3rd Ave version 3.1

Well here we go again...another long gap in coverage and sinking hits. I am just about finished moving into the apartment and finally my back and upper body can rest.

Meanwhile, I hope you noticed the photo on the top right so you can see where I get the title of the blog and my mug. The layout and style of the blog has also been revamped to look a bit nicer, I trust. Please comment to tell me what you think if you feel up to it.

Reading the newspaper today (I have been doing that a lot lately, but sadly only the two local papers my parents subscribe to), I was really annoyed with the Deseret News' front page, top-of-the-fold article: "Edwards 'rarely present'" This article is clearly nothing but a RNC press release that the incompetent Lee Davidson plagiarized. Who in Utah cares that North Carolina Senator John Edwards wasn't there at Judiciary Committee meetings? Maybe North Carolinians might, or would-be federal judges, but it is pretty small potatoes. I have been to my share of committee meetings and most members/senators aren't there for them even if they aren't running for (Vice) President.

Below the fold was the obvious above the fold article (the Salt Lake Tribune had it in the right place anyway) : Marine Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun's mysterious abstains and return (whose family happens to live in South Jordan, Utah). This is the kind of thing big newspapers like the Globe, Times or Post will get the scoop on but it is a big story.

The Muslim Marine will have some big questions he needs to satisfactorily answer: Did he go AWOL? How did he get 500 miles to Beirut? How was he abducted from such a secure location? Did he escape from the captors? In sum: what the h-e-double hockey sticks happened to him?

In fairness, let's include his complete statement:

Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun's statement:
Good afternoon. In the name of God, I am glad to be home and thank you all for your prayers and support.
I understand that there are many questions . . . and respectfully ask that the media respect my need to spend some private time with my family.
I did not desert my post. I was captured and held against my will by anti-coalition forces for 19 days.
This was a very difficult and challenging time for me. Since my release, I have been fully participating in the repatriation process.
I thank everyone who was looking for me and give thanks to God for everything.
I would like to tell all the Marines as well as all those others serving in Iraq to keep their heads up and spirits high.
Once a Marine, always a Marine. Semper fi.
Thank you.

I don't know about you, but I still got questions.

On a personal note, I am going to dinner at my grandmother's house to see my cousin from NYC who went to college with me for two years (I was older) and the rest of the family. Have a nice day everyone.

Another long inexcusable gap

Boy the blog is really getting as out of shape as I am. In the past week, I have really been busy though, honest.

Moving stuff into our new apartment, buying a new TV (we sold our old one in Boston) and office chair. My back, arms, and shoulders have been taking a beating from lifting all these heavy boxes and furniture, but we are mostly done and it is starting to look like someone lives there.

This weekend, my mom is already in Jackson Hole with her friends the Cummings, whose Lucadia Corporation has made a bid to buy half of the ailing MCI (nee MCIWorldcom). The Cummings, incidently are also major donors to the democratic party, especially the Utah state branch. And the real reason she is up there is it is Ian's birthday.

My father meanwhile is being shipped off to Boston again for a labor arbitration case (he visited Christina and I last fall for part one of this case) Early in the morn on Saturday. I , of course have to deliver him to the airport at the crack o'dawn. My reward though for this is to have the house to myself...ourselves for the weekend.

This afternoon, the cable guy will come and we will have a million channels and a 3MBS internet connection in the apartment. To copy a cheesy movie title, I can't hardly wait.

Absense makes the heart grow...

Appologies for not posting in many moons. My blogging seems to have turned extremely personal as I tend to read the news less and less. Kerry-Edwards seems to be off to a good start and Bush-Cheney seems to be spinning their wheels (despite throwing all the mud they can scrape up) until the GOP convention in late August.

We seemed to have settled on an apartment and are looking forward to moving in soon. It is one of the more expensive ones in SLC but very nice and three blocks from the law school. You can't beat that. Maybe next year, we can get a condo and all that, but for now, we will live it up in this luxury apartment.

Just went golfing with the folks at the Country Club. I didn't play the "sport" but I love driving the cart around, it is so much fun. Dinner was standard WASP fare. The wife-to-be is off seeing "Anchorman"...barf. I hate how they promo these movies now.

Off to watch Tivo-ed Washington Week. This is my family.

How sad for you

Bush and his hatchet men are at it again. Only this time, everyone is starting to notice how inept they are. Ruy Teixeira compares what Bush claims on the economy vs. reality and then what the public believes via polls. The result? People know that the economy still sucks, and the White House can't spin its way out of that one.

Meanwhile, Mark Schmidt takes apart Bush's latest ineffectual (and, of course, negative) Ads. Here's the meat:

"These ads all aggressively fail the most basic test of any political ad: What do you hear when you're watching it out of the corner of an eye, doing dishes, talking on the phone, trying to stop one kid from taking the other one's Power Rangers, etc. I look at the "Yakuza" ad that way and all I hear is 'Kerry had a plan to fight terrorism [blah, blah, some Japanese thing I never heard of, blah blah], 'plan to fight crime [blah, blah]'. OK, sounds good, Kerry's against terrorism and crime. I watch the ad called "Patriot Act" like that, and the only thing I notice is the middle frames: 'Wire Taps' [Clang!] 'Subpoena powers' [Clang!] 'Surveillance' [Clang!] Bad things, scary mean government. But the point of the ad is supposed to be that those are good things, and Kerry is against them, except he sort of isn't ... Getting the point of this ad requires a logic even more nuanced than Kerry's own position, which begins to seem quite reasonable."

National Review's Jim Geraghty tries to task.

"Hope those New Hampshire dairy farmers were paying attention. The senator's explanation:

'I plead guilty. I did vote for it, because I represented Massachusetts,' Kerry said. 'I was a United States senator, and I was working in a context that we were living in a number of years ago, and that's the way we saw the world.

'We don't see the world that way now,' he told the crowd at the Dejno farm. 'I guarantee you that as president, I'm not going to be president of New England, or president of Massachusetts; I'm running to be president of the United States of America. And I'm going to stand up for farmers in Wisconsin and Minnesota and Iowa and other parts of the country just as hard as I did before.'

But Senator, the point is that you weren't standing up for farmers in Wisconsin and Minnesota and Iowa before, you were sticking it to them to benefit farmers in your home state." I dunno, sounds to me like those are two different things, what you did in congress as a representative of Massachusetts and what you would do as President of the USA.

On some issues, that line of reasoning is sound. For example, how one voted on the war, or No Child Left Behind, the PATRIOT Act (alas, Kerry voted for all of them), or the $87 billion (Kerry voted no). But others are purely local issues. The Northeast Dairy Compact is one that pits New England (and upstate NY/Rural PA) against the Midwest.

After a while, they just start to get pathetic.

crossed off my list

Sorry for not writing in a couple days. Since I last blogged, I have joined CostCo, opened a absolutely free joint checking/saving account with the University of Utah Credit Union, taken my fiance to two job interviews, gotten a gift for my now ex-boss, and purchased an automobile. (see below for pictures and details)

I haddn't needed a car for the 6 years I was out on the East Coast (DC to Boston region) but out here in the Salt Lake Valley it is must that between the two of us, we have at least a car of our own.

Oh, by the way, happy birthday America. True patriots question authority and work to make the USA live up to the founder's ideals (or our ideals of them, since they were also slave-holding elitists).

It is an automatic, which is a must for the wife-to-be. I actually prefer manual, but this car still has nice power. 

Not a bad booty either. This car's trunk (or if I were to use the British terminology, the boot) is very large. The rear seats fold down easily for skis and what not. Overall, very practical and sturdy car for the next 5 years or so. 

Here is the car we bought, I think it fits our combined personality. 

It has a cloth interior. My future father-in-law says we should get seat covers to prevent stains which will hurt resale value. I wonder how long a "no food or drink in the car" order will last. 

First day of the rest of my life

Last night I got into Salt Lake at 1 AM MST, (which is 3 AM EST) yet somehow I woke up at 7 am MST, so I am still really tired but now I really can't fall asleep since their are workers re-stucco-ing my family's house.

Christina is off with an old friend from High School, who I've known since pre-Kindergarten. Meanwhile, I will sit and contemplate what to do with myself in my new surroundings.

All my big purchases (car, apartment/condo) are coming up soon and setting up steps (opening a bank account) will begin tomorrow. But for now, I am taking trips down memory lane via my old desk in my old room, which is not a museum but a storage bin. My bed has been disassembled and new furniture and boxes abound.

Looking at old pictures and letters and notes reminded me of all those thoughts I had at one point in my life. About what I was going to do with myself, what I thought was profound at the time. Makes me smile and wince, and often times agree.

I still am an idealistic person who wants to change the world, now I just know better what has a chance of working and how to do it. Or maybe I haven't changed as much as I thought I have, but merely have gotten older and more cynical.

Last Post for a couple days

Despite wanting to talk about the Sumpreme Court ruling on "illegal combatants" (go Supremes!) I thought my last post on EST should explain why I am leaving. My essay for Utah Law School really sums it up nicely.

I have spent most of my life trying to get away from Utah and law school. Maybe this seems like a strange way to start an essay for admission to the S. J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah, but to me it all makes sense. Let me explain.

