June 2003 Archives

Washington Monthly Contributing Editor Nicholas Thompson writes about the troubling and growing divide between Republican officeholders and scientists:

The administration's stem-cell stand is just one of many examples, from climate change to abstinence-only sex-education programs, in which the White House has made policies that defy widely accepted scientific opinion. Why this administration feels unbound by the consensus of academic scientists can be gleaned, in part, from a telling anecdote in Nicholas Lemann's recent New Yorker profile of Karl Rove. When asked by Lemann to define a Democrat, Bush's chief political strategist replied, "Somebody with a doctorate." Lemann noted, "This he said with perhaps the suggestion of a smirk." Fundamentally, much of today's GOP, like Rove, seems to smirkingly equate academics, including scientists, with liberals.

We should all feel uncomfortable about this situation because President Bush and our national leaders face increasingly complicated decisions that have a scientific foundation. Having one party turn away from an embrace of science is an unwelcome and potentially hazardous development.

Will those supporting the recall of California Governor Gray Davis (D) stop with him, or is there a larger agenda at work?

The goal could be larger than expected, as I note in a post just made on the Political State Report.

Jules Witcover places in context some of President Bush's recent statements about Iran and its weapons of mass destruction and is left to ask:

Should a free society be placed on a new course of imperialism without the understanding and approval of its people? Where is the debate and challenge in Congress to this profoundly alien concept to American principles of foreign policy?

What a quaint idea. One worth revisiting and then implementing.

A Washington Post editorial makes note of President Bush's recent offer of billions in aid, a Camp David visit, and a "long-term relationship" to Pakistani Gen. Pervez Musharraf and asks an important question:

[These offers are] a huge boost for a man who overthrew Pakistan's last elected civilian government in a military coup, presided over his country's delivery of nuclear weapons technology to North Korea, directed its last military offensive against India and broke his promises to restore democracy and crack down on extremist Islamic groups. It's fair to ask what the Bush administration will get in exchange.

Washington Times Chief Political Correspondent Donald Lambro joins the unpatriotic dissenters by writing:

Something has gone wrong with our plans to quickly rebuild Iraq and put it on the road to democracy and economic growth. A big part of the problems we are struggling to overcome has to do with the way we are using our combat forces there, where they are being sent and what they are being asked to protect.

Of course, only the "unpatriotic" were stating concerns about that fact prior to the war.

A committee sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations will release a study tomorrow arguing that the nation should spend $98 billion more over the next five years on "first responders" than currently planned. John Mintz reports:

The 20-member panel that wrote the report was headed by former senator Warren B. Rudman (R-N.H.) and Richard A. Clarke, a former top counterterrorism adviser to presidents Bill Clinton and George H.W. and George W. Bush. Other members include retired Adm. William J. Crowe Jr. and retired Gen. John W. Vessey Jr., both former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; William H. Webster, former director of the CIA and FBI; and Nobel laureate Joshua Lederberg.

The report, "Emergency Responders: Drastically Underfunded, Dangerously Unprepared," is a follow-up to an earlier study, also led by Rudman, that reached equally critical conclusions about the nation's lack of preparedness for emergencies, as well as gaps in protections for facilities such as ports and water systems.

The Bush Administration's reaction? Not to say that it will make good on its promises to help states, cities, and counties fund those who will be the first to respond to a terrorist attack.

No, this White House is left to argue that the number citied is "grossly inflated."

Of course, there might be money for domestic security programs if we stopped passing irresponsible tax cuts. Priorities, you know.

Many people tried to warn the Bush Administration about potential problems that the U.S. could face after removing Saddam from power.

Our military, however, is realizing that some of these worries have now materialized. Military leaders are now admitting that we are engaged in a guerrilla war in Iraq. The Los Angeles Times' Alissa J. Rubin reports:

Facing a marked increase in the frequency and brazenness of attacks on U.S.-led forces in Iraq in the last two weeks, military officials are for the first time speaking more openly about the potential for a long-term fight to quell the resistance to the American presence.

Although the term is rarely used at the Pentagon, from every description by military officials, what U.S. troops face on the ground in Iraq has all the markings of a guerrilla war — albeit one in which there are multiple opposition groups rather than a single movement.

The rising opposition could further hamper the civilian reconstruction and delay the military's exit from the country, according to military experts.

Thomas Oliphant observes that conservatives are unhappy with President Bush's reaction to this week's Supreme Court rulings on affirmative action and privacy rights. In fact, Oliphant goes so far as to argue that:

Those who hit from the left side of the plate stopped trusting Bush as a person and as a leader a long time ago. Now, those on the right must wonder if the liberals don't have a point.

William O'Rourke writes about the explosion of single-pocket politics, where wealth can buy one political power.

The Transportation Security Agency is coming under increasing pressure to reduce concerns about security employees stealing from checked baggage. Over 6,700 complaints have been filed about stolen property in the past six months.

Washington Post reporter Sara Kehaulani Goo makes an important observation in the story's eighth paragraph:

Travelers and members of Congress have expressed concern about people working in airport security who have criminal records. Hiring thousands of federal security workers after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks was intended to inspire the confidence of travelers. But this month the TSA admitted that it has yet to complete background checks on 22,000 of its screeners. The agency has fired 85 felons who had been hired.

The TSA declined on privacy grounds to say whether background checks had been made on the two Miami screeners arrested this week. The agency said budget problems have delayed installation of video cameras in airports to keep an eye on security workers. (emphasis added)

Let us recap. Government budgeting decisions are a reflection of priorities and values. The Bush Administration's actions indicate that this White House believes that irresponsible tax cuts targeting the affluent are more important than airline security funding.

I do not agree.

Those who watch this White House closely will not be surprised to learn that there is much more to the story behind the revelation this week concerning the Iraqi scientist with nuclear components in his backyard.

Joshua Micah Marshall has the rest of the story.

And there are many officials hoping the American people will once again have moved onto a new story and miss these sordid details.

The Daily Kos cites a recent Army Times editorial that takes the Bush Administration to task for following up its (empty) talk about supporting the troops with budget decisions that nickel-and-dime our military families.

Kos then provides a list of examples showing how the GOP's actions are not living up to their rhetoric:

Refuse to double the $6,000 gratuity to the families of soldiers who die in harms way.

They roll back pay increases for troops in harms way.

They refuse to pass servicemember-friendly tax provisions, as the GOP's corporate masters get first dibs.

They provide meager basic increases for the lower ranks.

They cut the Pentagon's building budget (which pays for things such as barracks improvements, bowling alleys and other quality-of-life improvements at military bases, something that was really important to us soldiers), in order to make room for Bush's tax cuts.

