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Showing posts from September, 2005

the United States, Iraq, and the post-oil Middle East: Part 2

I began the first part of this essay invoking the memory of Sergio de Mello, the United Nations diplomat killed on August 19th, 2003 in Iraq. His death symbolized in many ways the end of internationalist hopes for constructing a peaceful and equitable resolution to the U.S. occupation of Iraq. To start this essay, which due to its length will have to be Part 2 of a now three part series, let's revisit August of 2003. August 14th, 2003 saw this article by Steven R. Weisman and Felicity Barringer in the New York Times document the diplomatic conditions that made de Mello's death so disheartening: "The Bush administration has abandoned the idea of giving the United Nations more of a role in the occupation of Iraq as sought by France, India and other countries as a condition for their participation in peacekeeping there, administration officials said today. Instead, the officials said, the United States would widen its effort to enlist other countries to assist the occup

this is kid oakland blog

(or, as you can see above.... k/o ...for short.) My name is Paul and I live and work and write in Oakland, California. I've been writing as kid oakland since the first days of scoop at dailykos.com (2003) and you may know me from there, or from my participation at blog communities like booman tribune or MyDD . However it may be that you've found your way here...welcome! Think of this blog as a place to find writing on politics and culture from one progressive writer's point of view. I try to keep the content here fresh and the links reflective of the best writing and voices available on the net. Topics of interest include: local and regional blogging, electoral politics, national and international news stories mixed with essays and links on music and culture. If you liked my essays on dailykos, you'll find pieces like them here and links to other writers who work in a similar way. Simply put, k/o is a place to find writing by me, kid oakland, as well as the oc

Allen Chin- Katrina Photos

Allen Chin of the Gamma agency has an exhibit of black and white photos at BAG news . They are a must stop. There is so much there...some of it viscerally distrurbing...but number 25, a simple portrait, will send chills down your spine with its echoes of Dorothea Lange. (thanks to JaninSanFran at Happenning Here? for the link.)

John Roberts and William Bennett

On the day our new conservative Chief Justice John Roberts is confirmed and sworn in to lead the Supreme Court of our land, there is another story in the news...that of the conservative former Secretary of Education under Reagan and Drug Czar under the first President Bush, William Bennett . Studying the Supreme Court in American Politics our professor was always very clear about the political context of the Supreme Court. Simply put, the Justices make decisions in context. This is our current context: conservatism is "sick" in America, at the very top. William Bennett is no fringe figure. He was in charge of education and drug policy under two separate Republican Presidents. He was a "figurehead" in speaking out on conservative ethics during the Clinton impeachment. While there is no direct tie between the malicious views of Bill Bennett and the public record of John Roberts, Justice Roberts well knows that as Chief Justice for all Americans he has a duty to

meta dkos

I've pretty much lost my heart for dkos 'meta-battles' on dkos. Argh. But I do feel an obligation lay out my opinion and clarify some misconceptions, and then move on. For the sake of clarity, I think the discussion bink and booman started is a good one. However, I would like to clear up ways in which bink mischaracterized my views....even though I think his post, and this comment in particular, was valid and "fair enough." In a nutshell, my opinion is that dkos can only do... maybe ...two of the following three things successfully at one time: 1. Be Markos' private blog where he rants and posts whatever he wants and people read it. 2. Be KosMedia LLC...a kind of 'new media venture'...with subscribers, advertising, spin offs, staff writers and a commercial community: a kind of online magazine/forum/news service with reader generated content ...(that last part seems a bit of an eternal contradiction, imo.) 3. Be the big tent "open source

open thread

Like Curtis Mayfield? I do... That's why I visit soul sides . Don't like Curtis Mayfield...?? (Shame on you.) Try ear fuzz , in particular the Heath Brothers...absolutely gorgeous music.

state of the nation

In the grocery line here in California today: Clerk: "Gas looks like it's going up to $3.25...I found a place for $2.95...and a year ago I would have been screaming about that." Me: "No kidding, and we have it cheap here compared to the rest of the world." Clerk: "Yeah, but that's all tax, in England they pay $10 a gallon but it's all taxes." Middle-Class Woman behind me: "But at least it goes to their country...our money just goes to all those people we're at war with over there." State...of...the...nation.

the Mega-Mod

"General Motors is pinning its turnaround on a series of new full-sized SUVs -- the very models whose sales have fallen as gas prices have climbed. GM previewed the redesigned Chevrolet Tahoe and several other 2007 models last week." -from the WSJ, via billmon In other news, the Democratic Party is rolling out its "make or break" 2007 models just in time for mid-term Congressional elections. Having seen the party's market share shrink for two decades in the face of tough competition, the DNC is rolling out a revamp of its standby minivan meant to appeal to America's increasingly Exurban middle: the Mega-Mod is an eight-door minivan, with passenger air-bags, AM/FM radio, and radical new features like a sun roof and "sport" package option to appeal to NASCAR dads. Party CEO H. Dean claims the Mega-Mod's ad slogan: " it's just like you...you just didn't know that yet " will win over buyers who haven't yet caught on to the De

