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WE DELIVER HEADLINES! BUSH WATCH Nov. 1, 2002 Republicans conspire to steal more elections in 2002 By Jackson Thoreau So much political treachery by Republicans, so little time to cover and expose it all. This column is my attempt to cover just SOME of the many instances in which Republicans are conspiring to steal more elections come Nov. 5, 2002. Here goes: Republicans conspire with Libertarians against Democratic Sen. Cleland in Georgia In a recent letter that sounds like it was written by a Republican, Libertarian Party National Political Director Ron Crickenberger charged that "liberals tried to steal the 2000 presidential election with their ëSore Losermaní campaign in Florida. They stole control of the U.S. Senate when GOP turncoat Sen. Jeffords jumped ship, leaving Tom Daschle in charge. Now theyíre fighting to keep that control... and theyíre doing it ëby any means necessary.í Well, itís time to fight back... using our own political tricks." Crickenberger, who did not say how "liberals" are fighting to keep control "by any means necessary," bragged about the Libertarian Party helping to defeat Democratic incumbent Sen. Wyche Fowler in 1992, when Republican Paul Coverdell won in a runoff, after the Libertarians endorsed him. Crickenberger then outlined an "under the radar" scam this year to steal the votes of African-Americans who would normally vote for Democratic Sen. Max Cleland of Georgia. "Weíre going to get a sizeable percentage of black Democrats - the ones most likely to vote - to vote AGAINST the Democrat incumbent, and FOR the Libertarian candidate," Crickenberger wrote. "These are voters who are passionate about one issue that Democrats are on the wrong side of: education choice, like vouchers and tuition tax creditsÖ.This is an ëunder the radarí campaign - a ësneak attack,í if you willÖ.Cleland is the Libertarian Partyís most targeted Democrat in this yearís elections. We plan to attack him using other means as well, to pull black Democrats away from his vote total." So did Republicans put the Libertarians up to conduct such a negative, targeted campaign against a Democrat? Some sources I talked to said it sure sounded like it. This letter has been circulated by Republican sites like Newsmax, so at the very least, Republicans are helping Libertarians raise money for this campaign. Iím ashamed to admit that I voted for the Libertarian presidential candidate in 1980, when I was a confused college student who liked that partyís message of individual liberties. It was a wasted vote, one that would have been better spent on Democrat Jimmy Carter. There are some aspects I like about the Libertarian Party, but right now, itís hard to think of any. Republicans try to bribe Greens in New Mexico In New Mexico, state Republican Party Chairman John Dendahl admitted that he promised "at least $100,000" to the state Green Party in exchange for the Greens fielding candidates in two of New Mexicoís three congressional districts. His aim was to siphon votes from the Democrats, he said. Dendahl claimed he was acting as a "messenger" on behalf of an unnamed donor from the Washington, D.C., area. The Greens, to their credit, refused Dendahlís offer, which the Greens said was as much as $250,000, and did not field candidates for the congressional seats. The New Mexico attorney general said the bribe attempt demonstrated "an attempt to manipulate the election process," but the offer was not illegal under state law. Idle question: Since when is bribery legal? For more information, go to http://www.richardsonforgovernor.com/news/br_abqjournal_7112002.htm. I have received other reports of Republicans contributing to Green campaigns and even voting for Greens to bolster their chances at spoiling Democratsí hopes. I have not been able to verify most of them. Green Party leaders say that, unlike the Libertarians, they have not had a national strategy to intentionally spoil elections, and they are not conspiring with Republicans. Additional note: As a progressive, liberal Democrat who sometimes votes for Greens when there is not a Democrat in the race, I donít see the value of ostracizing Greens just because they support their partiesí candidates. Sure, I argue sometimes with Greens that they helped get Bush in office. But then, so did the Socialists, who also amassed more votes in Florida than Bushís margin of "victory" there. For years, Republicans have complained how Libertarians have siphoned votes from them, even blaming them for losing the U.S. Senate seats in 1996 in Georgia held by Cleland and in 2000 in Washington state held by Democrat Maria Cantwell. If that does happen, it is balanced out by Libertarians helping to elect Republicans, such as the late Sen. Coverdell from Georgia in 1992, and Greens helping to elect Republicans in states like New Mexico. I am slowly coming around to see that Democrats have to find ways to form alliances with Greens that will benefit both parties. One way is to support a concept Greens and others like the Center for Voting and Democracy are pushing called Instant Runoff Voting. Basically, voters rank two choices for an office. If one candidate fails to get 50 percent of the vote, the votersí second choices come into play. Under this system, Gore would have easily taken the presidency he won in 2000 without the hanging chads and despite the Republican fraud. And third parties like the Greens would have a better idea of their support ñ many progressive Democrats like me would give them my second-choice vote - and not be accused of spoiling elections. The concept has been tested in other countries - Australia uses it for parliamentary elections, as does the Republic of Ireland for presidential contests. San Francisco recently adopted IRV for major offices beginning in November 2003. The New Mexico state senate passed the measure in 2001, but it died in the house. For more information, visit http://www.fairvote.org/irv/index.html. I also support proportional representation, a more complicated system where parties obtain the proportion of positions according to the proportion of votes they receive. This system is at least partially used in 39 out of 41 major democratic countries, withthe U.S. and Canada the only exceptions. For instance, if the Democrats gained 49 percent of the national vote, they would receive 49 percent of the Congressional seats. If Greens get 3 percent of the vote, they actually would gain some representation in Congress. More info on this can be viewed at http://www.fairvote.org/pr/index.html. Of the two, I think IRV is more likely to be supported by the major parties than proportional representation. That said, I still hope Green voters at least consider voting for Democrats, especially in Congressional races [Greens are fielding 42 candidates for the House and six for the Senate]. We need to kick these Republicans out of office before they control every single segment of our government. Republicans recruit phony candidates to run as Democrats in Michigan Republicans in Michigan recruited "stealth" candidates to run as phony Democrats for nine state Senate seats, all Democratic-controlled districts. Local newspapers ñ see, there are some good journalists out there ñ exposed the scam after an 18-year-old was recruited to run, violating a law in which state Senate candidates must be at least 21. Michigan Republican State Senator Ken Sikkema acknowledged Republican involvement in the scheme, attributing it to "overzealous staffers." Republicans manipulate voting machines in Texas In Dallas, Texas, a bastion of Republican strength where both Bush and Cheney have lived for