In fact, Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee tried to restore $1 billion of the construction money, and proposed paying for it by trimming some of the recent tax cuts for those making more than $1 million. Get this: under Obey's proposal, instead of an $88,300 break, they would've gotten an $83,500 cut.

The Republicans killed the proposal. To Republicans in Congress, $4,800 for their richest benefactors was more important than improving the quality of life of our men and women in uniform.

As Kos argues, it is time for Democrats to expose the Republicans' hypocrisy on this point and provide specific alternative programs. Our nation should be serving these men and women -- and their families -- better.

You must excuse Jonathan Alter if he feels a bit betrayed by President Bush. After all, he actually thought the president meant it when he spoke during the State of the Union message about the importance of national service and promised to expand its funding. He observes:

It’s still hard for me to imagine that George and Laura Bush don’t care about what happens to the programs they’ve been trumpeting all over the country. But Ari Fleischer was noncommittal about restoring AmeriCorps to its current size with a measly $185 million supplemental appropriation (about one half of 1 percent of the latest tax cut). Actually expand-ing AmeriCorps from 50,000 to 75,000 corps members to fulfill Bush’s promise seems unlikely. Under pressure last week, Congress—with the backing of the president—passed a stopgap bill that straightens out a confusing accounting squabble but still leaves AmeriCorps with a 58 percent cut and tens of thousands fewer participants. That’s a lot of idealistic young people who have already signed up for this fall and will now be told they can’t serve their country.

How did this happen? Alter explains:

Who’s to blame? Radical Republicans in the House and a president who doesn’t get down deep enough into the messy details of policymaking to follow through. That’s the generous interpretation. The more cynical view is that Bush is a lip-service president who makes “compassionate conservative” promises and even signs bills in the Rose Garden with great flourish—then walks away. Exhibit A is the landmark No Child Left Behind Act, which imposes a series of costly accountability mandates on the education system (many of them commendable) without providing the resources to implement them. The congressional appropriation is $8 billion short of what Bush asked for.

As Alter notes, Bush is so powerful that he could sway Congress if he cared to do so. The fact that he refuses to fight for these promises speaks volumes about this Administration's misplaced priorities and misguided values.

Trudy Rubin argues that it is clear that the Bush Administration failed to plan adequately for Iraq's post-war situation:

Three weeks in Iraq makes very clear that no one in the Bush administration made serious postwar plans before the start of the Iraq war.

That lack of foresight is largely responsible for the huge occupation problems the Bush team now faces - as Iraqi anger mounts over lack of security, electricity, water, sewage and jobs. Unless the Bush administration invests many more resources into its Iraq venture, soon, it could lose the peace.

The painless solution promised by the Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz team has not materialized. Anger is growing, and we are in danger of losing control of the situation. Did we really remove Saddam just so a hard-line Islamic regime could take its place?

As Rubin argues, it is time for the delusions to end. Now that the die has been cast, it is time for the United States to live up to the financial obligations of being an occupying power.

If President Bush needs help finding the money, he can start looking at his irresponsible tax cuts.

Ellen Goodman writes about the Bush Administration's attempts to wiggle out of its pre-war justifications for attacking Iraq and the continuing search for weapons of mass destruction and is left to wonder:

A generation ago, ''Nightline'' began its tenure with each show announcing that it was Day 12 or Day 120 in the Iran hostage crisis. Where is the network today that would track Day 75 in the Search for WMDs? Where is the Democratic candidate who would adopt this admittedly high-risk strategy? Where is the member of the White House team - memo to Colin Powell? - willing to resign in protest over being misled into misleading?

Instead the president draws yet another link between 9/11 and Iraq, telling $4 million worth of donors in New York Monday night that ''terrorists declared war on the United States of America, and war is what they got.'' And he gets away with it.

The Bush Administration, and its supporters, have been telling those of us that finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq really does not matter.

Add George F. Will to the list of those who disagree. He writes:

Some say the war was justified even if WMD are not found nor their destruction explained, because the world is "better off" without Saddam Hussein. Of course it is better off. But unless one is prepared to postulate a U.S. right, perhaps even a duty, to militarily dismantle any tyranny -- on to Burma? -- it is unacceptable to argue that Hussein's mass graves and torture chambers suffice as retrospective justifications for preemptive war. Americans seem sanguine about the failure -- so far -- to validate the war's premise about the threat posed by Hussein's WMD, but a long-term failure would unravel much of this president's policy and rhetoric.

Will suggests a possible explanation for why no WMD have yet been found. One should give him credit for acknowledging this essential question and then attempting to answer it.

Will also notes that Bush is not paying a political price for the WMD problem. But, unlike President Bush and his supporters, he does not assume that the American people will continue to feel this way indefinitely. He concludes:

For the president, the missing weapons are not a political problem. Frank Luntz, a Republican pollster, says Americans are happily focused on Iraqis liberated rather than WMD not found, so we "feel good about ourselves."

But unless America's foreign policy is New Age therapy to make the public feel mellow, feeling good about the consequences of an action does not obviate the need to assess the original rationale for the action.

Until WMD are found, or their absence accounted for, there is urgent explaining to be done.

Robert Novak puts together reports about low troop morale in Iraq and the reaction to Army Chief of Staff General Eric Shinseki's retirement and concludes that there are hard times ahead for our nation's Army.

Shinseki, remember, warned before the Iraqi war that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's supporters were underestimating the number of troops required to police Iraq.

In his retirement address, Shinseki urged the Bush Administration to "beware the 12-division strategy for a 10-division army.'' Our troops are spread thin. Deployment time is up. We are using our reserves in ways and for lengths of time that no one intended.

Perhaps better pay would help recruit the soldiers we need in the post-September 11 climate. Especially if we are to implement the dangerous preemption doctrine.

Of course, as I often forget, tax cuts for the affluent are more important than such needs.

Jules Witcover explains to his readers how Gov. Howard Dean's presidential campaign is using the internet to raise more supporters and more money.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) has serious concerns about security at the Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, N.M.

He charges that the Energy Department has not followed through on a promised investigation of the problems and that whistle-blowers have been punished for coming forward.

When someone like Senator Grassley is concerned, and makes his concerns public, then you and I have cause for worry.

The Washington Post's Mike Allen writes:

The Bush administration yesterday released a highly selective analysis of the cost to families of rolling back scheduled tax cuts, an early sign of the White House's plan to brand Democrats as tax raisers throughout their race for the presidential nomination.

They need to talk about how many families have seen their tax burden increase as state and local taxes have gone up to counter reductions in federal monies -- including the lack of promised funds to help with homeland security measures.

They need to point out how financing tax cuts with deficits today is nothing more than a tax increase on our children and grandchildren.

They need to argue, especially to middle class voters, that many government services they take for granted are now jeopardized because of the tax cuts Bush has doled out to the affluent.

