MoJo Sections: Politics

Droning On

By Tom Engelhardt — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 13:28:14 -0800

This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

For drone freaks (and these days Washington seems full of them), here's the good news: Drones are hot! Not long ago—2006 to be exact—the Air Force could barely get a few armed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in the air at once; now, the number is 38; by 2011, it will reputedly be 50, and beyond that, in every sense, the sky's the limit.

Better yet, for the latest generation of armed surveillance drones—the ones with the chill-you-to-your-bones sci-fi names of Predators and Reapers (as in Grim)—whole new surveillance capabilities will soon be available. Their newest video system, due to be deployed next year, has been dubbed Gorgon Stare after the creature in Greek mythology whose gaze turned its victims to stone. According to Julian Barnes of the Los Angeles Times, Gorgon Stare will offer a "pilot" back in good ol' Langley, VA, headquarters of the CIA, the ability to "stare" via 12 video feeds (where only one now exists) at a 1.5 mile square area, and then, with Hellfire missiles and bombs, assumedly turn any part of it into rubble. Within the year, that viewing capacity is expected to double to three square miles.

Tea Partiers' Next Target: The Climate Bill

By Stephanie Mencimer — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:07:26 -0800

The Tea Party movement earned its stripes at town hall protests this summer by claiming that Democratic health care reform efforts would result in defenseless grannies being hauled before "death panels." Now the tea partiers have a new target—the cap-and-trade legislation moving through Congress—and new, unlikely victims to protect—the poor.

One of the key recruiting tools in conservative activists' push against the climate bill is a recent documentary called Not Evil, Just Wrong. The film styles itself as the latest conservative answer to Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. It has no commercial distributor, but instead debuted on an October 18 webcast heavily promoted by social conservative organizations like Focus on the Family and the American Family Association, as well as local Tea Party groups. Organizers claimed the online premiere attracted some 400,000 viewers.

Now the tea partiers are calling for local chapters to host screenings on November 21. An Escondido, California, branch recently invited members to a "record-setting international Cinematic Tea Party," in terms reminiscent of a social justice rally: "Join the Resistance against the extreme environmentalism that threatens the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of millions of people in the developed and developing world; this is the new road to poverty in America." (To facilitate these screenings, the filmmakers are selling a "Platinum Party Pack" on their online store, which for $99.95 gets you all the fixings for a rockin' party: invitations, T-shirts, posters, and even a small red carpet.)

Red carpet notwithstanding, Not Evil is unlikely to garner its creators, a pair of Irish former journalists, any Oscar nominations. The film is poorly organized and rehashes the familiar talking points of climate change deniers—global warming as bad science; climate concerns as hysteria akin to that over killer bees, etc. Pushing those views are the usual suspects, including Patrick Moore, the Greenpeace founder turned nuclear power lobbyist, and Thatcher-era British politician Sir Nigel Lawson.

Where Not Evil differs slightly from the standard denialist script is insistence that cutting carbon emissions will hurt the poor. "For too long, with environmentalists, it's not enough about people," says Ann McElhinney, one of the filmmakers, in an interview. "Is it warming? Is it cooling? Who knows? Is it caused by us? There's even more disagreement about that. All of these things should be about people. We should be fighting for the poor."

The Price of Health Reform: Abortion Rights?

By Rachel Morris — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:08:57 -0800

Will health care reform come at the expense of abortion rights? The Democrats’ historic health care bill squeaked through the House on Saturday only after pro-life forces scored a major victory. Despite months of wrangling over the public option and the price tag, in the end the legislation’s fate turned on an eleventh-hour push by conservative Democrats to broaden the bill's existing limits on government funding of abortion, in the form of an amendment authored by Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.). Here’s what happened and what it means:

Where Will They Get the Troops?

By Dahr Jamail and Sarah Lazare — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:57:34 -0800

This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

As the Obama administration debates whether to send tens of thousands of extra troops to Afghanistan, an already overstretched military is increasingly struggling to meet its deployment numbers. Surprisingly, one place it seems to be targeting is military personnel who go absent without leave (AWOL) and then are caught or turn themselves in.

Hidden behind the gates of military bases across the US, troops facing AWOL and desertion charges regularly find themselves in the hands of a military that metes out informal, open-ended punishments by forcing them to wait months—sometimes more than a year—to face military justice. In the meantime, some of these soldiers are offered a free pass out of this legal limbo as long as they agree to deploy to Afghanistan or Iraq—even if they have been diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

In August 2008 at TomDispatch.com, we reported on the deplorable conditions at the 82nd Replacement Barracks at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. There, more than 50 members of Echo Platoon of the 82nd Airborne Division's 82nd Replacement Detachment were being held while awaiting AWOL and desertion charges. Investigations launched since then—in part in response to our article—have revealed that the plight of members of Echo Platoon is not an isolated one. It is, in fact, disturbingly commonplace on other bases throughout the United States. And it is from these "holdover units," filled with disgruntled soldiers who have gone AWOL, many of whom are struggling with PTSD from previous deployments in war zones, that the military is hoping to help meet its manpower needs for Afghanistan.

Is Congress Creating Another Housing Bubble?

By Nick Baumann — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 03:00:04 -0800

Though the deeply divided Congress can't seem to agree on much these days, the House and Senate did manage to come together this week, with nearly unanimous votes, to extend an $8,000 first-time home-buyer tax credit. But among economists of various political persuasions, there's widespread agreement on the Obama-backed bill: It's a horrible policy that could wind up prolonging, if not worsening, the housing crisis.

