A mosque in the eastern Dutch city Enschede was daubed with swastikas and set on fire on Thursday morning.

[snip]

Jewish synagogues are more frequently the targets of similar attacks in the Netherlands.

REPORTER: "Senator Kerry is calling it a tragic milestone, reaching 1,000 deaths in Iraq."

McCLELLAN: "Well, we remember, honor and mourn the loss of all those who have made the ultimate sacrifice defending freedom ..."

REPORTER: "And you're convinced each one of those lives is worth it, Scott?"

McCLELLAN: "Each one -- well, let me say, when I say we remember, honor, mourn the loss of those who have made the ultimate sacrifice, we do so for those in Iraq and Afghanistan. We also remember those who lost their lives on September 11th ..."

REPORTER: "But the question is, for -- each of those families lost someone, a loved one, and each one of those is worth it -- that's the question."

McCLELLAN: Mark, I think -- I think of the cost we paid on September 11th, and September 11th changed the equation, as you've heard the President say...."

REPORTER: "How will the President acknowledge the milestone of 1,000 deaths?"

McCLELLAN: "My understanding is that -- I think it's over 1,200 when you take in Iraq and Afghanistan ... but obviously, you hear the President talk about the importance of what we're working to accomplish ..."

Whatever the intentions, the effects of the political institutions - legitimate and illegitimate - were to prolong the Iran-Contra investigations, to increase its cost, and to frustrate the prosecution of those who had helped conceal President Reagan's willful disregard of constitutional restraints on his power.

But if Congress made my work more difficult, the root of the problem was the executive branch's strategy. Ronald Reagan's advisors succeeded in creating a firewall around him. He escaped meaningful interrogation until it was no longer of use, and he escaped prosecution altogether, while subordinates suffered. The delay in producing government records and the concealment of personal notes were crucial to the strategy. George Bush's misuse of the pardon power made the cover-up complete.

What set Iran-Contra apart from previous political scandals was the fact that a cover-up engineered in the White House of one president and completed by his successor prevented the rule of law from being applied to the perpetrators of criminal activity of constitutional dimension.

MR. McCLELLAN: If the President had not fulfilled his commitment he would not have been honorably discharged. He was honorably discharged in October of '73.

MR. McCLELLAN: No. As I said -- absolutely not. If he had not fulfilled his commitments, he would not have been honorably discharged.

MR. McCLELLAN: The President met his commitments in Texas. He met his commitments in Alabama. He met his commitments when he returned to Texas in 1973.

MR. McCLELLAN: As I said, Caren, if he had not fulfilled his commitments, he would not have been honorably discharged.

We concluded that genocide has been committed in Darfur and that the government of Sudan and the Janjaweed bear responsibility and that genocide may still be occurring ... The evidence leads the United States to the conclusion that genocide has occurred and may still be occurring in Darfur.

Secretary of State Colin Powell is expected to declare that abuses in the Darfur region of Sudan qualify as genocide, a Bush administration official said Thursday. Such a determination would add pressure on the Sudanese government to rein in the militias there.

The Justice Ministry suspects terrorists have drawn up plans for an attack on the Dutch Parliament, Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam, the Borssele nuclear reactor, the Defence Ministry and the Leidschendam office of the AIVD secret service, it was revealed on Wednesday.

The revelations were made by newspaper NRC Handelsblad, which based its report on the case dossier lodged against suspected terrorist 18-year-old Samir A., who was arrested at the end of June by Rotterdam police.

[snip]

Police claim they uncovered indications during a raid on his home that the suspect was planning a terrorist attack. The prosecution says officers seized floor plans of possible targets.

Besides the building layouts, police also said they seized a silencer, two cartridge clips, night glasses and a bullet-proof vest. Bomb-making chemicals such as ammonia and hydrochloric acid were also found.

A. is currently believed to be the only suspect in the case, but a confidential AIVD report claimed in October last year that he was a member of a "network" of "young, radical Muslims".

