Conservative State Senator Wayne Kuipers proposed an interesting piece of legislation (2009 Senate Bill 636 Authorize “neighborhood schools”) recently that would:
[...] "authorize “neighborhood schools” run by parents and teachers under contract to a sponsor, such as a mayor, a city or the state board of education. They would have to meet certain standards, but would have more flexible rules than existing public schools (they could institure [sic] merit pay and would not be bound by strict seniority “tenure” mandates, for example). Teachers and parents at existing public schools could vote on whether to go independent, and applications to “secede” from a failing a failing school district and create a “neighborhood school” would have priority."
Kuipers chairs the Senate Education Committee, and is a supporter of misguided/ineffectual policies like "abstinence-only" sex education, he's also fought against legislation that would protect gay/lesbian students, and he's previously attempted to push for more charter schools.
As far as I can see, this is another step in the behind-the-scenes movement (led by conservative think tanks like the Mackinac Center and its not-so-subtle "swiftboating" proxy the "Education Action Group") to privatize education by simultaneously undermining public schools and assisting upper middle income households in fleeing from public schools by giving them tax cuts or subsidizing schools that more closely resemble private schools.
They began with vouchers, but the public is so thoroughly opposed to them that they've had to soften their approach and go about it more incrementally by creating small boutique schools that exist outside the boundaries of union contracts, pushing for charter schools, and taking every possible potshot at the performance of impoverished inner-city schools as a way of undermining all public schools. It will be interesting to see where this bill goes.
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UPDATE: Two additional pieces of legislation have been proposed by GOP senators in response to Wayne Kuipers bill that would allow for the creation of "neighborhood schools" that would basically create an alternate public school system to eliminate teachers' unions.
Senate Bill 638 (Authorize “neighborhood schools” )
Introduced by Sen. Patricia Birkholz (R) on June 11, 2009, to exempt the “neighborhood schools” proposed by Senate Bill 636 from the “teacher tenure” law provisions that make it difficult or impossible to pay Michigan public school teachers on the basis of merit, rather than years on the job, and which also make it very difficult to dismiss teachers.
(Source)
Senate Bill 639 (Authorize “neighborhood schools” )
Introduced by Sen. Bill Hardiman (R) on June 11, 2009, to revise the state “public employment relations act” to allow for the setting aside some of the terms of collective bargaining agreements proposed in Senate Bill 636 for “neighborhood schools,” in particular provisions that make it difficult or impossible to pay teachers on the basis of merit rather than years on the job.
(Source)
Even though the event was organized by Single Payer Michigan, the Teabaggers were given prominent placement; one of them was featured in the sole photo accompanying the story (which depicted Joan Fabiano placard ignorantly stating "It Worked so Well in Canada - Keep HR 676 I'll Keep my Freedom").
Both sides demonstrate in Grand Rapids over plan for single-payer national health system
by John Agar | The Grand Rapids Press | Saturday May 30, 2009, 9:38 PM
"GRAND RAPIDS -- As a local organizer of Single Payer Michigan, Chris Silva led a rally Saturday outside the Federal Building to build support for a single-payer national health system and dispel what he considers half-truths. "(Opponents) kind of think what we're talking about is socializing medicine, rationing healthcare, but that's simply not true," he said." (Source)
In all of the discussions I've had with Teabaggers, none of them have been able to articulate a coherent policy when it comes down to the specifics.
Broadly, they advocate for smaller government and lower taxes but that's where it ends. When asked about how they'll pay for their tax cuts, all they talk about is cutting programs they don't like (which are wildly-popular with the vast majority of the population). All of them (that I've talked to) absolutely refuse to touch the Defense Budget which constitutes the vast majority of discretionary spending.
