Last week was the 5th Annniversary of Bush's idiotic "Mission Accomplished" moment. And John McCain tried defending Bush, blaming it on the Navy. This led to a considerable amount of attention on John McCain's own suggestion that we should stay in the Iraq Quagmire for 100 years. Howard Dean in particular slammed McCain for his willingness to sacrifice American soldiers for oil profits for 100 years. Poor John McCain didn't like having people pick on him, so John "wimp" McCain began whining and complaining about it. Well, Mr. McCain, if you can't take criticism of a stupid policy, how the hell are you going to stand up to al-Qaeda? Oh, yeah...just like Bush you plan on wasting time, money, and lives in Iraq for 100 years rather than actually fighting al-Qaeda, the people who attacked us.

The Progressive Democrat Newsletter grew out of the frustration of the 2004 election. I have try mixing my own rants and ideas, with national issues, news items, and some very local groups and events in an attempt to both help shape debate and to help people find their own ways of getting involved.

This week I discuss a couple of major victories (one familiar to the dKos community, but only covering it now in my newsletter). I also continue to highlight the REAL Rudy Giuliani, countering some of his lies about 9/11/ I also do a roundup of local progressive events for places where I have had the most readers over the last couple of weeks. Don't forget to visit an advertiser or two and if you want more, please visit Culture Kitchen.

The Progressive Democrat Newsletter grew out of the frustration of the 2004 election. I have try mixing my own rants and ideas, with national issues, news items, and some very local groups and events in an attempt to both help shape debate and to help people find their own ways of getting involved.

This week I discuss the Republican led loss of privacy in America, bringing us down almost to the level of China in terms of Surveillance. I also discuss solar energy in America. I also do a roundup of local progressive events for places where I have had the most readers over the last couple of weeks including some events I am helping organize in NYC. Don't forget to visit an advertiser or two and if you want more, please visit Culture Kitchen.

Author Note. The following essay was co-authored with Coleen Rowley, retired FBI agent and former Minneapolis division counsel.

Among the most important public health advances of the past century has been the development of potent vaccines against dangerous and life-threatening illnesses. Polio, tuberculosis, and measles quickly come to mind. Through a process of inoculation, a small dose of the pathogen is intentionally administered to the patient which induces immunity against the full-blown disease.

In a similar way, social scientists have demonstrated that attitude inoculation can be used to prevent the transmission of hazardous beliefs and behaviors from one person to another. For example, research reveals that adolescents can more effectively resist pressure from cigarette-smoking peers if they are given role-playing opportunities in which they rehearse their responses to students pressuring them to smoke.

But today we are in urgent need of an inoculation campaign against an entirely different threat to our nation's health--namely, the Bush administration's exploitation of its "global war on terror" to eviscerate the rule of law and our constitutional checks and balances; to prolong the disastrous occupation of Iraq; and to lay the groundwork for military strikes against Iran. Ever since the tragic events of 9/11 six years ago, the White House has promoted this agenda by working non-stop to spread a simple yet infectious idea: All actions taken by this president and his representatives are necessary to protect the United States from future catastrophic terrorist attacks.

Just yesterday I delivered the bad news that a judge (a Bush appointee) denied the request of NASA scientists for protection against invasion of their personal privacy by the Federal Government. I mentioned that the case was under appeal. Those who have been following this story will know that this case directly affects my wife, who will also be required to waive her rights if she wants to work at a NASA facility even though none of the work she does is sensitive. This has been hanging over our heads for weeks now.

Well, in this case, the courts moved fast. The appeal has been successful and the Ninth Circuit Court has issued an injunction against the oppressive implementation of Homeland Security Presidential Directive #12.

The Progressive Democrat Newsletter grew out of the frustration of the 2004 election. Having organized protests against the Republican Convention, I found I had a core of activists who were looking to me for support after Bush "won" re-"election". My carefully thought out suggestions as to where we could go from that defeat led to this more-or-less weekly newsletter.

This week I discuss a very personal conflict with Homeland Security, which involved first bad news, then, on appeal, excellent news. Sometimes our court system works! I also cover the response our troops have for Rush Limbaugh, responses to Bush's opposition to healthcare for American children, and I discuss the situation in Burma. I also am finally getting back to some more local stuff including local events in NYC, a brilliant plan for winning in Colorado, and some local Virginia and New Jersey stuff. If you go to any of these articles, please click on some advertisements because that helps me keep doing this!

The Progressive Democrat Newsletter grew out of the frustration of the 2004 election. Having organized protests against the Republican Convention, I found I had a core of activists who were looking to me for support after Bush "won" re-"election". My carefully thought out suggestions as to where we could go from that defeat led to this more-or-less weekly newsletter.

This week I discuss a very personal conflict with Homeland Security. Yes...my wife is at the center of a battle for our Civil Liberties and my diary about that on Culture Kitchen went platinum with WELL over 12,000 reads in one week. I also cover recent Republican attacks on our troops, Rudy Giuliani's campaigns disguting exploitation of 9/11, and I put out a personal appeal to you to help us here in NYC take one more Congressional seat: NY-13.

