John Kenneth Galbraith

One of my heros has passed on. Liberal economist John Kenneth Galbraith died at the ripe old age of 97. I had been hoping he would make it to 100.

John Kenneth Galbraith, the Harvard professor who won worldwide renown as a liberal economist, backstage politician and witty chronicler of affluent society, died Saturday night, his son said. He was 97.
Galbraith died of natural causes at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, where he was admitted nearly two weeks ago, Alan Galbraith said.
During a long career, the Canadian-born economist served as adviser to Democratic presidents from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Bill Clinton, and was John F. Kennedy's ambassador to India.

I just recently noted that Galbraith headed a list of prominent 90 year olds. He was also on my list of the 100 people who have most influenced me during my life.

The one time I got to see John Kenneth Galbraith in person was when I still considered myself to be a Republican. I was at Texas A&M and attended a special program that featured William F. Buckley Jr., the prominent conservative I knew from his PBS show "Firing Line". I attended the event wanting to see Buckley and had no idea who the fellow was he would be debating. As it turned out, his debate partner was Galbraith and they were arguing over the merits of having a strong federal government, with Galbraith naturally taking the pro-government side.
While I didn't immediately change my views after that event, I did walk away with a favorable impression of Galbraith and over time I gained more and more respect for him as my opinion of Buckley declined.
Galbraith was a prolific author and today I own about a dozen of his books. But then, that was about the only way to get his viewpoint. While Buckley had his own TV show, his own magazine and a nationally syndicated column, Galbraith's only outlet was through his books which I would pick up at Half-Price Bookstore every chance I got.
It's a shame that more people end up being exposed to that blowhard Buckley than they are to Galbraith. I think it explains in part why the electorate is so foolish as to put incompentent people like George W. Bush in the White House.

Looking for someone to blame

I’ve said before that Republicans would probably be happier once they are back in the minority. They need Democrats to be in power so that they will have someone to blame for all the countries problems.
Somehow blaming everything on outspoken Hollywood liberals like Michael Moore or Jane Fonda who have zero influence in Washington just doesn’t quite cut it. So now we have a concerted effort to shine the light of culpability on Mary McCarthy, a veteran CIA analyst who was just 10 days away from retirement when she was “fired” for undisclosed contacts with the media and for allegedly leaking classified materials — a charge that she denies.
Rightwingers have been making a big deal out of the fact that McCarthy gave $2,000 to the Kerry campaign during the last election cycle and they have insinuated darkly that she sought to use her insider status at the Agency to damage the White House and hurt Bush’s chances at re-election. But the CIA has said she was not believed to be the person who exposed the CIA’s rendition program and its secret prisons in Eastern Europe, and they are apparently not taking the case all that seriously. They are not charging her with any kind of crime, nor are they launching a specific investigation targeting her. They are not even trying to penalize her by taking away her pension, thus the firing 10 days before her retirment has practically no ill effect on her whatsoever other than causing some embarrassment and spreading her name all over the news.
Meanwhile, these same rightwingers while pointing out McCarthy’s political ties have conveniently ignored the fact that the person who chose to fire her is Bush’s hand-picked choice for CIA director Porter Goss, a right-wing Republican and former congressman from Florida.
The Washington Post the other day had an editorial criticizing Goss for his selectivity in going after McCarthy while doing nothing on many other more pressing matters.

“He has taken no disciplinary action against CIA personnel identified by his inspector general as having played a part in the failure to prevent the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. He has taken no action against CIA interrogators known to have participated in the torture and killing of foreign detainees, or against those who knowingly violated the Geneva Conventions in Iraq.”

So the Mary McCarthy firing seems little more than a PR ploy by Mr. Goss. But conservatives like my friend Bill Crawford are almost desperate to make it into something much more convoluted than that.

Haloscan update

My Haloscan problems persist, but at least it looks like someone has finally identified the problem. Now I am just wating to find out if there is a solution.
Last week after I paid to upgrade my Haloscan account my comment links beneath each post began randomly disappearing throughout the day. I’ve racked my brain trying to figure out how to correct it to no avail. I was on the verge of dumping Haloscan and going with Blogger comments when I finally received this response from the administrator at Haloscan in their Help Forum:

One of the 3 servers that handles the comment loads seems to not be working correctly for just your account for some reason. I'll look into this and get back to you.

Just on my account? Aren’t I lucky!
At least I know now that it is nothing that I did. Hopefully they will figure out how to correct it and I will just be patient for a few more days.

White fluffy stuff

I can’t believe they are hiring a guy named Snow to be the president’s new press secretary.

Definition of Snow:
Slang To overwhelm with insincere talk, especially with flattery.

I think it says everything you need to know about Fox News that President Bush taps one of their news anchors to be his spokesman. Fox is the closest thing we have to a state-run media in this country.

32 percent

Bush just keeps falling and falling.

Bush's approval ratings slide to new low

President Bush's approval ratings have sunk to a personal low, with only a third of Americans saying they approve of the way he is handling his job, a national poll released Monday said.
In the telephone poll of 1,012 adult Americans carried out Friday through Sunday by Opinion Research Corporation for CNN, 32 percent of respondents said they approve of Bush's performance, 60 percent said they disapprove...

That’s pretty bad. And there is not much that Bush can do to turn things around as historian Sean Wilentz notes in his recent piece for Rolling Stone.

George W. Bush's presidency appears headed for colossal historical disgrace. Barring a cataclysmic event on the order of the terrorist attacks of September 11th, after which the public might rally around the White House once again, there seems to be little the administration can do to avoid being ranked on the lowest tier of U.S. presidents. And that may be the best-case scenario. Many historians are now wondering whether Bush, in fact, will be remembered as the very worst president in all of American history.

Bush’s problem is that he was elevated way above his level of competence when the Supreme Court annointed him president in 2000. He was already a miserable failure as a businessman at that point, running several companies into the ground before being saved each time by wealthy Bush-family friends. But he had done OK as governor of Texas, a state with a weak governor system that invests most of the governing power with the lt. governor. And before that he was at his best as the figure-head owner (2 percent) of the Texas Rangers baseball team.
But Washington, D.C., has proved to be his undoing. I think he went to Washington with the best of intentions, truly believing his own speechwriters who told him he was a “uniter and not a divider.” But what he found was a political environment that was already bitterly divided over the Clinton impeachment fiasco and he decided to try to get along by following his gut instincts, which were never that good to begin with.

The best that Bush can hope for now is that the electoral system is already so skewed in favor of incumbents and the wealthy that it will prevent the kind of political sea change that shoved Democrats into the minority two-years into the Clinton presidency. Only by holding on to a slim Republican majority will Bush manage to keep the lid on the numerous festering scandals that have plagued his incompetent administration.

Star Trek on the rebound

I was glad to see this bit of news the other day. It looks like the Star Trek franchise will be back in 2008 with a new feature film helmed by the guy who is doing the latest Mission Impossible movie. It will reportedly feature an all new cast as it looks at the early days of Star Trek (but not as early as the now defunct “Enterprise” series) when the young James T. Kirk and Spock first meet.
I wonder if they will give William Shatner a cameo?

Haloscan problems

I've been having some problems with my comment links disappearing ever since I paid to upgrade my Haloscan service. The links seem to randomly disappear throughout the day and I haven't any clue as to what is going on. This has not been a problem at my other non-upgraded blog. The folks at Haloscan have been less than helpful throughout all of this: Not responding to my e-mails, ignoring my posts in their technical service forum, and then finally giving me a weak "it's not our fault" response on Friday.

So anyway, I'm seriously considering switching to a different comment service although I hate to lose access to all my old comment, but I may not have any other choice.

The Decider

"I hear the voices, and I read the front page, and I know the speculation. But I'm the decider, and I decide what is best." — President Bush

When I first heard that quote from Bush it brought to mind an image of the dog Napoleon from Disney's The Aristocats.

"Wait a minute. I'm the leader! I'm the one that says when we go. OK, let's go. Charge!"

Of course, in my head I change "leader" to "decider" and change "we go" to "Rumsfeld goes" and so forth.

A weak effort at parody, I know. That's what comes with living with a 2-year-old who watches almost nothing but Disney movies, I guess.

But other folks out there have done a far better job of lampooning this newest Bushism. Frequent commenter Ann pointed me to this reworking of a popular Dr. Suess tale.

Also, via Atrios, comes this wickedly funny version of the Beatles' "I Am The Walrus".

Interestingly, "decider" is actually a legitimate word according to my dictionary, but it is certainly obscure.

