Monthly Archives: February 2009

Budget battles ahead

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The President’s proposed budget is a major change of direction for the country. But it is consistent with the themes of his election promises. And he may surprise folks in his strategic ability to move ahead. Check out this piece of today’s weekly address to the country:

I realize that passing this budget won’t be easy.  Because it represents real and dramatic change, it also represents a threat to the status quo in Washington.  I know that the insurance industry won’t like the idea that they’ll have to bid competitively to continue offering Medicare coverage, but that’s how we’ll help preserve and protect Medicare and lower health care costs for American families.  I know that banks and big student lenders won’t like the idea that we’re ending their huge taxpayer subsidies, but that’s how we’ll save taxpayers nearly $50 billion and make college more affordable.  I know that oil and gas companies won’t like us ending nearly $30 billion in tax breaks, but that’s how we’ll help fund a renewable energy economy that will create new jobs and new industries.   I know these steps won’t sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they’re gearing up for a fight as we speak.  My message to them is this:

So am I.

Video available here.

Medical marijuana

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Good news from the Obama administration on medical marijuana. Unlike the Bush administration, it now appears clear that the Feds will no longer raid facilities for dispensing medical marijuana in states where it is legal.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is sending strong signals that President Obama – who as a candidate said states should be allowed to make their own rules on medical marijuana – will end raids on pot dispensaries in California.

Asked at a Washington news conference Wednesday about Drug Enforcement Administration raids in California since Obama took office last month, Holder said the administration has changed its policy.

“What the president said during the campaign, you’ll be surprised to know, will be consistent with what we’ll be doing here in law enforcement,” he said. “What he said during the campaign is now American policy.”

Bill Piper, national affairs director of the Drug Policy Alliance, a marijuana advocacy group, said the statement is encouraging.

“I think it definitely signals that Obama is moving in a new direction, that it means what he said on the campaign trail that marijuana should be treated as a health issue rather than a criminal justice issue,” he said.

Obama is winning

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Over the past few weeks there have been relentless assaults by the GOP on the stimulus plan and other Obama administration proposals. Claims of pork, burdens on future generations, and “tax and spend” democrats have dominated cable news.  The Republicans hung together (save for 3 votes in the Senate) and voted against the President “on principal.”

How is that work out for them? Well, the President’s poll numbers are up.

Porn does not lie

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Guess which states have more subscribers to Internet pornography, red or blue?  Hint: think sexual repression.

Eight of the top 10 pornography consuming states gave their electoral votes to John McCain in last year’s presidential election – Florida and Hawaii were the exceptions. While six out of the lowest 10 favoured Barack Obama.

Convention on Modern Liberty

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privacyIn the UK today, the Convention on Modern Liberty, a day-long and nationwide forum on the erosion of liberty and privacy is underway.  We need the same kind of organizing in this country.

Writing in the Times of London, Phillip Pullman, a keynote speaker at the Convention, writes a lyrical piece on the reality of the modern police state. Read the entire piece, but here is an excerpt:

We are so fast asleep that we don’t know who we are any more. Are we English? Scottish? Welsh? British? More than one of them? One but not another? Are we a Christian nation – after all we have an Established Church – or are we something post-Christian? Are we a secular state? Are we a multifaith state? Are we anything we can all agree on and feel proud of?

The new laws whisper:

You don’t know who you are

You’re mistaken about yourself

We know better than you do what you consist of, what labels apply to you, which facts about you are important and which are worthless

We do not believe you can be trusted to know these things, so we shall know them for you

And if we take against you, we shall remove from your possession the only proof we shall allow to be recognised

The sleeping nation dreams it has the freedom to speak its mind. It fantasises about making tyrants cringe with the bluff bold vigour of its ancient right to express its opinions in the street. This is what the new laws say about that:

Expressing an opinion is a dangerous activity

Whatever your opinions are, we don’t want to hear them

So if you threaten us or our friends with your opinions we shall treat you like the rabble you are

And we do not want to hear you arguing about it

So hold your tongue and forget about protesting

What we want from you is acquiescence

The nation dreams it is a democratic state where the laws were made by freely elected representatives who were answerable to the people. It used to be such a nation once, it dreams, so it must be that nation still. It is a sweet dream.

You are not to be trusted with laws

So we shall put ourselves out of your reach

We shall put ourselves beyond your amendment or abolition

You do not need to argue about any changes we make, or to debate them, or to send your representatives to vote against them

You do not need to hold us to account

You think you will get what you want from an inquiry?

Who do you think you are?

What sort of fools do you think we are?


CIA investigation progresses

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gitmo-prisoners01

At last. It appears that the Senate intelligence committee will launch some kind of investigation regarding the CIA’s treatment of prisoners. Bush administration officials have argued that harsh treatment produced crucial intelligence that stopped potentially disastrous attacks.  Other argue that harsh techniques produce little or no accurate intelligence. The investigation is apparently to determine which of these views is correct. Determining the empirical truth of this matter would be extremely valuable going forward.

What happened to the fifth amendment?

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The fifth amendment of the United States Constitution provides:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Yet a court has ruled that a defendant must type in his PGP password to unencrypt his hard drive to help prosecutors build a case against him.

A federal judge has ordered a criminal defendant to decrypt his hard drive by typing in his PGP passphrase so prosecutors can view the unencrypted files, a ruling that raises serious concerns about self-incrimination in an electronic age.

In an abrupt reversal, U.S. District Judge William Sessions in Vermont ruled that Sebastien Boucher, who a border guard claims had child porn on his Alienware laptop, does not have a Fifth Amendment right to keep the files encrypted.

“Boucher is directed to provide an unencrypted version of the Z drive viewed by the ICE agent,” Sessions wrote in an opinion last week, referring to Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau. Police claim to have viewed illegal images on the laptop at the border, but say they couldn’t access the Z: drive when they tried again nine days after Boucher was arrested.

Falsity cheered at CPAC

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The annual CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) extravaganza is underway. This is a gathering in Washington of the most conservative of conservative politicians.  Yesterday a cheer went up when  Cliff Kincaid, head of a conservative group Accuracy in Media, claimed that President Obama was not born in the United States, despite the fact that it has been proven repeatedly that he was in fact born in Hawaii.