This morning I had yet another commuter moment while listening to NPR.  Once I arrived at work (Shhh!) I couldn't restrain myself from contacting the estimable Majority Leader.  I sent him the following letter and just wanted to share it with a few friends.

Something tells me that letters from constituents and party activists get all the attention of a used tea bag in our "Democrat" Congress.  However, one has to keep trying.

The letter follows.

After watching the disgusting RNC paean to terror last Friday, labeled these are the stakes, I literally dusted off my copy of Flash MX 2004: Hands-on Training and produced a response.  This thing literally wrote itself.  (You should have seen the first draft).  I've pared it down and published in youtube.

I realize it's long, but I'd like to see someone with skill, in the final week of the campaign, develop a 60 second ad to answer the repulsive RNC ad.  If you watch the ad, be kind because it's a virgin effort.  For my next trick, I have vowed to learn how to use the media controls and use video clips.

It would appear that Hamas has achieved a stunning upset.  In a free election that Jimmy Carter has praised as free and fair, the Palestinian people have chosen a new path, after three decades of increasingly corrupt and incompetent, one party rule.  This is a good thing.

Hamas has long been more than just a terrorist group.  We may dislike their religious fundamentalism and their use of violence  and terror, but they have also created numerous medical and healthcare centers and provided many services in support of Palestinian families in dire need.  The Fatah party is widely regarded as hopelessly corrupt and ineffective.  Hamas won the election on the belief that they are honest and dependable, in spite of their militancy.

I think the time to actually propose a motion to create a committee to investigate the impeachment of the President of the United States, NOW, not when it may seem feasible.  The reasons are simple and, I think, compelling.  As most of us here know, the COM (Corporate OWNED Media) acts effectively, as a willing tool of the Republican party.  A depressing number of the publishers and editors have proven, through the past decade at the very least, that they simply will not hold to account the most egregious corruption and outright crimes of any Republican led body.  At the same time, they MUST be willfully delighted to ignore, distort and obfuscate the majority of initiatives, statements and proposals of virtually any Democrat on the national scene.

 

I responded to this thread yesterday on the LeftCoaster http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/004550.php#more  and I've been thinking about it ever since.  The question is: should we stay the course, provide a Democratic plan for "success" or just get out of town?  It's an agonizingly difficult decision since we've been left no options that could be considered better than poor.  However one feels on the topic, though, I think it's important to try to put the question in context, something the CCM (Complicit Corporate Media) are supposed to help with.  I'm no Juan Cole, http://www.juancole.com/  but I'll try my best to provide a quick sketch.  Like most Americans, I cannot possibly understand the complexities of the roughly, 150 tribes, the complex web of numerous religious sects and political divisions at work in Iraq.  Nor can I intelligently discuss the effects of intermarriages, or the business and political interests that motivate individuals to behave the way they do.

More below

I was observing a hearing at the New Jersey Senate State House Annex yesterday regarding several proposed bills offered by Senator Gill, and it suddenly occurred to me, what a brilliant scam the Help America Vote Act has been.  Here we are, more than 4 years after the 2000 election was stolen, after up to 2 BILLION of taxpayer dollars have been spent or allocated, and we're still arguing bitterly about how to fix defective, ill-conceived voting machines.

It was a stroke of true genius for the Republicans to railroad that legislation through their recently hijacked Congress.  Is it truly possible for the DC Dems to be so TERMINALY clueless and stupid as to allow this to pass after such a total buttfucking as the post-Florida circus?  I really have to admit I can't understand it.  Maybe I'm just too suspicious by nature.  It was remarkably fortunate for the Republicans that EVERY company involved in making electronic voting machines was led by a CEO and most senior executives who were FUCKING BUSH PIONEERS!

More below the fold

Several news items this morning got me thinking.  First, I heard on NPR on the way in to work that the US has given, or is in the process of giving to Israel our latest technology, several "bunker busting" bombs.  The announcement presumed they could be used on "secret" nuclear sites in Iran.  WTC?!?  I find it outrageous that they should be "giving" Israel and such kind of weaponry, or even "letting" them spy out the specs for such a device.

The next news item was a report that Iran refused to give up its plan to enrich uranium, despite international pressure from the IAEA.

  While pondering the relationship between the Likud, Sharon government and the Likud cabal in the administration, I began to see what may be the much anticipated October surprise.

  Once you stop thinking about the Butch administration alone, but include its sister government in Israel, joined at the scrotum as they are, the idea of Israeli cooperation in the "surprise" opens some ugly doors.

   My scenario:  After some weeks of nucular fear mongering by the shouting windbags and their trusty sidekicks, making sure the American public understands the "imminent danger" of  Iran with nukes and not allowing the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv and/or New York, made possible by the "terror lovin'" Eyerainiuns, Israel launches a "preemptive" airstrike against Iranian nuclear facilities.  It wouldn't be hard for Israel to fly over US airspace (Iraq) and attempt a surprise attack with the bunker busters so fortuitously provided by us.  Naturally, Iran would try to defend itself.  In this scenario, losing a couple of aircraft in the raid would be a bonus.  

