On Student Immigrants and Air Pollution, this is what a Good President and Good Activists do

June 16th, 2012 | Posted by Jim Cook in Activism | Barack Obama | Environment | Politics - (0 Comments)

Readers who follow our series of articles regarding President Barack Obama know that we have been frequently and forcefully critical of the President for his illiberal policy reversals on behalf of corporate interests and subverting Americans’ constitutional rights. But people, even politicians who tend to flatten themselves for their audiences, are not two-dimensional beings. And so I’d like to recognize two recent actions taken by the Obama administration that move this country in the right direction.

First, Barack Obama used an executive order to stop deportations of illegal immigrants who came to this country as kids, have graduated from high school or otherwise served their country, and who don’t have criminal records. These are people who aren’t responsible for their immigration status and who have something to offer the United States of America. The move is a temporary stop-gap measure to give Congress more time to enact an appropriate permanent law, like the DREAM Act, that has been stalled by congressional Republicans.

Second, the Obama administration moved to save tens of thousands of lives every year by lowering the amount of deadly soot allowed to be expelled into our air by industrial smokestacks. In a move that would be hilarious if it were not so serious, Evan Tracey of the “American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity” took a stand in favor of allowing soot from “clean coal” plants to pollute Americans’ lungs, declaring that making the air safe would endanger corporate profits jobs. With its opposition, the corporate lobby group tacitly acknowledges that “clean coal” is a hoax.

And so today I say thank you, President Obama. If you were to engage in this sort of policy action more often, I might be more inclined to support your re-election.

It would be a mistake to simply thank Barack Obama for making the right moves here. Protesters applying persistent social movement pressure tipped the political scales, making the right thing to do also the politically astute thing to do. As President Obama is lauded for his actions, political activists in America should take heart and remember that their efforts are not always futile.

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Slavish Conservative Bootlicking: Let Government Do Anything to Keep 1 Person Safe

October 24th, 2011 | Posted by Jim Cook in George W. Bush | Homeland Insecurity | Liberty | Politics - (0 Comments)

James Delingpole sarcastically takes the New York Times to task for telling the world about Bush’s secret, illegal and unconstitutional warrantless wiretapping program that spied on innocent people.  His 296th Way to Drive a Liberal Crazy is:

296. Praise the Grey Lady for its principled decision in 2005 to expose President Bush’s Terrorist Surveillance wiretap program. Of course, there are conservative fools who witter on about stuff like national security, but liberals understand otherwise. Say to your liberal friend that you would rather a thousand innocent New Yorkers were blown to tiny pieces on the subway than live in a country where government attempts to eavesdrop on potentially innocent jihadists; you’re so proud that the crusading zeal and moral certitude for which the New York Times is so justly renowned has made that possible.

In Delingpole’s world, he knows that the people being spied on must be “Jihadists.”  In the real world, American soldiers talking to their wives were listened in on for government agents’ amusement.

In Delingpole’s world, deaths from terrorism are a major cause of death. In the real world, more people die every year from gallbladder attacks than have died from terrorist attacks over the past ten years.

In Delingpole’s world, the Constitution isn’t a respected document with the supreme force of law — it’s just a piece of paper to be ignored. In the real world…

… in the real world, Delingpole’s mentality has won out.

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The Laws We Break

June 20th, 2010 | Posted by Rowan in Ethics | Questions - (5 Comments)

It’s been 20 years now since I spent a night in jail as a consequence of a civil disobedience action against the Gulf War.

Which sorts of laws is it okay to violate?

What kinds of legal violations are you not willing to accept?

What makes the difference?

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Who Made Those Soccer Balls?

June 17th, 2010 | Posted by Jim Cook in Economy | Ethics | Liberal Links - (0 Comments)

While people around the globe keep their eyes glued to the World Cup, the sweatshop production of soccer balls stays well hidden. The International Labor Rights Forum has issued a new report that lends us a peek. Heading to the countries where soccer balls are made, the ILRF found soccer ball stitchers forced to work 21-hour shifts and not even paid the sub-poverty minimum wage. They also found kids working in those factories.

Read the report and ask yourself why after all these years soccer balls are still being made in sweatshops.

