It was good to hear Vice President Dick Cheney rebuke Russia this week. “In many areas of civil society — from religion and the news media, to advocacy groups and political parties — the government has unfairly and improperly restricted the rights of her people,” Cheney said in a speech in Lithuania. Russia and President Vladimir Putin have gotten a free pass for too long. But it’s going to take more than a few strong words to get Russia to reverse its retreat from democracy. And would Cheney have criticized Russia as harshly had it not been blocking U.S. efforts to penalize Iran for its nuclear program?
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
Maybe if President Bush had ever vetoed a bill, lawmakers would take his threats more seriously. But the U.S. Senate disregarded Bush’s promised veto Thursday and approved a spending bill that was $14 billion more than Bush said he would allow. The bill — which Kansas Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts voted for — would spend $109 billion on the war in Iraq, hurricane recovery, farm assistance and a heaping helping of home-state projects (a Wall Street Journal editorial described the bill as a “ball of blubber rolled out of the world’s greatest spending body”). The House, however, seems to be rediscovering some fiscal discipline, so the bill that ends up reaching Bush’s desk may be within his spending cap. If it isn’t, Bush needs to brush the cobwebs off his veto stamp and put it to use.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
Watching Ray McGovern grill Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld after an Atlanta speech this week was a bracing experience. If you haven’t seen the video, check it out here.
No, the tough questions weren’t from a journalist — most are still playing patty-cake.
But McGovern, a 27-year CIA analyst, was unusually well qualified to challenge the secretary’s half-truths and outright evasions about misuse of intelligence in the run-up to the Iraq invasion.
In one exchange, Rummy denied saying he had “bulletproof” evidence for the location of Iraqi WMDs. But then McGovern confronted him with his own words from 2003: “We know where the WMD are. They’re near Tikrit and Baghdad, and north, south, east and west of there” — and the secretary wilted, stunned, almost speechless.
Rummy tried a few feeble parries and denials, but McGovern had an overwhelming advantage — the truth.
What a great American. McGovern showed courage in exposing the deception and arrogance of Rumsfeld and speaking truth to power.
Posted by Randy Scholfield
Just because Kansas passed a law upholding a mother’s right to breastfeed in public doesn’t mean ordinary Kansans, or even nursing moms, got that needed message.
That’s why it’s a good idea the La Leche League and the Kansas Department of Health and Environment have started handing out some 40,000 breastfeeding “licenses” that women can carry with them to produce if they are confronted in public.
Of course, it’s sad that mothers would even need to carry permission to meet the food needs of their babies — but it’s a good idea, considering the number of ill-informed people who take it upon themselves to hassle nursing mothers.
As Brenda Bandy of La Leche League pointed out, the cards “might just be the little bit of added confidence some moms need.”
Posted by Randy Scholfield