"When governments at the state and local level are cutting back funding for everything from preschool education to nursing home care, the federal government is sending $8,000 checks" to home buyers who don't need assistance, says Dean Baker, the codirector of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. "It might be possible to develop a more warped economic policy, but it would not be easy." Mark Calabria, the director of financial regulation studies at the libertarian Cato Institute and a former Republican staffer on the Senate banking committee, agrees. "This is something where despite bipartisan opposition to it from experts, there seems to be massive bipartisan support for it on Capitol Hill," he says.

Ted Gayer of the centrist Brookings Institute issued what one CNN blogger described as a "smackdown" of the credit. Simon Johnson, the former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, and James Kwak, who writes a Washington Post column with Johnson, have called the credit "throwing good money after bad." And conservatives—Kevin Hassett, the director of economic policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, and Ronald Utt, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, have penned pieces slamming the home-buyer credit. Even the Obama-aligned Center for American Progress got in the act; Andrew Jakabovics, the think tank's associate director for housing and economics, criticized the credit's extension on National Public Radio.

The Tea Party's Takeover of the GOP

By Stephanie Mencimer — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:51:34 -0800

You have to hand it to Michele Bachmann: She has succeeded in turning the GOP into one big Tea Party.

This past weekend, the Minnesota Republican went on Fox News and called on viewers to show up on the Capitol lawn on Thursday at noon for a press conference and a last ditch attempt to kill health care reform. The gathering that resulted was marked by the now-routine extremism of the Tea Party conservatives. "I'm a bitter gun owner who votes," read one sign. Others questioned President Obama’s citizenship, portrayed him as Sambo, or called him a traitor. One said, "Obama takes his orders from the Rothschilds." Old ladies wore red T-shirts decrying "Obamao care." The crowd also took spirited swipes at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. At one point someone yelled, "Put down your Botox and show yourself."

But what was most noteworthy was that the entire House Republican leadership was also in attendance—and their rhetoric was just as over-the-top as some of the protesters. House Minority Leader John Boehner declared the health care bill the "greatest threat to freedom I have seen." In essence, Congressional Republicans were merging with a movement that gives open expression to racist and anti-Semitic sentiments.

Stimulus for Cotton Candy, Tango and a Fish Orchestra? Wacky, or Actually Worthy?

By Michael Grabell — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:39:36 -0800

This story first appeared on the ProPublica website.

Breakfast at Fuddruckers: $19.24.

Snow cone and cotton candy machine: $146.89.

Six extra preview performances of “Little House on the Prairie – the Musical”: $50,000.

Benefit to the economy? According to the recipients of this stimulus money: Priceless.

Last week, the federal government released the first comprehensive tally of the nearly $800 billion economic stimulus package. And while the White House has heralded marquee projects like road construction and solar panel factories, the stimulus package is also made up of hundreds of smaller purchases like office supplies, gasoline and lab rats.

Brodner's Cartoon du Jour: Mat-Soo

By Steve Brodner — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:05:36 -0800

Hideki Matsui. 2 RBI homer. 2 RBI single. 2 RBI double. His last night as a Yankee. But a Yankee for all time.

In Afghanistan, the Pentagon Digs in

By Nick Turse — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 10:03:53 -0800

This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

In recent weeks, President Obama has been contemplating the future of US military operations in Afghanistan. He has also been touting the effects of his policies at home, reporting that this year's Recovery Act not only saved jobs, but also was "the largest investment in infrastructure since [President Dwight] Eisenhower built the Interstate Highway System in the 1950s." At the same time, another much less publicized US-taxpayer-funded infrastructure boom has been underway. This one in Afghanistan.

While Washington has put modest funding into civilian projects in Afghanistan this year—ranging from small-scale power plants to "public latrines" to a meat market—the real construction boom is military in nature. The Pentagon has been funneling stimulus-sized sums of money to defense contractors to markedly boost its military infrastructure in that country.

In fiscal year 2009, for example, the civilian US Agency for International Development awarded $20 million in contracts for work in Afghanistan, while the US Army alone awarded $2.2 billion—$834 million of it for construction projects. In fact, according to Walter Pincus of the Washington Post, the Pentagon has spent "roughly $2.7 billion on construction over the past three fiscal years" in that country and, "if its request is approved as part of the fiscal 2010 defense appropriations bill, it would spend another $1.3 billion on more than 100 projects at 40 sites across the country, according to a Senate report on the legislation."

Igor Panarin's Doomsday Tea Party

By Nick Baumann — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:03:35 -0800

For more than a decade Dr. Igor Panarin, a Russian academic, has been predicting that sometime around 2010 the United States will collapse, splintering into separate states, some of them controlled by foreign powers. Outside of Russia, no one's put much stock in his crackpot and stereotype-based theories—until now, that is. Who are the newest members of the Igor Panarin fan club? Tea partiers who’ve rallied against the Obama administration's policies and blasted the president for pushing a "socialist" agenda. And he's especially big among tea party activists in Texas, who have hosted Panarin and promoted his work.

In Russia, Panarin, who hosts a weekly radio show, is considered a mainstream expert on the United States. Like Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, Panarin used to work for the KGB. He clearly has the support of the Kremlin, for he teaches at* the school that trains Russia's diplomats. And since the election of Barack Obama last November, Panarin has found a new audience in America among far right activists, many of whom believe Obama is destroying the country.