democratic views

Black

The power grid is down. The Internet is dark; web sites are gone, internet banking and all online resources have disappeared. No lights, no power, no traffic control. Airports are running on backup systems with limited capability, talking down airplanes one by one. Hospitals, military bases and public safety facilities are humming on backup power, hoping their emergency generators are resupplied by fuel companies they can't reach. No phones, no texting, no twittering.

Military communications are disrupted under the pressure of a flood of attacks of many different kinds, exacerbated by the loss of civilian network capacity. Some computers have stopped working, their guts eviscerated by electronic attacks. And this is just for ground-based systems. So far no direct attacks have been mounted on satellites.

China Announces Democratic Elections; Seeks Reconciliation with Taiwan

In a stunning move unforeseen by politicians and journalists worldwide, China's central committee declared "a new day for democracy" and announced that free, open, and democratic elections would be held as soon as they could be organized, probably within the next several months.

The government demonstrated its new commitment to human rights and rule of law by freeing Liu Xiaobo, co-author of last December's revolutionary call for freedom known as Charter 8, and thousands of other political prisoners; ending China's "one child" policy and the use of forced abortions; and abandoning all efforts to monitor or censor Internet traffic; and many more significant policy changes.

A Green Revolution in America Won’t Help Iran’s

Tom Friedman continues pushing for a gasoline tax, believing that it will push down the price of oil by fostering development of alternative fuels. His argument is that taking U.S. oil consumption away from petrodictators will push down the price of oil worldwide, depriving them of the revenues they need to bribe their peoples into accepting tyranny, and that once the people do not have generous benefits given them by the government they will rise up and seek democracy.

Reform or Revolution?

David Brooks found a great statement on revolutions from Michael McFaul: "In retrospect, all revolutions seem inevitable. Beforehand, all revolutions seem impossible." The context in which Brooks employs the quote is about the situation in Iran, where the regime is increasingly fragile and weak at the core and will likely employ more and more repressive tactics to stay in power.

It seems impossible to imagine a revolution in America, and even if one gets that far, to imagine what form it would take. We've seen significant reforms over the past 60 years, but there also has been blood in the streets, riots and burning of cities, vigilantism of many kinds, domestic terrorism over many issues. Watching the waltz in Congress as Democrats dilly and Republicans dally while the influence-peddlers play on, one wonders what they're thinking.

Pshah! Iran’s Bogus Election Results

If one can believe the data and analysis of the Iranian election turned out by Chatham House and the Institute of Iranian Studies at Scotland's University of St. Andrews (founded in 1413, the third-oldest university in the English-speaking world), the Iranian election is nothing but a massive fraud. How big? Well, when Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei asked on Friday "How can one rig 11 million votes?" the Chatham House analysis points the way.

No More Dirty Pix

No, I'm not writing about pornography. If you watch the movie "Taken" you'll see Liam Neeson, a former CIA agent trying to rescue his kidnapped daughter, obtaining a picture of one of the abductors from the evil-doer's reflection when he takes a picture of the daughter and her friend that ends up on the memory card of the girl's cell phone. Presumably Neeson or his buddies back at the agency have some fancy image-processing forensics software like Ikena that they use to clean up the picture enough to get a good ID of the bad guy.

On a more sinister note, if you've been watching the Iranian protests - too early to call it a revolution - through New York Times coverage that leads to various videos, or DemotixImages pictures, you can be sure the Iranian government is busy enhancing its own images in order to identify and start taking protest leaders off the streets.

For $50, you too can have that software, now on the market as vReveal, which is nicely described in a New York Times article by Anne Eisenberg. Don't buy before you try it: the company offers a free 30-day trial. If you're just a home video enthusiast, this program is nice to have; if you're a blogger or trying to get pics or videos up on the web to promote your work, it's a must-have.

The Nuances of Innocence

Innocent until proven guilty has a nice ring to it. Until you're found guilty even though you claim innocence, then later, desperate to get out of jail, go along with the charade that requires you to admit guilt - a Catch-22 that says you can't be paroled until you accept responsibility for the crime for which you were convicted. Then your admission of guilt is used to prevent you from further appealing your innocence. It's just one ugly fact of American justice, one of many traps that various states use in their legal machinery to maintain their conviction statistics.

