While everyone has emphasized the differences between George Bush and John Kerry, what's more revealing are the similarities. Both have avoided some of the nation's most obvious problems: the coming spending explosion to pay baby boomers' retirement benefits (mainly Social Security and Medicare); the relentless advance in health costs that's squeezing wages and other government spending; the rising tide of immigration and the associated social problems; Americans' uncontrolled thirst for insecure foreign oil; and the perils of letting Iran and North Korea go nuclear.Well... yes. And let's not forget George "I cut your taxes" Bush, who refuses to address the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) which will soon claw back most or all of the "middle class tax cut" from about 90% of its beneficiaries, or Kerry who is very much aware of that issue but apparently afraid to make it a campaign issue - after all, current budget and deficit projections anticipate the continued expansion of AMT revenues.
To be sure, the candidates had positions. But these consisted mostly of appealing platitudes that said what people wanted to hear.
At the root of all these glaring omissions is public opinion. On these issues, pleasant solutions don't exist. ... If the public won't abide honest discussion of clear problems -- and our leaders can't lead opinion -- then the problems simply fester. In this campaign, neither Bush nor Kerry has risen above that dilemma.Still, I wonder what would happen if an incumbent President, particularly one with a majority in both houses, truly took on the hard issues, rather than making every significant initiative take effect in his second term. What if a President dared to tell the truth and to lead during his first term, rather than treating it as an audition. After all, are we so stupid to think that Bush truly thought that the Israel-Palestine "road map" would be more or less complete in 2005? That the Medicare prescription benefit wasn't put off until 2006 because it is anticipated that many (or most) seniors will find it horribly lacking? That Afghanistan's Parliamentary elections won't take place until 2005 (even as its first Presidential election was moved up to make Bush-friendly headlines)? That although nominal sovereignty was handed over to a new, appointed council of Iraqi's, no election will occur until 2005? Everything difficult goes into the second term.
That suggests that many of our largest social problems will progressively worsen until they get so bad that we're forced to deal with them. Or they deal harshly with us. This is the true deadlock, and it may be incurable.
It is impossible to describe to you exactly what did happen in Detroit [in a meeting with 150 Vietnam veterans], the emotions in the room, the feelings of the men who were reliving their experiences in Vietnam, but they did. They relived the absolute horror of what this country, in a sense, made them do. They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, tape wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the country side of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.The Swift Boat Liars and affiliated groups like to misrepresent that quote, as if Kerry is attributing the atrocities to all veterans as opposed to describing stories from individuals who were confessing to have committed atrocities. We know, both from military records and from extensive photojournalism, that at some level the described atrocities did occur. And while in retrospect I'm sure Kerry would have tacked on a whole host of disclaimers, I think he made pretty clear that he was relating individual confessions and was not accusing the average G.I. of having beheaded civilians.
When Congress debated it after George Wallace threatened electoral deadlock with his third-party candidacy in 1968, opposition came from small states, whose senators feared they would be overlooked by the candidates, and from urban constituencies, who feared diminution of their power to swing big blocs of electoral votes through the unit rule.But it is not at all clear from his comment why small states should have that type of veto power, even if rarely manifested in an effect on the election result. Even less compelling is his complaint about the possibility of run-off elections:
Most proposals for direct election specify a minimum percentage for victory -- usually 40 percent or 45 percent -- with a runoff between the top two contenders if no one reaches that threshold. But as soon as you introduce the possibility of a runoff, you create an incentive for minor parties to form, in hopes of bargaining for favors or policy concessions from the runoff opponents.It seems easy enough to, say, not hold a run-off election, or (if people insisted) to put the threshold much lower (e.g., 34%) such that it would rarely if ever be a factor. Another response? Why is it "good" in Broder's mind that small states can bargain for favors or policy concessions due to their overrepresentation in the Electoral College, but not for "minor" parties (who carry enough clout to deliver a candidate a majority of the popular vote) to do the same?
