At the risk of oversimplification, I think that the national problems we have now are a manifestation of Republican excesses in the White House and Congress for WAY too long. The cumulative effect of destroying regulatory oversight, budget deficits, foreign policy blunders, anti-science policy and the general lawlessness within the Bush Administration has brought us this horrible situation. I worked hard for Obama since February 2007 and have great faith in his ability to lead us out of this mess. I have hope for us nationally.
California's problems are certainly related, but generally the budget problems in Sacramento are a manifestation of Democratic excesses for WAY too long. The unions played a major role in electing many of the key political figures and they expected (and received) a good return on their investment. It is unfair to call this a complete manifestation of Democratic excesses because Republicans fed liberally at the CCPOA and PORAC trough and delivered for law enforcement. When it comes to SEIU, the Democrats delivered.
The Bush Administration has released midnight regulation changes that make it easier for growers to slash the pay of domestic farm workers and hire imported foreign laborers instead of U.S. field workers. They will weaken government protections in an industry known for violating the minimum wage, housing requirements and other rules. We must do everything we can to avoid having these regulations implemented. Please help!
Los Angeles Times, 12/16/08: Not content to leave office as the most unpopular president in recent history, Bush is cementing his legacy of hardheaded autocracy by pushing through a record number of last-minute and particularly noxious changes in federal regulations. Bypassing congressional debate and often receiving public comments through government websites, the administration has in recent months issued dozens of "midnight regulations" that in some cases could take years to reverse. This isn't just leaving a stamp on the country, it's more like inking a tattoo.
(Welcome Assemblyman Ted Lieu to Calitics! And yes, enough is enough. - promoted by David Dayen)
"Enough is Enough"
Gordon Gecko in the movie Wall Street famously said, "Greed is good . . . Greed is right, greed works." Real life Wall Street, however, reminds us that excessive and unregulated greed wrecked havoc in the mortgage industry and took down our economy. The core cause of the chaos in our financial sector was the unregulated selling of unsuitable and risky subprime home loans that resulted in a massive wave of foreclosures.
During the mortgage boom, industry players became addicted to the drug of high-yield, adjustable rate subprime mortgages that they foisted on borrowers. Raking in massive quarterly and annual bonuses, corporate executives didn't care if borrowers could repay the mortgages a few years later. It was greed on speed, the future be damned, and now all of us are suffering the consequences.
As my recent diaries have shown there is a shortage of firefighters to meet the unprecedented amount of fires burning across our state. As I began digging into this yesterday I came across the same report highlighted in today's Monterey Herald - that US Forest Service firefighting efforts have been cut to the bone and left the nation vulnerable to massive fires. Deliberate staffing shortages have left the USFS unable to do vital off-season brush clearance, and left them without the staffing to get a quick jump on fires in their crucial initial stages.
The federal firefighting system is "imploding" in California, due to poor spending decisions and high job vacancy rates, as the region struggles to keep pace with what looks to be a historic fire season, a firefighters' advocacy group charges.
As a result, the firefighters say, small fires have exploded into extended, multimillion-dollar conflagrations because the U.S. Forest Service has been unable to contain them during the early "initial attack" stage...
As the "sheer number" of California wildfires pushed the nation to its worst measurable level of wildland-fire preparedness last week - Level 5 - a national multiagency coordinating group announced in a memo Monday that firefighter staffing levels in Northern California "cannot be maintained."
The report, by the FWFSA, has been around for a few months now. Wildland firefighters have been screaming about the issue to anyone who would listen, including Dianne Feinstein:
After facing pressure from California Sen. Dianne Feinstein and other lawmakers last spring, the Forest Service promised it would immediately fill its vacancies and launched a "Fire Hire" campaign to attract firefighters in Sacramento that concluded two weeks ago.
"I believe the agency should have been able to muster a stronger force," Feinstein said. "All signs indicate that things will only get worse."
Feinstein said that despite promises of full staffing from [USFS Administrator Mark] Rey, only 186 of the agency's 276 engines were manned at the start of the 2008 fire season.