My journeys outside Utah began my junior year of high school, when I spent a year abroad in Germany to avoid the state. I had lived my entire life in Utah and wanted to experience someplace, anyplace, else. In my considerations for college, I sought out schools where I could be as distant as possible from Utah. I have spent the last two years working in Washington, D.C. and Boston. For the last seven years, I have been home only for Christmas and a few weeks in the summer.

Furthermore, I told everyone that I would never go to law school. I did this because I thought I couldn’t be my own person if I followed in my family’s footsteps and became an attorney in Utah, so I tried everything else. One summer during college, I worked in Germany as an auditor for a Salt Lake-based company, American Linen. I savored catching the “bad guys” who were trying to cheat the company and other customers. Having had my anti-law school blinders on, I didn’t realize until this summer that this thirst for justice could be applied towards a career in law.

Yet something changed this summer, and I started dreaming and longing for Utah. I realized that I had incessantly talked about it to everyone I had met in the last seven years who wasn’t from the state. I constantly sounded like a travel agent or a tourism official, bragging about the climate, the ethos, the community, the skiing, the environment, and yes, even the easy-to-navigate grid system, especially to my friends from Boston (home of the cow-paths).

For the last seven years I groped in the dark, searching for a place and occupation that made me happy. After awhile, I realized I wasn’t missing just the mountains or the snow, but a part of myself. For all my trying to be different, I was denying who I was: someone is fascinated and excited by philosophical and practical sides of the law. That’s when things started to change. I found myself reading Supreme Court Briefs and Rulings, and loving every minute of it. In my job at the Massachusetts State House I had to pore through the law code for my constituents, I began to appreciate the importance of defining what the meaning of ‘is’ is. It quickly became apparent that the law is simultaneously an art and a science.

I now come before you a changed man: one who is no longer afraid of going back home and becoming a lawyer. In fact, I am looking forward to it, personally, academically, and professionally. I am reminded of the monument I pass by every time I drive home: This Is The Place. And now, I finally believe it.

Reflections and ruminnations

Bill Clinton's week in the limelight is winding down and it made me remember that while I think he was the best president I have lived through, his presidency is still be tinged with disappointment and sadness.

I read Joe Klein's "The Natural" and it hit the nail on the head. And Jon Stewart said about the same thing on Larry King last night. What a wasted opportunity is the best summary. So much charisma, so much intelligence, so much political wisdom, and yet a series of half-efforts when one thinks of what could have been.

We could have had universal health care 10 years ago, a Democrat House of Representatives, and a president Al Gore (well maybe not that either, the tragic figure.) Don't get me wrong, Clinton accomplished a whole lot economically and everything else.

All these woulda coulda shoulda thoughts got me thinking about how it was my last day on the job yesterday, my last days in Boston and the whole East Coast that matter. There is a whole 1-way ticket feel about all this. I am not just turning a leaf, but switching trees back. OK sorry about all those metaphors but I get all sappy these days.

My hope is that the next three years change me in a good way, and that I can preserve the good things about me and not let the irritating features of Utah and law school get to me. I will work hard on my schoolwork and myself. Hopefully, you all will enjoy the result.

I will attempt to keep on posting as often as I can. To me it is therapeutic and a necessary technology. Please stay in touch via email, phone, IM, comments, or even coming in person. From my Third Avenue to yours.

Quote of the LAST DAY

last day of work that is....

• CNN's Begala: "Look at it this way, though. Maybe Cheney was just telling Leahy the Republican version of safe sex" ("Crossfire," 6/24). On the Vice President telling the Ranking Member of Senate Judicary Committee Pat Lehy to go F%&@* himself on the Senate Floor.


Best Newspaper allusion to what Cheney said:


• According to the New York Times, Cheney "turned and stalked away, using an obscene phrase to describe what he thought Mr. Leahy should do" (Stolberg, 6/25).


How proper!


• Bush was questioned in the Oval Office for 70 minutes 6/24 by atty Patrick Fitzgerald and his team who are investigating whether Bush admin. officials "illegally leaked the name of" undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame.

And finally AP's Fournier recounts the "disastrous year" for Bush so far:

1. An "unremarkable" SOTU where his "opposition to performance-enhancing drugs in sports" stood out "against a bleak roster of new policies."
   
2. Ex-Treas. Sec. Paul O'Neill's book "claiming Bush was determined from the get-go to overthrow" Saddam Hussein.
   
3. Bush's "shaky performance on NBC's 'Meet the Press.'"
   
4. Ex-counterterrorism czar Richard Clarke "undercuts the president's tough-on-terrorism claims" before Congress.
   
5. NSA Condoleezza Rice "at first refuses to testify" before the 9/11 commis., "then bows to pressure."
   
6. Econ. adviser Gregory Mankiw says outsourcing "is sometimes a good thing."
   Bush "scuttles plans to name" businessman Anthony Raimondo manufacturing czar after Dems note he "laid of 75 workers" in '02 while building a plant in China.
   
7. "The death toll in Iraq mounts through the spring." GOP govs. "warn" the WH that "voters are getting antsy."
   
8. "Four U.S. contractors are killed and mutilated near Baghdad."
   
9. "Train bombers strike Madrid. Voters throw the Bush-backing" govt. "out of power" and Spain later "withdraws its troops from Iraq."
   
10. VP Cheney "comes under fire" for business dealings with Halliburton, "secretive deliberations on energy policy and unsubstantiated suggestions that his office might be behind the leak of a CIA operative's name."
    
11. Weapons inspector David Kay "concludes that Iraq did not have stockpiles" of WMD, "undercutting Bush's main justification for the war."
    
12. Dems "untie behind [John] Kerry after a short nomination fight."
    
13. Dem lawmakers "call for an investigation into whether" Bush's Medicare chief "pressured a subordinate to withhold estimates" of the full cost of the '03 Medicare bill.
    
14. Clarke "follows his testimony with a book claiming Bush ... failed to effectively confront" al Qaeda.
    
15. "Gas prices top $2 per gallon."
    
16. "Revelations that U.S. soldiers abused" Iraqi prisoners "fuel anti-American sentiment" abroad and "raise questions at home about U.S. moral authority in Iraq."
    
17. Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq behead American Nicholas Berg.
    
18. "The leader of Iraq's governing council is assassinated."
    
19. "A Memo reveals plans" for the Bush admin. to "slash domestic programs" should they win a second term.
    
20. Al Qaeda terrorists in Saudi Arabia behead American Paul Johnson.
    
21. Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq behead South Korean Kim Sun-il.
    
22. On 6/24, terrorists in Iraq "launched coordinated attacks that kill more than 100 people, including three U.S. soldiers."

Who needs enemies when you can shoot yourself in the foot on your own?

buried deep in a DKos thread

[x]Democratic Party that stands up for progressive principles, and win those voters back.

[y]I don't even think that's true anymore. These guys have jumped the shark into LaRouche territory.

Anybody who hangs around to watch Ralph masturbate his way through the most crucial election in decades isn't going to be "won back," and frankly I'd rather not have them around anyway. They keep crying that they don't have a seat at the table, but I haven't seen anything lately to convince me that they can keep their pants on through the entire meal, anyway.

Fun quotes

• A group seeking to legalize marijuana "announced that they had submitted sufficient signatures to qualify" for the NV ballot. But the group's pres. "subsequently discovered a box of about 6,000 signatures that no one remembered to turn in"



• "People ask me if I'm L, G, B or T. ... I tell them that I am 'S&M' -- straight and mayor" -- NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg (R), at a party celebrating gay pride last night



• "If someone wants to talk politics, I will certainly do that. If they want to talk about sex, I'll do that, too" -- ex-CA GOV candidate Mary Carey, who's appearing at Aurora's Star Bar and Grill for a "Halfway to New Year's Party"



• "You're an idiot" -- Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), after Rep. Duke Cunningham (R-CA) said during a heated gun debate "that perhaps investigators should check into Chappaquiddick" Remember that was his Dad (Teddy) not him. Patty just slaped a security guard in 2000 and hit his yacht against stuff.



• "Honestly, unless your name is in it, or he banged you, there is no reason to wait in line" -- Jon Stewart, on Clinton's book ("Daily Show," Comedy Central, 6/22/04).

PS when I get done with moving, I will get some pictures up to show the world the origins of the name of the blog...Ohh lobster day at the state house, gotta live it up while I still can.

Un-shockingly

Super-low turn out in GOP-pledged primaries (voters must sign a loyalty oath to the Republican party) in UT and SC produced predictable results.

In Utah, John "My dad plastered his name on every third building in the state" Huntsman, Jr. won the gubinatorial primary against former board of regents head (and former UT house majority leader) Nolan Harris, who had sold his soul to the devil by teaming up with Enid Greene Waldholz. Scott Matheson, Jr has his work cut out for him.

The Congressional primaries were similarly unsurprising. In the 2nd district, ex-state rep. John Swallow won again narrowly over the same oponnet Jim Bridgewater 53-47/6,000 votes, who had a super scary voice. Rep. Jim Matheson (yes, they are related) will have to get over his deja-vu and beat Swallow by more than the 1,600 he did last time. Look for lots of outside money this time. In the 3rd, the incumbent and resident moron Chris "Geneva Steel" Cannon won easily against anti-immigrant Throckmorton (can't remember his first name).


