tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-92939852012-01-25T14:58:25.314-05:00An uncomfortably close look at the Human Condition by an unrepentant Liberal.JimGnoreply@blogger.comBlogger661100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-69299394353501461702007-12-08T12:58:00.000-05:002007-12-08T14:35:52.200-05:00

[CIA Director Gen. Michael] Hayden told agency employees Thursday that the recordings were destroyed out of fear the tapes would leak and reveal the identities of interrogators. He said the sessions were videotaped to provide an added layer of legal protection for interrogators using new, harsh methods. President Bush had just authorized those methods as a way to break down the defenses of

JimGnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-6655242814939761122007-12-06T22:40:00.000-05:002007-12-06T23:39:12.912-05:00

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote, where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference, and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion

JimGnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-43073817071018081632007-12-04T20:33:00.000-05:002007-12-04T22:03:13.283-05:00

Democrats incredulous over Bush's account of Iran reportDemocratic presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden on Tuesday said he can't believe President Bush hasn't known for months about a recent intelligence estimate that downplays the nuclear threat from Iran.Joe Biden says "he refuses to believe" that Bush didn't know about a new assessment of Iran's nuclear program.Other Democratic candidates

JimGnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-67672628243893576662007-12-02T09:42:00.000-05:002007-12-02T10:52:58.045-05:00

Ending Famine, Simply by Ignoring the ExpertsMalawi hovered for years at the brink of famine. After a disastrous corn harvest in 2005, almost five million of its 13 million people needed emergency food aid.But this year, a nation that has perennially extended a begging bowl to the world is instead feeding its hungry neighbors. It is selling more corn to the World Food Program of the United

JimGnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-77305797961894660592007-11-25T16:49:00.000-05:002007-12-04T22:06:15.240-05:00

For their current cover story Mother Jones Magazine has invited 50 experts from generals to antiwar activists to comment on questions of when and how to exit Iraq. The results are interesting largely because there is no clear consensus. The people asked had opinions ranging from 'get out now' to 'we can never leave'. Predictions about what would happen when we exited ranged from 'they'll work

JimGnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-53851498562720786622007-11-23T11:06:00.001-05:002007-11-23T13:33:59.393-05:00

The most powerful leader in the world had called upon me to speak on his behalf and help restore credibility he lost amid the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So I stood at the White house briefing room podium in front of the glare of the klieg lights for the better part of two weeks and publicly exonerated two of the senior-most aides in the White House: Karl Rove and Scooter

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-35706145437484951152007-11-18T20:38:00.000-05:002007-11-23T13:34:40.691-05:00

OR - Sweet Delicious IronyFive authors have sued the parent company of Regnery Publishing, a Washington imprint of conservative books, charging that the company deprives its writers of royalties by selling their books at a steep discount to book clubs and other organizations owned by the same parent company.In a suit filed in United States District Court in Washington yesterday, the authors ...

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-24165176152560922002007-03-17T18:43:00.000-04:002007-03-17T18:56:52.613-04:00

Next week, the House will begin debate on an emergency war spending bill. Some in the Congress are using this bill as an opportunity to micro-manage our military commanders, or to force a precipitous withdrawal in Iraq, or threaten vital funding for Iraqi security forces, and fund projects that have nothing to do with the war on terror. I believe the members of Congress are sincere when they

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-74203902271918306052007-03-16T18:04:00.000-04:002007-03-17T14:57:50.257-04:00

The New York Times has editorialized that Bush's proposal for reforming our farm policies is A Bill Democrats Should Like. On the surface, it seems like they are correct that this is "one of the more sensible pieces of legislation to emerge from this administration in quite a while."It proposes a strict cap on payments to individual farmers as part of a larger effort to hold down traditional

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-29873142365119221432007-03-13T13:33:00.000-04:002007-03-17T13:42:02.184-04:00

