Republicans Broke Law to 'Guard' Convention

The ACLU of Minnesota, following on the discovery of a document by Wikileaks.org, reveals how the Republican Party used federal forces in efforts to "protect" the 2008 Republican National Convention from such threats as anti-war protesters, free speach advocates, etc.

Revealing RNC document leaked
For Immediate Release
November 21, 2008

The American Civil Liberties Union recently came across a revealing RNC Homeland Security Document. This official document was uncovered by the website Wikileaks, which according to its website "We help you safely get the truth out". This document outlines the planning leading up to the Republican National Convention and how security forces would be working together during the RNC. Many federal, state and local organizations were mentioned in this document, a number of which the ACLU did not know were involved. A number of these agencies are military based, which may directly conflict with Federal law that prohibits the military from engaging in domestic intelligence gathering.

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), is one of the organizations that is mentioned in the report that is particular cause for concern. NGA provides mapping tools and imagery intelligence that are obtained from the United State's military spy satellites which are controlled by the National Reconnaissance Office. In other words during the RNC, these top spying tools could have been utilized to gather intelligence on the homes of activists and media workers who were a part of the demonstrations. That information could have then been relayed to local officials.

A second agency that was involved in the planning is the Pentagon's Northern Command, NORTHCOM. Having NORTHCOMM at the table, assisting in the planning is troubling because it could mean that the military was involved in the crowd control strategies and dealing with potential civil unrest. According to a report in Army Times, it said that an active military unit has been deployed by NORTHCOM in the United States. This deployment marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment within U.S. Borders.

Furthermore it appears that the FBI may have been using a station faking technology that would allow them to locate an individual through their cell phone. The ACLU is concerned with how this technology is used and if there was proper judicial oversight. In the USA Patriot ACT, this process for obtaining a track was made easier, and could allow for little to no judicial oversight. This tracking via cell phones could have been used during the RNC without the knowledge of even the phone companies.

"These behaviors are a radical departure from separation of civilian law enforcement and military authority, and could, quite possibly, represent a violation of law," said Teresa Nelson, ACLU of Minnesota. The ACLU-MN will continue to investigate and will use their findings in future lawsuits against law enforcement officials.

Naomi Klein on Bush's Exit Crimes

Naomi Klein has an excellent essay on the Bush and Republicon campaign to loot the United States Treasury, rob from the American people, and in general rape and pillage this nation, something they've been doing anyway since at least the Reagan years.

Klein specifically addresses the theft of bailout funds, a multi-pronged Republicon strategy beginning with the absence of any real control over how recipients spend the funds on to gross overpayment by Paulson and on and on.

In the final days of the election, many Republicans seem to have given up the fight for power. But that doesn't mean they are relaxing. If you want to see real Republican elbow grease, check out the energy going into chucking great chunks of the $700 billion bailout out the door. At a recent Senate Banking Committee hearing, Republican Senator Bob Corker was fixated on this task, and with a clear deadline in mind: inauguration. "How much of it do you think may be actually spent by January 20 or so?" Corker asked Neel Kashkari, the 35-year-old former banker in charge of the bailout.

When European colonialists realized that they had no choice but to hand over power to the indigenous citizens, they would often turn their attention to stripping the local treasury of its gold and grabbing valuable livestock. If they were really nasty, like the Portuguese in Mozambique in the mid-1970s, they poured concrete down the elevator shafts.

The Bush gang prefers bureaucratic instruments: "distressed asset" auctions and the "equity purchase program." But make no mistake: the goal is the same as it was for the defeated Portuguese--a final frantic looting of the public wealth before they hand over the keys to the safe.

How else to make sense of the bizarre decisions that have governed the allocation of the bailout money? When the Bush administration announced it would be injecting $250 billion into America's banks in exchange for equity, the plan was widely referred to as "partial nationalization"--a radical measure required to get the banks lending again. In fact, there has been no nationalization, partial or otherwise. Taxpayers have gained no meaningful control, which is why the banks can spend their windfall as they wish (on bonuses, mergers, savings...) and the government is reduced to pleading that they use a portion of it for loans.