In South Carolina, Rep. Jim DeMint, a darling of the hard right-wing, bested washed up ex-Gov. Beasley. DeMint will get lots more money from the Club for Growth and other super-conservative groups. SC Education Superintendent Inez Tannenbaum, the Democratic nominee, while hammer DeMint on trade (DeMint is a free trader, which doesn't sit well with all those hundreds of thousands of unemployed factory workers who blame China and Walmart for their troubles) so DeMint will in turn change the subject to abortion.

After all, Utah and South Carolina are fighting for the right to be the most conservative state in the union, yet moderate Dems have a good shot in all three of the races I mentioned (the UT 03 race is not even worth talking about).

With any luck, this fall I will be signing "Oh Tannenbaum" with Governor-elect Matheson and still-Rep. Matheson.

Scandal sheet

Most people like reading about politicans, not for the visions, policies, or bills they espouse but for the trouble they get themselves in. To accomidate those with rubber necks, I point to the two biggest ones that happens to Pols yesterday:

1. IL SEN GOP nominee Jack Ryan lost his bid to seal papers of his custody battle between his ex-wife, actress Jeri Ryan, and it doesn't look good. According to the Chicago Tribune, Jeri "accused him of taking her to sex clubs in New York and Paris, where he tried to coerce her into having sex with him in front of strangers."


The Sun-Times says she specifically cited "a bizarre club with cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling." Ryan "said he has no plans to step down" despite the fact that US House Speaker Denny Hastert and other IL GOP have been openly shopping for ways to dump Ryan.

This man is not the guy from the Tom Clancy novels, he has been a rather inept campaigner, yet he still won the nomination in a landslide. But if he is still on the ticket, Obama will cruise.


2. CT Gov. John Rowland, also a Republican, (no party comment here) finally gave up last night trying to fend off a bipartisan investigation on whether to impeach the Governor for all the kickbacks, and other ethics violations that have found him under investigation also by the FBI. According to the Hartford Courrant, Rowland "offered no explanation for his resignation or its timing in a five-minute, 45-second speech." The only nod to the personal and political crisis came when John said, "I acknowledge that my poor judgment has brought us here"



3. And finally not to be outdone, Slick Willie is back, this time selling his book and legacy all over the country and dial. In "My Life," the former President tells how Hillary and him had counciling for years afterwards and how he wrote the book so that Chelsea wouldn't be so ashamed of him.


Yeah, can you imagine going through HS and college with EVERYONE knowing your Dad had oral sex with his intern? Poor kid.

Speaking of the intern, the NY Post reports that Monica Lewinsky "was invited to tour the Clinton Presidential Library," but "she declined"

I hope you all had fun with that, now wash your eyeballs out with soap.

weak-end

Well another weekend done and my second-to-last one here in Boston. Sunday was a whirlwind tour: from the JFK museum in Southie to the Cheesecake Factory in Prudential Center/Copley Place Mall to the Blue Man Group in the Theatre District and back home to Cambridge for some pork chops.

One thing I won't miss about the Bay State and all the other states in the East Coast his all their old, decaying crap. Like all these subway stops that look like they are about to rust off the bridge, stairs etc. Another thing is the old stuff designed before people had proper nutrition (AKA low ceilings and clearance).

Like when we were finding our seats at Blue Man. I was wearing my Red Sox hat forward on my head, which was the style at the time, whereupon I smacked right into the balcony made out of wrought iron with my forehead. Maybe I couldn't see it because it was a dark theatre and the balcony was pained black, or maybe it was the curse of the Bambino, or the fact that my fiancee and were row H, but it sure hurt. I tried to sit down and keep the world from spinning but the usher lady made me come out and sign a form saying I had injured my head and was fine, thank you very much. Of the options for injury, they had "shot" and "cardiac arrest" first of all, who is going to be able to fill that out. And secondly, why is shot even an option? "You never know in Boston," she said. Like Boston is Silver City, Nevada circa 1870. It has some of the toughest gun control laws in the country. And who would bring a gang fight or a gun fight into the Blue Man group?

Anyway, other than my ongoing headache and slight nausea at the time, I enjoyed the show and my Dunkin' Donuts coffee afterwards, which I will miss. While I sat in the food court of a place across from the theatre I listened to a homeless lady have an angry conversation with herself, which I will not miss.

On Thursday, I was involved in the contact lens scam. I went in for an eye exam and came out with a $90 bill (the exam was supposed to be covered 100% by insurance) and a pair of overly soft contacts that took me 30 minutes to insert into my eyes. My South African doctor, it seems deals only in Accuvue contacts, which allows him to go to a Enrique Iglesias concert and get his picture taken (guess who sponsored the concert series?). So my Johnson & Johnson Whore Doctor gave me these "blink them out" contacts which came out while at lunch at Cheesecake (and yes I did have cheesecake this time) and seem to be trying to escape this morning, making my vision horrible. The $90 is for fitting which includes these crappy lenses, a plastic case and small rise bottle and another trip there to the Doctor so he can con me into buying a years supply of lasts 2 weeks lenses. I feel compelled because if I don't switch brands, I will have to fork over another $90 to another Dr. in SLC to fit those. What racket these guys have. Can't wait until I learn about RICO and bust their sorry Suave butts.

Sorry all this blinking and dull pain in my forehead seems to make for angry postings.

On a lighter note, Bush's DC fed appeals court (which is one below the Supreme Court in many cases) nominee Thomas Griffith "has been practicing law" in UT "without a state law license for the past four years" according to the Washington Post. As long as they agree with you, they don't actually need to follow the law themselves or be qualified, right?

A Distraction?

For most of 2002, President Bush argued against the creation of the 9/11 Commission created saying the investigation would only distract his administration from the post-Sept. 11 War on Terrorism (c). Now to anyone who hasn't chugged down all the Bush Kool-Aid already knows that A)that never was the case and B)The commission have provided a much needed service to our country.

To remind readers, Bush opposed the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in early 2002, then decided to do a 180 and use DHS to beat Democrats like Max Cleland over the head with in the fall. Bush also was opposed to the commission, first making that bogus non-argument above and secondly putting Henry Kissenger, who isn't exactly known for his penchant for Open Government, in charge. Both backfired and Bush did a 180 again.

Now the WH is upset that the 9/11 commission restated the obvious: THERE IS NO CONNECTION BETWEEN AL-QAIDA AND THE ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11TH WITH SADDAM HUSSEIN Sorry about the caps, but appearantly 49% of the population still hasn't gotten the information. Even though their own anti-terrorism czar Dick Clarke told Bush repeatedly in 2002 and 2003 that there was nothing, as did Joe Wilson, they still flat out lied to the congress and the public in the "marketing" of going to war in Iraq. The sole example Cheney cited of "numerous contacts" between Hussein and Al Qaida was a meeting between a senior Iraq intelligence agent and bin Laden in Sudan in 1994, one that the commission said went nowhere. Why would an Islamic extremist and a securlarist get along?

The Times' Douglas Jehl's second key graph: "Far from a bolt from the blue, the commission has demonstrated over the last 19 months that the Sept. 11 attacks were foreseen, at least in general terms, and might well have been prevented, had it not been for misjudgments, mistakes and glitches, some within the White House." Some is putting it mildly, although I think the FAA and FBI stunk the most after reading the staff statements and watching the public hearings.

Former Gov. Thomas H. Kean of New Jersey, a Republican, and Lee H. Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman from Indiana , deserve tons of credit for toning down the partisanship of the other panelists and getting the most information possible out of this secretive White House through subtle pushing and the help of the 9/11 families' media savvy.

Hats off to the staff too, whomever those toiling men and women are. While their bosses go on TV, they wade through thousands of pages of semi-classified stuff, memos, chatter, tapes, bureaucracy, and more. The families want to know more for sure, like why the radios didn't work between NYPD and NYFD that faithful day, but they surely got much more than they would have if Bush had had his way...Which would have exactly nothing.

It's not just a river in Egypt anymore

Of course, I am talking about denial. Specifically, George W. Bush et al's refusal to face the facts on the utter lack of connections between Al Qaida and Saddam Hussein something that is obvious to slightly more than half the population (the other half voted for Bush in 2000 remember) and anyone in the intelligence community.

Maria Newman of the Times has this in the lede: " day after the commission investigating 9/11 reported that it had found no evidence of a 'collaborative relationship' between Al Qaida and Saddam Hussein, President Bush reiterated today that there were nonetheless links between the terror group and the Iraqi dictator.

"'The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and Al Qaida is because there was a relationship between Iraq and Al Qaida," Mr. Bush told reporters after a cabinet meeting today."

Such as? The truth is, all the wackos at AEI and other neoconservative think tanks can't find any proof that can stand up to the light of a table lamp, and the White House knows. Yet, they think they can still con John Q. Public (and not Jane, but Mr. White Male Middle Class voter in the exurbs) into thinking that was the reason for this horribbly botched occupation of Iraq.

Like the sand dunes in Saudi Arabia, the rationale for this war has shifted almost daily, each less credible than the next. And the most laughable one of them has floated back up the top because it seems to be the most powerful argument, if it were actually true (which it isn't).

Just sit back and think for a second. If were a secular, communist-lite despot of a 3rd world county sitting on a pile of oil (the 3rd largest proven reserves in the world) would A) make friends with Islamic radicals who want to sever Arabs ties to(what in their view is) the corrupting influence of crude that creates cozy relations with the "Infidels" in the West or B)Invade a weak nation with lost of oil to your south (which used to be part of your country many decades ago) and then use weapons or the threat of weapons to expand your control over the Middle East and become a much bigger despot.

Obviously, Saddam chose B...Isn't it what you would do if you liked money, power, writing romance novels, and letting your son strap electrodes to soccer players' testicles? If you chose A, you would have been invade 5 years ago at least and there would have a lot more evidence to prove it.

George W. Bush is a man of convictions alright. He becomes convinced of something, no matter what evidence presents himself, he will never change his mind. As long as he "knows in his heart" that it's true, then that should be good enough for the American people and world, even if its the most obvious and boldfaced lie the world has ever seen.

So why does Bush and Cheney still like to dust off and wheel out this old, tarnished lie? Because it scares the crap out of us and that's still what many of our poor soldiers believe who are dying to avenge 9/11 while getting shot at and blown up in Baghdad.

George W. Bush is a man of convictions alright. He becomes convinced of something, no matter what evidence presents himself, he will never change his mind. As long as he "knows in his heart" that it's true, then that should be good enough for the American people and world, even if its the most obvious and boldfaced lie the world has ever seen.

Alberto Desereto

WH Counsel Alberto Gonzales was, once upon a time, reportedly being considered and groomed for a seat on the Federal Bench and eventually even the Supreme Court. Supposidly he was on Bush's short list for a seat on the Supreme Court even.

Now he doesn't stand a chance in h-e-double hockey sicks in getting confirmed by the senate to be the President's Dog Catcher. Why? Slate's Alan Berlow explains:

"In the burgeoning Abu Ghraib prison scandal, Gonzales has surfaced as the author of one highly controversial memo and co-author of a second, both of which raise serious questions as to whether the president authorized or condoned the use of torture, a war crime under the Geneva Conventions. Although the president said he's only approved actions consistent with U.S. and international law, that hasn't settled the matter because the main thrust of the memos crafted by Gonzales as well as Justice, Defense, and intelligence agency lawyers, seems to have been to come up with justifications for torture within the law. It remains to be determined whether these memos, individually or collectively, provided the legal go-ahead for the policies that culminated in the abuses at Abu Ghraib. "

This wasn't the first time Gonzales had written currious legal opinions regarding international law. Back when Bush was governor of Texas, Alberto decided that these same Geneva Conventions didn't apply to the state of Texas, even though Texas is a part of the US via that whole constitution thing. The issue was a Mexican National who had put on Death Row and the Mexican Consolate in TX had never been notified of even his arrest. And just for fun, let me add that this man, Irineo Tristan Montoya, signed a English confession to brutally stabbing and murdering John Kilheffer in Brownsville, Texas, in 1985, despite the fact that he spoke only Spanish (he thought it was an imigration form, gee I wonder how he got that idea). By the way, two days after Gonzales' memo, Montoya was executed, over protestrations of Mexico and the State Department (even Albright herself tried to get involved). What's worse, Gonzales' interpetation of the constitution, or Bush's apparant repeated agreement with his interpetations?

Berlow sums up the longer term implications of Gonzales and Bush nicely: "Much more will be at stake if Gonzales' interpretation of the Constitution and international law is allowed to take root in the loosely defined war on terrorism. With the U.S. image worldwide at what may be an historic nadir, it is hard to imagine how a decision by the president to abrogate one of the cornerstones of international human rights law would either enhance that image or encourage other nations to shoulder any of the costs of the ongoing Iraq adventure. In the end, however, what is most important is what these memos say about who we are as a nation. If the president has, in fact, rationalized a decision to abandon the Geneva Conventions on Prisoners of War and the U.N. Convention Against Torture for the poisoned promise of torture, he should explain to the American public how that squares with this country's commitment to the most fundamental principles of justice and decency."

Dick and Scooter's Haliburden

It seems that not only has no-bid contractee Haliburton overcharged the Pentagon for gasoline to the tune of $61 million (by buying it on the cheap in Kuwait and then charging several dollars more per gallon in the field in Iraq). But now the LA Times reports that the Department of Defense (DoD)'s Contract Audit Agency "found that Halliburton's system of billing the government for billions of dollars in contracts was 'inadequate in part,' failing to follow the company's internal procedures or even to determine whether subcontractors had performed work." And four Halliburton employees "signed statements charging that the company had routinely wasted money." Among the overcharges, the employees said that Halliburton had paid $45 for a case of soda, $100 "per bag of laundry" and had "abandoned nearly new, $85,000 trucks in the desert for lack of spare parts." Ex-Halliburton employee Marie De Young: "There was this whole thought process that we can spend whatever we want because the government won't crack down in the first year of a war."

Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), (the guy who would be grilling the Bush administration into next Tuesday if the Democrats were in power in the House)on the reported involvement of Cheney's office with the Halliburton contracts: "He has insisted for months now that he and his office had nothing to do with the award of the sole source contract to Halliburton, and people in the administration have also insisted that this was done by the career people in the Army and not by political people. Well, we now have information from a briefing our staff received last week that, in fact the whole thing was brought to a meeting of the political appointees, including Scooter Libby, who is Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, and the reason it was brought to them is that they wanted to be sure that they didn't have any objection that they were going to go to Halliburton, even though there are other companies that could do the job. So I've written to Vice President Cheney and asked him for a full explanation."

More Waxman: "I've made no allegations. I'm simply reporting what the fellow that works for the Defense Department has told us in a meeting, that he brought this to Mr. Cheney's chief of staff, he brought it to the political people, and the decision was not made by the career people, but by the political people. So I've asked Vice President Cheney, without making any accusations about him, because we don't really know the truth at this point, we don't know the full story. But we do know that what he's been saying is inconsistent with the facts as we've now learned them."

CNN's Lou Dobbs responded: "Congressman Waxman, only in Washington could that be considered not an allegation, to suggest the facts are not in accordance with the statement. ... In other parts of the country, that could be called an outright lie"

So is Lou, who is on a personal cursade against job exporting companies, saying Cheney and Libby are liars? These are also the two who are under investigation by a grand jury for revealing the identity of Valerie Plame to scare ex-Ambassador Joe Wilson and others like him to reveal the truth about intelligence on Iraq. Something tells me these two are the center of all the bad things coming from this White House.

Best President in my life time, and Best First Lady




Prove me wrong Dubya, prove me wrong.

Quote of the Day

"Everybody knows that I've been given a gift by God, by God himself, to lead" -- ex-DC Mayor Marion Barry, announcing his DC Council bid (NPR.org).

Runner up

"It's to draw attention to the fact that the media wants to draw attention to naked people, but the fact that there's an illegal war going on is not important. Plus, it's really fun to ride your bike naked" -- World Naked Bike Ride spokesperson Sasha Webb

Go Granny D!

According to the Manchester Union Leader, 94-year-old Dorris "Granny D" Haddock (a big advocate of Campaign Finace Reform) and two others filed for the NH SEN Dem nod after the lone Dem "suddenly dropped out" (PoliticsNH.com). Burt Cohen dropped out "after his campaign manager disappeared."

From the "Yeah Right" Department

There have been 17 car bombs in Iraq this month. And several members of the Iraqi Government (current and post-June 30th) have been either killed or targeted.

Meanwhile, a State Dept report claimed that said terrorist attacks worldwide had decreased in '03 According to the LA Times, Sec/State Colin Powell "blamed mistakes in data collection, not political considerations," for a "very embarrassing" report.

See post below in which I refer to Mah Jong. 

Hiatus

I spent the last two days with my future in-laws. Thursday was Harvard's 353rd commencement, so you'd think they would have it figured out by now.

My father-in-law-to-be and I crammed in with everyone else on the rain-swept slopes of the Harvard Yard and never really got to see anything other than the jumbotron and jerky parents.

After that, we went to the more intimate setting of 635 graduates of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where my wife-to-be was getting her masters in Pyschology and Human Development.

We rested a bit after that whole drama and photo session, and then went out again for dinner with 10 of our friends from Harvard and our college years. I nearly lost my cell phone in the Indian resturant, but thank goodness the 4th waiter came clean. Then some more bubble tea so that I just about exploded.

Friday we took the rental car to southern Maine, "The way life ought to be" and relaxed in a touristy village on the seacost. The skies were almost spotless and it was only 70-something with a seabreaze mixed in. It was very relaxing and enjoyable, but maybe I had too much sun or buttery food or something because I could hardly eat dinner or play Maj Jongg when we got home. Driving and Harvard Square never mix, by the way.

Today was the morning nighmere of mailing two heavy boxes filled with books from Porter Square. Of course since the nation was busy embalming Reagan yesterday, the line was twice as long with half the staff and our boxes were 85 and 40 pounds respectively (so we had to buy another box and divide up the heavy one) After that, we journeyed to Watertown/Newton for a special Chinese Brunch place that looks like a dump on the outside but is really nice with amazing food inside.

As her parents are all packed up now and taking one last look at the Coop (to see if there is anything else there with the word "Harvard" on it for them to buy) before they head to the airport, I am able to catch up with current events.

Someone spilled the beans that Kerry had semi-asked McCain already and Johnie Maverick said no. At least McCain's people and hopefully Kerry's people kept it quiet for about a month. I am not surprised that it came out or the news but dissipointed in both. So much for keeping the whole thing under wraps. I really hope the Kerry people know what they are doing because things aren't going that great for them right now considering.