The higher courts are supposed to provide relief for those whose innocence might still be obtained under the principle of presumed innocence. But the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in the case of William G. Osborne shows that not only do we not have to worry about empathy infecting the conservative majority, we might well worry about whose interests that majority presumes to serve. The Court set aside a lower federal court ruling allowing Osborne (who is not anyone's poster child, though he's supported by the Innocence Project) to pay for newer DNA testing technology that might invalidate his conviction and set him free. Alaska – one of a handful of states in the country that has not enacted legislation governing the use of DNA testing - was defeated at the federal appellate court level when it tried to block Osborne's access to DNA evidence that might set him free. Alaska appealed – and appallingly, was supported by the Obama administration.

Obama’s Slippery Slope

A recent New York Times/CBS News poll shows that even as President Obama has maintained a consistently high approval rating of around 63% in the United States since his inauguration, the number of Americans who disapprove of how he's doing is growing. Nearly half of those who were on the fence and withholding judgment have now joined the ranks disapproving of Obama's performance. This poses problems for his policy programs, because it means that members of Congress will hear from more disaffected voters without seeing any upside among Obama supporters.

All A-Twitter over Iran

News flash: Iran's authoritarian regime steals an election; populist candidate defeated.

OK, maybe the results will hold up and Ahmadinejad really won. There wouldn't be much of a story if it ended there. Tom Friedman points out that a number of surprising developments are bringing democratic initiatives to the forefront throughout the Middle East. People are pushing back against both authoritarian governments and Islamist groups seeking power in a number of countries.

The Weekly Standard’s Screed

I imagine David Brooks is happy to have moved on from writing for The Weekly Standard. In the recent issue of June 8^th that I picked up at the airport and read while in flight, most of the writing was undistinguished, even if the topics were timely and important. The opinion was not only predictable but also tiresome, especially the two items published on the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court vacancy.

China’s Central Committee and the United States Cybercommand

On the left hand we have China's government mandate: starting on July 1 all computers sold must have monitoring software built in (code name: Green Dam, nicknamed "Green Damn" by privacy and civil rights activists). On the right hand we have the recently announced United States initiative to create a unified cybercommand to deter, detect, and defend against computer attacks, including developing an offensive capability. The Pentagon and the National Security Agency have been fighting turf wars over this for some time.

If you believe that developing an offensive capability is a new element in the U.S. military arsenal, there is still some real estate available for you with no proof of income or employment needed to secure your low, low mortgage rates. The U.S. has had information operations for quite a while. The U.S. government simply can't maintain credibility on this issue without acknowledging the fact that offensive cyberweapons are now on the table.

Goodbye To All That: Virginia Democrats Select R. Creigh Deeds for Governor

In what appeared to be a too-close-to-call race for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, voters delivered a crushing victory to R. Creigh Deeds. He's a rural candidate who triumphed over two urban contenders, Terry McAuliffe and Brian Moran, in a race where voter apathy was the biggest winner. During the past decade or more there have been growing tensions between fast-growing northern Virginia with increasingly Democratic voters against the rural Republicans in the rest of the state on many issues: transportation, gun control, smoking bans, and others. Lately the north has been winning, and the state delivered for Barack Obama and other Democrats in last fall's election.

Fool’s Gold: Three Books and a Film

After reading John Lanchester's New Yorker piece "Outsmarted," a review of three books on the collapse of America's free-market capitalism, the romantic comedy film "Fool's Gold" is just the tonic needed. When crisis fatigue sets in after following day after day, months turning into years of dire news, what could be better than a treasure-hunting caper in the Caribbean with a happy ending, where the bad guys get their comeuppance? That's about as far from Wall Street and the gung-ho capitalist business lobby as one can get, even if it is fantasy, and needs the rich guy with $700 million and his yacht to bankroll the adventure.

