That Was The Week That Was … full of bad news; the best line of the week came from Dubby, who welcomed us to his hanging. It was just his portrait, but … well … it had a certain ring to it, didn’t it?
Just a quick post today, dearhearts — one bonus article and a comment that the Illinois Governor is, in my opinion, a couple of fries short a Happy Meal; mentally competent people … especially those under FBI scrutiny … do not behave this way. He may well be a thug, but a whackadoodle thug nonetheless.
Perhaps he and George can hang together.
Just something to think about.
Jude
HARPER’S WEEKLY REVIEW
The Labor Department reported that 533,000 people lost
their jobs in November, a further 621,000 people were
forced into part-time employment, and 422,000 more simply
dropped out of the labor force. The report, describing a
situation far worse than economists expected, also
recorded 24,000 layoffs by auto dealers. Representatives
of the Big Three car companies, facing their lowest sales
in decades and, in the case of Chrysler and General
Motors, imminent collapse, again appeared before Congress
(traveling by car and commercial flights this time, rather
than on private jets) to ask for $34 billion in aid, a few
billion less than the value of Harvard University’s
endowment four months ago, before it lost $8 billion. The
Government Accountability Office released a 66-page audit
critical of oversight of the bailout. “The interests of
the government and taxpayers may not be adequately
protected,” said the report. “Program objectives may not
be achieved in an efficient and effective manner.” “This
is a big problem,” said President-elect Barack Obama of
the economy, “and it’s going to get worse.” Laid-off
employees of Republic Windows and Doors in Chicago staged
a sit-in, and Jesse Jackson brought them bags of
food. Zimbabwe, with unemployment at 90 percent and
inflation at 23 million percent, said it would issue new
$200 million notes. Police in Harare clashed with marching
doctors and nurses who were protesting the 10,000 cases of
cholera in the country; the Limpopo River was declared
infected. “Defecating everywhere,” said one
victim. Ireland recalled its pork.
Birmingham, Alabama, mayor Larry P. Langford was arrested
for corruption and charged with taking bribes. Four men,
two dressed as women, robbed a Harry Winston boutique in
Paris, taking $100 million in jewels and other
merchandise, and O. J. Simpson was sentenced to up to 33
years in jail for stealing some football memorabilia last
September. “It’s kind of a bittersweet moment,” said Fred
Goldman, who believes Simpson murdered Goldman’s son Ron
in 1994, “knowing that that S.O.B. is going to be in jail
for a very long time.” The real estate boom in Dubai was
slowing, and the exhumed body of Mohammad Daud Khan, first
president of Afghanistan, who was executed in a coup in
1978 and buried in a mass grave in Pul-e-Charkhi, was
identified by a small golden Koran. In the Nigerian state
of Akwa Ibom, police arrested a man who claimed to have
killed 110 witch-children, although the man later insisted
that he had only exorcised the children of their
witchiness. Scientists found that smaller spiders make
better lovers and that dogs get jealous. Aggressive
super-ants were taking over Europe and displacing other
ants; Hitler’s maid said that he had always been
charming. “We could hear him crying,” she said. Venice
flooded, and scientists in Wisconsin studying a stalagmite
from Jerusalem noted that the climate became increasingly
dry from 100 A.D. to 700 A.D., corresponding to the
declining influence of the Roman and Byzantine
empires. President George W. Bush unveiled his portrait at
the Union League of Philadelphia. “Welcome to my hanging,”
he said.
It was reported that Barack Obama’s grandfather was
imprisoned and tortured by the British in 1949 during the
Mau Mau uprising. “They would sometimes squeeze his
testicles with parallel metallic rods,” said Sarah
Onyango, 87, called “Granny Sarah” by the
president-elect. “That was the time we realized that the
British were actually not friends.” Tony Blair praised
Obama’s choice of Hillary Clinton as secretary of
state. Aleksy II, Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox
Church, died at 79, and after nearly 28 years in a coma
Sunny von Bulow died at 76. Psychiatrist Robert
Zajonc–who correlated birth order with I.Q.–died at 85,
and Oliver Selfridge, a student of Norbert Wiener and an
artificial-intelligence researcher who invented
“intelligent agents,” which he called “demons,” died at
82. Scientists at Berkeley found that as compared to
rich-child brains, the brains of poor children are often
more like those of stroke victims, with less response in
the prefrontal cortex. “This is a wake-up call,” said a
neuroscientist. Researchers studying Canadians found that
older brains are less efficient at filtering out
distractions, while researchers in Brazil found that
medical students are often depressed. A statistician in
California said that humans would soon reach their maximum
running speed. “Men are still on the upward trend,” said
Mark Denny of Stanford University, but “they are getting
near that plateau.” Horses and dogs are already running as
fast as they can.
