Trim And Tip-toe

Newsweek's Howard Fineman offers that while Bush says America won't cut and run in Iraq, the White House approach to get out of Iraq might be better described as "trim and tip-toe".

Social Darwinism

Robert Reich, writing in The American Prospect, takes conservatives to task for trying to have it both ways: rejecting Evolution but embracing Social Darwinism, a concept that followed Darwin’s theory by a few years introducing the idea of “survival of the fittest” to excuse the greed during the Guilded Age of the late 19th Century.

“Social Darwinism,” Reich writes “…allowed John D. Rockefeller, for example, to claim that the fortune he had accumulated through the giant Standard Oil Trust was ‘merely a survival of the fittest”... the working out of a law of nature and a law of God.’“

“The Conservative Movement, as its progenitors like to call it, is now mounting a full-throttled attack on Darwinism even as it has thoroughly embraced Darwin’s bastard child, social Darwinism. On the face of it, these positions may appear inconsistent. What unites them is a profound disdain for science, logic, and fact.”

“A democracy is imperiled when large numbers of citizens turn their backs on scientific fact. Half of Americans recently polled say they don’t believe in evolution. Almost as many say they believe income and wealth depend on moral worthiness.”

Permanent War

"We must stop behaving as if we are in a permanent state of war, in which any practice is justified by the exigencies of the moment. That's my biggest problem with Vice President Cheney's anything-goes jeremiads against terrorism. They suggest we will always be at war, and so it doesn't matter what the world thinks of our behavior. That's a dangerously mistaken view. We are in a long war but not an endless one, and we need to begin rebuilding the bridges to normal life."

-Columnist David Ignatius

Buy Nothing

Today has been declared "Buy Nothing" day by various groups responding to the twisted American"tradition" of going on a shopping binge the day after that other odd American tradition of going on an eating binge.

Of course, most of the world doesn't share our Thanksgiving feast of turkey and pumpkin pie and for many people around the planet everyday is "Buy Nothing Day". In the new Bush economy that concentrates wealth more and more among the already wealthy many poorer Americans are experiencing "Buy Nothing Day" on a regular basis.

Our government doesn't quite get the "Buy Nothing" idea as it continues to spend large sums of money on weapons and bombs and other holiday goodies. But Congress did pass a "spend nothing (on the poor)" bill recently when it reduced funding for school lunch programs, college loans, and health care for our country's most needy.

That same day they extended tax cuts once again for the wealthiest as they headed off for their Thanksgiving holiday, and the big kick-off of the Christmas shopping season.

Failing The Future

"America is on a massive borrowing and spending binge, and at the same time, failing to invest in the future. The United States is cutting research and development spending even as countries like China are pouring new money into R&D. Critics say the U.S. vision has become so short-sighted, it's not only borrowing from future generations, but setting up our children and grandchildren for failure."

-Anchor commentary on CNN

Demographic Tsunami

"Unfortunately, both spending increases and tax cuts are out of control. And we need to get control of the bottom line, and we need to do it quickly because we face an unprecedented demographic tsunami; namely, the retirement of the baby boom generation."

- David Walker of the Government Accountability Office in an interview on CNN

Senators Born To Run

Last week the two U.S. Senators from New Jersey introduced a resolution in Congress commending Bruce Springsteen on the 30th anniversary of the release of his “Born To Run” album. The Republican majority shot it down.

Admirably, this favorite son of New Jersey doesn't need (or even want) a resolution in Congress declaring anything about him. This is the artist who accepted an Oscar Award by saying sarcastically, "I guess it's all downhill from here".

The whole notion of a congressional commendation seems a little antithetical to Springsteen's "Born To Run" rebel-outsider image to start with. What will they come up with next? The Bruce Springsteen Community College in Trenton?

Springsteen receives all the accolades he needs by looking out over a crowd of 20, 40, 0r 60 thousand fans singing his 30 year-old songs along with him, word for word. He is one of the few artists who can get an audience of enthusiastic, sometimes inebriated fans to sit quietly and respectfully throughout an acoustic show as he did on his recent "Devils and Dust" Tour.

These days you can't even expect that kind of decorum in the halls on Congress.

Cut And Run

Just days after the right-wing, full-scale attack on John Murtha and any one who would dare suggest that it might be a good idea to begin to bring some of our troops home from Iraq, the Bush Administration is now announcing the reduction of troops that will begin in early 2006.

What ever happened to the "generational commitment" of forces to Iraq? Washington Post's Dana Milbank offers that perhaps Bush has been referring to the generation of a fruit fly.

Bomb The Messenger

News today that Tony Blair had to talk Pres. George Bush out of bombing the Al-Jazeera news network reminds us of the extremes Bush and company will go to to control the propaganda.

The Arab news network has done many things the White House resents including airing pictures of war wounded, reporting on Iraqi casualty numbers, and offering alternative views of the war.

Looks like CBS got rid of Dan Rather just in time. If the reckless news maverick was allowed to go on any longer bombs would be raining down on CBS News headquarters in NYC.

Face Of The G.O.P

The Democrats may have found the face of the Republican party they need going into the 2006 campaign season: Ohio Rep. Jean Schimdt.

Look for her picture and especially video of her snarling on the House floor calling fellow congressman and war vet John Murtha a coward. It’s not pretty.

Milking The Cows

"Because a lot of the farmers are prejudiced against New Yorkers, Hillary hauls me along as the token redneck, and I milk the cows and stuff."

- Former President Bill Clinton

Murtha on V.P.

"I like guys who've never been there that criticize us who've been there. I like that. I like guys who got five deferments and never been there and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done."

- Pennsylvannia Rep. John Murtha

V.P. for Torture

"I'm embarrassed the United States has a vice president for torture. He condones torture, what else is he?"

- Former CIA Director Stansfield Turner