Friday, October 08, 2004
Here's a quarter, buy yourself something nice
As little as 27 cents of every dollar spent on Iraq's reconstruction has actually filtered down to projects benefiting Iraqis, a statistic that is prompting the State Department to fundamentally rethink the Bush administration's troubled reconstruction effort.
Between soaring security costs, corruption and mismanagement, contractors' profits, and U.S. governmental costs, reconstruction funding is being drained away, leaving little left to improve the lives of Iraqis, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Strategic and International Studies. Senior administration officials and congressional experts on the reconstruction effort called the analysis credible. One senior U.S. official familiar with reconstruction suggested as little as a quarter of the funding is reaching its intended projects.
More.
posted by chris at 3:36 PM
Playing politics with Iraq
U.S. military and civilian officials have identified 20 to 30 towns and cities in Iraq that must be pacified before nationwide elections can be held in January, The New York Times reported Friday.
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Civilians involved in the process also told the Times that the new approach was formulated in part to counter criticism from President Bush's Democratic challenger, Sen. John Kerry, that the administration has no plan for Iraq.
So this new plan isn't really designed to quell terrorist uprisings, engender free elections in Iraq or spare the lives of our soldiers, but rather ("in part") to counter criticism from challenger John Kerry. This is also known as helping get Bush re-elected. Is everything politics with these people? Aaarrrrggghh! They make my head hurt. (From the ever-vigilant Americablog.)
posted by chris at 3:09 PM
Not talking to the press
From a Washington Post article about Bush's isolation from reporters:
Bush has held 15 solo news conferences since taking office. At the same point in their presidencies, according to research by Martha Joynt Kumar of Towson University in Maryland, Bill Clinton had held 42; George H.W. Bush, 83; Ronald Reagan, 26; Jimmy Carter, 59; Gerald R. Ford, 39; Richard M. Nixon, 29; Lyndon B. Johnson, 88; John F. Kennedy, 65; and Dwight D. Eisenhower, 94.
Fifteen solo press conferences! During a presidency that's seen the worst terrorist attack on America soil, 2 wars in the Middle East, a plummeting economy, corporate scandals, the largest deficit in history, spiralling health care costs, etc. And this guy doesn't need to talk to the press. Incredible.
posted by chris at 2:30 PM
"The economy is strong and getting stronger"
Riiiight...
U.S. businesses added 96,000 jobs to payrolls in September, the government reported on Friday, a weaker-than-expected total that was expected to sharpen a presidential debate later in the day over the economy's direction.
The Labor Department report, showing the unemployment rate in September held steady at 5.4 percent, will provide fodder for the second debate between President Bush and Democratic Presidential contender Sen. John Kerry, the first one in which the candidates are expected to discuss economic policy.
The September job-creation total came in below Wall Street economists' forecasts for 148,000 new jobs. Four hurricanes swept through the Southeast during August and September, which Labor said likely held down employment growth "but not enough to change materially" its estimate of September jobs.
posted by chris at 1:07 PM
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Thursday, October 07, 2004
Scaring the teachers
The Education Department is advising school leaders nationwide to watch for people spying on their buildings or buses to help detect any possibility of terrorism like the deadly school siege in Russia.
The warning follows an analysis by the FBI and the Homeland Security Department of the siege that killed nearly 340 people, many of them students, in the city of Beslan last month.
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The advice is based on lessons learned from the Russia siege. But there is no specific information indicating a terrorist threat to any schools or universities in the United States, Hickok said.
Another alert that's based on nothing and only meant to keep people afraid.
posted by chris at 10:11 PM
Tax cuts for everyone!
(Except the people that really need them.)
In an act of pre-election largess, House and Senate negotiators approved a sprawling corporate tax bill on Wednesday that would shower corporations and farmers in politically sensitive states with about $145 billion worth of new tax cuts.
The Center for American Progress and Taxpayers for Common Sense run some of the numbers.
$27.9 BILLION FOR CORPORATIONS THAT EARN PROFITS ABROAD: The bill would allow corporations that have accumulated billions in untaxed overseas profits to bring the money back to the United States at a fraction of the normal tax rate. Even Treasury Secretary John Snow admits the provision discriminates "against companies that don't have large overseas operations." It would be a $20 billion windfall for giant corporations like Hewlett-Packard and Eli-Lilly. A separate provision would change the way overseas profits are calculated – at a total cost of $7.9 billion – saving General Electric Co. alone hundreds of millions of dollars.
