We Are the Change

The Bush Energy Bill is a Trojan Horse

The Public Utilities Holding Company Act (PUHCA) is a cornerstone New Deal financial reform signed into law in 1935. What lays hidden and unmentioned in Bush’s energy bill is the elimination of PUHCA. I don’t know if the elimination of PUHCA is part of Bush’s war on everything from the New Deal or just meant to line the pockets of his buddies – probably both.
PUHCA subjects utility finances and operations to strict regulation by the states and federal government. Most importantly, it restricts ownership of utilities to public or private entities that are in the business of producing power, and keeps speculators out. It was partial PUHCA repeals in 1990 that opened the door to Enron and the energy speculator disaster that ensued.  For 70 years, we have had reliable, cheap electric power that has allowed strong economic growth, and no PUHCA regulated energy company has ever gone bankrupt.  That is why utilities are such good safe investments.

Lynn Hargis of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission says, “Once PUHCA is gone there will be a white-hot fury of buying and selling utilities and utility assets. This will kill renewables. Not only is it going to be horrible for the whole country, but nobody is even talking about it."
Jack Casazza, a Senior VP for an investor-owned utility says, "I'm a believer in capitalism and I believe in getting a reasonable return on my investment. But the company I came up in believed that you don't hurt the customer. I have grandchildren and I want to see this country run so they benefit, not so Warren Buffett can put money in his pocket."
When the speculators make a killing in the energy markets, where do you think that money comes from – you and me. Once PUHCA is gone, there will be nothing to prevent captive ratepayers from getting fleeced. If Bush has his way, get ready to see your power bill soar way beyond the true cost of energy while sending your payments to his buddies at Halliburton or GE.

A War of Deceit

"Anyone who has proclaimed violence his method inexorably must choose lying as his principle." - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

There are two kinds of people in the United States today: Those who want to determine once and for all if President Bush knowingly "fixed the facts" regarding Iraq, thereby misleading Congress and the American people into supporting an unnecessary war, and those who will cover their ears and hum loudly in order to maintain their belief that Bush and his advisors remain above reproach. Either you want to know if you've been lied to, or you don't care.

The Downing Street Memos are seven sets of minutes from cabinet meetings held by the British government after meetings with their U.S. counterparts in 2002 prior to the invasion. The contents of the memos are shocking and can be viewed at downingsteetmemo.com. The memos, written months before the war, detail how our government knew Iraq was not a greater threat than other nations and had few if any WMDs; how intelligence was manipulated to sell the case for war to both Congress and the American public; and how Bush's public assurances of "war as a last resort" was a lie to cover his privately stated intentions.

The Republican congress lowered the bar and established the precedent that a lie about an affair is an impeachable offense. So now the question must be asked: Isn't it a much, much greater offense to fabricate intelligence and lie to the Congress and the American people in order to get the country into a needless war in which thousands of American and Iraqi lives have been squandered? Isn't it time for the Republican controlled congress, if they are to retain even the slightest hint of even handedness, to empower a special prosecutor to start the serious process of investigating President Bush for impeachable crimes?

If the NeoCons Won't Send Their Kids, Why Should You?

This is an excellent article by Rich Procter.

Karl Rove slandered Democrats again yesterday. He said, "Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 in the attacks and prepared for war; liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers." Wow! Chickenhawk Karl Rove, who couldn't be bothered serving in Vietnam, has morphed into one fierce warrior! These Republicans love war, don't they? The fierce rhetoric, the fancy uniforms, the manly poses, the steely gazes. Just about the only thing Republicans don't love is the actual warfare itself - you know, "defeating the enemy" and stuff. That's icky! That's why they avoid it so vigorously.

What is one to make of our current crisis in Iraq? Month after month, armed forces recruiters are failing to meet their quotas. These same Republicans who love to call Democrats traitors and appeasers refuse to lift a finger to solve this situation.

Has Rush Limbaugh urged his tens of millions of listeners to hustle right down to their local recruiting station and get in on some of that "mopping up" action in the glorious parade to victory in newly Democratic Iraq? No.

Sean Hannity? Bill O'Reilly? Has James "Focus On Family" Dobson urged his followers to enlist? After all, on March 21, 2003, he said, "Saddam Hussein must be stopped. Appeasement of tyrants is never successful!" James, America needs your followers in uniform! It's a damn crisis! Why won't you lift a finger?

Hey, what the heck, George W. Bush his own bad self has two daughters. Why aren't they in the Army? Is their endless nocturnal quest for the perfect trashcan margarita really more important than stopping Islamofascism in the Middle East?

