Category Archives: Blog

We’re paying in New Orleans, we’re paying in Iraq

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[This piece also appearing in this week’s Prince George’s Sentinel: ] 

 

After the scandals of Watergate, with a Fourth Estate somewhat revitalized around the idea of investigative journalism – you don’t get a much better pep pill than having a big-name reporter played by Robert Redford – there was a fairly widespread understanding that the press should check governmental malfeasance, corruption, and excesses.

 

This broad concept came with some congressional attention to problems in the CIA and in the Pentagon, and with the thorough discrediting of the manipulations behind the Vietnam War, even with periodic scandals, public discourse sustained some general concept of governmental accountability through the seventies and even into the eighties.

That concept, muted and beleagered though it already was, is exactly what was attacked by a hideously well-funded right wing. The very notions of government accountability, individual judgment and participatory democracy were attacked root and branch with a savagery sometimes stealthy though often flamboyant, by an increasingly effective propaganda machine calling itself “conservative.”

 

By the time Clinton got into office, every voice for the poor and every fiscally rational policy for preserving a huge middle class were on the defensive. To strengthen the middle class, after all, you have to soak the rich and help the poor – but any candidate saying so would have had his assassination called for, jestingly of course, in mass media. They do but poison in jest.

Meanwhile, in the media and in behind-the-scenes think tanks and spuriously academic conferences, a well-subsidized faction spent ten to twelve years boosting (1) economic policies to erode any security for the vast majority of our population; (2) political tactics to splinter any moral opposition and to silence and intimidate genuine populism; and (3) extreme militarism in foreign policy and in budget priorities.

 

One result is the immoral, illegal and unconstitutional invasion of Iraq. In all the war-boosting over Saddam’s oppression – brought up only to justify invading – there was little mention of progressive and secular facts about Iraq, where oil revenues paid for infrastructure, healthcare and education, without taxes, and where women were comparatively advanced. The first Gulf War destroyed the infrastructure and was followed by sanctions that harmed the Iraqi people rather than Saddam Hussein, further undermining their ability to oust Saddam themselves.

 

More fundamentally, in all the talk about “democracy,” no prominent person in the news media said publicly that one country has no right to remake another country. Nobody said it: there is no such right, absent a threat requiring self-defense.

We know by now that there was no such threat. The claims about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were false. The accusations that Iraq had been behind 9/11 were false. The claim that Saddam was in league with Islamic fundamentalists was false. The anticipation that Iraqi was behind the anthrax mailings was false. The story that Iraq tried to purchase “yellowcake” uranium was false. The story of the aluminum tubes was ludicrously false. The story of Iraqi “mobile labs” for germ warfare was false.

 

Yet these claims and others were assiduously pushed by well-paid media personalities, while anyone who debunked or questioned them was vilified like Scott Ritter and Hans Blix, or marginalized like me.

We know now that the “war on terror” has been used as a good-times substitute for the Cold War rather than for genuine defense or genuine attention to issues of public health and public safety. Contractors, lobbyists, George W. Bush’s cronies and even some of his relatives have made money off it. Big media outlets have made money off it. But it has not advanced the most sensible and inexpensive measures to preserve and safeguard our major cities, our waterways, and our petrochemicals sector.

 

As New Orleans demonstrates again, anything that makes for huge “defense” contracts and macho posturing gets Bush’s attention. Anything that could genuinely benefit the country at large does not.

 

The current emergency must be addressed for now, with whatever help can be provided by people at all levels.

 

But for the future, a continuing question will have to be addressed: why are the people who brought about this disaster still in their positions? Obviously, most of Bush’s political appointees will keep their jobs rather than be given an impetus to drop the dime on him. Each of his nominees knows the miserable job done by his own agency and the culpable motivations behind his getting the job in the first place.

 

But why are the paid propagandists who boosted this war still appearing on major television networks?

items for possible donation currently up on eBay

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Ordinarily I don’t do product placement. But in the interests of saving time and energy, and since I’ve already done some of the scoping out online anyway, I am forwarding the information below to anyone who might be interested in long-distance purchase for delivery or drop-off.

