2004 Elections: Democratic Party Contenders

And now, Wesley Clark has looked the field over and thinks maybe it's time for him to come in. I guess all that reporting on CNN has given him a perspective.

Why are the dems so reluctant to talk about Iraq? So far, the place and situation have not been winners. Two months after the war stopped, sewage is running in the streets, and infant mortaliity passes India, because of bad water. It is the hot season, and electricity is still very spotty. It's beginning to look like the rebellious Iraqis are not only the remnants of Saddam's Baathist party, as Rummy keeps saying. More and more sem to be actively not happy. And according to today's NY Times, one of the officials there said they need the parts, and could do the work, but the Bush administration has not budged from the budget originally set.

This is not only not the picture that was painted for the Americans; it gets plainer by the day that we are seen as unwelcome intruders. And no one has come in to join that nebulous coalition. Now they talk about Iran, with Bush saying we'll use Iraq as a guide. Iraq is turning into something I think the admin, at this point, would be happier without. So why aren't we talking about alal that?

This just in, via Cursor.com:

Sneaky Republican Filibuster Move Coming Up
The Republicans have a plan to beat the filibuster of Bush judicial nominee Priscilla Owen. The L.A. Weekly article is enlightening in two respects: first, for another example of why Owen should not be moved up to the federal bench. Second, for the sneaky attack plan the Republicans likely will mount to get her in:

It works like this. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist attempts to gradually lower from 60 to 51 the votes needed to end a filibuster. That fails, because it requires 60 votes to change a Senate rule and the Republicans have only 50. Then Vice President Cheney rules on a constitutional point of order that 51 votes can end a filibuster of nominations. The Senate parliamentarian, appointed by Republicans, upholds his ruling. The filibuster blocking Priscilla Owen is ended. (And the road is cleared for the right-wing Supreme Court justices Bush will appoint later in his first term.) It would be quite an end to a Senate procedure in effect since George Washington held office.

Call your senators. Block this plan. Block Owen. TOLL-FREE CONGRESSIONAL SWITCHBOARD: 1-800-839-5276

watch out for a kerry/clark ticket.

it will put the kibosh on any attacks about the dems being weak on defense.

all i ask before i die is that john kerry, in response to a bush remark during their debate about kerry's criticism of bush's foreign polices in afghanistan and iraq, look at bush and say "well, george, just what war did you serve in?"

bush's head would explode.

And these just in from TomPaine.com/blog

Republican Ralph? link
Agence France Presse has the latest report on Ralph Nader's presidential plans. Looks like he's mulling an independent run or -- even Republican primary challenge to Bush -- if the Green Party does the sensible thing and avoids a repeat of his 2000 bid.
"Wouldn't that be interesting? A Republican run?" Nader says, arguing that even GOP voters deserve a choice. This eye-catching but bizarre notion will last about as long as one of Ralph's speeches, and not much longer. Which, of course, will make a lot of Nader detractors happy.
June 20, 2003 | 2:41PM

Small Change = Big Change link
Here's another reason to register and vote in MoveOn's e-primary next week. We've all heard how President Bush intends to raise $100 million to $200 million for his re-election effort, a sum that would seem to overwhelm all possible campaign fundraising efforts by challengers. Well, if each of MoveOn's million members made a contribution to a candidate on par with what they might give their local public radio station or pay for a local newspaper subscription, say, $10 a month, then -- well, do the math. The Bush campaign war chest may have some serious progressive competition.
June 20, 2003 | 1:16PM

Why is it "sneaky" when Republicans find a way to win by using the rules, but laudable when Democrats find a way to win by breaking the rules?

Tartarin didn't write that, Scrat. It's a quote.

But your quote from a Ken Starr colleague at Pepperdine really makes my day!

I'm quite sure that everyone knows that Tartarin did not write that. I have little control over how A2K renders quoted text.

I'm digging the new sig line scrat.

Be careful, McG, the guy who wrote it knows KEN STARR!!!!! (gasp!)

Re Scrat's signature line: The implication seems to be that any taxation is an infringement of liberty, therefore wrong. Am I interpreting that correctly? And why, pray tell, does Prof. Galles only list items like food, clothing and shelter as misuses of tax money? How about a military used to fight wars under false pretenses? Is that an appropriate use of tax revenue, and therefore not a violation of others' liberty?

You're so smart, D'art!!

No, D'art, whether willfully or due to ignorance, you are not interpreting it correctly, and in either case (willfully or ignorantly) there is no point in my explaining it to you. You either understand--but find it convenient to pretend that you do not, or you can't understand. In either case, explaining it would be futile.

