Sunday, October 22, 2006
Calif. Republican asks Pentagon to remove embedded CNN reporters
Calif. Republican asks Pentagon to remove embedded CNN reporters
By Thomas Watkins
Associated Press
SAN DIEGO - The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee asked the Pentagon on Friday to remove CNN reporters embedded with U.S. combat troops, saying the network's broadcast of a video showing insurgent snipers targeting U.S. soldiers was tantamount to airing an enemy propaganda film.
The tape, which came to the network through contact with an insurgent leader, was aired Wednesday night on "Anderson Cooper 360" and repeated Thursday.
In a letter to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., wrote: "CNN has now served as the publicist for an enemy propaganda film featuring the killing of an American soldier."
The letter was also signed by San Diego-area Republican congressmen Darrell Issa and Brian Bilbray.
"This is nothing short of a terrorist snuff film," Bilbray said at a press conference held in San Diego.
CNN producer David Doss wrote in a Web log Thursday the network televised the footage in an effort to present the "unvarnished truth" about the Iraq war.
In one instance, the tape shows a uniformed member of the U.S. military milling in a public area with Iraqis. A shot rings out. CNN fades the screen to black before the result - described as a victim falling forward - is visible.
Hunter said he hasn't received a response from Rumsfeld.
A Pentagon spokesman said Friday he didn't know whether Rumsfeld had seen the letter.
"The department takes this very seriously and will look into the matter and respond accordingly to the member in due course," said Lt. Cmdr. Chito Peppler.
CNN officials defended their decision to air the footage.
"Our responsibility is to report the news," said Laurie Goldberg, a CNN spokeswoman. "As an organization we stand by our decision and respect the rights of others to disagree with it."
More human remains found at ground zero
While Bush & company continue to get citizens of the US, Iraq, and other countries killed for no real reason in Iraq, and still hasn't captured the persons responsible for the attack on his watch on 9/11/01 . . .
Yahoo! News
More human remains found at ground zero
Workers recovered more human remains Saturday from several manholes as the city began a new search for Sept. 11 victims.
The search was ordered after the surprise discovery of dozens of bones in an abandoned manhole this week.
Utility and city officials on Saturday hand-removed material from other manholes after tearing into the pavement on a service road along the site's western edge. It was then sifted onsite by forensic officials for fragments of human remains, said deputy mayor Edward Skyler.
City officials said that about 15 more pieces of remains had been recovered, bringing the total to nearly 100 this week.
Upset relatives of some Sept. 11 victims called for a federally led new search for remains in and around ground zero after construction workers discovered bones in one manhole excavated as part of work on a transit hub, officials said.
The 80 bones and fragments found earlier this week ranged from a little less than an inch to 12 inches long, said Ellen Borakove, spokeswoman for the city medical examiner's office. The bones possibly include ribs, arms, legs and vertebra, she said.
The active search for the dead ended at the site in 2002 after a massive cleanup of 1.5 million tons of debris. About 20,000 pieces of human remains were found, but the DNA in thousands of those pieces was too damaged by heat, humidity and time to yield matches in the many tests forensic scientists have tried over the years.
More than 40 percent of the 2,749 Sept. 11 victims in New York have never been identified.
U.S. sees deadliest month of '06 in Iraq
Yahoo! News
U.S. sees deadliest month of '06 in Iraq
By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN, Associated Press Writer
Five bicycle bombs and a hail of mortar shells ripped apart a market south of Baghdad on Saturday, killing 18 people in yet another sign that Iraq's government and U.S. forces were struggling to contain sectarian violence. Three U.S. Marines also were killed, making October the deadliest month for American forces this year.
In Washington, President Bush met with his top military and security advisers to study new tactics to curb the staggering violence in Iraq, where more than 3 1/2 years of war have now taken more American lives — at least 2,791 — than the Sept. 11 attack on the World Trade Center.
U.S. officials have blamed the skyrocketing violence on the holy month of Ramadan, which ends Sunday for Sunni Muslims, as well as the increased vulnerability of American forces during a major two-month security sweep in Baghdad and the approaching U.S. midterm election.
A senior U.S. State Department official offered an unusually candid assessment of the security situation in an interview Saturday with Al-Jazeera television, saying the U.S. had shown "arrogance" and "stupidity" in Iraq. Alberto Fernandez, director of public diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, also said the U.S. was ready to talk with any Iraqi group except al-Qaida in Iraq to facilitate national reconciliation.
At least 44 Iraqis were killed or found dead Saturday, keeping the month on pace to be the deadliest for Iraqis since April 2005, when The Associated Press began tracking the deaths. So far this month, at least 907 Iraqis have been killed in war-related violence, an average of 43 a day.
That compares to an average daily death toll of about 27 since April 2005. The AP count includes civilians, government officials and police and security forces, and is considered a minimum based on AP reporting. The actual number is likely higher, as many killings go unreported.
The United Nations has said at least 100 Iraqis are now killed daily.
The deaths of the Marines raised the October death toll for American troops to 78, surpassing the year's previous high figure of 76 in April. With more than a week left in the month, October is on course to be the deadliest month for American service members in two years.
Despite the grim statistics, a British government minister said Saturday he expects Iraqis to take over much of the work being done by coalition troops within a year.
"The Iraqi army is coming along very well," Foreign Office Minister Kim Howells told British Broadcasting Corp. radio. "I would be very surprised if there was not that kind of capacity taking on a lot of the work done by the coalition forces."
The brutal market attack occurred in the violence-ravaged town of Mahmoudiyah shortly before Muslims began to prepare iftar, their evening meal to break the day's Ramadan fast. It also came two days before the Eid al-Fitr holiday, the day of feasting at the end of the Ramadan month.
A dozen mortars rained down on the market soon after the bombs hidden in plastic bags left on bicycles exploded, said police Lt. Hayder Satar. Such dual attacks are frequently employed by armed groups to inflict additional damage on crowds that form after the initial bombing.
Police said they discovered and disarmed a sixth bomb-laden bicycle, Satar said. He said about 70 people were wounded and taken to hospitals.
Until about a year ago, the town 18 miles south of Baghdad was about evenly mixed between Shiite and Sunni Muslims. Fighters of the Mahdi Army, loyalists of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, have since moved in, however, forcing longtime Sunni residents to flee and changing the population balance in favor of Shiites.
As violence spiraled closer to civil war this month, it also took an ominous new course with the outbreak of fighting among Shiites — the Mahdi Army and its rival Badr Brigade militia, the armed wing of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI.
