Sheriff Bouchard Pro-Torture

Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard is opposed to John McCain’s anti-torture bill.

…Bouchard said appropriate interrogation methods are necessary to keep the country safe.

"There are a variety of methodologies that can be used in interrogations," said Bouchard. "With proper training, we can bring forth information, but we need the tools."

McCain believes that Americans should “hold ourselves to humane standards of treatment of people no matter how evil or terrible they may be. To do otherwise undermines our security, but it also undermines our greatness as a nation. We are not simply any other country. We stand for something more in the world — a moral mission, one of freedom and democracy and human rights at home and abroad.”

Sheriff Bouchard needs to define what kinds of “tools” he thinks are appropriate in dealing with interrogations. In the meantime, try not to get arrested in Oakland County; human rights don’t mean much there.

[Hat tip: Michigan Liberal]

Tonto's Revenge

Robert Scheer believes the Republicans have pretty much lost the moral high ground.

Call it Tonto’s revenge: The outrageous rip-off of Native American tribes by a top Republican lobbyist is leading inexorably to a reckoning for the allegedly morally superior religious and political right.

“I don’t think we have had something of this scope, arrogance and sheer venality in our lifetimes,” Norman J. Ornstein, of the conservative American Enterprise Institute, wrote in Roll Call. “It is building to an explosion, one that could create immense collateral damage within Congress and in coming elections.”

Selling firewater to the natives—or in this case charging them $82 million for government breaks on slot machine and other gaming licenses - is not exactly what the high-minded prophets of the Republican revolution promised. And to see behind the scenes as Christian right superstar Ralph Reed, bought off by top Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, dupes his grassroots “pro-family” followers into unwittingly supporting casino-rich Indian tribes under the guise of anti-gambling initiatives, is to glimpse moral corruption of biblical proportion.

The web magazine Truthdig is working on connecting the dots on Abramoff’s web of corruption. The list of charges and accusations is lengthy, but of course so is the depth of the GOP corruption.

Abramoff has been a good friend to the GOP. But as the list of bad deeds and dirty connections grows by the day, watchers are worrying that this friendship is incompatible with a healthy democracy.

Incompatible? That's an understatement.

Help Wanted 75-100K

Would you like to earn up to 100K a year? Well, dust off that resume. Kellogg, Brown & Root may be the answer to your dreams – or quite possibly the nightmare you’ll never wake up from.

According to In These Times, KBR is holding job fairs to find workers to fill positions in Iraq ranging from chefs, electricians, mechanics, medics, laundry, pest control, construction and water purification workers. The pay ranges from $75,000 to $100,000 a year — with the first $80,000 tax-free if you last an entire year. They currently have between 50,000 and 60,000 people in Iraq with orders to keep sending 200 to 300 more a week – with no end in sight.

The cardboard display on the table outside the hotel conference room promotes benefits like "integrity," "adventure" and "pride," but "the money is the big draw," says Dale, another of about 60 KBR hopefuls at this afternoon’s session, which consists of an hour-and-a-half long presentation by Peter Howatt, a recruiter with KBR’s special projects group. Six other recruiters out in the hallway sift through resumes while Howatt lays out a far more realistic scenario than the military presents to army recruits. "We don’t pull any punches," Howatt told In These Times. "People know exactly what they are getting themselves into."

For the most part, the Vietnam veteran stays true to his word. In the first 10 minutes of his talk, Howatt provides his audience with the official KBR contractor death toll in Iraq and Afghanistan (68 at the time). He tells the applicants that they’ll be working 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, with 10 days off every 4 months. After a short film showing construction of a tent city in the desert, he advises the room full of military veterans, former Halliburton/KBR employees and average Joes and Jills (complete with a crying baby in the back) that if they are killed in an NBC (nuclear biological or chemical) attack and their remains are contaminated, they won’t be flown home to their families. Instead, they will be cremated.

But heads perk up at the mention of salary, and Howatt’s sales pitch to the group is tight: "If you owe back taxes, call the IRS, tell them you are gonna go overseas, make a ton of money, and they’ll be glad to let you go. Same with child support."

With 200,000 job applications on file, the KBR recruiter admits the poor economy “adds to our ability to go out and attract the right people.” It probably doesn’t hurt any that as of January 1, starting pay in the U.S. army will only range from $15,282 to $27,464 per year.

UPDATE: It appears that KBR is behaving just like any other typical corporation - they're outsourcing jobs. According to the United Press International, the U.S. military has paid Halliburton subsidiary KBR about $12 billion so far for logistics support and KBR in turn "hires subcontractors whose job it is to recruit, transport, house, feed and pay "third-country" nationals to stock, prepare, serve and clean up at the dining facilities at 43 bases across Iraq."