No, seriously, Scrat. Is your man against all taxation, or only against taxes for stuff he doesn't like?

No, seriously, D'art; if you don't understand the quote it would be pointless for me to explain it. Its meaning really is completely clear to anyone who can read.

No, seriously scrat- the quote is as obtuse as you are belligerent.

Oops, Scrat can't figure it out, methinks!

Does anyone have the latest poll re the Democratic candidates? I understand there has been some definite movement of the support percentages.

I'd love to know, Maple! It seems that the activity at MoveOn is making a big difference...

I have seen all too many phrases like Scrat's by-line attacking the tax system and programs of the progressive left when describing the role of a democratic state in promoting efficiency and justice in a world that is full of modern technology. The claim by some libertarian-like conservatives of interpreting all state action as mere "interference," as if a popularly elected government was merely a protections racket, is intellectually fraudulent. I see from such people little rational discussion on the where to draw the lines between government and everything else that arises from a society and its fundamental belief systems. Especially distasteful is hearing dishonest phrases like "limited government," as if anyone was defending unlimited government, and with uses of the word "government" that draw no distinction between the popular will of the people via democratic governments and other, less legitimate sorts. This sort of talk is basically an attempt to make democracy unthinkable.

Refusing to see the distinction renders democracy unthinkable and void and legitimizes a mindset that rejects social contracts between people for the common benefit. What surely follows is not freedom, in its true political sense, but the law of the jungle. And I can only assume that is the plan of most of the more virulent so-called conservatives, who believe that they are the strong and will rule the jungle. It is not in any sense a political philosophy, rather one of a method of achieving power.

And if these simple appeals to logic do not convince, listen to the words of the foremost modern theorist of libertarianism, one who is held up as some sort of demi-god by the Right, Friedrich Hayek. These passages come from his book The Constitution of Liberty (University of Chicago Press, 1960), from pages 221 through 231:

"To Adam Smith and his immediate successors the enforcement of the ordinary rules of common law would certainly not have appeared as government interference; nor would they ordinarily have applied this term to an alteration of these rules or the passing of a new rule by the legislature so long as it was intended to apply equally to all people for an indefinite period of time. Though they perhaps never explicitly said so, interference meant to them the exercise of the coercive power of government which was not regular enforcement of the general law and which was designed to achieve some specific purpose.

"The important criterion was not the aim pursued, however, but the method employed. There is perhaps no aim which they would not have regarded as legitimate if it was clear that the people wanted it; but they excluded as generally inadmissible in a free society the method of specific orders and prohibitions. Only indirectly, by depriving government of some means by which alone it might be able to attain certain ends, may this principle deprive government of the power to pursue those ends.

"The habitual appeal to the principle of non-interference in the fight against all ill-considered or harmful measures has had the effect of blurring the fundamental distinction between the kinds of measures which are and those which are not compatible with a free system.

"A functioning market economy presupposes certain activities by which its functioning will be assisted; and it can tolerate many more, provided that they are of the kind which are compatible with a functioning market. ... a government that is comparatively inactive but does the wrong things may do much more to cripple the forces of a market economy than one that is more concerned with economic affairs but confines itself to actions which assist the spontaneous forces of the economy.

"In so far as the government merely undertakes to supply services which otherwise would not be supplied at all (usually because it is not possible to confine the benefits to those prepared to pay for them), the only question which arises is whether the benefits are worth the cost. A great many of the activities which governments have universally undertaken in this field and which fall within the limits described are those which facilitate the acquisition of reliable knowledge about facts of general significance. So do most sanitary and health services, often the construction and maintenance of roads, and many of the amenities provided by municipalities for the inhabitants of cities.

"The range and variety of government action that is, at least in principle, reconcilable with a free system is thus considerable. The old formulae of laissez faire or non-intervention do not provide us with an adequate criterion for distinguishing between what is and what is not admissible in a free system. There is ample scope for experimentation and improvement within that permanent legal framework which makes it possible for a free society to operate most efficiently. We can probably at no point be certain that we have already found the best arrangements or institutions that will make the market economy work as beneficially as it could. It is true that after the essential conditions of a free system have been established, all further institutional improvements are bound to be slow and gradual. But the continuous growth of wealth and technological knowledge which such a system makes possible will constantly suggest new ways in which government might render services to its citizens and bring such possibilities within the range of the practicable."

Maple -- Here's a lovely anti-Bush-campaign piece in MSNBC:
http://www.msnbc.com/news/929206.asp?0cv=KB10