People LOVE war. It's the ultimate football game.

Ramsey Clark's latest message:

The case for impeachment is clear beyond question.

The list of Bush's crimes is long. The “Shock and Awe” invasion was Bush’s war of aggression -- a crime identified as the “the Supreme international crime” by the Nuremberg Tribunal. Remember Falluja, the American Guernica, a virtual destruction of a defenseless city by superior military technology (36,000 homes, 8,400 shops destroyed in the final assault alone); Abu Ghraib, the shameful celebration of sick forms of sexual torture; Haifa Street, Baghdad, where a U.S. helicopter gun ship killed 13 unarmed people and injured 50 dancing around a burned out Bradley Armored Vehicle; Abu Shifa, a small village, where U.S. soldiers were accused of rounding up civilians, forcing them into a room, then opening fire, killing 11 people, including a 75 year-old, a 6 month-old baby, and five children under the age five; Haditha, where Marines murdered 15 defenseless civilians, and injured many more, most women and children; and tiny Guantanamo, where the U.S. has compiled human rights violations in four years that have been denounced by the entire world including the United Nations. Yet President Bush arrogantly refuses to close the Guantanamo prison, or return the land and sovereignty to Cuba while U.S. officials fret over three prisoners who committed suicide in one day to “embarrass the U.S.”

The grand total of civilian deaths in Iraq is probably more than 250,000, and rapidly growing. (The Lancet Medical Journal) U.S. military deaths exceed 2500, the seriously injured number more than 15,000 and the number who will suffer mental and physical impairment from the occupation of Iraq is in the unknown tens of thousands.

What respect for human dignity! What reverence for life! What better way to make enemies?

The necessity for citizen action to secure impeachment is also clear beyond question. The Congress will not act unless We, the People demand it and vote those out of office who fail to respond.

Our government is geared for war as directed by transnational corporations, domestic industries, and the corporate media.

Both branches of our One Party system, Democrat and Republican, favor the use of force to have their way. Consider,

(1) Regime Change in Iran (1953) the Shah replacing democratically elected Mossadegh; Eisenhower (R);
(2) Regime Change in Guatemala (1954) military government for democratically elected Arbenz; Eisenhower (R);
(3) Regime Change in Congo (1961) assassination of Patrice Lumumba, Eisenhower (R)
(4) the Vietnam War (1959-1975), Eisenhower (R), Kennedy (D), Johnson (D), Nixon (R);
(5) Invasion of Dominican Republic (1965), Johnson (D);
(6) Contra Warfare against Nicaragua (1981-1988), resulting in regime change from the Sandinistas to corrupt capitalists; Reagan (R);
(7) Attack and occupation of Grenada (population 110,000)(1983-1987) Reagan (R);
(8) Aerial attack on the sleeping cities of Tripoli and Benghazi, Libya, (1986) Reagan (R);
(9) Invasion of Panama Regime Change (1989-1990), George H. W. Bush (R);
(10) Gulf War (1991), George H. W. Bush (R);
(11) "Humanitarian" occupation of Somalia leading to 10,000 Somali deaths (1992-1993) George H. W. Bush (R) and Bill Clinton (D);
(12) Aerial attacks on Iraq (1993-2001) Bill Clinton (D);
(13) War against Yugoslavia (1999) 23,000 bombs and missiles dropped on Yugoslavia, Bill Clinton (D)
(14) Missile Attack (21 Tomahawk Cruise Missiles) destroying the Al Shifa Pharmaceutical Plant in Khartoum which provided the majority of all medicines for Sudan (1998) Bill Clinton (D);
(15) Invasion and Occupation of Afghanistan, Regime Change (2001-present) George W. Bush (R);
(16) War of Aggression against Iraq and Hostile Occupation (2003)-present) George W. Bush (R);
(17) Regime Change in Haiti (2004) Democratically elected Aristide for three years of chaos and systematic killing, George W. Bush (R).
There have been major aggressions every several years.

Remember that every Congress in the past half century has approved excessive military budgets and the last three have approved increases that have made the U.S. military budget larger than those of all other nations combined.

The U.S. will remain a military threat to the world until it vastly reduces its military expenditures. The single highest priority for peace is cutting the U.S. military budget. The United States government may have been able to outspend the Soviet Union into economic collapse in the Cold War arms race, injuring the entire planet in the process. Now Bush has entered a new arms race and is provoking a Second Cold War with China. Yet what can China do, as the U.S. builds a first-strike oriented missile shield and uses Japan and a huge advanced military base at Pyongtaek on Korea's west coast, not 500 miles from Beijing?

