Shades of Exxon V Baker: Transocean Invokes Maritime Law To Limit Liability

[Image to left by Carolyn Kaster / The Associated Press of Steven Newman, president and CEO of Transocean Limited, testifies during a House subcommittee hearing on the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.]

The article below ran May 13, 2010 and I missed it. I wrote an article that ran in the Anchorage Daily News a couple of years ago objecting to the Supreme Court's decision in Exxon v Baker to permit the Circuit Court decision to stand that allowed Exxon attorneys to introduce ex post facto a new argument in the case: this very same limitation of liability now being requested by Deepwater Horizon Ltd. Will BP's attorneys be far behind in invoking this same precedent set by Exxon? I think not. All the while, of course, their PR shop will be telling the world that they will 'do the right thing' for the victims of the disaster. In the Exxon case, Professor Arthur Miller of the New York University School of Law, an expert in court procedure, filed an amicus brief objecting to the action of the Circuit Court in allowing the introduction by Exxon attorneys after the deadline for such new or amended legal argument had passed. Miller asked the SCOTUS to set aside the limitation on liability based upon the very argument now being advanced by Deepwater Horizon. Of course the Roberts Court ignored Professor Miller's plea and reduced Exxon's liability to a dime on the dollar of the original jury award.

It does not take a law degree or much of a legal imagination to guess where the Roberts Court's thumb will be applied upon the scales of justice when the BP gangsters and their consigliore finally reach their SCOTUS safe-house and the motherly embrace of Mama Scalia.
_____________________________________________
SCOTT HIAASEN, McClatchy Newspapers

MIAMI -- Reaching back to an 1851 law, the legal push to limit liability for the 2010 oil spill has begun. Transocean, Ltd., the Switzerland-based offshore contractor that owned the Deepwater Horizon floating drilling rig, has asked a federal court in Houston to limit its liability from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill to less than $27 million.


Invoking a little-known maritime law passed in 1851, the company said it should not have to pay any more than the salvage value of the charred oil rig and its freight, all of which sank in 5,000 feet of water after the April 20 explosion that killed 11 workers. Before the accident, the Deepwater Horizon was valued at more than $500 million.

In a statement, Transocean said the court petition was filed at the request of its insurance companies, and the petition will allow the company to consolidate all outstanding lawsuits before a single federal judge in Houston. The company said it now faces more than 100 lawsuits over the spill in several states.

Lawyers for those injured in the blast said the petition could also prevent any claims filed more than six months after the accident.

"It's very unfair," said Matthew Shaffer, a Houston attorney who represents a handful of Transocean employees injured in the blast. "It's a slap in the face to anyone who has been injured because of their negligence."

Transocean's filing comes as the Obama administration and Congress seek to retroactively raise liability limits that would cap the cost BP, the runaway well's owner, would have to pay. The current limit is $75 million. Some members of Congress have proposed raising that to $10 billion.

Shaffer said Transocean must prove it did nothing wrong to cause the accident in order to successfully limit its damages.

"I think it's hard to believe they didn't have any knowledge of what was going on on their own rig," Shaffer said.

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(c) 2010, The Miami Herald.

Huge Mineral Find in Afghanistan

Maybe Pebble isn't so attractive anymore.

Riki Ott: From the Ground: BP Censoring Media, Destroying Evidence

Riki Ott: From the Ground: BP Censoring Media, Destroying Evidence
BP and the "North To The Future" Foundation gave the University of Alaska a million dollars to archive Ted Stevens' boxes of papers. Thank you, BP. I wonder why they liked Ted Stevens so much? Anyway...interesting report from Dr. Ott.

The Next Stage of Human Evolution: A Unitary Consciousness

Let's picture an orb.

We can travel around it like a sun, but this orb is so dense that the equilibrium of the escape velocity of light equals v(1/v+1), meaning that the quantum of resistance is some factor greater than the velocity of light. Gases and the elemental layers are divided by their specific gravity and compressed so greatly that isotropic static from electrons in excess of the quantum equilibrium of each layer form rings at the borders between the layers. This means that light is refracted along these layers with the effect of a venetian blind. As we travel around, glimmers of light fractals--colored by the spectral characteristics of the isotropic layers—offer sparkling contrast to the dominant bands of absolute blackness.

The other thing we notice is that 'matter' from nearby satellites is being drawn like so many dust devils into the orb. The base of the dust devil being somewhere in the black bands and the top edge of the vortex roughly the diameter of the individual satellites that are getting sucked in.

A graphic novelist might imagine Aunt Hattie’s house and all of its furnishings ‘falling upwards’ toward the sky, along with that beautiful grove of poplars that we remember climbing as a child…up by their roots and into the swirling vortex toward the orb. Dear Aunt Hattie, herself, might be pictured by the artist in the foreground holding her Sunday hat in place looking somewhat like the model for Edvard Munch’s The Scream. Oh my, Auntie, we might cry out, you are falling into a great big hole! And there you have the most important visual clue to understanding our universe and how it ticks. Holes are geometric orbs suspended in space, not flat holes in the ground like the one into which Alice fell.

The geocentrism and biocentrism of us humans are revealed when we read about black holes; we habitually think of the simple gravity model of earth rather than envision the complex gravity of space. Yet we know that a black hole isn't a hole torn through our space when we can actually see the penumbra of a black hole through Hubble optics. The existence of a galactic backdrop tells us that back holes aren’t like holes in the boat; they are orbs suspended in space.

Doctor Robert Lanza’s observations about the “biocentrism” of the human observer are profound and liberating. Our biology provides a limited and imperfect lens through which we understand the universe. Even wonderful devices like the Hubble telescope, merely make our imperfections more precise. Philosophers have examined this issue of how we know and whether we can know since ancient times. They call this field of analysis epistemology. Dr. Lanza adds to that ancient discussion.

I believe the limits of our own biocentrism argue for the role of the artist and the poet in the fields of deepest scientific inquiry. Transcendent vision and intuitive leaps come from outside the biological lens. Carl Jung once wondered if the ecstatic visioning of the mystics might presage an evolutionary development of human consciousness when a unitary and not a fragmented awareness of the universe will be “normal”.

Maybe one day we will have a ‘technology of the sacred’ and ‘visionary’ engineering to aid in our survival and happiness.

Perhaps that day is closer than we dinosaurs may suspect.

Abby Sunderland is alive and apparently safe aboard her damaged sailboat

Abby Sunderland is alive and apparently safe aboard her damaged sailboat
Great news!

BP Logo Redesign Contest (PHOTOS)

BP Logo Redesign Contest (PHOTOS)

I LOVE this!

Abby Sunderland Feared Lost At Sea

Abby Sunderland Feared Lost At Sea

This is terrible. If you believe in it, pray for her...

~e

BP's Continued Denial Of Underwater Plumes Provokes Ridicule

by Dan Froomkin

An oceanographer just back from two weeks of taking water samples in the Gulf of Mexico told a House panel on Wednesday that BP officials are utterly wrong to keep saying there are no large masses of oil lurking below the surface.

"I think part of the problem is that it depends on what the definition of 'large' is," said Samantha Joye, a senior marine scientist at the University of Georgia. "I don't know what their definition of large is, but I'll bet it's not the same as mine."
Joye's instruments, deployed from a University of Miami research vessel, the Walton Smith, detected both the presence of oil and the depletion of oxygen in very deep water -- 900 to 1200 meters below the surface -- in a plume five to eight miles away from the leak site. As she explained in an interview: "All of the sensors we have to pick up oil and its various components go crazy in the plume."

Lab results from one of the first research vessels doing subsurface tests found only minor concentrations of oil, but Joye, who is expecting test results back shortly, said her samples will inevitably show more than that. "These stank to high heaven," she said. "They smelled like creosote, asphalt and diesel.""These plumes are real," she said, "and it's not just oil." Joye, who blogged her research, said she is also very concerned about the concentrations of methane and other gases, such as ethane, propane, butane and pentane, in the water.

BP officials have routinely tried to wave off the notion that much of the oil spewed from their blown out well is suspended in the water column, killing wide swaths of sea-life in the short run, and possibly endangering coastlines for decades to come.

The latest denial came Wednesday morning as BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles told NBC "we haven't found any large concentrations of oil under the sea, and to my knowledge no one has."
But Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey, whose House Energy subcommittee held Wednesday's briefing, said afterward in a statement to the Huffington Post: "It's said that sound travels for miles underwater, yet BP continues to be completely deaf when it comes to warnings from scientists about these underwater plumes. NOAA has found them. Independent scientists have seen them, even smelled them. When will BP finally listen?"
Another witness before Markey's subcommittee had actually taken a swim through underwater oil -- though much closer to the surface. Philippe Cousteau, the grandson of the famous oceanographer, showed members of Congress video of his dive through "swirls of this orange, toxic soup" that he described as "one of the most horrible things I've ever seen underwater."

The Obama administration, while at long last officially confirming the presence of some underwater oil, is still not exactly going out of its way to contradict BP, either. At a press briefing yesterday, Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen insisted that, rather than plume, "a cloud is a better term."

Joye dismissed the distinction between clouds and plumes as "semantics."

In her presentation, she pointed out that the deepwater oxygen depletion caused by the plume could well be a much longer lasting problem than oxygen depletion close to the surface, which can be replenished by photosynthesis and fast currents. Deepwater "dead zones" could last for years -- "likely decades."