The Bush Administration has joined its GOP Congressional allies in taking an extreme position in the government budget battles. It is well past time to paste them with the extremist label.

Someone let me know when our federal government is going to take the issue of airline security seriously. Sara Kehaulani Goo writes in the Washington Post:

As the summer travel season moves into high gear, members of Congress, airport security officials and advocacy groups warn that behind-the-scenes lapses have weakened security in ways that may not be apparent to travelers.

They are pressing the federal Transportation Security Administration to move more quickly to inspect air cargo adequately, thoroughly research the backgrounds of airport workers and finally begin screening all checked luggage for explosives.

But major problems remain and funding cuts are under consideration. Tax cuts for the affluent, apparently, are more important than giving the Transportation Safety Administration the resources needed, for example, to inspect airline cargo for explosives.

At least the flying public has so far not noticed the problems:

Dulles International Airport already was losing passenger screeners at a rate of at least one a day, Scott McHugh, the airport's federal security director, wrote in an e-mail to colleagues at other East Coast airports. He said that with fewer workers, the airport was able to screen only 57 percent of checked luggage for explosives.

"Up to now we have been able to hide this fact from the public (and any terrorist surveillance teams)," McHugh wrote in a June 6 e-mail obtained by The Washington Post.

The joys of blissful ignorance.

The Washington Post's Walter Pincus reports:

In a nationally televised address last October in which he sought to rally congressional support for a resolution authorizing war against Iraq, President Bush declared that the government of Saddam Hussein posed an immediate threat to the United States by outlining what he said was evidence pointing to its ongoing ties with al Qaeda.

A still-classified national intelligence report circulating within the Bush administration at the time, however, portrayed a far less clear picture about the link between Iraq and al Qaeda than the one presented by the president, according to U.S. intelligence analysts and congressional sources who have read the report.

The Boston Globe editorial writers rightly note that:

JUST WHEN it seemed impossible that Congress could tilt more shamelesly to the richest taxpayers, the US House yesterday voted to repeal permanently the estate tax on multimillion-dollar inheritances. The bill, which would increase the already ballooning deficit by $162 billion over 10 years, makes the recently enacted cut in the dividend tax look like something out of the New Deal. The Senate should reject this blatant giveaway or risk shredding one of the few remaining aspects of fairness in the nation's tax system.

Senator Ernest F. Hollings (D-S.C.) tries to bring attention to the federal government's rapidly increasing budget deficit.

Nobody is paying any attention to the budget deficit. Last month the House Budget Committee's Democrats forecast a deficit of nearly $500 billion, and The Post reported the story on Page A4. Last week the Congressional Budget Office reported that the deficit would balloon to a record $400 billion-plus, and The Post again buried the story on A4. Spending trust funds, such as Social Security, is what keeps the estimate at $400 billion. The actual deficit will be approximately $600 billion.

Bush and Daniels used to talk about how they would repay the nation's debt more quickly than any administration in history. Before Sept. 11, 2001, the president bragged that his budget reserved $1 trillion for unforeseen circumstances. Perish the thought that the war on terrorism, Afghanistan and Iraq cost $1 trillion. Those factors had an impact, but the real culprit, according to the nonpartisan Concord Coalition, is that this president has cut $3.12 trillion in revenue since taking office. These are the largest tax cuts in history, yet the administration claims they have no relationship to the record deficits reported on Page A4. Amazingly, he asks for more.

There are, of course, moral reasons. But Republicans no longer care about balanced budgets and making sure we avoid mortgaging our future and leaving an ever-increasing bill for our children and grandchildren to pay.

A Washington Post editorial today describes House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's (R-Texas) complaints over being criticized for linking campaign contributions to policy decisions. The editorial writers explain:

"IT NEVER CEASES to amaze me that people are so cynical they want to tie money to issues, money to bills, money to amendments," the House majority leader, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), said the other day. Would this be the same Mr. DeLay who is renowned for keeping a ledger in his office tracking "friendly" and "unfriendly" political action committees -- as measured by their contributions to the GOP? The same Mr. DeLay who was chastised by the House ethics committee for threatening a Washington trade association with retaliation after it hired a Democrat?

Perhaps DeLay will surprise me by calling for an investigation into questionable fundraising practices he and some of his colleagues used when dealing with Westar Energy.

But I doubt it.

In our new Gilded Age, good times continue to roll for some despite the sluggish economy. The Washington Post's Ben White reports about the continuing large increases in executive compensation:

Among the 1,019 public companies studied, the median bonus for chief executives in their posts in both 2001 and 2002 increased about 9 percent, to $451,000. Long-term incentive payouts, meanwhile, nearly doubled, from a median value of around $500,000 in 2001 to over $900,000 in 2002, according to the study, conducted by the Corporate Library, an independent research group, for release today.

Total cash compensation in 2002, including salary, bonus and other direct payments, rose nearly 17 percent, to a median of about $1.2 million, in 2002. The median figure represents the point at which there are an equal number of chief executives above and below.

You will often hear a conservative tax cut fanatic argue during budget debates that cutting taxes raises revenues. It is a nice little theory, albeit one unsupported by the facts.

Reed Davis, someone I met through a discussion list sponsored by The Concord Coalition, has taken the time to explain the truth behind the numbers. He writes:

The argument that the near-doubling of revenues during Reagan's two terms proves the value of tax cuts is an old argument. It's also extremely flawed. At 99.6 percent, revenues did nearly double during the 80s. However, they had likewise doubled during EVERY SINGLE DECADE SINCE THE GREAT DEPRESSION! They went up 502.4% during the 40's, 134.5% during the 50's, 108.5% during the 60's, and 168.2% during the 70's. At 96.2 percent, they nearly doubled in the 90s as well. Hence, claiming that the Reagan tax cuts caused the doubling of revenues is like a rooster claiming credit for the dawn.

Furthermore, the receipts from individual income taxes (the only receipts directly affected by the tax cuts) went up only 91.3 percent during the 80's. Meanwhile, receipts from Social Insurance, which is directly affected by the FICA tax rate, went up 140.8 percent. This large increase was largely due to the fact that the FICA tax rate went up 25% from 6.13 to 7.65 percent of payroll. Hence, the claim that the doubling of TOTAL revenues proves the effectiveness of tax cuts is including revenues which resulted from a tax hike to prove the effectiveness of a tax cut. This seems like the height of hypocrisy.

Reed has done a significant amount of great work that he has reproduced on his web site. It is worth your time to review it.

When Democrats retake control of the U.S. House of Representatives, whether it is next year or 10 years from now, we must remember this story reported by Jim VandeHei:

In 1994, Rep. David Dreier (R-Calif.) lamented how Democrats were routinely preventing Republicans from getting votes on their more conservative ideas. "All we are asking for is fair treatment on both sides of the aisle here," he said.

A decade later, Dreier now rules the House Rules Committee with an iron fist and routinely prevents Democrats from getting votes on their more liberal ideas.

On many high-profile issues, Dreier, whose committee decides the rules for each debate, has refused to allow Democrats an opportunity to offer a substitute amendment on the House floor. He has infuriated Democrats by denying them votes on their plans for everything from unemployment insurance to tax cuts.

This is political hardball. As Rep. Sue Myrick (R-N.C.) notes later in the story, the Republicans do run the place. But, when the Republicans return to the minority, we will need to remind them of their behavior on these matters if Democrats return the favor.

We must be ready to counter the selective amnesia that is likely to manifest itself at that future date. We see similar symptoms, after all, among Senate Republicans when they are reminded of their treatment of Democratic judicial nominations.

The Washington Post's Laura Blumenfeld's reports on the recent resignation of a White House counterterrorism aide and what he chose to do after leaving government service:

Five days before the war began in Iraq, as President Bush prepared to raise the terrorism threat level to orange, a top White House counterterrorism adviser unlocked the steel door to his office, an intelligence vault secured by an electronic keypad, a combination lock and an alarm. He sat down and turned to his inbox.

"Things were dicey," said Rand Beers, recalling the stack of classified reports about plots to shoot, bomb, burn and poison Americans. He stared at the color-coded threats for five minutes. Then he called his wife: I'm quitting.

Beers's resignation surprised Washington, but what he did next was even more astounding. Eight weeks after leaving the Bush White House, he volunteered as national security adviser for Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), a Democratic candidate for president, in a campaign to oust his former boss. All of which points to a question: What does this intelligence insider know?

I am not surprised. I have long joined those who have argued that the White House's actions in the war on terror fail to measure up to its rhetoric.

Knight-Ridder reporter Frank Davies writes:

A third of the American public believes U.S. forces found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, according to a recent poll. And 22 percent said Iraq actually used chemical or biological weapons.

Before the war, half of those polled in a survey said Iraqis were among the 19 hijackers on Sept. 11, 2001.

But such weapons have not been found in Iraq, and were never used. Most of the Sept. 11 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia. None were Iraqis.

How could so many people be so wrong about life-and-death information that has dominated news coverage for almost two years?

After all, when a president, albeit wrongly, declares that we have found the weapons of mass destruction, one should not be surprised to learn that a significant portion of U.S. citizens believe him.

One should be surprised to see how few Americans dare question him when the assertion proves wrong.

It may be true, but I doubt Karl Rove will use it. Note: This link will likely only work on Sunday, June 15.

Leonard Pitts thinks it is still too early to declare that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He rightly believes that patience is required, but not of infinite length.

He is troubled, though, by the nation's reaction to the WMD debate. He writes that our "collective shrug" about the justifications for going to war "is obscene":

Frankly, what troubles me more than the question of when the arsenal will be found is that we the people don't seem to care too much whether it's found or not. Before the war, the Bush administration said, emphatically and repeatedly, that the presence of banned weapons was the one thing that made the invasion an urgent necessity. And 41 percent of us told the Gallup Organization that only conclusive evidence of the weapons' existence would justify the war.

Two months later and with no weapons in sight, our convictions are, to say the least, wavering. According to a Gallup poll released earlier this month, 56 percent of us now say the war was justified whether weapons are discovered or not.

That change bespeaks a moral malleability that is singularly unattractive. More to the point, it bespeaks a disturbing willingness to rationalize this event, as if to say, now that it is a fait accompli, it no longer matters why we did it. And if the old reason is no longer operative, it's perfectly OK to sub in a new one.

We Americans love freedom so much that we'd know when it was in jeopardy. as Michael Kinsley explains:

We Americans are a freedom-loving people. Or so we like to think. Other peoples are freedom-loving too, we recognize. But, looking around the world, we suspect Europeans such as the Germans and the French of being a bit too eager to salute. Asians are conformists, we feel. Africans go from one military coup to the next, and Latin Americans aren't long past a similar habit. In America, though, we have a special knack for freedom. After all, we invented it.

Except, as Kinsley notes, everyone over the age of 50 in the United States today saw an example of the government restricting freedom and most found it quite acceptable.

Which is why vigilance is required. Even today.

David Broder yesterday reported on President Bush's broken promise to expand national service programs. Today, he comments on this remarkable failure:

Few subjects are addressed more frequently or more eloquently by President Bush than the challenge -- and opportunity -- of voluntary national service. In his two most recent State of the Union addresses and in dozens of speeches around the country, this president has urged Americans to devote time and energy to community projects. And he has pledged his best efforts to expand government programs of national service.

His advocacy seems entirely sincere, which makes it even harder to understand how the main instrument of such service -- the Ameri-Corps program -- may well shrink on Bush's watch.

This White House has been more than willing to spend its political capital to advocate for positions that were unpopular at the time. If Bush is such a strong supporter of the concept, and in theory a "compassionate conservative," it is time for him to leave the words behind and take some action.

Let's see. In the aftermath of the September 11 terror attacks, young people expressed a desire to serve the nation in far greater numbers. There is a national service program, AmeriCorps, that President Bush has repeatedly promised to expand.

Seems like a win-win situation.

Except President Bush and his Republican Congressional allies have decided to gut the program. David Broder reports:

Local directors of AmeriCorps, the community service program President Bush has repeatedly praised and promised to expand, said yesterday they have been notified of what they called "devastating" cutbacks in their allocation of volunteers for the coming year.

Memos sent to the states by the Corporation for National and Community Service, the parent agency for AmeriCorps, indicate that dozens and perhaps hundreds of long-established programs, including some singled out for praise by the president and first lady Laura Bush, will lose their funding.

In these times, our government should be rapidly expanding the opportunities for people to serve their nation. Some leaders understand that. For President Bush and his allies, however, tax cuts for the affluent are simply far more important.

Budgets, remember, are about priorities and values. Now we know the Republicans'.

They are not yet finished.

The Washington Post's Jonathan Weisman reports that conservative anti-tax crusaders are continuing their fight to transform radically the nation's tax structure.

You can guess who will benefit the most from such a change. Weisman explains the successes the anti-tax crusaders have already enjoyed:

But the conservative theorists say they have achieved far more in three years than they had expected.

Since Bush took office, this decade's federal tax bill has been cut by more than $1.7 trillion. That amount would more than double if tax-cut provisions now set to expire are extended. Federal tax revenue, as a percentage of the overall economy, will fall this year to about 16.5 percent, its lowest level since the Eisenhower administration.