 

You can shorten the process of donating by checking out some of the following item numbers on eBay. Go to www.ebay.com and type or paste the item number given into the search box:

 

FOOD:  4390221628 (raisins in 60-box lots); 4390222414 (72 applesauces per lot); 4390222718 (24 mixed fruit cups per); 4403384224 (72 strawberry applesauce); 4403384689 (24 fruit cups per); 4388782738 (Famous Amos cookies, 36 packs); 4386649704 (cinnamon bars 36 packs); 4398749159 (fat-free cereal bars); 4388783402 (granola bars, 12 boxes of 10); 4388784937 (cracker & peanut butter packs, 120 per); 4388758281 (cheese & crackers, 50 packs per).

 

Note: most of the above can be bought in lots up to 100, for about $25-$30 per lot. These are all “Buy it now” listings rather than auctions – somewhat more money and less time involved than for auctions.

 

BABY:  7710962976 (5 packs of 80 wipes); 7711032419 (20 lots of 25 pacifiers apiece); 8308244954 (wholesale nipples for bottles); 7706328388 (24 jars baby food, 96 lots); 7706493472 (18 baby washcloths); 7702767766 (hooded bath towels); 4403633818 (10 toddler chairs).

 

HEALTH & MEDICAL CARE:  5611133622 (2 first aid kits); 5612659035 (adult diapers, 96 lots of 12); 5612644448 (braces and ankle supports, 20 lots of 10).

 

Et cetera.

Paying is probably easiest through PayPal, but other options are available.

Roberts as Chief Justice? — more firsts

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Ever since Marbury v. Madison (1803), which established the courts as the arbiter of what the written law says, a core principle of U.S. government has been the independence of its judiciary.

 

There is not time enough in a single blog to list all the actual limits on that theoretical independence. In fact, there’s not that much time in the universe. Most administrations have tried to bend the courts to their will; countless members of Congress and other officeholders, federal and state, have attacked courts and judges; many if not most judgeships have been awarded on bases other than, or at least along with, judicial merit.

 

But never before in American history have we had a judgeship so blatantly under the wing of a thoroughly politicized White House that a judicial candidate marched out to podium with a president as though he – the nominee for a judgeship – were the president’s spouse.

 

Details matter, politics matter, and visual details matter, especially in this White House. Generally, the announcement of a president’s nomination for the Supreme Court has been made quietly, in a manner so dignified as almost to seem ex cathedra. With some exceptions (such as Nixon with Rehnquist), presidents historically have not put themselves forward much in the event, have not appeared prominently and markedly in the announcement, much less accompanying the judicial nominee. It may be generally understood that political factors are involved, but those are played down physically at least, in deference to the American system of justice and its core tradition of judicial independence. The scene is set minimally, to convey a proper distance from the man seated on the bench and the political process that put him there.

 

Not with these guys, though. Granted, Bush’s typical on-camera short walk to the presidential podium is probably ridiculous to start with. Television cameras could just as well be set up to show a president already in situ, and probably with more dignity. That tiny, tiny little one-man procession from an extremely nearby entrance to the podium, evidently so beloved by Bush and his crew, adds little or nothing to make an occasion more imposing. It does not augment the gravitas, though they seem convinced to the contrary.

 

But this latest paired stroll, slight a gesture though it might seem, has to be the ultimate twist of what has become an almost dementedly tin ear. Roberts might as well have come out arm-in-arm with GWBush, like two ladies in a Jane Austen novel taking a turn around the room.

Ways to help, besides cash: part 2: Houston

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DistributorContacts

 

 

Timely distribution of essentials is key. Thousands of the refugees in Houston are being sheltered at the Astrodome, which does not have refrigeration facilities adequate for the crowd. So any food donations for the Astrodome need to be non-perishable snacks, ready-to-eat or shelf-stable bottled juices. Drop off supplies at Gate 11, between McNee and LaConcha streets, on Kirby.

