Bush benefits from the media in several respects. There is a well-orchestrated right-wing amen corner that has no counterpart on the liberal side. It isn't just FOX, The Weekly Standard, The Washington Times, Rush Limbaugh, and The Wall Street Journal, all of whom function as an echo chamber for the administration line. There's simply no counterpart on the liberal side (the so-called liberal papers, like The Boston Globe and The New York Times play it absolutely straight in their news reporting.)

The ferocity and ideological zeal of the right-wing press influences the mainstream press. The right-wing pundits on the talk shows are part of a well-honed strategy. Their ''liberal'' counterparts are polite and moderate by comparison (where on the talk shows is the liberal counterpart to William Kristol?).

Why isn't Hersh's revelation front page news? Why are the rebuttals to Bush's outright fabrications relegated to the back of the paper? If these were Clinton lies, the press would be all over him.

TV is a culprit in yet another respect. It fosters spectacle, not democratic deliberation. It eats up time that might otherwise be spent doing the business of democracy. Viewers watch Bush's soothing speeches and take them at face value. Who has the time or inclination to check the details?

"I understand people had different opinions before the war, and before the war I readily supported that, if they could explain why. But a lot of these protesters now are International Workers Party members and socialists. . . . If you don't support the decision to go to war, once that decision has been made, you're not being patriotic."

"An Oregon antiterrorism bill would jail street-blocking protesters for at least 25 years in what critics consider a thinly veiled effort to discourage antiwar demonstrations."

" 'We need some additional tools to control protests that shut down the city,' said Lars Larson, a conservative radio talk-show host who has stumped for the bill.

Larson said protesters should be protected by free speech laws, but not be able to hold up ambulances or frighten people out of their daily routines, adding that police and the court system could be trusted to see the difference."

Staying
March 25, 2000 - American soldiers are fighting in Iraq. They are freeing the people from evil leaders. The soldiers are working hard. They are protecting Iraqi people in towns that they have captured. Some Iraqis do not believe the Americans will stay to help them. We freed them in 1991. Then we went away. Many Iraqis were killed as a result. This time is different. Marine Sgt. Jason Lewis said, "We are here to stay." Americans will bring food and medicine. They will help people who have been hurt. "Hopefully this time we'll do it right," said Sgt. Lewis, "and give these Iraqis a chance at liberty."

Burning Oats
March 18, 2003 - The Quaker Oats cereal plant in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, had a problem. It filled 12 railcars every day with oat hulls. How could it get rid of them? Quaker dumped the oats in a landfill. That's a lot of landfill. The University of Iowa heated its buildings by burning coal. That's a lot of coal. Now, the university is burning oat hulls. And it is saving about $500,000 a year. Quaker is saving landfills and earning money. The university is heating its buildings and saving money. Burning oats is a good use of God's creation.

This is the path — the correct path — that the president has charted, despite the opposition of so many of his diplomats, and despite the near-total indifference of the Western press to the plight of the Iranian, Iraqi and Syrian people. It is the path that most fully expresses our own revolutionary tradition, and gives the peoples of the Middle East the chance to recapture their dignity by empowering them to govern their own lands. Finally, for those obsessed by the Arab-Israeli question, it is the best chance for peace between the Israelis and Palestinians. President Bush has said that he will not support a Palestinian state that is governed by people hostile to democracy. Yet it is impossible for a democratic Palestine to emerge, let alone survive, so long as the dominant countries in the region are tyrannical supporters of terrorism.

This reporter witnessed [US] Humvees stopping outside a girls' school - currently closed because of the war - heaving their backpacks over a cement fence into the playground. On the roof of a Christian church next door, US troops were setting up communications equipment.

The entrance to a nearby boys' school had been reinforced with sandbags and armed Kurdish militiamen, pesh merga, were on guard outside. A boys' school was also seen being occupied by US forces, and local residents say three schools - all closed - now house US troops.