What, then, is the real purpose of the bailout? I fear it is something much more ambitious than a one-off gift to big business--that this bailout has been designed to keep pillaging the Treasury for years to come. Remember, the main concern among big market players, particularly banks, is not the lack of credit but their battered share prices. Investors have lost confidence in the banks' honesty, and with good reason. This is where Treasury's equity pays off big time.

By purchasing stakes in these institutions, Treasury is sending a signal to the market that they are a safe bet. Why safe? Because the government won't be able to afford to let them fail. If these companies get themselves into trouble, investors can assume that the government will keep finding more cash, since allowing them to go down would mean losing its initial equity investments (just look at AIG). That tethering of the public interest to private companies is the real purpose of the bailout plan: Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is handing all the companies that are admitted to the program--a number potentially in the thousands--an implicit Treasury Department guarantee. To skittish investors looking for safe places to park their money, these equity deals will be even more comforting than a Triple-A rating from Moody's.

Insurance like that is priceless. But for the banks, the best part is that the government is paying them--in some cases billions of dollars--to accept its seal of approval. For taxpayers, on the other hand, this entire plan is extremely risky, and may well cost significantly more than Paulson's original idea of buying up $700 billion in toxic debts. Now taxpayers aren't just on the hook for the debts but, arguably, for the fate of every corporation that sells them equity.

Interestingly, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac both enjoyed this kind of unspoken guarantee. For decades the market understood that, since these private players were enmeshed with the government, Uncle Sam would always save the day. It was the worst of all worlds. Not only were profits privatized while risks were socialized but the implicit government backing created powerful incentives for reckless investments.

Now, with the new equity purchase program, Paulson has taken the discredited Fannie and Freddie model and applied it to a huge swath of the private banking industry. And once again, there is no reason to shy away from risky bets--especially since Treasury has not required the banks to give up high-risk financial instruments in exchange for taxpayer dollars.

To further boost confidence, the federal government has also unveiled unlimited public guarantees for many bank deposit accounts. Oh, and as if this wasn't enough, Treasury has been encouraging the banks to merge with one another, ensuring that the only institutions left standing will be "too big to fail." In three different ways, the market is being told loud and clear that Washington will not allow the country's financial institutions to bear the consequences of their behavior. This may well be Bush's most creative innovation: no-risk capitalism.

There is a glimmer of hope. In answer to Senator Corker's question, Treasury is indeed having trouble dispersing the bailout funds. It has requested about $350 billion of the $700 billion, but most of this hasn't yet made it out the door. Meanwhile, every day it becomes clearer that the bailout was sold on false pretenses. It was never about getting loans flowing. It was always about turning the state into a giant insurance agency for Wall Street--a safety net for the people who need it least, subsidized by the people who need it most.

This grotesque duplicity is an opportunity. Whoever wins the election on November 4 will have enormous moral authority. It can be used to call for a freeze on the dispersal of bailout funds--not after the inauguration, but right away. All deals should be renegotiated immediately, this time with the public getting the guarantees.

It is risky, of course, to interrupt the bailout. The market won't like it. Nothing could be riskier, however, than allowing the Bush gang their parting gift to big business--the gift that will keep on taking.

Bailout for BONUSES!

Weegee. "The Critic", November 22, 1943. The war was on. We were still in the Depression. Look familiar?

The sheer Audacity of Greed. This is why the architects of Christianity invented Hell. There has to be some place where justice is finally meted out to evil monsters who steal from us and run organized crime machines like Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Lehman, Bank of America, and on and on. The People need some assurance that sooner or later these revolting worms will get what the United States government is absolutely unwilling to do. Thus Heaven for the poor, Hell for the leaches who make us poor. (1)

What am I raving about? The Boneses for Wall Street execs. Bloomberg news has a report on the BILLIONS being set aside by Goldman Sachs and others to kick back to their financial charlatans this holiday season.

My guess is that Michael Bloomberg, if he says anything, will support these kickbacks. First, these thieves are his friends. Second, for years it has been their obscene pay — and theirs alone — that has sustained the broader obscenity of New York City real estate prices.

Things were already bad. Over a year ago, reports flashed across the journalistic radar of the multimillion dollar party that Blackstone head Stephen Schwarzman had thrown for himself. But now We the People are pulling their asses out of the fire. We get laid off. We lose our homes. And they get bonuses totalling billions and billions of dollars. Perhaps Andrew Cuomo or someone with a comparable sense of decency will go after these beasts. We can be sure it will not be anyone in Washington, DC, including, I suspect, Barack Obama if elected.

The Schwarzman 60th birthday bash in 2007 included $1 million for Rod Stewart. Schwarzman, a Republicon, has said, "I don’t feel like a wealthy person."

I'm trying to imagine some historical or fictional representation of the poor or regular people coming upon the trappings of wealth.

Perhaps A Night To Remember — the classic 50s film about the sinking of the Titanic — when the steerage passengers, initially barred from reaching lifeboats (fact), finally break through the gates and pass through the first class areas of the ship.

Or perhaps the experience of the French peasants on overthrowing Louis XVI and seeing, however briefly the staggering wealth of the monarchy (before the Reign of Terror and Robespierre et al. tried to make themselves monarchs in all but name) .

It should bring tears to our eyes. Or rage. But most Americans seem unmoved. Rather, people lionize, idolize — American Idolize — the rich. "Future, Heaven of the poor" said poet W. S. Merwin. "In the Future, I'll win the lottery, become a star baseball player, an actor. I'll be rich, so they are my peers." Needless to say, the rich do not agree. Years ago, when I lived in Boston, a report emerged during a surge of public opposition to a very modest tax increase: Of those who bought lottery tickets, most spent more on lottery tickets than they paid in taxes each year. Such is the state of our delusions.

For a moment, we were moved by the bailout, moved to flood Congress with calls and emails. So the first pass at a bailout bombed. But now it's old news. And people like "Joe the Plumber" — middle class people — can still seriously fret over 'tax and spend' Democrats, as if a lottery win were just around the corner, just about to make us millionaires and catapult us into the party with Michael Bloomberg, Stephen Schwarzman, Henry Paulson.

Where are our tears? If We the People have no sense of decency, how can we condemn the self-appointed UberVölk of Congress and Wall Street?

---

---

NOTES

1. I don't know much about the intellectual history of Western religion, but it has always seemed to me that religion played a terribly important role in mollifying a possibly restless serfdom. "Things suck now, and the Lords live off the fat of our labour, but someday we will be rewarded for our suffering." Thus the religious class taught the poor while, of course, allowing the rich to buy their 'indulgences' for entry to Heaven.

Today, the religious class roughly parallels the politically powerful. (Not quite right, because we worship before the feet of the corporate elite, too.) The rich corporate Titans buy their indulgences in the form of bribes (called campaign contributions) to politicians.

I don't think it's any coincidence that, as times have gotten worse in recent years and particularly as disparities in the distribution of wealth of grown ever more extreme, people are turning more to religion. Increasingly, Americans are abandoning any hope of a good life and praying instead for a good life after.

2. New York Times essayist and conservative idiot Ben Stein has some vaguely relevant blather about a year ago. It should surprise none that he was dead wrong on very nearly every point. But he has a cool Ivy degree and that annoying delivery, so he must have been right even though he was wrong. That's religion, folks.

3. The Bride Wore Ritzy. New York Times, 22 April 2008

$150,000 For Palin's Clothes in Three Months

The "real American" is now a clothes horse for a wardrobe costing THREE TIMES what the average American makes in one year. And the Republicons spent this in three months.

Truth Really Is Stranger

I thought I had outdone the braindead bigots of the McCain-Palin campaign, but here is proof otherwise. At a rally in Minnesota, an attendee with a placard comparing Obama to Charles Manson.

Try getting into a Republican rally of any kind with so much as a button questioning any aspect of Republicon bullshit and you'll be stopped. So there is no doubting that officials allowed this placard in. And clearly, from the video, neither Todd Palin nor Norm Coleman said a word in criticism.

Coleman is at left, Palin at mike. Coleman is arguably one of the stupidest people ever to occupy a senate seat, and you'd be surprised how stupid many of them are — or maybe you wouldn't. (And I don't mean stupid in some hollow, rhetorical sense. Many of these members are remarkably ill-informed, and incapable of grasping anything beyond the simplest ideas.)

OBAMA KIDNAPPED THE LINDBERGH BABY!

Republicons, led by John McCon and Sarah Plain, are pulling out the stops. Desperation will do that. Remember that this is a guy who tells us that experience — most especially the experience of Vietnam — has prepared him for all the troubles that might come down upon us. But McCon is acting more like the folks in a Hollywood spoof. PANIC! PANIC! He and Sarah are running around like the sky is falling.

