Stopped at the dollar general last night on the way to church, and picked up five more hanging basket brackets, which will shortly be installed on the courtyard, along with the two plant hooks that have long languished in the garage since we moved in.
There are four more hanging baskets, each sans occupants, which means that someone (me) is going to have to find suitable tenants for the baskets, and re-plant same, followed by hangings. On the courtyard.
And, I'm going to move the plants around somewhat back there, seeing if I can catch the right mix of sun and rain for the hybiscus, which aren't very happy of late, and the crepe myrtle, which looks perpetually sunburned.
In just a few seconds on target.com, I found a decent drapery rod with finials and hardware, which I will snag on my relatively early morning store visit for miniature flourescent light bulbs, hanging chads (whoops, plants) and vodka. And dry cleaning.
Brought the TV home from church - another project for today will be to re-arrange the bedroom; I've decided that I don't have the gusto to paint.
Maybe NEXT weekend.
I also need to work on my website today. Something that produces income must be done.
Oh, and it would be a really good choice to work on my sermon for tomorrow morning, since I've set the bar fairly high.
Have a Diana social to attend tonight; Tom is going to be my "date," which is a good thing. He was looking SO cute - he had his hair cut and it just makes him look so desireable.
Managed to turn the switch on the camera to the WRONG position, so now its batteries are deader than snot. I was going to snap all kinds of pictures of the flower patch, send 'em to Tom and have him tell me what to pull and what to trim.
I guess I should get to work.
Oh, just since I can't post without showing you something that will broaden your mind, check out the first totally fear-based political ad, from the 1964 Presidential campaign.
DJHJD
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Most people aren't even aware of this at all, but your president - the one who you're so proud of - has committed felony violations of law as demonstrated by sworn testimony yesterday. Against you. And me, but you don't care if he does it to me so much.
When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
So, glad to have all those choices of motels to stay in, and all of those Denny's restaurants, plus having your government spend your tax dollars to listen in on your phone calls and email traffic just because it's keeping you safe from terrorists who don't exist according to the government's own heavily redacted records??
Be proud. Be very proud.
This morning's coffee was distinctly less bitter without Jerry Falwell in the world.
When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
So, glad to have all those choices of motels to stay in, and all of those Denny's restaurants, plus having your government spend your tax dollars to listen in on your phone calls and email traffic just because it's keeping you safe from terrorists who don't exist according to the government's own heavily redacted records??
Be proud. Be very proud.
This morning's coffee was distinctly less bitter without Jerry Falwell in the world.
Drapery rods and broken merchandise
Here at the office, with the investor representatives for one of our companies we do business with. Funny stuff - they're SO aggressive. But, do they have the technology? Will they be around in eight weeks to support us?
Had a lovely E-conversation this morning at 0100. We were reminiscing about his family's 1978 Mercury Marquis Meteor station wagon, that seated more people than it gained miles per gallon of fuel consumption. The conversation was a hoot - he was telling me bits and details about the car, and I was able to pinpoint the model, year and equipment by virtue only of those pieces. Then, this morning, I found this on eBay, which is proof that time travel exists.
We're supposed to get the drapery rod for the downstairs back window tonight, which will mean that we'll have blackout drapes by the morrow. EXCELLENT.
I got the new mini-stereo for the bedroom, and the old adage "You get what you pay for" seems to be in play. I unpacked it this morning, and the $40 (with shipping) $600 AIWA stereo looks lovely, but has a piece rattling around inside of it, and the CD player is wonky. I didn't have time to fiddle with it this morning, but perhaps this evening, I'll be able to figure it out. It has a cassette player, which is important to be able to play the myriad meditation tapes that I have accumulated.
Tonight, Curtis is coming over (he says.) He's moving to Corpus for a year, and he wanted to come and hang out. That boy's a mess. Some months ago, he called and said he needed my help - his wife had gained access to his email account, and was surfing through all of his hook-up profiles, checking his on-site emails from people with whom he'd been discussing hooking up. His request was that I log in as him on his accounts she hadn't yet found out about, cancel and delete those profiles, and scrub his email account of mail from those accounts.
Which I did, bitching the entire time. I told him he needed to figure out what his deal was - was he a married guy, or was he just a swinger that hit whoever he could find?
Yesterday, he told me that my phone conversation with him caused him to change his behavior strongly. He's not been hunting for external validation since we spoke that day.
Who knew?
Anyway, he wants to come hang out tonight before he runs off to Corpus with the wife and kiddies. I think I'll have him help me move the dresser and armoire in my bedroom so that I can get things the way I want them in there.
I really want matticia to come for Memorial Day weekend.
Trying to re-do some tax returns today that are MOST challenging for me. Bleh.
Had a lovely E-conversation this morning at 0100. We were reminiscing about his family's 1978 Mercury Marquis Meteor station wagon, that seated more people than it gained miles per gallon of fuel consumption. The conversation was a hoot - he was telling me bits and details about the car, and I was able to pinpoint the model, year and equipment by virtue only of those pieces. Then, this morning, I found this on eBay, which is proof that time travel exists.
We're supposed to get the drapery rod for the downstairs back window tonight, which will mean that we'll have blackout drapes by the morrow. EXCELLENT.
I got the new mini-stereo for the bedroom, and the old adage "You get what you pay for" seems to be in play. I unpacked it this morning, and the $40 (with shipping) $600 AIWA stereo looks lovely, but has a piece rattling around inside of it, and the CD player is wonky. I didn't have time to fiddle with it this morning, but perhaps this evening, I'll be able to figure it out. It has a cassette player, which is important to be able to play the myriad meditation tapes that I have accumulated.