And Joye called on NOAA to get more resources out onto the gulf to measure subsea oil. "I think they need dozens of ships."

But more than anything, she said, what scientists need to know is precisely how much oil and gas has leaked. Neither BP nor the Obama administration have been forthcoming on that front. Joye wrote:

It is virtually impossible to understand or quantify the ecological consequences of the BP blowout on the Gulf of Mexico ecosystem without knowing how much oil and gas has leaked from the wellhead. These numbers need to be estimated and corroborated independently based on available observational data. Unfortunately, the leak rate was not quantified robustly during the first month of the spill (at least that information has not been made publically available). Unless we know how much oil is leaking from the wellhead, we cannot gauge the full extent of the ecological consequences in deepwater or surface water environments. For example, how much deepwater water column oxygen consumption will be fueled by this influx of oil and gas? Which water column microbial communities will be stimulated by oil and gas? What is the time scale of this response? How will surface water microbial communities respond to surface oil and gas inputs? Potential fishery, marine mammal, and wildlife consequences of the BP blowout cannot be properly predicted until we know the magnitude of the disaster. To put it bluntly, the scientific community is hamstrung until we know precisely how much oil and gas has leaked and is leaking from the wellhead.
Or, as she put it to HuffPost: "We need to get that number!"
© 2010 Huffington Post

John Lundberg: Physicist Decodes a Walt Whitman Poem

John Lundberg: Physicist Decodes a Walt Whitman Poem

Mayor Dan & The Wing Nut: Moves on the Political Chessboard

David William Bronson has a profile that the profiler in "24" would say screams of Right-Wing nuttery.

Bronson was born in Wisconsin, as famous for its "treaty beer" and militias as it is for great football and a top flight State University system. Wisconsin has given birth to the good, the bad and the ugly. The good is Fightin' Bob LaFollette the founder of the progressive wing of the Republican Party. The GOP was founded in Ripon, WI. The Ripon Society is a centrist think-tank with roots in the progressive era. The bad is Joseph McCarthy who defeated LaFollette in the 1946 Primary for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate. Joseph ("Have-You-No-Decency-Sir") McCarthy who will forever be associated with political witch hunts and scurrilous tactics was a pure Wisconsin product. And finally, the ugly: racism. The mash-up of rural parochialism and the urban blue-collar class led to racial clashes as the post-WWII in-migration of non-white groups occurred. The hard-cobbled Scandinavian, Scot and German farm folk were alienated by the events of the 60s and early 70s. The appeal of the Nixon-Agnew politics of polarization was intense and the racial and class resentments that simmered just below the surface burst forth in the 1970s and 1980s over Native American Treaty Rights. My own Tribe, the Lac du Flambeau Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa in Northeast Wisconsin was right in the middle of the conflict. The LDF Band was asserting their spear-fishing rights on the lakes contiguous to their Reservation. This activity was consistent with the Treaty of 1857 and the LDF did not recognize the right of the State of Wisconsin to regulate a Government-to-Government Federal-Tribal fishery. The acrimony by the Whites was shocking. The demonstrations by White hunters and fishermen were particularly violent. Shots were fired at spear fishers. Boats vandalized and sunk, cars damaged, tires slashed. Physical threats and intimidation were used against Tribal members. Wisconsin Tribal members were called "Tree-N*gg*rs" by the protesters and anti-Treaty organizers were funded by outside hunting and fishing groups who saw the exercise of Tribal Treaty Rights as an assault on their freedoms and liberties.

It was in this ugly period of racial confrontation and political polarization that Mr. Bronson, Dan Sullivan's nominee to the School Budget Advisory Commission came of age, graduating from high school in 1976 and from college in 1981. Hunting and fishing are listed on his resume as his principal interests. I just wonder how he feels about Alaska Natives and Alaska History and School Within Schools and Bi-Lingual Bi-Cultural Education.

Better be careful with any word that begins with "Bi" because one thing we do know about Mr. Bronson is that he opposes the civil rights of Bisexuals, along with Gay and Transgendered citizens.

There is nothing in David Bronson's resume that reveals an interest in education. What it does tell me is that this guy has a clear political agenda; his educational agenda is not so clear. According to Mudflats Blog, Bronson home-schooled his children, meaning that his relationship to public education has been exclusionary.

So why does a person whose interests are hunting and fishing, whose civic activities have been focused on opposing civil rights for Gay citizens, whose political engagement is church-based and whose relationship to education has been home schooling suddenly gets the itch to be on the School Budget Advisory Commission?

And why did Dan Sullivan suddenly get an itch to plug a political commando from the Anchorage Baptist Temple into a Commission whose subject he has no interest or expertise?

Ahhhh, politics. Sullivan is as obvious and crude a player at the art of politics as they come.

The person Mr. Bronson will be replacing on the School Budget Advisory Commission is Elizabeth Valesquez. Last month Ms Valesquez was appointed to the Mayor's Municipal Budget Advisory Commission. Republican friends have told us that Dan Sullivan is positioning Ms Vasquez to run against Harriet Drummond, the popular West Anchorage City Assembly Member who has been a thorn in the side of the Mayor. Political observers recall how much mileage Adam Trombley got out of HIS stint on the Municipal Budget Advisory and Republican friends say that the Mayor intends to do the same with Valesquez.

The Republicans and Mr. Sullivan have their eye on the School Board for a couple of good reasons. First, they want more control over the School District Budget. The District Budget is larger than the City's and real control by the Mayor's pals over the hundreds of millions of dollars spent for goods and services in the city can't be asserted until the School District is brought to heel. Second, the political reality of the School District is that it is disciplined and well-managed meaning that the anti-government types who fester in the swamps of Republican LaLa Land have a hard time getting elected. Don Smith's election was a fluke, which is obviated by the nearly 2:1 number of votes that his two progressive opponents got in that contest. The decision by well-liked retired educator Tommy O'Malley to jump into the race after James LaBelle signed up and split the sane voting block is one that will touch raw nerves for years to come.

Nevertheless, conversations with some school board members reveal a general concern with Don Smith's agenda: make trouble, raise Hell, stir the pot, obstruct and basically disrupt School Board meetings until he can get fellow Right-Wing ideologues on the Board to make an effective minority. Smith's refusal to sign a conflict of interest pledge because he wants to oppose School Budgets before the Assembly makes him a hero to Sullivan and the Mayor wants to send in fresh troops to help Don Smith. Up next Spring are a few seats on the School Board and we can expect to see Don Smith's political locker partner, Bob Griffin, to be on tap. One School Board Member who is up next time told me that Bob Griffin is a "horrible ideologue" and part of the Pulpit-driven team fielded by the Anchorage Baptist Temple and ChangePoint-Alaska. Griffin lost, but he will be back. Mayor Sullivan wants to make sure, through this appointment, that David William Bronson will on the ballot as well.

The following is a list of 2 years of notes and commentary that I have posted on Facebook. In going over this list--as part of my garage cleaning in preparation for shutting down--I realize a few things: I have a lot to say and I put in a lot of work saying it and Facebook sucks as a medium of serious expression. The fact that FB notes does not permit rich text is one example of FB's limits. I pasted the formatted text into this box and voila! no formatting, unless I want to waste an hour putting in html tags. No thank you. :(

My very first post on FB was a note about our servile relationship to technology and the law; in this case: leaf blowers. I had some photos of contract lawn maintenance workers at Wells-Fargo leaf-blowing in the rain! And there were no leaves! WTF? I asked. Response: it's in the contract. In other words: we are legally obligated to behave stupidly.

My favorite post was April 2009 on When Life Is Only Sacred In The Womb: The Folly of Life as a Political Abstraction. Harriet and I attended a Planned Parenthood Awards Banquet at the Hilton and we had to negotiate a picket line from the Fetus Cult. This post constituted my thoughts on the matter.

My bravest post was on September 13, 2008 when I stood outside the newly opened Dena'ina Center at 7 AM facing hundreds of Palin Supporters welcoming their favorite daughter home after two weeks of non-stop media exposure. I was alone, holding a sign next to the entrance where people had to file past me to get in. My sign said STOP THE McCAIN-PALIN LIES! I memorialized my experience.

My dumbest post was an attempt to rally my friends for International Talk Like A Pirate Day using the likeness of Sister (Mother) Angelica, a Nun wearing an eye-patch and a snarl. I was later informed that Sister Angelica had suffered from a stroke, lost her sight in the eye with the patch and snarl was muscular atrophy. I ate a HARRRty dose of humble pie for that one.

My most frustrating piece was a December 8th post--on my Birthday--countering a Compass piece by Dan Sullivan. I was frustrated that no one in the opposition seemed to be aggressively challenging Sullivan. He is wrong on the economics and wrong on the history and simply wrong on the budget assumptions that was driving what promised to be a disastrous fiscal plan for the City. Bringing in a budget $10 M under the cap was just plain wrong. Of course history has proven me right. Woop-de-doo.

My least understood note was 12 Dialectical Precepts for a Meditation on the Future of Alaska that I posted October 2009. Silly rabbit.

Most fun was had with a piece simply titled "Mosquitoes" that ran July 3, 2009.

But the best post is this one. My last one.

