Uh-oh. Here we go again:

'President Bush increased the administration's pressure on Iran on Saturday, saying there were indications that the country was speeding forward in its production of a key ingredient for nuclear weapons fuel, a move he said was "a very serious matter'' that undercut Iran's denials that it was seeking to build weapons.'

I just hope we demand a little more hard evidence this time, before we let Bush & Co. start dropping bombs.

I saw Control Room this weekend: phenomenal. What is most compelling about it is how clearly it shows the complexity of war, and the media's roles in war, and the complexity of the relationships between the Arab world and the Western world.

This made me step back and realize that there are no right and wrong sides in this situation. It's been so easy, I think, to become subsumed in a totalizing position on this war--distaste (er, hatred) for Bush & Co., and certainty that we should not be in Iraq, quickly balloon into a simplified perspective about all of it. Watching this movie drew out my understanding of the endless ambiguities, the impossibilities of rightness or wrongness in the Middle East right now.

Be very afraid.

Even Howard Dean hears the call for a more responsible media. From his speech at Yale for a "The Media and the Election: A Postmortem" symposium, he cracked the whip on our failing media institutions, pointing out that corporate ownership, and a too-heavy focus on entertainment, are making it impossible for the media to fulfill their role in the democratic process.

And another excellent article on media failures by Frank Rich. This one is, well, much more chilling. And I applaud him. We need to hold the media accountable, we need to point out their failures, and we need to make sure they stop happening.

Some words of wisdom regarding the networks from Alessandra Stanley. (And an example of my favorite kind of writing--humour and sarcasm as trojan horse for pointing out the very sad and pathetic parts of our political and popular culture.)

Hmm. Curious.

This is what I like to hear:

'In a conversation with the British foreign secretary, Jack Straw, Mr. Powell once referred in frustration to Mr. Cheney, Don Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz as "[expletive] crazies," according to a recent British biography of Tony Blair.'

And other fun tidbits from Kristof.

Christopher Hayes's article on undecided voters is both funny and painful. But the most significant point comes at the very end, after he's revealed just how little connection people have with politics, and how separate they believe it is from their lives. He writes,

As far as I can tell, this leaves Democrats with two options: either abandon
"issues" as the lynchpin of political campaigns and adopt the language of
values, morals, and character as many have suggested; or begin the long-term and
arduous task of rebuilding a popular, accessible political vocabulary--of
convincing undecided voters to believe once again in the importance of issues.
The former strategy could help the Democrats stop the bleeding in time for 2008.
But the latter strategy might be necessary for the Democrats to become a
majority party again.

This is not even a question in my mind, and the former suggestion not an option. Adopting non-policy-based language just to get candidates elected directly contradicts any efforts to seriously re-engage citizens in politics, and re-create that political language Hayes is talking about.

People were more engaged in politics, and shared a common language and understanding of how policy fit into their lives, up until the last twenty years or so. It is not impossible, although it's not easy, to bring this engagement back. But it's worth it, and if we allow the degeneracy of politics the Republicans have instituted to continue, with our blessing and collusion, it will just become harder.

Yet more proof that the right wing likes to use "ethics" and "morality" when it suits them, and disregard them when it doesn't.

The House is trying to change current rules so that a member who is indicted by a state grand jury can still hold a leadership position. It's assumed they're doing this so that, in the eventuality that DeLay is indicted in Texas, he can retain his leadership position.

Aha, but "House Republicans adopted the indictment rule in 1993, when they were trying to end four decades of Democratic control of the House, in part by highlighting Democrats' ethical lapses. They said at the time that they held themselves to higher standards than prominent Democrats..."

They claim that they're changing the rule now because DeLay's potential indictment is nothing more than political revenge by partisans in Texas. It's amazing how they can turn everything around and blame it on the Democrats.

Er, scary:

'Porter J. Goss, the new intelligence chief, has told Central Intelligence Agency employees that their job is to "support the administration and its policies in our work,'' a copy of an internal memorandum shows.
"As agency employees we do not identify with, support or champion opposition to the administration or its policies," Mr. Goss said in the memorandum, which was circulated late on Monday. He said in the document that he was seeking "to clarify beyond doubt the rules of the road."'

