News and Politics

From metafilter.com:

This WP commentary discusses a new Harvard study says the conservative editorial pages are more intensely partisan, and far less willing to criticize a Republican administration than the liberal pages are to take on a Democratic administration.

Of course a liberal reporter did the study, but Mr Kurtz of the WP thinks his findings are well-balanced. I’m liberal, too, so I’ve got my biases, but I’ve felt this way for a while. I mean where’s the liberal equivalent of Rush Limbaugh, Andrew Sullivan, Bill O’Reilly, or Anne Coulter? People full of vindictiveness, name-calling, and outright hatred and condemnation?

From metafilter.com:

Attack Nader early and often to prevent the Greens from throwing another election into the hands of the Republicans. Michael Tomasky in the American Prospect argues that Howard Dean is the man who can best profit from this technique. Will Nader give us four more years of GW? He makes a good point that the Green Party would get more results from working within the Democratic Party than from essentially attacking it like they did in 2000.

Nader will only hurt the democrats more than he hurts Bush. If he runs again, it will guarantee Bush’s reelection.

Bush looks to ban gay marriage and implies gays are “sinners.” I’m not surprised; I guess the neo-cons got jittery when Bush refused to do their bidding and have asked for the value of their campaign contributions. [metafilter.com]

The Nation reveals the subtle manipulation behind the words of our speech mangler ‘n’ chief. [Morons Dot Org]

Original article here.

An article in the newest Adbusters magazine asks the question – is America becoming fascist? (a condensed version of this article written by Anis Shivani Oct. 2002). In it, Shivani states that “American fascism is tapping into the perennial complaint against liberalism: that it doesn’t provide an authentic sense of belonging to the majority of people. And that is a criticism difficult to dismiss out of hand. As the language of liberalism has become flat and predictable, some Americans have become more ready to accept an alternative, no matter how ridiculous, as long as it sounds vigorous and muscular.” More inside… [metafilter.com]

Here’s a Senegalese woman’s perspective on Bush’s visit to Dakar……
Dearest friends,
As you probably know, this week George Bush is visiting Africa.

Starting with Senegal, he arrived this morning at 7.20 PM and left at 1.30 PM. This visit has been such an ordeal that a petition is being circulated for this Tuesday July 8th be named Dependency Day.

Let me share with you what we have been trough since last week.

1- Arrestations: more than 1,500 persons have been arrested and put in jail between Thursday and Monday. Hopefully they will be released now that the Big Man is gone

2- The US Army’s planes flying day and nigh over Dakar. The noise they make is so loud that one hardly sleeps at night

3- About 700 security people from the US for Bush’s security in Senegal, with their dogs, and their cars. Senegalese security forces were not allowed to come near the US president

4- All trees in places where Bush will pass have been cut. Some of them have more than 100 years

5- All roads going down town (were hospitals, businesses, schools are located) were closed from Monday night to Tuesday at 3 PM. This means that we could not go to our offices or schools. Sick people were also obliged to stay at home.

6- National exams for high schools that started on Monday are post-poned until Wednesday.

Bush’s visit to the Goree Island is another story. As you may know Goree is a small Island facing Dakar where from the 15th to the 19th century, the African slaves to be shipped to America were parked in special houses called slave houses. One of these houses has become a Museum to remind humanity about this dark period and has been visited by kings, queens, presidents. Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton, and before them, Nelson Mandela, the Pope, and many other distinguished guests or ordinary tourists visited it without bothering the islanders. But for “security reasons” this time, the local population was
chased out of their houses from 5 to 12 AM. They were forced by the American security to leave their houses and leave everything open, including their wardrobes to be searched by special dogs brought from the US.

The ferry that links the island to Dakar was stopped and offices and businesses closed for the day.

According to an economist who was interviewed by a private radio, Senegal that is a very poor country has lost huge amount of money in this visit, because workers have been prevented from walking out of their homes.

In addition to us being prevented to go out, other humiliating things happened also. Not only Bush brought did not want to be with Senegalese but he did not want to use our things. He brought his own arm-chairs, and of course his own cars, and meals and drinks. He came with his own journalists and ours were forbidden inside the airport and in place he was visiting.

Our president was not allowed to make a speech. Only Bush spoke when he was in Goree. He spoke about slavery. It seems that he needs the vote of the African American to be elected in the next elections, and wanted to please them. That’s why he visited Goree.

Several protest marches against American politics have been organized yesterday and even when Bush was here, but we think he does not care.

We have the feeling that everything has been done to convince us that we are nothing, and that America can behave the way it wants, everywhere, even in our country.

Believe me friends, it is a terrible feeling. But according to a Ugandan friend of mine, I should not complain because in Uganda one of the country he is going to visit, Bush does not intend to go out of the airport. He will receive the Ugandan President in the airport lounge.

Nevertheless, I think I am lucky, because I have such wonderful
American friends. But there are now thousands of Senegalese who believe that for all Americans the world is their territory.

Love to you all
Codou

(originally posted to gambia-l@maelstrom.stjohns.edu )

From Metafilter:

GOP Warns TV Stations Not to Air Ad Alleging Bush Mislead the Nation Over Iraq They claim that the ad itself is dishonest, and cite the obligation of broadcast outlets to be free of misleading information. “Such obligations must be taken seriously. This letter puts you on notice that the information contained in the above-cited advertisement is false and misleading; therefore, you are obligated to refrain from airing this advertisement.” Despite the implicit threats, only one station has refused to run the ad, a Fox station.

From Metafilter:

Mississippi Gulag. Remember Tranquility Bay? Kids being forcibly deported to Jamaica, where they have to earn their right to speak by advancing in a perverted “level” system, with punishment ranging from laying on the floor for hours to painful “restraint” sessions? A report
by Assistant Attorney General submitted on June 19, 2003 to Mississippi Governor Ronnie Musgrove sheds light on two different “correctional” facilities, the Oakley and Columbia “Training Schools” in Mississipi. Boys and girls aged from 10 to 17 are hogtied for hours, pepper sprayed for disobedience, forced to eat their own vomit during exercises, or stripped naked and locked in a dark room for days because of suicide attempts. Between torturing sessions, they have to participate in good Christian prayers. These kids have to suffer abuse that would lead to a nationwide scandal if it happened to adults (or if sex was involved). AP has a brief summary.

Children are not property. I don’t care what the situation is, parents have no right to send their kids to someplace like this.

From Newsday via Orcinus:

No administration before George W. Bush’s ever claimed such sweeping powers for an enterprise as vaguely defined as the “war against terrorism” and the “axis of evil.” Nor has one begun to consume such an enormous amount of the nation’s resources for a mission whose end would be difficult to recognize even if achieved.

Like previous forms of totalitarianism, the Bush administration boasts a reckless unilateralism that believes the United States can demand unquestioning support, on terms it dictates; ignores treaties and violates international law at will; invades other countries without provocation; and incarcerates persons indefinitely without charging them with a crime or allowing access to counsel.

The drive toward total power can take different forms, as Mussolini’s Italy, Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Soviet Union suggest.

The American system is evolving its own form: “inverted totalitarianism.” This has no official doctrine of racism or extermination camps but, as described above, it displays similar contempt for restraints.

From CNN:

Ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s sons, Qusay and Uday, were killed Tuesday in a gunbattle with U.S. troops in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, the commander of U.S. ground forces in Iraq said.

Their bodies were identified from “multiple sources,” Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez told reporters in Baghdad.

“They died in a fierce gunbattle,” Sanchez said. “They resisted detention and the effort of coalition forces to apprehend them.”