Adjusting to reality

“I changed my mind as part of a necessary adjustment to reality,” — Francis Fukuyama

Francis Fukuyama, the famous neocon intellectual, did a brave thing recently: He changed his mind about the Iraq war.
In an Op-ed piece that ran in a number of papers over the weekend, Fukuyama makes some excellent points that are sure to rankle folks on both the right and left ends of the political spectrum.
First he says that “no one should be required to apologize for having supported intervention in Iraq before the war.”
I don’t necessarily agree with that, but fine, whatever.
But then he goes on to make this salient point:

The debate over the war shouldn't have been whether it was morally right to topple Hussein (which it clearly was), but whether it was prudent to do so given the possible costs and potential consequences of intervention and whether it was legitimate for the U.S. to invade in the unilateral way that it did.

I’ve made that same point here many times. Just because I opposed launching a pre-emptive strike and a massive land invasion of Iraq does not mean that I supported keeping Hussein in power anymore than Bush’s decision not to invade North Korea three years ago means he supports keeping Kim Jong Il in power.

Fukuyama makes a lot of other good points and I would urge everyone to go and read the whole article, but the part that struck me the most was right at the end where he bemoans the intransigence of most political opinion today:

Political debate has become a spectator sport in which people root for their team and cheer when it scores points, without asking whether they chose the right side. Instead of trying to defend sharply polarized positions taken more than three years ago, it would be far better if people could actually take aboard new information and think about how their earlier commitments, honestly undertaken, actually jibe with reality — even if this does on occasion require changing your mind.

This is sad but true in many respects. I know I have been guilty in the past of cheering on my “team” when I have not adequately studied and researched the issues being debated. Sometimes we all need to adjust our opinions to better align ourselves with reality.

Falling Georgie

Here is an entertaining timewaster for all those Bush bashers out there.
Just refresh the page to watch him fall again and again and again...

Happy Easter

I hope everyone had a nice Easter weekend. We went to Houston and had my little girl christened at the same church where her brother was christened two years ago and where my wife and I were married 16 years ago. By the same minister, no less.
My sister and her family were unable to make it, unfortunately, but they sent a whole bunch of Easter goodies and christening gifts in the mail. My mom did make it so the kids had the full attention of both sets of grandparents.
My in-laws then treated everyone to a brunch at a nearby cafe and afterwards we went back to their house for an easter egg hunt. My little boy is 2.5 and his cousins are 3 and 1.5 respectively, so it’s a great age to watch them running around in the backyard excitedly looking for plastic eggs in the grass.
We always end up with tons of food whenever the family gets together like that and we came home with a cooler full of leftovers. Another big treat was the delicious Easter cookies that my sister-in-law made. Now if I can just convince her to make those cookies on other occasions as well.

Rumsfeld is doomed

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld just got the kiss of death from President Bush.

President Bush said Friday that embattled Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has his "full support and deepest appreciation."

We all know what that means... In a few days, Rummy will be explaining that he needs to spend more time with his family, etc. etc.

Old comments are back

I finally ponied up some moolah to upgrade my Haloscan account so now all the old comments are back. Hurray!
Up until now, Haloscan had been dumping comments into a black hole after three months. The only annoying thing is that the comment number under each archived blog post still shows zero. So you don’t know if or how many comments are on any post and just have to click to find out. I’m not sure if this can be fixed, but I will check on it.

Kinky polls

The San Antonio Business Journal has an online poll up showing Kinky Friedman winning the governor’s race in a landslide with 53 percent of the vote compared to 24 percent for Rick Perry, 14 percent for Carole Keeton Strayhorn and an anemic 5 percent for Democrat Chris Bell.

The poll is no doubt a bit skewed today by the fact that Kinky is touting the results on his web site. But he was still winning with a healthy 40 percent of the vote before legions of Kinksters began flooding the site and driving up his numbers. Kinky also won a similar poll conducted last month by the Austin Business Journal.

While polls in general and certainly online polls are not the most accurate barometers for what will actually happen in November, it still raises the possibility that Kinky could be a big factor in the election. I think there is a good chance that Perry will not be able to reach 50 percent of the vote in November and will be forced into a run-off and it looks increasingly likely that his runoff opponent could be Kinky Friedman.

What will this mean for Texas? I’m not sure. It’s not great news for Democrats if their candidate comes in third or fourth in the election. But I’ve never held out very high hopes for Chris Bell. While I will vote for him in the general election, I just don’t think a one-term congressman has the stature or the name recognition necessary to pull off a victory in a statewide race like this. I hope I’m wrong. But that’s why I was hoping that John Sharp would have jumped into the race and that’s why I voted for Bob Gammage in the primary.
And while I’m not a “Kinkster,” I have to say that if the race came down to a Perry vs. Friedman runoff I would find myself asking “Why the hell not?”

UPDATE & CORRECTION

In comments, someone much wiser than myself points out there are no runoffs in general elections. D'oh! That shoots my theory out of the water. I don't see anyway now that Kinky can win the governership. It looks like we'll be stuck with Rick Perry for another four years. Damn.
Wait! Maybe if Chris Bell drops out and the Democrats cross-endorse Kinky and, and... Oh! Nevermind.

Local blogger additions

We have a prominent new addition to the local blogging community. District 10 City Councilman Chip Haass has launched a blog called Conversations With Chip at his regular web site.
In a news release, Haass said he plans to use the blog to take a stand on various public issues and to provide “yet another tool to listen to families and business owners” in his district.
So far he has three posts up covering a proposed bond referendum, the Animal Care Services Department and the city’s effort to land a professional sports franchise. The site does have comments, so head on over and give it a looksee.

Another new blogger since the last time I did my San Antonio blogging update is my friend Mack Harrison who runs Valley In Exile. Mack and I used to work together at the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal many moons ago. He was until just recently the opinion page editor for the McAllen Monitor, but he is currently attending law school at St. Mary’s University here in the Alamo City. Mack’s blog is very much focused on happenings in the Rio Grande Valley so if you want to keep up with what’s going on to our south be sure and check it out.

Bush's Heartland values

Here at what may be the low point of the Bush presidency, it seems an odd time to begin touting a project to restore the old Bush family home in Midland.

There is no denying that people in West Texas are diehard Bush backers. I’m sure a lot of the 38 percent of the U.S. population that still thinks W. is doing a bang-up job in Washington resides thereabouts. But it seems they are in a bit of a quandry about how to promote the Bush family house:

Promoters of the house as a historic landmark acknowledge that defining its particular story line has not been easy. Although the house itself suggests modest beginnings, the young couple that occupied it belonged to one of the most powerful families in contemporary American history, combining the wealth and power of Wall Street with a record of high public office.

George H.W. Bush's father, Prescott Bush, had been a U.S. senator from Connecticut, for instance, and the family tree included an original partner of financier J.P. Morgan. In some ways, the family compound on the ocean at Kennebunkport, Maine, may be a more authentic symbol of who the Bushes are.

"We've understood throughout the project that we cannot portray them as coming from a lifting-yourselves-by-the-bootstraps background with no resources," said Bill Scott, a Midland real estate broker and one of the organizers of the Bush home project. "We do not want to portray them as coming from humble backgrounds."

Instead, in addition to honoring the family that — perhaps more than even oil and high school football — put Midland on the map, developers suggest that this is where the Bush family may have learned Heartland values.

Of course, those Heartland values. That’s why the Bush clan moved out to dusty West Texas, not so much to make their fortune, which they already had, but to ground themselves in the American Heartland values that would give them the political spit-shine that they needed to make themselves more politically viable and to distance themselves from their real New England patrician roots.

There is no doubt that it worked. Much of George W.’s political success can be attributed to his image as a West Texas good ol’ boy. Nevermind that he went to private schools in Andover and then on to Yale and Harvard, when people think of Bush they think of him in boots and jeans and wearing a cowboy hat.

The Bush’s have ridden that wave a long way and today you will find no place where Bush loyalty runs stronger than in solid Red-State West Texas.


So then, how does Bush repay these fine people for giving his political career the gloss of midwestern authenticity that it required? Why, by giving them the back of his hand, of course. I still can’t get over the fact that Bush would put his presidential library anywhere but in West Texas. What an ingrate! Texas Tech University in Lubbock had by far the best bid of any place seeking to host the library. It would have been the ideal place for the Bush library, in the town where Bush Sr. would often turn for poll results favorable to his presidency and where Bush Jr. launched his political career with a run for Congress.
But now after all the excitement and anticipation they are left heartbroken and disappointed.