 

Aside from the Astrodome, here are more Houston destinations for food and other donations:

 

Houston Food Bank-New York Pizzeria partnered with M.E. Taylor Trucking Food Drive September 5th – September 12th: Donation Drop-Off Site: corner of Westheimer & Chimney Rock, Houston 77035

 

ACE Hardware Food Drive: Donations taken at all ACE Hardware locations, through September 10th

 

STAR OF HOPE Mission at 1811 Ruiz, Houston 77002 or 419 Dowling, Houston 77002, and 6897 Ardmore  Houston, TX 77054  (713-748-0700)

 

Urgent needs for Star of Hope Mission include:

  1. for children: diapers and pull-ups, children’s underwear and socks of all sizes; strollers; infant and children’s Tylenol and Pedialyte; baby formula
  2. for women: deodorant and toiletries including soap and hand and body lotions; OTC (non-alcoholic medications); women’s underwear and socks of all sizes; women’s clothes in plus sizes; feminine products; women’s watches; insulated travel mugs with lids
  3. for men: men’s socks and underwear; dress shirts, suits and sport coats in large sizes; duffel bags

Star of Hope Mission also requests Bibles, including large-print Bibles.

 

The following is a listing of local food pantries for the Houston Food Bank that will provide food for individuals affected by hurricane Katrina who are in the Houston area. Contact phone numbers are for business hours:

 

Gulf Coast-North Point Station
123 Northpoint  Houston, TX  77060
Contact: Debra Nichols  (281-272-1555)

 

GulfCoast -J.D. Walker Multi
7613 Wade Road  Baytown, TX  77521
Contact: Sheila Saltibus  (281-426-4757)

 

GulfCoast Pantry

5000 Gulf Freeway Bldg #1  Houston, TX  77023
Contact: Debra Nichols  (713-393-4700)

 

Gulf Coast-Kashmere Multi-Svc
4802 Lockwood  Houston, TX  77026
Contact:  Sharon Martin  (713-674-1301)

 

Gulf Coast-Magnolia Multi-Svc
7037 Capitol, Ste. 106-C  Houston, TX  77011
Contact:  Virginia Lanham  (713-921-2960)

 

Gulf Coast-Sunnyside Multi-Svc
4605 Wilmington  Houston, TX  77087
Contact:  Doris Sullivan  (713-734-6553)

 

Gulf Coast-Southwest Station
9888 Bissonett, Ste. 135  Houston, TX  77036
Contact:  Mary Armelin  (713-393-4700 Ext. 822)

 

Gulf Coast-Acres Home Multi-Svc6719 W. Montgomery Road  Houston, TX  77091
Contact:  Hazel Piggee  (713-692-1046)

 

Gulf Coast-West End Multi-Svc170 Heights Blvd.  Houston, TX  77007
Contact:  Vronda Taylor

 

Go to http://www.sohmission.org/KatrinaHelp.html with links for more locations where donations can be dropped off or delivered.

 

Ways to help, besides cash: part 1: Houston

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Los tres presidentes will be asking for money, money, money for hurricane relief, and let’s hope they ask for some from the oil companies.

 

Meanwhile, the basic needs of water, food and shelter have to be fulfilled before financial donations can be processed. You can participate by joining a group near you to collect materials, or by starting a collection drive and helping it get to the refugees. That means getting hold of a truck and taking the essentials of water, ice, energy bars, bug spray and first aid straight to the victims, as a group in my community (Cheverly, Maryland) is doing.

 

Houston, Texas, is taking in at least 45,000 refugees. Here are some Houston destinations in need of items dropped off or delivered:

 

1. The Houston Food Bank needs volunteers and paper goods, cleaning supplies, bottled water, peanut butter, heat-and-eat foods, single-serving foods and snacks that don’t require refrigeration. (713-223-3700 or www.houstonfoodbank.org/katrina.htm)

 

2. The Astrodome in Houston needs most non-perishable items, but especially baby products like diapers and wipes. Drop off supplies at Gate 11, between McNee and LaConcha streets, on Kirby.

 

3. Food is needed at North Channel Assistance Ministries, 13837 1/2 Bonham Street.

4. Food is needed at St. Peter Claver, 6500 N. Wayside.

5. Food is needed at LangstonFamilyLifeCenter, 2814 Quitman.

 

6. The Katy Chamber of Commerce at 2501 S. Mason Road, Suite 230, is taking donations of goods and services. (www.katychamber.com or 281-828-1100)

 

7. The Houston Chapter of the Red Cross is accepting donations of bottled water in crates of 24 only. Drop them off at their office, 2700 Southwest Freeway.