Tonight, Curtis is coming over (he says.) He's moving to Corpus for a year, and he wanted to come and hang out. That boy's a mess. Some months ago, he called and said he needed my help - his wife had gained access to his email account, and was surfing through all of his hook-up profiles, checking his on-site emails from people with whom he'd been discussing hooking up. His request was that I log in as him on his accounts she hadn't yet found out about, cancel and delete those profiles, and scrub his email account of mail from those accounts.
Which I did, bitching the entire time. I told him he needed to figure out what his deal was - was he a married guy, or was he just a swinger that hit whoever he could find?
Yesterday, he told me that my phone conversation with him caused him to change his behavior strongly. He's not been hunting for external validation since we spoke that day.
Who knew?
Anyway, he wants to come hang out tonight before he runs off to Corpus with the wife and kiddies. I think I'll have him help me move the dresser and armoire in my bedroom so that I can get things the way I want them in there.
I really want matticia to come for Memorial Day weekend.
Trying to re-do some tax returns today that are MOST challenging for me. Bleh.
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
"The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out... without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, intolerable."
--H. L. Mencken (1880 - 1956), American journalist, social critic and freethinker
--H. L. Mencken (1880 - 1956), American journalist, social critic and freethinker
Another article about what your government is doing with your tax dollars
Also a copyrighted article from
Casey Research, Inc. c/o InvestorsInsight Publishing, Inc.
14900 Landmark Blvd, Suite #350, Dallas, Texas 75254.
(c) Casey Research, LLC. 2007
China's Food Scandals
By Shannara Johnson
In our recent article "Honeybees and Food Supply," we mentioned that due to insufficient pollination of certain crops and vegetables, the U.S. might become more dependent on food imports from foreign countries, among them China.
According to the USDA Economic Research Service, exports from China to the United States already more than doubled from $1 billion in 2002 to almost $2.3 billion in 2006. Within the last decade, China has become the third-largest exporter of food--by value--to the U.S., shipping nearly five times as much as it did in 1996. The food categories showing the biggest growth are beverages, fish, nuts, fresh fruits and vegetables.
To us, that seems reason for concern, given the abysmal track record in food safety of the Chinese. Case in point: the latest scandal involving pet food containing tainted wheat gluten from China.
The culprit was melamine, a chemical made from coal, that reportedly led to severe illness in thousands of American pets. After the melamine incident spurred frantic investigations, the New York Times now claims that the contamination with that substance was actually no accident, but "business as usual" in China.
Two NYT journalists visiting the country found that "For years, producers of animal feed all over China have secretly supplemented their feed with [...] melamine, a cheap additive that looks like protein in tests, even though it does not provide any nutritional benefits, according to melamine scrap traders and agricultural workers here."
In response to the pet food scare, the FDA banned imports of wheat gluten from China--but is that really enough?
"Evidence is mounting," says the New York Times article, "that Chinese protein exports have been tainted with melamine and that its use in agricultural regions like this one is widespread. But the government has issued no recall of any food or feed product here in China."
However, melamine is not the only substance we should be worried about. The Chinese seem to like cutting corners when it comes to food production... which makes us wonder if this practice may, at least partially, be responsible for China's "everyday low prices" no other country can compete with.
In 2004, for example, the country experienced a domestic food scandal over fake baby formula that had "little more nutritional value than water," as the UK Guardian stated. The "bogus products, which contained only 6% of the vitamins, minerals and protein needed for a growing infant" killed at least 50 Chinese babies and left hundreds severely malnourished.
"Up to 200 babies who were raised on the formula [...] developed ‘big-head disease'--a symptom of acute malnutrition describing the lack of flesh on the torso and limbs, which appear to shrink in comparison with the cranium."
Mistaking the chubby cheeks of their newborns for health, many Chinese parents didn't act until it was too late. The scandal involved at least 36 different brands of fake formula, manufactured throughout China.
In the same year, there was a public outcry in Japan when it turned out that part of the 653 tons of soy sauce imported from China in 2003 had been made not from soybeans, but from human hair.
"Human hair makes an alternative to soybeans because it contains the amino acids that give the sauce its flavor," stated the Japanese Mainichi Daily News matter-of-factly. "Chinese soy sauce manufacturers say they want to continue making human hair sauce because it's much cheaper than using soybeans. But outrage caused the Chinese government to ban the process, although many unscrupulous soy makers continue prowling barbershops for their economic alternative."
Would you like some blonde or brunette with your sushi today?
In 2005, the Shanghai Star reported that "a survey conducted in the Shanghai local food market [...] found that cuttlefish were soaked in Chinese calligraphy ink to improve coloring, eels were fed contraceptive pills to make them grow long and slim and big fish were stuffed with small dead fish to make them heavier and bigger."
Well, that was in China and Japan, you may say, how does that concern us? After all, the U.S. does have strict regulations for food imports, doesn't it?
While it is true that U.S. food regulations are in place, their reinforcement is another matter entirely. The FDA is woefully understaffed, with only about 1,750 food inspectors at ports and domestic food-production plants.
The International Herald Tribune recently reported that in 2006, "inspectors sampled just 20,662 shipments out of more than 8.9 million that arrived at American ports. China [...] sent 199,000 shipments, of which less than 2 percent were sampled."
"The public thinks the food supply is much more protected than it is," William Hubbard, a retired FDA associate commissioner, told the IHT. "If people really knew how weak the FDA program is, they would be shocked. [...] There are so few inspectors that most domestic plants get a visit from an FDA inspector only once every five to 10 years."
