UNITED STATES NEWS DIGEST
D.C. Council Wants a Public Hospital, After Greater Southeast Goes Bust
Furious members of the D.C. Council grilled District officials and officers of Greater Southeast Community Hospital last week, as to how they intend to keep Greater Southeast operating. A ruling in Federal bankruptcy court in Washington will keep the five DCHC hospitals open until a hearing Nov. 26, but there is no plan for after that.
The Washington Times reports that several Council members are proposing the creation of a new public hospital. "I want to look at getting another hospital," said Council president Linda Cropp. "We don't want to be caught in circumstances where we can't provide services for our residents."
Council members were reportedly infuriated that D.C. Mayor Tony Williams was not present at the hearing, and that he had had only one discussion with the D.C. Department of Health about the crisis at Greater Southeast. They were also angry that neither the Health Department, Greater Southeast, or the D.C. Healthcare Alliance has any contingency plan for what to do when the hospital runs out of money.
Council member David Catania attacked the idea that DCHC was victimized by National Century Financial Enterprises. "They [DCHC] did business with a national finance company now in bankruptcy and under investigation for fraud," he said. "It was all out there two years ago. That's why we didn't want to enter into a contract with them."
Tax Hikes, Layoffs, Fare Hikes Dominate Discussion in New York City
Tax hikes, layoffs, and transit fare hikes are dominating the discussion in New York City over what to do about the city's projected $6.4-billion budget hole. New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein announced on Nov. 22 that he would be laying off 550 school administrators as part of an effort to cut $200 million out of the school budget. Talk at City Hall is that an increase in the city's income tax, along with an increase in the property tax, will be needed to save essential services. According to the New York Post, there is considerable skepticism as to whether Mayor Michael Bloomberg (R) will be able to squeeze another $1 billion out of those who pay income tax, including 800,000 commuters.
Meanwhile, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority unveiled proposals to jack up transit fares and tolls at bridges and tunnels. The New York Times poses the issue in the form of who will be hit harder, commuters who travel into the city on trains, or those who ride buses in the city. Maximum fare increases could be 50 cents for buses and about $1.40 for the trains.
Perle Disputes Military Experts on Iraq's Military Strength
The Nov. 17 Washington Post reported that senior military and CIA officials believe that Iraq's 15,000-strong Special Republican Guard will be a formidable combat force. Defense officials say that the 17 divisions of the regular army (300,000) are considered poorly trained and equipped, and only half of it is expected to put up much resistance once under attack, but the 80,000-man Republican Guard is considered a much more viable fighting force.
Former arms inspector Scott Ritter says that the Special Republican Guard are not the world's best soldiers, but "they're tough, they're loyal, and they will fight to the death." Saddam has created loyalty among his own and other Sunni tribes through marriages and appointments to official positions, Ritter says, and this strong tribal loyalty insulates Saddam against defections. Ritter also says that a bombing campaign would strengthen Saddam, not weaken him.
But warhawk Richard Perle of the Defense Policy Board knows better, saying that Saddam is weaker than most military planners suspect. "I don't believe we'll have to go into Baghdad, because I don't believe he will survive in Baghdad for any length of time," Perle says. "Dictators like Saddam do not last very long once it is clear they have been effectively challenged."
Perle is charged with blurring the lines between official and civilian roles, by a number of sources quoted in a U.S. News & World Report profile. They note that Perle uses his chairmanship of the Defense Policy Board and its access to classified information as if he were a government official; yet he can speak and write op eds as a civilian. "He enjoys all the benefits of being an insider without any of the constraints," says an unnamed former Clinton Administration official.
A senior State Department official says he's "appalled" by Perle's multiple roles. "To have access to both the councils of state, and to ink and pen, smacks me as a dangerous situation," he says. "That's not the way a good government should work."
Among those quoted as praising Perle, are Iraqi opposition figure Ahmed Chalabi (who says "Richard was of tremendous help," has arranged meetings with "very powerful people," and has invited him to address the Defense Policy Board), Michael Ledeen ("Richard believes America is a revolutionary country with a revolutionary mission: to spread freedom"), Frank Gaffney, and James Woolsey, former CIA head.