The record federal budget surplus of $236 billion in the last year of the Clinton administration has turned into a record deficit that is expected to surpass $400 billion this year, in part because of those tax policies. (emphasis added)

This is a radical attack on our progressive tax system. Perhaps it is been incremental enough for one not to have noticed. But Weisman sums up how large the changes have been:

Specific changes to the tax code mean the government now depends more on taxing wages than investment income such as dividends, capital gains and interest. Because investment income and inheritances tend to flow to the very rich, the effective federal tax rate on households earning more than $416,000 will have fallen from 32.7 percent when Bush took office to 26.9 percent by 2010, while their share of federal taxation will have dropped from 24.3 percent to 22.8 percent.

If we have large Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and national defense spending programs, but revenue lower than when these programs were smaller or did not exist at all, the result is obvious.

The Republicans want to gut other vital government services. If you are rich, you win. If you are middle class or poor, the net result could be described as "the hell with you." These theorists, after all, think that the poor should be taxed more to reduce the burden on the rich.

Are they really going to be allowed to win with such a program?

Want to be a pundit? Dr. Andrew Cline outlines what are, sadly, eight essential rules of punditry on his Rhetorica blog.

Jules Witcover thinks it's too early to start using it.

Remember how we were bombarded by the supposedly liberal media with stories about how House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was simply too liberal to govern? How she was supposedly "out-of-step" with America?

They were a big deal. Democrats were on the defensive for weeks.

I continue to marvel, then, at how the Republicans have yet to answer even token questions about their Majority Leader, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas). No one can seriously question that DeLay has far more power than Pelosi. He is, after all, the most powerful Republican in Congress. Nor can many doubt that DeLay is further to the right than Pelosi is to the left.

Paul Krugman tries to get this needed conversation started with an important column today. He writes:

There's no point in getting mad at Mr. DeLay and his clique: they are what they are. I do, however, get angry at moderates, liberals and traditional conservatives who avert their eyes, pretending that current disputes are just politics as usual. They aren't — what we're looking at here is a radical power play, which if it succeeds will transform our country. Yet it's considered uncool to point that out.

Many of those who minimize the threat the radical right now poses to America as we know it would hate to live in the country Mr. DeLay wants to create. Yet by playing down the seriousness of the challenge, they help bring his vision closer to reality.

E.J. Dionne gets Baltimore's Mayor to make an observation that may seem obvious but apparently has been missed by the tax cut-first politicians in our nation's capital:

"The most fundamental reason we have a federal government is to provide for the common defense," said Mayor Martin O'Malley of Baltimore, chairman of the conference's homeland-security task force. Yet the common defense against international terror has become a local burden. "When we're threatened by foreign attack," he said in an interview, the cities provide "the front-line troops."

Government budgets are about more than numbers. They are a reflection of our values and priorities. Think about the efforts to which President Bush and his Republican Congressional allies have gone to secure more irresponsible tax cuts. Then remember how those same people have repeatedly broken their promise to fund homeland security and anti-terrorism measures.

Dionne explains how we are all negatively affected by the GOP's misplaced priorities:

But there is something amiss when the cost of providing homeland security requires mayors to move police away from their normal crime-fighting duties. And it's troubling that the financial burdens may force these mayors to lay off some among the very cops and firefighters who are carrying the domestic burden of the battle. As O'Malley says, financing the struggle against international terror "off firehouse bingo proceeds and the local property tax" seems a strange choice for the world's only superpower.

Matt Miller has a warning for Democrats: you may not want to be so quick to agree with President Bush on a Medicare prescription drug plan. He writes:

Let me be clear: I'm not questioning whether we need to add such a benefit to Medicare. We do. But the current bills wouldn't start the new benefit until at least 2006. Any law passed this summer is mostly about Bush positioning himself and his party for the 2004 election. He understands this even if Democrats don't.

As can never be said often enough, there are two overarching premises Democrats must explode to beat Bush in 2004.

The first is the notion that our coming decades-long fight against terrorism is a "war." Out of fear, Democrats wrongly conceded this language in the first days after 9/11. If Democrats don't revise this choice - and mount a massive communications effort to properly define the nature of our security challenges in this new era - the "war" metaphor will deliver millions of contestable votes for the incumbent president in 2004.

The second major premise that must be exploded is that Bush's domestic policy is "compassionate." The compassion hoax is central to Bush's appeal to the independent voters who decide presidential elections.

Democrats need to make sure they don't define themselves right into an extended residency in the political wilderness.

Thomas Friedman has some sensible advice that opponents of President Bush's irresponsible tax cuts should consider.

He suggests that opponents need to ask the American people to replace the phrase "tax cuts" every time Bush says it with "service cuts" since that will be the result of these misguided policies. Friedman explains:

To name something is to own it. And the Democrats, for too long, have allowed the Bush team to name its radical reduction in services, and the huge dependence it is creating on foreign capital, as an innocuous "tax cut." Balderdash. This new tax cut is a dangerous foray into wretched excess and it will ultimately make our government, ourselves and our children less secure.

American University Assistant Professor Mark Clarence Walker rightly observes that:

One would not be remiss or incorrect to say that Congress has given the president total control over the conduct of international and security affairs even though the Founding Fathers of this country never meant it to be that way.

What should most disturb people is the abdication of congressional leadership. Our democracy was designed to function most effectively with Congress and the president holding each other responsible, limiting the power of the other and creating policy from the input of a plurality of leaders, not just one.

The United States was designed as a representative democracy, but if most of its representatives cede their power to the president, then we are right back where we started in 1776.

The Congressional Budget Office has confirmed what budget watchers have known for some time: the United States government this year is going to record its largest budget deficit ever.

We are looking at more than $400 billion in red ink this year. Of course, keen budget analysts know that this figure includes the still-large surplus in Social Security payroll tax revenues. Money that theoretically we are supposed to save to help finance the baby boom generation's impending retirement. So you can add another $100 billion or so to that figure to get a real view of our government's deficit spending.

Speaking of irrational, House Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Jim Nussle (R-Iowa) has the gall to blame this on...you guessed it, out-of-control spending!

"The past 21/2 years have put some appropriate demands on our government and on our budget because of some extraordinary circumstances," said Rep. Jim Nussle (R-Iowa), the Budget Committee chairman. "We have enacted sound policies that will grow the economy, but until we recommit to holding the line on government spending, deficits will continue to be an issue."

The talking points are straight from the unreality of the 1980s.

Mr. Chairman, let's take a short stroll through reality. You and your colleagues have worked with President Bush to enact at least two trillion dollars in tax cuts the past two years. Most discretionary spending increases have gone straight to the military -- a budget item Republicans have not been keen on cutting.

A Call to Economic Arms, the campaign book Paul Tsongas presented for his 1992 presidential run, remains one of the most important political works I have read. It is a book -- and Senator Tsongas a man -- who has much to do with my journey away from my youthful support of the GOP.