Prop 75: Reform Elves

Malacandra passed on this 'so bizarre it's a must-read' post to me...from the Arnold Schwarzenegger blog . Only deep, deep in the Republican mindset can a million dollar donation from a GOP big wig...rrr, I mean reform elf ...pulling strings behind the scenes be heralded as reform . Meanwhile the voices of nurses and teachers are written off and silenced... um... just because ! I guess when buying our political system counts as "reform", we've really passed through the GOP looking glass. You see, any millionaire elf giving dollars to Arnold for Prop 75 simply doesn't want working people's voices heard in Sacramento. In fact, you can take that to the bank. If you live in California, say "no" to Arnold and his fat cats...vote no on Propositions 73-78.

Nathan Rudy and the Blue 7th

I've had a link to Nathan Rudy's Blue 7th blog up for a month now. The reason for that is that I'm convinced that local blogs opposing vulnerable GOP representatives, in this case New Jersey Congressman Mike Ferguson, are the most important netroots trend for 2006. A lot of us online want to fundamentally change politics in this county. Taking back the House in 2006 is how we do just that. This is where online activism for 2006 should start, with local opposition blogs in the 80-100 vulnerable GOP districts. Blogs like Nathan Rudy's do three things: They provide local voters with the information they need to learn how wrong their GOP representative is. They provide local voters a way to sign up and pledge to fight to kick the GOP representative our of office They show quality local candidates that there's a pool of fired up Democrats ready to unseat the GOP incumbant This is where on-line and off-line activism meet. And the 2006 elections are very much a &qu

the United States, Iraq, and the post-oil Middle East

One observation you can make in the ongoing debate on all sides about the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq...questions of if, when, how, where , and in what context ...is how far removed from the context of any global, cooperative, far-sighted solution we've come. U.N. Special Envoy Sergio de Mello was killed in this bombing in Baghdad in August of 2003. As a result of which, the U.N. withdrew most of its outside personnel from Iraq for months. Since that time, a time in which the Bush administration spearheaded the nomination of "anti-U.N." ambassador John Bolton to the U.N. and the U.S. Congress has pushed the "oil-for-food" scandal onto the front pages (as if the "real scandal in Iraq" was the U.N. all along), no one has had much of anything constructive to say about U.N. involvement in helping bring an end to the U.S. occupation of Iraq. The answer, then, to the question of "when" the U.S. will effectively withdraw from Iraq in

taking back red california

Matt Lockshin, a reader who has been the source of a couple of my pieces on California politics here...has another good one: Take Back Red California , an organization dedicated to fighting for every vote in our recently "Blue" State. Oftentimes the difference between sticking in our Blue strongholds and actually working for change is as simple as crossing a hill. Richard Pombo , (link is to a must read Sierra Club article), a Congressman in an adjacent district to both Matt and me, just proposed to sell off, among other things, naming rights to our National Parks if not a few parks themselves. Pombo might just find that some Blue activists here in Barabara Lee's district (Oakland/Berkeley) have taken an interest in helping our allies and neighbors in Pombo's turf. Kicking Pombo out of D.C would be a nice start to the process of taking back red California.

a walk in the woods

I took a long walk in the woods today with a friend. After yesterday's march in the sun, surrounded by thousands of people, it was great to just stroll on the other side of the East Bay Hills, in the shade of huge hillside trees. There's a quiet creek that runs off the inside of Big Round Top. I've never hiked all the way back to it's source. There's no trail. Sometimes if I am hiking alone early in the morning or before sunset, I can hear the mule deer crunching in the brush away from me. There are places like this here near our city. Spots like the one on the French Trail in Redwood Park where you can stand alone, as the sun falls and watch rays of sunlight make their way through the silence of a hundred redwoods. If you've never been in a redwood forest, that's something they never tell you....they are quiet, and remarkably still. The canopy and wind...are so high up...and the underbrush is so sparse....that it's really you, and rocks, and soil,

open thread

I've got a post up at BooMan Tribune called democratic writing: on blogging and community ...and I'm working piece on Iraq for this space... what's on your mind today?

