dubyaD40.com - Guest Blog

dubyaD40.com's Guest Blog

What The Pundits Are Not Saying About Vitter
Friday, July 20, 2007

Stephen Crockett
July 19, 2007

This writer is surprised that the mainstream media seem to be controlling the political dialogue in America and (this is the surprising part) the political class is simply going along. The questions not being asked, the ideas not being reported and the serious problems not being addressed are much more important than those frequently available from the corporate controlled, mainstream media. The Vitter Sex Scandal is just one interesting example with a degree of sex appeal.

Why are politicians and media pundits not calling for the resignation of Senator Vitter? From the limited facts published in the corporate media, it looks like Vitter may be a criminal and a repeat offender. If the Republican Senator from Louisiana is truly a frequent consumer of the sexual services of prostitutes, he has violated laws.

Of course, Vitter may have sexual or emotional problems that explain his behavior. On the other hand, he may not be lying about his sexual behavior. It is slightly possible that all the others admitting to their sex for money relationships with Vitter are all liars. The DC Madam case just might be only a non-sexual escort service. The police and prosecutors might be wrong. Vitter might be innocent and everyone else guilty or wrong. For the official Vitter talking points to be valid, a large number of other individual must all be wrong.

Vitter is widely known as a morality crusader with his political base in the Christian Right. Vitter was a bitter critic of President Clinton during the impeachment process. Senator Vitter questioned Clinton's morality. Along with almost all the Republican leadership, he cited "breaking the law" over alleged perjury as the reason Clinton should be driven from public office.

Senator Vitter broke the law if he hired prostitutes. It is reported that Vitter did so often in different locations and with different prostitutes. If the details are correct, hiring prostitutes for sex is illegal in those jurisdictions. Using Vitter's own logic, he should be forced from office.

The sheer hypocrisy makes the Vitter Sex Scandal much worse. Vitter betrayed his wife. Vitter betrayed his oath of office. Vitter betrayed his supporters. He appears to be a liar along with being a hypocrite. Media pundits and politicians should be talking about this issue in these terms.

It might be worth exploring the legality of prostitution as a larger issue. The nation is long overdue for a new political dialogue on victimless crime issues like the legalization, regulation and taxation of marijuana. Even Republican politicians might approach these social issues with more open minds, as a result of their repeated involvement in recent sex and drug scandals.

These larger issues involve crowded prisons, racial bias in the jailing of citizens, judicial equity, voting rights, future employment opportunities and spending tax dollars. The mainstream media would do the nation a favor by discussing Vitter and enlarging the scope of public debate on the issues raised.

Stephen Crockett is co-host of Democratic Talk Radio

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Republican Rulers Are Out Of Control
Monday, July 16, 2007

Stephen Crockett
July 13, 2007

"Out of control, elitist power mongers" would be the best phrase to describe the political mindset of the Bush Republican machine. The current Bush Administration and their Senate allies are completely unwilling to bend to majority rule on the Iraq War or the other major issues of today. In the Republican elitist world, the people are to be ruled over instead of represented by Republican officeholders and judges.

Every American should read the 2004 book, Worse Than Watergate, by John Dean. While the book is a little dated by events occurring since 2004, it gives great insight into the legal, political and institutional mechanics of enforcing Republican elitist minority rule put in place very early in the first Bush term.

Courts were packed with biased judges who routinely place partisan interests and Republican ideology above the law. Legal precedents were established to provide unprecedented secret government and to undermine procedures to regulate executive authority. Regulatory bodies were filled with Republican partisan ideologues and political hacks.

One cannot really understand the importance of the US Attorneygate Firing scandals without understanding the issues raised in Worse Than Watergate. John Dean understands from personal experience the Constitutional issues, legal moves and institutions of government involved. Dean saw the big picture even before it was fully revealed to the wider public by ensuing revelations.

Bush and Cheney expanded claims of executive power to nearly dictatorial levels. They claim that Congress has no right to effectively examine almost any aspect of White House behavior or policies. In reality, the Bush Republicans basically deny the right of Congress to engage in Congressional oversight activities.

The ability of Bush to retain the support of the partisan core of the Republican Party concerning the Iraq War issue reveals that information control is essential to the efforts by the Bush Republicans to retain political power. Every dictatorial machine needs a rabid minority of hardcore supporters to stay in power.

On Iraq, Republican Senators have been put in a box by Bush. Republican Senators are likely to have problems in the Republican primaries if they vote to end Bush's War. Republicans are fed Bush Republican Spin on the issue by Fox News and the Right Wing Talk Radio Machine constantly. The Republican partisans live in another reality devoid of information that would destroy their belief system. Open government, education, unbiased information and honest answers are the enemies of Bush Republicanism.