We in America could save kids like Abdelrahim and Muhammad. This wouldn't require troops, just a bit of gumption to declare a no-fly zone, to press our Western allies and nearby Arab and African states, to impose an arms embargo and other targeted sanctions, to push a meaningful U.N. resolution even at the risk of a Chinese veto, and to insist upon the deployment of a larger African force.Well, Nicholas, if you can convince Karl Rove how doing more will translate into votes for Bush (and not for Kerry), perhaps Bush will have a moral awakening.
Instead, President Bush's policy is to chide Sudan and send aid. That's much better than nothing and has led Sudan to kill fewer children and to kill more humanely: Sudan now mostly allows kids in Darfur like Abdelrahim to die of starvation, instead of heaving them onto bonfires. But fundamentally, U.S. policy seems to be to "manage" the genocide rather than to act decisively to stop it.
Here is what I perceive as the explanation: Europe has always been a seething hotbed of anti-semitism. England, sadly, has the distinction of being the very first country to expel its Jews and initiate the blood libel. The Jews were not allowed back into England until the time of Cromwell, and feel to this day that they worship by the grace of the sovereign.Um... do I sense a slight bias in the author's perceptions?
First off, you have to remember that my opponent is a trial lawyer. A trial lawyer. Can we really afford to elect a president who is a trial lawyer?
Second, I have to say that my opponent doesn't talk straight. He uses complicated words to weave around the issues. I talk about my parents, he's talking about his "forefathers". I say "eighty-seven years ago", he's going on about "four score and seven years ago". What's up with that?
Third, and this is a big one, he's a flip-flopper. One day slavery is morally wrong, the next day he wants to keep it in place. Which one is it? This isn't a little issue, folks, whatever you think of that Dred Scott decision. I offer moral clarity.
Did I mention he looks funny? Does he even look like a President?
These are dangerous times. I believe I offer tested, strong leadership that can calm the waters of the troubled world. And I believe that we can together do things that are within the grasp of Americans.Perhaps this?
Charles Murray - Five percent of Americans pay 54 percent of all personal income taxes. They do not use more government services than other Americans; they use fewer. Why is this fair?Mr. Murray, as you certainly know, the tax figure you present ignores payroll taxes. Yet payroll taxes, which are another form of income tax, take a huge bite out of the paychecks of working men and women. As you also know, you are ignoring sales taxes, state and local taxes, property taxes, gas taxes, so-called "sin" taxes, and many other taxes which fall on the shoulders of this nation's working men and women. You are also ignoring user fees and license fees. But you know all of that. You wish to distract people from tax realities in order to justify even more tax cuts for the richest of the rich. I favor a system of taxation that is fair to all people, Mr. Murray, rich and poor, not one that favors any particular group of people, and that is what I will work for.
Charles Murray - Would you be willing to sponsor tort reform that requires plaintiffs to have used common sense before being eligible for damages?Mr. Murray, do you mean a calculus whereby the judge or jury deciding the case would allocate a percentage of fault to the victim, and adjust the verdict in proportion to the parties' fault - or even eliminate an award where a plaintiff was more than 50% responsible for his own injury? Such adjustments already occur, Mr. Murray, and they have existed for hundreds of years at common law. I am surprised you don't know that.
Charles Murray - You promise to create millions of jobs, but many people who run businesses say that nothing in your life has taught you how much effort, risk and sometimes heartbreak goes into creating one real job. Could you describe your experiences when you last had to meet a payroll, or when your boss had to meet a payroll?Mr. Murray, as a Senator I have an office staff, which I manage, and for which I have a budget. This is not really different from any other mid-management position. In terms of "making payroll", during the Clinton Presidency the government made payroll and turned a tidy profit - call it an enormous budget surplus. Under Bush, the government cannot make payroll, and has borrowed astronomical figures to make ends meet. Call it a record-breaking budget deficit. If you are suggesting that President Bush's dubious record in business is a qualification as President, the facts suggest something completely different.
