I really can’t top the language in this actual article; essentially it boils down to a offhand comment that the President made after the London arrests took place, where he told the American people that we were still facing a threat from “Islamic Fascists,” ushering a new hateful term next to the word “Islamic” which, aside from being irrelevant by definition, made the Muslim community squirm in their seats at having their religion associated with fascism. But who are the “facsists” again? Allow me to blockquote the opening from the article, written by Andrew Bosworth, Ph.D., a political science professor, in a series about real Fascism and modern America:

Neo-conservatives decided that World War III is to be waged against “Islamic-Fascists” or “Islamo-Fascism.”

Who is reading from the new script? William Kristol, Bill O’Reilly, Christopher Hitchens, Michelle Mankin, Michael Savage, Ann Coulter, Nick Cohen, Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh, Daniel Pipes, Glenn Beck, Oliver North – even George W. Bush, prompting legitimate complaints from Muslim-Americans.

How many names in there do we know? An impressive number of hatemongers, liars, crooks, bigots, racists, sexists, and other American extremists-heck, even our good old friend Glenn Beck is in the list. Not at all surprising. Let’s continue:

Middle Eastern powers include pan-Arab socialist dictatorships (Syria), monarchies (Saudi Arabia), constitutional theocracies (Iran), and assorted fundamentalist movements. None are “fascist.” For three decades of political scientists, “fascism” is a phenomenon of industrialized societies and exhibits features alien to the Middle East.

Classical fascism was evident in inter-war Italy, Germany and Japan, and full-blown fascism exhibits three dimensions: economic, political and cultural.

Bosworth goes on to define Fascism, and explain how as objectionable as the regimes in the middle east are, they’re nothing remotely similar to fascist, and that the very term was likely either tossed out in a moment of ignorance by the President and similarly latched onto by his gaggle of apologists and attack dogs, chomping at the bit at any opportunity to be as hateful and divisive as possible, or there was a far more malicious and distasteful rationale behind the President’s choice of words, one which is far more disturbing than the words themselves.

Bosworth is even kind enough to follow up his analysis of the Bush Administration’s failures in logic with regard to Islamic fundamentalism and its associated movement across the middle east (a lack of understanding and respect for one’s enemy that will more than likely-and already has in several ways-prove to be influential in the overall failure of current American foriegn policy) with some examples of how we can make progress at home. His words may ring from the GOP’s tin ears, but they’re definitely heard in the progressive community:

It’s not fair to perform a vivisection of the Bush regime without pointing to what a healthier body politic might look like – a “post-crisis” body politic.

1) The restoration of the checks and balances, and limited government, of a democratic republic. This includes voter protections and a pencil-paper-box voting system.

2) The restoration of foreign relations to open diplomacy (as envisioned by the Founders) – to the power of persuasion – unless attacked, upon which military force will be restricted to the forces demonstrably responsible. This means no foreign aid, no weapons sales, no forward bases, and no committing political adultery by dividing loyalties between the people of the United States and any foreign power. The American people can express their solidarity with people around the world with short-term disaster relief.

3) Challenging both Israel and Arab powers to follow the letter of international law. Compliance means full participation in an international economy and community (the carrot); and resistance invites the atrophy of embargoes, travel restrictions, and blockages (the stick). Under UN Resolution 181, Israel secures its right to exist according to the 1948 borders, with protection from the United Nations. Simultaneously, Israel withdraws all of its settler colonies from the West Bank, illegal under Article 49 of the Geneva Conventions: “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” And Jerusalem becomes the international city as intended in 1948.

4) Challenging the world’s people and states with a transformative proposal: universal nuclear disarmament. If states do not disarm, take the proposal to their peoples. Inspired, motivated and determined, masses of people will quickly sideline both foot-dragging politicians and terrorists. The best weapon against terror is not the US Army; it is civilized men and women everywhere. The world is ready to make nuclear weapons – and then war – extinct.

Thomas Paine: “We have it in our power to make the world new again.”