Miigwetch y'all

*********************************************************************************
2010
Goodbye to Facebook...Jun 6, 2010 My Sympathy Note to Jill Burke of "Palin Watch" (Alaska Dispatch)May 15, 2010 Comments on KTVA website accompanying Sarah Palin's Fox video feed, which they dutifully post Apr 28, 2010 On Muster, McVeigh, Bullies, & Chutzpah Apr 20, 2010 Letter in support of Assembly Resolution No. AR 2010-92 (independent legal counsel investigation of Sullivan Trust matter) Apr 13, 2010 The Full Indictment of David Brian Stone et al Mar 29, 2010 "Big Earl" & The Alaska Media-Cartoon Circa 1979 Mar 24, 2010 PLEASE READ & PASS ON: The Benefits of Health Care Reform In Alaska! Mar 22, 2010 IMMEDIATE BENEFITS UNDER THE ACT THAT JUST PASSED! Mar 21, 2010 E-Mail From A Citizen On The Sullivan Insurance Boondoggle Mar 7, May 15 My Sympathy Note to Jill Burke of "Palin Watch" (Alaska Dispatch) Apr 28 Comments on KTVA website accompanying Sarah Palin's Fox video feed, which they dutifully post Apr 20 On Muster, McVeigh, Bullies, & Chutzpah Apr 13 Letter in support of Assembly Resolution No. AR 2010-92 (independent legal counsel investigation of Sullivan Trust matter) Mar 29 The Full Indictment of David Brian Stone et al Mar 24 "Big Earl" & The Alaska Media-Cartoon Circa 1979 Mar 22 PLEASE READ & PASS ON: The Benefits of Health Care Reform In Alaska! Mar 21IMMEDIATE BENEFITS UNDER THE ACT THAT JUST PASSED! Mar 7 E-Mail From A Citizen On The Sullivan Insurance Boondoggle Feb 20 RAY METCALF TO PAUL LAIRD & DAN FAGAN: LET'S DEBATE, ANYTIME; ANYWHERE! Feb 17 Excerpts From "The Power Elite" C. Wright Mills (c) 1956 Feb 2 A Note on Republicans and Obama Hatred. Jan 22 THE CONSERVATIVE PATRIOTS OF WASILLA MAKE SCOTUS 'FREE SPEECH' DEMANDS--OF THE ALASKA PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION! Jan 21 Note to Erick Cordero's 'Future of Politics' Mock-Up; Enterprise Concept-CASH-IN ON SCOTUS UNLIMITED CORPORATE SPEECH DECISION! Jan 21 Summary of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission Jan 20 THE WORLD-WIDE WEB IS AT WAR! Jan 15 Senator Lisa Murkowski: Give Back The Money! Jan 4 A CURSORY REVIEW OF PARNELL PRESS RELEASES & ASSOCIATED QUESTIONS FOR TOMORROW'S "TALK OF ALASKA" CALL-IN WITH SEAN PARNELL Jan 4 SAVING THE ANCHORAGE DAILY NEWS: A TECHNOLOGY-BASED PARADIGM SHIFT FOR NEWSPAPERS

2009
Dec 29 Come To Harriet's New Year's Eve "Pre-Party" Before You Seriously Rock Out of 2009 Dec 21 All Hail Queen Esther: Ruler of America's Pity Party Dec 20 The Prayer for Attracting Auspicious Signs Dec 15 When Life Is Only Sacred In The Womb: The Folly of Life as a Political Abstraction Dec 13 90 Days of Shazaam Tags: The List Dec 8 RESPONSE TO DAN SULLIVAN'S COMPASS PIECE, December 8, 2009 Dec 7 Obama, the anti-Churchill? Dec 3 Count down to Copenhagen ... 4 days! Contact Andrea Sanders (FB Message) Dec 3 A Clash Of Visions for Anchorage Nov 26 Thanksgiving and Juanita Nov 19 ADP: MOTIVES BEHIND CITY ATTORNEY’S REPORT ANALYSIS QUESTIONABLE Nov 19 On Playing the "Beating Your Wife" Game Where The Puck Isn't: A Mixed Metaphor For Stupid Political Games Nov 17 Time for some Palintology Nov 10 JUANITA LAUESEN HELMS- Obituary Nov 3 Ambassador Alvarez's Visit to Alaska Nov 2 Mother of all Carry Trades Faces an Inevitable Bust Nov 1 Winter Poetry Oct 19 Public Option Vs "Private" Insurance Made Easy... Oct 15 Response To The Sender of An Anti-Obama 'Viral' Email *UPDATE* Oct 7 12 Dialectical Precepts for a Meditation on the Future of Alaska Oct 6 BRING BACK THE STATE INCOME TAX, RESTORE REVENUE SHARING & CUT RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY TAXES! Oct 6 CLEANING OUT MY BACKPACK... Sep 29 Flowers of Spring Do Die Sep 29 Editor, The Arizona Republic Sep 28 Republicans Wink At Potential Domestic Terrorism While Falsely Accusing Obama of Weakness Abroad! Sep 21Questions You Are Asked When Applying To The Benedictine Order of White Robed Monks... Sep 20The Year in Hate: Number of Hate Groups Tops 900 Sep 20 A Tribute To Sister (Mother) Angelica and My Foolish Use of Her Photo... Sep 17Autumn Splendor Sep 16 Texas State Board of Education Wants To Mandate A Conservative Historical Revisionism Sep 10 COMMENT DEADLINE: 5 YEAR PROGRAM FOR OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF DEVELOPMENT Sep 7 My Synopsis of President Obama's Speech To America's School Children in 8 Brief Paragraphs... Sep 7 Now You, Too, Can Argue Like A Conservative Pundit! Sep 6 Alaska's Apartheid Sep 2 Right-Wing Inspired Hate Crimes Against Latinos; I Wonder About the Identical Type of Violence Against Native Alaskans Here Sep 1 "Can You Hear Me Now?" A Few Studies on Cell Phone-Induced Cancer and Related Phenomena. Aug 28 My Letter to the Editor of Rex Rammell's Hometown Newspaper Aug 21 Message from Eric Seitz, attorney regarding Leonard Peltier's Parole Denial Aug 21 Peltier Parole Denied! Aug 14 meng's mountain Aug 12 Letter to the Editor: Investors Business Daily Aug 2 The Parable of the Water Tank (1897) Jul 24 Advice on Friends (Facebook and otherwise) Translated by Erick Sherab Zangpo. Jul 21 Leonard Peltier Solidarity Broadcasting Live and Streaming Jul 17 Thinks Conservatives Should Quit Complaining About "Cap and Trade " & Apologize For Their "Tax Cap" Disaster! Jul 3 BEWARE THE HUBRIS-NEMESIS COMPLEX Jul 3 On Mosquitoes Jun 29 IRS Issues Tribal Economic Development Bond Guidance Jun 25 Friends of Sanford: The Club For Growth--Right-Wing Ball Busters Jun 4 A Contrarian's Take On Ronald Reagan... May 31 It's All About Balance: The 'White Guy' Fulcrum Vs A Latina Fulcrum May 28 Attacking Judge Sotomayor Apr 30 When Life Is Only Sacred In The Womb: The Folly of Life as a Political Abstraction Apr 27 2004 Story on Computer Modeling Viral Epidemiology Apr 24 A Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth? Apr 13 Sarah To Alaska: "SCREW YOU!"; Campaign Trip During Closing Days of Legislature Slammed by Dems & Mat-Su Leaders Apr 8 Ted & Justice: Reflections on the Reign of Terror of Ken Starr Apr 1 Ted & God Mar 31 From The American Prospect: WHOSE AFRAID OF THE NEW MEDIA? Mar 29 The Anonymous Political Blogger in Alaska V Doogan's Thin-Skin Mar 28 Sarah's Shameless Sham: Rhetoric Trumps Human Need, Response To Presidential Candidate Palin's ADN Column Mar 28 Which Is Rep Eric Cantor (R-VA)'s Fave Britney Song? Mar 27 Legislature & Denali Commission Step In to Fill Alaska's Leadership Void as Palin Runs for President Mar 25 Municipal Assembly Takes A Pound of Flesh From School District Last Night Mar 17 AIG Capitalist Conundrum Nothing New To Victims of the Exxon-Valdez Oil Spill Mar 16 Alaskans Experience Don Young... Mar 5 "I have never seen such ineptness in our GOP leadership" RNC Member on Michael Steele Mar 3 ALASKA STIMULUS-PRELIMINARY Feb 26 Clarence Dullman Thomas & Pope Scalia and the Conservative-Doms of the Supremicist Court, Rule Against Tribes... Feb 25 Look At This Upcoming Agenda for the Conservative Political Action Committee Feb 23 Even as The Daily News Declines, There is Great Writing to be Found! Feb 21 The History of the Internet Feb 21 Blaine woman trying to get anti-evolution initiative on state ballot Feb 15 Resurgent Republicans Are Beltway Hallucination.... Feb 4" Begich says stimulus bill could create 8,700 Alaska jobs" by Dermot Cole Feb 4 My Email To Rachel Maddow Feb 2 House GOP’s Stimulus Plan Would Actually Raise Taxes For Many! Feb 2A Semi-Defense of Blagojovich Jan 22 Statement of President Obama on the 36th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade Jan 4 A Balanced View of Isreal's Actions Is Badly Needed! Jan 2 Republicans to flee D.C. for Inauguration

2008
Dec 23 Review Minnesota Senate Ballots for Yourself! Dec 19 Some raw thinking about the value of labor and Union contracts Dec 13 Memo to Sarah Palin: Here is how a real Governor acts... Nov 5 What I Thought About Listening to Barack Last Night... Sep 18 A Viral eMail Worth Posting Sep 13 My Solo Protest! Sep 12 Obama and the Palin Effect by Deepak Chopra Aug 18 Professor Calvin Broadus, Jr... Aug 16 Did I mention that I HATE leaf blowers. All-Ages & Edited Version

Brilliant Ad by Move On: "Health Insurance Public Option"

Homeless Encampment Tour, Anchorage, Alaska October 2009

Fareed Zakaria Interviews The Dalai Lama

The New Haven Fire Fighters & The Supremacist Court

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because of their race, reversing a decision that high court nominee Sonia Sotomayor endorsed as an appeals court judge.

