"Bush Knew!"
David O'Bedlam
Linkname: TOMPAINE.com - Two Loud Words
URL: http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/9689
--
"I will see the worship in their eyes, and I will lose it."
...................................................................
(C) 2003 TheDavid^TM | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
David O'Bedlam
>
> Linkname: TOMPAINE.com - Two Loud Words
> URL: http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/9689
To copy it here:
Two Loud Words
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times best-selling author of two
books, War On Iraq (Context Books) and The Greatest Sedition is
Silence (Pluto Press). His book Our Flag, Too: The Paradox of
Patriotism will be available in August from Context Books.
There have always been 'third-rail' issues in American politicssubjects
that, if touched upon, will lead to certain political death. For a long
while, and until very recently, Social Security was one of these issues.
A new one, surrounding the attacks of 9/11, has been born in this
political season. If 9/11 is discussed, the only allowable sub-topic to
be broached is whether the Bush administration is capable of keeping us
safe from another onslaught.
The Jan. 2 edition of The Boston Globe had a case in point on the front
page. An article titled "For Bush, Readiness is Key Issue" stated that,
"In speech after speech, President Bush has emphasized his
administration's pledge never to forget the lessons of Sept. 11. He says
the top goal of his administration is to prevent another attack." The
Globe article contained, in the next paragraph, the standardized
rejoinder: "And while Democratic opponents of the administration are
unanimous in their hope that that vulnerability is not exposed with
deadly results, they have also argued that Bush has done far too little
to protect the country from another attack. He has refused to adequately
reimburse state and local officials for homeland security costs, they
argue, and has ignored dangerous gaps in air cargo and port security."
Thus, the "preparedness-gap" becomes the whittled-down talking point du
jour. This is a whiff of colossal proportions, the implications of which
will echo down the halls of history unless someone develops enough spine
to speak the truth into a large microphone. The talking point is not
difficult to manage. It was splashed in gaudy multi-point font across the
front page of the New York Post in May of 2002.
Two words: 'Bush Knew.'
It is, frankly, amazing that this has fallen down the memory hole. Recall
two headlines from that period. The first, from the UK Guardian on May
19, 2002, was titled "Bush Knew of Terrorist Plot to Hijack US Planes."
The first three paragraphs of this story read:
"George Bush received specific warnings in the weeks before 11
September that an attack inside the United States was being planned by
Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, US government sources said
yesterday. In a top-secret intelligence memo headlined 'Bin Laden
determined to strike in the US', the President was told on 6 August
that the Saudi-born terrorist hoped to 'bring the fight to America' in
retaliation for missile strikes on al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan in
1998. Bush and his aides, who are facing withering criticism for
failing to act on a series of warnings, have previously said
intelligence experts had not advised them domestic targets were
considered at risk. However, they have admitted they were specifically
told that hijacks were being planned."
Another story on the topic came from The New York Times on May 15, 2002,
and was titled "Bush Was Warned bin Laden Wanted to Hijack Planes."
Unlike the Guardian piece, the Times chose to lead the article with the
Bush administration's cover story, one the administration has stuck with
to this day:
"The White House said tonight that President Bush had been warned by
American intelligence agencies in early August that Osama bin Laden
was seeking to hijack aircraft but that the warnings did not
contemplate the possibility that the hijackers would turn the planes
into guided missiles for a terrorist attack. 'It is widely known that
we had information that bin Laden wanted to attack the United States
or United States interests abroad,' Ari Fleischer, the president's
press secretary, said this evening. 'The president was also provided
information about bin Laden wanting to engage in hijacking in the
traditional pre-9/11 sense, not for the use of suicide bombing, not
for the use of an airplane as a missile.'"
Yes, we were warned, said the Bush administration, but who could have
conceived of terrorists using airplanes for suicide bombings?
A lot of people, actually.
According to a Time magazine story that appeared on Jan. 2, 2004,
National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice is balking at requests to
testify before Thomas Kean's 9/11 commission under oath. She also wants
her testimony to be taken behind closed doors, and not in public. The
crux of her hesitation would appear on the surface to be her comments of
May 16 2002, in which she used the above-referenced excuse that no one
"could have predicted that they would try to use a hijacked airplane as a
missile." If that excuse is reflective of reality, why does she fear to
testify under oath?
Perhaps Ms. Rice fears testifying because too many facts are now in hand,
thanks in no small part to the work of 9/11 widows like Kristen
Breitweiser, which fly in the face of the administration's demurrals. For
example, in 1993, a $150,000 study was commissioned by the Pentagon to
investigate the possibility of an airplane being used to bomb national
landmarks. A draft document of this was circulated throughout the
Pentagon, the Justice Department and to the Federal Emergency Management
Agency. In 1994, a disgruntled Federal Express employee broke into the
cockpit of a DC-10 with plans to crash it into a company building in
Memphis.
That same year, a lone pilot crashed a small plane into a tree on the
White House grounds, narrowly missing the residence. An Air France flight
was hijacked by members of the Armed Islamic Group, which intended to
crash the plane into the Eiffel Tower. In September 1999, a report titled
"The Sociology and Psychology of Terrorism" was prepared for U.S.
intelligence by the Federal Research Division, an arm of the Library of
Congress. It stated, "Suicide bombers belonging to Al Qaeda's Martyrdom
Battalion could crash-land an aircraft packed with high explosives (C-4
and Semtex) into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the CIA, or the White
House."
Throughout the spring and early summer of 2001, intelligence agencies
flooded the government with warnings of possible terrorist attacks
against American targets, including commercial aircraft, by Al Qaeda and
other groups. A July 5, 2001 White House gathering of the FAA, the Coast
Guard, the FBI, Secret Service and INS had a top counter-terrorism
official, Richard Clarke, state that "Something really spectacular is
going to happen here, and it's going to happen soon." Donald Kerrick, who
is a three-star general, was a deputy National Security Advisor in the
late Clinton administration. He stayed on into the Bush administration.
When the Bush administration came in, he wrote a memo about terrorism, Al
Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. The memo said, "We will be struck again." As a
result of writing that memo, he was not invited to any more meetings.
In a late November truthout interview, former Clinton advisor Sidney
Blumenthal said:
"Richard Clarke was Director of Counter-Terrorism in the National
Security Council. He has since left. Clark urgently tried to draw the
attention of the Bush administration to the threat of al Qaeda. Right
at the present, the Bush administration is trying to withhold
documents from the 9/11 bipartisan commission. I believe one of the
things that they do not want to be known is what happened on August 6,
2001. It was on that day that George W. Bush received his last, and
one of the few, briefings on terrorism. I believe he told Richard
Clarke that he didn't want to be briefed on this again, even though
Clarke was panicked about the alarms he was hearing regarding
potential attacks. Bush was blithe, indifferent, ultimately
irresponsible."
"The public has a right to know what happened on August 6," continued
Blumenthal, "what Bush did, what Condi Rice did, what all the rest of
them did, and what Richard Clarke's memos and statements were. Then the
public will be able to judge exactly what this presidency has done."
George W. Bush is going to run in 2004 on the idea that his
administration is the only one capable of protecting us from another
attack like the ones which took place on 9/11. Yet the record to date is
clear. Not only did they fail in spectacular fashion to deal with those
first threats, not only has their reaction caused us to be less safe, not
only have they failed to sufficiently bolster our defenses, but they used
the aftermath of the attacks to ram through policies they couldn't have
dreamed of achieving on September 10. It is one of the most remarkable
turnabouts in American political history: Never before has an
administration used so grisly a personal failure to such excellent
effect.
Never mind the final insult: They received all these warnings and went on
vacation for a month down in Texas. The August 6 briefing might as well
have happened in a vacuum. September 11 could have and should have been
prevented. Why? Because Bush knew.
This administration must not be allowed to ride their criminal negligence
into a second term. Someone needs to say those two words. Loudly. After
all, Bush has proven with Social Security and with 9/11 that third rails
can be danced across. All it takes is a little boldness.
Editor's Note: This article originially appeared on [3]TruthOut.org on
Jan. 5, 2004.
Published: Jan 05 2004
References
1. mailto:willia...@mail.truthout.org
2. http://www.SilenceIsSedition.com/
3. http://www.truthout.org/
4. http://www.tompaine.com/subscribe.cfm
David J. Loftus
Either he knew and he's a heartless bastard, or he didn't have the
foggiest idea what was going on and he's a moron.
Neither is acceptable in a President.
David Loftus
Michael S. Morris
Tuesday, the 6th of January, 2003
David Loftus:
Either he knew and he's a heartless bastard, or he didn't have the
foggiest idea what was going on and he's a moron.
Neither is acceptable in a President.
Nice try, guys, but honestly, the simple fact is the US receives
zillions of warnings and threats of terrorist attacks, and continuously.
Some of it is nutcases just shooting off their mouths, some of it
comes from groups whose intent is malicious, but whose ability to
do anything about it is nonexistent, and even from known terrorist
groups of proven ability, we obviously get more threats than
attacks. Bush, Clinton, whatever, it is hard to know which
threat to take seriously, and when. Plus, there's polical reality---no
one would have bought removing your shoes at airport security,
or even air marshals on flights, for example, prior
to the reality of 9/11. The idea of pinning complicity of
omission for 9/11 on Bush is simply ridiculous.
By the way, David, I got a vicarious (I guess that'd be the word for
it) disillusionment about what I take to be your man yesterday.
I disagree with Howard Dean's politics of course on several
fronts, and I certainly wasn't go to vote for the man, but he
struck me as having a kind of freshness and sincerity about him
that was admirable, and which would be acceptable to me in
a President, if he were at least suitably restrained by Congress.
It was also amusing watching the crowd of more mainstream Democratic
contenders playing the "sky is falling" game over Dean. The New
Republic has been pretty anti-Dean all along, gravitating towards
the party's more "established" candidates. But, anyway, the
"misstatements" thing which they've all been harping on has
seemed to me like so much smoke. The gubernatorial records being
sealed is bad, but I'm not sure it's a game-killer. But yesterday, on
NPR, I heard Dean holding forth in the debates on his goddamed
"spirituality".
And that, just after the New Republic last week claimed that
he was unelectable because he wasn't religious. I read that article
and thought it was exactly the sort of short-sighted and prejudicial
(they're all a bunch of goobers) thing that Silke would say about
the American electorate, and that the truth was that if Dean wasn't
particularly religious, it might even help get him elected. And
then, of course, he turns out to be a ad-man-driven worm just like
everybody else (Bush and Clinton certainly included) and you can
hear the weaseling and the all-things-to-all-people chameleon
in his voice. As I said, disillusionment.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
David O'Bedlam
[...]
> Plus, there's polical reality---no one would have bought removing
> your shoes at airport security, or even air marshals on flights,
> for example, prior to the reality of 9/11.
Which is why 9/11, a.k.a. the Reichstag Fire Redux, was such a good
opportunity for the planners of the Securitate State. You know, as
in "If a terorist threat did not exist we would have to invent one."
(Obbook: _1984_.)
If Bush is re-elected everything Silke has said about America and
Americans will prove an understatement.
D.
--
"I'm near the end, and I just ain't got the time."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
(C) 2004 by `TheDavid^TM' | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
Bruce McGuffin
> Tuesday, the 6th of January, 2003
>
> David Loftus:
> Either he knew and he's a heartless bastard, or he didn't have the
> foggiest idea what was going on and he's a moron.
>
> Neither is acceptable in a President.
>
> Nice try, guys, but honestly, the simple fact is the US receives
> zillions of warnings and threats of terrorist attacks, and continuously.
