Duty to Warn

Democrats and liberal defenders of John Kerry are throwing tantrums over Ralph Nader's new found affinity for conservatives who are aiding his ballot efforts in swing states. According to a Detroit News report, Greg McNeilly the Executive Director of the Michigan Republican Party said, 'We are absolutely interested in having Ralph Nader on the ballot.' Indeed these Republicans hope Nader will siphon votes away from Kerry, and tally the state's 17 electoral points on George Bush's score card come election day.

Right-wing organizations are also putting their efforts behind Nader out West. Citizens for a Sound Economy, an anti-tax, anti-government group run by Republican powerhouse Dick Armey, wants Nader on the Oregon ballot. A rigid Christian anti-gay group, known as Oregon Family Council, also believes voters should have a chance to pull the lever for Ralph in the fall. As you can imagine, Democrats aren't the least bit pleased with these recent developments. And they are the first to happily point out Nader's new bedfellows.

AUSTIN, Texas -- We cannot let pass without salute Martha Stewart’s remarks after being sentenced to five months in prison. In the long history of amazing things said by people in peculiar circumstances, you must admit, this ranks right up there. “There are many, many good people who have gone to prison,” she observed. “Look at Nelson Mandela.”

        We live in a great nation.

        Unfortunately, we are all likely to be driven batty if this presidential campaign gets any worse, which it is likely to do. Last week, I was on book tour doing one chat show after another and so got to experience first-hand the Republican orchestration of their talking points. And an impressive display it is. Truly, they speak with one voice, repeating the same thing over and over, never off-message -- just remarkable.

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) has noted a recent wave of reports from across the country indicating that FBI agents are contacting Arab and Muslim Americans, including citizens, for what has been described as voluntary interviews.  ADC would like to remind members of the Arab, Muslim, and Arab-American communities that equal protection and due process rights are afforded to everyone, including non-citizens, in the United States.

Unlike previous initiatives, the FBI has not communicated to ADC any plans to conduct such interviews. ADC urges anyone who is contacted by the FBI to contact the ADC Legal Department and provide details of the incident by calling (202) 244-2990, sending a fax to (202) 244-3196, or via email to legal@adc.org.

Upon request, ADC will do its best to provide third party observers, in cases where potential interviewees would want such additional safeguards. Additional useful "Know Your Rights" information can be found on the ADC website at:  http://www.adc.org/index.php?id=275.

The communities of east central Indiana are isolated from the realities of life in the middle east. We are rarely touched by the deaths of American soldiers--at least personally.

We read about Iraq, Israel, and Gaza on page 8A of our USA Today run-financed newspapers. The increasing terror of the middle east is mostly abstract to Indiana citizens.

Midwesterners are touched by the terror of higher gasoline prices. They know very well that Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and other middle east hot spots are sources of reasonably priced oil. American capitalism runs on low energy prices. Who had rather walk than ride?

As partisan politics goes, Midwest America voters are pragmatic in their solutions to most any problem--domestic and/or foreign.

Honesty and competence are values that Americans care about. The phrase, "an honest day's work," certainly works well in the heartland. All of life is an effort "to chase truths." Time never stays still.

"On this night I would like to depart from the usual speech demanded on such occasions when, every four years, we celebrate the process of democracy. On this night, ladies and gentlemen, I would instead like to speak about America's children.

While our nation has dutifully kept its gaze fixed on approaching catastrophes, we have become blind to the catastrophes already upon us. In this the most economically developed nation in the world, at least nine million children are uninsured and receive little or no preventive medical or dental care. This is to say nothing of the millions more undocumented children in our midst.

Millions of our children live in substandard housing. Millions are suffering mental and physical malnutrition from chronic hunger and chronic neglect and abuse. Our infant mortality rate ranks an abysmal 28th internationally. An astounding one-third of American three year-olds have not received their complete immunizations. Over the past few years of difficult economic times, all of these numbers have been growing.

AUSTIN, Texas  -- I like Bill Clinton's book. I feel as though I should immediately apologize for saying that. I mean, it's gotten a bunch of bad reviews -- all sorts of superior people have peed all over it and pointed out he shouldn't have said this, or he should have said that.

        Let me get my claim to intellectual superiority in here right away: I was prepared to dislike the book. I was prepared to find it self-serving, inadequate, insufficiently groveling and all that other good doo. Actually, I think it's well written, interesting and informative. I'd recommend it to almost anyone who's interested in politics, including young people with any inclination toward public service.

        I started reading it just to make sure Bill Clinton is who I always thought he was. Yep, same guy. Superb politician with a zipper problem. Interesting case. But even I learned quite a bit along the way.

When, in future, you find yourself wondering, “What ever happened to the Constitution?” you will want to go back and look at June 8, 2004. That was the day the attorney general of the United States — a.k.a. “the nation’s top law enforcement officer” — refused to provide the Senate Judiciary Committee with his department’s memos concerning torture.

In order to justify torture, these memos declare that the president is bound by neither U.S. law nor international treaties. We have put ourselves on the same moral level as Saddam Hussein, the only difference being quantity. Quite literally, the president may as well wear a crown — forget that “no man is above the law” jazz. We used to talk about “the imperial presidency” under Nixon, but this is the real thing.

The Pentagon’s legal staff concurred in this incredible conclusion. In a report printed by The Wall Street Journal, “Bush administration lawyers contended last year that the president wasn’t bound by laws prohibiting torture and that government agents who might torture prisoners at his direction couldn’t be prosecuted by the Justice Department. ...

Peace activist and great dissenter Dave Dellinger died on May 25, 2004 in Montpelier, Vermont. Dellinger is perhaps best known as one of the “Chicago Seven” (originally eight, until they bound and gagged Bobby Seal).

Dellinger described himself as a “moral dissenter” and rejected his affluent background leaving Yale during the Great Depression to live among the poor and homeless. He later revealed in his autobiography, From Yale to Jail (Pantheon Press, 1993) that he wanted to follow the path of Francis of Assisi. On that less-trod path in our culturally Christian society, Dellinger found himself living among the poor in Newark, New Jersey; he spent World War II in Lewisburg maximum-security penitentiary as a pacifist war objector; and he was beaten and bloodied throughout the civil rights and peace movements.

Recently I had the pleasure of attending a family reunion in a small town in the Northwest corner of Arkansas. Being in the Ozarks allows one to appreciate some of America’s natural beauty. We were in the retirement community of Bella Vista, just north of Bentonville. Never heard of it? Bentonville is the world headquarters of Wal-Mart. That’s right, I was in the belly of the beast.

One evening my vegan brother-in-law and my vegetarian wife decided it was time to purchase some food for our rented townhouse. We were told the only place to go would be the community market. Thinking a community market, like our very own in Clintonville, Ohio. As we pull in my wife quickly points out that it is in fact, a “Wal-Mart Community Market.”

After reluctantly entering and shopping, we went to the checkout line. The other two quickly said, “We’ll be outside.” Alone with the cashier, I was saddened and distraught by feeling forced to give money to Wal-Mart- not unlike the feeling of a progressive voting for John Kerry.

Talking with the cashier, I asked him if he liked his job, and he said he hopes to get over to the warehouse “better money.”