The Decision was 5-4, with the usual alignment. Justice Ginsberg's dissent is especially powerful, smacking the Right-Wingers with her comment that it is "understandable" why the White firefighters would appeal to "this Court".

The "Supremacist" Wing of The Court has deftly severed the principles of "intentional discrimination" from "disparate impact" meaning that it is now not enough to demonstrate the second, one also has to prove the first. Now a nod and a wink will suffice among a clique and if that clique carefully monitors the overt behavior of their group and take no documentable action, they can exclude others on the basis of race, sex, national origin or religion. The Bush Supreme Court Rules.

Here is my personal take on this case.

I was an emergency forest firefighter (so-called EFF) in my youth. Because I am Native American, I was sometimes placed with the Native Alaskan crews. The best firefighters I ever worked with was a hot shot crew from the Yukon Village of Stevens Village brought in to make fire breaks during the "Big Denver" fire in Manley Hot Springs in 1968. The Stevens crew was tough, smart, well-organized and had excellent leadership. The fire was so named because the leadership came out of Denver. This fire was of historic proportions and BLM brought their best and their brightest to Alaska to manage the command and control. It so happened that there was a group of professional firefighters out of Boise Idaho who rapidly assumed a lead role in fire management on the ground.

After the initial few days, I was transferred to another crew to deal with maintaining fire breaks. This crew was called the "Hippy" crew and was much more laid back and to my liking. Nevertheless, I was in a good position to observe what was going on. The blond, blue-eyed college guys from Denver and the blond, blue-eyed college guys from Boise shared a culture that excluded the Native Alaskans--and the "hippies" for that matter, but less so. The White Guys from Boise and Denver got the best rations, the best equipment, rode around in the chopper, and got radios. The "Indian Crew" got the crappiest details, the worst equipment and C-Rations instead of the fresh-paks of food that was flown in.

Now suppose there was an opening for a "pro-Crew" to travel with the Denver Chiefs. From every practical standpoint, the Stevens Village crew would be the best choice. But the Denver guys and the Boise guys are so tight...and the Indians are so....different. What could they do?

Well, one thing they could do is have a test. The test would be about BLM regulations and the DOI org chart and the physics of fire and the chemistry of fire retardant. It's all relevant.

Guess what? Most Stevens Village EFF went to a lousy village school and barely know the times table. Guess what? The tanned and groovy blue-eyed blonds would ride off to the Denver sunset together.

The point: don't tell me that all those high-fives among the White Fire Fighters wasn't (in part) a celebration of their cultural dominion.

The Price of Silence-An Awesome Video!

President Cool Plays It Right

President Cool Plays It Right

By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, June 23, 2009

The Washington Post

The foreign policy sins of the United States fall into two categories: commission and omission. The commission ones include the wars in Vietnam and Iraq, and a one-time Latin American policy tailored to the needs of United Fruit Co. The sins of omission are less well-known. They include the failure to redeem the hollow promises to various subjugated peoples -- the Hungarians of 1956, the Shiites of 1991 -- that America would come to their aid. In Iran, the Obama administration is intent on not adding to this list.

The current policy, much criticized by prominent Republicans, vindicated Barack Obama's boast in his Cairo speech that he is a "student of history." The student in him knows that the worst thing the United States could do at the moment is provide the supreme leader and the less supreme leaders with the words to paint the opposition as American stooges -- or, even worse, suggest to the protesters that some sort of help is on its way from Washington.

Some of Obama's critics have faulted him for not doing what Ronald Reagan (belatedly) did following the fraudulent election in the Philippines in 1986. After some dithering, Reagan virtually forced President Ferdinand Marcos into exile. How neat. How not a precedent for Iran.

Marcos was, to exhume a dandy Cold War phrase, an "American lackey." The Philippines itself was a former American colony. We knew the country. Hell, at one time, we virtually owned it.

In contrast, not a lot is known about how Iran is actually governed. If, for instance, the White House asked the State Department to send over someone with on-the-ground experience in contemporary Iran, the car would arrive empty. The last American diplomats left Iran in 1979. The United States has to rely on foreign diplomats and journalists for its information.

But information is not experience. It cannot substitute for the feel of the country -- a sense of what happens next. This sort of knowledge was precisely what the United States did not have about Iraq, and we have learned the hard way that satellites, intercepts and the like are no substitute for human intelligence. The Obama White House is showing commendable respect for what it does not know.

For instance, right now a crucial question is: What is the role of the former president, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani? As far as Washington is concerned, this powerful figure has dropped from sight. He presumably is in the opposition to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and, like other supposed reformers, had opposed the increasing power and influence of the military. But, as with many of the others, to call this deeply conservative and -- at least in the past -- virulently anti-American figure a "reformer" gives the word a whole new meaning.


Few of these nuances have made much of an impression on certain Republicans. As in the Cold War, they yearn for liberation rhetoric -- strong statements with a Jeffersonian flourish. Sens. John McCainand Lindsey Graham are two of the more notable proponents of this line of criticism, wondering why Obama did not initially condemn the crackdown in much more forceful terms, as did Nicolas Sarkozy of France and Angela Merkel of Germany. "The president of the United States is supposed to lead the free world, not follow it," Graham said.

Good point, usually. But not this time. Neither Germany nor France has America's history in Iran. It was America that staged the 1953 coup that ousted Mohammed Mossadegh and returned the shah to the Peacock Throne. Neither France nor Germany has been the object of Iranian vituperation since the 1979 revolution -- all that Great Satan nonsense -- and neither of these countries felt obliged to respond in kind: the axis of evil formulation of the Bush years. Pow! How brilliant.

Still, if McCain, Graham and others have a valid complaint, it is not with Obama's words but with his music. The President of Cool seems emotionally disconnected from events in Tehran -- not unconcerned but not particularly upset, either. This is a quality that will cost Obama plenty in coming years. He can acknowledge your pain, but he cannot feel it.

Iran, the first foreign policy "crisis," alerts us to what to expect in the future: a tightly controlled message from the White House (Anyone heard from Hillary Clinton lately?), a deliberate consideration of the options and no shoot-from-the-hip remarks. This is how Obama ran his campaign. This is how he'll run his foreign policy. As McCain should know, it works.

Right-Thinking Realism

>Note. A former Bush State Department Official says that President Obama is striking the right tone on Iran and would be advised to ignore critics on the Right.


Right-Thinking Realism
By Paul J. Saunders
Monday, June 22, 2009
The Washington Post

Attacks are mounting against President Obama for failing to offer sufficient support to backers of presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi in Iran, with claims that Obama is "siding with the regime" against the Iranian people. This approach to the crisis is derided as "realist" -- typically with quotation marks -- as well as cold-blooded and insufficiently committed to American values. But the president has struck the right tone in his public statements, calling on Iran's government to stop "all violent and unjust actions" and making clear that Washington and the world are watching. And he is right to avoid becoming more deeply involved in Iran's post-election political crisis, both practically and morally.

Many politicians and commentators seem to suffer from the illusion that the United States can have a decisive influence on Iran's political evolution. They appear to believe this despite the fact that engineering Iraqi democracy -- which a number of them also urged -- has been far more difficult and costly than was advertised at the outset. Moreover, Iran's political system is no less complex and is probably less well understood in America than Iraq's was before March 2003. How many American experts, officials or members of Congress have been to Iran in the past 30 years? It is Iran's 66 million citizens, not tough rhetoric or token assistance, who will determine how events in the country unfold.
Recognizing this, it is not only unproductive but dangerous for the United States to play too visible a role in Iran's domestic disturbances.

The question goes far beyond how actively supporting what amounts to a potential revolution in Iran could impact efforts at engagement or a "grand bargain." We must also ask ourselves how the Iranian people would react to U.S. involvement in a country where strong nationalist sentiment buttresses the political position of the country's conservatives and Washington is already regularly blamed for supporting a 1953 coup. Can the United States really help?

As British scholar Anatol Lieven has written for the Nixon Center's journal, the National Interest, one of the main reasons that Russia's democratic reform has failed while similar efforts succeeded in Central Europe is that democracy movements in Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and elsewhere were fueled by powerful anti-Russian nationalism -- a mobilization strategy that Russian democrats could not effectively employ against their own government.

Iran's reformers face a similar dilemma. The theocratic regime is losing legitimacy in part because of its economic failure. But as religious and economic legitimacy weaken, what else is left? Iranian nationalism could be decisive, and it is reckless to toy with something that we do not adequately understand.

Another reason for the Obama administration to let Iranians work out their politics on their own is that it is far from clear that there is a substantial difference for U.S. interests between the two competitors. While Mr. Mousavi has distanced himself from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's offensive rhetoric about the Holocaust, there is little to suggest that his policies would vary markedly from Ahmadinejad's on Iran's nuclear program or its ties to Hamas and Hezbollah. Ironically, as my Nixon Center colleague Geoffrey Kemp has suggested, a Mousavi victory could well lead to weakening international pressure on Iran on these issues as a result of European reluctance to undermine someone who, many would hope, could emerge as a moderate and a reformer. (This is not a call to "side" with Ahmadinejad.)

