Power to the People!

According to the WSJ piece "The Young and Ripped Off," this phrase now means something akin to "No Taxation without Privatization."

I recall protesting to keep clinic doors open, to end apartheid, and to stop the secret CIA wars in Central America. Not so that I can skate on my responsibility to contribute to society by paying my taxes.

Sad.

Santorum Will Poison Your Baby

Guess who just voted against a ban on human pesticide testing? Our buddy Rick Santorum. The AP reports that the ban is specifically directed at eliminating EPA rules that would permit the "agency to accept data from human tests on children, pregnant women, newborns, infants and fetuses. Even newborns of 'uncertain viability' could be tested under the draft EPA rule."

If his next baby dies from pesticide poisoning, you think he'll still bring it home for the family to see?

Goodbye and good luck!

The damn Internet slays another icon.

At UT, TEX is an ex
University hangs up on telephone registration system

TEX, the University of Texas' telephone registration system, will say "goodbye and good luck" for the last time when it's laid to rest July 15 at 5 p.m.

"An era has passed," said William Livingston, UT senior vice president and the voice of TEX, who can be heard reading the system's eulogy at the TEX number. "Something will have to replace old TEX."

That something is the Internet.

Side note: I love this photo. Ol' Tex in seersucker with a crazy grin. That's how I think I always pictured him anyway.

This will put a smile on your face

The best op-ed by a Republican I've read in a long, long time. I'd excerpt it here but you should really read the whole thing. Really.

As turns out,

it was a vote for Bush that was a vote for the terrortists (not the other way around).

Get it straight Tom Cole.

Border Cover-Up

Yet another cover-up from BushCo - I'm sure everyone will just sigh and mutter 'there they go again' because we're all so used to shit like this - but here it is anyway:

President Bush's proposal for a guest worker program to help stem the tide of illegal immigration actually prompted a surge of illegal border-crossings that the administration then sought to cover up, a watchdog group charged today, citing a 2004 survey by the U.S. Border Patrol.

Judicial Watch, a Washington-based public interest group, said the survey, obtained under a Freedom of Information Act request, showed that 61 percent of a sample of detainees who had been caught illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexican border in the wake of Bush's proposal said they had been informed by the Mexican government or the media that the Bush administration was offering amnesty to illegal immigrants. Nearly 45 percent said the purported amnesty influenced their decision to enter the United States illegally, Judicial Watch said.

"The results indicated that President Bush's proposal had actually lured greater numbers of illegal immigrants to violate the law," the group said in a 16-page report on the Border Patrol survey. It said the Bush administration aborted the survey on Jan. 27, 2004, within a few weeks after it began, because it was producing "politically inconvenient and/or potentially embarrassing data." The U.S. government never issued a report based on the survey.

"The White House directed Homeland Security public affairs officers to deliberately withhold information from the public and the media about the Border Patrol survey and a related spike in illegal immigration," Judicial Watch said, citing documents it obtained under the FOIA.

Ha Ha

From The Note:

Dear Mr. President:

[...]

Matt Lauer said this on network TV this morning:

"Twenty-one after the hour. If you'd like to watch President Bush's address to the nation tonight on Iraq, you can see it at 8:00 Eastern Time on MSNBC. Back in a moment on a Tuesday morning, this is Today, on NBC."

(A Note program Note: At this writing, as far as we know, here's what is on NBC instead of you: Average Joe: The Joes Strike Back LINK

"Stunning 26-year-old red-headed Anna is looking for love. Can she find it with an average Joe? Watch as this unsuspecting model is surprised by the arrival, not of traditional leading men, but by a swarm of well-intentioned average Joes."

"The enthusiastic guys hope to woo and win her over with their charm and personalities. But first, they'll have to navigate through an all-new series of dramatic challenges, outrageous surprises - and their toughest competition yet - seven strikingly handsome jocks who are cocky and confident that Anna will only have eyes for them."

"Plus, each week one lucky Joe gets a total makeover and surprises Anna with his new look. With plenty of romance, a trip to Tahiti and new twists at every turn, this new season promises lots of summer fun. Hunks beware, the Joes are fighting back!")

Malcolm X drummers -- now with photos!

A while back, I wrote about a Columbia Heights drum circle, see below.

Only in DC, Pt. II

Sure, make Durbin apologize, then admit the torture.

Un-fucking-believable.

The best of TX political oratory

The Texas Observer has collected the Texas lege session's most soaring and salacious political oratory. My favorites:

“I’ve already yielded more than a cheerleader at a drive-in.”
—Sen. Kel Seliger (R-Amarillo) on the Senate floor.

“It’s a learned behavior. It’s kind of like domestic violence or someone who drinks. There was someone in the family or close to the family who caused that.”
—Rep. Robert Talton (R-Pasadena) on homosexuality.