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Peter Pace, is facing some tough questions this morning about controversial comments he made about homosexuality and gays serving in the military during a newspaper interview.Pace was asked about his view on gays in the military by the Chicago Tribune. His answer was carefully worded, but his meaning was unmistakable."My upbringing is such that I

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-74006152778415033882007-03-12T15:47:00.000-04:002007-03-17T15:50:39.074-04:00

Sorry to come late to the party, but a dust-up by Glenn Greenwald in Salon on Ann Coulter's latest attention grabbing device deserves to be picked up on and amplified.He argues that the importance of Coulter's use of the "F-Word" to describe John Edwards lies more in what it says about Republicans than Coulter or Edwards. Greenwald goes beyond the standard observations that this is scarcely the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-28154222603640749222007-03-09T17:59:00.000-05:002007-03-09T18:05:08.800-05:00

What goes around comes around.He who lives by the sword...Payback's a bitch.Hoisted on their own petard.There are just too many metaphors.As new groups form to attack John McCain and Mitt Romney.In 2004 it was Swiftboat Veterans for Truth and Vietnam Veterans Against John Kerry smearing the service of John Kerry.And John McCain continued to campaign for the man responsible.Now a man named: Jerry

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-34516367670313957822007-03-08T12:21:00.000-05:002007-03-09T16:47:59.263-05:00

In the terror related cases of Lynn Stewart, Jose Padilla, Sami al-Arian and others, it's clear in each case that the prosecution of each person was out of scale with what they were being charged with and that, more importantly to my point, their treatment was not only not necessary to seek justice, but counterproductive.It's tempting to take these cases and try to make some case about the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-62544236771040636062007-03-07T15:23:00.000-05:002007-03-09T11:40:50.449-05:00

First, let's flashback to October of 2005. A brash young intrepid journalist named Robert Novak penned an op-ed called Criminalizing Politics.In today's polarized climate, both parties have contributed to the criminalization of politics. But Democrats, losers in both elections and the world of ideas, have turned to using the criminal process over the last two decades. That means depicting DeLay

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1132681368139451492005-11-22T12:34:00.000-05:002007-02-12T10:48:19.122-05:00

There is some low level clucking and hand wringing going on in Right Wing circles over a new law proposed by four liberal Democratic state senators in Massachusetts. Cynthia S. Creem, Robert A. O'Leary, Michael E. Festa, and David P. Linsky have introduced Senate Bill 938 to take a series of archaic laws off the books. These are all sections of Massachusetts Chapter 272.The stricken sections

JimGnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1132259488332044862005-11-17T15:25:00.000-05:002007-11-23T13:35:07.603-05:00

Expect the Right to be agog about this interview in Frontpage entitled Where the WMDs Went with “Bill Tierney, a former military intelligence officer and Arabic speaker who worked at Guantanamo Bay in 2002 and as a counter-infiltration operator in Baghdad in 2004.”I read it, so you don’t have to. Although, you’re certainly free to.Tierney clearly has an axe to grind.This conclusion is the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1132119785214387392005-11-16T00:31:00.000-05:002005-11-17T15:36:05.886-05:00

Last June 20th, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal of Illinois Tool Works v. Independent Ink. Trident, Inc., a subsidiary of Illinois Tool Works, holds a patent for a printhead that prints barcodes on boxes. Its standard form licensing agreement requires customers to purchase their ink for the Trident printhead exclusively from Trident. Trident’s website states, “Trident's inks meet all

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1131568492246303802005-11-09T15:23:00.000-05:002005-11-16T00:44:56.090-05:00

During the 2004 Presidential election, there was the unspoken, but likely oft thought, question of Mary - Mary Cheney that is. How does she do it? How can she do it? How does an out lesbian work for the reelection of a party and candidate committed to carving second class citizenship for gays and lesbians into the Constitution? And what about Dick (Cheney)? How can he look his daughter in the eye

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1131397237306457792005-11-07T15:56:00.000-05:002005-11-09T15:51:51.536-05:00

