Three Quick Friday Hits

Three interesting items appeared in the New York Times today – here is the first…

Compared with the immense size of the stimulus program, the actual number of arrests so far has been microscopic. Earl E. Devaney, the chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, the watchdog for stimulus money, said recently that federal prosecutors were looking at only nine stimulus-related cases, including accusations of Social Security fraud and of businesses improperly claiming to be owned by women and members of minorities.

“Quite frankly, I’m a little surprised it’s that small,” Mr. Devaney testified recently before the Senate, explaining that his office passes along questionable expenses to the various federal inspector general offices following the money, as well as to the Department of Justice. “I know, from talking to them, they’re very interested in sending some very loud signals early, as often as they can, with this money.”

The small number of cases is partly a function of how much stimulus money has been spent so far, and how it has been spent. While more than $150 billion of it has been pumped into the economy, according to a recent report by the White House, some $62.6 billion of that was in the form of tax cuts. Of the rest, $38.4 billion was sent to states for fiscal relief; $30.6 billion was spent to help those affected by the recession by expanding unemployment benefits and other safety-net programs, and $16.5 billion was spent in areas like infrastructure, technology and research.

It should have been about $62 billion in infrastructure and $16.5 billion in tax cuts, but what’s done is done.

And as noted here, FBI Director Robert Mueller has issued a warning about potential fraud arising in the future over the “stim.” Mueller has also issued warnings about mortgage and white collar business fraud in the past, which is probably the prudent thing to do. Basically, I wouldn’t read too much into his warning today by itself, unless further evidence of “stim” fraud arises of course.

Here is the second item, including the following…

LOS ANGELES — Government auditors reported Thursday that the effort to secure the Mexican border with technology and fences has fallen years behind schedule, will cost billions of dollars extra in maintenance costs and has no clear means of gauging whether illegal crossings have been curtailed.

Mark Borkowski, who directs the Secure Border Initiative for the Department of Homeland Security, stood by the program as “transformational,” but did not challenge the findings. “We are as frustrated as anybody is” with the setbacks, Mr. Borkowski said in an interview.

The report, by the Government Accountability Office, Congress’s watchdog, said the department had fallen about seven years behind its goal of putting in place the technology the Bush administration had heavily promoted when it announced the Secure Border Initiative in 2005.

And by the way…

The apprehension of illegal immigrants at the border has fallen to lows not seen in decades, but scholars and Mexican officials say the recession and the lack of jobs in the United States have contributed to the drop.

So aside from despoiling habitat, there really is no way to gauge whether or not the “fence” is any good, is there? Pathetic.

And speaking of environmental disasters, here is the third story…

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department is investigating whether a former secretary of the interior, Gale A. Norton, violated the law by granting valuable leases to Royal Dutch Shell around the time she was considering going to work for the company after she left office, officials said Thursday.

The officials said investigators had recently turned up information suggesting that Ms. Norton had had discussions while in office with Royal Dutch Shell about future career opportunities. In early 2006, Ms. Norton’s department awarded three tracts in Colorado to a Shell subsidiary for shale exploration. In December 2006, she joined Shell as the company’s general counsel in the United States for unconventional oils, a company spokeswoman said.

The existence of a federal criminal investigation was first reported Thursday by The Los Angeles Times.

Ms. Norton, 55, was President George W. Bush’s first interior secretary. In that job, she was an ally of Vice President Dick Cheney in the administration’s general approach of opening up more federal lands for energy exploration.

Gaylie, Gaylie, how does your garden grow (I mean, before the ground beneath it is ripped apart for natural gas exploration, leaving it utterly useless).

By the way, this post celebrating Norton’s resignation from Interior three years ago contains a link to an Inquirer Op-Ed from Norton claiming that it’s “time for the denial to end” on drilling in the Alaska Natural Wildlife Refuge.

If Norton is eventually found guilty, I have an idea for her sentencing (speaking of “the mountains she loves so much”). As someone who should have acted as a steward of the environment, I believe she should be forced to parachute into the Rockies with food and water rations for about a week, along with a Swiss army knife. From that point, she’s on her own.

A Double-Barreled Dubya Disgrace

Via HuffPo, this article from The Atlantic last Friday tells us the following…

(Last) Thursday’s annual Census Bureau report on income, poverty and access to health care-the Bureau’s principal report card on the well-being of average Americans-closes the books on the economic record of George W. Bush.

It’s not a record many Republicans are likely to point to with pride.

On every major measurement, the Census Bureau report shows that the country lost ground during Bush’s two terms. While Bush was in office, the median household income declined, poverty increased, childhood poverty increased even more, and the number of Americans without health insurance spiked. By contrast, the country’s condition improved on each of those measures during Bill Clinton’s two terms, often substantially.

…

Bush’s record on poverty is equally bleak. When Clinton left office in 2000, the Census counted almost 31.6 million Americans living in poverty. When Bush left office in 2008, the number of poor Americans had jumped to 39.8 million (the largest number in absolute terms since 1960.) Under Bush, the number of people in poverty increased by over 8.2 million, or 26.1 per cent. Over two-thirds of that increase occurred before the economic collapse of 2008.

The trends were comparably daunting for children in poverty. When Clinton left office nearly 11.6 million children lived in poverty, according to the Census. When Bush left office that number had swelled to just under 14.1 million, an increase of more than 21 per cent.

The story is similar again for access to health care. When Clinton left office, the number of uninsured Americans stood at 38.4 million. By the time Bush left office that number had grown to just over 46.3 million, an increase of nearly 8 million or 20.6 per cent.

The trends look the same when examining shares of the population that are poor or uninsured, rather than the absolute numbers in those groups. When Clinton left office in 2000 13.7 per cent of Americans were uninsured; when Bush left that number stood at 15.4 per cent. (Under Bush, the share of Americans who received health insurance through their employer declined every year of his presidency-from 64.2 per cent in 2000 to 58.5 per cent in 2008.)

When Clinton left the number of Americans in poverty stood at 11.3 per cent; when Bush left that had increased to 13.2 per cent. The poverty rate for children jumped from 16.2 per cent when Clinton left office to 19 per cent when Bush stepped down.

…

So the summary page on the economic experience of average Americans under the past two presidents would look like this:

Under Clinton, the median income increased 14 per cent. Under Bush it declined 4.2 per cent.

Under Clinton the total number of Americans in poverty declined 16.9 per cent; under Bush it increased 26.1 per cent.

Under Clinton the number of children in poverty declined 24.2 per cent; under Bush it increased by 21.4 per cent.

Under Clinton, the number of Americans without health insurance, remained essentially even (down six-tenths of one per cent); under Bush it increased by 20.6 per cent.

