May 7, 2004
Daily Op/Ed Wrap-up
"...If George Bush loses in November -- and the race is his to lose, not Kerry's to win -- it will be because of questions of competence, not ideology. Slowly but surely, the sense seems to be growing in Red America that this crew of ideologues is incompetent. If that impression Doesn't turn around, all the advertising money in the world won't help in November."
"Thanks to the mess in Iraq -- including a continuing campaign of sabotage against oil pipelines -- oil exports have yet to recover to their prewar level, let alone supply the millions of extra barrels each day the optimists imagined. And the fallout from the war has spooked the markets, which now fear terrorist attacks on oil installations in Saudi Arabia, and are starting to worry about radicalization throughout the Middle East. (It has been interesting to watch people who lauded George Bush's leadership in the war on terror come to the belated realization that Mr. Bush has given Osama bin Laden exactly what he wanted.)..."
Christopher Scheer: Bush's New, New Lie
"In reality, the United States plans to send new troops to Iraq. It is building 14 "enduring" bases in the Tigris and Euphrates river basins. And we have appointed tough-guy Reagan-era hatchet man John Negroponte to run the world's biggest embassy in the same building that currently houses the CPA. The United States will continue to control all the money, all the military forces (U.S. and Iraqi) and all the key political appointments in Iraq. To call this "limited" sovereignty is a bit like describing the situation in Iraq as "volatile..."
Steve Chapman: Partisan redistricting turns democracy into a mirage
"Gerrymandering has been a part of our political order for more than 200 years. But thanks to modern technology, it now bears about as much resemblance to the original type as an M-16 does to a musket..."
"I disagreed with Bush's war from the outset, but I've been clinging tepidly to John Kerry's uninspiring call to "stay the course." No longer.
We're done in Iraq. The genie of Arab outrage is flowing over the Babylonian desert and we will never jam it back into the bottle. We've lost all hope of winning hearts and minds. The longer we stay, the more we'll aggravate the problem, and the more soldiers we'll lose..."
"Solicitor General Ted Olson appeared on "Larry King Live" to complain about the conduct of the public hearings before the 9/11 Commission. His remarks are representative of the growing chorus of Republican complaints about the Commission on this score..."
Jackson Diehl: Nader seems to be zeroing in on Kerry
"As Nader sees it, while those imaginary troops magically restored order in Fallujah and Najaf, "free and fair elections" would be held. But how would Iraqis agree on a governmental and constitutional framework? Nader admits this will be difficult but says Iraq "should be able to sort out these issues more easily" without the United States. Americans should provide humanitarian aid and help rebuild Iraq's infrastructure, he adds -- but only if no U.S. company is allowed to profit from such work..."
Boston Globe: A privatized war
"...The Pentagon's increasing reliance on contractors is a privatizer's way to have the military fight more wars without reverting to the political third rail of the draft or incurring the substantial cost of recruiting and retaining more volunteer troops. But at Abu Ghraib prison, relying on a shadow army of civilian contractors raises the issue of whether the Defense Department is not paying attention or whether it is consciously trying to avoid accountability."
Arianna Huffington: Democracy: Version Bush
"Welcome to George W. Bush's version of America?Bush Democracy. Apparently, he's had his fanatical neocon programmers working overtime to iron out all those bothersome bugs and kinks that have been holding the United States back for the last 228 years?exasperating glitches like openness, integrity, accountability, responsibility and the value of an informed public..."
Los Angeles Times: In Judgment of the Judges
"Scalia has been pilloried for his each-man-is-an-island view of ethics, not just by TV pundits and in letters to the editor but by judges in courthouse lunchrooms across the country. To these men and women, Scalia's unwillingness to step aside after his January duck-hunting trip with Cheney ? right after the court agreed to hear the vice president's case and not long before the oral arguments ? clearly violated federal rules instructing a judge to disqualify himself "in any proceeding in which his impartiality might be questioned." Their concern goes beyond Scalia; they fear that in the public mind, it casts a shadow on every judge..."
Posted by fightingdem at May 7, 2004 12:14 PM | TrackBack