Christie Whitman - You have been critical of President Bush's rejection of the Kyoto Protocol, yet in 1997 you joined 94 of your Senate colleagues in effectively rejecting its terms. What has changed to make you accept now what you then rejected?Christie, as you know, President Bush has done far more than reject Kyoto. He has politicized the EPA, rejected scientific opinion, buried official reports, and has otherwise taken a very non-scientific approach to the issue of climate change. Meanwhile, evidence of climate change is all around us, perhaps nowhere more strikingly than in the President's brother's state of Florida. You ask what has changed? What hasn't changed? Whatever disagreement may exist as to its cause, climate change is very real and it would be a priority for any competent President.
Christie Whitman - The president's Clear Skies proposal calls for a 70 percent reduction in some of the worst air pollutants, including mercury, over the next decade. While the current Clean Air Act has made a difference, it is cumbersome, it almost always involves lengthy litigation that delays any benefits, and it doesn't set any specific level for the reduction of mercury. Why haven't you led the fight to avoid lawsuits and instead demand the results the president has advocated?Christie, it is almost comical that you mention mercury levels, given that one of President Bush's first acts when he took office was to attempt to raise the acceptable level of mercury in drinking water - water than the men, women and children of this nation trust to be safe and clean. And while portions of the President's proposal would diminish harmful emissions, independent analysis indicates that it will be less effective in doing so than the existing legislation. You should also know from your extensive experience in government that "simpler" is not always "better". The President has attached a pretty name to a proposal which is in many ways a license to pollute. It is better to fix the existing legislation, flawed though it may be, than to replace it with a pro-industry bill - which is I guess what people like you would have us call "results" - that will damage our environment, and endanger the health of the people of this nation.
Stephen L. Carter - During the long period it would take to carry out your plan to improve the public schools, would you, in the interest of racial justice, support a system of vouchers to enable the parents of poor inner-city children to pay for private schooling to cover the transitional years? Throughout the five or more years that your plan envisions, many inner-city children will continue to receive substandard educations, and to suffer in other material and spiritual ways.Stephen, I would of course encourage states to develop the systems they deemed necessary to ensure that inner city children get quality education during the transition, and states may well choose to use vouchers. But as you surely realize, you cannot "fix" a system by emptying it of its best students, nor can you transfer students into private schools and charter schools which don't exist. A voucher system does not magically create additional space in existing schools - that takes years, and as you have implicitly stated we can't wait. Unfortunately, opportunists who latch on to voucher and charter school programs can create cataclysmic failures for parents and students, as occured in California this fall when a single "charter school" provider failed, shuttering sixty schools around the state, and leaving 6,000 students scrambling to enroll elsewhere. You don't fix an educational system by diverting resources to untested programs and profiteers.
Stephen L. Carter - If the answer to the first question is no, would you call on well-to-do Democrats to show their support for public education, and for the poor, by voluntarily sending their children to the schools that the inner-city parents are required to use? After all, a sudden influx of middle-class families might force a cure for many of those schools' deficiencies.Stephen, as you know, that is a ridiculous question. I want to ensure that all parents, rich or poor, receive quality education. I don't begrudge President Bush his years at Andover, Yale and Harvard, even though his well-connected family might have pressed for serious improvement in any public schools he might have instead attended, because they wanted to provide him with the best education and opportunities. That, as you know, is achieved by making the system better, not through absurd stunts such as the one you propose. I wouldn't ask you to send your children to the worst school you could find, merely to prove a point, and if I did I would fully expect you to reject my invitation. Where did your kids go to school?
Stephen L. Carter - If the answer to the second question is no, are there any sacrifices that you would call upon middle-class Americans to make for the sake of improving the condition of the worst-off among us?Stephen, perhaps you aren't aware of this, but the middle class pays a tremendous price to fund the public education system. States like Michigan have enacted elaborate systems to create fairness in educational funding, such that the City of Detroit has funding per pupil which exceeds the state average. Again, I am very surprised that you don't know this, but the middle classes are already contributing.
