Sunday readings

For the first Sunday of Lent:
Deuteronomy 26:5-10

Then you shall declare before the LORD your God: "My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down into Egypt with a few people and lived there and became a great nation, powerful and numerous. But the Egyptians mistreated us and made us suffer, putting us to hard labor. Then we cried out to the LORD, the God of our fathers, and the LORD heard our voice and saw our misery, toil and oppression. So the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror and with miraculous signs and wonders. He brought us to this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey; and now I bring the firstfruits of the soil that you, O LORD, have given me." Place the basket before the LORD your God and bow down before him.

Romans 10:8b-13

"The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,"[Deut. 30:14] that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, "Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame."[Isaiah 28:16] For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile--the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved."[Joel 2:32]

Luke 4:1-13

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry.

The devil said to him, "If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread."

Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone.'"[Deut. 8:3]

The devil led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And he said to him, "I will give you all their authority and splendor, for it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. So if you worship me, it will all be yours."

Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.'"[Deut. 6:13]

The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. "If you are the Son of God," he said, "throw yourself down from here. For it is written: "'He will command his angels concerning you
to guard you carefully;
they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.'"[Psalm 91:11,12]

Jesus answered, "It says: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'"[Deut. 6:16]

When the devil had finished all this tempting, he left him until an opportune time.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Here's something the 'liberal media' will bury

John Kerry's speech:
Fighting a Comprehensive War on Terrorism Here are some excerpts:

This war isn’t just a manhunt – a checklist of names from a deck of cards. In it, we do not face just one man or one terrorist group. We face a global jihadist movement of many groups, from different sources, with separate agendas, but all committed to assaulting the United States and free and open societies around the globe.

As CIA Director George Tenet recently testified: “They are not all creatures of bin Laden, and so their fate is not tied to his. They have autonomous leadership, they pick their own targets, they plan their own attacks.”

At the core of this conflict is a fundamental struggle of ideas. Of democracy and tolerance against those who would use any means and attack any target to impose their narrow views.

The War on Terror is not a clash of civilizations. It is a clash of civilization against chaos; of the best hopes of humanity against dogmatic fears of progress and the future.

Like all Americans, I responded to President Bush’s reassuring words in the days after September 11th. But since then, his actions have fallen short.

I do not fault George Bush for doing too much in the War on Terror; I believe he’s done too little.

Here are some of the main points of Senator Kerry's plan:

First, if I am President I will not hesitate to order direct military action when needed to capture and destroy terrorist groups and their leaders. George Bush inherited the strongest military in the world – and he has weakened it. What George Bush and his armchair hawks have never understood is that our military is about more than moving pins on a map or buying expensive new weapons systems.

America’s greatest military strength has always been the courageous, talented men and women whose love of country and devotion to service lead them to attempt and achieve the impossible everyday.

[snip: the Bush administration's failures]

Second, if I am President I will strengthen the capacity of intelligence and law enforcement at home and forge stronger international coalitions to provide better information and the best chance to target and capture terrorists even before they act.

But the challenge for us is not to cooperate abroad; it is to coordinate here at home. Whether it was September 11th or Iraq’s supposed weapons of mass destruction, we have endured unprecedented intelligence failures. We must do what George Bush has refused to do – reform our intelligence system by making the next Director of the CIA a true Director of National Intelligence with real control of intelligence personnel and budgets. We must train more analysts in languages like Arabic. And we must break down the old barriers between national intelligence and local law enforcement.

In the months leading up to September 11th, two of the hijackers were arrested for drunk driving – and another was stopped for speeding and then let go, although he was already the subject of an arrest warrant in a neighboring county and was on a federal terrorist watch list. We need to simplify and streamline the multiple national terrorist watch lists and make sure the right information is available to the right people on the frontlines of preventing the next attack.

[snip: the Bush administration's failures]

Third, we must cut off the flow of terrorist funds. In the case of Saudi Arabia, the Bush Administration has adopted a kid-glove approach to the supply and laundering of terrorist money. If I am President, we will impose tough financial sanctions against nations or banks that engage in money laundering or fail to act against it. We will launch a "name and shame" campaign against those that are financing terror. And if they do not respond, they will be shut out of the U.S. financial system.

Fourth, because finding and defeating terrorist groups is a long-term effort, we must act immediately to prevent terrorists from acquiring nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons. I propose to appoint a high-level Presidential envoy empowered to bring other nations together to secure and stop the spread of these weapons. We must develop common standards to make sure dangerous materials and armaments are tracked, accounted for, and secured. Today, parts of Russia’s vast nuclear arsenal are easy prey for those offering cash to scientists and security forces who too often are under-employed and under-paid. If I am President, I will expand the Nunn/Lugar program to buy up and destroy the loose nuclear materials of the former Soviet Union and to ensure that all of Russia’s nuclear weapons and materials are out of the reach of terrorists and off the black market.

[snip: our responsibility in Iraq and Afghanistan]

But nothing else will matter unless we win the war of ideas. In failed states from South Asia to the Middle East to Central Africa, the combined weight of harsh political repression, economic stagnation, lack of education, and rapid population growth presents the potential for explosive violence and the enlistment of entire new legions of terrorists. In Saudi Arabia and Egypt, almost sixty percent of the population is under the age of 30, unemployed and unemployable, in a breeding ground for present and future hostility. And according to a Pew Center poll, fifty percent or more of Indonesians, Jordanians, Pakistanis, and Palestinians have confidence in bin Laden to “do the right thing regarding world affairs”

We need a major initiative in public diplomacy to bridge the divide between Islam and the rest of the world. For the education of the next generation of Islamic youth, we need an international effort to compete with radical Madrassas. We have seen what happens when Palestinian youth have been fed a diet of anti-Israel propaganda. And we must support human rights groups, independent media and labor unions dedicated to building a democratic culture from the grass-roots up. Democracy won't come overnight, but America should speed that day by sustaining the forces of democracy against repressive regimes and by rewarding governments which take genuine steps towards change.

We cannot be deterred by letting America be held hostage by energy from the Middle East. If I am President, we will embark on a historic effort to create alternative fuels and the vehicles of the future – to make this country energy independent of Mideast oil within ten years. So our sons and daughters will never have to fight and die for it.

[snip: more on the homeland security front]

And our children’s future demands that we also do everything in our power to prevent the creation of tomorrow’s terrorists today. Maybe there’s no going back to the days before baggage checks and orange alerts. Maybe they’re with us forever. But I don’t believe they have to be. I grew up at a time of bomb shelters and air raid drills. But America had leaders of vision and courage in both parties. And today, the Cold War is memory, not reality.

I believe we can bring a real victory in the War on Terror. I believe we must, not only for ourselves but for all who look to America as “the last best hope of earth.” I believe we can meet that ideal – and that’s why I’m running for President.

NPR checks the facts for Juan Williams

NPR : Bush's Military Service
But I'm not giving any money as long as Juan Williams and Mara Liasson are on the air kissing up to Republicans. And complaining to NPR's ombudsman Jeffrey Dvorkin is worthless. And I'm not a mindless zombie following orders from the blogosphere--I've been contributing to NPR for most of the last ten years. The one exception: the year Canadian wacko rightwinger David Frum was a frequent 'analyst.' Here is a typical hack-job from Mr. Frum, a review of Al Gore's book Joined at the Heart:

Hacker contends that Joined at the Heart follows in the tradition of Earth in the Balance: another Gore production written in a voice of almost terrifying frankness. In 1992, Gore told us that if he ever became president, he would dismantle the American economy in the name of environmental regulation. Ten years later, he is ready to execute similar destruction on the American family.

Mr. Frum, who was a speechwriter for George W. Bush, coined the phrase 'axis of evil.'

He could discover no sign of the promised transfiguration.