Which doesn't bode well for foreign imports--and the risk is only getting greater. For example, after reading the following, you might want to scrape chicken and shrimp off your menu.
Currently, the U.S. government is working on a new proposal that would allow chickens raised, slaughtered and cooked in China to be sold in the United States.
In China, livestock are often fed antibiotics banned by other countries to maximize output, states a May 9 article in the Boston Globe, and for economic reasons, many farmers raise both chicken and shrimp.
While U.S. poultry farms are mostly huge, standardized businesses, in China, "there are hundreds of thousands of these little farms," Michael Doyle, director of the Center for Food Safety at the University of Georgia, told the Globe. "They have small ponds. And over the ponds [...] they'll have chicken cages. It might be like 20,000 chickens in cages. The chicken feces is what feeds the shrimp."
The result: "The U.S. Department of Agriculture has found that up to 10 percent of shrimp imported from China contains salmonella [...]. Even more worrisome are shrimp imported from China that contain antibiotics that no amount of cooking can neutralize."
By the way, unlike seafood, under current U.S. regulations store labels are not required to indicate the country of origin for poultry--so we'll literally never know where our next meal comes from.
Our solution: close down the FDA and let the market compete for the best inspection standards, with the winners being those that are able to win the confidence of the public by delivering the highest-quality foods, at the best prices. Outrageous, you say? Well, per the above, it seems to us to be a better idea than the government-managed fiasco that most people now rely on to assure the safety of their food.
Enjoy your dinner!
Casey Research, Inc. c/o InvestorsInsight Publishing, Inc.
14900 Landmark Blvd, Suite #350, Dallas, Texas 75254.
(c) Casey Research, LLC. 2007
China's Food Scandals
By Shannara Johnson
In our recent article "Honeybees and Food Supply," we mentioned that due to insufficient pollination of certain crops and vegetables, the U.S. might become more dependent on food imports from foreign countries, among them China.
According to the USDA Economic Research Service, exports from China to the United States already more than doubled from $1 billion in 2002 to almost $2.3 billion in 2006. Within the last decade, China has become the third-largest exporter of food--by value--to the U.S., shipping nearly five times as much as it did in 1996. The food categories showing the biggest growth are beverages, fish, nuts, fresh fruits and vegetables.
To us, that seems reason for concern, given the abysmal track record in food safety of the Chinese. Case in point: the latest scandal involving pet food containing tainted wheat gluten from China.
The culprit was melamine, a chemical made from coal, that reportedly led to severe illness in thousands of American pets. After the melamine incident spurred frantic investigations, the New York Times now claims that the contamination with that substance was actually no accident, but "business as usual" in China.
Two NYT journalists visiting the country found that "For years, producers of animal feed all over China have secretly supplemented their feed with [...] melamine, a cheap additive that looks like protein in tests, even though it does not provide any nutritional benefits, according to melamine scrap traders and agricultural workers here."
In response to the pet food scare, the FDA banned imports of wheat gluten from China--but is that really enough?
"Evidence is mounting," says the New York Times article, "that Chinese protein exports have been tainted with melamine and that its use in agricultural regions like this one is widespread. But the government has issued no recall of any food or feed product here in China."
However, melamine is not the only substance we should be worried about. The Chinese seem to like cutting corners when it comes to food production... which makes us wonder if this practice may, at least partially, be responsible for China's "everyday low prices" no other country can compete with.
In 2004, for example, the country experienced a domestic food scandal over fake baby formula that had "little more nutritional value than water," as the UK Guardian stated. The "bogus products, which contained only 6% of the vitamins, minerals and protein needed for a growing infant" killed at least 50 Chinese babies and left hundreds severely malnourished.
"Up to 200 babies who were raised on the formula [...] developed ‘big-head disease'--a symptom of acute malnutrition describing the lack of flesh on the torso and limbs, which appear to shrink in comparison with the cranium."
Mistaking the chubby cheeks of their newborns for health, many Chinese parents didn't act until it was too late. The scandal involved at least 36 different brands of fake formula, manufactured throughout China.
In the same year, there was a public outcry in Japan when it turned out that part of the 653 tons of soy sauce imported from China in 2003 had been made not from soybeans, but from human hair.
"Human hair makes an alternative to soybeans because it contains the amino acids that give the sauce its flavor," stated the Japanese Mainichi Daily News matter-of-factly. "Chinese soy sauce manufacturers say they want to continue making human hair sauce because it's much cheaper than using soybeans. But outrage caused the Chinese government to ban the process, although many unscrupulous soy makers continue prowling barbershops for their economic alternative."
Would you like some blonde or brunette with your sushi today?
In 2005, the Shanghai Star reported that "a survey conducted in the Shanghai local food market [...] found that cuttlefish were soaked in Chinese calligraphy ink to improve coloring, eels were fed contraceptive pills to make them grow long and slim and big fish were stuffed with small dead fish to make them heavier and bigger."
Well, that was in China and Japan, you may say, how does that concern us? After all, the U.S. does have strict regulations for food imports, doesn't it?
While it is true that U.S. food regulations are in place, their reinforcement is another matter entirely. The FDA is woefully understaffed, with only about 1,750 food inspectors at ports and domestic food-production plants.
The International Herald Tribune recently reported that in 2006, "inspectors sampled just 20,662 shipments out of more than 8.9 million that arrived at American ports. China [...] sent 199,000 shipments, of which less than 2 percent were sampled."
