Politics

I have vowed, repeatedly, never to read David Brooks again: I have low blood pressure, as it happens, but a person can never be too careful. Still, every few months or so I spot a sentence out of the corner of my eye before I realize it’s his, and it’s so completely inane that I can’t help myself. Today, the sentence in question was this: “In weak moments, I think the best ticket for this country would be Bush-Kerry.” With a horrible sinking sensation, I knew that I was going to have to read on.

Fortunately, Brooks did not dwell on the supposed merits of a Bush-Kerry ticket. Instead, he analyzed the debates. I was not surprised that what he said was inane. I was surprised, however, at how entirely false it was. People like Brooks are, as Emerson once said, “not false in a few particulars, authors of a few lies, but false in all particulars. Their every truth is not quite true. Their two is not the real two, their four not the real four; so that every word they say chagrins us, and we know not where to begin to set them right.”

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There were a few points in the debate where I thought Bush said something that was just wrong. For instance, he said that “There are 100,000 troops trained, police, guard, special units, border patrol.” Last Friday Reuters reported that “The Pentagon also said on Monday that only about 53,000 of the 100,000 Iraqis on duty now have undergone training.” However, rather than going over lots of statements, I want to focus on one that I worry will be passed over, namely Bush’s claim, on a question about homeland security, that “Of course we’re doing everything we can to protect America.” This statement is clearly, flatly false.

I wrote about this several weeks ago here. The quickest way to find a list of things that we have not done to make our country safer is to download a GAO report on the status of key recommendations made by the GAO to the Department of Homeland Security, and flip to p. 30, where you will find a list of recommendations that have not yet been implemented. And the quickest way to show that Bush did not tell the truth is to note that in eight of the cases where DHS provided an explanation of delays in implementing recommendations, it cited funding problems. Those recommendations include, among other things, deploying isotope identifiers to detect radiation in ports, finding people whose visas have been revoked because the government suspects them of involvement in terrorism, and controls over foreign military sales. These are all things that would have made our country safer, and that we did not do simply because we were unwilling to commit the necessary funds.

Below the fold I go over some areas in which this administration has failed to secure our country. Many of them are shortened versions of points I made my earlier post; sorry for the repetition. But I think it’s important to ask, about each of the items listed (and the list is far from exhaustive): is this something that Bush thinks his administration cannot do? If so, what does that say about the capabilities of his administration? If not, how does he square this with his claim that “we’re doing everything we can to protect America”?

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Complex and tricky negotiations are taking place even as we speak for your Humble Essayist to be able to liveblog the debates – but I cannot promise anything, so here’s an open thread to comment in anyway.

Still, I have my beer, my popcorn and my Robotic Right-Wing Talking Points ready and at hand, so let the debates begin! Dance, candidates! Dance for Moe Lane! Dance noooowwww…. sorry; was channelling Giblets for a moment, there. Either that, or Flying Dog beer’s stronger than advertised. (Shrug) Heck, I’ve got tomorrow off…

UPDATE: I’ve retreated upstairs. Reactions”

ME: Interesting.

FIANCEE: Dear God, that was pointless.

And there you have it, America.

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For those of you who have been wondering, as I have, how anyone can support a President as disastrous as George W. Bush, a report from the Program on International Policy Attitudes explains it for us: his supporters have no idea what he stands for. Via Kos:

“As the nation prepares to watch the presidential candidates debate foreign policy issues, a new PIPA-Knowledge Networks poll finds that Americans who plan to vote for President Bush have many incorrect assumptions about his foreign policy positions. Kerry supporters, on the other hand, are largely accurate in their assessments. The uncommitted also tend to misperceive Bush’s positions, though to a smaller extent than Bush supporters, and to perceive Kerry’s positions correctly. Steven Kull, director of PIPA, comments: “What is striking is that even after nearly four years President Bush’s foreign policy positions are so widely misread, while Senator Kerry, who is relatively new to the public and reputed to be unclear about his positions, is read correctly.””

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As the candidates bunker down to practice for Thursday’s debate*, having set the tone they wanted going in as best they can, there seems to be a momentary calmness in the air today. It’s kind of eerie even. So let me stir things up with a good old-fashioned Dean-era left-wing rant.

For those who already know they’re voting for Bush it must seem incomprehensible that so many on the left literally hate him so much (he seems so likeable….so “guyish”). You’ll have to take my word for it: it’s more than just visceral. We fear what he has in store for the nation in his next term. The plan is in place, the set-up complete. Four years from now you will not recognize the United States of America if he gets back in. Environmental regulations will have been neutered, social programs will have been decimated, industry will actually set policy, courts will be landmined, civil liberties will be under constant attack, and media will no longer even pretend to serve the public.

For those who already know they’re voting for Kerry it must seem incomprehensible that anyone could look at the administration’s record and want four more years of the same. I can only imagine that the Bush-supporters’ dislike of Kerry is somewhat visceral as well. I know they have a laundry list of reasons and rationales to not support Kerry, but overall that list was decided on long before Kerry was the nominee (I paid attention during the primaries, you see). It’s simply been fine tuned since then.

There remain many reasons not to re-elect Bush. From the practical (he’s probably not really calling the shots and we don’t know exactly who is but they’re not as good at their jobs as they are at spin) to the more philosophical (power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, and this administration is systematically dismantling the checks and balances of government). Really, I believe that.

As the Republican Congress attempts to curb the powers of the courts, as DeLay gets bolder with each new success in his gerrymandering shenanigans, as the media get cocky enough in their own power to admit publicly they’re a business that wants Republicans to win, as the administration increasingly works around the laws to weaken the regulations its industrial backers don’t like, as the religious right turns its churches into campaign headquarters in hopes of getting a big slice of that faith-based initiative pie, the absoluteness of Republican power is growing. Widespread corruption is an inevitability. It will not be pretty.

Happy Monday!

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Via Josh Marshall, from the Washington Post:

“President Bush and leading Republicans are increasingly charging that Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry and others in his party are giving comfort to terrorists and undermining the war in Iraq — a line of attack that tests the conventional bounds of political rhetoric.

Appearing in the Rose Garden yesterday with Iraq’s interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, Bush said Kerry’s statements about Iraq “can embolden an enemy.” After Kerry criticized Allawi’s speech to Congress, Vice President Cheney tore into the Democratic nominee, calling him “destructive” to the effort in Iraq and the struggle against terrorism.”

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And by “here,” I mean New York City.

Back in May I wrote about the gathering indications, despite all the compassionate campaigning, that the Bush Administration is planning for some significant budget cuts in “virtually all agencies in charge of domestic programs.” At that time, the administration was dismissing the alarm bells people were ringing as much ado about nothing…they were simply doing some math and scenario planning: Go back into your houses, folks, nothing to see here.

***Well, as is usually the case with the Bush administration, what you fear they’re really up to is mild compared to what they’re really up to.*** What’s especially disturbing about their latest efforts is that they seem to be specifically screwing some key Blue states.

The Bush administration has proposed reducing the value of subsidized-housing vouchers given to poor residents in New York City next year, with even bigger cuts planned for some urban areas in New England. The proposal is based on a disputed new formula that averages higher rents in big cities with those of suburban areas, which tend to have lower costs.
The proposals could have a “significantly detrimental impact” in some areas by forcing poor families to pay hundreds of extra dollars per month in rent, according to United States Representative Christopher Shays, a Connecticut Republican. That extra burden could be too much for thousands of tenants, “potentially leaving them homeless,” Mr. Shays wrote in a recent letter to the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

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After 9/11, you’d think it would be obvious that we should work hard to secure our country against terrorist attacks. Some of this work has to be done overseas, but some of it involves taking steps here at home to make it more difficult for terrorist attacks against us to succeed. The Bush administration has argued that they have made America safer. But if you examine their record on homeland security, there are very serious problems.

Basically, what has happened is this: in the wake of 9/11, after initially opposing both steps, the Bush administration formed the Department of Homeland Security and federalized airport screening. Since 9/11 had demonstrated glaring holes in aviation security, the Congress passed measures requiring significant improvements in baggage and passenger screening. While there have been a few problems (pdf), like the fact that we still screen only 5% of air cargo, air transportation is now much safer than it was before 9/11.

However, nothing about al Qaeda’s history suggests that having used airplanes to attack us once, they will stick to airplanes in the future. This being the case, we should have worked equally hard to protect ourselves in other vulnerable areas. But we haven’t. As the 9/11 Commission report notes (p. 391), “Over 90% of the nation’s 5.3 billion investment in the TSA goes to aviation — to fight the last war.” Other areas remain dangerously insecure, in a way that, after 9/11, I find it hard to understand. For some highlights, read on.

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Both Kevin Drum and Matthew Yglesias are talking about a subject that we can agree on–gerrymandering sucks!

Kevin’s idea to fix it is a bit wacky, and Matthew’s fix is a radical reform from the American district concept (For a look at what his ballot could look like in California see under the extended entry something I shamelessly stole from commenter “Bumperstickerist”).

My concept is shared by some other people in a few of the comments. Take a fairly simple computer program and feed it only a very few variables. Make compactness an important variable or maybe general fit to county lines. Feed it only population data, no race data, no party affiliation data, no religious data, no economic data. Make the program simple enough that it can be replicated on any home computer. Use publically available census data. After the first decade draw the lines with a slight weighting to keeping the district close to its original boundary. That’s it. No safe districts based on gerrymandering.

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Via DailyKos
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Kerry delivered a crystal clear speech on Iraq and Terorism at NYU today. Here are some highlights:

On Terror:

In fighting the war on terrorism, my principles are straight forward. The terrorists are beyond reason. We must destroy them. As president, I will do whatever it takes, as long as it takes, to defeat our enemies. But billions of people around the world yearning for a better life are open to America’s ideals. We must reach them.

To win, America must be strong. And America must be smart. The greatest threat we face is the possibility Al Qaeda or other terrorists will get their hands on a nuclear weapon.

To prevent that from happening, we must call on the totality of America’s strength. Strong alliances, to help us stop the world’s most lethal weapons from falling into the most dangerous hands. A powerful military, transformed to meet the new threats of terrorism and the spread of weapons of mass destruction. And all of America’s power – our diplomacy, our intelligence system, our economic power, the appeal of our values – each of which is critical to making America more secure and preventing a new generation of terrorists from emerging.

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