Judge Hits Bush on Terror Group IDs
By Sam Garchik
On Tuesday, a federal court ruled that the Patriot Act definition of a terrorist group was too vague (remember Peace Fresno from Fahrenheit 9/11?).
The decision, fought for by the Center for Constitutional Rights and the Humanitarian Law Project, said that the rule was unconstitutional because it "imposes penalties
for mere association," on groups and people. The head lawyer in the case said that "This law gave the
president unfettered authority to create blacklists, an authority
President Bush then used to empower the Secretary of the Treasury to
impose guilt by association."
The biggest implication of this decision is obvious - Shrub has more
limits on him in his so-called 'war on terror.' The ruling also reveals
that the GOP has a long way to go to remake the courts in their ideal
image, which is good news for peace and justice everywhere. And it
affirms that good police work, not executive power, is always the best
option when it comes to fighting crime.
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Thursday, November 30
Judge Hits Bush on Terror Group IDs
by
Sam Garchik
on Thu 30 Nov 2006 09:37 AM CST
Wednesday, November 29
The Center for Media and Democracy Presents "The Falsies"
by
Sam Garchik
on Wed 29 Nov 2006 08:46 AM CST
The Center for Media and Democracy Presents "The Falsies"
By Sam Garchik The CMDP is currently taking "The Falsies," a list of 14 slick moves companies or government organizations puled on the public to hide shameful actions. I guess it's true - there is a lot of money in PR. The other great thing about "The Falsies" is that it's global. For example, the Maldive islands, home to resorts and Diego Garcia, are apparently hiring a PR firm to cover up all the nasty things the government does. And someone put out a new first-person shooter game showing people killing U.S. soldiers - the only thing is it's a copy of some game that was once called "Quest for Saddam." And why is Tom Daschle's picture up there? At any rate, remember to vote for the most blatant self-promoting PR move of the year at The Falsies. Tuesday, November 28
How Cool is This? Track Your Congressman's Spending
by
Sam Garchik
on Tue 28 Nov 2006 09:32 AM CST
How Cool is This? Track Your Congressman's Spending
By Sam Garchik I'm in the process of going through my email left over from election time. I'm also adding some links so: I added three new blogs - BlogNetNews/Iowa, Straight out of the Cornfield, and Political Fallout. Check them out. Also, I got a pretty good sized email from the Sunlight Foundation, the folks who are working on the Congresspedia. They have this awesome site that allows you to enter in any zip code, and their Google Map Mashup shows you where your tax payer dollars are being spent on pork. The Sunlight Foundation also has a lab area, where you can check out their latest tools for governmental transparency. I'll add this link to our page as well. Monday, November 27
Thanksgiving Break is Now Officially Over
by
Sam Garchik
on Mon 27 Nov 2006 07:55 PM CST
Thanksgiving Break is Now Officially Over
By Sam Garchik Tom Lindsey is riding again! Check out Political Fallout (Links to be added in the near future..) Also, while I was out, the Regents decided they needed another search for a UI President (Nick Johnson is all over this one), some guy named Obama is running for President (which, even though he won that tough race against Alan Keyes in Illinois in 04 brings the total candidates I like to about 0) and asking John Norris, who I am sure is a nice guy but who didn't do much for Kerry here in 04 imho, how to do it, and my DD is handicapping the 08 Senate. Of personal interest to me is the fact that Sally Pederson is leaving the IDP to help Tom run for Pres. I met her a few times, and was always impressed with how genuine she seemed. Tom is lucky to have her working for him. I hope the next IDP chair is as gracious as she is, and thinks big-tent like she does. Chris Woods has more details on her possible replacement and the process of selecting a new chair here. Stay tuned for more posts, and keep the info coming my way. Wednesday, November 22
Call to Join Daily Kos Stem Cell Supporters
by
Sam Garchik
on Wed 22 Nov 2006 09:47 AM CST
Call to Join Daily Kos Stem Cell Supporters
By Daily Kos Stem Cell Supporters
Hey all -
Here's an invite to join my new Yahoo Group, the Daily Kos Stem Cell Supporters Group. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DailyKosStemCells/
Please send this around to folks who support stem cell research, i.e., friends, neighbors, loved ones, bloggers, activists, and almost everyone you can think of.
Thanks!
Miriam, Member, Democracy for NYC
If stem cell research funding is important to you, please be advised that a new and highly innovative initiative has begun, in advance of the re-introduction of HR 810 this January. By taking less than a minute to join this initiative, you can help to dramatically raise the profile of stem cell research among millions of key activists and bloggers across the nation, and ensure that it is not relegated to the back burner when the new Congress takes office.