The U.S. at this time is capable of striking any place on earth with a nuclear armed missile within one hour of the order to fire, launched from a Trident II, or other nuclear weapons system. We are at this time spending billions on a new generation of nuclear weapons that can be used tactically, against four blocks of Falluja, or an alleged Al Queda camp in Pakistan. At the same time, we threaten Iran and others for seeking to develop nuclear energy with the claim that they may build a crude bomb. Yet the only defense a nation today has to U.S. militarism is the threat of nuclear retaliation. The U.S. is seeking total dismantlement and prohibition of all weapons of mass destruction everywhere else, because it possesses the vast majority of all WMD’s and far superior delivery systems.

George Bush loved being a War President while he was winning - winning over the bodies of impoverished and defenseless people, that is. Someone told him only war presidents can be great presidents. He will love war again if his polls go up.

President Bush would rather make enemies by the use of force to have his way, than seek agreement with friends by helping others and recognizing their rights and interests. He prefers to go it alone, and then entice or coerce whatever help he can get from others, whether it is for Iraq, global warming, the prohibition of land mines, or the use of minors in war, addressing hunger, poverty, AIDS, natural disaster relief, or most United Nations activities, and absolutely, the International Criminal Court which might indict him. He is spared defeat at the polls because he cannot seek re-election.

He can be held accountable only by impeachment. The American people must not acquiesce to his crimes.

Consider that all the major candidates, Democrat and Republican -- Clinton, Edwards, Kerry, McCain, Frist -- voted for the war and/or favor the Iraq Occupation.

To stop U.S. militarism, the U.S. must vastly reduce its military expenditures, 50% in five years and further down from there on. It must use those savings to combat poverty, hunger, sickness and unemployment at home and abroad.

The U.S. must seek friends by word and deed, rather than make enemies. The harm George Bush has done to the way the rest of the world sees our country will take a generation to overcome, after we change our warlike ways.

But the only way to convince the world that We the People do not approve of the conduct of George W. Bush is to impeach him. Otherwise we can only be seen as approving of his acts, or as powerless to prevent them.

And the only way we can deter the next, and future Presidents, from seeking war rather than peace is to impeach George W. Bush and his key advisors now. Only then will political leadership know the American people will not accept more war.

Last week ImpeachBush.org placed an ad calling for the impeachment of George W. Bush on the second page of the internationally read newspaper, USA Today. The impeachment movement has placed similar ads in the Boston Globe, the New York Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle. The time to impeach is now.

Ramsey Clark
June 15, 2006

The Red, Whitenoise and Blue

It's—
That—
Time of year for the GOP's noise!
Every speech you hear seems to say
"We're the good guys! Every lib-er-al's from He-e-e-ell!
We'll protect your land,
Values, marriage and
Fool you while we treat
Big oi-l we-e-e-ell."



"Election year stunt or legislative rescue for society troubled by the breakdown of traditional families"?? Do they even need to ask? Maybe it would be better to call it an aggressive move on the political chessboard. It worked last time, why not use it again?
 

How would Jesus vote?

A recent email from the Human Rights Campaign:

WASHINGTON – Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese made the following statement as the Federal Marriage Amendment (S.J. Res. 1) was marked up today by the Senate Judiciary Committee:

"This shameful election-year ploy puts the Senate one step closer to a vote that threatens to write discrimination into the U.S. Constitution. Today's vote served only to divide Americans, not help us with our collective challenges. As this amendment nears a vote on the Senate floor, it's critical that fair-minded Americans speak up and speak out against discrimination in the Constitution."

With less than 24 hours notice, the Senate Judiciary Committee moved the mark up from a public hearing room to a restricted-access room in the Capitol. The President's Room is not open to the public and does not even have enough chairs for every Senator on the committee to sit.

Solmonese continued, "Using the Constitutional amendment process as a political tool is bad enough, but doing it behind closed doors is appalling. The U.S. Senate shouldn't be playing fast and loose with our most fundamental freedoms."

In 2004, the Senate and House both fell far short of the two-thirds vote necessary to send the amendment to the states for ratification. In the Senate, the vote against cloture was 50 to 48, with six Republicans voting no. The Republicans who opposed cloture were Senators Campbell, Chafee, Collins, McCain, Snowe and Sununu. In the House, the vote was 227 to 186.

Many prominent Republicans and conservatives expressed opposition to the amendment in 2004, including Vice President Cheney, Arlen Specter, Rudy Guiliani, Chuck Hagel, David Dreier, George Pataki, Bob Barr, Alan Simpson, George Will and David Brooks. This year, those numbers increased to former Senator Danforth who called the amendment, "silly" and "contrary to basic Republican principles." First Lady Laura Bush was recently quoted as saying, "I don’t think it should be used as a campaign tool, obviously." Sen. John McCain has repeatedly reaffirmed his opposition to the amendment. And today George Will again restated his opposition by lauding Sen. John Sununu's vote against the amendment was a vote against the "federal usurpation of the traditional state responsibility for marriage law" and that it "affirmed the value of cultural federalism."