8. The U.S. Coast Guard station at Houston’s Ellington Field is seeking donations of goods for hurricane victims. Call 713-578-3000 for information on their needs.

 

Products typically needed include:

Bottled water

Baby food and formula, baby wipes, diapers

Toilet paper, sanitary wipes, feminine products

Insect repellent

Socks

Flash lights with batteries

Aspirin, Neosporin, first aid kits

Plastic garbage bags

Propane tanks

Camping utensils, tarps, tents

Manual can openers

Pet food

Generators

Small AC Units

Liquid Soap

Canned goods (with can openers), trail mix, nuts, cereal bars, crackers

 

One way to help the hurricane victims: with bottled water

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Getting water promptly to the victims and refugees of Hurricane Katrina is essential. One relief effort being coordinated in the rural South is the bottled water drive through Delta State University, in Cleveland, Mississippi – on Highway 61, about an hour and a half south of Memphis.

 

The campus Student Government Association is partnering with the BolivarCountyEmergencyOperationsCenter and the local Red Cross chapter. Donations will be accepted through Friday, Sept. 9.  

 

Here are the addresses for dropping off or delivering factory-sealed containers of water, as soon as possible:

·        Delta State University, Highway 8, Cleveland MS 38733 (1-800-GO-TO-DSU or 800-468-6378). Drop off at the information booth, first floor of the H.L. Union Building

·        Knight Rider Mart, intersection of Highway 8 West and Bishop Road (664 Highway 44 North), no phone number given

·        The Bolivar Commercial newspaper, 821 North Chrisman Av, ClevelandMS (662-843-4241) 

 

N.b.: The Bolivar Commercial office is probably the best bet, for now, unless you can reach someone at the local Chamber of Commerce or through the county. “Suitcase campuses” tend to be partly closed down on weekends, especially over a holiday weekend.

 

Call the Bolivar EOC (fire dept) at 662-843-2300 before sending or giving them any more water, because as of 3:46 p.m. EST they still had some left and want to clear out the space before taking on more water supplies.

 

“The water will be transported and dispersed throughout Mississippi to victims and work crews dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.”

  

Call the statement office at (662) 846-4715 for further information. [Unfortunately, phone communications will be at a minimum over the Labor Day weekend.]

Capital Plaza could have helped the hurricane refugees

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Once again, we are all paying a price for the small-time chicanery of big corporations, and not solely with regard to surging (gouging) gasoline prices. Capital Plaza, at 6200 Annapolis Road in Landover Hills, Maryland, is geographically far removed from the initial impact of Hurricane Katrina, but it is still a microcosm of what could have been done.

 

As PG residents inside the Beltway know, the Capital Plaza mall space has sat underused for several years now while its owner-manager, the Nellis Corporation, tried unsuccessfully to land a series of big stores to serve as anchors for mall development. Some of the underused space was left when Hechinger’s, the large local hardware chain, went bankrupt, some when other department store chains went under. Compounding the problem, the landlord kept the mall’s remaining tiny, struggling business tenants on month-to-month leases for more than two years, basically guaranteeing that no vibrant mall traffic could grow and develop. This year, they terminated even those leases.

 

The result:  one million eight hundred thousand-plus square feet (1,805,560 sf) of commercially developed space goes begging, almost half a million square feet of it (491,650 sf) enclosed.

 

On behalf of the victims of the dreadful hurricane, we could have made some halfway decent lemonade from this lemon. Let’s start with the most important issue:  life and death. Citizens of New Orleans, Biloxi and Gulfport among other cities have been displaced and stranded with only their lives — without belongings, without shelter, without even food and water – sitting and lying on what remains of streets and highways. The cities and their terribly poor outlying rural surrounding areas have people clinging to their last half-bottles of water. These desperate American citizens do not have facilities even for sewage, much less for ordinary amenities that usually taken for granted. Making the situation more desperate is the fact that help can hardly get to them unless it is transported by air – meaning that cargo planes and helicopters are needed. And they can hardly get out to safer havens without air transport – meaning, again, cargo planes and helicopters.

 

The Capital Plaza parking lot is big enough for helicopters to land in and is also located conveniently near the College Park airport, which serves private planes.

