BakerMuckraker
Blogs in the Month of
JULY - 2006
- July 27,
Watching the War(s) From a Treadmill
- July 13,
MAUVE ALERT!
- July 06,
Our Travel Issue: Wag the Dog
WATCHING THE WAR(S) FROM A TREADMILL
The other day, Muckraker was on a treadmill, and there was a tv, and CNN was on. So he watched it. He doesn’t usually, so he found it interesting to see what CNN is doing.
For what seemed like most of an hour, came reports from Lebanon. At the end of all those pictures and all that verbiage, alas, he had learned very little that he couldn’t derive from three meaty paragraphs in an article (of course, it’s harder to read articles on treadmills, which is why print media are dinosaurs). Bombs were dropping, rockets were flying, innocent people were dying, and everybody else was to blame. The reporters only knew a few things, but were ready to earnestly repeat them over and over. Virtually no revelations, no analysis, no help in understanding the carnage or the choices being made.
Cut to anchor Paula Zahn. Alternately grimacing and grinning, she introduced her Faith Correspondent (or something like that) – a woman who looked young and pleasant enough, but hardly seemed to have spent a lot of time doing comparative religion or poring over sacred texts at a seminary -- more like a couple of years out of journalism school, if that. (Perhaps she was “faith” correspondent because CNN execs now hire correspondents on faith, praying they will up the ratings.) There was a report on how Pentecostals and other evangelicals are convinced that the world is about to end – with the Lebanese horrorshow doing double duty as Armageddon, Chapter One. Anyway, Paula interrupted her to say that – Hold on! We now go to a debate over whether the world is coming to an end.
The “faith correspondent” miraculously reappeared on-camera, this time joined by two youngish men. (Must have been taped, methinks, or else she moves at the speed of faith.) One fellow looked rather ordinary (and is--Muckraker once had a beer with him before he became world famous for his book and PBS persona as the person 'Walking the Bible'), and the other was slick, handsome, with long hair and stylish glasses, very British GQ. It was explained that Muckraker's old acquaintance is now an "expert" on religion, and the other gent an editor of a magazine on religion -- which, it seems, is no longer the sole province of the sidecurl, the cokebottle lens and the greasy pompadour.
Then, the two proceeded to essentially agree that the world was not coming to an end, with Zahn asking the “expert” what “the Jews” think while the expert explained what “the Jews” think, with no indication at all that the “expert” is himself Jewish, which would be helpful to know in such a discussion. As would some explanation of why the the religion editor, a fellow looking so terminally hip and trendy and I-want-it-now, is the one who presumably spends a lot of time at potlucks with holy rollers in drive-in megachurches.
ON TO MY POINT: Oh dear, what is that point? Well, readers look to Muckraker for strong insights and prescriptions to the world’s problems. Everyone and their mother (including Muckraker’s own mother) keep bombarding him with essays on what the fighting means, who is good and who is bad and why and whatnot, but all Muckraker knows is that, as relates to the Mideast, and Lebanon, and Iraq.....he hasn’t a clue.
MORE WHOLESOME
In case the world does not end, we can get back to worrying about what we eat. Muckraker recently came across an article that claims that Whole Foods, the “haute-crunchy supermarket chain”, is a whole lot of marketing balderdash. This piece, which is not totally persuasive, but pretty much so, says that the claims about Whole Foods helping small farmers, and about the meaning of organics, must be taken with a grain of salt (presumably of the low-sodium variety.)
The article, which ran in March but only recently emerged when Muckraker cleaned off his desk, ran in Slate. The author, appropriately named Field Maloney (middle name probably Greens), says:
>….the Whole Foods banner says "Help the Small Farmer." "Buying organic," it states, "supports the small, family farmers that make up a large percentage of organic food producers." This is semantic sleight of hand. As one small family farmer in Connecticut told me recently, "Almost all the organic food in this country comes out of California. And five or six big California farms dominate the whole industry." …[S]o the line about the "small family farmers that make up a large percentage of organic food producers" is sneaky. There are a lot of small, family-run organic farmers, but their share of the organic crop in this country, and of the produce sold at Whole Foods, is minuscule…..”<
The author also claims that, at least in the New York store he/she visited, precious little of the produce was locally-grown, despite banners promoting Whole Foods’ commitment to local farmers. Of course, Muckraker doesn't see as many orange groves and pineapple swamp around New York City as he used to back when he played for the Brooklyn Dodgers, so, maybe that point is not too fair. Still, New Jersey grows a few tasty things.