$101 MILLION FOR NASCAR: The bill makes technical changes in the tax treatment of grandstand facilities, which will be worth $101 million to race track owners struggling to make ends meet.
$44 MILLION FOR IMPORTERS OF CHINESE CEILING FANS: The bill suspends a 4.7 percent duty on ceiling fans through 2006, a provision that primarily benefits Home Depot. Lobbyists for Home Depot also had the provision inserted into the administration's energy bill, but that bill failed to clear Congress.
$28 MILLION FOR CRUISE SHIP OPERATORS: A provision in the bill would allow cruise ship operators to delay paying taxes for certain products. The delay is worth $15 million for Carnival Corp. and $8 to $10 million for Royal Caribbean.
$27 MILLION FOR HORSE AND DOG GAMBLERS: The bill exempts foreign gamblers from paying taxes up front on their winnings at horse and dog tracks.
$11 MILLION FOR FISHING TACKLE BOX MANUFACTURES: Excise taxes on tackle boxes would be reduced from 10 percent to 3 percent. One of the biggest beneficiaries would be Plano Molding Co. – which just happens to be headquartered in House Speaker Dennis Hastert's district.
$9 MILLION FOR BOW AND ARROW MANUFACTURES: The bill eliminates taxes on "youth bows" that are not powerful enough to be used for hunting. It also reduces taxes for a device – called a broadhead – that is attached to the tips of arrows.
posted by chris at 1:47 PM
Cheating
Yesterday, the White House announced that President Bush would be delivering a "major policy address" on terrorism today. The cable news networks broadcast it live and in full. Yet the "address" turned out to be a standard campaign stump speech before a Pennsylvania crowd that seemed pumped on peyote, cheering, screaming, or whooping at every sentence.
The president announced no new policy, uttered not one new word about terrorism, foreign policy, or anything else. He did all the things he wanted to do in last Thursday's debate—accuse his opponent of weakness, bad judgment, vacillation, and other forms of flip-floppery—though this time without a moderator to hush the audience, much less an opponent to bite back.
In short, the cable networks were lured into airing an hourlong free campaign ad for George W. Bush.
Under campaign rules, the cable networks have to give Kerry equal time for something like this. They and the White House will get out of it, however, on this "major policy speech" technicality. When you flounder on live TV against a worthy opponent, it's best to go back to what you know best: a well-practiced stump speech before an adoring audience.
UPDATE: Not near as much attention was paid to this speech as to the first debate.
posted by chris at 1:27 PM
The wild west
People soon will be able to carry guns and other dangerous weapons onto the grounds and parking lots of Reagan National and Dulles International airports, after officials yesterday eased what they said were overly restrictive rules.
Without debate, the board of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority unanimously agreed to permit passengers and other airport visitors to carry guns, knives and other weapons as long as they keep them out of terminals and other buildings that access airfields. Passengers who are taking guns with them on flights still will be allowed to carry them into the terminal but are supposed to make arrangements with airlines in advance, officials said.
The action comes after pressure from an increasingly high-profile Virginia gun rights group whose members have taken to wearing firearms on their hips in public places to make their case.
Virginia allows people to openly display guns, so a group of gun rights nuts have been carrying their weapons around to area restaurants and other public places to generate support for the good ol' days of the wild, wild west. And now, this small group of people have pressured DC-area airports to allow guns on airport property. Great, cause we need more guns near airports. I'll just leave it with this quote from the article:
Airport security experts said the new law doesn't worry them. Douglas R. Baird, an aviation security consultant, said, "It doesn't raise any concerns with me because if you have the authority of the state to be armed, I don't see why you can't be armed at an airport."
posted by chris at 10:55 AM
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Wednesday, October 06, 2004
And one more time for good measure
Iraq now appears to have destroyed its stockpiles of illicit weapons within months of the Persian Gulf war of 1991, and by the time of the American invasion in spring 2003, its capacity to produce such weapons was continuing to erode, the top American inspector in Iraq said in a report made public today.
The report by Charles A. Duelfer said the last Iraqi factory capable of producing militarily significant quantities of unconventional weapons was destroyed in 1996. The finding amounted to the starkest portrayal yet of a vast gap between the Bush administration's prewar assertions about Iraqi weapons and what a 15-month postinvasion inquiry by American investigators has concluded were the facts on the ground.
At the time of the American invasion, Mr. Duelfer concluded, Iraq had not possessed military-scale stockpiles of illicit weapons for a dozen years and was not actively seeking to produce them.
More. And even more.
posted by chris at 3:20 PM
No-bid contracts from the Pentagon - get yours today!
More than 40 percent of Pentagon business, a total of $362 billion, has been awarded on a no-bid basis over the last six years, according to a report issued Wednesday that showed that the biggest companies won the bulk of their contracts without going through a competitive process.
The nation's largest military contractor, the Lockheed Martin Corporation, received the most Pentagon business on a noncompetitive basis. Seventy-four percent of Lockheed's $94 billion in Pentagon contracts received since fiscal 1998 was awarded without competition, according to the report, which was written by the Center for Public Integrity, a Washington nonprofit group that studied 2.2 million Pentagon contracts worth a collective $900 billion.
"Competitive bidding at the Pentagon happens less often than we think, and the no-bid controversy surrounding Halliburton in Iraq actually is, unfortunately, not an aberration," said Charles Lewis, the center's executive director. Mr. Lewis's organization was one of the first to study contracts won by Halliburton and other companies in Iraq and Afghanistan, and today's report grew out of that earlier work.
At Boeing, the nation's second-largest contractor, 60 percent of the $81 billion in Pentagon contracts since 1998 was awarded without competition, as was 67 percent at the No. 3 contractor, the Raytheon Company, which received $40 billion in contracts over the same period. Of the nation's top 10 military contractors, 9 won more than half of their Pentagon contract dollars through noncompetitive awards.
Story.
posted by chris at 2:03 PM
Post VP debate fact check
Man, facts and figures were just flying thru the air last night. It's hard to track them all down, but try here, here or here.
posted by chris at 1:39 PM
One last time for the people in the back
The government's most definitive account of Iraq's arms programs, to be released today, will show that Saddam Hussein posed a diminishing threat at the time the United States invaded and did not possess, or have concrete plans to develop, nuclear, chemical or biological weapons, U.S. officials said yesterday.
The officials said that the 1,000-page report by Charles A. Duelfer, the chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq, concluded that Hussein had the desire but not the means to produce unconventional weapons that could threaten his neighbors or the West. President Bush has continued to assert in his campaign stump speech that Iraq had posed "a gathering threat."
The officials said Duelfer, an experienced former United Nations weapons inspector, found that the state of Hussein's weapons-development programs and knowledge base was less advanced in 2003, when the war began, than it was in 1998, when international inspectors left Iraq.
Story.
posted by chris at 1:25 PM
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Tuesday, October 05, 2004
Giving away the farm
Secretary of State Colin Powell is not staying for a second Bush term. When he goes, the last bulwark against complete neoconservative control of U.S. foreign policy goes with him. The implications are enormous, yet the American electorate appears to be blinded by the Bush campaign's deliberate manipulations of 9/11.
Powell has served both as the reasoned voice of career diplomats and the experienced voice of career U.S. military in the Bush administration. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld ignored military advice and excluded Department of State career professionals from Iraq planning. Power was concentrated in the hands of a clique of neocon ideologues he placed in key policy positions, including Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz and Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith. In the first term of George W. Bush, protégés of now disgraced former Defense Policy Board member and neocon godfather Richard Perle achieved control or subordination of every executive branch foreign-policymaking body -- except the Department of State.
But if Bush is reelected (god forbid) and Powell leaves (which is extremely likely), don't count on him being replaced by another somewhat moderate (in comparison) Sec. of State. Expect him to be replaced by another neocon nutjob.
posted by chris at 5:13 PM
Is it spin or outright lies?
Atrios has it and I'm just gonna post the whole thing:
On CNN:
A senior Defense Department official said that Bremer never asked for more troops and expressed annoyance the ambassador appeared to be second-guessing the advice of military officials. Bremer stepped down after the June 28 handover to an interim Iraqi government.
On CNN TV just now:
[rough transcript]
Officials here again say that during the time frame Paul Bremer served in Iraq he was in constant contact with the Penatgon, with the White House, he visited here several times and spokesman for Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld says the Secretary doesn't recall any point that Paul Bremer brought up with him at least the need for more troops. If it had come up, the Secretary would have paid a great deal of attention to that.
From July 1, 2003:
WASHINGTON - The top American administrator in Iraq, confronting growing anti-U.S. anger and guerrilla-style attacks, is asking for more American troops and dozens of U.S. officials to help speed up the restoration of order and public services.
Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld was reviewing the request from L. Paul Bremer, U.S. officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Bremer's request underscores how difficult it has been for his small civilian staff and some 158,000 U.S.-led troops to meet the demands of Iraqis for security and other basic needs. It also conflicts with upbeat public statements from President Bush, Rumsfeld and Bremer himself on the progress made on Iraq's political and economic reconstruction.
posted by chris at 5:05 PM
New terror warnings coming soon
Why?
When the federal government issues a terrorist warning, presidential approval ratings jump, a Cornell University sociologist finds. Interestingly, terrorist warnings also boost support for the president on issues that are largely irrelevant to terrorism, such as his handling of the economy.
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"Results showed that terror warnings increased presidential approval ratings consistently," says Willer. "They also increased support for Bush's handling of the economy. The findings, however, were inconclusive as to how long this halo effect lasts."
(via Kevin Drum.)
posted by chris at 5:01 PM
What post-war planning?
The former US governor of Iraq has admitted the United States "never" had enough ground troops in Iraq to establish firm control of the country, directly contradicting assertions by President George W. Bush and top Pentagon officials that the US military had what it needed to win the war.
The admission, made in a speech Monday, was certain to add fuel to already heated exchanges between President George W. Bush and his Democratic rival, John Kerry, who has repeatedly accused th president of failing to adequately plan for post-war Iraq.
"We never had enough troops on the ground," Ambassador Paul Bremer told a conference of insurance professionals in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia.
Of course, it remains to be asked why Bremer didn't make a bigger deal about this at the time.
UPDATE: He did...see two posts up.
posted by chris at 1:25 PM
See if Cheney reads this one
A new CIA assessment undercuts the White House's claim that Saddam Hussein maintained ties to al-Qaida, saying there's no conclusive evidence that the regime harbored Osama bin Laden associate Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
The CIA review, which U.S. officials said Monday was requested some months ago by Vice President Dick Cheney, is the latest assessment that calls into question one of President Bush's key justifications for last year's U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
The new assessment follows the independent Sept. 11 commission's finding that there was no "collaborative relationship" between the former Iraqi regime and bin Laden's terrorist network.
Maybe this can be one of the first debate questions tonight?
posted by chris at 1:21 PM
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Monday, October 04, 2004
Rumsfeld doubts Iraq/Al Queda link
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has cast doubt on whether there was ever a relationship between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda.
The alleged link was one of the justifications used by President Bush for the invasion of Iraq.
In front of an audience in New York, Mr Rumsfeld was asked about connections between Saddam and Osama Bin Laden. "To my knowledge, I have not seen any strong, hard evidence that links the two," he said.
More.
posted by chris at 8:26 PM
Capturing the youth market
The popular Hello Kitty brand -- commonly found on stationery, purses, pajamas and other items for children -- will soon start appearing on a new platform: a MasterCard debit card.
"Freedom! You can use the Hello Kitty Debit MasterCard to shop 'til you drop," the card's Web site enthuses.
The prospective audience? The young women who grew up with the 30-year-old icon -- as well as much younger girls. "We think our target age group will be from 10 to 14, although it could certainly go younger," said Bruce Giuliano, senior vice president of licensing for Sanrio Inc., which owns the brand.
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"Children are now open game, prey to many financial institutions in this country," said Joline Godfrey, author of "Raising Financially Fit Kids" and chief executive of Independent Means Inc., a California financial-education firm. "Financial institutions used to be pretty conservative members of the community, preaching balanced budgets, home ownership and savings. Over the course of time, they have become more partners with retailers teaching children how to spend and consume." As a result, she said, the cards become a "great educational tool . . . to say to kids, 'Spend, spend, spend, buy, buy, buy.' "
Cause it's never too late to create the newest little consumer.
posted by chris at 8:10 PM
You forgot Poland!
Sorry, George, Poland's outta there.
Poland, a key U.S. ally in Iraq, should withdraw its troops from the Mideast nation at the end of next year, Poland's defense minister said in an interview published Monday. It was the first time a Polish official has indicated when Warsaw might end its presence in Iraq.
posted by chris at 8:08 PM
The Talking Points of Fear
Or how to scare the holy hell out of America...
Here's the video and here's a brief explanation (check out the first comment).
posted by chris at 8:04 PM
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