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Thursday, November 11, 2004
Simon Rosenberg and Howard Dean
by kos
Thu Nov 11th, 2004 at 14:08:37 PST
Not that I hadn't considered this before, but I'm glad ABC News writes about a possible Howard Dean/Simon Rosenberg team to head the DNC.
Several top party strategists are in the mix. Rosenberg, the president of the New Democrat Network, has the support of many of younger party fund-raisers and is seen by some as a hands-on manager who could correct the party's problems over the long term. Some Democrats partial to Rosenberg believe he'd make a great behind-the-scenes facilitator for a party chair like Dean. Among the other tidbits in this story:
- Brazille and Ickes do not want the job. Neither do former NH Guv Shaheen or current VA guv Warner (who hopefully makes a Senate bid in 2006).
- Vilsack (IA guv) and Barnes (former GA guv) DO want the job. Both are being encouraged by the "moderate" wing of the party.
- The AFL/CIO's John Sweeney, not a Dean ally, seems comfortable with a Dean chairmanship.
As to the challenges facing the new DNC chair, this piece notes the following:
- reforming dilapidated state parties in many of the battleground states, which are incapable of years-long voter registration efforts and which pale against much stronger GOP organizations in those same states;
- curing disaffection by fund-raisers who are inclined to spend to keep the Democrats competitive but want bang for their buck and need benchmarks, like election victories, to keep them engaged;
- bringing together a fractured base, combined with worries that a once solid hold on Hispanics has slipped;
- dealing with the 2008 primary calendar and serving as an honest broker between Iowa and New Hampshire, which would like to keep their first-in-the-nation status, and states like Michigan, which want to sunder the old calendar in favor of more influential regional primaries;
- dealing with labor unions, which face internal struggles to reform how they operate and hemorrhage hundreds of thousands of workers to nonunion contracts every year.
Here's my take: we need someone who isn't part of the status quo. If we get another party insider, we'll get more of the same: losing.
Take out Clinton from the equation, and we haven't had any real electoral success at the federal level in over a generation. Is Dean the answer? Who knows, but what do we have to lose? It's not as if the current crew have any clue about winning.
And this crap about being a "moderate" party is just that -- crap. We got the independent voters this time. Didn't mean shit. We still lost. The Republicans learned this years ago. It's about time we learn the lesson. This doesn't mean becoming the party of Dennis Kucinich. It means becoming the party of Democrats, unafraid to stand for something other than Republican-lite.
Posted at 11:51 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
Stop Simon Rosenberg
Simon Rosenberg should NOT be the DNC Chair. The Blogsphere should NOT support him.
Here is why:
1. Vision
2. National Majority
3. Charisma
4. Youth
5. Internet savvy
6. Integrity
7. Centrism
8. Message
9. Broadmindedness
http://www.bopnews.com/archives/002411.html
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/11/192758/09
1. Vision
Simon is well known as an individual of vision. We want a short sighted party, one that is always scrambling from one ad hoc battle to the next, with no idea of the future, and no ability to speak to the aspirations of Americans.
2. National Majority
Simon is well known as someone who wants the Democratic Party to nationalize the issues and seek a majority and governing coalition. We all know that the Democratic Party is much better off fighting every election over backyard issues, and having no principles that will get in the way.
3. Charisma
Having a DNC Chair who is sauve and engaging would ruin the party's long cultivated image of being boring and flat. People would begin to confuse us with Republicans, who are often telegenic. Don't undercut our brand! Boring is Beautiful!
4. Youth
The Democratic Party wants to be the party of old things, musty things, dry things, not the party of the future, and of an America that is part of the 21st century. Afterall in 1932, one speaker at the Democratic Convention stood up and said that there would never be any progress from Thomas Jefferson, and never should be. If it was good enough to win the election of 1808, it should be good enough to win the election of 2008.
5. Internet savvy
We don't want a DNC chair associated with new media, and the future of communications. In fact, we should go back to carving our message on clay tablets, because otherwise we will scare off people who still think the printing press is a controverial idea.
Where would we be in the blogsphere if we couldn't complain about the DNC? Think how many thousands of bloggers would be out of cheap sources of jokes. And being listened to. God, we'd all have a heart attack if that happened.
6. Integrity
The Democratic Party's long tradition is to create openings for the Republicans to question our integrity. Appointing an individual as soundly and squarly honest as Simon would be a major blow to this long standing policy.
7. Centrism
Simon is well known for believing that the future of the Democratic Party is as the standard bearer for the broad majority of Americans. Instead, we should appoint someone who is either a Zell out, so that we won't be attacked by Miller any more, or who has experience blowing leads in an election, to establish continuity with our recent past. Merely doing the greatest good for the greatest number by winning elections is so 20th century.
8. Message
Simon is well known as someone who believes that the Democratic party should have a harmonized message to take to voters, a clear and concise phrasing of why people are Democrats. The current cacophony was good enough to lose control of the governorships of the largest states, the Presidency, the Congress, the Supreme Court and the national agenda. Why mess with failure? It can't get any worse than this.
9. Broadmindedness
Simon is well known for being able to talk across the spectrum of the Democratic Party, and for opening doors. We want a cold, aloof, and closed party apparatus, lest the Republicans steal all our good ideas.
In fact, the only thing that can be said in his favor is that the New Democratic Network doesn't have one of those trendy browser icons. Don't need those either. After all, Martin van Buren didn't need them.
Posted at 11:26 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
Moveon: Investigate Our Vote
Questions are swirling around whether the election was conducted honestly or not. We need to know -- was it or wasn't it?
If people were wrongly prevented from voting, or if legitimate votes were mis-counted or not counted at all, we need to know so the wrongdoers can be held accountable, and to help prevent this from happening again. That's why we believe that:
"Congress must investigate the integrity of the voting process in the 2004 election." |
http://www.moveon.org/investigatethevote/
Posted at 10:50 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
Fuck Simon, we can do worse
by Stirling Newberry
Thu Nov 11th, 2004 at 18:07:16 PST
( From the diaries -- kos)
Simon Rosenberg should NOT be the DNC Chair. The Blogsphere should NOT support him.
Here is why:
1. Vision
Simon is well known as an individual of vision. We want a short sighted party, one that is always scrambling from one ad hoc battle to the next, with no idea of the future, and no ability to speak to the aspirations of Americans.
2. National Majority
Simon is well known as someone who wants the Democratic Party to nationalize the issues and seek a majority and governing coalition. We all know that the Democratic Party is much better off fighting every election over backyard issues, and having no principles that will get in the way.
3. Charisma
Having a DNC Chair who is sauve and engaging would ruin the party's long cultivated image of being boring and flat. People would begin to confuse us with Republicans, who are often telegenic. Don't undercut our brand! Boring is Beautiful!
4. Youth
The Democratic Party wants to be the party of old things, musty things, dry things, not the party of the future, and of an America that is part of the 21st century. Afterall in 1932, one speaker at the Democratic Convention stood up and said that there would never be any progress from Thomas Jefferson, and never should be. If it was good enough to win the election of 1808, it should be good enough to win the election of 2008.
5. Internet savvy
We don't want a DNC chair associated with new media, and the future of communications. In fact, we should go back to carving our message on clay tablets, because otherwise we will scare off people who still think the printing press is a controverial idea.
Where would we be in the blogsphere if we couldn't complain about the DNC? Think how many thousands of bloggers would be out of cheap sources of jokes. And being listened to. God, we'd all have a heart attack if that happened.
6. Integrity
The Democratic Party's long tradition is to create openings for the Republicans to question our integrity. Appointing an individual as soundly and squarly honest as Simon would be a major blow to this long standing policy.
7. Centrism
Simon is well known for believing that the future of the Democratic Party is as the standard bearer for the broad majority of Americans. Instead, we should appoint someone who is either a Zell out, so that we won't be attacked by Miller any more, or who has experience blowing leads in an election, to establish continuity with our recent past. Merely doing the greatest good for the greatest number by winning elections is so 20th century.
8. Message
Simon is well known as someone who believes that the Democratic party should have a harmonized message to take to voters, a clear and concise phrasing of why people are Democrats. The current cacophony was good enough to lose control of the governorships of the largest states, the Presidency, the Congress, the Supreme Court and the national agenda. Why mess with failure? It can't get any worse than this.
9. Broadmindedness
Simon is well known for being able to talk across the spectrum of the Democratic Party, and for opening doors. We want a cold, aloof, and closed party apparatus, lest the Republicans steal all our good ideas.
In fact, the only thing that can be said in his favor is that the New Democratic Network doesn't have one of those trendy browser icons. Don't need those either. After all, Martin van Buren didn't need them.
Posted at 10:15 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
Filibuster Alberto Gonzalez
The Alberto Gonzalez Torture Memo advocates legal tricks to circumvent the Geneva Convention. Gonzalez said the law was quaint. He also refused to uphold the Vienna Convention.
The blood from Abu Ghraib is on the hands of Alberto Gonzalez and the Supreme Court has ruled illegal his Gitmo internment. Domestically, Alberto Gonzalez has served Enron as a lapdog and worked as a death expeditor in Texas.
Abu Graib Gonzalez belongs in the Hague, not the Justice Department.
This nomination is inadequate to preserve the rule of law and will be rejected by every Senator who cares about basic human values.
From dKosopedia, the free political encyclopedia.
- Gonzales was largely responsible for the chain of events that led to Abu Ghraib - actually writing a memo to Bush advocating the disregard of Geneva Convention torture rules, one of the so-called Torture Memos.
- Gonzeles was the legal architect for the Gitmo detainee system, much of which various courts (including the Supreme Court) have ruled unconstitutional.
- Gonzales had a tight financial and political connection to Enron, making him unable to impartially handle the largest corporate fraud in modern history or to enforce the laws needed to prevent the next Enron-like scandal.
Quite a track record for a lawyer, huh? Get the word out that we cannot have this guy be our #1 law enforcement officer. Details below:
1. Albert Gonzales is currently White House General Counsel. While there, he "asked for" and received a memorandum regarding the "Status of Taliban Forces ... Under the Geneva Conventions." The memo concludes that the Taliban forces are not covered under the Geneva Convention, which protects prisoners of war from torture. Gonzales let his feelings be known in a January 25, 2002 memo to the President, writing:
In my judgment, this new paradigm [the war on terror] renders obsolete Geneva's [i.e., the Geneva Convention's] strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions.
Gonzales's pro-torture memo gave fruit to an Order by the President accepting this rationale, making it part of what what Newsweek called the "root of torture" that led to the Abu Ghraib debacle.
2. Also while at the White House, Gonzales was the author of the Gitmo detainment procedures:
[H]e drew up the rules for holding suspected terrorists at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The detainees have been designated enemy combatants, denied prisoner-of-war status under the international Geneva Convention. These rules have repeatedly been rejected by federal courts as unconstitutional, including the Supreme Court last summer.
3. Gonzales is "inextricably tied" to Enron, casting doubt on his ability to impartially handle the biggest corporate fraud in history. As the described in the press even now:
Gonzales also has connections to scandal-ridden energy giant Enron. He is a former partner in the Houston law firm Vinson and Elkins, which represented Enron. He also received $6,500 in campaign contributions from the company when he ran for re-election to the Texas Supreme Court. Indeed, Gonzales got rich off of Enron as a corporate partner at Vinson & Elkins, which is the law firm that was sued for crafting these deals.
Remember, the federal government's case against Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling is still ongoing. Gonzales owes his fortune and much of his early political future to Ken Lay, so making him the nation's top law enforcement officer while the federal government prosecutes Lay presents an obvious conflict of interest. Also, we cannot trust the investigation and enforcement of rules against the future "Enrons" to a corporate lawyer who was possibly contributed to the Enron debacle in the first place.
Alberto Gonzalez:
Alberto Gonzalez
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=246536
Alberto Gonzales: A Record of Injustice
As White House Counsel
GONZALES APPROVED MEMO AUTHORIZING TORTURE: An August 2002 Justice Department memo "was vetted by a larger number of officials, including...the White House counsel's office and Vice President Cheney's office." According to Newsweek, the memo "was drafted after White House meetings convened by George W. Bush's chief counsel, Alberto Gonzales, along with Defense Department general counsel William Haynes and [Cheney counsel] David Addington." The memo included the opinion that laws prohibiting torture do "not apply to the President's detention and interrogation of enemy combatants." Further, the memo puts forth the opinion that the pain caused by an interrogation must include "injury such as death, organ failure, or serious impairment of body functions—in order to constitute torture." The methods outlined in the memo "provoked concerns within the CIA about possible violation of the federal torture law [and] also raised concerns at the FBI, where some agents knew of the techniques being used" overseas on high-level al Qaeda officials. [Gonzales 8/1/02 memo; WP, 6/27/04; Newsweek, 6/21/04; NYT, 6/27/04]
GONZALES BELIEVES MANY GENEVA CONVENTIONS PROVISIONS ARE OBSOLETE: A 1/25/02 memo written by White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales said "the war against terrorism is a new kind of war" and "this new paradigm renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions." The memo pushes to make al Qaeda and Taliban detainees exempt from the Geneva Conventions' provisions on the proper, legal treatment of prisoners. The administration has been adamant that prisoners at Guantanamo are not protected by the Geneva Conventions. [Gonzales 1/25/02 memo; Newsweek, 5/24/04]
GONZALES ADMITTED HIS VIEWS 'COULD UNDERMINE U.S. MILITARY CULTURE': The 1/25/02 memo shows Alberto Gonzales was aware of the risk that ignoring the Geneva Conventions could create for the military. One concern expressed is that failing to apply the Geneva Conventions "could undermine U.S. military culture which emphasizes maintaining the highest standards of conduct in combat, and could introduce an element of uncertainty in the status of adversaries," which is what happened at Abu Ghraib. Secretary of State Colin Powell strongly warned against taking this decision, as did lawyers from the Judge Advocate General's Corps, or JAG. This week, a federal judge ruled that "President Bush had both overstepped his constitutional bounds and improperly brushed aside the Geneva Conventions" when he established military tribunals in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to try detainees as war criminals. [Gonzales 1/25/02 memo; Bloomberg, 6/14/04; New York Times, 11/9/04]
GONZALES BLOCKS INFORMATION FROM CONGRESS: Historically, senators have been allowed to review some memoranda by judicial nominees. But, in a letter [about nominee Miguel Estrada], Gonzales told the Democrats that the administration would not produce the memos, because to do so would chill free expression among administration lawyers and violate the principle of executive privilege, which protects the internal deliberations of the president's aides. [New Yorker, 5/19/03]
As Texas Chief Legal Counsel
DEATH PENALTY MEMOS: GONZALES'S NEGLIGENT COUNSEL: As chief legal counsel for then-Gov. Bush in Texas, Gonzales was responsible for writing a memo on the facts of each death penalty case – Bush decided whether a defendant should live or die based on the memos. An examination of the Gonzales memoranda by the Atlantic Monthly concluded, "Gonzales repeatedly failed to apprise the governor of crucial issues in the cases at hand: ineffective counsel, conflict of interest, mitigating evidence, even actual evidence of innocence." His memos caused Bush frequently to approve executions based on "only the most cursory briefings on the issues in dispute." Rather than informing the governor of the conflicting circumstances in a case, "The memoranda seem attuned to a radically different posture, assumed by Bush from the earliest days of his administration—one in which he sought to minimize his sense of legal and moral responsibility for executions." [Atlantic Monthly, July/August, 2003]
MEMORANDUM ON TERRY WASHINGTON: A CASE STUDY IN INCOMPETENCE: In his briefing on death-row defendant Terry Washington – a mentally retarded 33-year-old man with the communication skills of a seven-year-old – Gonzales devoted nearly a third of his three-page report to the gruesome details of the crime, but referred "only fleetingly to the central issue in Washington's clemency appeal—his limited mental capacity, which was never disputed by the State of Texas—and present[ed] it as part of a discussion of 'conflicting information' about the condemned man's childhood." In addition, Gonzales "failed to mention that Washington's mental limitations, and the fact that he and his ten siblings were regularly beaten with whips, water hoses, extension cords, wire hangers, and fan belts, were never made known to the jury, although both the district attorney and Washington's trial lawyer knew of this potentially mitigating evidence." Nor did he mention that Washington's lawyer had "failed to enlist a mental-health expert" to testify on Washington's behalf, even though "ineffective counsel and mental retardation were in fact the central issues raised in the thirty-page clemency petition" it was Gonzales's job to review. This all came at a time when "demand was growing nationwide to ban executions of the retarded." [Atlantic Monthly, July/August, 2003]
GONZALES TOLD GOV. BUSH HE COULD IGNORE INTERNATIONAL LAW: In 1997, Alberto Gonzales wrote a memo for then Gov. Bush to justify non-compliance with the Vienna Convention. The Vienna Convention, ratified by the Senate in 1969, was "designed to ensure that foreign nationals accused of a crime are given access to legal counsel by a representative from their home country." Gonzales sent a letter to the U.S. State Department in which he argued that the treaty didn't apply to the State of Texas, as Texas was not a signatory to the Vienna Convention. Two days later, Texas executed Mexican citizen Irineo Tristan Montoya, despite Mexico's protestations that Texas had violated Tristan's rights under the Vienna Convention by failing to inform the Mexican consulate at the time of his arrest. (Slate, 6/15/04)
GONZALES GETS BUSH OUT OF JURY DUTY TO KEEP DUI SECRET: In 1996, as counsel to Gov. Bush, Gonzales helped to get him excused from jury duty, "a situation that could have required the governor to disclose his then-secret 1976 conviction for drunken driving in Maine." Gonzales argued "that if Bush served, he would not, as governor, be able to pardon the defendant in the future." [USA Today, 3/18/02]
As Texas Supreme Court Justice
GONZALES DOES ENRON'S BIDDING: As an elected member of the Texas Supreme Court, "Enron and Enron's law firm were Gonzales's biggest contributors," giving him $35,450 in 2000. Overall, Gonzales raked in $100,000 from the energy industry. In May 2000, "Gonzales was author of a state Supreme Court opinion that handed the energy industry one of its biggest Texas legal victories in recent history." Since Bush brought him into the White House, Gonzales has worked doggedly to keep secret the details of energy task force meetings held by Vice President Cheney. [New York Daily News, 2/2/02]
ACCEPTING DONATIONS FROM LITIGANTS: In the weeks between hearing oral arguments and making a decision in Henson v. Texas Farm Bureau Mutual Insurance, Justice Alberto Gonzales collected a $2,000 contribution premium from the Texas Farm Bureau (which runs the defendant insurance company in this case). In another case, Gonzales pocketed a $2,500 contribution from a law firm defending the Royal Insurance company just before hearing oral arguments in Embrey v. Royal Insurance. [Texas for Public Justice]
by VirginiaDem
Wed Nov 10th, 2004 at 12:21:39 PST
Bush can't appoint a moderate to save his life, so we've got to get the Kos machine back in gear and out of its post-election malaise.
LTEs, message boards, emails, word of mouth - let the world know why we can't have Gonzales be the top law enforcement official in the country.
Borrowing from Kos and other blogs to consolidate everything in one place:
- Gonzales was largely responsible for the chain of events that led to Abu Ghraib - actually writing a memo to Bush advocating the disregard of Geneva Convention torture rules.
- Gonzeles was the legal architect for the Gitmo detainee system, much of which various courts (including the Supreme Court) have ruled unconstitutional.
- Gonzales had a tight financial and political connection to Enron, making him unable to impartially handle the largest corporate fraud in modern history or to enforce the laws needed to prevent the next Enron-like scandal.
Quite a track record for a lawyer, huh? Get the word out that we cannot have this guy be our #1 law enforcement officer. Post any addition reasons, and I'll update the diary.
Details after the jump...
1. Albert Gonzales is currently White House General Counsel. While there, he "asked for" and received a memorandum regarding the "Status of Taliban Forces ... Under the Geneva Conventions." The memo concludes that the Taliban forces are not covered under the Geneva Convention, which protects prisoners of war from torture. Gonzales let his feelings be known in a January 25, 2002 memo to the President, writing:
In my judgment, this new paradigm [the war on terror] renders obsolete Geneva's [i.e., the Geneva Convention's] strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions.
Gonzales's pro-torture memo gave fruit to an Order by the President accepting this rationale, making it part of what what Newsweek called the "root of torture" that led to the Abu Ghraib debacle.
2. Also while at the White House, Gonzales was the author of the Gitmo detainment procedures:
[H]e drew up the rules for holding suspected terrorists at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The detainees have been designated enemy combatants, denied prisoner-of-war status under the international Geneva Convention.
These rules have repeatedly been rejected by federal courts as unconstitutional, including the Supreme Court last summer.
3. Gonzales is "inextricably tied" to Enron, casting doubt on his ability to impartially handle the biggest corporate fraud in history. As the described in the press even now:
Gonzales also has connections to scandal-ridden energy giant Enron. He is a former partner in the Houston law firm Vinson and Elkins, which represented Enron. He also received $6,500 in campaign contributions from the company when he ran for re-election to the Texas Supreme Court.
Indeed, Gonzales got rich off of Enron as a corporate partner at Vinson & Elkins, which is the law firm that was sued for crafting these deals,
Remember, the federal government's case against Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling is still ongoing. Gonzales owes his fortune and much of his early political future to Ken Lay, so making him the nation's top law enforcement officer while the federal government prosecutes Lay presents an obvious conflict of interest. Also, we cannot trust the investigation and enforcement of rules against the future "Enrons" to a corporate lawyer who was possibly contributed to the Enron debacle in the first place.
Posted at 10:07 pm by sanfrancisco
Democrat Blog Swarm Permalink
Alberto Gonzalez
The Honorable Alberto R. Gonzales
Counsel to the President
 Judge Al Gonzales was commissioned as Counsel to President George W. Bush in January of 2001. Prior to serving in the White House, he served as a Justice of the Supreme Court of Texas. Before his appointment to the Texas Supreme Court in 1999, he served as Texas' 100th Secretary of State from December 2, 1997 to January 10, 1999. Among his many duties as Secretary of State, Gonzales was a senior advisor to then Governor Bush, chief elections officer, and the Governor's lead liaison on Mexico and border issues.
Prior to his appointment as Secretary of State, Gonzales was the General Counsel to Governor Bush for three years. Before joining the Governor's staff, he was a partner with the law firm of Vinson & Elkins L.L.P. in Houston, Texas. He joined the firm in June 1982. While in private practice, Gonzales also taught law as an adjunct professor at the University of Houston Law Center.
Among his many professional and civic activities, Gonzales was elected to the American Law Institute in 1999. He was a board trustee of the Texas Bar Foundation from 1996 to 1999, a board director for the State Bar of Texas from 1991 to 1994, and President of the Houston Hispanic Bar Association from 1990 to 1991. He was a board director of the United Way of the Texas Gulf Coast from 1993 to 1994, and President of Leadership Houston during this same period. In 1994, Gonzales served as Chair of the Commission for District Decentralization of the Houston Independent School District, and as a member of the Committee on Undergraduate Admissions for Rice University. Gonzales was Special Legal Counsel to the Houston Host Committee for the 1990 Summit of Industrialized Nations, and a member of delegations sent by the American Council of Young Political Leaders to Mexico in 1996 and to the People's Republic of China in 1995.
Among his many honors, in 2003 Gonzales was inducted into the Hispanic Scholarship Fund Alumni Hall of Fame, was honored with the Good Neighbor Award from the United States-Mexico Chamber of Commerce, and received President's Awards from the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the League of United Latin American Citizens. In 2002, he was recognized as a Distinguished Alumnus of Rice University by the Association of Rice Alumni and was honored by the Harvard Law School Association with the Harvard Law School Association Award. Gonzales was recognized as the 1999 Latino Lawyer of the Year by the Hispanic National Bar Association, and he received a Presidential Citation from the State Bar of Texas in 1997 for his dedication to addressing basic legal needs of the indigent. He was chosen as one of the Five Outstanding Young Texans by the Texas Jaycees in 1994, and as the Outstanding Young Lawyer of Texas by the Texas Young Lawyers Association in 1992. Gonzales was honored by the United Way in 1993 with a Commitment to Leadership Award, and received the Hispanic Salute Award in 1989 from the Houston Metro Ford Dealers for his work in the field of education.
Gonzales was born in San Antonio, Texas and raised in Houston. He is a graduate of Texas public schools, Rice University, and Harvard Law School. Gonzales served in the United States Air Force between 1973 and 1975, and attended the United States Air Force Academy between 1975 and 1977. He is married to Rebecca and is the father of three sons.
Posted at 10:10 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
Joe Biden, on the Geneva Convention:
"There's a reason why we sign these treaties: To protect my son in the military. That's why we have these treaties -- so when Americans are captured, They Are Not Tortured."
Alberto Gonzalez, on the Geneva Convention:
"The nature of the new war places a high premium on other factors, such as the ability to quickly obtain information from captured terrorists and their sponsors in order to avoid further atrocities against American civilians...In my judgment, this new paradigm renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions."
Joe Biden on Alberto Gonzalez:
"I think he's a pretty solid guy...If you had said to me six months ago I can have Gonzales or Ashcroft, it wouldn't have been a hard choice."
I will, however, leave you with this bit of advice about the future of the Democratic Party: if Republican submitted a bill called the "Democrats Eat Babys" Act of 2005, and the Democratic Party resubmitted the same bill with the word "babies" spelled correctly, the Dems would get attacked for being obstructionists and trying to co-opt the Republican agenda.
The major thing keeping the Democratic Party from developing a spine and a coherent platform of its own is that those in charge are too afraid of the counterattack from Republicans. This, I think, is the major psychological hurdle that Democrats face - and one that Republicans haven't worried about in decades.
Posted at 09:12 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
Days since the U.S. government first placed the nation under an “elevated terror alert” that the level has been relaxed : 0
Years of “elevated” or “high” terror alerts since then : 2
Aid that U.S. leaflets dropped on Fallujah in July threatened to freeze if insurgent attacks continued : $102,000,000
Number of insurgent attacks in Fallujah in the week before and after the leafletting, respectively : 21, 36
Compensation the U.S. government has paid Iraqis for wrongful deaths, injuries, and property damage since 2002 : $4,475,643
Total “death gratuities” the U.S. government has paid since then to survivors of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq : $11,436,000
Total amount Ohio’s crime-victims compensation fund has paid the survivors of one U.S. soldier killed in Iraq : $5,656.77
Maximum percentage income- and corporate-tax rate under laws made for Iraqis by the Coalition Provisional Authority : 15
Days a House committee postponed July hearings on antidepressants while its chair considered a pharmaceutical-lobbyist job : 50
Number of the 5 Republicans investigating Rep. Tom DeLay on ethics charges who have taken donations from his PAC : 4
Number of Ohio election boards being sued over erroneously informing parolees that they may not vote : 21
Number of banks robbed in Davenport, Iowa, while John Kerry and George Bush gave speeches there on August 4 : 3
Estimated number of right-wing Jewish extremists Israel monitors as potential threats to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon : 300
Years after leaving his post during the Vietnam War that a Connecticut man was arrested for desertion in July : 34
Minimum number of Guantánamo detainees who boycotted their military tribunals in August : 13
Average number of kidnappings per week in Iraq since March : 5
Number of non-Iraqis detained there by U.S. forces in the last year : 400
Ratio of the minimum number of beheadings by the Saudi government last year to those by Saudi terrorists so far this year : 50:1
Posted at 05:15 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
DNC Chair Simon Rosenberg?
by Chris Bowers
Cobbling together as much information as I can, right now I think the battle for the next chair is basically a four-way race. There are 440 members of the national committee, and they will elect a new chairman early next year.
The Big Four
- 1. Harold Ickes. If he is the choice of the Clinton people, as is the rumor, he must have the inside track right now.
- 2. Simon Rosenberg. He is interested, or is at least floating a trial balloon (my apologies to Rosenberg fans who will certainly dislike the link I produced--it was the most recent one I could find). With centrist and insider cred, coupled with respect among the netroots, he might be able to emerge as a compromise figure between the Clinton and Dean people.
- 3. Howard Dean. If people like Breaux are warning about Dean, then our Internet polls and netroots are not the only people pushing for him to become the next chair. And yes, he is interested.
- 4. Jean Shaheen. Seems to have emerged as the favorite of the Kerry people, and is supposedly "testing the waters." Hard to know how much having Kerry's backing will help her now. Pelosi also seems to be backing her, which could quickly allow Shaheen to move up in the rankings.
Posted at 05:09 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
by Chris Bowers
The 2004 election, or at least the pre-election analysis of 2004, is over. As such, it is time that, as a site, we move on in order to stay relevant. The President, House, Senate and Governor's pages have become antiquated, and we need new content.
As such, coming soon to the Menu Box will be five new special pages, replacing our existing four. Combined, I believe they will go a long way toward addressing our post-election needs:
- Activism. This page will contain descriptions and links to various forms of growing online activism that we can become involved with. The first two links on this page will be the reader suggested Creation of National Community Newspapers Association, that will work to expand independent media across the country, and BlogPac, where the liberal, netroots street fight will be waged at a higher level than ever before. Let me know what else you think deserves attention.
- MyDD book club. I suggested this idea late last night, and it seems to have sparked a lot of interest. So, we are going to go ahead with this project as well. Our first "book" will be Phillip Agre's long essay What Is Conservatism and What is Wrong With It, and our first discussion will start on Wednesday, November 18th, at 10 pm Eastern. From that point, we will have a discussion of an actual book every other Wednesday night, starting at 10 pm Eastern. You can vote now on nominations for the December 2nd discussion, which will be of an actual book. After every discussion, I will compile the nominations for the next book and put it to a front-page vote. The Book Club page will archive all previous discussions, as well as provide information about the upcoming book and links for people to purchase the upcoming book and books we have already discussed.
- Vote Defense. I asked the community, and the community has spoken. People want more attention to the voting troubles associated with this election than we are giving. So, soon there will be an entire page on MyDD where each of the specific allegations, as well as new allegations, can be discussed. I will monitor the discussion, and post summaries of current investigations. The page will also provide links to other sites doing the same thing. Of course, someone is going to have to present me a summary of what is going on in order for me to do this effectively.
- Balance of Power. This page will serve as a reference site for the current balance of power within the federal government and all state governments. It will include the partisan index chart, state-by-state maps of party control over US Senate and Governorships, the new database I am building on the 2002 and 2004 House elections, and a list, with links, of party control of ever branch of every state legislature in all fifty states. Basically, it will be a complete overview of which party controls what. We need this information to help us know where to attack next.
- Elections 2005 In December, there are important House run-offs in Louisiana. In less than one year, there will be a number of state legislature, mayoral and Governor's elections. Between now and then, there will probably be some special elections. This page will serve as a reference point for all elections that will take place over the next twelve months.
Our fight continues, and MyDD will change to help support our fight as best as possible. No good blog rests on its laurels. Together, our community will seize the future.
Posted at 03:38 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
by kos
Thu Nov 11th, 2004 at 12:14:42 PST
The latest tally:
Eighteen U.S. troops have been killed and another 69 wounded in this week's offensive to take control of the rebel-held Iraqi city Falluja, a senior U.S. Marine Corps commander said on Thursday. And to what end? The people we really want to capture or kill are long gone.
Not to mention that this senior U.S. Marine Corps commander is a liar. 69 wounded? From the same article:
A spokeswoman at the U.S. military's Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, the usual destination for seriously wounded U.S. troops stationed in Iraq or Afghanistan, said 102 Americans arrived from Iraq in two plane loads on Thursday. They joined 125 wounded troops who arrived there from Monday to Wednesday. That's 227 wounded so far. Some may not be from Falluja, but if we're suffering more wounded outside Falluja than in the city we're currently besieging, then Iraq is a bigger mess than anyone thinks.
Meanwhile, Mosul is spiraling out of control.
And while U.S.-led troops fought for the upper hand in Falluja, insurgents in the northern city of Mosul set police stations ablaze, stole weapons and brazenly roamed the streets.
Residents said Iraq's third largest city seemed to slide out of control as grenade blasts and gunfire rang through empty streets and smoke billowed from two burning police stations.
Rebels attacked Iraqi national guards controlling a bridge in the city center, killing five of them, witnesses said.
A cameraman for Reuters filmed gunmen raiding weapons and flak jackets from a police station before setting it on fire [...]
The U.S. military issued a statement admitting that local security forces had been overrun in several areas and said local authorities were doing what they could to restore order [...]
Violence has worsened in Mosul, a strongly nationalist city of three million people, over the past year, but residents said the chaos of the past two days had broken new ground. So we'll have to attack Mosul (which is 10 times larger than Falluja), pushing all those insurgents back to Falluja. And Iraq's endless spiral of violence will continue unabated.
Posted at 03:29 pm by blog swarm
Political News Permalink
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