Anyway, Field Maloney reports, and you decide.
THIS JUST IN: BUSH ASKS ABOUT IRAQ
Reader JK Harms forwarded a transcript that a friend had found – of a Chris Matthews interview on MSNBC. Muckraker always enjoys Chris Matthews, though transcripts just don’t do justice to Matthews’ perpetual semi-hollering style.
The interview is from May 30, and again Muckraker must apologize for his procrastination – but some things have the timelessness of a good smelly cheese, and this is one.
At one point, Matthews recites statistics on growing bloodshed in Afghanistan and Iraq, followed by this:
>MATTHEWS: ….President Bush met with some of the top experts on Iraq today and among them were retired General Barry McCaffrey, who commanded the 24th Infantry Division during Desert Storm, and is now an MSNBC military analyst, and retired general Wayne Downing who commanded the Special Operations Task Force during the first Gulf War and is now an NBC News military analyst. ……
…..MATTHEWS: General McCaffrey, I want your perspective on this. Start with your meeting today with the president. What did he seem to want to hear from you gentlemen from very high ranks who have had experience particularly in that country?
GEN. BARRY MCCAFFREY (RET), MSNBC MILITARY ANALYST: ……He was actually open to different thinking and wanted to better understand what differing viewpoints were…..
MATTHEWS: Was it a how or a why? How big was the question? Was he saying can we win this, how big a question did he put to you experts?
DOWNING: What he was really saying, Chris, to me was, what can we do better? What are the issues? What are the things that you think we need to do. One of the things that came through very strongly, he must have said this three or four times, I have a responsibility to the American fighting men, to the parents of the American fighting men, to make sure that I am doing the right thing.
He also feels a real responsibility, I believe, towards the American people. To explain to them, to the Congress, what’s going on, because he is committed, Chris..
….MATTHEWS: General McCaffrey, did you have a sense that he had a posed question in his head or was it a general sort of opportunity to hear from outside? Did he [have] something bugging him that he wanted to solve?
MCCAFFREY: No, to be honest, I was very pleased with sort of his demeanor in the whole thing. He was actually on receive. He wanted to hear people’s viewpoints. It wasn’t framed with a series of provocative questions. We had gotten some from the NSC staff before we went in there, but basically I thought each one of us was allowed to make several points in our own words.
He listened intently and seemed to take it aboard. It was clearly signaling, there was an awareness, 20,000 killed and wounded, $300 billion, this thing got off track. There’s a variety of arguments three years ago that are interesting to make, but all of us are looking at going forward, what do we do and that was really the nature of the dialogue.
MATTHEWS: Did he explain the presence of Karl Rove in the room?
DOWNING: No…..
....MATTHEWS: I thought he had taken the official statement from Josh Bolten, the new chief of staff at the White House, [Rove] is now doing politics only, no policy. So what the hell was he doing in a policy discussion? You’re smiling, General.
DOWNING: Maybe he came to see Barry and I because he likes us.
MATTHEWS: The reason I ask …..-- it’s whether there is in fact a war component to the president’s campaign for Congress this year and whether they’re planning something. They’re going to do something over there to turn things around before November. But Karl Rove just sat there and watched apparently. General McCaffrey?
MCCAFFREY: Well I think all of them sat there and watched. …… <
Now, call Muckraker a cynic, but you don’t suppose that Bush met with the generals so that the generals could then go onto Hardball with Chris Matthews and talk about how concerned and engaged the president is? Maybe THAT’S what they’re doing to try and turn things around: get more talking heads onto television programs, spinning Bush’s newfound interest in the details of what he unleashed three years ago.
Here are suggested headlines:
General Pleased With President’s Demeanor.
President Actually ‘On Receive’
Anyway, a weekend approaches, and Muckraker, is going Off-Receive. He will be On-Receive again in the near future -- of course, by appointment only.
MAUVE ALERT!