The US military, for its part, says it has no information on this particular operation. "But it certainly is our policy to not establish military headquarters or other operations in protected areas under the Geneva Convention," says Lt. Col. Gary Keck, a spokesman for the Department of Defense in Washington.

An armed Kurdish militiamen working with the soldiers was dispatched to order this correspondent to leave - even though the activity was on a public street.

Alfred Rubin, a professor of international law at Tuft's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, says the US actions may violate The Hague Convention, which compels combatants to take "...all necessary steps to spare as far as possible buildings dedicated to religion, art, science, charitable purposes, hospitals, and places where the sick and wounded are collected."

This operation comes as coalition leaders accuse President Saddam Hussein of violating the rules of war by hiding military personnel and weapons in civilian facilities. US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has accused Mr. Hussein of using "schools, hospitals, orphanages, and cultural treasures to shield military forces thereby exposing helpless men, women and children to danger."

The Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Richard Myers has said, "It is a violation of the law of armed conflict to use noncombatants as a means of shielding potential military targets - even those people who may volunteer for this purpose.

"Therefore if death or serious injury to a noncombatant resulted from these efforts, the individuals responsible for deploying any innocent civilians as human shields could be guilty of grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions."

The US troops moved into the residential neighborhood four days ago, according to a local resident, and appear to be planning to stay.

if I must send up little ribbons of smoke at first and then a thick choking cloud that smells of fuel, combust in fine spontaneous style, coming out in fiery limbs and hair all over at the same time, go down in a screaming crackling heap of blackened alligator skin -- I do not want it set by a stupid bully with piggy close-set eyes and a smirky way of speaking.

Okay.

Because ohhh, how I hate the stupid bully. I hate his smugness. I hate his hair. I hate the way he says "evil" like he's got a bone in his throat. I hate his tax cuts, I hate his stance on my uterus, I hate the whole goddamn war and every goddamn thing that led up to it that makes me ashamed of my citizenship and afraid of the retaliation that will undoubtedly come, and I hate that I can't do a thing about any of it, really, except sit around hating, and then I hate that, too. Hate hate hate hate hate hatey hate.

Maybe you can see why I'd rather just go out for a few bottles of beer. Yes, it's easier, but I don't do it because of that, or because I feel any melodramatic obligation to burst into flames from love instead. I do it for selfish reasons. I do it because I can't face believing the worst -- about human nature, about the government, about any of it. I fear that, if I do face it and if I do believe the worst about human beings, that I won't see any point even in going out for a few bottles of beer after that, that the "why bother" will burn me to ash from the inside out, but invisibly, like radiation. I don't want to lose faith in people -- a strange thing for a woman so regularly annoyed by people to say, I suppose, but people bug me precisely because I expect better from them most of the time, and I don't want to think that better instincts can't prevail, or generally don't prevail even if they can, or whatever. I can't live like that.

A U.S. project that was supposed to train 3,000 Iraqi dissidents to be liaisons between American troops and Iraqi civilians has been shut down indefinitely.

After months of preparation and publicity, the $90 million program at an air base in southwest Hungary managed to draw just 82 recruits.

When it announced the program in December, the Pentagon envisioned something much larger and bolder. Not only would recruits be trained as translators and liaisons between U.S. troops and Iraqis, but they also would be groomed in civil and military administration to help smooth the transition in a postwar Iraq.

Congress earmarked $90 million for the effort, and as many as 1,500 American trainers were selected to conduct classes in topics ranging from self-defense and handgun skills to working with humanitarian organizations.

Human Uzi Ann Coulter, who left Washington for New York because of the disappointing dating scene, has left New York for Miami.

"YES -- I HAVE MOVED TO THE CITY OF INTERNATIONAL INTRIGUE!!!!" the tall blond bestselling author e-mailed us yesterday. "Many reasons. Among them: The tax rate is a lot better for my business. The weather is better for my business. The real estate prices are better for my business. Moreover, that Democrat Michael Bloomberg is a latter-day John Lindsay -- he's wrecking New York City and I didn't want to pay for his fascist smoking police." Never mind that Bloomberg ran for mayor as a Republican.