Sebastian Mallaby poses an interesting dilemma in today’s Washington Post.Consider one piece of the avian flu mess: the challenge of stockpiling the potentially lifesaving drug Tamiflu. The challenge presents the standard intellectual-property dilemma: Should we respect the patent rights of Roche, Tamiflu's maker, thereby strengthening incentives for companies to develop tomorrow's cures? Or

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1131117882311286742005-11-04T10:12:00.000-05:002005-11-07T16:04:54.553-05:00

Recently, I wrote about the reaction of the Kansas legislature to a court ruling striking down a law as unconstitutional that punished a gay man for 17 years for a crime that straight people could receive a maximum sentence of 15 months for.Said one member of the legislature, “You have the court substituting its moral judgment for the moral judgment of the people, as expressed through the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1130785792856746932005-10-31T14:03:00.000-05:002005-11-04T13:45:24.866-05:00

Let me write the Generic Conservative Op-Ed on the nomination of Third Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Samuel Alito to the United States Supreme Court.Hypocritical liberals, who previously decried the use of ideology in selecting nominees to the Supreme Court, are aghast that President Bush has - gasp - chosen a conservative. Judge Alito is a solid, well-respected legal scholar and liberals have

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1130608246327608482005-10-29T12:44:00.000-05:002005-10-31T14:11:38.346-05:00

I understand the desire to see those smug, self-righteous SOB’s get their comeuppance. Flaunting the laws, lying to the public, abandoning all but the sheerest pretense of interest in good governance – these guys have it coming.Nevertheless, my discomfiture with the celebratory atmosphere among my fellow liberals continued to grow as callers to Air America wished the hosts a Merry Fitzmas in

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1130288481322702792005-10-26T07:55:00.000-05:002005-10-31T14:10:20.846-05:00

"You have the court substituting its moral judgment for the moral judgment of the people, as expressed through the legislative body. I think it's making a bold statement about judicial power." Question: If a 18 year boy has consensual sex with a 14 year old girl and receives a maximum of 15 months in prison, what should the sentence be if a 18 year old boy has consensual sex with a 14 year old

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1130275130877934322005-10-25T16:17:00.000-05:002005-10-25T16:34:54.840-05:00

Perhaps, ultimately, the trouble with Harriet is that she and Bush are too close, the issue is too personal and each of them just forgot in their own way that this is not a private matter, but one of great and lasting public importance.I’m certain Ms Miers is a fine person, a deeply religious person and fun at parties. But she’s transparently not qualified to be on the Supreme Court, or at least

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1129665742476069342005-10-19T06:59:00.000-05:002005-10-19T13:40:05.966-05:00

I wasn’t going to do another Judith Miller post. But this is just too easy.Howard Kurtz ponders the fallout in the Washington Post in The Judy War. I've been trying to figure out why the Judy Miller saga has become so all-consuming for so many people.After cycling through some possible explanations which all miss the point he reaches a conclusion.It's the war, of course. We're re-fighting the war

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1129593407874552952005-10-18T06:56:00.000-05:002005-10-18T16:35:02.890-05:00

Slate's Mickey Kaus opines:Here is how the NYT itself reported the final argument made on behalf of Judith Miller before she was jailed:Robert S. Bennett, a lawyer for Ms. Miller, urged Judge Hogan to conclude that Ms. Miller would never talk, making confinement pointless.It's now clear confinement wasn't pointless. It worked for the prosecutor exactly as intended. After a couple of months of

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1129573295484063722005-10-17T13:20:00.000-05:002005-10-18T16:36:47.926-05:00

Prior to the referendum on the Iraqi Constitution, I made some predictions: I don’t know if it will pass. My guess is that it will - one way or another. Administration critics will worry about the possibility of the referendum failing, but be quick to point out that its success would not necessarily represent a milestone toward democracy. Even the best of constitutions don’t mean anything

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1129326393985026512005-10-14T16:43:00.000-05:002005-10-18T16:37:38.083-05:00

Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged announces ABC News online, along with enough other online news outlets that it made Google News Top Stories for the second day now. The only thing newsworthy here is that this is now news.Flashback to the 2004 elections. Each of Bush’s campaign stops were carefully staged events with closely vetted participants. Protesters were herded off to “Free Speech

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1129241694261950882005-10-13T17:09:00.000-05:002005-10-18T16:38:59.210-05:00

Let me tell you what’s going to happen with the referendum on the Iraqi Constitution this weekend. Oh, I don’t know if it will pass. My guess is that it will - one way or another. I meant here in the US.Administration critics will worry about the possibility of the referendum failing, but be quick to point out that its success would not necessarily represent a milestone toward democracy. Even the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1120071029243758222005-06-29T13:40:00.000-05:002005-06-29T13:58:39.126-05:00

If, after all this time, Bush still needs to justify the war, it ain’t gonna happen. But, of course, answering the questions of people like me was not the point. The objective was to repackage the lines that have worked before and shore up enough support to push the approval ratings for the war just past the magic 50% mark. But perhaps the most important objective of the speech is not even that

JimGnoreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1116548572175206102005-05-19T19:22:00.000-05:002005-05-19T19:22:52.183-05:00

You can real the real thing here, in Katha Pollitt’s article in the current The Nation. Or continue on for my derivative version.Most people would welcome the news that promising new vaccines are on the horizon for the most common of STD’s. You’d be even more excited if I told you that this STD contributes to cervical cancer and preventing it would save approximately 4000 lives each year. That is

JimGnoreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1116182873404745582005-05-15T13:46:00.000-05:002005-05-15T14:11:59.723-05:00

A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic. – Joseph StalinI’ve been a bad blogger. While it’s no excuse, certain personal matters had called me away for an extended time. And now I return to finish off a piece that was less than current at the time I started it. I had, even then, determined to not write about the Terri Schiavo matter. It has been so extensively blogged on, what

JimGnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1111344995936222622005-03-20T13:26:00.000-05:002005-03-20T21:00:42.953-05:00

The fundamental problem with charges of "judicial activism" is that it is in the eye of the beholder. Judicial activism is understood to be the court making decisions not based on law or the constitution but rather creating new law from the bench. So say the Supreme Court strikes down a law as unconstitutional based on what they claim to be solid constitutional grounds. If you agree with the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1110134807046504132005-03-06T13:42:00.000-05:002005-03-06T18:58:42.296-05:00

(With apologies for my long absence, this post was intended for last weekend. Last weekend not only marked the end of Black History Month, but also a year since the coup in Haiti overthrowing, once again, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.)One of my favorite books in my collection is the astoundingly well-written, researched and edited Africana, edited by Kwame Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1108956183314859402005-02-20T22:05:00.000-05:002005-02-22T23:59:20.426-05:00

(This was written in response to call for essays on the the meaning of Right Wing in American politics by News Snipet Blog.)Here, and elsewhere, I have written about three different George W Bush’s.George the Theocrat This George is rigidly ideological and dogmatic. He’s a Christian. But he’s true object of fundamentalist worship is America. He has a set view of the world which is not amenable to

JimGnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1108693386726540552005-02-17T21:12:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:00:26.756-05:00

From the US Constitution, Bill of Rights (emphasis added)Amendment VNo person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1108258508779432302005-02-12T20:10:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:01:25.796-05:00

Sociobiology has gotten a bad rep among leftists of various sorts. It brings to mind all kinds of fears about social darwinism, eugenics, biological determinism and memories of nineteenth century scientists measuring skull size in an attempt to demonstrate racial differences in intelligence.Recently sociobiology has begun to enjoy something of a renaissance - from 1994’s The Bell Curve to the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1108098740727040392005-02-10T23:15:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:02:29.746-05:00