 

The mall buildings at Capital Plaza are not palatial, by any means. I am well aware that only desperate people would appreciate being sheltered what remains of a shopping mall.

 

But the flood refugees are desperate. And those mall buildings do have, or until days ago still had, some essentials for minimal shelter, aside from floors, roofs and walls, they have or recently had plumbing, security, even air-conditioning. The parking lot is also more than big enough for back-up generators.

 

I am aware that the logistical difficulties of conveying refugees to this area would be immense. But the local American Legion and countless other organizations stand ready to help, should any organizing ability be offered at any level.

 

Unfortunately, the Capital Plaza property has been leased by the Wal-Mart corporation, after a stealthy local lobbying campaign using tactics of infiltration and duplicity. (Wal-Mart, of course, is the source of many of those guns now being used in looting New Orleans.)

 

And now Wal-Mart has already begun demolition at Capital Plaza. Perhaps if we move fast enough, we can intervene and can still use this space for the valuable effect of saving lives and health.

President Tlevesoor rides again

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The power of a fantasy is not always reduced by its ludicrousness. Tin-pot “Il Duce” of Italy, Benito Mussolini, envisioned himself as heir to Julius Caesar and proposed twentieth-century Italy as a “New Roman Empire.”

 

George W. Bush, whose personal fondness for dressing up in costumes has been amply demonstrated, apparently fancies himself the rightist avatar of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a figure on the world’s stage on course to reverse everything accomplished by FDR and by the New Deal.

 

The parallel, which exists only in Mr. Bush’s mind, is becoming progressively more overt. CNN reports that the president is about to set out on a course of public speeches to compare the “war on terror” to WW2. The objective, bizarre as it is, is to make the “war on terrorism” seem a global war, and thus to make it into a global war. That innocent people are dying by thousands, and that American service personnel are being injured and killed, hardly weighs in the scales. The odd unit in the White House wanted to invade the Middle East (“We’re at war,” Bob Woodward quotes Bush as saying immediately after 9/11), and they did it; they want to exert an inappropriate control over the other branches of government, the states, and the press, and they’re doing that too.

 

The objective is not to reduce terrorism but to pump it up into the “global war” that administration mouthpieces keep claiming it is, relying partly on the self-evident fact that every nation includes a young male population, and partly on the reliability of their own policies to inspire hatred around the globe. Any thinking person knows you can’t actually fight “terror” with a “war” or send legions around the world to deal with guerrilla tactics, but the administration and its media outlets use the most transparently offensive Orwellian language to discredit peace itself, or any notion that maps onto rationality, and every Bush appointment and policy amounts basically to throwing gasoline on the flames. Meanwhile, that we actually have, in office, in the White House, an odd crew that at some level wants a world war is so genuinely unthinkable that it is almost impossible to state in public discourse. The unthinkable has become unmentionable, but it’s happening: our President Tlevesoor is operating to reverse Roosevelt on every significant foreign and domestic policy.

 

The signs are accumulating. Bush has made increasingly explicit criticisms of Franklin Delano Roosevelt personally, including remarks about “Yalta” made abroad. Inveterate antagonists of New Deal policies including Social Security are being nominated by Bush for positions they would never have gotten before, including judgeships. The White House has even attacked Social Security (backing off for now), and according to Professor Yoshi Tsurumi of Baruch College, who taught Bush at Harvard Business School, Bush referred to Social Security and Medicare as “socialism” thirty years ago. Tsurumi has confirmed these remarks to me in a telephone interview.

 

The assault through private depredations is not just on Social Security but on all security. The Bush administration is not merely attacking Social Security; it is bent on undermining all security for a huge and self-confident middle class. The attacks are indirect as well as direct. When an employer like Wal-Mart moves into an area without providing affordable health benefits, the cost of employee health care is thrown upon Medicare. Policy moves that weaken private charity or state services throw a further health burden upon Medicaid. Meanwhile, corporate employers are not exactly being encouraged to provide good pensions for their employees. While corporate income at the top goes ever upward with bonuses, stock options and “golden parachutes” either not tied to performance or tied mainly to stock price, pensions are joining health insurance as a benefit out of reach even for middle management. A court decision allowed bankrupt United Airlines to break its pension promises.