Descriptions of the absurd snuff porn movie The Passion of the Christ reminded me of In the Penal Colony by Franz Kafka--here is an excerpt translated by Ian Johnston. (Full public domain text here.)

The Traveler, by contrast, was very upset. Obviously the machine was breaking up. Its quiet operation had been an illusion. He felt as if he had to look after the Officer, now that the latter could no longer look after himself. But while the falling gear wheels were claiming all his attention, he had neglected to look at the rest of the machine. However, when he now bent over the harrow, once the last gear wheel had left the inscriber, he had a new, even more unpleasant surprise. The harrow was not writing but only stabbing, and the bed was not rolling the body, but lifting it, quivering, up into the needles. The Traveler wanted to reach in to stop the whole thing, if possible. This was not the torture the Officer wished to attain. It was murder, pure and simple. He stretched out his hands. But at that point the harrow was already moving upwards and to the side, with the skewered body--just as it did in other cases, but only in the twelfth hour. Blood flowed out in hundreds of streams, not mixed with water--the water tubes had also failed to work this time. Then one last thing went wrong: the body would not come loose from the needles. Its blood streamed out, but it hung over the pit without falling. The harrow wanted to move back to its original position, but, as if it realized that it could not free itself of its load, it remained over the hole.

"Help," the Traveler yelled out to the Soldier and the Condemned Man and grabbed the Officer’s feet. He wanted to push against the feet himself and have the two others grab the Officer’s head from the other side, so he could be slowly taken off the needles. But now the two men could not make up their mind whether to come or not. The Condemned Man turned away at once. The Traveler had to go over to him and drag him to the Officer’s head by force. At this point, almost against his will, he looked at the face of the corpse. It was as it had been in his life. He could discover no sign of the promised transfiguration. What all the others had found in the machine, the Officer had not. His lips were pressed firmly together, his eyes were open and looked as they had when he was alive, his gaze was calm and convinced. The tip of a large iron needle had gone through his forehead.

How much do the Gospel accounts of the crucifixion dwell on the physical torture of Jesus? Not much. How much more the Gospels focus on the spiritual battle that Jesus was fighting! Jesus wasn't crying "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" merely because of the physical pain he was feeling--he was feeling the pain of separation from his Father. The burden of all of humanity's sins and guilt was placed on Jesus shoulders, and its just punishment:

Tell me, all who hear him groaning,
Was there ever grief like this?
Friends through fear his cause disowning,
Foes insulting his distress;
Many hands were raised to wound him,
None would intervene to save;
But the deepest stroke that pierced him
Was the stroke that justice gave.

--2nd verse of "Stricken, smitten, and afflicted" by Thomas Kelly, 1769-1854.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

No Beards?

BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Young Turkmen face beard ban:

President Niyazov appeared on television saying that men can no longer grow their hair and that beards are not allowed, at least among the young.

More rules to live by in Turkmenistan:

It is forbidden now to listen to car radios or to smoke in the street; opera and ballet performances have been banned on the grounds that they are unnecessary.

Horse Race

Delegate counts from the Green Papers

               delegates

               hard  soft (in soft delegate order)

John Kerry      382  519.5 

John Edwards    153  177

Howard Dean      57  111.5 (has withdrawn from race)

Wesley Clark     63   68   (has withdrawn from race)

Alfred Sharpton  12   12   

Dennis Kucinich   0    7 

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Another review of 'The Passion of the Christ'

From Mennonite Weekly--Ultraviolent 'Passion' an incomplete picture by Burton Buller of Mennonite Media:

The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson's hell-fire and brimstone sermon on celluloid, falls far short of making a case for why I want to be a follower of Jesus.

The film is a violent blood-fest extraordinaire. As well it should be. Ancient torture rituals were not pretty sights.

Gibson venerates the broken body of Christ but says little about the point of the brokenness: the resurrection. His theological viewpoint demands that lots of blood flow from Christ's wounds because there needs to be enough blood to cover all of humanity's many and grievous sins. Told in this way, the salvation story is incomplete.

What turns me on to Christ is the new life salvation demands. New life is embodied not in Christ's beaten and broken body but in his triumph over death. Either Gibson doesn't understand that part of the salvation story, or he forgot to include more than a single nod to it.

Why I'm not supporting NPR this year

Click here to find out why. (From Electrolite)

Ralph Nader is a fraud, part 1

Now I'll begin an occasional series on the horribly mis-guided Ralph Nader. Our first installment features a quotation from Mark A. R. Kleiman post: Will Ralph get another free pass?:

One of the bitterest lessons I learned as a young and naive liberal staffer on Capitol Hill was that the 'public interest research' produced by the Nader groups was systematically fraudulent. Every time I actually got into an issue deeply enough to understand the details -- nuclear power, toxic waste, pharmaceutical regulation -- I discovered that the Naderites had no more respect for the facts than the industries they were fighting: in some cases, less.

(My emphasis)
Dr. Kleiman is a professor of policy studies at UCLA. He worked as a legislative assistant for Representative Les Aspin in 1974-75.

The Passion of the Christ

I will not be watching this movie. It apparently is not satisfied with the biblical accounts: it adds fiction to the facts, and claims that it is factual. Here's a review by Philippa Hawker in The Age [Australian newspaper]:

There have been statements, from Gibson and from his supporters, that The Passion of the Christ is distinguished by its fidelity to the gospels, a claim which seems disingenuous.
Apart from the difficulty of being faithful to a set of accounts that don't always agree, much of the film is concerned with imagining precisely what's left out of the gospels - graphic detail of physical punishment and suffering.
And there are numerous additions, above and beyond dramatisation and interpretation.
There's a punitive scene involving a crow pecking out the eyes of one of the criminals crucified alongside Jesus.
A single drop of water (a divine tear?) is shown falling from the skies after Jesus's death, in a vertiginous shot from the heights.
Gibson inserts a demonic figure, seen only to Jesus, who addresses and undermines him, and who turns up, at the end, with a weird-looking baby swaddled in black clothing. (In the credits, this figure is called Satan, and is played by an androgynous-looking woman, Rosalinda Celentano).
Pontius Pilate (Hristo Naumov Shopov) is given a wife, Claudia (Claudia Gerini), a compassionate figure who pleads with her husband not to condemn Jesus.

Ms. Hawker concludes her review with these comments:

Yet it is hard to imagine what elements of this film would inspire conversion, or comfort believers.

The sustained, insistent violence, over more than two hours, becomes distancing and repetitive, with moments of excess that border on absurdity.

It is, in the end, not much more than a grim and perplexing test of endurance.

I heard one reviewer say that the violence of the movie reaches Monty Pythonesque levels.
If you want to see a good movie about Jesus, try The Gospel According to Saint Matthew by Italian Communist and homosexual Pier Paolo Pasolini. It burns with Jesus' righteous anger at sin and injustice, and is much truer to the text.

Update

No sooner do I end this post, I Google Pasolini and find this review by Richard Nilsen in The Arizona Republic which concludes with this:

The best movie Jesus: In 1966, Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini created The Gospel According to St. Matthew, an austere black-and-white film that lets the words speak for themselves without tricking them up with cinematic wizardry. Using only amateur actors found in the Sicilian villages where Pasolini shot, his film is one of the most moving and believable ever. Perhaps it takes a homosexual Communist Italian to find the right tone for the Gospel.

I can't make the claim that Pasolini's movie is the best, since I haven't seen most of the ones Mr. Nilson lists. Grounds for further research . . .

US Preparing for Military Draft in Spring 2005

Here's something to keep an eye on: US Preparing for Military Draft in Spring 2005 Here's a link to S 89. Here's a link to HR 163.

Mr. Bush throws a bone to the social conservatives

I see that Mr. Bush has finally come out of the closet and supports the Marriage Amendment. Here is the poorly (or cleverly?) drafted text of the proposed amendment:

Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this constitution or the constitution of any state, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.

At second glance, it appears that the amendment may ban all new marriages. Nothing in law, etc. "shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups.

This confused drafting is the product of a committee--a committee that was divided as to the real intent of the amendment. Read this article in the Washington Post for more information about the Amendment So Confused that Even the Authors Do Not Agree on What it Means. (registration required) On the one hand:

Musgrave, Daniels and White House officials all say the intent is to prevent judges from ordering states to grant marriage licenses or civil unions to same-sex couples, as courts in Vermont and Massachusetts have done.

But they say the proposal is not meant to stop state legislatures from creating civil unions that give gay couples some of the tax benefits, inheritance rights and other privileges of marriage.

On the other hand:

Two of the amendment's principal authors, professors Robert P. George of Princeton and Gerard V. Bradley of Notre Dame Law School, contend that the opening sentence also would forbid some kinds of civil unions.

They argue that future courts would have to interpret the amendment to protect not just the word "marriage," but also its essential meaning -- in the same way that, if the Constitution forbade states from creating "navies," they clearly could not establish "flotillas" or "armadas," either.

I am not surprised to find Robert Bork involved; a good thing he was kept of the Supreme Court.

Whenever I think about this issue, I wonder--what is the compelling state interest in forbidding gay marriage? Denying gays all the benefits that flow to married heterosexual couples? As Atrios says,

Obviously, if gay people had these rights civilization would end.

Atrios' posting has a link to the General Accounting Office's report (in PDF format) listing all of the rights and benefits of civil marriage (all 1049 of them.)

Countries of Particular Concern

Religious Freedom Commission Cites Countries of Particular Concern:

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, an independent nine-member advisory body established by Congress, is calling on the State Department to designate 11 countries as 'countries of particular concern' because of 'egregious, systematic, ongoing abuse of the right of religious freedom.'

The countries are Burma, China, Eritrea, India, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Turkmenistan and Vietnam, said Commission Chairman Michael Young during a briefing at the State Department's Foreign Press Center in Washington February 18.

The Commission believes that 'the designation of these countries is one of the most important steps towards the advancement of human rights that the United States takes every year, and we have strongly urged the Department of State to name those particular countries,' he said. He added, however, that there were some dissenting opinions within the Commission about India's designation.

Prediction: our good allies in the war on terror (Saudi Arabia and Pakistan) will not be mentioned. Note: not one of the countries singled out for abuses of religious freedom is a member of the Coalition of the Willing.

Mother Jones on Bush's Scandals

Justice a l'Orange (from Tom Engelhardt at Mother Jones):

The Bush administration has been in trouble ever since its arrogance met its incompetence at Intelligence Pass last summer; ever since Plame Gate began (see below), ever since George's guys tried to solve their problems -- all those already nagging lies and exaggerations, all the fun and games that panicked a country into war -- by throwing CIA director George Tenet to the sharks, and he refused to walk the plank.

Ever since then, they've been gathering angry constituencies -- in the military, in the 'intelligence community,' in Congress, in the bureaucracy, in the media, even on the right -- and trailing behind them an ever growing gaggle of barely suppressed scandals, investigative committees, nosy commissions, grand juries, and intra-bureaucratic buck-passing. Their pattern -- not completely unfamiliar, if you think back to previous administrations -- has been to mount the barricades, declare, 'Thus far, and no farther; they shall not pass,' and then, when the weather gets heavy, fall back to the next set of barricades.

The attorney general will not recuse himself; no special prosecutor will be appointed . . . You complete that one. The president will not testify; the president will testify but only before one or two people and not under oath . . . and so forth. If you watched carefully, you would see the administration slowly and quietly giving ground for some time on issue after issue, problem after problem, a sign of weakness -- and an explanation, in part, for the sudden loss of media docility. (The pack smells blood.)

Recently, the pace has been upped. We're already in the midst of an early, down-and-dirty presidential campaign. (The President will remain presidential, concerned only with matters of office; he will not descend into the pit. The President will descend but only... you see it's a formula that holds up everywhere.) The polls tell us that the economy, health care, and jobs are what most "concern" Americans. As well they should. Figures on the war in Iraq, while dropping, have remained relatively high for the president. ("For the first time since the United States invaded Iraq a year ago," reports Brad Knickerbocker of the Christian Science Monitor considering the latest polls, "the nation is evenly divided over the war.")

But I think this is deceptive. The truth is that the ragtag insurgency, the missing WMD, and assorted other problems in Iraq as well as the steady drip of American casualties -- or rather the inability to shut it all down there, to deliver the Iraq promised to the American people -- has driven this administration before it (just as other administrations were once driven by the unending war in Vietnam). Issue by issue, the traffic jam in Washington can be traced right back to that.

Then Mr. Engelhardt summarizes the various scandals that are bubbling just under the surface:

Plame Gate: indictments are coming soon

Blaming the CIA etc. for 'intelligence failures' in the run-up to the Iraq war--when it was the White House exagerating the threat and relying on the corrupt Iraqi exile community for post-war planning

9/11 commission: will it ever conclude anything?

Cheney/Halliburton, 'unvarnished' secret advice from big oil companies, etc.(and Cheney's chummy relationship with Supreme Court Justice Scalia)

Mr. Bush's chickenhawk Vietnam War service

A grand jury investigating the Niger uranium phony documents

A grand jury invesitigating allegations of Halliburton's Cheney era bribes to Nigerian officials

See the links to all these stories on the Mother Jones site. It's only a matter of time until some of this really hits the fan. My humble prediction: Mr. Bush will not be re-elected.

Praise the Lord

Social conservatives are finally realizing that Mr. Bush and other Republican politicians are merely using them (from the horrible Washington Times--but even a broken clock is right twice a day):

Religious conservatives helped Ronald Reagan win the presidency in the 1980s and helped Republicans retake the House and Senate in 1994, but complain that they have little to show for their loyalty to the GOP.

'I'm not blaming the president, but religious conservatives have been doing politics for 25 years and, on every front, are worse off on things they care about,' said Gary Bauer, president of American Values. 'The gay rights movement is more powerful, the culture is more decadent, the life of not one baby has been saved, porn is in the living room, and you can't watch the Super Bowl without your hand on the off switch.'

Religious right leaders say their constituents aren't likely to defect to the Democrats.

Sunday Readings

Readings for Transfiguration Sunday:
Deuteronomy 34:1-12

Then Moses climbed Mount Nebo from the plains of Moab to the top of Pisgah, across from Jericho. There the LORD showed him the whole land--from Gilead to Dan, all of Naphtali, the territory of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the western sea, the Negev and the whole region from the Valley of Jericho, the City of Palms, as far as Zoar. Then the LORD said to him, "This is the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when I said, 'I will give it to your descendants.' I have let you see it with your eyes, but you will not cross over into it."

And Moses the servant of the LORD died there in Moab, as the LORD had said. He buried him in Moab, in the valley opposite Beth Peor, but to this day no one knows where his grave is. Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died, yet his eyes were not weak nor his strength gone. The Israelites grieved for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days, until the time of weeping and mourning was over.

Now Joshua son of Nun was filled with the spirit of wisdom because Moses had laid his hands on him. So the Israelites listened to him and did what the LORD had commanded Moses.

Since then, no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face. Who did all those miraculous signs and wonders the LORD sent him to do in Egypt--to Pharaoh and to all his officials and to his whole land. For no one has ever shown the mighty power or performed the awesome deeds that Moses did in the sight of all Israel.

II Corinthians 4:3-6

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

Luke 9:28-36

About eight days after Jesus said this, he took Peter, John and James with him and went up onto a mountain to pray. As he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became as bright as a flash of lightning. Two men, Moses and Elijah, appeared in glorious splendor, talking with Jesus. They spoke about his departure, which he was about to bring to fulfillment at Jerusalem. Peter and his companions were very sleepy, but when they became fully awake, they saw his glory and the two men standing with him. As the men were leaving Jesus, Peter said to him, "Master, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters--one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah." (He did not know what he was saying.)

While he was speaking, a cloud appeared and enveloped them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. A voice came from the cloud, saying, "This is my Son, whom I have chosen; listen to him." When the voice had spoken, they found that Jesus was alone. The disciples kept this to themselves, and told no one at that time what they had seen.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Nut-case Nader to Make Another White House Run in 2004

Here's the story: Nader to Make Another White House Run in 2004 (washingtonpost.com) (registration required)

Ralph Nader, whose third-party White House bid in 2000 was blamed by some Democrats for helping elect President Bush, said on Sunday he will try again this year, running as an independent.

Ignoring the pleas of Democrats who have asked him to stay out of the race, the veteran consumer advocate said he was running out of a strong desire to evict Bush from the White House.

This guy is even more insane than I thought: "running out of a strong desire to evict Bush from the White House"? This time, I hope liberal and progressive voters are smart enough not to vote for this idiot.

Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us

Uh oh! the Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us (from the Observer):

Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters.

A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.

The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy as countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food, water and energy supplies. The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say the few experts privy to its contents.

'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes the Pentagon analysis. 'Once again, warfare would define human life.'

Just a little light reading for the beach. Perhaps we should consider the unthinkable: require trucks and SUVs to be more fuel efficient.

An aphorism for today

Die Körper wären nicht schön, wenn sie sich nicht bewegten.--Johannes Kepler

Bodies wouldn't be beautiful, if they didn't move.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

New headline service

Another free service bites the dust. Here's another one to try.

Update:

I see that I need a bigger picture on the left; or what else can I put in that box???

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Ralph Nader calls me a censor?

Here's what Ralph Nader thinks of people who ask him not to run for President: they are censors.

During a Feb. 4 interview on NPR's "All Things Considered" program, Nader had this to say when asked about an editorial in The Nation urging him not to run this year: "It's a marvelous demonstration by liberals, if you will, of censorship. Now mind you, running for political office is every American's right. Running for political office means free speech exercise, it means exercising the right of petition, the right of assembly. And so when they say 'Do not run,' they're not just challenging and rebutting; they're crossing that line into censorship, which is completely unacceptable."

Mr. Nader, are you telling me that I can't ask you not to run for President? Who's attempting to censor whom?

Ralph Nader, do not run for President.

I'll post every negative thing I can find about the phony Ralph Nader if he decides to run.

Islamist extremists destroy ninth school in Pakistan

So how effective is the war on terror? BBC NEWS | South Asia | Ninth Pakistani school destroyed

Harness Children Power!

Here is a unique invention from South Africa: A toy that powers a water pump:

Cavorting on a roundabout has always been fun for children. Now pure, clean borehole water can be pumped into water storage tanks while the playground roundabout equipment is in use. The Play-Pump is a specifically designed and patented playground roundabout that drives conventional borehole pumps, keeping costs and maintenance to an absolute minimum, while entertaining the children.

Horse Race

Here are the latest delegate counts, post-Wisconsin, from The Green Papers
Current delegate counts (soft, hard)

John Kerry------(494.5, 363)

John Edwards---(171, 146)

Howard Dean---(112.5, 56)

Wesley Clark----(44, 63)

Al Sharpton-------(12, 10)

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

News Flash: Pot calls the Kettle Black

Hey people, lay off the negative smear campaigns and dirty tricks (like the allegations about Senator Kerry's 'girlfriend'). Republicans are bound to be upset at what they have unleashed: Larry Flynt claims he has some dirt on George W. Bush (from Lloyd Grove's Lowdown in the New York Daily News):

Activist rocker Moby raised Republican hackles last week when he advised President Bush's enemies to engage in political mischief.

Moby told my fellow gossips Rush & Molloy: 'For example, you can go on all the pro-life chat rooms and say you're an outraged right-wing voter and that you know that George Bush drove an ex-girlfriend to an abortion clinic and paid for her to get an abortion.'

Now the incorrigible Larry Flynt says he plans to market a Bush abortion story as genuine - in a book to be published this summer by Kensington Press.

"This story has got to come out," the wheelchair-bound Hustler magazine honcho told the Daily News' Corky Siemaszko. "There's a lot of hypocrisy in the White House about this whole abortion issue."

Flynt claimed that Bush arranged for the procedure in the early '70s.

"I've talked to the woman's friends," Flynt said. "I've tracked down the doctor who did the abortion, I tracked down the Bush people who arranged for the abortion," Flynt said. "I got the story nailed."

Flynt wouldn't disclose whether he plans to name the woman.

Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie - who in a speech last week accused "Kerry campaign supporters," not just Moby, of hatching the Internet chat room scheme - was unavailable for comment on Flynt's charges.

But RNC spokesman Yier Shi told me: "The Democrats will do anything in this election, judging by their campaign tactics, to smear without any evidence or background. This is just another one of those cases."

Of course, if allegations like this are true, they are another nail in Bush's re-election coffin. To me, the Democrats have a great shot at winning the Presidency as long as leftist kooks like Ralph Nader (not a dime's worth of difference between Republicans and Democrats?) stay out of the race. I am more doubtful about the House and Senate. But divided government is probably best--let's hear it for gridlock!

Molly Ivins on Election 2004

WorkingForChange-And they're off!

In the category of most ludicrous attack, we have an outcry (well, sort of an outcry) over the horrible news that John Kerry takes money from special interest lobbyists. Lawsy, I swan, I had to sit down and fan myself when I heard it. Corporate special interest money in politics! What next? In fact, Kerry has compiled an enviable record by Democratic standards in this field. He's Number One in special interest money, reflecting nothing other than Washington's early conventional wisdom on the subject.

Happily for politics as usual, Kerry has surged to the fore and is now undergoing the pluperfectly idiotic political experience of being called the candidate of special interests by Republicans! Oh, this is so rich, how can you not rejoice? President Bush has only raised 28 times as much money from corporate special interests as John Kerry, and four times as much directly from lobbyists. But that didn't stop the Bush campaign from sending out an email video to 6 million supporters accusing Kerry of being the candidate of the special interests!

In another lovely development, it turns out Al Sharpton's campaign is being "financed, staffed and orchestrated" by Roger Stone, long-time Republican dirty trickster. According to Wayne Barrett in The Village Voice, Stone helped raise money in several states from his own relatives and political pals so Sharpton could qualify for federal matching funds, which is an infuriating waste of taxpayer's money and a perfect example of why public campaign financing laws need to be written carefully. Sharpton on his own doesn't have a broad enough appeal to qualify for federal funds.

Stone has a long history of political skullduggery, including heading the Republican street forces in Miami after the 2000 election that started the "riot" at the Dade County Courthouse. And Sharpton has a long history of playing footsie with Republicans, including his role in the 2001 New York City mayoral race.

Small KwaZulu-Natal farmers aim big

Niche markets for small farmers: from Mail and Guardian Online:

Essential oils, organic vegetables and ingredients for trendy desserts are some of the niche items being produced in a project that is breathing life into small-scale farming communities in KwaZulu-Natal.

Taken over from Oxfam, which started it, it forms part of the provincial department of economic development and tourism's programme to bring small-scale farmers in traditional areas into agricultural production for high-return niche markets, many of them overseas.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu calls for apology over Iraq war

From a speech to be given today: Tutu calls for apology over Iraq war (from iafrica.com news):

How wonderful if politicians could bring themselves to admit they are only fallible human creatures, and not God, and thus by definition can make mistakes

And another quote:

It may not be fanciful to see a connection between this and the belligerent militarist policies that have produced a novel and dangerous principle, that of pre-emption on the basis of intelligence reports that in one particular instance have been shown can be dangerously flawed and yet were the basis for the United States going to war, dragging a Britain that declared that intelligence reports showed Iraq to have the capacity to launch its weapons of mass destruction in a matter of minutes.

An immoral war was thus waged and the world is a great deal less safe place than before. There are many more who resent the powerful who can throw their weight about so callously and with so much impunity.

Sunday readings

For the sixth Sunday of Epiphany:
Jeremiah 17:5-8

This is what the LORD says:
"Cursed is the one who trusts in man,
who depends on flesh for his strength
and whose heart turns away from the LORD.
He will be like a bush in the wastelands;
he will not see prosperity when it comes.
He will dwell in the parched places of the desert,
in a salt land where no one lives.

But blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
whose confidence is in him.
He will be like a tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes;
its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought
and never fails to bear fruit.

I Corinthians 15:12, 16-20

But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? . . .
For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.

Luke 7:11-17

Soon afterward, Jesus went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went along with him. As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out--the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her.
When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, "Don't cry."
Then he went up and touched the coffin, and those carrying it stood still. He said, "Young man, I say to you, get up!"
The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother.
They were all filled with awe and praised God. "A great prophet has appeared among us," they said. "God has come to help his people."
This news about Jesus spread throughout Judea and the surrounding country.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Note to self

Look up these links when my papers are written for this week: links about Russian singer-songwriter Vladimir Vysotsky (from Volokh Conspiracy)
A reward for doing my work first, and then playing.

Here is a translation of Mr. Vysotsky's song The Penal Code:

We don't need complicated subjects and plots --
We know it all, whatever you give us.
For instance, I think our Penal Code
Is better than any book on earth.

And if I'm restless and can't sleep
Or if I'm dead from a hangover,
I'll open the Code on any page,
And I can't help but read it to the end.

I never gave my comrades advice,
But I know robbery is a great honor with them.
Well, I just read about this:
"No less than three, no more than ten."

Just think about these simple lines, --
Why do we need the novels of all times and lands?
There's everything in them -- barracks as long as terms,
Scandals, fights, cards, and betrayal.

I wish I'd never seen these lines in a hundred years --
Behind each one I see someone's fate!
And I'm happy when the section isn't too bad:
Someone may yet get lucky.

And my heart beats like a wounded bird
When I start reading my own section.
And the blood in my temples bursts and pounds so,
Like when the cops come to get you.

Remember that whereever you are, the law exists to show you how sinful you are. But I'm thankful I don't live in a Communist dictatorship.

Big brand retailers turning up the heat for vulnerable workers

Let us now praise the Wal-Marts of the world--Big brand retailers turning up the heat for vulnerable workers (from Oxfam):

Big brand retailers turning up the heat for vulnerable workers

Big brand companies and retailers in the fashion and food industries are driving down employment conditions for millions of women workers around the world, according to a new study by international agency Oxfam.

Oxfam says that huge retailing empires are undermining the very labour standards they claim to uphold by using a common business model that demands ever-quicker and cheaper delivery of the freshest and latest products.

The companies are using their power at the top of global supply chains to squeeze their suppliers to deliver. This pressure is dumped immediately onto women workers in the form of ever-longer hours at faster work rates, often in poor conditions and with no job security. The report says that millions of women are being denied their fair share of the benefits of globalisation as a result.

'This is where globalisation is failing in its potential to lift people out of poverty and support development,' says Oxfam's Make Trade Fair campaign director Phil Bloomer. 'There is a widening gap between the rhetoric of global corporate social responsibility and the reality of the corporate business model. Many corporations have codes of conduct to hold their suppliers accountable for labour standards, but their own ruthless buying strategies often make it impossible for these standards to be met.'

Donkey attacks

Donkeys are attacking people in South Africa (SABCnews.com)

Officials are baffled by two incidents where people were attacked by donkeys in the Limpopo Province. One of the victims has died.

Abraham Lincoln's Birthday

Just a little note for those people that think the American Civil War was about tariffs or states' rights or whatever--it was about slavery. Here is President Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address, delivered March 4, 1865:

Fellow-Countrymen:

AT this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured.

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, urgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war—seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.

One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war, while the Government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Pick the real patriot:

Radley Balko at the History News Network blog asks the question:

A) Man A volunteers for military service in wartime, despite possessing the background and privilege that could have gotten him a deferment. He serves honorably, is wounded, and wins multiple medals for heroism. Somewhere along the way, he begins to doubt the usefulness of the war, and the sincerity and honesty of the politicians waging it. When he returns from service, he speaks up, and chastises what he believes to wasteful and foolish foreign policy, and the needless loss of life of 60,000+ U.S. troops.

B) Man B, knowing that grad school deferments are becoming harder and harder to come by, opts for the National Guard to avoid serving in Vietnam. He accumulates a spotty record while there, and is disciplined for failing to show for meetings and physicals. There are large discrepencies in his record of service. He ends his NG stint early once he realizes he can safely go to Harvard for his MBA without fear of getting drafted. But he supported the Vietnam war, at least in principle.

To buy the current conservative defense of President Bush, you have to believe that Man B is more of a patriot than Man A. In hawk land, fighting and bleeding for your country isn't nearly as indicative of a man's loyalty to country as his willingness to send other men to bleed and die, in this case for a war that history has shown to be a failure and a fraud.

Yesterday, I heard Sean Hannity quoting Senator Kerry's testimony before Congress about the Vietnam War completely out of context, implying that Kerry was a witness to atrocities in Vietnam and did nothing about them. Sean Hannity is a liar.

Delegate Count Horse Race

Democratic Party Delegate Counts (info from The Green Papers)
(after Maine, Virginia, and Tennessee)
(2,161 delegates needed for nomination)
Current delegate counts (soft, hard)
John Kerry--------(432,324)
John Edwards----(146, 121)
Wesley Clark*---(44, 63)
Howard Dean----(86, 40)
Al Sharpton-------(8, 8)
Dennis Kucinich--(6, 0)

* General Clark is leaving the race. (Washington Post)

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Dr. Atkins Weighed 258 pounds? Vegetarians and Animal-Rights Activists Are to be Blamed

CBS News | Report: Atkins Qualified As Obese | February 10, 2004-20:11:59:

Dr. Robert Atkins, whose popular diet stresses protein-rich meat and cheese over carbohydrates, weighed 258 pounds at his death and had a history of heart disease, a newspaper reported Tuesday.

Atkins died last April at age 72 after being injured in a fall on an icy street.

Before his death, he had suffered a heart attack, congestive heart failure and hypertension, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing a report by the city medical examiner.

Dr. Neal Barnard, president of the Physician's Committee for Responsible Medicine, comments:

If Dr. Atkins himself paid a price for following this sort of diet for a long period of time, that is indeed a tragedy . . .The only relevance this would have is if he used himself as an example to show what the diet could do over the long run, and encouraged other people to go on the unhealthy diet that made him a lot of money. . .Over the long run it is not a good approach to weight control. For some people, it seems to contribute to increased risk of heart problems. We have heard of people dying after following this sort of diet.

I notice that the Center for Consumer Freedom (a horrible public relations and lobbying firm) is criticizing the critics of Atkins. (Of course, the Washington Times prints up every press release the phony Center for Consumer Freedom sends out.) The Center for Consumer Freedom is run by Rick Berman's PR firm, Berman & Company Inc., based in Washington DC. It aggressively targets groups seeking to promote controls relating to alcohol, tobacco, food safety, animal rights or the environment. When I get angry enough about these people and the beef lobby, I'll write about their efforts to minimize regulation of the beef industry--which enabled BSE (Mad Cow Disease) to get to the United States. But here's a start:
Berman's mission--excellence in lying:

Welcome to Berman and Company
Berman and Company is a dynamic research and communications firm. We blend aggressive, creative thinking and tactics with functional expertise to achieve extraordinary results for our clients.

Berman and Company has a clear mission: “Change the debate.” Many PR firms promise access to the media. Law firms pledge to defend their clients. Lobbying firms promise access to friendly legislators. At Berman and Company we do all this. But we go further. We change the debate. If necessary, we start the debate.

We see each new issue as a fresh challenge. We never resort to canned, off-the-shelf solutions. We consistently create new approaches to policy debates. Our success is based on three core competencies: credible research as the foundation for effective messages disseminated via aggressive communications.

But here's what this really means, in light of Berman's customers:

Berman & Co., a Washington, DC public affairs firm owned by lobbyist Rick Berman, represents the tobacco industry as well as hotels, beer distributors, taverns, and restaurant chains. Berman & Co. lobbies for companies such as Cracker Barrel, Hooters, International House of Pancakes, Olive Garden, Outback Steakhouse, Red Lobster, Steak & Ale, TGI Friday's, Uno's Restaurants, and Wendy's. It also operates a network of several front groups, web sites, and think tanks that work to keep wages low for restaurants and to block legislation on food safety, secondhand cigarette smoke, and drunk driving.

In a 1999 interview with the Chain Leader, a trade publication for restaurant chains, Berman explained the focus of his lobbying efforts, which mirror his non-profit groups' activities. "In effect, our work is restricted to and focused on issues that affect shareholder value," he said. "These big issues include labor costs as they relate to health insurance and the minimum wage." He also stated that he attacks activists more aggressively than other lobbyists. "We always have a knife in our teeth," he said. Since activists "drive consumer behavior on meat, alcohol, fat, sugar, tobacco and caffeine," his strategy is "to shoot the messenger.... We've got to attack their credibility as spokespersons."

See more about Berman's activities at Disinfopedia.

Although Berman refuses to disclose the identity of its anonymous funders, the following companies have been linked to Berman & Co. in news reports and other public documents:

American Restaurant Group, Inc.

Anheuser-Busch

Arby's

Brinker International, Inc.

Burger King

Carson Restaurants Worldwide

Chili's

Chi-Chi's

Cracker Barrel

El Torito

Empire State Restaurant and Tavern Association

Hard Rock Café

Hooters of America, Inc.

Houston's Restaurants, Inc.

International House of Pancakes

Jack-in-the-Box

KKR Enterprises, Inc.

Luby's, Inc.

Marie Callender Pie Shops, Inc.

Marriott Corp.

Metromedia Restaurant Group

Olive Garden

Outback Steakhouse, Inc.

Panda Management Company, Inc.

Perkins Family Restaurants, L.P.

Philip Morris

Rare Hospitality International

Red Lobster

Shoney's, Inc.

Sizzler

Steak & Ale

TGI Friday's

Uno Restaurant Corp.

Vicorp Restaurants, Inc.

Wendy's

And there's another list of contributors here at ConsumerDeception.com.

Colin Powell on sons of the powerful and well-placed

Colin Powell, from My American Journey:

War should be the politics of last resort. And when we go to war, we should have a purpose that our people understand and support; we should mobilize the country's resources to fulfill that mission and then go in to win. In Vietnam, we had entered into a halfhearted half-war, with much of the nation opposed or indifferent, while a small fraction carried the burden.

I witnessed as much bravery in Vietnam as I expect to see in any war. I am proud of my service in the Americal Division. We had our bright moments and outstanding soldiers. Another officer who served in that division was a lieutenant colonel named H. Norman Schwarzkopf. Norm Schwarzkopf, I, and so many others who went on to major military responsibility must have carried away something useful from the experience. I am proud of the way American soldiers answered the call in a war so poorly conceived, conducted, and explained by their country's leaders. Dozens of my friends died in that war. As small a circle as the CCNY Pershing Rifles lost its third member in Vietnam in 1968, John Young. All this heroism and sacrifice are precisely the point: you do not squander courage and lives without clear purpose, without the country's backing, and without full commitment.

I particularily condemn the way our political learders supplied the manpower for that war. The policies--determining who would be drafted and who would be deferred, who would serve and who would escape, who would die and who would live--were an antidemocratic disgrace. I can never forgive a leadership that said, in effect: These young men--poorer, less educated, less privileged--are expendable (someone described them as "economic cannon fodder"), but the rest are too good to risk. I am angry that so many of the sons of the powerful and well-placed and so many professional athletes (who were probably healthier than any of us) managed to wangle slots in Reserve and National Guard units. Of the many tragedies of Vietnam, this raw class discrimination strikes me as the most damaging to the ideal that all Americans are created equal and owe equal allegiance to their country.

(emphasis added)
How many senator's sons and daughters are serving in Iraq today? How many representative's children? How many of the wealthiest of us bear any burden at all in Iraq?

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

The Dollar Plunges

Apparently the Bush Administration feels the dollar's decline in value versus the euro is just fine. Read News Analysis: How Main St. and Wall St. Will Feel as the Dollar Plunges for more information.

By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
Published: February 9, 2004
WASHINGTON, Feb. 8 — Treasury Secretary John W. Snow has tacitly but unmistakably abandoned Washington's longstanding support for a strong dollar in favor of a weak dollar that is getting weaker, though he continues to insist there has been no change in policy.

Stripped of the code words and elliptical references to "excessive volatility" in exchange rates, the message that Mr. Snow delivered this weekend to finance ministers from Europe and Japan was that the dollar's plunge against the euro is just fine and that the dollar should now decline more rapidly against Asian currencies as well.

This is an attempt to make American exports more competitive.

But the long-term risks are substantial. At some point, a weaker dollar will inevitably lead to higher prices for imported goods — almost all consumer electronics bought by Americans, most of their clothing, many of their cars and much of the oil that provides the fuel to drive them.

A much bigger risk is that a plunging dollar could contribute to a rise in interest rates, as foreign investors demand fatter risk premiums before agreeing to buy hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Treasury securities to finance America's high levels of indebtedness.

The United States needs to attract $1.5 billion a day in net capital inflows from abroad — $500 billion a year more than it sends out — which means that the world is being flooded by American I.O.U.'s at levels never seen before. The administration's huge budget deficits could increase that need for foreign capital even more, and higher interest rates would add billions of dollars to those deficits.

Mr. Bush's deficits would be even worse if interest rates weren't unusually low.

Delegate count horse race

Results through Michigan and Washington, but not Maine; information from The Green Papers:
Current delegate counts (soft, hard)
John Kerry------(240, 314)
John Edwards---(72, 90)
Howard Dean---(40, 77)
Wesley Clark----(45, 50)
Al Sharpton-------(8, 8)
Dennis Kucinich--(0, 1)

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Sunday readings

Today was Cub Scout day at the church that sponsors my son's pack. Here is the reading that Joe gave, Isaiah 6:1-7:

In the year that King Uzziah died,
I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted,
and the train of his robe filled the temple.

Above him were seraphs, each with six wings:
With two wings they covered their faces,
with two they covered their feet,
and with two they were flying.

And they were calling to one another:
"Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty;
the whole earth is full of his glory."
At the sound of their voices the doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

"Woe to me!" I cried. "I am ruined!
For I am a man of unclean lips,
and I live among a people of unclean lips,
and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty."

Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand,
which he had taken with tongs from the altar.
With it he touched my mouth and said,
"See, this has touched your lips;
your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for."

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

"I was going to Harvard Business School and worked it out with the military."