Ron Thatcher, president of the union that represents 20,000 Forest Service employees, has estimated that attrition has left the service at 70 percent to 80 percent of its authorized staffing levels, and that up to 39 percent of fire crew leader positions were vacant as the 2008 fire season kicked off.
Rey, Bush's USFS administrator, has a long background in the timber industry. He blames environmentalists for the problems, but firefighters and those who know the issue are having none of it.
In a little noticed vote yesterday, the Merida Initiative passed easily through the House of Representatives 311-106. It provides $1.6 billion with an emphasis on training and equipment to fight drug cartels in Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America, because as Rep. Brian Bilbray explained:
"Either we can go after these cartels in Ensenada, or we can fight them in Escondido," said Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-Carlsbad), who voted for the plan. "I'd prefer that we move now and take care of this problem south of the border. The drug wars in Mexico and in other regions have grown horrendously violent, and their destructive ways must be quashed."
While the outcome of the 2008 presidential election remains unknown, one certainty goes unappreciated: the Bush presidency will soon be over! A new animated film offers a joyful musical tribute to the end of an era.
"The Waiting Is Over" shows a glimpse of what the future may hold with the passing of the presidential torch. It's a hand-clapping, foot-stomping celebration guaranteed to lift your political spirits.
The Bush Administration's Dept. of Interior "lost" the indian gaming agreements for three months, according to the SD U-T. So, the federal government didn't even cast more than a cursory glance at them before they were approved by the federal government. I suppose it's just one more chit in the incompetency jar for the Bush Administration. No worries, you'll hardly notice it amongst all the others. In fact, the Department's Response was pretty much standard Bush operating procedure:
"Somebody made a mistake; we don't know who," said Nedra Darling, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, a branch of Interior. "This is a very busy office. There was a mistake made and we're moving on."
So, I guess it's all over and done with, right? Oh, except the fact that we are left to deal with this POS in California. But, we'll just move on, no need to fix the problems, or anything like that. Now, I think i've heard the phrase "mistakes were made" before, where was that? Ah, yes. Abu Gonzales. That ended well.
(Cross-posted from Warming Law, which focuses on covering and analyzing the fight against global warming from a legal perspective. My name is Sean Siperstein, and I run Warming Law as part of my work for Community Rights Counsel, a non-profit, public interest law firm that assists communities in protecting their health and welfare. Given the blog's focus, a lot of what I write about ends up having to do with efforts by the administration and the auto industry to hold up California's pioneering efforts in fighting global warming (here's our full archive of posts about the EPA waiver application), and as such I'm (belatedly) taking up a suggestion to post select items here. Thanks for the opportunity to join the discussion; I really look forward to it!)
Reacting to last week's lawsuit challenging the EPA's failure to produce a timely decision on California's waiver application to enforce its own auto emissions standards, EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson cited-- as he had many times before-- the need to painstakingly evaluate thousands upon thousands of in-depth public comments on the waiver.
However, a quick look at Thursday's lawsuit filing reveals that while the White House, Transportation Secretary Peters and the auto industry might have schemed to politicize that process, they nevertheless failed to significantly influence it (at least in a formal sense):
5. The comments submitted to USEPA overwhelmingly support the GHG Regulation. Of the approximately 98,000 comments referenced in the USEPA's docket, more than 99.9% support the GHG Regulation. Only one automakersubject to the GHG Regulation [Editor's note: General Motors] submitted any opposition to the USEPA. Two automaker trade groups submitted opposing comments.
This is noteworthy (and, frankly, laugh-inducing) because, as emails obtained by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee indicate, a central purpose of the administration's surreptitious lobbying effort was to encourage negative comments from governors and members of Congress. Indeed, the communications in question took place rather hurriedly over the weeks leading up to EPA's June 15 deadline for public comment.