"The public thinks the food supply is much more protected than it is," William Hubbard, a retired FDA associate commissioner, told the IHT. "If people really knew how weak the FDA program is, they would be shocked. [...] There are so few inspectors that most domestic plants get a visit from an FDA inspector only once every five to 10 years."
Which doesn't bode well for foreign imports--and the risk is only getting greater. For example, after reading the following, you might want to scrape chicken and shrimp off your menu.
Currently, the U.S. government is working on a new proposal that would allow chickens raised, slaughtered and cooked in China to be sold in the United States.
In China, livestock are often fed antibiotics banned by other countries to maximize output, states a May 9 article in the Boston Globe, and for economic reasons, many farmers raise both chicken and shrimp.
While U.S. poultry farms are mostly huge, standardized businesses, in China, "there are hundreds of thousands of these little farms," Michael Doyle, director of the Center for Food Safety at the University of Georgia, told the Globe. "They have small ponds. And over the ponds [...] they'll have chicken cages. It might be like 20,000 chickens in cages. The chicken feces is what feeds the shrimp."
The result: "The U.S. Department of Agriculture has found that up to 10 percent of shrimp imported from China contains salmonella [...]. Even more worrisome are shrimp imported from China that contain antibiotics that no amount of cooking can neutralize."
By the way, unlike seafood, under current U.S. regulations store labels are not required to indicate the country of origin for poultry--so we'll literally never know where our next meal comes from.
Our solution: close down the FDA and let the market compete for the best inspection standards, with the winners being those that are able to win the confidence of the public by delivering the highest-quality foods, at the best prices. Outrageous, you say? Well, per the above, it seems to us to be a better idea than the government-managed fiasco that most people now rely on to assure the safety of their food.
Enjoy your dinner!
Copyrighted article from
Casey Research, Inc. c/o InvestorsInsight Publishing, Inc.
14900 Landmark Blvd, Suite #350, Dallas, Texas 75254.
(c) Casey Research, LLC. 2007
Please note that I have no commercial interest in my blog, so any cross-posts here are for distribution of the material only, and I have no material gain.
What's Happening in the War on Terror?
By Doug Hornig
Let's just make this clear at the outset: We do not in any way deny that the threat of terrorist violence exists in this country (and around the world). Nor do we wish to minimize the suffering of people who have been victims of that or any form of violence.
But having said that, the War on Terror--itself a misnomer, as Doug Casey likes to point out, since terror is a tactic, and you can no more make war on it than you can on cavalry charges--seems in some ways to have disappeared behind the clouds put out by the Washington fog machine.
It's a bit like the old story about the guy who blesses his neighbor's house by saying, "May this house be safe from tigers," then takes the credit when no tiger-related incidents come to pass.
See, the government tells us, our anti-terror measures are really working. There have been no attacks lately, because we've stopped them.
Lots of them, apparently. The only trouble is, we have no specifics. All the foiled plots are so sensitive that we can't be told anything about them, for reasons of national security.
Now, personally, we can't see all that much downside to telling the American people at least a few details about what they saved us from, if only to help rebuild people's eroding confidence that government can, in fact, keep us safer than we would be able to do on our own.
But no. So what we're left to fall back on are cold, lifeless statistics.
These are not terribly encouraging. According to a Justice Department Inspector General's audit report published in February, only 2 of the 26 sets of statistics on domestic counterterrorism efforts compiled by the Justice Department and FBI from 2001 to 2005 were accurate. The numbers were both over- and understated, depending on the data cited and the part of Justice doing the counting, the report said.
The biggest problem lay in numbers submitted by the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys, which tallied hundreds of terrorism cases which, in reality, were minor crimes with no connection to terrorism.
Critics were quick to point out that the government has an interest in both under- and overreporting terrorism cases, the former because it helps people feel safer, and the latter because it means more money for the reporting agency.
Justice Dept. spokesman Dean Boyd immediately said that "the notion that the Justice Department inflated its statistics is false," and the I.G.'s report was careful to stress that the discrepancies appeared to be unintentional, having more to do with shoddy bookkeeping, disagreements over definitions, and other problems.
Yet it's worth noting that the I.G.'s office delineated the inaccuracies even after having accepted the government's tallies at face value. That means if the government said it was a terrorist case, it was recorded as such. There was no follow-up.
Still, the audit turned up any number of airport arrests on immigration and false document charges, and such non-terrorist activities as brokering fraudulent marriages, false information on a passport application, and dealing firearms without a license. These, and others, were lumped in with terror cases solely because they were investigated by federal Joint Terrorism Task Forces, even when prosecutors said they shouldn't be.
A skeptical Washington Post put a team of investigative reporters on the story back in 2005, after President Bush said publicly that "federal terrorism investigations have resulted in charges against more than 400 suspects, and more than half of those charged have been convicted."
The Washington Post's conclusion: "An analysis of the Justice Department's own list of terrorism prosecutions [...] shows that [only] 39 people [...] were convicted of crimes related to terrorism or national security."
The rest were tried for "minor crimes [that] produced modest punishments. The median sentence for all cases adjudicated, whether or not they were terrorism-related, was 11 months."
Thus the massive sweeps initiated since 2001 have yielded little in the way of results. Of the fear that there may be embedded terrorist cells within the country, Martha Crenshaw of Wesleyan University, who has been studying terrorism since the 1960s, says, "we really don't know if they exist here in any significant way. It's possible that they could have sleepers planted here for a long time and we could always be very surprised. But I'd say that's less likely compared with them trying to repeat a 9/11-style infiltration from the outside."
Perhaps that's what Canada is thinking, that we're exporting our terrorists to their country. How else to explain the difficulty of present-day border crossings.