protest: cindy and rita

I was glad to read the news that Rita has proved, so far, less deadly than feared, though still an utterly serious disaster. It is a tremendous relief after Katrina's devastation. Having spent all day marching in the streets of San Francisco, where I joined up briefly with the Booman Tribune contingent ...I have to say the march in San Francisco was about the people who came more than anything else. Their creativity, their opposition to the war, their resoluteness and indomitablility in just being themselves, and, as Chris Bowers pointed out, their support for Cindy Sheehan. For myself, I was quite happy to spend the day with my East Bay cadre, ages 3 through 63...and this, reading a note in the NYT , rang a bell.... "In San Francisco, as protesters marched toward downtown, David Miles, 49, pumped up the volume on his iPod, attached to a 12-volt battery and large speakers on wheels. "War," the Vietnam-era protest song by Edwin Starr, suddenly filled the air. The ly

things that make you go, hmm

Ripley, at zen cabin , did some research on BYU connections to the Bush Administration in the wake of D. Kyle Sampson's appointment to be Chief of Staff at DOJ. "Hmm..."

the Roberts nomination and the Democrats

There have been some interesting, intelligent pieces written on the Roberts vote in the Senate. LarryNYC cleared some of the fire and smoke of the initial blog response to make this nuanced speculation into what was and wasn't going through various Senators minds. (presidential prospects, future use of the filibuster, comity, the gang of 14, politics) AnthonySF did yeoman work on an up to date list of who is voting which way. New Direction added a heavy devil's advocate pov to the mix. It's worth a look. The emerging conventional wisdom nod goes to a "we lost this one in 2000, '02 and '04" take...which is an analysis that may or may not lead to David Sirota's bracing: "As pathetic and braindead as the media is in only being able to see their narrow, insulated little playground of Washington, D.C. in terms of inaccurate stereotypes that reflect nothing of the actual real world, the current state of Democratic Party affairs is more pathetic.

rita

There's really nothing to say but god help those in its path...up and down the Gulf Coast...and fleeing inland.

the mod squad

Reader Matt points out that here in California we have a "Mod Squad," or Moderate Caucus, that defeats environmental legislation with the help of corporate $$$ and the GOP. (Article from the Capital Weekly ): "The so-called Moderate Caucus was first organized as a campaign finance committee in 1998 by then-Assemblyman (and now Congressman) Dennis Cardoza, who wanted to raise corporate money for Democrats that traditionally had flowed to Republicans. But only in the last couple of years has the Mod Squad flexed their political muscle. The caucus currently has fifteen members, 10 of [whom] are Latino, with Assemblymen Juan Vargas, D-San Diego, and [Joe] Canciamilla, [D-Pittsburg] serving as "co-conveners." In June 2004, the Moderate Caucus circulated its first ever "action alert" listing a dozen bills--sponsored by fellow Democrats--to be targeted for defeat. Circulated only to other moderate members, the list angered both the Democratic leadership

David Sirota on strategists

Catnip at Booman pointed up this piece by David Sirota on the Huffington Post. It's quite good and worth reading the whole thing. "...the New York Times today quotes "Democratic strategists" saying that "with Roberts widely expected to win confirmation, members of their party should vote for him in order to appear open-minded and save their ammunition for the fight ahead." Yet, it was the same Democratic strategist class that helped create the perception in the first place that Roberts is "widely expected to win confirmation." If you recall, the very first day after the Roberts nomination was announced, Democratic strategists (most likely before they even gave a cursory review of Roberts' record) pitched a front page story to the Washington Post headlined "Democrats Say Nominee Will Be Hard to Defeat." Great strategy for a party that is perceived to stand for nothing: lead the biggest debate with an admission that you don't ha

John Edwards on the 'Working Society'

From a speech given at the Center for American Progress : "There is a powerful hunger for a sense of community in this country again, a sense of national community, a sense that we are all in this together, that there is a higher purpose for our national community. People understand. They get it. They understand that they’re supposed to work hard and be responsible for themselves and for their families, but they know there’s more to America than them taking care of themselves. This administration may think that every single American is an island, but Americans know that Katrina’s victims shouldn’t have been out there on their own, and that no American should be out there on their own...[ snip ] To be true to our values, what our country needs to build is a working society; an America where everyone who works hard finally has the rewards to show for it. In this working society, nobody who works full-time should have to raise their children in poverty or in fear that one more health

Harold Arlen and Saul Bellow

A composer and songwriter who exemplified the verve and swagger of the NYC streets...Harold Arlen was so sweet ...just listen...and then read this essay , Come Rain or Come Shine by John Lahr from the New Yorker. It may be one of the best pieces of writing I've read all year. It's just perfect and beautiful and heartbreaking. It makes me think of this passage from Philip Roth's document in tribute to Saul Bellow, yet another great New Yorker essay. In the midst of writing a depressing novel in post-war Paris, Bellow recalled how he seized on the inspiration for his greatest novel... the Adventures of Augie March : "...when spring came I was deep in the dumps. I worked in a small studio, and as I was walking toward it one morning to wrestle yet again with death in a Chicago hospital room, I made the odd discovery that the streets of Paris were offering me some sort of relief. Parisian gutters are flushed every morning by municipal employees who open the hydrants a

