Thursday, March 31, 2005

"TRMPAC, in its own words"

The Texas Observer has the story, with screen shots of emails, brochures, checks, and memos detailing the election law violations, as well as the PAC's cozy ties to La Cucaracha Grande:

Maloney also relates in his e-mails that he will be delivering "2 checks from Reliant" to "TD" (Tom DeLay). The circumstances under which DeLay sealed the Reliant deal earned him a rebuke from the U.S. House ethics committee in 2004. In early June 2002, DeLay held a two-day golf tournament at the Homestead resort in Hot Springs, Virginia. The cost of attending the event was a corporate contribution of $25,000 to $50,000. Five energy companies were invited by Maloney to attend: El Paso Corp., Mirant, Reliant Energy, Westar Energy, and Williams Companies. (DeLay's dealings with Westar would earn a separate rebuke from the committee.) The golfing took place just before a House-Senate conference on an omnibus energy bill. (It's understandable why, four months later, Maloney would complain about Reliant's tardiness.) The Homestead event was supposed to benefit equally TRMPAC and DeLay's Americans for a Republican Majority (ARMPAC), according to an e-mail from an ARMPAC staffer to TRMPAC's accountant.

The Majority Leader has insisted that there was no relationship between the solicited money and any actions to influence the legislative process in Congress. Furthermore, DeLay has claimed while lashing out at Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle that he had no more than an advisory role in TRMPAC. Still, it's not hard to see why the Williams Company might be confused about where to send the check and who was in charge.


And Republicans are beginning to acknowledge in unnerved tones that maybe it's time for King Cockroach to go.

Damn, that dripping is getting faster...

Wednesday, March 30, 2005

Independent Media in a Time of War

Last evening a group of us went to see Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now! speak at the River Oaks Theater here. Over 500 people were in attendance; the event was sold out and it was SRO in the back of the theater. Also speaking was Javier Couso, brother of Jose Couso, the Spanish cameraman killed when a US military tank fired on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad nearly two years ago, who is in the United States to call for an independent investigation into the death of his brother and the prosecution of those responsible. Amy was also preceded by a short documentary with the title above, and the film consists of one of her speeches illustrated with US media coverage of the Iraq war, and occasionally juxtaposed with some rarely-seen footage from independent and foreign reporters in-country. You can see it here if you have RealPlayer and a broadband connection. It's about 30 minutes. There's also a transcript here, along with a link to the video for those on dialup.

I'd like to summarize my thoughts from last night, but it's difficult to do so. You see, things are much, much worse than I thought.

Now most of you reading this are fully aware that the corporate media (sometimes referred to as the MSM, though there's barely anything mainstream remaining about it) has gone bad. In fact it's soured. Curdled. No, come to think of it, it's worse even than that. It's growing black, moldy, fuzzy lily pads. It's gone so bad that it's almost completely worthless. Oh there's a few things worth saving, but we'll talk about those later. For now, we're going to focus on the negative.

And some of you reading this have started to curl your upper lip into a sneer. That's OK; if you can make it to the end of this post it means your mind is still open to the possibility that something has gone seriously wrong in this country, and it's actually not all the fault of the neoconservatives currently in control of all branches of our government. Keep reading, please.

In the documentary, Amy asked the question (in reference to the coverage of the Iraq war): "If there was a state-run media in this country, what would be the difference?"

And after watching Sheperd Smith say "Stay brave, stay aware, and stay with FOX", and Paula Zahn say "We're savoring these pictures" as bombs explode in downtown Baghdad on the first night of 'shock and awe', and a parade of retired generals talk about "rolling up the Republican Guard" and "We're coming, and there's nothing you can do to stop us" as pictures of warplanes and battleships and missles flying into their targets in grainy black-and-white video play, and breathless embedded reporters say, "It's just like a video game"...

... I have to answer, "yes, what would be the difference?"

Javier Cuoso revealed data relating to the attack on the Palestine Hotel, where his brother and hundreds of other journalists -- unimbedded -- were staying (this information being well known to US and coalition forces). For example, I was not aware that there are very specific rules of engagement associated with firing on a known and obvious civilian facility, even if the soldiers perceive a threat. There are high level chain-of command authorizations which must be secured in advance of any action. The military will prosecute harshly breaches in those rules of engagement and breakdowns in the chain-of command.