Mushroom clouds over Iran

When I opened up the latest email from MoveOn.org and read "Not only do the officials say war is really on the table, they report that the Bush administration is making plans to use nuclear weapons"—when I read that, my hair stood straight up. I thought Okay, okay, wait a second, this might not be true. Eli Pariser and the crew at MoveOn may have gone off the deep end with the power thing. MoveOn apparently has 3 million members now and maybe the leaders have gotten drunk on their ability to mobilize that many people with just email. At this point in time, after everything that's gone before, Dubya and friends are stupid enough to even think of planting mushroom clouds in Iran??

Who knows? Anything's possible. Maybe it's just a red herring created by Karl Rove. Maybe it's just a late April fool's joke. I'm hoping for a better-case scenario than finding out it's true.

This is part of MoveOn's email:

The big question on all of our minds, of course, is whether the president really is willing to wage nuclear war with Iran. After the disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq, would he really attack the much larger, much stronger, much better armed country next door with nukes?

As he did before Iraq, President Bush claims he's just pursuing a diplomatic route—but he still refuses to take nukes off the table. In the New Yorker piece, Seymour Hersh—who broke the Abu Ghraib story—quotes numerous administration and Pentagon officials who make very clear that war plans involving nukes are in the works.

Even a conventional attack would likely be a disaster. But just the threat of a nuclear attack could close off our best diplomatic options. Ironically, it would also increase pressure within Iran to create a full-fledged nuclear program—strengthening Iran's hard-liners. With most experts estimating Iran is 5 years or more away from having a nuclear weapon, there's time for a diplomatic solution.

And the consequences of an actual attack would be horrifying. The civilian deaths from a nuclear assault could be in the thousands or hundreds of thousands. According to a front-page article in the Washington Post, CIA experts believe Iran would almost certainly counter-attack through its terrorist network, Hezbollah. With 150,000 American troops right next door in Iraq, Iran would have what security experts call a "target rich" environment. Even Jack Straw, the British Foreign Sectrary, said that the nuclear option was "completely nuts."

Is there anything that would preclude a sitting president and his cabinet from being given psychological testing? I would really like to know if these people are nuts or not. Wouldn't you?

Green enough

On its St. Patrick's Day page, Yahoo describes the holiday as "Originally a day to honor the patron saint of Ireland, March 17 has become a worldwide celebration of all things Irish."

Okay, so what day do we celebrate all things Costa Rican? Or Turkish? Or Rwandan? I don't have any problem with the Irish celebrating the birthday of their patron saint, but I'm baffled by the pervasiveness of St. Patrick's Day. If you toured elementary-school classrooms today anywhere in the U.S., would you find many that weren't decorated with shamrocks and leprechauns? All greeting-card shops have been shimmering for weeks with the vernal glow of green foil. I did't notice—was Oprah wearing a shamrock brooch today?

It makes sense to me that St. Patrick's Day parades became part of the American landscape after the discrimination Irish immigrants experienced in the mid-nineteenth century (although Wikipedia argues that the prevalence of NINA signs—"no Irish need apply"—at that time is mostly an urban legend). The parades functioned as Irish Pride parades, like Gay Pride parades function now, to establish solidarity and improve the self-image of an underpriveleged minority. But I think the Irish are doing okay now in the U.S. Are parades still needed?

I have to assume that the branding of St. Patrick's Day has been so successful in the U.S. because beer is involved. Similarly, the branding of Christmas has been so successful because of the gift-giving custom and its impact on the economy. The branding of Valentine's Day has been so successful because chocolate is involved. The Wikipedia article on St. Valentine, however, was an eye-opener for me. Valentine's Day was removed from the Catholic calendar in 1969?? Nobody told me! I'm amazed that we still celebrate it. The story of Valentine, or Valentinus, was dismissed as almost entirely legend nearly four decades ago. But you'd never know that from the Valentine's Day displays in the stores.

