American Realistan

Where have I been, you ask? Sorry that I didn’t warn you prior to this, but I’ve been busy giving away the bride for the last week.

My daughter Zookeeper married the-future-Dr. Doolittle this last weekend, and everyone knows what the father’s job is. All-in-all, things went well in spite of my participation, and the happy couple is now off on their honeymoon.

Now I can get back to work toward the goal of ending the reign of King George of Crawford. I will have new posts up soon.

When James Taylor wrote “Sweet dreams and flying machines in pieces on the ground”, he could have had Air America in mind.

Air America’s 92 affiliates reach 2.4 million listeners per week (58 percent of the country!) through 19 hours of original programming a day, Mon-Sun 6a12m. These numbers should have meant that Air America would be successful economically.

But that wasn’t to be. In a press release Piquant LLC, which does business as Air America Radio, announced that it has filed for Chapter 11 protection in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York after “good faith efforts to resolve outstanding debt with a creditor from the company’s earliest days broke down.” Court documents showed that MultiCultural Radio Broadcasting Inc., a creditor with whom the network had tussled in its early days, had Air America’s bank accounts frozen.

You could hear the chortling from the wrong-wingers.

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If Abraham Lincoln was correct that America is truly a land governed of the people, by the people, and for the people, then California’s Proposition 1A [PDF] makes some strong moves to support his contention.

California raises only about $5.4 billion from gasoline and other motor fuels of the $20 billion spent each year by the state to maintain land transportation infrastructure of all varieties. This revenue is generated through two specific taxes: an excise tax of 18 cents a gallon, which is expressly restricted to funding the maintenance of transportation in California; and 6 cents worth of sales tax, which a previous proposition also limited to use for transportation maintenance.

I happen to be a proponent of the assessment of taxes for a specific purpose only, such as Prop 1A intends. When the people know what a tax is intended to fund, there is clear understanding of whether or not the intention of the tax is being met. This then makes it easier for people to be the watchdogs of their own government as our Founding Fathers envisioned. To do anything else leaves far too much unaccountable discretion which can be abused by our elected representatives to favor certain contributors with little recourse remaining to the people except to conduct a recall or await the subsequent election.

Proposition 1A is intended to tighten the regulatory language of the previous measures by limiting the ability of the state government to use these funds for other purposes.

One of these non-transportation uses was to replace rerouted education funding for primary education, which aroused opposition from State Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg, who decried that Prop 1A would oust education as the state’s primary budget priority.

I happen to be sympathetic to Goldberg’s complaint, but the opposition holds the trump.

Back in 2002, 70% of those voting decided that the priority for fuel tax revenues was to be transportation, and Prop 1A is intended to see to it that the will of the voters as expressed then isn’t subverted now, even by such a worthwhile goal as improved public education.

Ms. Goldberg will have to find a way to convince California voters to support education in another manner.

As a Californian myself, I strongly urge my California readers to support Prop 1A.

There are a couple of linked stories today that involve Catholic dogma.

Pope Ratzinger, Benedict XVI, is expected today to reject the concept of limbo, and Mark Foley is being challenged to name the Catholic clergyman who molested him when he was a young teen.

“He should absolutely report the perpetrator, living or dead,” said David Clohessy, national director of the 7,000-member Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. “He should do it now, not when his civil lawyer says it is convenient. Every day that a molester walks free is a day when he can hurt other kids.”

Foley better hope that Pope Ratzinger, Benedict XVI, finds that there’s no Hell also - he’s going to go there if what people imply about him proves to be true.

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Despite the pain that they feel over the murders of five of their children, the Amish community of Nickel Mines, PA, has taken the family of murderer Charles Carl Roberts IV under their wing.

A statement released by the Mennonite Disaster Service from one elder asked “Who will take care of the family? It’s not right if we get $1,000 and they get $5. We must set something up for these children’s education.”