“If we outlawed everything some people find offensive, there wouldn’t even be a Texas in the first place.”
—Cindy Campos, lifeguard, on the bill by Rep. Al Edwards (D-Houston) to outlaw sexually suggestive cheerleading as “told” to the Onion.

“Every time I get stopped they want to search my vehicle.”
—Sen. Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa (D-McAllen) on the need for consent searches to stop harassment of people who look like him.

“I can’t define yours for you or you define mine for me. I don’t have a word-for-word description of it, but any adult who is involved with sex at all in their life—they know it when they see it. I can’t give you a demonstration this evening.”
—Rep. Al Edwards (D-Houston) on which sexually suggestive moves his sexy cheerleader bill would outlaw.

“I’m not sure we’d want one,”
replied Rep. Kent Grusendorf (R-Arlington).

“When you become black, Mr. Bohac, you will understand why there is a Voting Rights Act.”
—Rep. Garnet Coleman (D-Houston) in an exchange with Rep. Dwayne Bohac (R-Houston) during debate on a measure that would make it more difficult for the poor and minorities to vote.

“This amendment is blowing smoke to fuel the hell-fire flames of bigotry. When people of my color used to marry someone of Mr. Chisum’s color, you’d often find people of my color hanging from a tree. That’s what white people back then did to protect marriage.”
—Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston) on a bill by Rep. Warren Chisum (R-Pampa) to add a ban to gay marriage in the Texas Constitution.

Pictures

Blogger now let's us easily add/host pictures on the blog. Yay!

Only in DC

. . . would you have to apologize for saying that barbaric and fascistic behavior is, well, barbaric and fascistic.

Senator Durbin, I am disappointed in you. You were correct the first time. You should have refused to apologize. Shame on you for sucking up to the Republican Noise Machine. What's next: Barbara Boxer retracting her challenge to Ohio's electoral votes? Stand up for yourselves, Dems! No one is going to do it for you.

Durbin's original statement ("If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags or some mad regime - Pol Pot or others - that had no concern for human beings.") was the dead-on truth.

Americans should be ashamed of the treatment the Guantanamo prisoners received. I, for one, am ashamed to be from the same country as those who condone this behavior.

Supreme Court Strikes Again

Maybe I will feel differently after reading the entire decision, but the so-called "liberal" members of the Court (and I use that appellation very loosely) seem to have opened the door to this premise: any time anyone finds a use for land that would create more jobs and more taxes than the current use, the government can "take" it under the Fifth Amendment. This would require of course, that the government pay fair market value, but it effectively transfers all land-use power to the economic developers and away from more community-minded uses (such low-value uses, for example, as parks, open spaces, and apartment buildings).

As an advocate for the rights of communities, I am not so much concerned about the rights of poor, put-upon property owners. They can fend for themselves.

But I am concerned about what our already besieged communities will look like after Wal-Mart, Marriott, and Blockbuster video have convinced cities and burghs across the country that strip malls and hotels should replace homes, parks, homeless shelters, schools, and other public services in prime locations near city centers, beaches, lakes, and public transportation hubs.

Where will we all go when the apartment buildings are shut down? It boggles the mind.

Moonbeam for Atty General

Jerry Brown just got married (at 67) and is planning a run for AG of my home state.

I cut my teeth on this guy's Presidential Campaign. I wonder if he has any openings on his campaign staff...

You might also want to check out his blog (although it does not compare to the Asylum we are running here).

How sleazy do you have to be...

...to ask a rabbi to give you a fake award:

Yesterday's Senate hearing into superlobbyist Jack Abramoff's alleged defrauding of Indian tribes had something for everyone. There was the yoga instructor who took the Fifth. There was the lifeguard selected to run a think tank from a beach house at Rehoboth. And there was Exhibit 31, an e-mail from Abramoff to a rabbi friend.

"I hate to ask you for your help with something so silly but I've been nominated for membership in the Cosmos Club, which is a very distinguished club in Washington, DC, comprised of Nobel Prize winners, etc.," Abramoff wrote. "Problem for me is that most prospective members have received awards and I have received none. I was wondering if you thought it possible that I could put that I have received an award from Toward Tradition with a sufficiently academic title, perhaps something like Scholar of Talmudic Studies?"

There were titters in the audience as Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.) read aloud the e-mail, then outright laughter as he continued reading: "Indeed, it would be even better if it were possible that I received these in years past, if you know what I mean."

"Adios, mofo"

From the Star-Telegram. More from the Houston TV station.

Nice

From Capitol Buzz:

When Bill Frist stood on the floor of the U.S. Senate in March and diagnosed Terry Schiavo in Florida, he may have violated a Tennessee medical rule that requires a special license to practice telemedicine.

Chapter 0880-2-.16 of the Rules of the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners states that “No person shall engage in the practice of medicine across state lines in this State, hold himself out as qualified to do the same, or use any title, word, or abbreviation to indicate to or induce others to believe that he is licensed to practice medicine across state lines in this State unless he is actually so licensed in accordance with the provisions of this rule.”