Both groups are believed to receive training, arms and money from the Shiite theocracy that runs neighboring Iran. Much of the top SCIRI leadership and Badr Brigade chieftains took refuge in Iran during Saddam's Hussein's rule, which was marked by brutal persecution of Shiites.
Gunfights between the two militia groups broke out Saturday in Hamza al-Gharbi, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, after a bomb exploded near SCIRI offices. SCIRI supporters accused Madhi Army fighters of setting off the blast, police Capt. Muthana Khalid Ali said.
At least two people were killed and four injured in the fighting, said another police official, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Ali said Iraqi army and police called for backup from American forces, who imposed a curfew on the city. There was no immediate confirmation of U.S. involvement from military spokesmen.
The new bloodshed came after Iraqi security forces reasserted control over the southern city of Amarah, where rogue members of the Mahdi Army briefly seized control Friday. Twenty-five gunmen and police died in gunbattles before the Iraqi army moved in to retake the city, where the security forces are dominated by members of the Badr Brigade.
The Shiite-on-Shiite violence was particularly alarming because the groups' political wings both back Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Shiites are dominant in parliament. Further conflict between the militias could wreck Shiite unity and bring down al-Maliki's government.
The prime minister is already under heavy U.S. pressure to disband the militia networks. He has not responded and this week even ordered the American military to release a key al-Sadr lieutenant who had been detained on suspicion he was involved in sectarian killings.
Until February, violence in Iraq had largely been the work of Sunni Muslim insurgent attacks on U.S. forces or Shiites. But the Feb. 22 insurgent bombing of a major Shiite shrine in Samarra unleashed a rampage of sectarian killings among Shiites and Sunnis.
Iraq's main Sunni Arab party on Saturday strongly backed an accord signed the day before between Sunni and Shiite religious figures in Islam's holiest city, Mecca. Organizers say they aim only to stop sectarian killings, rather than impose a truce to halt attacks against U.S. forces.
Elsewhere, U.S. forces said they killed a key coordinator of foreign fighters under al-Qaida in Iraq in a raid in Ramadi west of Baghdad. They said the man, who was not identified by name, had been responsible for providing weapons and financing to foreign fighters in the country, as well as producing and distributing video clips and other propaganda.
___
Associated Press writers Hamza Hendawi and Sinan Salaheddin contributed to this report.
Problems Plague Election Administrators; Election Officials Struggle to Learn How to Operate Voting Machines, Train New Poll Workers
ABC News
Problems Plague Election Administrators
Election Officials Struggle to Learn How to Operate Voting Machines, Train New Poll Workers
By DEBORAH HASTINGS
The Associated Press
- Wendy Noren had all the voting machines she needed. What she lacked was the stuff that made them work. So the elections supervisor of Boone County, Mo., didn't sleep Tuesday night.
Instead, she worked furiously into the next morning, outlining a last-minute election plan for a county of 150,000 people, a plan that relied on pen and paper and hand-counted votes with the country's midterm election little more than two weeks away.
"I was not going to be able to have an election with the machines," said Noren, "because I didn't have the ballots, and the supplies necessary to load the ballots. I had the machines and nothing else."
In the continued fracas over electronic voting, election administrators across the country headed down to the wire still not sure whether they have enough of the newfangled machines that caused such an uproar in some states in 2004. They also are struggling to train hundreds of new poll workers on the intricacies of using and servicing the electronic devices.
Hampered by last-minute deliveries and a confusing array of new voting rules, election officials said they can only hope they don't face a rerun of 2004 long poll lines caused by malfunctioning machines, poll workers who didn't understand the machines or didn't show up, and recounts that in some cases took weeks to complete.
Noren resolved her supply problem Wednesday morning after she withheld payment on the county's $1.3 million contract for the machines, she said. Electronic Systems & Software assigned a senior vice president to the case. Still, at this late stage in an election that could change the majority of Congress, the equipment delay has put her 10 days behind in training and two weeks behind in testing the machines.
"It has to be right. I'm not going to do something that isn't," she said.
Similar stories have been repeated across the country but their scope and severity are impossible to determine because there are no federal rules for reporting such problems and there's no repository for keeping them, voting advocates say.
But a study released last week by a coalition of voting-rights groups determined that much of the problem is caused by the failure of many states to mandate how many electronic voting machines must be available at each precinct.
In 2004 in Ohio, for example, there were two machines for 1,300 would-be voters at Kenyon College, resulting in extremely long lines and waits of up to 11 hours. At another nearby precinct, there were many machines and no lines, according to the study conducted by The Century Foundation think tank, Common Cause, and The Leadership Council on Civil Rights.
The study concluded that little had been done to correct the problems from 2004. And some states, it said, had since then made it harder to vote.
More than 90 percent of voters will cast some type of electronic ballot on Nov. 7 either on a touch-screen, or on ballots that are electronically scanned, according to Election Data Services, a nonpartisan political consulting firm. Nearly one-third of those voters will be using new equipment, the company said.
Every seat in the House of Representatives is up for grabs. In the Senate, 33 seats will be decided, as will the offices of 36 governors. Republicans hope to keep control of Congress and Democrats hope to seize it in the midterm elections, which come as President Bush's job approval rating has plummeted, the war in Iraq rages on, and congressional scandals have made headlines.
In 2002, Congress approved the Help America Vote Act, a one-time infusion of money to help states redo their antiquated election systems. Its specific intention was to avoid the hanging-chad disaster of 2000, when recounts of paper ballots in Florida dragged on for weeks and ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Some $3.9 billion was promised to states, to be accompanied by reworked election standards.
But in the end, only three-fourths of that amount was disbursed, election officials said. And many of the pay-outs occurred before newer, stricter voting rules had been created.
Meaning many states bought their machines without federal guidelines.
The big three of machine manufacturers Nebraska-based Electronic Systems & Software, California-based Sequoia Voting Systems, and Diebold Election Systems of Ohio supply most of the country's precincts.
After the 2004 breakdowns, those companies became the targets of lawsuits in at least nine states. The suits, filed by voters and voter advocacy groups, claim the machines can be easily hacked, are prone to malfunction, and often don't provide a paper receipt that can be used to verify one's vote.
The companies deny those claims. But increased demand for the new technology has delayed some deliveries and created problems still being worked out, the companies say.
According to last week's report, states including Florida, Georgia, Pennsylvania and Washington are also vulnerable to machine shortages, having suffered similar problems two years before.
"Since 2004, little has been done to ensure that there will be sufficient numbers of machines at the ready to accommodate large numbers of voters," the report said. Voting reform activists claim precincts in minority neighborhoods had far fewer machines than those in wealthier areas.
In Ohio, after the state's fiasco in the last election, officials said counties must provide one touch-screen machine for every 175 registered voters. But that provision doesn't take effect until 2013.
Meanwhile, in states such as Florida, election officials are prepared for the worst, but hoping for the best.
Leon County, Fla., elections chief Ion Sanchez who got into a bitter, public fight with Diebold after he hosted a test of their machines in which a security expert was able to hack into their system says his county is ready. He has only 125 touch-screens, which he uses to satisfy the Help America Vote Act requirement of providing equipment that can be accessed by the disabled.
"We're all squared away," he said. But he has spoken to others who aren't a North Carolina elections supervisor who is waiting on delivery of back-ordered motherboards for her machines as well as Noren in Missouri's Boone County, which includes Columbia.
She blames the machine mess on the failure of federal officials to think through a very complex problem.
"Nobody sat down and said, 'How do we do this right?' They slapped together electronic voting without any standards. Then they had problems with that. So they said, 'Slap a printout on it and that will fix it.'
"Well, if you ask me and I'm an election official the weak point of any system is the printer. You know how frustrating it is when a printer jams. Everything has to be done exactly right (on these machines), and exactly in order. Things are not always going to go right when you have machines and people and paper."
And she is short about 100 poll workers this year. Yet, Noren was able to pull off the 2004 election without a major problem. She worked herself nearly to death, she said, and so did her staff. But it got done.
This time, she says, she's working even harder. And it's not over yet.
Diplomat cites U.S. 'stupidity' in Iraq
Yahoo! News
Diplomat cites U.S. 'stupidity' in Iraq
By HAMZA HENDAWI, Associated Press Writer
A senior U.S. diplomat said the United States had shown "arrogance" and "stupidity" in Iraq but was now ready to talk with any group except Al-Qaida in Iraq to facilitate national reconciliation.
In an interview with Al-Jazeera television aired late Saturday, Alberto Fernandez, director of public diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department offered an unusually candid assessment of America's war in Iraq.
"We tried to do our best but I think there is much room for criticism because, undoubtedly, there was arrogance and there was stupidity from the United States in Iraq," he said.
"We are open to dialogue because we all know that, at the end of the day, the solution to the hell and the killings in Iraq is linked to an effective Iraqi national reconciliation," he said, speaking in Arabic from Washington. "The Iraqi government is convinced of this."
The question of negotiations between the United States and insurgency factions has repeatedly surfaced over the past two years, but details have been sketchy. One issue that was often raised in connection with such negotiations was the extent of amnesty the United States and its Iraqi allies were willing to offer to the insurgents if they disarmed and joined the political process.
Fernandez spoke to the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera after a man claiming to speak for Saddam Hussein's outlawed Baath Party told the network the United States was seeking a face-saving exodus from Iraq and that insurgents were ready to negotiate but won't lay down arms.
"Abu Mohammed", a pseudonym for the man, appeared to set near impossible conditions for the start of any talks with the Americans, including the return to service of Saddam's armed forces, the annulment of every law adopted since Saddam's ouster, the recognition of insurgent groups as the sole representatives of the Iraqi people and a timetable for a gradual, unconditional withdrawal of U.S. and other foreign troops in Iraq.
"The occupier has started to search for a face-saving way out. The resistance, with all its factions, is determined to continue fighting until the enemy is brought down to his knees and sits on the negotiating table or is dealt, with God's help, a humiliating defeat," he said. The man wore a suit and appeared to be in his 40s but his face was concealed.
"There is an element of the farcical in that statement," Fernandez said of Abu Mohammed's comments. "They are very removed from reality."
Still Fernandez warned that failure to pacify the widening sectarian strife in Iraq as well as an enduring insurgency would damage the entire Middle East.
"We are witnessing failure in Iraq and that's not the failure of the United States alone but it is a disaster for the region. Failure in Iraq will be a failure for the United States but a disaster for the region."
Although the actual identity of Abu Mohammed remains unknown, the interview adds to growing indications that Iraq's Sunni insurgents sense the tide may be turning against the United States and the Iraqi government it backs.
Fernandez's comments, on the other hand, join a series of sobering remarks by President Bush and the U.S. military in recent days.
Bush this week conceded that "right now it's tough" for U.S. forces in Iraq and on Saturday met with his top military and security advisers to study new tactics to curb the staggering violence in Iraq. Three U.S. Marines were killed also Saturday, making October the deadliest month for American forces in Iraq this year.
U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell said attacks in Baghdad were up 22 percent in the first three weeks of the holy Muslim month of Ramadan despite a two-month old U.S.-Iraqi drive to crush violence in the Iraqi capital.
On Wednesday, and again on Friday, Sunni insurgents believed to belong to al-Qaida in Iraq, staged military-like parades in the heart of five towns in the vast and mainly desert province of Anbar, including the provincial capital Ramadi. Some of these parades, in which hooded gunmen paraded with their weapons, took place within striking distance of U.S. forces stationed in nearby bases.
The parades proved to be a propaganda success, with TV footage of Wednesday's parade shown in many parts of the world, a likely embarrassment for the U.S. military as well as the embattled Iraqi government.
House committee dismisses bulk of investigative division
USA TODAY
House committee dismisses bulk of investigative division
By Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — The House Appropriations Committee has let go about 60 private contractors who made up most of an investigative unit that was auditing billions of dollars in government spending, including the $62 billion federal relief package for Hurricane Katrina, the panel's spokesman said Thursday.
The investigators, attached to the committee's Surveys and Investigations division, were released during the past week, committee spokesman John Scofield said. He said that the quality of the unit's work had been questioned by leaders of the Republican-controlled committee, including some Democrats, but he declined to say who.
The shake-up — which leaves only 16 full-time employees in the investigative unit — comes about a year after the Appropriations Committee's chairman, Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., launched the Katrina review by saying the unit would "conduct a wide-ranging assessment and analysis of disaster spending." At the time, Lewis said the unit had a tradition of "comprehensive" reporting.
It's unclear how the departures will affect the work of the unit, whose contract staff is made up of former employees of the FBI, CIA and other government investigative services. Some of them had worked for the unit for several years. Scofield said the dismissals would not compromise any ongoing investigations. Scofield said he could not identify the specific work being done by investigators because much of the unit's inquiries involve classified information.