> Some of it is nutcases just shooting off their mouths, some of it
> comes from groups whose intent is malicious, but whose ability to
> do anything about it is nonexistent, and even from known terrorist
> groups of proven ability, we obviously get more threats than
> attacks. Bush, Clinton, whatever, it is hard to know which
> threat to take seriously, and when. Plus, there's polical reality---no
> one would have bought removing your shoes at airport security,
> or even air marshals on flights, for example, prior
> to the reality of 9/11. The idea of pinning complicity of
> omission for 9/11 on Bush is simply ridiculous.
Al Franken's book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them has a
chapter on this. If we take Al at face value, then certainly Bush
should have known something. Al reports a great effort by outgoing
Clinton administration people, and this Clarke fellow who stayed on
into the Bush administration, to inform W. and Condoleeza about Al
Queda. Allegedly, Clinton's people had drawn up a plan to attack Al
Queda in Afghanistan, and kill Osama, but decided to hand it over to
Bush and let him decide, rather than start something so late in
Clinton's last term. The lying comes in when Bushies deny they were at
the various briefings where this information was passed on. Mind you,
Al doesn't claim they were told exactly what sort of attack to
expect when, just that one was coming.
Bruce
Sam Culotta
> Al Franken's book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them has a
> chapter on this. If we take Al at face value, then certainly Bush
> should have known something. Al reports a great effort by outgoing
> Clinton administration people, and this Clarke fellow who stayed on
> into the Bush administration, to inform W. and Condoleeza about Al
> Queda. Allegedly, Clinton's people had drawn up a plan to attack Al
> Queda in Afghanistan, and kill Osama, but decided to hand it over to
> Bush and let him decide, rather than start something so late in
> Clinton's last term. The lying comes in when Bushies deny they were at
> the various briefings where this information was passed on. Mind you,
> Al doesn't claim they were told exactly what sort of attack to
> expect when, just that one was coming.
>
> Bruce
This may have resulted in large part due to the "ABC" ( Anything But
Clinton ) policy that was in place after the Bush people took office. If
so, it's a sad commentary on the state of contemporary politics ( as if we
need further sad commentary ) that it was more important to establish their
difference from the Clinton administration than it was to govern
effectively.
As little regard as I have for Bush and his administration I reject the
notion that he or any of his helpers would purposely endanger American
citizens.
It's much more likely that they were ( and are ) too insular and arrogant to
recognize the danger.
Sam
"Bruce McGuffin" <mcgu...@edinburgh.ll.mit.edu> wrote in message
news:ouru138...@edinburgh.ll.mit.edu...
Michael S. Morris
Tuesday, the 6th of January, 2004
I said:
Plus, there's polical reality---no one would have bought removing
your shoes at airport security, or even air marshals on flights,
for example, prior to the reality of 9/11.
David:
Which is why 9/11, a.k.a. the Reichstag Fire Redux, was such a good
opportunity for the planners of the Securitate State. You know, as
in "If a terorist threat did not exist we would have to invent one."
(Obbook: _1984_.)
Given the milquetost nature of the "Securitate State" planned by those
bugbears of yours---let alone the one erected, I'm afraid I find your
hysteria in this regard to be pretty laugh-aloud funny.
This "SS" doesn't come close to what the governments of the
United States did in open suppression of civil liberties during the
Napoleonic-era crises with France and England
(the Alien and Sedition Acts and the Embargo), the
run-up to the Civil War (especially the gag rule on
petitions against slavery from 1835-1844), the suspension of
habeas corpus during the Civil War, the arbitrary crushing of Free
Speech during WWI (people imprisoned for treason for
saying aloud "Fuck the President!"), the internment of
Japanese-Americans during WWII, the Cold War blacklisting
and witchhunts, or the VietNam era trigger happy riot police.
The Bush Administration has tried to claim the FBI can have
investigative access to library records? And there might be a
constitutional amendment defining marriage as het, passed
in backlash at Lawrence v. Texas (Bush-era ruling that it is)
and the excess zealotry of Massachusetts judiciary? Whoo,
boy, the fascist police state is just around the corner! To me,
it looks you want so desperately to perceive yourself as
in opposition to fascists and fascism that you are willing to
lie to yourself and everyone in order to believe it so.
David:
If Bush is re-elected everything Silke has said about America and
Americans will prove an understatement.
If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination), then Bush will almost
certainly be re-elected, and I doubt Silke's opinion of America and
Americans will have shed any illumination about that at all.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Tuesday, the 6th of January, 2004
Bruce McGuffin wrote:
Al Franken's book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them has a
chapter on this. If we take Al at face value, then certainly Bush
should have known something. Al reports a great effort by outgoing
Clinton administration people, and this Clarke fellow who stayed on
into the Bush administration, to inform W. and Condoleeza about Al
Queda. Allegedly, Clinton's people had drawn up a plan to attack Al
Queda in Afghanistan, and kill Osama, but decided to hand it over to
Bush and let him decide, rather than start something so late in
Clinton's last term. The lying comes in when Bushies deny they were at
the various briefings where this information was passed on. Mind you,
Al doesn't claim they were told exactly what sort of attack to
expect when, just that one was coming.
I guess I do not begin to believe Al Franken at anything like face value.
Wasn't he exposed for lying himself----posing as a serious academic trying to
get cooperation on a questionnaire---in order to get Ashcroft or Rumsfeld
or somebody to respond to him for material to use in his book?
Also, what you say completely cuts against the Clintonites---they were
going to attack Al Qaeda but they held off so that Bush could do it. What
nonsense! They had a couple of years after the attack on the Cole in which
to respond. It's a little like the way Clinton "signed" Kyoto for the
photyo-op
and then tabled it knowing it hadn't a powder's chance in hell of getting
ratified,
and Bush ends up being the guy who goes down in the popular press as the guy
who nixed Kyoto. Why couldn't the Clintons have gone after Al Qaeda
years before? Or Bush's father? Or Reagan? We've been avoiding real
response to terrorism for at least 20 years, probably better something like
30 years, to take in NIxon, Ford, and Carter.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
David J. Loftus
> By the way, David, I got a vicarious (I guess that'd be the word for
> it) disillusionment about what I take to be your man yesterday.
He's the man I'm backing to beat Bush, yes. Hardly ideal, but the
only one I think has a shot at ousting this administration.
> I disagree with Howard Dean's politics of course on several
> fronts, and I certainly wasn't go to vote for the man, but he
> struck me as having a kind of freshness and sincerity about him
> that was admirable, and which would be acceptable to me in
> a President, if he were at least suitably restrained by Congress.
> It was also amusing watching the crowd of more mainstream Democratic
> contenders playing the "sky is falling" game over Dean. The New
> Republic has been pretty anti-Dean all along, gravitating towards
> the party's more "established" candidates. But, anyway, the
> "misstatements" thing which they've all been harping on has
> seemed to me like so much smoke.
Quite so. Dean "misstates" because he's not afraid to answer
questions that nearly every other candidate -- at least viable
candidates who don't have appreciable polling numbers to protect
-- ducks.
> The gubernatorial records being sealed is bad, but I'm not
> sure it's a game-killer.
I heard that Governor-now-President Bush did the same in 2000.
> But yesterday, on NPR, I heard Dean holding forth in the debates
> on his goddamed "spirituality".
Oops. Well, pity, but perhaps necessary. A lot of working men
(and lately non-working folks) care about this sort of thing.
> And that, just after the New Republic last week claimed that
> he was unelectable because he wasn't religious. I read that article
> and thought it was exactly the sort of short-sighted and prejudicial
> (they're all a bunch of goobers) thing that Silke would say about
> the American electorate, and that the truth was that if Dean wasn't
> particularly religious, it might even help get him elected. And
> then, of course, he turns out to be a ad-man-driven worm just like
> everybody else (Bush and Clinton certainly included) and you can
> hear the weaseling and the all-things-to-all-people chameleon
> in his voice. As I said, disillusionment.
A touch, I do confess it. But he still has an awful lot going for him.
He always comes across much better to me "in person" -- making a speech
on his own, answering citizens' questions -- than in TV debate format
(although he doesn't do too badly there; just a bit hard and stiff, but
how would YOU do if everyone else was throwing brickbats at you?).
The press has already pegged him in a couple small slots, but there's
a lot more interesting stuff about jobs, the environment, and other
policy matters that I never hear about anywhere but directly from Dean's
mouth, or presumably, from his Web site.
Policy-wise, I might prefer Kucinich, Edwards, maybe even Kerry or
Gebhardt, but Dean's got charisma, drive, momentum -- I think he can
move a broader electorate against Bush than the others can.
What tickles me most about him is that he had to sneak off to night
school to start working on his medical degree because he was afraid
his family (part of the Dean Witter investment group) would disapprove
because they wanted him to continue with the family business.
David Loftus
David O'Bedlam
The only "major party" U.S. presidential candidate I see with a strong
anti-war, anti-"stasi" plank is Kucinich, who alone has pledged to roll
back the "post 9/11" bullshit -- but Kucinich can't win because the TV
networks say he can't. If you bother to vote, remember that voting for
anybody but Kucinich is a vote FOR the warfare state, FOR the continued
occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, FOR the "PATRIOT ACT", and FOR "with
us or against us" unilateralism. Ergo, to speak practically, since it's a
foregone conclusion that Kucinich won't win because the vast majority of
you will obey your television's order not to vote for him, this year's
election really boils down a choice between to making this shit worse
(Bush) or keeping it the same (Dean).
Therefore, given my usually correct estimation of the intelligence of the
American electorate, I predict that Bush will win by a "landslide". Thus
you may now begin counting the days until my virtual voice is silenced,
either by the rulership or by my own hand.
I now offer this campaign slogan free of charge to the Republican Party:
"Do In `TheDavid^TM', (Re-?)Elect Bush!"
Sincerely,
`TheDavid^TM'
--
"I will see the worship in their eyes, and I will lose it."
...................................................................
(C) 2004 TheDavid^TM | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
>
> David:
> If Bush is re-elected everything Silke has said about America and
> Americans will prove an understatement.
>
> If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
> Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination), then Bush will almost
> certainly be re-elected, and I doubt Silke's opinion of America and
> Americans will have shed any illumination about that at all.
I certainly agreed that there's more and worse reasons for Bush's
reelection than the paltry few I might have mentioned.
Mazzolata
> If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
> Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination)...
Do you have any reason whatsoever for assuming that this is even a
possibility ?
Sam Culotta
> I guess I do not begin to believe Al Franken at anything like face value.<
I don't doubt he's used all the tricks of the trade to win his point given
he has a political agenda and was a show business person before he became a
political pundit and satirist, but I think he's at least as believable as
Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Coulter, and their ilk. In fact, I think his facts are
as well founded or better than all the above.
But who can we believe when it comes to political pundits and satirists, if
anyone. And since you don't seem to hold Bush in very high regard despite
defending most of the administration's behavior, what available politician
would you most like to see as president ? My favorites like Bill Bradley
and Mario Cuomo tend to step aside for lesser men.
Sincerely,
-
Sam
Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed
by those who are dumber.
Plato
"Michael S. Morris" <msmo...@netdirect.net> wrote in message
news:3FFB16BA...@netdirect.net...
jonah thomas
> As little regard as I have for Bush and his administration I reject the
> notion that he or any of his helpers would purposely endanger American
> citizens.
Given the historical data that elements of the Truman, Eisenhower,
Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, Bush Sr and Clinton administrations
purposely endangered american citizens....
Why not?
> It's much more likely that they were ( and are ) too insular and arrogant to
> recognize the danger.
That isn't an either/or choice, you know.
Bob Henderson
"David O'Bedlam" wrote :
A summary of evidence of the Shrub administration's complicity:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4582.htm
Michael S. Morris
Tuesday, the 6th of February, 2004
I said:
If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination)...