It looks like Frist violated this rule when he took to the Senate floor to make his diagnosis. Now it's up to us to make sure he is held accountable. Keep in mind that this is NOT the first time Frist has put his medical license in jeopardy.

Click here to learn how to file a complaint with the Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners. To contact the Board, call(615) 532-3202 or 1-800-778-4123.

A bit of Texas history

You wouldn't be reading this blog today if it weren't for Jack Kilby who died on Monday at his home in Dallas. The Washington Post has a nice write up:

Kilby won the 2000 Nobel Prize in physics for his 1958 invention of the integrated electronic circuit, which made personal computers, satellite navigation systems, cell phones and the $200 billion field of microelectronics possible. He invented the hand-held calculator, which commercialized the microchip, and held more than 60 other patents.

"In my opinion, there are only a handful of people whose works have truly transformed the world and the way we live in it -- Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, the Wright brothers and Jack Kilby," Tom Engibous, chairman of Texas Instruments, where Kilby worked for years, said in a statement. "If there was ever a seminal invention that transformed not only our industry but our world, it was Jack's invention of the first integrated circuit."

And the Dallas Morning News has this to say:

So take a few moments as you go through your day to appreciate the contributions of that guy whose name you probably won't remember a couple of weeks from now: Jack Kilby.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Kay Bailey for Veep?

Oh boy...

Ouch

All bets, unfortunately, are off

Kay Bailey ain't running (for guv, that is). The new question - can Strayhorn/Rylander/one tough grandma beat Perry? And would she be better?

What's good for the goose

is apparently too good for the gander. The Dallas Morning News yesterday published an article about how rich the Texas freshman class is.

Wealth aside (that is a topic for another rant), the article detailed a number of Texas Representatives who collect public pensions. Yes, we taxpayers, who are facing Social Security privatization and benefit cuts, and private pension funds being underfunded, converted to risky "defined-benefit plans," or going belly-up (sorry United employees), are paying for the "retirement" of folks who may have spent relatively few years in service and who definitely are not retired.

How many times have we heard of an average Joe being let go after 19 years on the job, coincidentally just one year before his pension vests? What is poor Joe to do? Serve as a Texas state or local judge or legislator, apparently.

Yes, I support fair pay and pension plans for legislators. How else will we have a snowball's chance in hell to get a citizen-legislature instead of a millionaire's club? Still, the level of pension need not be out of proportion to the pensions available to average citizens. And it should not be overly generous at a time when the state of Texas is underfunding Medicaid, SCHIP, and public education. And certainly not at a time when a few of those same legislators are considering cutting Social Security, all that stands between some Texans and an impoverished retirement.

Some examples of pensions now being collected (and yes, I only picked the Rs. Read the article if you want the rest.):

"Rep. Ted Poe, R-Humble, got $119,944 after retiring as a judge. . . . Rep. John Carter, R-Round Rock, collected $77,466. . . . Mr. Hall, a former county judge and state lawmaker, got $53,493. "

More on Texas Death Penalty

The American Prospect has a great (and depressing) piece on
The Unique Brutality of Texas.

More on the lynching vote

A loyal reader of CruzBustamante.com pointed out "one of the most offensive quotes ever" in the Chronicle's story on Senators Cornyn and Hutchison trying to explain their decisions not to co-sponsor the lynching apology.

Chris Paulitz, a Hutchison aide, said the senator's staff did not push her to co-sponsor the resolution because "it was guaranteed to pass."

"For her, lynching is something that is very present," Paulitz said. "This is something she knows very personally. But as a member of the Senate leadership, you just can't co-sponsor everything."

Paulitz emphasized that in 1998, Hutchison attended the funeral of James Byrd Jr., a black man from Jasper, Texas, who was dragged along a road and killed by three white men.

"Knowing something personally is more than attending a funeral. But here's to using funeral attendance to make you appear like you are not kowtowing to the racists in Texas like you really are," he writes.

Damn straight.

Frist's Flippity-Fucking-Flop

From today's AP:

Frist, R-Tenn., said he never made his own diagnosis... "I raised the question, 'Is she in a persistent vegetative state or not?' I never made the diagnosis, never said that she was not."

From the Washington Post, 3/19/05:

Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), a renowned heart surgeon before becoming Senate majority leader, went to the floor late Thursday night for the second time in 12 hours to argue that Florida doctors had erred in saying Terri Schiavo is in a "persistent vegetative state."

"I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office," he said in a lengthy speech in which he quoted medical texts and standards. "She certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli."

His comments raised eyebrows in medical and political circles alike. It is not every day that a high-profile physician relies on family videotapes to challenge the diagnosis of doctors who examined a severely brain-damaged patient in person.

What a bunch of BS.

A little Arnie Action for ya

Arnie's Speech booed? What are those crazy Californians up to? Don't they know he's the Governator?

