12 school as Mr. Tierney, being "a very, very bright guy," and being on the liberal Berkeley faculty. Like how Mr. Tierney sneaks the fact they went to the same school in there, like it's affirmative action for the rich and connected? (At the risk of piling on: of course you haven't gotten much mail about The Crusher lately, Mr. Tierney, because you only just announced his hiring, and only in a line at the end of his latest column. Gosh, how stupid do you think we all are?) (And at the risk of piling on further: no one takes away The Crusher's right to free speech, but no one has an inalienable right to be paid for said speech, either. I don't get paid for writing this blog -- if I did, I fear it would corrupt me.) Anyway, Hullabaloo suggests you submit anything you've written about torture, ever, to the Inquirer as an op-ed; the post links to the Inquirer's own instructions for doing so. And I've got one more thing to say to the Inquirer: I don't hate conservative op-ed writers, I hate bad op-ed writers. If they're so desperate to hire conservatives, they might try asking Paul Craig Roberts, who is also at Berkeley, though I doubt very much he speaks to The Crusher. Of course, Mr. Roberts is against the Iraq War, against "free" trade, against torture, against warrantless wiretapping, and against the bailout, so maybe he doesn't rate as a "conservative" to the Inquirer board -- despite being, you know, the father of Reaganomics.

Meanwhile, Firedoglake blogger Christy Hardin Smith would like you to call five crucial Senators in order to push along a vote on the nomination of Dawn Johnsen to the Office of Legal Counsel. I have supported Ms. Johnsen's nomination on the basis of her fervent and righteous opposition to Bush Mobb legal positions, including those of The Crusher; if she were pro-life instead of pro-choice, I'd still support her. Wasn't Mr. Bush complaining constantly during his second term that you just couldn't get good people into government? Well, he was talking about specific bad people who got hounded out of government by their own incompetence, but it does often seem you just can't get good people into government, and Mr. Reid's stalling on a vote on Ms. Johnsen sure does seem like that. I do not endorse Ms. Smith's point that the Democratic leadership should be twisting more arms, because the Democratic Party's infighting is none of my concern as a citizen. I only endorse the point that Ms. Johnsen would be a good OLC head, and that calling Sens. Reid, Durbin, Schumer, Leahy, and Bayh would help get her in. Calling Sens. Nelson of Nebraska and Specter of Pennsylvania would probably also help; you can find contact info for them using the tools in the upper left-hand corner of this page.

UPDATE. Maybe the Inquirer could try getting former Powell Chief of Staff Col. Lawrence Wilkerson as a columnist. But, nah, he's too conservative for them. And by "conservative" I mean "conservative," not "the reactionary mishmash of militarism, nativism, corporatism, and religious extremism that characterizes most so-called conservatives today."

Take Yer Damn Medicine!

By now you've all heard how Senate hearings on health care systematically exclude single-payer advocates, though some form of government-insured care is the choice of the majority of Americans in every poll I've ever seen. Sadly, Mr. Obama seems to be trying to be "bipartisan" or "post-partisan" or "nice" or whatever about it, accepting health care corporations' voluntary pledge to cut the growth of health care costs by 1.5 percentage points every year. Not cut costs, mind you -- but the growth of costs, which reminds me a bit of Mr. Bush's pledge to cut the increase in greenhouse gases, not the total amount of greenhouse gases. And, Mr. President? "Voluntary" agreements are so, like, 2002. We can do better than that. True Majority helps you write a letter to the editor about single-payer health care. Well, they say a "public option," but I say no more "options" for corporations. If you're stuck for stuff to say, Progressive States can help you, as they describe how well already-existing public plans work at the state level.

Meanwhile, the Senate will consider giving $100 billion to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) without, and stop me if you've heard this one before, very much debate or adequate oversight of what the IMF decides to do with the money. No one wants to hurt developing nations, but you ought to be suspicious when lawmakers want something done superfast. And a lot of times "hurting developing nations" is exactly what the IMF does -- as you probably know if you saw the film Life and Debt, which described, among other things, how the IMF ruined the banana and milk industries in Jamaica in the name of participation in a global economy. The Senate Appropriations Committee will likely move on this legislation tomorrow, so RESULTS helps you call your Senators. They'll never see it coming.

Finally, in case you thought "Thieves in the Temple" was all about pointing out why newspapers suck and not about pointing out what newspapers could do to stop sucking (you know, besides doing a better job reporting the news), I submit for your approval this Free Press report describing strategies newspapers might employ to survive. Newspapers aren't going to like a lot of these strategies, particularly the ones labeled "become non-profit." But maybe newspapers shouldn't be profitable ventures -- certainly they can't handle it, if the last twenty-plus years or so are any indication. And I didn't like my medicine when I was a kid either (that yellow Triaminic? Yuckasaurus!) and I turned out OK.