Join it today, at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DailyKosStemCells/ DailyKos.com is the single largest political blog on the web, by far. With more than 6 million page views a week, it gets far more traffic than any site supporting or opposing stem cell research. Further, its audience includes thousands of other bloggers, meaning that an issue that gets hot there can quickly spread to thousands of other blogs. In terms of reaching activists, and getting them to support a cause, there may be no better place to start online than DailyKos.com. Literally hundreds of stories (or "diaries") are posted each day on DailyKos, on a variety of subjects, including stem cell research. By signing up at DailyKos, you get the power to "recommend" pro-stem cell postings, simply by clicking on the "recommend" box next to the post. You don't need to write anything, just have a look and recommend, if you like the post. When a post has enough "recommends," it goes to DailyKos's coveted home page, creating maximum visibility to thousands of people across the country. In short, if we can get enough recommends for stem cell posts, they will get far more mindshare from the activists and bloggers at DailyKos.com. We've already had success with this. Recently, we achieved home page status for a great candidate, who went on to win his race for Congress. Further, multiple posts about the Michael J. Fox/Rush Limbaugh clash achieved home page status, helping dramatically raise the profile of this issue. When you join the DailyKos Yahoo group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DailyKosStemCells/, you will be informed right away when pro-stem cell posts are put up -- giving you the chance to "recommend" them as quickly as possible. Further, if you choose to write stem cell posts yourself, you can ask the group to recommend those as well. Thanks again, and please join today
Monday, November 20
Progressive Goals for the Next Legislature in Iowa?
by
Sam Garchik
on Mon 20 Nov 2006 09:33 AM CST
Progressive Goals for the Next Legislature in Iowa?
By Frank Sample This was posted at the Yahoo DFIA Group. I am curious as to what people are thinking about when it comes to the goals for the future. If we pay attention to the voice of the elections, consider the following: 1. Are we going to wait for the Congress to make a national minimum wage or are we going to make one for Iowa?
2.
The public funding of elections sounds ethical, but if we do that do we
cut out the direct mail industry jobs which are good for the Iowa US
Postal Service Offices and
entry level workers these direct mail shops employ? 3.
Let's stop the attack on the teacher's unions. We all know that the so
called merit pay is oriented to cliques, brown-nosing, sexism, and age
discrimination. So let's stop the merit pay machine now. The fact
that Mr Anti -Union Doug Gross is one of the top promoters of the
teacher merit pay should tell us something!
4. Let's increase teacher pay and reduce class sizes so we keep teachers in Iowa
and adequately mentor and teach our students!
5. Why don't we pay high school and college students to tutor more of Iowa's children.
6. We need to get public transportation to where it serves our children, students, and elderly.
7.
Lack of public transportation is probably one of the the
reasons recovering drug users and alcoholic drivers from are unable to
get to work and to their legally required classes and parole officer
meetings and end up hanging out with other problem people just to get
rides and are then tempted to relapse.
8. We
might as well get some leper colony type communities for our child sex
and other sex offenders so that we are not keeping them at large and
unaccounted for.
9. We need computers and internet in the homes of the low income children / students. Perhaps a
child income tax credit for this for all.
10.
We need more protection for planned parenthood facilities and other
women's health clinics. Let us increase harassment penalties and call
those who target the facilities, the staff and the clients what they
are TERRORISTS!!! and make appropriate limits for the offenders so they
can't live within 200 miles of a clinic.
11.
We need more job safety inspections and worker safety training programs
and more funding for personnel ant the Iowa department of inspections
and appeals.
12. We need more funding for
English language courses for our imigrees so they can join in our full
society and prosper with our manpower starved workforce and mix more
successfully with our existing populace. Mandate an immigrant worker
program to work for citizenship the immigrants shall attend English
classes and pass
tests. Yes we can put more teachers to work and help our economy.
13. More mental health care as the mentally ill are more unemployed and with out all health insurance.
14.
Lets work towards single provider health care insurance. If Canada can
do it why can't we? Let's turn company profits into actual doses
of medicines and treatments.
15. Let's get our college tuition assistance back into line for Iowa students.
16. Let's make a department of Organic Agriculture and Direct Marketing to promote this growth industry in Iowa.
17.
Let's promote the growth of Iowa Orchards, Vinyards and other Fruit
and Vegatable production. We have an opportunity to employ people if
we get some labor intensive agriculture and some direct marketing going.
18.
Let's give a tax break and a maybe a stipend to people who care for sick and / or elderly parents in their own homes.
If we grow our economy we will increase our population and our wealth
and we will get an infusion of new hearts and minds into Iowa that can
only increase our wealth of diversity and an enlargement of expectation
of fairness for all people regardless of their race, creed, color,
gender, age, religion, and sexual orientation.
Frank Sample
unionkj2001 <kwj54@...> wrote:
Saturday, November 18
Iowa Jobs Down in October
by
Sam Garchik
on Sat 18 Nov 2006 04:14 PM CST
Iowa Jobs Down in October |
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