Trapper John at Daily Kos reminds us that the real scandal of George W. Bush's National Guard service: He was able to get out of his commitment 8 months early to go to business school. Due to Mr. Bush's stop loss orders, soldiers today do not have that option even after their commitment is over.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Liberty for all? Not exactly.

Move along folks. There's nothing to see here, just the Federal Government cracking down on peace activists (from Daily Kos.) Here's what Brian Terrell, one of the activists under subpeona, has to say about what the Feds are up to:

Yesterday, February 3, Detective Jeff Warford of the Polk County Sheriff's Office-FBI-Joint Terrorism Task Force came to Catholic Peace Ministry's office here in Des Moines with a subpoena for me to testify before a Federal Grand Jury next Tuesday, February 10. Mr. Warford also served papers on Elton Davis at the Catholic Worker House and Patti McKee, who was coordinator of Iowa Peace Network until last month. The Grand Jury process is shrouded in secrecy. We do not know who or what the object of this investigation may be, beyond "possible violations of federal criminal law in the Southern District of Iowa."

The proceeding will be behind closed doors. We may not have an attorney present. We have the right to plead the Fifth Amendment, refusing the answer questions that might incriminate us. The government, then, can offer us immunity from prosecution, in which case we will obliged to answer under threat of contempt of court and could be imprisoned for the length of the Grand Jury session, 18 months, should we continue to refuse to answer. This immunity would be limited to our own testimony and anything any of us say could be used against the others.

Whatever is going on, this is definitely an escalation on the part of the government's war on dissent and clamp down on civil liberties. The fact that anything that we three and the peacemaking communities we represent could possibly attract the notice of a "Terrorism Task Force" is reprehensible. Please spread the word, express concerns you have with Federal and Polk County authorities. Keep us in mind and prayer.

See the links to stories in the Des Moines Register about the case. This comment and following ones in the same thread remind us how governments can use violent acts as a pretext to crack down on organized protest.

That's the pretext, of course (none / 0)

One "assault" by one agent provocateur or kid, and Big Brother will have its pretext to shut down an entire branch of the organized opposition.
by C S McCrum on Sun Feb 8th, 2004 at 20:39:42 GMT

Apparently, an act of passive resistance is being charged as an assault, and the government is making a Federal case about it.

I'm gratified to report that our government is working so hard to protect us from terrorists.

Paul Krugman reviews 2 books on George W. Bush

From The New York Review of Books: The Wars of the Texas Succession. The books reviewed are:

American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush
by Kevin Phillips
Viking, 397 pp., $25.95

The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O'Neill
by Ron Suskind
Simon and Schuster, 348 pp., $26.00

Mr. Krugman on Mr. Bush's corruption:

In any previous administration—at least any administration of the past seventy years—this sort of incestuous relationship among foreign governments, private businesses, and the personal fortunes of people in or close to the US government would have been considered unusual and prima facie scandalous. What we learn from Kevin Phillips's new book, however, is that this kind of intertwining of public policy and personal self-interest has been standard operating procedure not just for George W. Bush, but for his entire family.

The Bush family sees itself as a dynasty in the making. Read the review for more about how the Bush family has enriched itself at the public trough and shady business deals for generations.

And here's something for Christians to think about:

What Phillips doesn't explain, or at least not to my satisfaction, is why crony capitalists have been able to make an effective alliance with the religious right, while other groups—say, Democrats tied to the labor movement —have not. After all, fundamentalists in America are, on average, relatively poor, and tend to be hurt by right-wing economic policies. It's true that, as Phillips points out, modern fundamentalist doctrine encourages a belief in self-reliance, with a corresponding benign attitude toward wealth and hostility to policies that redistribute income. But the Bush family does not, to say the least, consist of self-made men, and its policies actually do involve redistribution—from the have-nots to the haves. What makes religious leaders see an elite dynasty as their friend?

Mr. Krugman on The Price of Loyalty:

Ron Suskind—an investigative reporter with a knack for getting insiders to tell what they know —offers a detailed, deeply disturbing look at how the Bush administration makes policy.

Here's an example of Bush policy-making at its finest: the steel tariff.

Or take the steel tariff. The decision to impose a tariff on steel imports was a terrible one in every way one can think of. It was bad for the economy; it was obviously illegal under international law. It squandered US credibility on trade issues; it was a clear betrayal of the administration's own rhetorical commitment to free trade and free markets. But throwing steel-producing regions a bone might—just might—yield some small political gains.

The Clinton administration refused to impose a steel tariff even during the 2000 campaign; had it betrayed its principles, West Virginia might have gone to Al Gore, who would now be in the White House. When the issue arose again in early 2002, Bush was still immensely popular. "If you can't do the right thing when you're at 85 percent approval, when can you do the right thing?" asked one official. But politics prevailed, and the tariff went through. (The tariff was later rescinded, after the World Trade Organization—predictably—ruled that it violated international law. But the damage was done: US credibility on trade issues had been damaged severely. Partly because of this loss of credibility, international trade negotiations—supposedly an administration priority —have stalled.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What emerges from Suskind's book is a picture of an entirely cynical administration—much more cynical than Nixon's, in which the corruption was localized, and large parts of the policy process continued to be run by serious, even idealistic people. (Old hands at the Environmental Protection Agency describe the Nixon administration as a golden age.) Under Bush, it seems, political rhetoric bears no relation to reality—what officials say has nothing in common with what they do, or what they think. And policy decisions are driven almost entirely by politics, by what the political arm thinks will play well with "the base."

Bad example, but entertaining.

Absolutely unreadable blog design: but I want to know--how is that done? Especially notice the changing colors on the scrollbar on the right side of the page. Wow! Also check out the choose your music button.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

South African politics

Elections are coming in South Africa, amidst much celebration of 10 years of democracy since the end of racist apartheid rule. Here is the text of Thabo Mbeki's State of the Nation 2004 address (pdf, 72KB). But not everyone is thrilled at the prospect of South Africa becoming a one-party (African National Congress) state: The South African newspaper Business Day [update: corrected title] notices some of the opposition--Tony Leon of the Democratic Alliance. Here are some remarks as Mr. Leon opens the 2004 campaign for the Democratic Alliance:

[A government] that puts people first, one that keeps its promises, one that delivers.
. . .
Speaking under the slogan "South Africa Deserves Better", he said the DA and its partners in the "coalition for change" had clear goals.

To create a mighty bloc in Parliament that will fight for real change; to govern in the Western Cape; to govern in KwaZulu-Natal, to be the second biggest party in every other province in South Africa.

Make no mistake: ANC and its allies on the one hand, and the DA and its allies on the other.

It is a choice between multi-party democracy that thrives, or a one-party state that withers.

It is a choice between real non-racialism, or the neo-racialism of the ANC.

It is a choice between real power to the people and the provinces, or more and more power to the president.

Here's a bit more from Mr. Leon's weekly letter to his supporters:

It is simply extraordinary that the President would say that South Africa does not need new policies when 8 million people are out of work, 21 million South Africans live in poverty, violent crimes such as rape and murder are at crisis levels, a million of our fellow citizens have died of AIDS, and nearly half a million more will be infected with HIV this year. The fact that the President does not think this situation requires urgent change suggests an unbelievable complacency.

(The DA website uses frames, so I don't know how to directly link to the letter.)

I will be checking South African newspapers for coverage of other opposition candidates and parties. I wonder what happened to the Afrikaner Nationalist Party? Now they are the New Nationalist Party.

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Giant Solar Electricity Project in Australia

When complete, this will feature the tallest human structure ever built--the central tower will be a kilometer tall. See EnviroMission Limited for more information.

The Solar Mission Project is the realisation of large-scale clean green renewable energy generation from the world’s first 200MW solar thermal power station using innovative Solar Tower technology.