With over 70 percent of Americans opposed to Bush's war policies, Republican Senators are unlikely to win the 2008 general elections as supporters of Bush's Iraq War. The vast majority of Americans do not live in the alternative reality of Bush Republicanism. Those citizens already realize that Bush's way can never win the Iraq War. Bush Republicanism ran the effort for far too long and the damage is done. Things like torturing prisoners or killing Iraqi civilians cannot be undone. Bush put our goals out of reach.

We lost the Iraqi populace by staying far too long and doing the wrong things. Bush Republican incompetence, greed and ideology lost the peace in Iraq that our military had gained. Some of same problems seem too apparent in Afghanistan.

Bush and Cheney lost the Iraq War. In order to save Bush Republicanism from total ideological extinction, they are trying to run out the clock so the inevitable withdrawal can be blamed on the next, likely Democratic Presidency! Bush and Cheney will abuse their offices by imposing their minority view on the vast majority of dissenting fellow citizens concerning Iraq because it serves their goal to retain power in the future.

The Bush Republicans will block national health insurance or efforts to replace free trade with fair trade although overwhelming majorities of Americans support both. Fairer tax burden distribution and stronger environmental protections will be fought by the Republicans. Easier voting and ending "no-bid" government contracts will be opposed by the Republican elitists. What they cannot win in the legislature will often be blocked by their partisans in the courts. Their power will always come before democracy or common decency.

Hiding failure and corruption is the Bush Republican way. Few Americans believe that Libby should have been given special treatment by Bush. Libby intentionally obstructed a criminal investigation that seemed to reach the highest levels of the Bush White House. Had Libby not lied, investigators might have indicted Karl Rove or Vice President Cheney. Citizens might have discovered that Bush ordered the outing of a covert CIA agent for political reasons. If so, Bush and Cheney might have been impeached.

The only thing that might have made Scooter Libby talk was jail. By taking time in jail off the table, George W Bush effectively covered up the truth about this terrible crime committed by White House operatives. Libby is one of the Republican elitist rulers. Under Bush Republicanism, he is effectively above the law like his bosses.

It is time to end elitist, minority rule and restore representative democracy. We have a government to repair. We have the American Dream to save.

Stephen Crockett is co-host of Democratic Talk Radio

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Just a Thought

Agnes Kincaid
July 13, 2007

This is just a thought, but when will we become tired of men and women who spout twenty dollar words with two cents worth of intent? In the still of the night I wake up with thoughts of "have I done enough today to possibly make a difference in not only my family's life, but to others as well?" Maybe I have but I'm more than willing to rise again in the morning and work as hard if not harder than the day before to improve some portion of life for others. It seems as if our governing body doesn't have that same sentiment in mind. We elect representatives to do just that; represent the voice of the people, and I hate to be the bearer of bad news but that isn't happening and I don't foresee it in the near future.

What is the idea of justice nowadays? Is it that as long as you follow some mad ideology you can get a free pass for infringing on the rights and privileges of others? We aren't created equal and we are all expendable to the point that we as a nation look the other way as our government takes each of our constitutional rights and removes them from our reach. Are we so afraid that we cower in the dark so that we might scoot under the ever expanding radar of our government? Could it possibly be that we are so beaten down and apathetic that we can't find where our give a damn was busted? I don't believe so, and that one word, "believe" is the dangerous idea. It means I still have faith in humanity and the human race to want to survive and prosper, rather than die and only leave a dust trail for a marker where we have been. Everyone has a varying ideology that is so eclectic that we must be able to find some points to agree upon, but it seems as if the major factors are so splintered that even if we could find a "middle of the road", we would still remain so childish and stubborn as to the smaller ones as to make peace impossible.

If I seem bitter then please forgive the sentiment. It's genuine and as I see it it's far better than what I see the care takers of this country giving us. For those out there who want to build a Utopia that doesn't include everyone, I beg that you leave out my invitation, because I'm afraid you would find my way of living very inappropriate to your way of thinking. But in the interim please get out of my life and keep your obsessive/compulsive, control freak ideology out of my way, because I think you will find I'm not your kind of subject, and I am mistress of my own castle and I have no master.

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Democrats Support The Fairness Doctrine
Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Stephen Crockett
July 10, 2007

Corporate Media pundits and sell-out Democratic personalities are denouncing a return to the Fairness Doctrine standards in broadcasting eliminated by the Reagan Administration. They are falling into a trap set by the Republican Right and the largest corporations in America. Essentially, they are letting Republican political spin set the agenda for "acceptable" political views.