several years, machines used for early voting are marking votes made for Democratic Sen. Candidate Ron Kirk in the column of Republican John Cornyn. Dallas County Democrats have sued to suspend early voting. Election officials blame mistakes on the calibration of the machines in the key Senate battle. I have lived in Dallas County for decades, and it has a long history of such electoral manipulation. I donít trust election officials here at all. Republicans intimidate African-American voters in Arkansas In Arkansas, Republican Sen. Tim Hutchinson and Democratic attorney general Mark Pryor are locked in another tight, key Senate race. Democrats have charged that two Hutchinson campaign workers tried to harass African-Americans at a county courthouse by asking for identification ñ in addition to their voters registration cards - before they could vote. A Democratic Party official said it was a "calculated effort to intimidate African-American voters." Judging by what went on in 2000, especially in southern states like Arkansas, it sounds like Republicans are continuing their racist tactics. Missouri Republican election official accused of confusing issue In Missouri, Democrats have filed a lawsuit to block rules issued by Republican Secretary of State Matt Blunt concerning a law allowing a voter whose eligibility is questioned to cast a provisional ballot counted only if eligibility is later verified. The law was passed after Republicans complained of alleged voter fraud in strong Democratic precincts in St. Louis in 2000. Democrats say Bluntís new rules confuse the issue. South Dakota Republicans try to keep Native Americans from voting Republicans are trying to keep absentee votes made by Native Americans in South Dakota from being counted in the hard-fought Senate race between Democratic Sen. Tim Johnson and Republican Rep. John Thune. Republicans have asked for federal election monitors on American Indian reservations, which some say will intimidate new voters. Republicansí use of private planes from Enron and Air Force One Bush, Cheney, and other Republicans have spent thousands of taxpayersí money to campaign for Republican senators using Air Force One in recent months. Clinton and other Democrats did this, but not to the extent that Bush & Co. are doing so this year. Besides outspending Democrats by about five-to-one in the 2000 battle for Florida, Republicans used private planes from Enron Corp. and Halliburton Co., the firm headed by Dick Cheney that also practiced phony accounting fraud, to crisscross the state and block the counting of Florida votes. White House influence on Ventura administration in Minnesota Chief White House dirty trickster Karl Rove himself reportedly called Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura, a Reformer-Independent, and Secretary of State Mary Kiffmeyer, a Republican, to get them to agree to throw out absentee votes for the late Sen. Paul Wellstone, but retain those for Rep. Senate candidate Norm Coleman. A ruling issued by Kiffmeyerís office read like one of Roveís memos, not like previous rulings by the office. The Minnesota state Democratic Party took the issue to court and won a concession that new ballots have to be mailed to those who voted absentee. Ventura is also considering appointing an independent to Wellstoneís seat, which could throw the Senate to Republicans until new ones are installed in January. Previously, Bush himself called up Coleman to tell him to run for the Senate instead of governor, as Coleman originally planned to do. More dirty tricks in Florida The Sept. 10 primary in Florida was marred by widespread confusion, mostly in Floridaís two biggest Democratic-strong counties, Miami-Dade and Broward. Numerous glitches were reported concerning the touch-screen voting machines, causing long lines and delayed results. Rep. Gov. Jeb Bush tried to blame Democratic election officials in those counties for the problems, despite the fact that the Republican-controlled elections department ultimately calls the shots. In the Democratic primary, Bill McBride barely won over Janet Reno, the former U.S. attorney general who was strongly opposed by Bush. Also in Florida, misleading fliers are being circulated again, saying that some people should vote on a day after Nov. 5. Similar fliers were circulated in Florida before the 2000 election, which some say confused some voters there. Republicans try to turn the tables by accusing Democrats of dirty tricks The Republican National Committee has issued a hotline [1-866-NOT-TRUE] and Web site [http://democratattacks.com] to report supposed Democratic attacks and dirty tricks. Itís a case of the thieves trying to point the finger at others so no one will finger them. Here are some examples of "outrageous" Democratic "dirty tricks" reported to the RNC: * "Lois Capps is doing her usual thing, speaking about how Republicans are hurting the elderly." [The nerve! Imagine that, a Democrat telling the truth about Republicans! What a dirty attack!] * "There are television ads running in the greater Boise area attacking the president's plan." [Call the National Guard! A TV ad attacking the presidentís policies, oh no!] * "In Allentown, there was reported repeatedly on the news a bus trip to Canada for drugs, saying in the report that the people on the bus won't be voting for our Republican candidate because of his stance, then interviewed the head of the trip who endorsed O'Brien, the democratic congressional candidate. I didn't know (if) it was out of the game book, it wasn't presented that way, it was a local news story." [More Democrats controlling the news media, telling a newscaster what to say, no doubt!] I reported an attack to the RNC myself, though it was one done by Republicans. I havenít seen it listed on the RNC site yet. Should I hold my breath? Iím sure you have heard of more dirty tricks by Republicans this year. Itís amazing that we let them get away with it. Finally, thanks to all who sent emails, information, and links to other stories raising questions about Sen. Wellstoneís suspicious plane crash. I will continue to pursue those, believing that "accident" was the ultimate dirty trick played on that great American. Vote Democratic on Nov. 5. Thoreau can be emailed from http://www.oocities.org/jacksonthor/. The Top Ten Reasons to vote Republican in Nov. 2002 By Jackson Thoreau No. 10: So schoolchildren can pledge allegiance everyday to "one nation under God and Enron." No. 9: So super-wealthy Americans can afford to hire some more special guards to keep the increasing protesters and homeless population out of their sight when they venture into public places. No. 8: So more far-right judges who stop our elections to tell us who really won can be appointed to the Supreme Court. No. 7: So HMOs can replace your doctor with "customer service representatives," and so universities can teach courses on the proper way to say, "Do you want fries with that?" No. 6: So Wall Street interns can learn the ropes by gambling with Social Security funds in the stock market. No. 5: So Republicans can control all branches of our government and bring about a real dictatorship. No. 4: So your children and grandchildren can view some "nice, clean oil wells," instead of the scenery, when they visit our national parks. No. 3: So we can continue to blame everything that goes wrong on Clinton. No. 2: So the poor and minorities can fight and die disproportionately in perpetual wars to make the world safe for democracy and keeping Republicans in office. And the No. 1 reason to vote Republican in 2002: So Ann Coulter can be appointed Secretary of Foreign Affairs and either put up or shut up!!!!!