the road ahead

We on the blogs did an extremely poor job at defining what a "yes" vote on Roberts would mean. And now the response to those "yes" votes, votes we could all see coming, has been nothing if not counter productive ( Armando and Booman ). The strategy, spearheaded by dailyKos, of focusing on NARAL and Lincoln Chafee got us exactly here . (Link to Liberal Oasis.) The trend of blogs attacking the left this last year (and Howard Dean's embrace of "pro-life Dems") now comes face to face with a "yes-on-Roberts" by a wide swath of middle-of-the-road Democrats and a strategic mishandling of one of the crucial votes of our lifetimes. Simply put, when we needed the Democrats to show a fighting unity here...we on the blogs did little to create that unity. Unity is hard to create when so much energy has been turned to attacking our own. Markos definined 2005 as the year of the "attack blogs." This attack was defined not by building unity

justice not vengeance: simon wiesenthal

As a teenager I had a chance to hear Dith Pran speak. I can't help but think of Dith Pran, his words, his presence and his lonely struggle to give voice to the Cambodian dead upon hearing the news of Simon Wiesenthal's passing. Simon Wiesenthal , first of all, survived. It is one of those facts that is easy to overlook. It is a raw fact; there is no moral to it. The central fact of Wiesenthal's life was the destruction and genocide of the European Jews, followed by his dogged pursuit of justice against the perpetrators of that genocide. Wiesenthal was an inmate in five separate concentration camps. In one camp, he was one of only 34 people to survive. He tried to kill himself twice. He and other survivors of Mauthausan sewed this flag in secrecy as the war came to an end. (ph. credit Simon Wiesenthal Center) It was more than a symbol...it was also, no doubt, in their minds, a possible tool for survival during allied liberation. Wiesenthal spent his life after the

woolworths: 1985

Some time ago, way back in 1985 to be exact, I was asked by my ethics teacher to say a few words to an assembly about what Jesus meant to me. At the time, I was coming to the position I have today: one of respect for the historical and spiritual person, and those who follow his justice teachings...but one of estrangement from organized religion. Here's the gist of what I had to say: Back in 1985 there were still Woolworth's cafeteria counters around this country. If you were the type of high school kid who was into Flannery O'Connor or William Saroyan or Carson McCullers...you might find yourself sitting at one of them...an undulating series of "U"'s behind which waitresses served grilled cheese sandwiches and patty melts and poured coffee... reading away at your book...perhaps a story by Delmore Schwartz ...among the fixed income retirees who tended to congregate for the lunch time specials. Cities can be brutal. Recessions can make that brutality more v

open thread

This open thread brought to you by.... the Sacred Heart of Plastic Baby Meta Jesus .

anti-racism and the global majority

"The problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color line." WEB DuBois, 1903, The Souls of Black Folk It's been pretty clear reading the feedback and commentary of the last few weeks post-Katrina that a large swath of the "liberal blogosphere" views racism as something related to personal morality. ie. Folks embrace the notion that you can be free of racism if you treat "other races" equally, or without a sense of personal prejudice. Now, I would argue, in agreement with WEB DuBois that the "color line" is still the central issue of our times. In effect, until people come to understand that we are one and act like it...until people understand that we may have different skin tones and backgrounds but that there are, in fact, no other races ...that there is no such thing...well, until then, racism and its pervasive historical legacy will be the operative evil of the day, for all of us. Simply put, the idea that any of us can av

Katrina death toll

I've been doing this search of Google News every day now since September 1st. We know so little about who died and where and when, or who might still be alive . If I told you that even as the President gave his speech last Thursday night there were still people living and dying in New Orleans, you would be hard pressed to believe me. Click on the link. That's the truth. And it's a symbol of our government's ineptitude, its callousness, of the real meaning of Homeland Security, and what the "rescue effort" meant. Here, in America, three weeks after Katrina hit land, folks are still dying in homes, are still being rescued. And none of us really knows how many we've lost. Think about that.

america america america

Walking down the aisles of my local grocery market, I think, "How much of this stuff is really poison?" Chips, Pretzels, Ice Cream, Frozen Dinners, Sugar Coated Cereal, Processed Sandwich Meat, Bread sweetened with High Fructose Corn Syrup, Protein Bars with Palm Kernal Oil, Crackers made with Partially Hyrdrogenated Soybean Oil, Flavored Water, Saline-injected hormone-fueled Chicken Breasts, Tomatoes, Potatoes and Peppers grown and sprayed and sprayed and sprayed again in California's Central Valley. What can you buy that's real? That isn't corporate factory food? Not much. We're factory made here in the USA. And, in some ways, after conversations with so many friends, in so many places...I'm coming to realize...that in some ways, Rockwell's Thanksgiving America is already over, we just haven't realized it yet. The wallpaper is peeling off the walls. Grandma's dead. She won't be baking any more pies. They've got a new development