Grassroots Democratic activists do want a return to the Fairness Doctrine and Equal Time provisions in broadcasting. Private business owners are using without charge the public airwaves. These businesses are making huge profits by using public assets that belong to all American citizens. They owe us a public obligation to present diverse opinions and provide balanced public programming.

Using public property for private profit comes with strings. Private profits are only acceptable if the overall policy serves the public good. Our government policy cannot be based solely on making the highest level of profit for the private businesses involved in broadcasting.

Broadcasters who do not give all major viewpoints a voice on their segment of the public airwaves should lose their licenses. This was the situation before the corporatist radicals surrounding Ronald Reagan rigged the system by gutting almost all the public service regulations previously in effect. We need to return to our traditional, pre-Reagan standards.

It is unfortunate that the Corporate Media wants to take support for the Fairness Doctrine off the table for the political leadership of both major Parties. It is really a fool's errand. The grassroots of the Democratic Party strongly support the Fairness Doctrine and will demand that our candidates support it in 2008.

The Corporate Media attacks on the Fairness Doctrine are creating a backlash. Activists now will not stop at a return of the Fairness Doctrine in broadcasting. Centralized media control is now widely seen as a serious threat to our democratic institutions by most reformers. We need a complete change of direction when it comes to regulating broadcasting.

We need to limit radio station ownership to no more than 20 stations. We should encourage local ownership and minority ownership. Ownership of major city newspapers, radio stations and television stations in the same market should be prohibited.

Democrats should join with other reformers to make our public airwaves actually serve the public interest. Centralized media ownership curtails competition. It lowers the quality of programming. It promotes the possibility of politicization of programming. It drives up advertising costs. It hurts content diversity. It is broken and needs to be fixed! Democratic politicians who side with the large media corporations instead of the grassroots activists are going to have serious future political problems.

Stephen Crockett is co-host of Democratic Talk Radio

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Scientists Discover the God-Gene
Monday, July 9, 2007

B. Lotticoli
Sunday, July 1, 2007

(Topeka, KS) Scientists at Deotech Biosciences, Inc. have discovered an aberrant single nucleotide pair, SNP, that they have nicknamed the god-gene. The SNP was discovered, by accident, while performing genomic sequencing of blood samples collected from a group of volunteers at a local evangelical church.

Dr. Theo Cratus, PhD., the lead researcher at Deotech, said; "It is a major breakthrough in DNA analysis and it could answer many questions about why evangelical fundamentalists have an uncontrollable desire to impose their religious beliefs on society."

Dr. Cratus went on to say; "This aberrant gene, recently labeled Genesis II, may be an artifact left over from when we were a less evolved species. It is so potent, that even in a recessive state, it will code for the highly unusual protein known as raptureglobin. Raptureglobin, found in the brain, when audibly stimulated by the recitation of Old Testament Bible verses, will manufacture intoleranceine, an alkaloid substance similar in molecular structure to dopamine. In test subjects intoleranceine produces a level of euphoria with similar effects to those of having multiple orgasms, only more intense. This euphoria has been found to be extremely addictive, the effects of which may last for years."

Dr. Cratus's extensive research will be published in this months issue of the New Fynnland Journal of Medicine.

Unfortunately, Deotech has determined that a simple biochemical blood test for intoleranceine is not feasible to manufacture because the level of intoleranceine produced in the brain is below the detectable limits of our current instrumentation. But a simple, non-invasive, visual test for intoleranceine has been devised. Show a test subject, suspected of possessing the aberrant gene a photograph of a homosexual pride parade or a rainbow flag. If the individual does in fact posses the aberrant gene, he/she will immediately go into a trance-like state from the production of intoleranceine and will start quoting Bible verses from Leviticus, which in turn will produce more intoleranceine and send him/her deeper into the trance-like condition.

The only known method to reverse the effects of intoleranceine and bring the test subject back from their trance-like condition is to read to him/her, loudly, from the New Testament. Passages read from Matthew Chapter 5, the Sermon on the Mount, or from Matthew Chapter 25, What One Must Do to Gain Entrance to Heaven, will be found extremely offensive by the test subject and the effects will be for the raptureglobin to produce the antidote, toleranceine, which will block the intoleranceine from it's receptor site. This will, immediately, bring the test subject out of his/her trance-like condition.

Other known manifestations of individuals possessing this unusual gene are their unfaltering desire to return prayer to the public schools and place monuments of the Ten Commandments in front of court houses. In advanced stages they suffer from the paranoia of a secular societal war on Christmas.

Scientists at, Deotech Biosciences, Inc., pleased with their new discovery, are now focusing their efforts on searching for the SNP that causes conservatism, an extremely regressive/degenerative psychological disorder.