The article also provides comparative information on the presidencies of Poppy Bush and The Sainted Ronnie R, though I would argue that that doesn’t help Dubya at all (I have to admit that I was surprised to learn that real income grew under Reagan, though so did both childhood and adult poverty).

Also, the New York Times published an extensive feature article yesterday on water pollution focusing on Charleston, West Virginia, though a series of articles will follow this one focusing on other states…

Jennifer Hall-Massey knows not to drink the tap water in her home near Charleston, W.Va.

In fact, her entire family tries to avoid any contact with the water. Her youngest son has scabs on his arms, legs and chest where the bathwater — polluted with lead, nickel and other heavy metals — caused painful rashes. Many of his brother’s teeth were capped to replace enamel that was eaten away.

Neighbors apply special lotions after showering because their skin burns. Tests show that their tap water contains arsenic, barium, lead, manganese and other chemicals at concentrations federal regulators say could contribute to cancer and damage the kidneys and nervous system.

“How can we get digital cable and Internet in our homes, but not clean water?” said Mrs. Hall-Massey, a senior accountant at one of the state’s largest banks.

She and her husband, Charles, do not live in some remote corner of Appalachia. Charleston, the state capital, is less than 17 miles from her home.

“How is this still happening today?” she asked.

An excellent question – basically, what we learn from the article is that we’d made a lot of progress in water cleanup efforts until about the last ten years or so, when everything started to slide backwards (we also learn about how politicians have taken their marching orders from the polluters to fire inspectors for trying to do their jobs; the story tells us about a man named Matthew Crum who suffered this fate – as far as I’m concerned, Crum is a great American).

And a big reason why we’ve fallen down on water safety is as follows (you knew what was coming, didn’t you?)…

Enforcement lapses were particularly bad under the administration of President George W. Bush, (E.P.A.) employees say. “For the last eight years, my hands have been tied,” said one E.P.A. official who requested anonymity for fear of retribution. “We were told to take our clean water and clean air cases, put them in a box, and lock it shut. Everyone knew polluters were getting away with murder. But these polluters are some of the biggest campaign contributors in town, so no one really cared if they were dumping poisons into streams.”

The E.P.A. administrators during the last eight years — Christine Todd Whitman, Michael O. Leavitt and Stephen L. Johnson — all declined to comment.

Of course – however, the following should also be noted…

In statements, E.P.A. officials noted that from 2006 to 2008, the agency conducted 11,000 Clean Water Act and 21,000 Safe Drinking Water Act inspections, and referred 146 cases to the Department of Justice. During the 2007 to 2008 period, officials wrote, 92 percent of the population served by community water systems received water that had no reported health-based violations.

…

The Clean Water Act, (lawmakers and environmentalists say), should be expanded to police other types of pollution — like farm and livestock runoff — that are largely unregulated. And they say Congress should give state agencies more resources, in the same way that federal dollars helped overhaul the nation’s sewage systems in the 1970s.

Some say changes will not occur without public outrage.

“When we started regulating water pollution in the 1970s, there was a huge public outcry because you could see raw sewage flowing into the rivers,” said William D. Ruckelshaus, who served as the first head of the Environmental Protection Agency under President Richard M. Nixon, and then again under President Ronald Reagan.

“Today the violations are much more subtle — pesticides and chemicals you can’t see or smell that are even more dangerous,” he added. “And so a lot of the public pressure on regulatory agencies has ebbed away.”

And as noted here, The Supreme Court of Hangin’ Judge JR has played a particularly nefarious role in all this, especially in the ruling linked to above which overturned a Court of Appeals verdict and allowed 4.5 million tons of lethal mining waste to be dumped into Alaska’s Lower Slate Lake, with the full knowledge that doing so would exterminate all life in the lake (somehow, though, The Supremes, by a 6-3 ruling… Ginsburg, Souter and Stevens dissented…determined that doing this was “less environmentally damaging than other options” – yep, you read that correctly).

Fortunately, the Clean Water Restoration Act was introduced by Sen. Russ Feingold here; no vote has been scheduled yet, but one should be with all speed (so many Bushco screwups to fix, so little time, I know).

Finally, in a Bushco-related matter, The Philadelphia Inquirer decided to give column space to Torture Yoo again today (the appropriate takedown from Will Bunch via Atrios is here).

Bunch takes on the main issue of Yoo’s past culpability head-on, of course (with Yoo weighing in against the upcoming Holder investigation of course – pathetic that the Inky doesn’t realize that they’re allowing Yoo to, in essence, try to obstruct justice), though Yoo pointed out something of lesser significance in his column that I still want to address anyway…

Henry L. Stimson, secretary of state under President Herbert Hoover, once explained the shuttering of the United States’ only code-breaking unit with these words: “Gentlemen do not read each other’s mail.” Unfortunately, we do not live in a world of gentlemen. Stimson realized this in his next cabinet post, as FDR’s secretary of war on the day of Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.

In response, I give you the following from this interesting article about U.S. code breakers during World War II…

Fifty years ago–and more than a year before Pearl Harbor–Americans scored one of their most brilliant victories of World War II.

The commander was a Russian immigrant and sometime geneticist named William Frederick Friedman. The nature of the battle might be suggested by Friedman’s intense interest once in the 50,000-word novel “Gadsby,” which Ernest Vincent Wrigh wrote without using the letter “e.” Friedman’s troops were a motley assemblage of academics, math wizards and puzzle freaks. With a left-handed assist from William Shakespeare.

Together, after 18 baffling months of dead-end days and floor-walking nights that temporarily collapsed Friedman into a mental ward, they broke the Japanese diplomatic code.

Their collective genius did not foil, of course, the sneak Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that brought the United States actively into the war. Crossed and sometimes disconnected wires in American intelligence enabled that. But code breaking by Friedman, et al., laid the groundwork for the pivotal victory of the U.S. fleet at Midway in June, 1942. Indeed, code breaking was an essential ingredient of the Allies’ ultimate triumph.

Yes, the quote from Stimson is accurate, though how Yoo could claim to know what Stimson “realized” 78 years ago is laughable (and assuming some fault lies with Stimson for Pearl Harbor – which, to me, is debatable at best – I cannot think of a word for the egomania of someone criticizing past history who belonged to a regime that had its own problems with “crossed and sometimes disconnected wires in American intelligence,” to the point where the result of that circumstance was observed just about eight years ago today).

Update 9/15/09: Yep, this egotistical jackass would know all about “five-spiral crashes,” wouldn’t he?

Update 9/23/09: Of course…

Monday Mashup Part 1 (8/31/09)

I guess you can file this under a new category for this site called “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do.”