This is taken (with links to the full thing) from a series on Culture Kitchen and Daily Gotham describing my own family's ongoing experience with Bush's paranoid America. The original story is a three-part (to date) story which has been picked up outside the blogsphere, but not so much within the blogshere.

Since parts are a Culture Kitchen exclusive, I will mainly excerpt here with links the original diaries. The basic jist of the series is this: every single Federal employee is now to be treated as if they work on sensitive projects requiring extensive background checks. All Federal employees are being asked to sign blanket waivers giving up their basic rights so that the government can investigate every aspect of their personal life should they deem it necessary for any reason. Keep reading...

The topic below was originally posted in my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal as well as the Independent Bloggers Alliance, the Peace Tree and Worldwide Sawdust.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

So reads the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights. However, the Constitution does not prevent employers from encroaching upon the free speech of their employees. Even so, most Americans assume their right to free speech is protected in all aspects of their life - including their jobs. The reality is quite different.

I once stated that Earth In The Balance was Al Gore's soul on paper. This book is then his heart, and it is well worth the read.

I was pondering just yesterday the plight of Mr. Buttle. How many of us are going to end up just like him; tortured to death because of a typo? See I can never decide what's worse. The loss of our civil liberties or the mind numbing incompetence of the people in whom our precarious freedoms are entrusted.

Here's what brought this to mind. Yesterday my internet service was out for most of the day. In my frustration, I called Verizon, who owns all the pipe around here, and keeps it functioning about as well as the duct-work in Terry Gilliam's "Brazil." But when I called them, a customer service rep (the lot of them are the bane of my existence) told me that he could not tell me anything, because when I told him the name on the account, he insisted that I was wrong. I explained, "A bill manages to find its way here every month and we pay it." This confused him terribly. I asked him if the name on the account was the one for which we receive a myriad of calls; the previous owners of our dialing digits... yes. Well that explains why we're getting so many wrong numbers six months later. So I was gaffed off because of a data entry error by the same company that left us without phone service for a month when they botched our order. I loathe Verizon.

In Al Gore's magnificent treatise on government and the excesses of presidential power that he delivered a year ago, he used the phrase, "the consent of the governed." He called those of us who are the governed to seek within us the same spirit that steered our forefathers through the tossed and stormy seas of great change to birth a nation to now guide us to a new "golden age." His words were daring, bold, brave, visionary, and at the same time reminiscent of that very spirit that first saw us fighting an empire and changing the course of history. They were words that made me proud for the first time in a long time to be an American.

Howard Zinn
Born On This Day In 1922

If those in charge of our society - politicians, corporate executives, and owners of press and television - can dominate our ideas, they will be secure in their power. They will not need soldiers patrolling the streets. We will control ourselves.

Howard Zinn

On a shelf above my computer is an old, very fragile, dog eared paperback copy of "A Peoples History Of The United States." The pages are turning yellow and the binding is dried out and broken. Every time I open it I have to make sure that I put the pages back in the correct order.

I bought it back in the early 80's and it has been with me ever since. I've read it cover to cover several times and referred to it on countless occasions over the years.

In the early nineties, I believe it was in the spring of ninety two, after the second or third reading I was moved to write the author a letter of thanks.

I thanked him for writing a book that I wished that I had the talent, insight and energy to write and for his struggles in the civil rights movement in the 60's as well as his significant struggle against the war in Vietnam.

Much to my surprise and delight, a few weeks later I received a two page letter of reply, thanking me in return and encouraging me to continue to write and remain politically active. We corresponded perhaps twice more and spoke on the phone once. He was very gracious and I was thrilled to have the opportunity to speak with someone I admired so greatly.

There are many Americans that I have admired in my life, there are some that I have looked upon as heroes, but none more so than Howard Zinn.

Mr. Zinn is a true American hero. A young man who answered his country's call to arms in World War Two and took his personal knowledge of the madness and horror of war and inhumanity and turned it into a life that would become a fight for peace and social justice.

Bob Higgins

Worldwide Sawdust

Robert Birnbaum, who took the excellent photograph above, interviewed Howard Zinn a few years ago.

Read it here: Robert Birnbaum talks with the author of A People's History of the United States

More on Howard Zinn

Wikipedia Article on Howard Zinn

It's time to tell Dick Cheney to stick "9-11" up his nose. It's been over 5 years since, and that is still his old standby excuse for every little, different thing.

What makes a good candiate? Groups like Emily's List and Working Families Party have a tendency to look to the candidates who have money, whose skills are in fundraising. Some people seem to think only lawyers can be effective politicians. And some simply think all candidates are pretty much the same and despair of finding excitement in supporting a candidate.

I don't buy any of those. I do get excited about candidates. They do not tend to be the ones who are supported by big money interests, and they are not always lawyers, but they are the candidates who are smart, articulate, and good on the issues. But there is one thing more that really makes a candidate kick ass. Dedication to the community. In some ways this may be the thing that can break through racial, cultural and political divides, because a candidate who proves him or herself to the community can get broad support: black and white, rich and poor, liberal and moderate. I want to discuss just such candidates.