[snip]

The suspect is a Dutch citizen of Moroccan origin.

The suspect was also arrested on 17 October 2003 based on bugged telephone conversations. The AIVD alleged at the time he was involved in preparing an attack with four other extremists.

During a search of a house on that occasion police seized hydrochloric acid and artificial fertiliser, raising suspicions that the suspects intended to construct a bomb. They were eventually released due to a lack of evidence.

The suspect first hit headlines back in January 2003 when he reportedly tried to travel to Chechnya to join Muslim separatists there.

The suspect and his companion became stranded in the Russian cold and Russian authorities sent them back to the Netherlands.

Pollster John Zogby calls into question the party breakdown of the Newsweek's poll, stating that it favors GOPers. The Newsweek sample of regis. voters consists of 38% GOP, 31% Dem and 31% indie voters. Zogby, who uses 35% GOP, 39% Dem, and 26% indie in his polls, writes that the Newsweek base is not representative of the electorate. This differential accounts for why Newsweek puts it at an 11-point race, where as Zogby puts it at a 2-point race. "There is no evidence anywhere to suggest that Democrats will only represent 31% of the total vote" (Zogby stated) ....

Emory professor Alan Abramowitz argues that it is not only Newsweek that is too GOP friendly, but Time as well. Also, Abramowitz notes, Gallup is projecting that 89% of Bush supporters and 79% of Kerry supporters will vote. This is "way out of line" with American National Election Studies trends which show an average of only 3% difference between the turnout of each party.

Gallup's sample also includes more GOPers than Dems, which is opposed to the '00 exit polls. If Gallup's trial heat is applied to to the '00 electorate, Kerry comes out with a 4 pint lead: 50%-46% ...

State Department lawyers reviewing the report, based on 1,136 interviews collected in 19 refugee camps in neighboring Chad last month, said the evidence of rape, killing of male babies, use of racial epithets, burning of villages and displacement could easily meet the legal definition of genocide. Powell visited Darfur in June and requested the investigation.

A draft of the report, which was obtained by The Post and which will be issued in its final form Thursday, says the Sudanese government in coordination with the Arab militia known as the Janjaweed sought victims who were non-Arabs. Assailants often shouted racial and ethnic epithets such as "Kill the slaves" and "We have orders to kill all blacks."

Use of the word genocide is "a political question now," a high-ranking State Department source said. "Not a legal one."

[A]nalysts have said the United States is reluctant to antagonize Sudan because the Bush administration does not want to jeopardize a U.S.-backed peace deal to end a separate civil war with rebels in southern Sudan. In addition, Sudan, which once harbored Osama bin Laden, now plays a role in the war on terrorism.

High-ranking Sudanese officials, including the head of National Intelligence Security Services and the former external affairs intelligence chief, are among the key figures ordering and coordinating the violence in Darfur, State Department sources said.

"Senior Bush administration officials appear reluctant to publicly identify senior officials involved in the atrocities in Darfur, including First Vice President Osman Taha and NISS chief Salah Abdala Gosh, because these officials are also in charge of the counterterrorism efforts and have been cooperating with U.S. officials," said Ted Dagne of the U.S. Congressional Research Service. "Targeting these officials could end cooperation on counterterrorism."

[O]ne truth that now stands beyond dispute. Khartoum will not cease to commit genocide until the international community stops it. This requires urgent humanitarian intervention, with robust military support. Even the contemplated African Union force of 2,000 to 3,000 peacekeepers is woefully inadequate to the task. (Khartoum adamantly refuses to accept any force with a peacekeeping mandate.) A peacekeeping/peace-making force will require more than ten times this number if it is to halt genocide in Darfur.

The question is, as it has been for so many months now, whether the world is serious about stopping genocide in Darfur. There is no present evidence to suggest that this is the case. If Colin Powell refuses, out of political expediency, to determine that deliberate, racially/ethnically-animated human destruction is genocide, then we will have what should prove the defining evidence of our refusal, yet again, to stop genocide in Africa.