Usually.

Cuoso said (through an interpreter):

"The recent attack on the Italian journalist shows yet again that the US military has decided that journalists are fair game in Iraq. The Bush administration agreed to a full investigation of the attack on Giuliana Sgrena, so we believe that a full, independent investigation is long overdue into the attack which killed my brother. Then, those responsible should be brought to justice."


Wasn't Eason Jordan fired for saying something like that? Oh that's right, he resigned.

And Amy Goodman spoke for about 45 minutes, keeping the crowd hushed with the story of her experience in East Timor at a protest and subsequent mass execution of the protestors by the Indonesian army in 1998. But she also mentioned the experience of Phil Donahue, whose MSNBC program was cancelled at a time when it was one of the channel's highest rated programs, on March 19, 2003 -- the eve of the Iraqi invasion. (Of course you already knew that MSNBC's parent company, GE, is one of this country's largest defense contractors, right?)

Donahue, one of the few anti-war broadcast voices prior to the beginning of the war, has kept silent about the dismissal for the past two years, but no longer. He related to Amy the gist of the memo he received at the termination of his program two years ago: essentially it said that since the US was going to move ahead with the invasion, that it was important to 'speak with one voice in support of the country'.

If we had state-run media in this country, what would be the difference?

Aaron Brown was asked, in an interview aired on Democracy Now!, why the pictures of the blown-to-bits Iraqis weren't being shown by CNN; his answer was, "They're tasteless." Well, war is tasteless, said Ms. Goodman, in reply. No response from Brown.

Wolf Blitzer, when asked by Jon Stewart if he had any regrets about how the runup to the war was vetted by his network, said: "Haven't you ever made a mistake?"

At one of her speeches in New York, Amy related that al-Jazeera regularly showed pictures and video of Iraqi casualties, and a German journalist approached her afterwards and said, "It's not just al-Jazeera that's showing these. All over Europe we see them day and night. It's just here in the United States that you don't see them."

You see, it's much worse than we thought.

Then again, some people actually like buttermilk. It's simply unhealthy, of course, to drink it every day.

Update: Lyn at the Houston Democrats blog has a take, including pictures.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Whoever did this is going to Hell

This blog is kinda sick, but I must confess that I L'dMAO. So maybe I am, as well.

Chris Bell is THE MAN

The Austin American-Statesman (reg. req.) interviewed potential Democratic gubernatorial candidate Chris Bell; here's some of what he said:

Q. How much money should a Democrat expect to raise to be competitive with the eventual Republican nominee?

A. A lot. Actually, an obscene amount, but let me put it in perspective. We think we need to raise far less than it cost Texas hospitals to provide basic health care in ERs to the uninsured, and about 40 times less than the amount in federal matching funds for children's health insurance we have turned away. It will cost 45 times less than Texas would have saved by reimporting prescription drugs, but almost twice as much as drug companies spend a year for Texas lobbyists. Perhaps worst of all, it's less by a lot than the tuition increases that UT students paid.

You want an exact number? We figure it'll cost as much as the amount of CHIP money that the state auditor said Gov. Rick Perry lost through mismanagement. And I'll wager the governor has no idea how much that is.


Awesome.

The ice is spring-thaw thin, but he's still skating

"If you've seen a chicken in the barnyard get a peck on his head so a little blood is showing, then the other chickens all rush in and peck him to death, that is the danger for Tom DeLay right now. He's got a little blood on his head, and sometimes that is enough to get you killed."

-- Charlie Wilson

Charlie Wilson was my congressman for 25 years. He represented the 2nd district of Texas when it still represented the southeastern counties of the state. I mean deep east Texas, where the piney woods still hide moonshine stills and the most fun a teenage boy can have on a Saturday night is to go hunting deer with a spotlight in his pickup. You may remember him as "Good Time Charlie", who usually had a bottle blonde on his arm and a cocktail in his hand. Or as the saviour of the mujahideen, the Afghanistan rebels who kicked the first leg out from under the Soviet Union.

