Rep. Gary Odom, D-Davidson County

Nashville – State Coordinator of Elections Mark Goins has again refused to comply with state law, said House Democratic Leader Gary Odom on Friday.

“Goins and Secretary of State Tre Hargett have continuously failed to enact Tennessee’s Voter Confidence Act of 2008, which mandates the purchase of optical-scan voting machines that use paper ballots,” said Odom (D-Nashville). “The use of paper ballots ensures that Tennesseans’ votes are counted correctly.”

In a letter dated July 31st, Goins, in response to several requests from Odom’s office, said that he had the sole authority to “interpret” the law and was not going to implement the Act.

“I’m not going to stand by and let Mr. Goins ignore the law that was passed in a bi-partisan fashion in 2008,” Odom said. “The intent of the Voter Confidence Act of 2008 is simple: it is to put into place an election process that uses optical-scan paper ballot machines for the 2010 elections. To conclude anything else is simply an effort to ignore the law.”

Tennessee Secretary of State, Tre Hargett

“Secretary of State Tre’ Hargett and his election coordinator Mark Goins, in one of their first actions in office, had a bill introduced to repeal the Voter Confidence Act,” Odom said.

“They later amended it to extend the deadline so that they could get enough votes to at least stall the purchase of paper ballot machines,” Odom said. “Ultimately, the bill to delay the implementation of the Voter Confidence Act did not pass. Goins needs to do his job and implement the Act.”

The Secretary of State currently has approximately $37 million in federal funds appropriated by Congress. These funds may only be used to buy voting machines and for the administration of elections.

The Federal Reserve

Washington D.C. – Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), who has led the effort challenging the use of TARP funds through two administrations, Tuesday questioned whether or not “banks are parking a historic amount of taxpayers’ money in the Federal Reserve while the businesses and consumers across America are starved for credit” and whether the Federal Reserve is “paying banks not to make loans.”

Kucinich raised the question in a hearing this morning before the Government and Oversight Committee at which the Special Inspector General for TARP, Neil Barofsky, testified.

Kucinich cited Tuesday’s Fed news report on Bloomberg.com:

Meanwhile, banks’ excess reserves at the Fed rose to a record $877.1 billion daily average in the two weeks ended May 20, from $2 billion a year earlier. Excess reserves — money available for lending that banks choose to leave with the Fed instead — averaged $743.9 billion in the first two weeks of this month. – Bloomberg.com

“If these reports are true, this raises significant questions about who the Fed is working for. There is record unemployment and businesses and consumers across American are starved for capital, if the Fed is paying higher interest rates on term deposits in order to induce banks to keep money at the Fed rather than lend, it would be an outrage,” Kucinich said.

Kucinich recounted for Barofsky the policy path which TARP followed when it was first presented to Congress:

“First Congress was told that TARP was for the purchase of toxic assets, to help keep people in their homes. Then the Bush Administration switched the program.

“Next Congress was told that the TARP funds were instead needed to bail out the banks, in the form of a direct capital infusion, to keep credit markets alive.

“If TARP isn’t about keeping people in their homes or providing credit to businesses, what is it for? I think the vast majority of Americans would be outraged to learn their tax dollars were facilitating hoarding at the Fed and increased profit making for banks,” Kucinich said.

Kucinich said that the Domestic Policy Subcommittee, which he chairs, will ask Fed Chairman Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Geithner to explain the program.

In March, the Domestic Policy Subcommittee held a hearing entitled, “Peeling Back the TARP: Exposing Treasury’s Failure to Monitor the Ways Financial Institutions are Using Taxpayer Funds Provided under the Troubled Assets Relief Program.”

NASHVILLE, TN (8.6.08) – In a statement about the fragile state of our electoral system, Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr., singled out Nashville-based filmmaker David Earnhardt’s election integrity documentary, UNCOUNTED: The New Math of American Elections, saying that it offered “warnings about the fragile state of our electoral system” and “evidence of how voting machines themselves can create problems.”

UnCounted made its premiere in November, 2007, to a standing room only crowd at Nashville’s Belcourt Theater, where Clarksville Online was the only media present to cover the event. Clarksville Online and the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in December, 2007, teamed up with Uncounted producers David and Patricia Earnhardt to co-sponsor an equally packed screening of this film in Clarksville.

UnCounted details the issues of the past several elections, examining both the broader scope of problems with electronic voting and the focusing that same lens on a number of the most controversial problems including malfunctioning or potentially manipulated voting machines, the lack of verifiable voting (the paper ‘trail’), and an insufficient number of machines at a number of polls.

In his statement, Congressman Jackson held up Michigan and Tennessee, states that will hold their primary elections this week, as examples where people go to the polls without having an explicit right to vote.

“The affirmative right to vote is not in the Constitution. Until we put it there we will continue to have presidents selected by the Supreme Court, partisan officials crafting rules in their favor, and voters disenfranchised by political games or plain old sloppiness. The Advancement Project report details a dizzying array of Election Day meltdowns, and in Uncounted there’s evidence of how voting machines themselves can create problems. Without the constitutionally-protected right to vote, we don’t have the power to make sure that every vote is counted in a complete, fair and efficient manner.”

– Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr.

“Every Congress since 2001, I’ve introduced House Joint Resolution 28 (H.J. Res. 28), legislation calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution granting everyone the affirmative right to vote. It’s time to scrap the states’ rights-based system we have now, and place the right to vote alongside the constitutionally-protected right to free speech. Voting gives you the political power to protect all of your other rights. That power is the bedrock of our democracy. It should not be left to political whims, economic downturns and disenfranchising procedures,” said Jackson.