– Paul Ford
http://harpers.org/archive/2008/12/WeeklyReview2008-12-09
bonus
Blagojevich’s Fundraising Shakedowns Detailed
Derek Kravitz, WaPo
12/10/2008
What ultimately led to federal conspiracy and bribery charges against Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (aside from well-placed wiretaps)? Federal agents say it wasn’t the elaborate scheme for an ambassadorship or notions that he would sell President-elect Barack Obama’s now-vacant Senate seat.
It was the shakedowns.
Since October, the FBI has conducted several interviews with longtime fundraiser John Wyma, chairman of the Friends of Blagojevich campaign committee (Wyma is dubbed “Individual A” in court documents - PDF). He told federal agents that the governor was making a strong push to collect at least $2.5 million in campaign cash by Jan. 1, when stricter new ethics laws take effect in Illinois.
With Wyma’s help, federal agents allegedly caught the two-term governor not only trying to raise cash from wealthy donors in exchange for favors, but threatening to withhold state money and projects if he didn’t get what he wanted.
At one point, Blagojevich allegedly instructed a lobbyist to approach and solicit $500,000 in campaign money from an unnamed highway contractor (The Chicago Sun-Times says at least one of the lobbyists the governor dealt with was former chief of staff Alonzo Monk). That highway contractor stood to benefit from a $1.8 billion project to build new interchanges and “green lanes” in Illinois, an initiative announced in October.
“I could have made a larger announcement but wanted to see how they perform by the end of the year,” Blagojevich said, according to a federal wiretap quoted in the court documents. “If they don’t perform, (expletive) ‘em.”
The contractor, only identified as “Highway Contractor 1,” is said to be an officer with one of the largest suppliers of concrete in Illinois and heavily involved in the American Concrete Pavement Association, a concrete workers’ group based in Skokie, Ill. Blagojevich also allegedly spoke with a former U.S. House member who was working with the governor to pass a capital bill worth billions of dollars in transportation-related improvement projects.
After mentioning the unnamed ex-congressional lawmaker, Blagojevich told the contractor to “call me if you need anything.”
According to news reports, Blagojevich recruited two former congressman — ex-House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) and former Rep. Glenn Poshard (D-Ill.), president of Southern Illinois University — to help out with the construction project. It is unclear if the unnamed lawmaker knew about Blagojevich’s fundraising plans.
Randell C. Riley, executive director of the Illinois chapter of the concrete group, said today the references to the Illinois concrete industry and his organization came “as a complete surprise,” adding that he did not know who the contractor is and was unaware of any suspected corruption in Illinois state politics.
It’s unclear if the highway contractor ever gave money to Blagojevich’s campaign.
Blagojevich also allegedly tried to get $50,000 from Patrick M. Magoon, chief executive officer of Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago, in exchange for not rescinding $8 million in state funds for the hospital. The indictment says Magoon never contributed to Blagojevich’s campaigns.
After news of the attempted shakedown surfaced, Children’s Memorial released a statement saying the hospital “is very disappointed that the $8 million in Illinois funding that the pediatric providers of Illinois believed would enable them to care for Illinois’ neediest children has been tied to an alleged pay-to-play scheme. If such allegations are true, Children’s Memorial, pediatric physicians and the children of Illinois have been victimized.”
One notable name found among the governor’s alleged targets was John P. McCormick, the deputy editorial page editor for The Chicago Tribune. Blagojevich apparently singled McCormick out, demanding that he get fired.
It appears the governor thought the cash-strapped Tribune would be “driving” the impeachment process against him. His chief of staff, John Harris, said McCormick should be fired because he was the “most biased and unfair” of the paper’s editorial writers. In return, Blagojevich allegedly offered to help, or hinder, the Tribune Co.’s attempts to sell the Chicago Cubs. The company, which recently declared Chapter 11, was seeking aid from the Illinois Finance Authority to ease the sale of the team’s ballpark, Wrigley Field.
