Sunday, July 06, 2003

40 Millionaires in US Senate by Jeremy Johnson 07 Jul 03 At least 40 of the 100 US senators are millionaires, some many times over, according to financial disclosure filings submitted last month. Republicans on the list outnumbered Democrats by a narrow margin of 22 to 18. However, Democratic senators hold the top five spots on the list and eight of the top ten, according to an analysis of the forms by CNN. These latest financial disclosures underscore the widening gap between the average American and those who claim to represent them in government. Even those congressmen who report a relatively modest net worth are pulling down a salary of $154,700, with leadership positions paying $171,900 annually. Heading the list is the Massachusetts Democrat and presidential candidate John Kerry, with an estimated net worth of between $164 million and $211 million. He reports holdings in 75 mutual funds, along with two held jointly with his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, heiress to the Heinz food company fortune. Assets that she owns independently, which other sources estimate at hundreds of millions more, are not required to be included. [World Socialist Web Site] 11:26:15 PM  Google It!

Billionaires for Bush Editorial 02 Jul 03 George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Laura Bush have been darting across the country these past few weeks raising money for Bush-Cheney '04 Inc. Bush, who broke all precedent in his 2000 bid by opting out of the presidential public-financing system and the spending limits it imposes, is once again pushing the envelope - and the corporate execs, lobbyists and wealthy individuals he has enriched are sending envelopes back, stuffed with checks. His operatives say he hopes to raise $170 million for next year's primaries - an obscene amount, since he will have no Republican challenger and his Democratic opponents will be held to a $45 million spending ceiling. But they're deliberately lowballing his total. Given the $101 million he raised in 1999-2000 and the unwise doubling (by the reform-hungry McCain-Feingold-Shays-Meehan squad) of the individual donation limit to $2,000, Bush starts with a potential funding base of $200 million or more. Nothing like this has happened since the robber barons and the trusts united behind William McKinley's 1896 campaign. [The Nation] 11:10:07 PM  Google It!

Ex-Envoy: Nuclear Report Ignored By Richard Leiby and Walter Pincus 06 Jul 03 Joseph C. Wilson, the retired United States ambassador whose CIA-directed mission to Niger in early 2002 helped debunk claims that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium there for nuclear weapons, has said for the first time publicly that U.S. and British officials ignored his findings and exaggerated the public case for invading Iraq. Wilson, whose 23-year career included senior positions in Africa and Iraq, where he was acting ambassador in 1991, said the false allegations that Iraq was trying to buy uranium oxide from Niger about three years ago were used by President Bush and senior administration officials as a central piece of evidence to support their assertions that Iraq had reconstituted its nuclear weapons program. 'It really comes down to the administration misrepresenting the facts on an issue that was a fundamental justification for going to war,' Wilson said yesterday. 'It begs the question, what else are they lying about?' [Washington Post] 11:03:52 PM  Google It!

Thanks to the Net, Howard Dean Hits the Big Time by Randolph T. Holhut 06 Jul 03 DUMMERSTON, VERMONT. They aren't laughing anymore. The people who believed that former Vermont governor Howard Dean was nothing more than a hopeless longshot for the Democratic presidential nomination now know otherwise. That's because the political pros and the Washington press corps (or as Media Whores Online likes to call them, the 'Beltway Kool Kidz') not only underestimated Dean, they also underestimated the power of the Internet as an organizational and fundraising tool. Dean pulled off a pair of shockers in recent days. In MoveOn.org PAC's online Democratic presidential primary, Dean crushed the rest of the field. With nearly 320,000 votes cast (or more votes than were cast in the 2000 New Hampshire Democratic presidential primary and Iowa and South Carolina presidential caucuses, combined), Dean won 44 percent of the vote. Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich was second with 24 percent and John Kerry was a distant third with 16 percent. Considering the voters who cast ballots in the MoveOn primary (myself included) constitute a more liberal electorate than most primary states, it wasn't much of a surprise to see the rest of the field in single digits. John Edwards had only 3 percent of the vote. Dick Gephardt and Bob Graham drew less than 2.5 percent. Carol Moseley Braun (2.21 percent) outpolled Joe Lieberman (1.92 percent) and Al Sharpton finished last at 0.53 percent. [American Reporter] 10:33:04 PM  Google It!

Look Up Under 'Library Nanny' by J.R. Labbe 29 Jun 03 The highest court in the land decided last week that libraries can lose government funding if they don't make it harder for patrons to view constitutionally protected material. Say what? The Supremes ruled that the federal government -- translation: Congress -- can withhold money from libraries that choose not to install porn blocking computer programs. Attorneys for the libraries had argued -- rightfully -- that the law will turn their clients into censors. They lost anyway. The First Amendment be damned. Only the naive would think that government hasn't been in the business of social engineering for a long, long time. One look at the tax code reveals that Congress thinks selected behaviors are good for society, so citizens are rewarded for participating in them. Home ownership. Tithing. Not growing certain crops. Growing children. It also is clear that government has attempted to manipulate behavior by withholding funds from legal activities that it deems unseemly. Must we revisit the issue of National Endowment for the Arts funding and the Robert Mapplethorpe exhibit? Grown people should not have to explain their reading interests to anyone, not even librarians. That much, the high court did recognize. Last week's decision instructs libraries that do install the software to be prepared to disable it 'without significant delay' upon the request of an adult user. Unfortunately, adult users still have to go to a librarian to ask for access to the entire World Wide Web. How embarrassing. Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist said the Constitution 'does not guarantee the right to acquire information at a public library without any risk of embarrassment.' Can't that logic be turned around? Is there a right that guarantees you'll never be offended by anything you read or see in a public library? Methinks not. Congress and a majority of Supremes, however, think otherwise. [Star-Telegram] 9:22:56 AM  Google It!