Charlie's a lobbyist now, has been since he retired from Congress in '97. Which means he's plugged snugly into the rumor mill. Republicans always liked him because he was a staunch anti-communist; Democrats because he was liberal on domestic issues like fiscal and social policy (more so even than the rest of the Texas delegation, which once upon a time was as overwhelmingly Democratic as it is Republican today). So he's in an enviable position in that everybody talks to him.

If the Wall Street Journal and Charlie Wilson say Tom DeLay's in serious trouble, you can bank that.

Still:

"My conservative colleagues rely heavily on the Wall Street Journal, but recognize the paper has an agenda different than social conservatives," said Richard Viguerie, a pioneer in conservative political direct mail and founder of the Conservative Digest magazine. "The Journal is concerned about stable leadership for big business," said Viguerie. "But for (social) conservatives, DeLay is one of our own. He walks with us."


And there's also this:

"He can raise money for them, he can get them important leadership assignments, he can help them get re-elected," said Michael Franc, a government expert for the conservative Heritage Foundation. "In return, there are about 200 members of the House who are willing to lay their bodies on the line for him."


Emphasis mine.

I'm pretty much convinced at this point that until those 200 Republicans feel it necessary to make a change, there won't be a change. And they probably won't feel it necessary unless there is an indictment.

And if that drags all the way out to the 2006 elections, that might be a very good thing for Democrats.

Saturday, March 26, 2005

Irresponsibility generating chaos

This post is cogent. I'm going to sample a couple of pieces of it, but please go read the whole thing:

Over the last three days or so, however, the coverage on the Little Three news networks -- Fox, CNN, MSNBC -- has ceased to be humorous. There is a difference between bad coverage and willfully irresponsible coverage, and another line between willfully irresponsible coverage and dangerously irresponsible coverage. In the last three days, those lines have been crossed. Repeatedly ...

Against this background of exploitation and misinformation, the usual bevy of archconservative media pundits has in the last several days begun to increasingly endorse a premise that is, to any rational mind, remarkable: the notion that because the courts have ruled in this particular fashion, it is now time for individuals and government figures to disregard the courts, and take matters into their own hands ...

Unless you are deeply stupid, you can see where this is leading. There have now been about a dozen individuals arrested for trying to enter the clinic to give Terri food or water, an action that (because she cannot swallow) in and of itself stands an excellent chance of killing her. Both Judge Greer and Michael Schiavo are under police protection; Florida lawmakers are finding their pictures on "Wanted" posters; home addresses of Greer and other judges are being distributed ...

Now, there are times when the news media is simply sloppy; there are times when journalists simply get stories wrong, and there are times when, as in the trials of Michael Jackson, Kobe, O.J., Martha Stewart, etc., the news channels are simply swept away by their natural tendency towards low-cost voyeurism. But this isn't one of those times. This isn't petty irresponsibility or sloppiness, to be chalked up to the dwindling resources of corporate newsrooms.

This is a decision on the part of producers to willfully bend the lines in a manner that promotes sensationalism and potential violence, by intentionally tossing known-false information into a wire-taut public conflict to enhance the "ratings value".


That's it, exactly.

William Randolph Hearst would be so proud.

Steve Gilliard reaches a similar conclusion, with Bush the president, Bush the governor, and DeLay and Frist taking the blame. And yes, they most certainly are at fault; but there'd be no grandstanding without a grandstand to stand on.

This charade is right on the verge of turning violent.

Friday, March 25, 2005

CNN declared brain-dead

by James Wolcott:

Two prominent neurologists who have asked to remain anonymous have examined CNN behind closed doors and determined that the network is irreversibly brain-dead, as flooded with cerebral fluid as the hull of the S.S. Poseidon. It still retains some primitive reflexes and signs of animation, but a brain-scan revealed the sort of minimal activity usually associated with punch-drunk prizefighters condemned to a flophouse cot, or a broken toaster. "CNN barely has two brain cells left to rub together," one doctor said, lacing up his tennis shoes for a quick getaway.


Yes, my advice is to pull the plug. DNR.

Thursday, March 24, 2005

Kinky in town tomorrow

Kinky Friedman, the erstwhile novelist/musician/2006 Texas gubernatorial candidate will sign & discuss his novel Ten Little New Yorkers on Friday the 25th at 6 pm at Murder By The Book (2342 Bissonnet, Houston TX 77005, 713-524-8597 or (888) 4-AGATHA).