So, days later, Blagojevich was told about the firings of 11 staffers at the Tribune. When he found out McCormick wasn’t one of them, he instructed an aide to tell his chief of staff.
“What’s the deal? . . . McCormick stays at the Tribune, huh?”
McCormick told The Post’s Howard Kurtz last night that he is “gratified” that the pressure “didn’t work,” even though the $150 million benefit being dangled on Wrigley Field was “a lot of enticement.” The governor, he said, “is mad at an institution, and I’m a guy who types. There’s a level of personal animosity there
that I wouldn’t have anticipated.” ++
“So keep fightin’ for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don’t you forget to have fun doin’ it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin’ ass and celebratin’ the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was.”
~ Molly Ivins, 1944 - 2007
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
December 10th, 2008
This post is about the ongoing push against gay marriage; useless, in my opinion, since the evolutionary curve will not allow homophobic legislation to hold much longer. The younger generations get it, and don’t see this as an issue. It seems mostly smoke and mirrors to me, at this point — although I applaud the conversation and the ongoing insistence that this civil rights issue come out of the shadows. We will look back, sometime soon, and wonder what took us so long.
The Christocrats won’t let it go, of course, since they argue … incredibly … that it endangers the institution of marriage itself. I wish just ONE of them could explain that intelligently, but so far … no dice.
An article below indicates that the split in California votes on Proposition 8, while pushed and prompted by moneyed religious special interest groups, broke down in the general public not by race but by income and education.
Education is always the answer, isn’t it — and a living wage. Peace and prosperity fit hand in glove.
We’ll look at Prop 8, the Mormon money and power moves, and how this matter is not finished in California; good news from Iowa indicates that their Supreme Court will consider the challenges against same-sex marriage. The conversation is widening.
In other news, Obama continues to steam ahead occulting the limping power of the current Prez, who has nothing but butterflies issuing from his butt in a cloud of fantasy.
Job loss took center stage this weekend, with a half-million evaporating in November; this brings the unemployment rate up, including long-term unemployed, to about 12%.
Here’s a link to some of the proposed public works plan, largest since Eisenhower — which is appropriate, since the economy is at WWII levels.
And here’s the link to Obama’s interview on Meet the Press this weekend, in case you missed it; he announced Bush-bashed General Shinseki to head the Vet’s — here’s a quote from Daily Dish in regard to the pick:
Whenever he talks about this selection, Obama (plus his lieutenants) can describe it completely, sufficiently, and strictly in the most bipartisan high-road terms. They have selected a wounded combat veteran; a proven military leader and manager; a model of personal dignity and nonpartisan probity: an unimpeachable choice. Symbolic elements? If people want them, they can work with Shinseki’s status as (to my recollection at the moment) the first Asian-American in a military-related cabinet position, not to mention a Japanese-American honored for lifelong military service on Pearl Harbor Day.
Meanwhile, the Chicago worker-protest has drawn Obama’s support and prompted the Illinois Governor to suspend business with Bank of America. I trust the Lib’s will take note of that as their panties twist into a ‘centrist’ knot.
The Supreme’s, wisely, refused one of the Obama birth certificate challenges; another awaits — it interests me that much ado was made on the Right about Hawaii while none at all was made about McCain’s birth in Panama; if we’re splitting hairs, lets split ALL of them.
I’m sure all this is giving the Republicans fits — they like it when the little people keep their yaps shut; me’thinks those days are long gone.
We’ll start our collection with a Fiori, and move on to a YouTube [and musical] starring Jack Black — excellent articles here, including one from the Advocate and a Newsweek piece taking on the religious concepts; the last piece is interesting … are astrologers as maligned as gays?
Hmmmmm. It’s a rather odd assumption, although both sets of ‘heathens’ are considered open enemies by the Religious Right and friends of the Horned One. The argument seems a bit frivolous, but it’s worth a peek as a think-piece.
Say it with me: separation of church and state.
Jude
State-run Sacraments
Mark Fiori ‘toon
Proposition 8: The Musical
Funny or Die
Next stop on gay marriage debate in courts: Iowa
AMY LORENTZEN, AP
Dec 07, 2008
The gay marriage debate moves to the Midwest this week as the Iowa Supreme Court hears arguments in a challenge to the state’s ban on same-sex marriage.
If the high court rules in favor of the half-dozen gay couples who sued, it would make Iowa the fourth state after Massachusetts, California and Connecticut to uphold the right of same-sex couples to legally marry. In California, however, voters have negated the courts by amending the state constitution to ban gay marriage.
The Iowa case has been moving through the legal system for more than three years, and it could take a year or more for the state Supreme Court to issue a ruling after hearing oral arguments Tuesday morning.
Camilla Taylor, an attorney for Lambda Legal, a gay rights organization representing the gay and lesbian couples behind the lawsuit, said the state has historically been a leader in supporting minority and women’s rights.
“Iowa has an opportunity to play the role that it often has played in the past — being at the forefront of civil rights struggles — often long before other states were willing to be similarly courageous,” she said. “This is not an uncomfortable role for Iowans, and we are looking at them to make a reality out of the promise of equality in the Iowa Constitution.”
Lambda Legal filed the lawsuit in 2005 on behalf of six Iowa couples who were denied marriage licenses, as well as three of the couples’ children. It names former Polk County recorder and registrar Timothy Brien.
The lawsuit prompted a ruling in August 2007 by Polk County District Court Judge Robert Hanson, who said a state law allowing marriage only between a man and a woman violated the constitutional rights of due process and equal protection.
After that ruling, nearly two dozen people applied for marriage licenses, but only one couple managed to get married before Hanson stayed his decision the next day in anticipation of the state’s appeal to the Supreme Court. The marriage of Sean Fritz and Tim McQuillan of Ames stands, although its validity could depend on the high court.
The Polk County attorney’s office declined to comment on the pending case. In court documents, it has criticized the lawsuit as an attempt to shift public policy decisions from the Legislature to the courts.
Maggie Gallagher, president of the Manassas, Va.-based Institute for Marriage and Public Policy, a conservative group that opposes same-sex marriage, said Americans have repeatedly made clear that they want traditional marriage protected.
“I think it has to be clear to judges that Americans do care about this issue, and in 30 out of 30 cases, when they’ve been allowed to vote, they say that same-sex marriage is not a civil right,” she said. “Americans don’t think that two men in a union are just the same as a husband and wife, and they don’t really appreciate the idea that the legal system is going to force them” to accept that.
However, Aderson Francois, a law professor who heads Washington-based Howard University’s Civil Rights Clinic, said that while a majority of Americans may oppose gay marriage, it should be left to the courts to decide issues of constitutional equality.
“It doesn’t really matter whether a majority of people want to deny that right; the constitution simply doesn’t provide for that,” he said.
Francois predicts that the Iowa Supreme Court, like other courts, will rule in favor of the gay couples.
“On the pure legal, constitutional issue, it’s close to a no-brainer that two adults ought to have the right to marry whoever they choose — that the state ought not to be preventing that,” he said.
Iowa has a history of favoring minority rights. In its first decision in 1839, the state Supreme Court said a Missouri slave who traveled to Iowa to earn money for his freedom was not a fugitive. The state was the first to admit a woman to the bar in 1869, three years before the U.S. Supreme Court said women didn’t have the right to practice law. The court also issued early rulings against racial segregation.
The plaintiffs in the gay marriage lawsuit include Dawn and Jen BarbouRoske of Iowa City, who have two daughters and said they want their relationship and their family to be fully recognized under the law.
Jen BarbouRoske tells of searching for a preschool for their daughter and almost settling on a place before being told the girl wouldn’t be allowed to talk about her family during family units. In court records, Dawn BarbouRoske expressed her worries over a medical condition her partner suffers from that could require hospitalization and once required an emergency room visit.
“I was terrified that the hospital staff would refuse to recognize our relationship, and that I would not be permitted to stay by her bedside,” she said.
Dawn BarbouRoske said in an interview that they want people to understand they are “just everyday folks” who are seeking the same rights as other Iowans.
“We just happen to be in love with someone of the same sex. We are committed to our community, our neighborhood and taking care of our kids,” she said. “When it comes down to it … whether you agree or not about same-sex marriage, it really is a basic civil right.” ++
Education and income were strong factors in vote against gay marriage
Mike Swift, Mercury News
12/03/2008
A majority of blacks and Latinos voted to ban same-sex marriage in California last month, but socioeconomics — not race and ethnicity — was the decisive factor in Proposition 8, according to a new statewide survey of voters.