Does anyone know of any very thorough books on the history of CIA? I've become a bit obsessed in recent months (again, blame Chomsky). I'm reading The Cultural Cold War right now, which deals primarily with CIA propaganda campaigns after World War II, in Europe and elsewhere, to promote "liberty" and "freedom," as defined in a capitalist democracy. It's interesting, and includes a lot of history of the development of the Agency, but I want more.

Oh, gross. This is not the right way for the Democrats to gain votes and strength in the national spotlight. This just makes liberals look even more weak in our standards and beliefs, more easily changeable.

We cannot water down or change fundamental and important aspects of our beliefs in order to win votes. We can't become mini-Republicans to win, because then it will mean nothing that we did win. I don't argue against trying to win more religiously-minded people to the Democratic party, but we can't do it by pandering to the worst aspect of that population. We have to find those whose faith and religiosity includes ideas about social justice, honesty, and helping fellow citizens. We we can win over those who are backing Bush & Co. by pointing out just how far their actual policies are from Christian morality. Show their hypocrisy, and they will lose support.

Er, I hate watching people make bad choices, and knowing I have very little power to do anything about it.

In the "Too Much Analysis" category: Maps and Cartograms of the 2004 election.

Ultimately pointless, but amusing nonetheless. Acid trip geography.

What I'm reading these days: Against Love by Laura Kipsis (again), The Plot Against America by Phillip Roth, Manufacturing Consent by Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky, Election by Tom Perotta, The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin, Heir to the Glimmering World by Cynthia Ozick. Bracing myself to read: Don Quixote.

This is probably not something Phillip Roth expected people to come away from his most recent novel, The Plot Against America, thinking about, but I'm thinking about it nonetheless. And maybe it's some kind of misguided nostalgia talking, but Robert Putnam adroitly points out that I'm not misguided feeling this way:

Technological advancements in newsmedia dissemination have weakened American communities and their relationships to politics, and the relative absence of a social base for political knowledge-gathering has drastically affected the workings of American politics.

It's a small example, and a friend of mine rightly pointed out that this is not the whole story behind our current political disengagement. But here is the picture that Roth painted in my mind: Prior to the widespread appearance of television, and television news, people had to go to theaters to watch the news, where they were surrounded by many other people, all also there to watch the news. They sat in dark rooms, and learned, collectively, what was going on in the world.

This simple act created a sense of community that we are sorely lacking, and which is a fundamental necessity in a functioning democracy. Now, we can all come after an arduous day at work, and watch the nightly news while we're cooking dinner and trying to make our kids do their homework, half paying attention, and feeling that we're actively engaged and knowledgeable, because, hey, at least we watch the nightly news. There's no effort involved, and, more significantly, there's no community involved. Everyone is in his own home, watching his own television, and not, afterwards, talking about what he just saw with everyone else who just watched the same thing.

There are new communities developing--I will use this word once, and only once, ever in the history of my writing here: the blogosphere. But one has already to be politically curious and driven to bother seeking this community out in the first place. It is simply too easy now to disavow any community, and any connection to politics, and to news events generally.

And the eternal question--how to re-engage people, in an intelligent and reality-based way, in public policy? Do we, as my friend's comments perhaps inadvertantly imply, need another Great Depression? Another Great War? Or are we too jaded and satiated by SUVs for things even of this magnitude to be able to impact us anymore?

Maybe I'm just too disheartened and full of hatred for humanity these days to formuate a rational argument, or even a rational thought, anyways.

We're going to hell, in a nicely tailored Kate Spade handbag. Sweet, dude.

The outcry over Specter's innocuous comments just points up the hypocrisy of the right wing. They attack liberals for attempting to apply "litmus tests" to any potential Supreme Court judges, claiming that it's flawed and partisan to ask a potential judge how he feels about abortion, or whether he would try to overturn Roe v. Wade. But they freak out and cry foul against one of their own when he merely mentions that an explicitly anti-abortion judge might have a hard time in confirmation hearings. Apparently, it's only considered a "litmus test" if the Democrats are asking the question. The illogic of this whole issue makes my head spin, so much, obviously, that I'm rendered inarticulate.

Charles Krauthammer has a good point: the whole "moral issues drove Bush's re-election" story is a media-concocted load of crap. He deftly juggles and re-arranges survey statistics (which seems to be a necessary skill these days) to point out that War and Foreign Policy, and Economic Issues, were, in fact, of much greater concern to the electorate.