Of course we could blame retailers for creating hype to increase sales. But that doesn't explain everything. If retailers in Santa Monica all got together and started hyping St. Monica's Day on August 27 because August needs a holiday, would the tradition catch on and spread throughout the Western world? Probably not. Why don't we celebrate St. Agnes' Eve on January 20? She's the patron saint of chastity, gardeners, girls, engaged couples, rape victims and virgins, and "folk custom called for [young girls] to practice rituals on Saint Agnes' Eve (20th-21st January) with a view to discovering their future husbands." Retailers could come up with a decorating theme involving lambs and wool scarves and mace sprayers and diamond rings, and Keats' "The Eve of St. Agnes" could be set to music, if it hasn't been already, and played in stores the week leading up to the holiday. Would it become a mainstream holiday? Probably not. A holiday has to resonate with people in order for them to respond to retailers' hype. For some reason, Sts. Valentine's and Patrick's Days do and Sts. Monica's and Agnes' Days don't.

It seems innocent enough to decorate with shamrocks and leprechauns, doesn't it? It's cute, the kids like it, where's the harm in a green milkshake? The green thing celebrates the welcome approach of spring. A lot of us like Celtic music, at least in small doses. Okay, but is there equal time dedicated to celebrating Costa Rican, Turkish and Rwandan cultures? And is it okay that there isn't? In a multicultural environment, all religious holidays should be observed equally. And that, of course, would result in an overabundance of holidays and the need to change decorations every three or four days. Why not let now-useless religious holidays like St. Patrick's Day just fade into cultural history? Do we have a reason to continue celebrating them other than "[Shrug] It's what we've always done"? Is that a good enough reason to do anything?

Just say no to green beer.

A little catastrophe music

A recent email from MoveOn.org mentions that Bush "campaigned, attended birthday parties and played guitar" while Hurricane Katrina bashed New Orleans, and I couldn't help but notice the parallel between Nero plucking the lyre while Rome burned and Dubya pickin' n' grinnin' while New Orleans sank. The differences are instructive regarding executive protocol: during a firestorm, play the lyre; during a hurricane, play the guitar.

The video revealing that Bush was briefed about possible levee breaches has been dismissed by Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke as "nothing new or insightful." He said that "most transcripts of discussions had already been made available to congressional investigators examining the response to Katrina." Dzzzzzzzzzz. Now, did a little warning buzzer go off when you read that? The investigators learned from the transcripts that Bush had been briefed, and they weren't concerned that, four days after Katrina made landfall, Bush said "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees"? Did the investigators actually read the transcripts? Or were they anticipating that the public would never find out how much the President knew? Surely the investigators would know how the public would react if we learned about the briefings. Move over, Downing Street Memo. Now there's the Crawford Briefing.

I expect that conservative bloggers' reactions to the video are uniformly "This is old news." Okay, you're right. The investigators learned nothing new from the video. But how did news like this get old? They thought it wasn't important enough to report? Based on what criteria?

I've actually reached the point where I'm no longer appalled by the amount of fibbing by the Bush administration. I've started feeling bad and embarrassed for them. They so are the Not Ready For Prime Time Players. Even Condy Rice, a smart, smart lady, doesn't seem to know when it's not a good time to fib. Maybe if the Bush administration could start fresh all over again in 2001, with all of the knowledge they've gained since then, we would have an administration making much wiser decisions.

Does your oven have a Sabbath mode?

This undated press release from GE describes an option which became available on April 1, 2001:

GE Introduces New Sabbath Mode Feature on Cooking Products to Meet the Needs of Observant Jewish Consumers

..."Although the Sabbath and holiday laws, especially as they relate to the cooking and heating of foods, are rather complex, the engineers at GE are to be congratulated on their ability to have appreciated and comprehended the intricacies of Halacha (Jewish law) as they developed a Sabbath mode that will enhance the Sabbath and holidays of observant Jewish families," noted Dr. Avrom Pollak, president of the Star-K Kosher Certification. "This new feature is truly kosher consumer friendly and we at the Star-K are confident that the observant Jewish community is going to show significant interest in GE cooking appliances," he continued.

Most modern ranges are equipped with an integrated twelve-hour shut-off safety device. This feature shuts down the oven's power after the oven has been operating consecutively for twelve hours. The GE cooking products with Sabbath Mode will override the twelve-hour shut-off. The oven will not shut off automatically making it possible to keep cooked foods warm on the Sabbath or use the range over religious holidays for cooking and warming food.

In addition to overriding the shut off, the Sabbath Mode feature will meet the observant Jewish consumer's restrictions for observing the Sabbath and other holidays by:

Eliminating tones or timer beeps.

Not displaying icons.

Permitting temperature adjustments on holidays without displays or beeps.

A more truthful name would be "stealth mode," wouldn't it?

Okay, now explain this to me: How is changing cooking temperatures but avoiding the appearance of changing cooking temperatures keeping the Sabbath holy?

Anybody? ...Nobody can explain this to me?

What you're doing is lying about whether you are cooking on the Sabbath or not. Why is lying okay on the Sabbath but cooking is not?

Anybody? Help me out. I'm at a loss here.

Okay, so I'll resort to Wikipedia:

In Jewish philosophy it is recognized that many of the 613 mitzvot cannot be explained rationally. They are categorized as chukim, comprising such laws as the Red Heifer (Numbers 19). There are three basic points of view regarding these laws:

One view holds that these laws do have a reason, but it is not understood because the ultimate explanation for mitzvot is beyond the human intellect.

A second view holds that most of the laws have some historical and/or dietary significance (such as preventing the consumption of unhealthy food, or differentiating oneself from non-Jews through dietary restrictions); and

A third view holds that these laws have no meaning other than to instill obedience.

Probably the second sentence of the next section of the Wikipedia article is the key: "Indeed, the Hebrew word for 'holiness' is etymologically related to the Hebrew word for 'distinction' or 'separation.'" Wait a minute. Holiness is equated with separation? As it turns out, all of the irrationality of the mitzvot is acceptable because it creates a separate-and-thus-better status for those who follow it. An irrational basis for superior social status? Is that a good idea? I mean, in 2006?

In a sense, I can understand the hatred of the Arabs for the Jews. I don't understand the degree of the hatred, but I can understand its origin--a nation which shares ethnic origins with the Palestinians and Syrians (genetic links have been found on the Y chromosome) assuming an inherent superiority for thousands of years without any factual basis, more or less playing the part of Mrs. Oleson in Little House on the Prairie. That would get a little old after a couple of centuries. Of course I could balance this argument with a discussion of the equal irrationality of Islamic law, but that would probably result in the torching of Google headquarters, the parent company of Blogger, which hosts this blog.

Why should I care? What business is it of mine if six million Jewish Americans may want to own an oven with a Sabbath mode?

9/11 comes to mind. The continuing insurgency in Iraq comes to mind. Whenever an insurgent shoots at an American soldier, he's actually trying to shoot at Israel. My neice's husband safely returned from a tour of duty in Iraq. Why should it matter to me that my neice's three kids, at least for the time being, won't have to grow up without a dad?

"My oven is the cause of 9/11 and the war in Iraq?? You're a shvents, shmendrik, shmegege, schmuck!!," Linda Richman might sputter on Saturday Night Live. No, of course the oven isn't to blame. The clinging to the irrational belief system is to blame. The refusal to let go of the elevated status the irrational belief system provides is to blame. The willingness to lie to maintain the appearance of following the irrational belief system is to blame. Self-centeredness, on an international scale, is to blame.

The same can be said of Muslims. And Catholics. And Protestants. Clinging to any belief system that on occasion requires an explanation like "My ways are higher than your ways" is stupid.

In the centuries before giant military transport ships and satellite communications and Stealth bombers, friction between conflicting irrational belief systems occurred less often and the collateral damage was much more confined. Now that Earth is wired like one large city, being stupid has a much greater impact.

I let go of mine. Let go of yours.

Thoughts on Super Bowl Sunday

Iran, gay-bar shooting, Muhammad-cartoons backlash, suicide bombers, Gaza, surveillance, the Super Bowl, FEMA, Alito, intelligent design, millionaire Christians, SUVs, cell phones...

Bennett and Beck?

My email to CNN:

Bill Bennett and Glenn Beck?

We won't be watching CNN anymore.

Thanks for the memories!

It's the end of an era. I'm feeling nostalgic.

Impeachment

Congressman Schiff,

It's admirable that the left has shown restraint regarding impeachment. That has been laudable. If liberal Congressmen had bulldozed forward with impeachment proceedings earlier, it would have appeared simply as a revenge tactic. Now that we all have spent time carefully considering the accusations and their legal implications, it will be clear to everyone why impeachment is moving forward.

The issues are substantial. Among them:

1. The Bush administration lied to the people and Congress about the justifications for going to war in Iraq.

2. It has now been revealed that Bush, like Nixon three decades ago, has carried out an illegal wiretapping program against the people of this country.

These are serious offenses which constitute high crimes and misdemeanors. I urge you to support impeachment.

It's probably not too much of a stretch to imagine that, because my blog is listed in the Big Brass Alliance, my phone has been tapped and my emails intercepted. Of course, the surveillance people quickly lost interest when they observed so little activity, but it does bring the issues closer to home to realize that even my privacy may have been invaded.

I'm curious whether criminal investigations will be undertaken once Bush is no longer a sitting president. If not, I will wonder why not. Won't you?

Sometimes it's the simple things that are the most eloquent and moving

AP photo

The headline on Yahoo, "Sign tallying military deaths upsets Army," caught my eye and I clicked on the link to find the image above showing Scott Cameron of Duluth, Minnesota, sitting beside his simple, poignant sign.

That's right... That's why I got involved in political blogging in the first place. Not over whether the right team or the left team wins or loses, but because there's a human cost in fighting a war that was begun primarily to enhance the prestige of a President.

Sometimes it's just the simple things, a small sign with numbers that change daily, or a mom sitting in a folding chair near the entrance to an estate, that cut through the noise of ideological competition and remind us why we're competing in the first place.

If you really think about the intelligence of the designer...

The University of Kansas Religious Studies Department will be offering a new course next semester called "Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationism and other Religious Mythologies." (Update: The course has since been cancelled.)



And of course, the Intelligent Design Network's John Calvert, an attorney and managing director in Johnson County, Kansas, reacted to the offering of the course by saying "To equate intelligent design to mythology is really an absurdity, and it's just another example of labeling anybody who proposes (intelligent design) to be simply a religious nut. That's the reason for this little charade."

"Little charade." That reminds me of Kristinn Taylor calling Cindy Sheehan's vigil a "publicity stunt."

Since I've been thinking about intelligent design for about four and a half decades (I'm 49 now and I probably started seriously thinking about God creating the heavens and the earth when I was around 4), you can imagine I've developed a few opinions on the subject. A couple of years ago, while I was writing an episode of my yet-to-be-produced drama series, the topic of the origin of the universe came up, as it usually does whenever I write about characters who are deep thinkers. In this episode, the central character, Zeph, who is from a deeply religious Amish background and is now an agnostic, has a long, laid-back discussion with a new friend, Sadiq, an Iraqi-American who grew up in a mostly secular environment and is now exploring his Muslim heritage. This is an excerpt from the dialogue.

SADIQHave you kept any of your faith from when you were Amish?

ZEPHMostly I've been describing myself as an atheist. But to be truly scientific, I need to acknowledge the possibility of the existence of God, and so I should call myself an agnostic.

SADIQYou acknowledge the possibility of the existence of God?

ZEPHIt's a long shot, but sure, it's possible. Since we learned from Hume in philosophy 101 that nothing can be conclusively proven, we know that we can't conclusively prove the non-existence of God. Of course every fervent believer takes that as absolute proof that God exists, because his non-existence can't be proven.
      (Looks to Sadiq apologetically)
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—

SADIQIt's okay. I'm not a fervent believer.

ZEPHHave you always believed in Allah, or was that something you had to develop when you returned to Islam?

SADIQI've always believed there was something, some supernatural entity. Some self-aware, creative energy-accretion. And so it was a simple matter of applying the name Allah to that entity when I started studying Islam. Actually, the book I started with was Islam for Dummies.

ZEPHYou didn't. Heh.

SADIQThen I read a few other books. I couldn't accept every statement I read about the nature of Allah. But studying those books...felt good. I felt a profound sense of well-being. A connectedness with past generations.

Zeph nods in recognition.

ZEPHYeah. I miss that.

SADIQYou can't come to the point where you can accept the idea of just an entity, a guiding presence in the universe? Forget names. Any names we've come up with for the entity are wrong. It has its own name.

Zeph shrugs and frowns and hesitates before responding.

ZEPHI acknowledge the possibility of it.
      (Shrugs)
It's hard to explain. It's like... Picture somebody blowing smoke rings up into a dark room. Or I guess they would be smoke domes. Smoke balloons. It's a dark room, but there's enough light that we can see these smoke domes slowly expanding and dissipating. Okay, now, at the microscopic level, think of all of the particles of soot that make up that smoke. Incredibly fine, tiny particles of soot. Okay, now think of each tiny particle of soot...as a galaxy.

Sadiq processes this a moment and then chuckles.

SADIQNot just a star, a galaxy of stars in each particle of soot. "Billions and billions."

ZEPHHeh. "Come with me..." Okay, now locate the speck of soot that represents the Milky Way.

SADIQYeah, I see your point—an entity who can relate to the universe at that scale, how can it interact with us at our scale?

ZEPHIt's totally possible that an entity exists who finds the spread of galaxies no more complex than a city. Or a motherboard. And it's totally possible that an entity exists who can interact with our daily lives.

SADIQYeah—but how can those entities be the same, the scales are so vastly different. I see.

ZEPHAnd it's entirely possible that there are nested entities ranging from the local to the universal. And beyond! But then you're starting to talk about a corporate chart. A population of entities.

SADIQAnd if you don't like something about the local entity, can you go to its supervisor?

ZEPHHeh. But then again, after reading about quantum weirdness, I have to admit that my thinking about scale is limited to my three-dimensional experience.