[ Welcome to Neo-Fascism 101 ]
Source: Virtual Citizen

And it’s about time. Well, okay, it’s not really about time, since the courts have been forced to check executive power several times now during Bush’s presidency, so this is just another crack in the armor of the so-called “unitary executive.” Seriously though-the FISA set up a process, a very efficient and effective process, to allow for due process in the interest of speed and national security in order to keep the country safe. But unfortunately, the Bush administration has proven again that when there’s a choice; between a legal and ethical way to protect the United States while simultaneously ensuring that the freedoms and liberties of the people that make America a nation worth defending-and so much different from its enemies across the globe-versus more intrusive and invasive method that treats the American people like criminals and forsakes our rights and freedoms, the Bush Administration will go for the latter every time.

It’s a shame, and I’m more than glad that a federal judge sees it the way that millions of Americans do; that our freedoms and liberties are part of what makes America a wonderful, glorious country, and they should be protected, not just from threats externally in the form of terrorists who wish to destroy our way of life, or even silent enemies who despise us for any other reason, but from threats within as well, even if those threats are in the form of those in power who want nothing more than to set the prescedent that unchecked executive power in a so-called “time of war” is perfectly acceptable.

Here’s to U.S. District Court Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, who passed the ruling yesterday. I’ll raise a drink to you, madam, for your fine work not just protecting the rights and freedoms of all Americans, but in standing by the law and not allowing the Bush Administration to circumvent it, twist it, and use it to their whim in a sad excuse at a power grab.

The news is here:

[ NSA Eavesdropping Program Ruled Unconstitutional ]
Source: CNN

But perhaps the best thing I’ve read on the issue so far is over at The Nation. David Corn brings the ruling home with some excellent analysis on how the Bush Administration could have very easily made this program legal but didn’t because of a combination of stupid optimism that they were invincible and a belligerent need to prove that the executive branch could have any power it wanted in a “time of war.” Sadly, it turned out to be completely false. I’m sure the Justice Department will appeal, but here’s hoping that the program can be killed long enough for the political tide to turn.

In the meantime, Corn explains thet the ruling essentially dishonestly makes the argument that “the program is legal. We can’t talk to you about it, we can’t explain why, and we can’t tell you what we’re doing because all of those things are state secrets, but hey-just trust us!” As if that were legitimate.

In her [U.S. District Court Judge Anna Diggs Taylor's] decision, she accused the administration of dishonestly arguing that the lawsuit filed by the ACLU and others (including journalists, researchers and lawyers) against the NSA wiretapping should be dismissed because it would expose state secrets:

It is undisputed that Defendants have publicly admitted to the following: (1) the TSP [Terrorist Surveillance Program] exists; (2) it operates without warrants; (3) it targets communications where one party to the communication is outside the United States, and the government has a reasonable basis to conclude that one party to the communication is a member of al Qaeda, affiliated with al Qaeda, or a member of an organization affiliated with al Qaeda, or working in support of al Qaeda. As the Government has on many occasions confirmed the veracity of these allegations, the state secrets privilege does not apply to this information.

She added:

Defendants assert that they cannot defend this case without the exposure of state secrets. This court disagrees. The Bush Administration has repeatedly told the general public that there is a valid basis in law for the TSP. Further, Defendants have contended that the President has the authority under the AUMF [legislation authorizing Bush to use military force against Iraq] and the Constitution to authorize the continued use of the TSP. Defendants [the Bush administration] have supported these arguments without revealing or relying on any classified information. Indeed, the court has reviewed the classified information and is of the opinion that this information is not necessary to any viable defense to the TSP….Consequently, the court finds Defendants’ argument that they cannot defend this case without the use of classified information to be disingenuous and without merit.

In other words, Bush cannot hide behind an it’s-classified defense. (Taylor did say that the administration could do so in a related matter–the data-mining of phone records by the NSA. That’s because not enough information has been publicly released about this covert program.)

Very well done.

[ In the NSA Case, a Judge Says No to King George ]
Source: The Nation

An excellent piece appeared in yesterday’s Washington Post showing exactly how necessary the Voting Rights Act still is, despite the naysayings of a few racist conservatives in the House of Representatives; and shows us exactly who it is in our halls of government are actively seeking to make it more difficult for people to get out to the polls in America than it is even in war-torn nations like Iraq or in other third-world nations where a voter headed out to the polls is taking his or her life in his or her hands.