But in his attempt to point out how something so unfounded and meaningless is picked up and ballooned out by the media in order to have a coherent story and sell advertisements, he falls prey himself to another annoying media habit: accusing the "liberals" of, well, of everything, or at least of being patently ridiculous.

Aren't the Republican Party leaders themselves claiming a great moral mandate, and attributing their win to the religious right? Wasn't it Karl Rove's great strategy to mobilize those missing evangelicals? Bush has made no secret of leading with his faith, relying on churches and other religious organizations to help him campaign. How is this suddenly a liberal bogeyman? Why is it brilliant strategizing for the Republicans to scream wildly about morality and God, but a sign of liberals' humiliation and sense of moral superiority to talk about how the Republicans are screaming wildly about morality and God?

Newpapermen irk me. I can't believe I sometimes still want to be one of them.

I thought our federal judges and Supreme court judges were supposed to be the best of the best. Why would we want someone who's barely qualified nominated to our highest courts? Someone who practiced law without a license in two separate instances?

From Washingtonpost.com's Washington in Brief:

Nomination Hearing Set for Griffith

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) has scheduled a nomination hearing Tuesday for Thomas B. Griffith, President Bush's choice for an open seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, committee sources said.

Griffith's nomination has been stalled by revelations that he practiced law without a valid license in the District and Utah. Hatch's office scheduled the Tuesday hearing before the Judiciary Committee without naming the nominee to be considered, but committee sources said Hatch has indicated it is for Griffith, a former counsel to the U.S. Senate and now the general counsel for Brigham Young University in Utah.

Hatch told reporters last week that he hoped to hold Griffith's hearing before Congress adjourns its lame-duck session in the next two weeks and Hatch's committee chairmanship ends, even if there is no time to have the Senate vote on Griffith's nomination this year.

After an unusually long investigation into Griffith's past this summer and fall, the American Bar Association on Sept. 29 gave Griffith a vote of "qualified," with a large minority voting "not qualified." That is the lowest possible passing grade the bar association gives judicial nominees.

Of the 10 Bush administration appeals court nominees who received the same rating, six were confirmed to the bench.

What are "moral issues?" A recent Zogby poll reveals exactly what I suspected in the first place--the values people voted on aren't so narrow as to include only gay marriage and abortion. The morality of being in Iraq, and the values of social and economic justice in America were higher on people's minds than either of the two "moral issues" the Republicans keep talking about. You can read a more articulate break down of that poll here.

Oh, thank buddha. At least one small piece of good news has entered my life in the past week: Ashcroft is out.

I find it pretty humourous, and awfully indicative of the non-reality based lives of Bush & Co., that he had this to say about his tenure as Atty General:

"The objective of securing the safety of Americans from crime and terror has been achieved."

Oh, certainly.

Eh, fuck him. Maybe they'll finally uncover the statue of Justice, with her indecent bare breasts.

Larry Thompson, the oft-mentioned possible successor of Ashcroft, doesn't seem too bad. Ok, his "crack down" on corporate crime was a bit of a joke. But I feel less wary that he'll bring us into a Handmaid's Tale kind of religious right future.

In the Oh, really? How very interesting files:

"In a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday, the oil services company [Halliburton] said that the Justice Department expanded its investigation into Halliburton, that government probes have found that bribes may have been made in Nigeria and that A. Jack Stanley, a former senior executive, may have been involved. "

And you don't say?

"[T]he FBI expanded a probe into charges of contract irregularities by Halliburton in Iraq and Kuwait. Lawyers for a Pentagon official said the FBI requested an interview with her over her complaints that the Army gave a Halliburton unit preferential treatment when granting it a $7 billion contract to restore Iraq's oil fields. "

And more...

"The Justice Department's Public Integrity Section is examining whether Attorney General John D. Ashcroft, when he served in the Senate, violated criminal campaign funding laws or federal disclosure laws relating to the transfer of a mailing list to his campaign committee. "

Oh, I'm not done:

"Also proceeding is special counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald's probe into the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's employment to columnist Robert D. Novak. Novak said his sources were two senior administration officials."

(All quotes stolen straight from Dana Millbank's White House Notebook.)