 

Meanwhile, the White House has not supported the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), which was designed to shore up employees’ retirement plans like those at United. And while taxing huge inheritances is falsely called a “death tax,” the administration continues to impose what amounts to a “survival tax”; patients in long-term care or assisted living generally have to use up all their assets in the world to qualify for Medicaid. And it goes without saying that any effort to prevent or to redress abuses through collective bargaining, public agencies like OSHA, or private litigation is savagely opposed by everyone working with the White House.

More on ‘Plamegate’: not just trifles

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Even a short chronology from the over-all ‘Plamegate’ timeline is informative:

 

April 21, 2003: Judith Miller article appears in the New York Times, buttressing administration claims about Iraq WMDs (“smoking gun” etc); Miller also appears on Fox News the same day making the same claims about an Iraqi scientist as source for WMD claims.

 

April 22, 2003: Miller appears on PBS with similar claims.

 

June 7, 2003: New York Times reporters Judith Miller and William Broad publish an article, “Some Analysts of Iraq Trailers Reject Germ Use,” substantively revising or deflating Miller’s previous reporting on Iraq bio-weapons.

 

(Sarcastic Internet comment: “Using a canvas-sided truck for production of an inflammable gas always made more sense from an engineering standpoint.”)

 

June 8, 2003: then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice appears on Meet the Press, maintaining that administration allegations about Iraq WMD were not inflated or wrong and denying that warnings or qualification reached the top level of the administration.

 

June 9, 2003: former ambassador Joseph Wilson gets in touch with Times editor David Shipley, who offers him “fifteen hundred words to tell my story,” according to Wilson’s book (The Politics of Truth, p. 332).

 

June 10, 2003: a State Dept memo by a Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) analyst refers to Mrs. Wilson/Valerie Plame, and expresses continuing INR doubts re the Niger uranium.

 

June 30 (approx.): Joe Wilson emails his op-ed column to the Times, according to Wilson in response to emailed questions. He also states that some time that week, he discussed the piece with Shipley. The op-ed casts serious doubt on administration claims that Iraq tried to purchase “yellowcake” uranium from the poor African nation of Niger.

 

July 5: at “about 10:30 p.m.,” according to Wilson’s book, the op-ed hits the Times web site; at 10:32 Wilson gets a call from a New York Post reporter; at 10:34 he gets a call inviting him on Meet the Press the next day (p. 333).

 

July 6, 2003: Joseph Wilson’s op-ed appears in the New York Times.

July 7, 2003: the White House retracts the allegation that Iraq tried to purchase uranium from Niger.

(This claim underlay the “sixteen words” in Bush’s 2003 State of the Union speech. Reportedly it was also inserted into a Dec. 2002 State Department “fact sheet” on Iraq by John Bolton, now our ambassador to the U.N.)

July 7: Bush and other members of his administration take off on a trip to Africa.

July 8: I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, VP Cheney’s chief of staff, meets with Judith Miller and they discuss Wilson’s wife; a friend of Wilson’s encounters conservative columnist Robert Novak; and the friend then informs Wilson that Novak mentioned Wilson’s wife in connection with Niger.

July 8 or July 9: presidential aide Karl Rove talks with Novak; Wilson’s wife is mentioned.

July 11: Novak’s column naming Wilson’s wife as a CIA operative and saying that she had suggested his Niger trip, as “confirmed by two senior administration officials,” goes out on the AP wire; Karl Rove holds conversation about Mrs. Wilson with Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper (Cooper then emails his bureau chief about the conversation; email now has been turned over to the grand jury); Karl Rove emails Stephen Hadley about the conversation

July 12, 2003: an administration official tells Washington Post Walter Pincus that  Wilson’s Niger trip was a “boondoggle” from his wife, a WMD operative.

July 14, 2003: Novak’s column appears in many daily newspapers.

July 16, 2003: then-CIA head George Tenet testifies to the Senate Intelligence Committee that the president had been “warned off” some wording regarding Niger and alleged Iraq WMD. (The president subsequently accepted Tenet’s resignation from the CIA.)

