] One of the latest incidents came when John Sachs, 18, a
] Johnston High School senior and Democrat, went to see
] Bush in Clive last week. Sachs got a ticket to the event
] from school and wanted to ask the president about whether
] there would be a draft, about the war in Iraq, Social
] Security and Medicare.
]
]
] But when he got there, a campaign staffer pulled him
] aside and made him remove his button that said,
] "Bush-Cheney '04: Leave No Billionaire Behind." The
] staffer quizzed him about whether he was a Bush
] supporter, asked him why he was there and what questions
] he would be asking the president.
]
]
] "Then he came back and said, 'If you protest, it won't be
] me taking you out. It will be a sniper,' " Sachs said.
] "He said it in such a serious tone it scared the crap out
] of me."
]
]
] Sachs stayed at the event, but he was escorted to a
] section of the 7 Flags Events Center where he was
] surrounded by Secret Service and told he couldn't ask
] questions. "I was just in a state of fear," he said. "I
] was looking at the ceiling and I didn't know what to
] expect, I was so scared."

[ ! -k]

DesMoinesRegister.com | Politics

] A friend with a child in the Richland County,WI high
] school where George Bush appears today reports the
] following. Students were told they could not wear any
] pro-Kerry clothing or buttons or protest in any manner,
] at the risk of expulsion. After a parent inquired, an
] alternative activity will be provided, probably a movie
] being shown in an auditorium. (The school secretary
] reportedly said that students had the choice of just
] staying home if they didn't want to attend the Bush
] rally, but the principal subsequently offered an
] alternative.)

[ Granted, this *could* be the school administration more than the Bush camp. Though I'm pretty sure I've been reading stories about people being ejected from Bush rallies for wearing pro-kerry gear too, so maybe not.

Doesn't matter, this seems incredibly inappropriate. It's nothing more than a canned media event, exploitative and offensive. -k]

Daily Kos :: Free speech, Bush style

] A secret document obtained from inside Bush campaign
] headquarters in Florida suggests a plan - possibly in
] violation of US law - to disrupt voting in the state's
] African-American voting districts, a BBC Newsnight
] investigation reveals.

[ Seems a little bit sensational, but I trust the BBC more than a lot of US media outlets. Regardless, I'd rather have too much scrutiny than not enough. -k]

BBC NEWS | New Florida vote scandal feared

] The young, computer-savvy veterans of 2000 have joined
] forces again and are reviving vote-pairing for the 2004
] presidential election. Although Nader's base is obviously
] much smaller now, with most of his progressive supporters
] long since having gone home to the Democratic Party, even
] a few thousand votes in the swing states could turn the
] election for Kerry.

[ This is a very interesting article. To say nothing of the validity of the practice, the fact that this is even happening, i think, points to some of the serious faults in our electoral system. That so-called third party candidates, and in the Dark Red and Dark Blue states, even one of the two majors, are completely marginalized, is a serious problem.

As much as this election has been focused on the need to remove a threat, i have long thought that in a greater sense we need a broader range of viewpoints, and a more wider ranging debate among our leaders. -k]

The Return of Vote-Pairing - Vote-pairing nearly saved Al Gore in 2000. Could it give Kerry a decisive boost this year? By Jamin Raskin

] This has been rumored in Washington for several days. And
] now the Nelson Report has broken the story.
]
]
] Some 350 tons of high explosives (RDX and HMX), which were
] under IAEA seal while Saddam was in power,
] were looted during the early days of the US occupation.
] Like so much else, it was just left unguarded.

[ It's all over the media now, in varying degrees of aggressiveness. The NYT article (iirc) puts the number at 380 metric tonnes, almost a million pounds of easily transported, safe-to-handle, high explosive material, now in the hands of enemies. Such a bad situation for our troops. -k]

TPM : Missing TONS of High Explosives

] Eminem%u2019s fan base tends to poo-pooh the arguments of
] the more politically sensitive hip-hoppers, which breaks
] down as a sort of rap-world street-feud of Hobbesians
] versus Rousseauvians that has been brewing since at least
] the mid-eighties.