(8:48 am CDT September 8, 2004)

CHICAGO -- Illinois Republican U.S. Senate candidate Alan Keyes injected religion into his race against Democratic candidate Barack Obama on Tuesday. According to a list of quotes put out by the Democratic candidate, Keyes said in a radio interview at the Republican National Convention that Jesus would not vote for Obama.

The quote was part of a list Obama sent reporters of Keyes' accusations and epithets about him since Keyes became a candidate, NBC-5 political editor Dick Kay said. Kay also reported that Keyes called Obama a "socialist and a liar" on a cable access news show on Monday.

... Keyes, who has focused his campaign on abortion, said that his statement about whom Jesus would vote for was based on Obama's pro-choice votes in the Illinois Senate.

"Christ would not stand idly by while an infant child in that situation died," Keyes said. "And I'm not the only person, obviously, who thinks if you are a representative of me, I cannot vote for you if you would ignore the dignity and claims of that child's life. So, yes, I did respond quite logically -- you'll see it's quite logical, right -- with the conclusion that Christ would not vote for Barack Obama, because Barack Obama has voted to behave in a way that it is inconceivable for Christ to have behaved."

"It's absolutely essential that eight weeks from today, on November 2nd, we make the right choice, because if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we'll get hit again, that we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States ..."

"This is an issue, which candidate is going to lead, be more likely to defend America to prevent the next attack. I think it's unquestionable that Republicans are more likely to prevent the next attack....However, I will grant that John Kerry will improve the economy in the emergency services and body bag industry."

"In this election, [the Democrats] will speak endlessly of risk; we will speak of progress. They will make accusations; we will make proposals. They will feed fear, and we will appeal to hope."

"It's absolutely essential that eight weeks from today, on November 2nd, we make the right choice, because if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we'll get hit again, that we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States ..."

(prerequisite band music playing American-style theme)

(fade from black, soft focus on Donald Trump)

Trump (pointing into the camera): Mr. President, you're fired! John Kerry, you're hired!

Trump calls the war in Iraq "a total catastrophe" and praises John Kerry: "He's a great guy. He's a very smart guy, and I think he's highly underestimated, and I think he's going to run an amazingly successful campaign. Look at what he did in the primaries. It appeared as if he was off the radar, and all of a sudden he made this great comeback. I have a feeling he's going to do very well."

We look forward to these debates. We look forward to having a debate about debates.

These are sample questions for Senator Kerry:

1) How soon would you begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq and what conditions would you set for beginning such a pullout?

2) What specific policies do you propose to stimulate job growth and how much would these policies cost the U.S. taxpayer?

3) How will your diplomatic approach to North Korea differ from the administration's? What if this totalitarian nation continues to sell conventional weapons or other destructive materials to third-world dictators?

4) Given the fact that the baby-boom generation will begin drawing benefits from Social Security, what steps do you propose to ensure the financial solvency of the program? Would you support another increase in the Social Security retirement age?

5) As tensions rise between Taiwan and China, are you prepared to go to war, if necessary, to defend Taiwan from a possible Chinese attack?

These are sample questions for President Bush:

1) What kind of chairs or stools do you find most comfortable for debates?

2) After tonight's debate (first scheduled debate in Miami), are you planning to go to Norman's restaurant to try their one-of-a-kind grilled grouper on mango-Habanero chutney?

3) Should this year's presidential debate include a brief intermission so that country singer Lee Greenwood can perform his hit song "God Bless the USA"?

4) Do you prefer to use a metal or wooden lectern at debates? If the answer is "wooden," please specify your preference -- cherry, oak or maple?

5) Do you plan to glance at your wristwatch a few times during the presidential debate, just as your father did at one of the 1992 debates?

President Bush may skip one of the three debates that have been proposed by the Commission on Presidential Debates and accepted by Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), Republican officials said yesterday.

The officials said Bush's negotiating team plans to resist the middle debate, which was to be Oct. 8 in a town meeting format in the crucial state of Missouri.

[edit]

Officials familiar with the issue said he plans to accept the commission's first debate, which is to focus on domestic policy, and the third one, which is to focus on foreign policy.

The audience for the second debate, to be at Washington University in St. Louis, was to be picked by the Gallup Organization. The commission said participants should be undecided voters from the St. Louis area.

In the first and third presidential debates and the vice presidential debate the candidates shall be seated with the moderator at a table.

The first presidential debate shall focus primarily on domestic policy and the third presidential debate shall focus primarily on foreign policy. The second presidential debate shall be held as a town meeting in which citizens will pose questions to the candidates. The vice presidential debate shall cover both foreign and domestic policy topics.

In the second presidential debate, the town meeting participants will pose their questions to the candidates. The town meeting participants will review their questions with the moderator before the debate for the sole purpose of avoiding duplicate questions. The participants in the town meeting, to be chosen by the Gallup Organization, will be undecided voters from the St. Louis, Missouri, standard metropolitan statistical area.

A presidential adviser said campaign officials were concerned that people could pose as undecided when they actually are partisans.

"It's not a fear of the format," said the adviser, who refused to be identified to avoid annoying Bush. "They want two debates that are focused on clear differences on foreign and domestic policy. We benefit from the differences."

Pastor Joseph Fuiten, president of Washington Evangelicals for Responsible Government and an opponent of same-sex marriage, called the judge's decision "an astounding widening of rights for homosexuals."

Many members of his church, Cedar Park Assembly of God in Bothell, identify themselves as former gays, he said. "I have no black members who used to be white."

"It's a huge leap," he said of the protected-class finding. "Everything flows from that. It entitles [gays] to full protection."

THE PRESIDENT: And then they say, well, how are you going to pay for it? [Kerry] said, oh, just don't worry about it. We'll just tax the rich.

First of all, you can't raise the money, enough money to pay for his promises, by taxing the rich. Secondly, when you tax the rich, you're taxing nearly a million small business owners, because they pay tax at the individual income tax level. Thirdly, you've heard that rhetoric before, haven't you?

AUDIENCE: Yes!

THE PRESIDENT: Yes. Oh, don't worry, we'll tax the rich. Well, that's why the rich hire accountants and lawyers. They dodge, you pay, but we're not going to let him tax you, because we're going to win this election in November. (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, John Kerry will try to tax the rich, but they'll all just hire accountants and hide their money so he can't get it.

I, on the other hand, am very realistic about how the rich evade federal law for their own enrichment. I realize that they, unlike you good folks, have discovered borderline illegal ways to avoid paying hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes. It's just not fair, but rather than clamping down on them and closing loopholes and actually enforcing tax laws, well, I'm just gonna give 'em tax breaks.

The way I see it, we weren't going to get that money anyway - and at least this way all my friends won't be criminals.

Besides, I'm pretty sure that once we lower taxes, all the tax cheats will probably stop cheating. It's just like when you lower the price of cars, people stop stealing cars. It's the same basic principle. Vote for me in November.

A State Department report detailing atrocities in the Darfur region of western Sudan concludes that the Sudanese government has promoted systematic killings based on race and ethnic origin, but officials said Tuesday that there was strong debate over whether Secretary of State Colin L. Powell should classify the violence as genocide.

The issues are hard to understand. U.S. and European security is not at stake.

This was more or less George W. Bush's attitude when he was running for president in 2000 and said the Clinton administration had been right not to intervene to stop the 1994 Rwanda genocide, in which some 800,000 people died. "That's an important continent," he said of Africa, "but there's got to be priorities. . . . We can't be all things to all people in the world."

[edit]

But if there is such an anniversary -- if the genocide proceeds deliberately before us, even as we have all been warned and warned again -- what will it say about the Bush presidency? Well, he was very busy in the summer and fall of 2004, and Darfur is far away.

The Pentagon and Bush's campaign have claimed for months that all records detailing his fighter pilot career have been made public, but defense officials said they found two dozen new records detailing his training and flight logs after The Associated Press filed a lawsuit and submitted new requests under the public records law.

[snip]

The records show his last flight was in April 1972, which is consistent with pay records indicating Bush had a large lapse of duty between April and October of that year. Bush has said he went to Alabama in 1972 to work on an unsuccessful Republican Senate campaign. Bush skipped a required medical exam that cost him his pilot's status in August of that year.

Bush's 2000 campaign suggested the future president skipped his medical exam in part because the F-102A was nearly obsolete. Records show Bush's Texas unit flew the F-102A until 1974 and used the jets as part of an air defense drill during 1972.

A six-month historical record of his 147th Fighter Interceptor Group, also turned over to the AP on Tuesday, shows some of the training Bush missed with his colleagues during that time.

Significantly, it showed the unit joined a "24-hour active alert mission to safeguard against surprise attack" in the southern United State beginning on Oct. 6, 1972, a time when Bush did not report for duty, according to his pay records.

[snip]

As part of the mission, the 147th kept two F-102A jets - the same Bush flew before he was grounded - on ready alert to be launched within five minutes' warning.

Democratic National Committee communications director Jano Cabrera [said:] "For months George Bush told the nation that all his military records were public," he said. "Now we know why Bush was trying so hard to withhold these records. When his nation asked him to be on call against possible surprise attacks, Bush wasn't there."

I'VE GOTTEN A LOT OF THESE, TOO [KJL]
An e-mail: "Notice in the pictures of Kerry shooting trap at Edinburg, Ohio that he has no eye or ear protection. No real trap shooter would do that. It is against ATA (Amateur Trapshooting Association) rules and the rules of every gun club I know. Thanks to the gun club where these pictures were taken for exposing Kerry as a phony by letting him shoot without protection."

In an expansive conversation, Mr. Clinton, who is awaiting heart surgery, told Mr. Kerry that he should move away from talking about Vietnam, which had been the central theme of his candidacy, and focus instead on drawing contrasts with President Bush on job creation and health care policies, officials with knowledge of the conversation said.

"It's Time to Report for Duty"

In early 2003 President Bush claimed that Iraq was attempting to purchase the materials necessary to build nuclear weapons. Although White House officials subsequently admitted they lacked adequate evidence to believe that was true, various members of the administration dismissed the issue, noting that the important thing was that the subsequent invasion of Iraq achieved stability of the region and the liberation of the country.

Many Americans apparently agreed. After all, there were other reasons to depose the Hussein regime. And the belief that Iraq was an imminent nuclear threat had rallied us together and provided an easy justification to doubters of the nobility of our cause. So what if it wasn't really true? To many, it seemed naïve to worry about something as abstract as the truth or falsity of our claims when we could concern ourselves with the things that really mattered -- such as protecting ourselves from terrorism and ensuring our access to oil. To paraphrase Nietzsche, the truth may be good, but why not sometimes take untruth if it gets you where you want to go?

[edit]

An unswerving allegiance to what you believe isn't a sign that you care about truth. It is a sign of dogmatism. Caring about truth does not mean never having to admit you are wrong. On the contrary, caring about truth means that you have to be open to the possibility that your own beliefs are mistaken. It is a consequence of the very idea of objective truth. True beliefs are those that portray the world as it is and not as we hope, fear, or wish it to be. If truth is objective, believing doesn't make it so; and even our most deeply felt opinions could turn out to be wrong. That is something [the current administration] would do well to remember. It is not a virtue to hold fast to one's views in face of the facts.

[edit]

It is vital that a government tell its citizens the truth -- whether it be about Iraq's capacities for producing weapons of mass destruction or high-ranking officials' ties to corporate interests. That is because governmental transparency and freedom of information are the first defenses against tyranny. The less a government feels the need to be truthful, the more prone it is to try and get away with doing what wouldn't be approved by its citizens in the light of day, whether that means breaking into the Watergate Hotel, bombing Cambodia, or authorizing the use of torture on prisoners. Even when they don't affect us directly, secret actions like those indirectly damage the integrity of our democracy. What you don't know can hurt you.

Thanks for coming. Thanks for having me. It's a beautiful part of the world. People are good people here.

Too many OB/GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country.

House Republicans plan to use this month’s legislative agenda to focus pre-election attention on national security and prevent the Democrats from changing the subject to domestic issues that could help Sen. John Kerry’s White House bid.

Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-World's Biggest Asshole) and his forces want to pass a resolution as early as this week that would highlight the successes of the war on terrorism, echoing the themes of the GOP convention last week and seeking to build upon the political momentum Republicans grabbed in New York.

The resolution will address the nation’s success in routing the Taliban in Afghanistan and its accomplishments in capturing and killing al Qaeda operatives, thwarting terrorist plans, toppling Saddam Hussein and introducing democracy to Iraq.

As an evangelical Christian, I find myself on what Robert Reich calls the “anti-modernist” side of contemporary conflicts. I suspect most of the moderate to liberal evangelicals recently profiled in your magazine ... would find themselves on the anti-modernist side as well. This surprises and troubles me, as I consider myself not only a modernist but also a strong Democrat, a defender of the separation of church and state, and a long admirer of Reich’s writings.

As a Christian, I accept the Bible as the authoritative word of God and believe that there is such a thing as absolute truth. At the same time, I recognize that these views are not held universally. Many people reject religion altogether, while those who believe in God disagree among themselves as to which religion is the true faith. I join with the secular liberals in believing such differences must be settled, if at all, through discussion and persuasion rather than through coercion.

The real conflict is not between secular modernists and religious anti-modernists. Those who would impose onto others their vision of truth -- whether secular or religious -- pose the real threat.

Michael Hayes
Professor of Political Science,
Colgate University, Hamilton, NY

* Will abortion be legal? In most or in all circumstances?

* Should same-sex marriage be legally recognized? Should this issue be determined by federal or state law? If not gay marriage, what about civil unions?

* Should federal funds for drug rehabilitation, homeless shelters and other social programs be disbursed to religious groups that will actively proselytize to recipients of these tax-funded programs?

While the world focuses on the crisis in Darfur, three times as many people have been suffering for many more years in two other conflicts involving the Sudanese government.

And, while money has flowed in to help the 2 million people in Sudan's Darfur region who have been caught in 18 months of civil war, few funds are available for the 6 million Sudanese and Ugandans affected by related conflicts that have lasted more than 18 years.

[edit]

[A UN official] recently returned from a trip to northern Uganda, where more than 1.6 million people have fled their homes because of an 18-year-old civil war between government forces and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army.

The rebels, operating from bases in the southern region of neighboring Sudan, rarely try to hold territory in Uganda and concentrate their attacks on civilians. The group has abducted more than 30,000 women and children to use as servants, concubines and child soldiers, according to UNICEF.

As a result, more than 90 percent of the population in northern Uganda has taken shelter in 180 refugee camps.

[edit]

In the 1980s and 1990s, the Ugandan government supported the southern-based Sudan People's Liberation Army in its battle with the Sudanese government in Khartoum. Sudan's government, in return, backed the Lord's Resistance Army, a cult-like group that has little contact with the outside world.

Two young boy's get treated for severe burn wounds in the Lira hospital in northern Uganda, Monday, Feb 23, 2004, after a massacre believed to be committed by the Lord's Resistance Army rebel group in the Barlonyo camp 26 kilometers north of the town that killed at least 200 people. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo)


A Ugandan soldier walk past a charred body, Monday, Feb 23, 2004,in the Barlonyo camp 26 kilometers north of the Lira in northen Uganda after a massacre believed to be committed by the Lord's Resistance Army rebel group in which at least 200 people were killed. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo)