MotherJones.com | MoJoBlog - Social Issues and Political Commentary: October 8, 2006

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October 13, 2006

Fight Big Oil with Clinton-Gore in '06!

California's Proposition 87, which would impose some $4 billion worth of taxes on oil companies and use the proceeds to fund alternative energy development, got a much-needed publicity boost today when every Democrat's favorite (living) ex-president, Bill Clinton, exhorted voters to support it at a Los Angeles rally. That's a nice addition to the support his former veep, Al Gore, has already thrown behind the measure. The petroleum industry is lobbing tens of millions of dollars at the initiative in an effort to sink it - with disheartening success. Support for it has dropped from 52 per cent to 44 per cent among Golden State voters in recent weeks.

State Pols: Kill Child Molesters

With the November elections just a few weeks away, a number of state-level politicians are baying for the death penalty to be extended to repeat child molesters. Oklahoma and South Carolina have already passed such laws this year, and now law-and-order candidates from Texas to Minnesota want to see their states do the same. Never mind the usual ethical arguments - critics point out that these laws could easily backfire: if child rapists know they could face execution anyway, why not silence their victims by murdering them?

Police In Virginia Threaten To Arrest Anti-Marriage Amendment Canvassers

Pam Spaulding notes that people canvassing houses in Warrenton, Virginia in an attempt to educate citizens about the dangers of passing the proposed marriage amendment are being threatened by police. Members of local law enforcement are dragging out an ordinance meant to control door-to-door sales. There is no evidence that the ordinance is being used to threaten candidates going door-to-door--only opponents of the marriage amendment.

The amendment reads as follows:

Shall Article I (the Bill of Rights) of the Constitution of Virginia be amended to state:

That only a union between one man and one woman may be a marriage valid in or recognized by this Commonwealth and its political subdivisions.

This Commonwealth and its political subdivisions shall not create or recognize a legal status for relationships of unmarried individuals that intends to approximate the design, qualities, significance, or effects of marriage. Nor shall this Commonwealth or its political subdivisions create or recognize another union, partnership, or other legal status to which is assigned the rights, benefits, obligations, qualities, or effects of marriage.

The ACLU of Virginia has intervened.

Jeb: "I Wasn't Hiding in the Closet"

NewMax.com,the up to the minute conservative site has the latest in the Jeb Bush saga:

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has disputed media accounts that said he hid in a closet to avoid anti-Republican protesters during a visit to Pittsburgh last week.

Bush encountered protesters Oct. 6 while on his way to a fund-raising event for Republican Sen. Rick Santorum at Pittsburgh’s exclusive Duquesne Club.

Curiously, those media accounts seemed to focus more on the "closet” aspect of the story than on the behavior of the unruly, obscenity-shouting mob. The stories mentioned prominently that Bush sought "refuge in a subway station supply closet.”

Bush said it was actually a boiler room.

Bush said he had to seek safety in the boiler room when he came across the protesters, but also said he was never concerned for his safety because he was taller and "more burly” than most of the protesters who chased him.

Anna Politkovskaya's Last Article Hits Close to Home

Russia's Novaya Gaeta newspaper has published the last article written by murdered journalist Anna Politkovskaya. It's a short, yet unsparing, look at the use of torture on Chechens accused of terrorism. Even if you haven't been following Russia's long, brutal anti-terrorist campaign in Chechnya, the piece rings some depressingly familiar themes. The New York Times has a translation. It's worth a read:

Before me everyday are dozens of files—copies of the criminal cases of people jailed for “terrorism” or of those still under investigation.

Why is the word “terrorism” in quotation marks? Because the overwhelming majority of these people are designated terrorists. The practice of “designating terrorists” did not simply supplant in 2006 some kind of earnest anti-terrorist war. It came to breed on its own potential terrorists and a desire for vengeance. When prosecutors and the courts work, not for the sake of the law, but on political commission and with the only goal of providing good reports for the Kremlin, then criminal cases are baked like pancakes.

An assembly line producing “open-hearted confessions” effectively guaranties good data on the war on terror in the North Caucasus. ...

The practice of designating terrorists is the area in the sphere of “counterterrorist operations in the North Caucasus” where, head to head, two ideological approaches clash: Are we, the lawful, fighting against the unlawful? Or, are we battling “their” lawlessness with “ours?” This clash of approaches is guaranteed to exist for the present and future. The result of this “designation of terrorists” is the increase in number of those who won’t put up with it.

October 12, 2006

Senate Investigators Accuse Norquist of Fraud

In a report issued today, Senate investigators say that five conservative non-profit groups, including one headed by Grover Norquist, sold their clout to Jack Abromoff and thereby perpetrated a fraud on taxpayers.

Officers of the groups "were generally available to carry out Mr. Abramoff's requests for help with his clients in exchange for cash payments," said the report, issued by the Democratic members of the Senate Finance Committee after a one-year investigation.

The report states that the groups probably violated their tax-exempt status "by laundering payments and then disbursing funds at Mr. Abramoff's direction; taking payments in exchange or writing newspaper columns or press releases that put Mr. Abramoff's clients in a favorable light; introducing Mr. Abramoff's clients to government officials in exchange for payment; and agreeing to act as a front organization for congressional trips paid for by Mr. Abramoff's clients."

The five groups include: Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform, the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy (co-founded by Norquist and Gale Norton), Citizens Against Government Waste, the National Center for Public Policy Research, and Toward Tradition

In one email examined by Senate investigators, Jack Abramoff referred to Norquist as a "hard-won asset" of his lobbying empire. In exchange for Norquist's opposition to taxes on Brown-Forman products, he required, according to an email, a "donation" of $50,000 for his group. Other emails indicate explicit discussions of money exchanged for support.

In Missouri, No Talent for Winning

Via Taegan:

In Missouri's U.S. Senate race, a new SurveyUSA poll shows Claire McCaskill (D) leading Sen. Jim Talent (R-MO), 51% to 42%.

In the last month, McCaskill has gained eight points on Talent.

Key finding: "Most of the movement in the race comes from Independent voters, who supported Talent by 12 points in September but now support McCaskill by 13 points, a 25-point swing."

An Anxious World, Contemplating a Fiery Extinction, Turns to...Harvard

It's easy to make fun of Harvard (but why is it so easy?) -- and it's also fun, so let's. As "malign narcissist" Kim Jong-Il poises a manicured finger over the nuclear button and all of humanity cringes in fear, the Harvard Crimson will not (will not!) be distracted from Topic Number 1.

This is a headline. A real one:

Nukes in Korea, But Eyes Turn To Harvard

And this is a real lead paragraph:

North Korea’s alleged nuclear test this week occurred deep underground in a mountain tunnel in the North Hamgyong Province, but in its aftermath, the world’s eyes are on Harvard Square.

Harvard is on this.

Harvard’s experts are in demand because the University’s extensive infrastructure, including the MTA Project at the Kennedy School of Government and the Harvard Negotiation Project at Harvard Law School, has been geared toward resolving the stalled talks and nuclear problem in North Korea since long before Monday’s approximately half-kiloton nuclear blast.

Um...okay. (Heckuva job!)

So what should we think? What can we do? What does this all mean?

"This is what happens when you are long on heated rhetoric but short on consequences.” -- Ashton Carter of Harvard’s Preventative Defense Project

“[I am] shocked but not surprised” -- Carter again (we laypeople may be surprised, but only experts get to be shocked.)

“Despite the fact that [North Korea] has previously been warned, they disregarded it at a cost they were prepared to take.” -- Graham Allison of the Kennedy School

“The next step should be to stop, take a deep breath, look the reality in the face unblinkingly, and recognize that the policy we and others have followed has failed.” (Allison again)

“One may consider a few sanctions, but those would be largely symbolic since North Korea is pretty isolated.” -- Jeffrey G. Lewis, head of Harvard's Managing the Atom project.

Next up: Harvard psychologists on Foleygate ("Clearly, this is a guy who's into young boys"); Harvard literature profs on Orhan Pamuk's Nobel Prize ("This will undoubtedly raise his profile."); and the stars of the Kennedy School on the Iraq war ("We stay, we lose; we leave, we lose; Oy!"). Where would we be without Harvard?

The Housing Bubble May Have Burst, But Discrimination Hasn't

Not only have foreclosure rates been on the rise but just this week, the National Fair Housing Alliance released a scathing report documenting racially discriminatory practices among real estate agents in New York, Georgia, and Illinois.

Some details:

-In Atlanta Coldwell Banker agents required African American applicants to provide bank pre-approval letters before being allowed to view homes while no such documentation was required by whites.

-In Chicago, Coldwell Banker agents practiced “blatant” discrimination towards African American buyers looking to purchase homes on the north side, showing them an average of 7 units versus 36 units shown to white buyers.

The reports harshest words, however, were saved for the Corcoran Group in Brooklyn. African American home buyers were routinely given limited information and, in a move reminiscent of red-lining commonly practiced by real estate agents until the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977, one agent drew red lines on a map around predominantly white neighborhoods, steering white clients to white neighborhoods.

As the report said of this practice, “During our 16 years of existence, the National Fair Housing Alliance has never seen such a literal and blatant example of sales steering.”

Doesn’t say much for progress.

--Amaya Rivera

Positively K Street--Only When Rove Says So

According to The New Republic, a friend of former Congressman Mark Foley's reports that by early 2006, Foley had planned to retire from Congress and set himself up as a lobbyist. The problem, according to this source, was that Karl Rove wanted otherwise. Rove allegedly made it clear to Foley that if he did not run for re-election, his future as a lobbyist was uncertain.

"The White House made it very clear I have to run," Foley is said to have remarked to his friend. The New Republic source explains that Foley was told that serving another two years in the House would "enhance his success" as a lobbyist.

Whether Rove and his minions knew about Foley's problem with pages is unknown, of course, but given both Rove's tendency to know everything and Foley's lack of discretion, it seems very unlikely that they wouldn't.

Out of the Closet and Into the Polling Booth

There are more queers in the heartland than there were five years ago, according to a new analysis of 2005 Census data released [PDF] by the Williams Institute, a think tank focused on sexual orientation. Nationwide, the number of out same-sex couples increased by 30 percent in five years—five times the 6 percent growth rate of the general population. The Midwest saw the largest gains.

The study suggests that far from driving gays and lesbians into the closet or into Straight to Jesus programs, anti-gay ballot measures may be helping bring gays and lesbians out of the closet. States that were among the first to forbid same-sex marriage have seen greater than average growth in the number of same-sex couples living together and announcing it on government forms. The surge may surprise supporters of the anti-gay measures on the ballot in eight states: In six of those states, the number of same-sex couples has increased by 30 percent or more since the 2000 Census.

The larger numbers of gay and lesbian voters may affect more than just gay issues in November. As it turns out, of the 10 states that have seen the number of same-sex couples increase by half or more, eight figure among the key congressional races in the upcoming election.

Pollsters have hardly been in hot pursuit of how gays and lesbians will vote.

Repro Rights Groups Asks Judges to Subpoena White House Docs in Lawsuit Over Plan B

Yesterday the Center for Reproductive Rights, on behalf of the several women’s rights groups, asked federal judges to grant a subpoena of White House documents and officials in its lawsuit against they filed last year against the FDA. The suit claims the prescription drug regulatory arm did not follow procedure when it sent a “not approvable” letter in response to the original application for sale of Plan B over-the-counter. The May 2004 letter ultimately led to a more than two year delay of non-prescription access to the emergency contraceptive.

Chris Mooney wrote for Mother Jones about the letter, which was sent in spite of a 23-4 vote in favor of approving the drug by the Reproductive Health Drugs Advisory Committee. One opposed adviser was David Hagar, a Kentucky obstetrician who was staunchly opposed to RU-486, had attacked the birth control pill for promoting promiscuity, and had written a book in which he advised Bible readings to relieve premenstrual syndrome, all before he was appointed by George W.

The FDA's letter cited Hager’s concern for "inadequate sampling of younger age groups" saying there needed to be more data on Plan B's use among girls younger than age 16. Never mind that scores of drugs are approved every year without data targeting specific age groups.

Barr Laboratories (now Barr Pharmaceuticals) subsequently submitted a revised application to make the drug available without a prescription only to girls and women ages 16 and older. The drug was finally approved for sale to those 18 and older, in August. (See Mother Jones’ full timeline of Plan B hurdles here).

The FDA says it plans to file a motion for dismissal.

October 11, 2006

Angelides vs. Leno

You know things are getting bleak when the best California's Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides can do is to whine about not getting as much face time with Jay Leno as Leno's old pal Arnold Schwarzenegger. Protesters gathered outside Leno's studio and Angelides' campaign manager sent a letter to NBC to decry what they called the network's unfair gift of extra exposure to Arnold, in the form of a cozy interview yesterday. OK, it's true that Schwarzenegger has refused to participate in more than a single debate with Angelides, thereby limiting the Dem's free time on broadcast TV. But c'mon, Phil. Maybe if you had some actual ideas or positions that anyone was excited about, Jay would want to talk to you, too.

Schwarzenegger's Affirmative Electoral Action

Republicans have been muttering about wooing African American and Latino voters away from the Democrats for years - and Arnold Schwarzenegger is the latest to give it a serious shot. Not content with the stomping in the polls he's already giving his challenger, state treasurer Phil Angelides, California's depressingly popular governor has been stumping hard in black and brown neighborhoods in Los Angeles and elsewhere. His staff is even helping black churches apply for grants from the after-school program he helped launch before his run for office. It seems to be paying off: polls are showing that while only nine per cent of California's African Americans are registered Republicans, 20 per cent support Schwarzenegger.

Who Decides What A Dual-Use Item Is?

Robert M. Thorson, a Connecticut geologist, has traveled throughout his career to conferences and conventions, and for the last three years, he has taken with him one of his favorite rocks, a banded piece of the Hebron Gneiss, which he describes as resembling "a broken slice of layer cake composed of licorice and cream cheese." This is one of Thorson's favorite rocks, and, he says, a touchstone for those who have attended his lectures.

While attempting to fly to Hood River, Oregon, to attend the Stone Foundation's annual meeting, Thorson had his rock confiscated by TSA staff at Bradley International Airport. Thorson does not check luggage on business trips, so the rock was in his carry-on bag. A TSA employee pronounced it a "dual-use item," then called her supervisor, who inspected the specimen and also declared it a dual-use item. Thorson was given the option of going back to the ticket counter and checking his rock as baggage, but he did not think he had time to do so. He then asked if he could claim the rock upon his return, and was told that he could not.

In his editorial in the Hartford Courant, Thorson muses that perhaps a stethoscope should be considered a dual-use item because a doctor could strangle someone with it. For some time now, I have been asking why pockets knives have to be confiscated, but neckties and tube socks are okay, despite the fact that both could be used to strangle someone, as could the cord of a notebook computer or other electronic device or appliance.

Says Thorson:

Who knows? Perhaps your tax dollars will be used by an internal think tank of agency hire-ups to ponder why on earth a geologist would travel with a rock. Who knows? Perhaps the government will wiretap my phone or check my library records to see whether I have checked out a Koran or a book about stone-age warfare.

Pombo Denies Abramoff Ties, Even as Evidence Mounts

Recently released documents from the Northern Mariana Islands indicate that Richard Pombo’s (R-Ca) relationship to disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff was much cozier than he has let on.

The AP is reporting that previously unseen lobbying records from the Marianas show Abramoff billed for phone calls to Pombo’s office in 1996. They also establish that between 1996 and 2001 Abramoff and his associates met with Pombo’s staff on more than two dozen occasions.

Pombo’s spokesman Brian Kennedy told the AP that those meetings "never happened” and the staff-level contacts were "greatly inflated." Abramoff, who pleaded guilty in a congressional corruption investigation, is "an admitted felon" who can't be trusted, Kennedy said.

As Mother Jones reported in September, Pombo has received at least $31,250 from Abramoff, his associates and clients, and even accompanied him on a delegation to the Marianas in 2004.

Will this influence voters’ come November 7? Pombo and his opponent Jerry McNerney are in a tight race for California’s 11th congressional district seat; as of last week Pombo held a two-point lead in the polls. Last Thursday, at the first and only debate between the candidates Pombo said of Abramoff “I met the guy two or three times in my whole life--he never once lobbied me on anything.”

--Amaya Rivera

Firm Must Pay for Asbestos Cleanup in Libby, Montana, Say Supremes

Yesterday the Supreme Court let stand earlier rulings that W.R. Grace, which had operated an asbestos mine in Libby, Montana, must pay $54 million to the EPA for Superfund cleanup costs at the mine, according to the Los Angeles Times.

For a devastating portrait of the town, whose residents, according to an EPA toxicologist, suffered "the most severe residential exposure to a hazardous material this country has ever seen," read Maryanne Vollers and Andrea Barnett's "Libby's Deadly Grace" from the May/June 2000 issue of Mother Jones.

Bush's New Space Policy: To Infinity and Beyond

Via Secrecy News, we learn that the Bush administration just cranked out a new National Space Policy. Much of it's similar to Clinton-era policy, but there are some stellar exceptions. Like this one:

The previous policy prudently reserved judgment "on the feasibility and desirability of conducting further human exploration activities" beyond the International Space Station in Earth orbit.

But in a rhetorical flight of fancy, the new Bush policy purports to adopt a new national "objective of extending human presence across the solar system," no less.

Less fanciful, yet more predictable, is the insistence that "The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit U.S. access to or use of space." In other words, in space no one can hear you whine about international law.

The True Cost of the War: 600,000 Iraqis Dead?

In his current column, Wall Street Journal pundit Bret Stevens recounts this story of Condi Rice meeting with the paper's editors last year:

[...] she said that she had telephoned George W. Bush as she flew out of Baghdad on her (then) most recent visit: "Mr. President," she said (and I quote from memory) "this is going to be a great country."

Meanwhile, there's new evidence of just how far from greatness Iraq really is. A new study [PDF] in the Lancet finds that over 600,000 Iraqis may have died in the wake of the American invasion. This, as the Journal reports, is considerably higher than any previous figure, including the "30,000, more or less" that President Bush tossed out last December. That figure, as Adam Shemper wrote in the May/June issue of Mother Jones, came from Iraq Body Count, a website that has been diligently tallying reports of civilian deaths. But IBC uses a conservative, media-based approach, while the new report from Johns Hopkins uses a statistical model known as "cluster sampling." No doubt there will be plenty of academic and partisan sniping about what the real number is. Whatever the final figure, it's a stark reminder of the daily barrage of violence facing average Iraqis. Stephens notes that Rice did not repeat her "great country" story when he met with her recently. He chooses to remain optimistic. "Perhaps she feels that way still: It would be distressing indeed if she did not." But wouldn't it be just as distressing if she still thought Iraq is on the path to greatness?

Update: In this morning's press conference, Bush said he doesn't believe the report is credible and is "amazed that this is a society which so wants to be free that they’re willing to—you know, that there’s a level of violence that they tolerate."

October 10, 2006

Dogs Used To Both Intimidate and Bite Prisoners

This sounds like another Guantanamo Bay or Abu Ghraib story, but the practice of using dogs to both terrify and bite uncooperative prisoners is one that takes place in Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, South Dakota, and Utah. According to Human Rights Watch, in these five states, dogs are used on prisoners who refuse to leave their cells. First, the dogs are used to intimidate the oppositional prisoners. If the intimidation does not work, the dogs are instructed to bite.

The practice is most common in Connecticut and Iowa prisons, according to Human Rights Watch. Arizona and Massachusetts banned the use of dogs this year.

Both German Shepherds and Belgian Malinois are used for cell extractions. When a handler and his dog enter a cell block to perform a potential cell extraction, the dog barks loudly, jumps against the cell door and scratches at the window. If the sight and sound of the dog does not get the prisoner to comply, the dog is then released. The officer with the dog is supposed to maintain a hold on the leash, but that does not always happen.

The dog is trained to bite whatever part of the prisoner it can get to, and there is always at least a puncture wound resulting from the bite. A prisoner who continues to resist can wind up with muscle or tissue tearing.

GOP Rule and North Korean Nukes

Think Progress brings to our attention that most of the growth of North Korea’s nuclear weapons program occurred under "conservative administrations known for their supposed 'strength' on defense" beginning in the mid-1980s under Ronald Reagan. Read their full timeline of events here.

No Pets Left Behind

On Friday, President Bush quietly signed into law a bill requiring states to help evacuate pets in the wake of a natural disaster. The law follows one of the lesser publicized tragedies of FEMA’s bungled evacuation of the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina. Because of a “no-pets” policy, FEMA forced evacuees to abandon their dogs, cats and any other domesticated friends (including service-animals). An estimated 50,000 pets were left to drown, starve or otherwise suffer. And remember all those folks who refused to leave their homes? According to a recent poll, 1 in 5 say they refused to evacuate because they did not want to leave their pets behind.

The documentary Dark Water Rising, now out on DVD, chronicles Katrina’s animal casualties and the tireless efforts of rescuers who worked to save them. The film also offers an unfiltered look at the hurricane’s devastation of New Orleans’ poorest neighborhoods and hints at the kind of bureaucratic ineptitude and infighting that have slowed reconstruction.

--Koshlan Mayer-Blackwell

Who Holds the Solution to the Byline Gender Gap?

Alternet's (formerly Mother Jones') Ann Friedman takes a strong position on magazines' byline gender gap, going so far as to recommend quotas, which Alternet has employed in order to ensure that efforts to even the byline score are made. Quotas are often the subject of controversy, but when looking at the results published by WomenTK.com, and highlighted in Mother Jones last January, it’s impossible not to be struck by the gap and to reach out for any and all solutions. Here’s Friedman’s go at the ratios (male-to-female contributing writers/editors):

The American Prospect: 21:12
The Atlantic: 27:6
Harper's: 30:2 (masthead not online)
In These Times: 6:6
Mother Jones: 10:5
The New Yorker: 44:18
The Nation: 26:4
The New Republic: 12:2
Salon: 14:7
Slate: 20:6
Washington Monthly: 30:5

Yup, Mother Jones is in there, and although we look better than most, there’s always room for improvement.

Warships Headed to Iran

Is the Bush administration really nuts enough to go to war with Iran when the military is stretched thin in Iraq and Afghanistan? Several media outlets, including Mother Jones, think the administration is capable of it. But the predictions of war with Iran are moving beyond armchair psychoanalysis and into wargame-watching.

A strike force led by the aircraft carrier Eisenhower is currently making its way to the entrance of the Persian Gulf, with a predicted arrival date of October 21. The Navy officially claims that the Eisenhower’s deployment is part of a normal rotation of ships in and out of the Gulf. But The Nation reports that the carrier’s deployment date was pushed up significantly. Both Time and MSNBC say the move was accompanied by a request from the Chief of Naval Operations to revamp a plan to blockade Iran from the Persian Gulf.

The Nation got its story from an anti-war retired Air Force Colonel, Sam Gardiner, who claims that officers of the deploying ships contacted him and "complained that they were being sent to attack Iran without any order from the Congress." But the president might see it differently. When Bush addressed the U.N. in mid-September, he claimed that Iran's leaders were "fund[ing] terrorism and fuel[ing] extremism." And President Bush has made a point of broadly interpreting the post-9/11 congressional vote authorizing him to combat terrorism (including as authority to conduct warrantless surveillance on American citizens). He could potentially initiate conflict with Iran with no further congressional approval.

Babs and Bush Duet

Babs kicked off yet another farewell tour in Philadelphia on Wednesday night and one of her guests was longtime fan and political compadre George W...OK, it was Bush impersonator Steve Bridges, the same guy who tag-teamed with GWB at the White House Correspondents Dinner. Babs' shtick, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported, was to toss the faux Bush softballs "only to have him give glib, breezy answers, like proposing to solve the national debt by selling Canada. "They don't use half of it!" he exclaimed.

Web Redesign Shows Fox News' True Colors?

Conspiracy theory of the day, courtesy of advertising/branding blog Snark Hunting:

Gearing up for November’s elections, Fox News has quietly morphed their corporate color scheme, replacing nearly all of the red with blue.

Hey, when your brand is all about championing the powers that be, being a chameleon is your only survival option.

Sure enough, its web site has lost a lot of its once red-blooded palette. And I don't think it's because they're Billy Bragg fans. (Right: FoxNews.com before and after.)