David K. Shipler - You speak of "compassionate conservatism," yet you rarely talk about the poverty that afflicts millions of Americans, including many who work hard at low-wage jobs. Your administration has inadequately financed or reduced the budgets of housing, child care, job training and other programs vital to helping the working poor. What do you see as government's proper role, and how would you change policies in a second term to demonstrate true compassion?David, there is a difference between being "compassionate" and giving handouts. If I see a vagrant on a street and give him change, I may subsidize a sandwich, or perhaps a bottle of booze, but I do nothing to lift him out of his situation. I see the government's role as being to help people climb the ladder, not to subsidize them so that they are comfortable sitting on the floor when they could be climing. Not that I like to resort to the cliche, but compassionate conservativism is a hand up, not a handout. It's teaching a man to fish. There's no compassion in keeping poor people poor, even if you make their poverty somewhat more comfortable. You display compassion by helping them to achieve.
David K. Shipler - The federal government has begun to finance "faith-based initiatives." Previously, religious groups had to create separate, secular entities to receive federal money for services for the poor. Now, grants go to religious organizations that can discriminate against people of other faiths in hiring. Some will inevitably use tax dollars to promote their religious beliefs. Are you trying to break down the First Amendment's wall separating church and state?No. Further, the Supreme Court is the final arbiter of the boundaries between church and state, and to the best of my knowledge my proposals have been held constitutional. What I will not do is put arbitrary hurdles in front of an organization that wants to help people, merely because it is affiliated with a religious organization.
David K. Shipler - Using the Patriot Act and other means, you have tried to evade the courts and minimize the rights of those accused of terrorism. Your administration has conducted searches without warrants, obtained gag orders on those forced to turn over records, monitored conversations between lawyers and their clients, employed unverified intelligence reports in criminal proceedings, and claimed the power to imprison Americans indefinitely without indictment or trial. Now that a couple of major cases have collapsed, what proof exists that these measures are actually being used against the right people? How many terrorist plots have they foiled?David, you have asked a lot of questions there, perhaps because you are aware that your questions don't stand on an individual basis. On September 11, 2001, our nation faced a terrorist attack on an unprecedented scale, and it became obvious that we needed to root out sleeper cells which might be planning additional attacks on our people. Congress passed the legislation required to achieve that necessary end. How many terrorist plots has this foiled? So far, on the home front, all of them. But we can't drop our guard, because while we have to succeed 100% of the time the terrorists only have to succeed once. Congress is presently revisiting provisions of the Patriot Act which are due to expire under the sunset provisions of that legislation, and if provisions are deemed unnecessary Congress will presumably permit them to expire.
Alice M. Rivlin - According to your former Treasury secretary, Paul O'Neill, Vice President Dick Cheney believes that "deficits don't matter." Do you agree with the vice president? If so, why promise to cut the deficit in half in your next term? If not, what dangers do you think large sustained deficits pose for our economy? Do you worry about burdening your daughters and their children with rapidly growing federal debt and interest payments?Alice, I have expressed that deficits matter, and I have expressed that I intend to halve the deficit over the next four years. It is not always bad to have a deficit - sometimes it is necessary to stimulate the economy, and sometimes it is the necessary result of national emergency, sometimes both. And that's what we faced after 9/11. But I have consistently advocated for eliminating the deficit.
Alice M. Rivlin - You say that you want to allow young workers to put part of their Social Security taxes into personal accounts. They could invest these accounts in stocks or bonds and leave them to their heirs. At the same time, you promise not to reduce scheduled benefits for current and soon-to-be retirees. But taxes paid by working people are used to pay benefits to current retirees. If the taxes paid by younger workers are diverted to their personal accounts, where will the money come from to pay those benefits? Would you try to borrow the additional money (estimated to be at least $1 trillion)? Would you take money from other programs? Would you raise taxes?Alice, obviously the plan would be for a savings program that also permits Social Security to continue to self-fund. That would not require any new taxes or debt.