SADIQQuantum weirdness... Schrödinger's cat. Superposed states.

ZEPHYeah. Split a beam of electrons, alter one of the beams, and the other beam is altered simultaneously, regardless of the distance between them.

SADIQYeah, I remember a lecture on this. It's as if the separated particles are actually the same particle in a different dimension.

ZEPHSo, in a six-dimensional universe, this universe might be fairly easy to manage. It's possible.

If a proponent of intelligent design wants to make bold, confident statements about its validity, he or she must be as familiar as possible with the nature of the known universe for those statements to be informed and credible. But when the human brain honestly tries to grasp the incomprehensibility of, say, the number of atoms in the known universe, or the time it takes light to travel from here to the edge of the known universe, confidence usually isn't the result.

Alito's 1971 pro-gay stance complicates things

An Associated Press article by Calvin Woodward, quoted below, reveals that, as an undergrad at Princeton, Alito chaired a student conference which drafted a report condemning sodomy laws and discrimination in hiring based on sexual orientation, along with other forms of invasion of privacy.

Of course, that was more than three decades ago.

It will be interesting to hear Alito's responses to questions about the report and whether his views have significantly changed since that time. I suspect they have or he would never have been nominated. But Joe Solmonese of the Human Rights Campaign is hopeful that Alito hasn't moved all the way away from his youthful philosophy.

Time will tell.

WASHINGTON - In college, Samuel Alito led a student conference that urged legalization of sodomy and curbs on domestic intelligence, a sweeping defense of privacy rights he said were under threat by the government and the dawning computer age.

President Bush's choice for the Supreme Court, in a report written years before ubiquitous personal computers made electronic privacy the everyday concern it is now, warned of the potential for abuses by officials and companies collecting data on individuals.

Three decades before the Supreme Court decriminalized gay sex, Alito declared on behalf of his group of fellow Princeton students that "no private sexual act between consenting adults should be forbidden." Alito also called for an end to discrimination against homosexuals in hiring.

As a federal appellate judge, Alito has built a scant record on gay-rights issues and a mixed one, at best, on privacy matters generally, in the view of civil liberties advocates who are still examining his opinions.

But they saw in the 1971 report a prescient thinker taking on issues ahead of their time, including the need for computer encryption, stronger oversight of domestic intelligence and curbs on the surveillance powers of states.

"The document itself is amazing," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "It is a dramatic statement in support of the right of privacy.

"Nonetheless," Rotenberg went on, "his decisions as an appellate judge over the last 15 years do raise some significant concerns about his willingness to apply Fourth Amendment privacy standards." Rotenberg cited an example in which Alito appeared to support the strip search of two people involved in an authorized search but not named in a warrant.

The college report was first reported in The Boston Globe.

The Human Rights Campaign, which advocates gay rights, said the report gives senators the basis to question Alito on that subject and privacy matters broadly in his confirmation hearings.

"If these are his views today - and there is no indication they are not - it's a hopeful sign that may provide some insight into his philosophy," said David Smith, the group's policy vice president. "This isn't pop-the-champagne-cork time. His views need to be explored."

Even so, Smith was struck that Alito's report would raise a subject few tackled back then, and come down so unequivocally on it. "Very few people were standing up for gay Americans 34 years ago," he said.

Harriet Miers, whose withdrawal from contention led to Alito's nomination, had gone on record in 1989 as favoring equal civil rights for gays but opposing repeal of the Texas anti-sodomy law, since overturned by the Supreme Court. Smith said that in comparison with Miers' known views on gay rights, "Alito wins and it isn't by a nose."

Alito is listed on the paper as the chairman of the conference, entitled the Boundaries of Privacy in American Society, and author of the report's seven-page summary of findings. It was done for Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Alito was a senior acting as a "commissioner" for the undergraduates in his group.

Mark Dwyer, a college roommate of Alito's, said such class projects were typically "one of those academic exercises of 'let's pretend in the real world.'"

Rotenberg said the report sounds much like one produced later by a national committee drawn together by that era's Health, Education and Welfare Department. Recommendations in that report became the basis of the landmark 1974 Privacy Act.

"A lot in this paper is surprisingly forward-looking," he said.

In it, the young Alito writes that the Census Bureau should be barred from asking unnecessarily intrusive questions, federal privacy ombudsmen should be appointed and the government should face strict conditions for keeping and distributing dossiers on citizens.

Much as privacy-savvy Web sites today promise not to disseminate personally identifiable information, Alito said the government should limit its use of information on individuals to "bulk statistics."

"The cybernetic revolution has greatly magnified the threat to privacy today," he said.