Robert Pearre, the unit's director, did not respond to requests for comment.
Scofield said the "pace" of the Katrina review was not as critical as the quality of the work. "There is nothing sinister here. It's about how we do the best oversight."
The committee's ranking Democrat, David Obey of Wisconsin, was in his home state and could not be reached for comment.
Established in 1943, the investigative unit has focused mainly on defense and intelligence spending programs. Its reports usually are not made public. Regarding Katrina spending, however, Lewis has said he intends to reveal the results of the committee's investigation because of "the national importance of the Katrina recovery efforts and the record amount of funds that have been appropriated."
The committee's review of Katrina spending is one of several examinations of how government relief was directed and spent after the nation's worst natural disaster.
Last year, the Justice Department launched a separate inquiry into Katrina-related incidents of alleged fraud in which dozens of people have been charged. Many were accused of filing fraudulent claims of property damage in order to get thousands of dollars in government relief checks.
Contributing: Kathy Kiely
U.S. jails man once tortured by Taliban
USA TODAY
U.S. jails man once tortured by Taliban
By Michael J. Sniffen, Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Abdul Rahim insists he's an apolitical student who fled a strict father. But he's fallen into a black hole in the war on terror in which first the Taliban and then the United States imprisoned him as an enemy of the state.
Arrested by the Taliban in Afghanistan in January 2000, Rahim says al-Qaeda leaders burned him with cigarettes, smashed his right hand, deprived him of sleep, nearly drowned him and hanged him from the ceiling until he "confessed" to spying for the United States.
U.S. forces took the young Kurd from Syria into custody in January 2002 after the Taliban fled his prison. Accusing him of being an al-Qaeda terrorist, U.S. interrogators deprived him of sleep, threatened him with police dogs and kept him in stress positions for hours, he says. He's been held ever since as an enemy combatant.
Rahim's story is one of several emerging from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay as defense lawyers make bids to free their clients while the Bush administration tries to use a new law to lock them out of federal courts.
After the Supreme Court overturned President Bush's plans for commissions to try detainees, Bush obtained a new law from Congress barring federal courts from hearing appeals for release by any alien "properly detained as an enemy combatant." The Justice Department told district and appellate judges this week they no longer have jurisdiction to hear dozens of such pending cases.
A court fight over that is certain.
Calling the move to strip jurisdiction "a direct attack on our constitutional structure," Federal Public Defender Steven T. Wax in Portland, Ore., said, "We will litigate that as hard as we can in whatever forum we can find, because they are wrong."
Other detainees whose lawyers filed new evidence in U.S. District Court motions this month include:
•Adel Hassan Hamad, a Sudanese charity worker arrested at 1:30 a.m. July 18, 2002, in his Peshawar, Pakistan, apartment. Co-workers swear he was a hospital administrator with no connection to terrorists. A dissenting U.S. Army major on the panel that reviewed the unclassified and secret evidence against him called it "unconscionable" to detain him because some employees of the same charity may have supported terrorist ideals.
•Nazar "Chaman" Gul, a 29-year-old Afghani who thought he was working as an armed fuel depot guard for the Karzi government installed by U.S. forces. The man who hired him swears that was the case, but he is accused of being a member of a terrorist group. The lawyers say he has been mistaken for a commander of that terror group, named Chaman Gul, also held at Guantanamo.
All three are represented by Wax and his assistants. Wax's staff traveled to Afghanistan, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates to gather dozens of sworn statements from co-workers, relatives, fellow inmates and people who knew these detainees but haven't spoken to them in years. These newly filed accounts substantiate details of the detainees' denials that they were terrorists.
"These clients are not enemy combatants," Wax said in an interview. The new law "does not apply to people who are not enemy combatants," he said.
Wax said it would be unconstitutional to apply the jurisdiction-stripping bill retroactively to existing cases. And he said the Supreme Court has ruled before that it has the final say over its jurisdiction in these so-called habeas corpus petitions for release from custody. Following President Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus for prisoners of war, the high court in 1866 set a man free after finding he was not a prisoner of war, Wax noted.
The government feels differently about Wax's clients.
"Multiple reviews have been conducted since each detained enemy fighter was captured, including for these three individuals," said a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Jeffrey Gordon. "There is a significant amount of evidence, both unclassified and classified, which supports continued detention of these detainees and others at Guantanamo."
Now 28, Rahim, buttressed by testimony from friends and relatives, says he wound up in Afghanistan in a bid to escape his father, a strict teacher of Islamic education who objected to his borrowing money outside the family for a college trip. With his father holding his passport, he tried futilely to get from his home in the United Arab Emirates to Europe or Canada.
Finally a friendly diplomat got him deported to Afghanistan where he and others say he hoped to be declared a refugee and moved to Europe by international aid agencies. He says the Taliban conscripted him and sent him against his will to the Al Farouq terrorist training camp. When he tried to leave 18 days later, they imprisoned him, he says.
In spring 2000, Abu Dhabi television broadcast a video of a tearful, fidgeting Rahim saying a U.S. agent recruited him to find Osama bin Laden. "I deserve to die ... but if the Taliban let me live, I want to spend the next 22 years fighting for jihad," he said.
On Jan. 17, 2002, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft said U.S. forces found five videotapes in the ruined Afghan home of bin Laden aide Mohammed Atef — one of the men Rahim says directed his torture. Ashcroft said the tapes show young men delivering "martyrdom messages from suicide terrorists" and identified one as "Abd Rahim."
Rahim's attorney Stephen Sady said any Taliban tapes of Rahim "were the product of torture" and no different from false confessions Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., made to stay alive in a North Vietnamese prison.
"After two years the Americans came and saved me from the prison," Rahim told U.S. officers. "I told them about the videotape the Taliban made of me ... it created confusion to the point that the Americans believed I was working with al-Qaeda."
He added: "Nothing changed in my life. I was taken from prison to prison."
Cuts in Medicare Reimbursements May Mean Fewer Suppliers to Provide Wheelchairs to Disabled
ABC News
Cuts in Medicare Hurt Wheelchair Users
Cuts in Medicare Reimbursements May Mean Fewer Suppliers to Provide Wheelchairs to Disabled
By MARY CLARE
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Patricia Meier, a 63-year-old quadriplegic and Medicare recipient, needs to replace the wheelchair she has used for five years. Normally, Meier could simply use her Medicare benefits to replace the power wheelchair, which adjusts her position to prevent sores, with another one from WestMed Rehab Inc., a medical supplier near her home in Box Elder, S.D. But WestMed, along with several other suppliers across the country, says it will no longer provide power wheelchairs to most Medicare recipients after Nov. 15, when cuts in Medicare reimbursements go into effect.
WestMed planned an announcement on Thursday.
The Medicare changes are intended to eliminate widespread fraud identified by the Health and Human Services Department, which oversees the program.
WestMed, based in Rapid City, S.D., is the only major wheelchair supplier within 300 miles of Meier's home. Concerned about the prospect of wheelchair supplies ending in their state, South Dakota's congressional delegation pressed federal health officials for more information.
If Meier were to replace her chair without using Medicare, it could cost her between $17,000 and $20,000. With Medicare, she would pay only 20 percent of that.
"When I was able-bodied I bought cars cheaper than that," said Meier, who was injured in a car accident 20 years ago. "I don't know how I would be able to afford it."
With other suppliers saying they, too, won't be able to provide mobility equipment to many of their customers, those living with multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries and other conditions could be without the wheelchairs they need to get around.
Many wheelchair users "are going to have to pay out of pocket," said Tim Pederson, CEO of WestMed Rehab.
A 2004 study conducted by the HHS inspector general showed that Medicare reimbursements for certain power wheelchairs were far higher than the prices paid by consumers and suppliers. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administers both health care programs, expenditures for power wheelchairs increased by 2,705 percent between 1995 and 2003 from $43 million to $1.2 billion in just over just eight years.
Agency spokesman Jeff Nelligan said the increase is a "direct result of the excessive prices Medicare pays for these products."
Most suppliers have supported overhauling the system, as many companies have abused it. But they say the government has gone too far.
The changes "do eliminate the fraud and abuse, but it also eliminates the benefit," said Pederson of WestMed Rehab. "They are painting the entire industry in that broad brush, and they look at all of us as crooks."
Cara Bachenheimer, vice president of government relations for Invacare, the country's leading wheelchair manufacturer, said suppliers across the country have informed the company that they will be purchasing less equipment because of the reduced Medicare reimbursements.
Carol Gilligan, owner of Health Aid of Ohio Inc., said she will have to stop selling power wheelchairs altogether.
"There's just no way you can make a living," she said of the new reimbursements. "We have to change our business model."
Andrew Imparato, president of the American Association of People with Disabilities, said Medicare is not asking what is in the best interest of the patient.
"People are either going to have to figure out a way to finance them outside of Medicare, pay it out of pocket or just use their current chair until it breaks down," he said.
Several members of Congress have written to the agency in the weeks since the announcement. The entire South Dakota delegation sent a letter to the Health and Human Services Department on Wednesday asking for more information. Pennsylvania Sens. Arlen Specter and Rick Santorum, both Republicans, wrote the department last week asking for a delay in implementation of the new fees.
The Pennsylvania senators expressed concern about the payment formula used to calculate the reimbursements, noting that the formula does not always take current market prices into account.
Federal Judge Orders Bush Administration to Release Vice President Dick Cheney's Visitor Logs
ABC News
Judge Orders Cheney Visitor Logs Opened
Federal Judge Orders Bush Administration to Release Vice President Dick Cheney's Visitor Logs
By MATT APUZZO
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - A federal judge has ordered the Bush administration to release information about who visited Vice President Dick Cheney's office and personal residence, an order that could spark a late election season debate over lobbyists' White House access.
The Washington Post asked for two years of White House visitor logs in June but the Secret Service refused to process the request. Government attorneys called it "a fishing expedition into the most sensitive details of the vice presidency."
U.S. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina ruled Wednesday that, by the end of next week, the Secret Service must produce the records or at least identity them and justify why they are being withheld.
The newspaper sought logs for anyone visiting Cheney, his legal counsel, chief spokesman and other top aides and advisers.
The Secret Service had no comment on the ruling Thursday. In court documents, government attorneys said releasing the documents would infringe on Cheney's ability to seek advice.
"This case is about protecting the effective functioning of the vice presidency under the Constitution," attorneys wrote.
A lawsuit over similar records revealed last month that Republican activists Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed key figures in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal landed more than 100 meetings inside the Bush White House.
The Post cited those records, which were released to the Democratic Party and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, as evidence that the documents should be released.
Thousands of U.S. Troops Are Being Held Back From Overseas Duty Because of Debt
ABC News
Troops' Debt a Growing Security Concern
AP Enterprise: Thousands of U.S. Troops Are Being Held Back From Overseas Duty Because of Debt
By THOMAS WATKINS
The Associated Press
SAN DIEGO - Thousands of U.S. troops are being barred from overseas duty because they are so deep in debt they are considered security risks, according to an Associated Press review of military records.
The number of troops held back has climbed dramatically in the past few years. And while they appear to represent a very small percentage of all U.S. military personnel, the increase is occurring at a time when the armed forces are stretched thin by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"We are seeing an alarming trend in degrading financial health," said Navy Capt. Mark D. Patton, commanding officer at San Diego's Naval Base Point Loma.
The Pentagon contends financial problems can distract personnel from their duties or make them vulnerable to bribery and treason. As a result, those who fall heavily into debt can be stripped of the security clearances they need to go overseas.
While the number of revoked clearances has surged since the beginning of the Iraq war, military officials say there is no evidence that service members are deliberately running up debts to stay out of harm's way.
Officials also say the increase has not undermined the military's fighting ability, though some say it has complicated the job of assembling some of the units needed in Iraq or Afghanistan.
The problem is attributed to a lack of financial smarts among recruits; reckless spending among those exhilarated to make it home alive from a tour of duty; and the profusion of "payday lenders" businesses that allow military personnel to borrow against their next paycheck at extremely high interest rates.
The debt problems persist despite crackdowns on payday lenders and the financial counseling the Pentagon routinely offers to the troops.
Data supplied to the AP by the Navy, Marines and Air Force show that the number of clearances revoked for financial reasons rose every year between 2002 and 2005, climbing ninefold from 284 at the start of the period to 2,654 last year. Partial numbers from this year suggest the trend continues.
More than 6,300 troops in the three branches lost their clearances during that four-year period. Roughly 900,000 people are serving in the three branches, though not all need clearances.
The figures gathered by the AP represent just a piece of problem, because the Army which employs an additional 500,000 people and accounts for the vast majority of the 160,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan rejected repeated requests over the past month to supply its data, saying such information is confidential.
At Point Loma, Patton said clearance revocations in key areas such as military police forces have gotten so common that he often looks for two sailors to fill a single posting.
Still, Patton said he had never heard of anyone racking up bills to get out of combat. "There are folks who find ways of avoiding being deployed, as there always will be, but I've never seen any do it through finances," he said.
Security clearances are revoked when service members' debt payments amount to 30 percent to 40 percent of their salary. The exact amount depends on the military branch.
There are three levels of clearance confidential, secret and top secret. Not all troops need clearance. Marine infantrymen don't, but some Marine specialists, such as those in intelligence, do. So do many jobs in the Navy and Air Force.
Financial problems are the overwhelming reason security clearances are revoked. Other reasons include criminal activity, questionable allegiance and ill health.
A key reason the military revokes clearances on financial grounds is the fear that soldiers in debt might be tempted to sell secrets or equipment to the enemy.
Also, "when they are over there fighting, we like them to have their heads in the game," said Maj. Gen. Michael Lehnert, commander of Marine Corps bases in the western United States. "We like to have them ... not worrying about whether or not they are going to be able to make the mortgage payment or car payment."
Members of the brass also blame runaway interest rates at payday lending businesses, many of which are clustered outside bases around the country. Several states have cracked down on payday lending practices, and on Tuesday, President Bush signed legislation limiting how much these businesses can charge military personnel.
Some personnel fall into debt upon returning from combat.
"It can be hard to cut that sense of elation and desire to live for the moment," Lehnert said. "Some tend to get themselves overextended financially."
Also, when they go to war, they get combat pay, and none of their income is taxed. That can lead them to overspend when they come home.
Patton said that like other services, the Navy offers zero-interest emergency loans. Also, military personnel commonly take money-management classes as part of basic training.
"Every time we go in and do an indoctrination brief, there is instruction or training in place to give them some of the pitfalls of debt," said Terry Harris, a personal finance educator at the Pensacola Naval Air Station in Florida. "We do inform them about the pitfalls of security clearances being lost to that."
The increase in finance-related revocations could actually be a good sign it could reflect greater awareness among the troops, according to Chief Master Sgt. Rodney J. McKinley, the Air Force's highest-ranking noncommissioned officer.
"We have a few more people coming forward and saying, `Hey, I'm having some financial difficulty and need help,' versus going down the other path where they keep so quiet," McKinley said.
Associated Press Writers Pauline Jelinek in Washington, Melissa Nelson in Pensacola, Fla., and Estes Thompson in Raleigh, N.C., contributed to this report.
Arkansas Governor Criticized for Concentration Camp Joke on Radio Show
ABC News
Ark. Governor Criticized Over Joke
Arkansas Governor Criticized for Concentration Camp Joke on Radio Show
By ANDREW DeMILLO
The Associated Press
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Republican Gov. Mike Huckabee drew criticism from a Jewish Democratic group Friday for jokingly crediting his 100-pound weight loss to a stay in a concentration camp.
Huckabee, who is considering a run for president in 2008, made the comment Wednesday on Don Imus' radio show after the host told him he looked "emaciated."
"I have just come out of six weeks at a concentration camp held by the Democrat Party of Arkansas in an undisclosed location, making a hostage tape," Huckabee said. "That's why I look that way."
A spokesman for the National Jewish Democratic Council said Huckabee should apologize.
"It's insensitive, and we think making light of the Holocaust isn't something any elected official should be doing," said David Goldenberg, deputy executive director of the Washington-based group.
Huckabee denied the comment was a reference to the Holocaust or a slight against Jews.
In a statement issued through his spokesman, he said he has visited Israel nine times and taken groups to Israel's Holocaust memorial, and "I have a great deal of respect for the Jewish people."
"I never identified a particular kind of camp, and to make such a far-reaching statement is laughable and is the type of allegation that makes people cynical," he added.
Huckabee, who now weighs around 185 pounds, has written a book about his weight loss and has emphasized health, diet and exercise as governor.
Callers to Imus' radio show, also telecast on MSNBC, were challenged to guess Huckabee's heaviest weight (290 pounds). The winner won $1,000.
Huckabee, who is prevented by term limits from running again and leaves office in January, has been visiting early presidential battleground states such as Iowa and New Hampshire.
Thus Spake Zarabushtra
Huffington Post
Jayne Lyn Stahl
Thus Spake Zarabushtra
Wouldn't it be nice if the news came with an expiration date, especially where the president's speeches, or should I say "proclamations," are concerned? Yes, proclamations is a better word for this commander-in-chief's utterances as he is no more open to debate than Napoleon was. Moreover, he is no more willing to talk truth, or negotiate with the American people than he is with the leaders of North Korea and Iran.
Indeed, Mr. Bush seems to demonstrate an amazing ability to conveniently forget that he was elected, as well as that elected officials give news conferences, and not public declarations. Moreover, his habit of warping distinctions between terms like "prisoner of war" and "enemy combatant," "strategy" and "tactic" defies not logic, but common sense.
So, for an administration whose clam to fame was pre-emptive, or offensive foreign policy to be on the defensive, and on the front page of the news almost as much as on the front lines of combat, is clearly not what they had in mind when they cooked up, along with Tony Blair, a pretext for invading, and occupying a sovereign state. (The Downing Street Memo). And, indeed, if Abraham Lincoln is best remembered for the Emancipation Proclamation, future generations (if there are any) may best remember The Downing Street Memo when they think of the 43rd President of the United States.
And, talk about defying logic, how is it that, less than 24 hours ago in a "brief interview" with the Associated Press, Mr. Bush insisted he will not change "strategy" in Iraq, and about 4 hours later at a local CVS drug store, he said he would consider "if a change in tactics is necessary to combat the escalating violence." Is this doublespeak, or if White House Press Secretary Tony Snow gives his blessing to this distinction, does it hold up?
How is it that one can change "tactics" without changing strategy? Assuming, for a moment, that one can change tactics without altering strategies, would it be asking too much to insist that this administration be more specific as to what it means to change tactics, as well as what its current strategy in Iraq is? On October 17th, Senator Barbara Boxer wrote a letter to James Baker, chair of the Iraq Study Group, urging that they release the study group's recommendations for a change of course in Iraq, but this president has demanded that results of this independent assessment be put on hold until after the midterm election.
Is it possible that this president just might be rethinking his Iraq policy, or thinking his Iraq policy? Or, can it be that the label "flip flop" which Dick Cheney slapped on candidate John Kerry, in the 2004 election, has come back to haunt Mr. Bush; will our great-grandchildren think of him, ironically, as President Flip Flop when it comes to Iraq?
We should be so lucky. To vacillate requires critical thinking, a propensity this commander-in-chief has yet to demonstrate. Remember, nobody could ever accuse Macbeth, or George W. Bush of flip-flopping; Hamlet maybe, but not Macbeth.
Yet, just this morning in a hugely publicized meeting with top generals in the White House, Bush apears to be practicing what was the alleged art of his former opponent in 2004, John Kerry, with respect to reviewing "Iraq strategy...amid increasing election-season pressure to make dramatic changes to address deteriorating conditions" in that country. (AP) While the White House claims that today's meeting is routine, they've created enough spin to make a spider dizzy. This morning, Condoleezza Rice, the president's next door neighbor in the state of denial, has said only "I wouldn't read into this somehow that there is a full-scale push for a major re-evaluation," (AP) and right she is. The only thing this administration is engaged in is a "full-scale push" for re-evaluating whatever tactics it needs to best bring about a Republican victory at the polls in November.
Yes, as I sit here writing this, our president sits at a conference table in the Roosevelt Room to discuss a possible change in battle plan with Donald Rumsfeld, and Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine General, Peter Pace, the same Peter Pace who, less than 48 hours ago in Miami, defended Rummy's leadership by saying "He leads in a way that the good Lord tells him is best for our country." It appears from the general's statement that, while our illustrious military has yet to find any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, they've come upon some dynamite pot. Moreover, one can only wonder how it is that the "good Lord," after visiting with Mr. Rumsfeld, hasn't paid a visit to Abu Ghraib, or the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay lately, or over the past half dozen years, and if he has why hasn't He come up with other ideas for the secretary of defense's public service?
The good news, I guess, is that at least the Joint Chiefs of Staff didn't say the president himself "leads in a way that the good Lord" tells him to; the president, mind you, clearly takes his orders from a higher sauce (er, source).
Consider the irony, too, that this wartime meeting of generals is taking place in the Roosevelt Room; FDR would, no doubt, be rolling around in his grave were he to be there, or at the CVS pharmacy yesterday where the president stopped off not to pick up his daily minimum requirement of Viagra, but to proclaim that "Millions of seniors are benefiting" from his Medicare plan, as well as that his "compassionate approach to health care is working for America's seniors;" (AP) indeed many more of whom are going to bed hungry every night so that they can get their prescriptions filled.
Yes, these are strange times indeed when the Joint Chief of Staffs says our secretary of defense takes commands from the Lord while, just yesterday, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, a lawyer was sentenced to jail for contempt of court when uttering the word "Lord" during a trial. What would our friend Franklin Delano Roosevelt have to say about that? Or Thomas Jefferson? Or Benjamin Franklin? Where is their much-touted separation of church and state? In the same circular file as Iran-Contra memos of Oliver North? Bush pere? Or, in the one Richard Nixon used to deposit memos about planning Watergate we have yet to see, and never will. What would all those who signed the Declaration of Independence have to say about a military on a mission not unlike that of Joan of Arc, or the Great Crusades?
Aren't we glad that the president is meeting with the higher arcanum of generals, this morning, so that we can get another news release telling us that he has, yet again, decided to "stay the course," and as he proclaimed in his weekly radio address: "The last few weeks have been rough for our troops in Iraq, and for the Iraqi people...The fighting is difficult, but we have seen difficult fights before. In World War II and the Cold War, earlier generations of Americans sacrificed so that we can live in freedom." Was the Cold War fought by soldiers, and on a battlefield? If so, where?
Wasn't the Cold War a conceptual battle, a showdown between opposing ideologies like the so-called "War on Terror?" Is there a difference between flesh and blood combat, and a clash of ideology? Can we afford, as a civilization, to blur the line between the two? Can we accept leadership, whether it be for two years or two minutes, that confuses hand to hand combat with a clash of ideas?
More to the point, how dare a commander-in-chief refer to "a loss of life" (AP) as if "life" were a commodity. Somebody needs to tell this president that we have lost hundreds of thousands of human lives (plural) in this battle, and that life is not a collective noun. Do you think, for a moment, that Winston Churchill or Franlin Roosevelt ever, for a moment, thought about combat mortality as an abstraction? For a president to approach changing military tactics, and/or strategies, in much the same way as one would talk about changing manicurists is madder, and more precarious, than any assertion of deus ex machina, however ludicrous, his Joint Chiefs of Staff can make.
Proclamations aside, taking liberties with language aside, we must remember that election was not intended to be a quick fix, or a panacea, but a blueprint for change. We must not ask for change; we must demand it.
Google's New PAC Skews Republican
Google's New PAC Skews Republican
San Jose Mercury News
Looks like Google's been watching Fox News — its new Google NetPAC, launched last month, made contributions to three Republicans congressional candidates, according to the San Jose Mercury News. The Merc's Frank Davies reports $1,000 contributions to each of Reps. Heather Wilson of New Mexico, Deborah Pryce of Ohio, and James Sensenbrenner, head of the House Judiciary Committee and sometime gavel-wielding control freak. At least two of the candidates, Wilson and Sensenbrenner, have porfolios that implicate the use and regulation of the Internet.
Three of Google's new lobbyists were drawn from Republican ranks:
Jamie Brown, former legislative liaison in the Bush administration, and former GOP senators Connie Mack and Dan Coats (Davies does not mention what proportion of Google's lobbying staff that comprises). According to Davies, in the past Google executives have donated "overwhelmingly to Democrats and liberal groups" (he also notes that Google employees skew Democratic). Google lobbyist Alan Davidson says PAC donations are intended for the building of "long-term relationships with policy-makers" supported "across party lines." To that end, Google also donated $1,000 each to two Democrats candidates, Rep. Anna Eshoo* of Palo Alto (where Google HQ is located) and Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan. More here.
What If Joe Lieberman Gave the Senate Back to the Republicans?
Huffington Post
Cenk Uygur
What If Joe Lieberman Gave the Senate Back to the Republicans?
Just think about this very real possibility for a second: The Democrats win back the Senate by a one vote margin after a mighty struggle. They pull off a stunning victory in Tennessee, they put away Missouri and Ohio, they win everywhere else and they retain New Jersey. And then they walk back into the Senate, Joe Lieberman switches sides, and everything that we have all worked for goes to absolute waste!
