Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Sioux Nation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: American Spirit who wrote (18502)	5/24/2005 5:44:38 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 361213

"In Iraq, George W. Bush has demonstrated an old truism of geopolitics – wishful thinking mixed with bellicose rhetoric makes for a deadly cocktail, as it certainly has for tens of thousands of Iraqis and more than 1,600 U.S. soldiers. The question now is: can the U.S. political system wean itself from an addiction to this poisonous brew of swagger and delusion?" consortiumnews.com

To: American Spirit who wrote (18502)	5/24/2005 7:36:16 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 361213

Is Arnold Losing It? washingtonmonthly.com

To: American Spirit who wrote (18502)	5/24/2005 1:56:17 PM
From: geode00	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 361213

At this point, both sides are mad although I do believe Dobson is angrier and much more hysterical than anyone else in the country. THAT says something. The most interesting analysis I've heard: it's the triumph over the bigbusiness interests in the Republican party over the freakshow fake fundamentalist Christians. Apparently, bigbiz is sick to death of the bs over gay marriage and abortion and wish to proceed toward more greed without having to worry about God. ROTFLMAO.

To: American Spirit who wrote (18502)	6/6/2005 2:59:34 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 361213

The Bush administration has developed so many ways of manipulating information that the Watergate coverup now seems quaint. Has anonymous sourcing outlived its usefulness? - - - - - - - - - - - - By Albert Scardino salon.com June 2, 2005 So it was Mark Felt who checked the position of the flowerpot with the red flag on Bob Woodward's balcony -- a sign that the reporter wanted to speak to Deep Throat. Felt, deputy director of the FBI in 1972, preempted death by revealing that it was he who gave Woodward and Carl Bernstein, his fellow Washington Post reporter, the inside dope on Tricky Dicky. The two had pledged not to expose him until their source was dead. When Felt self-exposed in Vanity Fair this week, the gumshoe journalists initially refused to confirm or deny, but the Post then confirmed he was the one. Felt, the world's most famous anonymous source, may have come forward just in time to grab the last seat at the funeral of anonymous sourcing. Until Watergate, the unnamed source was usually confined to gossip columns and political tipsters. Watergate made anonymous sourcing indispensable. With it, every critic had a curtain to hide behind. Without it, no story seemed quite scandalous enough. Editors adopted ever more complex rules to hold anonymous sourcing in check, but the rules never held for long. It was just too easy for the unscrupulous to bludgeon the defenseless. Over the next 30 years, anonymous sourcing ate away at the credibility, integrity and effectiveness of the American press, until even journalists became alarmed. Paradoxically, that third-rate burglary, as President Nixon called it, and the ensuing coverup also made information free. In reaction, dozens of states and municipalities rushed through sunshine laws to open their records and meetings to the public. The federal government followed with a freedom of information law, prying open file cabinets and record books in every agency and department. By the end of the 1970s, there was hardly a cloud in the sky. By the early 1980s, deceit began to develop immunity. The Reagan administration evolved propaganda techniques to overcome disclosure. The fresh air turned stale. Reagan held fewer press conferences and organized more public events than any other president in modern history -- until George W. Bush. As a tool for exposing corruption, anonymous sourcing wore itself out by the late 1990s. No need for unnamed accusers to expose wrongdoing when well-financed characters are willing to go before cameras with embarrassing revelations about their employers, political enemies, celebrities, families, even themselves. The Bush administration has developed so many ways of manipulating information that anonymous sourcing would now be of little use. Secret "military" tribunals, indefinite detention without charge, torture, kidnapping, dressing up official press releases as news stories for complicit publishers -- these all make the Watergate coverup seem quaint. In another era, the revelations in the Post shocked the nation and stirred Congress to start impeachment proceedings, driving Nixon from office. The more horrific crimes and misdemeanors of the current White House have been exposed by insiders and outsiders, but so far the wheels of justice have not started to grind. If Nixon were still with us, he'd be envious. - - - - - - - - - - - -

To: American Spirit who wrote (18502)	6/6/2005 3:13:16 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 361213

THE RUSSERT WATCH: OUR READERS ASK THE QUESTIONS TIM RUSSERT DIDN'T June 06, 2005 Arianna Huffington huffingtonpost.com THE RUSSERT WATCH: OUR READERS ASK THE QUESTIONS TIM RUSSERT DIDN'T On Friday we asked you to send us the questions you’d like to hear Tim Russert ask RNC chairman Ken Mehlman, his guest on this week’s Meet the Press. We got dozens of great responses. The best one wasn’t actually a question, but a spot-on observation: “It really doesn't matter what question you ask if you don't ask a series of follow-up questions and prevent the interviewee from filibustering. ... If Russert were to do this no one would come on his show anymore." Here are the top ten questions we got… none of which -- surprise, surprise! -- Russert asked Mehlman: 1. Roger Matile: Given the problems the military is having with recruiting, have you encouraged your son to volunteer for the U.S. Army? 2. Theresa Clare: With all the evidence and allegations regarding the way the U.S. has treated prisoners -- both kidnapping people and taking them to other countries to be interrogated, and also the treatment in U.S.-run prison camps -- don't you think it's the responsibility of the Republican congressional leadership, and even the President's responsibility, to convene an independent inquiry into these issues? 3. Rebmarks: Traditionally, the Republican Party was the party of fiscal restraint. What happened to that? How is it that this Republican administration and Congress seem to think that it is perfectly okay to saddle our children with our bills because we keep charging everything and refuse to ante up what it takes to pay for them? 4. Christine Moore: President Bush claims that he opposes destroying life to save life when explaining his reasons for opposing stem cell research. At the same time, he justifies the war in Iraq by saying that lives are being saved, though tens of thousands of innocent civilians have been killed in the process, thus "destroying life to save life." Would you kindly explain the contradiction? 5. cynicalgirl: Ken, why hasn't the White House responded to requests by Rep Louise Slaughter and Rep John Conyers regarding the unusual access given to the White House to Jeff Gannon/James Guckert? 6. Don P: In refusing to comply with the Senate's requests for the NSA intercepts requested in the Bolton nomination, and in using Dick Cheney to change the rules of the Senate on a simple majority, isn't the administration destroying the constitutional requirement for checks and balances? 7. Ryan1: Does Bush have a plan to deal with skyrocketing health care costs? Secondly, fuel costs are going up, and experts say they may never come down. This administration seems to be committed to fossil fuels, and offers only token gestures when it comes to developing alternative energy sources. What are the administration's plans to deal with this problem? 8. Fred R.: Ken, can you shed any light into the connection between Grover Norquist, President Bush, and Bush "Pioneer" Jack Abramoff? 9. Richard: Electronic voting boxes can be manipulated, so why use them? 10. Buzzramjet: Do you think a special prosecutor's office should be set up to investigate the Downing Street Memo? Or the charges at GITMO? Or where all the money that Halliburton refuses to account for went? Or voting irregularities around the country?