Even after the California Supreme Court’s landmark ruling, after an estimated 18,000 same-gender couples wed between June and November, and after the two sides in the Proposition 8 campaign spent more than $83 million to sway voters, the state remains locked in an ideological stalemate on same-sex marriage, exactly as it was three years ago. Neither side in the same-sex marriage debate holds a majority. Forty-seven percent are in favor of same-sex marriage; 48 percent oppose it.
The new survey by the Public Policy Institute of California of 2,003 Californians who voted Nov. 4 found significantly less support for Proposition 8 among blacks than had been indicated by exit polls. Election Day exit polls triggered recriminations between gay rights advocates and black leaders. And now the new data indicates that 61 percent of Latinos voted for the ban, an even higher percentage than exit polls indicated on Election Day.
But while a majority of non-white voters backed a ban on gay marriage, the key finding in the new survey was that voters’ position on Proposition 8 was determined more by their level of education and income than their race or ethnicity, said PPIC president Mark Baldassare. Among Californians with a high school diploma or less, 69 percent voted for Proposition 8. Among college graduates, 57 percent voted against it.
“Both among whites and non-whites, among college graduates and among upper-income voters, Prop. 8 lost,” Baldassare said. “Among both whites and non-whites, among non-college graduates and lower-income voters, Prop. 8 won. It seems to me that some of what we attributed to race and ethnic differences really had to do with a socioeconomic divide in regard to same-sex marriage.”
Because African-Americans and Latinos tend to have lower incomes and a lower share of college graduates than whites, Baldassare said the racial voting pattern on same-sex marriage was really a reflection of education and income.
Support for a ban on gay marriage weakened from the 61 percent of voters who backed Proposition 22 in 2000 to the 52 percent who voted yes on Proposition 8. But in trying to delve into how voters sized up this year’s vote, the PPIC survey suggests that stronger support for same-sex marriage in the future is uncertain, even though most younger voters favor gay marriage.
If the state sees more growth among groups who are less educated and less affluent, “then you are not necessarily going to see a situation where you have growing support for gay marriage in California,” Baldassare said.
As other polls had shown, the measure drew overwhelming support from evangelical Christians (85 percent in favor), robust backing from political conservatives and strong opposition from liberals. Baldassare said it’s difficult to say from the polling why people with higher incomes and a college degree tend to support same-sex marriage.
“It has to do with exposure to different ideas,” Baldassare said, struggling to interpret that link. “It’s perceptions about lifestyle differences, tolerance for differences, broader view of social trends and issues — all those things tend to come with more education.
“I didn’t really expect to find this” in the survey, he added. “I hadn’t thought about probing it.”
The PPIC survey found some other racial and social patterns in voting on other statewide initiatives. Proposition 1A, the high-speed rail bond, won with 60 percent support from non-white voters. And Proposition 4, which would have required a parent to be notified before a minor could have an abortion, also lost. It was supported by a strong majority of evangelicals, Latinos and voters without a college degree. Proposition 11, the political redistricting reform that appears headed for victory, drew support from those who approve of the governor’s performance, and disapprove of the Legislature.
But on the controversial Proposition 8 vote, not everyone agrees that socioeconomics trumps all else in how a person views same-sex marriage.
“I think it is true that there is a socioeconomic component to the vote on Prop. 8. I also think it’s not nearly as clear-cut as perhaps the research is suggesting,” said Frank Schubert, the manager of the Yes on 8 campaign. “There’s lots of overlapping between African-Americans and Latinos and other demographics in terms of how they look at Prop. 8. … You can have a liberal, middle-income African-American voting in favor of traditional marriage, and I don’t know how you ascribe one particular component of a person’s makeup to how they voted the way they did.”
One striking finding in the new survey was how intensely a state characterized by its diversity of lifestyles, languages, races, national origins, religions and rural vs. urban communities became so galvanized by same-sex marriage in 2008.
PPIC found that 63 percent of voters were more interested in Proposition 8 than any of the dozen statewide initiatives; no other ballot measure drew more than 5 percent of voters.
“We can say from our polling,” Baldassare said, “that we’ve never seen anything like the interest that was generated by Prop. 8.” ++
(more…)
December 8th, 2008