Most of the workers are deemed unskilled and work seven days a week for 12 hours a day, according to their contracts, one of which was obtained by United Press International. In practice, workers said in interviews, most only work six days a week.

There is no provision for sick leave. Any employee who threatens a strike or attempts to organize is subject to immediate dismissal and the employee required to pay for his return plane ticket.

For this they are paid $150 a month, roughly 45 cents an hour.

Salaries are deposited in bank accounts in Africa so the money is available to the workers' families.

The workers also get a $40 a month cash allowance on top of that, but the contract states the money is a gift, and the amount discretionary and may be eliminated.

This whole scenario stinks, but you can bet your last dollar Kellogg, Root & Brown executives will make out like bandits.

It Really Is True

...you CAN fool some of the people ALL of the time.

[Hat tip: Shakespeare's Sister]

Bear in mind, this is a Fox News poll, but still:

[S]ome Americans think there are still weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. A 42 percent plurality thinks Iraq had weapons before the war and moved or destroyed them, while 28 percent think there were no WMD at all. Almost one in five (19 percent) think there are still WMD in Iraq.

The poll also revealed that "the long-standing polarization between the parties continues, as there are almost as many Republicans that approve of the job Bush is doing (78 percent), as there are Democrats that disapprove (80 percent)."

Like I said at the beginning, you can fool some of the people all of the time - and I'm not talking about the Democrats.

Fair Tax Reform

Economist Dean Baker pushes for tax reform that treats income equitably a la Ronald Reagan '86.

The key idea behind the ‘86 reform was not to lower tax rates, but to eliminate loopholes. It also took a key step that stands in opposition to the current flavor of Republican tax breaks. The ’86 tax reform treated all types of income—wage income, capital gains, dividends and rents—the same way. This meant that a person who earned $70,000 from working would pay the exact same tax as someone who got $70,000 in dividend checks or who made $70,000 in profit on stocks.

Taxing all income the same way meant that there was no money to be made by gaming the system—for example, by disguising wage income as capital gains income. Reagan proudly boasted when he signed the bill that people would now make money by working and investing, not gaming the tax code.

Compare this to the type of reform being pushed by the Bush administration.

This spirit behind this approach to taxes runs counter to the current tax cuts being pushed by President Bush and the Republicans in Congress. Sen. Frist, in particular, has pledged that he won’t bring back a conference committee on the tax cuts to the Senate floor without the capital gains and dividends provision. Frist and his colleagues think it’s unfair that people who get money from dividends or profits on stock pay the same tax rate as people who earn their living working as truck drivers or schoolteachers. The Republicans want to extend their tax breaks from 2003, under which the maximum tax rate on dividends and capital gains would be just 15 percent. This compares to the 25 percent rate paid by many middle-income workers.

Republicans claim that most Americans would benefit from tax breaks on dividends and capital gains because so many people are now stockholders. However, this claim is misleading. The vast majority of shareholders own very little stock that would benefit from a tax break.

Most people hold their stock in 401(k) type retirement accounts. The money earned in these accounts is taxed as normal income after retirement, regardless of how it was earned. This means that when a schoolteacher or firefighter pays taxes on the dividends earned by the stock held in their 401(k)s, they will pay the standard tax rate—quite possibly 25 percent. The special 15 percent tax rate is reserved for that relatively small group of wealthy people who have substantial stock holdings outside of retirement accounts.

Our tax code should treat workers and investors the same; to treat them differently smacks of class discrimination. However, that's precisely the message the GOP seems to be sending: Americans fortunate enough to sit around all day and live off of their trusts funds deserve more tax relief than hard-working Americans who bust their tails to go to work everyday.

Fatherly Advice

The one single theme of the Bush presidency that bothers me the most is his faith, or actually the way he lives his faith. He shows great concern for issues like abortion, but he turns his back on the poor struggling to provide basic needs for their families. In other words, Bush talks the talk, but he doesn't walk the walk when it comes to his faith. Extreme evangelicals may be on his side, but more and more mainstream Christians are starting to speak out and challenge the president to act on his faith.

A tongue-in-cheek rebuke of Bush is online at the Society of Mutual Autopsy in the form of a letter from Bush's father. Bush Sr. is concerned that his son may in fact be a true follower of the Gospel, and he warns him not to do anything that may tick him off.

Dear Son,

I hear from Uncle Dick that you're going through yet another rough patch. Chin up! Remember what I've been telling you all these years: God Helps Those Who Help Themselves to Everything. Now, we Bushes have certainly helped ourselves to gazillions, and God has truly blessed us in return. After you said God told you to invade Iraq, remember how Pat Robertson gave you God's blessing? You are truly blessed my Son. I made sure of that.