Jackson Thoreau is co-author of We Will Not Get Over It: Restoring a Legitimate White House. The 110,000-word electronic book can be downloaded at http://www.oocities.org/jacksonthor/ebook.html or at http://www.legitgov.org/we_will_not_get_over_it.html. Thoreau can be emailed at jacksonthor@justice.comThe Top Ten Reasons to vote Republican in Nov. 2002 Bush's Karen Hughes Leads Nasty, Desperate Republican Campaigns In Texas By Jackson Thoreau "Regarding the campaigns, I will be a loud and proud supporter of the Republican ticket and of Gov. Perry and of John Cornyn for the U.S. Senate, but I do not expect to be involved in any professional capacity in their campaigns. They have very capable people managing their campaigns and Iíve only got one campaign left in me and as I said I hope itís the presidentís re-election in 2004." ñ Karen Hughes to MSNBC, July 8, 2002 "Karen Hughes spent Wednesday stumping for Republican Senate hopeful John CornynÖ.Hughes, who resigned in April to go home with her family to Texas but still keeps in close contact with the president, shrugged off questions about whether her presence was a sign that Bush is concerned about the tight race. She said she had offered to campaign with Cornyn in April because the race is important to her personally." ñ Associated Press story, Sept. 18, 2002 Earlier this year, when key Bush babysitter and ghostwriter Karen Hughes left Washington, tearfully saying how much she missed Texas, I was one of the few columnists in the country to call Hughesí bluff. While others were taking Hughesí lies at face value, I wrote way back in May, "Hughes recently left the White House amid what some sources tell me were some key differences with Rove and others, as well as marching orders from Bush to help his Texas Republican friends. In other words, donít believe the BS fed us that Hughes just, sniff-sniff, ëmissed Texas.í" Therefore, I was not surprised to see how nasty and negative and desperate Republican Gov. Slick Rick Perry, who was appointed to that seat when Bush took over the White House, Senate candidate John Cornyn, and Lt. Gov. candidate David Dewhurst have become in their campaigns lately. I was not surprised to see Hughesí name actually appearing in mainstream news articles saying she was campaigning for Cornyn and others, despite her published comments saying she would not do so when she left Washington a few months before. I have come to expect lies uttered from Republicans not just on occasion, but every time they open their freaking mouths. I donít believe one word the Bush Republicans say [some like U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, one of the few House Republicans to oppose Bushís war resolution, deserve more respect]. Hughes, in fact, is lying about only being a campaigner for Cornyn. My sources say she has pretty much taken over Cornynís campaign from those "capable people" and is heavily involved in advising people running Perryís and Dewhurstís races. Bush mastermind Karl Rove is also heavily involved in advising these campaigns ñ Bush & Co. do not want to lose a top Texas position to the Democrats, which would be seen as a huge SLAAAAPPPPP!! to Bushís face. Bush himself has wasted more public taxpayersí dollars by flying several times recently on Air Force One to Texas to campaign for Cornyn, Perry, and Dewhurst, rather than actually work on issues like the economy and national security. Recent polls in these races have been closer than Bush can believe. Democratic Gov. candidate Tony Sanchez, who has spent millions trying to gain name recognition, recently trotted out a poll by a national firm he hired, Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin & Associates, that has him only three points behind Perry. Democratic Senate candidate Ron Kirk, a former Dallas mayor, has been neck-and-neck in polls with his Republican opponent for months, a seat Republicans have held for four decades that is seen as a key in the battle to control the Senate. Kirk has also picked up key endorsements like the Austin American-Statesman. Democratic Lt. Gov. candidate John Sharp, a former state comptroller who even Republicans like former baseball pitcher Nolan Ryan support, has also been very close in the polls. A big sticking point with independent voters in Texas is the stateís budget crisis that Bush left in his wake to steal the White House. Estimates run as high as a $12 billion shortfall next year. Bush squandered the surpluses he was fortunate to have as governor of Texas with corporate tax cuts and increased spending on prisons. Does that sound familiar, after Bush took our federal budget from having surpluses under Clinton to deficits again? Thatís why you see Perry running negative attack ad after negative attack ad against Sanchez. Most of the ads, such as Perry claiming a bank in which Sanchez was a director was involved in criminal activity, have been blatantly false. Thatís the kind of dirty campaigning Bush and Rove learned from Bushís fatherís campaign manager, Lee Atwater, who publicly confessed his sins before he died. Bush and Rove and Hughes, who can engage in lying and dirty campaigning with the worst of them, have never confessed such sins and have no plans to do so. Sanchez has run some negative ads against Perry ñ there is so much material here - but also more with a positive message, telling his ideas. Sanchez has mostly hit Slick Rick with helping out his campaign contributors at the expense of average taxpayers, including a horrendous insurance crisis in which companies that contributed mucho bucks to Perry raked over ratepayers with large increases that werenít justified. Sanchez has also rightly questioned Slick Rick becoming a multimillionaire during his political career by helping out right-wing business yahoos like James Leininger, a key contributor to Perryís campaigns. Perry said it was mere coincidence that he purchased 2,800 shares of stock in a hospital equipment company controlled by Leininger, Kinetic Concepts, in 1996 on the same day a California investment group started buying 2.2 million shares of the company, boosting the stock's value. Sure, it was a coincidence that Perry made $38,000 on that stock deal alone. Slick Rick also claimed coincidence that a property he bought in 1996 was sold for a $235,000 profit in 1999 just six days after Bush signed a bill that raised the value of the land by allowing more development. In probably Slick Rickís boldest move, he appointed former Enron Chairman Max Yzaguirre as chairman of the Public Utility Commission in June 2001, a few months before the Enron scandal broke. The day after Slick Rick appointed Yzaguirre, he accepted a $25,000 campaign contribution from Enron CEO Kenneth Lay. Yzaguirre presided over some 30 cases involving his former company in a clear conflict of interest before he was finally forced to resign from the PUC. Sanchez has also rightly pointed out how under Perry, the number of low-performing schools has risen and classroom sizes have become more overcrowded. In 1999, Slick Rick even supported slashing $250 million from early childhood and ninth-grade dropout prevention programs to pay for a sales tax cut. Sanchez is not the only candidate to criticize Slick Rick. Green candidate Rahul Mahajan, who at least admits there are differences between Democrats and Republicans, has hammered Perry on his inability to stop industrial plants from polluting, support of the death penalty, and poor healthcare record. Earl O'Neil, an independent running for Texas governor and owner of a small oil business in Abilene, has also soundly criticized Perry and Bush. On his Internet site, OíNeil says, "Under the last two Republican governors, we have witnessed a subtle move to eliminate smaller oil and gas producers and with good success. In 1990, there were 16,000 Texas oil and gas producers, today there are approximately 7,000 and losing more each day." Besides Perryís and Bushís favoritism to Big Oil, OíNeil opposes free-trade agreements like NAFTA they support. "I do not believe NAFTA has helped the Texas farmerÖ.Under the Republican farm bill, most subsidies are shared by 10 percent of the farmersÖ..Agriculture today is a classic example of Republican corporate theory." In response, all Slick Rick and Conniving Karen and Cancerous Karl can do is attack the messenger, which is usually aimed at some lying ad about Sanchez. Itís amazing they get away with this. Moving to the Senate race, Democrat Kirk has pretty much taken the high road, while being called one of the worst labels Republithugs can throw, a "liberal," in almost every ad Cornyn-Hughes-Rove does. [Sharp is called the same label in ads.] The Republithugs have also tried to call Kirk a high-priced corporate attorney, which he was at one point, but Kirk also balanced that by being a supporter of civil rights and the ACLU. Kirk once spoke at a Dallas ACLU banquet I co-chaired, something Cornyn would never dream of doing. Kirk is nowhere near a liberal ñ his Green opponent Roy Williams is more so ñ Kirk is a moderate who tries to find a balance. Heíll make a terrific senator ñ that body desperately needs at least ONE African-American. Meanwhile, Cornyn has made race an issue, as his press spokesman at one point called the top of the Democratic dream ticket, which features a Hispanic, African-American, and Anglo, while the top three Republicans are all white, a "racial quota system." Cornyn also refused to return large contributions made to him from Enron and Worldcom executives, made decisions favorable to keeping certain Worldcom and Enron records closed, and declined to release public records that would show who is contributing to Cornynís own political slush fund. While Kirk has campaigned on issues like saving Social Security, reducing the price of prescription drugs, and working on bipartisan measures to create jobs, Cornynís main answer is to say he will do whatever Bush-Cheney want him to do, such as support a blood-for-oil war in Iraq, put oil wells in national parks, and invest Social Security funds in the stock market. As attorney general, Cornyn mostly focused on local matters like child support and consumer complaints, which are not exactly federal issues a U.S. senator confronts. He has little background in national affairs, while Kirk headed one of the countryís largest cities and has been involved in federal committees like the Census one. The BS is flying in political campaigns across the country. The White House is running scared at the thought of Jeb Bush losing the Florida governorís race and is heavily involved in that campaign, to mention one other. But as they say in Texas, the BS is bigger ñ and more apparent - here. --10.15.02 Jackson Thoreau is co-author of We Will Not Get Over It: Restoring a Legitimate White House. The 110,000-word electronic book can be downloaded at http://www.oocities.org/jacksonthor/ebook.html or at http://www.legitgov.org/we_will_not_get_over_it.html. Thoreau can be emailed at jacksonthor@justice.com.
By Jackson Thoreau Proof of what I had been expecting came Tuesday: Under the illegitimate Bush regime, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. That didnít come from a liberal think tank; it came straight from the horseís mouth, the Republican-controlled U.S. Census Bureau. Once again, it only took Bush-Cheney one year to erase what Clinton-Gore had done. Under Clinton-Gore, the U.S. poverty rate dropped to 11.3 percent in 2000, tying the record low set in 1974. In the initial year of the Bush regime, the poverty rate climbed for the first time in eight years ñ since Poppyís administration - to 11.7 percent, the feds reported Tuesday. The 11.7 percent is just what the Census Bureau, which is under the Republican-led U.S. Commerce Department, will admit to ñ some believe the real poverty rate, like the real unemployment rate, is much higher. Moreover, the share of income going to the poorest fifth of households declined, for the first time in four years, from 3.6 percent in 2000 to 3.5 percent in 2001. And the percentage of income going to the richest 20 percent of households went the opposite way, increasing from 49.6 percent in 2000 to 49.8 percent in 2001 [I really had to dig to get that stat; the Republican-led Census Bureau is spinning the truth, hiding information, and deleting certain tables in an attempt to misrepresent and hide what is actually occurring]. In other words, the poor are multiplying and getting poorer, while the rich get richer. Thatís what many of us knew would happen under Bush-Cheney, and itís happening faster than many predicted. Republican spinsters will blame the terrorist acts of Sept. 11, 2001, for such trends, like the number of Americans living in poverty rising to 32.9 million in 2001, up from 31.6 million in 2000. Many blamed all the layoffs ñ which have continued at about the same rate in 2002 as 2001 - on those events and anything else that went haywire under Bush. But I blame Bush-Cheney. The buck stops there. Republicans always talk the talk about taking responsibility. Well, walk the walk, Repugs. Take some responsibility for this, suckers. Remember Bushís tax cuts for the super wealthy and funding cuts for programs that help poor and middle-income people in early 2001? I challenge anyone to name one thing Bush has done to help a person climb out of poverty. All this criminal has done is help his rich-buddy campaign contributors get filthy, bloody richer. Bush doesnít care about poor people, or even middle-income people. When are more people going to learn that? And heís worse than most Republicans who suck up to the wealthy because Bush tries to play up his Christian image more than most. Unlike Christ, who Bush is supposed to try to follow, Bush does nothing to help the poor. Heís just a big, stinking hypocrite, and I really get mad every time I see him posing with some poor kid in a Big Brothers center ñ whose funding he cuts ñ as a cynical attempt to gain some more votes. Bush just makes fools of people. And itís maddening as hell that more people donít see it, or if they do, donít speak out against it. As the 2002 elections approach, we have to hammer people with these wealth trends. Under Bush, the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer, the poverty rate is rising, and household income is falling. Keep repeating that to whomever you come across. Or you can say that the national unemployment rate rose from 5 to 7 percent under Bush I, declined from 7 to 4 percent under Clinton, then rose again from 4 to 5.7 percent under Bush II. Similarly, the poverty rate rose under Bush I [to as high as 15 percent], then dropped to 11.3 percent [tying the record low] under Clinton, and rose again under Bush II. So why do we keep electing these only-help-the-rich Republicans? Moreover, corporate layoffs are still significant. Some 1.1 million American workers were laid off in the first half of this year, about the same number laid off in the similar period last year, according to the Labor Department. In the first half of 2000 ñ under our last elected president ñ 300,000 fewer workers were sent packing. And donít believe the bull that corporate crooks and their apologists cite for such layoffs; most firms making layoffs are still making money. I was laid off in October 2001 after working for almost a decade as a reporter and editor for Belo Corp., which owns The Dallas Morning News and other properties. Belo blamed a poor bottom line in 2001 for the layoffs, although it just about broke even. In the first half of 2002, Belo made $57.3 million in net income. They replaced me with a younger reporter they could pay less and laid me off right before I would reach ten years with the company, qualifying for a better pension and benefits like more vacation. And now, the bastards are arrogantly ignoring the state investigators looking into my human rights age discrimination case. To repeat, the economy is in shambles, and all Bush cares about is further enriching his rich buddies in a immoral blood-for-oil war in Iraq that could help him and other Repugs remain in office because a lot of people are just too uninformed or confused or blindly patriotic to see through this war business. I hope enough people wise up come November and vote these Republican a-holes out of office. But I suspect Florida and other states have some more election rigging up their sleeves. Iím getting more cynical everyday, but until the evidence changes, what else am I to believe? --Sept. 25, 2002 Jackson Thoreau is co-author of We Will Not Get Over It: Restoring a Legitimate White House. The 110,000-word electronic book can be downloaded at http://www.oocities.org/jacksonthor or at http://www.legitgov.org/we_will_not_get_over_it.html. Thoreau can be emailed at jacksonthor@yahoo.com.
By Jackson Thoreau The Iraq attack is on. The shadow U.S. president, Head Chicken Hawk Cheney, sounded the call this week in a forceful speech. And I think Head Chicken Hawk Cheney is so wrong that itís hard to focus on anything else, even a looming deadline for a larger project. The Chicken Hawks are on the verge of starting World War III, or at least a much larger war in the Middle East that will eventually affect all of us. I know a lot of people want to stop them. I have already increased my support of peace organizations and made plans to participate in some public demonstrations in the Dallas area against the Chicken Hawksí offensive, blood-for-oil war. I have been writing letters, making calls, battling against Chicken Hawks in chat rooms and message boards, even invoking Christís Sermon on the Mount and call to love our enemies, to what seems like little avail. But I persist, as do many others, against the odds. Who knows, I might even march across the entire damned country again, as I did in 1984 in protest of Reagan-Bushís Cold War policies. Anyways, Head Chicken Hawk Cheney made it sound like Saddam Hussein is a menace to the world worse than Hitler was in the 1930s. A message to Chicken Hawks Cheney-Bush: Hussein might be bad in numerous ways, but Iraq is no Nazi Germany. And the U.S. today is more like Nazi Germany was than Iraq is. Iraq is still severely weakened by the Persian Gulf War of 1990-91, when our bombs destroyed many Iraqi civilian facilities like homes, schools, mosques, and hospitals and more than 100,000 Iraqis died, along with 148 Americans. And itís really hurt by the economic sanctions imposed by the UN in 1990, with underlying support from the U.S. More than one million additional Iraqis - many of them children under the age of five - have died of sanctions-related causes like amoebic dysentery and starvation. In fact, Ramsey Clark, the former U.S. Attorney General, reported to the UN Security Council in 1997 that the number of Iraqi children under age five who died increased from about 7,000 in 1989 to 57,000 in 1996. That number continued to rise to 78,000 dead in 1998, according to the Iraq Resource Information Site. Iraq has some 2,000 tanks and several hundred aircraft and spends a piddling $1.4 billion annually on defense, less than Vietnam, Columbia, and Kuwait. How can you compare tiny Iraq to Nazi Germany in the 1930s, which probably had the worldís most powerful military machine at the time and was a real threat to world peace? How is devastated Iraq supposed to overtake us, especially when UN inspectors like Scott Ritter say they have no weapons of mass destruction? If Saddam can get a nuclear bomb, so can any two-bit dictator, and then what do we do? Are we going to go after all the two-bit dictators? How will we find them all when we canít even locate bin Laden? Then look at the U.S.: We are arguably the most powerful, sophisticated military machine in known history. We spend about $396 billion a year on the military ñ and that number is expected to increase substantially in the coming years [at the height of the Cold War with the former Soviet Union, we spent about $300 billion]. The closest country in military spending is Russia at $60 billion annually, according to the Center for Defense Information. Another country in that "axis of evil" the Chicken Hawks wants us to fear so much, North Korea, spends even less at $1.3 billion. Iran, the third "evil" country, is up there at $9.1 billion but still only ranks 13th in the world in military spending [see http://www.cdi.org/issues/wme/spendersFY03.html for a list of what other countries spend]. The Chicken Hawks lie and spin propaganda as much as the Nazis. They are taking away many of our civil liberties as we speak. They have concentration camps for people they call "terrorists," many of whom are being held without any rights, without as much as us knowing their names. Some say our government plans to impose martial law and put many of us in such camps in the near future. A Web site with more information on the comparison between us and the Nazis is at http://members.aol.com/rantpage/newtsies.htm; also see W. David Jenkinsí and Sara DeHartís excellent series on the subject at http://www.bushwatch.net/lost.htm. So tell me, which country is more likely bent on world domination, US or Iraq? Itís weird that Republican leaders like Dick Armey have raised more questions than high-profile Democratic ones. Is that because many Democrats fear the Israeli lobby, which has already helped defeat two Congress members, Cynthia McKinney and Ike Hilliard? Doesnít Israel and its supporters realize that attacking Iraq could make it worse for Israel in the long run, especially if Hussein attacks Israel, Israel counters, and countries like Iran, Syria, and Libya join Iraq against Israel? Then Pakistan and India could fire nuclear weapons at each other. Then we will have a real mess. And meanwhile, where is bin Laden? I do believe we have fought just wars, but invading Iraq is not one of them. My father fought in one, World War II, when we were attacked and the Nazi criminals threatened to dominate our world. If I was of age during such a war as that, I would have gladly answered the call. Itís sad that I now have to say we now seem more like the ones who want world domination than the ones who would fight against the forces that want to rule the planet. We hold all of the cards in this game. We can force World War III or attempt to bring about a lasting peace through political, diplomatic efforts. We can join with the international community more to target bad guys like Hussein through world courts and sanctions. Or we can blow the world to bits. Recently, thousands of patriots protested Bushís war and environmental policies at his appearance in Portland, Ore. The protesters were a cross section of middle America, including babies, young children, the elderly, and people in wheelchairs. They were met by fascist police in riot gear who fired rubber bullets at them, sprayed tear gas in babiesí faces, and choked and beat defenseless older women. For photos and reports on this outrageous, fascist police action, go to http://portland.indymedia.org:8081/front.php3?article_id=17241&group=webcast. Many people blamed the violence on the victims and told protesters not to bring their children to such actions. But the ones who are to blame for the violence are the ones who did it, which in this case, as usual, were the police and the Bush forces who put them up to it. It's important to allow our children to participate in democracy, not just read about it in textbooks. Democracy might get messy at times, but it's our responsibility to show our kids that you have to stand up for what you think is right. You have to stand up to the Nazi bullies. I brought my son to a Washington, D.C., demonstration against Bush in May 2001 when he was 1 and to another in Texas before that. I plan to continue to bring him to such events, but I might think twice about certain events if I believe we might be met by fascist police. It's important for protesters to bring their children to show the media, police, government, and everyone else that we are middle America, we have families, and we aren't going to stand for what the illegitimate leaders in the White House are doing to our country and the planet. We are not just some radical leftovers from the '60s ñ I was only 10 in 1969. We are Patriots who want our country back. Look at the Boston Tea Party of 1770. That was a violent protest in which property was vandalized for a reason, and we glorify the participants, as we should. In todayís protests, do we have the right to damage property when it works to show a point, like point out how the tax on tea was wrong? Thatís one of many questions up for debate. One question that should not be debated is that now is the time for action, as strong as you can muster. We must continue to stand up to the Chicken Hawks the way our forefathers did the British and patriotic Americans have done throughout our country's existence, until we finally cast them into the fiery furnaces of their own Hell. Our forefathersí legacy ñ and our childrenís future - demand no less. --September 4, 2002
By Jackson Thoreau On July 9, I drove by the house where Dick Cheney lived in the wealthy Dallas suburb of Highland Park when he and other Republicans stole the White House some 20 months before. I have driven by this $2.7 million mansion numerous times since Cheney sold it in late November 2000 to Dianne Cash, a major Republican donor who owns another Highland Park mansion. I'm not exactly sure what makes me drive by this mansion so much. Perhaps I'm just curious to see if anyone is actually inhabiting this house, or if it was just sold quickly so Cheney could act like he wasn't living there in November 2000 in violation of the 12th Amendment to our Constitution. I've never seen any evidence of inhabitation, no cars parked in the driveway or trash put out for collection. Perhaps I'm just outraged, searching for anything to hang this guy and administration out to dry. Or perhaps I see in this empty house that was quickly sold by an official with an emptier conscience, this sham of a deal in the midst of a wider coup d'etat, some symbolism for what is wrong with our country. On July 9, I observed something different from my other visits to this well-heeled neighborhood, where the cops have the reputation of stopping anyone who doesn't look wealthy [I was once ticketed here for not wearing a seat belt - as a passenger - on my way to a fund-raiser for groups that fight hunger in downtown Dallas]. There were several cops in front of the Cash-Cheney mansion, as if they were guarding the home from a potential terrorist attack. A partial roadblock was in view. An officer waved me past. I looked at Cheney's old home and saw no cars in the circle driveway, no evidence of inhabitation, once again. Why the cops - was it more symbolism of the approaching police state? It was a weird, almost surreal scene. I nodded to the officer and drove on. A few miles down the road in the Dallas city limits, I passed by much smaller homes. Many were in need of repair and paint. There were no cops in sight. Some people stood on street corners, asking for money. I opened my window and waved a bearded man to me. "I'm down on my luck, buddy, can you help?" he asked. I handed him a bill and nodded. "I know what you mean, man. It's like the '80s have returned." He nodded. "Times are tough. They always seem to be tough for me." The next day, times got tougher in Cheney's world, too. Judicial Watch, the same conservative watchdog organization that hounded Clinton for eight years, filed a lawsuit against Cheney and the Dallas-based company, Halliburton Co., that he headed from 1995 until 2000. The action accuses Halliburton of overstating revenues by $445 million from 1999 through 2001 to deceive investors and try to keep its stock price high. The previous day, Public Citizen, a more liberal watchdog group, called for an independent counsel to investigate Halliburton's Enron-like phony accounting shenanigans. Others called for action against Bush for his insider trading and other transactions, such as two low-interest loans he received from Harken Energy Corp. when he was a director of the same firm. And the mainstream media jumped on the actions, for a change, unlike two months ago when it virtually ignored the SEC investigation of Halliburton [for example, the Dallas Morning News, where I once worked as a reporter, didn't even name Cheney in its May 29 story on the SEC probe and ran it in the business section, not on the front page]. The Judicial Watch lawsuit, which the media covered largely because it was a conservative outfit going after conservatives and because members of groups like Democrats.com and Citizens for Legitimate Government hounded them [Public Citizen was mostly ignored], was featured on the Web sites of MSNBC, CNN, USA Today, and others all day Wednesday. Some, like the Dallas Morning News, which has largely overlooked Cheney's misdeeds at Halliburton despite him working right under its nose, downplayed or ignored the lawsuit on Wednesday, once again. While Bush hypocritically called for an end to the kind of insider loans and deals he once benefited from, Cheney cowardly hid in his White House bunker all day, letting his spokespeople issue the expected "no comments" or pathetic, unspecific denials. Yep, that's a great example of corporate and political leaders taking responsibility, huh, kids? In my mind, there's little question Bush and Cheney are corporate and political criminals. The case against Bush has been documented more extensively than the one against Cheney - for example, read the late J.H. Hatfield's bio on Bush called Fortunate Son. Cheney is another matter. One of the few hard looks I've seen on him was, coincidentally, just released July 11 by the non-partisan MoveOn Bulletin [http://www.moveon.org/moveonbulletin/bulletin1.html]. Perhaps some are intimidated, but I'm on the record as going so far as to call Cheney evil ["The Evil Dick Cheney," June 21, 2002, http://www.americaheldhostile.com/ed062102-1.shtml]. After that column, which covered everything from Halliburton's illegal deals with Iraq, Libya, and other countries to Cheney's CIA connections, appeared on America Held Hostile, Bush Watch, Online Journal, Democratic Underground, Buzzflash, Smirking Chimp, Liberal Slant, and other sites, I received an outpouring of response. Joe Jackson even contacted me to be on his radio show in Utah. Many said I didn't go far enough, as they linked Cheney to bizarre mind-control experiments and sex and drug parties [no, I can't confirm those]. Others pointed to more easily-verified sins, such as Cheney - as Gerald Ford's chief of staff - firing former CIA director William Colby in 1975 to install Bush Sr. at that position after Colby began to talk too much in public about CIA abuses. There's also Cheney not voting in 14 of 16 local elections in the Dallas area before November 2000. Some called me a communist and issued the usual lame-brained insults in defending the indefensible [for the record, I have never been a communist, but I've been a columnist, which to some right-wingers means about the same thing]. It was refreshing to see how upset some people were about Cheney's - and thus Bush's - misdeeds, and they weren't taking it, unlike the way many took the Republicans pilfering of the White House in 2000. They weren't resigned to it. Some even saw some hope that things could turn. And it was even more interesting to see that 95 percent of those responding to a CNN poll Wednesday on whether Cheney should answer questions about Halliburton's accounting fraud said yes. Two days before July 9, I attended two religious services on Sunday - don't ask me why, I'm not that religious. One was our regular Texas Methodist Sunday service, where instead of scripture readings and a sermon, I listened to patriotic tunes and messages that "freedom is not free." They even flashed a large photo of Bush, commander-in-thief, on the wall. My wife, who is pregnant with our second child, said she felt nauseous several times. I knew exactly how she felt, though the sick feeling in my stomach wasn't from a growing baby. Later that evening, we attended a community celebration at another church, where our young son enjoyed a pony ride, fireworks show, and petting zoo. We had to sit through a fundamentalist revival, more patriotic songs reminding us of the greatness of America, and more messages that "freedom is not free." A preacher even prayed for Bush to gain intelligence. If that occurred, I really would start believing in miracles again. The sick feeling in my innards remained. I'm sure this is how some felt as the wave of Hitler's Nazism grew in Germany in the 1930s. I'm sure some felt the same sickness, the hopelessness, as McCarthyism raged across our country in the 1950s, destroying lives and careers. Many more felt it the day they killed John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., Robert Kennedy, John Lennon. Though I didn't vote for Carter in 1980 and thus helped Reagan gain power, I later felt it when Reagan brought us to the brink of a nuclear war with the former Soviet Union. And now, instead of the Russians being our bogeyman to fuel the right-wing's power grabs and militaristic build-up, it's the Arabs. And Arab-Americans. The Los Angeles Times reported on July 6 that courts and prosecutors have been deluged with hate crimes against Arab-Americans and people from Pakistan and other countries who are now American citizens [http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-backlash6jul06.story]. That concerns me not only because hate crimes are wrong, but because my wife is Arab-American, thus my son and child-on-the-way are part Arab-American. And I don't like the kind of country that Republican leaders like Bush-Cheney are developing. For one thing, many Republicans act like we're the first country to undergo a tragedy. They conveniently forget that African-Americans and some other minorities have long had to endure terrorism in this country and not just of flying in airplanes or working in tall buildings or key government buildings. Many were taken from their homes in the middle of the night and lynched. Many were killed as they prayed in church. That's terrorism. Europe has had to deal with the real threat of bombings at civilian sites for decades at the hands of the Irish Republican Army and other such groups. I walked through Belfast, Ireland, in 1985 under clouds of threats - a bomb went off in a building close to where we stayed - as part of a courageous peace project, and it was literally a war zone. But most residents there weren't wringing their hands, acting like it was the end of the world. They were dealing with it, quietly and bravely. Some people there seemed to know as much about my country as I did. Many were interested in helping less developed nations move forward, even as tanks patrolled their streets. Many Americans are like the spoiled rich kid who doesn't like the teacher saying he can't be class president without actually winning an election. In the eyes of most of the rest of the world, the U.S. is the spoiled rich kid who eats the whole cake, rather than leave any pieces for others. While many Americans work to erase that perception, many more are selfish and unaware, even uncaring, of what's been going on around us for years. When Bush-Cheney pull us out of the Kyoto Treaty and the World Court, many of us applaud. Then we wonder why most Europeans don't support our planned invasion of Iraq - which I sure as hell don't support - and other international initiatives. I'm not saying we shouldn't have a time of patriotic outbursts to help us deal with what occurred last Sept. 11. Some of that is fine and understandable. But we also should not forget there is a darker side to our country - the other America - that we still have to fix. We can't just continue to go around repeating nationalistic "We're No. 1" slogans and ignore the problems, as Bush-Cheney would like us all to do. We have to do more to bridge our deep racial divide, to reverse the growing homelessness and poverty as the rich get richer, to count every vote. And we have to make a more sincere effort to work with other nations on international problems. I will continue to drive by Cash-Cheney's empty mansion, the symbol of the emptier consciences of those who continue to ignore the growing chasm between the haves and have nots. Even though I was among the more than 2 million Americans laid off from a job myself last year - the most since 1982 - I will continue to give directly to the growing number of homeless I see. Let them spend the money how they want, even if they buy cheap liquor. They cannot afford the same prescribed medication that richer Americans use to anesthetize their existence. I will not turn my head at the growing ranks of the poor - after equaling a record low 11.3 percent in 2000 under Clinton-Gore, the poverty rate is believed to have grown under Bush-Cheney - then sing patriotic songs in church about supposed unity in America. I will not support an administration that is mostly about hypocrisy and cynicism, as it superficially labors to keep "one nation, under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance and only deepens the actual social and environmental problems with its selfish, help-the-rich-get-richer policies. For example, a study released last month by Citizens for Tax Justice and Children's Defense Fund said that 52 percent of the Bush-Cheney tax cuts will go to the wealthiest one percent of Americans by 2010, if that program is not changed. Meanwhile, Bush's budget included no new funding for Head Start or child care programs. As CDF President Marian Wright Edelman said, "The Bush administration's words say 'Leave no child behind.' The Bush administration's deeds say 'Leave no millionaires behind.'" That's a key aspect to note when dealing with Bush-Cheney; do not believe what they say, but look at what they do. Let me say this as clearly as I can: We are not one nation, under God. We are two nations - even more than two nations if you count the haves, have nots, and those teetering on the edge - with a wide diversity of opinions on the interpretation of a higher power. We are multiple nations, multiple factions, trying to gain access to power, trying just to survive, watching those strange, fatalistic reality TV shows with horrific amusement. I really believe that, down the road, it will be organizations like Democrats.com and Citizens for a Legitimate Government, Web sites such as Bush Watch, Buzzflash, America Held Hostile, Democratic Underground, Smirking Chimp, Liberal Slant, BartCop, and Online Journal, Internet groups like Not My President, the Fallout Shelter, and Citizens Against Bush, progressive media members like Robert Scheer, Molly Ivins, and Meria Heller, and courageous politicians like Cynthia McKinney, that will be seen as providing the most light through this tunnel of darkness we are passing through right now. There are times when we're working to expose the Bush-Cheney regime until 4 a.m., to the detriment of our health and family life. But something drives us onward. Let us continue to speak out. Let us continue to light the way to higher ground, so we can gain some perspective on where we have to go to truly become one nation. Better yet, one world. Thoreau can be emailed from http://www.oocities.org/jacksonthor/.
Jackson Thoreau is a contributor
to America Held Hostile and
co-author of We Will Not Get Over It: Restoring a Legitimate
White House. The 110,000-word electronic book can be downloaded
at:
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