Not long ago, Americans traveled to Canada on a drivers license and a smile, much as travelers today can move freely among the European Union members' countries. No longer.
Canadian authorities can now tap into American law enforcement databases, and they use them. Got any youthful indiscretions on your record? Some college drug use, a DUI, a shoplifting incident you've regretted ever since? Forget about getting into Canada.
"It's completely ridiculous," says Chris Cannon, an attorney representing a man who was told he was "inadmissible" to the country. Because of a marijuana possession conviction. In 1975. Such stories are now commonplace.
All of this has come about because of a 2002 partnership known as the Smart Border Action Plan, which combines Canadian intelligence with U.S. Homeland Security information. Basically, "They can call up anything that your state trooper in Iowa can," says Canadian customs attorney David Lesperance, who adds that this "is just the edge of the wedge." Soon to come are similar data-sharing agreements with any number of other countries.
Of course, you can get into Canada, even with a prior. But you have to apply for a "Minister's Approval of Rehabilitation." Now, doesn't that have a nice ring to it?
We're sure our neighbors to the north feel oh, so secure.
Finally, returning to the home front, we'd like to mention that the DHS is hard at work trying to track down foreigners who remain in the country even after being ordered to leave. A DHS I.G.'s report from March states that there are 52 separate teams on the case.
Honestly, we have no doubt that these are diligent, hard-working officials who are doing their best. But it's going to be a struggle. The bad news is that the agency still has a staggering backlog of about 620,000 fugitive aliens.
It's best if they're not all caught at once because, as the I.G.'s report readily admits, there would be insufficient jail space to house them.
Casey Research, Inc. c/o InvestorsInsight Publishing, Inc.
14900 Landmark Blvd, Suite #350, Dallas, Texas 75254.
(c) Casey Research, LLC. 2007
Please note that I have no commercial interest in my blog, so any cross-posts here are for distribution of the material only, and I have no material gain.
What's Happening in the War on Terror?
By Doug Hornig
Let's just make this clear at the outset: We do not in any way deny that the threat of terrorist violence exists in this country (and around the world). Nor do we wish to minimize the suffering of people who have been victims of that or any form of violence.
But having said that, the War on Terror--itself a misnomer, as Doug Casey likes to point out, since terror is a tactic, and you can no more make war on it than you can on cavalry charges--seems in some ways to have disappeared behind the clouds put out by the Washington fog machine.
It's a bit like the old story about the guy who blesses his neighbor's house by saying, "May this house be safe from tigers," then takes the credit when no tiger-related incidents come to pass.
See, the government tells us, our anti-terror measures are really working. There have been no attacks lately, because we've stopped them.
Lots of them, apparently. The only trouble is, we have no specifics. All the foiled plots are so sensitive that we can't be told anything about them, for reasons of national security.
Now, personally, we can't see all that much downside to telling the American people at least a few details about what they saved us from, if only to help rebuild people's eroding confidence that government can, in fact, keep us safer than we would be able to do on our own.
But no. So what we're left to fall back on are cold, lifeless statistics.
These are not terribly encouraging. According to a Justice Department Inspector General's audit report published in February, only 2 of the 26 sets of statistics on domestic counterterrorism efforts compiled by the Justice Department and FBI from 2001 to 2005 were accurate. The numbers were both over- and understated, depending on the data cited and the part of Justice doing the counting, the report said.
The biggest problem lay in numbers submitted by the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys, which tallied hundreds of terrorism cases which, in reality, were minor crimes with no connection to terrorism.
Critics were quick to point out that the government has an interest in both under- and overreporting terrorism cases, the former because it helps people feel safer, and the latter because it means more money for the reporting agency.
Justice Dept. spokesman Dean Boyd immediately said that "the notion that the Justice Department inflated its statistics is false," and the I.G.'s report was careful to stress that the discrepancies appeared to be unintentional, having more to do with shoddy bookkeeping, disagreements over definitions, and other problems.
Yet it's worth noting that the I.G.'s office delineated the inaccuracies even after having accepted the government's tallies at face value. That means if the government said it was a terrorist case, it was recorded as such. There was no follow-up.
Still, the audit turned up any number of airport arrests on immigration and false document charges, and such non-terrorist activities as brokering fraudulent marriages, false information on a passport application, and dealing firearms without a license. These, and others, were lumped in with terror cases solely because they were investigated by federal Joint Terrorism Task Forces, even when prosecutors said they shouldn't be.
A skeptical Washington Post put a team of investigative reporters on the story back in 2005, after President Bush said publicly that "federal terrorism investigations have resulted in charges against more than 400 suspects, and more than half of those charged have been convicted."
The Washington Post's conclusion: "An analysis of the Justice Department's own list of terrorism prosecutions [...] shows that [only] 39 people [...] were convicted of crimes related to terrorism or national security."
The rest were tried for "minor crimes [that] produced modest punishments. The median sentence for all cases adjudicated, whether or not they were terrorism-related, was 11 months."
Thus the massive sweeps initiated since 2001 have yielded little in the way of results. Of the fear that there may be embedded terrorist cells within the country, Martha Crenshaw of Wesleyan University, who has been studying terrorism since the 1960s, says, "we really don't know if they exist here in any significant way. It's possible that they could have sleepers planted here for a long time and we could always be very surprised. But I'd say that's less likely compared with them trying to repeat a 9/11-style infiltration from the outside."
Perhaps that's what Canada is thinking, that we're exporting our terrorists to their country. How else to explain the difficulty of present-day border crossings.
Not long ago, Americans traveled to Canada on a drivers license and a smile, much as travelers today can move freely among the European Union members' countries. No longer.