Even Ray Charles, who is both blind and dead, can see why recruitment is down. It's because we're getting our ass kicked in Iraq, and potential recruits (correctly) perceive that the Bushies think that anyone who signs up for military service is a sucker.

Yes, the Bushies love to lob 20 megaton bombast. If words were bullets, Iraq would be our 51st state, and there'd be a Wal-Mart on every Baghdad street corner. Every time George Bush opens his mouth, he's blathering about our "commitment" to bring democracy to the Middle East. We all know actions speak louder than words. So what do the actions of the Bush Administration tell us? Wellllllllll......

"We're gonna start a war, and we're gonna lie about why we're getting in. Don't worry, we'll "fix" the data later. We're gonna use the war to win the 2002 mid-terms, so we can get some more tax cuts for our business buds. And after the suckers who bought our lies find out we fibbed, we're gonna change the reason we're there, and dare the press to call us on it. Oh, and one more thing - we're gonna use the war to blackjack the Democrats every chance we get."

"We're not gonna squander money on body armor for the dumb bastards who sign up. If they want that stuff, their folks can buy it for 'em. Hell, we got other priorities - like "losing" 8.8 billion dollars that's somehow gonna end up in the pockets of Republican donor/private contractors."

"We're not gonna bother protecting any o' them Iraqi ammo dumps. Hell, what's the worst that can happen? Them terrorists can steal a couple of tons of RDX and use it to blow up our troops. So?"

"If somebody gets injured, we're gonna charge 'em for their meals in the VA Hospital. Hell, you think we're made o' money? Damn free-loaders."

"If some dumb bastard gets himself killed, we're sure as hell not gonna let the local news show his flag-draped coffin coming home. That would make us look bad! And don't even think about the President wasting his precious "mountain bike" time at a military funeral! What a bring-down! Hide them bodies, and that's an order!"

"Oh, and one more thing. If one of these soldiers ever decides to run for office, you can make damn sure we're gonna use his service against him. Need proof? Lookit what we did to John Kerry. We're gonna ridicule his idiotic decision to enlist, make fun of any decorations he gets under fire, and trash him for - what else - not having the simple common sense God gave George Bush, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Tom Delay, Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, and every other Great Warrior in the Bush Administration. The military is for suckers, pal."

This war was a tons o' fun when it was a Fox News Shock N' Awe TV Spectacular, complete with Presidential Aircraft Carrier Photo Op Goodness. But that party is over, and the Bushies need a whole bunch of new suckers. They've shown they won't spend a penny of political capital going to their Young Republican "Future Pharmaceutical Lobbyists of America" base. So whose left? Oh yeah - the weak-willed, traitorous appeasers on the left. Good luck recruiting them, Mr. President.

Preliminary Thoughts on an Intentional Community on the Big Island of Hawaii

Have you ever have the desire to live in a real community of friends instead of in our modern world where everyone is so busy and aloof that true connections are rare? Life in a community is a vital and instinctive part of being human. Look at our primate cousins; they all live in groups. Look at our human ancestors; they all lived in tribes.
I have been doing some reading on intentional communities and, in particular, those qualities common to the most successful communities. I have been toying with the notion of starting or sharing in the creation of an intentional community on the east side of the big island of Hawaii probably the Puna district.

Qualities to aim for in an intentional community:

• A strong shared vision fostering a sense within each person that everyone in the community is part of everyone else. This is the most important quality, around which everything else rotates. The strong shared vision also acts as a first-level filter, so that only people with congruent visions are likely to apply for membership into the community.
• A balance between individual growth and a sense of community. Barbara Fiske of the Quarry Hill community writes, “Communities, like all intimate relationships, have to solve the problem of preserving both closeness and individuality. One danger is that the individualistic refugees from social repression who are drawn to voluntary communities will be so bent on “doing their own thing” that the community will fly apart into anarchy. The opposite danger is that the community will be so insistent on total absorption into its goals that personal individuality will cease to exist.”
• Develop clear procedures to avoid misunderstanding. Community should be an adventure among friends, not an exercise in bureaucracy. The painful experience of many groups makes it clear, however, that a little bureaucracy is both necessary and helpful. Specifically, it is wise to develop clear, written procedures for decision making, resolving disputes, handling finances, and determining membership.
• Putting the strong shared vision into action. One possibility might be a community business that members could participate in and receive compensation based on their amount of work. There would also be a distribution of profit based on each members percent of ownership of the community. A couple business ideas that could be a good fit into the economy of Hawaii would be a bio-diesel company or a solar panel sales and installation business.
• Shared concerns for the Earth and its inhabitants. Again, this goes hand-in-hand with the shared vision.

