By: Robert Reno  

Right about now, millions of Americans are receiving the depressing news that their 401(k) balances have shrunk to levels that may force them to postpone retirement and reassess their prospects for a secure old age.

If this puts them in a foul mood, it could make them lose patience with the notion that President George W. Bush knows where he's leading the economy and has sense enough to get it there. In the quarter that ended Sept. 30, the one now being reported to shareholders, common stocks took their worst beating in 15 years. Since its historic high of 11,722.98 in January 2000, the Dow Jones industrial average has declined by about 4,000 points. The Standard & Poor's index of 500 stocks is now headed for its third straight year of decline, something that hasn't happened since the 1930's.

Already, Republicans are throwing up defense maneuvers including a nine-page memo issued by Bush's Commerce Secretary, Donald Evans, who argued: "There is more than ample cause for optimism about the economy." He insisted that "most of the economy is following a normal recovery pattern". But the stock market clearly isn't.

From:  

A leading Shi'ite Muslim religious authority urged Muslims on Saturday to confront what he called an attack on Islam in U.S. preacher Jerry Falwell's reference to the prophet Mohammad as a "terrorist".

In a statement, Sheikh Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah said Falwell's remarks reflected the thinking of President Bush and his backers among the staunchly pro-Israeli U.S. Christian Right.

"All Muslims must make a stand against this attack on Islam, its prophet, and Muslims themselves", Fadlallah said. He stopped short of urging a violent reaction: "We do not desire physical violence against this person and those who share his views, including President Bush, who belongs to Zionized Christianity, but... to stand up to this oppressive campaign against Islam and Muslims."

"If you don't do it, it ain't gonna be done. You will be doing the Lord's work [voting liberals out of office], and he will richly bless you for it."

- Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), at a pro-Israel rally sponsored by the Christian Coalition, on Friday at the Washington Convention Center

By: Glenda Gilmore  

A U.S. attack on Iraq, which seems inevitable, will be the most craven abdication of democratic principles in our country's history. As I write, the House has approved, and the Senate is debating, a resolution that gives President George W. Bush, in Sen. Robert Byrd's words, "virtually unchecked authority to commit the nation's military to an unprovoked attack on a sovereign nation". The Bush Administration recently articulated its foreign policy plans this way: "Our forces will be strong enough to dissuade potential adversaries from pursuing a military build-up in hopes of surpassing, or equaling, the power of the United States." This means that the United States of America may invade any country, anywhere, any time, before it becomes a threat. Bush's National Security Strategy makes the United States an imperial power in the most sinister sense of the term, and Congress' resolution will finally and unabashedly give George W. Bush the job he seems so sure he deserves: emperor.

Editorial from:  

The events of the past two weeks raise serious questions about whether Mr. Pitt and the President really meant what they said. The single biggest test of the law's implementation - the selection of a credible chairman for the new audit oversight board - is being inexplicably mishandled. Having asked a good candidate whether he would accept the job, and having encouraged him to leave his existing job early in order to make himself available, Mr. Pitt is backing away from him, apparently as a result of pressure from the audit lobby. Mr. Bush, who could stiffen Mr. Pitt's resolve by threatening to designate a different SEC commissioner as chairman, has apparently forgotten his reformist promises of three months ago.

The good candidate is John H. Biggs, the head of a large retirement fund and a long-standing advocate of honest accounting. Mr. Biggs meets each of the three qualifications for the job laid down in the reform law. He has a demonstrated commitment to the interests of investors, having run investments on behalf of pensioners and campaigned energetically for reforms of corporate governance. He has a strong grasp of accounting, having served as a trustee of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which writes accounting rules, as well as of the FASB's international counterpart. And he understands auditing, having been a member of the Public Oversight Board that used to oversee the profession. One could not ask for a better candidate, which is presumably why Mr. Pitt initially approached him.

By: Stephen Sacco  

There is no question in my mind. "Regime change" (as the catch phrase goes) is justified, perhaps even necessary. Should we continue to sit by idly as a man who seized power, without the support of the majority of the people in a free election, calls for war and, most important, is in possession of weapons of mass destruction? No, we must not.

George W. Bush has got to go. Fortunately we have only to vote to effect this regime change.

This Democrat wants to give a little advice to his Republican friends out of sympathy: dump Bush for your own good. I know that I've brought tears to the eyes of all the right-wingers with my magnanimous offer of counsel. (What can I say? I'm a compassionate Democrat.) However, before you stop reading, hear me out.

The tragically flawed policies of George W. Bush are of concern to all Americans regardless of party affiliation...

"I am deeply troubled that lives may be lost without a meaningful attempt to bring Iraq into compliance with UN resolutions through careful and cautious diplomacy. The bottom line is I don't trust this President and his advisors. Make no mistake, we are voting on a resolution that grants total authority to the President who wants to invade a sovereign nation without any specific act of provocation. This would authorize the United States to act as the aggressor for the first time in our history."

- Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA), opposing H.J. Res. 114: Authorization for Military Force Against Iraq

By: Harley Sorensen  

First, Bush insisted that Saddam allow arms inspectors into Iraq. Second, Saddam said: "Okay, bring 'em on. We have nothing to hide." Third, Bush said: "He's bluffing. We're not sending any inspectors."

If anybody else had been President (except maybe Papa Bush), arms inspectors would have been on the next flight to Baghdad. If Saddam was bluffing, there was one sure way to prove it: Call his bluff.

Bush threw in his cards. Pretty dumb, eh?

But Bush is not as stupid as he pretends to be. And I'd guess, all kidding aside, that he's a pretty decent poker player. So when Bush does something that appears not to make sense, as in this case, look for the hidden agenda.

In this case, the hidden agenda is Bush's burning desire to invade Iraq and kill Saddam Hussein, the man who tried to kill his father.

By: Joe Conason  

Rarely has there been a display of hysterical exaggeration like that observed over the past few days in Washington, where the government is preparing for war with Iraq. According to President George W. Bush, as well as Senators John Warner, Joseph Lieberman, and many others who have spoken lately in the Capitol, there is no limit to the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. According to them, it is 1939, and we are again facing the twilight of Western civilization.

The Iraqi dictator is more dangerously armed than Hitler ever was, said Senator Warner. He could attack us with model airplanes loaded with germs. Senator Lieberman agreed that those unmanned planes - also mentioned by the President in his Cincinnati speech - are a terrible threat, perhaps an even bigger threat than the "primitive" nuclear weapons that Saddam doesn't actually possess. The fatuous exchange between the gentlemen from Connecticut and Virginia revealed how thin the rationale is for an invasion.

Editorial from:  

In issues large and small, the Bush administration has spent the better part of two years rolling back Bill Clinton's environmental legacy. It has abandoned the Kyoto accord on global warming, weakened protections for wetlands and eased mining laws. Now it appears to be aiming at even bigger game - the National Environmental Policy Act, regarded as the Magna Carta of environmental protection and perhaps the most important of all the environmental statutes signed into law by Richard Nixon three decades ago.

The act, NEPA for short, is no stranger to controversy. Bureaucrats blame it for gridlock, commercial interests for blocking progress. Environmentalists, of course, love it, as well they should.

By: SnoopDopeyDogg  

The Bush Regime's assertion that we must act now in order to prevent a possible strike from Saddam flies in the face of logic, and counter to the strategy with which we fought the Cold War: Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD) We held the threat of retaliation over Russia's head in order to prevent their use of "weapons of mass destruction", knowing full well that our use of such weapons against Russia would guarantee a response by the Soviets. Similarly, it is his knowledge of a unified military response against Iraq, proven after his invasion of Kuwait, which is keeping Saddam from using "weapons of mass destruction", and attacking him would only guarantee his use of them, or prove that Cheney is lying about their existence or the seriousness of their threat. SAD (Saddam's Assured Destruction) has, and will, work as well as its proven strategic predecessor MAD.

Strangely, those vanguards of patriotism that chided President Clinton for launching cruise missiles as a supposed attempt to divert voters' attention away from his domestic problems, are silent regarding the possibility that Cheney is doing the same thing on a much larger scale. Why is an invasion of Iraq so expedient now? By sheer coincidence, of course, the midterm elections are just weeks away and Saddam has done nothing different within the last few weeks that he has, or hasn't, been doing over the last several years...

By: Robert Wright  

...The world is now much closer to being a community of interdependent, law-abiding states, a place where military pre-eminence is not a prerequisite for national security. There are those who think that a superpower facing eventual decline but for now possessing unprecedented influence would be wise to sustain this trend, encouraging respect for international law and the evolution of international policing structures.

President Bush isn't one of these people. In dramatically lowering the threshold for pre-emptive attack, he undermines the civilized world's consensus against unprovoked transborder aggression, a principle central to international law (and to his father's rationale for the Persian Gulf war).

And as for international policing structures: the Bush manifesto says nothing about, say, adding an enforcement mechanism, complete with tough inspections, to the toothless Biological Weapons Convention. Nor does it mention the Chemical Weapons Convention or the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the world's other two major attempts to police weapons of mass destruction. This omission is striking, given that the Bush vision purports to be organized around the threat of such weapons getting into the hands of rogue states or terrorists. "The gravest danger our Nation faces lies at the crossroads of radicalism and technology", President Bush writes in the introduction to the report.

By: Paul Corrigan  

Republicans have been talking about war, sex, and tax cuts for so long that many of us stopped believing the public was capable of seeing through the smokescreen. Thank goodness what was true in 1992 is true today. Money talks and bullshit walks. The DNC ad showing Bush pushing a senior in a wheelchair down the trendline of economic indicators is not only funny, but it also rings true, despite the Republican charge that it is a dirty trick. Imagine the Republicans having the gall to call anything a dirty trick. I never believed the Republican bullshit, but I must admit I was beginning to believe that the American public was getting smitten with waving the flag and jingoistic groupthink.

"Instead of demonstrating purpose without arrogance, as the President promised in his inaugural address, the administration's policy projects exactly the opposite: arrogance without purpose."

- Sen. John Edwards (D-NC)

By: Bernard Weiner  

There are less than 30 days to go before the midterm elections. Normally, voters stay away from the polls in these off-years because usually not much is riding on the outcome.

At the risk of over-iteration, I hope it's obvious that everything is riding on the outcome this time.

If the Bush Administration suffers a defeat at the polls, losing control of the House of Representatives, say, and/or can't recapture the Senate, it means its aura of invincibility is gone. The people have seen Bush&Co. in action and said we don't fully trust your judgement, we'd rather the power get shared with those in nominal opposition. Sand thus gets thrust into the Bush&Co. wheels, slowing down the juggernaut of those anxious for imperial military adventures abroad, those comfortable with the shredding of Constitutional due process and civil liberties at home, those willing to give away the environment to corporate polluters.

"Robert Torricelli, a powerful fund-raiser who helped raise more than $100 million for the Democratic party, took inappropriate gifts from a businessman, including an $8,000 gold Rolex watch, for which he was severely admonished by the Senate Ethics Committee in July. To recap: raising $100 million in contributions from gigantic corporations - ethical; taking a watch - unethical. That's the Senate Ethics Committee, an oxymoron since 1974."

- Jon Stewart

By: John F. Borowski  

Chided by the Sierra Club back in the 80's after giving them three years filled with frustration and digging deeply into his own pockets, Hermach decided to create a group unwillingly to play by modern environmental groups newest rules: even when we win your children lose. "Big environmental organizations have become monolithic, often compromising before their feet hit the floor in the morning. They never seem to ask for what they want and willing to 'fix the game' just to claim victory." His rhetoric is sharp and adamant, with the belief that the time for tradeoffs and compromise with those who pillage National Forests, fill wetlands, and jeopardize the livability of this planet has ended.

Hermach refers to a favorite quote of his by Carl Sagan, famous author and scientist who transformed the complex jargon of science into a digestible form for common folks. "Sagan said that we no longer have enough environment to be able to predict with any degree of probability or certainty the survival of the human species", retorted Hermach. "That statement itself dictates a level of dedication to our children's future that doesn't include selling out as part of a political solution to environmental degradation."

The White House's focus on Saddam is meant to divert attention from America's still-AWOL Public Enemy No. 1.

By: Arianna Huffington  

We all know who attacked us on Sept. 11, 2001, don't we? No, not Osama bin Laden. God, that is so last year. It never turns out to be the person you first suspect. It was Saddam Hussein. For some reason we couldn't find him when we went after him in Afghanistan, bringing that magic elixir of regime change along with us. But now we've got a better idea: Track him down where he actually lives, in Baghdad, and punish him right in his own backyard. It's the only way to obtain justice for the thousands he killed on 9/11.

At least that's the way the White House is now pitching the story.