Alice M. Rivlin - In a recent open letter, 169 economists and business school professors, including 56 professors from Harvard Business School, your alma mater, sharply criticized your economic policies. They said your proposals for Social Security and making the tax cuts permanent "only promise to exacerbate the crisis" and that "your tax policy has exacerbated the problem of inequality in the United States." Do you dismiss these critics as uninformed? If not, what would you say to persuade them they are wrong?Alice, if you have ever tried to have a discussion with a group of economists, you would know that they rely upon theoretical models, and they frequently disagree over the most basic of economic projections, and it just so happens that they disagree with this Administration's economic advisers. For every fifty six economists who are adamant that their projections are 100% right, there are countless others who are just as certain that they are 100% wrong. The classic joke about an economist, stuck at a bottom of a hole, is that his solution for escaping is "first, we assume a ladder". With all due respect to Harvard's economists, life gets more complicated outside the ivory tower.
Alan Ehrenhalt - As a candidate in 2000, you argued in favor of compassionate conservatism and a restoration of decency and moderation to the national government. Those of us who voted for you took this seriously. But your personal demeanor as president has been belligerent and dismissive of virtually anyone who opposes your policies. You state flatly that anyone who is not with you is against you, and at least imply that disagreement is equivalent to disloyalty. You refuse to admit making mistakes, even when it is obvious that you made them. You all but invite attacks on the country with "bring it on" taunting that makes you sound more like a gang leader than a responsible head of state. What happened to your promise of compassion? Have you concluded that moderation and decency are not useful qualities in a president?How can I respond to your question without first observing that, as you caricature and misrepresent my statements and record, you engage in the very conduct you are supposedly criticizing me for having done. I have already addressed the compassion my Administration seeks to bring, and I am sorry that it is not the welfare state you want. There we disagree, and there, presumably, despite all evidence of the failures of the welfare state, you will stick adamantly and without reflection to your desire for the expansion of the failed welfare state. Moderation and decency are very useful qualities in a President. But adhering to a failed welfare policy is not moderate, is not decent, and is just plain wrong.
Alan Ehrenhalt - When you were governor of Texas, you complained about the long list of mandates that Washington was imposing on the states without supplying the money to pay for them. You criticized the Republican Congress for ignoring legitimate state complaints. "Mandates are mandates, regardless of the philosophical bent of the person doing the mandating," you said in May 1998. "It starts at the White House." But your administration has imposed billions of dollars in mandates without even a pretense of offering sufficient money for states to meet them. Did your concern for fairness to Texas and the 49 other state governments simply evaporate when you moved into the White House?Alan, I am not sure what you are trying to criticize. You don't appear to have a problem with unfunded mandates, just the fact that I have in the past criticized them. I think if you had a problem with any particular mandate I have created, or had evidence that it was unfunded, you would have presented it as an example. The usual example people bring up of a supposedly "unfunded" mandate is "No Child Left Behind". Yet that Act brought billions of dollars of federal revenue to the states. While you seem to think that we can tax and spend, tax and spend without regard to consequences, we face real world budget constraints. You surely aren't proposing that we eliminate "No Child Left Behind", so are you asking me to raise taxes? People who want to pay more taxes already know who to vote for, and it's not me.
In 1977, the venerable insurance company Crum & Forester sponsored one of the first print ads that included what would become a staple of anti-lawsuit rhetoric: the fictional lawsuit horror story. The ad told the story of a guy who collected a $500,000 jury verdict after he was injured using a lawnmower as a hedge clipper. The agency later conceded that it had no factual basis for the story, but that didn't keep it from circulating widely in the media and in conservative political speeches.More than ten years later, my torts professor related this story as being about a man who had cut off his thumbs while using a lawn mower as a hedge trimmer. (Think about that for a minute - even if you were to try to cut a hedge with a lawn mower, how could you hold it such that it would be your thumbs which were injured?) A quick Nexis search confirmed the story to have been a fabrication. Another example came from a different professor, I believe in Civil Procedure:
Back in 1986, [60 Minutes] profiled the owner of a ladder manufacturing company who claimed his company had been hit with a $300,000 jury verdict in a suit by a man who fell off a ladder because he set it in a pile of manure. The business owner claimed the lawsuit alleged the company should have warned buyers of the dangers of setting ladders in dung. The real lawsuit had nothing to do with manure; the ladder had broken with less than 450 pounds on it, even though it had a safety rating that said it could support up to 1,000. Tedesco says the show never ran a correction.That story, also, was recounted as fact.
Take the idea of a "tort tax," the financial hit allegedly taken by every citizen because of the legal system, which Taylor raised in his December Newsweek article. It dates back to 1988, when Manhattan Institute fellow Peter Huber coined the term in his book, Liability, and claimed that the tort system cost Americans $300 billion a year. Three years later, the figure made its way into a speech given by Vice President Dan Quayle, who blamed lawyers for wrecking the economy. After the speech, several researchers examined the methods Huber had used to arrive at that figure. Huber, they found, had simply made it up. As The Economist observed in 1992, "the $300 billion figure has no discernible connection to reality."What was also interesting was seeing that the doctors had no conception of the actual cost of medical malpractice, which the insurance industry estimates at 2 - 3% of the health care dollar, subject to being reduced by approximately 0.4 - 0.5% if all current "tort reform" measures are implemented. And the current "reforms" would have no effect on "defensive medicine", because they are uniformly aimed at limiting the recovery of the most injured victims of malpractice in the most meritorious cases.
Some academic researchers suspect that all the hype about the litigation crisis might actually be making Americans more litigious by giving them the erroneous impression that compensation is available through the courts for most injuries. As McCann says, "Tort reformers may have produced more frivolous claims while making legitimate claims harder to bring."
It's hard to dismiss the thought that the Republicans voted as a show of support for capital punishment, not on the merits of the case.More likely, it was a vote for "finality" - literally for form over substance - although not as explicitly stated as in some other cases. (Read the opinions - PDF Format)
But Ken Mehlman, Mr Bush's campaign manager, told the Guardian the vice-president had made clear the fundamental philosophical differences between the two tickets. "He was saying in a world where 19 people with boxcutters can kill 3,000 Americans in the course of 20 minutes, allowing to remain in power a brutal dictator who defied the world, who had a weapons of mass destruction capability... wasn't acceptable and wasn't safe.Does that follow? Maybe we should have invaded China, as that is probably where the boxcutters were made....
Cheney easily quoted facts and figures, names and situations, voting records and current trends with the ease that some of us quote "Simpsons" episodes. (Or "Star Wars" movies.)Um... Leaving the fact-checking to others for the moment, the author expects us to be impressed that Cheney's abilities parallel her uncanny ability to quote "Star Wars"? So she is telling us that we should cast our votes for Senator Palpatine? (Does that put GW in the role of Darth Vader?)
The coming elections and the battles for the cities will either put Iraq on a path to normalcy or introduce us to some new hell. Yesterday, Rumsfeld said Iraq had "a crack" at being a success. At least he's not overhyping.Mr. false dichotomy strikes again.
The coming offensive in Fallujah could be the bloodiest combat that U.S. forces have faced yet in Iraq. Worse, it could push interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's fragile interim government toward the breaking point. One early warning sign was this week's comment by interim President Ghazi Yawar, a Sunni Muslim, criticizing recent U.S. airstrikes on Fallujah as "collective punishment." It was Yawar's threat to quit the interim government last April that helped halt the previous U.S. offensive in Fallujah.has to also know that a strategy for the present situation in Iraq, let alone an exit strategy, could be dramatically changed by the success or failure of such a venture - and that even a military success could result in a profound setback if it inspires the collapse of the Allawi government, broadens the "resistance", or prevents elections.
If you try to put yourself in the boots of a U.S. soldier in Iraq, what you want to know from the candidates is: Can we win this thing, and if not, how can we get out? Unfortunately, the debate didn't really illuminate those essential questions. The most difficult days in Iraq may well lie ahead, but neither candidate has leveled with the country about how severe that test will be, or what fallback plans he has if his assumptions prove overly optimistic.The questions are not entirely unfair, but Ignatius again ignores the fact that what might work today might not work tomorrow, let alone next month. The answer to "can we win this thing" seemed a bit different when Bush was strutting beneath his "Mission Accomplished" banner than it does today - and the colossal mistakes made since that time make it much less likely that we will achieve the results we most desire. Then, "winning" was defined as creating a stable nation with a secular, democratic government. Today, "winning" seems to be defined as achieving stability, preventing civil war, and creating a government that is not hostile to western interests. Would Ignatius call a plan to achieve that end a plan for victory?