I have a guilty confession to make. I kinda like Ann Coulter. Oh, I don’t agree with her much – well, ever – except maybe through accident or coincidence. I like her because she has a kind of honesty that many of her other conservative comrades do not. Sure, she lies, makes stuff up – and the like. That’s not what I mean. Some are conservative commentators who are actually quite reasonable,

JimGnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1107967416465184462005-02-09T11:34:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:03:30.166-05:00

When GWB, in his first term, introduced each of his two large transfers of the tax burden to middle and lower income earners – er – tax cuts – er – tax relief packages, I was struck at the time at how they were being discussed in isolation of the budgets they would impact. How could Congress, I recall thinking, pass any tax package without considering the deficits it might produce or the spending

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1107642101826297122005-02-05T16:56:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:07:17.213-05:00

I have never served in the military, nor would I want to. By temperament and ability, I would be quite unsuited to the task, even in my younger days. I am not particularly combative or competitive. And I fancy myself to be something of an iconoclast.Also, they wouldn’t have to ask, I’d tell.Yet I find myself in the curious position of a peacenik who’s glad that there are other people who are

JimGnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1107396415162916352005-02-02T21:00:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:08:09.393-05:00

When the recent elections in Iraq failed to descend into total chaos as some had feared, many of the war’s supporters shared another “mission accomplished” moment. While a far cry from the establishment of a stable democracy, I agree that the outcome does provide sound justification for cautious optimism.But at what cost?Seldom have so many people engaged in a cost/benefit analysis of an action

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1107276243126196272005-02-01T11:36:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:09:14.906-05:00

Germany has an unemployment problem. With 10.5% unemployment, it’s one of the highest rates in Western Europe. Still struggling to absorb eastern Germany and saddled with a barely growing economy, Germany has become willing to consider restrictions and cuts to its comparatively generous social welfare system. The unemployed must register with the Labor Office and be available to its placement

JimGnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1107233487742620842005-01-31T23:45:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:10:38.343-05:00

Mother Jones recently interviewed Noah Feldman, a former adviser to the Coalition Provisional Authority and an Associate Professor of Law at New York University, about the ethics of nation-building and his experiences in Iraq. In it is the following exchange:MJ.com: As a follow-up, you wrote something really interesting in the book that builds off philosopher Robert Nozick's notion of "protective

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1107064338068841622005-01-30T01:38:00.000-05:002005-02-23T00:11:34.490-05:00

So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world. We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1106542520903408122005-01-23T23:42:00.000-05:002005-01-24T00:22:03.273-05:00

The overall response of the American public to the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami has challenged one of my long standing rules of thumb: the compassion of the American populace, on the whole, in matters of disaster or tragedy, is inversely proportional to the number of people involved, the distance from American shores and the darkness of the skin of those affected. I do not mean to deny

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1105830988914956742005-01-16T11:04:00.000-05:002005-01-16T12:32:48.880-05:00

In the wake of the ‘success’ in Iraq, President Bush’s approval numbers seem to be slipping. It seems that in the absence of some great demon to fear, Bush starts to become less appealing to the American public. Luckily, the Social Security system is collapsing. Unless bold action is taken, benefits will run out in a matter of minutes. We cannot wait. We must act now, preferably boldly. We cannot

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1105763859400973952005-01-14T21:29:00.000-05:002005-01-14T23:50:42.143-05:00

New Year’s Day, America’s most extreme homophobe posted a “News Release” on his web site God Hates Fags. Thank god for tsunami. Thank God for 3000 dead Americans! Yes! Thank God for Sept. 11 and 3000 dead sodomite Americans in 2001. God sent the Muslim planes to destroy fag New York’s twin towers and hurl 3000 vile Americans into Hell. Even so, God sent Tsunami last week to execute vengeance

JimGnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1104377852538488352004-12-29T22:08:00.000-05:002004-12-29T23:01:39.136-05:00

