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How to ruin American (any?) Enterprise by Ben Stain "Encourage a mass culture that spits on intelligence and study and instead elevates drug use, coolness through sex and... " ..your point of view on this guy statements appreciated
comment posted at 5:40 AM on Dec-16-02

The New Politics of Consumption, an excellent article by the author of The Overspent American, examines why so many want so much more than they need, and offers a rough sketch of an alternative consumer ethos. The responses to the article are also quite interesting. Via Sassafrass.
comment posted at 5:24 AM on Dec-16-02

I hope this isn't a double post. I've searched but couldn't find anything. It has special relevance to me since I am joining the Air Force in five months. John McCain (R-AZ) and Evan Bayh (R-IN) are pushing a bill through Congress that will allow for a short-term enlistment of 15 months into the military. Being 25 and wanting to pay off my loans, I may have taken this route had it been available to me. It would be especially helpful to college burn-outs to step out of college for a little over a year. Unless you are very anti-military, does this make signing "the dotted line" any more attractive?
comment posted at 3:11 PM on Dec-15-02

What is so scary about what this American is saying ? Call me all the names in the book you wish but I will admit that I enjoyed this interview that Lyndon LaRouche gave in the Turkish Magazine Yarin! Hear Me, Hear Me I must say that I am not a follower nor have never ever been a follower of our perennial Presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche! I just thought the article pointed out some interesting points and is a worthwhile read! Why do I feel as an American Citizen that I have to apologize for this? Well go ahead and do a google search- with the name LaRouche along with the words, mind control, fascists, communists, homosexuals, mind-control, CIA, totalitarian, or homosexual etc and you will bring up a multitude of links. What is it about this guy? Why doesn't he get such a bad rap in foreign countries (google search it) h b
comment posted at 6:09 AM on Dec-14-02

At InfoSecuity 2002, an annual corporate security conference, new "computer forensics" software is on display, including software "that allows corporate IT folks to research employees' criminal histories, credit information, financial asset details, friends and associates. "

The software is called Red Alert 2.0, and more specifically the research software is an optional subscription based add-on called Intelligent Information Dossier plus. Isn't this tantamount to your employer spying on your private life, in real time?

As I work for a very large military contractor myself, I could easily see something like this being used where I work. Would you feel comfortable working for a company that uses this sort of intrusive software?
comment posted at 9:45 PM on Dec-13-02

Quick break for a Public Service Announcement:
How to talk someone down from a bad trip.
comment posted at 4:33 AM on Dec-10-02
comment posted at 5:30 AM on Dec-10-02
comment posted at 7:33 PM on Dec-10-02

Is it all about oil? Daniel Yergin (The Prize) discusses Iraq's oil after Saddam. I found it highly informative and somewhat surprising. He emphasizes the small role that Iraq will play in the oil market. By the time production ramps up in five years, Iraq will still be a second tier producer, grouped with Norway and Mexico. Not exactly the petro bonanza some predict. There are more predictions by this veteran oil-watcher.
comment posted at 11:06 AM on Dec-8-02

Peace Activist Philip Berrigan Dead at 79 Yes, I know, obituaries are depressing. But this man was one of my very few heros. He fought a good fight, but in this age of corporate sponsored and government promoted dimunation of conscience can a single person "bearing witness" to the immoral actions that go on in this world really make a difference? Or is the idea of citizen protest just a quaint vestige of another era? [NYT link]
comment posted at 9:40 AM on Dec-8-02
comment posted at 10:34 AM on Dec-8-02

Time to think about the Bush Administration's stance on HIV. Thinking about it allows you to go on and on thinking about it. You know what they were writing about Bush in 2000 (compliments of first Google hit)?
Riddled with AIDS, burdened by poverty and plagued by wars, Africa will present significant foreign policy challenges to the administration of President-elect George W. Bush, analysts on the continent say.

Though many fear Bush will pay little attention to Africa, its problems may be too great to ignore.

What ever are we going to do now?
comment posted at 7:39 AM on Dec-1-02

Conservatives dispute Bush on Islam Bush critics, we are told, though they support him believe his statements about Islam are basically political and that Islam is not a peace-loving religion. Though I am not sure on this issue, I do not think citing a passage or two in this or that holy scripture is sufficient to apply to any religion, since what it does (or has done) differs often from what it's stated position is. In this article I find myself torn between disliking in general anything that right-wing conservatives utter and also disliking anything that Bush has to say! My shortcoming, no doubt.
comment posted at 7:02 PM on Nov-30-02

Henry Kissinger has been named head of the "independent commission" to investigate the Sept. 11 attacks. President Bush named Kissinger head upon signing bill to establish the commission. Kissinger has a controversial history and arguable distance from "independence". Given that, can the American people have any reasonable expectation of an honest inspection by their government of what lead up to that day? Will the burning questions even be asked, let alone answered?
comment posted at 12:42 PM on Nov-29-02

Strange Bedfellows fight tyranny? - Bob Barr, Dick Armey to join ACLU Quoth James Madison: (Federalist Papers #47) - "The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many . . . may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." and Benjamin Franklin:"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." William Safire Slammed the Bush Adminstration (Nov 15) over John Poindexter's Total Information Awareness program. NOW: Bob Barr, a gun-rights anti-gay firebrand conservative to join the ACLU? Dick Armey's joining as a consultant? Say that again? And Nat Hentoff reports that the Journal Gazette of Fort Wayne, Indiana ran a broadside called (sept. 8) "Attacks on Liberty" - "In the name of national security, President Bush, Attorney General John Ashcroft, and even Congress have pulled strand after strand out of the constitutional fabric that distinguishes the United States from other nations. . . . Actions taken over the past year are eerily reminiscent of tyranny portrayed in the most nightmarish works of fiction" MEANWHILE...an email of an editorial by right wing radio personality Chuck Baldwin, "Bush Government 'Out of Control' ("The Bush administration seems determined to turn our country into the most elaborate and sophisticated police state ever devised") first published in an online Christian Fundamentalist antiabortion newpaper is making the (right wing) rounds. It asks: "Does that mean one must leave the Republican Party in order to fight for liberty?" [antitroll protection dislaimer: most Democrats signed the Patriot Act, the principle cause of concern behind the statements and editorials linked to on this post]
comment posted at 5:52 PM on Nov-27-02

Brew your own Biodiesel! My brother just bought a new VW Jetta Turbo Diesel, and one of his reasons for picking this particular car was it's ability to run on reformulated fatty acid alkyl esters.That got me Googling, and I found this site where you can purchase your own home-brew kits. They even have demo starter kits.
comment posted at 7:01 PM on Nov-12-02

Our Bastard(s) Somoza Speaking of brutal Nicaraguan dicatator Somoza, Harry Truman is supposed to have said "He's a bastard, but he's our bastard." Looking for a source for this quote, I discovered it's attributed to Truman, FDR, and Nixon. This is such a broad chronological range that I figured I could narrow it down by finding out when Somza lived. No such luck: according to two biography^*/histories, there were actuall three Somozas: Anastasio Somoza Garcia, who fathered Luis Somoza Debayle and Anastasio Somoza Debayle, and the Somoza dynasty that ruled Nicaragua from the mid 1930s through the late 1970s. All three of those presidents could well have made the comment. But I'm still stuck for a source...

* This link (the first history/bio) requires anyone clicking from an outside page to go through an extra "Welcome Mat" page on the first time through. Annoying, but no registration required.
comment posted at 1:24 AM on Nov-12-02

I'm amazed. (And no, this isn't a Lone Star thread.) For all the politics fuss we've engaged in over the last 2 years, I'm a bit surprised that no one thought it a fit topic for discussion that Florida lost 100,000 votes this week. In Broward County. But of course, those are the *only* votes we lost track of, right...?
comment posted at 8:15 PM on Nov-8-02

"According to a classified document prepared for Rumsfeld by his Defense Science Board, the new organization will carry out secret missions designed to 'stimulate reactions' among terrorist groups, provoking them into committing violent acts which would then expose them to 'counterattack' by U.S. forces. In other words - and let's say this plainly, clearly and soberly, so that no one can mistake the intention of Rumsfeld's plan - the United States government is planning to use 'cover and deception' and secret military operations to provoke murderous terrorist attacks on innocent people. "
comment posted at 7:05 PM on Nov-5-02

Makes you think.... Read the first sentence in the "Special to the Web" paragraph at the bottom of the page. I'll see you inside...
comment posted at 11:25 AM on Nov-3-02