Immigration question

Via Eschaton, I see that The Rude Pundit has an intresting question about the path to U.S. citizenship taken by Bush’s Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez.
It appears that Gutierrez and his family were illegal immigrants when they came to the U.S. in the early 1960s and then benefited from an amnesty program in 1966 that granted them citizenship.
I would think something like that would be of particular interest in light of the recent debate over immigration reform.

Defending Democrats

As a rule, I don't feel compelled to jump up and defend every statement made by every Democrat or outspoken liberal on the planet.

Whether the verbal perpetrator is Al Sharpton or Michael Moore or Cindy Sheehan, I'm more likely to shrug and say 'so what' when someone complains about something they said that has stirred up criticism from the right. It's not like these people are in any kind of elected or elevated position within the Democratic Party.

Even when it is an elected Democrat, like Rep. Cynthia McKinney, I would still point out that she has little to no influence within the party.

Now if the offending bit of verbage sprang from the mouth of Howard Dean, John Kerry, Al Gore, Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi, then there is more of a necessity to offer a defense, or at least a clarification that one does not always agree with everything the party bosses have to say.

But on the whole, those of us among the 62 percent of Americans who think Bush is doing a lousy job as president don't always agree on the fine points and the details.

Kerry's little 10-point plan

John Kerry has been on the attack recently starting with this op-ed piece in the NY Times and now today a report of sharply criticizing the Bush administration at a political conference in New York.

"The Bush administration is wondering when Iraq will have a functioning government. I want to know when we're going to have a functioning government," Mr. Kerry said.

The Times article says at one point Kerry offered a "little 10-point plan" for Democrats in response to criticisms that they don't have an agenda for the nation. I thought the list, while obviously needing more details on most points, does a good job of summarizing the key differences and areas of dispute between Democrats and Republicans today.
Here is the plan:

1. Tell the truth.
2. Fire the incompetents.
3. Find Osama bin Laden and secure our ports and our homeland.
4. Bring our troops home from Iraq.
5. Obey the law and protect our civil rights.
6. Support health care
7. Support education
8. Support lobbying reform
9. Support alternatives to oil
10. Reduce the deficit.

A fickle fan

I should have learned long ago to base my sports allegiances on the teams and the cities rather than on the individual players. That way I wouldn’t get soured on a sport each year when I learn that half the players I liked are no longer on my favorite team. Some people are diehard fans of a team every year regardless of who is on the team - Cubs fans and Red Sox fans tend to be like that. But I would always get too attached to individual players such that when they left, so did my loyalty for the team.

I suppose I’ve always rooted for the Texas teams because it was my home state, but calling them my favorites would be a stretch. Growing up on military bases and moving around the country in the 1970s made it hard to form an attachment with struggling teams like the Houston Astros, the Texas Rangers and the Houston Oilers. For one thing, I rarely got to see them play since we lived so far away, and secondly they had no standout players back then and never were in contention for a pennant or a Super Bowl.
The Dallas Cowboys were the exception. Roger Staubach was my hero and the fact that he played for a Texas team made it easy to call them my favorites.
But baseball was another story. My favorite team from my youth was the Cincinnatti Reds because I loved Johnny Bench and Pete Rose. At the time, my father was stationed at Grissom AFB in Indiana and I could often see games featuring the Reds on TV. But I never had any connection to Cincinnatti, so when the Big Red Machine was dismantled in the latter part of the ‘70s I lost interest in the team.

I didn’t really have a “favorite” team again until 1998 when Chuck Knoblauch was traded to the New York Yankees. I had a personal connection with Knoblauch in that we both attended Texas A&M at the same time where I got to see him play and he had been one of my wife’s high school classmates at Bellaire High School in Houston. During Knoblauch’s first year in the majors in 1991 he helped the Minnesota Twins win the World Series and was voted Rookie of the Year. When he went to the Yankees, something seemed to click with the team and they went on to win three World Series championships in a row in dominating fashion.
So for a while I was a big time Yankees fan. Even after Knoblauch had his throwing problems (and ended up being benched and then traded to Kansas City where he ended his career in obsurity,) I continued to root for the Yankees because I had become attached to the other players on the team - Paul O’Neil, Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada, Tino Martinez, Scott Brosius, Bernie Williams, Andy Pettitte, Orlando Hernandez, and so on.

But once again I am torn. The Yankees are still a good team with a lot of great players (but not the chemistry they had in ‘98-’00), but the only people left from the time I was a big fan are Jeter, Posada and Bernie Williams (on the verge of retirement). Even the coaching staff has changed with the exception of Joe Torre.
So do I continue rooting for the Yankees, or find someone else? (I had considered becoming a Texas Rangers fan a while back, but then they turned around the next year and traded Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, Rafael Palmeiro, etc. and I said the heck with it.)
Last year I decided to root for the Astros in earnest. I thought it was pretty neat when they picked up Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens from the Yankees so I decided to follow them for a while. Until San Antonio gets a team, the Astros are the closest thing to a home team for me now so I will keep rooting for them. But they haven’t risen to the level where they would replace the Big Red Machine or the ‘98-’00 Yankees in my estimation.

A&M gets Hammered

I knew there was a reason why I never liked Tom DeLay from the first time I heard of him.

Wikipedia has this interesting tidbit from DeLay’s past:

“...he had previously been expelled from Baylor University for drinking and vandalism (he was caught painting a building at Texas A&M green and gold, Baylor's colors).”

I wonder which building he was defacing? It’s a wonder he didn’t get strung up by the students after he was caught.

Just to put this in perspective, DeLay got a deferrment from the draft so that he could attend Med school at Baylor where he drank, partied and ultimately got kicked out. While there, he decided to vandalize the school (A&M) that was training many of the military officers who would fight in the war he was avoiding.

Years later, DeLay was apparently still resentful of the school that caught him vandalizing its property as well as the school that kicked him out over that incident. Speaking to a group attending a conference at First Baptist Church in Pearland, DeLay advised them not to send their kids to Baylor or A&M. Why? Because in DeLay’s opinion they aren’t good Christian schools since they don’t teach creationism.

The Virginian

Speaking of rats and sinking ships...
All good liberals are doing the Snoopy dance today to celebrate another great victory for the forces of light and goodness.

Rep. Tom DeLay, the former House Republican leader so powerful he was nicknamed "The Hammer," said Tuesday he will resign from Congress and drop out of his re-election race to protect his congressional seat from a Democratic victory.

In a videotaped announcement, DeLay credits liberal Democrats with his decision to turn tail and scurry away.

"I refuse to allow liberal Democrats an opportunity to steal this seat with a negative personal campaign," DeLay said.

While I would love to take full credit for this, this is just another dodge by the master of political manipulation. If you watched the video, you may have noticed DeLay’s lips moving which is usually a good indication that he is lying.
The truth of the matter is that with his second close aide now being fitted for an orange jumpsuit, DeLay will be needing to focus all of his attention on keeping his butt out of jail.

Meanwhile, it looks like DeLay is not only vacating his Congressional seat, he is abandoning the great state of Texas and changing his permanent residency to Virginia. This is apparently a manuever to allow Republicans to pick a replacement for his spot on the Nov. general election ballot.

(DeLay) said he will change his legal residence to his condominium in Alexandria, Va., from his modest two-story home on a golf course here in the 22nd District of Texas. "I become ineligible to run for election if I'm not a resident of the state of Texas," he said, turning election law to his purposes for perhaps on last time. State Republican officials will then be able to name another Republican candidate to face Democrat Nick Lampson, a former House members who lost his seat in a redistricting engineered by DeLay.

It’s just as well. As the Dixie Chicks might say, I was always embarrassed that Tom DeLay was from Texas. Good riddance.

Doing what he does best

President Bush was out today doing something that I fully support. He was throwing out the first pitch of the new baseball season.
As a former part-owner of a Major League Baseball franchise, I think Bush is imminently suited to this task and therefore I’d like to suggest that he make throwing out first pitches the priority of his administration for the rest of his term. He should plan on throwing out the first pitch at every game throughout the entire season. This will keep him fairly busy, so he will need to pass on those other bothersome tasks of governing to someone else. Deadeye Dick Cheney is clearly not mentally or emotionally stable enough for such a task, so I say let Condi have a go at it. Lord knows she couldn’t do a worse job and it will also give her the practice she needs so she can be ready to run against Hillary in 2008.
This shift of priorities would also help improve Bush’s dismal poll ratings which might even hit the 50 percent mark again before he leaves office.
Take my advice, Mr. President! Let’s Play Ball!!!

Broken contracts

My conservative friend Bill Crawford now has a regular gig writing a weekly column for National Review Online that purports to show all the good things happening in Iraq that the “mainstream media” has allegedly failed to report on.
I think that is wonderful for Bill and I offer him my hearty congratulations.

But what I don’t understand is why Bill and all the other ardent war supporters aren’t pulling their hair out over stories like this one.

BAGHDAD -- A reconstruction contract for the building of 142 primary health centers across Iraq is running out of money, after two years and roughly $200 million, with no more than 20 clinics now expected to be completed, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says.

Is that the best we can do!?! Two years and $200 million and they can only complete 20 out of 142 health clinics as promised?
And apparently the Bush administration is fine with it. We are going to pay the contractor, Parsons Inc., the full amount and not hold them accountable for the unfinished work. Furthermore, we apparently have no plans to expend any more funds to have the work completed. Officials in Iraq are just hoping some foreign donors will step in and help fill the gaps.

I said a while back that Bush does not deserve the credit he has been given for rebuilding Iraq because it is clear that he never intended to commit the kind of financial resources necessary to do the job. Bush and Co. were half expecting the Iraq invasion to go something like the invasion of Grenada, a painless exercize meant only to boost Republican electoral prospects for the upcoming mid-term elections. What they got was an extended Vietnam-like quagmire that has engulfed all of our military resources and threatens to drag on for countless years to come.

Kevin Drum at Political Animal calls the war supporters’ bluff today, demanding to know specifically what they are willing to do to “win” this war.

So: what's the plan, hawks? "Whatever it takes" is just cheap talk. Are you suggesting higher taxes to fund a dramatic increase in military end strength? A draft? A ground invasion of Iran? A permanent military occupation of the entire Middle East?

Because that's probably what it would take. Right now, nearly a thousand Iraqis are dying every month, the per capita equivalent of about 100,000 deaths per year if this were taking place in the United States. And keep in mind that this is the result of a mere low level civil war, not the real thing. What happens when full scale civil war breaks out and the U.S. military is stuck in the middle?

What's the plan then?

No, Kevin, of course they would never raise taxes. Republicans don’t raise taxes, they just raise the debt limit.

Anti-immigration nonsense

I can't believe they said this.

'Let the prisoners pick the fruits'

I'm so glad these Republican yahoos are holding press conferences to spout their ignorance. The public really needs to see what kind of people we have running the House today.

UPDATE
Here is my conservative friend Mark Harden’s response from comments:

"Let the illegal aliens pick up the trash along the highways" instead of community service prisoners, then.

One thing about those protest marches. Wait, two things. First, they were about as "spontaneous" as an Imam-inspired crowd of Muslims storming out of the mosque after Friday prayers to scream "Death to the Jews!". Particularly high school students cutting class to be involved. How amazing they would do that! Second, some claim it's not possible to deport 11 million illegals - maybe we can start by rounding them up 400,000 at a time at these marches. Third, the comparison to civil rights marchers is logically flawed. Blacks marched in the 60s for civil rights that were due to them, which they were not receiving. These people are illegally here...they currently have no civil rights that are being unfairly denied them. So, you can say they are marching to convince legislators to provide them these rights, but they are not marching in the same sense as the civil rights marchers. [Preemptive response: maintain proper distinction between civil rights and human rights. Yes, we should be kind to these illegals...as we deport them.]

OK, so that was three things. So arrest me. Besides, laws aren't meant to be enforced if enough people ignore them.

First, they probably would pick up the trash along the highways if we would pay them a fair wage. Second, the idea of using prisoners to pick fruit would be an unprecedented use of forced labor to benefit a private enterprise - unprecedented at least since the time of slavery and indentured servitude. That is unless Dana Rohrabaher and his supporters are really communists and are calling for nationalization of our agricultural industry.

Now as to the marchers, no, of course they were not spontaneous. These people don’t pay that close of attention (or any at all) to what is going on in Washington. They had to be riled up - in this case by Spanish-language radio stations. But once aroused, the crowds are responding angrily to what they perceive as an attack on their heritage and their worth as human beings. This business of carrying the Mexican flag, which has gotten many on the right riled up, is no different than those good ol’ boys down south running around waving the Rebel flag from the back of their pickup trucks. It’s a symbol of defiance and cultural pride mixed into one, not an attack on the U.S.

Finally, I think there is a valid comparison between these protests and the ones for Civil Rights for blacks. In each case, you have a large segment of our society that is or was used for cheap labor, that has subsequently been left disenfranchised. In one case, the cheap laborers were forcibly brought to this country, in the other case they came on their own. Either way, they are here to stay whether we like it or not.

Still alive and kicking

I had heard about this website before but just today decided to check it out.
It seems kind of morbid, but it is really quite facinating. Just check out the list of people still living who are 85 and above. You will be surprised to learn that some people on the list are still alive, and shocked to learn that other people are that old.

Here is a sample:

John Kenneth Galbraith (97) The New Deal economist and prolific author of popular books on economics. I own a large collection of his works and got to see him in person when I was in college when he was touring around the country doing one-on-one debates with William F. Buckley.
Michael DeBakey (97) The famous heart-transplant surgeon from Houston.
Dolores Hope (96) The widow of Bob Hope who died a few years ago at age 100.
Karl Malden (94) The actor who was Michael Douglas’ older partner on the hit ‘70s cop show Streets of San Francisco.
Studs Terkel (93) Another prolific author and interviewer whose many works have found a place in my library.
Milton Friedman (93) Nobel Prize winning economist and proponent of right-wing free-market theories. Is in a contest with Galbraith to see who can outlive the other.
Lady Bird Johnson (93) Beloved former first lady and widow of LBJ.
Former President Gerald Ford (92) He made news recently when he went to the hospital with a touch of pneumonia, but he apparently pulled through and is back out on the golf course.
Harry Morgan (90) The actor who portrayed Col. Potter on the M*A*S*H TV series.
Sargent Shriver (90) Democratic vice presidential candidate who married a Kennedy and became father-in-law to Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Augusto Pinochet (90) Facist dictator of Chile.
Eli Wallach (90) Actor who played Tuco (the Ugly) in The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

The list of Octogenarians is equally interesting, but I am out of time for now.

Fun with photography

Sometimes it amazes me what people can do with the Internet.
Case in point:

Yesterday somebody noticed this picture on the web site of a Republican running for Congress in California. The guy claimed it was a picture of downtown Baghdad and went on to say that it demonstrates that media reports of chaos and turmoil there are overblown and just flat wrong.

But then some people on the web started looking more closely at the photo. They noticed a conspicuous absense of Arabic on any of the visible signs in the photo. They note that the girl in the picture is not wearing a head scarf and even more scandalously is wearing a strapless dress!
Soon there were allegations going around the web that the photo was not of Baghdad. But where is it and how could you ever prove it?

Well, amazingly, earlier today someone over at Daily Kos tracked down a photo of the same street scene from a slightly different angle making clear that the scene is not that of wartorn Baghdad, but a peaceful suburb in Istanbul, Turkey.

As Atrios was quick to note: it’s Istanbul Not Baghdadinople

Needless to say, the lying Republican (is that redundant?) was forced to pull the picture off of his web site.

Facing the music

I’ve picked up a lot of new music recently including the new albums by the Rolling Stones (A Bigger Bang), Paul McCartney (Chaos and Creation), and Bruce Springsteen (Devil in Dust). I also finally picked up the latest U2 album that won all of the Grammy Awards.
But even with all this new music, I find myself turning everyday to listen to a long-gone band from the early ‘70s that I discovered recently when perusing the record section at my local public library.

I found a four-disc compilation of The Faces, a short-lived British band that featured frontman Rod Stewart and lead guitarist Ron Wood, and I’ve been completely blown away. The music is fun, catchy and rocks harder than I expected when I first picked it up.
I already had a copy of Rod Stewart’s “Every Picture Tells A Story” which was recorded about the same time with many of the same band members, so this collection is like finding a treasure trove of material in that same vein.

The Faces could be described as the second-best bluesy early 70s English rock act - after the Rolling Stones, of course. It’s given me renewed respect for Rod Stewart and especially for Ron Wood, who I had previously only known as the latter-day replacement with the Rolling Stones.

It’s a shame they didn’t stick together longer, but sometimes the creative spark only lasts a short time and then everyone has to go their separate ways to find new inspiration.

White House in turmoil

President Bush is shaking up his staff as expected and the first to go is Chief of Staff Andy Card.

Here, from the NYTimes, is a quick summary of recent developments in the Bush White House under Card’s watch:

...his stewardship of the Bush team had come under question in recent months after a series of mishaps, including the failed Supreme Court nomination of Harriet Miers, the slow public disclosure of Vice President Cheney’s shooting accident and the unexpected Republican revolt over a plan to turn management at a half dozen ports to an Arab-owned company.

