Did George W. Bush know most Guantánamo prisoners were innocent?

Apr 09 10

BradPolitics , 2 Comments

Interesting article from The Times (London):

George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld covered up that hundreds of innocent men were sent to the Guantánamo Bay prison camp because they feared that releasing them would harm the push for war in Iraq and the broader War on Terror, according to a new document obtained by The Times.

The accuser is Lawrence Wilkerson a former aide to Gen. Colin Powell.  Here is the article.

Hard for me to scope out the truth of the matter. Unfortunately competency and veracity were not in abundant supply in the George W. Bush Administration.  It is obvious, the Bush administration had not the foggiest clue as what to do with the prisoners once they had them.  Anyway I pass the news story on for your edification.

Towns and States are in the Federal Soup Line

Apr 02 10

BradPolitics, Rants No Comments

Another excellent article from the Chesterton Tribune: Chesterton’s pluses are minuses in quest for economic development dollars.  I have no problem with the article itself, but it occurred to me while reading it how dependent even small towns have become on the Federal government for handouts of very basic operational funds.

It’s like the towns and cities all have to stand in a Federal soup line begging for money just to re-build sewers and pave roads.  This cannot be healthy.

I’m a Federalist, I think States Rights are important as long as they are not used as an excuse for racism. But for Federalism to work and for the States to act as a check on the powers of the Federal Government, the states have to reduce their dependence on the Federal Treasury.

My way of thinking is that the Federal Government has no business building sidewalks in Chesterton or Otis or Valparaiso.  That is, there are a whole lot of things that the Federal Government is paying for that should be paid for out of State or local funds.

In a perverse way, the Federal Government, by handing out money to local governments, lets the State governments off the hook on such things as raising taxes where needed, tax reform, competency in the local collection and disbursement of state taxes, and more.  It also undercuts the authority and importance of the States: when you accept Caesar’s coin you play by Caesar’s Rules.

The Right is Rewriting History

Apr 02 10

BradPolitics , No Comments

If you tried to make this up for a novel nobody would believe you.

Not satisfied with U.S. history, some conservatives rewrite it

The most ballyhooed effort is under way in Texas, where conservatives have pushed the state school board to rewrite guidelines, downplaying Thomas Jefferson in one high school course, playing up such conservatives as Phyllis Schlafly and the Heritage Foundation and challenging the idea that the Founding Fathers wanted to separate church and state.

Read the whole thing.

I am going to be consistent:  I deplored this sort of stuff when the Left tried to do it and I condemn it when the Right starts it.  I honestly expected better out of the Right.

This is right out of the Communist play book and long term will come back to bite the Right when people realize they have been intentionally mislead.  It all goes to Trust, once you lose it it is hard to get it back.

Of Subprime Mortgages and the Collapse of the Financial System

Mar 18 10

BradCurrent Events, Politics No Comments

“There is a sucker born every minute.”

I want to point you to a great interview done by Terry Gross on her show Fresh Air:

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine chronicles the 2008 financial collapse through stories of the people who realized what was happening to the U.S. economy while it was happening — and then made vast fortunes by betting against the markets.

The interview of author Michael Lewis was riveting.  Normally my eyes glaze over when financial stuff is discussed for too long, but this interview explains how the whole subprime mortgage system worked, and how a few individuals saw Wall Street’s house of cards for what it was and made money by betting against the system they thought was corrupt.

You can listen to it online here.

The part that bothers me, is that we have done very little to reform the financial system that had gone bad.  And frankly, I don’t think the Wall Street types admit any culpability.  Nobody has gone to jail. There has been almost no reform. I can’t sit here and say the same thing won’t happen again.  That is scary and I don’t think anyone in Washington is listening.