That’s right, the Republican party. It’s the conservatives, the GOP, the so-called “big tent,” that is doing everything in its power to not just deny American citizens the right to vote, not just keep the status quo, but turn the clock back to their so-called “good old days,” where white Christian men ruled supreme over households of women who believed life had nothing more for them but children and cooking, and heaven forbid a black man be seen looking twice at a white woman or he’d find himself castrated and strung to the tallest branch the Klan could find. Those were the “good old days,” before African Americans were represented in government, before Latinos could take to the streets to demand that heaven forbid they be treated like human beings by the nation that pioneered the notion of “human rights,” before women could cut their hair short without being ridiculed and could take jobs that didn’t involve dressing scantily for the boss or didn’t have the titles “nurse,” “secretary,” “stewardess,” or “teacher.”

Ah, the good old days.

So why does the GOP want to make it so hard to vote? They’re afraid of losing the power they had in those good old days. They’re afraid of the power of the people, the human desire for social and political progress, the constant strive towards the American dreams of equality, justice, fairness, and opportunity. Opportunity, to the conservative right, is a dish best served to friends, while everyone else gets a heaping helping of “welfare reform” and “budget cuts,” and “free-marker layoffs.” Jabari Asim explains this fear, and how its been manifested in terms of the simplest method of holding on to power that the republicans and conservatives could think of-taking an example from their so-hated counterparts in the middle east and other dictatorial countries-hold sham votes, or keep those who disagree with you from the polls entirely;

It’s easy to imagine, for instance, that in such a country, Mbaguna could have been stopped short of the polls and turned away for some untenable reason — say, lack of a photo ID. In Congo, sure, but certainly not in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

Or so one would like to think. But the efforts of Republican lawmakers in Georgia, Indiana and, most recently, Missouri seemed aimed at making it as difficult to vote beneath our spacious skies as it is in war-torn Third World nations. Missouri, my home state, became the third member of this notorious trio in June, when Gov. Matt Blunt signed into law a requirement that voters show government-issued photo IDs at the polls starting in November.

Blunt and others say the law will prevent fraud. Their opponents rightly point out that the measure disproportionately affects those who have been disfranchised in the past, such as the poor and racial minorities. Besides, they argue, Missouri hasn’t exactly suffered from an epidemic of imposters showing up to vote.

As one of the lawsuits filed to block the measure puts it, “It is statistically more likely for a Missourian to be struck by a bolt of lightning than to have his or her vote canceled by someone posing as another voter to cast a ballot.”

Welcome to the new Conservative America. Fall in line, or have your rights stripped.

[ Still Battling Voter Suppression ]
Source: The Washington Post

The conservative right have always hated science for exposing the experimental truths behind false claims, providing accurate proof to support things like environmental protection, safer sex, health care for all, and other ideals that conservatives have always hated-opting in favor of a unique and nonsensical combination of faith and worship of the almighty dollar-and while the Bush Administration and the right-wingers in power have made no secret of their war on science, even more evidence is coming to the fore to prove that decisions at every branch of scientific federal institution, from the EPA to the FDA, has been tainted by political whitewash by conservatives, hoping to water down the truth or simply alter it entirely to suit their political goals.

Gene Gerard, writing an editorial for TruthOut, lays out the issue and the mass of evidence quite clearly:

Unions representing thousands of scientists and other specialists employed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently complained that EPA officials are ignoring science. The unions indicated that agency administrators are allowing numerous toxic substances to be used in agricultural pesticides. This revelation comes on the heels of a survey of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) scientists which found that the agency has become so political that it’s no longer protecting public safety. While all presidential administrations, by their very nature, are political, it’s increasingly clear that the Bush administration is using politics to corrupt science.

Nine unions comprised of 9,000 EPA scientists maintained that multiple agricultural pesticides are dangerous for pregnant women, children, and the elderly. In a letter to EPA administrator Stephen L. Johnson, union leaders indicated that agency officials seem to believe that “the concerns of agriculture and the pesticide industry come before our responsibility to protect the health of our nation’s citizens.” An EPA scientist warned that the agency often ignores scientific studies that disagree with industry-funded studies. This isn’t surprising, given that the EPA’s own inspector general acknowledged earlier this year that the agency had failed to protect children from pesticide exposure.

Late last month, the Union of Concerned Scientists released the disturbing results of its survey of FDA scientists. The survey was sent to almost 6,000 FDA scientists, of whom about one-fifth responded. The responses revealed that 20 percent had been asked explicitly by FDA administrators to provide incomplete, inaccurate or misleading information to the public. And 60 percent of the scientists reported that commercial interests have inappropriately induced or attempted to induce the reversal, withdrawal or modification of FDA actions.

Gerard goes on to discuss the seriousness of what’s happening at EPA and FDA behind the scenes, and the altered science that may very well be coming out of those institutions as a resuly of someone’s political meddling. Science shouldn’t be subject to political whim, and shouldn’t be contorted to support or refute a specific political agenda, much less a commercial one-but it seems that the conservative right has no scruples in this case. (not much to say about others, either) We can only hope that by shining light on the matter, the pressure will be alleviated; or simply hope and pray for a change in the guard soon.

[ The Political Corruption of Science ]
Source: TruthOut

Is it curtains for conservatism? I can only hope so.

I’m not the only one who hopes so, and apparently there’s evidence to suppport that idea. According to E.J. Dionne Jr., quietly discussed by conservative politicians and mostly hidden behind the flaming rhetoric of the vocal conservatives is the possible retreat of their movement and the sense of wandering loss that many conservatives have felt since their movement was hijacked by power-mad politicians and activists who have since completely laid waste to their ideals and hopes, and the dirty tricks have begun in order to save the Republicans from themselves come November.

Dionne looks to the history of conservatism as a healthy balance to progressivism and wonders for a moment where it all went wrong, and why modern conservatives are not just a threat to America, they’re also a threat to themselves; and observes self-congratulatory dirty tricks in the name of conservatism, like the Republican leadership’s attempt to tie a repeal of the Estate tax to the actual lives and livlihoods of millions of Americans trying to scratch out a living on minimum wage. Dionne even remembers when liberalism went into a tailspin after the end of the 1960s when liberals and progressives started fighting each other more than the opposition. The entire piece is an excellent historical and editorial read.

[ Curtains for Conservatism ]
Source: The Washington Post (courtesy of Working for Change)

Last week, Representative John Conyers released the final version of his report, entitled The Constitution in Crisis, which runs about 350 pages and over 1400 footnotes, all detailing the immense campaign by the Bush Administration to circumvent the Constituional limitations of Presidential powers as well as federal laws and regulations. I’m glad to see that someone is paying attention to the Bush Administration’s offenses, even if no one has the position or the numbers to take him to task about them. Conyers cites approximately 26 laws and regulations that the Administration has violated or skirted blatantly.

I’ll lead in to the link with an excerpt from his post at Daily Kos and Huffington Post about this:

The American people have paid the price for this strategy of deception followed by, in the words of one anonymous Republican official, “slime and defend.” We have paid with the lives of more than 2,500 of our sons and daughters in uniform and in hundreds of billions of dollars of our taxes.

The Administration also appears to have used the war on terror as an excuse to eviscerate the basic protections afforded to us in the Constitution. There have been warrantless wiretaps of law-abiding Americans, in clear contravention of federal law, not to mention the creation of a huge unchecked database of the phone records of innocent Americans.

All the while, the Republican Congress sits idly by. Rather than performing its constitutional duty as a co-equal branch, it has chosen to stymie any and all efforts at oversight. After six long years of deceptions, attacks and yes, outright lies, I am convinced the American people have had enough.

[ The Constitution in Crisis ]
Source: Daily Kos

Jared Bernstein, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, penned an excellent piece for TomPaine.com last week cheering on the Democratic and moderate effort to beat back a poison pill by the far-right legisators in Congress to authorize a minimum-wage increase….at the cost of the Estate Tax.

Let’s take a look at the logic here: “Sure, we’ll ‘outfox’ the Democrats by offering up a minimum wage increase that will force employers to hate them, but also force them to betray their base by supporting a multi-billion dollar giveaway to our best and wealthiest friends!” Right. Too bad it didn’t work, and too bad we’ll be paying attention to the November elections to make sure the Republicans don’t try to use this as slinging mud when it comes campaigning time.

Bernstein points out the folly of the proposal to begin with, and a underhanded and malicious campaign to tie the two issues together by the Republican leadership that just simply fell apart because the issues were too far apart.

Even for veterans of minimum wage horse trading, the coupling of the bill to repeal most of the estate tax with a minimum wage increase set a cynical new low. The increase in the minimum, to $7.25 by 2009, simply replaces the value by which inflation has eroded the wage over the past few decades, giving a direct lift worth around $1,200 per year to about 6 million low-wage workers. And it does so without adding to the $300 billion budget deficit.

The estate tax reduction—which clocks in with a 10-year cost of $268 billion—returns about $1.3 million to 8,200 wealthy estates, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. CBPP also points out that the size of the tax cut would grow with the size of the estate; as many as 900 estates worth more than $20 million would receive an average tax cut of $5.4 million in 2011.

It gets worse. The lobbyists for the National Restaurant Association managed to inject a paragraph into the minimum wage part of the bill that would have significantly lowered the pay of minimum wage workers who work get tips (like waitpersons) in seven states.

So not only was it underhanded and vile, it was sabotaged to fail even if it managed to pass. Great way to stab the American people in the back, Republicans. After all though, it is what you do best. So to that congressperson who stood on the floor of the House and claimed, to the faces of all the legislators in house at the time, that Democrats had to be angry because the Republicans “outfoxed them” on their own issue? Congratulations-you just “outfoxed” yourself into the ground, and voters will be punishing you for it come November.

[ The Day The System Worked ]
Source: TomPaine.com

Okay, so let’s take a look at the new rules of engagement, according to reports that a Colonel in command of a group of soliders from the 3rd Battalion of the 101st Airborne Division issued to the troops in the field who now stand accused of murdering innocent cvilians in cold blood:

“We were told that everybody on this island was hostile,” Clagett said. “They were known al Qaeda insurgents, and we’re going to kill all military-age males, so be prepared.”

NIGHTLINE: So you were told specifically to kill all military-age males?

CLAGETT: Correct.

NIGHTLINE: Were you ever told on any other mission that you were to kill all military-age males? Did that ever happen before this event?

CLAGETT: No.

NIGHTLINE: Never?

CLAGETT: Never.

So right, the new rules of engagement are to kill any male between age x and y, regardless of whether or not they have a gun in their hands, they’re pleading for their lives, shielding their families, or merely looking out the window. In fact, that’s exactly what happened:

When the soldiers first landed, close to the Syrian border, they encountered no resistance whatsoever. The place seemed empty.

Eventually, they came upon a house where a man was looking out of the window. He was shot immediately.

Clagett is contesting that he followed orders and did what he was supposed to do on that island, and he contends that he did the right thing. His account differs from other soliders who were there that day, and we may never completely know the truth, but Clagett and several other soliders are awating a decision on their Article 32 hearing, which will decide if they’ll be court martialed.

The moral here isn’t to hold disdain for the actions of our soliders, and its not to hate the American military intervention in Iraq, to me the moral here is that this is another in a seemingly neverending stream of evidence that this was a horrible idea to begin with, things aren’t getting better and its time for change, that our men and women in uniform-even when doing the best they can-still are having difficulty relating and adapting to the situation there (and why shouldn’t they? The military is a fighting force, not a police force) and that we really, really need to try something else, or at the very least make a concerted effort to earn the trust of the Iraqi people. I don’t think we’ve really done that yet-we’re so busy talking about how we’re there for them that our actions belie an occupying force. As long as our walk doesn’t match our talk, we’ll never drive out the insurgency.

[ The 'Band of Brothers' Unravels ]
Source: ABC News