Saturday, March 27, 2004

Bush gaves new meaning to "stumping"


March 25, 2004 | Back Issues « previous |
New Bush Rollbacks Endanger Northwest Salmon Industry, Forests

More stumps and fewer salmon are on the Pacific Northwest's horizon. On Tuesday, the Bush Administration announced rule changes that end the "Survey and Manage" standard that has helped protect old-growth forests for the past 10 years, as well as hundreds of rare and endangered species. The administration also weakened provisions of a rule designed to protect vulnerable streams and salmon from damage due to logging.[1]

As described in the March 5 BushGreenwatch, the 1994 Northwest Forest Plan's "Survey and Manage" standard required the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to "look before logging" -- to survey public lands for sensitive plants, fungi and fauna native to northwest forests. The need to protect these species, which serve as indicators of forest health, has often reduced or canceled logging of old-growth forests.

Now, forest managers will decide on a case-by-case basis whether protection is important. The rule changes will affect 5.5 million acres of forests on public lands.[2]

"The Bush Administration is making it easier to cut old-growth trees for an industry that will fund its reelection campaign," said Jeremy Hall of the Oregon Natural Resources Council Action in Eugene. "The industry donated more than $1 million dollars to the President and his party and the payback is logging trucks loaded with our biggest trees."[3]

Also on Tuesday, the administration announced that individual timber sales would no longer be required to meet all the protections for stream and watershed health established by the Northwest Forest Plan's Aquatic Conservation Strategy. Instead of monitoring the effects of logging on a site-by-site basis, agency managers will instead assess entire watersheds, which can range in size from 30 to 150 square miles.[4]

Damage to streams and salmon will be impossible to judge on such a large scale until it is too late, according to Glenn Spain, Northwest Regional Director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations. "Under the old rules you're supposed to assess the impact of a timber sale based on the particular characteristics of the site -- such as slope and stream conditions. You're supposed to know what you're doing," Spain told BushGreenwatch.

"Under the new rules, there will be no connections made between the logging on the ground and the effect on the salmon. They don't have to know what they're doing, or mitigate impact," said Spain. "It's a don't-know, don't find-out policy that institutionalizes scientific ignorance."

"I'm a registered Republican, but I did not vote for a rollback in the fundamental protections of public resources that support sustainable industries, such as fishing," Spain added. "We have tens of thousands of family-wage jobs at risk. The fishing industry is worth one billion dollars in the Pacific Northwest, and over $150 billion nationwide. No fish, no fishermen, no fishing jobs."

###

SOURCES:
[1] Earthjustice press release, Mar. 23, 2004.
[2] "Key rules are eased to boost logging," The Oregonian, Mar. 24, 2004.
[3] Earthjustice Press Release, op. cit.
[4] The Oregonian, op. cit.
END

Contributor: http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/. They have a news letter.



MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Bush Supports Outsourcing!!!


March 17, 2004 | Daily Mislead.org Archive
Powell Admits Bush Supports Outsourcing


Last month, President Bush strongly endorsed the loss of U.S. jobs to foreign labor markets, personally signing a report that touted overseas outsourcing despite more than 8 million Americans being out of work. After the public reacted with outrage, the White House tried to back off its endorsement of outsourcing, with the president reassuring America that he is concerned about "people looking for work because jobs have gone overseas" and saying that "we need to act to make sure there are more jobs at home." However, as the controversy subsides, the president is apparently endorsing outsourcing once again.

Specifically, the president has deployed Secretary of State Colin Powell to India "to assure Indians that the Bush administration would not try to halt the outsourcing of high-technology jobs to their country." The admission came despite a new study showing that up to 14 million American jobs could be lost to outsourcing in the coming years. Instead of endorsing congressional action to prevent such a tide of lost jobs,"the White House endorsed Mr. Powell's comments" that outsourcing is just "a natural effect" that cannot be stemmed.

The president's support for outsourcing is less puzzling when considering who is funding his campaign. As an earlier Daily Mislead9 report showed, the president's campaign pocketed more than $440,000 and his party more than $3.6 million from the companies that are most exploiting outsourcing to ship U.S. jobs overseas.

Sources:
"Bush Econ Advisor: Outsourcing OK," CBSNews.com, 2/13/04.
"Exporting American Jobs: Bush Adviser's Comments Ignite Firestorm, Bring Attention to Trend," ABCNews.com, 2/13/04.
"Employment Situation Summary," Bureau of Labor Statistics, 3/5/04.
"Bush adviser backs off pro-outsourcing comment," CNN, 2/13/04.
"Presidential Speech," WhiteHouse.gov, 2/12/04.
"Powell Reassures India on Technology Jobs," New York Times, 3/17/04.
"Outsourcing Hits Close to Home for Workers in Northwest Ohio," Miami Herald, 3/14/04.
"Senate votes to stop outsourcing," BBC News, 3/5/04.
Daily Mislead, 3/10/04.
END

Contributor: http://www.misleader.org/


MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Focus on Bin Laden "A Mistake" & KNOW to Bush as far back as April of 2001


White House, 4/01:

A previously forgotten report from April 2001 (four months before 9/11) shows that the Bush Administration officially declared it "a mistake" to focus "so much energy on Osama bin Laden." The report directly contradicts the White House's continued assertion that fighting terrorism was its "top priority" before the 9/11 attacks1.

Specifically, on April 30, 2001, CNN reported that the Bush Administration's release of the government's annual terrorism report contained a serious change: "there was no extensive mention of alleged terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden" as there had been in previous years. When asked why the Administration had reduced the focus, "a senior Bush State Department official told CNN the U.S. government made a mistake in focusing so much energy on bin Laden."2.

The move to downgrade the fight against Al Qaeda before 9/11 was not the only instance where the Administration ignored repeated warnings that an Al Qaeda attack was imminent3. Specifically, the Associated Press reported in 2002 that "President Bush's national security leadership met formally nearly 100 times in the months prior to the Sept. 11 attacks yet terrorism was the topic during only two of those sessions"4. Meanwhile, Newsweek has reported that internal government documents show that the Bush Administration moved to "de-emphasize" counterterrorism prior to 9/115. When "FBI officials sought to add hundreds more counterintelligence agents" to deal with the problem, "they got shot down" by the White House.

Sources:
Press Briefing by Scott McClellan, 03/22/2004.
CNN, 04/30/2001.
Bush Was Warned of Hijackings Before 9/11; Lawmakers Want Public Inquiry, ABC News, 05/16/2002.
"Top security advisers met just twice on terrorism before Sept. 11 attacks", Detroit News, 07/01/2002.
Freedom of Information Center, 05/27/2002.

Contributed by http://www.misleader.org/


MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

LEFT BEHIND! Some 25,000 Texas children to lose heath care.


Children's Health Insurance Program COULD DROP NONPAYING FAMILIES

ASSOCIATED PRESS March 26, 2004


AUSTIN (AP) - About 25,000 Texas children from low-income families could lose health coverage because their families have fallen behind on premium payments, a spokeswoman for the state Health and Human Services Commission said.

The state asked families five months ago to pay more for the Children's Health Insurance Program. The premium hike was one of several tightening measures that have helped shrink the program in response to budget cuts.

Kristie Zamrazil, spokeswoman for the commission, said the state has extended a temporary grace period for the families and no coverage has been cut off for failure to pay premiums.

She declined to say how long the grace period would last.

The program, which enrolled more than a half-million children last summer, covered 388,281 as of March 1. Enrollment has decreased by 119,000 children since Sept. 1, when budget cuts and several new rules took effect.

The commission inserted fliers in many families' January and February premium billings warning that nonpayment would prompt policy termination.

Fast-declining enrollment in CHIP has sparked protests from opponents of cuts and tighter enrollment and eligibility rules. The new rules were imposed as the Legislature and governor grappled with a $9.9 billion budget shortfall.

Commission officials hoped for better compliance so they could avoid knocking more children off the program, said Patti Everitt, executive director of the Children's Defense Fund of Texas.

"If children are without health insurance, the costs shift to local communities, and they understand that is the reality of cuts to CHIP," Zamrazil said in Friday's editions of the Dallas Morning News.

With the higher premiums, health plan executives warn that the state risks reversing some of its savings. They predict that costs per insured child will go up if the state removes the 25,000 children with past-due accounts, about 6 percent of enrollees.

Affected families have incomes between 100 percent and 150 percent of the federal poverty level or for a family of four, annual income of $18,850 to $28,275.

The commission's delay in cutting children from the program angered Republican Rep. Leo Berman of Tyler.

"The notice shouldn't have been sent out in the first place if it wasn't going to be enforced," Berman said.

Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, said Republicans such as Berman complained last year about families making $35,000 or $40,000 a year qualifying for CHIP.

"But who's suffering? The people who make the least money who are eligible for the CHIP program," Coleman said. "The new policy is cruel and mean."


©Tyler Morning Telegraph 2004 END

SO, HOW WILL THIS READ AFTER HE'S BEEN OUR PRESDENT AND NOT JUST TEXAS' GOVENOR?




MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Friday, March 26, 2004

Demand that Condi Rice come clean


Suddenly, a lot of doubt surrounds National
Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice's assertions about 9/11. Many of her statements have recently been
contradicted by other key officials and by news reports.

Americans have a right to know the truth about what
the White House did to prevent 9/11. Yet Rice is
refusing to testify in public before the bipartisan
commission investigating the attacks.

Please call the White House now, and demand that
Rice testify in public:

The White House
202-456-1112

Then, please call your Senators and Representative,
and ask them also to
demand that Condoleezza Rice and other top
administration officials testify
in public before the 9/11 commission.

You can reach them at:

Senator Dianne Feinstein
Phone: 202-224-3841

Senator Barbara Boxer
Phone: 202-224-3553

Congressman Richard W. Pombo
Phone: 202-225-1947







MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Telling the Truth = Getting fired Per Bush


March 12, 2004 | Daily Mislead.org Archive
Bush Threatened to Fire Official for Telling Truth


During this time of record deficits, President Bush promised the country that his drug-industry backed Medicare bill would cost $395 billion.1 But just weeks after he signed the bill into law, his own budget office admitted that the bill would actually cost well over $500 billion.2 And today a new report shows that the President knew that the bill cost more than he had claimed, and yet he deliberately hid the information from the public until the legislation was already signed into law.

As revealed in an exclusive Knight-Ridder report, the White House threatened to fire its own top Medicare actuary "if he told lawmakers about a series of Bush administration cost estimates" that priced the bill at more than $500 billion.3 At the time, conservative Republicans had "vowed to vote against the Medicare drug bill if it cost more than $400 billion." This means that the president deliberately misled members of his own party on behalf of the pharmaceutical industry that pushed the bill and has been a top contributor to his campaign.4 As Rep. Sue Myrick (R-NC) said, "I think a lot of people probably would have reconsidered" voting for the bill had they not been deliberately misled by the White House.

At Knight-Ridder's website you can see the full text of the 6/26/03 email that Medicare's top actuary Richard S. Foster sent to colleagues informing them of the White House threat.5

Sources:
"Federal Deficit Hits Record $374B", CBS News, 10/20/2003.
"Medicare drug plan balloons", Washington Times, 01/29/2004.
"Bush administration ordered Medicare plan cost estimates withheld", Knight Ridder, 03/11/2004.
Open Secrets.Org.
"E-mail from Richard S. Foster, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services", Knight Ridder, 03/11/2004.
END
Contributor: http://www.misleader.org/. They have a news letter via email.


MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Thursday, March 25, 2004

An OP/ED from USA Today - Fighting words: 'Under God'


The Pledge of Allegiance didn't start out to be a political or religious icon, much less the cultural lightning rod that was put before the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) on Wednesday.


Yet the failure to acknowledge these more humble roots, and stay true to them, undermines the pledge's original purpose of uniting the nation.


The Pledge of Allegiance - originally directed simply to "my flag" - was written in 1892 as a contribution to the widely read magazine The Youth's Companion as part of its observance of the 400th anniversary of Columbus' "discovery" of America.


Though a Baptist minister wrote the words, he didn't make any religious reference. "Under God" was added by Congress 62 years later as a Cold War political symbol that contrasted with "godless communism."


Before and since, this modest affirmation of patriotic ideals has been used as a weapon in wars by believers and atheists attacking each other - and by believers attacking fellow believers. Opportunistic politicians also have used the pledge repeatedly to challenge opponents' patriotism and faith.


Ironically, to win the case he argued before the Supreme Court on Wednesday, the atheist dad challenging the invocation of the words "under God" in a public school classroom has to exaggerate the phrase's religious importance. And, his challengers, who say they are defending the place of religion in American life, have to minimize the pledge's religious value.


The disputed two words can survive constitutionally only if the justices are convinced that the phrase is effectively meaningless: what courts previously have dismissed as "ceremonial deism" that lacks significant religious content. That's the rationale given in deflecting attacks on the motto "In God we trust" and other generic religious references in public life.


The irony helps explain why some prominent mainstream religious scholars filed briefs in the case opposing the use of the words "under God." They believe it trivializes faith or "takes the Lord's name in vain" - a violation of the Ten Commandments.


Even before "under God" was added, the pledge was used to justify persecution of members of religious sects who refuse to say it, such as Jehovah's Witnesses. They believe that paying homage to a flag places another deity before God.


Sadly, what started out as a proclamation of one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all, also has become a source of intense division.



MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Wednesday, March 24, 2004

As long as you kept sending your $ they'll kept spending it...


When NASA first started sending up astronauts, they quickly discovered that
ball-point pens would not work in zero gravity. To combat this problem, NASA
scientists spent a decade and $12 billion developing a pen that writes in
zero gravity, upside down, on almost any surface including glass and at
temperatures ranging from below freezing to over 300 C.

The Russians used a pencil.

Enjoy paying your taxes--they're due again.

And what we'll we get from that investment, nothing, well maybe not NOTHING. We'll be able to buy one someday after your goverment sells the rights to manufacture it to some Corp. It's our money and it's our Pen. Think about it!


MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".



send comments via Email to me, D

Monday, March 22, 2004

Ex-Terrorism Adviser Richard A. Clarke on U.S. Officials.


A man who has worked from Reagon till and including Bush Jr., who is doing his daddy's 2nd term.

By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press Writer - WASHINGTON - Richard A. Clarke's commentary on top government leaders, from his new book, "Against All Enemies."

_President Bush: Clarke blames Bush for doing a "terrible job" fighting terrorism. Says "the critique of him as a dumb, lazy rich kid was somewhat off the mark," but that Bush looks for "the simple solution, the bumper-sticker description of the problem."

_President Clinton: Clarke says he was "beyond mad" over Clinton's lack of discretion that led to his impeachment, but generally praises Clinton as a charismatic, sharp thinker who couldn't get CIA, Pentagon and FBI to deal with terrorism issues. Says Clinton's approval of missile attacks against Iraq over the assassination attempt during Bush's father's presidency deterred Saddam Hussein from future terrorism against America.

_Vice President Dick Cheney: Clarke describes Cheney as quiet and calm but radically conservative. Says Cheney believes U.S. could handle Iraq alone and "everyone else is just more trouble than they are worth." Blames Cheney for failing to speak out about the threat of al-Qaida during senior White House meetings.

THE REST OF THE STORY

MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".


send comments via Email to me, D

Sunday, March 21, 2004

I'm in good company this time, last time we were on differant sides




http://www.barbrastreisand.com/news_statements.html#gala
Read the blog of Barbra Streisand
Posted on March 8, 2004
"How can anyone legislate who you can love?..."

THE STRUGGLE FOR EQUAL RIGHTS CONTINUES

Remarks by Barbra Streisand Upon Her receipt of The
Human Rights Campaign Humanitarian Award, March 6, 2004

© Barbra Streisand 2004
I have been fortunate to receive a few awards in my lifetime, and I always appreciate them, but I must say that this is a very special one because the gay community has supported me from the very beginning. I know that this is a challenging moment in your history. So I am very proud to accept this award from the Human Rights Campaign at this time. You are on the frontlines in the struggle for equal rights, even as continued prejudice stands in the way.

The American Constitution is a magical document that has evolved over 200 plus years. While we revere it, it did not start out as a perfect document. This Republic was founded with a Constitution that counted slaves as three-fifths human. It took decades and a Civil War, the deadliest in U.S. history, to erase that stain upon our country. It took over 100 years to bring women into the political system by giving them the right to vote. Interracial marriage was illegal in some states until 1967. Now the Bush Administration wants to change the positive inclusive direction of our Constitution by calling for an amendment that authorizes discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

Well, I say, no way. Dr. Martin Luther King taught us that the arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice. We must always go forward, towards greater liberty and greater equality, not backward.

You know, for me, the realization that two people should have the right to form a sacred union regardless of their gender was strengthened when I saw a performance of the play The Normal Heart in 1985. After feeling the love those two men had for each other, I dare anybody not to want them to get married by the end.

The law cannot dictate matters of the heart. When two people form a deep bond, there is usually a soul connection, and the soul has no gender. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are fundamental rights in this country. Happiness can be many things - a good meal, a good friend, a warm puppy, and certainly...love. How can anyone legislate who you can love? That is a human right, the right to love and be loved.

And when you love someone, whether you're in a heterosexual or same-gender relationship, shouldn't you be able to visit them in the hospital when they're sick or dying? Shouldn't everyone have the right to enter into a loving, legally binding, committed relationship that takes on special responsibilities and obligations?

Current civil union legislation doesn't go far enough in protecting equal rights. We must not deny gay families many of the benefits that help keep families strong...social security, pensions, veteran's support, inheritance, the right to take unpaid leave to care for a spouse...the list goes on and on.

Instead of helping families, this president wants to spend a billion and a half dollars to bolster marriage. Turning government into a marriage counselor is a joke...a waste of time and money. It's not a policy; it's a diversion.

But this administration regularly uses the politics of diversion to their advantage. They cleverly use divisive cultural issues to avoid talking about other serious problems, such as unemployment and healthcare. They go after Saddam because they can't find bin Ladin ... They want to send missions to Mars instead of protecting the Earth... Tax cuts for the wealthy instead of assisting the poor...

You have to look at what Bush does, not what he says. Talk is cheap. He expresses empathy for military families and then cuts their benefits...He names a proposal "The Clear Skies Initiative" that pollutes the planet...He says he'll be a uniter and then drives us apart...He steals the slogan "No Child Left Behind" and then breaks his promise to fund his reforms.

Truly, I stand here flabbergasted at what is going on in today's world. Never in my life have I witnessed a president and an administration that is so out of step with the needs of the country, so threatening to our future and so abusive in its use of power.

The Clinton administration left this country with a budget surplus, and also a surplus in the goodwill we shared with our allies. Now we have a deficit in both.

Before the war in Iraq, I went to hear Scott Ritter speak - he had been a weapons inspector for seven years. He told us there was no imminent threat to the United States, that the program to develop nuclear weapons had been dormant since 1998. There was no connection between Iraq and al Qaeda (one is a secular society and the other fundamentalist), that chemical weapons have a short shelf life and wouldn't be usable today...in short, everything Scott Ritter told us has turned out to be the truth.

But this president (the only one to cut taxes during a war) made terrorism a partisan cause. He charged Democrats with being soft on terror, a lie. He appointed John Ashcroft to trample our civil liberties as Attorney General, and, from a human rights point of view, his use of Guantanamo Bay has roused international protest.

Now as the president gears up for his re-election campaign, the right wing propaganda machine is ready to take the skin off of John Kerry, the Democratic Party's nominee. I've never seen anything as ruthless or as relentless as this. They can take a slur hatched at the Republican National Committee or a lie huckstered by the Heritage Foundation, repeat it on Fox, hit it on Limbaugh, print it in the Wall Street Journal, until it's coming out of every media outlet imaginable. Repeating lies over and over doesn't make them any more true. But it does make people believe the lies a little more until finally they stop demanding the truth.

I've seen their ferocity up close, as I witnessed the astounding assault on the CBS movie about Ronald Reagan, in which my husband starred and Craig and Neil produced. They attacked that movie and drove it off network television before any of them had ever seen it.

The Right Wing is very well-organized. They fight dirty. They project their own nastiness onto their opposition. Remember how they accused the Democrats of stealing the election in Florida, while they themselves were doing just that!

We're now in a period that whenever you say something that's critical of the government, you are accused of being unpatriotic. Bush even lent himself to an utterly despicable campaign in Georgia that impugned the patriotism of Senator Max Cleland, who had sacrificed three limbs in the same Vietnam War that the president ducked. Talking about patriotism, let's never forget Bush's fellow Republican, Teddy Roosevelt, who in 1918 said, "To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."

Indeed, this country now faces a fundamental choice. Multilateral security or pre-emptive wars. Closing or widening the gaps between the haves and the have nots. Facing the truth or accepting the lies. The public taking an interest or tuning out. Extending our rights or turning them back.

Mr. Bush will dress himself up as a compassionate conservative once more for the election, but he has embraced a remarkably radical policy, which I pray the public finally sees. The mishandling of national and economic security. The shameless politics of special interests and crony capitalists. (And when you talk about special interests it's important to differentiate between public interests that benefit the larger good of the people, like protecting the environment or finding a cure for cancer, versus the special interests that are limited to a particular industry or corporation, like Enron or Halliburton).

Bush recently pushed through a prescription drug bill that actually gives a better deal to the drug companies than to the seniors who need the drugs. And what about the new energy plan that actually increases our dependence on Persian Gulf oil (even though he recently said just the opposite in his State of the Union speech).

The Republicans will try to win the election by convincing the American public that they are the father figures who can keep us safe. But the facts contradict the myth. Two and a half years after the largest attack on American soil, our borders remain easily penetrable. We have the capacity to inspect only 2% of cargo containers coming into our country. Local law enforcement has been weakened by spending cuts, and our intelligence lacks manpower and updated technology. And which party's budget provides the most for homeland security? The Democrats!

This president is so transparent. The only way he would agree to investigations of the mishandling of intelligence leading up to the Iraqi war, is if we wait until after the election to get the reports. Has this administration no shame? What job are we not doing that has allowed them to pull the wool over the eyes of the American people?

But...there is hope. It's starting to turn. I can feel it. The media is finally asking the president and his staff the tougher questions, and looking into the issues that should have been investigated years ago. The people are speaking out at all levels from the grassroots to Washington. All of the good work so many people are doing is finally making a dent. We won't be scared into submission.

What should scare us is that we have no checks and balances on this administration. They control the White House, the Senate, the House of Representatives and the Supreme Court. All we have is each other. So each of us must do what we can to create positive change in November. I know the Human Rights Campaign will be at the center of the struggle for equality. And let's be smart...Let's be pragmatic...Let's not allow the Republicans to use gay marriage as a political tool in this election year. Truth and justice eventually wins out.

I am proud to stand with you tonight as the recipient of this prestigious award. Together we can and we will win the fight.
© Barbra Streisand 2004

MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".


send comments via Email to me, D

Here's one you may not have know of Eisenbower did this and so has Bush


EISENHOWER LETTERS REVEAL
SECRET PLAN IN CASE OF ATTACK

WASHINGTON (AP) - A few weeks after the Soviets launched the first manmade satellite in 1957, shattering America's sense of security, CBS President Frank Stanton was summoned to the White House to see President Eisenhower.

Stanton knew his friend was agonizing over how to respond to Sputnik and the terrorizing thought that permeated America: Had the Soviets gained a huge first-strike advantage in the nuclear arms race?

But Stanton learned Eisenhower also was wrestling with how best to ensure the U.S. government could function if a Soviet attack wiped out many American leaders.

Stanton, who had no experience or ambitions in government, was taken aback when the president asked if he would be willing to oversee a federal communications agency after such an attack.

"I was surprised and startled by the breadth of the assignment," said the 96-year-old Stanton, who lives in Boston.

Nervous about the awesome task of keeping the nation's telephone, radio and television systems operating after an attack, Stanton said he nevertheless "agreed to do my chore."

Stanton was one of six private citizens secretly recruited and granted authority by Eisenhower to run major components of the government in an emergency. No public announcement of the appointments was made. Their existence was confirmed by recently publicized Eisenhower administration letters.

"The president was planning for the unthinkable," said retired Army Gen. Andrew J. Goodpaster, Eisenhower's staff secretary. "He wanted to bring in the wisdom and competence to reinforce whatever elements of the government survived and provide some assurance that our government could not be decapitated."

Presidents are granted vast powers under the Constitution to lead the nation in times of war or enemy attack.

Shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks, President Bush created a shadow government of 75 to 150 officials who worked in mountainside bunkers outside Washington to ensure the government would function if the capital came under attack.

All those officials already were in government when they were given the assignment. Eisenhower is believed to be the first president to go outside government to look for leaders in a crisis.

"Eisenhower went beyond the normal lines of succession, which I think was a reflection of the widespread paralyzing fear that swept the country in the 1950s," said Peter Kuznick, a history professor and director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University.

Besides Stanton, the appointees included George Baker, a Harvard Business School professor who was tapped to oversee transportation; Harold Boeschenstein, president of Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp., in charge of manufacturing and production; Aksel Nielsen, president of the Title Guaranty Co., housing; J. Ed Warren, senior vice president of the First National City Bank of New York, energy; and Theodore Koop, vice president of CBS, to oversee an emergency censorship agency. Koop would have had 40 civilian staff members to monitor and control wartime information about the devastation.

Eisenhower also appointed two Cabinet secretaries and Federal Reserve Chairman William McChesney Martin to emergency posts for currency stabilization, food and labor.

"The people Eisenhower chose, while they were his friends, they were also the captains of industry of his day. People like Bill Gates today," said Bill Geerhart, editor of a Web site called Conelrad, or Control of Electromagnetic Radiation. That was the name of nation's first emergency broadcasting system, established by President Truman.

The site posted the Eisenhower documents after obtaining them from the Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kan.

The selections were based as much on the appointees' geographic location and personal relationships with Eisenhower as their expertise. Nielsen, for example, was Eisenhower's regular fishing buddy.

The presidential form letters dated March 6, 1958, provide for the appointees to immediately take office in the event of a national emergency. Until then, they were asked to keep their status secret. They were promised an undisclosed salary but there were few specifics about their jobs.

The documents show the secret group met in July 1960 with the now-defunct Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization to discuss staffing for their agencies. But work barely got started before the group was relieved of its duties by President Kennedy, who took office in 1961.

Still, subsequent administrations have made contingency plans for government continuity - often involving citizens outside government - in the event of a devastating attack. For example, Kennedy's director of emergency planning, Frank Ellis, said in 1961 that the president had emergency appointees for transportation, agriculture and communications.

During the Reagan administration, then-Rep. Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, who was chief executive of the pharmaceutical company G.D. Searle & Co., were key players in a secret program to set aside the legal lines of succession and install a new president in a catastrophe, The Atlantic Monthly reported this month.


MY ADVICE endeavors at keen.com. The number is 1-800-275-5336 (800-ask-keen) + ext. 0329063 for tech stuff, 0329117 for running a small business, and 0329144 on investing. Want to CHAT, I use Yahoo's IM as the_web_ster. View me in the Friends & Family part of webcamnow.com, just click on "view cams", then in the Java window click on WebcamNow Communities drop down arrow & select Friends & Family. Under the live webcams look for & click on me "the_webster".


send comments via Email to me, D