Mazzolata:
Do you have any reason whatsoever for assuming that this is even a
possibility ?
Well, I have not been following the Demo-critters very carefully,
but a CEO friend of mine has been watching every debate, and most
of the going talk shows, and he claims that apparently is a
possibility. Don't know---it seems to me that that would be a
guaranteed way to lose.
Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely to
pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
jonah thomas
> Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
> gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely to
> pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
> were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
I don't see how you can figure how gerrymandered things were before by
how much they can be gerrymandered now.
The way you figure how gerrymandered things were is by looking at how
twisty the lines were on the map.
Since there's no particular algorithm for choosing districts, the
system is basicly broken and we need some better way to do it that
isn't as open to manipulation.
David J. Loftus
> I guess I do not begin to believe Al Franken at anything like face value.
I guess you didn't bother to read his book, Mike.
> Wasn't he exposed for lying himself----posing as a serious academic trying to
> get cooperation on a questionnaire---in order to get Ashcroft or Rumsfeld
> or somebody to respond to him for material to use in his book?
Ehh, Mike . . . he wasn't "exposed" -- he "exposed" himself, which is to say
he's very honest in his book about what he did in that case. None of the people
he approached responded, either because they didn't want to embarrass
themselves, or because he wasn't very furtive about covering his tracks, using
Kennedy School of Government stationery for this little escapade.
It hardly matters that nobody in the Bush Administration responded to his
invitation to contribute, because simply by asking the question he was
making a possibly telling point about their hypocrisy.
David Loftus
Donald L Ferrt
> The only "major party" U.S. presidential candidate I see with a strong
> anti-war, anti-"stasi" plank is Kucinich, who alone has pledged to roll
> back the "post 9/11" bullshit -- but Kucinich can't win because the TV
> networks say he can't.
The Man held up a Pie Chart on a Radio Debate!!!!!!
Kucinich Shows Pie Chart on Radio Debate
By Associated Press
January 6, 2004, 8:44 PM EST
DES MOINES, Iowa -- Federal spending was the topic and Democratic
presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich came prepared with a pie chart to
argue his point about a bloated Pentagon budget.
But although many listened to Tuesday's presidential debate, few could
see the Ohio congressman's prop.
The debate was broadcast only on National Public Radio.
As Kucinich challenged Democratic front-runner Howard Dean for
refusing to acknowledge that the Pentagon budget needs to be cut,
debate moderator Neal Conan of NPR interrupted.
"Congressman Kucinich is holding up a pie chart, which is not truly
effective on radio," Conan told his listeners.
Kucinich was not deterred.
"Well, it's effective if Howard can see it," he replied.
Mazzolata
> Tuesday, the 6th of February, 2004
>
> I said:
> If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
> Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination)...
> Mazzolata:
> Do you have any reason whatsoever for assuming that this is even a
> possibility ?
>
> Well, I have not been following the Demo-critters very carefully,
> but a CEO friend of mine has been watching every debate, and most
> of the going talk shows, and he claims that apparently is a
> possibility. Don't know---it seems to me that that would be a
> guaranteed way to lose.
So the fact that Dean was the one that suggested that they all agree to
support the eventual nominee must be irrelevant to this "friend" of
yours. This just sounds like typical Republican smearing, Fox News style.
> Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
> gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely to
> pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
> were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
Whoa, watch that spin cycle, you're going to have nothing but rags come
out of it.
David E. Latane
On Wed, 7 Jan 2004, Mazzolata wrote:
> > Well, I have not been following the Demo-critters very carefully,
> > but a CEO friend of mine has been watching every debate, and most
> > of the going talk shows, and he claims that apparently is a
> > possibility. Don't know---it seems to me that that would be a
> > guaranteed way to lose.
>
> So the fact that Dean was the one that suggested that they all agree to
> support the eventual nominee must be irrelevant to this "friend" of
> yours. This just sounds like typical Republican smearing, Fox News style.
The third party notion was an obvious plant of the press boobies in the
direct pay of the Bush administration--like Robert "out the spy" Novak.
If you've got $200,000,000 to burn in a campaign staffed by the heirs of
"tricky dick" you've got top spend it on something, especially with the
incredibly low interest rates ruling out saving, and the incredibly week
dollar hurting the fact-finding junket abroad.
D. Latane
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2004
David:
If Bush is re-elected everything Silke has said about America and
Americans will prove an understatement.
I said:
If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination), then Bush will almost
certainly be re-elected, and I doubt Silke's opinion of America and
Americans will have shed any illumination about that at all.
Silke:
I certainly agreed that there's more and worse reasons for Bush's
reelection than the paltry few I might have mentioned.
You figure he's the one who placed all the C-4 explosives at
the structural supports of the WTC in the dead of night? I always
thought it was supposed to be Karl Rove.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2004
I said:
Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely
to
pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
jonah:
I don't see how you can figure how gerrymandered things were before by
how much they can be gerrymandered now.
Seems to me if the shift is 8 congressional seats out of
30 some, that is a big shift.
jonah:
The way you figure how gerrymandered things were is by looking at how
twisty the lines were on the map.
Not really. On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
district getting divvied up between 4 Republican districts.
Indianapolis is sort of like that---there is the city, which
Democratic congressman Julia Carson seems to have some
sort of a lock on. Then there are the "white-flight" suburbs
represented by Republican Dan Burton. (Both Dan and Julia are
nutcases, in my opinion, of their respective stripes, but that
does enter into my story.) In order to have it that way, Burton's
district is a twisty snaky thing that goes around the city. I'd say
it's pretty distorted now in the Democrats' favour. I'd say if
the Republicans were able to redraw it so as to, say, split the metro
area
northa and south like a pie, that would *also* end up distorting
the representation, but probably not so drastically as it is now.
jonah:
Since there's no particular algorithm for choosing districts, the
system is basicly broken and we need some better way to do it that
isn't as open to manipulation.
Now there I agree up until the end of the first clause,
though my conclusion would be basically that there is
no help for gerrymandering.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2004
I said:
If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination)...
Mazzolata:
Do you have any reason whatsoever for assuming that this is even a
possibility ?
I said:
Well, I have not been following the Demo-critters very carefully,
but a CEO friend of mine has been watching every debate, and most
of the going talk shows, and he claims that apparently is a
possibility. Don't know---it seems to me that that would be a
guaranteed way to lose.
Mazzolata:
So the fact that Dean was the one that suggested that they all agree
to
support the eventual nominee must be irrelevant to this "friend" of
yours. This just sounds like typical Republican smearing, Fox News
style.
Perhaps. I'll have to ask him if he watches Fox. I doubt it, though.
It does seem a pretty stupid "smear" for Republicans to try, since
it either will happen or won't, and if it happens it'll be to the
Republicans' advantage, and it is not going to matter at all if it
doesn't happen (doesn't change anybody's primary vote now). So, from
the point of view of Republicans, it seems that suggesting it might
happen is lose-lose strategy, since the only possible effect might be
to remind some Democratic voters to vote for the party candidate instead
of Dean if Dean ends up going independent.
Anyway, as to what Dean has said about supporting the eventual nominee,
my understanding is that Dean has said he'd open up his gubernatorial
paper if Bush would open up his. And then, when it was pointed out
to him that Bush's already had been open all along, he reneged on that
one. So, I'm not sure I'd trust too much what the man has said.
I said:
Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely
to
pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
Mazzolata:
Whoa, watch that spin cycle, you're going to have nothing but
rags come out of it.
You figure my inference that the Democrats must have had those
Texas districts way gerrymandered in their favor is "spin"?
I thought it was just an inference that if 8 seats out 30 are
being changed by this manouver, something pretty drastic is
happening. Although the inference is certainly based on my
direct knowledge of the case of Indianapolis,
which certainly *is* gerrymandered so that there will can
be an inner-city district where the Democrats can win.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2003
Bob Henderson wrote:
A summary of evidence of the Shrub administration's complicity:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4582.htm
So, was it Karl Rove or Bush himself who cut power to the buildings
and went in using nightvision glasses, while carrying a Glock 9, and
planted all those demolition charges?
Guys, guys---we are talking mass murder and treason and a conspiracy
here the size of the state of New York, with no one having
yet broken ranks of all those complicit security guards and
military guys and White House advisors, and all for the sake of
getting the FBI access to library records?
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Mazzolata
> Mazzolata:
> So the fact that Dean was the one that suggested that they all agree
> to
> support the eventual nominee must be irrelevant to this "friend" of
> yours. This just sounds like typical Republican smearing, Fox News
> style.
>
> Perhaps. I'll have to ask him if he watches Fox. I doubt it, though.
> It does seem a pretty stupid "smear" for Republicans to try, since
> it either will happen or won't, and if it happens it'll be to the
> Republicans' advantage, and it is not going to matter at all if it
> doesn't happen (doesn't change anybody's primary vote now).
No, the whole point is to smear Dean *now*, make him lose primaries by
saying he's putting himself before the party. The point is that they're
scared of Dean, more than any other candidate, despite what Rove would
have you think. What is being said about Dean's unelectability is
*exactly* what was being said about Clinton in 92, and don't think the
people running Bush's campaign don't know that.
jonah thomas
> I said:
> Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
> gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely
> to
> pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
> were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
> jonah:
> I don't see how you can figure how gerrymandered things were before by
> how much they can be gerrymandered now.
> Seems to me if the shift is 8 congressional seats out of
> 30 some, that is a big shift.
Yes, it is. So was it gerrymandered 4 seats the other direction before
and now they take those back and get 4 more seats, or are they going for
a big 8-seat grab? You can't tell from just the numbers.
> jonah:
> The way you figure how gerrymandered things were is by looking at how
> twisty the lines were on the map.
> Not really. On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
> district getting divvied up between 4 Republican districts.
> Indianapolis is sort of like that---there is the city, which
> Democratic congressman Julia Carson seems to have some
> sort of a lock on. Then there are the "white-flight" suburbs
> represented by Republican Dan Burton. (Both Dan and Julia are
> nutcases, in my opinion, of their respective stripes, but that
> does enter into my story.) In order to have it that way, Burton's
> district is a twisty snaky thing that goes around the city. I'd say
> it's pretty distorted now in the Democrats' favour. I'd say if
> the Republicans were able to redraw it so as to, say, split the metro
> area
> northa and south like a pie, that would *also* end up distorting
> the representation, but probably not so drastically as it is now.
Which group of voters is larger? If you choose to split it so that the
larger group gets the majority in both pieces, then you get one outcome.
If you split it so the smaller group gets a small majority in one
district and the larger group gets a large majority in the other
district, that's a different outcome. One way the larger group gets 2
votes and the smaller group none, the other way they each get one. What
basis is there to choose?
Some ways it makes sense to arrange for people with common interests to
be in the same district. Then they cadn get somebody who truly
represents them, which is generally a good thing.
> jonah:
> Since there's no particular algorithm for choosing districts, the
> system is basicly broken and we need some better way to do it that
> isn't as open to manipulation.
> Now there I agree up until the end of the first clause,
> though my conclusion would be basically that there is
> no help for gerrymandering.
The problem is basing national representation on local address. We
don't have any agreed rational way to split up the voters, so every time
it gets changed the people who think they'll lose by it yell that it's
gerrymandering. Which it often is.
One alternative would be to give up location for choosing
representation. States still have a little importance so we could keep
those, but then let people vote for whoever in the state they want to
represent them, regardless of location. Then you'd get somebody
representing Indianapolis if somebody makes that his central theme and
enough people from Indianapolis agree that's what they care about.