(From Yahoo News) "California Gov. Arnold faced down booing, jeering protesters on Tuesday as he delivered a commencement address at his alma mater, where tuition has risen as a result of his budget cuts.
. . .
Earlier in the day, a couple of hundred protesters representing unions, students and a smattering of other causes gathered for an anti-Schwarzenegger rally outside the college.

Trevor Dilling, a student who wore a chicken costume, said he was insulted by the governor's decision to speak at the college, which caters to mainly low income and minority students."

Original link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/politics_schwarzenegger_dc

I'm not sure what the chicken suit is all about, but notice how the always insightful mainstream media mentions that as if to some how delegitimize the student position (I mean, if they can be funny, they can't be serious, right?). Who needs a discussion of why such quaint notions as pensions and tenure are important to teachers and other public servants (who make significantly less than their public sector counterparts I might add)?

Well, I say more power to you Trevor.

Arnie is a chicken, a wimp, and a girlie-man, if you must go there (and I think we must). He's the man who promised Californians that he was so rich he couldn't be bought. He promised to be an independent. He promised it would not be "business as usual" in California. And yet he there is, towing the anti-union party line and spouting the public servant-bashing Republican talking points. Serving last year's warmed over policy points like last week's warmed over corned beef hash (and smelling up the place while he is at it).

Uh, What?

Is this for real? A controlled demolition?

A former Bush team member during his first administration is now voicing serious doubts about the collapse of the World Trade Center on 9-11. Former chief economist for the Department of Labor during President George W. Bush's first term Morgan Reynolds comments that the official story about the collapse of the WTC is "bogus" and that it is more likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent Building No. 7.

Oh wait, this might explain things:

Reynolds, who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas and is now professor emeritus at Texas A&M University...

This guy ought to be taken out back and shot...

...figuratively of course.

Asbestos boss likely to breathe free

Houston businessman Eric Ho bought the defunct Alief General Hospital in 1997 with the intention of converting it to housing. He was informed by the seller that it required as much as $400,000 worth of asbestos abatement.

After receiving a bid for $325,000 from a licensed asbestos removal firm, he instead put his handyman in charge, who hired 10 or 11 Mexican farm workers to do the job.

They were given neither training nor proper protective clothing. They were not told that the material they were scraping off of pipes and beams with putty knives included asbestos.

And when a city inspector shut the project down, Ho instructed the workers to continue at night so as not to be detected. Some of the workers lived at the job site. Others ate among the dust they created with their putty knives.

So glad to see this guy landed on his feet

Former Bush Aide Who Edited Reports Is Hired by Exxon

Dr. Frist should lose his license

Breaking news from the Think Progress blog:

Freshly-released autopsy results reveal that Terri Shiavo was blind:

Pinellas-Pasco Medical Examiner Jon Thogmartin concluded that…her brain was about half of normal size when she died. …

Thogmartin says her brain was “profoundly atrophied” – and that the damage was “irreversable.” He also says, “The vision centers of her brain were dead” – meaning she was blind.

Which makes Dr. Frist’s expert “diagnosis” all the more outrageous:

Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), a renowned heart surgeon before becoming Senate majority leader, went to the floor late Thursday night for the second time in 12 hours to argue that Florida doctors had erred in saying Terri Schiavo is in a “persistent vegetative state.”

“I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office,” he said in a lengthy speech in which he quoted medical texts and standards. “She certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli.”

Lynching follow-up

Atlanta Journal Constitution, via Atrios:

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) refused repeated requests for a roll call vote that would have put senators on the record on a resolution apologizing for past failures to pass anti-lynching laws, officials involved in the negotiations said Tuesday.

...

As dozens of descendants of lynching victims watched from the Senate gallery, the resolution was adopted Monday evening under a voice vote procedure that did not require any senator's presence.

Eighty senators, however, had signed as co-sponsors, putting themselves on record as supporting the resolution. By the time the Senate recessed Tuesday evening, five other senators had added their names as co-sponsors, leaving 15 Republicans who had not.

It's worth noting that Frist pulled this stunt while 91-year-old James Cameron, the only known survivor of a lynching, sat in the gallery.

Why I love Mark Morford

Apparently Gillette has a new razor that is, well, basically a female vibrator. Mark Morford breaks it down in a way only he can:

But the funny thing is, I'm not sure which target market gets the inane Vibrance, exactly... Is it women who haven't masturbated since they accidentally sat atop a throbbing riding lawn mower and who are just a little sexually terrified but simultaneously easily titillated and more than a little gullible, and who want to relive the vibratory experience but can't say "vibrator" without getting a rash? Women like, say, Laura Bush?

Anyone who can work a Laura Bush dig into a column on female razors that vibrate has earned my readership. You can subscribe to his twice-weekly newsletter here.

Haha!

No wonder Cornyn is the least popular Senator.

Young Neidermeyers

Ugh. The Times reports on the young Neidermeyers in town for Heritage Foundation internships.