Basically, George W. Bush is losing this election all by himself, with no help from Kerry. That is, Kerry isn't winning so much as Bush is losing. Then again, I really don't care as long as Bush isn't reelected. Hope everyone is enjoying the weekend of nice weather.

Bye-bye Boston Countdown

On June 25th, I will enter and leave the Massachusetts State House for the last time as a legislative aide. Bloggers who want to get an inside view of the next ConCon on gay marriage will have to find another person. While I am excited to go off to Utah and start a new life as an adult with a car, a house, a JD, and a wife (well some will come in 1 or 3 years), I am a bit sad to see this old life go by the wayside.

In the meantime, here is something for your amusement:

"Expressing frustration at the realization that things have turned out badly or not as planned or that one has just said or done something foolish" -- OED definition of "Doh"

Let the worshiping begin

Remember how I said that Ronald Reagan is the GOP's Kennedy, a man idolized and almost worshiped? Well, now we are getting closer towards worship.

OH state Rep. Ron Young (R) introduced a resolution requesting Congress add Reagan to Mount Rushmore.

Ex-Reagan speechwriter/Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), who wants to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 said he has "no qualms about replacing Jackson, whom he said "is 'not standing up to the scrutiny' of time." But Senate Maj. Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) spokesperson Bob Stevenson said Frist "wants to keep Jackson on the currency": "Obviously, folks in Tennessee view Ronald Reagan as having accomplished so much for this generation of Americans, he deserves a much higher denomination than the $20" (Friedman, Long Beach Press-Telegram, 6/7). Higher than $20? Does that mean that Grant is on the chopping block? Or will it be Franklin?

Actually it is John F. Kennedy, who some GOPers consider a "comunist." Rep. Jeff Miller (R-FL) will propose to replace JFK on the half-dollar with Reagan. Miller spokesperson Dan McFaul noted that JFK replaced Benjamin Franklin on the coin in '63," and Miller "merely felt it was time for a change." Said McFaul: "Nothing's wrong with Kennedy. ... The tradition at the U.S. Mint was for coins to remain unaltered for 25 years, and we're looking at about 41 years." A Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) aide said Kennedy "had no comment" (Long Beach Press-Telegram, 6/7). Meanwhile, a House GOP aide said: "Having a living member of the Kennedy family in a prominent role on the Senate side is an assured death sentence for any effort to remove JFK from the 50-cent piece" (Roll Call, 6/8).

Not to be out done, "Once Reagan's body has been interred" on 6/11, Americans for Tax Reform pres./Ronald Reagan Legacy Project pres. (and over crazy right-wing nut) Grover Norquist "will launch a campaign in Congress" to put Reagan on the $10 bill in place of Alexander Hamilton. Said Norquist: "Hamilton was a nice guy and everything, but he wasn't president." He added: "As a board member of the NRA, I can also tell you that he was a bad shot." (Oh, that's witty. Did you know that Hamilton is my ancestor? You best not be steppin')

USA Today's Page writes, unlike Reagan, "Hamilton lacks a modern-day political constituency -- one reason the $10 bill is being targeted." Hamilton's Federalist Party is "defunct," whereas Reagan's GOP controls the WH, House and Senate.

Majority Whip Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) says he will "sponsor the proposal when the time is right," and Frist spokesperson Stevenson said there "'could be a head of steam behind the idea.'" But Dems "aren't quite ready" to go along; Senate Min. Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) spokesperson Todd Webster said: "Ronald Reagan did many things during his presidency that deserve to be remembered, and Democrats and Republicans will discuss how best to honor his legacy." Ultimately the decision is "up to" Hamilton's "successors," currently Treas. Sec. John Snow. Norquist said he "already has met with Snow" and senior WH officials, saying: "Everybody thought it was a good idea, and nobody thought it was a bad idea."

GOPers ran into "resistance in recent years" when they tried to replace FDR on the dime with Reagan. Dems "flipped," and even Rep. John Sweeney (R-NY), whose CD "includes Roosevelt's Hyde Park home, fought it." The effort "fizzled after Nancy Reagan said she wouldn't endorse" it (Long Beach Press-Telegram, 6/7). Rep. James McGovern (D-MA) said on 6/7 "he's reconsidering the fight he led in Congress to block" GOPers from putting Reagan on the dime. Said McGovern spokesperson Michael Mershon: "we're reviewing the situation. No decisions have been made. This week is a time for mourning and celebrating Ronald Reagan. We will come back to this later." Mershon did note that FDR has "always been associated with the dime due to his fundraising work" for polio with an org. that "came to be known as the popular 'March of Dimes' campaign."

Also, some have "suggested a compromise of putting Roosevelt and Reagan on alternating sides of the coin" (Miga, Boston Herald, 6/8). Enough with the coinage and currency!

At the same time, they are going to have state mourning for about a week and basically do the Lenin thing to his poor body so that all worshipful "movement" conservatives can pay homage to Dear Leader.

I think the Daily Show's Jon Stewart best summs up the hidden angle on the Reagan coverage: "The people I really sorry for here are Carter and Ford. Because, you know they're watching this and thinking, 'I'm not getting that'" By the way, President Ford and former First Lady Betty will be on Lary King Live tonight. I pity him sometimes.

name that building
No, its not a game show. The Third Avenue is now permitting Congress and the government in general to name stuff after President Ronald Reagan, who died on Sunday at the age of 93. Too bad GOPers decided to do this 10 years ago, when the man was still alive but not the same Ronnie they once knew in the 1980s.

On one level I can understand why they did it, Reagan is the Republicans Kennedy, only Democrats didn't name everything under the sun after him until after he was killed, not years before he died of a long-drawn out disease.

True, Alzheimer's disease is a horrible way to go. It must be hard to watch loved ones melt away into a living corpse. Personally, I can't really think of a good thing he did as president. I guess reforming the tax code was good in 1986, and bankrupting the USSR was great too, but at what cost? We also bankrupted ourselves. He cast out millions with mental illness and made them the problem of state prisons and societies. Ronnie conducted a war without congressional consent, armed Saddam Hussein with WMDs and other more conventional weapons. He tried to eliminate the Department of Education, and his secretary there of (Bill "Vegas" Bennett) systematically undermined education and its funding. Reagan tired hard to break and weaken unions, subtly supported racism through his choice of campaign stops (at sights of famous lynchings in Mississippi), blamed women on Welfare for their plight, and a host of other things I can't think of at the moment because I was 9 when he left office.

One shouldn't speak ill of the dead I know, and I wish his family peace and well that Ronnie is no longer suffering. I also will let GOPers have their moments of silence and mourning this week, as they shuttle Dutch's body to and from Southern California (and the Rotunda in DC on Thursday). Its a big deal that he died, but in a sense, he was dead 10 years ago when they started naming airports, buildings, anything they could after Reagan.

1 George down, 1 to go

CIA director George Tenet resigned his post late Thursday, in time for the weekend "take out the trash" Friday bad news dumping of the Bush administration. Tenet claims it was for "personal reasons" which one blogger really goes to town with this Washingtonian cop-out. So while Bush is in Italy visiting the pope to get more Catholic voters, the other George fell on his sword.

The question is, why did it take so long? [Slate's Chris Suellentrop has also wondered this for a long time] Why wasn't this man fired on say September 12, 2001? Or right after the 6th month of no WMDs? Why now, when it is painfully obvious he did a horrible job, presiding over two of the Agencies biggest intelligence blunders in history. And if you count Chalabi (which I don't blame him for) there's three.

Douglas Jehl of the New York Times thinks that the 700-page Senate Intelligence Committee report on all the failings of Tenet's CIA is what prompted Georgie to high tail out of there. The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler hints that Tenet is going to be the Administration's scape goat for Iraq and 9/11.

If Bush and his pals decide to do that, I just can't wait for the 60 minutes interview and series of articles on what he told Bush and Bush told him back. There has to be a reason, other than how cool it is to know secret stuff, that George Tenet stayed on all this time. He must have a couple Aces up his sleeve. Some public comments on this event are semi-revealing.

Former CIA Director Stansfield Turner said, "I'm very surprised. I certainly thought that the president was not going to acknowledge that there were problems in his own inner circle. I certainly thought that Tenet, being a very loyal-type of civil servant, would not walk out on the president in the middle of an election campaign. I think the president feels he's in enough trouble that he's got to begin to cast some of the blame for the morass that we are in in Iraq on to somebody else and this was one subtle way to do it."

Fred Kaplan of Slate makes a point few have noticed: "So, what would happen if the 9/11 commission or any of the other boards of inquiry dealing with the various intelligence scandals were to re-call Private Citizen Tenet to testify? Would he suddenly remember meetings and conversations that had earlier slipped his mind? Years ago, Tenet worked as a staff member for Sen. John Heinz, whose widow is now married to John Kerry. Do they keep in touch? (Just asking.)" Will Saletan coins the phrase "Informer Without Results" for Tenet.

AP has this: "A year and a half before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, a British Muslim [named Niaz Khantold] the FBI that he was trained to be a hijacker for Osama bin Laden and was in the United States to carry out attacks, NBC News and The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday"

So all it all, I am looking forward to the fall of Bushism and the end of this charade of his "sucessful" War on Terror and "leadership" after 9/11.

Fun facts

• Bush "has consulted" an outside attorney "in case he needs to retain him in the grand jury investigation of who leaked the name" of Valerie Plame last year. Sounds like this crime goes all the way to the top.