In that book, Tsongas asked a question of the Reagan/Bush 41 years from the perspective of the younger generations who were being left the burden of a large and growing national debt. A question that unfortunately has relevance to today's political world. He wrote that as these young generations age they will wonder:

How could they lull the American people into accepting such staggering debt without widespread revolt?

More pointedly, they will ask, why did people allow this enormous accumulation of debt which now burdens their generation? This, of course, raises the pointed question of generational morality.

Will we continue to allow the Republicans to push the burden of these tax cuts onto our children and grandchildren? Will we continue to accept these generationally immoral policies?

As Taegan Goodard's Political Wire reported last week, Howard Dean's campaign blog has been upgraded.

The new blog has went live yesterday. It is now being published with Moveable Type, and you will want to update your bookmarks so they get you to the new blog home.

Dean's people thank blogger Rick Klau for getting the Moveable Type blog up and running. He deserves the kudos. Blogging is going to become an increasingly important part of campaigning in the coming months.

The Daily Kos has come up with an excellent idea: working with the Democratic National Committee to set up a system by which bloggers can make contributions to the party and get credit for it. Reading that post is worthwhile to see how the idea came to him and was implemented.

You can contribute to the ePatriot effort here. Kos is essentially Beta-testing this program and his initial success should lead to its spread throughout left-leaning bloggers.

The full power of the internet to organize and fundraise for campaigns has yet to be harnessed. Kos' ePatriots idea and campaigns' use of Meetup.com are small indications of what is possible.

Given the Repubicans' current fundraising advantage, Democrats need to take advantage of what the internet can offer. Markos deserves much credit for making this happen.

Update: As you can see from the link and graphic to the right, I have signed up for the ePatriots program. I hope you will consider making a donation to the Democratic National Committee and participating in this new internet-based effort!

Neil Peirce compares President Bush's failure to make national service a priority with the ambitious plans of some potential opponents and wonders:

The question is: Will American voters see more value in such initiatives -- and community-based investments -- or in the Republicans' tax cuts? Can an argument for strengthening our youth, to focus first on the physical security and social strength of our communities, compete with the Bush camp's formula of assertive foreign military operations, diminishing domestic programs and, through tax cuts, less personal sacrifice?

Tax cuts for the rich vs. a new civic engagement. The 2004 election will be fought, in part, on those lines. We must, as a nation, choose wisely.

Richard Cohen comes to a harsh, yet accurate, conclusion about our nation's Attorney General:

A cavalier attitude toward civil liberties, an inability to concede mistakes, a refusal to see imperfections in the criminal justice system, a zealously irrational belief in the death penalty -- and pretty soon you can read between the lines of that Justice Department report: The attorney general is far more dangerous than any of the immigrants he wrongly detained.

Bad news for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas), Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), Rep. W.J. "Billy" Tauzin (R-La.) and Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.). More people are asking questions about $56,000 in donations to groups associated with them and legislation to help the energy company Westar.

A Washington Post editorial today explains:

As Post writer Thomas B. Edsall reported last week, the Westar executives believed, as is evident from documents disclosed in a federal investigation of the company, that their donations to political groups linked with the four key Republicans would cause Congress to exempt their firm from a federal regulation they regarded as troublesome. Whether the campaign contributions were a quid pro quo for legislative action on a measure sought by Westar should not simply be a subject of debate between press secretaries and the media. Given the political game plan described by Westar executives and the subsequent legislative action that was taken, the matter warrants prompt investigation by the Department of Justice.

One also wonders just how many of these scandals we are going to tolerate from Rep. Tom "I am the federal government" DeLay?

Matt Miller argues that the dynamics that allow the Bush Adminstration to get away with proposing such an irresponsible tax cut policy are nothing new in American history.

Miller suggests revisiting Arthur Schlesinger Jr.'s book The Age of Jackson and the thoughts of a little-remembered Virginian named John Taylor to see an early explanation of this phenomenon:

In a rambling 700-page volume called "An Inquiry Into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States," Taylor identified two threats to the natural economic order, "two modes of invading private property; the first, by which the poor plunder the rich ... sudden and violent; the second, by which the rich plunder the poor, slow and legal."

As Schlesinger explains, Taylor thought the first risk irrelevant in America - there simply weren't enough hopeless poor folks to fuel violent revolt. Schlesinger continues: "The real peril, he believed, lay in the second mode: plunder from above, orderly and legalized. The succession of privileged orders through history - the priesthood, the nobility, the banking system - showed how every age had known its own form of institutionalized robbery by a minority operating through the state."

If ever a phrase captured Bush tax policy, "plunder from above" is it.

A war on the poor.

Brent Staples explains how local radio has largely been destroyed by media consolidation.

Worse, this is a mistake that the Federal Communications Commission wants to repeat.

Democrats runnning for president, and their advisors and supporters, need to understand and react to the following point made by Lawrence J. Haas and Richard Klein:

Still, in a post-9/11 world, Democrats will never have an adequate chance to debate those issues — on which they can campaign and win — if they can't overcome public skepticism about how they would handle the nation's defense. It's not the economy, stupid, any longer — and asking whether voters are better off today than they were four years ago will mean are they safer and more secure, not richer and better employed. Whether Democrats like it or not, the road to the White House in 2004 runs through national security.

A Boston Globe editorial discusses disturbing developments in the airline security debate:

After all it took to get Congress to make airport security a federal responsibility, it is dismaying to see some airport managers trying to revert to the private-sector passenger screeners who helped make airport security so porous before Sept. 11. According to the Airports Council International-NorthAmerica, a trade organization, the managers believe that private firms can get passengers through more quickly than the screeners hired, trained, and deployed by the Transportation Security Administration. The managers should be more concerned about the thoroughness, not the speed, of security screening.

Speed is more important than safety? It did not even take two years for that particular amnesia to manifest itself. How anyone would dare make this idiotic argument today is beyond me.

The Globe's editorial continues by noting that a top priority today should be finding some way to increase screening of airline cargo. That's right. We still have not done much in that area.

Must we make the same mistakes again?

Michael Kinsley makes an important point about the breakdown of the implicit deal between democracy and capitalism. He writes:

The majority acknowledges that capitalism benefits all of us, even if some benefit a lot more than others. The majority also takes comfort in the belief that everyone has at least a shot at scoring big. The affluent minority, meanwhile, acknowledges that its good fortune is at least in part the luck of the draw. It recognizes that domestic tranquility, protection from foreign enemies and other government functions are worth more to people with more at stake. And it retains a tiny yet prudent fear of what beast might be awakened if the fortunate folks get too greedy about protecting and enlarging their good fortune.

Democrats are so afraid of being tagged as class warriors that the do not see the class war in which the Bush Administration is currently engaged. The same conservatives who think the rich are taxed too much also believe that the poor are not taxed enough.

