In the current issue of The Nation; unfortunately for subscribers only:

Red-hot rage may seem in order when the country's values have been trampled upon by a government with a dubious claim to legitimacy. Yet the theatrics of rage can easily play into Bush's hands.

Righteousness, if not rooted in humility and focused on results--on persuasive power--will offend more than it attracts and fall victim to its own arrogance, as surely as arrogance undercuts Bush.

The power of nonviolence rests in its welcoming spirit, its power to elicit identification and its promise of reconciliation. Consider the brave young men and women of the civil rights movement, sitting with dignity at lunch counters throughout the South. In film footage of the time, you can see them attacked by uncivilized whites, who curse them, beat them--and thus reveal themselves as bullies and cowards. The civilly disobedient cover themselves in self-defense but never raise their hands in anger. They appeal over their adversaries' heads to the majority who, they believe--they have to believe--will see the justice of their cause.

As thousands of Republicans gather to nominate Bush for re-election, and as many more protesters--perhaps fifty times more--gather to express themselves against the damage Bush is doing, Americans of all stripes will be watching. Fair-minded people can understand dignified opposition even when they disagree with it. Rage in the streets is something else altogether. Protesters who spell "Bush" with a swastika, who smash windows, fight the police or try to block Manhattan commuters might as well stay home and send their contributions to the Republicans.

Written by Todd Gitlin and John Passacantando.

Swift. Chris Gruber at Open Source Politics has put together a series of articles answering the false charges of the Swift Boat Liars for Bush. Click here, here, here, and here.

 

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If Bush can win reelection despite the failure of his two most consequential -- and truly radical -- decisions, he will truly be a political miracle man. But as his own nominating convention approaches, the odds are against him. ...

 

In The [Washington} Post's polls every month since January, more voters have voiced disapproval of his performance on those two issues than approval.

 

Time is short for changing people's minds. Bush is dragging two huge weights -- and he has no one to blame but himself.

If the election were held today, there’s a good chance George W. Bush would not be reelected. And if he doesn’t change the course of his campaign or dramatic news events don’t change the race, he’s not going to be reelected in November.

Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge visited the Iowa State Fair on Wednesday in what was billed a “viewing of security measures.” Critics said it was just a photo op. Either way, Ridge assured Iowans that the fair was safe, “so go have a good time and don't worry about a thing.”

• Bush is losing Hispanic voters.
• Bush is even losing Cuban-American voters.
• Bush is losing Native American voters.
• Bush is losing Arab-American voters.
• Bush is losing senior citizens.
• Bush is losing young citizens.
• Bush is losing women voters.
• Bush is losing men voters.

Democrats might fear out-of-control protests at the Republican convention as much as Republicans do. “The political repercussions will boomerang,” said Rep. Anthony Weiner, a New York Democrat. “I believe a lot of Republicans would like to point to a lot of kids with spiked hair and rings through their noses and say, ‘This is what John Kerry is about.'

See also Mahablog here and here.)

Other than that, what else does Bush have to run on? Failure, failure, and more failure, that's what. He can smear Kerry all day long, but unless he comes up with something positive to offer, he's toast.

"The narcissism of the sixties has infected many and left them with a sense of self-importance that the world revolves around them. " --Rush Limbaugh

Now, don't misunderstand. I have nothing against protesting. I've never done it. I have been the victim of it more than once, but I've never done it. Meantime, we're at war. For every eye that has to police the protesters, that's one eye less watching for terrorists. Do they care? No. Because they want everybody to hate the president. They hate the Republicans, they hate this, they hate that. Okay, we know it, we know it. Now what? You hate the president. You hate the country. You hate this and you hate that. Your hatred for whatever you hate is the most important thing in the world. How do you deal with these kinds of people, my friends? How do you deal with people who are driven and defined by their hatred?

Meantime, we're at war. For every eye that has to police the protesters, that's one eye less watching for terrorists.

Among other things, he envisions protesters locking down the streets of New York by chaining their arms together inside metal tubes, creating what's called a sleeping dragon. "You lock your arms in," he says. "When the cops come, they have to saw through these steel tubes. You get 30 people and you lock down a street for six hours. While this is happening, it gives other protesters a great opportunity to make their statement, to be further disruptive. They can lie down with these people, they can chant at the police, they can sit down where they are and be arrested for that or block further public space. They can disrupt the normal flow of society."

Norman Mailer warned (New York magazine, August 9) "You can feel that, yes, you’re working to change the system, but are you changing it or confirming it?"

 

Violent, hateful protest confirms the status quo. Us old people remember how the Vietnam era protests confirmed the Nixon Administration and made it more politically powerful. Let's not make that mistake now.

 

Remember the second rule, have a point. Hate doesn't have a point. We hate them, they hate us, end of story. The stalemate has to be broken.

The Parks Commissioner just turned them down again with one paragraph. The guy comes out of a known liberal family and he battles against freedom of speech. Why did he turn them down? He was told by the police commissioner and mayor, both of whom are acting as errand boys for the Republican National Committee. The Republicans want demonstrators to rally on Chambers Street, near the former World Trade Center site, in order to say, "Look! At the place where people died, they demonstrate against our troops."

As violence continues in postwar Iraq and U.S. forces have yet to discover any WMDs, some critics say the media, including The Washington Post, failed the country by not reporting more skeptically on President Bush's contentions during the run-up to war.

An examination of the paper's coverage, and interviews with more than a dozen of the editors and reporters involved, shows that The Post published a number of pieces challenging the White House, but rarely on the front page. Some reporters who were lobbying for greater prominence for stories that questioned the administration's evidence complained to senior editors who, in the view of those reporters, were unenthusiastic about such pieces. The result was coverage that, despite flashes of groundbreaking reporting, in hindsight looks strikingly one-sided at times.

Does this strategy of attacking combat Vietnam veterans sound familiar? In 2000, a similar Republican smear campaign was launched against Sen. McCain. In fact, the very same communications group, Spaeth Communications, that placed ads against John McCain in 2000 is involved in these vicious attacks against John Kerry. Texas Republican donors with close ties to George W. Bush and Karl Rove crafted this "dishonest and dishonorable" ad. Their new charges are false; their stories are fabricated, made up by people who did not serve with Kerry in Vietnam. They insult and defame all of us who served in Vietnam.

But when the noise and fog of their distortions and lies have cleared, a man who volunteered to serve his country, a man who showed up for duty when his country called, a man to whom the United States Navy awarded a Silver Star, a Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts, will stand tall and proud. Ultimately, the American people will judge these Swift Boat Veterans for Bush and their accusations. Americans are tired of smear campaigns against those who volunteered to wear the uniform. Swift Boat Veterans for Bush should hang their heads in shame.

"Does this strategy of attacking combat Vietnam Veterans sound familiar?" These are your own words from your own article. Now ask yourself the same question. You are also attacking "combat Vietnam Veterans." The same standards should apply to both sides. Both sides should have credibility and let the public decide who is being honest.

HAMBURG, Germany -- Washington has barred German judges access to al Qaeda captives in the retrial of the only Sept. 11 suspect ever convicted, a Hamburg court heard on Tuesday, throwing the case into doubt.

Mounir Motassadeq, 30, is charged with plotting the 2001 attacks with Mohamed Atta and others, and membership of a terrorist organization. ...

His first conviction was overturned because judges had no access to a key al Qaeda figure in U.S. custody.

In a letter to the German embassy in Washington, read out in court, U.S. authorities said they had to protect the sources and methods of the security services.

Since when?

The letter said "interactive access" to such prisoners could hamper their interrogation and lead to critical secret information, including about terrorist threats, being divulged.

The U.S. decision casts doubts on the new proceedings.

The issue has led to tension between Germany and the United States, which clearly wants a conviction in the case but is unwilling to allow testimony from the interrogation of al Qaeda captives to be aired in open court.

Now, there may be legitimate reasons why the Bush Administration doesn't want such testimony made public, particularly if ongoing intelligence operations were compromised. However, the Bush Administration isn't a bit shy about compromising intelligence operations for political purposes, is it?

Other reasons the Bushies might not want the world to know about prisoner testimony include (a) the testimony might conflict with Bushie ideology regarding al Qaeda, specifically alleged connections with Saddam Hussein; or (b) something about the testimony might reveal it was obtained through use of torture. Or even (c) the testimony is worthless and the people being detained and interrogated are innocent, and are just being held to cover Bush's butt and make it look like the Bushies are actually doing something about terrorism.

Washington reacted angrily when Motassadeq was freed from custody in April, describing him as dangerous.

If single women voted at the same rate as married ones, there would have been 6 million more voters in 2000—200,000 in Florida alone. Why are they alienated? One reason might be how liberal they are. On every single issue, these voters lean left, especially on economics. Eighty-eight percent worry their incomes might not keep up with rising prices (only 68 percent worry about being the victim of a crime); they are sufficiently environmentalist that only 12 percent are "cool" toward environmental groups. The Democrats, if they stopped talking corporate and spoke to these people's issues, would have won that election, and just about every other one besides.

These days, talking about things like the growing gap between the rich and the rest of us is judged not very nice. Fixing it might require breaking some eggs. The pundits would call it "class warfare." So whenever a concession is demanded in the interests of unity, it will be demanded of the party's left wing, never of the corporate types.

Like the time, Tuesday night, one party liberal—this one—returned to find his seat occupied by one of those blue-suited thirtysomethings. I asked him to give it up. He refused. "We gave lots of money to the Democratic Party," he said, and demanded I sit in the aisle. "It would be shameful if I couldn't get a seat."

It was on behalf of all those poor single women who don't vote and who really hold the explosive power for beating George Bush on November 2, 2004, that I refused to give up my seat.

I can relate to that.

CBS News Correspondent Jim Axelrod, who's traveling with the Kerry campagin, notes that Kerry and Edwards were not only drawing substantial crowds at organized rallies, but surprisingly high turnouts at rural train depots as well. CBS News

 

For the city of Flagstaff, it was practically the second coming.

Presidential nominee John Kerry arrived to screaming crowds in downtown Flagstaff Sunday night, where an estimated 8,000 to 10,000 local residents welcomed the candidate looking to unseat President Bush in November. [Arizona Daily Sun]

The polls may not show much of a post-convention bounce for Mr. Kerry, but his crowds tell a different story. Before the convention, he only rarely drew more than a few thousand people to a rally. Since setting off from the convention in Boston, though, his events have consistently been mob scenes, with or without his running mate - and with or without Ben Affleck, who accompanied him for the first two days of the trip.

In Harrisburg, Pa., on July 30, more than 15,000 people mobbed the Capitol plaza. In Grand Rapids, Mich., home of the Republican former president Gerald R. Ford, Mr. Kerry drew close to 10,000 people near where President Bush had attracted just 4,500 a few days before. [New York Times]

By most yardsticks, Kerry’s train trip across St. Louis a la Harry Truman’s whistle-stop campaign in 1948 was a success. The weather was perfect. Crowds were large and enthusiastic.

And even when his 15-car train passed the western Missouri towns of Lee’s Summit and Independence after midnight Friday without stopping, hundreds of people had gathered to cheer. [Columbia Daily Tribune]

PollingReport.com has a nifty new page summarizing the latest batch of national polls.

Currently, every August poll is listed, both for registered voters, and for likely voters. Of the eight polls, only one shows a Bush lead, and then only under the "likely voter" category. The rest show anywhere between a 1- and an 8-point Kerry lead.

 

Bush spends a lot of time in the 43-45 range, not a good place for an inbumbent to be. [Kos]

And then there's Bizarro World --

Kerry's post-convention week hasn't been very good. An effort at an impromptu photo-op with some Marines he met at a Wendy's went sour, with the Marines complaining that he "imposed on" them and saying that they preferred Bush.  Photos of Kerry in a bunny suit at Kennedy Space Center -- undignified, perhaps, but harmless in themselves -- became a liability when Kerry's campaign manager claimed that their release was a "dirty trick," only to have it come out that the Kerry campaign had asked for their expedited release. Oops!

...And Kerry's personality hasn't won people over. Reliably liberal columnist Jules Witcover reported that Kerry's campaign is "not a big hit on the road," ... Mickey Kaus, who has already endorsed Kerry, is dropping hints about the "Torricelli option" -- dropping Kerry for a more appealing candidate at the last moment -- but I think it's too late for that. [Glenn Reynolds and Glenn Reynolds]

Glennie is either heavily medicated, or he needs to be. BTW, does anyone beside the wingnuts give a bleep about the "bunny suit" photos?

 

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A federal judge held a reporter for Time magazine in contempt of court Monday for refusing to testify before a grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of a covert CIA officer.

In an order issued July 20 but not made public until Monday, U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan ruled that Time's Matthew Cooper and "Meet the Press" host Tim Russert were required to testify "regarding alleged conversations they had with a specified executive branch official."

NBC News issued a statement saying that Russert already had been interviewed under oath by prosecutors on Saturday under an agreement to avoid a protracted court fight. The interview concerned a July 2003 phone conversation he had with Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby. ...

The subpoenas of Russert and Cooper were issued by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago, who was appointed as a special prosecutor in the leak case. Hogan denied the claims by the two journalists that they were protected by the Constitution from having to testify.

Hmmm, she said. Or maybe, no big deal. NBC said that Russert had not known Plame's name or her identity as a CIA operative, and "that he did not provide that information to Libby." (But did Libby provide that information to Russert?)

Matthew Cooper and Time intend to appeal the ruling.

If nothing else, this tells us that U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald is on the job.

Pakistan, Britain are furious that US officials confirmed name to newspaper.

 

by Tom Regan | csmonitor.com

Reuters reported on Saturday that Pakistani intelligence officers said US officials