One 200MW power station will provide enough electricity to around 200,000 typical Australian homes and will abate over 750,000 tonnes of greenhouse producing gases from entering the environment annually.

The monolithic scale of the project is sure to attract world attention and add value to the construction of the power station through tourism and associated economic benefits.

Here is a description of how it will work:

Solar Tower technology is not simply solar energy. Solar Tower technology is created when the sun’s radiation is used to heat a large body of air, which is then forced by the laws of physics (hot air rises) to move as a hot wind through large turbines to generate electricity. A solar thermal power station using Solar Tower technology will create the conditions to cause hot wind to flow continuously through its turbines to generate electricity.

(Hot air? Maybe they can install these turbines above every legislative body.)

Early this week, the company said that the pre-feasibility stage of the Solar Tower project is complete.

Enviromission and its partners will now undertake a detailed examination of the financial structuring and development required to deliver Solar Tower technology to the Australian energy market.

I notice that shares of Enviromission stock sell for about 18 cents Australian. Get in on the ground floor! Buy now! (Disclaimer: Ghost Town Orange does not provide legal, financial, or accounting advice. Consult your own professional shaman before investing in anything.)

Another top story revisited: Senate hackers

Remember the Republican staffers caught stealing and leaking Democrat internal documents? Daily Kos has more, quoting from The Hill.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's (R-Tenn.) top aide on judicial nominees [namely, Manuel Miranda] is expected to announce his resignation at the end of this week - a sacrifice offered by the GOP leadership in hope of persuading the Democrats to wind down the fight over leaked Judiciary Committee memos.

It seems the Democrats are not rolling over and playing dead over Bush's horrible judicial nominees. Hurrah!

Father, let me dedicate All this year to you
In whatever earthly state You will have me be
Not from sorrow, pain, or care Freedom dare I claim;
This alone shall be my prayer: Glorify Your name.
--from New Year's Hymn by Lawrence Tuttiett, 1864 (alt.)

Plame Case: some progress

Remember the White House's exposure of a CIA agent as payback for criticism of the bogus Niger uranium story? The FBI is closing in on Vice President Cheney's staff--namely John Hannah and Lewis "Scooter" Libby (note: this is a Moonie site). Mr. Hannah is Mr. Cheney's senior national security aide (contact man for the Iraqi National Congress (the primary source of the overly-optimistic post-war scenario) and Mr. Libby is Mr. Cheney's chief of staff. More at Daily Kos on Mr. Hannah. Comments at Daily Kos speculate that Mr. Unvarnished Advice Cheney may be dumped from the Bush re-election ticket in the fall. Hmmm.

Music: don't be a passive consumer

Enjoyment

Music: healing the rift by Ivan Hewett
The Western world must learn to sing again
By Michael Church
01 January 2004
Until recent times, says Ivan Hewett, music was everywhere, and always an authentic expression of the social situation that called it forth. The idyll was shattered, in the developed West, by the notion that music could be transportable: a mass could be taken out of church and performed in a concert hall. Then music began its long retreat from the public domain. It turned into something made en famille, then something listened to in the privacy of a room, until finally the Walkman reduced its operative space to six inches between the ears.
Hewett's book is fruitfully complex: I could have extracted several other narratives which would have summarised music's trajectory just as well. The 'rift' in his title denotes nothing so banal as that between classicists and modernists. His big theme is the falling-apart of the laboriously-constructed musical realm of the early 20th century, and the perennial desire, among composers, to make it whole again. As he makes clear, that crisis reflects a falling-apart in our entire culture. Putting it together again - if such a thing is possible - would benefit us all.

Mr. Church continues his review by commenting on the rise of the programme note as recent composers feel compelled to explain how to listen to the music. Why are composers so intent on creating private musical languages? What is the social function of music? Mr. Church concludes:

What now? Hewett offers a brilliant tour d'horizon of music's multifarious new directions - aided by sampling tricks, fuelled by PC notions - but concludes that if we want to "heal the rift", we can't delegate the job to composers. We must all start making music again. If we play and sing, we will once more listen actively too. And that way lies musical health.

Note to self

Read The Scotsman - International - International community accused of accepting bribes from Saddam and follow the links--who accepted bribes from Saddam Hussein?

Another gold rush?

News for the gold bugs:
Alaska Journal of Commerce: Pebble now state's biggest gold mine 02/02/04:

Pebble now state's biggest gold mine

By Tim Bradner
Alaska Journal of Commerce

Alaska has another huge gold prospect. Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. announced Jan. 21 that the Pebble gold-copper minerals deposit near Lake Iliamna southwest of Anchorage has estimated gold resources of 26.5 million ounces and an estimated copper resource of 16.5 billion pounds.

The new estimates make Pebble the largest gold resource deposit in North America and the second largest copper deposit on the continent, according to Ronald W. Thiessen, president of the Vancouver-based mineral exploration company.

Pebble now eclipses another large Alaska gold project, Donlin Creek, as North America's largest. Donlin Creek, with 25.2 million ounces of gold resources, is now No. 2.

I notice that the Pebble gold deposits are on state land:

Pebble is on state-owned lands, but the project is being closely watched by Bristol Bay Native Corp., another Native regional corporation which owns mineral lands nearby.

And I notice that the state will be funding the improvements needed to develop these gold resources:

In a related development, the state Department of Transportation and Public Facilities has begun a reconnaissance engineering study of a possible road to the Pebble deposit from the west side of Cook Inlet.

A $500,000 contract has been let to Peratrovich, Nottingham and Drage, an Anchorage engineering consulting firm, to survey possible road routes and port sites, according to Mike McKinnon, manager for DOTPF's rural roads project. The study is to be complete by the end of the year.

And we'll pretend this is a triumph of private enterprise and individual initiative.

And in related news, the volatility of South Africa's currency has reduced earnings for some gold mines:

Though the currency has weakened this month, its overall strength virtually canceled the benefits of high gold prices to miners in the last quarter, and the rand remains volatile. Indeed, the 28 percent appreciation in the rand from 2002 to 2003 actually reduced by 15 percent the price in rand that South African producers received for their gold, said Roger Baxter, chief economist at the Chamber of Mines of South Africa. According to Mr. Baxter, the average dollar price of gold rose 17 percent, from $310 an ounce in 2002 to $364 in 2003. In that period, the rand price for an ounce of gold fell to 2,735 rand from 3,248. "It's not so much a reduction of revenues, but a slashing of margins," says Nick Goodwin, a gold analyst for the South African financial services firm Tradek. "Margins are on par with the lows of the past." Miners of precious metals, who sell their product in dollars but count costs in rand, have been hit by the strength of the currency, but none as hard as the gold miners, whose deep deposits have historically made South Africa a high-cost producer compared with other countries. Profit margins at the gold miners were at their rosiest in the first quarter of 2002, when the industrywide margin was 40 percent, excluding capital spending, Mr. Goodwin said. At that time, the price of gold in dollars was just $290, well below the $406.60 price now, but the rand was trading at an average of 11.53 to the dollar, compared with 7.17 currently. By the third quarter of last year, though, that profit margin had narrowed to 22 percent, a wan figure in the capital-intensive industry.

So, higher cost South African mines will go out of production. Note that the real story is the weakness of the U. S. dollar, but I don't expect anyone to notice that.

2004 Democratic Hard and Soft Count Delegates

Look here for state by state totals -- from the Green Papers. Here are the totals:

Candidate	Hard Delegates	Soft Delegates
Kerry	134	162
Edwards	62	80
Clark	44	49
Dean	19	27
Sharpton	1	1
Kucinich	0	0

And here are the definitions of hard and soft delegates. Remember that 2,161 delegates are needed to win the nomination. (Updated: I notice that CNN says that Al Sharpton won a delegate in Delaware.)

(I have no idea why there is all that blank space above the table.)