• Minutes before leaving for Europe this a.m., Pres. Bush, announced CIA dir. George Tenet is resigning for personal reasons: "Today George Tenet, the director of the CIA, submitted a letter of resignation. I met with George last night in the White House. I had a good visit with him. He told me he was resigning for personal reasons. I told him I'm sorry he's leaving. He's done a superb job on behalf of the American people. I accepted his letter. He will serve at the CIA as director until mid-July at which time the deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John McLaughlin, will serve as the acting director. George Tenet is a the kind of public servant you like to work with. He's strong, he's resolute. He served his nation as director for seven years. He has been a strong and able leader at the agency. He's been a strong leader in the war on terror and I will miss him. I send my blessings to George and his family. I look forward to working with him until the time he leaves the agency and I wish him all the very best" Two words: Yeah right



• Monica Lewinsky "is denying a report that she wants to make a movie" about her WH affair with ex-Pres. Clinton, "in which she hopes she'd be played by Mandy Moore." I am sorry but not only is Mandy Moore too thin and pretty to play Monica, she is also a blond. What has America come to when they can't find an actress with moderate talent who looks like Lewinsky to play her in the trashy made-for-TV movie? Why do all roles have to go through Britney Spears and her clones?



• ex-Washington DC Mayor and former crack addict Marion "The B*tch set me up!" Barry "would not confirm" on a radio show whether he is running for City Council, but he "urged listeners" to call 678-6979. Callers to that number are told to press 3 if they are calling for "Marion Barry for Ward 8 City Council." Ward 8? Isn't that the "I wish we were in Montgomery County, Maryland" section of DC where my Uncle lives? I don't think they will go for you Barry. Afte all, last time there was a "big" snow storm in DC and you were mayor, you were on vacation and didn't help out all those morons who can't handle the snow.

Playing the role of "Dumb Blond"

James Fallows writes an interesting article for the 7-8/04 issue of the Atlantic Monthly, noting that Pres. Bush "has been far more skillful in his debating career than is generally appreciated, and his successes in that realm put his widely noted lack of eloquence in a different light. During his career George Bush's speaking style has changed significantly. ... But his underlying approach to political communication has been constant -- and extremely effective."

Fallows watched "dozens of hours' worth" of Bush and John Kerry "in action." But he writes, "it was the hour in which Bush faced Ann Richards" in '94 "that I had to watch several times. The Bush on this tape was almost unrecognizable -- and not just because he looked different from the figure we are accustomed to in the White House. ... This Bush was eloquent. He spoke quickly and easily. He rattled off complicated sentences and brought them to the right grammatical conclusions. He mishandled a word or two ... but fewer than most people would in an hour's debate. More striking, he did not pause before forcing out big words, as he often does now, or invent mangled new ones."

"The man on the debate platform looked and sounded smart and in control" in '94. If you had to guess which of the two candidates had won the debate scholarship to college and was about to win the governorship, you would choose Bush." So the question is, what happened? Did Bush suddenly, like Algernon become stupid [again]?

I think Dubya is again much smarter than liberal Bush-haters give him credit for. He knows what people like, and that is a simple man with a clear vision. He appeals to what many Americans think he is "like them" and average by talking simply and having trouble with big words, especially foreign ones. By seeming dumb, Bush has made winning debates easy. Because no matter how good Gore (or Kerry) is/will be, Bush is still the mouse that can talk, and his performance is pretty good for a mouse.

Plan C

The FDA overruled its own scientists last month, preventing the "morning after" pill known as Plan B to be available over the counter. So far so typical for the Bush administration, who favors ideologs over actual science [please read the article; he is an old friend of mine from the DLC]

Today's Slate points out a large fallacy in the FDA administrator's logic for blocking Plan B: that sex is very rare for 11-14 year olds after all, despite his claims.

"A North Carolina research group called Family Health International placed ads in public places, announcing a hot line that anyone could call to have an EC [the shortened, chemical name for Plan B] prescription phoned in to a pharmacy. Over two years, 121 calls came from women 40 or older; 845 from women 30 to 39; and 4,000 from women 20 to 29. There were 783 calls from 19-year-olds, 840 from 18-year-olds, 612 from 17-year-olds, 409 from 16-year-olds, and 167 from 15-year-olds. From there the call volume plummeted: Just 31 calls came from 14-year-olds and four from 13-year-olds. No 12-year-olds called in. One 11-year-old did. Combined, girls ages 11 to 14 made just 36 out of 8,000 EC requests, less than .5 percent of the total." Of course, that number may get higher if you can get it like aspirin instead of calling in for it, but other studies show it to be pretty small.

Well how about the CDC's own study, then? A 2003 report, called Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance, "just 7 percent of today's adolescents have sexual intercourse before the age of 13. Among these, the vast majority are boys. For girls-- the population Galson [the FDA Administrator] is talking about [when he decided not to let Plan B go over the counter]-- the figure is much lower: The 2003 data show that only 4 percent of girls have sex before they are 13." Slate's Lisa Mundy points out that most of these girls are in the most need of the morning after pill. They are less likely to use condoms (partially because many of their encounters at this age consists of forced sex by older men) or other birth control and are unlikely to get abortions because of parental notification laws, which means they will become teen mothers and high school dropouts.

During the Clinton years, teen pregnancy dropped dramatically; during the Bush presidency, you guessed it, it is going up. This not only reflects the worsening economic conditions but further hinders our future competitive ability. High School dropouts don't usually found successful, dynamic 21st century companies, let alone industries. In fact, they will probably be more of a drain on public funding than support to it. Isn't it worth a little effort now to save big bucks in the end?

And just so you know, Plan B is actually a combo of several birth control pills and not is RU-486. "B" is something people used to make at home until a company started making it is cheap large batches. So if you think Abortion is murder, but take the pill, you can't have any qualms with Plan B. But if you are stricter pro-lifer, then perhaps it is still murder to you to prevent a fertilized zygote from attaching to the lining of the uterus.

The reason it is called the morning after pill is of course because it is most effective immediately afterwards or the next morning. And precisely because sex is the type of activity that doesn't comply with doctor's hours, getting a prescription is overly burdensome.

Due to Galson's ruling, the company that manufactures Plan B is now going for plan C: asking for it to be sold "semi-over the counter" to 16 year olds and up. This will make the morning after pill like cigarettes and condoms in some places, you have ask for them and show ID. This just another way of discouraging their use, really counteracts the whole point of making them over the counter anyway. Then again, our more liberal neighbor to the north, Canada, does the same thing.

The Affair that wasn't



Alexandra Polier, (see above) the woman who was accused of having an affair with Democratic Presidential Nominee-to-be John Kerry writes her story in the latest New York magazine: "I met John Kerry for the first time in January 2001, in Davos, Switzerland." She says she introduced herself, "and he looked pleased to hear a familiar accent." Kerry asked "What are you doing here?" and ordered her "a drink. We moved swiftly through American foreign policy to his political ambitions." Polier, "with a confidence that probably seemed very forward": "I think you're going to be the next president of the United States." He asked if she "had any desire to work on a political campaign, so I ran through my resume." He "seemed impressed, and after sharing Davos gossip for fifteen minutes, he shook my hand and said": "Get in touch with my office. Maybe there's something you can do for the campaign."

More Polier: "I called the senator's office the week I got back and was invited to a fund-raiser in New York later that month. His assistant assured me that the $2,000 ticket would be comped. When Kerry eventually arrived, everything seemed glamorous. At first I was afraid that he wouldn't recognize me. 'Alexandra, so glad you could make it,' he said when he reached me. Beckoning to a handsome aide who'd walked in with him, he introduced me to his finance director, Peter Maroney. We were the youngest people in the room by fifteen years, and after discovering the coincidence of growing up in the same hometown, we hit it off. I found him charming, smart, and charismatic -- a cuter version of his boss."

More Polier: "As the last guests were heading out, Kerry came back and suggested we all go to dinner at Churrascaria Plataforma, a Brazilian restaurant nearby. I was surprised to be invited, and flattered when I was seated between Peter and the senator. I hoped it was my wit and enthusiasm, not my blonde hair and long legs, that got me a seat at the table. --Her picture tells me it was at least a little bit of both (looks couldn't have hurt)

Yet more Polier: "I felt like a serious player. Four mojitos later, the conversation was animated. Plans for a Kerry presidency were punctuated by platters of skirt steak and roasted salmon. The senator was flirtatious and funny. I felt I held my own with the other dinner guests, and Kerry announced to them that he hoped I would be coming onboard the campaign soon. And after dinner, as Peter put me into a cab, I knew I would be hearing from the senator's finance director again. A phone friendship with Peter followed, and we started dating that spring. I contemplated moving to Washington and spoke a few times on the phone with Kerry, who indulged me by offering advice about my career. The presidential race was still three years away, and by then I'd been accepted at Columbia. Peter was a little nervous about dating a fledgling reporter, but our relationship was fun." She adds: "Eventually the relationship fizzled out, but we remained friends, talking often. When I left the States last fall, we stayed in touch via e-mail, and Peter would send me links to articles mentioning his successes." According to Polier, one email she received read: "Al, there's a rumor going around the office that you slept with my boss."