King the Universalist Replaced by Reagan the Sectarian

Irony is such savage joy. On June 3, 2009, the statue of Thomas Starr King, a Unitarian Universalist minister who was instrumental in keeping California in the Union during the American Civil War, was removed from its honored place in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. It was replaced by a statue of Ronald Reagan. How fitting that California Republicans would vote to replace a figure who has been known for more than 150 years as "the orator who saved the nation" with one of a partisan saint whose epiphany inspired religious devotion to lower taxes, lower taxes, and lower taxes.

Recent polls asking who Americans consider our worst presidents find Reagan in the second quartile from the top, but Robert Parry suggests that Reagan deserves to be pushed toward the bottom. George W. Bush, who ranks near the bottom in every poll, is no doubt counting on history to be as kind to him as it thus far has been to Reagan. But there is no mistaking the different effects Thomas Starr King and Ronald Reagan had upon this country. King, at a time when the nation was in danger of breaking apart, was instrumental in keeping it together. He was recognized in his time and has been considered a unifying force for well over a century. Reagan has become a polarizing figure whose most ardent acolytes persist in pushing divisions forward and making reconciliation on public policy matters of utmost importance difficult to achieve.

It is unfortunate that California chose to replace a character whose life and work was dedicated to promoting toleration in religion and politics with an icon who first shilled for corporate America and then became the mouthpiece for a conservative ideology that has arrested the development of American ideals. The National Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capitol has been diminished by the banishment of Thomas Starr King, who after all these years must now find a new home to commemorate his legacy.

Tonight, Tonight Is Not Just a West Coast Story

Two nights ago Conan O'Brien took over the Tonight Show after Jay Leno's 17-year run. But even 17 years after Johnny Carson retired, it's still his show, no matter that he got it from Jack Paar, as ancient historians will remember. The Tonight Show is an American icon, with more franchise value than General Motors.

The first night was too much Conan, which is what I often think of Conan on the occasions when I've tuned him in on his Late Night show. The sleek set hearkens back to the classic curtains that Johnny stepped through for 30 years, adding to the burdens that Conan faces in growing into the show. He made a joke about being on the lowest-rated network (as Leno often did) then tripled the ante with mention of GE's tumbling stock and GM's sponsorship. But the unspoken part of that joke is that he's been handed a No. 1 ratings leader and he'd better not screw it up. Let's call the first night a shakedown cruise, and not an omen, or an ominous sign of further troubles ahead. He's likeable enough – but I can see David Letterman sharpening his fangs and getting ready to draw late-night blood.

GM: Grubbing for Money

What else could Fritz Henderson say at the GM press conference announcing the company's bankruptcy as he tried to keep his job? After all, someone has to stick around to run the company that has been run into the ground by management and labor alike so that the government doesn't have to do it. After the "safe harbor" announcement that protected his speech, Henderson thanked his new owners and overseers for the $30 billion bailout they offered him. He pledged that the "new GM" would dedicate itself anew to build the "very best cars and trucks" that would be "highly fuel efficient" with "world class quality" using "green technology development" with "truly outstanding design" and that the company would be "dedicated to our customers."

Oh, really? What were they supposed to have been doing all these years past? Why should we believe that the same management team that got GM (and now taxpayers in the U.S. and Canada) into this mess has the chops to do what they've been unwilling or unable to do for the past few decades? What's changed other than the departure of Rick Wagoner, the big chief who got pushed aside by President Obama? Are they suddenly going to hire the best design talent away from their competitors? Are they suddenly going to unveil new technologies that they've been sitting on for years while taking the low road and building uninspired gas guzzlers? Where did Henderson's epiphany come from? Did he participate in new research into psychedelic drugs chronicled in the Fingerprints of God and have a revelation that will lead to a new way forward?

The Obama administration had little choice if they wanted to prevent a bad situation from getting worse. General Motors, now busted in rank and off the Dow Jones index, appears to be too big to fail, especially after the pandemic threats posed by the collapse of U.S. financial institutions weakened the U.S. economy and caused global chaos. But that doesn't mean U.S. taxpayers have to like the solution, and if the new GM doesn't deliver big government will take a beating.