So here's a partial rundown of the charges:

• Obama is a socialist.
• Obama is a mole for "jihadis"
• Obama is a crypto-Muslim
• Obama would let people like Mohommed Atta get a driver's license
• Obama is palling around with terrorists
• Obama pals around with uppity blacks like Jeremiah Wright
  

Who's this supposed to win over? Reagan Democrats — also known as "racists"? Barefaced, unabashed racists — also known as "Conservatives"?

Clearly, McCon and his Eva Braun need a little help. So it's time for a contest:

WHAT CAN OBAMA BE BLAMED FOR?

There need to be some ground rules:

1. Obama can only be blamed for events since 1900. Dred Scott decision is impermissible (bad example anyway, because McCain/Palin support Dred Scott). Benedict Arnold is right out.
2. Obama can only be blamed for events that will happen before the sun goes nova. End of the universe is off limits.
3. No dead languages, please. Welsh, Aramaic, French — all fine. No Etruscan.
4. Please avoid glaring contradictions (all other contradictions are fine). So blaming Obama for the US getting into Vietnam and for losing Vietnam is a stretch.
5. If you do feel compelled to blame Obama for something unusual like, say, the Crucifixion of Christ, please make it plausible — Obama will need a time machine.
   

Submitting your candidates (candidates, get it? . . . I made myself laugh)
Example:

Or . . .

"OBAMA SPEAKS IN TONGUES!"

Write your suggestion on the most offensive postcard you can find and mail to:

John McCain 2008
P.O. Box 16118
Arlington, VA 22215

Or call 703-418-2008

Send in your idea and if McCain wins,
you get a "Special IRS Audit". So it's a win-win!

The November Not-So-Surprise

2000 — The Republicons, through one of two or three worst Supreme Court decisions in American history, successfully pulls off a Very American Coup.

2004 — Diebold and the Ohio Secretary of State deliver the state of Ohio's electoral votes to the Bush imperium.

2008 — Across the country, the Republicon Party is working to intimidate voters, strike voters from the rolls, and otherwise set the stage for another coup.

Steal Back Your Vote. We can combat the Republicon campaign to destroy the Constitution and democracy.

Believe it. Check former Republican LA District Attorney Vincent Bugliosi's essay in The Nation.

See also:

Bruce Ackerman. "Anatomy of a Constitutional Coup", London Review of Books. 8 February 2001.

John McCon Conquers the Republicons!

Does that McCon 'promise' to 'suspend' the campaign already sound terribly old. Here is the little tin dictator meeting the little tin conman for a nice little not-a-campaign photo-op.

The Nation has more on the latest Republicon con.

Senator McCon Chickens Out

Senator McCain claims he has the best interests of the nation at heart by putting his campaign "on hold" to attend to the resolution to the financial crisis. What a crock. McCain's chicken-out is another cynical campaign gimic. He's afraid. He's worried his meds won't be sufficient to contain his temper in debate. And he's worried that he'll take a pastin' at the hands of a significantly better debater.

Whoever has the Least Will Pay the Most

Republicons Use Racist Language (Again) to Describe Obama

Lynn Westmoreland, Republicon of Georgia has referred to the Obamas using classically racist language. In April, Kentucky Republicon Geoff Davis (Geoff as in Jeff as in Jefferson?) referred to Obama with similarly racist language: "That boy's finger does not need to be on the button."

From the McClatchy story:

A Republican lawmaker is facing criticism over using the racially charged term "uppity" to describe Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, on Thursday.

Rep. Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia used the word in a conversation with reporters just outside the House chamber about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and Michelle Obama.

According to The Hill newspaper, a Washington publication, Westmoreland said, "Just from what little I've seen of her and Mr. Obama, Sen. Obama, they're a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they're uppity."

Westmoreland has distinguished himself in other ways:

- 2005: distributed a memo to fellow members of Congress. The memo copied verbatim points lobbied for by the auto industry.

- Co-sponsored a bill to place the Ten Commandments in the House and in the Senate. Yet, when he appeared on the Colbert show, was only able to name three of those Commandments (presumably the three he's violated).

- Dropped out of college (frankly, that doesn't mean much).