Effective Leaders
by The Grand Rapids Press | Sunday May 31, 2009, 3:35 AM
"Kent County's Mark Jansen has the distinction of being named the most effective state senator in a survey of political insiders sponsored by Lansing news agency MIRS and conducted by EPIC/MRA. Surveys were sent to more than 1,000 lawmakers, lobbyists and others connected to state government. [...] Rep. Dave Agema, R-Grandville, was named the least effective legislator in the House." (Source)
Out of fairness to Agema, the MIRS rankings are biased because they don't count sheep-hunting skills which is where he really excels.
"When you reduce tax rates, revenue going into government actually increases."
Context: What Cox is referring to is the Laffer Curve - an economic concept positing that at a certain point, lowering taxes will actually increase revenue to the government by lowering the operating expenses of the private sector and allowing it to expand. Fans of supply-side economics (like Cox and the rest of the libertarian-leaning Michigan GOP) frequently wield it like a blunt instrument to justify tax cuts for the wealthy.
Ignoring the reality that the Laffer Curve contains some dubious assumptions, Cox (like so many conservatives) is misrepresenting how the curve works. It's not an immutable fact that lowering taxes will always increase revenue; rather, it posits that there is an optimum level of taxation (beyond that, however, lowering taxes lowers revenue). The reality is that economists posit that a government entity's tax rate must be far higher than Michigan's (which is in the middle of the pack nationally) for lowering taxes to result in an increase in revenue.
Cox announced that he plans to eliminate the Michigan Business Tax and the slapped-on surcharge, which would require tearing a $2 billion+ chunk out of the already-suffering budget. He also announced that he plans to personally hunt down Osama bin Laden, invent calorie-free ice cream, and pledged that every resident will get a pony.
Kidding ... sort of. The reality is that Cox's campaign promises are completely out-of-sync with reality. At a private fundraiser/debate with the Detroit Chamber of Commerce, he just followed up the previous one with the gem that he promises not to raise taxes if elected Governor (something none of the other GOP candidates were foolish enough to do).
Unfortunately I can't find his campaign website so I'm unable to look at his economic proposals to scrutinize them. If he's like any of the other GOP gubernatorial candidates though - his proposals will be full of empty rhetoric and unsupported claims that magical treasure troves of "fat" can be trimmed from the state's budget with no consequences for cut social services or education spending.
The Grand Rapids Press just ran an op-ed from Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce President Bill Jackson ("Opinion: Eliminate the MBT, open Michigan for business") that argues for the elimination of the Michigan Business Tax (MBT). Wizardkitten already did an excellent job of breaking down the op-ed, but I'm compelled to weigh in.
For those keeping score, the Chamber argued for the early elimination of the Single Business Tax (SBT) with no plan to replace the revenue and then didn't like what it got when legislators threw together the MBT as a replacement.
Jackson states: "... any honest debate about Michigan's troubles must include the negative impact of the Michigan Business Tax. Evidence continues to mount supporting the outcome of the 2008 West Michigan Regional Policy Conference. Over 600 business and community leaders from throughout the region came together last fall and overwhelmingly voted the elimination of the MBT as our No. 1 priority."
The opinions of a bunch of fervently anti-tax individuals do not constitute "evidence" that the Michigan Business Tax is harming the state's economic development. The only thing that is "evidence" of is that business owners don't like paying business taxes. Hardly groundbreaking. I don't disagree that the MBT may discourage some economic growth - but the Chamber is going to have to produce some actual statistical measures to quantify that claim, not the shrill whining of its membership.
Attempting to rebut the argument that the state can't afford the massive tax cut, Jackson observes:
"Some would say the state's budget cannot take the blow the elimination of the MBT would create. In January 2009, the Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce, The Center for Michigan, Detroit Renaissance, the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce and the Michigan Chamber of Commerce proposed a series of structural governmental reforms to our leaders in Lansing. This proposal illustrated $1.6 billion in budget savings. To date not a single measure has been taken up for consideration by either chamber of the Michigan legislature."
"Structural governmental reforms" is business-speak for "massive cuts to social programs."
Even if we assume that the numbers are correct for these proposed "reforms" that would magically free up $1.6 billion dollars in the budget - that STILL doesn't fill the gap eliminating the SBT would cause. This year, the MBT is expected to bring in $2.6 billion in revenue, leaving a shortfall of a BILLION DOLLARS that still would have to be resolved.
Yet another bait-and-switch proposal from the Michigan GOP.
Guantanamo Bay prison is not Arkham Asylum.
Lex Luthor, The Riddler, and Mr. Freeze are not in Guantanamo Bay. These prisoners are not super-villains – they’re malnourished (alleged) terrorists who have been completely disconnected from the outside world for several years.
I don’t know what Republicans are imagining – do they think that as soon as we bring the Guantanamo prisoners on to US soil, they’re going to tunnel under their cells and find kryptonite which they’ll use to break out of jail to go on a crime spree?
One might remind them that this country once imprisoned Nazis on US soil with no problems. Where do they think the worst domestic terrorist in US history, Timothy McVeigh, was held until his execution?
Has anyone told them that we currently have terrorists in US prisons? Jose Padilla and Richard Reid (the shoe bomber) are both at the ADX Supermax Prison in Florence, Colorado. So are Omar “the Blind Sheikh” Abdel-Rahman and Wadih el-Hage from the 1993 World Trade Center bombings.
I’d also like to point out that these legislators are basically attacking the competence of the professionals in the corrections industry who have kept the worst of the worst locked up for decades with no problems. Due to their diligent work, no one has ever broken out of a supermax facility, and yet they’re being treated as though they were incompetent by the legislature.
For all of the GOP tough-guy “bring ‘em on,” “dead-or-alive” talk, these people really are cowards.
"Cheney is saying that the fact that we're not doing this now, he doesn't say waterboarding in particular, but he says the fact that we're not doing this now is leaving the country vulnerable. That is what he's saying."
As the US is (stupidly) about to dismiss yet another Arabic translator who is a victim of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) policy - we're provided with yet another comparison that illustrates how bogus are the justifications for the administration's war crimes. In spite of the desperate need for translators, the Bush Administration dismissed them in droves (thus hampering our anti-terrorism efforts) for no other reason than discovering that they're gay.
If the Bush Administration was truly interested in protecting the nation, shouldn't it have been violating the DADT policy with as much impunity as it was violating the Geneva Conventions and 1996 War Crimes Act?
By DAVID BARSTOW | Published: May 5, 2009
"In a highly unusual reversal, the Defense Department’s inspector general’s office has withdrawn a report it issued in January exonerating a Pentagon public relations program that made extensive use of retired officers who worked as military analysts for television and radio networks.Donald M. Horstman, the Pentagon’s deputy inspector general for policy and oversight, said in a memorandum released on Tuesday that the report was so riddled with flaws and inaccuracies that none of its conclusions could be relied upon. In addition to repudiating its own report, the inspector general’s office took the additional step of removing the report from its Web site." More ...)
"Itoldjaso." The Bush Administration was, in fact, illegally lying to us in the run-up to the Iraq war by - and then they tried to cover it up.
This is, of course, only one of the tactics they used to lie us into the Iraq war (in addition to attempting to suppress dissent by Joe Wilson, cover up conflicting intelligence, and lying outright about what intelligence they were holding on Iraq's alleged WMD programs).
It should be noted that the aforementioned program ("Message Force Multipliers") was developed and executed by Torie Clarke (author of "Lipstick on a Pig: Winning In the No-Spin Era by Someone Who Knows the Game"). Clarke still continues to be invited to speak to the members of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) in spite of the fact that she's engaged in illegal propaganda on behalf of the US government (to say nothing of shredding PRSA's code of ethics).