The Anabaptist Foundation, which is assisting with collections at several Pennsylvania banks, received $14,623 in two days. Yesterday’s collections had not yet been tallied by afternoon, when tellers were still wading through some 500 pieces of mail, said foundation director Rich Lauer.

“The Amish are not asking for the funds, but they know they can be used well, and that sending them is part of the healing of other people,” Mr. Lauer said.

The money will be used for expenses including medical care and the transportation of families to see children hospitalized in Philadelphia and Hershey.

The Amish are as grateful for the help as they are unaccustomed to it, according to Elmer Stoltzfus, an Amish bishop from another part of Lancaster County. “These are innocent victims. It’s not their fault, it’s not their doing and they’ll be going through some suffering and grieving,” Mr. Stoltzfus said.

“It’s been a lesson in receiving help graciously. It’s part of life and it’s a lesson we all need,” he said.

Could you ever expect to hear something like this coming out of the loud mouth of a Jerry Falwell or a Pat Robertson?

Me neither.

Actress Sienna Miller may not ‘get’ Pittsburgh, but it has just become one of my Favorite Cities.

In an action which should be seen more often all across America, Florida’s Bu$hCo governor was forced to hide in a janitor’s closet while a protest against him and Rick Santorum was held in front of Pittsburgh’s Duquesne Club, where Bush was supposed to aid in a Santorum fund-raising effort.

Pittsburgh citizens held up signs with sayings such as “Pittsburgh is a Santorum Free Zone” and “Honk if you’re sick of Rick” while chanting “Jeb, go home” and “We don’t want you here!”

Jebbie the Butt managed to finally attend to event by entering the building through the servant’s entrance in the rear.

Bush aides had no comment concerning the report that Jeb asked what those “smelly containers we passed out back” were.

Protester - On To The White House!

Fair Use Notice is hiding in a workman’s chamber below the fold. (more…)

Judy Keen, USA TODAY reporter, is whining on behalf of the Republican Party that the Foley Affair has diverted attention away from the issues the GOP wants us to focus on for the coming election.I assert that by doing so, Keen is instead diverting attention away from issues the GOP would rather we forgot - like why Attorney General John Ashcroft announced July 26, 2001 that he would no longer fly commercial flights.

Ashcroft reportedly received the same briefing by July 17, 2001, that CIA Director George Tenet gave on July 10, 2001, when he attempted to alert Condoleeza Rice that a major terrorist attack on the United States was imminent.

I say that something got through to her, for the information was enough for unnamed Pentagon officials to cancel plans to fly on 9/11 (as reported by Newsweek), and may have played a role in the scheme of short-selling of airline stocks by unknown persons during that period as well.

It is becoming more and more clear all the time that the Bush Administration knew a whole lot more about the coming attack than they have to date admitted.

It’s time that the American people voted for the truth after five years of lies and outrages instead of more of the same - and maybe worse. They owe it to those who died to keep this country free - and to those who died on 9/11 in the name of oligarchic advancement.

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I happen to be in the middle of reading Woodward’s State of Denial, and he reports (p.45) that on June 3, 2001, Saudi Prince Bandar had dinner with George W. Bush, Colin Powell, and Condi Rice for the express purpose of explaining to them how the Arab world viewed the United States.

Bandar spent five hours to try to hammer into their thick heads that ” … moderate Arab countries, as well as the US, have lost the media war and the Arab public opinion. What the average Arab sees everyday is …Women, children, elderly … being killed by the Israelis” with American-made and -provided arms.

The specific phrase of Bandar’s to remember for this post is “lost the media war”.

Bandar did what looked logical to him. He went to the leader of this nation to protest that the Arab side of the story wasn’t being heard, and that there would be dire consequences. He was wasting his time. To explain Bandar’s specific problem, I’m going to paraphrase a stanza from Jesus Christ, Superstar:

Mohammad in 700 had no mass communication

Unlike the Arabs’ opponents, who have mastered the use of mass mail along with the political usage of the rest of the media world.

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