I tend to dislike that approach. It's been followed somewhat by the
french and the israelis and it tends to lead to fragmentation. Too many
splinter groups represented by loudmouth zealots who have nothing to
gain by compromise.
Maybe we'd do better with some strict rule for how to divide up states
into districts. Never mind if it gave a few peculiar results, if you
can just follow the rule then you aren't gerrymandering. s a first stab
at that:
1. Get some rule to decide how big an urban area must be to have
delegate. We'd need a definition of "urban area" for that, something
easy to measure and hard to cheat on. The urban area must justify at
least one delegate, other numbers should get rounded -- if it has enough
voters for 1.6 delegates round it to 2, for 1.4 delegates round it to 1.
Each urban area will have contained some incorporated city or town in
1990, pick the largest of them. Pick the city hall of that city, as of
1990. This is the center of the urban area. If the urban area is large
enough to have more than one delegate, divide it as follows: Draw a
line due north from the city hall to the edge of the urban area. Pick a
second line clockwise of the first so the urban area between them has
1/N of the voters. Draw more lines with 1/N in each case.
This means that some delegates for urban voters will represent almost
twice the number of voters as others. The biggest difference will be in
small areas that are on the cusp between one delegate and two. This is
acceptable.
Then take the remaining population, round the number of delegates,
divide the area into N districts according to some inflexible rule, and
you're done. Get a mathematician to make the rule. Here's a candidate
for the 2*I case: Divide the nonurban area by a straight north-south
line, with 50% of the voters on each side. Then divide each half by a
straight east-west line that puts 50% of the voters of that half on each
side. Continue this I times.
The politicians would argue over it, each side looking for ways to get
an advantage. Whatever advantage one got would be temporary, within a
few elections things will change around. The important thing is to make
it simple and clear and not open to reinterpretation. We'd need a
simple clear way to decide what's an urban area. Get a commission that
decides it on a case-by-case basis and we're back to gerrymandering.
Here's another alternative: Let the National Library Association decide
where the district lines are. They're good at getting information, they
have libraries in each district, and they have a reputation for fair
dealing and good will to everybody. Also, if politicians start to pay a
lot of attention to librarians and do them lots of favors, that would be
good for the nation.
(Sorry about the formatting, my 9-month-old accidentally saved this
partway through.)
francis muir
> On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
> district getting divvied up between 4 Republican
> districts.
Wow! This sounds just like the school bussing
programs the Dems were so fond of advocating.
Bruce McGuffin
> Tuesday, the 6th of January, 2004
>
> Bruce McGuffin wrote:
> Al Franken's book, Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them has a
> chapter on this. If we take Al at face value, then certainly Bush
> should have known something. Al reports a great effort by outgoing
> Clinton administration people, and this Clarke fellow who stayed on
> into the Bush administration, to inform W. and Condoleeza about Al
> Queda. Allegedly, Clinton's people had drawn up a plan to attack Al
> Queda in Afghanistan, and kill Osama, but decided to hand it over to
> Bush and let him decide, rather than start something so late in
> Clinton's last term. The lying comes in when Bushies deny they were at
> the various briefings where this information was passed on. Mind you,
> Al doesn't claim they were told exactly what sort of attack to
> expect when, just that one was coming.
>
> I guess I do not begin to believe Al Franken at anything like face value.
> Wasn't he exposed for lying himself----posing as a serious academic trying to
> get cooperation on a questionnaire---in order to get Ashcroft or Rumsfeld
> or somebody to respond to him for material to use in his book?
>
Anyone who takes offense at the item you refer to here is looking for
a reason to be offended. The whole thing was pretty clearly a joke.
Al sent questionaires to various right-wing public figures, on Harvard
stationary (Al was doing some kind of appointment at the Kennedy
school), asking for material to use in his new book "Savin' It", an
inspirational book for young people on sexual abstinance. He
specifically asked for examples of times when the respondants could
have had sex, but didn't. I guess even John Ashcroft realized it was
a joke, since nobody responded.
> Also, what you say completely cuts against the Clintonites---they were
> going to attack Al Qaeda but they held off so that Bush could do it. What
> nonsense! They had a couple of years after the attack on the Cole in which
> to respond. It's a little like the way Clinton "signed" Kyoto for the
> photyo-op
> and then tabled it knowing it hadn't a powder's chance in hell of getting
> ratified,
> and Bush ends up being the guy who goes down in the popular press as the guy
> who nixed Kyoto. Why couldn't the Clintons have gone after Al Qaeda
> years before? Or Bush's father? Or Reagan? We've been avoiding real
> response to terrorism for at least 20 years, probably better something like
> 30 years, to take in NIxon, Ford, and Carter.
In fact, I think it's considered poor form in political circles for a
lame duck president to start a conflict in his last few months of
office. As to when a government takes notice of a threat, and how long
it takes them to respond, your guess is as good as mine. Though
Clinton did lob a few cruise missiles at Al Qaeda after the embassies
in Kenya and Tanzania(?) were bombed. Al's complaint about Bush
et. al. (and I've heard the same complaint from other sources) is that
1) the Bushies had a head start, because Clinton's people went out of
their way to alert them to the threat, and, perhaps even worse, 2)
when Bush ignored the threat, and it turned out he was wrong, he and
some of his people (i.e., Condoleeza Rice) lied to the press about
having been briefed on the threat.
Bruce
Michael S. Morris
Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2004
I said:
On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
district getting divvied up between 4 Republican
districts.
francis:
Wow! This sounds just like the school busing
programs the Dems were so fond of advocating.
Bingo.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Mazzolata
> Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2004
>
> I said:
> On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
> district getting divvied up between 4 Republican
> districts.
> francis:
> Wow! This sounds just like the school busing
> programs the Dems were so fond of advocating.
>
> Bingo.
Yeah, giving minority kids a chance to succeed in a good school is just
the same as getting rid of any chance that they have for political
representation.
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
> Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2004
>
> I said:
> On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
> district getting divvied up between 4 Republican
> districts.
> francis:
> Wow! This sounds just like the school busing
> programs the Dems were so fond of advocating.
>
> Bingo.
Huh? The goal of the bussing programs is the create schools with a
sub-population that roughly resembles the general population. The goal
of gerrymandering (on both sides, needless to say) is to create a
sub-population that does precisely NOT resemble the general population.
They are exactly opposite practices.
francis muir
<mazz...@hotmail.com> wrote:
So you allow that segregation has its virtues?
Sam Culotta
Bush didn't know shit.
Sam
"David O'Bedlam" <thed...@troll.weezl.org> wrote in message
news:Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@gebyy.jrrmy.bet...
>
>
> Linkname: TOMPAINE.com - Two Loud Words
> URL: http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/9689
>
>
> --
> "I will see the worship in their eyes, and I will lose it."
> ...................................................................
> (C) 2003 TheDavid^TM | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
>
francis muir
DZYKb.21937$P%1.211...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
<sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Mike's case would do precisely the opposite.
It would split up a segregated Latino/Black district and fuse the
pieces with four otherwise all-White (more-or-less) districts, thus
helping to create four new, pan-cultural, multi-ethnic, techni-colored
Congessional Districts. What could be more beneficial than that?
Oh, I quite forgot. Segregation is good.
smw
francis muir wrote:
It seems to me that he is objecting to the gerrymandering and not
objecting to the bussing. How does this constitute an endorsement of
segregation?
smw
francis muir wrote:
No, you forgot that the Latino/Black district is already the result of
gerrymandering. Really, Fido, what's ailing you?
>
Mazzolata
>>
>>Huh? The goal of the bussing programs is the create schools with a
>>sub-population that roughly resembles the general population. The goal
>>of gerrymandering (on both sides, needless to say) is to create a
>>sub-population that does precisely NOT resemble the general population.
>>They are exactly opposite practices.
>
>
> Wrong, wrong, wrong. Mike's case would do precisely the opposite.
> It would split up a segregated Latino/Black district and fuse the
> pieces with four otherwise all-White (more-or-less) districts, thus
> helping to create four new, pan-cultural, multi-ethnic, techni-colored
> Congessional Districts. What could be more beneficial than that?
>
> Oh, I quite forgot. Segregation is good.
>
The sub-population that Silke was referring to in the second case is
*Congress*, not the electorate of any specific district. Surely you're
not that dumb?
Mazzolata
Actually I mis-stated, or over-simplified, in my previous mail ...
Although gerrymandering creates districts that may or may not reflect
the general population, the end result affects the make-up of congress.
Ironically, the more that individual districts resemble the general
population, the less likely it is that congress will do so. This is the
motive behind what you might call "good gerrymandering" - the idea that
the only way to get minorities elected is to create "minority majority"
districts. This is distinctly opposed to the Tom Delay kind of
gerrymandering, which has a single goal - to get as many republicans in
power as possible.
smw
Mazzolata wrote:
Yes, I know. The whole concept, however, strikes me a bankrupt. I vastly
prefer the German system that combines directly elected representatives
with a proportionate representation. In national elections, that is, you
have two votes, one for candidate, one for party. The directly elected
candidates go straight to the Bundestag, where the remaining seats are
filled according to the results of vote-2.
Bruce McGuffin
> Tuesday, the 6th of February, 2004
>
> I said:
> If Howard Dean splits the Democratic Party (decides to pull a John
> Anderson if he doesn't get the nomination)...
> Mazzolata:
> Do you have any reason whatsoever for assuming that this is even a
> possibility ?
>
> Well, I have not been following the Demo-critters very carefully,
> but a CEO friend of mine has been watching every debate, and most
> of the going talk shows, and he claims that apparently is a
> possibility. Don't know---it seems to me that that would be a
> guaranteed way to lose.
What Dean said is that some of his supporters are not traditional
Democratic voters and probably won't vote for another Democrat in the
general election. His opponents tried to make that look like a
threatened third party run, but Dean denied it. I think this partiular
tempest has already moved to the back teapot.
Bruce
Death From Above
<<Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@gebyy.jrrmy.bet>>, David O'Bedlam
<thed...@troll.weezl.org> spleniated...
>The only "major party" U.S. presidential candidate I see with a strong
>anti-war, anti-"stasi" plank is Kucinich, who alone has pledged to roll
>back the "post 9/11" bullshit -- but Kucinich can't win because the TV
>anybody but Kucinich is a vote FOR the warfare state,
Kucinich doesn't support the welfare state?
ash
['So...he's actually Patrick Buchanan?']
smw
Death From Above wrote:
WARfare, friend, not WELfare.
Death From Above
<<3FFB8E47...@netdirect.net>>, Michael S. Morris
<msmo...@netdirect.net> spleniated...
>Well, I have not been following the Demo-critters very carefully,
>but a CEO friend of mine has been watching every debate, and most
>of the going talk shows, and he claims that apparently is a
>possibility. Don't know---it seems to me that that would be a
>guaranteed way to lose.
Dean hinted he would go third-party if he didn't get the nomination.
He has since said he would support whatever democrat gets the nomination.
>Heard today about the Republicans getting court approval to
>gerrymander districts in Texas. Apparently that way they are likely to
>pick up 8 House seats? Which makes it sound like the districts
>were pretty darn gerrymandered already in the other direction.
1> The statewide voting in Texas in the 2002 election split either
55-45% in favor of the Republicans or 60-40% (max) in favor of the
republicans. Given that Texas has 32 house seats, that implies that our
delegation should be split 18 (17.6)-14 in favor of the Republicans or 19
(19.2) - 13 in favor of the Republicans.
2> During the 2000 redistricting cycle, the Texas Senate was
controlled by Democrats, and the House by Republicans. They deadlocked on a
redistricting map. In accordance with state law, the redistricting was
conducted by a panel of three judges, all Republican. (The Supreme court
requires that all districts have EXACTLY the same population. Redistricting
therefore must be performed no matter what.)