The most important thing to avoid in an intentional community is the possibility of becoming cult-like. Defining cult-like as a regimented or controlling governance that usually proclaims some path as the “right” or only way. This usually occurs in communities founded by a charismatic leader or under the auspices of a fundamentalist religion.
I want to form an intentional community in a rural area of eastern Hawaii close to Hilo. We would grow a large portion of our own food; this is aided by the 365 day growing season and abundant rainfall. We would create a profitable small business that would provide a benefit to not only our community but to Hawaii in general. This business would free our community members from being tied to the standard commuting and working grind. We want to respect the land that we live on and engage in a sustainable way of life.

The community I envision should have:

A strong statement of vision. I’m working on this.

Democratic governance. Questions to be resolved: Should each person have one vote (like the Senate) or should each person have a percentage vote based on their monetary buy-in (similar to the House of Representatives)? This presumes that some people may buy in to the community with different amounts which might not be the case. Or perhaps a family of six buys in for the same amount as a couple, should the family of six have six votes and the couple two? Perhaps both should be used. If the vote involves spending community money or selling assets; the percentage vote should be used. But if the vote is about some community issue like “should we allow cats to run loose in the community commons”, then each person should have one vote. Should voting be limited to adults?

A corporate-like legal structure. The mention of the word “corporation” leaves a bad taste in my mouth but we would need a legal structure that would allow people to leave and sell their share. Buying into the community would be similar to buying shares in a corporation. Community assets would be held in common (individuals could own their homes) and if you wanted to sell your stake and leave, you could either sell back to the community or to someone wanting to join (with community approval). A good place to start is to contact successful communities for suggestions.

More to come on an intentional community in Hawaii as I research and learn more.

The Deal: A New Film About Politics and War for Oil

Written before the Iraq war by a former vice president of Goldman, Sachs & Co. in collaboration with the former head of the Goldman Sachs Oil and Gas department; The Deal is a wake-up call for America. Against the backdrop of a Middle East oil war against radical fundamentalists, The Deal tells the story of a proposed merger between an American and a Russian oil company, and the lengths and depths to which our country will find itself forced to descend in pursuit of the next “black crack fix” unless we dramatically change our ways.

Questions to ponder after seeing the film.

• How realistic do you think that [the film] was? Do you think oil companies and our government really behave like that? If they do, would we know about it? Would the public do anything about it?
• Do you believe that an investment banker in Tom's position would ultimately choose to blow the whistle, even at the expense of his own career? How severe a crisis do you think there is with the lack of corporate ethics today?
• Do you think it matters who is in office, or do you think that both political parties are pretty much in the same position, as it relates to their relationship to the oil producing nations and to the major oil companies?
• Senator Lucas in the film indicates that the government must continue to buy the oil, even though it means dealing with our enemies. How does this parallel our relationship with Saudi Arabia, post 9/11? Do you agree with the White House and its policies in regard to Saudi Arabia, given the apparent links to Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda?
• How important a goal should it be for the U.S. government to keep the price of oil at or below $3.00/gallon?
• Once it becomes clear that a deal such as the one in the film is illegal, who do you think bears primary responsibility for exposing it? The government? The oil company? The investment bankers? Who do you think has the most to lose, and why? Do you think the ends justify the means?
• Jared Tolson (the CEO of the oil company) says "if we don't buy that oil [from the Arab extremists], they'll just sell it to the French or the Chinese, who'll be happy to sell us a meager portion at even higher prices". Do you think that's really how it works?
• Who do you think is closer to telling the truth about our energy situation-the government or a film like this?
• Do you think that trying to drill for more oil, mine more coal, and re-start the nuclear power industry are the best way to solve the country's energy problems (like the Bush administration does)? Or should more money be spent on renewable resources and conservation?
• Do you believe that we are on the brink of an oil crisis? How should we balance environmental concerns with economic ones?
• How can we identify those energy companies who are serious about helping to promote cleaner alternative energy sources and reducing our overall dependence on hydrocarbons and specifically on foreign oil?
• Our energy policies reflect, on many levels, the fact that our country has always had an attitude that we would never run short of resources. Given the current situation, do you feel that is still a prudent attitude? If not, what would you do to go about changing it?
• What do you think about Abbey's alternative energy tax credit plan? Do you think Congress and the major oil companies would actually go out of their way to kill such a bill? Do you think such plans can actually work to stimulate the development of alternative sources of energy?

Former Bush Advisor Thinks 9/11 Was an Inside Job

A former Bush team member during his first administration is now voicing serious doubts about the collapse of the World Trade Center on 9-11. Former chief economist for the Department of Labor during President George W. Bush's first term Morgan Reynolds comments that the official story about the collapse of the WTC is "bogus" and that it is more likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent Building No. 7. Reynolds, who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas and is now professor emeritus at Texas A&M University said, "If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an 'inside job' and a government attack on America would be compelling." Reynolds commented from his Texas A&M office, "It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause of the collapse of the twin towers and building 7. If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely to be correct either. The government's collapse theory is highly vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears to account for the full range of facts associated with the collapse of the three buildings."

Contriving an Excuse for War

This article is from the London Times. Unfortunately, you can't find this information in the U.S. press.

Ministers were warned in July 2002 that Britain was committed to taking part in an American-led invasion of Iraq and they had no choice but to find a way of making it legal.

The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier.

The briefing paper, for participants at a meeting of Blair’s inner circle on July 23, 2002, said that since regime change was illegal it was “necessary to create the conditions” which would make it legal.

This was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal US action.

“US plans assume, as a minimum, the use of British bases in Cyprus and Diego Garcia,” the briefing paper warned. This meant that issues of legality “would arise virtually whatever option ministers choose with regard to UK participation”.

The paper was circulated to those present at the meeting, among whom were Blair, Geoff Hoon, then defence secretary, Jack Straw, the foreign secretary, and Sir Richard Dearlove, then chief of MI6. The full minutes of the meeting were published last month in The Sunday Times.

The document said the only way the allies could justify military action was to place Saddam Hussein in a position where he ignored or rejected a United Nations ultimatum ordering him to co-operate with the weapons inspectors. But it warned this would be difficult.

“It is just possible that an ultimatum could be cast in terms which Saddam would reject,” the document says. But if he accepted it and did not attack the allies, they would be “most unlikely” to obtain the legal justification they needed.  Read more...

Why We Don't Have a Free Press

The recent talk about Watergate and if that story could be uncovered by today's press has brought up comparisons with the media of today and 30 years ago. Today, practically all the major media outlets in this country have been bought up by 5 corporations (Time Warner, Disney, Murdoch, Bertelsmann, and Viacom). The board rooms of these corporations are populated mostly by conservative Republican white males.

The editors that are needed to stand behind their reporters are beholden to the corporate board rooms.  So when a reporter goes out on a limb to cover a controversial story, he is at risk of having that limb cut off behind him by his editor if the editor is pressured by the board members.

Remember back to Watergate and how reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein were supported by their editor Ben Bradlee and he in turn was supported by the owner Katherine Graham. Katherine Graham and Ben Bradley received plenty of pressure to pull back from the story but they were able to resist this pressure because they were not beholden to those that wanted to kill the story.

That can't happen today. If a story breaks that has severe ramifications for those in power, it will succumb to the pressure that will surely be brought to bear by those in the board rooms that are connected to and benefit from the connections to those powerful folks being investigated.

Therefore we only have an illusion of a free press. Our press is superficial in its coverage since stories of real import that require digging and investigation to uncover will succumb to pressure from those in power.  The Watergate story could not have been revealed in today's press - thanks to consolidation of independent media outlets under a handful of Republican controlled corporations. The press in the U.S. is free to report on anything it sees fit except that if a story hits to the heart of the entrenched Republican interests, it will be killed. We do not have freedom of the press.

"Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost." - Thomas Jefferson

The New Pentagon Papers

It is worth while to revisit this article by Karen Kwiatkowski that meshes well with the Downing Street Memo and its' revelations of fixing the intelligence around the policy of invading Iraq.

In July of last year, after just over 20 years of service, I retired as a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force. I had served as a communications officer in the field and in acquisition programs, as a speechwriter for the National Security Agency director, and on the Headquarters Air Force and the office of the secretary of defense staffs covering African affairs. I had completed Air Command and Staff College and Navy War College seminar programs, two master's degrees, and everything but my Ph.D. dissertation in world politics at Catholic University. I regarded my military vocation as interesting, rewarding and apolitical. My career started in 1978 with the smooth seduction of a full four-year ROTC scholarship. It ended with 10 months of duty in a strange new country, observing up close and personal a process of decision making for war not sanctioned by the Constitution we had all sworn to uphold. Ben Franklin's comment that the Constitutional Convention of 1787 in Philadelphia had delivered "a republic, madam, if you can keep it" would come to have special meaning.