For more information on that pathetic argument, you should read a recent series of columns written by Slate's Timothy Noah. He has been reporting on these developments for months.

At times you may wonder what direction he's headed and whether he'll arrive, but George F. Will today endorses government subsidies for Amtrak and passenger rail services. He writes:

Thirty-two years and more than $40 billion in subsidies (in today's dollars) after Amtrak was cobbled together from the remnants of various passenger rail systems, a nationwide poll shows 71 percent public support for subsidizing Amtrak at current or increased levels. Support for Amtrak is strong among all regions, ages, education levels and income groups.

Amtrak -- long-distance trains, legislative logrolling and all -- should be counted as a cost of democracy. It is here to stay, like true love, only more so.

A conservative argues, albeit lukewarmly, that the government needs to subsidize rail just as it heavily subsidizes airline and automobile transportation.

Frankly, the mere recognition by someone on the right that our government subsidizes airlines and cars is a welcome development. Only by understanding that fact can we begin to develop more rational transportation -- and energy -- policies.

The Washington Post's Dana Milbank writes that it is getting increasingly difficult for the Bush Administration to lower expectations about how successful President Bush's plans will turn out to be.

Good.

As Milbank explains, lowering expectations has been a classic Bush tactic throughout his political career. Milbank gets a great quote from a former Republican Party Chairman to make this point:

"This is a president who loves to be misunderestimated -- it is so part of his persona," said Rich Bond, a Republican strategist and former party chairman. "It has served to his advantage over and over again."

Each claim that Bush is "an idiot" or "stupid" helps create the environment that Bush uses to win.

So stop it!

Bush has proven over and over that he is smarter than his critics maintain. It is one of the reasons he has been able to win on so many policy issues.

We must stop lowering Bush's expectations for him. It is really stupid to continue falling into this Bush/Rove trap.

It appears that the Democrats in the Massachusetts State Legislature may finally be successful in killing the Clean Elections public campaign financing program the state's voters passed in an initiative by a 58-30 margin in 1998.

What is Clean Elections? It is a voluntary public finance program that has proven successful in Arizona and Maine. Under the program, candidates have to qualify for funding by receiving a set number of signatures and small donations to demonstrate support for their candidacy. Candidates then agree to a spending limit and to forgo any private fundraising. Once a candidate qualifies, he or she receives public money for the state primary and general election.

This reform allows candidates to focus on meeting their potential constituents and working on policy instead of attending an endless number of fundraisers. It allows people who are not rich to consider getting involved in government affairs. It helps to remove the influence gap between lobbyists who make donations and the average citizen.

The fact that the Massachusetts Legislature has refused to fund this voter-approved program is pathetic. It also shows the contempt this current cabal of lawmakers has for the Commonwealth's voters.

The tagline on the Massachusetts State web page is "Your Government, Your Way." Perhaps it is time for those in charge of the Massachusetts page to stop insulting people with such a lie.

(Click here to read about an effort to bring the Clean Elections system to California.)

Insanity defined: repeatedly performing the same action and expecting a different result.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer editorial cartoonist David Horsey puts the Republicans' repeated tax cut efforts into proper perspective.

The September 11 terrorist attacks exposed many holes in our system. In addition to the security and intelligence problems, we also learned of a potentially dangerous shortcoming in our Constitutional system.

The Continuity of Government Commission outlines the problem:

September 11th raises the possibility that foreign enemies might seriously disrupt the filling of vacancies in Congress, presidential succession, and achieving a quorum for the Court so much so that our basic institutions might not function in a normal constitutional manner.

If United Flight 93 had departed on time and the hijackers had flown to Washington without interference, the plane might have hit the Capitol between 9:00 and 9:30 A.M. At nine o'clock the House met with Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) presiding and recognized Representative Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), who spoke about the World Health Organization. Representative Tim Johnson (R-IL) took over the chair and recognized Representative Cass Ballenger (R-NC), who discussed the budget surplus. The chair then recognized Representative Peter DeFazio (D-OR), who talked about the Social Security Trust Fund. The floor was not heavily populated that Tuesday morning, with most business scheduled later that day, but there were still a number of members on the floor and many others in leadership offices or in private meetings in the Capitol. How many members of the House were in the building that morning is difficult to calculate, but it is clear that many would have perished. Had the attacks occurred a little later in the day, the toll would have been even greater. What if the plane had hit the Capitol the week before, on September 6, 2001, when Mexican President Vicente Fox addressed a joint session of Congress with the vice president and the president's cabinet in attendance? What if the attack had been carried out during a major vote when almost all members were present.

What ought to be done? A commission on the continuity of government, sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institution and headed by us, issued a report this week recommending a constitutional amendment to give Congress the power to provide legislation for the appointment of temporary replacements to fill vacant seats in the House after a catastrophic attack and to temporarily fill seats in the House and Senate that are held by incapacitated members. Under this authority, vacancies would be filled quickly so that the House and Senate could proceed with a full membership after an attack. A temporary appointee would serve only until a special election was held to fill the vacancy or, in the case of an incapacitated member, until that member recovers, dies or the term of office ends.

We must not allow terrorists and murderers to take advantage of these Constitutional problems. Now that we see their potential impact, our political leaders have an obligation to fix them.

We, the People, also have an obligation to see that they do.

Paul Krugman, to the chagrin of many, once again states an obvious conclusion about the Republicans' continued drive for more and more tax cuts:

Of course, the big betrayal was George W. Bush's decision to push this tax cut in the first place. There is no longer any doubt that the man who ran as a moderate in the 2000 election is actually a radical who wants to undo much of the Great Society and the New Deal.

Look at it this way: as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities points out, this latest tax cut reduces federal revenue as a share of G.D.P. to its lowest level since 1959. That is, federal taxes are now back to what they were in an era when Medicare and Medicaid didn't exist, and Social Security was still a minor expense. How can we maintain these programs, which have become essential to scores of millions of Americans, at today's tax rates? We can't.

Those who oppose this fiscal revolution need to start saying so.

Proposition 13, the groundbreaking anti-tax initiative, was approved by California taxpayers 25 years ago.

Prop. 13 continues to loom large over California's political scene. While the cap on residential property tax remains untouchable, other elements of the initiative -- including its two-thirds vote requirement to pass a state budget or tax increase -- are targeted by needed reform efforts.

One of the great ironies of California politics lies in the fact that Prop. 13 fell short of receiving the support of two-thirds of voters itself.

That's right. If Prop. 13 had to achieve the difficult two-thirds vote mark it requires of tax and budget decisions, it would not have gone into effect.

Thomas Friedman explains why we must succeed in rebuilding Iraq:

But my ultimate point is this: Finding Iraq's W.M.D.'s is necessary to preserve the credibility of the Bush team, the neocons, Tony Blair and the C.I.A. But rebuilding Iraq is necessary to win the war. I won't feel one whit more secure if we find Saddam's W.M.D.'s, because I never felt he would use them on us. But I will feel terribly insecure if we fail to put Iraq onto a progressive path. Because if that doesn't happen, the terrorism bubble will reinflate and bad things will follow. Mr. Bush's credibility rides on finding W.M.D.'s, but America's future, and the future of the Mideast, rides on our building a different Iraq.

But while we must not overlook those investigations, our priority now must be to ensure that Iraq (and the oft-forgotten Afghanistan) establish progressive regimes. Our safety is at stake in those efforts.

Jules Witcover examines how President George W. Bush has become the Great Justifier.

Bush's talent for coming up with new rationales for his actions when the old ones fail is nothing new. The public just continues to fall for them.

Drawing from his unlimited reserve of gall, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) says that he will only consider fixes that would provide the recently passed child care tax credit increase to low-income families as part of a broader new tax cut package.

So, here's the chronology. Pass an irresponsible tax cut while lying about it by claiming that all tax payers will enjoy its benefits. Analysis shows that this Republican argument is false since low-income taxpayers do not get the tax cut. Then say that the fix -- something needed to remedy the lie -- will only happen if the Republicans get another irresponsible tax cut.

It is a brilliant strategy, actually. One wonders why some Democrats continue to fall for it.

Is this another miscalculation in the Bush Administration's plan to rebuild Iraq? The Washington Post's Rajiv Chandrasekaran reports:

Iraqi political leaders vowed today to press ahead with plans to hold a large national conference aimed at selecting a transitional government despite a decision by the top U.S. civilian administrator here to call off the assembly and appoint an interim advisory council with limited authority.

Recent recents from polls of Arab nations indicate that the U.S. continues to lose the public relations battle. If this rebuilding effort does not go well, and we are left with a nation and a region loathing us for our administration there, more terrorism is inevitable.

That obvious conclusion is one reason why the Bush Administration's refusal to fund homeland security measures is so unacceptable.

The Washington Post's Dana Milbank and Jonathan Weisman report the results of new Bush tax cut analyses by two liberal organizations:

Three successive tax cuts pushed by President Bush will leave middle-income taxpayers paying a greater share of all federal taxes by the end of the decade, according to new analyses of the Bush administration's tax policies.

As critics of the tax cuts in 2001, 2002 and 2003 have noted, the very wealthiest Americans -- those earning $337,000 or more per year -- will be the greatest beneficiaries of the changes in the nation's tax laws. And, as administration officials have argued, low-income taxpayers will also enjoy a disproportionately lighter tax burden.

The result is that a broad swath of lower-middle, middle- and upper-middle-income people, as well as some rich Americans, will carry a greater share of the federal tax burden after the laws passed in the past three years are fully implemented.

But the results tell an entirely different story.

Joshua Micah Marshall writes a necessary condemnation of NASA's leadership over their failure to consider rescue efforts for the doomed Columbia crew:

You almost wish they hadn't, but the team came up with two very credible -- though certainly not foolproof -- plans to rescue the seven astronauts. In both scenarios the ship, Columbia, was doomed...

None of these ideas were sure-fire, of course. But they would have had a fighting chance.

Our astronauts should be able to expect that we will do all we can to bring them home if something goes wrong.

NASA, and by extension this nation, clearly broke that pact.

The Hill's Alexander Bolton reports that John Podesta's efforts to create a new liberal think tank are on target for a September opening.

Podesta, one of President Clinton's Chiefs of Staff, has been working to create a new organization with an annual budget of at least $10 million. That would make it the largest liberal think tank in Washington.

Liberals have been losing the think tank battle for some time. As Bolton writes:

By contrast, the Heritage Foundation, which has an annual operating budget of around $30 million, states its mission unambiguously: “To formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense.”

Republicans can rely on a slew of other well-funded conservative think tanks, such as the AEI (annual expenses: about $16 million), the Hudson Institute (annual budget: about $7 million), and the Cato Institute (annual budget: about $15 million).

Democrats have fewer allies, with less money. The Center on Budget & Policy Priorities has an annual budget of around $8 million; the Economic Policy Institute has a budget close to $5 million.

I look forward to reading the reports and information that will start being produced this fall.

Slate media critic Jack Shafer has started a resignation watch for New York Times Executive Editor Howell Raines.

With the Cold War long over, and Russia a nominal ally, Thomas Oliphant wonders how anyone can justify measures that keep the U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals on a hair-trigger alert. He writes:

How else does one explain the following facts that ''increase the risk of accidental or unauthorized nuclear launch,'' cited in a report from the Rand Corporation commissioned by the Nuclear Threat Initiative, which Nunn cochairs with fellow Georgian Ted Turner:

The two countries remain in a stance that allows their strategic nuclear weapons to be launched within minutes.

Russia's nuclear forces have deteriorated but remain in a dangerous posture, allowing once-mobile garrisoned intercontinental missiles to be launched through the roofs of their storage facilities and submarine missiles to be launched from their moorings. The suggestion is of a ''launch on warning'' policy.

Russia's satellite systems have major deficiencies that limit their ability to tell the difference between real attacks and false alarms confidently and quickly.

The United States still keeps more than half its fleet of Trident nuclear submarines at sea, including regular patrols near the Russian coast, along with attack submarines.

Oliphant explains some suggested measures that could be implemented quickly. Our leaders need to focus on efforts to reduce the chance of an accidental nuclear launch. They also need to make increasing the security of the Russian nuclear arsenal a top priority.

Paul Krugman draws a conclusion that should trouble you:

It's no answer to say that Saddam was a murderous tyrant. I could point out that many of the neoconservatives who fomented this war were nonchalant, or worse, about mass murders by Central American death squads in the 1980's. But the important point is that this isn't about Saddam: it's about us. The public was told that Saddam posed an imminent threat. If that claim was fraudulent, the selling of the war is arguably the worst scandal in American political history — worse than Watergate, worse than Iran-contra. Indeed, the idea that we were deceived into war makes many commentators so uncomfortable that they refuse to admit the possibility.

Welcome to the new Political Parrhesia server. My old host was giving me major problems with Moveable Type. That is one of the reasons I did not post in the end of May.

I hope this new home will work better. So far, so good.

I have just posted the following to the Political State Report:

The effort to force the first Gubernatorial recall election in California's history continues to overcome obstacles and gain momentum. Leading Democrats last week acknowledged that Rep. Darrell Issa's (R) effort will have the necessary resources to qualify the recall for the ballot. Governor Davis' campaign team has begun strategizing, leading Democrats face tough decisions, and it all will affect the debate over closing California's $38 billion budget gap.

Click here to read the entire post.