In one recommendation that was commonly debated at the time but a nonstarter today, he said all computer systems should be licensed by the federal government.

The report, two years before Roe v. Wade affirmed a constitutional right to abortion, does not address that subject. Abortion-rights supporters consider that right to be a fundamental matter of privacy.

As an appeals court judge, he held that states can require women seeking abortions to notify their spouses. The Supreme Court disagreed.

Also on the bench, Alito supported a high school student who was taunted because he was perceived as gay, and a family seeking to adopt an HIV-positive child. The adoption had been challenged on grounds that the child posed a medical threat to the family's other child.

Alito also, however, wrote the majority opinion in a 1999 decision overturning a school district's wide-ranging anti-harassment policy, ruling in favor of Christian students who wanted to preach against homosexuality.

EDITOR'S NOTE - Associated Press writer Rosa Cirianni in Princeton, N.J., contributed to this report.

My note: When seeing a current photo of Alito, I can't help but wonder if he isn't in the closet. He doesn't look fem, of course, or stereotypical. His look is much more that of a nerd. But that smile... He trips the gaydar lightly.

I have an idea! Let's not investigate each other!

Rep. Schiff,

MoveOn.org informed us today that on the House ethics committee "Republicans and Democrats have agreed not to investigate each other." Is this true? If it is, it more or less negates the need for an ethics committee.

MoveOn also says that "It takes a complaint from just one member of Congress to get the process moving." They recommend signing ethics complaints against Rep. Cunningham and Rep. Ney. Two complaint forms in PDF format have been prepared by Assistant U.S. Attorney Melanie Sloan, Executive Director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. I'm sure you've received these forms from other constituents, but if not please let me know how to forward them to you.

Background information prepared by CREW is abvailable here:
Rep. Cunningham
Rep. Ney
Thanks very much.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

MoveOn.org's email:

Dear MoveOn member,

Republican Rep. Randy Cunningham is being investigated by federal authorities for accepting bribes from a defense contractor. But he's not being investigated in Congress, where the ethics committee could force him out of his seat. That's because the House ethics committee is deadlocked—Republicans and Democrats have agreed not to investigate each other.

Last week, Democrats stood up to Republican corruption on the House floor. Republicans had initially lost a vote on a new energy bill that amounted to a huge giveaway to oil companies, but they held open the vote until they could force some representatives to change their position. They ended up winning 212-210. When Democrats realized what was happening, they started yelling "Shame!" on the House floor. You can watch the video of chaos erupting here.

Now, Democrats have an opportunity to clean house. By signing ethics complaints against a few key Republicans like Rep. Cunningham, they can break the deadlock, get the ethics committee working again, and make sure that Republican representatives are held accountable for their actions. Your representative, Rep. Schiff, could be the signature that would get this process going.

Ask him to sign an ethics complaint today at:
http://political.moveon.org/breakthestalemate/?zip=91202&institution=FH&id=6132-6402300-c7w.mzcBdawZ1Pq.SZLw1A&t=2

It takes a complaint from just one member of Congress to get the process moving.
Republican corruption is one of the key reasons why Americans will vote for Democrats in 2006. But re-starting the ethics committee is also a good in its own right—it helps ensure that all representatives, Republican and Democrat, obey the rules and steer clear of slimy deals with lobbyists.

Democrats have been understandably wary of working with a Republican controlled ethics committee. But now Tom Delay has been indicted for money laundering. Bill Frist was subpoened by the SEC for possible insider trading. Karl Rove is implicated in a criminal investigation of who outed CIA agent Valerie Plame. It's clear to everyone there's an ethics crisis in Washington at the highest levels and America would be scrutinizing every move the ethics committee makes.

It's time for Democrats to "go big" against corruption, and breaking the "ethics stalemate" is one of the best ways to do that. Until it's broken, there is little incentive for members of Congress to obey ethics rules—they know they won't get investigated. This is how people like Tom DeLay managed to stay in power for so long.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group, has prepared ethics complaints against two members of Congress—Rep. Randy Cunningham (R-CA) and Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH). In order for an investigation to begin a member of the House of Representatives must sign the ethics complaint and forward it to the ethics committee in Congress.

Ask Rep. Schiff to do that now at:
http://political.moveon.org/breakthestalemate/?zip=91202&institution=FH&id=6132-6402300-c7w.mzcBdawZ1Pq.SZLw1A&t=3

Thanks for all you do.

–Tom, Eli, Rosalyn, Nita and the MoveOn.org Political Action Team
Friday, October 14th, 2005

Just a thought, but I don't know that Americans will vote Democrat in 2006 because of Republican corruption. It's possible that most Americans are corrupt as well.