The final argument against a stronger public American position on Iran's protests as they now stand is a powerful moral one. The United States encouraged Hungarians in an uprising against their communist leaders in 1956, only to watch as the brave individuals who chose to stand against their regime were killed mercilessly by their own government because they lacked sufficient internal or external support to succeed. If the American people are not prepared to offer real help to the protesters in Tehran's streets -- up to and including military force to ensure that they win -- it is profoundly immoral to urge Iranians to action from the sidelines. Some of the American commentators and politicians now critical of the president gave the same rhetorical "support" to Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili last year, emboldening Saakashvili and contributing to a war that was disastrous for Georgians.

No one advocating support for Mousavi seems prepared to accept responsibility for the outcome. But without doing so, fighting Ahmadinejad to the last Mousavi voter would be far more cold-blooded than anything the Obama administration has done -- especially knowing what we know about the Iranian regime.

Mousavi's backers will prevail in Iran if they have sufficient public and political support, including inside the country's military and security services. If they don't, we can hope that they survive and draw useful lessons to try again another day. U.S. efforts to force the issue are more likely to set back Iran's political evolution than to advance it, and President Obama has done the right thing with his measured comments. If the crisis escalates, it may be necessary to do more, something the administration itself has said. Otherwise, those who truly want to see political reform in Iran would do well to stay out of the way.
---
Paul J. Saunders is executive director of the Nixon Center and served in the State Department during the second Bush administration.

Can You Say Irony?

This post from a Facebook Friend:

"Can You Say Irony...I knew You Could:

Andree McLoed has posted this on the ADN in regards to the story about Rep Bob Lynn wanting ethics complaints to be kept secret…….

Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission Chairwoman Sarah Palin said Friday she is resigning amid frustration that she is being forced to keep silent about ethics allegations against Republican Party of Alaska chairman Randy Ruedrich.

“I’m forced to withhold information from Alaskans, and that goes against what I believe in as a public servant,” Palin said in a Friday interview."

http://www.adn.com/sarah-palin/background/story/513761.html

This Stuff Drives The Republicans Nuts!

President Obama demonstrates a quality that drives the Right crazy--his ability to be spontaneous and maintain his zen-like cool. If George Bush did something like this, Fox would have been gushing all kibnds of sticky stuff through your cable box. Instead, they sneer at O helping a "kid skip school

The Irony of Right Wing Attacks on Judge Sotomayor

“To Thine Own Self Be True”, the advice of the Oracle of Delphi; true then, absolutely true now. Sotomayor is being damned by Right for speaking openly about the affects of her background...gender, race AND class. When she discussed the differences her perspectives bring to the bench than a “White Male” (quickly grabbed and echoed by the Right-Wing White Males gassing up the airwaves) she WENT ON to conclude that she had a special responsibility to be aware of those perspectives and balance them in her judicial role. This LAST part of her now famous “White Male” speech is conveniently left out by her critics. In essence Judge Sotomayor was saying “To Mine Own Self, Be True”.

Yet when we look back to the nomination of Sam Alito, we read the same sort of speech...his ethnicity, his culture his parent’s class...all asserted to be a VIRTUE so as to TEMPER and MODERATE his judgment on the bench. Clarence Thomas, the most transparent beneficiary of a racial quota in American History was lauded by the Right for his race and class while the Right asserted that attacks on his record and questions of his character constituted a “High-Tech Lynching”. No race card played there! And who can forget the lachrymose bleating of the Right Wing when Liberals dared to question the competence of Alberto Gonzales; Karl Rove chuckled to Newsweek’s Robert J. Samuelson that his Latino heritage made him “untouchable”.

Shall we ignore the fact that Judge Sotomayor has the most judicial experience of any Supreme Court nominee in a century? The fact that she HAS a record of decision allows the opposition to twist and spin a body of work to mean whatever serves their cause.

Will Sotomayor be “objective” in her rulings? She is brilliant and experienced and I will trust her to be fair. No one comes to the bench as a tabula rasa, unetched and pure. The Republican opponents of William Frankfurter’s nomination by President Roosevelt whispered that Frankfurter’s experiences with anti-Antisemitism in Austria where he was born might make him too “pro-Jewish”, whatever that meant.

Had Rush Limbaugh been alive in the 1930s he would be shrieking that poison for his Republican colleagues, just as he is today.

Tripping With Al Franken

When Life Is Only Sacred In The Womb: The Folly of Life as a Political Abstraction

Harriet and I attended a dinner for Planned Parenthood at the Hilton this evening. It was an uplifting event in which individuals were honored for their hard work supporting the lives of families and children in our community. Planned Parenthood is one of the most important "pro-life" groups I know. They work with "life" in the lower case "l", the gritty, real and difficult life that constitutes our imperfect human estate.

Outside the Hotel there were about a dozen folks holding up pictures of bloody chicken-like fetuses. As I walked through the protesters I realized that to them life is an abstraction, with a capital "L". The fetus does not really represent life; "Life" is embodied in the fetus. There is an important difference here. After all, If life is sacred, and here I mean the web of life on Earth, the public policy agenda of so-called 'Pro-Life' activists would look FAR different.

But when life is only sacred in the womb, it is possible to tolerate corporate behavior that steals from families, exposes life to environmental risk and causes illness and death through accident or calculation to thousands around the world.

When life is only sacred in the womb, illegitimate wars that cause the deaths of 100s of thousands go unchallenged by "Pro-Lifers".

When life is only sacred in the womb, so-called "Pro-Life" politicians can pander to the Health Insurance Lobby and prevent Universal Health Care from becoming a reality.

The so-called "Pro-Life" side is silent on the imprisonment of 7% of our population in a penal system designed to warehouse bodies rather than care, reform, or redeem human life. They insist on a "law and order" agenda that criminalizes behavior in a bid to legislate morality. They support the prosecution of children as adults, they oppose funding a justice system for the poor, then they support the mandatory sentencing of those who are convicted.

With global warming, the extinction of species, and the explosion of urban and suburban sprawl throughout the globe-- the predicament of ALL life warrants our prayerful attention.

Yet, one of the (many) contradictions of the Sacred Wombsters is this: They believe that the Fate of the World is in God's Hands. I remember Nixon's "Born Again" Interior Secretary Kleppe testifying before Congress. Here is how the Secretary explained his reluctance to enforce environmental regulations (I paraphrase): God is the steward of the earth and this world will end. When the appointed time for the end comes, there will be little that any of us can do. So why bother?

So if environmental public policy designed to protect life is unnecessary because God will destroy this sinful earth anyway, then, when it comes to salvaging fetuses, why bother?

This is the point when the Wombsters start all the happy talk about "The Elect" and the "Rapture" when all the bloody chicken-fetuses take wing and soar to heaven. But unless you are Sarah Palin and believe that humans palled around with dinosaurs 6,000 years ago, it's kind of hard to believe that what began with calamity can possibly end any other way.

When the globe finally tilts as ice mass is redistributed in the form of water and the angle of rotation of the planet shifts just slightly, eliciting a movement of continental plates, the Evangelical will feel the Earth move and he/she shall seek protection from the calamity. The Evangelical will be praying not for everlasting life but simply for life; not for the glory of Heaven, but for survival on this earth.

Life is not abstract at all. Life is just life; isn't that enough?

HILLARY LIBERATES THE STATE DEPARTMENT!

One of the great moments of this transition to power!

McCain and the End of Anti-Government Government

There is a message in the Florida GOP primary and it would be good for all candidates to listen. When the issues in the campaigns moved from experience to change and then from the war in Iraq to the economy, Mitt Romney’s campaign machine quickly adapted. Romney attacked McCain as being a "liberal" and touted his own experience in the "private sector" as making him qualified to manage the economy from the White House. Unfortunately for Romney, his strategy helped to solidify Republican moderates to McCain--and yes, they are out there. Moderates and "secular" Republicans who had flocked to the "Straight Talk Express" in 2000 had been turned off by McCain's pandering to the evangelical wing of the party and came to question his judgment because of his stubborn support for an ill-conceived war. Romney, on the other-hand, had started with a moderate reputation as a pragmatist Governor of Massachusetts and then, fighting to salvage his Christian credentials from Mike Huckabee, moved to the ideological extreme with his party. The moderate Republicans’ grew disenchanted with Romney as McCain regained his pragmatic footing when the fear of Huckabee, after his surprise victory in Iowa, drove the economic conservatives in New Hampshire to McCain. The GOP machinery then threw their support to McCain in South Carolina as the growing economic crisis made the familiar more appealing, while Huckabee and Romney battled for the evangelical vote. Entering Florida with the backdrop of the economic crisis, the Romney camp finally figured out that it was about the economy, but in a stupid way. With voters haunted by the specter of a recession, the last thing Romney should have done was to remind people of his background as a predatory capitalist.

If Romney made a mistake by bragging about his success as a venture capitalist, he made a second error by talking about McCain as a big government liberal. A slight majority Republicans who chose the economy as the most important issue picked McCain over Romney. Think about that and its implications. Romney had made an issue of McCain's background as a "Washington Insider" running massive ads burnishing that caricature of McCain while simultaneously making much ado of McCain’s opposition to the 2001 and 2003 Bush Tax cuts. Yet, according to the AP exit polling, a majority of economically fraught Republicans picked McCain over Venture Capitalist Romney.

The cautionary tale is this: people are well aware that two things are driving the U.S. Economy to the brink: capitalists--people just like Mitt Romney-- have been inflating equity, taking unearned profits and turning the mortgage market into a ponzi-scheme while the Regulators--people like the Central Bankers and the SEC --have not been doing their job.

It is a mistake to think that only liberals and Democrats are tired of being ripped off by the free-booting capitalism of the Bush era. Republicans are frustrated with thick-headed bureaucrats giving too much deference to predatory insurance companies. Republicans are worried about banking and mortgage underwriting system that has been played by speculators like the proverbial drunken sailor. Republican as well as Democratic children have been scammed by the student-loan practices of colleges that have, in effect, taken bribes from corporations who receive a non-competitive franchise to practice on their campus. And Republicans and Democrats alike are disgusted with the "disappearance" of $14 Billion in Iraq, and the mismanagement for profit of a war which, whether you agree or disagree with that War. After 8 years of George Bush, Republicans as well as Democrats yearn for a government that works.

The rejection of the telegenic Romney, with his fat wallet and private sector resume in Florida may be the harbinger of a change in the Republican tent that is as counter-revolutionary in spirit as the “revolution of Hope” being evangelized by the Obama campaign.

The Republican counter-revolution is against that which took place in the 1990s with the Contract for America and has termed out with the close of the Bush Administration. Conservatives argued that government doesn't work and for years they got themselves elected with the objective of proving themselves right. With the Bush legacy now in shambles and the economy in crisis, perhaps in 2008 the anti-government Government of the neo-Conservatives has finally lost its cachet.

I hope so.

Rice to face subpoena in espionage case

By MATT APUZZO, Associated Press Writer

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and more than a dozen other current and former intelligence officials must testify about their conversations with pro-Israel lobbyists, a federal judge ruled Friday in an espionage case.

Lawyers for two former American Israel Public Affairs Committee lobbyists facing charges have subpoenaed Rice, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, Deputy National Security Adviser Elliott Abrams and several others to testify at their trial next year. Prosecutors had challenged the subpoenas in federal court.

Lobbyists Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman maintain the Israeli interest group played an unofficial but sanctioned role in crafting foreign policy and that Rice and others can confirm it.

If they ultimately testify in court, the trial in federal court in suburban Alexandria, Va. could offer a behind-the-scenes look at the way U.S. foreign policy is crafted.

The lobbyists are accused of receiving classified information from a now-convicted Pentagon official and relaying it to an Israeli official and the press. The information included details about the al-Qaida terror network, U.S. policy in Iran and the bombing of the Khobar Towers dormitory in Saudi Arabia, federal prosecutors said.

But defense attorneys argued that top U.S. officials regularly used the lobbyists as a go-between as they crafted Middle East policy. If so, attorneys say, how are Rosen and Weissman supposed to know the same behavior that's expected of them on one day is criminal the next?

U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III said the lobbyists have a right to argue that "they believed the meetings charged in the indictment were simply further examples of the government's use of AIPAC as a diplomatic back channel."

Defense attorney Abbe Lowell cheered the ruling.

"For over two years, we have been explaining that our clients' conduct was lawful and completely consistent with how the U.S. government dealt with AIPAC and other foreign policy groups," Lowell said on behalf of both defendants. "We look forward to the trial."

Ellis left open the possibility that the Bush administration may challenge the subpoenas on the grounds they would reveal privileged information. But the judge said his ruling Friday "may trump a valid governmental privilege."

If so, that could force the government to decide whether to allow the testimony or drop the case.

Neither the State Department nor the Justice Department had an immediate comment.

Among those subpoenaed in the case were: former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz; former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage; and Marc Grossman, former undersecretary of state for political affairs.




Copyright © 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

Theory on why "Conservatism" = Corruption in Alaska

All of the convicted, indicted, and confessed political criminals are political conservatives. Is that an accident? Hardly. And here is why.

In Alaska "Conservative" has become tantamount to to being anti-Government, anti-Regulation, and, basically, anti-Enforcement of rules of conduct with respect to Government. Ironically, these same "Conservatives" pound their hollow chests about Law & Order but that is usually enforcing laws against the most eggregious kind, crimes against person and property. Conservatives who do not believe in Government, however, do not see "white collar" crime the same way.

"Conservatives" in Alaska think Government is the enemy. I like to say, Conservatives don't believe government works and get themselves elected to prove that they are right.

"Free Enterprise" on the other hand is sacrosanct to Alaskan Conservatives--or what passes North of 60 as Free Enterprise. The so-called Private Sector is supposed to be Private and free from the interference of the much-hated "Government".

Conservatives in Alaska have been taught that the "Sharp Operator" is King and if you can "bend the rules" and beat the competition and make money that...well...hell, that's the American Way, right?

Conservatives in Alaska believe in Family Values as endorsed by the 50 or so most influential Pastors in Alaska--who also happen to be Republicans: tax breaks, anti-abortion, faith-based grants and the like. So if the Alaskan Conservative takes care of those items, it really doesn't matter to the "faithful" what that elected official does or what rules are violated.

Conservatives in Alaska have learned to deliver the Pork to their constituents and keep the good ol' boyz happy, be it artificial turf for their kids to play football on or funding State Troopers to patrol the Hillside Neighborhood in Anchorage.

So...if the Pastors are happy and the biggest mouths of their constituency are warm with contentment from the Sow's Milk of public pork, the most important thing for the Alaskans Conservative to do is to beat-up "Government" and figure out a way to make money and connections.

Alaskan Liberals are certainly subject to temptation, but not as much as Alaskan Conservatives. Why? Because "Liberals" understand secular ethics; they don't believe that their judgement is reserved to the Lord--they accept personal responsibility for their behavior in the Here and Now. It turns out that the thing that Alaskan Conservatives ridicule Liberals about is the quality we most need in elected officials: a believe in and respect for the operation of Government.

People who believe government can work are more likely to make it work. People who have a strong secular ethical code of behavior are less likely to be corrupt than those who believe that everything will be sorted out in the Afterlife and what is God's is God's and what is Ceaser's is Ceaser's.

Let's hear it for those Liberal Secular Humanists in Alaska!

Blogger Pachacutec on the Corruption of Telecoms

This aricle appeared in the Huffington Post of October 11, 2007-m2k

[Right, that's crime boss Randall L. Stephenson, CEO of AT&T]

Monday I shared a train ride with Jane. She was headed to New York to make an appearance on a panel at NYU, and I was headed to Philly on business.

We talked and worked, though Jane was hampered by the failure of her Verizon mobile wireless service to connect her online. Why? Because, though she had been told her bill would be bundled with her cellphone service at the time she purchased the additional wireless service, they didn't do it, so her autopay system did not pay her wireless bill. Result? No service. Further result? An hour of senseless haggling, time on hold, and so forth with a "customer service" representative who researched the problem and then insisted on charging Jane a reconnection fee. . . for Verizon's mistake!

Everyone I know has stories like this. My AT&T wireless charges me out the wazoo and drops my calls with demonic frequency. Meanwhile, it seems Comcast, Verizon and AT&T garner an ever growing proportion of my monthly payments while providing me with less and less service.

If we had been on a train in Europe, not only would we have gotten to our destinations faster, but we would have had free wireless with no hassle. The reason the telecom industry is so bad is because it has bought congress, written anti-competitive, anti-consumer regulations into law, so that its services get worse and worse while it places itself on precisely the business path to destruction the US auto industry has already trod.

It lies to consumers on an individual level, as Jane experienced, and more broadly, launches dishonest anti-net neutrality campaigns and seeks to absolve itself from its participation in illegal surveillance of US citizens. Oh, and it tries to destroy free speech, thank you very much. The more it builds its business model around anti-competitive, anti-consumer corporate welfare and lies, the more it must cling to protectionist, anti-innovation strategies just to survive, systemically cutting the knees out from small businesses and innovative startups. It's a slow, steady slog toward business death. Just ask Ford how that works out.

What's more, the rumor is the Senate version of the new FISA bill, with the blessing of Harry Reid and the Democrats, will include retroactive immunity for the telecoms for their lawbreaking. We've been fighting today to prop up the House progressives to fight for a better version of the FISA bill in the House, but we also need to let Harry Reid and the rest of the capitulation caucus in the Senate know that retroactive immunity is purely unacceptable during the next few days.

Gee, are there any Democratic senators who might consider launching a filibuster on the Senate FISA bill, even against the will of the leadership, like maybe, anyone from a state that likes cheese, or a senator who guest blogs at SavetheInternet.org or anyone running for president who asserts he's truly committed to the Constitution?
What are your telecom nightmare stories? Share them in the comments.

(Send comments to:)
Pachacutec at Firedoglake.

Monday I shared a train ride with Jane. She was headed to New York to make an appearance on a panel at NYU, and I was headed to Philly on business.
We talked and worked, though Jane was hampered by the failure of her Verizon mobile wireless service to connect her online. Why? Because, though she had been told her bill would be bundled with her cellphone service at the time she purchased the additional wireless service, they didn't do it, so her autopay system did not pay her wireless bill. Result? No service. Further result? An hour of senseless haggling, time on hold, and so forth with a "customer service" representative who researched the problem and then insisted on charging Jane a reconnection fee. . . for Verizon's mistake!
Everyone I know has stories like this. My AT&T wireless charges me out the wazoo and drops my calls with demonic frequency. Meanwhile, it seems Comcast, Verizon and AT&T garner an ever growing proportion of my monthly payments while providing me with less and less service.
If we had been on a train in Europe, not only would we have gotten to our destinations faster, but we would have had free wireless with no hassle. The reason the telecom industry is so bad is because it has bought congress, written anti-competitive, anti-consumer regulations into law, so that its services get worse and worse while it places itself on precisely the business path to destruction the US auto industry has already trod.
It lies to consumers on an individual level, as Jane experienced, and more broadly, launches dishonest anti-net neutrality campaigns and seeks to absolve itself from its participation in illegal surveillance of US citizens. Oh, and it tries to destroy free speech, thank you very much. The more it builds its business model around anti-competitive, anti-consumer corporate welfare and lies, the more it must cling to protectionist, anti-innovation strategies just to survive, systemically cutting the knees out from small businesses and innovative startups. It's a slow, steady slog toward business death. Just ask Ford how that works out.
What's more, the rumor is the Senate version of the new FISA bill, with the blessing of Harry Reid and the Democrats, will include retroactive immunity for the telecoms for their lawbreaking. We've been fighting today to prop up the House progressives to fight for a better version of the FISA bill in the House, but we also need to let Harry Reid and the rest of the capitulation caucus in the Senate know that retroactive immunity is purely unacceptable during the next few days.
Gee, are there any Democratic senators who might consider launching a filibuster on the Senate FISA bill, even against the will of the leadership, like maybe, anyone from a state that likes cheese, or a senator who guest blogs at SavetheInternet.org or anyone running for president who asserts he's truly committed to the Constitution?
What are your telecom nightmare stories? Share them in the comments.
Pachacutec blogs at Firedoglake.

Response To Pete Kott's Theory On Appeal

Kott asks judge to toss jury decision : comments
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Posted: October 9, 2007 - 3:37 pm

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8 October 9, 2007 - 4:26pm | metanoia2k

This Is An Interesting Legal Theory

Forget "intent", established by the Giver through confession; set aside "force and effect" revealed through recorded conversations in which Kott clearly establishes a "duty" to the Giver by reporting on PPT developments, there is no "nexus" because Pete Kott was a FRIEND?????

yeah, sure.

Based on this theory, the only time someone could be convicted of insider trading, corruption or abuse of office would be if they had no relationship other than the business of bribery...

I give Kott's lawyer snaps for trying. I guess he feels he's gotta do something for all the money he's being paid.

Politics is,by its nature, a process of "influence" and the leveraging of "relationships". The question before the court is not whether there was a warm and fuzzy relationship between the suckuh and the suckee but whether he performed his duty in a corrupt and criminal manner. Kott's efforts to engineer a shut-out of the House with no PPT bill and his breathless play-by-play reporting to "Uncle Bill" is enough of a nexus to satisfy me.

Whether one is a whore for pleasure, for money or for devotion, one are still a whore;peddling one's influence for the approval of the Pimp Daddy is no less corrupt than a straight quid pro quo. In this case, money may not have turned the wheel, but it sure greased it.

The evidence shows that Pete Kott saw his job was to stand and deliver for Bill Allen and he saw his role as a state legislator as means to that end. He was not elected to work for Bill Allen.

(Exit with banjo playing the theme from Deliverance)

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Airport security struggles with reality

ELSTUN LAUESEN
COMMENT

(Published: October 3, 2007)
Do you remember this old joke: A guy comes into a bar wearing a tinfoil hat. He sits down and orders a drink. The bartender asks him about the tinfoil on his head. "I have a mortal fear of being eaten by bears, so I wear this on my head to keep them away." The bartender replies that bears haven't been seen in these parts for years. The customer replies proudly, "See ... it works!"

Lately, whenever someone tells me that the so-called "War on Terror" is working because there has been no attack on the United States since 2001, I look for the tinfoil hat.

We should call the Department Homeland Security by its functional name: Department of Homeland Insecurity. In the wake of 9/11 this nation has unquestioningly accepted layers of stupid rules each piled upon the other, from shucking shoes to placing liquids and gels in quart-sized plastic bags on the airport screening conveyor belt. I was recently annoyed by Coast Guard rules that force inter-island ferry passengers in Ketchikan to carry their luggage in the driving rain from the terminal to the cart left parked hundreds of feet away at the ferry ramp. After assisting an elderly couple struggling with heavy bags, I returned to the ticket agent and asked her why the driver doesn't pull up to the terminal and let us load our luggage more conveniently. "Coast Guard rules" she said quickly. Obviously I was not the first to ask. "They don't want the loading and unloading to be so close to their building -- it's for security reasons." I rolled my eyes. The agent added: "I know ... it doesn't make any sense. If someone really wanted to do something ... well ... you know."

My travel experiences under the Idiocracy of Homeland Security have given me lots of waiting time to stew about what our country has become in the years since Sept. 11. My thoughts frequently turn on two of the main dogma of the Warrior-In-Chief.

• The world changed on Sept. 11, 2001 -- Of course this statement is untrue. This is still the same old world as before, fraught with dangers and uncertainties. What has changed is our frontier perception of fortress America: We have been dramatically attacked on our own soil. The attack caught us offguard in much the same way as the attack on Pearl Harbor shocked and surprised us. But unlike the ebullient FDR who took us into World War II calling for courage and sacrifice, GWB calls on us to be afraid and to keep consuming.

By embracing fear, our political leaders have created a kind of post-9/11 traumatic stress disorder. It just seems to me that our domestic and foreign policies have become more insular, violent and paranoid. For the past several years, poor old Uncle Sam has been sitting up in the attic cleaning his rifle and peeking out of his curtain, scaring the neighbors. Now the crazy old goat is building a giant fence around his yard to keep out the "aliens."

• Our enemies hate us for our freedom and our values -- By that measure, I think we are losing the war -- not militarily, since this war has no military objectives; we seem to be compromising the very freedoms and values we are defending. As comedian Bill Maher says, "If we lose our sense of humor, the terrorists will have won." Likewise, if we are fighting to defend our freedom, then the USA Patriot Act is an act of friendly fire, badly wounding our cause. The 9/11 PTSD also seems to be draining our optimism as a people, a terrible fate for the nation that has been a beacon of hope to others for over 200 years.

All that being said, however, I will probably continue my own sheeplike compliance with the silly rituals of Homeland Insecurity, including submitting my smelly shoes for security screening and schlepping my bags around concrete barriers to the ferry dock.

I have recently noticed something hopeful, however: A lot of us sheep are starting to snarl at the herders -- especially the ones wearing the tinfoil hats.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Elstun Lauesen is a rural development specialist. E-mail, elauesen@oz.net.

Corruption in Alaska

The insidiousness of corruption is that it is not easily identified by the average person. It works on us incrementally, taking little bites of our Soul at a time. Our religious institutions are no help to us because they portray evil with a capital "E". They make it out to be something grand and apocalyptical when, in fact, it isn't. Evil has a little "e". It is practiced by ordinary people. A fudge on the taxes here; a refusal to "get involved" in a neighbors crisis there.

If this is all true of ordinary people living out their ordinary lives, what about ordinary people who are granted exceptional lives? . With the power granted by temporal political office, ordinary men and women are brought into contact with the "power elite". We are all subject to the subtle seductions of flattery and attention. Becoming full of oneself when the flattery is earned through effort in one thing, but flattery is much more sulfurous when one is the recipient because of the office that he or she holds.

The Alaskan political scandals constitute Exhibit A in the ordinariness, banality and, one might even say, dreariness that evil can employ in its practice of destroying the angels of our higher nature.

Vic Kohring and all the rest--including Ted Stevens--were ushered into office in part because of their ability to resonate as ordinary, hard-working, good people.

Long before the FBI obviated a corrupt political system, we continued to elect these people to office. Even after Berkowitz took to the House floor and decried the scandalous behavior of Bill Allen and the asses that he owned, we were willing to re-elect these people, the ordinary men and women. When we re-elect someone because they "bring home the bacon" to our district, or flatter our prejudices or champion our causes despite their well-documented bad behavior we do so because we are either: ignorant or we are ourselves corrupt.

In either case old Thomas Jefferson, if he were alive today, would be looking for an exorcist to stop the the spinning head obscenities and vomiting of his precious democracy in Alaska today.

OLBERMAN'S OUTRAGE 1 WEEK BEFORE THE ELECTION

Iraqi coalition on brink of collapse as country descends towards civil war

Iraqi coalition on brink of collapse as country descends towards civil war
· Key ally tells PM to choose between him and Bush
· Iranian leaders to meet Talabani at Tehran talks

Jonathan Steele in Irbil, Robert Tait in Tehran and Julian Borger in Washington
Saturday November 25, 2006

Guardian

Iraq's precarious government was teetering yesterday as a powerful Shia militia leader threatened to withdraw support after sectarian killings reached a new peak and the country lurched closer to all-out civil war.
The prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, was forced to choose between his US protectors and an essential pillar of his coalition, when Moqtada al-Sadr declared his intention to walk out, potentially bringing down the government, if Mr Maliki went ahead with a meeting with President George Bush in Jordan next week.