Anchor Judy Woodruff began by briefly outlining MoveOn's complaint: "[R]ecent polls have shown George W. Bush leading John Kerry and MoveOn.org claims Gallup's polling techniques exaggerate Republican support." Woodruff then gave Gallup editor-in-chief Frank Newport almost three minutes to respond, uninterrupted, to the charges. Naturally, Newport defended Gallup's methodology, but essentially asked viewers to take it on faith that he knows what he's doing.
Still, officials of the debate commission said they were agreeing primarily to those things Mr. Bush's aides had emphasized as especially important to them: a strict time limit on candidate responses, an electronic warning when candidates exceed their speaking time that can be seen and heard by viewers at home, and a prohibition against the candidates' directly posing questions to each other.Gotta keep the ugly truths from being aired....
So, if the super-rich won't pay because no one's interested in making them pay, what on earth can be done? How can the public's interest in fair taxation be revived? How could the government find the courage to stop the tax cheats?(I think the teachers and dustmen would first check the tax returns of their neighbors and supervisors, and the media would certainly go after controvercial public figures and politicians.... But most people would probably be very uncomfortable with the disclosure of their personal financial information.)
I have a cruel and unusual proposal: everyone's tax returns should be published. If the teachers and dustmen of this country could see that certain multi-millionaires are paying less tax than they are, they'd be so angry that the government would surely be obliged to act.
The requirement is because the forms are designed to be mailed like post-cards and must be thick enough to survive mechanical sorters at the U.S. Post Office, according to Blackwell's spokesman Carlo LoParo.Yes, you heard that right. In order to protect registrants from having their registration forms destroyed in the mail, those which arrive intact but aren't on sufficiently thick paper stock are to be discarded.
"Our directive stands and it is specifically in place to protect new registrants to make sure the forms are not destroyed," LoParo said.
On September 18, the U.N. General Assembly passed a watered-down U.S.-sponsored resolution saying "it shall consider" possible oil sanctions on Sudan, but not, at the present time, any sanctions against Khartoum's murderous leaders.So what Mr. Brooks seemingly means is that the U.S. engaged in a series of diplomatic moves meant to make Bush look good, but without taking any constructive or binding steps toward ending the violence. Without exercising genuine diplomacy, to overcome international resistance to effective intervention, or to build an actual coalition which might act. Which, as it seems, is all Babbling Brooks wants of his beloved President.
John Kerry, at the National Baptist Convention in New Orleans, in a speech hardly mentioned in the media except notably by Stanley Crouch in the September 13 Daily News, "got a standing ovation by calling on President Bush to take leadership in 'the immediate deployment of an effective international force to disarm militia and facilitate the delivery of humanitarian assistance in Darfur.'"So one might expect Babbling Brooks to expend a sentence or two endorsing Kerry's position. Or suggesting that, as Kerry indicated, the President could do more about the situation. Or expressing that it is a shame that the President chose a watered-down resolution over the type of authorization Kerry called for.
Some person or persons conceived a scheme to create a series of false ... documents and append a photocopied signature to one of them. ... Who was the forger? Did others conspire with him or her to present a seeming government document - with knowledge of its falsity and with intent to defraud...? Who was to benefit and how?Wow. Is Safire reconsidering his blind support for Chalabi's declaration that he had thousands of documents establishing unprecedented corruption and avarice, provign that pretty much every anti-War voice in the West had received bribes from the "Oil for Food" Program? Um... no.
What benefit did the Bush-hating Burkett gain from CBS in return for his fake documents? One plausible answer: he got coveted access to someone high up in the Kerry campaign.Sure. CBS is secretly brokering contacts between its confidential sources and "someone high up" in the Kerry Campaign.... And Ahmed Chalabi has the proof, if only those evil Kerry supporters hadn't somehow persuaded the Bush Administration to accuse him of funneling highly classified information to Iran (which, fortunately for Chalabi who is now safely ensconced in Tehran, frequently offers asylum to supporters of the U.S. who have not lent it any aid or comfort), simultaneously allowing a band of thugs to raid one of his investigator's offices and steal each and every document, whether on paper or in electronic form (including all backup copies) which would have documented the claim.
The only hope for stopping the mudslinging is if well-meaning people try to police their own side.Now that such a brilliant idea has been presented, certainly both sides will actively police against distortions of the record and muckraking in their own ads, and the ads of their supporters, and will actively condemn any misrepresentation. After all, it is better to lose an election than to win dishonorably.
It was sad that Mr. Kerry's commendable war record was clouded by the more outrageous of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth's attacks, and it was somewhat surprising that Mr. Bush's National Guard service again became a big topic of debate.Well, I guess they didn't technically contradict yesterday's claim that it was Kerry's fault that the outrageous Swift Boat Liar ads (that "keep on coming") and discussion of Bush's record (yes, yesterday that was Kerry's fault as well) clouded the issues. But they did suggest that other forces played a role.
After weeks of politically damaging delay, John Kerry finally seems to have found his voice on what ought to be the central issue of this year's election: the mismanaged war in Iraq and how to bring it to an acceptable conclusion. It was none too soon. While the fate of the Iraqi people, the success of the war on terrorism and America's international standing have all been teetering ominously in the balance, Mr. Kerry has allowed the presidential campaign to veer off into squabbles about events long past - like the candidates' 30-year-old war records - and about Mr. Kerry's confusing and sometimes contradictory recent statements on foreign policy.Oh, sure. It is Mr. Kerry's fault that when he gave the media the opportunity to act responsibly in relation to those remote events, the media instead gave undivided attention to the rantings and ravings of the now-discredited Swift Boat Liars.
When Richard Harries reviewed a previous book of mine, he said it was typically Jewish - 280 pages on what to do and 20 pages on what to believe, whereas if it had been a Christian publication, it would have been the other way round.I think that the same can be said of a split within Christianity, between those who believe that Christianity should emphasize the manner in which Christ lived his life, with the goal being to apply those lessons to live a good and ethical life, and those sects which focus instead on the manner of Christ's death, as exemplified by Mel Gibson and his "The Passion of the Christ". To those who believe that your life's work is meaningless unless you are "born again", the notion of more secular Christians that the best of Christianity comes from living an ethical and moral life derived from Christ's teachings may also seem like a parody of faith. To the more secular, though, the "born again" Christian who expounds a devout piety while leading what amounts to an immoral life - whether limited to preaching hate and intolerance, or whether delving further into a personal exploration of the "seven deadly sins" - seems more the parody.
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For Judaism, it is the practical consequences of belief in God that are important, not the belief itself. If God exists, then the world has a purpose, life has meaning, all people are equal and every individual matters. The prayers, too, are not so much for God's benefit but for ours. By praising God for caring for the living, supporting the fallen and healing the sick, we are effectively saying these are godly/goodly attributes and mapping out our own tasks.
Over the centuries, this has led to an emphasis on action rather than faith, to the extent that the latter has become assumed to the point of neglect. It gives rise to the saying - somewhat tongue-in-cheek but containing a sizable grain of truth - that "to be a good Jew, you don't have to believe in God, just do what He says".
For some Jews, this is a parody of a faith that is brim full of God's glory; for others, it is a welcome description of a religion whose strength is that the heretic is not the person who believes the wrong thing, but who does the wrong thing.
Because the Gallup Poll, despite its reputation, assumes that this November 40% of those turning out to vote will be Republicans, and only 33% will be Democrat.(emphasis in original). For historic reference, the coaster references John Zogby:
If we look at the three last Presidential elections, the spread was 34% Democrats, 34% Republicans and 33% Independents (in 1992 with Ross Perot in the race); 39% Democrats, 34% Republicans, and 27% Independents in 1996; and 39% Democrats, 35% Republicans and 26% Independents in 2000.[Insert eyeroll here]
