Not content with barring British MPs from entering the country, the Conservative government is now threatening to remove our own members of parliament from public government-run consultations for the crime of distributing a pamphlet containing a point of view (scroll down to the Update here). I have to admit they caught even me by surprise with this one.
H/t to Dawg.
Glenn Greenwald has a post up that includes a partial transcript of Bill Moyer's session with Bill Maher on last night's Real Time. It includes this from Moyer on the subject of American "nation building" in Afghanistan.
If you're an Afghani and look up and see Arnold Schwarzenegger and the California legislature coming to build your nation, you're going to run - you're going to put up a No Trespassing sign.
I've seen several bloggers recommend this article in The Nation by Chris Hayes and I'm going to join them. It's partly a brief history of the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations With Respect to Intelligence Activities which was created in 1975 and is more colloquially known as the Church Committee. Led by Senator Frank Church of Idaho, the committee conducted a wide-ranging investigation of abuses committed by the American intelligence apparatus, from the CIA's attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro (among other international figures) to the FBI's spying on American citizens, including attempts to blackmail Martin Luther King into committing suicide. The work of the committee is widely credited with inspiring reforms to improve oversight on those agencies and one of the hallmarks of the Bush administration was its attempts to either roll back or circumvent that oversight.
Hayes also tries to build a case for a modern day Church Committee:
Public debates over intelligence are qualitatively different from other policy discussions. In a debate over whether, say, the economic stimulus has been effective, there is a presumption that all participants are working from a common set of data--GDP growth, unemployment, government spending, etc.--but with different interpretations and emphases. Such is not the case when the issue is the effectiveness of intelligence programs or the scope of covert activities. Those debates are conducted on fundamentally unequal footing. Critics may charge that torture is counterproductive and produces bad intelligence, but defenders of the secret government can wave away such concerns by saying, more or less, You don't know what we know.
What the Church Committee did was to eliminate this inequality by wrenching an entire segment of the state into the light of day. It created a universally accepted set of facts, a canonical public record that turned the secret conversations of the powerful and initiated into the material for a broad debate. It brought the world of intelligence into the public sphere, the place where self-governance ought to take place.
The first paragraph of that quote put me in mind of statements by CSIS that tell us all about the terrible things they've prevented without telling us anything at all about the terrible things they've prevented. National security, you know.
The title of this post, by the way, is a quote from Richard Clarke who is best known for serving as a counter-terrorism advisor to both the Clinton and Bush 43 administrations. On his retirement in 2003 he became a vocal critic of Bush's War on Terror™. He agrees with Hayes on the merits of a thorough investigation.
If any of this is of interest, read the whole thing.
Yours truly on June 17th when it was reported that the Harper-Ignatieff deal to "study EI" had rescued us from a summer election.
Ignatieff claims he got results but he didn't. He got an agreement to talk about maybe getting some results in three and a half months.
There was an opportunity to actually make a difference back in January and Ignatieff passed. He's done the same here because nothing has actually happened.
Joan Bryden of The Canadian Press as picked up today by the Toronto Star.
Senior Liberals are signalling they're unlikely to use their first opportunity, in early October, to pull the plug on Stephen Harper's minority government.
And while they may well try to force an election later in the fall, the Liberals' national campaign co-chairman says it won't be over the issue of employment insurance reform.
"We're not having an election on EI," said Senator David Smith. ``I don't hear Canadians clamouring for an election on this issue."
Back in the spring there were three or four issues Ignatieff felt were of vital importance but in the end he decided that EI was the issue. Now apparently it's not. I'm guessing that there will be no action on this file now because the Liberals have already signalled that it's not that important to them. Once again Ignatieff seems to be just giving up any leverage he might have had.
Can't anybody here play this game?
Banks scrap joint donations to credit counselling
A group representing non-profit credit counselling agencies across Canada says the country's banks are dismantling a single, unified donation program and moving instead to a one-on-one system that could mean more red tape and increased costs for the group.
Credit Counselling Canada, or CCC, said the current program, where banks collectively donate money to help it offer counselling and education programs for consumers, is being scrapped at the end of October.
CCC director Scott Hannah said once the program ends it will have to negotiate separate donation agreements with each of the 19 banks and other financial institutions it currently deals with in Canada.
Yesterday we were informed that unemployment continues to climb and even those who say we're now in recovery have warned that while GDP may start to inch upwards, unemployment will get worse before it gets better. So you would think credit counselling would be needed now more than ever.
But I'm sure this is only happening because the banks are suffering too. Yeah, that must be it.
The banks' participation in this program was originally coordinated through the Canadian Bankers Association and their spokesperson assures us that members of the organization are still committed to providing the service but have come to the conclusion that it would be better if each individual bank set its own policy. So I would imagine those individual banks are all set to answer questions on what their policies might be. Right?
Individual banks contacted refused to comment on the upcoming change, or were not immediately available.
Right.
Economist Dean Baker is another one of those who warned of the coming recession long before it was generally acknowledged. Here he is at TPM writing about the latest projections by the American Congressional Budget Office.
CBO now believes that the collapse of the housing bubble will cause even more and longer lasting damage than it did back in January. As a result of slow growth and high unemployment, the government will collect considerably less in tax revenues over the next decade than would have been implied by the earlier set of economic projections. The government will also be paying out more money in unemployment benefits, food stamps and other transfer programs than would be the case if the economy were healthier.
The real story in the new CBO projections should be the more dire economic outlook. CBO now expects the unemployment rate to be near 10 percent through most of 2010. Its new projections will show that the unemployment rate will only return to more normal levels in 2013 or even 2014, more than six years after the collapse of the housing bubble threw the economy into recession.
Baker goes on to suggest that the American government should prepare a second stimulus package and then outlines why that idea will meet with opposition. He's not optimistic.
And with an American economy that looks to remain pretty much a basket case for the next few years, I'm not too optimistic about the recovery that we're supposed to be in the midst of. We're too dependent on American consumer demand to drive our economy and the American consumer doesn't look like he'll be a great customer for a while yet.
I haven't used the acronym "MSM" or the phrase "mainstream media" in quite a while, probably a couple of years at least. I believe it was kos (whose every instruction I'm programmed to obey without question — aren't we all?) who pointed out that using that description implies that others, meaning bloggers, are somehow outside the mainstream. And that's just silly.
Bloggers are your family and friends, your neighbours and your coworkers. There are certainly a few that are on the fringes in various ways but that's just as true of the general population. But other than maybe being more opinionated than the average I'm not sure what kind of generalizations you can make about bloggers as a group that won't break down pretty quickly.
While the phrase "corporate media" can be applied in the U.S., even that can be awkward when you have to deal with a CBC or a BBC. So generally if I want to talk about media outlets that use traditional means to communicate, I just call them "traditional media." And if I'm occasionally critical of them, consider the possibility that rather than wanting to vanquish them, I find them to be rather important in ways that have a significant impact on my life and would like them to do a better job.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled hostilities. And if you're not sure what I'm on about, the latest chapter starts with this David Olive column.
Update (in keeping with internet traditions, of which we are aware):
Skdadl suggested I link to the follow-up post Olive wrote for his blog, The Great Recession (which is on the sidebar). So I have but the link comes with the advice that there's more going on out there. The only other link I have for you is this post at bastard.logic which I enjoyed. Apparently Warren Kinsella responded to the original column and there was some discussion attached to his post. There has been other discussion that I've skimmed over and doubtless much more that I'm not aware of and not inclined to go looking for. I haven't tried to stay on top of the story for the simple reason that I think the basic premise is wrong.
The other day I mentioned that AIG had a new CEO (whose name is Robert Benmosche) and the people responsible for approving his compensation, which would be the U.S. government, had agreed to a package worth high seven figures and possibly eight figures with bonuses. That would suggest that someone, somewhere, has a fair amount of confidence in the gentleman. Matt Taibbi has written a post in response to an interview with Benmosche and I'd have to say that Taibbi's confidence level doesn't seem to be quite as high.
This guy Benmosche should not only be fired immediately, he should be doused in barbecue sauce and dropped in a pool full of mako sharks. At the very least as a signal to the public that someone is paying attention, this guy has to go.
You can read the rest here.
Taken together tonight's offerings represent a bit of a mixed bag. The opening tune is also known as Talking Sailor and was written by Woody Guthrie.
At same time that you float the idea of actively asking for a majority in the next election campaign because the country needs stability, have several of your elected members attempt to publicly distance themselves from a policy that is personally identified with your finance minister. Do it at exactly the point where two of the provinces have been won over by him and others are considering following suit but haven't yet committed.
Several sources have lately told us that the recession is over and they're now joined by the IMF. You'll have to forgive me if I remain skeptical but it seems to me that the people touting a recovery are the same people who didn't see the recession coming until it was on us.
One of those who was well ahead of the pack in predicting a crash was Nouriel Roubini and in this piece he provides some detail as to why the global economy will continue to struggle. Then he suggests that where we are isn't actually recovery but at the point between two dips in a double-dip recession. Not exactly joyful news but worth considering.
Any talk of recovery right now is based on a very narrow indicator that seems to have become increasingly decoupled from any measure of the general welfare. That's how we get a phrase like "jobless recovery" and that's why even those who are talking about a recovery are qualifying it six ways from Sunday by warning that growth will be "sluggish" and unemployment will get worse before it gets better.
And with all that bad news, maybe I should leave you with a little good news. The new CEO of AIG, the huge insurance company that was at the centre of the recent financial storm and which is now 80% owned by the American taxpayer, has had his compensation package approved to the tune of $7 million a year and possibly millions more in "performance-based incentives." Doesn't that just make your day?
H/t to Hootsbuddy at Newshoggers for the Roubini piece.
Tonight's post marks the passing of two different musicians. One made a career out of preserving music history and the other figured prominently in the history of more recent popular music.
Mike Seeger passed away on August 7. Aside from being a folk musician, you'll see him variously described as a folk lorist and an historian. He spent his life studying and performing early American music to preserve it and to share it. It was for that purpose that he founded the New Lost City Ramblers, a folk group which survived to celebrate its 50th birthday last year. Here they are performing while Mike's half-brother Pete Seeger looks on.
Mike is the one in the middle playing autoharp. He also played guitar, mandolin, cello, fiddle and banjo. At least. I saw one performance on YouTube where he was playing some kind of wind instrument with pipes that I couldn't even begin to identify.
Among the recommendations made by Justice O'Connor in his inquiry into the Maher Arar case was a serious review of the way in which the RCMP is held accountable. Or isn't held accountable, depending on your point of view. Government spokesthingies like Stockwell Day have been quick to assure us that this kind of recommendation has been acted upon but it's difficult to give much credit to that assurance in the face of a report like this.
The Commission for Public Complaints spent 19 months reviewing cases in which the Mounties investigated themselves and the chair of that body has reported back.
He told reporters the force does not track investigations against its own and has no understanding of the scope of the problem.
"There is currently no national, centralized co-ordination of member investigations," he said. "That means that no member of the RCMP, including the RCMP commissioner, can tell you how many criminal investigations have been undertaken into its own members.
"More serious is that no one can tell you how many members have been investigated for serious injury, sexual assault or death nor can they identify how many charges have been laid against their members nor what the outcome was."
Which brings us back to the opening paragraphs of the article:
The RCMP watchdog says the Mounties should not investigate their own members in the most serious cases -- especially when someone has died -- due to conflict of interest.
In a new report, the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP recommends sexual assault and serious injury cases involving Mounties sometimes be turned over to outside investigators to ensure independence.
That seems like such an obvious sentiment it's difficult to see why it needs to be repeated. Endlessly. Over and over.
I forget what I was looking for when I came across some clips by Ray Bonneville earlier this week. It often works that way. Eventually I'll remember and get back to my orginal search but meanwhile here's a song about New Orleans to start the evening off.
I've had a moving experience.
It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. The good, the bad, and the ugly. Srsly, you don't want to know, because if I keep writing like this we'll all get seasick.
Friends, though -- those I do want to mention. The kittehs and I would not be here and as slaphappy glad to be alive as we all are without several people who really went a few extra miles for us. May I grow up to deserve the wonderful friends I have, and may I learn to be as effectively generous as they are.
Some keyboards first, and then a song for my friends on the turn.
The title of the tune is Throwdown at the Hoedown. Have I mentioned that two of my favorite sax players are Jeff Coffin?