Next Generation of Conservatives (By the Dormful)

They are young and bright and ardently right. They tack Ronald Reagan calendars on their cubicle walls and devote brown bag lunches to the free market theories of Friedrich von Hayek. They come from 51 colleges and 28 states, calling for low taxes, strong defense and dorm rooms with a view.

And let's get one thing straight: they're not here to run the copying machine.

Yuk, yuk, yuk. This intern has some noble and lofty career goals:

Katherine Rogers, a junior at Georgetown, is spending the summer in the Keith and Lois Mitchell room, on the Mr. and Mrs. Theodore Smyth floor, just upstairs from the Norma Zindahl Intern Lounge, which is adjacent to the William J. Lehrfeld Intern Center. Ms. Rogers's father is a longtime Heritage donor, and she is working in donor relations, which she thinks will be useful in her intended career as a pharmaceutical lobbyist.

A fucking pharmaceutical lobbyist? If I were her guidance counselor I'd shoot myself. I'd be more proud if my daughter wanted to be a stripper, rather than a whore for an industry that knowingly markets deadly drugs to children, price-gouges the taxpayer, and overcharges the American consumer.

Finally, the article contains a sad, though dead-on accuarate, admission by the left:

"There's no question that the right wing over the last 25 years did a much better job of creating a farm system," said Ralph G. Neas, the president of People for the American Way. Like many other liberal groups, his has recently expanded its campus outreach activities in an effort to keep pace with the right.

"They invested in young people," Mr. Neas said. "We're trying to catch up."

Ok, this is an unfair ad hominem attack, but doesn't the guy on the right look like a child molester?

Texas Senators: Pro-Lynching

Cornyn and Hutchinson are apparently both pro-lynching. According to Chris Geidner they are among the group of only 6 senators that didn't co-sponsor a bill apologizing for not outlawing lynching back in the day. The bill's sole intent was to "(apologize) to the victims of lynching and the descendants of those victims for the failure of the Senate to enact anti-lynching legislation."

Kos has more info on the issue.

Here's hoping Howard Dean adds 'racist' and 'bigots' to 'Christian' and 'white' the next time he's describing the Republican Party.

Update: No one seems to know exactly who did and didn't co-sponsor this bill. According to some sources, Kay Bailey did sign-on but I can't find anything that says Cornyn did. Both of the links mentioned above have run downs on the various lists from various sources.

Supreme Court rebukes Texas again on the death penalty

It's almost a weekly occurence. They keep messing with Texas. First they say you can't kill the retarded, then they say you can't kill juveniles. Now they say you can't intentionally strike all the blacks out of the jury pool so you can get a white jury to convict a black defendant!

Now wonder DeLay and Cornyn are so angry with the federal judiciary. Story excerpts below. Two scary things to think about: 1) Though the US Supreme Court overturned the conviction 6-3, the US 5th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld it. That bastard court is about to get even worse with the addition of Priscilla Owen (she essentially kills people herself). 2) Clarence Thomas voted in the minority on this one. Not suprising really, but c'mon, Clarence, you really wonder why Black people don't like you when you just said it was OK for Dallas County prosecutors to stack the deck in court to try to kill a black defendant?

Supreme Court Overturns Death Row Conviction in Texas

The Supreme Court overturned the conviction of a black death row inmate who said Texas prosecutors unfairly stacked his jury with whites, issuing a harsh rebuke to the state that executes more people than any other.

[...]

Since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, Texas has executed over one-third of the more than 900 people put to death in the United States.

Justices last year issued stinging reversals in three cases involving Texas death penalty convictions on various grounds, a striking number for a conservative-leaning court that generally favors capital punishment. All the cases involved black defendants.

Miller-El contends that Dallas County prosecutors had a long history of excluding blacks from juries and pointed to training manuals that were distributed to prosecutors from the 1960s into the early 1980s. The manuals advised prosecutors to remove blacks or Jews from death penalty juries on the theory that those groups would be more sympathetic to criminal defendants.

The Post pops Perry

Does Rick Perry hate the troops? Nope, just the gay ones!

The Wash. Post says he's Dishonoring Texas. I don't know. It takes a lot to dishonor Texas. Maybe this is just mildly embarassing.

Mr. Perry was asked by a reporter what he had to say "to gays and lesbians who are serving in the military right now in Iraq who are going to come back to Texas and may not be entitled to the same rights as the rest of us?" Mr. Perry responded that "Texans have made a decision about marriage, and if there is some other state that has a more lenient view than Texas, then maybe that's a better place for them to live."

[...]

Mr. Perry, a veteran himself, did not take the trouble to honor the service of gay people now in harm's way or mention that they were welcome in Texas. He didn't mention the need to respect different life choices or note that same-sex couples might have deeply committed relationships. His message was simple: If you don't like it, leave. It's a message unworthy of the governor of any state.

Owen Wilson and Ann Richards

And we go from serious talk about racist Bush nominees to celebrity gossip:

In an interview for Playboy's July issue, Owen Wilson describes the Texas Gov. Ann Richards as "an extremely attractive woman. A handsome woman, as they say sometimes.'' Wilson told the bunny reporter, "Her voice and attitude are representative of the best kind of Texas woman.''

They don't like black people, either

From Capitol Buzz:

Henrietta Holsman Fore, the Bush White House’s nominee to be Under-Secretary of State for Management, was forced to resign from the Wellesley College Board of Trustees for saying that blacks preferred pushing drugs to working in a factory. Even when she tried apologizing for the comments in a letter to the college newspaper, Holsman reiterated her statement that she had trouble keeping black assembly-line workers from going ''back to the street to earn more money'' selling drugs. [NYT, 2/12/87]

Ties into my previous post quite nicely.

Update (6/10/05): The Center for American Progress reports in their daily Progress Report email:

Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) grilled Henrietta Holsman Fore, currently director of the U.S. Mint and nominee to be undersecretary of state for management, about racially insensitive comments that had been attributed to her in a speech she gave in 1987 at Wellesley College. According to the Chicago Tribune, Fore had suggested blacks preferred pushing drugs to working in factory jobs and that Hispanic workers were lazy. Obama peppered Fore with questions for 20 minutes before suggesting that her "stereotypical notion about how people performed" do not make her well-suited for overseeing human resources and the civil rights office of the State Department. The Tribune noted that Fore never issued a firm denial of the statements attributed to her in the 1987 speech.

Marine recruiting

Crazy doings by the Marines in the Northwest.

When Marine recruiters go way beyond the call

"You don't want to be a burden to your mom," they told him. "Be a man." ...

The sergeant was friendly but, at the same time, aggressively insistent. This time, when Axel said, "Not interested," the sarge turned surly, snapping, "You're making a big (bleeping) mistake!"

Next thing Axel knew, the same sergeant and another recruiter showed up at the LaConner Brewing Co., the restaurant where Axel works. And before Axel, an older cousin and other co-workers knew or understood what was happening, Axel was whisked away in a car.

"They said we were going somewhere but I didn't know we were going all the way to Seattle," Axel said.

Hate

The NY Times reports today, the radical right is now attacking programs that promote tolerance. Apparently acceptance isn't a family value.

Emboldened by the political right's growing influence on public policy, opponents of school activities aimed at educating students about homosexuality or promoting acceptance of gay people are mounting challenges to such programs, at individual schools, at statehouses and in Congress.

Chief among the targets are sex education programs that include discussions of homosexuality, and after-school clubs that bring gay and straight students together, two initiatives that gained assent in numerous schools over the last decade.

Next thing you know they'll be pushing for legislation that requires homosexual kids sit in the back of the school bus.

It's like we're trying to make crazier criminals

USA Today reports that Texas's habit of keeping huge numbers of inmates in solitary confinement really only results in crazier inmates.

After years in solitary, freedom hard to grasp

The inmates typically are allowed out of their cells for no more than an hour a day to exercise alone; their exposure to TV and reading material also is limited.

[...]

He says some of the ex-inmates had reconfigured their new living spaces at home to "recreate" the look and feel of their tiny cells.

"The rooms were always small and dark," Haney says. "The beds were made in the same way. Shoes were always stacked by their bed, just like in prison." One of his clients slept in a bathtub during his first few nights out of prison, Haney says, because the "cold, solid tub felt most like his cell."

[...]

But Stuart Grassian, a Harvard University psychiatrist who has studied the long-term effects of isolation on offenders, says that "if the public understood what kind of condition these people are in when they (are freed), they would be appalled. It's set up for these folks to fail" and "create new victims."

[...]

In the spring of 2004, he got drunk and began firing a gun in his apartment. After he woke up in the local jail the next morning and learned that he had been charged with a new felony, Morales says he panicked and tried to escape from the jail's exercise yard.

Convictions on the gun and escape charges earned him 35 more years in prison. He expects to serve all that time in solitary confinement because of his past association with a gang in prison.

"I wake up today, and I can't believe it," Morales says during an interview at a state prison in Gatesville. "I had so many plans, but I guess it's all over now."

Morales, whose most serious offense may have been the weapons case in which no one was injured, will be 68 when he is scheduled to be released in 2040. Counting his previous prison term, he will have spent 45 years in isolation.

No one deserves 45 years in solitary with limited tv and reading materials. That's torture. That human rights concern aside, this obviously increases crime on the outside and recidivism. It'd be one thing if Texas's draconian criminal justice policies worked, but I guess effectiveness isn't really the point. It's all about showing how tough you are to the folks back in suburban Fort Worth.

Ban the ban!

So glad to learn of a group pushing back against the proposed smoking ban in DC (besides the bar and restaurant association of course). As their website explains:

Ban the Ban is a grassroots organization dedicated to preserving choice in Washington D.C. for smokers and non-smokers alike. We oppose Smoke Free DC's efforts to ban smoking in the capital's bars and restaurants. We support the right of business owners to make their own decisions about smoking policies in their establishments and the right of workers and customers to patronize smokefree establishments if they don't wish to be exposed to secondhand smoke.

We do not accept funding from tobacco companies.

Ban the Ban raises money from house parties, T-shirt sales, and the contributions of local businesspeople. Smokefree DC and its allies are heavily funded by outside groups with an agenda that would destroy nightlife in D.C.

Contact the City Council here.

That genocide thing

It's pretty sad (though not uncommon) when The Onion has the sharpest political commentary on an issue:

Well, I Guess That Genocide in Sudan Must've Worked Itself Out On Its Own

I was pretty worried a year or so ago when the news came out that thousands of people had been indiscriminately slaughtered in Darfur. It was unsettling to hear that citizens of one ethnicity (Arab, maybe?) were systematically mass-murdering the population of some other ethnicity (Was it the Ganjaweeds? It's been so long since I've read their names!) But lately, the main stories in the news seem to be about Deep Throat, the new summer blockbusters, and something about stem cells. Since I'm sure I would have remembered if the U.S. had intervened in some way to stop it, I can only assume that the whole genocide-in-Darfur thing has somehow worked itself out.

[...]

Good thing, 'cause for a while there, it seemed like the Sudan situation was pretty serious, especially when both President Bush and Sen. Kerry talked about it in the presidential debates. Heck, that the Darfur conflict qualified as genocide was practically the only thing they agreed on! So, if both presidential candidates acknowledged on TV that genocide was taking place, it's pretty safe to assume that someone stepped in before more innocent victims were systematically butchered. Right?

Apologies to Kristof at the Times, who has been going off incessantly about this issue. Unfortunately, like Herbert and the death penalty, eventually we'll all get tired of it and he'll move on.

He did have a great piece yesterday though.

In 1999, Madeleine Albright traveled to Sierra Leone and met child amputees there, wrenching the hearts of American television viewers and making that crisis a priority in a way that eventually helped resolve it. Ms. Rice could do the same for Darfur if she would only bother to go.

Mr. Bush values a frozen embryo. But he hasn't mustered much compassion for an entire population of terrorized widows and orphans. And he is cementing in place the very hopelessness he dreads, by continuing to avert his eyes from the first genocide of the 21st century.

We'll get back to ranting about Texas soon enough, but first, take a minute to tell Bush to act.

New Mayor in San Antonio

The 70-year-old judge beat the 30-year-old newcomer. It's a shame the 8th largest city in the US can't get rid of its ridiculous term limits that force contests like this.

In 1990, San Antonio voters approved a referendum to limit City Council and mayoral tenure to two, two-year terms during the elected official's lifetime. In all, the maximum time a politician elected to City Hall can serve is a total of eight years (four years as a council member and four as mayor.

So no one can hang around long enough to figure out how to get things done, build any sort of coalition, or accomplish anything before looking at the next office or watching the political gaze of the city turn to the next contest.

Well, no shit.

The Post reports Liberals Rethinking Senate Filibuster Deal.

...several sharply conservative judges are now being seated, and it is far from clear that the "extraordinary circumstances" clause will enable Democrats to block future conservative nominees to the Supreme Court or elsewhere.

Go back to Texas

I'm a little late in seeing this but couldn't let it pass by without a comment. Here's hoping this shit never happens.

Not giving DC residents the right to vote is one thing, having a Senator from Texas overturn one of the few laws DC government has the right to pass is another thing completely.

I love how the press release talks about undermining the Constitution. What about undermining democracy, representative government, and state's rights?

Kerry is an idiot

I totally agree with this.

McKinnon still a Republican

Mark McKinnon, Bush's TV consultant, VP of Public Strategies, one-time Democrat, and former editor of the Daily Texan, has committed to working for John McCain in 2008.

The article points out that McKinnon contributed a few thousand bucks to Texas Dems in the 2002 cycle - much to BushCo's chagrin. Too bad all he can do is throw some cash at the Party that made his career. As Molly Ivins might say, in Texas you get a lot more respect when you dance with them what brung ya.

Your business is a crack house

The Dallas Observer has an amazing article on a story that the Dallas Morning News has apparently completely missed. Corruption on a massive scale is going down in big-D where they're using nuisance laws to screw with local businesses:

The central accusation against the city is that it misappropriated a law aimed at crack houses and hot-sheet motels and used it instead to oppress and gouge legitimate businesses. Under the guise of nuisance abatement, the city sends police SWAT teams into respectable businesses, files suit against them and engages in other scare tactics, witnesses said, in order to get things out of them.

"We had diverse businesses and individuals unconnected to each other who gave startlingly similar stories about these threats," Keel tells me. "One witness swore that he was encouraged to give a donation to a particular local official's birthday fund and on other occasions was told to hire certain people to avoid this problem."

The investigation is being headed up by State Rep. Terry Keel who says, "I can argue that this evidence at a minimum--at a minimum--shows that the city of Dallas was in essence targeting lawful businesses in high-crime areas for this type of enforcement action in an attempt to make the businesses pay for the privilege of being protected by the police."

It's not often that we here at CruzBustamante.com support anything Republicans do - after all, they've never made an honest living in their lives, but if this article is even half true then here's hoping that the Rs and Ds can come together and get rid of the city hall officials acting like goodfellas.

American Progress Report has a good zinger today

WHITE HOUSE BLAMES MEDIA: White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan used the administration's admission of Quran mistreatment as another opportunity to blame the media. McClellan said that it was "unfortunate" that some media outlets "have chosen to take [the incidents] out of context." McClellan stressed that "99.9 percent" of Qurans were not mishandled. In a related story, there are 193 countries in the world – 99.5 percent were not invaded by the United States based on false claims the country possessed weapons of mass destruction.

Best of luck in prison, Mr. DA

So normally I'm against prison time for drug offenders, but in this guy's case I'd make an exception.

It's a shame he'll be doing time in federal prison instead of a state penn though.

Texas Ex-Prosecutor Is Sentenced

AMARILLO, Tex., June 1 (AP) - A former district attorney who had a reputation for being tough on drug offenders was sentenced Wednesday to five years in federal prison on drug-related charges.

Dean Reads Our Blog

Mad props to Governor Dean for talking about the massive corporate swindling that we recently blogged. As the WaPo reports:

Dean sought to broaden the debate over Bush's proposal to restructure Social Security to include the issue of private pensions, citing Labor Department statistics estimating that private companies underfunded their pension plans by $450 billion last year.

He suggested that Bush is responsible for the failure of private industry to protect those pensions. "The president wants to take away our Social Security," he said, "and then he's going to take away the private pension plans, too? What does he think ordinary Americans live on after they get to be 65 years old?"

Dean's comments are from a speech he gave at the Campaign for America's Future Conference going on this week in D.C. I highly encourage checking out their site, especially their interactive conference section, for videos, pictures, transcripts, and more from the likes of Lakoff, Dean, Edwards, and Villaraigosa.

Texas at Risk of Losing 'Killer' Status

The Houston Press has a darkly humorous piece on the decline of executions in Texas over the past few years. Apparently we're running the risk that the unofficial motto 'Everything's bigger in Texas' may no longer apply to the death penalty. We're actually on the verge of losing to, gulp, California...

The article is appropriately sardonic and filled with passages like this:

There are still some head-in-the-sand optimists like Dudley Sharp, the former head of Houston’s Justice For All and now a freelance death-penalty advocate and expert.

To be sure, Sharp admits, “there’s definitely a more organized anti-death-penalty movement these days.” He allows that some fellow advocates see the Supreme Court’s ruling barring juveniles from being tried for capital murder as “a major change, a parting of the seas, where you have the majority of the court relying on or calling to European opinion” (with “European opinion” being pronounced as if it were “Michael Moore”).

[...]

He blames the media for highlighting so many stories of death row prisoners being exonerated, saying many of those cases are just being sent back to the courts. No more than “30 or 40 are innocent,” he says, “and I think that’s probably a high figure.”

(In case you’re wondering, 30 or 40 innocent people put to death would come under the category of You Can’t Make an Omelette Without Breaking Some Eggs. “No one,” Sharp says, “wants to see an innocent person sentenced…but if you’re going to have no death sentences because there may be some innocent people sentenced, would there be any sentences at all for any crimes?”)

Don't miss the author's suggestions on how we can maintain our status as the most screwed up criminal justice system in the country.

US legal system not far off Indonesia's

There's been plenty of outrage in Australia over Schappelle Corby's 20 year drug sentence for allegedly smuggling marijuana into Indonesia. And now, the discussion has reached daytime television in America.

Star Jones Reynolds, commenting on the View,

...showed the least compassion for Corby, sentenced last week to 20 years in a Bali jail for smuggling marijuana.

"You come to this country (US), you reap the benefits of our laws," Jones Reynolds said.

"You go and visit somebody else's country, then you have to adhere to their laws."

I know, it's really not fair to pick on The View. This week's guests included Christina Applegate and Carson Daly. But Star Jones is a former New York prosecutor! She worked in the Brooklyn DA's office.

The drug sentence Corby got is in line with what first time offenders get in New York for a hell of a lot less drugs under the infamously cruel Rockefeller laws. Star Jones worked for the same office that put Ivan Wright in prison for 19 years for selling small amounts of cocaine.

Now, I have a serious "there but for the grace of God go I" sympathy for Corby, and think it's a terrible injustice, even if she is guilty, but where's the sympathy for the young people in our country facing the same shit? Like Elaine Bartlett, who did 16 years for a first-time cocaine offense.

I'd comment on the racism here, but it'd be way too obvious.

You gotta laugh at the absurdity

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And, finally, check out Baldie McEagle.