As the smoke begins to clear in San Diego, the stories and reactions to the fire will start competing with the recovery effort atop the fold. First on the minds of many in government seems, not surprisingly, to be response time and firefighting capacity. Unforunately, Republicans are again demonstrating that they make up in bluster what they lack in remote semblance of coherence. Southern California Republican Congressmen such as Duncan Hunter, Brian Bilbray, Darrell Issa, Jerry Lewis, Elton Gallegly and Dana Rohrabacher have been lining up for every available reporter to knock Governor Schwarzenegger and the state's CalFire bureaucracy for supposedly impeding firefighting efforts throughout the region last week. They've flown so dramatically off the handle in fact that even Chris Reed has it right on their craziness- or at least part of it:
The congressmen who are doing such a good job exposing the state's bureaucratic tomfoolery in its wildfire response have some explaining to do themselves. Couldn't they have spared an earmark to cover the cost of outfitting the California Air National Guard's C-130 with a fire-retardant tank, something that was promised to happen after the 2003 wildfires but never did?
Instead, Duncan Hunter funneled $63 million into the DP-2 Vectored Thrust Aircraft boondoggle. And Dana Rohrabacher worried more about buying expensive planes the military didn't want than about helping California's wildfire-fighting capacity. This is from a May story in the Washington Post:
... Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) has made one of the biggest earmark requests in the new Congress, seeking $2.4 billion to build 10 more C-17 planes -- which the Pentagon has said it does not need.
These gentlemen have ended up discussing almost every issue in the country, all in the context of the fire. And they've managed to be completely wrong every time. So without further ado, an "oh the humanity" sampling from the past week.
This morning, I once again awoke indoors in Beaumont, CA with a scratchy throat and stuffy nose. We are miles away from any fire devastation yet are feeling the consequences. 'Snow' floats down onto housing tracts and farms from Los Angeles to Phoenix. An orange sky stretches seemingly forever north, south, east and west of Beaumont and the Inland Empire. At first it reminded me of the Southern California fire storm that hit a few years ago after my partner and I moved to CA.
Then, I remembered that those fires reminded me of the environmental consequences of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. You have the odors that are unexpected and ill-defined. You have the constant particulate matter in the air. And you have difficulty breathing and shortly will have Bush, the Bush Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, a Republican Governor, and Republican local officials lying to the affected citizenry.
Arnold Schwarzenegger has been fairly good on SCHIP issues. A little slow, but fairly good. Back in August, he wrote a letter with Governor Eliot Spitzer (D-NY) opposing limiting rule changes in SCHIP. While the letter (PDF) stops short of supporting the program passed by Congress (it hadn't been passed at the time), he has shown support on severaloccasions in the past.
Well, now the president has vetoed SCHIP. It didn't take the president very long, I suppose he really, really fears creating any "middle class entitlements". So, it is no longer enough to simply enough to merely voice his support for SCHIP, and to decry a potential veto. I know, I know, time is tight with your upcoming vacation to China, but can't you squeeze some time in for the kids? The time is now, he must actively lobby to garner the final 16 votes needed in the house to override this veto. In fact, there are enough votes in California alone to override. 18 California Republicans voted against the bill, so there's a place to start. The only GOP holdout, Mary Bono, is praying that the SCHIP vote masks the rest of her reactionary voting record.
While Arnold seems to have lost some of his patina of being outside of the system for California Republicans, he still holds some allure outside of the state. So, even if he isn't successful with 16 of the CA's Republican Congressmen, he should be working on those from other states. Use some of that "post-partisan" rock stardom for the good of the nation, you know? Leaders from groups around the state and the nation are looking to Arnold to lead on this issue. The AARP was particularly vocal on pressuring Arnold. And FamiliesUSA, who supported this video, is working overtime to pressure any and all votes in support of SCHIP. Arnold should be as well. Once again, it is Arnold who must decide if his legacy will be that of just another Republican to katybar the doors to progress, or of a leader who reaches across lines and uses his political capital for the good of the state, and the nation.
(Seriously, is there anybody as cool as Hilda Solis? (Well, maybe there are a few others who are tied.) She always supports progressive goals and organizations and pursues policy for policy's sake. Too bad we can't say that of all of our Representatives. Thank you Representative Solis. - promoted by Brian Leubitz)
This morning I spoke on the House floor to ask why President Bush didn't allow the United States to take part in the United Nation's major Global Warming discussion this week. You can watch my floor statement on my YouTube page here.