Muckraker has long raised doubts about the competency of those protecting the American people from harm, starting with the two guys Bush put in charge of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. And he has salivated at the opportunity to dig into some other aspects of the safety net whence goes billions of taxpayer dollars, imagining all manner of ridiculousness.
But, as is so often true, reality trumps all. A report from the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security (via the New York Times) finds that:
>It reads like a tally of terrorist targets that a child might have written: Old MacDonald’s Petting Zoo, the Amish Country Popcorn factory, the Mule Day Parade, the Sweetwater Flea Market and an unspecified “Beach at End of a Street.”
But the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security, in a report released Tuesday, found that the list was not child’s play: all these “unusual or out-of-place” sites “whose criticality is not readily apparent” are inexplicably included in the federal antiterrorism database.
The National Asset Database, as it is known, is so flawed, the inspector general found, that as of January, Indiana, with 8,591 potential terrorist targets, had 50 percent more listed sites than New York (5,687) and more than twice as many as California (3,212), ranking the state the most target-rich place in the nation.
The database is used by the Homeland Security Department to help divvy up the hundreds of millions of dollars in antiterrorism grants each year, including the program announced in May that cut money to New York City and Washington by 40 percent, while significantly increasing spending for cities including Louisville, Ky., and Omaha.
“We don’t find it embarrassing,” said the department’s deputy press secretary, Jarrod Agen. “The list is a valuable tool.”…..
In addition to the petting zoo, in Woodville, Ala., and the Mule Day Parade in Columbia, Tenn., the auditors questioned many entries, including “Nix’s Check Cashing,” “Mall at Sears,” “Ice Cream Parlor,” “Tackle Shop,” “Donut Shop,” “Anti-Cruelty Society” and “Bean Fest.” <
Best of all is that one of these things that they felt needed protecting was the Apple and Pork Festival in Clinton, Ill. Which is kinda funny (and kinda sad too) because, after all, Bush is supposed to be the guy who was going to cut waste in government after Clinton. Under Clinton, at least the Pork for Protection would probably have gone to the Big Apple.
PUT IT IN THE VAULT
With that as the backdrop, Republican leaders are trying to score election-year points by accusing the media of leaking crucial information to terrorists. Whether the Inspector General’s report on guarding the Cotton Candy Shack should have remained a closely guarded secret can be debated. But on the Hill, they’re incensed by the revelation that the US government tracks international financial transactions as a means of following bloody money. Meanwhile, other Republicans, mindful that they have to face a certain number of sane voters in November, are bailing out (per the Times) and focusing on the true significance of the media reports -- not that they revealed some important secret, but that they revealed how the White House continues to keep our elected representatives in the dark about official snooping:
>The Republican chairwoman of a House subcommittee said Tuesday that the Bush administration had failed to inform Congress adequately that it was sifting through a vast international banking network in an effort to track terrorists’ finances.
The lawmaker, Representative Sue Kelly of New York, chairwoman of the House Financial Services subcommittee on oversight, was joined by members of both parties in accusing the administration of being too secretive and unaccountable to Congress about the program. Its existence was disclosed last month by The New York Times and other newspapers.
“Many people in Congress who should have been briefed by the administration were not,” Ms. Kelly said. “What else is it that we don’t know?”<
"Ya don't know nuffin'!" snickered an administration official who requested anonymity because he'd rather not publicly confess his loathing for the democratic process. [NOT].
>Ms. Kelly said during a subcommittee hearing on Tuesday that no one on the full committee had been informed about the program in its nearly five years of existence, even though it was squarely within the committee’s jurisdiction. She asked for an investigation into the program by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress.
……Stuart Levey, under secretary of the Treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, said at the hearing that the program’s effectiveness had probably been damaged by the disclosures.
“Its exposure represents a great loss to our overall efforts to combat Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups,” Mr. Levey said. “It’s one thing to say you are following the money. It’s quite another thing to tell people exactly what they’re looking at. Very, very few of them knew what Swift was.”<
Well, even Muckraker knew what Swift was – and he ain’t so Swift.
>But Mr. Levey, who acknowledged that Treasury officials had repeatedly boasted about their efforts to monitor international financial transactions, and that a United Nations report in 2002 had mentioned Swift, offered few examples of how the recent disclosures had provided useful information to terrorists.
When pressed on how the program had been undermined, Mr. Levey said the news reports had disclosed that officials used administrative subpoenas to get data and that different intelligence agencies worked together in searching records. <
In dispatches monitored by the Muckraker News Network, Abdul bin-Data has been overheard expressing concern that administrative subpoenas had been used, and was urging that Al Qaeda’s subcommittee on fiscal flapdoodle address the matter. Post haste.
UNCOMMON WISDOM BREAK
Muckraker would like to send a shout out to his homeboy (that’s friend in the old language) Jon Rowe over at the Tomales Bay Institute. That nonprofit group has just released a fascinating report on The Commons Rising.
In summary, these folks entertain the crazy notion that much of what is on earth – air, water, sidewalks, ideas, names, and such – are actually shared in common. And that we have a right, responsibility, and opportunity to protect and enjoy those commons.
But, being a reporter, MR will dispense with his take on The Commons, and simply share the press release:
>For many years, corporations have encroached upon and depleted the shared natural gifts and social creations that belong to all of us. However, citizens are now organizing to protect this important sector of the economy…
..[T]he rise of this emerging commons sector “won’t replace corporations, but it will complement and temper them. In so doing, it will provide benefits that corporations can’t provide: healthy ecosystems, economic security, stronger communities, and a participatory culture.”
…”Seeds of a new commons are sprouting…” They’re creating new institutions such as free collaborative websites and ecosystem trusts; innovative legal tools such as conservation easements that restrict real estate development and new creative property licenses that allow for affordable sharing; and new kinds of social networks such as community gardens and time banks….Other trends cited in the report include the restoration of public plazas, growth in open source science, a surge in free online classified advertisements such as Craigslist, and efforts to make corporations pay for polluting….<
More info on all of this can be found at www.onthecommons.org . But Muckraker is still a bit perplexed by all this decency, and would like to know: what’s in it for HIM?
A TROUSER IN DISTRESS
The New York Times business section pulls back the denim to reveal a European industry that generates the artificially-aged garments that are so popular.
>Giovanni Petrin remembers well his first efforts at beating up jeans.
Italian industrialists had visited Japan years ago to observe how the Japanese washed denim garments with small stones. “So we took white stones from riverbeds here in the Veneto,” said Mr. Petrin, referring to the northern Italian region where his jeans factory is situated. “It destroyed the washing machines, and the jeans.”
Only after the Italians learned that the Japanese used pumice did the trick work.<
Please to use only pumice, entrepreneur-san!
>Now sales of jeans with the used, worn or beat-up look are booming on both sides of the Atlantic, making battered jeans a case study of the push and pull of global competition, and wrapping Europeans and Americans in more jeans than ever before. They have fanciful American brand names like Diesel, Replay and Seven for all Mankind, but in fact, the real driving forces behind these names are all Europeans, and now they are asserting their design influence as the premium and elite niches of the jeans market are exploding.
At the heart of this phenomenon are the artificially aged garments laboriously engineered by Europeans like Mr. Petrin, a compact bearded man of 55, the chief executive of Martelli Lavorazioni Tessili…. <
Personally, Muckraker is sick and tired of other people making a fortune on things he thought of first. So he’d like to get out front on this one. MR imagines a whole line of distressed and artificially aged products, including:
-Credit cards already broken in by someone else, with a pre-existing balance due to help loosen the purse-strings.
-Spray-on ‘half-day-old beard’ look
-Entire pre-rumpled ensembles for academics and journalists
-A five-minute out-of-box treatment that makes your hair look like you’ve just been in a mean rumble with a bunch of oversized alley cats. Why spend hours in the salon trying to get that effect?
-Presidents who look like they've already been through the ringer. Gaunt, haggard, disoriented- looking. Pre-aged Presidents, let's call it.
Let’s hear your ideas. Best will be posted.
COLLAPSES IN JUDGMENT
Ken Lay has really started a new trend, according to a Times article.
>Bob Lanier, the former mayor of Houston, collapsed in a Houston church just as a memorial service for Kenneth Lay, the disgraced founder and former chairman of Enron who died last week, was getting underway.
The memorial service attracted a large crowd of mourners, including family members, former coworkers and members of the Houston power elite, on a sweltering summer morning with temperatures near 90 and high humidity.
Emergency medical technicians were summoned as Mr. Lanier lay on the floor of the First United Methodist Church for about 15 minutes. He was given oxygen, and then appeared to stand up, to applause from the crowd of mourners in the church. He was placed on a gurney and taken by ambulance to a local hospital.
….Mr. Lanier, 80, was mayor of Houston for six years in the 1990’s, and appeared as a character witness when Mr. Lay was tried, along with other former executives, for fraud and conspiracy in the collapse of Enron, which was based in Houston. Mr. Lay was convicted and was awaiting sentencing when he died July 5 at a home he owned near Aspen, Colo.
….Former President George H. W. Bush was in attendance, along with many wealthy Houstonians, whose Mercedes and Lexus cars and luxury sport-utility vehicles were parked in a lot across the street. A line of shiny black S.U.V.’s waited at the curb in front of the church to transport Mr. Lay’s family after the service to a reception at an exclusive West Houston country club.<
Muckraker wishes Mr Lanier a speedy recovery, and hopes that everyone else remains robust, but could imagine a scenario where, like Slobodan Milosevic and Mr. Lay, a whole host of figures began experiencing a new form of domino effect based on some complex formulation of hot weather, sense of guilt, and impending judgment. Best to keep those luxury vehicles idling.
OUR TRAVEL ISSUE
Dear Diary: It's been a long time since Muckraker blogged, and he feels bad about that. But, like a lot of Americans -- and the staff at National Lampoon -- he's been on some road trips.
When Muckraker checked into his room at the Hilton hotel in Midland, Texas (George W. Bush spent his formative years in that West Texas city), recently, he found the following note on his bed, purporting to be from the manager, accompanying a complimentary notepad:
Welcome Texas Department of State Health Services
Travel Should Create New Ideas Use This to Record Them
He did record a few thoughts, at least mentally, and would now like to commit them to ‘paper’. They include the following:
-Being welcomed as a member of the Texas Dept of Health when one is not indeed from TDH does not inspire confidence in the hostelry. In fact, it makes one wonder whether the department was actually holding a conference at the hotel -- or simply making room inspections. If the latter, they would have been interested to learn that MR's colleague Jon Larsen checked into his room to find the bed unmade, the sink filled with discolored water and a plunger sticking out of the toilet.
-Being greeted by a front desk clerk who is missing nearly all of her top front teeth neither inspires confidence in the hotel’s medical-dental benefits nor restores the luster that the Hilton brand once had – before the company began licensing the name to anyone who claims experience in having once made a bed.
-Sending one’s pants for dry-cleaning and discovering that they have been put through such a high-powered process that all the buttons shattered and the metal clasps were heat-sealed does not inspire confidence.
-Naming your bar “Ali Bubba’s Lounge” suggests that the décor ought to have more sizzle, playfulness, or comfort factor than a doctor’s waiting room.
Or is Muckraker just being cranky? If so, he'd best stick to politics and news, which he understands better than the world of non-smoking queens (and no, he doesn't mean Elton John...)
DOH! I SAID THAT?
Supporters of the invasion of Iraq haven't always felt the same about foreign military adventures. Check out what some of them said back when Bill Clinton committed troops to peacekeeping in Bosnia, after nearly 200,000 had perished in a genocidal bloodbath there (this item via Ilene Proctor):
>"Well, I just
think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be
over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."
--Joe Scarborough (R-FL) [now conservative talk show host]
"Explain to the
mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body
bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
--Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99
"[The]
President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a
foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He
has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he
has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be
away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."
--Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)
"If we are
going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear
mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy."
--Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush
"I had doubts
about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had
done enough in the diplomatic area."
--Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)
"..History
teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This
administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President
began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered
questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There
are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no
legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for
mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to
bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining
what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan
for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no
plan today"
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)
"Victory means
exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us
what the exit strategy is."
--Governor George W. Bush (R-TX) <
GOREING AL’S (AND HILLARY’S) OX ON GLOBAL WARMING
So what’s all this talk about global warming? If you're suddenly enamored of Al, thanks to his movie on the demise of life on earth, or Hillary's prospects to right all wrongs, at least consider this tompaine.com archeological dig, courtesy of Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch:
> In 1999, some friends of mine with an organization known as the International Center for Technology Assessment petitioned the [Clinton] Environmental Protection Agency to take action against global warming pollution from motor vehicles (which are second only to electric power plants as a source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States). The crux of the case was whether these emissions were “pollutants” that ought to be controlled because they harm health and the environment.
Well, duh!
As obvious as the answer might seem, the Clinton administration took no action on the petition and no steps to reduce global warming emissions, though it did issue a 1998 legal memo that concluded that global warming pollutants could be regulated. (Memo to file: Gore’s movie might have been stronger had he not tip-toed away from the issue during the 2000 campaign, apparently out of concern of losing coal and car states like West Virginia and Ohio, which he lost anyway.)….<
For more on the limitations of the Democrats in the "better alternative department," check out a new report from our friends at RealNews, which looks at what Hillary and Al's friends do to earn a living when they're not in the White House:
>Democrats have, increasingly, belied their long-assumed commitment to the little guy and the average American by cozying up to the money trough as well.
This pattern accelerated markedly under the Clinton Administration, which, despite some reformist tendencies, often aided the big-business agenda, easing domestic regulations and passing international trade agreements that tended to unshackle the large corporation. Some of these changes were clearly in the public interest, such as streamlining cumbersome and often-antiquated bureaucratic processes. But many others were not: lowering environmental thresholds and diminishing governmental oversight. Once the Democrats turned into the opposition, key Clinton figures found a home in offering their advertising, public relations and arm-twisting skills to industry trade associations and corporations. They retained their links to the party, and have lived a kind of dual life ever since, moving effortlessly from corporate work to campaign work and back......<
KRISTOL CLEAR INTENTIONS
Do ya think that in an election year, the media could maybe do a slightly better job contextualizing the "issues" that suddenly shriek out like a cry of 'fire' in a crowded theater? Stuff like the Marriage Protection Amendment or the effort to attack the media itself for allegedly giving comfort to terrorists? For perspective, they would need look no further than an essay by Canadian professor Shadia Drury, an internationally-recognized expert on neo-conservatism: (thanks to prompting from “A” and an original plug from Randy Henriksen):
>How can America be saved from her dangerous fascination with liberty? Irving Kristol came up with the solution that has become the cornerstone of neoconservative policies: use democracy to defeat liberty. Turn the people against their own liberty. Convince them that liberty is licentiousness - that liberty undermines piety, leads to crime, drugs, rampant homosexuality, children out of wedlock, and family breakdown. And worse of all, liberalism is soft on communism or terrorism - whatever happens to be the enemy of the moment. And if you can convince the people that liberty undermines their security, then, you will not have to take away their liberty; they will gladly renounce it.<
WWW.CORPNANNY.GOV?
The newish, smart New York City-based think tank, Demos, is featuring an upcoming talk by Dean Baker (no relation to Muckraker, though MR hopes to be referred to as ‘Dean Baker’ as soon as he gets tenure at some cool journalism school) :
>welcoming Dean Baker, macroeconomist and Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, D.C., and author of The Conservative Nanny State.
In his new book, Baker debunks the myth that conservatives favor the market over government intervention. Rather, Baker documents how conservatives rely on a range of "nanny state" policies that ensure the rich get richer while leaving most Americans worse off. Baker calls for sound economic policy that will harness the market in ways that produce desirable social outcomes – decent wages, good jobs and affordable health care. <
Decent? Good? Affordable? Sounds like a fomenter of class warfare. Hey, there's another 'issue' for 2006.
CONTRACTING LIKE NOBODY'S BUSINESS
If you think the ‘nanny state’ scenario is bogus, check out the New York Times on all the giant corporations that somehow get federal contracts that were earmarked specifically for small businesses:
>The Small Business Administration and other federal agencies are mandated by law to provide at least 23 percent of federal contracts to small businesses. But for years, government studies show, large corporations like GTSI, Boeing, General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman have been counted as small businesses either through legal loopholes, via acquisitions or simply by mistake. And despite some efforts by the federal government to correct the mistakes, problems persist.