U.S. adds $20 million to emergency relief fund Rejecting a U.N. official's suggestion that it had been a "stingy" aid donor, the Bush administration yesterday announced $20 million more in relief for victims of the Asian earthquake and tsunamis and dispatched an aircraft carrier and other ships to the region for possible relief operations. The announcement brought the United States' total aid

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1104294660126515232004-12-27T23:17:00.000-05:002004-12-28T23:31:00.126-05:00

Add this to the list of symptoms that is the evolving neuroses of the religious right, wishing a Merry Christmas not as a gay holiday greeting, but as passive aggression; not as a sincere expression of conviviality but as an assertion of the primacy of fundamentalist Christianity in American culture. More than a handful of people in the religious right are terribly concerned that Christmas, and

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1103486328411242702004-12-19T14:58:00.000-05:002004-12-19T15:25:22.020-05:00

This past week I’ve been pulled away by some personal issues. But these are issues that have political and economic dimensions. I am an owner in a small manufacturing operation in the automotive parts rebuilding aftermarket. The industry we are in has experienced, over the past decade or so, a dramatic and often painful restructuring and contraction. Tough decisions have needed to be made over

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1102891950415156842004-12-12T17:31:00.000-05:002004-12-12T17:52:30.416-05:00

The distrust of and animosity toward the United Nations that many conservatives demonstrate is as old the institution itself. Progressives, too, have often been critical of the UN. But this criticism tends to center on issues like the UN’s general inability to respond well or quickly enough to emerging humanitarian crises. While conservatives of the Limbaugh sort seem more intent on contending

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1102787549850940582004-12-11T13:49:00.000-05:002004-12-12T21:19:24.140-05:00

There’s an interesting column by Patricia Williams in the 12/13/04 issue of The Nation in which she talks about her opinions regarding and feelings toward Condoleeza Rice. Her main point is that however glad she might be to see a black women rise to such prominence, it doesn’t erase her distaste for Rice’s policies and actions over the last four years. These are, in fact, separable issues: the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1102567899917814072004-12-08T21:47:00.000-05:002004-12-11T13:13:41.613-05:00

Unlike many in the blogosphere, I am just old enough to have arrived at a feminist consciousness just a decade after Roe v Wade. Stories of the “bad old days” of illegal back alley abortions were not so distant as they seem today. And vigilance about regression to the pre-Roe America was more present on people’s minds. Not coincidentally, I think, more people, even men, were likely to think of

JimGnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1102275787061234542004-12-05T14:12:00.000-05:002004-12-05T14:43:07.063-05:00

You may remember, from last April the flap over pictures of flag draped coffins of American casualties in Iraq in a cargo plane about to depart from Kuwait. The photographer lost her job over these, even though she did not work directly for the government or the military. Apparently this was so we could be freed from having to look at the consequences of our invasion of Iraq. The case the

JimGnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1102186003581553872004-12-04T13:33:00.000-05:002004-12-04T14:00:07.770-05:00

December 3rd marked the 20th anniversary of the tragedy in Bhopal. From www.bhopal.net, an activist and advocacy group seeking justice for the victims of the tragedy in Bhopal. 3rd December 1984 Shortly after midnight poison gas leaked from a factory in Bhopal, India, owned by the Union Carbide Corporation. There was no warning, none of the plant's safety systems were working. In the city

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1102020649535478312004-12-02T17:45:00.000-05:002004-12-02T15:50:49.536-05:00

With apologies for the long delay, I will now deliver what I promised – sorta. In Part I, I re-wrote the 1951 and 2001 State of the Union addresses by swapping the words Communism and Terrorism (and their derivatives) and changing or omitting historically specific details, while maintaining the integrity of the themes and ideas. It was my intent to show the continuities and dissimilarities of

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101874366059101942004-11-30T23:01:00.000-05:002004-11-30T23:12:46.066-05:00

The other night NBC re-ran Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life for what I’m sure is its millionth iteration on TV. I decided to watch it once more with the question in mind: Could this be considered subversive? I don’t mean in 1946 when it was first released. That may have been true too. But I’m thinking about how this plays to a modern audience – or rather, how it might play if they really