July 20, 2003: Andrea Mitchell at NBC tells Wilson that a senior White House source told her to press Wilson’s family relations rather than the 16 words.

July 21, 2003: Chris Matthews tells Wilson that Karl Rove called his wife “fair game.”

July 24: the CIA reports possible violations to then-Attorney General Ashcroft. According to the blog “Daily Kos,” the web site of oddly un-credentialed White House reporter “Jeff Gannon” (Guckert, who also solicits sex on the Internet with some mention of money) debuts the same day.  (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/2/9/191334/075)

July 30: the CIA files a crime report regarding the Plame leak with the Department of Justice.

August, 2003: the Washington Times publishes apiece by PNAC member Frank Gaffney Jr. implying bias at the INR: “This bureau’s intelligence products have tended to reflect the policy predilections of State’s permanent bureaucracy, rather than the facts.” Subsequently, rightwing web sites target the INR as a holdover of treasonous liberals.

Sept. 26, 2003: DOJ’s Counterespionage section decides to pursue a criminal investigation.

Sept. 29: DOJ requests FBI to investigate the leak; DOJ notifies CIA that Counterespionage also requested an investigation.

Sept. 30: at least 12 hours later, then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales emails White House staff, telling them to preserve all materials and emails relating to the investigation.

Oct. 3: White House gives staff until 5:00 p.m. on Oct. 7 to turn over phone logs, records, etc., pertaining to the leak.

Nov. 3, 2003: “Talon News,” i.e. Jeff Gannon/Guckert, posts a third segment on Joe Wilson, casting doubts on the INR and its notes/memo re the CIA meeting that instigated Wilson’s Niger trip.

Nov. 7, 2003, a Friday:  John J. Kokal of the INR is found dead at bottom of the State Department building. Kokal worked in the Near East division. According to a D.C. Fire Department spokesman, he “was wearing a dress shirt, tie and slacks, but was not wearing shoes nor a suit jacket.”

[A shorter version of this piece appeared in this week’s Prince George’s Sentinel. ]

Our new Supreme Ct Nominee: His wife is big in satellite systems; her company is targeting Iraq

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Yet another first for our boundary-breaching White House: for the first time in American history, we’re going to have a justice on the high court whose spouse facilitates financing and putting together global satellite systems.

 

Also, the company in which she is a partner, Shaw Pittman, emphasizes among other things its expertise in facilitating business in Iraq:

 

“We offer one-stop service to clients pursuing projects in Iraq, from solicitation and RFP counseling to working with key government and multilateral agencies, and from initially penetrating the Iraqi marketplace to final project implementation. Our attorneys are recognized as leaders in their fields, and at the cutting-edge in a variety of disciplines relevant to Iraq reconstruction. A number have served in senior government positions in key agencies – including the Departments of Transportation, Navy, Justice and Commerce, as well as the Agency for International Development (USAID) and the World Bank.”

http://www.pillsburylaw.com/go/areamaster.nsf/practices-all/International:%20Iraq%20Reconstruction

 

Iraq has not yet been able to achieve an integrated communications service (many Iraqis don’t even have their electricity back, yet.) By numerous accounts, satellite communications/networks loom as a large unfilled need in Iraq. Jane Sullivan Roberts’ credentials are solid, and business-wise, her walk in life is largely helping clients put together and get financing for satellite systems, according to her company bio:

 

“Ms. Roberts practices with the firm’s communications and global sourcing groups, concentrating in representing clients in sophisticated transactions involving technology. She has extensive experience in representing clients in the buying and selling of space-related goods and services, including companies involved in the development of multi-billion dollar global and regional satellite systems. Ms. Roberts’ experience also includes representing clients in information technology outsourcing transactions; software licensing, development, and maintenance contracts; and professional services arrangements. Prior to 1992, Ms. Roberts practiced litigation in a wide variety of matters before various courts and decision-making bodies, including large international commercial arbitrations involving nuclear power plants before the International Chamber of Commerce.” http://www.pillsburylaw.com/Go/bios.nsf/professionals/Jane%20Sullivan%20Roberts

(I like that afterthought re nuclear power plants. Shades of Homer Simpson.)