Now, I know what it's like to be down in the polls. Let's not forget '92. But if you're feeling a bit low, why not watch Joel Osteen instead of reading your Bible? Granted, this fellow Texan is a bit too touchy-feely for my taste, but he does say that the Lord is all about success. I'm sending you his upbeat #1 New York Times bestseller, "Your Best Life Now." Soon you'll be experiencing victory, joy, and happiness every day of your life!

As you know, mum was a bit disturbed when you decided to leave the family's Episcopal faith for that middle-class Methodism. And while I would never proclaim Jesus Christ as my favorite philosopher, I got to admit that move really helped secure your political base with the righteous Republicans.

But I just heard from your mother you're so despondent that you actually got down on your knees and decided this time to really commit your life to Christ and, God forbid, the tired, the poor, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Please tell me this isn't so. I didn't pay good money to get your fanny on Easy Street just so you could go off and pull a Dorothy Day or a Martin Luther King Jr. I thought I taught you better than that. Please, son, stop with this loony discipleship business before you embarrass the entire family.

After all we've done for you, how can you give up your ranch, your SUVs, and your cozy, cash-cow bedmate, Halliburton? Not to mention that brand new $100,000 set of digitally engineered cheat-to-win golf clubs I gave you on Father's Day. How else do you think you've been making all those birdies? I know you, son, and you have a habit of rushing into things without thinking about the long-term consequences. And if you choose to follow Christ, it's going to have eternal consequences.

You can kiss goodbye to fun - and you know how much you like to have fun. No more two-month long vacays. No more $200,000-a-plate barbecues. You'll be out there fighting for peace, and all you'll get is war and destruction. To quote Luke 12:51-53, "Do you suppose that I came to give peace on earth? I tell you, not at all, but rather division. For from now on five in one house will be divided: three against two, and two against three. Father will be divided against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother." These are definitely not Bush family values.

Now I hear you're facing pressure to abolish the death penalty and end the war in Iraq. Please, my son; focus on Leviticus 24 with its call for "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" instead of this "turn the other cheek" crap. Between you and me, Jesus wasn't always the sharpest knife in the drawer. Just look at the riff-raff He chose as his disciplines. Uneducated fishermen who are nothing but welfare bums, a tax collector turned raving liberal, two hotheaded rowdy youths nicknamed "sons of thunder" and a political activist a.k.a. terrorist. Would you want untouchables like these to enter the halls of the Yale Club?

Uncle Karl says you've been talking about running around Washington D.C. loving God with all your heart and soul and loving your neighbor as yourself. Have you no decency? Have you no shame? Never, ever, has a Bush fed the hungry, clothed the naked, welcomed the stranger, and visited those in prison. We have a family tradition to uphold, after all.

Finally, I can't afford to have you sell all of your possessions, give the money to the poor, and chuck the presidency of the greatest nation on earth. Please son, I'm retired. I need the tax cuts you promised me.

Now, my Prodigal Son, it's time to come back to the fold. A place is waiting for you at the National Prayer Breakfast. After all, the Bible does say, "Honor thy father and mother," and despite what Christ says, I am your father.

Signed,
Poppy

Pappy Bush forgot a line: "Never, ever, has a Bush attended a funeral for a soldier killed in war."

Jesus Is the Reason, Except in Washington

Three weeks from today is Christmas Eve - the night of our dear Savior's birth - and millions of homes across the country will decorate Christmas trees in His honor, except for Washington. Our politically correct Capitol decorates a "Holiday" tree in honor of - well, I don't know what they honor exactly, maybe gross consumerism that enriches corporations and drains household pocketbooks?

There is one person in Washington who wants to return the emphasis where it belongs, House Speaker Dennis Hastert. [Hat tip: Think Progress]

House Speaker Dennis Hastert has decided to mark the season by loudly insisting that the Capitol’s decorated spruce be called a “Christmas tree,” as opposed to a “Holiday tree.” He is right on this point. It is a Christmas tree. And while the Speaker may consider his action a “work,” the message of Jesus means more.

The message of Jesus IS important and that message is that faith without works is dead. If we celebrate the birth of Christ as a Christian nation, but act in ways that neglect the needs of the poor, then we are a nation of hypocrites.

If Speaker Hastert really wants to put Christ back into Christmas, he should start by joining a long list of religious leaders in supporting a budget that isn’t balanced on the back of the poorest and most vulnerable.

Before the House went on Thanksgiving break, it passed $50 billion in spending cuts that target millions of poor and working-class Americans... The Congressional Budget Office estimated the House bill “would cut food stamp benefits by about $45 a month for 225,000 people” and that 40,000 children would lose their eligibility for free meals at school. At the same time, conservatives are seeking to “extend several of Mr. Bush’s biggest tax cuts, including those on stock dividends and capital gains” — over half of the benefits from those cuts go to people earning over $1 million per year.

Hastert should heed the true spirit of Christ by caring for the vulnerable. As Jesus reminds us in Luke 4:18-20, by following his example we can “bring good news to the poor.”

Washington has an opportunity to act with Christian charity and restore the spending cuts. I pray they will listen to their hearts and do what's right.

Vote For Wal-Mart Slogan

Take action and help choose the slogan that will further expose Wal-Mart's high costs to America! Vote for the slogan that you'd like to see published - and publicized - on a prominent billboard less than a mile from Wal-Mart's Bentonville, Ark., World Headquarters.

The deadline is Sunday, December 4th, 11:59pm EST, so VOTE today.

When you're done, come back and tell me your favorite slogan. I voted for "Profits for China, Foodstamps for Americans!"

"Duke" Gets the Royal Treatment

Duke Cunningham cried and blubbered after pleading guilty to charges of fraud and conspiracy, but that frown will soon be replaced by a smile. Cunningham will keep his government pension and could retain the privileges enjoyed by other former members of Congress according to The Hill. Unbelievable. The man serves in the House for 17 years, but after admitting to tax evasion, conspiracy and accepting $2.4 million in bribes, he will be allowed to keep his taxpayer funded pension.

What a double standard. Average Americans should have it so good. [Hat tip: The Carpetbagger Report]

Here's the pitch voters should hear: A corrupt congressman has more retirement security than you do.

About a month ago, PBS's NOW with David Brancaccio did a very disturbing piece on the crumbling pension system for millions of American workers.

Currently, 44 million Americans are enrolled in traditional defined benefit pension plans. Here's how they're supposed to work: during your working years, your employer is supposed to set aside money on your behalf, with the promise that they'll pay you a monthly benefit when you retire. But there's a problem: looking to save money today, many companies aren't setting aside enough money for the retirees of tomorrow.

Bradley Belt calls that "underfunding." Add it all up, he says, and the shortfall for America's pension plans is staggering.

How staggering? It's a $450 billion problem.

When Duke Cunningham can count on his congressional pension, but workers at United Airlines can't, it's time for Congress to take a look at this issue.

Maybe its time to do something about those "legacy costs" in Washington.

Declining Status in the World

The midwest has always been known as the industrial engine of our country, and manufacturing jobs have traditionally paid good wages and benefits, which in part helped create a strong middle class. The tide has been turning for some time though, particularly for the auto industry, and the standard of living workers once enjoyed is rapidly disappearing. We’ve lost our industrial edge, and our image and standing in the world have suffered as a result. America is no longer #1 in terms of industrial might.

The U.S. is losing its edge in other areas too. The Christian Science Monitor points to these troubling indicators:

As 2005 draws to a close, foreigners hold about $3 trillion (yes, that's trillion) in US dollars, Treasury bonds, and other government securities such as Fannie Mae mortgages. Two-thirds of this is held by four Asian countries - Japan, China, Taiwan, and Korea. It is a mark of confidence that foreigners are willing to put so much of their money into our money, but the cumulative result is that foreigners are acquiring huge claims on American assets. This is the stuff of nightmares for US economic policymakers worrying about what would happen if the Asians should decide to cash in their dollars all at once. Worse, what if the Asians decided, as the US has sometimes done, to use their economic clout for political purposes?

It’s not just the foreign deficit we need to be worrying about either; our federal deficit has skyrocketed.

It used to be said that budget deficits didn't matter because we owed the money to ourselves. But that is no longer true. Both as a government and a people, we are living beyond our means…

We need to have a national debate about the federal budget. This should not be a repetition of the silly argument in which Republicans accuse Democrats of taxing and spending and Democrats accuse Republicans of neglecting the poor in favor of the rich. The budget is our main tool for allocating resources and setting national priorities and values…

The other part of budgetmaking is taxes. Tax policy is deciding who pays how much for the costs of the budget. Tax policy can also be used for social purposes, that is, the redistribution of wealth…

At the same time, we have to adjust to a changing world. We don't know how to deal with globalization. The Chinese, on their way to becoming a world power, don't know how to deal with the clash between a liberalizing economy and an authoritarian political system. General Motors, long the world's biggest automaker, is threatened in that position not by Ford, not by Volkswagen, but by Japanese Toyota. And this comes on the eve of the 64th anniversary of Pearl Harbor. Better an economic than a military threat, but the irony remains.

An economic threat may be less painful in terms of death and destruction, but how long can we hold onto our military might if we lose our economic superiority? The USSR is a perfect example of a country that lost its military edge when its economy faltered. Is that the future of this country?

And what is the future for millions of Americans who already live in poverty? What about the millions without health care? We need to raise taxes and reduce spending in ways that reflect our national values, but I don’t believe most American’s values include bankrupting our country on the backs of the middle and lower classes while enriching the coffers of corporations and the upper class. We CAN do better for the people in this country. The question is: What are we waiting for?