"The professionals gave us the Titanic, amateurs gave us the Ark. Career politicians are ribbon cutters. They see the governor's office as a job; I see it as an opportunity to make that Lone Star shine again. I'm an Independent, which is the party of George Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, Sam Houston, and Davy Crockett."

Yes; well, he's nuts, but that's never been a disqualification to stand for political office in Texas ...

I just posted my first riff

over at the Houston Democrats blog.

Some of us will be Drinking Liberally this evening. You're invited.

Update: Lisa in the comments corrects me about the official DL meeting. Some of us will carry on the tradition anyway and you're still invited. Post if you need more info.

Wednesday, March 23, 2005

More upward pressure on gasoline prices coming

The refinery explosion which occurred today at the BP Amoco facility in Texas City (near Galveston, south of Houston) claimed at least 14 lives and sent nearly one hundred people to the hospital.

Terrorism has been ruled out, according to the FBI.

This refinery, the third-largest in the nation, produces 3% of the nation's daily gasoline supply.

Without demeaning those of my neighbors who lost their lives or were injured today, one of the significant impacts of this event will be an immediate spike in the price of gas, perhaps as much as 10-15 cents per gallon. That's depending on how long this refinery's gasoline production is interrupted. "Immediate" can be defined as within the next few days. That will occur at your pump, wherever it is you happen to live in the United States.

I believe the price of gasoline, already steadily escalating, will begin surging. I think $3.00 a gallon, here in Texas, by Memorial Day, is a distinct possibility. I hope I'm wrong, because the impact of such a circumstance on the economy -- locally as well as nationwide -- will be severe.

And now back to your Terri Schiavo/Michael Jackson/steroids-in-baseball regularly scheduled programming.

Update: Perhaps I was Chicken Little in my prediction:

Other than the unit affected by the blast, the rest of the refinery was running normally, said Hugh Depland, spokesman for BP, formerly British Petroleum.

He declined to answer questions about the capacity the refinery was running Thursday or how production would be affected.

Gasoline prices could rise slightly because the plant is such a large gas producer. In afternoon trading Thursday in New York, the price of unleaded gasoline for April delivery was up less than a penny at $1.583 a gallon.

One of my favorite times of the year

...and not just because everything's greening out.

No, the true joy I feel is related to college hoops, MLB spring training, golf tournaments, and the NBA push for the playoffs.

Last night the Rockets threw a net around Shaquille O'Neal and the Heat, the best team in the East and derailed their 12-game winning streak. That capped a couple of weeks of dominance over their Western conference opponents -- except for the Timberwolves. That hiccup aside, the Rockets seem to be peaking at the right time; I think they could go far in the playoffs, especially if some key cogs on their rivals stay injured (Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, etc.)

I'm still favoring one of those Tobacco Roaders -- UNC, Duke, or Kentuckaay --for the NCAA championship. Though it's nice to see Bob Knight having another little moment. I really think that guy has mellowed out at last.

I also like Ezeqiuel Estacio for the fifth spot in the Astros rotation and Willy Taveras in center. Now rather than later, please, Phil Garner. And maybe go ahead and get Bobby Higginson.

The Shell Houston Open is next month and I already have my tickets. And a few opportunities to play on the board.

Hope you're enjoying your spring as much as I am.

It's like living in a real city

blogHOUSTON, by way of Pegasus News, links to the Dallas Morning News for some coverage, including a nifty little pocket guide in .pdf format, enabling one to utilize and enjoy the Houston light rail line and the stops along it.

(Though it's not without their daily snarky potshot at the Chronicle -- which must be the staff's prime directive -- I read blogHOUSTON regularly, despite their much-too-conservative bent.)

Here's my humble O about the light rail:

We live within walking distance of the Smith Lands station and have been taking the train downtown for Astros games, Rockets games, and Main Street Square for dining and entertainment. We took a self-guided Art Deco tour of buildings along the line last fall, and two weeks ago went to the Cartier exhibit at the MoFA. I've been riding the rail to my doctor's appointments lately, saving me the hassle and expense of parking.

Nothing has transformed my experience of living in Houston to a greater degree than this train coming by my house.