 

The following statements by and about Ms. Roberts come from an article titled “High flyers, high margins, high society and space VC,” in the publication Space Business International (4th quarter 2000):

“Shaw Pittman is a composite organization, in which teams of associates, corporate finance partners, technology procurement and transfer partners, intellectual property strategists, corporate deal-makers work together with the clear aim of dominating Washington’s high-tech legal world. They’ve made a good start – hands on involvement already in 25 percent of all metropolitan VC closures in Q1-2000.

‘Despite the March 2000 downturn in US stock markets, there is still lots of VC money available’, says Roberts. ‘But the way the money is channelled has changed – it’s harder to fund business-to-business dot.coms, especially where you have to build a brand; and likewise for business-to-consumer deals. But there is still plenty of money left to fund wireless technologies, Internet infrastructure, next generation networking devices and b2b software plays.”

 

“‘And Washington DC is cementing its position as an international hub of the commercial space and satellite industry. In terms of corporate headquarters, we have many major players, including Loral Cyberstar, Astrolink, Skybridge, Hughes Spaceway, Final Analysis, Ellipso, INTELSAT, COMSAT, WorldSpace, and XM Satellite Radio. Not to mention the major aerospace players …’”

 

“Ms Roberts’ specific targets are the procurement of satellite systems and related services and technologies such as launch services, launch insurance, terrestrial networks, terminals, call centers and billing systems. ‘As a technology transaction lawyer, my role is to use contractual techniques to minimize my client’s completion risk, that is the risk the satellite system will not be completed – designed, built and deployed – within established performance, cost and schedule objectives. For a company seeking venture capital, it is critical to demonstrate to potential investors that the company is successfully managing its completion risk.’”

 

“So – how to close a transaction to buy a satellite system: ‘In a typical transaction where a client lacks substantial financial backing, we call up our experts in intellectual property, export control, bankruptcy, securities, debt financing, and dispute resolution. We have roughly 300 lawyers in the DC metro area and if, need be, we can call upon another one hundred lawyers in our New York, Los Angeles and London offices. Each of those offices is also focused on the high-tech industry.’”

[This link is down, but you can get to the article by clicking “cached” in a google search.]

 

A quite good, concise article by Ms. Roberts, on the risks of putting together a new satellite system and attempting to break into the market, is found at

http://www.pillsburylaw.com/go/News.nsf/news-publications-all/52D9281973A9BE6B85256FD40066ADE8?OpenDocument

“The risks of building and financing a new satellite system fall into three broad areas: market, regulatory and completion. Market risk is the risk the target market does not want or cannot pay for the satellite services offered. Regulatory risk is the risk of not obtaining all regulatory approvals required to build and operate the satellite system, such as for orbital locations allocated by the International Telecommunications Union, spectrum licensed by the satellite operator’s “host” or “home” government, and “landing rights” granted in each country that will receive the new satellite service. Completion risk is the risk the satellite system will not be completed—designed, built and deployed—within the established performance, schedule and cost objectives.”

(from Satellite Finance, Issue 16)

 

Perhaps it will surprise few people that Shaw, Pittman, where Ms. Roberts is a partner, is offering its services for a newly privatized Iraq:

“Pillsbury’s Iraq Reconstruction Practice is mobilized to offer clients strategic legal advice in their postwar reconstruction efforts. Comprised of lawyers from several offices and backgrounds with relevant legal, industry and regional experience, the team is well poised to support virtually every endeavor in post-war Iraq, including:

·                                 Infrastructure development, construction and procurement

·                                 Intellectual property, technology and outsourcing services          [etc.]

www.pillsburylaw.com/go/areamaster.nsf/practices-all/International:%20Iraq%20Reconstruction

 

The company’s web site does not indicate that Ms. Roberts is on its Pillsbury Iraq Reconstruction Team. A call to the company to inquire whether she has yet had clients/projects in Iraq has not yet been returned. Stay tuned.

 

Meanwhile, the nominee husband’s numerous investments also include Shaw Pittman. One wonders whether a Justice Roberts would have to recuse himself on any cases involving Iraq, including cases about profiteering; procedure re “detainees” rounded up in Iraq; Iraq contract fraud; and/or regulatory or other violations by satellite systems companies that hired his wife’s firm or his wife herself.