The stakes for small businesses are huge as they try to compete for contracts in an expanding federal marketplace. Since 2000, the amount of federal contracting has grown 55 percent, to $377 billion.
Last year, at least $4.9 billion worth of contracts, coded as small business, went to 13 of the largest government contractors...<
Muckraker has long objected to the Times’ practice of treating egregious corporate behavior as unworthy of the general news section. If you read that paper and didn’t see the above-referenced article, that’s because you weren’t looking at the business section. Which is usually an uneasy amalgam of eye-glazing reportage of interest only to those minding their own bucks and generally useful material of import to every citizen. Free the news! Get it into the front section.
EXCUSES, EXCUSES
Muckraker is working on a book. Whenever he dawdles, he feels guilty. But now he feels better, because he has just learned from Editor and Publisher (via Romenesko) that:
>Some 16 years after signing a book contract to write about press coverage of the civil rights era, legendary journalist Eugene Roberts has finished the project, to be published by Alfred A. Knopf in November. <
Sixteen years, and the publisher still wants it. And to think that Muckraker worried 16 months was a long time! Off to the beach for him.
PRESIDENTIAL POP COVERAGE
Have you discussed the Japanese prime minister’s visit to Graceland with your neighbor yet? If not, you’d better get to it. According to a so-called expert quoted by the New York Times,
>“The visit is generating intense news interest in both countries” <
-- presumably because of the Elvis angle. Well, this just in: Elvis has left the building. And Bush has barely checked in, in many respects.
As readers of this blog know, Muckraker becomes ruffled, enraged, apoplectic, and also mildly peeved by stories in the paper that try to show the fun side of the big guy in the big house, especially when so many crucial investigative stories aren't being done for lack of resolve or resources. But sometimes, there's a lot to be learned from the light stuff about how things really work:
>Back in 2001, when both were newcomers to their jobs, President Bush and Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi of Japan bonded by tossing around a baseball at Camp David. Now that Mr. Koizumi, a huge Elvis Presley fan, is on his way out of office, Mr. Bush is giving him the ultimate going-away gift: a private presidential tour of Graceland….
But the trip is about more than just two aging rock 'n' roll fans on a road trip to see the Jungle Room.
It is a way for Mr. Bush to thank the Japanese prime minister for sticking by the United States on the war with Iraq and, more broadly, it is a case study of Mr. Bush's own brand of diplomacy, one that relies on personal chemistry and perks.
From invitations to his ranch in Crawford, Tex., to mountain biking trips at Camp David like the one he took this month with the prime minister of Denmark, Mr. Bush showers the trappings of his office on leaders he likes, and withholds them from those he does not.
…Mr. Bush is not nearly as tight with the new prime ministers of Italy and Spain, for example, as he was with their predecessors, Silvio Berlusconi and José María Aznar. Both former prime ministers stood firm with Mr. Bush on Iraq, taking heat for it at home. Both were rewarded with invitations to the ranch, the highest honors in the Bush hierarchy of perks.
….Current and former White House aides say Mr. Bush likes leaders who are decisive, optimistic and resolute in the face of criticism — not coincidentally, qualities the president often ascribes to himself.
…the president never clicked with Jacques Chirac, the president of France. "Chirac is gloomy," Mr. Fleischer said.
Mr. Koizumi, by contrast, is just plain fun, which is one reason Mr. Bush likes him so much. Mr. Bartlett put it this way: "I think he just gets a total kick out of the guy."
Aside from idolizing Elvis — the Japanese prime minister shares both a birthday, Jan. 8, and a hairstyle with the King of Rock 'n' Roll — Mr. Koizumi is also a fan of baseball, which automatically puts him in good stead with Mr. Bush, a former part-owner of the Texas Rangers.
He also likes old Gary Cooper movies; when the two leaders met for the first time in Washington, Mr. Bush gave Mr. Koizumi a Gary Cooper poster. In 2003, during a stop in Tokyo, Mr. Koizumi reciprocated with a Japanese robotic dog.<
Cool. Very very cool. Truly "Wag the Dog." Next time, take him to Midland, Texas, for some karaoke at Ali Bubba's Lounge. That'll be good for another war or two.