"Soon he'll be mandating that New Yorkers have a glass of milk and engage in calisthenics every day. He seems to imagine that New Yorkers were drawn to that city for the clean living. It's literally mind-boggling that the mayor's response to a disastrous NYC economy is to crush the restaurant and bar business. I'm not sure even Lindsay could have come up with something so breathtakingly stupid. Reduced bar business means reduced tax revenues means Ann-Pays-More. So I'm gone.

"Also, I'm sick of working all the time and I need to sit on the beach and drink pina coladas with little umbrellas for a while to recuperate. Perhaps I will have a cigar with my pina colada -- which is still legal in Florida. And of course, Matt Drudge is in Miami -- as well as lots of swarthy, patriotic Cubans: the nation's best Americans. Having felt the lash of Democratic 'patriotism' at the Bay of Pigs, I believe they will like my next book."

Coulter's next right-wing polemic is titled "Treason."

We are absolutely right to stand with Israel, and our opponents are absolutely wrong.

The moral ambiguities of our diplomatic elites notwithstanding, Israel is not the problem; Israel is the solution!

This struggle is one of good versus evil; nations and organizations who fail to distinguish between the two disqualify themselves from input on this matter.

This Report is designed to document the human rights conditions in countries around the globe; however, it compares the human rights record of a free, tolerant, and pluralistic nation with that of a terrorist network. There is no comparison, and to assert one is ridiculous.

Israel is governed by democratically-elected representatives; the Palestinian Authority is governed by a gang of murderers.

Since [September 11th], Congress and the Bush administration have toughened immigration policies by targeting newcomers for special law-enforcement scrutiny and jailing refugees seeking asylum, among other measures. Tuesday, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said the administration may consider rules that would allow the government to revoke the U.S. citizenship of those holding dual citizenship....

The military, however, has embraced immigrants willing to serve. President Bush in July signed an executive order allowing all active-duty immigrants serving as of Sept. 11, 2001, to apply for U.S. citizenship without waiting the three years normally required for enlisted personnel....

Many immigrant-soldiers see their service as a chance to combat some of the hostility Americans may feel toward foreigners. "They're showing their support for this country, and that the American people can trust them," [one sargeant] says. "A lot of people are into the thinking that immigrants only come here to take their jobs and do nothing else, but a lot of them give a lot to this country. I would love to do combat in Iraq if I get my chance."

"The United Nations is in dire need of repair. Not destruction -- the concept of a forum where nations can address common problems, such as hunger and human rights, can prove useful -- but massive, wall-to-wall fixes.

Among those repairs should be a retreat by the United Nations from extensive involvement in matters of war and peace. In this arena, the United Nations usually only makes things worse. Even if it didn't, we shouldn't require U.N. approval to defend our citizens and interests. Otherwise, we're essentially letting the parochial concerns of other nations dictate U.S. policy."

"dominated by organizations promoting Communism, anarchy, large-scale urban rioting, financial disruption, and violent attacks on governmental, corporate, military and media centers in America."

The Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2002 are grounded in the conviction that we must recognize the problem and describe it with full objectivity if we are to proceed to solving it. We gain little by ignoring human rights abuses or flinching from reporting them.

In a world marching toward democracy and respect for human rights, the United States is a leader, a partner and a contributor. We have taken this responsibility with a deep and abiding belief that human rights are universal. They are not grounded exclusively in American or Western values. But their protection worldwide serves a core U.S. national interest.

I myself feel that our country, for whose Constitution I fought in a just war, might as well have been invaded by Martians and body snatchers. Sometimes I wish it had been. What has happened, though, is that it has been taken over by means of the sleaziest, low-comedy, Keystone Cops-style coup d'etat imaginable. And those now in charge of the federal government are upper-crust C-students who know no history or geography, plus not-so-closeted white supremacists, aka "Christians," and plus, most frighteningly, psychopathic personalities, or "PPs."