However, as Nathan Newman points out on TPM - their outlandish science fiction scenarios are uncalled-for because several states have laws on the books like the EFCA and they're working just fine with little to no evidence of abuse. When compared to the current situation where abuse by employers is all-too-common (who currently rule like tyrants), the case for the necessity of the EFCA becomes clear.
Here's an excerpt:
State Laws Allowing Majority Sign-up for Unions Shows why "Employee Free Choice Act" is Fair Option for Workers
By Nathan Newman - May 7, 2009, 11:57AM |
[...] "Just to reinforce the lack of evidence of union coercion, a new report from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was released this week examining the whole history of majority sign-up in that state. The report found that between the years 2003 and 2009, 21,197 public sector workers used majority sign-up procedures allowed by state law to form unions with only one complaint about union coercion filed during that whole period -- and even that complaint was dismissed as without merit by the state Labor Relations Board." (More ... | Read the Full Study by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
If Arlen Spector wants to become a legitimate Democrat (instead of a spineless rat jumping a sinking ship) - his first step should be to reconsider his opposition to the EFCA.
During the Bush Administration, one of the many appalling things that was accomplished was a framework for protecting fundamentalist bigots in healthcare who force their beliefs on the general public by denying them medical services that conflict with the professional's personal morality. The practical application was to limit access to contraception - especially the "morning-after pill" - as part of the right's underhanded campaign to limit reproductive freedoms.
The mendacity and hypocrisy of the Republican party is apparent when one considers the practicality of applying this standard to other fields than medicine. Republicans fight hard against protections for whistleblowers (who are, of course, conscientious objectors). They would also never approve of this standard being utilized, for example, by a police officer who happened to think our drug laws were immoral and refused to arrest anyone on drug-related charges.
So how about it Sen. Kahn? - Should Rastafarians be allowed to go to work for the DEA and refuse to handle investigations related to marijuana?
- Grand Rapids Press: In the Press' write-up of the election, they incorrectly listed the Grand Rapids Community College Board of Trustees election as being a "Grand Rapids" issue - when in reality anyone from the entire Kent Intermediate School District is eligible to vote.
- WOOD TV completely omitted the GRCC Board of Trustees election from their list of tomorrow's elections.
- WZZM TV doesn't even have their election coverage site up yet (prompting me to wonder if bad information is better than no information at all). Interesting note: WZZM also has their 2008 presidential election information still up (with links to the campaign websites of Barack Obama, John McCain, Ralph Nader and Bob Barr).
- WXMI TV had a brief story with limited details and links to the ballot information at local county clerk offices.
The text of the postcard states:
"The Grand Rapids teachers' union wants expensive health insurance and a 6-10 percent raise. Those demands would cost the district - and taxpayers - millions of dollars they can't afford. The union is trying to guarantee those perks by taking control of the school board. If the union's endorsed candidates - Tony Baker, Wendy Falb and Kevin Weiss - win next Tuesday, the union will have its way and the rest of us will pay. Taxpayers should stay in control of public schools. Please vote in Tuesday's school board election and prevent a union takeover of the Grand Rapids district. Find out more about the teachers' union's agenda at MEAexposed.com"
It's interesting that the copy says "the rest of us will pay" given that the EAG is based out of an office in Muskegon.
Not surprisingly, I could find no content on either the EAG website nor on the MEAexposed website that supported the claim that Falb, Baker and Weiss are controlled by the teacher's union or that they were "handpicked" by Paul Helder (as Kyle Olsen alleges in a Grand Rapids Business Journal op-ed).
There's no shortage of hypocrisy in the fact that a shadowy front group that refuses to disclose its funding sources is pointing fingers and alleging school board candidates are unduly influenced by outside parties.
Media Mouse has some excellent analysis of the EAG and this latest effort (as well as some new information gleaned from the front group's website about their ideological origins and financial backers).
Another WOOD TV 8 Meterologist Promoting Global Warming "Skepticism"
MediaMouse.org | Posted by Ed Cutlip on Thursday, April 30, 2009 at 11:00 AM
"WOOD TV 8 meteorologist Bill Steffen is picking up where Craig James left off in hyping flawed science on global warming. Before he retired, James never turned down the chance to either argue against global warming on his blog or in presentations to the community). Now Bill Steffen appears to be filling the void that was left when James quit and when his blog posts were erased from WOOD TV 8's website. Like Craig James, Steffen is using his status as a meteorologist--and a trusted member of the community for some--to argue against the scientific consensus on global warming. " (More...)
It's important to raise the issue of climate change denial among people even at the local weather personality level because these people are used as validation by the climate change denial crowd (including at the congressional level by people like Sen. James Inhofe).
"GOP Claims Prison Money Can Be Saved Without Releasing Inmates
WOOD Radio | Wednesday, April 29, 2009
... "Wayne Kuipers, from Holland, is one of those with proposed laws that would do more to try to reform prisoners, rather than simply house them. For instance, he wants to see some sort of mentoring process to oversee associations and friendships that an inmate might make behind bars. And he proposes five specific conditions inmates must meet in order to be eligible for parole, including tests to show he or she is free of addictive drugs, including alcohol." (Source...)
There are, of course, no details on Kuipers webpage, nor his Twitter feed (though he did mention that he was part of a tree-planting event at an elementary school; I suppose that begins to undo some of the anti-environmental policy he's supported over the years ... ?).
Kuipers has been shopping this idiotic farce around for years. He appeared on a July 20, 2007 episode of "Off the Record" to present his plan for reform to the corrections system. At no point during the discussion does he offer ANYTHING resembling a concrete plan plan, and he ignores attempts to introduce reality into the discussion (like the impact of the economy on recidivism - which he admits he hasn't even analyzed). A particularly hilarious moment comes right off the bat when Kuipers is asked by John Lidstrom from the Gongwer News Service "why is it a bad idea to make adultery a misdemeanor?" and Kuipers completely dodges the question.
Like a good politician, Kuipers sticks to his non-plan plan arguing "there there is programs out there, faith-based and non-faith-based, that can help change the behaviors of some of our criminals." The lie he's telling is that we can keep our harsh sentencing guidelines and that there are inexpensive or free ways to rehabilitate prisoners. The reality is that we're now paying the piper for the hundreds of millions of dollars in social services funding that have been cut out of Michigan's budget since the 1990s.
I would contact Kuipers' office to get the names of these "programs" he references and information on where their success rates can be documented - but I know from previous experience that I'll be ignored (Kuipers is a big supporter of the Bush Administration's "Abstinence-Only" sex education programming and when I asked his office for evidence of several claims he made about the success of such programs, they never delivered. This is unsurprising, however, given the dismal failure of these programs as both the rates of sexually-active teens and teen pregnancy have increased under the Bush Administration after massive declines).
It's also pointed out by John Lidstrom that these sorts of programs were cut by the Republican-led legislature to save money 15 years ago. This raises an excellent point: the extent to which Kuipers and his Republican colleagues have caused the current problem by 1) pushing for increased penalties and mandatory minimum sentencing (which have swelled the sizes of our prisons), and 2) by slashing funding for health and social services programs that reduce rates of addiction/substance abuse and help prisoners re-enter the working world.
On the first point, here's a list of the legislation Kuipers has supported: increased penalties for and a broadened definition of gang-related activity, increased penalties for tampering with public safety devices, shelved (as Judiciary Committee Chair) bills that would have eliminated sentences of life without the possibility of parole for juvenile offenders, and many other things.
On the second point, it's well-documented how much the cuts to social services in Michigan have contributed to crime, and the Michigan GOP-controlled senate (as well as all of the GOP's gubernatorial candidates) have campaigned on platforms of MORE cuts to social services (as well as to education). Kuipers has actively opposed additional funding for social services and even appropriating additional funds for things like Community Health.