The Political Graveyard -- It all started innocently enough.....I was reading a piece by a professor of media and journalism studies who wondered: Was Paul Wellstone murdered?" and cited an unusual number of democrats who had died in plane crashes. Was it true, I wondered? -- My search led me to The Political Graveyard, with it's endless categorizations of the details in the deaths of US politicians. Deaths by religious affiliation, politicians killed by poison or gunfights, opium overdoses or car crashes. But was it true? Yes, the site seemed to confirm the deaths (for the last 3 decades or so) of a statistically anomalous number of national democratic politicians (sitting or running for office) in plane crashes....but the site just grabbed me and wouldn't let me leave: Charles Tillinghast James (1805-1862): died while making his own cannon, Richard Ellis (1781-1846): died when his clothes suddenly caught fire, Thomas Caute Reynolds (1821-1887): killed himself by leaping down an elevator shaft, Sidney Theodore Roebuck (1901-1982): died from RAT poison, and MY FAVORITE, Elmer Severson (1922-1999), who died from spinal cord injuries he lost a "tussle with a cow"
comment posted at 6:21 PM on Nov-2-02

A Liberal Argument for Iraqi Regime Change from Salman Rushdie Such a pleasure to read a well-written op-ed piece for a change.
comment posted at 10:42 PM on Nov-1-02

Americans the streets, finally! 100,000 (or so) in DC protest the war in Iraq. Parallel protests in cities worldwide. Why is no lawmaker stepping up to represent this constituency?
comment posted at 3:15 PM on Oct-27-02

Two men held in connection with sniper case And I was just getting used to seeing 24-7 coverage of it on every frigging channel. Now we'll have to hear about Iraq or Martha Stewart again.
comment posted at 6:35 PM on Nov-2-02
comment posted at 11:08 AM on Nov-3-02

A Left-wing European human-rights activist's take on Iraq. No, not what you'd come to expect by now. Far from the pro-forma accepted perspective of the Left, Thomas von der Osten-Sacken, a German human rights activist makes a case for the war in Iraq in this insightful interview. He mentions plenty of things I haven't read about before in regards to Kurds and has quite a few strong words to say about Germany and the recent fashions of the European Left.
comment posted at 2:32 AM on Oct-8-02

The Push For War (by Anatol Lieven). "The most surprising thing about the Bush Administration's plan to invade Iraq is not that it is destructive of international order; or wicked, when we consider the role the US (and Britain) have played, and continue to play, in the Middle East; or opposed by the great majority of the international community; or seemingly contrary to some of the basic needs of the war against terrorism. It is all of these things, but they are of no great concern to the hardline nationalists in the Administration....The most surprising thing about the push for war is that it is so profoundly reckless....What we see now is the tragedy of a great country, with noble impulses, successful institutions, magnificent historical achievements and immense energies, which has become a menace to itself and to mankind."

Excecutive summary: Lord Acton foretold all fruit of "military superiority".
comment posted at 9:40 AM on Oct-4-02

The Street Harassment Project sounds like a pretty good thing. Street harassment has been a crusade for my girlfriend for some time now, and it looks like she's not alone.
comment posted at 4:47 PM on Oct-3-02

US Foreign Policy Goals - Condoleeza Rice. Only $29.95 from C-SPAN, well worth it. Will clear up many misconceptions. Unfortunately, thanks to macho chest thumping and grunting by prominent talking heads on camera, the Rice message isn't getting across. (Free transcripts instead of $29.95 tapes might help.) Intelligent criticism of the sea change in foreign policy, from elder statesman George Kennan. What good does it do us to have information available on the web if we can't afford to buy it?
comment posted at 4:15 PM on Oct-3-02

Poetry or propaganda? Gov. James E. McGreevey [of New Jersey] has called for the resignation of the state's poet laureate, citing a poem critical of Israel that Amiri Baraka read at a festival earlier this month. "Who knew the World Trade Center was gonna get bombed," read a line from the poem, which was cited by the Jewish Standard weekly newspaper. "Who told 4,000 Israeli workers at the Twin Towers to stay home that day? Why did Sharon stay away?" Read the poem in question here.
comment posted at 1:14 AM on Oct-2-02
comment posted at 6:01 PM on Oct-2-02

Bill O'Reilly's views on American protection of Israel, and the response of the Muslim World.
comment posted at 8:08 AM on Oct-1-02

U.S. helped Iraq start bioweapons program

"I don't think it would be accurate to say the United States government deliberately provided seed stocks to the Iraqis' biological weapons programs,'' said Jonathan Tucker, a former U.N. biological weapons inspector. "But they did deliver samples that Iraq said had a legitimate public health purpose, which I think was naive to believe, even at the time."

" -isn't iraq just another case of blowback and is anyone asking what the next round of "blowback" will be if we go in again?
comment posted at 5:39 PM on Sep-30-02

Student arrested with boxcutter & scissors. But the thing that really boggled my mind was this: "Since February, we've taken more than 25,000 boxcutters from carry-ons and off of passengers. We've taken more than 500 firearms and 215,000 knives," Johnson said." For one thing, I guess I had never realized how much box cutting went on in the US - but the bizarre piece is the guns. A half dozen I can see, but five freakin' hundred? How can that many people - in the post 9/11 world - still be trying to get serious weapony onto airplanes?
comment posted at 2:06 PM on Sep-30-02

One of my co-workers commited suicide. There were no apparent signs; on the contrary, she was young, dedicated, driven, and personable. I was shocked to learn that suicide is the 11th leading cause of death in the U.S. It doesn't make sense to any of us, but it makes you think a lot more about the lives of the people we often spend eight hours a day with.
comment posted at 9:30 AM on Sep-27-02

Gore: Saddam must go Al Gore has told Iraqi opposition politicians that the United States remains committed to the overthrow of President Saddam Hussein. "There can be no peace for the Middle East so long as Saddam is in a position to brutalise his people and threaten his neighbours" - Al Gore [more inside]
comment posted at 7:40 AM on Sep-25-02

Finally released, The British Government's Dossier On Iraq appears, after two hours of reading, to be quite remarkable in it's - well - unremarkableness.(.pdf link from mainpage)
comment posted at 6:42 AM on Sep-24-02

Drive on air. A new engine design that not only runs on air, but cleans it too.
comment posted at 12:47 PM on Sep-20-02

Arming Saddam. "ABC News Nightline opened last June 9 with words to make the heart stop. "It is becoming increasingly clear," said a grave Ted Koppel, "that George Bush, operating largely behind the scenes throughout the 1980s, initiated and supported much of the financing, intelligence, and military help that built Saddam's Iraq into the aggressive power that the United States ultimately had to destroy."

Does it matter if no one reports it? Does a tree falling make a sound if no one hears it? Are these facts not relevant to the war against Iraq? For your debating pleasure, a blast from the past.
comment posted at 2:39 PM on Sep-20-02

PeaceTrees Vietnam. Reversing the Legacy of War. "A group of American volunteers, including Vietnam War veterans, helped Vietnamese victims of the war move Thursday into a newly built 'peace village' on the site of a former U.S. Marine base. The 100 families who will live in the village lost relatives or limbs in explosions of bombs, shells or other ordnance left over from the war. PeaceTrees Vietnam, the Washington State-based nonprofit group which sponsored the $385,000 project, says it spent months digging out 339 pieces of ordnance both American and North Vietnamese to make the 100-acre site safe."

Beautiful project and story....but one can't help wonder how many years will pass before we reverse the legacies of today's (and tomorrow's) wars.
comment posted at 11:21 AM on Sep-20-02

When was the last time we bombed Iraq? 1991? 1992? How about 4 days ago. And again six days before that to name just a few. The US Bombing Watch page keeps detailed tabs on all bombing attacks by allied forces since March 9, 2000, but the bombing has continued since the end of the Gulf War [via rc3.org].
comment posted at 1:41 AM on Sep-20-02
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comment posted at 11:09 AM on Sep-20-02

India's slide into facsism... An essay in The Nation by India's Arundhati Roy — novelist, essayist, activist — lays down the facts around a very troubling assertion: people-heavy, nuclear-armed, legitimacy-seeking, proto-super-power India is quickly becoming a fascist state.
comment posted at 7:12 PM on Sep-18-02

This war plan forces me to stand by the dictator who tortured me. Iraqi writer, an exiled dissident and victim of Hussein's regime speaks against war and sanctions: "You are "either with us or against us", they say. As an Iraqi that means choosing between war and the dictator. To be on the side of the oppressed does not mean we are unaware of the complexity of the situation. To campaign for the lifting of sanctions, for an end to the paralysing bombardment and daily threat of war is to stand by the Iraqi people; it is that policy which will help them to change the oppressive regime. Any change should be initiated from within Iraq, not imposed by Bush or Blair."
comment posted at 9:03 AM on Sep-18-02
comment posted at 11:43 AM on Sep-18-02
comment posted at 7:04 PM on Sep-18-02

Enron course original documents - University of Chicago. Actg 494: Special topics in Accounting: Accounting and Disclosure After Enron
comment posted at 9:08 AM on Sep-18-02