Canadian authorities can now tap into American law enforcement databases, and they use them. Got any youthful indiscretions on your record? Some college drug use, a DUI, a shoplifting incident you've regretted ever since? Forget about getting into Canada.
"It's completely ridiculous," says Chris Cannon, an attorney representing a man who was told he was "inadmissible" to the country. Because of a marijuana possession conviction. In 1975. Such stories are now commonplace.
All of this has come about because of a 2002 partnership known as the Smart Border Action Plan, which combines Canadian intelligence with U.S. Homeland Security information. Basically, "They can call up anything that your state trooper in Iowa can," says Canadian customs attorney David Lesperance, who adds that this "is just the edge of the wedge." Soon to come are similar data-sharing agreements with any number of other countries.
Of course, you can get into Canada, even with a prior. But you have to apply for a "Minister's Approval of Rehabilitation." Now, doesn't that have a nice ring to it?
We're sure our neighbors to the north feel oh, so secure.
Finally, returning to the home front, we'd like to mention that the DHS is hard at work trying to track down foreigners who remain in the country even after being ordered to leave. A DHS I.G.'s report from March states that there are 52 separate teams on the case.
Honestly, we have no doubt that these are diligent, hard-working officials who are doing their best. But it's going to be a struggle. The bad news is that the agency still has a staggering backlog of about 620,000 fugitive aliens.
It's best if they're not all caught at once because, as the I.G.'s report readily admits, there would be insufficient jail space to house them.
Just thinking
I'm thinking that I am really glad to be in my house. It's very comfortable. I feel as comfortable in it as I did in my apartment in Midtown, but the fear and the anxiety isn't there. Neither is the nightly carousing in the parking garage, and the weekend-only thump-ing from the club on the corner.
I'm thinking that I want to create a bunch of money and remodel the house in the manner I've envisioned.
I'm thinking I need to hop back on the pony that is Fabulair.
I'm thinking that I need to get off my ass and outline my novel, and get a bunch of stuff sold on eBay.
I'm thinking that I want to paint my bedroom this weekend.
It's franchise tax day - I've done the only return that needs be mailed off.
Jerry Falwell is dead. It is next to impossible for my heart not to lift from that news.
I'm thinking about this "Jay Leno" post. I'm wondering how many of the enthusiasts who re-posted it really READ it. "protected us from terrorism?" You're kidding, me, right? I don't think I have enough time today to write about that one.
How about "cut taxes and ended the recession?" How about that NO ONE but pundits and ideologues credit Bush's tax cuts with anything but providing more money for the wealthy to put in their offshore bank accounts?
No Child Left Behind, the largest fully unfunded mandate in the history of legislation?
Hurricane Katrina - black people losing their lives and livelihoods - days before a Bush photo op - four. White kids being shot at Va Tech - days before a Bush appearance and emotional performance - less than one.
The largest budget deficits in history?
Calling the US Government obligations to the Social Security Trust fund "IOUs" with a dismissive wave, and then trying to privatize Social Security in a manner that has proven disasterous for every other country that's tried a similar scheme?
Setting up Medicare so that they had to buy drugs at catalog prices and making it illegal to negotiate pricing? Then, claiming that Medicare's broken and should be shut down?
Lying to the US, to the Military, and to the world community about Iraq and their threat to the US?
Utter destruction of the military?
Stripping the National Guard away from the states, making most states incapable of response to a national disaster or civil disturbance (like Hurricane Katrina?)
Refusing over $600,000,000 in foreign aid offered without conditions to the victims of Hurricane Katrina?
Let's just stay away, for the moment, with the rampant politicization of the government, violations of campaign laws, unleashing bank regulations to allow for the sub-prime lending boondoggle that may end up melting down the housing market, the hundreds of billions of dollars shoveled into the pockets of Halliburton on no-bid contracts?
I'm thinking that I want to create a bunch of money and remodel the house in the manner I've envisioned.
I'm thinking I need to hop back on the pony that is Fabulair.
I'm thinking that I need to get off my ass and outline my novel, and get a bunch of stuff sold on eBay.
I'm thinking that I want to paint my bedroom this weekend.
It's franchise tax day - I've done the only return that needs be mailed off.
Jerry Falwell is dead. It is next to impossible for my heart not to lift from that news.
I'm thinking about this "Jay Leno" post. I'm wondering how many of the enthusiasts who re-posted it really READ it. "protected us from terrorism?" You're kidding, me, right? I don't think I have enough time today to write about that one.
How about "cut taxes and ended the recession?" How about that NO ONE but pundits and ideologues credit Bush's tax cuts with anything but providing more money for the wealthy to put in their offshore bank accounts?
No Child Left Behind, the largest fully unfunded mandate in the history of legislation?
Hurricane Katrina - black people losing their lives and livelihoods - days before a Bush photo op - four. White kids being shot at Va Tech - days before a Bush appearance and emotional performance - less than one.
The largest budget deficits in history?
Calling the US Government obligations to the Social Security Trust fund "IOUs" with a dismissive wave, and then trying to privatize Social Security in a manner that has proven disasterous for every other country that's tried a similar scheme?
Setting up Medicare so that they had to buy drugs at catalog prices and making it illegal to negotiate pricing? Then, claiming that Medicare's broken and should be shut down?
Lying to the US, to the Military, and to the world community about Iraq and their threat to the US?
Utter destruction of the military?
Stripping the National Guard away from the states, making most states incapable of response to a national disaster or civil disturbance (like Hurricane Katrina?)
Refusing over $600,000,000 in foreign aid offered without conditions to the victims of Hurricane Katrina?
Let's just stay away, for the moment, with the rampant politicization of the government, violations of campaign laws, unleashing bank regulations to allow for the sub-prime lending boondoggle that may end up melting down the housing market, the hundreds of billions of dollars shoveled into the pockets of Halliburton on no-bid contracts?
Monday, May 14, 2007
The sort of sentiment expressed in the rant falsely attributed to Jay Leno seems to me to be saying, fundamentally "sit down, shut up and ride."
One of the things that USAmerica USED to be about was that people could speak up when they saw something that was unfair, that wasn't working, and they could engage the process to cause change. If that change didn't turn out to be good, we could change it again.
Now, the overwhelming sentiment (primarily coming from people who are of fairer skin) is that people shouldn't EVER complain or object, and if one does, one is somehow anti-American.
American, in the position of such sentiment, means white, Christian (which, if you actually read the bible, isn't very much in keeping with what Jesus actually preached, but is more a justification from different parts of the bible for bigotry and racism) and Republican.
Just yesterday, I was wearing my t-shirt that spoofs President Bush and Dick Cheney, and my neighbor finally figured it out. Her demeanor immediately changed, and she walked away from our conversation, her words trailing off as she lost interest in me as a person.
If I'm not a Republican, then I'm not worth talking to.
Either we stand for the principles of the Constitution, as enumerated in the Bill of Rights, or we are just in favor of the corporations making as much money as possible while we numb ourselves with intoxicants and media.
So, which is it? Do we have a free press, a right to assemble, a right to free speech, a right to not have religious beliefs forced down our throats, or is the only piece of the bill of rights with validity the one that says that the population shall have the right to bear arms?
The media, when I was a younger person, tended to present views slanted toward a more "liberal" opinion; actually, they tended to show things on the exploratory side of the middle, which passes for "liberal." There are really no liberals anymore, except for a few people that are now so far from the mainstream (which has moved hard right) that they appear to be whackjobs.
"Liberal" would look like Denmark - cradle to grave health care, full government management/paid disability, free education, and a 60% functional tax rate.
"Liberal" now here in the USAmerica looks like believing in Habeas Corpus and separation of church and state. "Liberal" is in belief in the Bill of Rights, Medicaid and Social Security.
After the Watergate scandals, a group of very wealthy conservatives began to aggressively buy up media properties. ABC, CBS, NBC, the Tribune organication, Knight-Ridder, CNN all became wholly owned subsidiaries of multi-national corporations.
Part of the changes wrought by this buy-up was that news organizations had to become profitable. Prior to that, news organizations ran at a loss or at cost, based on a philosophy that news' responsibility to the public was a higher duty than was profitability. This resulted in a massive RIF of investigative journalists. For instance, the billionaire buyer of the Tribune properties recently said something to the effect of that the USAmerica only needed three investigative newspapers in the country, and the WaPost and the NYTimes were two. In connection with a MASSIVE layoff of reporters and staff at the Tribune's properties.
The other major part of the change was that the new corporate owners began to insert their own management, and began to drive news content away from progressive, moderate or even middle of the road viewpoints.
News, like most everything else in USAmerica, began to be far less locally unique and far more processed for a national, 7th grade sensationalist audience.
Have you ever noticed that the kidnapped children and raped women who are featured on the news are ALWAYS blond?
Have you noticed that CNN turns into "COPS" when there's a police chase on?
The news media is to blame in the sense that people now have no reliable information source of what's really happening with their tax dollars, and who's doing what. They do know, though, that Julio and Maria had another knock down, drag-out drunken fight, and that Julio's been deported and Maria had the shit kicked out of her before the SWAT team showed up.
I stopped watching local news more than 15 years ago when they led with a murder that they had to go to a Mississippi trailer park to get. Who cares?
I stopped reading the local paper when it was clear that they were shills for one side of the political spectrum - and not a liberal side, young man, so don't start making assumptions.
Most people's opinions of the world are formed thoroughly by their parents' views, and they do very little analytical review except to try to gather evidence that what they think is correct.
Even during the Watergate era, Republicans were people who believe in fiscal conservatism, and they respected "liberal" points of view, complained quietly that the news media didn't focus enough on the other sides of the issue and were open to voting for the best candidate.
Now, people who identify themselves as Republican believe that people who have any opposing view should leave the country.
Even during the McCarthy era when people were terrified to speak out, and the media ran fear mongering stories of Communists in the school boards, people were open to reasonable debate. At least, I think so.
One of the things that USAmerica USED to be about was that people could speak up when they saw something that was unfair, that wasn't working, and they could engage the process to cause change. If that change didn't turn out to be good, we could change it again.
Now, the overwhelming sentiment (primarily coming from people who are of fairer skin) is that people shouldn't EVER complain or object, and if one does, one is somehow anti-American.
American, in the position of such sentiment, means white, Christian (which, if you actually read the bible, isn't very much in keeping with what Jesus actually preached, but is more a justification from different parts of the bible for bigotry and racism) and Republican.
Just yesterday, I was wearing my t-shirt that spoofs President Bush and Dick Cheney, and my neighbor finally figured it out. Her demeanor immediately changed, and she walked away from our conversation, her words trailing off as she lost interest in me as a person.
If I'm not a Republican, then I'm not worth talking to.
Either we stand for the principles of the Constitution, as enumerated in the Bill of Rights, or we are just in favor of the corporations making as much money as possible while we numb ourselves with intoxicants and media.
