From A Defence of Poetry by Percy Bysshe Shelley:

...the hierophants of an unapprehended inspiration, the mirrors of the gigantic shadows which futurity casts upon the present, the words which express what they understand not, the trumpets which sing to battle and feel not what they inspire: the influence which is moved not, but moves. Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the World.

Here’s an example of the sort of thing that makes you wonder: yesterday ABC News reported on its Web site that the Clinton campaign is holding a "Rural Americans for Hillary" lunch and campaign briefing — at the offices of the Troutman Sanders Public Affairs Group, which lobbies for the agribusiness and biotech giant Monsanto. You don’t have to be a Naderite to feel uncomfortable about the implied closeness.

I’d put it this way: many progressives, myself included, hope that the next president will be another F.D.R.  But we worry that he or she will turn out to be another Grover Cleveland instead — better-intentioned and much more competent than the current occupant of the White House, but too dependent on lobbyists’ money to seriously confront the excesses of our new Gilded Age. (emphasis added)

So writes the New York Times' Paul Krugman  in today's op-ed titled Death of the Machine.

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Writing on the op-ed pages of today's New York Times ("How Congress Forgot Its Own Strength" Week in Review - Sunday Oct. 7, 2007) Mario Cuomo, former NY Governor and one of the most eloquent speakers the party has ever produced, calls out the Democrats in Congress and specifically challenges the presidential candidates on their refusal to lead from strength regarding their constitutionally mandated authority to declare, or NOT to declare, war.

Senators Jim Webb of Virginia and Hillary Clinton of New York are right to demand that the president go before Congress to ask for a "declaration of war" before proceeding with an attack against Iran or any other nation.  But there is no need for this demand to be put into law, as the two Democrats and their colleagus are seeking to do, any more than there is need for legislation to guarantee our right of free speech or anything else protected by the Constitution.

       By unanimous vote, Ben Bernanke's Federal Reserve took a page out of Alan Greenspan's playbook and cut interest rates by half a percentage point (or 50 basis points in bizspeak), rallying the equity markets, giving cause for much backslapping on Wall Street, and kicking the economic can down the road.  Bonds rallied too, oil neared $82/barrel, with gold at 715+/ounce... and "li-i-ke a rock!" the US dollar dropped dramatically in value across the board, nearing 1.40 against the EURO.  

       This Fed decision was perhaps the most anticipated in many years and it did not disappoint in surpring most people watching.  One thing is clear, the dollar has been sacrificed to the market, and inflation has been declared less important than liquidity.

Bloomberg.com is reporting that, for a second day, customers at Northern Rock lined up at branches throughout the UK to withdraw their savings.  The Financial Times  reports on estimates of up to 2 billion pounds having been withdrawn in the first day's panic and one can only imagine what further withdrawals were made on day two.

Northern Rock Plc branches around the U.K. had lines of customers stretching outside their doors seeking to withdraw deposits for a second day after the Bank of England authorized emergency funding to the mortgage lender.

C. Vivian Stringer, the Rutgers coach of the women's basketball team is speaking now on CNN, delivering a most eloquent statement in response to the racist and sexist remarks made at the expense of these talented and still hopeful young women.  There's a video link here: Rutgers reacts to Imus

Ms. Stringer is offering a clear, calm and withering review of our society as relates to race and gender. Needless to say, her words speak to the bigger issue of a cultural and societal failure that threatens to destroy the very fabric of democracy.  It's time for this to be dealt with, politically and personally.  One need only to remember the ghastly scenes from Katrina to be reminded of how devastating a problem it is that we face.  

In the past, when the USA spoke, the world listened.  Our hard power/soft power approach to foreign policy and world economics proved to be, more often than not, a winning combination.  Well, those were the days my friends.  The world has stopped listening. Our influence has waned and the last fifty years, in particular, resemble the historically familiar path of empire, from dominance to decline.  A half century later, the opportunity to heed President Eisenhower's warning has passed and in that time other global players have emerged, many with our help and the world's hope.

 

   

       Attorneys from both sides are nonplussed at the surprise declaration of a mistrial in the court-martial of Lieut. Ehren Watada. Prosecutors scrambled to explain it as resulting from procedural dilemmas while the defense, describing the case as a "hopeless mess" is already on record as saying a second trial would be met with a motion for dismissal based on double jeopardy.

       Hear their responses, along with others, in this video report from Mike Barber at truthout.org.:

Eric Seitz (defense atty): "The judge [Lieut. Col. John Head] acted on his own and for his own reasons and I frankly don't understand, anymore than the government counsel does, what his thinking was or what his legal basis was because I don't believe there was any."

       Nevertheless, Seitz considers the end result to be a great victory for his client. And the ramifications could be much larger than Lieut. Watada's indvidual innocence, as was his intention all along.  

      The senior Senator from New York State, Chuck Schumer, got together with Charlie Rose last night for a free ranging political discussion and a plug for his "first" book, Positively American.  I’ve not read the book. I can not comment on it.  And after hearing Senator Schumer speak of Joe and Eileen and his 50% solution,  I felt no urge to rush out and buy it.  I did manage, however, to find my jaw after it dropped to the floor and rolled under the sofa. And what made my head explode? Read on, especially if you know the law.  I thought I did.

I'm watching Amy Goodman on Hardball as I type and if you can get a transcript you will be ecstatic. She leaves both Chris Matthews and her "opposite" Michael Smerconish drooling in the dust of her fierce and passionate argument.  Here's a cheap link to MSNBC [http://www.msnbc.com] though I doubt a transcript is available yet.  But it makes me feel better about this very cheap diary.

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt."

     Or was it the oft quoted Anonymous who said that?  Apparently the jury is still out, but whoever uttered the famous words was clearly ahead of the science.

     Okay I lied.  I know nothing of genes and genetic locuses.  You'll find no links here directing you to genetic or genomic research, and to my knowledge, no one in that field is actually taking my untested thesis to the lab.  But if they did...

     Dr. Richard Bulliet, of Columbia University's Middle East Institute, made an observation the other evening during an interview with Charlie Rose that was stunning for both the simplicity of its obviousness and the darkness of its ramifications.  He pointed out that the Shiite leaders in Iraq, with whom we are allied in an attempt to rebuild that damaged country, including the current Prime Minister Jaawad al-Maliki, are themselves closely allied with Shiite Hezbollah in Lebanon, led by Nasrallah. That would be the same Lebanon which, in only a week, has been set back "fifty years" (according to the Lebanese PM) by the relentless bombing of the US and EU supported assault by the IDF. Oops.

On Thursday, the Senate voted 67 to 30 in favor of moving the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh (for the US Court of Appeals- DC) to a floor vote, all but assuring his confirmation.

A report on page A18 of today's NY Times ("Avoiding Clash, Senate sends Judicial Nomination to Floor" 5/26) quotes Diane Feinstein:  "I don't believe he's filibusterable."  She will, of course, vote against him on the floor. According to the Times, the Democrats are promising to block the nomination of the next name on Bush's wish list, Terrence Boyle from North Carolina.

Where have we heard that before?