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Feel welcome to read posts up to the end of November 2004 here, if you wish. Then come see us at our new home.  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 1:22 PM

 
Bush heads north, into the Canadian cold
resident Bush traveled to Ottawa today, purportedly to mend a relationship more damaged during his first term in office than at any time since the Vietnam War.
   At a joint press conference with Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin, Bush acknowledged the obvious, saying yet again he realizes not everyone agrees with his decision to invade Iraq (story).
   Then, along with the usual insistence we're on the way to seeing a free, peaceful and prosperous Iraq join the ranks of the world's democracies, Bush went past spin to all-out con job.
   Just as he had done about various things along the 2004 campaign trail, Bush dropped in an implication-by-association that something he wants to be true is true. He mentioned that the U.S. invaded Iraq after that country repeatedly violated U.N. resolutions. The con job, of course, is conveying to the uninformed and poorly informed the notion that the U.S. invasion was justified by Iraq's defiance of the U.N. — and, by extension, might even have had the U.N.'s blessing.
   In truth, in early 2003 Iraq had handed over weapons information demanded by both the U.S. and U.N. In truth, U.N. weapons inspectors were at work in Iraq when Bush ordered the preinvasion buildup and positioning of U.S. military forces. In fact, when Bush told the U.N. to get the inspectors out because invasion was imminent, the U.N. was busy telling Bush to hold off, to let the inspectors do their work, to avoid precipitous military action.
   And as we so well know, it turned out Saddam Hussein had done a lot more to comply with the U.N. resolutions than the Bush administration knew or else would admit to knowing. As we so well know now, the U.N. weapons inspectors found no weapons of mass destruction because Iraq didn't have them. But President Knowitall invaded anyway.

   We suspect few Canadians are so poorly informed as to be misled by Bush's spiel. Clues of that could be seen in sizeable protest demonstrations and in the single-finger salutes Bush alluded to during the press conference. It's also indicated by poll results showing 58 percent of Canadians think Bush's re-election was a mistake, as reported by ABC News this evening.
   Never one to face a less-than-adoring audience if he can avoid doing so, Bush passed on the traditional address visiting U.S. presidents make to Canada's Parliament. That's probably just as well, since he obviously has little to say beyond spin they've already heard.

  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 7:48 PM

 
Ridge will leave small shoes to fill
   Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge (sigh) announced today that he's resigning (yawn) as of Feb. 1, or sooner if a replacement gets the OK from Congress (story).
   The affable, well-spoken Ridge's tenure as the first Cabinet-level appointee for homeland security will be remembered for his making colored alert warnings at politically useful times during an election year and little else. Overall, Ridge's service in what should've been a tough, demanding post has been a go-along, get-along exercise in underperforming mediocrity. However, he's been as loyal as a pet poodle.
    All of which is to say he's the quintessential Bush appointee.
   Ridge says he wants to spend more time with his family. He's also said to be a shoo-in for a job as the trophy executive at a major, unnamed defense-industry corporation. That ought to be good for making mountains of money in return for molehills of effort — he'll be a natural.

  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 3:25 PM

 
Story says Oklahoma e-voting totals rigged
   According to a Saturday report on the Web, e-voting machines in 57 Oklahoma counties somehow started counting backward, all of them providing winning totals for President George W. Bush in the Nov. 2 election. That conclusion is apparently based on a report of early vote results, when the counts were at about 70 percent of votes cast, published in the Tulsa World newspaper.
   This story, "Voting Machines Count Backwards in Okla.," from okimc.org claims the early totals reported by the conservative newspaper had Kerry ahead, but when the state's official totals became known, Kerry had lost in all of Oklahoma's 77 counties.
   Further adding to suspicions, the okimc.org story says "All 77 counties use the Optech Eagle voting machines and Tabulators made by ES&S, Sen (Chuck) Hagel's Republican company."
   If proven true — and we're not saying this is true, based only on a single Web posting — such a fixing of Oklahoma vote totals wouldn't change the election outcome. What it might do to the good is focus public attention on the need for much better e-voting machines along with rigorous oversight and auditing of their use, before during and after elections. To that end, we hope the possibility of rigged vote tallying in Oklahoma is investigated and either verified or debunked.
   Whatever the outcome in Oklahoma, it remains true that these hi-tech toys are a perfect setup for stealing elections. If e-voting systems aren't substantially improved, and soon, you can be sure it's only a matter of time until we have a major election fraud scandal.

  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 12:56 PM

 
Don't expect school violence decline to last
   Violent crimes against students in the nation's schools have declined by 50 percent over the last decade. That's welcome news, but schools still aren't out of the woods.
   An AP story reports:
   And the next time you hear someone bashing public school teachers, consider this:
   Obviously, one of these crimes is too many, especially considering the lifelong damage that can be done when a youngster is brutalized. And each incident creates a potential ripple effect. Other kids witness violence, which is bad. Desire for vengeance can escalate, involving more kids and more-destructive, even deadly, violence.

   One especially good thing the Clinton administration did was to create a federal program adding 100,000 police officers across the country. The COPS program, as it was known, made it possible to put officers into thousands of schools, including some of those most wracked by violence. Credit COPS with helping bring the school (and community) violence stats down.
   But here, too, it's a good-news, bad-news situation. The Bush administration has eliminated funding for the COPs program, after reducing funding severely during the first term. As a result, communities across the country, many struggling to make ends meet during our jobless and otherwise very uneven economic recovery, have had to cut their police forces. Invariably, that has resulted in school-based officers being reassigned elsewhere.

   Don't be surprised if the school violence numbers start going back up. However, take comfort in the fact we're spending megamillions to train, equip and deploy more Iraqi police officers.
   Oh, and then there's the pending matter of making Bush's many tax cuts permanent. Better a millionaire should keep getting his $130,000 annual refund than that our most troubled schools should have police officers to help keep the peace. After all, that millionaire might need the money to send his kid to a nice, safe private school.


  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 10:28 PM

 
Edwards: Democrats must express values
   “In order for us to unite the country ... those voters have to believe that our values — my values and the values of other Democratic leaders — are the same values they believe in. That means we have to be touching them, reaching out to them.”
  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 9:01 PM

 
Cost of Bush's war blunder keeps going up
   There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. There was no native resistance movement within Iraq begging us to invade and set them free. Saddam Hussein, fiendish despot though he was, was not in cahoots with al Qaeda in any substantial or meaningful way, where U.S. security was concerned. Iraq did not figure in our war against terrorism, except in the rhetoric of the Bush administration.
   Those who opposed invading Iraq were right about our troops becoming bogged down in a deadly quagmire. They were right about the country breaking down into lawless chaos. President George W. Bush and his neoconservative crusaders were as wrong as they could be in nearly everything they told the American people and the world to justify invading Iraq.
   Despite Bush's stated and restated intention of holding elections in Iraq by the end of January, the country is less secure and stable than the day our troops pulled into Baghdad. Obviously, without the country being secure and stable any election result will be suspect in the eyes of Iraqis and most people around the world. Any new leader, any new government in Iraq,will desperately need to be perceived as legitimate. As of now, the chances of that being the case next February appear to be slim to none.
   That's the situation as the price our military people are paying for Bush's wilful, foolish blunder rises inexorably, day after bloody day. Here's what the Association Press reports that cost to be this weekend:
   To paraphrase, a foolish nation and its soldiers are soon parted.


  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 7:01 PM

 
Wyoming voters went over the top, literally
   Wyoming, a solidly Republican red state and home of Vice President Dick Cheney, managed an amazing feat of electoral . . . ahem, enthusiasm? . . . in the recent election.
   From the Wyoming secretary of state's official Web site, no less, comes news that 106 percent of registered Wyoming voters turned out to vote. Look down the page, on the right.
   How did they do that? Oh, we'll pass. Don't want to be put down as a whacko conspiracy theorist, or anything. If you've got an idea, however, feel free to leave a comment.
   Final thought: We hope this doesn't get back to Majority Leader Tom DeLay and his henchme . . . er, associates back in Texas. They don't need any more ideas.


  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 12:02 AM

 
Boortz on par with allegedly bad principal
   Just imagine, a school principal prohibiting a teacher from presenting materials to his students that refer to God. That means no Declaration of Independence, no George Washington's journal, no John Adams' diary and no Samuel Adams' "The Rights of the Colonists."
   That's the charge teacher Steven Williams of Stevens Creek School in the Cupertino suburb of San Francisco makes against Principal Patricia Vidmar and the school district in a lawsuit. Williams says he's being discriminated against because he's a Christian and that his First Amendment right of free speech is being denied.
   Williams says that for months Vidmar required him to submit lesson plans and handouts for her prior approval. She censored out all those with references to God and Christianity, he claims.

   Along with apparently being an exercise in stupidity, this is perfect fodder for the right-wing propaganda industry. Expect Limbaugh and all the little limbaughs to jump all over it. Expect OReilly and the rest of Fox News to have a field day with it. Expect the right-wing bloggers to chime in. They will all demagogue it as evil liberalism at work.
   Back in the real world, if Williams' allegations hold up in court, Vidmar's career as an educator should promptly be prohibited. Anyone who can't appreciate the difference between teaching history in which important historical figures mention God and teaching religion in a promotional way isn't fit to teach or to manage a school.
   Of course, the news story on this is woefully incomplete, with no information at all coming from Vidmar, from the Cupertino Unified School District or from the district's attorney. That's not because the reporter didn't try to get both sides of the story. It's because only one side, the one bringing suit, would comment. That's typical in our lawsuit-ridden society.
   This means that unless Vidmar, the district or its attorney speaks up, only Williams' side of the story will be out there, ricocheting through the right-wing noise machinery.

   Neal Boortz, whose Atlanta right-wing talk radio show is syndicated around the country, describes himself as, "The Talkmaster, Mighty Whitey and The High Priest of The Church of the Painful Truth." He's already cranked up the volume on this at his Web site.
   After presenting the facts from the one-sided story, without mentioning the one-sided nature of it, of course, Boortz offers these predictable observations:
   "Out there in Pelosi-land," Boortz says, of course without having checked with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to see what she actually thinks of the case. But hey, when you've got a microphone and your own set of dittoheads, why bother with facts? Your listeners want demagoguery, so give them what they want.
   The case as presented pits an apparently ill-treated teacher against an apparently dim-witted school principal. We don't know at this point if the crux of this is a personality conflict, idiotic overzealousness, an incredible misinterpretation of the Constitution's Establishment Clause, or some combination of those things. It's clear, though, that it's not about all school principals or all schools. But that doesn't stop Boortz from politicizing it and demagoging away.
   Ah so, based on half a story about a lawsuit that's only just been filed, not tried, much less proven, Boortz indicts all public schools everywhere — nay, all government — as utterly incompetent and not to be trusted.

   In another, better time in this country, this would be enough for most people to write Boortz off as a raving crackpot, an anti-American crackpot at that. But today, Boortz and similar know-it-alls-with-a-microphone enjoy large audiences of people who share their unwillingness to let truth get in the way of a few cheap shots at schools, government and all the people who serve in both.
   By contrast, one inadequately checked story and prize-winning newsman Dan Rather gets run out of his CBS anchor seat, written off as an irredeemably biased hack by Boortz and others like him. The truth is, Boortz and his ilk are no better than the school principal in question is alleged to be.


  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 3:10 PM

 
Happy Thanksgiving
   Relax and have a wonderful holiday. May the enjoyment of closeness with family and friends bring warmth to your heart. May good food and shared laughter satisfy you, body and soul. If you're traveling, may your journey be safe and not too tiring.
   We're taking this day and perhaps Friday off from posting. But since you're here, why not scroll down to see if there are items of interest that you may not have read before? As always, your comments are welcome.

  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 1:17 PM

 
Rendell should clear way for Philly broadband
   Philadelphia wants to provide low-cost broadband Internet to its citizens — a move telecom industry lobbyists are doing their best to kill (story).
   City officials see creating a municipal wi-fi system as a way to bridge the digital divide that leaves too many less-affluent, inner-city people out of access better-off suburban dwellers take for granted. The need to bridge this gap is especially important for schoolchildren, they say.
   Industry people claim it's unfair competition because the city can use tax revenues to fund the project, estimated to cost $10.5 million to set up and more than $1 million yearly to operate. Private-sector outfits have to secure and pay for their financial backing.
   That argument would be more persuasive if more telecom companies had actually gone after Philadelphians' business. In fact, they have not — just as they have not in many cities and towns across America, as well as many rural areas. The telecoms have shown a strong preference for cherry-picking locales, favoring those likely to yield high subscribership quickly among businesses, educational institutions and consumers.
   Furthermore, although they like to talk about the benefits of competition, as they did in testifying before Congress last year, the record of these outfits shows them to generally averse to competing. The result is higher prices and fewer choices for consumers, greater profits and easier sledding for the companies.
   In the Philadelphia case, lobbyists have gotten language outlawing municipal, for-a-fee services into a catchall bill that Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell has until the end of the month to sign or veto.
   Here's hoping Rendell torpedoes the bill. Let the telecoms earn their keep by actually competing for a change, rather than getting fat off the toil of their lobbyists, as they've done to too great an extent so far. Let the have-nots in Philadelphia, especially their kids, catch a rare break. Who knows, in time some of those kids may as grownups be among the well-heeled demographic segment the telecoms prize.


  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 11:30 PM

 
Woe be unto U.S. if foreign creditors get antsy
   "In furtherance of moral values, Congress now has to raise the debt limit by another $800 billion. We actually reached the debt ceiling in early October, but obviously the R's didn't want that vote coming up before the election. Then after they finish spending a staggering amount of money, the R's will return to make President Bush's tax cuts permanent.
   "Now, I realize that the Bushies consider it a point of pride to pay not one iota of attention to what the rest of the world thinks about us. But I would like to point out that the rest of the world is holding our paper. And foreign investors have demonstrated elsewhere that they are quite capable of taking alarm over unsound fiscal practices and pulling out completely, leaving bankrupt countries behind."


  — By S.W. Anderson
¶ 10:12 PM