And that doesn’t even mention the things that have really made Bush unpopular this year such as the neverending quagmire in Iraq or their bungled response to Hurricane Katrina.

Bush has tapped budget director Josh Bolten to step in and take Card’s place. Think Progress notes that during his time as budget director, Bolten watched the federal deficit grow by $1.8 trillion.
“In the Bush administration, this is grounds for a promotion,” they conclude.

All Americans are created equal...

Are the rights outlined in our Constitution only for Americans? That is apparently what Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia believes.
Certainly, there are some rights and obligations that go along with citizenship, such as the right to vote and the obligation to pay taxes. But that is not what is at issue with the detainees at Guantanamo. Here we are talking about more basic rights, such as the right to a fair trial and adequate legal representation; the right not to be held indefinitely without charges; and so forth.
It would seem to me that when our forefathers were drafting the Constitution they had in mind certain inalieanable rights of mankind - all of whom were created equal, you might recall - and that these rights were not something Americans were just going to bestow upon themselves, but rather it was a philosphy of how one should view fellow men throughout the world.

This idea that the prisoners at Guantanamo have no rights because they are not Americans is to me a betrayal of the values that we as Americans take such pride in. For a comparable analogy, imagine a Christian who believes that the only people they have to show Christian love to are other Christians. Non-Christians they can treat like garbage and it is OK.

The way we have treated the prisoners at Guantanamo is a disgrace and a betrayal of our core American values. We are a less worthy nation in the eyes of the world today because of Gitmo and Abu Gharib.

I just hope the other members of our Supreme Court see things differently than Scalia.

Defending Jimmy Carter

In the comments to a previous post, Mark Harden raises the specter of Jimmy Carter as the low point in presidential office holders of the modern era. He even goes on to accuse the former president of treason for his post-presidential peacekeeping activities.

Jimmy Carter’s record of unmitigated failure as president is completely unassailable. Even I could do no worse. His post-presidential treasonous acts make Carter even more reprehensible, by the way.

Where did that come from, I wondered. How could a guy who has done so much to advance the cause of human rights and alleviate human suffering become so despised?
Even winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 seems to have just stoked the flames of resentment against this elder statesman.

...the sanctimonious, grasping Carter (who had shamelessly campaigned for the prize for years) accepted the prize under those stated conditions...in effect, spitting on his own country.

Mark goes on to say that Carter’s basic human decency is a “myth” and accuses him of being “a disgusting apologist and enabler for any dictator who opposes the United States.”

Then my friend Libertas weighs in with his own denunciation of Carter (and every other president dating back to LBJ).

Jimmy Carter sold himself as a peanut farmer while actually a nuclear physicist. He was a hypocritical snob, sadistically hard on the help and totally incompetent at domestic and foreign policy, all Arafat, Sadat and Zion improv theatre not withstanding. At least Sadat not withstanding. But Ayatollah Khomeini on the rise. As for his treason, it is mostly against other nations whose rigged elections he habitually certifies with his cosmetic auspices. But the canal he “returned” to the Panamanians was ”leased” to the Chinese under Slick Willie.

To help me understand where all this animosity is coming from, Mark pointed me first to a new book just out that calls Carter Our Worst Ex-President. And then to an article in National Review that levels a vicious and rather offensive tirade against Carter.
I went ahead and read the anti-Carter screed by National Review managing editor Jay Nordlinger in an effort to try and understand what’s going on here, but I just came away disgusted by the piece. Nordlinger’s prose is like a stinking pile of dung deposited on the pages of National Review. The fact that they would publish this crap and continue to employ such a person says a lot about the integrity (or lack thereof) of that publication.

Here is how Nordlinger begins his screed:

I’ve got Carter on my mind, so look out. Why Carter? Didn’t he leave office in 1981 (the same day the mullahs decided to spring the hostages, lest RR send a few up their gazoo)? Yes, but he’s back in the news, yapping absurdly about the Middle East and getting ready to visit Castro down in Cuba (May 12 to May 17).

Lest RR send a few up their gazoo?? I assume he is talking about missiles, but as everyone knows now Reagan did send the mullahs a bunch of missiles. Only they weren’t directed at anyone’s gazoo. They were instead neatly gift-wrapped and delivered along with an autographed Bible and a chocolate cake.

Nordlinger goes on to assail Carter’s post-presidency foreign policy adventures for not always adhering to the party line of whichever administration was then in power:

You recall how Carter irked Clinton on Haiti and North Korea. His low moment, however, came during the run-up to the Gulf War, when he wrote members of the U.N. Security Council — including Mitterrand’s France and Communist China — urging them to thwart the Bush administration’s effort. Our government found out about it when the Canadian prime minister, Brian Mulroney, called the defense secretary, Dick Cheney, and said, “What the . . .?” Some people actually allowed themselves to utter the word “treason.”

In this New Yorker essay Hedrick Hertzberg addresses
the Haiti situation that did indeed irk many folks at the time. However, he notes that the end result were good.

The bottom line was: There was no bloodshed. The elected, legitimate president of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was restored, the killings and human rights violations were stopped, Cedras and his pals ended up leaving the country, and Haiti now has a better chance than anyone thought possible to become a relatively normal country instead of a nightmare of death and cruelty.

Hertzberg goes on to challenge the slam against Carter that he coddles dictators:

...these gestures spoke not to any admiration for tyrants but to a Christian eagerness to redeem sinners... In practice, Carter has always showed himself as ready to anger authoritarians as to flatter them, in pursuit of peace and human rights....

But back to Nordlinger, I doubt seriously that Carter used the term “thwart the Bush administration” in his letter to the Security Council, although I don’t doubt it did not square with the message being put out at the time by the Bush administration. Looking back now, however, I think most people would agree that it would have been best had Bush and Co. been thwarted. Not that I would like to have seen Saddam Hussein remain in power, but the costs in blood and treasure to our nation have far exceeded any meager threat the Iraqi regime posed even if they did have a musty stockpile of chemical or biological agents buried somewhere.

Nordlinger goes on to dismiss Carter’s crowning achievements at Camp David in one paragraph without referencing any supporting material other than one unidentified academic’s offhanded remark on the Charlie Rose show.
Then he goes on for several paragraphs assailing Carter for being overly proud of his achievements and for being unseemly in his pursuit of praise. His evidence for this? Carter allegedly “teared up badly” during the 1984 Democratic National Convention when keynote speaker Mario Cuomo praised his work at Camp David. And then there was an appearance on C-SPAN once where he sat silently as a caller praised his work. But according to Nordlinger, something much more unseemly was going on:

Carter enjoyed it in a truly unseemly fashion, grinning and grinning, seeming to draw his very life from it. It was perfectly human — perfectly natural — but obscene in a way. I felt almost as though I had to look away: like I was seeing something too private, something I wasn’t meant to see.

What the hell?!? Where did Nordlinger come up with that? It sounds like he has an unhealthy obsession about Carter and tends to fantasize about what he might be thinking at odd moments. It’s really strange.

But finally we get to the heart of the piece and I at long last discover what it is about Carter that is bugging not just Nordlinger, but my friend Mark Harden as well. You see, according to Nordlinger, Carter is “passionately anti-Israel.” The evidence for this? Well, the Carter Center gets a lot of funding from Arabs, for one thing, and Carter is known to be friendly with many Arab leaders. Nevermind the fact that George W. Bush and family also have recieved considerable financial backing from Arab leaders and have maintained a long and close friendship with many of the most influential people in the Middle East. For some reason, Bush is not accused of being anti-Israel.
So what else did Carter do to attract this particular smear?

In the 1990s, Carter became quite close to Yasser Arafat.

Ah, that explains everything. You see, in the view of most right-wingers, Arafat was the epitome of all that is evil and the Palestinian people aren’t much better. Meanwhile, Israel is all light and goodness and can do no wrong. So if you are trying to negotiate a peace settlement between these two groups, you have to take Israel’s side 100 percent of the time or you are in league with the terrorists. The fact that you may support Israel, but disagree with policies put forward by the right-wing Likud government is a distinction that some people refuse to make.

So the rest of the article just veers back and forth on these themes, taking cheap shots and making the same arguments over and over again. Very tiresome.

For me, Carter is a great man and a great ex-president. He may not have had the best four-year run while in office, but as Mark Schmitt notes he might have done better in another time when his moral leadership would have made a positive difference.

Another press conference

Bush had another press conference today? Good grief! It’s either feast or famine with this guy. Has this become a new addition to his permanent everyday schedule?

7 a.m. Get up and go for morning jog;
7:30 a.m. Eat breakfast;
8:30 a.m. Briefing from Condi and Rove;
9 a.m. Hold press conference to defend decision on Iraq;
10 a.m. Nap time...

Speaking of Iraq, here is an excellent timeline compiled by the folks at Think Progress.
Also, the WaPo has a couple of good stories today worth checking out

Freedom, Yes, Iraqis Say, But at Great, Grave Cost

BAGHDAD, March 20 -- By almost any standard, Bashar Muhammed, the owner of a thriving Internet cafe, is a Baghdad success story. Three years after the United States invaded Iraq and overthrew Saddam Hussein, the Internet business here is booming, and Muhammed has what most Iraqis could only dream of under Hussein -- freedom, a cutting-edge job, lots of customers.
But when conversation turns to his life and prospects, he sighs and voices frustration that Americans just don't get it.
"It is true that we got freedom after the war, but uncontrolled freedom -- chaos and violence," he said in a cool, deliberate tone. Five of his relatives have been killed in car bombings and assassinations, Muhammed said, noting that most recently an uncle was killed for being a Sunni Arab.
"The new generation is growing on violence and sectarian ethics, and this will affect Iraq for many years to come," he said. "We are living a more devastating war every day."

Old Forecasts Come Back to Haunt Bush

Three years of upbeat White House assessments about Iraq that turned out to be premature, incomplete or plain wrong are complicating President Bush's efforts to restore public faith in the military operation and his presidency, according to pollsters and Republican lawmakers and strategists.

Bush vs. Reagan

I never thought I’d see the day when liberals would be vigorously defending Ronald Reagan, but that is just what we have now in the ongoing discussions of whether George W. Bush is the Worst. President. Ever.

I have to agree with Schmitt and Marshall, Reagan was a far better president than Bush. GW will one day take his place in the pantheon of really bad presidents such as Grant, Buchanan, Harding, Coolidge, (Andrew) Johnson, Pierce and so on. While some would argue that he has still not sunk to the level of Buchanan or Grant, I think there is no question that he is the worst president of the 20th and 21st Centuries.

$9 trillion debt limit

This will be President Bush’s legacy:

Congress raised the limit on the federal government's borrowing by $781 billion yesterday, and then lawmakers voted to spend well over $100 billion on the war in Iraq, hurricane relief, education, health care, transportation and heating assistance for the poor without making offsetting budget cuts.

Or raising taxes, which would be the fiscally responsible thing to do... Instead, we just keep piling up the debt onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. But Republicans today don’t believe in raising taxes, so they just raise the debt ceiling instead.

It was the fourth debt-ceiling increase in the past five years, after boosts of $450 billion in 2002, a record $984 billion in 2003 and $800 billion in 2004. The statutory debt limit has now risen by more than $3 trillion since Bush took office.

If these are all things that we need to pay for, then we should take responsibility and pay for them. Raise taxes and pay the bills! Quit just running up huge debts on the false hope that it will all just go away.

Gov. Perry calls Bush a Liar

While touring the Texas Panhandle areas damaged by the recent grassfires, Gov. Rick Perry told reporters that he has asked President Bush for federal aid.
He then added the following:

He said the federal government made "very substantial promises" about reimbursements for help the state provided after Hurricane Katrina but "has not lived up to its word." That concerns him as Texas needs help with wildfires, he said.

So the "federal government" has not lived up to its word, which is a nice way of saying that they lied. But who is the "federal government" in this case who is not good to their word? Who made these "very substantial promises"? President Bush, perhaps?

This isn't the first time that Perry has complained about broken promises from Washington:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican who holds George W. Bush's former job, told Congress Tuesday the federal government has turned its back on the Lone Star State. He demanded an additional $2 billion to repair damage and other hurricane-related costs in Texas.
Perry criticized the federal response to the devastating storms, saying states slammed by Katrina are getting more generous help than his state, which bore the brunt of Hurricane Rita.
"Financial aid has been a fraction of what was promised," Perry told the Senate Appropriations Committee. Funding for housing, education and community development has been shortchanged, he said.

I'm afraid that if Perry gets any shriller about the Bush administration breaking promises that we will see Karl Rove coming out and reminding everyone that Perry used to be a Democrat.

Outrageous story of the week

This story in the New York Times just makes you want to pull your hair out by the roots. How do you like paying extra fees on your utility bills disguised as taxes that the government never collects? Since the link will only be good for a short time, I’m posting the whole story here so please excuse the length.

Many Utilities Collect for Taxes They Never Pay
By DAVID CAY JOHNSTON

Many electric utility companies across the nation are collecting billions of dollars from their customers for corporate income taxes, then keeping the money rather than sending it to the government.
The practice is legal in most states. The companies say it is smart business.
But some representatives of utility customers say that the practice, which involves using losses from other subsidiaries to reduce taxes owed, is not fair. They say that money that utilities are required to collect for federal and state taxes — typically a nickel on each dollar paid for electricity — should go for just that, or not be included in electric bills.
Otherwise, they argue, these legal monopolies make more than they are authorized to, and other taxpayers have to make up the difference in higher taxes or reduced services.
An examination of regulatory filings by The New York Times shows that companies with electric utilities in at least 26 states have pocketed money intended for income taxes, and that utilities can legally do so in 21 more states.
Because they are legal monopolies, utilities must charge rates set by state regulators. These cover all costs — from buying fuel, to building new power plants, to a virtually guaranteed profit and paying the taxes on that profit.
Normally, customer payments for those taxes eventually find their way to federal and state governments. That is usually the case for independent utilities like Consolidated Edison, which serves the New York area, and American Electric Power, which operates in 11 states from Kentucky to Oklahoma.
But in recent years many utilities have expanded into unregulated businesses, like energy trading and aircraft leasing, while others have been acquired by companies that own other businesses. When those other businesses lose money or create artificial losses through tax planning, those losses can be used to offset income earned by the utilities.
As a result, the parent companies owe less in taxes than their electric customers paid. Sometimes these companies owe nothing, or receive large tax refunds. By not remitting the taxes, the parent companies effectively have more money to invest in their operations or pay to shareholders in dividends.
The ability to intercept tax payments is not limited to electric utilities. Natural gas, water and telephone utilities can use the same techniques. The potential tax benefits are much smaller for gas and water utilities, however. And most telephone companies are no longer regulated as monopolies and their rates no longer include income taxes. (The taxes and fees that phone companies add to monthly bills are not corporate income taxes.)
Among the electric utilities whose customer tax payments are not reaching tax coffers is Pepco, serving four states and the District of Columbia. Pepco collected nearly $546 million from customers to cover its income tax bill for the years 2002 through 2004. Yet the parent Pepco Holdings did not pay income taxes during those years; indeed, it received $435 million in tax refunds.
Pepco says the beneficiaries of those refunds were not the company's shareholders, but utility customers. A vice president, Anthony J. Kamerick, said that without the ability to use taxes embedded in monthly electric bills to help finance its unregulated investments, including new power plants, electric customers would pay higher rates.
Customers paid Xcel Energy, a big utility in 10 Midwest and Western states, at least $723 million to cover taxes from 2002 to 2004. But the money did not go to the government; in fact, the company received cash refunds of $351.4 million.
A spokesman, Ed Legge, said the refunds resulted from a failed energy trading business. "Utility customers did not bear the risk of that business, and they should not benefit either," he said.
Also expressing the utilities' view, Paul L. Joskow, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said, "For the customer, the result is the same." If the utility were a stand-alone company and filed its own tax return, he added, the customer would pay the same for power.
But critics argue that when utilities collect taxes the government never receives, customers do lose.
The Minnesota attorney general, Mike Hatch, said, "Essentially, the utility ratepayers pay the tax twice, once through the utility bill and again through the lost revenue to government that means either higher taxes for them or less government services." Mr. Hatch is trying to require that any taxes included in Xcel bills be paid to the government. Xcel opposes this.
The critics say that while many profitable businesses use losses to minimize their tax bills, utilities are unique because their taxes are built into the bills that customers pay.
Critics also say utility companies are enriched beyond the limits set by law if they pocket the tax money. "Utilities are entitled to a just and reasonable return," said Myer Shark, a 93-year-old lawyer who sued unsuccessfully to recover $300 million in taxes paid by Minnesota customers of Xcel. "But when they keep the taxes, they are earning an unjust and unreasonable rate of return."
Enron was a pioneer in turning taxes into profit. Since 1997 the company, now in bankruptcy, has collected nearly $900 million from customers of a utility it acquired, Portland General Electric, to cover income taxes. But none of that money reached the federal government from Enron, and only a quirk in the law forced Portland G.E. to pay about $800,000 in income taxes, of which $20 went to the state of Oregon.
Enron could keep the tax money because it created 881 subsidiaries in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and other tax havens, tax shelters that on paper generated losses for the parent.
The tax benefits are one reason Wall Street these days likes electric utilities, long seen as unexciting investments. Warren E. Buffett, Henry R. Kravis and David Bonderman are among investors drawn to utilities in recent years in hopes of earning returns through parent companies that can be several times those typically approved by state regulators for the utilities themselves.
For decades utilities have been able to delay paying the government the taxes collected from customers; the delayed taxes are known as phantom taxes. But the more recent issue involves taxes the government will never receive because tax rules have not caught up with changes in the ownership structure of utilities.
Three decades ago, said James T. Selecky, a utility-rate consultant to the Minnesota attorney general, "we had true utility companies with very few or minor other operations," so the taxes eventually flowed to the government. But that is no longer true.
Only a few states have mechanisms to prevent pocketing such money. West Virginia and Oregon require that taxes be paid to the government, although the Oregon law, enacted last year, is under attack by utilities there.
In Pennsylvania, the state Supreme Court ruled in 1985 that "fictitious" expenses, such as taxes government never receives, cannot be included in utility rates.
The prospect that a utility could charge for taxes that the government would never receive became a major issue in Oregon when David Bonderman's Texas Pacific Group tried to buy Portland General Electric in 2004.
Texas Pacific specializes in revamping financially troubled companies like Burger King and the clothier J. Crew. Such companies typically have tax losses, but little or no profit to make use of them. If Texas Pacific had acquired Portland General Electric, whose profits are virtually guaranteed and which had $92 million a year of taxes embedded in the bills customers pay, it could have used the losses from its other companies to offset the utility's profit and keep the money paid by customers ostensibly for taxes.
Texas Pacific persuaded Oregon utility regulators to keep most records of the purchase proceedings secret.
When these documents became public, they showed that Texas Pacific expected annual returns greater than 33 percent, three times the expected rate of return for a utility. That revelation generated public and official criticism. The state Public Utility Commission unanimously rejected the Portland purchase a year ago.
In the wake of the controversy, the Oregon Legislature passed a law requiring that taxes on electric bills be turned over to the government and rates adjusted each year to accurately reflect what customers paid and governments collected.
MidAmerican Electric, an Iowa utility holding company controlled by Mr. Buffett, and PacifiCorp, a Scottish-owned electric utility, have been lobbying in Oregon for repeal of the law.
The National Federation of Independent Business's Oregon chapter, with 12,000 members, favors the law. J. L. Wilson, its executive director, said it helped prevent a practice that "just bumps up electric rates."
One way to make sure customers do not pay for taxes that governments never receive would be to require each utility to file its own tax return. That way, taxes would be paid to the government, not to a parent company.
Another solution has been advanced for three decades by Robert Batinovich, a California businessman who promoted innovative approaches to regulation when he was chairman of the California Public Utilities Commission in the 1970's. Mr. Batinovich, now chairman of Glenborough Realty Trust in San Mateo, Calif., suggested exempting regulated monopolies from the corporate income tax. "It's just a disguised consumption tax, just another way to take from the little guy," he said.
But he said that if governments wanted to raise money from regulated utilities, it would be easier just to add a tax, similar to a sales tax, to monthly bills and require that all that money be turned over.