The three judges were conservative, and only redraws the districts
lines as neccessary to adjust to the changing population. This resulted in 21
majority Republican districts, placing six Democrats in minority Democrat
districts. (Note that 21 Republican districts is 65% of the total number of
districts.)
3> In the the 2002 midterm elections, Republicans gained control of
the Texas Senate. The six Democrats, much to Republican surprise, were
re-elected in majority Republican districts. The strongest example of that is
Charlie Stenholm, a WMD (White Male Democrat). In a district that otherwise
went 78-22 in favor of Republicans across the ballot, he was re-elected 72-28.
Meaning he could have been re-elected with 50% purely on Republican votes.
4> Tom DeLay (Duh-lay aka DEE-lay) bug exterminator extraordinaire,
did not care for this outcome. Therefore the Republcians decided to go back
and re-redistrict. Redistricting is almost always left alone for 8 years
regardless of the outcome. (Thus, the quorum breaking by the House Democrats,
something that is almost never done.)
5> Since there were already 21 Republican districts, the primary
purpose of the redistricting was to engage in 'kidnapping' or 'bodysnatching'
which involves redrawing an incumbent's district in such a way that it
populated by voters unfamiliar with him. While they were at it, they also
packed the Democratic districts with as many Democratic voters as possible,
and spread the remaining Democratic voters as thinly as possible in the
Republican districts, making for 22 majority Republican districts (a 69-31%
split).
6> In 1986, the Supreme court said you cannot gerrymander districts
solely for the purpose of electing a minority to congress. They have not acted
on redistricting since.
7> Texas is trending Democratic. Should the Texas House and Senate
become majority Democratic, in say 2008, the precendent has been set for them
to immediately redraw the district lines. In fact, as of now, it seems that
statehouses can redraw lines anytime they wish. This is probably not a good
thing.
8> Given that those six Democratic congressmen (now five - Ralph Hall
switched parties) were elected in majority Republican districts, it is
entirely possible that some or all of them will be re-elected in their new
majority Republican districts. Presumably the legislature will then redraw the
lines AGAIN in 2005.
ash
['Isn't this fun?']
Robert Lee
@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com:
> WARfare, friend, not WELfare.
Not that it matters, since the real reason you should vote for Kucinich is
that he is the lone voice in Congress standing firm against space-based
psychotronic mind control weaponry.
--
--Robert
"There are men in this world," he said, "who go about demanding to be
killed. You must have noticed them...these are people who wander through
the world shouting 'Kill me. Kill me.' And there is always somebody
ready to oblige them."
--Mario Puzo, The Godfather
francis muir
RpZKb.21944$P%1.211...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
<sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
Precisely! The Dems, ever mindful of their Southron roots,
gerrymandered along segregationist lines and the Party of
Lincoln redresses the imbalance.
francis muir
It looks as though your mojo is in need of a service.
There is a distinction between "welfare" and "warfare".
Mazzolata
>
> Precisely! The Dems, ever mindful of their Southron roots,
> gerrymandered along segregationist lines and the Party of
> Lincoln redresses the imbalance.
>
In order to re-segregate the Capitol ?
francis muir
Iz_Kb.21991$P%1.212...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
<sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
Why am I reminded of that sly poem that Good Gordon,
Lord B, wrote directed at his wife, Annabella Milbanke,
as he left England for the last time. The little girl
mentioned is the mathhead Ada Gordon, generally known
as Lovelace for reasons I have never understood. I
understand that AM was pissed beyond all reason and
belief.
FARE thee well! and if for ever,
Still for ever, fare thee well:
Even though unforgiving, never
ąGainst thee shall my heart rebel.
Would that breast were bared before thee
Where thy head so oft hath lain,
While that placid sleep came oąer thee
Which thou neąer canst know again:
Would that breast, by thee glanced over,
Every inmost thought could show!
Then thou wouldst at last discover
ąTwas not well to spurn it so.
Though the world for this commend thee‹
Though it smile upon the blow,
Even its praises must offend thee,
Founded on anotherąs woe:
Though my many faults defaced me,
Could no other arm be found,
Than the one which once embraced me,
To inflict a cureless wound?
Yet, oh yet, thyself deceive not;
Love may sink by slow decay,
But by sudden wrench, believe not
Hearts can thus be torn away:
Still thine own its life retaineth,
Still must mine, though bleeding, beat;
And the undying thought which paineth
Is‹that we no more may meet.
These are words of deeper sorrow
Than the wail above the dead;
Both shall live, but every morrow
Wake us from a widowąd bed.
And when thou wouldst solace gather,
When our childąs first accents flow,
Wilt thou teach her to say ŚFather!ą
Though his care she must forego?
When her little hands shall press thee,
When her lip to thine is pressąd,
Think of him whose prayer shall bless thee,
Think of him thy love had blessąd!
Should her lineaments resemble
Those thou never more mayąst see,
Then thy heart will softly tremble
With a pulse yet true to me.
All my faults perchance thou knowest,
All my madness none can know;
All my hopes, whereąer thou goest,
Wither, yet with thee they go.
Every feeling hath been shaken;
Pride, which not a world could bow,
Bows to thee‹by thee forsaken,
Even my soul forsakes me now:
But ątis done‹all words are idle‹
Words from me are vainer still;
But the thoughts we cannot bridle
Force their way without the will.
Fare thee well! thus disunited,
Torn from every nearer tie,
Searąd in heart, and lone, and blighted,
More than this I scarce can die.
smw
Dear, can we pretend that you have not forgotten the political issue at
hand? Districting is meant to ensure some kind of minority
representation, however badly it does at the job. Districts that are
segregated along racial lines, in this weird system, appear to be the
only way to produce a congress that is not segregated along racial
lines. An irony, to be sure, but a political reality. So you may want to
make up your mind whether you consider segregation good or bad, no
matter your desire to give mazz grief.
francis muir
<mazz...@hotmail.com> wrote:
Members of Congress do not speak for themselves,
but for the persons they represent. Hence:
"Representative"
It is, of course, the various media who would have
you believe otherwise. Just as they teach that the
Pork Barrel is an evil thing when the reality is
that it shows just how a servient representative
should act.
smw
Mazzolata wrote:
Yeah, for once, Fido's wildly and oddly off the mark here. Consider
annoying him less so we can have the old one back?
Bob Henderson
"Michael S. Morris" wrote
>
> Wednesday, the 7th of January, 2003
>
> Bob Henderson wrote:
> A summary of evidence of the Shrub administration's complicity:
> http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4582.htm
snip
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA
Case No. 03-5273
ELLEN MARIANI, Individually, as
Personal Representative of the Estate
of LOUIS NEIL MARIANI, deceased,
and others similarly situated 1 ,
Plaintiff,
vs.
GEORGE W. BUSH 2 , President of
the United States, Officially and
Individually,
and ....... snip
Complaint filed Sep 12 2003 under theprovisions of the Constitution and the
Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
==========================
The 62 page complaint is on the web in PDF. I don't have a reference but
google should find it.
Mazzolata
I don't usually annoy him deliberately. OK, sometimes I do, but he can
be a cranky old fart at times.
David E. Latane
On Wed, 7 Jan 2004, smw wrote:
> Yes, I know. The whole concept, however, strikes me a bankrupt. I vastly
> prefer the German system
surprise! surprise!
D. latane
francis muir
WJ0Lb.22062$P%1.212...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
<sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
>
>
> francis muir wrote:
>> On 1/7/04 11:50 AM, in article
>> RpZKb.21944$P%1.211...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
>> <sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>
>>> francis muir wrote:
>>>
>
>>>> Oh, I quite forgot. Segregation is good.
>>>
>>> No, you forgot that the Latino/Black district is already the result of
>>> gerrymandering. Really, Fido, what's ailing you?
>>
>>
>> Precisely! The Dems, ever mindful of their Southron roots,
>> gerrymandered along segregationist lines and the Party of
>> Lincoln redresses the imbalance.
>
> Dear, can we pretend that you have not forgotten the political issue at
> hand? Districting is meant to ensure some kind of minority
> representation, however badly it does at the job.
Codswallop. The sole purpose of redistricting is to meet a
Constitutional provision that Congressional districts throughout
the United States all contain, as far as is reasonably possible,
the same number of persons.
smw
If that's supposed to be ironic, it's rather weak. I don't prefer it
because I'm German, I prefer it because it makes minority representation
possible, curbs the personality vote (remember the "I'd rather have Bush
than Gore for dinner" op-ed pieces four years back?), and keeps the big
parties on their toes.
But let's hear your objections. If you have any.
smw
francis muir wrote:
> On 1/7/04 3:36 PM, in article
> WJ0Lb.22062$P%1.212...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
> <sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
>
>
>>
>>francis muir wrote:
>>
>>>On 1/7/04 11:50 AM, in article
>>>RpZKb.21944$P%1.211...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com, "smw"
>>><sm...@ameritech.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>francis muir wrote:
>>>>
>>
>>>>>Oh, I quite forgot. Segregation is good.
>>>>
>>>>No, you forgot that the Latino/Black district is already the result of
>>>>gerrymandering. Really, Fido, what's ailing you?
>>>
>>>
>>>Precisely! The Dems, ever mindful of their Southron roots,
>>>gerrymandered along segregationist lines and the Party of
>>>Lincoln redresses the imbalance.
>>
>>Dear, can we pretend that you have not forgotten the political issue at
>>hand? Districting is meant to ensure some kind of minority
>>representation, however badly it does at the job.
>
>
> Codswallop. The sole purpose of redistricting is to meet a
> Constitutional provision that Congressional districts throughout
> the United States all contain, as far as is reasonably possible,
> the same number of persons.
Oh, come on, this is the height of fucking absurdity. The Republicans
are gerrymandering Texas for "the sole purpose" of having the same
number of people in their districts? What have you been drinking?
mephisto
Probably not. K. is one of those kind hearts that truly believes that
evil is solely the child of ignorance. He's fucking hopeless.
> ['So...he's actually Patrick Buchanan?']
They're alot closer (philosophically) than you think, I think.
---
'L'amour-propre est le plus grand de tous les flatteurs.'
Richard Harter
But only one of letters.
Richard Harter, c...@tiac.net
http://home.tiac.net/~cri, http://www.varinoma.com
A man with money is always charming - pomposity is just
an eccentricity, forgivable in the rich.
M J Carley
>If that's supposed to be ironic, it's rather weak. I don't prefer it
>because I'm German, I prefer it because it makes minority
>representation possible, curbs the personality vote (remember the
>"I'd rather have Bush than Gore for dinner" op-ed pieces four years
>back?), and keeps the big parties on their toes.
PR also has the advantage (I'm familiar with the Irish single
transferrable vote system) of making it possible to vote for the party
you really want to win and then for the party you think might win so
that you can try to keep out the party you really don't want to win.
This would have allowed Americans to vote for Nader followed by Gore
and spared us four years of whining.
--
`The above passage is carefully calculated to deprave the cultivated reader. '
No MS attachments: http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html
Home page: http://staff.bath.ac.uk/ensmjc/
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
Mazzolata:
So the fact that Dean was the one that suggested that they all agree
to support the eventual nominee must be irrelevant to this "friend"
of
yours. This just sounds like typical Republican smearing, Fox News
style.
I said:
Perhaps. I'll have to ask him if he watches Fox. I doubt it, though.
It does seem a pretty stupid "smear" for Republicans to try, since
it either will happen or won't, and if it happens it'll be to the
Republicans' advantage, and it is not going to matter at all if it
doesn't happen (doesn't change anybody's primary vote now).
