Our 100 Days

Robert Borosage of The Huffington Post grades our role as citizens during Obama's first 100 days in office. Again, it is a mixed bag.

29 April 2009

May 9: Endangered Species

The Obama Administration has until May 9th to unilaterally roll back the devestation wraught by the Bush Administration to the Endangered Species Act. I encourage you to let the administration know that you want these protections for the environment reinstated. You can add your name to the cause here.

28 April 2009

The First 100 Days

Robert Kuttner has an interesting take on Obama's first 100 days as president at The Huffington Post. It is a decidedly mixed bag for the president.

27 April 2009

Addition: Arianna Huffington offers her take on this same topic here.

Cashing in on MLK

It is sad that I have rarely -- if ever -- heard a kind word about the children of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Most stories indicate that they are selfish, conniving individuals. Typifying this is a new account of their actions by George Washington University professor Jonathan Turley. I mention it now only because I learned new information from Turley dealing with the planned Washington memorial for King in DC. Yuck.

26 April 2009

Torture & the American Psyche

New York Times columnist Frank Rich has written a great op-ed about how everyday Americans are confronting -- or in many cases, refusing to confront -- the fact that our government under the Bush Administration orchestrated and carried out a system of torture. What is more, it was a system of torture designed not to keep us safe, but to further purely political ends.

Five years after the Abu Ghraib revelations, we must acknowledge that our government methodically authorized torture and lied about it. But we also must contemplate the possibility that it did so not just out of a sincere, if criminally misguided, desire to “protect” us but also to promote an unnecessary and catastrophic war. Instead of saving us from “another 9/11,” torture was a tool in the campaign to falsify and exploit 9/11 so that fearful Americans would be bamboozled into a mission that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda. The lying about Iraq remains the original sin from which flows much of the Bush White House’s illegality.

Levin suggests — and I agree — that as additional fact-finding plays out, it’s time for the Justice Department to enlist a panel of two or three apolitical outsiders, perhaps retired federal judges, “to review the mass of material” we already have. The fundamental truth is there, as it long has been. The panel can recommend a legal path that will insure accountability for this wholesale betrayal of American values.

President Obama can talk all he wants about not looking back, but this grotesque past is bigger than even he is. It won’t vanish into a memory hole any more than Andersonville, World War II internment camps or My Lai. The White House, Congress and politicians of both parties should get out of the way. We don’t need another commission. We don’t need any Capitol Hill witch hunts. What we must have are fair trials that at long last uphold and reclaim our nation’s commitment to the rule of law.

I would recommend reading the entire piece here.

26 April 2009

Bea Arthur

I just came home from an evening with friends to the sad news of Bea Arthur's death. I am a huge fan of Arthur. She was a wonderful comedian, who had made me laugh all of my life. "Maude" was truly groundbreaking work and the cast of "Golden Girls" still has me in fond stiches from time to time. If you don't find Arthur funny, you simply don't know funny. I'm glad that I'll still get to enjoy her work in reruns, but I'll miss her nonetheless.

25 April 2009

26 April 2009 Addition: More on Arthur here.

US Torture and the Media

Arriana Huffington has another interesting piece out today, this time on the media coverage of the use of torture by the United States. Rather, it is really about how our media isn't covering the topic... or at least not that well.

23 April 2009