Still more Polier: "Peter recommended I talk with Kerry's spokeswoman, Stephanie Cutter. Several hours later, the two of them called me back, telling me they also had a lawyer in the room. Cutter sounded young and hard, and I imagined her like Lara Flynn Boyle on The Practice. She peppered me with questions. When had I first met the senator? 'Davos.' Were there any pictures of us together? 'No,' I said. 'Think back, Alex, think hard,' she said, both stern and unsympathetic. I thought, Wait a minute, I'm the victim here. 'Have you ever been alone with the senator?' she continued. 'No.' 'Are you sure?' she drilled. 'Yes. I'm sure,' I said, trying to joke a bit. 'I think I would remember!' No response. Had I spoken with anyone in the press? 'No.' 'Okay,' she said, pausing, sounding slightly relieved."

"I began by calling political reporters and strategists, who told me that as early as the New Hampshire primary, on January 27, two weeks before the story appeared on Drudge, there had been rumors swirling that Kerry had an intern problem. ... I had assumed that the story, like much of the initial reporting, was part of a Republican dirty-tricks campaign to break Kerry's momentum. ... As I began to trace the rumor, I learned that the vaguer it was, the easier it was to spread. Without a specific intern's name attached, the story was initially impossible to disprove. ... As I continued to dig, it occurred to me that Bush wasn't the only one with a motive. Clark, Dean, and Edwards all stood to gain if Kerry imploded." Says a reporter who covered the Clark camp: "This story played into so many agendas, everyone wanted it to be true."

More Polier, on then-Clark strategist Chris Lehane: "I wondered if Lehane had been the source, especially since he had switched horses mid-race. ... Joe Trippi, Howard Dean's former campaign manager, told me he'd also heard Lehane had been shopping the rumor -- presumably on Clark's behalf. Drudge claimed Clark himself had told reporters on his campaign bus that Kerry was going to 'implode' over a scandal, but when I called Wesley Clark Jr., a screenwriter in L.A., who had helped out on his father's campaign, he told me Drudge had ignored the context of his father's quote. 'He was reacting to the latest issue of The National Enquirer, which had just run a front-page story about Kerry and possible scandals, when he said that.'"

More Polier, on calling Lehane herself: "I asked him where he'd first heard the rumors about Kerry and me. He blamed political reporters. I asked him if he had used the rumors to try to help Clark. He denied it. 'There are just so many media outlets out there now, Alex, that these kind of baseless rumors can easily get turned into stories,' he said smoothly, and then the phone went dead. I called him right back, but he didn't answer. I called again less than an hour later, and this time his outgoing message had been changed to, 'Hi, you've reached Chris. I'm traveling and won't be able to retrieve my voice mail.' I wondered how he was able to run a PR company without retrieving voice mail. Our conversation was unsettling, but it was hardly conclusive." According to Polier, Matt Drudge told her: "In retrospect, I should have had a sentence saying, 'There is no evidence to tie Alex to John Kerry.' I should have put that." He added: "If Clark had not gone out there and said, 'Kerry is going to bomb,' I never, ever, would have gone anywhere near this'"

I'm sorry, but as much as I don't believe Lehane, he is still more believable than Drudge. Clark had nothing to do with this, other than hiring the scumbag Lehane and maybe listening to his bad advice.

Weekend update



Remember that Utah State Legislature that decided not to run after soliciting sex from an undercover cop for $40? Well now he is resigning his seat as well.

Rebecca Walsh of the Salt Lake Tribune reports that "On April 12, Bird pleaded guilty and was placed on probation for a year and ordered to go through the city's 'Johns Program.'

"Friday, Bird said he would leave his legislative seat as soon as he clears up some health insurance issues.

"'I'm trying to write something up now,' he said. 'It's not coming easy. I brought a lot of grief to my wife, my family and the party. I just made a big mistake. I sure feel bad about it.'"

The John's Program lets those who solicit prostitutes to clear their records by attending a 10-week course of therapy classes aimed at diverting "Johns" from soliciting again. If Bird completes the program, his class B misdemeanor citation -- which means he would have gotten a max of six months in jail and a $1,000 fine -- will be cleared in a year.

Check, Check, 1, 2, 3, check

No, this post is not about roadies, it is about my friend Dave K, who is working for a government contractor down in New Mexico. I just got a call from people doing a background check on Dave and if you knew him, the questions would be hillarious.

This guy is the most law-abiding nice guy I have ever met, who is still fun to be around and not self-righteous (unlike our previous postee). They ask me if he lives within his means (is a dealer), if he does drugs, is noisy (desides video games or watching Top Gun?), if he has friends with foreign nationals, if he has traveled outside of the country, etc.

Anyway, the lady had a nice southern twang and it went pretty fast (I mostly answered "not to my knowledge" or "no" when I wasn't gushing about Dave). You can't joke around with those people, they really don't get it. How cool would it be to have a friend with access to classified stuff, even if he will never talk about any of it?

Righteousness 0, Hypocrisy 1


Utah state Representative Calvin Bird (R-Springfield) (above) is dropping his re-election bid after his arrest for soliciting a decoy prostitute. The mea culpa? "I should have known better than to pull over and talk to the lady." Talk, right, that's it. Wait there's more "No improprieties happened, but the offers were there. It was really dumb." Paging Capt. Obvious.

According to the Deseret Morning News, "Bird, 56, was driving in the area of 1899 S. State at 4:30 p.m. on Sept. 30 when he pulled over and attempted to solicit sex from an undercover Salt Lake City police officer posing as a prostitute, according to police and court documents."

His primary (and only) challenger Aaron Tilton had an even better oh-so-Utahn response. "You are kidding me," Tilton said Thursday night when he stopped knocking on doors to take a cell phone call with the news. "Oh, my heck. Wow."

I wonder what Bird's wife Linda and the 6 children or the 3 grandchildren think of all this.

Nickname alert!

Instead of saying "the Kerry camp" or "Kerry's advisors" I am going to refer to them as "Circle K."

Man, whatever happened to that convience store? Did they get swallowed up by Apu's expansion plans?


vs.

This just in from Captain Obvious

CBS News reports that a Kerry/McCain ticket would crush a Bush/Cheney ticket 53% to 39% (just Kerry by himself against Bush is 49-41) according to their poll. The chattering class of Washington reporters say two things to this: 1) McCain's ego is too big to be second fiddle; and 2) Even if he would, party regulars would balk at a pro-life running mate.

While there may be some truth to Number 1 (which is why The Third Avenue recommends tapping the Arizona Senator for Secretary of Defense) Number 2 is far off base. Democrats are so desperate to win that they will have just about anyone on the ticket to defeat Bush, and McCain these days is acting more like a moderate Democrat than even the moderate Democrats. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, not exactly known for her moderation on Abortion is quoted as saying "There are pro-Life Democrats in the House" i.e. what's the big deal, as long as a Kerry administration wouldn't reverse Roe v Wade.

More and more high up Democrats (Joe Biden types) are infatuated with the idea of a "unity government" by inviting moderate Republicans into the cabinet like John McCain and Chuck Hagel to some how end the era of extreme partisanship that started when Slick Willie came to town. Maybe they watch too much British parliament on C-SPAN late a night (I know I do..."Will the right honorable gentleman from Hampshire concede that he is a bloody moron?" "Hear, Hear!" [great stuff]), or maybe they are onto something.

Aren't we all tired of this Witch Hunt? Washington really does have the feel of Salem, Massachusetts these days. But instead of being discovered as a Witch it is as a moderate or conciliator with the other party or just the other party (when it comes to the GOP schemes like "the K street project"). This is part of the reason why I left. It gets to be too exhausting and if it weren't real, would be laughable.

The rest of the country doesn't think like this. They are ready for real change and don't want to be spun any more. If Kerry can trick McCain into joining the ticket, Bush should start getting out the boxes and order the U-haul in advance.

Will you please sign for this package? 

Who's kidding who[m]?

The London Guardian (the equivalent to the New York Times if the [London] Times were compared to the Wall Street Journal) has just started a series of articles analyzing whether Iraqi National Congress head Ahmad Chalabi was Persian spy, essentially conning the US government into getting rid of its biggest enemy: Saddam Hussein.

Ex-US intelligence folks are on CNN and in the articles saying this has all the tell-tell signs of a intelligence operation: befriending heads of state and gaining influence (Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, hard-right members of Congress) and giving them bad intell that would lead them towards deposing Saddam.

The thing is though, Chalabi was pretty open about his friendliness to the Iranian government and intell services, and maybe he was our back channel to their information. Then again, everyone in the intell business knew he was telling us crap, that's why the CIA stopped listening to him since the late-nineties. Ex-Ambassador Joe Wilson proved Chalabi's uranium story was bogus too, but instead of coming to grips with this, the administration simply exposed Wilson's wife to threaten the rest of the intelligence community from coming forward with more stories.

All of this leads one to the conclusion that the Bush administration wanted to be misled into war, they wanted to find evidence, no matter how flimsy, that connected Saddam to an active weapons program, and better still, September 11th. The whole thing is a willing deception, maybe all the way to the top, or to con the top (AKA the President).

In short, the US wasn't conned, the American people were conned, the US soldiers dying in Iraq who think they are avenging 9/11 are being conned, but you, dear reader, wasn't conned. Now we just need to convince the press and the American people, who are about to be duped again. T

his time, we can't let the Bush administration pass the buck by pretending that they didn't know anything about Chalabi and were conned.