In this latest rewrite of history, Osama has suddenly lost his beard and grown a mustache, morphing into the Butcher of Baghdad - or one of the look-alike stand-ins Saddam has been using for public appearances since 1998.

Thanx 'Monkey Boy'!

By: Mike Hersh  

Considered the finest ex-President by many, Jimmy Carter is perhaps the most underrated President as well.

He brokered peace in the Middle East, as most people know. But many don't realize he also increased defense spending every year. As a former naval officer, he reformed and revamped the military. The new dollars added to our security, not just the deficit. He continued the tried and true containment policies which helped win the Cold War.

Facing economic woes when he took office in [1987], he took the painful steps needed to halt inflation without stopping job growth. Carter's policies helped create nearly two million new jobs per year.

Refusing to be told we have to choose between what's good for labor and good for business and say the best thing is if both do well. Refusing to be told that crime policy has to be about prevention or punishment and saying what works is both. That education has to be about excellence or equity; that health care has to be about access or quality; that environmental protection can only come at the expense of economic growth. All these things are factually untrue, but they dominate, control and paralyze the politics of countries all over the world."

- President William Jefferson Clinton, in Blackpool, England

From:  

Only a month until election day, and the Republicans are up to their old tricks again. At the top of the list, Doug Forrester (1) is trying to win his seat the old-fashioned way: by stealing it. George W. Bush (2), is busy slandering Senate Democrats in classic Republican chickenhawk style. Meanwhile, Dick Posthumus (3) is playing the race card in Michigan, while Jerry Falwell (4) shows his tolerance of other faiths, and Richard Perle (5) disses the chancellor of Germany. Jeb Bush (8) is back, scapegoating gays for his own failures, while Charles Grassley (9) plays the Hitler card.

"For 45 years of the Cold War we were in an arms race with the Soviet Union. Now it appears we're in an arms race with ourselves."

- Admiral Eugene Carroll Jr., U.S. Navy (Ret.), Deputy Director of the Center for Defense Information

By: Michael Hammerschlag  

Bush has provided no proof for any connection between Saddam and Al Qaida - the alleged meeting between Atta and an Iraqi diplomat in Prague had to be embarrassingly disavowed. Of the hundreds of Bin Laden's satellite calls to Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Germany, USA, Pakistan, England... there wasn't one to Iraq. Bush's changing rationales remind me of Chevy Chase's 'land shark'. Saddam with nukes is a chilling prospect - but it still that - only a prospect. If he warrants an invasion, what of Iran, which has killed 400-700 Americans in their Hezbollah Beirut (Marine barracks and Embassy) and perhaps Lockerbie bombings. Russia is building a nuclear plant for them, presumably the Israelis can be counted on to annihilate it like they did the Iraqi reactor in 1981, but where's our logic? Al Qaida members have reportedly taken refuge in Iran. We have far more to fear from diversion of nukes in Pakistan or Russia after an Islamic coup or attack than we do from isolated and sequestered Saddam. What of the paranoid freak on a permanent bad-hair day in North Korea, who has let up to 2 million of his people starve, rather than open his kingdom to the world? He is close to making nukes too.

As sad as it is, this conflict is largely driven by politics - the President's popularity rests on his martial prowess - without a conflict, the electorate's attention may turn towards the devastated economy, deficits, and corporate scandals lapping at the feet of the Bush administration. Indeed, without 9-11, his popularity percentage might now be in the 30's. The tens of billions this war would cost would also crush the beaten down economy - Bin Laden's last instruction.

"What about Max Cleland? Is he interested in the security of the American people? I'm disgusted by the tenor of the war debate that has seemingly overtaken this capital city... This war strategy seems to have been hatched by a political strategist interested in winning the midterm election at any cost. It is despicable that any President would use the serious matter of an impending war as a tool in a campaign."

- Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia

By: Don Van Natta Jr.  

For the first time in the 81-year history of the agency, the auditing arm of Congress, the Comptroller General of the United States went to federal court to ask a judge to order a member of the executive branch to turn over records to Congress.

Lawyers for David M. Walker, the Comptroller General and head of the General Accounting Office, and for the Vice President argued over whether a judge could require the White House to reveal the identities of industry executives who helped the administration develop its energy policy last year.

Judge John D. Bates of Federal District Court, who was appointed in December by President Bush, did not decide the case today. "I will consider this as quickly as I can", Judge Bates said before returning to his chamber.

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