In the spring of 2002, I was a cynical but willing staff officer, almost two years into my three-year tour at the office of the secretary of defense, undersecretary for policy, sub-Saharan Africa. In April, a call for volunteers went out for the Near East South Asia directorate (NESA). None materialized. By May, the call transmogrified into a posthaste demand for any staff officer, and I was "volunteered" to enter what would be a well-appointed den of iniquity.

The education I would receive there was like an M. Night Shyamalan movie -- intense, fascinating and frightening. While the people were very much alive, I saw a dead philosophy -- Cold War anti-communism and neo-imperialism -- walking the corridors of the Pentagon. It wore the clothing of counterterrorism and spoke the language of a holy war between good and evil. The evil was recognized by the leadership to be resident mainly in the Middle East and articulated by Islamic clerics and radicals. But there were other enemies within, anyone who dared voice any skepticism about their grand plans, including Secretary of State Colin Powell and Gen. Anthony Zinni.

From May 2002 until February 2003, I observed firsthand the formation of the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans and watched the latter stages of the neoconservative capture of the policy-intelligence nexus in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. This seizure of the reins of U.S. Middle East policy was directly visible to many of us working in the Near East South Asia policy office, and yet there seemed to be little any of us could do about it.

I saw a narrow and deeply flawed policy favored by some executive appointees in the Pentagon used to manipulate and pressurize the traditional relationship between policymakers in the Pentagon and U.S. intelligence agencies.

I witnessed neoconservative agenda bearers within OSP usurp measured and carefully considered assessments, and through suppression and distortion of intelligence analysis promulgate what were in fact falsehoods to both Congress and the executive office of the president.

While this commandeering of a narrow segment of both intelligence production and American foreign policy matched closely with the well-published desires of the neoconservative wing of the Republican Party, many of us in the Pentagon, conservatives and liberals alike, felt that this agenda, whatever its flaws or merits, had never been openly presented to the American people. Instead, the public story line was a fear-peddling and confusing set of messages, designed to take Congress and the country into a war of executive choice, a war based on false pretenses, and a war one year later Americans do not really understand. That is why I have gone public with my account.

Read more...

Racism Rears Its' Ugly Head

This article by Howard Witt of the Chicago Tribune shows how alive and well racism is in Texas. Linden, TX: They picked up Billy Ray Johnson outside a convenience store in this East Texas bayou town, a place where Confederate flags fly in some front yards and a mural of barefoot slaves picking cotton greets patrons inside the local post office.

On a cool September night in 2003, they drove the 42-year-old mentally retarded black man to a cow pasture where a crowd of white youths was having a party. They got Johnson drunk, they made him dance, they jeered at him with racial epithets.

Then, according to court testimony, one of Johnson's assailants punched him in the face, knocking him out cold. They tossed his unconscious body into the back of a pickup and dumped him by the side of a dirt road, on top of a mound of stinging fire ants.

Johnson, who family members say functioned at the level of a 12-year-old before the attack, was in a coma for a week. He suffered a brain hemorrhage that slurred his speech, weakened his legs and deprived him of his ability to take care of himself. His body was covered with hundreds of painful ant bites.

Today he lives on public assistance, confined to a nursing home in nearby Texarkana, where his family fears he will have to remain for the rest of his life.

The four young white men convicted of various charges in the incident are confined in the county jail, but not for long. A judge last month sentenced three of the four to terms of 30 days in jail, and the fourth to 60 days.

Even that, however, was more than the jurors who heard two of the cases thought appropriate: They acquitted the defendants of the most serious charges and recommended no jail time at all.

To many African-Americans in Linden, the impoverished county seat of Cass County hard by the Arkansas and Louisiana borders, what happened to Johnson was nothing less than a hate crime, frighteningly reminiscent of the worst racial attacks in the Old South.

"There's people down here doing things to dogs, and they get more than a year in prison," said Lue Wilson, 58, Johnson's cousin and legal guardian. "You'll never get a jury in Cass County to convict a white man for doing something to a black man."

But to many whites here, the incident was simply a story of some "good ole boys" drinking too much and getting out of hand.

"It was a very unfortunate and senseless thing," said Wilford Penny, 73, who last month completed a 6-year term as Linden's mayor. "But I don't think there was anything racial about it. These guys were drinking, and this guy [Johnson] liked to dance. I'm not surprised when they get to drinking and use the n-word. The black boy was somewhere he shouldn't have been, although they brought him out there."

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