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American Political Discourse in a Nutshell

June 7th, 2010 | Posted by Jim Cook in Liberty | Media | Politics - (0 Comments)

This about sums it up:

It should be against the law to use the terms “teabagger” or “teabagging” or “teabag” when referring to patriotic Americans trying to save the county from Socialism and FEMA internment camps.

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You Can’t Wear A Burka in Belgium. That’ll Teach Muslims to Not Get Angry!

April 29th, 2010 | Posted by Jim Cook in Liberty | Outside the USA | Politics | Religion - (1 Comments)

If there’s one thing I’ve learned about human nature, it’s this: if you want to discourage a variety of expression and stop getting people from getting upset about it, the best thing you can do is to make that variety of expression against the law. Typically, people who have just had their mode of clothing outlawed by government smile, lift their chin, put on what everybody else is wearing and don’t make a fuss about it. Now that the burka is being made illegal by the Belgian parliament, I’m sure the issue will just go away and nobody will feel like they have any grievances against the society around them at all. Inter-religious friction will dissipate and we’ll all just be like one happy family that does things the one way that things should be done.

Great job, Belgium! Try outlawing frowns next.

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Illegal Immigration: Where’s the Fire?

April 28th, 2010 | Posted by Jim Cook in Homeland Insecurity | Mysteries | Politics - (5 Comments)

Back in 2005, during the last border scare, Theo asked where the flood of illegal immigrants was to justify the calls for the restriction of our rights. There was no flood. Illegal immigration was actually ebbing at the time:

2003 was the last year of available data. Now data is available through 2008:

Deportable Aliens located by the Border Patrol, 1977-2008

You’re reading the graph right: the number of illegal aliens found by the Border Patrol and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement in 2008 was actually the lowest number in the last 30 years, and it’s not because there are fewer, more poorly equipped Border Patrol and ICE agents out there to catch ‘em. No, the Border Patrol budget has gone up and up and up.

There are fewer, not more, illegal immigrants in the United States than before. This is why claims that “we’ve got to do something to face this crisis” don’t and won’t convince me that we’ve got to strip people of their constitutional rights and whip up a police state. The data didn’t demonstrate a crisis five years ago, and they don’t demonstrate a crisis today.

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FBI: We Were so Busy in 2001 We Couldn’t Follow the Law from 2003-2006

April 19th, 2010 | Posted by Jim Cook in Homeland Insecurity | Politics - (0 Comments)

In testimony to Congress last week, FBI General Counsel Valerie Caproni’s made this excuse for the FBI practice over four years of declaring terrorist threats that didn’t exist in order to grab Americans’ phone records without a warrant:

For reasons lost in the fog of history – but no doubt partially the result of the intense pace of activity in the months following the 9/11 attacks – the FBI did not adequately educate our workforce that Congress had provided a clear mechanism to obtain records in emergency situations.

When and how often did the law-breaking happen? A letter by House Judiciary Chair John Conyers to FBI Director Robert Mueller clarifies:

As you are aware, the IG report documents numerous improper actions by FBI personnel to obtain personal telephone record information on individuals between 2003 and 2006, including actions that “violated the requirements” of federal law. More than 700 times, such information was obtained about more than 2,000 phone numbers by so-called “exigent letters,” some of which were signed by FBI agents even though they believed that factual information in the letters was false. For more than 3,500 phone numbers, the call information was extracted without even a letter, but instead by email, requests on a post-it note, or “sneak peeks” of telephone company records. In several cases, FBI personnel violated additional rules by seeking telephone records of news reporters, including one case where actual phone records were improperly obtained concerning Washington Post and New York Times reporters.

Let’s get this straight: according to Caproni, the FBI — the nation’s top law enforcement organization — broke the law to spy on more than 5,500 phone numbers from 2003 to 2006 because nobody “adequately educated” FBI agents about the law. Nobody “adequately educated” FBI agents about the law from 2003 to 2006 because the FBI was so gol-darned busy “in the months following the 9/11 attacks” … of 2001.

Well, that makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? Now why won’t everyone just take the word of the FBI and stop all this fussing?

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P.S. Who would be the person ultimately responsible for communicating the state of law to the FBI? That would be the FBI General Counsel. Who was appointed FBI General Counsel in 2003? That would be Valerie Caproni.

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