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101789654733561042004-11-29T22:31:00.000-05:002004-11-29T23:40:54.733-05:00

Sometimes you just have to take a day or two to calm down… Whenever a criticism of a media story takes the form of: they shouldn’t have done it, one’s guard naturally goes up against the possibility of censorship. I believe in a free press. Nevertheless, they shouldn’t have done it. In case you’ve been living under a rock for the last six years, on October 7th, 1998, Matthew Shepard was

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101666041434684822004-11-28T13:14:00.000-05:002004-11-28T13:20:41.436-05:00

Hot Ambercrombie Chick posed this question on her blog. I have a little bit of a brevity problem. So I've put my answer here. First I’d like to make a distinction between Human Nature and the Human Condition. Although these are often used interchangeably, it is useful to differentiate them. Human Nature is how we’re wired, how we’re built, what follows simply from the fact that we are Homo

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101659314121115822004-11-28T11:20:00.000-05:002004-11-28T20:34:04.483-05:00

I will post Part II of Access of Evil shortly. However everyone in the blogosphere is much exercised about the following NYT article about W's plan to privatize social security. I didn't want to be left out. (Scroll down for my incredible insights.) Bush's Social Security Plan Is Said to Require Vast Borrowing By RICHARD W. STEVENSON ASHINGTON, Nov. 27 - The White House and

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101587056264598212004-11-27T14:49:00.000-05:002004-11-27T15:24:16.263-05:00

Compare and contrast these two speeches separated by 50 years. First: This …Congress faces as grave a task as any Congress in the history of our Republic. The actions you take will be watched by the whole world. These actions will measure the ability of a free people, acting through their chosen representatives and the its free institutions, to meet a deadly challenge to their way of life.

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101503826775605622004-11-26T16:01:00.000-05:002004-11-27T15:27:55.030-05:00

In Part I, I looked at some of the issues that have arisen in the aftermath of the November 2nd Election Fiasco, or our post 11/2 world. I ended with: But why? Why this rush to forget yet again? I’ll save my diatribe as to why the mainstream media follow the herd for another post, another day. Right now I’m interested in the question of why so many people are so eager to put this behind them.

JimGnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101344361521109622004-11-24T19:44:00.000-05:002004-11-24T19:59:21.520-05:00

How does a blog that claims to challenge hidden assumptions celebrate a holiday with origins rooted in imperialism, racism and colonialism and that has morphed into an orgy of consumption? Give it a rest for a day. Whether it's turkey or tofurkey for you, enjoy friends and family!

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101273450654510622004-11-24T09:06:00.000-05:002004-11-26T13:49:52.986-05:00

The ink was barely dry on the Supreme Court decision stopping the Florida recount and effectively awarding the presidency to George W Bush. MSNBC’s law stud Dan Abrams had barely caught his breath from running down the courthouse steps. The pundits already had their lines memorized. We were being instructed to move on, to get on with the business of running the country, and you know, shopping.

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101253265473010982004-11-23T18:38:00.000-05:002004-11-26T13:33:36.900-05:00

The liberal media (the real liberal media, I mean) are much exercised these days with analyzing and dissecting the November 2nd Election Fiasco. “How could we have lost?” they ask. Or, as Slate so depressingly put it: “Why Americans Hate Democrats.” What they all seem to agree on is: it’s not the gays. The line goes something like: Everyone thinks that the election was decided on “Moral Values”

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9293985.post-1101236779300689822004-11-23T13:55:00.000-05:002004-11-23T14:08:07.356-05:00

To say that “9/11 changed everything” has become a cliché. It has also become an excuse. The Bush Administration has used the events of September 11th, 2001 to explain, in part, every failing and problem of the last four years. The reason why this narrative works is that most of us accept uncritically the idea that Evil is Other. And the bigger the Evil, the more distant must the Other be. “They

JimGnoreply@blogger.com0