Lies, damn lies, and statistics

I don't know about you, but during the Constitutional Convention I heard the argument ad nausium about how Scandinavian countries marriage rates were iron-clad proof that gay marriage delegitimizes heterosexual marriage so much that "the institution itself is practically extinct" Religious conservatives sent us flyers, booklets, even DVDs on the matter.

Now, UMASS-Amherst Professor M.V. Lee Badgett finally wrote an article for Slate that sets the record straight (no pun intended). After looking at the study Stanley Kurtz and his ilk site, Professor Badgett sums it up in this 'graph:

"No matter how you slice the demographic data, rates of nonmarital births and cohabitation do not increase as a result of the passage of laws that give same-sex partners the right to registered partnership. To put it simply: Giving gay couples rights does not inexplicably cause heterosexuals to flee marriage, as Kurtz would have us believe. Looking at the long-term statistical trends, it seems clear that the changes in heterosexuals' marriage and parenting decisions would have occurred anyway, even in the absence of gay marriage."

America, Badgett points out, "already wrestles with the social tensions that Kurtz claims have occurred as a result of gay marriage in Scandinavia: deepening divisions over gay issues in churches [see the American Episcopal Church], the increasing acceptance of lesbian and gay relationships in the media [see Queer Eye for the Straight Guy], and the occasional radical voice arguing for the abolition of marriage. Yet heterosexual couples keep getting married—more than 2 million of them every year."

Despite emails my boss has gotten that claim this week's dreary weather is a direct result of gay marriages (if so, why did God wait a week to curse the Bay State), I don't think social and religious conservatives "Chicken Little approach" to fighting gay marriage is going to work.

Training wheels



Last week, Bush told Hill GOPers that the US is going to have to "take the training wheels off" of Iraq and let them govern themselves. This comment (about the only thing of substance he said to his fellow Republicans, according to reports) is pretty condescending thing to say for the cradle of civilization, as Josh Marshall points out. Kerry quipped that maybe the training wheels had already fallen off.

All learning-how-to-ride-a-bicycle-equipment-metaphors aside, tonight's speech by President Bush is critical to stopping the slide of bad news as power transfer dateline looms before us. Maybe Bush will do more than tell us, "the entity to which we are handing power over to" but I doubt it. My first clue: The networks don't think so either, which is why none of them are covering the speech live, only CNN/Fox News/MSNBC.

Now maybe it is because this is the first of 6 speeches, or maybe because it is more of the same rhetoric minus reality. There is a nice piece on Richard Pearle's sweetheart deals in this morning's Post. TIME has a great piece on the master con artist Ahmad Chalabi, who convinced Cheney et al to invade Iraq based on his bogus intel and then give Chalabi over $300M of US tax dollars to have his own private army and possible future government. Turns out, Chalabi sold secrets to the Taliban-lite Mullah's of Iran and is now in jail in Iraq.

So much for the flowers and chocolates welcoming Chalabi predicted to US troops, or the large stockpiles of WMDs, or the gushing oil revenues that would make the reconstruction pay for itself.

Did you know that until the handover, the US is a member of OPEC? Why the hell are gas prices so high, if we are a voting member of the oil cartel? Is it because Bush and fellow oilmen prefer "stability" (ie ever higher prices) over uncertainty? Or do I not understand how the US can participate in OPEC meetings as the representative of Iraq. Someone please explain it to me.

Clarification

Dear loyal readers,

The photos that were up on the site yesterday were of my right ring finger, which I injured playing basketball in Cambridge with a college friend and his friend from High School along with three other random people.

Yes I know, woe is my precious, beautiful digits that faithfully write you my thoughts every weekday (well almost). The point of the previous pictures was to illustrate the damage I did to my finger (just a nasty bruise).

One never appreciates how much an item is needed or used until one cannot use it. That is, it hurts to type, hold on to the bar on the T, and lots of other things. Same thing with the Congress and the Presidency, you forget how important and powerful those positions are until they fall into the wrong hands.

Now we are blessed with a bottomless pit occupation and an angry region posed to attempt acts of terrorism against us, a exploding national debt (posed to burden my generation and my children's generation with higher car and house payments), more polluted land, air and water, higher gasoline prices, higher long-term unemployment, more crumbling schools, exploding health insurance costs, etc.

That's why we need to be like these people and vote in droves.

try this one on for size


Thanks to Wonkette for finding this.

Deija-Vu, all over again

The other day I was downtown drinking an iced coffee at Dunkin Donuts. When I looked out the window, I saw their rival, Starbucks, across the street. That isn't that surprising, but I remembered back about 14 months ago when I went in there to Meetup with the folks running the Draft campaign of Wesley Clark in Massachusetts.

Back then, we all laughed at how we were all unemployed and poked fun at one who just finished law school (and poor sap) had to take the bar exam.

Over a year later, the actual Clark campaign has come and gone, with many of us having gotten jobs working for Clark (not me) in New Hampshire or MA and are now back to being unemployed. Now I am leaving my job at the State House, only to have the JD Clark-ie apply for my job. Where I am going? Law School. All this made me feel like Neo seeing the cat in the Matrix.

Meanwhile, my boss has finally gotten serious about reviewing resumes and sending out job descriptions. I am not worried about her finding someone, I am literally buried in resumes coming in from the internet and off the State House network. The trick is to find the right one for my boss, who might go for a local yokel now that I left for law school (although I warned her that I would be here 1-2 years at the start).

It all goes to make me feel lucky to have been chosen, especially in the current/past job climate. My heart goes out to all of those who are trying to get work and into graduate school to avoid trying to get work (because there is little to be found). Trust me, I have been there.

Emily Miller needs some anger management therapy

Emily Miller, a "top aide" to Sec/State Colin Powell and ex-press sec. to House Maj. Leader Tom DeLay has received more attention than "she bargained for" after trying to forcibly end a 5/16 "Meet the Press" interview with Powell.

As Tim Russert and media critics "piled" on the criticism, Miller defended herself, saying Russert had already run over the allotted time with five interviews waiting to be conducted on a similar time schedule.

Little did we know though, that Miller caused another "press spat" while working for DeLay. Peter Perl was writing a DeLay profile for the Washington Post Magazine. After interviewing DeLay's sister about a "rift" within the extended DeLay family, Perl received a call from Miller.

Perl: "The next evening, I got a phone call from DeLay's press secretary, Emily Miller, who burst into a scathing tirade. 'You lied! ... You betrayed him! You twisted his words! ... We don't know you. You don't exist. ... You are dead to us.' I grabbed for a pencil to take notes, but she was speaking faster than I could transcribe ... It was also the only time Miller neglected to specify that her comments were for my background information, not for publication"

She needs to take a chill pill. OK, maybe two.

In other news, Jon Stewart gave the commencement address at his alma mater, William & Mary, this year. Some highlights:

Stewart, on his college days: "What I lacked in looks I made up for with a repugnant personality. ... You could say that my one saving grace was academics where I excelled, but I did not. And yet now I live in the rarified air of celebrity, of mega stardom. My life a series of Hollywood orgies and Kabala center brunches with the cast of 'Friends.' At least that's what my handlers tell me. I'm actually too valuable to live my own life and spend most of my days in a vegetable crisper to remain fake-news-anchor fresh."

Stewart, on his graduating from college: "I know that the decisions that I made after college worked out. But at the time I didn't know they would. See college is not necessarily predictive of your future success. And it's the kind of thing where the path that I chose obviously wouldn't work for you. For one thing, you're not very funny."

Stewart: "Let's talk about the real world for a moment. ... I don't really know how to put this, so I'll be blunt. We broke it. ... I don't know if you've been following the news lately, but it just kinda got away from us. Somewhere between the gold rush of easy internet profits and an arrogant sense of endless empire, we heard kind of a pinging noise, and uh, then the damn thing just died on us. So I apologize."

Stewart continues: "You fix this thing, you're the next greatest generation, people. You do this -- and I believe you can -- you win this war on terror, and Tom Brokaw's kissing your ass from here to Tikrit, let me tell ya. And even if you don't, you're not gonna have much trouble surpassing my generation. If you end up getting your picture taken next to a naked guy pile of enemy prisoners and don't give the thumbs up, you've outdid us."

Stewart's "real advice": "College is something you complete. Life is something you experience. So don't worry about your grade, or the results or success. Success is defined in myriad ways, and you will find it, and people will no longer be grading you, but it will come from your won internal sense of decency" (release, 5/18).

A Tough Poll to Swallow, or to Bridgewater



Bridgewater claims the '02 UT 02 race "won't be repeated this year," but says Bob Bernick, "so far, things are looking about the same." Bridgewater beat Swallow in both the '02 and '04 UT GOP convos. In '02, Bridgewater lost to Swallow in the primary, who himself went on to lose to Rep. Jim Matheson (D) by 1600 votes.



Due to paranoia, only registered GOPers can vote in the 6/22 primary. But, Bernick points out, "unaffiliated voters, those belonging to no party, can register as Republicans at the polls and pick up a GOP ballot," There are more registered GOPers than Democrats in Utah, but like other states, more non-affilated voters than either cominded. Of course, Utahns are pretty conservative, especially relative to places like Cambridge or San Francisco. Still, Blue Dogs like Jim proved they can win. In in Jim's case, has and will win. Read the full article here.