With all of the back-and-forth from former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge about whether or not he was pressured by Bushco to mess around with the “color-coded alert” system (he admitted he was here, but more recently, he seemed to be “walking back” that one here), I realized that it was incumbent upon yours truly to be more aware of developments concerning this vital function of our government (and I feel much better about the fact that this is now under the control of Janet Napolitano versus Mike “City of Louisiana” Chertoff).

So, to what corporate media outlet should I venture to satisfy my thirst for knowledge? Why, Fix Noise of course!

And as I looked over their site’s special section on Homeland Security, I found the following:

As you can see, they are stuck in a pre-1/21/09 time warp.

And that reminds me of the quote that Jessica Lange, portraying the legendary country music singer Patsy Cline in “Sweet Dreams,” once uttered to her husband Charley Dick, played by Ed Harris: “Well, people in hell want ice water; that don’t mean that they get it.”

And speaking of the Bushes, Michael Barone wrote the following today at creators.com about the Kennedys (there’s a connection I think, and I’ll get to it; the title of Barone’s piece is “The End of America’s Experiment With Royalty”)…

Other political families — the Adamses, the Harrisons, the Tafts — produced multiple generations of national politicians but generated nothing like mass enthusiasm. The sons of Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt set out on political careers but never got very far.

The Kennedy boys — John, Robert and Edward — were different. They won three elections to the House, 12 elections to the Senate and one to the presidency. From 1960 to 1980, they were major presences, active or off to the side, in every presidential contest.

…

The next generation of Kennedys has had mostly disappointing political careers. Joe Kennedy and Patrick Kennedy made it to Congress; Kathleen Townsend and Mark Shriver failed to do so; Maria Shriver made it to the governor’s mansion in Sacramento, but Townsend failed to do so in Annapolis; Caroline Kennedy will not follow her father and uncles in the Senate.

I suspect the royal status the Kennedys temporarily achieved in our democratic republic will seem bizarre to future generations. Perhaps it already does even for those of us who can remember the 1960s.

I realize that the whole “royalty” thing concerning the Kennedys is all “sooo sixties,” as Barone observes (as in the “Mad Men” era as opposed to the Woodstock era), but there are some who believe that there is still somewhat of a legend concerning another family that has lived in the presidential spotlight for twelve years, including the last eight. And it’s not as if Barone hasn’t done his part to perpetuate that “dynasty” also.

This tells us of Barone urging Dubya to appoint his brother Jeb as a “special envoy to the Americas” (with Barone channeling Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Council for the Americas), and this tells us of Barone urging Florida governor Charlie Crist to appoint Jeb Bush as a senator to fill the seat vacated by Mel Martinez prior to a special election (at least Ted Kennedy won his seat in ‘62 in another special election without benefit of an appointment…I had some thoughts on Jeb Bush also here).

I wonder if the fact that Barone has taken it upon himself to act as the Jeb Bush Employment Agency “will seem bizarre to future generations” also?

And finally, this story tells us that Sen. John McCain…

…(said) his private comments about harsh interrogation methods were misrepresented by the Bush Administration in a recently released legal document intended to justify a six-day course of sleep deprivation for one CIA detainee in November 2007…

The newly declassified memo by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel mentions a secret briefing McCain and other members of Congress received sometime before Oct. 17, 2006. The memo says the lawmakers were told about six CIA interrogation techniques, including prolonged sleep deprivation.

The memo recounts McCain’s reaction this way: “[S]everal Members of Congress, including the full memberships of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees and Senator McCain, were briefed by General Michael Hayden, Director of the CIA, on the six techniques that we discuss herein,” writes Steven G. Bradbury, a deputy assistant attorney general in the July 20, 2007, memo, which cites a CIA summary of the discussions. “In those classified and private conversations, none of the Members expressed the view that the CIA detention and interrogation program should be stopped, or that the techniques at issue were inappropriate.” (See TIME’s photos: “The (Mis)Adventures of the CIA.”)

A spokeswoman for McCain said that contrary to those claims, the Arizona Republican repeatedly raised objections in private meetings, including one with Hayden, about the use of sleep deprivation as an interrogation technique. “Senator McCain clearly made the case that he was opposed to unduly coercive techniques, especially when used in combination or taken too far – including sleep deprivation,” says Brooke Buchanan, a spokeswoman for McCain.

It’s commendable that Sen. McCain voiced his objections to sleep deprivation as a “harsh interrogation method” (again, assuming his spokeswoman is telling us what really happened). However, as noted here from February ’08…

…Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), a former prisoner of war, has spoken strongly in favor of implementing the Army Field Manual standard (for all intelligence agencies also…a standard that bans water boarding, by the way). When confronted today with the decision of whether to stick with his conscience or cave to the right wing, McCain chose to ditch his principles and instead vote(d) to preserve water boarding:

I realize our corporate media would collectively wet its metaphorical pants, as it were, as opposed to calling out this man on such inconsistencies (I’d give fluffyhead David Gregory a picture of our 7th president if he ever did that), so it is up to us filthy, unkempt liberal blogger types such as yours truly to do so.

McCain deserves our eternal thanks and gratitude for his sacrifice on behalf of our country. But that doesn’t mean that, when it comes to his votes in public service, the “hero” narrative should obscure some rather craven political calculation that ends up endangering our military, which would be more subject to the “harsh methods” we used on others in defiance of laws we signed ourselves years ago.

A “Heal The Vet” “Reset” At The VA?

This AP story tells us the following…

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs now estimates that more than 600 veterans erroneously received letters telling them they had been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease, VA spokeswoman Katie Roberts said Thursday.

As a result of the panic the letters caused, the agency plans to create a more rigorous screening process for its notification letters and is offering to reimburse veterans for medical expenses incurred as a result of the letters.

“That’s the least they can do,” said former Air Force reservist Gale Reid in Montgomery, Ala. She racked up more than $3,000 in bills for medical tests last week to get a second opinion. Her civilian doctor concluded she did not have ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

ALS is a rapidly progressive disease that attacks the nerve cells responsible for controlling muscles and typically kills people within five years.

This takes us to the VA home page where there is a Q&A on the ALS-related mixup at the bottom, including the following (the explanation provided here is a computer glitch)…

Why did Veterans who do not have ALS get letters?

• VA used data and information from its data base to identify Veterans diagnosed with ALS or who had filed a claim for ALS, but were not currently receiving disability compensation benefits for the condition. However, as a result of problems in the codes VA used to identify these Veterans, VA sent the letter to some Veterans who do not have ALS.

What is VA doing to correct the mistake?

• We are working to identify the specific problems that caused the misidentification of Veterans records. We will ensure any future data extracts for similar outreach purposes are properly formulated and independently validated to prevent these types of problems in the future.

What will VA do to prevent this from happening again?

• As a result of this incident, VA is creating a more rigorous process that includes thorough and careful screening of the data, comprehensive review and approval process that will include involvement from our stakeholders before release of notifications letters.