The San Diego Board of Supervisors voted yesterday to attempt to bill the federal government for the supposed cost of undocumented immigrants. In an exceptionally pathetic (even by normal standards) attempt to steal money and headlines without any underlying logic, the Board commissioned a report to examine only the negative economic impact of undocumented workers and ignore the economic benefits of taxes paid and goods and services purchased. The kicker? They want the bill to be paid with money that the undocumented immigrants paid into the Social Security system via taxes. Taxes of course were not included in the study.
"Our troops are not political props, and they aren't chew toys".
Indeed.
Remember that Rieckhoff is an Iraq War vet, and founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. He was responding to the GWBush speech today to the VFW, and also to Ari Fleischer's (R-Warmonger) new war porn group.
Impeachment is the right remedy right now. But transforming it from blog-shriek into reality - if that can be done - will require a fresh approach.
My approach has some fresh footprints to fill with life and energy some existing Congressional oversight powers that have been gathering dust in the closet even though they have the Supreme Court stamp of approval and have been very effective against uncooperative executive branch officials in the past. It is a bold and dramatic approach tailored to counter Bush's obstructionist MO and false bravado. Bush now has a pattern of obstructing justice by refusing to permit witnesses to testify or provide evidence in oversight hearings while he waves his sword of executive privilege. But, Bush's sword is nothing more than pretentious swaggering to scare Congress from exercising its powers or litigating.
It's time for Congress to use its powers in a 3-step plan to get the evidence we need to convince the public and lawmakers that "Impeachment is the right remedy right now."
You know it is bad for a president when he gives a war time speech to the troops and gets a tepid response. Bush was in Cali yesterday, down at Fort Irwin, giving a speech. The troops weren't exactly enthusiastic. (h/t to Carpetbagger)
Dozens of camouflage-wearing troops sat quietly at their lunch tables, some joined by family members, as Bush spoke during a visit to this remote base in the high desert of California, where Iraqi-American actors train soldiers to understand Iraq's cultural differences. [snip]
A number of the troops who listened quietly are from units about to rotate into service in Iraq.
Barbara Boxer has moved to Rancho Mirage, replacing Mary Bono as the California desert's star legislator. Someone seems a bit put out. No wonder, it will be much harder for Mary Bono to pose as an environmentalist in this desert now that a real one has come to town. Especially as Bono continues to serve as a loyal Bushie, even voting against HR 580 (US Attorney oversight) last night. That's hardcore. But I digress.
Last week at the Gore hearings Mary Bono insinuated that Senator Boxer represents a threat to her district's constituents. Boxer is using global warming as an excuse to play politics, says Mary. I dealt with the credibility of her witness and the extreme nature of her position on global warming here.
But Mary Bono's scripted swipe at Barbara Boxer, on behalf of the nation's poor, merits its own discussion. Here's the video.
Chris Reed has a post up [...] on his UT blog discussing the continuing "media error-a-thon" in regards to classifying those without health care in the United States. His complaint is that there are not 47 million Americans without health insurance. Rather, there are 47 million people in America without health insurance. His gripe so much as I understand it is that immigrants, legal or otherwise, shouldn't be part of the health care discussion in the first place and that including them improperly legitimizes these people as Americans and artificially inflates the health care problems faced in this country.
Why'd he do it? Why did George Bush propose a series of initiatives widely acknowledged as "dead on arrival"? Obviously to distract from his foreign policy woes-but his proposals also serve as an attempt to recast the healthcare debates in terms favorable to the insurance industry while gumming up the drive for genuine healthcare reform that our nation so badly needs. We'll take a look at the evidence and the unfriendly reaction this plan received around the nation.
While the outcome of the 2008 presidential election remains unknown, one certainty goes unappreciated: the Bush presidency will soon be over! A new animated film offers a joyful musical tribute to the end of an era.
Meteor Blades wrote: