John Ashcroft is a dangerous menace to American values. He doesn't believe in freedom, states' rights, or the rights of an individual to freely practice no religion. His Pentecostal agenda is at odds with the needs of the country and the Constitution, and I call for his immediate resignation for the good of the United States of America which all of us, including Ashcroft, love.

Heroes Thomas Paine Thomas Jefferson Benjamin Franklin Alexander Hamilton

 
One Buck Forty or Die Off the beaten path for me, but a Dvorak article on monopoly pricing in the music industry is more interesting than another post about the venality of the Bush team.
posted by Dave Roberts at 11:30 AM

 
Mr. Bush, Stop the Insanity Molly Ivins joins Mark Twain in a vociferous denunciation of the Bush war strategy.
posted by Dave Roberts at 11:47 PM

 
Victory of the Loud Little Handful Mark Twain on the hollering for war.
posted by Dave Roberts at 11:44 PM

 
It Takes a Solar Village (washingtonpost.com) for Clueless and the rest, it's really a very simple proposition. The sun, the roofs, and the conservation. That's it.
posted by Dave Roberts at 11:34 PM

 
It's Not About Oil? Even Cato doesn't buy the administration's argument that oil doesn't figure into the discussion about Iraq.
posted by Dave Roberts at 6:33 PM

 
Nunn-Lugar Suffers Cuts Despite Big Boost to Pentagon Budget This is an old time commentary, but highlights the stupidity of our programs to defend against weapons of mass destruction. The most effective program we have is being cut...

posted by Dave Roberts at 6:26 PM

 
Judge Concludes Energy Company Drove Up Prices This article lays the wood upside the head of those who think Gray Davis was whining about the big, bad energy companies. According to the judge, El Paso illegally exercised market power in the provision of natural gas. The early estimates are for $4 billion, but with damages it could go higher. It'll be appealed of course, but the circle of energy bad guys continues to widen. Bring back sensible regulation of the energy markets, please.
posted by Dave Roberts at 9:50 PM

 
GIRLS! GIRLS! GIRLS! By RALPH PETERS You can't read this too often. For many of us in California this has been an obvious no-brainer situation, but lots of people still don't get it. I'll toss my religious right friends who want to control their wives into the "don't get it" pile along with their Islamic fellow travelers. Get with it, boys, the babes are here to stay.
posted by Dave Roberts at 9:53 AM

 
California Energy
Crisis Whitewash I don't know why Lynn Kiesling felt it necessary to excuse the five generators accused of manipulating California's energy market, but her arguments sound feeble and incomplete at best. For anyone who lived through those days it was apparent the market was being whipsawed by a group of banditos who had been given the keys to the bank. Nobody denies the fundamental stupididty of California's regulatory efforts. If you invite Ken Lay to help plan your system, Enron's going to have a built-in edge. However, the mere existence of an opportunity for chicanery doesn't mandate bad behavior. The outirght lying and cheating that went on all fly in the face of the business ethics we should expect from major corporations. The abdication of FERC from any effort to restrain the obvious exercise of market power pricing is a scandal in its own right, but one that Billy Tauzin has been too busy to undertake. As anyone can tell you, Martha Stewart's insider trading is far more important to our national well being than market manipulation by major energy producers.
In the final analysis that may emerge in a few years it will be clear that both California and the major energy producers were at fault. However, California's fault was an excess of trust. The producers fault was an excess of greed. The two are not equivalent.

posted by Dave Roberts at 1:32 AM

 
Globalization, Alive and Well A year of travel in Southeast Asia and Central America taught me the same lesson that Friedman talks about in this editorial. The argument among the people who matter, the hungry and poor, isn't about whether globalization is bad or good. It's about how quickly it can be brought to bear to alleviate poverty and misery without disrupting the elements of social order that countries need to survivie intact. The next time a European or American protester tells you that globalization is bad, ask them about their most recent visits to Bangladesh, Vietnam, or India. It's the height of arrogance for anyone in the west to assume that poverty, degradation, high childhood death rates, or any other symptom of economic malaise are anything but a preventable problem. The gentle Buddhists of Thailand haven't chosen to be poor. They are just late to the development table. They can still be gentle and sweet, but give them a chance at indoor plumbing, phones, universal education, and decent health care for all first.
posted by Dave Roberts at 12:33 AM