If you thought we hated Lieberman now, wait till you get a load of us then. There is no possibility that is more disheartening and more repulsive - and, unfortunately, more real.
I don't have enough sources to say for sure that he will do this. But there are substantial indications. He is already furious with the rest of his Democratic colleagues for not supporting him in the general election against Lamont. He already agrees with the Republicans on every major foreign policy issue. He even went out of his way last week to say he would vote for John Bolton.
Stop and think about that for a second. John Bolton is the most extreme nominee the White House has sent up to the Senate in the last six years - and that is saying a lot! He couldn't get confirmed to be our ambassador to the UN twice because Republicans - who have rubberstamped everything this administration has done - stopped him twice.
Bolton was the only person who did not make it through the Republican rubberstamp machine. And Lieberman is threatening to undermine the Democratic unity and Republican revolt on Bolton by voting for him.
That speaks volumes. That means even if Lieberman doesn't formally caucus with the Republicans, he will vote with them on every single foreign policy issue - and then some. It was Republicans who blocked Bolton twice (along with the unified Democratic stance) - and Joe would go beyond the Republicans to make sure Bolton gets through.
With Lieberman in the Senate, even if all the Senate races break for the Democrats, the White House will still get their way on every foreign policy issue. You wonder why we fight so hard against this wolf in nonpartisan clothing. I'm afraid Lieberman thinks that nonpartisan is another word for Republican.
Lieberman still says that he would vote to invade Iraq again knowing all that we know now. That's maniacal. He says he would have run the war better if it was up to him. Oh I see, so they would have thrown roses at our feet if Joe had run the war?
Anyone who looks at Iraq now and thinks the invasion was a good idea is either insane or a Republican. Which one is it, Joe?
But it's not just foreign policy issues. Remember Lieberman worked hard to make sure the most extreme judicial nominee sent up by the White House, Sam Alito, was not filibustered. Afterward, Alito sent James Dobson a glowing thank you letter. I wonder if Joe got one, too. He should have, there was no one more helpful to making sure Alito got on the bench.
Is there any chance the next Bush nominee to the Supreme Court (if that dreadful possibility comes to fruition) will be blocked by the Democrats if Lieberman is still in the Senate? I would guess not.
I just can't get over the idea of a Democrat in Connecticut voting for this guy. I find it mind boggling. But now when you add the possibility that Joe will cross over and hand the Senate back to the Republicans, it becomes unthinkable. Are the Democrats of Connecticut really going to hand the Senate back to the White House? That seems inconceivable. Will someone please explain to them what they are about to do.
I can see it now. Dick Cheney throws his arm around Joe Lieberman and says, "Your president needs you. We're at war and this is not the time to be undermining US leadership. Joe, you have to vote with us on this critical national security issue."
Who in their right mind thinks Joe Lieberman is going to say no to that?
All this hard work and it can be flushed down the drain because of one guy. If you know anyone who lives in Connecticut, please talk to them and don't let them make this mistake. It's not just about them, it's about all of us. It's about the direction of this country. In order for the Democrats to effectively challenge this administration and win back the Senate, Joe must go!
German neo-Nazis rally outside Berlin jail
Reuters
German neo-Nazis rally outside Berlin jail
BERLIN (Reuters) - A group of 750 neo-Nazi sympathisers demonstrated outside a Berlin jail on Saturday against the detention of the singer of an outlawed rock group.
German police said several hundred anti-fascists chanting "Nazis raus" (Nazis go away) were separated from the rally by police. There were no incidents of violence.
The far-rightists were protesting the detention of an obscure singer, Michael Regener. He also goes by the name "Lunikoff".
He was sentenced in December 2003 to three years and four months in jail after a court ruled his band "Landser" was a criminal organization that spread racial hatred. He began his sentence in April 2005 after losing legal appeals.
Some protesters carried posters reading "Freedom for Lunikoff" as they marched near the Tegel prison in northwestern Berlin.
Israel's ambassador to Germany, Shimon Stein, said in an interview published on Saturday in the Neue Osnabruecker Zeitung newspaper he was concerned that Jews were not feeling safe in Germany. "They are no longer able to pursue their Jewish way of life here freely," Stein said.
Saturday, October 21, 2006
Osama with a Bomb -- Republicans Go with the Dirty Daisy TV Commercial
Huffington Post
Blake Fleetwood
Osama with a Bomb -- Republicans Go with the Dirty Daisy TV Commercial:
This weekend the Republicans will go with their -- "Osama with a bomb" television ad.
Osama is Coming! Osama is Coming! Osama is Coming!
"These are the Stakes."
This ad harks back to the powerful anti-Goldwater ad of the 1964 presidential campaign: the message was that if you vote Republican, you will get blown up by an atom bomb. Republlican Barry Goldwater was successfully portrayed as a war monger and Lyndon B. Johnson won an overwhelming majority. The original Daisy ad received massive news coverage and has become an icon of negative political advertising. The transcript:
SMALL CHILD [with flower]: One, two, three, four, five, seven, six, six, eight, nine, nine ....
MAN: Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one, zero.
[Sounds of exploding bomb.]
JOHNSON: These are the stakes: To make a world in which all of God's children can live, or to go into the darkness. We must either love each other, or we must die.
ANNOUNCER: Vote for President Johnson on November 3rd. The stakes are too high for you to stay home.
The current message is, if you vote for the Democrats, you are going to get blown up by the boogeyman. The problem is Republicans have $100 million to drive home this message.
Democrats demounced this "fear and smear" attack ad and called it "A shameful ad invoking the image of despicable terrorists to scare the American people."
The Democrats must go to a more forceful rapid media response.
Political jujitsu is the art of taking the opponent's best issue and turning it against him,
So when the commercials scream:
Terror! Terror! Terror!
Democrats have to turn the word Terror into Bush Terror for the voters.
Headline the message that the Republicans have made this an unsafe world, that Bush, like Goldwater, is going to get us blown up.
The Democrats need to remind voters that Terror has gotten worse because of the Bush policies, that the threat of violence comes from Bush's provocative policies.
Make them think:
How come Bush didn't get Osama in the first place?
Every time the Republicans evoke fear by broadcasting a picture of Osama, the reaction should be:
How come Osama is still out there?
Is a bomb coming because of where Bush has taken us?
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