The SCLM would be outraged that Iran dared to shoot down ISRAELI aircraft that were just protecting themselves against terror.  The same justification of preemption given for our invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq would be hard to counter without honest media asking hard questions and GASP, providing context for once.

  Kerry would be between Iraq and a hard place.  If he denounces Israel for obvious violations of international law, he loses votes.   If he agrees with the action, he's me tooing again and loses votes.  If he's silent, he's weak on terrorism and, you guessed it, he loses votes.

For Sharon, it's a slam dunk.  He gets to beat the war drums and silence political opposition.  He can wrap up the Palestinians and damn way he pleases and he's fighting terror. Any Palestinian retaliations would be warmly welcomed. Assuming Iran would try to retaliate, he gets to use the most modern and well trained war machine in the region, backed by the full force of his eternal ally, the US.  I wouldn't be surprised if Syria somehow gets dragged in as well.

 For both "leaders" they get to first, castigate the UN (assuming they would naturally object to grotesque violations of treaty and international law) and then completely sideline international objections.  If  "French speaking" Kerry spoke in the UN's defense, he would take a huge hit and would obviously "hate America".

Bottom line: the "wartime President" is the only hope we have and the war on Islam becomes hot and perennial.  Our little experiment of representative democracy will take a generational hit from which it may never recover.

 Since I think it would take 2-3 weeks to whip up the right frenzy, I will fearlessly predict an Israeli attack on October 15, give or take 5 days.   Have a nice day ;  )

I just received this email from Tim Karr at mediachannel.org.

A letter from CNN managing editor and news anchor Aaron Brown has given us pause. Over the past five days, Media for Democracy members have sent more than 10,000 letters to television media executives asking them to devote more airtime to the problems of electronic voting machines.

On Monday our efforts seemed to have yielded fruit. CNN ran a story on these machines. Yesterday, I wrote Brown to thank him and ask that he engage Media for Democracy members in a
constructive dialogue on CNN standards for  election coverage.

His reply follows:
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"No I will not. Further because this cut and paste campaign has annoyed the hell out of me for a week I won't even pay attention to what you guys want or say or think or do. There is no skill
and no passion in cutting and pasting. It's just what lemmings do. I can't begin to tell you how offended I am by it all. You may feel free to pass this along to the rest of the group."

------------------------

   Tim then asked us what we thought and invited us to post on the discussion panel or send him a personal response.  I chose the latter and I'll post it below.

  Aaron Brown is not one of the worst "newsmen" on Cable.  Many of the others at mediachannel.org advocated boycotting CNN and/or their sponsors.  I thought of something more radical, however.  It's something that I think THEY would notice immediately and is actually something that saves US time and money.

   This afternoon, I called Comcast and CANCELLED MY CABLE SUBSCRIPTION.  To paraphrase the Bible, If thine O'Reilly offends thee, then cut it off.  Many other posters here have reported they unplugged form the Matrix and, after peering blinkingly at the strange object in the sky for a while, they realized it was the sun and there was a whole world out there.  They, on the whole seem to be happy at the conversion.

   I know I'm going to miss C-Span but, when I think about it, not much else.  Hell, I may even start talking to my wife again, if she can pry me away from the keyboard.  There really are good reasons for cutting the cord.  It saves at least $30-50 a month, which in Georgie's world, can mean a lot.  I'd rather send the money to MoveOn.  Everyone reading this knows you get far more,, and much higher quality news from the Internet than you do from Corporate Owned Media.  Less time spent boobing out means more time spent interacting with your family, your pets or even, GASP, meeting new people.    Perhaps Kos wouldn't be able to do without his Cubs games, but I truly believe some of us will actually enhance our lifestyles without cable or satellite.  

Nothing would make the media "giants" sit up and take notice than having thousands of people calling their cable distributors and saying, "Shut it Down".  I was asked why I wanted to quit.  I informed the poor hard working employee that I didn't find any value in the cable news programs, the 24-hour sports was banal and repetetive and, frankly, I would rather get my movies from Netflix or the corner Video rental center that Showtime or HBO.  There was a long moment of shocked silence.

  Without viewers, they don't get as much money from advertisers.  Without ears, their propoganda is as the sound of a tree falling in the forest, with no one to hear.  It calls for some real change in our lives.  Who's to say that change wouldn't be for the better?  Just a thought.  

Below, my letter to Tim Karr:

Dear Tim,

  I believe his response deserves to be made public because it is counterproductive on several different levels.  First of all, he becomes incensed at the methodology, which no doubt is annoying and he probably gets the same treatment from "conservative" groups as well.  I can understand his frustration.  My letter, by the way, was not cut and pasted.  It was original. I'm sure many others took the time to articulate their concerns, even though it seemed unlikely that they would be read by anyone in authority.  However, to state:

 "No I will not (engage in dialogue). Further because this cut and paste campaign has annoyed the hell out of me for a week I won't even pay attention to what you guys want or say or think or do."

   The feeling is clear that, if Aaron Brown is annoyed, the concerns of 10,000 fellow citizens are not worthy of consideration.  The importance of the issue at question is, apparently, contemptible  and he then insults the humanity (lemmings) of those who would dare bother him with their lack of "skill and passion".  

   To me, this is not acceptable behavior for one who acts as a journalist.  Ego should be subordinate to journalistic instinct for getting to the bottom of a good story.  I understand that CNN did run a story about the critical issue of democracy in the voting booth and that his testy response is to the idea of communicating further with the "lemmings" who "annoyed the hell out of" him.  What's not clear is whether Mr. Brown was a positive force in running the story initially and whether he will now ignore it because he has taken personal offense at those who used an increasingly common, and probably very annoying form of communication.

   I personally feel this simply unprofessional and not acceptable in one who has so much responsibility and opportunity to encourage a healthy debate.

   You may feel free to pass this along to Mr. Brown.  Many of us are offended by the current, deplorable state of journalism in the major media.   I would like to think that Mr. Brown is still capable of investigating the merits of the issue that is of such crucial importance to so many of his fellow citizens.

The "trial" program to provide internet voting for deployed  Military and their dependents has recently been in the news because a group of computer security experts recommend scrapping the entire system as hopelessly vulnerable.  In news reports, I've only heard the firm Accenture, formerly infamous as Anderson Consulting, mentioned.  Perhaps it would be more troubling if people were aware that the underlying technology was provided by Election.com, a firm in which 51.6%, a controlling interest was recently purchased by Osan Ltd. This is a firm described as being controlled by unnamed Saudi businessmen, and which may actually be based in Yemen.

When it comes to electronic voting, especially when it's based on international Internet access, our attitude should be "Trust, but verify."  I urge everyone to request that, in order to actually test the results of this most dangerous experiment, that traditional paper ballots also be sent out, in the usual fashion.  Soldiers and their families can then vote electronically, but the paper ballots will provide an essential re-count mechanism.  If there is no ability to verify the results, how can anybody be sure the system worked?

  I've been thinking about the shameless pandering WRT space recently conducted by the Elect (this time) at Any Cost Bush political machine.  I won't waste much energy debating yet another under funded, bait and switch proposal designed to sway the great unwashed and further the not-so-hidden agenda of the PNACers.    According to the PNAC Mein Kampf, Rebuilding America's Defenses, (p. v in the introduction) "http://www.newamericancentury.org/RebuildingAmericasDefenses.pdf"  
"our" role in Space is to:

"Control the new International Commons of space and cyberspace, and pave the way for the creation of a new military service - U.S. Space Forces - with the mission of space control" (insert either stirring or ominous music here)

     These proposals will not be funded by this administration, even if He manages to occupy the White House again.  But, now that the topic has been introduced, we may be able to take some advantage of it by proposing a space program that actually is revolutionary and effective.  It must be revolutionary because we simply can't continue to employ (estimated) 5,000 highly trained technicians to spend $140 million and up to six months to inspect, disassemble and painstakingly refurbish our aging "fleet" of barely usable, white elephant shuttles.  There can be no more perfect example why Congressional budget battles should NEVER be allowed to determine the means and ends of human exploration of space.

     To design a program, we first need to have a desired outcome.  I can think of two not necessarily contradictory reasons for leaving the confines of our planet.  The first, and by way of personal disclosure, most compelling of these reasons, is to discover more about our universe and ourselves.  NASA has been trying to fulfill that goal (modestly) throughout most of my adult life.  Again, due to the absurd cost, progress has been maddeningly slow.  The second outcome, manned Space programs have always been hostage to the political whimsy of the day, usually yielding damned little of lasting value, yet at enormous cost.  I am very supportive of having humans explore space in the classical sense.  Our ability to learn, adjust expectations and discover new information is currently impossible to build in a surrogate machine. So, to me, the most obvious, indeed, overwhelming need is for us to develop new means for getting goods and services outside of the planet's gravity well at a cost that can make it almost mundane, not a career capping endeavor for groups of scientists who might get, at most, a few tries at the prize.

     While grants from the British government and a few scientific societies might fund something as important and compelling as the voyage of the Beagle, it was the East India Company, and others like them that made global travel and commerce a reality.  We need private industry to get involved if we're ever to expend the resources needed to inhabit space.  

     I have a modest proposal; one that is largely re-useable at both ends of the endeavor and which could be a good counter-proposal to the Bush mendacity.  The cost should be far lower than a (relatively) meaningless trip to Mars, long after Bush is collecting Medicare.  The benefits should be measurable and far more timely than the Bush/Rove proposals, as well.  

     I believe that we should be pursuing two, separate tracks for entering space; one for people and one for scientific or industrial cargo.  We must have a truly re-useable "space plane" type of device for ferrying people and small quantities of supplies into high Earth orbit.  It's pathetic for our shuttles to be limited to (around) 165 miles above Earth.  That's not anywhere near the useful parts of orbital space.  Also, it should be able to take off and land on it's own, or supplemented power.  It should be able to utilize aerodynamic control and a tough skin to survive re-entry without having to be completely refurbished after a flight.  This type of craft has been pretty well explored and many of the biggest aerospace companies are already working on projects.  That's fine.  Bush may actually fund further research on this part, since it goes to his cronies.  It will keep the Rockwells, Boeings and Lockheeds happy.  We can say Bush got this one right (assuming he actually does provide anything for research) and move on to the meat of my proposal.  

   What we desperately lack is a way to move large payloads into high-Earth orbit or beyond.  For this, I propose a new approach.  Instead of using century old "rocket science", we could develop a staged approach to space.  

   Stage 1 - Somewhere, possibly in the Rockies, there may exist a mountain with a desirable slope.  Up this slope, we should build a very long, mag-lev track that can be used to boost the spacecraft launch assembly to near sonic speeds.  The launch package could hopefully, be going about 600 miles an hour at about 12/14,000 feet before the first bit of fuel is expended.  The payload would be a cargo container, about the size of a semi-trailer/railroad car etc.  This container would be mounted on a lifting body, or variable geometry aircraft, which would boost the payload to around 140,000 feet and maybe mach 3 or 4, or faster.  It would do this by means of hydrogen fueled ramjets.  The difference in speed from leaving the launcher and achieving the supersonic speed necessary for the ramjets to kick in, could be made up by either turbojet engines or recoverable, solid rocket boosters, similar to ones called JATOs, developed by the Air Force in the 60's to get overloaded Armageddon bombers off the ground.  However the process worked, the manned or unmanned launcher would drop off just before an expendable solid rocket booster kicks the cargo container on up to orbit.  These boosters are about the only part of the system that might not be cost effective to recycle.  The launch aircraft returns to base and lands.  Since it never actually goes into space, required refurbishment should be minimal and it could be turned around in a reasonable period.

Stage 2 - What I think has great potential, is that the cargo containers would all be designed with standardized hatches, connections, possibly even pre-wired and configured as labs before they're sent up.  A very similar process to the modules loaded into the back of the Space Shuttles now.  These containers could be strung together and used as habitat, research and manufacturing labs, or even as moveable "stations".  Whatever economic value there may be in space, it's got to help having thousands of cubic meters of habitable space in which to operate.

     This is just a bare bones illustration of a process I think could work.  As a political issue, I think its value could be explained to good effect.  At least one Western state Governor would get a bonanza handed to him or her.  The project would provide high paying jobs.  These would be involved in construction, maintenance/operation of the facility and many thousands of jobs in supporting industries.  I can only guess, but I think we could argue from 20,000 to 50,000 new jobs, happening in the next 2-10 years, not 10-30 years in the future.  

   By reducing the cost and planning requirements from today's ludicrous levels to a realm accessible to small to middle sized industry and entrepreneurial coalitions, we could see more progress in the next twenty-five years than we'd see in 60 years of the current, elephantine, top down model.  Wide utilization of space might also help to suppress the ugly ideas coming from PNAC and therefore the Pentagon and VP Cheney's office, about controlling space and militarizing it.  I know many of us are interested in actually experiencing space, or at least enabling our children to do so.  Unless the current model is thrown away, we will never be able to make space anything other than an occasionally inspiring (vicarious) journey or a terrifying threat over our heads.

   I haven't seen a lot of recent research utilizing such a model.  Obviously, there are critical areas that need feasibility studies.  Especially the effects of high speed travel close to the ground.  What kind of aerodynamic problems would appear?  What are the limits to the size of launch vehicles and payloads, etc.  My point is that, if the Democratic candidate [Dean ;-) ] could point out some of the obvious fallacies in the Rove plan, and propose thoughtful, innovative and feasible proposals of his own, this could be another way to take one of Rove's half-baked ploys away from the White House and use it as a weapon against them.  The only way to deal with this crowd is to keep throwing them off balance.  The boy genius/turd blossom is actually not so good at thinking on his feet.  If we resist their definitions, both of us and of the problems we face, and we don't let them craft our environment, and we make them react to our initiatives, then we win and they crawl back under a rock to plan further mischief.

     If anyone wants to discuss my ideas, please hold forth.  I'm all agog.