[ Uhhh. Yeah. This is an interesting read... -k]

Eminem on Bush and Iraq: Comments by Hale and White

This year Child's Play is expanding to help Children's Hospitals across the United States. Each star on the map below represents a Children's Hospital that needs your help. Selecting one will direct you to that particular hospitals Amazon wish list. Any items you purchase from that list will be delivered directly to the hospital you selected. Also be sure to choose the shipping address to the hospital instead of your own!

[ For those of you who don't know, this is a project that the comic geniuses and latter day rennaissance men over at Penny Arcade started last year. The response was pretty astounding and as far as charities go, this one is as good as any. Not to mention, it's easy to trust that the donation will go where it's meant to.

Anyway, if you're of a mind, i recomend it as a good cause. -k]

Child's Play Charity

] My own opinion is that the rich already pay too
] much -- it seems patently unfair to ask anyone to pay
] over 30 times as much as his neighbors (unless he
] receives 30 times as much in government services, which
] strikes me as implausible). If you share my sense of
] fairness, you'll join me in condemning the president's
] tax policy.
]
]
] But if, on the other hand, you believe that the tax
] system should soak the rich even more than it already
] does -- or, to put it more genteelly, that the tax
] system should be more progressive than it already
] is -- if, in other words, you are a mainstream
] Democrat -- then George W. Bush is your guy.

[ Hm. Without getting too deeply into the issue, the fundamental flaw i see here is the analogy of taxes as a direct payment for government services. They are not, never have been, and should not be. They are an investment in the infrastucture of the nation, physical and societal. Tax dollars fund education, health care and food and environmental protection, among other things -- spending which, by its very nature, is difficult or impossible to treat in a payment-for-services-rendered context. Investments do not always pay back directly to the investor. In this case, they pay back the future generations of americans, who will be better equipped to succeed with the benefits conveyed to them by current taxes. And are likewise payments into a system that provided the rich with the framework on which they could build their own success.

The rich have their success, in a large part, to hard work, personal ambition and shrewd action. However, it seems like many fall into the trap of assuming that such things are the entire cause of their success. That they are self-made in the most pure sense of the word. In reality, of course, they reap the benefits of a national infrastructure which was built and funded by earlier generations of americans. No one exists in a vaccuum, and it is interconnectedness which permits success to thrive through the exploitation of relationships. In the best case, these are positive-sum relationships, yeilding improvement for all parties, as opposed to the enrichment of one to the detriment of others. I see the progressive tax system as a way to ensure that positive sum result, by ensuring that those who have benefitted most from the world are paying back into the system, enhancing opportunities for future generations.

This argument doesn't even touch on issues of philanthropy, or helping others, but stems from a pure argument of fairness. Entitlements and government programs are often couched in the rhetorical framework of a reward for freeloaders... lazy people at the bottom of the food chain who can't be bothered to invest themselves in their own survival. Certainly, there are those who fit this description, but it seems untenable to assume they are the majority. Rather, the proper application of government funds as investments in the future serves to provide the very opportunities that will be exploited by a new generation of enterprising people. To succeed greatly, and then fail to return the favors granted to you by the society you live in is just as much freeloading as demanding unfettered welfare checks. Progressive taxes are right. -k]

Bush's Tax Cuts Are Unfair ... - To the rich. By Steven E. Landsburg

] "Newton was not the first of the age of reason," Keynes
] said. "He was the last of the magicians, the last of the
] Babylonians and Sumerians, the last great mind which
] looked out on the visible and intellectual world with the
] same eyes as those who began to build our intellectual
] inheritance rather less than 10,000 years ago." Newton
] opened a door to our world, sure. But he belonged to the
] world we have left behind.

[ Neat. James Glieck informs, as always. -k]

Isaac Newton's Gravity - How a major new exhibition gets the scientist wrong. By James Gleick

] "It is actually quite hard to read RFID at a distance,"
] said Want.

[ Is it? -k]

Wired News: American Passports to Get Chipped