Boston Liberal

I was slowly becoming a fan of Boston Legal. I figure any show that features two former Star Trek alumni, plus Murphy Brown and the guy from Stargate must be doing something right. But after watching last night’s episode I am completely sold.
Check out the clips here or here (extended version) of James Spader’s character making an impassioned speech in court about the sad state of our nation and the loss of our civil liberties. Great stuff, sure to make liberals swell up with sentimental tears, while causing steam to pour out of most conservatives’ ears.
I’m definitely reprogramming my DVR to start recording this series.

GOP longing for better days

Now that President Bush is sitting at an all-time low approval rating, I think it would be better for everybody if the Democrats would retake control of the government. Seriously. Democrats would be delighted, obviously. The country would be better off in the long-run with competent people back at the helm, and even Republicans would be happier.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen my Republican friends happier than they were back in the 1990s when the economy was booming, federal spending was declining, welfare rolls were being chopped and they could spend everyday bad-mouthing the Democrats and blaming Bill and Hillary Clinton for the demise of Western culture.
But today I see these same Republicans cringing everytime they pick up the newspaper or turn on the news and have to learn of some new idiocy perpetrated by this inept administration. What lunacy will they have to defend next? Bush appointing Harriet Meyers to the Supreme Court? Dick Cheney shooting someone in the face?
How many more scandals will they have to cover up and try desperately to ignore? Abramoff? Valerie Plame? Domestic spying?
What will be the next cherished ideal they will have to watch flounder and fail spectacularly? Supply-side economics? Gun-barrel diplomacy? Faith-based social services?
I see my conservative friends straining every day to come up with some new rationale for blaming all their current troubles on the liberal media or on powerless minority Democrats in Congress. You know they aren’t really taking it seriously. It’s more therapeutic than anything. If only there was some Democrat somewhere with some actual power and some actual authority who they could pass the buck to (and I’m not talking about the governor of Louisiana).
I know that deep down the Republicans miss the good old days when they were in the minority, free to lob bombs at their opponents while having no obligation to demonstrate that their ideas could actually work better.
Well, don’t worry, my friends! Happy days will soon be here again! Chin up, and all. We can weather these last few years of Republican irresponsibility before the electorate finally sets things straight once again. Then Republicans can go back to doing what they do best - representing this country’s wealthy minority and working with lobbyists to insert as many loopholes into the tax code as possible.

I’m glad I quit watching '24'

I was really hooked on the show '24' during its first thrilling season. But I still remember being completely turned off with the way they ended that first season by killing off Jack Bauer's wife. I figured they did that just to free his character up to have romantic trysts with different women every episode, just like James Bond.
But now I see they’ve started killing off characters left and right to the point that current fans are screaming foul.
It is so unreasonable to like to watch a show and not have to worry that your favorite character might get offed in the next episode?

Bush ready to “cut-n-run”

It looks like Bush has finally gotten the message via his pathetic poll numbers and has decided to “cut-n-run” from Iraq.

President Bush vowed for the first time yesterday to turn over most of Iraq to newly trained Iraqi troops by the end of this year, setting a specific benchmark as he kicked off a fresh drive to reassure Americans alarmed by the recent burst of sectarian violence.
Bush, who until now has resisted concrete timelines as the Iraq war dragged on longer than he expected, outlined the target in the first of a series of speeches intended to lay out his strategy for victory.

My confidence level in the ability of the Iraqi security forces to hold together after we leave is zero. I don’t think it matters how much longer we stay there propping them up. They will scatter to the high winds the moment we pull up our stakes and move out.

Good News Friday

I’m about to go out of town for the weekend to the Rodeo in Houston but first I thought I would leave this roundup of happy stories (for Democrats, that is).

First, the collapse of the Dubai ports deal has thoroughly exposed this administration’s gross incompetence once again.

When President Bush and senior adviser Karl Rove mapped out plans for a political comeback in 2006, this was nowhere on the script. Suddenly, the collapse of a port-management deal neither even knew about a month ago has devastated the White House and raised questions about its ability to lead even fellow Republicans.

The bipartisan uprising in Congress in the face of a veto threat represented a singular defeat for Bush, who when it came to national security grew accustomed during his first five years in office to leading as he chose and having loyal lawmakers fall in line. Now, with his poll numbers in a political ditch, the port debacle has contributed to a perception of weakness that has liberated Republicans who once would never have dared cross Bush.

Now it looks like the scales are finally falling off of peoples’ eyes and they are beginning to come to the realization that George W. Bush is without question the Worst. President. Ever.

Republicans fret as Bush's popularity sinks

More and more people, particularly Republicans, disapprove of President Bush's performance, question his character and no longer consider him a strong leader against terrorism, according to an AP-Ipsos poll documenting one of the bleakest points of his presidency.

Nearly four out of five Americans, including 70 percent of Republicans, believe civil war will break out in Iraq — the bloody hot spot upon which Bush has staked his presidency. Nearly 70 percent of people say the U.S. is on the wrong track, a 6-point jump since February.

By the way, Bush’s overall approval in this poll is 37 percent. WooHoo!!
(By the way, I am not in any way celebrating the prospect of civil war in Iraq. That is just a symptom of Bush's miserable failure as a world leader. The good news is that if people finally start to recognize the serious problems we are facing in the world, we might be able to do something about them before it is too late.)

Next, the Washington Post’s political blogger thinks Democrats have an excellent chance to pick up seats in the Senate and maybe even regain control of that chamber in November.

Democrats should be optimistic -- if not yet elated -- about their prospects for gaining Senate seats this fall as takeover opportunities for their party continue to dominate The Fix's Friday Line.
Republican incumbents hold the top five slots this week -- meaning they represent the five Senate seats up for grabs this fall most likely to change party control.

And those five most vulnerable Republican senators are Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania; Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island; Conrad Burns of Montana; Mike DeWine of Ohio and Jim Talent of Missouri. Democrats also have a good shot at taking the open seat in Tennessee from the retiring Bill Frist.

Oh, and good riddance to Gail Norton, certainly a strong contender for Worst. Interior Secretary. Ever.

Meet the new boss...

Shiite death squads, torture chambers and now mass executions.

Remind me again how this new government in Iraq is supposed to be better than the old regime.

Annual war costs increasing

Annual expenditures for the Iraq war will reach $117.6 billion this fiscal year, according to today’s Wall Street Journal.
That’s an 18 percent increase over the previous 12-month period. Monthly expenditures in Iraq are running at $5.9 billion plus another $1 billion for Afghanistan.

All of that in spite of the fact that troop levels are supposed to be drawn down this year. The Pentagon estimates personnel costs will decrease by 14 percent this year, but that is offset by big increases for the procurement of new equipment - $25.7 billion in 2006, up from $18.8 billion in 2005. Also, maintenance spending is up 30 percent.

Why is this? Higher fuel prices are part of the reason. Another is the loss of support from National Guard troops who have been sent home after their mobilization has run its course. To make up for the loss of manpower, the military has been hiring contractors for all the logistical chores that the Guard used to help out with.
“They don’t have enough people,” said Rep. John Murtha, D-Penn.

The WSJ goes on to report that three years in Iraq has taken its toll on stocks of military equipment requiring the creation of in-country maintenance facilities in Iraq.
“There are unprecedented costs. It’s staggering,” says U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, a member of the Appropriations Committee.

All of this has given us “...a total defense budget that in real dollars surpasses those of the Vietnam War era and the defense buildup under Ronald Reagan at the height of the Cold War.”

We are now entering our fourth year in Iraq with the country teetering on the verge of Civil War. We can’t afford to keep this up. We already have record deficits that are weighing down the economy. Our military is stretched past the breaking point. And we are being led by an administration that has proven itself to be dangerously incompetent and is incapable of figuring any good way out of this mess.

Primary ups and downs

I haven't really grasped the full extent of the primary results from yesterday. I was happy to see in the one race where I had a vote, Carlos Uresti prevailed over Frank Madla for the state Senate District 19 seat.

But while that was cheerful news, it appears that Republican Henry Cuellar prevailed over Democrat Ciro Rodriguez for the Dist. 28 congressional seat.(Thanks to Red State for the picture.) I guess I just don't understand why so many so-called Democrats in Laredo would support someone like Cuellar just because he is the home-town boy. If I had a choice between a Laredo Democrat like Richard Raymond versus San Antonio Republican Henry Bonilla, there is no question that I would support Raymond.

I wasn't surprised to see Tom DeLay win his primary race. The national media seems to think that was the big story of the day. I'm actually glad that he won because I think it will be easier for Nick Lampson to beat him in November than some fresh Republican without the baggage that DeLay has.

James Leininger was only partly successful in his bid to knock off anti-voucher Republicans. It looks like his puppet candidates prevailed in two of five races. I could have told him he was wasting his money going after Delwin Jones in Lubbock though.

Walls in Heaven

It amazes me sometimes the things that must occupy the minds of right-wing fundamentalist preachers. Here is a case where one of the local ayatollahs apparently got in trouble with his flock because of a misperception that he might be suggesting that maybe, just maybe, all the Jews in the world aren’t going to hell in a handbasket.

Neither San Antonio televangelist John Hagee nor the Rev. Jerry Falwell has expressed a belief in a "dual covenant theology" as reported Wednesday in the Jerusalem Post, Hagee and a local rabbi said Thursday.
"Dual covenant theology" refers to a belief that Jews can be saved without believing in Jesus Christ — as Christians do — because of God's covenant with the ancient Israelites....
Falwell, in a statement posted on his Web site, www.falwell.com, said he stands "on the foundational biblical principle that all people — Baptists, Methodists, Pentecostals, Jews, Muslims, etc. — must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ to enter heaven."

To tell the truth, I don’t believe in a "dual covenant theology" either. I believe in a single covenant that God has with the entire human race - each and every person individually - regardless of whether they are Israelites, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, agnostics or atheists.

But it is sad to see these supposed leaders of Christianity today dithering over whether they think God arbitrarily condemns trillions and billions and billions of people to eternal damnation or maybe just trillions and billions and millions of people. All because they were born into a culture where they weren’t taught to repeat the magic phrase that automatically unlocks the doors to heaven to them while keeping them sealed shut to everyone else.

The Catholic theologian Hans Kung once said it would probably be necessary for God to put up walls in Heaven to keep certain groups of people from knowing that other groups are up there too.

Common sense wins out

It’s nice to see the Supreme Court can still agree on common sense issues such as this one.

The Supreme Court yesterday unanimously upheld a federal law that forces colleges and universities to permit military recruiting on campus, despite the schools' objections to the Pentagon ban on openly gay people serving in the armed forces....

The Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights (FAIR) -- a coalition of law schools and professors that formed to sue the government -- had said the law "compelled speech" that made it appear schools were endorsing the government's exclusion of acknowledged gays in the military, thus violating the schools' right to free speech under the First Amendment.

But in writing for the court, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said that Solomon "neither limits what law schools may say nor requires them to say anything."

"Law schools remain free under the statute to express whatever views they may have on the military's congressionally mandated employment policy. . . . Nothing about recruiting suggests that law schools agree with any speech by recruiters and nothing in the Solomon Amendment restricts what the law schools may say about the military's policies," Roberts wrote.

A shining example

I don’t remember where I saw this first, but it is from an interview with country singer Dolly Parton
on the Larry King Live show on CNN where they are talking about her Oscar-nominated song for the movie Transamerica. I thought her answer was just an excellent example of what it means to have a good heart.

KING: Why have you been -- you've been interested for a long time in gay/lesbian, transgender stories, why?

PARTON: Well, I'm not interested in anything. I haven't made any efforts to do -- I just am totally accepting of people. I really believed that everybody should be allowed to be who they are.

KING: That's what I mean.

PARTON: Well yes, I'm very tolerant of just people in general. I believe we're all God's children. I think we all have a right to be who we are. I'm certainly -- I'm not a judge and I'm certainly not God, so I just try to love the God core in all people. And I know that is in the center of us all, so I just try to accept people for who they are, whatever that is.

I think you could hold up Dolly Parton in this instance as an example of the true Christian spirit in contrast to Fred Phelps and his ilk.

Oscar upset

That must be some kind of record for fewest number of Academy Awards won by a Best Picture flick. Crash, which surprised everyone and took the award from Brokeback Mountain, only went home with three total Oscars - in addition to Best Picture, it won for Original Screenplay and Film Editing.
Two films that weren’t even nominated for Best Picture took home that many Oscars - King Kong which won for Best Visual Effects, Best Sound and Best Sound Editing; and Memoirs of a Geisha which won for Art Direction, Cinematography and Costume.
Brokeback Mountain also walked away with three Oscars after being snubbed for Best Picture - Best Director, Adapted Screenplay and Original Score.
No other film had more than one Oscar for the evening. Capote, Walk the Line, Syriana and The Constnat Gardener split up the acting Oscars; Hustle and Flow won for Best Song and Chronicles of Narnia won for Best Makeup.

I missed Jon Stewart’s opening monologue, but from what I did see I thought he did a good job of hosting the show. My personal favorite, though, is still Steve Martin.
I was happy to see George Clooney win the Best Supporting Actor trophy. He had the best line of the night with his brief acceptance speech:

You know, we are a little bit out of touch in Hollywood every once in a while. I think it’s probably a good thing. We’re the ones who talked about AIDS when it was just being whispered, and we talked about civil rights when it wasn’t really popular. And we, you know, we bring up subjects. This Academy, this group of people gave Hattie McDaniel an Oscar in 1939 when blacks were still sitting in the backs of theaters. I’m proud to be a part of this Academy, proud to be part of this community, and proud to be out of touch.

I know how he feels. When I saw that more people tuned into American Idol than the Olympics the other week, I had no doubt I am out of synch with the masses.