This 2005 story tells us that Bushco and the Republican-controlled Congress tried to make changes to the VA’s computer recordkeeping system, but ran into predictable results…

A $3.5-billion computer overhaul at veterans’ hospitals across the country is poised to fail unless the Department of Veterans Affairs makes drastic changes, according to a closely guarded government study obtained by the St. Petersburg Times.

The multiyear project is designed to modernize almost all phases of hospital computing at the VA, including appointment schedules, lab reports, drug prescriptions and a clinical record system already widely admired as one of the best in the world.

But a February report by Carnegie Mellon University, which the VA hired to evaluate the computer conversion, says the ambitious undertaking – known as HealtheVet, or HeV – is “not viable” and an “unacceptably high risk.”

And if the project fails, the VA could not deliver timely medical care to 5-million veterans, another internal VA document says. The result would be “gridlock.”

“The VA must rethink HealtheVet,” says the Carnegie Mellon report. “Current plans are not realistic given the complexity and magnitude of HeV and the VA’s ability” to carry out those plans.

And this story from about a year ago tells us that “HealtheVet” was “far from complete,” in particular…

Without an integrated plan that includes independently validated cost estimates, VA increases the risk that HealtheVet could incur cost increases and continued schedule slippages and not achieve its intended outcomes. Various levels and types of oversight are currently being provided for the HealtheVet initiative by business owners, developers, and departmental information technology governance boards. However, the business owners have not yet implemented a complete governance structure, several key leadership positions within the developers’ organization are either vacant or filled with acting personnel, and the governance boards have not yet scheduled critical reviews of HealtheVet projects. Until all elements of governance and oversight are in place, the risk to the success of the HealtheVet initiative is increased.

And it’s not as if former Bushco VA Secretary Jim Nicholson was completely truthful on other agency-related matters to Congress (here and here). But in the matter of “HealtheVet,” Keith Ashdown of Taxpayers For Common Sense said in the 2005 story that…

“At this time of record-high budget deficits, it makes sense that agencies of the federal government be extra vigilant with taxpayers’ money,” Nelson wrote. “Not addressing potential problems with a national health-data repository now could lead to another fiscal disaster.”

“It’s horrifying, billions of dollars at stake and it seems nobody is minding the ship over there.”

I will acknowledge that a conversion of medical data on the scale of “HealtheVet” is a daunting task for anyone regardless of their political affiliation. However, we had years to get this right when we were under Republican “governance,” and the massive ALS screwup, though perhaps not a “smoking gun,” is at the very least evidence that Secretary Shinseki should testify to Congress exactly at what state of operational readiness we are – or aren’t – as this stage of the “HealtheVet” initiative.

(No posting tomorrow, by the way – talk amongst yourselves…)

Thursday Mashup (8/6/09)

From the “We Decide, Then Report” file, John Lott tells us the following from Fix Noise (here, taking an off day from compiling statistics on how much safer we would be if we all had assault rifles, no doubt)…

Only in Washington could a program that is spending money 13 times faster than was planned be labeled a “success.” The “cash-for-clunkers” program ground to a halt last week because in less than a week, a program that was supposed to last until November 1, had spent the entire $1 billion allocated to it. Let’s just hope that the government takeover of the rest of the health care industry doesn’t result in similar “success.”

Meanwhile, in the reality based community (here)…

The Obama administration’s much-maligned “cash-for-clunkers” trade-in system has made an immediate and indisputable impact on the struggling U.S. auto industry, with consumers flocking to dealerships in numbers not seen in years and auto companies posting strong sales they directly attribute to the government program.

Ford announced on Monday that their July U.S. auto sales were up a strong 2.3% over results from one year ago, a result that company executives linked to “cash-for-clunkers.”

And as noted here, the Senate is expected to vote on authorizing $2 billion more of funding for the program today.

Yes, I’ve read that this is expected to create a mini “auto bubble” also (funny – I wish more people noting that had paid attention to the housing and dot.com “bubbles” as well), with a likely dropoff to occur when the program ends, but who knows for sure? And how can it be a bad thing when the auto industry shows signs of life?

As noted here…

If the Senate approves the additional money, it’s likely to lead automakers to increase production and bring back laid-off workers. Many automakers reported low inventories due to increased sales from the program at the end of July. Already Hyundai Motor Co. has added a day of production to its Montgomery, Ala., plant, and Ford is considering increases.

Ford’s chief financial officer, Lewis Booth, said Wednesday night the company would decide this month and make an announcement in early September.

Among states, Michigan has taken most advantage of the program, requesting more than $44 million in vehicle vouchers. California dealers had requested nearly $40 million in vouchers, and Ohio had sought nearly $38 million.

Senate passage would send the legislation to the White House for Obama’s signature and assure consumers there will be no interruption in the program that has led to packed car dealerships nationwide.

The deals are aimed at boosting auto sales, which have been at their lowest levels in two decades.

Which of course means that the program is opposed by the Repugs, including Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, a state which, to the best of my knowledge, manufactures no automobiles whatsoever (maybe armored, but that’s it).

As noted here, President Obama is going to visit Bozeman, MT next week to pitch health care reform. As this story tells us, this is the first visit of a sitting president to this area of “big sky country.”

(And gosh, J.D. Mullane of the Bucks County Courier Times actually didn’t trash health care reform today, but wrote about a “missing ape sculpture” instead…insert your snark here).

Maybe while Obama and his entourage are staying over, someone could remind Repug State Rep Michael More that introducing language in a bill that could be potentially interpreted to justify an armed insurrection against this country isn’t a good idea (here).

And the both the president and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are coming under attack for the following based on this (as if Obama doesn’t have enough to do – he’s been in An Oval Office for how long now? Six months and two weeks?)…

President Obama got lots of attention last month for his drop-in visit to Ghana after the G20 meeting in Italy, where he blasted African leaders for misruling the continent and condemning its people to poverty and backwardness. “Repression can take many forms, and too many nations, even those that have elections, are plagued by problems that condemn their people to poverty,” said Obama. “No person wants to live in a society where the rule of law gives way to the rule of brutality and bribery. That is not democracy, that is tyranny, even if occasionally you sprinkle an election in there. And now is the time for that style of governance to end.”

They were fine words. But not much else. Obama didn’t single out any particular leader for criticism, and he gave the speech in Ghana, one of Africa’s handful of functional democracies. In her own trip to Africa this week, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit bright spots like South Africa, Cape Verde, and Liberia. But she also has a perfect opportunity to name and shame the continent’s worst leaders. There’s only one problem: she’s going to blow it.