Mr Maliki, a moderate Shia, faced the dilemma as the cycle of killings reached new levels of savagery. Yesterday, there were reports that at least 60 Sunnis had died in revenge killings and suicide attacks, including one episode in which Shia militiamen seized six Sunnis as they were leaving a mosque, doused them with petrol and set them alight, while soldiers reportedly stood by. In another attack, gunmen burned mosques and killed more than 30 Sunnis in Baghdad's Hurriya district before US forces intervened.

The violence added new urgency to a regional summit in Tehran this weekend on Iraq's fate. Iraq's neighbours, particularly Syria and Iran, have been accused of pulling strings in the Iraqi chaos, and Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is today due to play host to his Iraqi counterpart, Jalal Talabani.

The Syrian leader, Bashar al-Assad, was invited but reports from Damascus suggested he would not attend. Syria restored diplomatic relations with Iraq this week after a 24-year gap.

In a reflection of the importance Iran attaches to the summit, Mr Talabani is also expected to meet the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the ultimate say on foreign policy.

Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, predicted that Mr Talabani's visit would produce "important agreements". He described the violence and the US-British occupying forces as "two sides of the same coin" adding: "The two issues should be taken into consideration jointly and a comprehensive solution found."

Observers in Tehran said the government there hoped to use its summit as an overture to Washington. "The Iranian leadership are trying to use Mr Talabani, who has a special role inside Iraq and has never criticised Iran, as a mediator between Tehran and Washington," said Saeed Leylaz, a political analyst. "Mr Ahmadinejad is hopeful that he can attract America's attention through Iraq."

One unknown quantity at the summit will be how much sway the Ahmadinejad government has over Mr Sadr, who visited Tehran last January and met senior Iranian officials, including the country's chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani.

The broader question, growing more urgent each day, is whether anyone can now control the cycle of violence. Thursday was the most deadly day for Iraqi civilians, and morgue statistics showed that the past month has been the bloodiest since the 2003 invasion, according to the UN, with 3,709 civilians killed.

Since taking office, Mr Maliki has been under constant US pressure to disarm the Mahdi army and other Shia militias, while remaining beholden to them to stay in power. The Sadr party demanded yesterday that Mr Maliki "specify the nature of its relations with the occupation forces", demanded a timetable for a US withdrawal, and issued its ultimatum over the scheduled Bush-Maliki meeting in Jordan next Wednesday and Thursday.

"There is no reason to meet the criminal who is behind the terrorism," said Faleh Hassan Shansal, a Sadrist MP.

The White House appeared determined that the meeting should go ahead, after President Bush attends a Nato summit in Latvia on Tuesday. "The United States is committed to helping the Iraqis and President Bush and prime minister Maliki will meet next week to discuss the security situation in Iraq," said Scott Stanzel, a deputy White House spokesman.

Mr Sadr's people have six cabinet seats and 30 members in the 275-member parliament. Their vote in the intra-Shia haggling helped to select Mr Maliki as prime minister over other Shia rivals.

Mr Sadr used Friday prayers in the main mosque in Kufa, his headquarters in the Shia heartland south of Baghdad, to focus on Sunni leaders. He urged them to help end the slide into sectarian civil war.

Appealing directly to Harith al-Dari, the leader of the Association of Muslim Scholars, a radical Sunni organisation which has always denounced the US occupation, Mr Sadr told the congregation: "He has to release a fatwa prohibiting the killing of Shias so as to preserve Muslim blood and must prohibit membership of al-Qaida or any other organisation that has made Shias their enemies."

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2006

HIDEOUS, WRENCHINGLY FUNNY, BRILLIANTLY SICK comedy of the absurd

The Following was taken off the Yahoo News Boards
**********************************************************

OH MY GAWD! BWA-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
by: meantoannoyuh2k (162/M/Wherever) 11/04/06 11:56 am
Msg: 224 of 227
12 recommendations

...someone help me off the floor...

OK. KKKonz...You have converted me. I have become a believer in God...

Know Why?

BECAUSE NO ONE BUT GOD COULD HAVE WRITTEN THIS HIDEOUS, WRENCHINGLY FUNNY, BRILLIANTLY SICK comedy of the absurd but God Himself.

The Bush Era is so stocked with twisted irony and bizarre takes that no human writer could do it justice.

My GOD this is awful. Perle can go to the deepest ring of Hell along with all the other egomaniacal KKKonz who did this to the world.
*******************************************************************************

The Writer was reacting to the following story:

CONSERVATIVES CHALLENGE IRAQI POLICY
By BARRY SCHWEID, AP Diplomatic Writer
Fri Nov 3, 6:38 PM ET


A leading conservative proponent of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq now says dysfunction within the Bush administration has turned U.S. policy there into a disaster.

Richard Perle, who chaired a committee of Pentagon policy advisers early in the Bush administration, said had he seen at the start of the war in 2003 where it would go, he probably would not have advocated an invasion to depose Saddam Hussein. Perle was an assistant secretary of defense under President Reagan.

"I probably would have said, 'Let's consider other strategies for dealing with the thing that concerns us most, which is Saddam supplying weapons of mass destruction to terrorists,'" he told Vanity Fair magazine in its upcoming January issue.

Asked about the article, White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said, "We appreciate the Monday-morning quarterbacking, but the president has a plan to succeed in Iraq and we are going forward with it."

Other prominent conservatives criticized the administration's conduct of the war in the article, including Kenneth Adelman, who also served on the Defense Policy Board that informally advised Bush. Adelman said he was "crushed" by the performance of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

The critiques come as growing numbers of Republicans have criticized Bush's policies on Iraq. The war, unpopular with many Americans, has become a top-tier issue in next week's congressional elections.

Perle said "you have to hold the president responsible" because he didn't recognize "disloyalty" by some in the administration. He said the White House's National Security Council, then run by now-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, did not serve Bush properly.

A year before the war, Adelman predicted demolishing Saddam's military power and liberating Iraq would be a "cakewalk." But he told the magazine he was mistaken in his high opinion of Bush's national security .

"They turned out to be among the most incompetent teams in the postwar era," he said. "Not only did each of them, individually, have enormous flaws, but together they were deadly, dysfunctional."




Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.


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A Memo To Don Young

To: Don Young
From: An AlaskaVoter
Subject: Democracy and Your Conditions of Employment.

Don, it has come to my attention that you refuse to campaign for your office.

According to the conditions of your employment, you are supposed to stand for election every two years.

Let me remind you that “stand for election” doesn’t mean standing thousands of miles away from Alaska in your residence in Virginia or standing in your Bermuda shorts in the Marianas.

Standing for election means coming home and mixing it up with your opponents. But you have refused to debate your campaign opponents this campaign season.

Your main opponent, Diane Benson, flew to Sitka for the Alaska Day parade because she knew you would be there, but you cancelled when you learned that she did so. Then, a few days later, she traveled to Fairbanks to a meeting you were scheduled to attend and, again, you learned that she would be there and you cancelled on those nice folks who wanted to talk to you.

I thought it was very accommodating of Diane Benson to help you meet your employment condition of “standing for election,” but then I learn, through the newspaper, that you are not actually campaigning when you travel to Alaska three weeks before an election.

The problem as I understand it is, if you had debated with Diane, the Congressional Accounting Office or someone might misconstrue this as campaigning and you might have to reimburse the federal government for your plane ticket to Alaska. With only $2 million in the bank, your campaign can ill-afford that. I understand.

I also understand that you want to be scrupulous as to appearance; a clear bright line between campaigning and doing “the people’s work”. The lavish reception in your honor during the GOP Convention in Philadelphia, courtesy of Jack Abramoff and Preston Gates & Ellis, was clearly on one side of the line and the fact-finding trip you took to the Northern Marianas Islands, an Abramoff client, was on the other side of the clear bright line.

But you know what? This memo isn’t about splitting legal hairs. It’s about your job. It’s on the line.

It’s on a clear, bright line called election day.

You see, this month (October) is on track to being the deadliest month for our soldiers this year and the fourth deadliest since the start of the war. Nearly three thousand of our soldiers and guardsmen have died, supposedly for democracy. You yourself have said they are over there fighting for democracy. My question, therefore, is simple:

Don, don’t you owe it to those who are dying over there to participate in the process called democracy here at home?

There are other issues on the voters’ minds that relate to your job: our economy is turning sideways, our social contracts are broken, and Congress has become something akin to the K Street bordello. You, Congressman, need to stand up and face these issues in front of us voters.

In response to an Anchorage Daily News reporter’s question, your campaign manager said: "A campaign event? We do not have any campaign events."

Don, your campaign manager has just earned my designation as the Maytag Repairman of the 21st Century: all dressed up with nothing to do.

In truth, I have lived with you so long, I have become strangely attached to that the ‘eau de bull’ that suffuses your tenure. But, Don, fewer and fewer Alaskans are so sentimental.

Recent polls show that you are an incumbent in trouble.

With nearly total name recognition, you barely eked out a majority in the Craciun poll (52%) and you fall short of that goal in the more recent Hays Research Group poll (43%). In the Hays poll, that pesky Diane Benson trails by only nine points. In both polls, there is a relatively large block of undecided voters. And it’s not just polls, Don; it’s the voters. The 102,000 votes cast in the Republican primary included 21,000 voters who deliberately did not vote for you. You received only 81,000 of those primary votes.

Don, maybe the Independents and Non-Partisans who voted in the Republican Primary were trying to tell you something. And maybe, just maybe, you will get the message on November 7.