Many Tennesseans were stunned to hear the news that yesterday morning at 10:18 a.m. a lone gunman walked into a welcoming congregation in Knoxville and opened fire on the congregants who were gathered in anticipation of watching their children perform a scene from the musical “Annie” as part of the morning services, killing two people and shooting several more in the head before being tackled to the ground. That church, the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, is a beacon of joy and hope in East Tennessee. Its congregation is made up of some of the most loving, kind and gentle people in the fine city of Knoxville, and the horrific tragedy which was visited upon that church is a wakeup call to good people throughout Tennessee to re-examine our approach to gun control in Tennessee and throughout this nation.

Sadly this is not the first nor the last example of guns in churches, schools and public spaces being used to kill innocent men, women and children. In the past decade alone, dozens of people have been killed in our nations schools, churches and public gathering places by people who had obtained guns legally and illegally with the sole intention of killing unarmed civilians. The public school shooting rampage phenomenon started here in the South only a decade ago when two students in Jonesboro, Arkansas opened fire on their fellow middle school students killing five and wounding eleven. Since that time our nation has witnessed school shootings in over a dozen states with victims numbering in the hundreds. There have also been shootings at shopping malls and church shootings in the past year in Texas, Colorado and now Tennessee.

Unfortunately, in many of these cases, the guns that were used in the commission of felony first degree homicides were obtained legally. Either the guns were in possession of parents who were not able to keep the guns from the access of their children, or in some cases rifles were used. In many states there are no laws regarding the use of these weapons by minors. In other cases guns were obtained illegally. No matter how the gun was obtained, it was used in the commission of a crime against men, women and children who lost their parents, children or grandchildren as was the case today in Knoxville.

I cannot imagine the horror of the children yesterday watching as their parents were shot in front of them, but this incident further illustrates to me the need for effective gun control regulations at the federal level. The fact is that guns kill people and in the United States they kill a lot of people. The United States has the highest per capita murder rate in the developed world, with 14 people per 100,000 dying of gun violence each year. This adds up to nearly 10,000 people a year who die at the hands of a gun, not including the additional 16,000 suicides that happen each year with the use of a gun. This is nearly thirty three times the number of Americans who have been killed in Iraq since the beginning of the war.

The recent Supreme Court ruling on the second amendment by the Bush and Reagan stacked court insures that our nation’s cities can continue to live in perpetual fear of similar incidents happening around the nation as what happened in Knoxville on Sunday. Cities are already scrambling to deal with the chilling new reality handed down by the Supreme Court this summer, which seems to mean that it is open season for every crazy person who can get their hands on a gun in our nation’s urban centers.

There is a solution though, and it is up to Congress to exercise the political will to make a decision to pass laws which place strict limits on gun ownership and to hold gun sellers strictly accountable for who they sell their products to. We have a responsibility to protect our children and our nation’s citizens have a right to live free of the fear of being visited with violence as they go about their daily lives of working, shopping and worshiping as they choose. As a candidate for federal office I believe that federal government has the responsibility to place strict limits on gun ownership in this country. Gun rights advocates argue that guns make us safe, but I believe that a heavily armed nation is a dangerous place to live. It is time to make our country safe for our children. Now is the time for comprehensive gun control for a safer America.

Now everyone knows that it is not polite to intrude on people in their private moments. The problem is that big brother doesn’t seem to know that peeking into people’s private communication is wrong and it should be illegal. Unfortunately President Bush wants to continue to grant immunity to telecommunications companies in the name of the so called ‘war on terror’ which in actuality is a war on the American people and the telecommunications infrastructure is the front line in the gradual diminishment of civil rights that Congress has permitted in recent years.

We need representatives in Washington DC who support protecting Americans instead of distrusting us. As a candidate for federal office I support legislation to abolish the Department of Homeland Security, that Orwellian agency constructed in the days after 9-11, which has crafted the war on the American people and their rights since. I support the elimination of FISA loopholes and the closing of Guantanamo Bay and the return of all detainees to their countries of origin. I believe that the American people deserve full and open disclosure on all activities related to government spying conducted against her citizens. Finally, I support the elimination of discreet, undocumented funding of the Central Intelligence agency.

Our rights are not negotiable. Telecommunication companies have violated those rights and have broken the law in order to appease a corrupt and power hungry administration that is willing to throw out Habeus Corpus, the right to privacy and international law in a reckless drive down the road to never-never land. Corporations must be held accountable and the President and his cronies must be called to account for violating our basic constitutional rights. Unfortunately, Senator Obama has been a disappointment on this issue and has refused to honor his commitment to filibuster this legislation. As a result, we are once again adrift without a rudder, a captain, a ship or an engine, being dragged along by the tides of fear.

It is time to reject the efforts of George Bush and anyone else who wants to grant retroactive immunity to corporations that spy on Americans. Congress has proven itself to be too weak-kneed to stand up to the fear mongers, but there is a new line of candidates running for office who are not so willing to roll over and play dumb. Treason is not patriotic. We all know that the government spying on us is wrong, and that any agency or corporation that assists in breaking into our most intimate communications is not behaving in a democratic fashion. The new reality is that our privacy is being compromised until we roll back FISA protections and strip immunity for corporations that spy on Americans.

For more information on this issue please visit: http://www.usalone.com/no_following_orders.php

I’m sure that electronics showrooms and a host of other retailers are hoping for a spending surge in a few months, but will it happen, and will it be enough to jump start the economy? The jury will be out for a while on that one.

I do know that for me any refund or other form of “windfall” will not quickly refuel the economy. My TV works just fine. I won’t buy a cell phone. My closet is full of clothes. I borrow more DVDs from the library than I will ever buy. A trip to Barnes and Noble could constitute a “weak moment” but since B&N is in Nashville, I’d have to say “not likely.” I’ll just pocket the cash for a rainy day.

Given the rising cost of energy (including gas) and my heartfelt belief that the cost of gas, winter heat, summer air conditioning, and yes, the cost of groceries at the local market, are only going to rise, my refund could be designated for those future costs. My windfalls, in any form, are usually earmarked to prepay things like rent, utilities and internet service. And keeping my pantry stocked. I like the feeling of knowing my housing and basic services are guaranteed, that a shortfall or the unexpected will not leave me on the edge of a nervous breakdown or a financial panic attack.

For many Americans this refund is all or part of one month’s escalating mortgage payment, a boost to pay off credit card debt, or a bit of gas pump relief. Maybe a car or insurance payment. For the insecure or worried, it could likely be a nest egg, a hedge against the unexpected. In fact, it should be a nest egg. It’s not really “found money,” though even if it were, is that a reason to run out and spend it at random or on a whim?

The fact is, for most, the refund is piddling. $600 is one month’s rent for many people. Or a month of groceries. Maybe one or two pricey prescription co-pays. In Mitt Romney’s Tax-achusetts it’s the price of two months of the most minimum mandated health insurance package.

I find myself laughing (ironically) at the speed at which government rushes to fuel money to the people to “shore up the economy” even as that same government is fueled by pork-barrel spending and racking up war debt a billion dollars at a time, mortgaging the future of our children and grandchildren, and indenturing our military to another decade of servitude in the Middle East while our roads crumble, our our families and elderly struggle with housing and medical costs, our housing market crumbles, and our students are encouraged to “pursue higher education” through the vehicle of further indebtedness (college loans).

American’s are highly skeptical about the notion of progress in Iraq, with only 11% polling responding that they are “pleased” with the results of the war. Yet Americans seem resigned to the fact that US troops are going to remain in Iraq. The simple fact is that the United States cannot afford to continue this war. In addition to the complete lack of international support for Bush’s folly, the middle class can no longer afford to pay for the war. The national debt is at an all time high of $9.1 trillion dollars and Congress has appropriated another $580 billion dollars in military spending, far in excess of the actual amount of appropriations needed to defend the national security .

The United States Senate has sent a message to the American people, that they do not care about them or about their future. By voting in line with the President the Senate has showed that what it cares about most are defense appropriations and handing out thousands of spending contracts. This makes sense in light of the fact that the Senate is composed mostly of millionaires, as almost 50% of the Senate is in this category, while in the US population as whole only about 1% are millionaires. The investment interest of the current class of Senators is heavily weighted towards money and much less toward people or the American interest.

Then there is the military . . .

According to a recent poll from the Center for American Progress, the Bush administration is doing a remarkably poor job of helping out veterans and their families. Military families have turned sharply against the Bush administration, with only 35% responding favorably when asked if their needs were being met. The Senate does not have a clear direction for the war in Iraq and it is relying on the Bush administration for leadership on this war that the President has unilaterally led us into. What the Senate should be doing is exercising leadership of its own, by rejecting the Omnibus Spending Bill, reducing federal spending for the war in Iraq, and bringing our troops home.

By spending another $70 billion dollars on a failed war, we are only prolonging the inevitable withdrawal. Although Americans feel ambiguous about their responsibilities to the Iraqi people, the Iraqi people do not feel nearly so ambiguous. They want the troops out and they want their country returned. We have bombed their country, killed their people, created two million refugees and polluted their country with depleted uranium, and still the Senate thinks we should stay the course and that we are making progress.

It is time to end the war and bring the troops home. Tennessee deserves progressive leadership and deserves a candidate who will stand up for common sense and not for private contractors and military appropriations. We have lost to many good men and women, created too much devastation and human misery because of our narrow sighted actions in the middle east. It is time for us to face up to our mistakes and begin to reconcile ourselves with the international community. It is time to begin reducing our national debt, reducing our military spending and stepping out of the post cold-war mentality of the neo-cons. It is time to bring the troops home now!

These changes were required in every state for the 2006 federal election. Millions of tax dollars were allocated and dispersed to the states to upgrade and buy new equipment that would incorporate these requirements.

Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machines are touch screen machines with no paper ballot. In Tennessee manufacturers of electronic voting systems including Diebold (a Diebold Voting Machine is shown above right), ES&S, Hart, and Microvote, eagerly marketed their Direct Recording Electronic machines to county election officials, although most of these manufacturers also produce optical scan voting systems. Optical scan systems are less costly, more efficient, and most importantly use paper ballots, marked by each voter, then optically scanned to record and count the vote.

Problems with DREs

DREs are essentially notebook computers programmed to display ballot images, record and count voter choices, and store this information on removable memory cards. Like any computer, the DREs can get a virus, be incorrectly programmed, or malfunction, either through innocent mishap or malicious intent. It is important to remember that when problems occur with the DREs, there is no independent record of each vote, so no meaningful recount or audit is possible.

Thousands of problems with electronic voting systems have arisen in dozens of states, including votes “flipped”, votes not counted, and malfunctioning memory cards. While most problems have been machine malfunctions from programming errors or poll worker inexperience, some less savory problems have occurred, including in 2006 in Memphis, where evidence revealed tampering had occurred in the central vote tabulator. It is clear that DREs are vulnerable to errors, malfunctions and tampering. As a result, it’s impossible to safeguard votes on such equipment.

In early 2005, I organized Save Our Democracy, a grassroots group that has continuously learned about voting issues and equipment. In 2006 SOD formed a coalition with Common Cause TN. The group’s members have also worked with county and state election commissions, legislators, the state coordinator of elections and other citizen groups to encourage county commissions to purchase optical scan voting systems, NOT DRE’s.

Finally in 2006, 93 of the 95 Tennessee counties chose DRE systems. Only Pickett county bought an optical scan system, while Hamilton County converted to optical scan voting nine years ago.

The current reality in the US and Tennessee

In 35 states, all votes are cast on voter verifiable paper ballots. Only five states still use DREs exclusively. Tennessee lags behind, with only two counties safeguarding their elections. We must have legislation that mandates paper ballots.

What’s the answer? The simple fix is making sure all voters vote on electronic voting systems that start with a paper ballot that they mark. Throw out the DREs and replace them with optical scan voting systems. Election officials will tell us there is not time to switch to optical scan machines before the November 2008 election. In 2006,however, the counties ordered and installed completely new equipment in seven months, so there is time to make the change to optical scan systems by November.

What’s happening in the Tennessee Legislature?

In 2005, Rep. Susan Lynn and Sen. Bill Bryson introduced the first bill to mandate paper ballots. In the 2006 legislative session, we worked closely with Rep. Gary Moore and Senator Joe Haynes to craft a comprehensive bill, The Voter Confidence Act that would mandate paper ballots, post election audits, and high level security for the voting systems. After the 2006 election, legislators began to appreciate the problems with the DREs: 12 bills were introduced in 2007 that would increase voter security. All of these bills, including The Voter Confidence Act SB 1363 HB 1256, are currently being reviewed by a joint Senate-House Study Committee that will report its recommendations to the General Assembly by Feb. 2008. The next meeting will be Dec. 18.

A second examination revealing the flaws and dangers of electronic voting issues is also underway. The TN Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations -TACIR – is conducting a sweeping examination of voting and election issues. Their two interim reports, written by the staff and issued in June and September, 2007, urge the state to move to optical scan voting systems as soon as possible.

Sign up at www.votesafetn.org to receive our email alerts.

Reprinted from Gathering to Save Our Democracy (11.12.07)

The bill raises fuel efficiency standards, requiring that cars average 35 miles per gallon by the year 2020. Although this is quite modest compared to other countries standards, it represents the first US increase in efficiency standards in over 30 years.

The bill also mandates that some of the electricity produced by utilities come from renewable sources. Contact your legislators to support this minimal change to US energy policy. Support H.R. 6

Such is the case with the hate crimes bill, familiar to many as the Matthew Shepard bill, a meticulously drafted act that would have categorized crimes based on gender identity or sexual orientation as hate crimes. Matthew Shepard was a young, gay university student in Wyoming who was beaten into a coma and subsequently died.

The Matthew Shepard Bill was a bill whose time had not only come but was terribly overdue, but being incorporated into a package of military spending (i.e. Iraq War funding) resulted in a kill on the battlefield of equal rights and civil liberties. Matthew Shepard and gays across America have become casualties of war.

Sponsored by Sen. Edward Kennedy and garnering the support of most Democrats and many Republicans, the bill still fell some forty votes short of passage in the U.S. House of Representatives, and that failure should be considered a crime against human rights. The root cause of this failure was the link to escalating cost of war in Iraq.

Perhaps it is time for truly important bills to be presented on their own merit and not be linked to such an unrelated hot button items as military spending. It is my fervent hope that the leaders in our Congress who supported this bill will not allow it to fade away.

The Matthew Shepard Bill would have been landmark legislation for the protection of millions of Americans against hate crimes. Instead, a vote against Defense Department spending became a vote against human rights.

You wouldn’t know it if you just watch TV news or read the corporate press, but this past Tuesday, something remarkable happened. Despite the pig-headed opposition of the Democratic Party’s top congressional leadership, a majority of the House, including three Republicans, voted to send Dennis Kucinich’s long sidelined Cheney impeachment bill (H Res 333) to the Judiciary Committee for hearings.

The vote was 218 to 194.

Now the behind-the-scenes partisan maneuvering that preceded that vote was arcane indeed, with Kucinich first exercising a member’s privilege motion to present his stymied impeachment bill to the full House, only to have Speaker Nancy Pelosi arrange for a colleague (Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-MD) offer a motion to table it. The Republicans, anxious to embarrass the Speaker, threw a wrench into that plan, though, by voting as a bloc to oppose tabling. Since Kucinich already has 22 co-sponsors for his bill, it was clear that the tabling gambit would fail. As soon as that became apparent, rank-and-file Democrats, unwilling to be seen by their constituents as defending Cheney, rushed to change their votes to opposing the tabling motion. In the end, tabling failed by 242 to 170 with 77 Democrats supporting a pleasantly surprised Kucinich.

In order to avoid a floor debate on the merits of impeaching the eminently impeachable Vice President Cheney, Pelosi and her allies then moved to send Kucinich’s bill directly to the Judiciary Committee. They were joined by three Republicans, including maverick Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul (R-TX).

Now the hope of the Democratic leadership is that this means Kucinich’s impeachment bill will continue to be safely bottled up in a subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee. But it may not work out that way for them.

Whatever the explanation, this impeachment bill has been endorsed by a floor vote of the full House, with bipartisan support.

For the Judiciary Committee to sit on it now and not schedule a hearing would be a gross travesty of parliamentary procedure and custom.

Indeed, some House members not associated with Kucinich’s resolution are now openly calling for immediate hearings into Cheney’s impeachable actions—specifically lying the country into a war in Iraq, and threatening war with Iran.

One indication of the change in the political climate in the House is the announcement by Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL), a six-term congressman and a member of the House Judiciary Committee, that he will call for the Judiciary Committee to take up Kucinich’s impeachment bill. This is significant because Wexler, no left-wing hothead, is not a co-signer of the Kucinich bill.

In an email message to constituents, Wexler said:

I share your belief that Vice President Cheney must answer for his deceptive actions in office, particularly with regard to the preparations for the Iraq war and the revelation of the identity of covert agent Valerie Plame Wilson as part of political retribution against her husband.

…Cheney and the bush Administration have demonstrated a consistent pattern of abusing the law and misleading Congress and the American people. We see the consequences of these actions abroad in Iraq and at home through the violations of our civil liberties. The American people are served will with a legitimate and thorough impeachment inquiry. I will urge the Judiciary Committee to schedule impeachment hearings immediately and not let this issue languish as it has over the last six months. Only through hearings can we begin to correct the abuses of Dick Cheney and the bush administration; and if it is determined in these hearings that Vice President Cheney has committed High Crimes and Misdemeanors, he should be impeached and removed from office. It is time for Congress to expose the multitude of misdeeds of the Administration and I am hopeful that the Judiciary Committee will expeditiously begin an investigation of this matter.

Also calling for prompt action by the Judiciary Committee in the wake of the Tuesday House vote was Carol Shea-Porter, a first-term Democrat from New Hampshire, who also is not a sponsor of the Kucinich measure. In explaining her vote to send the Kucinich bill to the Judiciary Committee, she said:

It is the duty of the Vice President to faithfully execute the laws of the United States of America and to defend the Constitution. There is growing evidence that the Executive Branch has ignored some of our laws and has attempted to bend the Constitution to its will. Members of both parties decided that this issue is too important to ignore. I voted with my Republican and Democratic colleagues to investigate the Vice President’s actions in office.

She characterized the resolution sending the bill to the Judiciary Committee a “strongly bi-partisan vote.”

With these kinds of endorsements and calls for action, it is clear both that Speaker Pelosi is looking increasingly pathetic and out of touch with her “impeachment is off the table” mantra, and also that Judiciary Chair John Conyers (D-MI), who seems to have been intimidated by the Speaker for the past year, but who earlier had been a leader in exposing the crimes of the Bush/Cheney administration, is getting strong support for taking a bolder stand.

Stephen Cohen (D-TN), a member of the Judiciary Committee who is a co-sponsor of the Kucinich resolution, says he thinks that there will be an impeachment hearing in the committee.

The 22 House members who have already signed on as co-sponsors of Kucinich’s Cheney impeachment resolution are: Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Maxine Waters D-CA), Hank Johnson (D-GA), Keith Ellison (D-MN), Lynn Woolsey D-CA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Albert Wynn (D-MD), William Lacy Clay (D-MO, Yvette Clarke (D-NY), Jim McDermott (D-WA), Jim Moran (D-VA), Bob Filner (D-CA), Sam Farr (D-CA), Robert Brady (D-PA), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Donald Payne (D-NJ), Steve Cohen (D-TN), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX), Carolyn Kilpatrick (D-MI), Ed Towns (D-NY, Diane Watson (D-CA, and Danny Davis (D-IL).

The change is attitude toward impeachment among the rank and file, and the evident increasing willingness to buck the Speaker, reflects growing awareness of the groundswell of popular anger with the Bush administration and the Democratic Congress over continued funding of the Iraq War, and over continued erosion of Constitutional government and civil liberties by an administration that wants unfettered executive power and by a Congress that is afraid to act.

The latest polls show three in four Democrats in favor of impeaching the vice president and president, while a majority of all Americans favor impeaching the vice president and roughly half of all Americans favor impeaching the president.

This is before hearings and presentation of evidence have even begun!

A failed strategy

The Democratic strategy for the 2008 election has been to do nothing overly confrontational, to pass no significant legislation, to collect lots of money from corporate interests, and to hope that the Republican Party, saddled with an unpopular administration and an unpopular war, will implode.

The strategy, however, is proving to be a disaster, as public support for the Democratic do-nothing Congress has fallen even below the president’s record low numbers. Just running against Republicans, Bush/Cheney, and the continuing war risks seeing Democrats go down to defeat in ’08.

It is awareness of this looming electoral disaster that underlies the growing restiveness among rank-and-file Democrats in the House, all of whom have to face the voters in less than a year’s time.

As recently as a month ago, it didn’t look like impeachment was in the cards,

Now it’s starting to look like we Cheney’s going to be put in the dock.

It may not be long before we start to see bills of impeachment filed against President Bush too.

The corporate media enjoy making fun of Rep. Kucinich, a height-challenged but dedicated progressive who has made a career of standing tall for his views. If his bill ends up leading to impeachment hearings against Cheney, Kucinich will end up having the last laugh.

About Dave Lindorff

Dave lindorff is a Philadelphia-based investigative journalist and columnist. His latest book, co-authored by Barbara Olshansky, is “The Case for Impeachment” (St. Martin’s Press, 2006 and now available in paperback).

His work is available at thiscantbehappening.net. He also contributes material to The Daily Kos.

• Hire about 250 more ALJs.

• Replace some of the several thousand positions lost in SSA field offices over the past two years.

• Increase hiring in DDSs to replace a loss of over 800 positions.

While this level of funding is not enough to eliminate the disability claims backlog, without this appropriation, the backlog will continue to increase and SSA service will worsen, as SSA’s staffing drops to its lowest level in over 30 years. This bill is very important to people with disabilities and their families!

The House and Senate are expected to take up the Labor, Health and Human Services and Education (L-HHS-ED) appropriations conference report as soon as today, November 6. It may be combined with the Military Construction-VA appropriations bill.

While President Bush has threatened to veto the bill if it is passed by Congress, it is critical that this level of funding is established for SSA as a congressional priority for FY 2008.
The message for your Representative and Senators:

• Ask for support the Labor-HHS-Education FY 2008 appropriations conference report when it comes up for a vote.

• SSA needs the level of funding in the bill; it is critical to address the growing disability claims backlog.

Why does SSA need this level of funding?

• Waiting times at the hearing level are at a record high. [Editor's Note: As mother of a disabled daughter, I watched my daughter struggle through a nearly FIVE YEAR wait for adjudication of her claim, a time frame that included an additional nine months of waiting for a second hearing when the results of the first were tossed out for 'judicial error.' Waiting levels are beyond 'high'; they are unconscionable.]

• Individuals waiting for decisions face extreme hardships because of the delays.

• Access to other key services also has been diminished. Local SSA offices have been threatened with closing or having their hours open to the public reduced.

Your contacting your Congressional delegation today will help move this important legislation forward.

Congresswoman Blackburn’s local number is 931-503-0391.

Senator Corker’s Washington number is 202-224-3344.

Senator Alexander’s Washington number is 202 224 4944.

This post was submitted by Beverly Fisher, a Clarksville attorney “working with people trying to get social security disability.”

With the help of grassroots supporters, the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans for America Action fund is running this ad to break through the clutter. If you’re interested in getting involved, whether you’re a veteran or a concerned civilian visit their web site.

As a recent report from the Government Accountability Office reveals, seven months have passed since the Walter Reed crisis and serious problems in veterans’ care remain.

Click here to view the embedded video.

As of October 1, the veterans’ budget is late. Until it is approved, the VA will be forced to ration care.

Now, it’s up to the President and Congress to approve the budget. Add your name to the statement, and demand they take action.

The VA Budget

Last year, the VA provided benefits to 3.5 million veterans and their families and health care for 5.5 million patients.

Unlike programs such as Medicaid and Medicare, which require mandatory funding, allocations for the VA are discretionary. Only once in the past 13 years has the veterans’ budget been passed on time.

As a result of the stalled VA budget, the VA is forced to operate at last year’s funding levels. Hospitals must ration care and postpone new programs and construction and repair projects.

This year, Congress authorized the highest increase in the veterans’ budget in over 77 years, for a total of approximately $88 billion. This is significant progress, but unfortunately, while the funding waits in conference, wounded veterans are again kept in waiting.

Care and Benefits for Wounded Veterans

Since 2001, more than 26,000 troops have been wounded in action, and almost 45,000 veterans have been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

Many of these servicemembers face delays when they seek treatment from the VA.

A significant cause of the delays is the maze of paperwork troops and veterans must navigate to get care or benefits. The VA disability benefits system is so severely backlogged that there are over 378,000 pending disability claims, including 83,000 that have been waiting an average of 177 days or more, according to a recent GAO report.

Some veterans with serious mental health problems have committed suicide while waiting for emergency counseling, and others have fallen into debt awaiting government compensation for their injuries.

Also according to the GAO report, there are plans to train case managers and psychiatric nurses about PTSD and traumatic brain injury (TBI) but only 6 of the 32 Warrior Transition Units have completed training for all staff.

About Annette L. McLeod

Annette L. McLeod is the wife of Army Specialist Wendell W. McLeod, Jr. On July 6, 2005, at the end of a ten-month deployment, Spc. McLeod sustained multiple injuries while serving near the Iraqi border in Kuwait.

On August 8, 2005, Wendell arrived at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. During his stay, Spc. McLeod experienced sporadic appointments, was often denied the necessary tests and treatment, and had his identity stolen. Furthermore, though Wendell suffered from traumatic brain injury, the doctors concluded that his cognitive impairments were the result of a pre-existing learning disability.

In hopes of sparing other military families from having to go through a similar ordeal, Mrs. McLeod testified before the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee on March 5, 2007. In her testimony, Mrs. McLeod called attention to the bureaucratic hurdles and poor care that her husband and other soldiers faced at Walter Reed. Her full testimony can be found here.

Today, Wendell continues to suffer from migraines, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and chronic pain. He also has behavioral and short-term memory problems. As a result, Annette has assumed the role of almost full-time caretaker for her husband.

About Staff Sgt. John Daniel Shannon

Staff Sgt. John Daniel Shannon was wounded in Iraq on Nov. 13, 2004, during a gunfight in the town of Habaniya. He suffered a gunshot wound to the head that resulted in the loss of his left eye and a traumatic brain injury.

At Walter Reed Army Medical Center, SSG Shannon endured bureaucratic neglect and was continually denied proper benefits. Largely as a result of lost paperwork and delayed treatment, it took Shannon over two years to secure medical retirement through the Medical Evaluation Board and Physical Evaluation Board.

On March 5, 2007, SSG Shannon spoke out about the problems at Walter Reed during his testimony before the Government Reform and Oversight Committee. His testimony revealed that injured troops encountering obstacles to receiving their proper treatment often give up their benefits in order to move on with their lives. His full testimony can be found here.

About IAVA

Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) is the nation’s first and largest group for veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  A non-profit and nonpartisan organization, IAVA represents more than 60,000 veteran members and civilian supporters in all 50 states.

With a majority vote censuring Freedom of Speech, Congress today smacked down the voices of hundreds of thousands of Americans who are simply saying “we want a drawdown; we want our troops home.” In other words, Americans who want to bring an end to the Iraq War.

Congress did it in the guise of patriotism, but this smackdown was also a blow to the very soldiers who are, according to these same officials, fighting for Democratic/Bill of Rights issues — such as free speech — in Iraq. In the U.S. Senate, a majority of our duly elected Senators, apparently with no more pressing issues to debate, voted on a Republican-sponsored symbolic resolution against MoveOn.org and their widely circulated anti-Petraeus ad that was printed as the general was testifying before Congress about the status of the Iraq War on the anniversary of Sept. 11.

The Senators, with Hilary Clinton and Christopher Dodd among the 25 refusing to join the censure, passed a resolution stating that Petraeus “deserves the full support of the Senate” and the Senate “strongly condemn(s) personal attacks on the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all members of the United States Armed Forces.”

“Yesterday, they couldn’t even pass a bill to give soldiers adequate leave with their families before redeploying. But they’re spending time cracking down on a newspaper ad?” – MoveOn.org

Questioning Petraeus and the Bush war machine, as MoveOn.org had the guts and the tactical brilliance to do, is not slamming our troops. It slammed Bush domination of everything related to Iraq. Unfortunately, when it comes to Iraq, Petraeus is the man in the driver’s seat, pushing that machine through the Iraq landscape.

But this isn’t just about MoveOn.org’s New York Times ad. It’s not about peace activists not supporting the troops either. Because that in itself is a lie. We [anti-war activists and peace mongers] love our troops. We are just fed up with administrative mechanizations that are keeping them mired in an increasingly untenable, endless war that will result in years of occupation.

In case you don’t get it, they are talking about us. Not just the big guys like MoveOn.org. And no, not just the smaller sites such as Clarksville Online that include both voices of dissent and opposing responses to those dissenting voices, or groups like Veterans for Peace or United for Peace and Justice or FreeThinkers for Peace and Civil Liberties. They are talking about shutting up ordinary Americans, turning off our voices, intimidating us into silence. They just happened to fall on a really big target in the form of MoveOn.org.

The reality is that they are talking about citizens like you and me, everyday people who live in small cities like Clarksville, and communities like Oak Grove, Kentucky, or Ashland City, or Paris, Tennessee. And if you think that this action doesn’t affect you because you aren’t a voice of opposition, or are simply ambivalent on this issue, or don’t want to be involved, think again.

Sooner or later it will be your turn. Because once the precedents are set, once the censures are in place and deemed an acceptable response to what people don’t want to hear, once the Bill of Rights has been set upon and trod down into the dirt (it’s more than halfway there now) with a bi-partisan Congress jumping up and down on it to snap its neck and paralyze its intent, it will be too late. Barring another American Revolution, we will have to live with such follies foisted upon us by the men and women we elected (or didn’t elect) to represent us — and that includes the President.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It started on September 11 with the Senate hearings, testimony by General David Petraeus, and a controversial ad by MoveOn.org that referred to him as General Betray Us; the controversy over the ad content made all the major papers worldwide and garnered a lot of instant replay. And while I think that underneath that cultivated appearance of truth and some token gestures that mean “let’s revisit this in ‘08″ or better yet, leave it to the next president to clean up, I’m not sure I would have slapped Petraeus down that hard. I might have saved my smack-down KO punch, prioritized it for the top dogs in the White House I didn’t vote for and the candidates I did vote for who are not living up to my expectations and their campaign rhetoric.

The Senate testimony with Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker was scheduled for maximum effect, overlapping the 9-11 memorial services — an American tragedy revisited, a tragedy orchestrated by Bin Laden (not Saddam) and including quite a few Saudis — but wait, they have oil and are friends of the White House; can’t alienate them. If they got mad and shut off our oil supplies we might have to ride bikes more often, walk a bit farther, get healthier, build a few more sidewalks, use expanded public transit systems, nurture alternative fuels and — oh yes — make a dent in oil profits.

But I digress.

MoveOn.org made the front page with that Betray-Us ad; it made front pages world wide. So did today’s resolution on censure, but I don’t think it’s going quite the way Congress hoped it would.

At a very small meeting in my town tonight, a meeting with scarcely a dozen people, a meeting that had nothing to do with politics, two individuals commented on the congressional slapdown. One was familiar with MoveOn but had, because of the Congressional smackdown, decided it was time to not just read their platform but support them financially; the other was unfamiliar with MoveOn until this flap and has now decided to join it and lend his fiscal support to them. Not because of the ad, but because of the visceral Congressional response to MoveOn’s act of free speech.

“[It is] a sad day in the Senate when we spend hours debating an ad while our young people are dying in Iraq. Now that the Senate has twice voted on this ad, it is time to move on and vote to end the war.” – Christopher Dodd

MoveOn.org today circulated a defiant e-mail vowing to keep up the fight and said of the Senate:

“Every day, our brave men and women are dying in a bloody civil war this Senate has done nothing to stop. Yesterday, they couldn’t even pass a bill to give soldiers adequate leave with their families before redeploying. But they’re spending time cracking down on a newspaper ad?

“So, we’re making clear where America stands. We’re releasing a statement from MoveOn members—and anyone else who feels the same way—saying, ‘We will not be quiet, we will fight back. We will keep speaking out until Congress forces an exit plan for this awful war.’”  – Eli Pariser, MoveOn.org

MoveOn.org has an e-mail list of 3.2 million, with numbers booming in the aftermath of the ad. It reminded me a of a scene in the A&E film The Magnificent Ambersons, where young George tries to defend his mother against potentially malicious chatter. His fiery protest and demands for retractions only gave the gossip greater credence and blew it up into the talk of the town; left alone it might have lingered but would have drifted into nothing on its own. There’s a message in there, and if you really read the ad — it questions the validity, the honesty of the general’s White House white-washed testimony but never once questions his patriotism.

Like the soldiers who serve under him, Petraeus is doing his duty. I watched his testimony, and found him to be refreshingly less rah-rah-sis-boom-bah than the President about the purported successes in Iraq and quite willing to admit that deployments cannot be infinite and there the possibility of failure looms. He admitted we might lose. Or at least, not win. Wow.

So what do I want to see and hear?

I’d like to see my elected Representatives and Senators respond to a reality check. Election 2008 is around the corner. America is divided and at the public level, party lines are beginning to blur. I am not happy with them.

A lot of Americans feel the same way. If they aren’t registered to vote, I’m encouraging them to register. And to get ready to vote. It’s never too soon for that. Despite questions about the validity of voting machines and the balloting process, if enough ticked off Americans show up at the polls, it will make a difference.

Americans, many, many Americans, are fed up with the status quo of the war and the economy and a Congress (House and Senate) that can’t seem to get anything done (not counting the military aspects of increased war debt, longer deployments, shorter stateside duty).

Maybe, though, they won’t have to do much more, because We the People of America can opt out of the mayhem on Capitol Hill by choosing to not vote for incumbents who do not reflect or respond to our views. We can choose to put our campaign dollars and our votes where our conscience stands.

We the People of America will not be silenced at the whim of an wimpy, impotent, lackluster Congress, nor will those of us who oppose the War in Iraq back down from our beliefs or the exercise of our basic right to dissent. It’s all there, in the Bill of Rights. Overshadowed by the Congress and the Patriot Act. Read the fine print, people. Before your congress steps on it again.

The report will be presented to Congress Tuesday, and President Bush will present his view of the data on September 15th in an attempt to validate his push for continuation of the multi-billion war effort and continued presence on Battlefield Iraq. The report, supposedly the product of military leaders including General David Petraeus in Iraq who are “assessing” the status of post-Saddam Iraq, is in fact being amended, adjusted and otherwise penned by the White House. Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker are expected to speak before Congress on the 11th or 12th of September.

A careful monitoring of national websites and online versions of major newspapers gives us the following headlines:

Pentagon Disputes Part of Iraq Report (Chicago Tribune 8-30-07)

We have provided the GAO with some information which we believe will lead them to conclude that a few of the benchmark grades should be upgraded from ‘not met’ to ‘met.’ — Geoff Morrell, Pentagon Press Secretary.

White House Is Gaining Confidence That It Can Win Fight In Congress Over Iraq Policy (New York Times 8-30-07)

While lawmakers have been home for summer recess, Mr. Bush has been able to use his presidential platform , delivering speeches to promote what he calls the success of his troop build-up.

The NYT article also referenced the following:

The momentum back in June and early July was really running hard against the war, and it was starting to snowball. But that snowballing stopped, and it has probably kind of reversed itself somewhat. — Charley Cook, Analyst & Editor, The Cook Political Report/NYT

Iraqi Government Gets Failing Marks In GAO Report – CNN 8-30-07

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) will report that at least 13 of the 18 benchmarks to measure the surge of U.S. troops to Iraq are unfulfilled . . .

CNN went on to report that:

…the administration is making a case to play down the findings…

Pentagon Asks Congressional Auditors to Revise Iraq Benchmark Report Findings – FOXNews 8-30-07

WASHINGTON — Stung by the bleak findings of a Congressional audit of progress in Iraq, the Pentagon has asked that some of the negative assessment be revised.

After four years of combat, and four years beyond Saddam Hussein, Iraq can claim only a 20% success rate in meeting its objectives, according to CNN. Critics of the forthcoming report say it’s stringent guidelines were predestined to “lock in failure. So if you don’t like a report, re-write it to suit your needs (a great example for all the children ‘left behind’ to study in some future history class). In this case, define “needs” as more taxpayer dollars in a flow of undetermined duration.

The Washington Post, in a story released today, said the GAO report indicates that only three of the 18 political and security benchmarks set for the Iraqis have been reached, though preliminary reviews released in July indicated that eight of the 18 terms were met. The Post referred to the report as “strikingly negative.” Not what the Bush White House wanted to hear. White House spokesman Tony Snow said it was ‘no secret” the benchmarks had not been met.

What angers many Americans (in addition to the outrageously high cost of this war, the toll it is taking on soldiers, the body unrelenting counts) is that while ordinary American soldiers, many on extended multiple deployments, are fighting the battle for Iraqi freedom in the broiling desert heat, Iraqi Parliamentarians are on vacation — just as our Congress and Senate were throughout August.

One reported sourced from Sen. Harry Reid’s office indicated that the President would be in for a “reality check” as Congress chews over the report and suggested that Republicans who support the President on the Iraq War issue would be jumping over the same cliff. The image of lemmings jumped into my mind as I churned that statement about.

To sustain Battlefield Iraq at its present pace, Congress must approve both new financing for the war and supplemental funding for the existing cost of conflict in both Iraq and Afghanistan. For FY07, that is a staggering $147 billion dollars.

It costs American taxpayers $200 million a day to stay at war. Total costs (direct and indirect) will be at least $400 billion dollars, and one estimate has the tab topping TWO TRILLION dollars. That’s $2,000,000,000,000. That’s a lot of zeros. That’s a lot of debt to saddle on the next generation — and it is the next generation that will still be picking up the lion’s share of the tab for this supposedly internationally-supported effort to implement democracy in Iraq. Tennessee’s liability, its share of this cost, comes in at just under $7 billion dollars. So far.

If not vested in war, the funding amounts in question would have done the following:

• Built 4,000,000 housing units
• Hired 7,700,00 teachers nationwide
• Funded Head Start for 59,200,000 children
• Insured 267,800,000 children
• Funded college tuition at public four-year institutions for 21,600,000 students

– Data courtesy of the National Priorities Project

That’s the real-life real-time net worth of the Iraq war. That’s not calculating cost of providing universal health care to the American people, infrastructure repair and upgrades to our highways and bridges, border and port security, investments in sustainable energy, and myriad other issues/programs. Is it perhaps time for Congress to ask the people what they want their tax dollars invested in?

I’ll be watching and listening as the debate begins to rage, as the manipulations and revisioning develop in the Machiavellian realm otherwise known as Washington, D.C. Every American should be watching.