See how our corporate media cousins have moved from magnifying perceived misdeeds of the Obama Administration to now forecasting what they will do wrong instead; Newsweek must be in possession of tarot cards, tea leaves, an Ouija board, and maybe even Harry Potter’s wand…amazing!

The article specifically singles out Umaru Yar’Adua of Nigeria, Mwai Kibaki, of Kenya and Joseph Kabila of the Congo as people who are particularly bad actors. And yes, Hillary Clinton has said here that not having a USAID agency head named by the White House is “frustrating beyond words.”

But I think the following should be considered (from here)…

The Obama administration inherited a foreign aid system starved of civilian experts and burdened by a bewildering array of mandates. USAID’s full-time staff shrank by 40 percent over the past two decades, but the assistance it oversees doubled, to $13.2 billion in 2008. The agency has a skeleton crew of technical experts, with four engineers for the entire world, Clinton noted recently. Increasingly, USAID has become a conduit for money flowing to contractors, who have limited supervision from the agency.

As USAID has weakened, foreign assistance programs have proliferated across government agencies, especially the military, causing duplication and confusion. Meanwhile, aid budgets have been saddled with presidential directives, “buy America” provisions and congressional earmarks that raise the cost of aid and reduce its effectiveness, development specialists say.

“In the USAID budget, every dollar has three purposes: help build an Air Force base, support the University of Mississippi, get some country to vote our way,” said the Rev. David Beckmann, president of the aid group Bread for the World, describing the plethora of political claims attached to aid. The development program, he said, “is a mess.”

The waste of billions of U.S. reconstruction dollars in Iraq and the growing role of development in the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan have given new urgency to long-running debates about reforming the aid system.

And as noted here (last year)…

…the United States currently provides economic aid and security assistance to such repressive African regimes as Swaziland, Congo, Cameroon, Togo, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, Rwanda, Gabon, Egypt, and Tunisia. None of these countries holds free elections, and all have severely suppressed their political opposition.

Among the worst of these African tyrannies has been the regime of Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo of Equatorial Guinea. Obiang has been in power even longer than the 28-year reign of (Robert) Mugabe and, according to a recent article in the British newspaper The Independent, makes the Zimbabwean dictator “seem stable and benign” by comparison. Obiang originally seized power in a 1979 coup by murdering his uncle, who had ruled the country since its independence from Spain in 1968. Under his rule, Equatorial Guinea nominally allowed the existence of opposition parties as a condition of receiving foreign aid in the early 1990s. But the four leading candidates withdrew from the last presidential election in December 2002 in protest of irregularities in the voting process and violence against their supporters. In that election, Obiang officially received more than 97 percent of the vote (down from 99.5 percent in the previous election.)

Though the U.S. State Department acknowledged that the election was “marred by extensive fraud and intimidation,” the Congress and the administration devoted none of the vehement condemnation that was so evident after the recent, similarly marred election process in Zimbabwe.

One major reason for the difference in response is oil. The development of vast oil reserves over the past decade has made Equatorial Guinea one of the wealthiest countries in Africa in terms of per capita gross domestic product. Virtually all of the oil revenues, however, goes to Obiang and his cronies. The dictator himself is worth an estimated $1 billion, making him the wealthiest leader in Africa; his real estate holdings include two mansions in Maryland just outside of Washington, D.C. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the country’s population lives on only a few dollars a day, and nearly half of all children under five are malnourished. The country’s major towns and cities lack basic sanitation and potable water, while conditions in the countryside are even worse.

During his most recent visit to Washington in 2006, Obiang was warmly received by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who praised the dictator as “a good friend” of the United States. Not once during their joint appearance did she mention the words “human rights” or “democracy.” At the same press conference, Obiang praised his regime’s “extremely good relations with the United States” and his expectation that “this relationship will continue to grow in friendship and cooperation.” None of the assembled reporters raised any questions about the regime’s notorious human rights record or its lack of democracy, instead using the opportunity to ask Secretary Rice questions about the alleged threat from Iran.

Does Obama have work to do in Africa? Yes. Does our Democratic Congress? Uh huh. And our media? Bueller?

Did Dubya have work to do? Next question.

Now, Newsweek, since we’ve settled all this for now, can you just report stories like grownups again for a change?

And finally, this tells us the following…

After a period of relatively low bankruptcy filings during 2006-07, U.S. consumer bankruptcies rose sharply in 2008 and continue to climb in 2009. Consumer filings reached 126,434 in July, the highest monthly total since the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (BAPCPA) was implemented in October 2005, and pushed the consumer total for the first seven months of 2009 past 800,000 filings.

Just to refresh our memories, here are the brave souls who opposed this horrible law (all Dems)…

Daniel Akaka
Barbara Boxer
Maria Cantwell
Jon Corzine
Mark Dayton
Christopher Dodd
Byron Dorgan
Dick Durbin
Russ Feingold
Dianne Feinstein
Tom Harkin
Ted Kennedy
John Kerry
Frank Lautenberg
Patrick Leahy
Carl Levin
Joe Lieberman
Barbara Mikulski
Patty Murray
Barack Obama
Jack Reed
Jay Rockefeller
Paul Sarbannes
Chuck Schumer
Ron Wyden

And here are the cowards who supported it (Dems are noted)…

Wayne Allard
Lamar Alexander
George Allen
Kay Bailey Hutchison
Max Baucus (d)
Evan Bayh (d)
Bob Bennett
Joe Biden (d)
Jeff Bingaman (d)
Christopher “Kit” Bond
Sam Brownback
Jim Bunning
Conrad Burns
Richard Burr
Robert Byrd (d)
Tom Carper (d)
Lincoln Chaffee
Saxby Chambliss
Tom Coburn
Thad Cochran
Norm Coleman
Susan Collins
John Cornyn
Kent Conrad (d)
Larry Craig
Mike Crapo
Jim DeMint
Mike DeWine
Elizabeth Dole
Pete Domenici
John Ensign
Mike Enzi
Bill Frist
Lindsay Graham
Charles Grassley (he sponsored it)
Judd Gregg
Chuck Hagel
Orrin Hatch
John Isakson
Jim Inhofe
Daniel Inouye (d)
Jim Jeffords (i)
Tim Johnson (d)
Herb Kohl (d)
Jon Kyl
Mary Landrieu (d)
Blanche Lincoln (d)
Trent Lott
Richard Lugar
Mel Martinez
John McCain
Mitch McConnell
Lisa Murkowski
Ben Nelson (d)
Bill Nelson (d)
Mark Pryor (d)
Harry Reid (d)
Pat Roberts
Ken Salazar (d)
Rick Santorum
Jeff Sessions
Richard Shelby
Gordon Smith
Olympia Snowe
Arlen Specter (d?)
Debbie Stabenow (d)
Ted Stevens
John Sununu
Jim Talent
Craig Thomas
John Thune
David Vitter
George Voinovich
John Warner

(And Hillary Clinton voted Present, which I think is questionable also.)

A pox on those “Yes” voters for all time…

Try Driving To Stay Alive Instead

Over the last few days, the New York Times has provided extensive coverage on the issue of driving while talking on a cell phone (hands-on or hands-free) and texting (Matt Richtel is the author of the thorough reporting on this issue, particularly last Sunday but today also).

Last Sunday’s report featured the following information…

A 2003 Harvard study estimated that cell phone distractions caused 2,600 traffic deaths every year, and 330,000 accidents that result in moderate or severe injuries.

Yet Americans have largely ignored that research. Instead, they increasingly use phones, navigation devices and even laptops to turn their cars into mobile offices, chat rooms and entertainment centers, making roads more dangerous.

A disconnect between perception and reality worsens the problem. New studies show that drivers overestimate their own ability to safely multitask, even as they worry about the dangers of others doing it.

Device makers and auto companies acknowledge the risks of multitasking behind the wheel, but they aggressively develop and market gadgets that cause distractions.

Police in almost half of all states make no attempt to gather data on the problem. They are not required to ask drivers who cause accidents whether they were distracted by a phone or other device. Even when officers do ask, some drivers are not forthcoming.

The federal government warns against talking on a cell phone while driving, but no state legislature has banned it. This year, state legislators introduced about 170 bills to address distracted driving, but passed fewer than 10.

Five states and the District of Columbia require drivers who talk on cell phones to use hands-free devices, but research shows that using headsets can be as dangerous as holding a phone because the conversation distracts drivers from focusing on the road.

Oh, and as noted here (and as Richtel tells us today), the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration recommended in 2002 and 2003 that cell phones not be used except in emergencies. However, as the story tells us, “that recommendation was kept from the public, partly over worries that members of Congress and other public officials would consider the proposal a move by the NHTSA that ‘crossed the line into lobbying,’” The New York Times reported, according to MSNBC (as noted here, the NHTSA administrator at the time was Dr. Jeffrey Runge).

(Bushco, working to screw you over, as always – even though they’re gone, their wretched legacy lives on).

The Times’ Sunday story began with the tale of Christopher Hill, a good driver and a good person by all appearances who experienced a horrendous lapse in judgment when talking on a cell phone; he ran a red light in his Ford Ranger pickup truck and didn’t notice Linda Doyle, a driver in a small sport utility vehicle, until the last second. As the story tells us, Hill hit her going 45 miles per hour (and) she was pronounced dead shortly after the accident.

The story also tells us that David Strayer, a psychology professor at the University of Utah and a leading researcher in the field of distracted driving, said “we’ve spent billions on air bags, antilock brakes, better steering, safer cars and roads, but the number of fatalities has remained constant…Our return on investment for those billions is zero (because) we’re using devices in our cars.”

And the story also tells us that that goes for hands-free phones also (echoing today’s findings), which also demands more of our time behind the wheel than we can spare when trying to avoid accidents on the road.

Also…

Some states have overcome opposition to pass restrictions. Joe Simitian, a state senator in California, managed to get his hands-free legislation, an effort he began in 2001, passed in 2006. He argued, based on data collected by the California Highway Patrol, that drivers using cell phones caused more fatalities than all the drivers distracted by eating, children, pets or personal hygiene.

In each previous year, the bill was killed — after lobbying by cell phone carriers, including Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile. Mr. Simitian said that in the first two years, he would visit the offices of his colleagues on the Transportation Committee on the day of the vote and “find three cell phone industry lobbyists sitting in the legislator’s office,” Mr. Simitian said. “They’d just smile.”

He said they fought him even though their brochures said that distracted driving was dangerous. The exception was Verizon Wireless, which supported his efforts from the start.

Opposition gradually eased, and his bill requiring use of headsets while driving took effect in July 2008. In the first six months the California law was in effect, a preliminary California Highway Patrol estimate showed that fatalities dropped 12.5 percent — saving 200 lives. Mr. Simitian said it was too soon to determine whether the law or other factors caused the drop.

Mr. Simitian said one reason political opposition eased was that fellow legislators saw the dangers firsthand. “They’d come to me and say: ‘You may be bringing me around. I almost got creamed at the corner,’ ” he recalled.

For its part, the cell phone industry trade group said it had dropped its objection to restricting cell phone use by drivers — it now is neutral on the subject — because it decided the industry should play no role in trying to shape public policy on the issue. “The change came after we had an epiphany that, if you will, we’re in the business of providing service, and how they use that service is at their discretion,” said Mr. Walls, the industry spokesman.

But Mr. Windsor from Nationwide Mutual and others are skeptical of the cell phone industry’s explanation. They believe its position changed because its business has changed to rely less on total minutes that people spend talking. Cell phone companies’ growth is coming more from customers surfing the Internet, downloading games and using other data services — things that people typically do less of behind the wheel.

Mr. Simitian believes that a ban on talking on cell phones while driving would save even more lives. But he hasn’t proposed one, and has no plans to. “It’s a political nonstarter,” he said. “It’ll be a cold day in hell before people give up their phones altogether in cars.”

At this point, I need to share the following observation. We recently drove the Doomsymobile to the Jersey shore and back as well as to the Phillies game and back on Monday and counted about half a dozen people playing with their cell phones looking to retrieve messages, check a contact list, or God knows what else. And they were doing this both while stuck in traffic and trying to maintain their speed on the highway (and I’ve lost count of the number of distracted drivers I have to share the road with who are engrossed in cell phone conversations).

(I don’t know if anyone else out there besides me is old enough to remember this, but back when high schools offered driver education – I don’t know whether that has been chopped from school budgets or not, but if it has, it should be reinstituted – a requirement of the training was to watch this horrendously scary short film called “Signal 30” I believe, which shows the aftermath of an auto accident. As far as I’m concerned, this should be required viewing for anyone attempting to receive a driver’s license.)

Now that I’m finished with my rant on this subject, I’ll provide this link to a post with extensive information on PA cell phone legislation, and this tells us of a cell phone driving bill that was recently defeated in the PA State House by a narrow margin (and yes, people do a whole host of nutty things behind the wheel, and I’ll admit that I haven’t exactly been a “saint” either at times, but the amendment offered by Rep Chris Ross concerning “changing the CD in a car, eating or drinking while driving, shaving, putting on makeup and driving with your pet animal on your lap” is just a bit of overkill).

I realize that, ultimately, what we are trying to do here is legislate good behavior (a quixotic effort at best, I know), particularly given that the whole “gadgets” biz cares only about feeding our perceived need to endanger our lives while we entertain ourselves (and a spot-on column by MoDo today amplifies that point also).

What we need, however, is a “push back” of common sense in response (and let us all hope and pray for no more lost lives before that day finally arrives).

More On The “Exonerating Report” That Wasn’t

In his New York Times column yesterday, Frank Rich reminded us of a news story that more or less came and went with barely a notice, and that was the withdrawal of the Pentagon Inspector General’s report which basically “exonerated the Bush Pentagon of allegations that it violated regulations in the conduct of its Retired Military Analyst program,” as Media Matters noted here about 10 days ago.

(Also, in the case of the WaPo, there was no notice of the withdrawal in the Post’s print edition, noted by Media Matters – the “exonerating report” was issued in January…a prior post on the Pulitzer-winning story of the defense analysts written by David Barstow of the New York Times is here).

This document, from TPM Muckracker, is the official notice of the report’s withdrawal from Donald M. Horstman, Deputy Inspector General for Policy and Oversight, citing “inaccuracies in the data concerning retired military analysts’ relationships with Defense contractors”; Horstman also noted that the report “did not meet accepted quality standards for an Inspector General work product.”

That’s all well and good, but my question is this: who wrote the report?

The letter from Deputy IG Horstman lists an individual named John R. Crane, Assistant IG for Communications and Congressional Liaison, at (703) 604-8324 as the contact person (this DoD link also lists Thomas F. Gimble as the principal deputy IG – I’ll try to contact assistant IG Crane and I’ll let you know if I find out anything).

However, I have a feeling that the person who can answer my question (if he were disposed to do so) is Gordon S. Heddell, who formerly was the IG of the Department of Labor (didn’t know they had one – wonder how he “got on” with “Puffy” Chao?) before he also assumed his duty as the acting DoD IG in July last year, as noted here (and as noted here, concern over Heddell’s “split time” arrangement between the two agencies was voiced by Repug Sen. Charles Grassley).

The report that supposedly exonerated the military contractors should be the subject of a congressional hearing, and another DoD IG report should be commissioned at the earliest opportunity (yet another Bushco mess for the Obama Administration to clean up). And at the hearing, acting DoD IG Gordon Heddell should be the first person called to testify.

Wednesday Mashup (5/13/09)

Nothing really in particular to note here except the following…

I got a kick out of this Onion News Network story, dancing on that razor’s edge between news and satire again; My favorite line? “For the first time in my life I know who the secretary of the treasury is…(and) I don’t like it.”

Please click here to access an online petition urging Congress to support President Obama’s health care initiative.

Also, I was intrigued by this story in today’s New York Times, which tells us…

WASHINGTON — An internal government memorandum that came to light on Tuesday challenged the scientific and economic basis of a proposed Environmental Protection Agency finding that climate-altering gases are a threat to human health and welfare.

The undated and unsigned government document, marked “Deliberative — Attorney Client Privilege,” was compiled by the White House Office of Management and Budget from comments offered by various agencies. A White House official said that many of the criticisms and suggestions came from holdovers from the administration of President George W. Bush and had been rejected by Obama appointees.

…

Some of the objections mirror longstanding criticism of the proposed E.P.A. action (to regulate carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act) from Republicans and business lobbies who say that the Clean Air Act is the wrong instrument for combating global warming and that such regulation will have devastating effects on the economy.

Senator John Barrasso, Republican of Wyoming, waved the document at Lisa P. Jackson, the E.P.A. administrator, at a hearing of the Environment and Public Works Committee. Mr. Barrasso called it a “smoking gun” that proved that the proposed finding was based on politics, not science.

“This misuse of the Clean Air Act will be a trigger for overwhelming regulation and lawsuits based on gases emitted from cars, schools, hospitals and small business,” Mr. Barrasso said. “This will affect any number of other sources, including lawn mowers, snowmobiles and farms. This will be a disaster for the small businesses that drive America.”

Ms. Jackson replied that the E.P.A. was obligated by the Supreme Court to decide whether heat-trapping gases pose a danger to human health and the environment. She said much of the analysis behind the proposed finding had been completed before she assumed office in January. She added that the comments reflected “people’s opinions” and were not binding on the agency.

Well, well, I would call that some well-orchestrated political theater by a puppet of some of this country’s most notorious energy interests (and I say that based on this article, which tells us the following about Barrasso)…

John Barrasso has received $136,400 in oil contributions during the 110th congress. $110,500 of those dollars were from industry PACS.[5] These numbers make Barrasso one of the top recipients of oil and coal money in the Senate. In addition to oil money, Barrasso has accepted $82,250 in coal contributions during the 110th congress. $70,000 of those dollars were from industry PACS [6].

Oh, and by the way, John, who exactly is it that’s in charge of your party again (here)?

Update 5/14/09: So NOW we know who wrote that supposed “smoking gun” memo, according to Barrasso (here – yeah, way to look legitimate by appearing with Glenn Beck…but you STILL won’t say Flush Limbore runs your party, will you?).

I have to admit that I’m truly puzzled by this story, which indicates more maneuvers by the pro-gun lobby in this country, specifically the following…

The 10th Amendment (to the Constitution) declares that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” It inspired the so-called “Sagebrush Rebellion” three decades ago that swept the West, preventing the federal takeover of public lands pushed by the Carter Administration and propelling the self-proclaimed Sagebrush Rebel, Ronald Reagan, to the Presidency. Now it is being invoked by pro-gun advocates to press for state rather than federal regulation of gun manufacturers. (See pictures of America’s gun culture.)

(Now) Montana has passed a law allowing local gun manufacturers to sidestep federal regulations as long as the weapons they make are sold within the territory of the state. “It’s a gun bill, but it’s another way of demonstrating the sovereignty of the state of Montana,” Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer said, according to AP, as he signed the bill into law in mid-April. “I like big guns, I like little guns, I like pistols, I like rifles, and I would like to buy a gun that’s made in Montana.”

And yes, the support of this bill by Schweitzer, who was and may yet be again a rising star in the Democratic Party, was most definitely NOT a shining moment for him.

However, the real “gotcha” part of the story for me comes near the end…

The irony is that most of the major gun manufacturers are located in blue states – Smith and Wesson in Massachusetts, Colt in Connecticut. Other large manufacturers, like Browning located in Utah, are engaged in global commerce. Montana’s bill will apply to boutique gun manufacturers who make expensive, custom-made hunting rifles, usually purchased by affluent hunters and collectors.

Putting aside the utterly farcical notion that any weapon manufactured in a state that passes one of these laws such as Montana would NEVER, under any circumstance, travel outside the borders of that state, possibly to be used in the commission of a crime (with Paul Helmke of Handgun Control saying that such a law wouldn’t hold up because “there are rules when you’re part of the Union”) am I to understand, then, that this law would mandate that these guns could only be purchased and used in the state in which they were manufactured? What the hell kind of business sense (or lack thereof) does THAT show?

Guess that kind of explains why this state has a region known as “the flathead” (the jokes write themselves sometimes, people).

Tune In For The New, Post Kev-Mart FCC!

Of all of the incoming Obama appointments, one that is truly important but could be easily forgotten in the flood of news since our 44th president was sworn in is that of a new FCC commissioner to replace the happily-now-departed Kevin Martin and his predecessor, Michael Powell (and oh yes, please remind me once more how Powell was nominated as a commissioner by Bill Clinton – he was nominated as chairman by Dubya, though).

This gives us a rundown on Martin’s tenure, the only redeeming aspect of which was his continued oversight (some would say persecution, but not me) of Comcast for “blocking access (to) its subscribers (of BitTorrent’s) file sharing software in (the company’s) first documented instance of violating net neutrality,” though, as Matt Stoller also notes at Open Left (embedded in the prior post), Martin also “aggressively pushed through a merger of AT&T and Bellsouth into the largest telecom company in the world, supported the massive Sirius-XM Merger, supported relaxed cross-ownership restrictions on local media, deregulated DSL broadband providers, and enforced indecency provisions” (nothing wrong with that last one, I know, except when you consider how ridiculous those provisions became under Bushco).

And considering that last item in particular, this Murdoch Street Journal story tells us that the soon-to-be-Souter-less Supremes…

…order(ed) a federal appeals court to re-examine its ruling in favor of CBS Corp. over Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction.

The court Monday directed the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia to consider reinstating the $550,000 fine that the Federal Communications Commission imposed on CBS over Ms. Jackson’s breast-baring performance at the 2004 Super Bowl.

Last year, the appeals court threw out the fine against CBS, saying the FCC strayed from its long-held approach of applying identical standards to words and images when reviewing complaints of indecency.

The appellate court said the incident lasted nine-sixteenths of one second and should have been regarded as “fleeting.”

But last week, the Supreme Court narrowly upheld the FCC’s policy threatening fines on so-called fleeting expletives on live television.

So the court basically reinstated the fine against CBS for the whole “Tit That Will Never Die” fiasco AND the fine in the case of Bono saying that winning a Golden Globe was “f*cking brilliant!” (yeah, way to add onto this mess by not curbing your tongue, Mr. “I’m Trying-To-Save-The-World” Potty Mouth!).

I thought this was an instructive portion of this Journal story on the subject…

“Programming replete with one-word indecent expletives will tend to produce children” who use them, Justice Scalia wrote.

In dissent, Justice Stevens called it “ironic…that while the FCC patrols the airwaves for words that have a tenuous relationship with sex or excrement, commercials broadcast during prime-time hours frequently ask viewers whether they too are battling erectile dysfunction or having trouble going to the bathroom.”

Yeah, Stevens blew it on the Indiana Voter ID ruling last year, but he has a thing or two “on the ball” here.

But the most important aspect of this to me is as follows…

The decision (on the fleeting expletives) effectively sends the issue to the Obama administration, which has three vacancies to fill on the five-member FCC. With broadcasters pledging to press the free-speech argument next, the commission will have to decide whether to continue a defense of the Bush administration rule or, as many in the entertainment and communications industries have urged, drop it altogether.

Obviously, I would tend to believe that the latter here is the best course of action.

And what’s needed fairly urgently I think are hearings on the person named by Obama to head the FCC, and that would be Julius Genachowski; as noted here, Genachowski’s nomination has been received by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, but hearings have yet to be scheduled. My suspicion is that hearings are likely to be delayed until Obama names a Republican appointee (the commission must have two Democrats and two Republicans; the other Dem commissioner nominated, as noted here, is Mignon Clyburn, the daughter of James Clyburn, the Dem U.S. Hose rep from South Carolina and House Majority Whip).

Well, if Obama is looking for a Repug nominee, here and here are two individuals who I believe should be considered – hard to find a still-moderate Repug under the age of 70.

And once the new commission is in place, these ridiculous fines and rules for indecency and language should either be eliminated or rolled back to Clinton-era levels, the last time we had adults running the executive branch of government before now.

Update 6/26/09: Good news (here).

“Gassy” Goldberg’s Earth Day EPA Assault

As I searched online to come up with posting material related to the 39th commemoration of Earth Day today, I came across the following choice item from the “Doughy Pantload” himself, in which he tells us…

One of the most important events of our lifetimes may have just transpired. A federal agency has decided that it has the power to regulate everything, including the air you breathe.

Nominally, the Environmental Protection Agency’s announcement last Friday only applies to new-car emissions. But pretty much everyone agrees that the ruling opens the door to regulating, well, everything.

According to the EPA, greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide — the gas you exhale — as well as methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and sulfur hexafluoride. It is literally impossible to imagine a significant economic or human activity that does not involve the production of one of these gases. Don’t think just of the gas and electricity bills. Cow flatulence is a serious concern of the EPA’s already. What next? Perhaps an EPA mandarin will pick up a copy of “The Greenpeace Guide to Environmentally Friendly Sex” and go after the root causes of global warming.

(And by the way, concerning the EPA and “cow flatulence,” I believe this is noteworthy information.)

Continuing…

Two years ago, the Supreme Court — the least democratic branch of our formal government — decided in Massachusetts v. EPA that the agency could regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. With this judicial green light, the EPA has launched its power grab over all that burns, breathes, burps, flies, drives and passes gas.

…

…Democrats are delighted by the EPA decision because it allows them to have their preferred policy — carbon regulation — without actually having to vote for it.

Either way, it doesn’t sound like these folks take their oaths of office very seriously.

Well, I’m sure “pretty much everyone” agrees on the following concerning the Massachusetts v. EPA Supreme Court ruling (as noted here)…

The Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency determined in 2003, first, that the EPA lacked authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (GHGs), second, that even if the EPA did have such authority the EPA declined to regulate carbon dioxide and other GHGs.

And the individual in charge of the EPA at this time was Christine Todd Whitman, succeeded by Michael Leavitt in August 2003 (the petitioners filing suit in response to the EPA’s ruling included twelve states, several cities and territories, and a coalition of environmental groups – the Court’s 2007 ruling was that the Bushco EPA did indeed have the authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, though they refused to do so, with Leavitt’s successor at EPA, Stephen Johnson, fighting the efforts of 17 states to do what the EPA would not until 1/20/09).

Based on this, then, I suppose Goldberg could pass for an expert on flatulence, at least of the pundit variety for sure. And it’s also important to note that, even under the foul, fetid Bushco reign and for all time before and since, the EPA, as a government agency, has been “charged to protect the environment and human health.”

Talk about not taking an oath of office very seriously (from ’01 to’09 anyway)…