To say somebody is a PP is to make a perfectly respectable medical diagnosis, like saying he or she has appendicitis or athlete's foot. The classic medical text on PPs is The Mask of Sanity by Dr. Hervey Cleckley. Read it! PPs are presentable, they know full well the suffering their actions may cause others, but they do not care. They cannot care because they are nuts. They have a screw loose!

And what syndrome better describes so many executives at Enron and WorldCom and on and on, who have enriched themselves while ruining their employees and investors and country, and who still feel as pure as the driven snow, no matter what anybody may say to or about them? And so many of these heartless PPs now hold big jobs in our federal government, as though they were leaders instead of sick.

What has allowed so many PPs to rise so high in corporations, and now in government, is that they are so decisive. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reason that they cannot care what happens next. Simply can't. Do this! Do that! Mobilize the reserves! Privatize the public schools! Attack Iraq! Cut health care! Tap everybody's telephone! Cut taxes on the rich! Build a trillion-dollar missile shield! Fuck habeas corpus and the Sierra Club and In These Times, and kiss my ass!

"No matter where we go or what we do, though, we offer more than help. We offer hope. To suffering people in a broken world, we share the news of the only One who can bring true peace -- Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace.

"Tucked into a House budget bill that would deliver $726 billion in tax cuts to Americans are measures that also would trim veterans' health care and benefits by nearly $25 billion over 10 years.

Late last week, the House of Representatives voted 215-212 on a budget that would take $844 million next year and $9.7 billion over 10 years from veterans' medical care. It also would chop $15 billion from veterans' disability and other programs, including $204 million from Impact Aid, which supports education for service members' children."

"Harry Weiss doesn't look like a porn producer. Tall, balding, wearing a dress shirt and tie at the VCA booth at CES in Las Vegas, he looks more like a gladhanding insurance salesman than the sales manager of VCA's new Xplicit line. This is okay with him.

"Let Rob Black look like a pornographer. Me, I look like a regular guy," he says, smiling.

His eyes narrow. "But I'm the guy who's got your little sister in my attic, with her ankles pinned around her ears. And she's lovin' it."

An NRCC spokesman was very tight-lipped about the matter in general, but left open the possibility that Weiss would indeed be invited to Washington for a fundraiser.

"It's a big tent," spokesman Carl Forti said of the Republican Party.

The bill's advocates use the "investor class" appeal to cast the measure in a more historical context. "At the end of the day, this will be remembered in the same way as the Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts of 1964 and 1965," Norquist insists. "Those in favor say, 'I want to help you, investor.' And those opposed say, 'I don't like you, investor.'"

"Already there is a behind-the-scenes effort by former senior Republican government officials and party leaders to convince President Bush that the advice he has received from Vice President Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz -- a powerful triumvirate frequently at odds with Secretary of State Colin L. Powell -- has been wrong and even dangerous to long-term U.S. national interests.

"This lazy form of moral equivalence is not rare among the radical left in this country. But it is based on a profound moral abdication: the refusal to see that a Stalinist dictatorship that murders its own civilians, that sends its troops into battle with a gun pointed at their heads, that executes POWs, that stores and harbors chemical weapons, that defies 12 years of U.N. disarmament demands, that has twice declared war against its neighbors, and that provides a safe haven for terrorists of all stripes, is not the moral equivalent of the United States under President George W. Bush. There is, in fact, no comparison whatever. That is not jingoism or blind patriotism or propaganda. It is the simple undeniable truth."

Such intellectual laziness is not rare among the radical right in this country. But it is based on a profound moral dogmatism: the refusal to see that an un-elected president that allows the government to spy on and imprison its own citizens, that executes POWs, that stores, harbors and sells chemical and biological weapons, that has violated international law, and shunned and killed numerous treaties, that has just launched a pre-emptive war against another country, and that provides a safe haven for terrorists is not morally pure. Anyone who puts forth such simplistic arguments has not only lost their mind, they have lost their right to participate in public debate.