Meijer, developer agree to pay $1.5 million to Acme Township officials who say they were harassed
by Shandra Martinez | The Grand Rapids Press | Wednesday April 29, 2009, 4:18 PM
"Meijer Inc. and a developer will spend $1.5 million to settle a lawsuit with five Acme Township officials who contended both harmed them with frivolous lawsuits and illegal campaign activity. Under the terms approved by a circuit judge today, a payment of $300,000 was to be paid to each official: Township Trustees Ronald Hardin, Frank Zarafonitis and Erick Takayama and township planning commissioners Robert Carstens and Clare David." More...)
"UNCLE ZOG WANTS YOU!
Zionist agents control your children through the media
Obama is a ZOG agent working on White slavery
Will you allow your culture and people die? [sic]
Want to learn more? Contact: www.whitepridemi.com
konungr14@yahoo.com"
This is apparently the latest action from the group which also hung up banners (one on the Ford Fieldhouse and one on the Bostwick parking ramp) back in March 2009:
GRCC Student Newspaper Report, April 8, 2009
White Pride MI Discussion Board Discussion of Event, April 17, 2009
From other discussions on the group's message boards, it appears someone using the alias "WhiteDevil" (listed as a "global moderator" on the board and one of the "senior members") is the one dropping flyers (he makes reference to doing so in December, 2008 as well).
The group has also been active elsewhere, like dropping flyers (titled, among other things, "MISSING: a future for white children") at the Barnes & Noble at the Rivertown Crossings mall (as they document in a March 9, 2009 video on the YouTube site of one of the members).
MediaMouse.org recently reported about the Southern Povery Law Center's latest report counting/documenting the hate groups in the US (Michigan has the unfortunate distinction of ranking 10th in the nation with the total number of hate groups at 23). We can apparently bump that number up to 24 now, as the SPLC doesn't yet have "White Pride MI" documented.
We have the technology to create Baconnaise, but women still earn less than men. Appalling.
I guess I'm fairly naive, but I was rather surprised when I entered the professional working world only to find that gender discrimination is still alive and well (and sadly, some of the worst of it is practiced by other women). I encountered situations where I, a low-ranking flunkie, would be have my suggestions taken more seriously than female colleague who was far more educated and experienced than I was even if they were the same thing.
The latest mouthpiece for the GOP's "tax cuts uber alles" policy is Gubernatorial Wanna-be and current Attorney General Mike Cox, who continues to crank up his campaign for next year's election. Lifting Dick DeVos' entire campaign playbook, Cox is calling for billions in tax cuts and offering no way to pay for all of them. Here's how his proposal breaks down:
-$1.3 billion (cutting 1/2 of the $2.6 billion in revenue from the MBT)
-$700 million (cutting the $700 million income tax addition)
+$187 million (changing benefits for teachers/state employees)
----------------------------------------
-1.873 billion (umm...)
"Cox said offering tax credits to select industries like film and renewable energy, though helpful, isn't the answer. He said no governor has a crystal ball to predict economic winners and losers. 'Warren Buffett — he still gets it wrong,' he said of one of the world's most famous investors and businessmen. 'Who says the governor of Michigan gets all the right picks?'"
Someone might want to mention to Cox that using Warren Buffett as his example might be a bad idea given that Buffett is a supporter of increasing taxes (particularly when it comes to a more progressive tax rate). Buffett has also invested in alternative energy and electric cars.
Cox's argument is bunk because it's not as though Gov. Granholm decided by herself that alternative energy and the entertainment industry would be opportunities for future growth; those sectors have been identified by numerous segments around the world (including investors in the private sector) and the measures only passed with bipartisan support in both houses of Michigan's congress.
Cox cites a Tax Foundation study in which he notes Michigan has the third worst "tax climate" in the US, claiming that if we went along with his (magical) plan to slash business taxes in our state that we could leap to seventh place. This should prompt some analysis.
First, the Tax Foundation (a right-leaning, anti-tax think tank that is sometimes less than forthright) weighs taxes differently and in some cases cases they're comparing apples to oranges. For example, as they concede "One problem associated with a relative scale, however, is that it is mathematically impossible to compare states with a given tax to states that do not have the tax." Here's their weighting system for coming up with their overall tax climate rating:
1. 29.96% —Individual Income Tax Index
2. 22.21% —Sales Tax Index
3. 20.10% —Corporate Tax Index
4. 15.57% —Property Tax Index
5. 12.16% —Unemployment Insurance Tax Index
Second, assuming Cox's math is sound and the cuts would enable us to suddenly ascend to the seventh spot, it's currently held by Texas. Hardly something to aspire to. Texas currently enjoys a poverty rate of 16.3% (despite its economic woes Michigan's is only 13.9%, just above the national average of 13%). I would bet that Texas' educational attainment rates are lower than Michigan's, but the state cooks the books on education so much (thanks to G.W. Bush) that it's difficult to get an accurate reading.
Cox doesn't mention that Texas can also afford its tax climate largely because, like Alaska (#4 on the list) of the revenues it enjoys from oil/natural gas taxes (which are paid for by Michigan residents, among others, in the form of higher fuel costs). In 2008, $4,121,526,666 (five percent of Texas' revenues) were from taxes on oil and natural gas.
Even if Mike Cox's math weren't an utter embarrassment, the fact remains that he's campaigning on a plan to continue doing what put Michigan's economy in dire straits: pushing for across-the-board tax cuts which does nothing to diversify the state's economy and doing so without giving the public a fair accounting of what cuts to government services would be necessary to pay for them.
My hope (as a flaming leftist) is no, and for a couple of reasons:
1) As a practical matter gun control won't work because it's never worked (especially not in the US where Pandora's Box is already open and tens of millions of unregistered firearms are already in circulation). Contrary to the hysterical predictions of gun control advocates, gun-related crime hasn't skyrocketed with the liberalization of the nation's concealed-carry weapons permits or the massive increase in the number of firearms in circulation which is at an all-time high of around 250 million (here are the numbers from the Bureau of Justice Statistics).
2) It's a loser of an issue (largely because of the aforementioned realities about firearms and crimes). That's why the democrats have virtually stopped campaigning on it. It validates the rantings of the tinfoil-hat wearing segment of the right wing, and gives the GOP something to rally around that they can use to distract everyone from the collapse of their deregulationist economic policy.
Senate Report Links CIA To Military's Harsh Tactics
NPR.org, April 22, 2009
"The brutal treatment of terror detainees and prisoners by members of the military followed directly from the CIA's use of harsh interrogation techniques, according to a Senate report that is likely to add fuel to the debate over the United States' use of torture. The 232-page report released Tuesday by the Senate Armed Services Committee came less than a week after President Barack Obama released Bush-era memos that detailed the use of harsh tactics by the CIA." ... [More ...] | [Read the Report]
Oh, by the way - for anyone who wants to pretend that the Bush Administration didn't know what was doing was "Torture" - there's now evidence coming out about their extensive efforts to destroy the evidence of the legal opinions they solicited to cover their tracks.
AND, while we're on the topic of torture; for this crowd that keeps justifying tossing out democracy and the rule of law with the premise "well, they had to do what they needed to do after 9/11" - that argument is a hot load of bull. Here's why: after the September 11th attacks, congress did EVERYTHING the Bush administration wanted - AND FAST. The "USA PATRIOT Act" was introduced on September 19, 2001, passed by both houses of congress on October 24, 2001, and signed into law by October 26, 2001.
Just over a month and everything the administration asked for was in place. There is NO reason whatsoever that the Bush Administration couldn't have approached congress and requested legislation to justify torture if they felt it was necessary. It would have been signed, sealed and delivered with the efficiency of a F-1 pit crew.
So why the secrecy ... ?
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