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I am a half century old progressive who enjoys good satire as a way to comment on society. Do it with a smile.

My favorite quotes...

"I am certainly not an advocate for frequent and untried changes in laws and constitutions. I think moderate imperfections had better be borne with; because, when once known, we accommodate ourselves to them, and find practical means of correcting their ill effects. But I know also, that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths disclosed, and manners and opinions change with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also, and keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors."
-- Taken from a letter by Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval - Monticello, July 12, 1816.

"Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change
their minds cannot change anything." -- George Bernard Shaw

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Judicial Activism
Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Bob Kincaid
July 3, 2007

Funny. The Republicans spent all that time warning us about "activist judges," when all the time, we should've been watching out for an "activist president."

Remember when the judge hailed Paris Hilton back into court to send her back to jail after the Sheriff of L.A. County had already put her on home confinement? I recall Robert Shapiro appearing on the teevee somewhere to announce that what the judge had done was illegal. And yet, somehow, it stuck, and Paris had to eat Cheez-Its for a week, instead of caviar.

OK, Ok, OK! I'm laying off Paris, already. There's a greater point here.

The point is, the Honorable Reggie B. Walton, whose judgment of Scooter Libby just got defecated on by George Bush, can do something similar, only easier and, in this case, perfectly legal.

Today, in announcing the commutation of Libby's prison term, George Bush said the following:

I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby's sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison

With a swipe of his special commutin' crayon, Bush once again eviscerated the will of OUR representatives, in this case a judge and a jury. No surprise coming from the guy who raised the "signing statement" to a high crime and vitiated the will of Congress on more times than I have time to enumerate. Moroever, George also wiped out the will of the Congress in this sentencing, too. Congress long ago passed the sentencing guidelines that Judge Walton applied to Scooter in reaching the sentence he imposed. Judge Walton didn't exactly consult a Ouija board to come up with the sentence. It was a process of applying the Sentencing Guidelines: the same sentencing guidelines he uses when he sends African-American kids up the river for ten years for having a rock of Crack in their pockets.

George also acknowledged that some portions of the sentence were untouched:

He will remain on probation. The significant fines imposed by the judge will remain in effect.

And therein lies the rub! Scooter is still on probation.

Judge Walton has the power, if he so chooses, to hail Scooter Libby back into court and revoke his probation, imposing a prison term on this treasonous monster, this liar, this affront to the dignity of the Republic.

Judge Walton should do so, promptly. Why? Scooter's probation was predicated on the imposition of a term of incarceration. In effect, it represents time Scooter would spend as a free man under the Court's supervision once he had served his sentence. Since Scooter will serve no initial prison time, he is not entitled to the period of probation imposed by Judge Walton. Scooter, therefore, should spend the period of his probation in federal prison.

This is eminently reasonable and legal, and there's not a blessed thing, short of a pardon or another commutation, that George could do about it. Would George commute again? Would he just pardon him this time? Let's find out! The White House doesn't want to pardon Scooter because that would make him unable to resist a Congressional subpoena. He wouldn't even have to take the Fifth. If George is forced to commute twice, there's a slim chance the American People might even notice that the rule of law is being drowned in a pigsty by the Bush Administration.

Beyond that, with Judge Walton being a Bush appointee, how could the right-wing attack him? If he refuses to revoke the probation, Judge Walton opens himself to charges that he is part of the whole scam. Please remember that a judge on the Federal Bench isn't supposed to avoid impropriety. He is compelled to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.

Failing to revoke Scooter's probation would create an appearance of impropriety that would be cognizable by the Judiciary Committees of both houses of Congress.

If you'd like to send a letter to Judge Walton suggesting that he revoke the probation of Scooter Libby, you may do so by sending him snail mail at this address:

The Honorable Judge Reggie B. Walton
United Sates District Court for the District of Columbia
E. Barrett Prettyman United States Courthouse
333 Constitution Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20001

Judge Walton's chambers may be reached by phone at (202) 354-3290
You can send a fax to Judge Walton at (202) 354-3292

If you decide to call or write, please remember that we want to encourage this judge to do the right thing. Frothing at the mouth, or vulgar language will not only be counter to our effort, but may even get you a visit from a federal marshall.

That's pretty much it. I'll save the florid, purple prose for a better blogger.

If you want to see justice done, then get busy. Start writing. Start phoning. Start faxing. Tell your friends. Tell your neighbors. Tell perfect strangers. Send this blog post far and wide. Take credit for it yourself. I don't care. If we don't at least try, then we acquiesce in the sickening slide of this country further into fascism.

Link to the original article
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