Mazzolata:
No, the whole point is to smear Dean *now*, make him lose primaries
by
saying he's putting himself before the party. The point is that
they're
scared of Dean, more than any other candidate, despite what Rove
would
have you think. What is being said about Dean's unelectability is
*exactly* what was being said about Clinton in 92, and don't think
the
people running Bush's campaign don't know that.
Sorry, but I don't buy that at all. I think who's scared of
Dean is the Democratic establishment. I think the Bushies would
much rather face Dean in the election than, say, Clark.
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
Death From Above wrote:
1> The statewide voting in Texas in the 2002 election
split either 55-45% in favor of the Republicans or 60-40%
(max) in favor of the republicans. Given that Texas has
32 house seats, that implies that our delegation should
be split 18 (17.6)-14 in favor of the Republicans or 19
(19.2) - 13 in favor of the Republicans.
It implies absolutely nothing of the sort. If that 55% majority
were perfectly integrated throughout the state, it might
imply that all 32 Texas House seats should be Republican.
*You* are assuming that the districting should somehow be worked
so as to provide proportional representation for the two
political parties. There is nothing to say in law or in the
Constitution that this *should* be the case, however. Lots
of other things could be represented by how the districts are
drawn---race, for example, or urban centers versus rural interests,
or people who wear glasses versus people who don't. As far as I
understand, this is up to the state legislature, as long as the
districts are not drawn so as deliberately to disenfranchise racial
minorities (a highly debatable point, since there it is certainly
not the case that if a group makes up 20% of the population it should
end up with 20% of the seats in a winner-take-all system---i.e.
disenfranchised relative to what?).
DfA:
During the 2000 redistricting cycle, the Texas Senate
was controlled by Democrats, and the House by Republicans.
They deadlocked on a redistricting map. In accordance with
state law, the redistricting was conducted by a panel of
three judges, all Republican. (The Supreme court requires
that all districts have EXACTLY the same population.
Redistricting therefore must be performed no matter what.)
The three judges were conservative, and only redraws
the districts lines as neccessary to adjust to the changing
population.
So, given your history---that these judges redrew districts
minimally to account only for population shifts---, it would seem
the districts as of 2000 must have been set by the lege somewheres
back around 1992. Who drew the lines then?
DfA:
This resulted in 21 majority Republican districts,
placing six Democrats in minority Democrat districts. (Note
that 21 Republican districts is 65% of the total number of
districts.)
An absolutely irrelevant observation, as I've said. You imply
that that 65% number ought to be 55% or at max 60%. In fact,
there is no agreed-upon principle which says that either of
those would be fair.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2003
Yeah, and there are those who want to try Henry Kissinger as a war
criminal,
too. Sensible people call them nutcases. I think this complaint is
the complaint of a nutcase. If I were wrong and there really is a
VRWC around September 11, then all guilty parties ought to be tried
and executed, after being impeached and removed from office where
relevant. But, conspiracy theories like this are stupider in my
estimation
than the young-earth creationism of some Christian fundamentalists.
We'd have to believe in thousands of complicit persons in mass murder,
none of whom have broken ranks yet. We'd also have to believe that this
all had some purpose---that war in Afghanistan and Iraq were "good for
business" or somesuch, when it seems like just the opposite has played
out. The cost of the war has imperiled the most important part of
Bush's platform---the tax cuts, and it has certainly delayed recovery
from the bursting of the Clintonian "irrationally exuberant" stock
bubble.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
jonah thomas
> Mazzolata:
> No, the whole point is to smear Dean *now*, make him lose primaries
> by saying he's putting himself before the party. The point is that
> they're scared of Dean, more than any other candidate, despite what Rove
> would have you think. What is being said about Dean's unelectability is
> *exactly* what was being said about Clinton in 92, and don't think the
> people running Bush's campaign don't know that.
*
> Sorry, but I don't buy that at all. I think who's scared of
> Dean is the Democratic establishment. I think the Bushies would
> much rather face Dean in the election than, say, Clark.
Everybody's scared of a front-runner. My guess is, though, that it's
only the Bushies who have anything to be scared of Dean. Suppose he
gets elected, then he's likely to wind up like Clinton and do
everything the republicans want even while they vilify him.
Given the level of political leadership we've had in the last 20 years
I think we'd do better to have a president and legislature of
different parties and they stay deadlocked all the time. Having our
government do nothing is probably about the best we can hope for. But
it isn't likely. Still, I wouldn't too much object to another Bush
administration with a 2/3 democratic majority in house and senate.
Provided it's true that none of his people had anything to do with
9/11. It isn't enough that Bush didn't know they were doing it; they
could do it again without him knowing.
I think the argument that it's republicans who're scared of Dean is
based on the idea that republicans control the media. If they didn't
want this particular smear to get out, it wouldn't have gotten
reported much. I'm not sure that's true. Maybe it isn't that
republicans control the media. Maybe it's just that democrats are
basicly boring and mostly they don't do anything that people care
about, so of course the media don't report on them much unless they
actually do something scandalous.
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
I said:
On NPR they were talking about a "black and Latino"
district getting divvied up between 4 Republican
districts.
francis:
Wow! This sounds just like the school busing
programs the Dems were so fond of advocating.
I said:
Bingo.
Silke:
Huh? The goal of the bussing programs
"Busing", no?
Silke:
is the create schools with a
sub-population that roughly resembles the general
population.
Look, this bullshit deserves reams of response or nothing.
I don't want to write reams. "The general population" does
not exist in quite the way your childlike faith in it suggests.
All there are are different demographic percentages
by race and ethnicity depending on where and how large
you draw the geographical lines.
Silke:
The goal of gerrymandering (on both sides, needless to say) is to
create a sub-population that does precisely NOT resemble the general
population.
Nonsense. The Republicans in Texas, assuming the radio reported it
correctly, divvied up a "black and Latino" district into 4 separate
Republican districts. If so, A) I'd call that gerrymandering. B) They
moved
the districting in the direction of resemblance to "the general
population"
and not in the direction away from resemblance. The goal of
gerrymandering is to win elections. That's all.
Silke:
They are exactly opposite practices.
They are exactly the same (the Republican example in Texas
of divvying up a "black and Latino" district into 4 Repub districts,
and the example of divvying up inner-city kids and busing them
to the suburbs) in that they try to "socially engineer" both the
schools and the congressional districts to reflect the ethnic
mix of "the general population". Now, granted, the gerrymandering
in Indianapolis---Democrat inner-city congressional district,
Republican suburban district snaking around the city tries to
represent differences in locality (inner-city versus the burbs)
in the representation. So that one would be opposite. Gerrymandering
is about winning elections, and neither really about making
districts either resemble or not resemble "the general population".
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
Silke:
No, you forgot that the Latino/Black district is
already the result of gerrymandering. Really, Fido,
what's ailing you?
Exactly. There is gerrymandering which moves the districting in
the direction of "resemblance to the general population" and
there is gerrymandering which moves it in the opposite
direction.
Therefore gerrymandering per se is neither the same nor the
opposite of busing. Sometimes it is the same (the case francis
commented on) and sometimes it is the opposite (the creation
of the black/Latino district in the first place). But what it is
about is party politics and trying to win elections.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
francis muir
> Therefore gerrymandering per se is neither the same nor the
> opposite of busing. Sometimes it is the same (the case francis
> commented on) and sometimes it is the opposite (the creation
> of the black/Latino district in the first place). But what it is
> about is party politics and trying to win elections.
And there is nothing, absolutely nothing egregious about
that last; it is the lifeblood of a representative democracy.
jonah thomas
> Yeah, and there are those who want to try Henry Kissinger as a war
> criminal, too. Sensible people call them nutcases.
Wait a minute. Aside from the question of practicality of actually
staging a trial, are you arguing that Henry Kissinger might not
actually be a war criminal? Do you have some sort of evidence that
might imply he could be innocent?
> I think this complaint is
> the complaint of a nutcase. If I were wrong and there really is a
> VRWC around September 11, then all guilty parties ought to be tried
> and executed, after being impeached and removed from office where
> relevant. But, conspiracy theories like this are stupider in my
> estimation
> than the young-earth creationism of some Christian fundamentalists.
> We'd have to believe in thousands of complicit persons in mass murder,
> none of whom have broken ranks yet.
Would it have to be thousands who weren't spies? We do have a few FBI
etc people who testify they were tracking those particular people and
were ordered not to. How many people would have to be complicit?
> We'd also have to believe that this
> all had some purpose---that war in Afghanistan and Iraq were "good for
> business" or somesuch, when it seems like just the opposite has played
> out. The cost of the war has imperiled the most important part of
> Bush's platform---the tax cuts, and it has certainly delayed recovery
> from the bursting of the Clintonian "irrationally exuberant" stock
> bubble.
That argues that the hypothetical conspirators were ultimately
competent. They could have predicted great results that didn't
happen. See, we could use your same logic to show that the US never
chose to fight in Vietnam. The results were bad for us in many ways,
we got a lot of casualties and lost the war, it was tremendous expense
that we paid for incompetently leading to stagflation, etc. "We'd
have to believe that this all had some purpose." But it was a
mistake. Maybe it would have worked out if we'd been more resolute,
but we weren't resolute enough to carry it off. If only the
vietnamese had bombed the Empire State building or Pearl Harbor or
something....
Here's a detail. Suppose the hypothetical conspirators predicted the
effects of the bombing. Everybody else got it wrong, why would they
get it right? They'd use the official estimates and figure that the
planes would take out a couple of floors and everybody else would
likely get out OK. They might hypothetically have been very upset
when the buildings collapsed and the estimates came out of 50,000 or
so casualties, when they'd been estimating in the hundreds and little
disruption of stock market trading etc. People naturally tend to
assume superhuman conspirators who never fail, but real conspirators
tend toward making fuckups like everybody else does.
And if there are dozens of surviving conspirators, there might very
well be a real leak within the next few years. Provided enough of
them survive that long.
``a2w
jonah thomas
OK, how about rigging the computers to miscount tthe votes as a method
of party politics and trying to win elections?
You have to draw the line somewhere. I say that it's marginally OK to
systematically lie to voters to try to get them to vote for you, but
it isn't OK to try to keep their votes from counting.
Gerrymandering is an explicit attempt to keep my vote from counting.
It's wrong. It is absurd that we let politicians decide the districting.
If we don't find a nonpartisan way to figure voting district
boundaries we ought to admit that we don't know how to run an election
and invite the UN to draw up our districts for us.
Mazzolata
When blacks and Latinos have congregated in cities, surely it is more
reasonable and more representative to make that city the hub of a
district, rather than carve the city into tiny chunks, each attached to
a large, mostly white suburban area? This is the what the republicans
will do at any opportunity. It is clearly more gerrymandered than the
alternative, and removes the likelihood of the minority citizens having
representation that actually cares about their needs.
(And yes, I do know that some districts created specifically to
encourage minority representation look like snakes twisting through the
countryside, and regard them as examples of a good thing taken way too
far).
francis muir
> Gerrymandering is an explicit attempt to keep my vote from counting.
> It's wrong. It is absurd that we let politicians decide the districting.
It is absurd that YOU let politicians decide the districting.
In fact each State decides how they administer it, and it is
up to YOU to do something about it if you don't like it. Do
you seriously believe that whining will get you anywhere?
Bruce McGuffin
Nobody here has mentioned the real issue, which is that the Republican
party has developed computer programs to gerrymander more efficiently
than it's ever been done before. Allegedly the new district lines in
Texas are tailored right down to individual houses, based on the
residents' voting history.
Bruce
David O'Bedlam
> On Wed, 07 Jan 2004 14:52:25 -0800, francis muir
> <francis....@balliol.org> wrote:
> >There is a distinction between "welfare" and "warfare".
>
> But only one of letters.
No, in TWO of the letters.
w e l f a r e
w A R f a r e
See?
D.
--
"I will see the worship in their eyes, and I will lose it."
...................................................................
(C) 2004 TheDavid^TM | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
francis muir
McGuffin" <mcgu...@edinburgh.ll.mit.edu> wrote:
It was about time that the Party of lincoln caught up with the
spectacularly efficient gerrymandering and vote-stuffing, &c.,
&c. that was the hallmark of the Dems in Illinois and Texas in
the not-too-distant past.
"Vote Early, Vote Often"
Bruce McGuffin
> In the referenced article, smw <sm...@ameritech.net> writes:
>
> >If that's supposed to be ironic, it's rather weak. I don't prefer it
> >because I'm German, I prefer it because it makes minority
> >representation possible, curbs the personality vote (remember the
> >"I'd rather have Bush than Gore for dinner" op-ed pieces four years
> >back?), and keeps the big parties on their toes.
>
> PR also has the advantage (I'm familiar with the Irish single
> transferrable vote system) of making it possible to vote for the party
> you really want to win and then for the party you think might win so
> that you can try to keep out the party you really don't want to win.
> This would have allowed Americans to vote for Nader followed by Gore
> and spared us four years of whining.
Well, at least spared us four years of liberal whining.
Bruce
obbook: Savage Nation by Michael Savage (nee Weiner)
Steve Murgaski
wrote:
>Michael S. Morris wrote:
>> I think this complaint is
>> the complaint of a nutcase. If I were wrong and there really is a
>> VRWC around September 11, then all guilty parties ought to be tried
>> and executed, after being impeached and removed from office where
>> relevant. But, conspiracy theories like this are stupider in my
>> estimation
>> than the young-earth creationism of some Christian fundamentalists.
>> We'd have to believe in thousands of complicit persons in mass murder,
>> none of whom have broken ranks yet.
>
>Would it have to be thousands who weren't spies? We do have a few FBI
>etc people who testify they were tracking those particular people and
>were ordered not to. How many people would have to be complicit?
If the whole thing was a planned conspiracy, then smashing a plane
into the pentagon doesn't make sense to me. It isn't good PR. You
can't wax eloquent about the poor innocent military planners who lost
their lives through this act of incomprehensible, senseless terrorism.
American politicians hardly ever use that crash at all.
Same with the plane that went down in Pennsylvania.
Also, if Bush had known all the details before it happened, he
should've been tempted to play the fearless leader role right away.
You'd expect him standing up in the whitehouse on Sep. 11, making
passionate speeches about evil, and not giving in to terrorists.
Instead he was flying around in planes, or hiding in bunkers, or some
such thing, for the first 12 hours or so.
I don't think the conspiracy idea is ridiculous, but I can't see it as
a complete explanation.
Maybe people in the US government were warned that this could happen,
but they get many such warnings, and didn't pay attention. Maybe
people in the FBI were indeed ordered not to investigate Bin Laden,
since his family is connected to Bush, through business. But none of
that necessarily means the whole thing was known beforehand, and
allowed to happen. It could just be a series of bad decisions coming
together.
Undoubtedly the tragedy is being exploited. But that seems like
standard operating procedure.
David O'Bedlam
> Death From Above wrote:
> > Kucinich doesn't support the welfare state?
>
> Probably not. K. is one of those kind hearts that truly believes that
> evil is solely the child of ignorance. He's fucking hopeless.
What does evil and ignorance have to do with the welfare state? You're
being academical, Oli.
Mazzolata
>
> It was about time that the Party of lincoln .. <snip senile rambling>
>
Lincoln would not recognize today's Republicans as his party.
francis muir
> francis muir wrote:
>
>> It was about time that the Party of Lincoln .. <snip senile rambling>
>
> Lincoln would not recognize today's Republicans as his party.
Maz, I am concerned that you and smw and perhaps some others may
get your respective knickers in such a twist as to do yourselves
some injury so let me whisper the words that seem to have passed
you by: EXTENDED IRONY. It is rather well known that the phrase
"The Party of Lincoln" is always to be interpreted in its ironic
sense, in much the same way that Swift really was not advocating
a diet of neonates.
rec.arts.books should be a forum for debate where the model should
be the classical Greek SUMPOSION. We are not here to spew our beliefs
across the internet but to argue positions which may, hopefully, have
little or nothing to do with our personal beliefs. Can you see no
virtue in "for the sake of argument"?
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
I said:
Yeah, and there are those who want to try Henry Kissinger as a war
criminal, too. Sensible people call them nutcases.
jonah thomas:
Wait a minute. Aside from the question of practicality of actually
staging a trial, are you arguing that Henry Kissinger might not
actually be a war criminal?
I guess I thought he was Secretary of State, and negotiated the
removal of US troops from the Vietnam War with a murderous and
implacable enemy, Le Duc Tho.
jonah thomas:
Do you have some sort of evidence that might imply he could be innocent?
I've read Stanley Karnow's _Vietnam: A History_ and think that
if anyone were to be charged with being a war criminal for
extending the conflict years beyond when it would have been to
their advantage to sign the Treaty, it would have been the North Vietnamese
leadership. I certainly can't see that Henry Kissinger ever did anything
wrong. I'm not even sure that I see Nixon, the US President and
Commander in Chief (different guy than the Secretary of State)---in
ordering the "Christmas bombing of Hanoi" for instance did anything
wrong, given the communist recalcitrance and delaying at the peace talks.
I said:
I think this complaint is the complaint of a nutcase. If I were
wrong and there really is a VRWC around September 11, then
all guilty parties ought to be tried and executed, after being
impeached and removed from office where relevant. But,
conspiracy theories like this are stupider in my estimation
than the young-earth creationism of some Christian fundamentalists.
We'd have to believe in thousands of complicit persons in mass murder,
none of whom have broken ranks yet.
jonah thomas:
Would it have to be thousands who weren't spies?
I think it would. I also find it the height of credulity to
believe that two persons in Washington could keep a
secret between them.
jonah thomas:
We do have a few FBI etc people who testify they were
tracking those particular people and were ordered not to.
How many people would have to be complicit?
The whole security force of the WTC to plant charges to
demolish the towers, or get out of the way of the people
who planted the charges? They all volunteered to be killed
in the attack?
I said:
We'd also have to believe that this
all had some purpose---that war in Afghanistan and Iraq were "good for
business" or somesuch, when it seems like just the opposite has played
out. The cost of the war has imperiled the most important part of
Bush's platform---the tax cuts, and it has certainly delayed recovery
from the bursting of the Clintonian "irrationally exuberant" stock
bubble.
jonah thomas:
That argues that the hypothetical conspirators were ultimately
competent.
So, they are clever enough to perpetrate the attack, involving the
witting or unwitting cooperation of thousands of people, and
cover it up in such a way there is no smoking gun, and yet they
are not competent to have been able to predict some personal
gain they were going to get out of all of it?
jonah thomas:
They could have predicted great results that didn't
happen.
Such as?
jonah thomas:
See, we could use your same logic to show that the US never
chose to fight in Vietnam. The results were bad for us in many ways,
we got a lot of casualties and lost the war, it was tremendous expense
that we paid for incompetently leading to stagflation, etc. "We'd
have to believe that this all had some purpose." But it was a
mistake. Maybe it would have worked out if we'd been more resolute,
but we weren't resolute enough to carry it off. If only the
vietnamese had bombed the Empire State building or Pearl Harbor or
something...
Seems to me the Vietnam example cuts my way: Government is
stupid and incompetent at keeping secrets. Seems to me mostly what
was done was done in the open, and mistakes were made. The consipracy
idea supposes a level of cleverness inconsistent with government's
basic incompetence.
jonah:
Here's a detail. Suppose the hypothetical conspirators predicted the
effects of the bombing. Everybody else got it wrong, why would they
get it right? They'd use the official estimates and figure that the
planes would take out a couple of floors and everybody else would
likely get out OK. They might hypothetically have been very upset
when the buildings collapsed and the estimates came out of 50,000 or
so casualties, when they'd been estimating in the hundreds and little
disruption of stock market trading etc. People naturally tend to
assume superhuman conspirators who never fail, but real conspirators
tend toward making fuckups like everybody else does.
So, with this scenario, these conspirators are getting CIA guys to
sacrifice themselves as faux "Arab terrorists"? And you think anyone
in his right mind is going to predict the extent of the effect on
the stock market of even 4 airliners crashing into open fields because
of terrorist strike?
jonah:
And if there are dozens of surviving conspirators, there might very
well be a real leak within the next few years. Provided enough of
them survive that long.
Television must do this to brains.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
Richard Harter
<thed...@troll.weezl.org> wrote:
>On Thu, 8 Jan 2004, Richard Harter wrote:
>> On Wed, 07 Jan 2004 14:52:25 -0800, francis muir
>> <francis....@balliol.org> wrote:
>[...]
>
>> >There is a distinction between "welfare" and "warfare".
>>
>> But only one of letters.
>
>No, in TWO of the letters.
>
> w e l f a r e
> w A R f a r e
>
>
>See?
But I didn't write "one of the letters"; rather I wrote "one of
letters", which signifies otherwise.
See?
Richard Harter
<thed...@troll.weezl.org> wrote:
>On Thu, 8 Jan 2004, mephisto wrote:
>> Death From Above wrote:
>
>> > Kucinich doesn't support the welfare state?
>>
>> Probably not. K. is one of those kind hearts that truly believes that
>> evil is solely the child of ignorance. He's fucking hopeless.
>
>What does evil and ignorance have to do with the welfare state?
Much.
>You're
>being academical, Oli.
Richard Harter, c...@tiac.net
Mazzolata
> On Thu, 8 Jan 2004 13:24:28 +1400, David O'Bedlam
> <thed...@troll.weezl.org> wrote:
>
>
>>On Thu, 8 Jan 2004, Richard Harter wrote:
>>
>>>On Wed, 07 Jan 2004 14:52:25 -0800, francis muir
>>><francis....@balliol.org> wrote:
>>
>>[...]
>>
>>
>>>>There is a distinction between "welfare" and "warfare".
>>>
>>>But only one of letters.
>>
>>No, in TWO of the letters.
>>
>> w e l f a r e
>> w A R f a r e
>>
>>
>>See?
>
>
> But I didn't write "one of the letters"; rather I wrote "one of
> letters", which signifies otherwise.
>
> See?
Umm, I think he knew that, and someone was having their plonker pulled ...
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
> Silke:
> is the create schools with a
> sub-population that roughly resembles the general
> population.
>
> Look, this bullshit deserves reams of response or nothing.
> I don't want to write reams. "The general population" does
> not exist in quite the way your childlike faith in it suggests.
> All there are are different demographic percentages
> by race and ethnicity depending on where and how large
> you draw the geographical lines.
Your knee's jerking. I didn't specify which general population. It's a
simple question of redistributionn within a given line.
> Silke:
> The goal of gerrymandering (on both sides, needless to say) is to
> create a sub-population that does precisely NOT resemble the general
> population.
>
> Nonsense. The Republicans in Texas, assuming the radio reported it
> correctly, divvied up a "black and Latino" district into 4 separate
> Republican districts. If so, A) I'd call that gerrymandering. B) They
> moved
> the districting in the direction of resemblance to "the general
> population"
> and not in the direction away from resemblance. The goal of
> gerrymandering is to win elections. That's all.
And in the case of the Texas gerrymandering, the goal of winning the
election includes denying representation to the majority of the minority.
Death From Above
<<Iz_Kb.21991$P%1.212...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com>>, smw
<sm...@ameritech.net> spleniated...
>Death From Above wrote:
>> On Tue, 6 Jan 2004 16:34:39 +1400, in message
>> <<Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@gebyy.jrrmy.bet>>, David O'Bedlam
>> <thed...@troll.weezl.org> spleniated...
>>>The only "major party" U.S. presidential candidate I see with a strong
>>>anti-war, anti-"stasi" plank is Kucinich, who alone has pledged to roll
>>>back the "post 9/11" bullshit -- but Kucinich can't win because the TV
>>>networks say he can't. If you bother to vote, remember that voting for
>>>anybody but Kucinich is a vote FOR the warfare state,
>> ['So...he's actually Patrick Buchanan?']
>WARfare, friend, not WELfare.
Fair enough.
Therefore, next question: Why Kucinich instead of Carole Mosley Braun?
Or why the troll instead of the black lady? Or Al Sharpton for that matter?
ash
['Is Carole Mosley Braun in favor of the WARfare state? Why not Ralph Nader?
Or whomever the Greens nominate? Hell, why not Dean?']
Death From Above
<<BC21CDA9.178A6%francis....@balliol.org>>, francis muir
<francis....@balliol.org> spleniated...
>> Kucinich doesn't support the welfare state?
>> ash
>> ['So...he's actually Patrick Buchanan?']
My mojo is fine, thank you.
>There is a distinction between "welfare" and "warfare".
No shit.
ash
['Have you tried any of those lovely dick enhancers they're always sending
spam about?']
smw
francis muir wrote:
Especially if it leads to single party rule. Yeah, sure.
>
Death From Above
<<%L4Lb.32703$IM3....@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>>, mephisto
<devilofatimetra...@ninth.circle.mil> spleniated...
>Death From Above wrote:
>> On Tue, 6 Jan 2004 16:34:39 +1400, in message
>> <<Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@gebyy.jrrmy.bet>>, David O'Bedlam
>> <thed...@troll.weezl.org> spleniated...
>>>The only "major party" U.S. presidential candidate I see with a strong
>>>anti-war, anti-"stasi" plank is Kucinich, who alone has pledged to roll
>>>back the "post 9/11" bullshit -- but Kucinich can't win because the TV
>>>networks say he can't. If you bother to vote, remember that voting for
>>>anybody but Kucinich is a vote FOR the warfare state,
Er, probably does support the WELfare state, but evidently not the
WARfare state. Whatever that is.
>K. is one of those kind hearts that truly believes that
>evil is solely the child of ignorance. He's fucking hopeless.
Right. A pure-bred secular humanist.
>> ['So...he's actually Patrick Buchanan?']
>They're alot closer (philosophically) than you think, I think.
Philosophically, probably not. Buchanan IS a practicing Catholic.
Practically, probably so. Almost certainly so, since there was an article in
American Conservative suggesting that the true (non-neo-)conservatives get
together with the left to oppose invading Iraq.
>'L'amour-propre est le plus grand de tous les flatteurs.'
{blink} Whole what of big men?
ash
['This is just one fo those weeks, isn't it?']
Richard Harter
wrote:
No, really? I didn't know that. It's quite all right, you can have
your plonker back.
jonah thomas
> jonah thomas wrote:
>
>>Gerrymandering is an explicit attempt to keep my vote from counting.
>>It's wrong. It is absurd that we let politicians decide the districting.
> It is absurd that YOU let politicians decide the districting.
It is absurd that WE let politicians decide the districting.
> In fact each State decides how they administer it, and it is
> up to YOU to do something about it if you don't like it. Do
> you seriously believe that whining will get you anywhere?
Are you suggesting I take unilateral action? Blow up a state capitol or
something? No, this is something that requires political action and the
start is for a collection of fed-up voters to agree that we aren't going
to keep taking it.
I suppose nuking Texas might be a viable start but it wouldn't really
solve the problem.
Mazzolata
> francis muir wrote:
>
>> jonah thomas wrote:
>>
>>> Gerrymandering is an explicit attempt to keep my vote from counting.
>>> It's wrong. It is absurd that we let politicians decide the
>>> districting.
>>
>
>> It is absurd that YOU let politicians decide the districting.
>
>
> It is absurd that WE let politicians decide the districting.
>
>> In fact each State decides how they administer it, and it is
>> up to YOU to do something about it if you don't like it. Do
>> you seriously believe that whining will get you anywhere?
>
>
> Are you suggesting I take unilateral action? Blow up a state capitol or
> something? No, this is something that requires political action and the
> start is for a collection of fed-up voters to agree that we aren't going
> to keep taking it.
I think that is exactly what he's telling you. Of course, Francis knows
as well as you and I do that there is very little chance of a once a
decade process ever being a high enough priority for the majority of
voters that anything would ever get done about it. Especially as at
least half the population will be happy about the most recent round of
gerrymandering anyway.
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
Silke:
And in the case of the Texas gerrymandering, the goal
of winning the election includes denying representation
to the majority of the minority.
Well, they have a choice of either that or denying it to
the minority of the majority. Either way, somebody gets denied
representation. In point of fact, usually I'm the one who gets
denied representation. I'd bet, in terms of your political preferences
and mine, that you, even given that you are a non-citizen, have always
been much more closely "represented" in American congressional
districts in which you have lived than I ever have been in those
in which I have lived.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
>
>
> Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
>
> Silke:
> And in the case of the Texas gerrymandering, the goal
> of winning the election includes denying representation
> to the majority of the minority.
>
> Well, they have a choice of either that or denying it to
> the minority of the majority. Either way, somebody gets denied
> representation.
???? The alternative to one-party rule is not another-one-party rule,
but more-than-one-party rule.
> In point of fact, usually I'm the one who gets
> denied representation.
Yup. No white guys with money anywhere in sight in congress.
Michael S. Morris
Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
Silke:
Especially if it leads to single party rule. Yeah, sure.
You are very foolish in such a comment. The point is
clear: The people of Texas may take their revenge on their
Texas legislators by electing Democrats, who may then
perfectly well gerrymander the districts in the opposite
direction.
In fact, the radical nature of what the Republicans
have done in Texas carries a political cost, and there will be a
payback to the Republicans, and, the system can get more
unstable---the opposite of single party rule.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
David O'Bedlam
> But I didn't write "one of the letters"; rather I wrote "one of
> letters", which signifies otherwise.
I stand corrected, but I don't get your point. Is it that you see
no difference between "warfare state" and "welfare state" except
for the spelling?
I don't think you mean to say there's no difference between the
concepts "warfare" and "welfare" (or "Welfare"), right?
(Fer cryin' out loud, I'm easily confused when I'm sober!)
David O'Bedlam
> >What does evil and ignorance have to do with the welfare state?
>
> Much.
So TELL ME, man! I'm all ears, or whatever!
D.
jonah thomas
>>>We'd have to believe in thousands of complicit persons in mass murder,
>>>none of whom have broken ranks yet.
>>Would it have to be thousands who weren't spies? We do have a few FBI
>>etc people who testify they were tracking those particular people and
>>were ordered not to. How many people would have to be complicit?
> If the whole thing was a planned conspiracy, then smashing a plane
> into the pentagon doesn't make sense to me. It isn't good PR. You
> can't wax eloquent about the poor innocent military planners who lost
> their lives through this act of incomprehensible, senseless terrorism.
> American politicians hardly ever use that crash at all.
We don't know the constraints they were working under.
> Same with the plane that went down in Pennsylvania.
If there were specific orders not to shoot it down at that point, word
might get out and it would have to be explained. On the other hand,
it could have been shot down without orders. The pilot who did that
might be in trouble but we wouldn't hear about it -- officially that
plane was never shot down at all.
> Also, if Bush had known all the details before it happened, he
> should've been tempted to play the fearless leader role right away.
> You'd expect him standing up in the whitehouse on Sep. 11, making
> passionate speeches about evil, and not giving in to terrorists.
> Instead he was flying around in planes, or hiding in bunkers, or some
> such thing, for the first 12 hours or so.
That's a good point. That makes it very plausible that Bush wasn't in
on it. It makes him look very bad and I can't imagine a reason. True
we don't know the constraints, but it's hard for me to imagine that one.
> I don't think the conspiracy idea is ridiculous, but I can't see it as
> a complete explanation.
> Maybe people in the US government were warned that this could happen,
> but they get many such warnings, and didn't pay attention. Maybe
> people in the FBI were indeed ordered not to investigate Bin Laden,
> since his family is connected to Bush, through business. But none of
> that necessarily means the whole thing was known beforehand, and
> allowed to happen. It could just be a series of bad decisions coming
> together.
One central filter that needs to be put on all the data is that all
the official data is coming from large organizations that don't want
to look bad. If bin Laden wasn't behind it, why didn't he deny
responsibility? Well, he had to express sympathy with suicide bombers
or he'd lose credibility among his own people. So his own alleged
statements don't tell us whether it was his people doing it. If it
was his people doing it, we don't know whether they got the signal
from him or from somebody who'd deciphered his codes. That last could
be CIA or Mossad either one.
The FBI looks better if they were on top of it but got called off by
politicians. The CIA etc look better if they made lots of warnings
that got ignored. Everybody's trying to shift the blame, except bin
Laden who looks bad unless he takes responsibility.
> Undoubtedly the tragedy is being exploited. But that seems like
> standard operating procedure.
There's the question who benefits. This is not reliable, nothing is
reliable at this point. People can benefit by accident and they can
do things hoping for results that it turns out don't happen. But the
obvious first candidate is the Sharon regime. Bush was actually
talking with saudi leaders, he gave his personal word that he would
support a full palestinian state next door to israel. He pressured
Sharon some. After 9/11 Sharon got everything he asked for without
being asked for anything in return, and Bush had no sympathy
whatsoever for any palestinians. And witgh the US army in iraq it
will be a very long time before iraq is ever a military threat to
israel. And every moslem fanatic who sneaks into iraq to kill
american soldiers is one less to sneak into the west bank to kill
israeli soldiers. 9/11 was the best thing that ever happened to Sharon.
The other group that obviously benefitted was the american empire
idiots. They'd been pushing hard for invading iraq and it looked like
nothing was happening. After 9/11 for awhile they got everything they
wanted too. Would either group balk at killing a few americans for a
great purpose? Of course not. And they likely didn't expect to
destroy the whole building. Bin Laden allegedly said he was surprised
at the destruction, and maybe so was everybody who calculated it.
There are pople who claim a conspiracy that planted lots of explosives
to get that result, but it doesn't make sense to me. (Which doesn't
say it's wrong or right, physical evidence might say about that. But
it doesn't make sense.) Bin Laden didn't benefit more by destroying
the whole building, he'd have done at least as well to just take out a
couple of floors. Probably so would the israelis or the empire
idiots. It could very likely have been an honest miscalculation on
whoever's part. Why get a lot of people involved with explosives to
get a result that wasn't necessary? Well, if some of the guys with
explosives show up and lead us to their bosses we might find out it
really did happen that way and maybe they'll explain what stupid idea
led them to it. It doesn't seem plausible but then there hasn't been
a plausible explanation for any of it, yet.
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
>
>
> Thursday, the 8th of January, 2004
>
> Silke:
> Especially if it leads to single party rule. Yeah, sure.
>
> You are very foolish in such a comment. The point is
> clear: The people of Texas may take their revenge on their
> Texas legislators by electing Democrats, who may then
> perfectly well gerrymander the districts in the opposite
> direction.
What makes you think I wouldn't object to one-party-rule by democrats?
> In fact, the radical nature of what the Republicans
> have done in Texas carries a political cost, and there will be a
> payback to the Republicans, and, the system can get more
> unstable---the opposite of single party rule.
You're cute.