So, which is it? Do we have a free press, a right to assemble, a right to free speech, a right to not have religious beliefs forced down our throats, or is the only piece of the bill of rights with validity the one that says that the population shall have the right to bear arms?
The media, when I was a younger person, tended to present views slanted toward a more "liberal" opinion; actually, they tended to show things on the exploratory side of the middle, which passes for "liberal." There are really no liberals anymore, except for a few people that are now so far from the mainstream (which has moved hard right) that they appear to be whackjobs.
"Liberal" would look like Denmark - cradle to grave health care, full government management/paid disability, free education, and a 60% functional tax rate.
"Liberal" now here in the USAmerica looks like believing in Habeas Corpus and separation of church and state. "Liberal" is in belief in the Bill of Rights, Medicaid and Social Security.
After the Watergate scandals, a group of very wealthy conservatives began to aggressively buy up media properties. ABC, CBS, NBC, the Tribune organication, Knight-Ridder, CNN all became wholly owned subsidiaries of multi-national corporations.
Part of the changes wrought by this buy-up was that news organizations had to become profitable. Prior to that, news organizations ran at a loss or at cost, based on a philosophy that news' responsibility to the public was a higher duty than was profitability. This resulted in a massive RIF of investigative journalists. For instance, the billionaire buyer of the Tribune properties recently said something to the effect of that the USAmerica only needed three investigative newspapers in the country, and the WaPost and the NYTimes were two. In connection with a MASSIVE layoff of reporters and staff at the Tribune's properties.
The other major part of the change was that the new corporate owners began to insert their own management, and began to drive news content away from progressive, moderate or even middle of the road viewpoints.
News, like most everything else in USAmerica, began to be far less locally unique and far more processed for a national, 7th grade sensationalist audience.
Have you ever noticed that the kidnapped children and raped women who are featured on the news are ALWAYS blond?
Have you noticed that CNN turns into "COPS" when there's a police chase on?
The news media is to blame in the sense that people now have no reliable information source of what's really happening with their tax dollars, and who's doing what. They do know, though, that Julio and Maria had another knock down, drag-out drunken fight, and that Julio's been deported and Maria had the shit kicked out of her before the SWAT team showed up.
I stopped watching local news more than 15 years ago when they led with a murder that they had to go to a Mississippi trailer park to get. Who cares?
I stopped reading the local paper when it was clear that they were shills for one side of the political spectrum - and not a liberal side, young man, so don't start making assumptions.
Most people's opinions of the world are formed thoroughly by their parents' views, and they do very little analytical review except to try to gather evidence that what they think is correct.
Even during the Watergate era, Republicans were people who believe in fiscal conservatism, and they respected "liberal" points of view, complained quietly that the news media didn't focus enough on the other sides of the issue and were open to voting for the best candidate.
Now, people who identify themselves as Republican believe that people who have any opposing view should leave the country.
Even during the McCarthy era when people were terrified to speak out, and the media ran fear mongering stories of Communists in the school boards, people were open to reasonable debate. At least, I think so.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
It's about time to hop into the shower and head down to church, but I got the recharged batteries in the camera, and have some pictures to show my progress over the last day and a half at home.
This is what the downstairs closet looked like before I moved in:
Then, I junked it all up, which was annoying me. The stuff I wanted to get at was at the bottom, and the stuff I didn't need to get at was unorganized, and it all looked very heterosexual garage, if you follow my meaning. So, here's what it looks like now:
Speaking of heterosexual garages, this is what a homo-garage looks like:
I asserted that I had waxed the car, here she is - the light's not the best, so I'll take some more pictures later:
Yesterday, when I was hanging pictures, I put up my great-grandfather's framed "Lord's Prayer" in the dining room on the ONLY open spot on the wall. It's from the 1890s, and I noticed this morning how great it looks there -
The lithograph is very detailed, and it's been beaten up over the last 110 years, but it's very cool:
I was looking into the dining room from the kitchen, which was what drew me into said dining room whence I noticed how good said lithgraph looked from the corner of my eye -- the morning sun streaming in the windows in front was awesome:
It looks even cooler around 6:30 to 7:00 in the morning.
So, this afternoon, gardening. Yuck. I am going to take the overgrown patch o'dead pansies and make it look - barren. At least it will be better than overgrown with weeds. And, pictures from upstairs where I've hung all the family frames, and if I'm a really good boy, a bunch of eBay listings.
This is what the downstairs closet looked like before I moved in:
Then, I junked it all up, which was annoying me. The stuff I wanted to get at was at the bottom, and the stuff I didn't need to get at was unorganized, and it all looked very heterosexual garage, if you follow my meaning. So, here's what it looks like now:
Speaking of heterosexual garages, this is what a homo-garage looks like:
I asserted that I had waxed the car, here she is - the light's not the best, so I'll take some more pictures later:
Yesterday, when I was hanging pictures, I put up my great-grandfather's framed "Lord's Prayer" in the dining room on the ONLY open spot on the wall. It's from the 1890s, and I noticed this morning how great it looks there -
The lithograph is very detailed, and it's been beaten up over the last 110 years, but it's very cool:
I was looking into the dining room from the kitchen, which was what drew me into said dining room whence I noticed how good said lithgraph looked from the corner of my eye -- the morning sun streaming in the windows in front was awesome:
It looks even cooler around 6:30 to 7:00 in the morning.
So, this afternoon, gardening. Yuck. I am going to take the overgrown patch o'dead pansies and make it look - barren. At least it will be better than overgrown with weeds. And, pictures from upstairs where I've hung all the family frames, and if I'm a really good boy, a bunch of eBay listings.
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