"Many times, those who have experienced war look at it as a last resort, and those who haven't, see it as a first resort," says retired Marine Corps Gen. Anthony Zinni, commenting on Richard Perle and his ilk. "Those who didn't show up for Vietnam and are now hawksthat's the worst." A Pentagon general agrees: "Guys like that talking about combat is like a monk talking about sex. It's interesting and titillating, but have they ever been there? No."
Administration Will Arrest Some Iraqi Americans in Event of War
The Nov. 17 New York Times reports that the Bush Administration has begun to monitor thousands of Iraqis who are in the U.S.including Iraqi-Americans with dual citizenshipto identify potential terrorist threats; this includes students and Iraqis working for U.S. corporations. Some are already being subjected to electronic surveillance, under national security warrants.
In the event of a U.S. invasion of Iraq, the Times says, there will be arrests and detentions of Iraqis or Iraqi sympathizers if they are believed to be planning terrorist operations.
However, officials say that no specific threats against the U.S., or against U.S. interests overseas, have been detected so far, from either this domestic surveillance, or from overseas monitoring and surveillance operations.
Ashcroft Moves Fast To Expand Wiretaps, After Favorable Ruling in National Security Case
Within a few hours of a ruling by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review, Attorney General John Ashcroft held a press conference to announce that the Justice Department is vastly increasing its capability to conduct national-security wiretaps.
The ruling, the first ever by the Court of Review, overturned a May ruling by the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court, which had blasted the Justice Department and the FBI for misleading the FISA Court on numerous occasions, and said that restrictions on the use of information derived from national-security wiretaps, in criminal cases, must be maintained, despite the Justice Department's interpretation of the USA/Patriot anti-terrorism act passed last year right after Sept. 11.
For many years, the Justice Department has (at least officially) operated on the presumption built into DOJ Guidelines since the late 1970s, that the standard of evidence for national-security wiretaps is lower than for a criminal investigation and prosecution.
The FISA Court of Review is composed of three judges selected by Chief Justice William Rehnquist; all three are Reagan-Bush Administration appointees.
The Justice Department is planning to assign lawyers to terrorism task forces in Washington and New York, in order to facilitate the securing of secret warrants, now that the way has been cleared by a special appellate panel of the Foreign Intelligence Court of Review, weakening the barrier between criminal and intelligence investigations. The court decision allows the use of wiretaps in criminal prosecutions of terrorist suspects. A senior Justice Department official told the New York Times, "We're working very quickly and we want to get as much help out to the field as possible."
Some civil libertarians are warning of a return to the days of J. Edgar Hoover's FBI, when agents routinely surveilled and investigated people and groups for political reasons. The ACLU makes the point that the standard of evidence for warrants has been lowered, such that the FBI might use secret warrants not only to spy on a terrorist suspect, but also anyone who innocently comes into contact with him.
"A Green Light To Spy," is how a New York Times editorial characterized the ruling on national-security wiretaps. "Anyone who worries that the war on terrorism will inspire an era of unprecedented government spying on Americans has new cause for concern today," the editorial says, and it calls on the Supreme Court to reinstate the original ruling of the lower FISA Court, and for Congress to redraft the law. A Washington Post editorial, entitled "Chipping Away at Liberty," blames Congress, but is softer on Ashcroft than is the New York Times.
CSIS Lunatics Decide Quick Iraq War Could Help U.S. Economy
A dozen military, Middle East, economic, and oil utopians met Nov. 12 at the Center for Strategic and International Studies to discuss "theoretical scenarios" of the likely economic impact of an Iraq war on the U.S. economy. Leading figures from Salomon Smith Barney, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, the Petroleum Industry Research Foundation, and the National Defense University participated, along with a gaggle of CSIS nuts and former Federal Reserve Board Governor Laurence Meyer. These august fools decided that there is a 40%-60% chance of a "swift victory" within four to six weeks, of any war with Iraq, and that it would improve the U.S. economy by the second quarter of 2003, what with the equity markets rally they projected for the second quarter of 2003, with all the current messy "uncertainty" removed.
Of course, the war might turn into a six- to 12-week war, with "moderate" civilian deaths and a conventional military exchange between Iraq and Israel. That would knock things down a bit, but by 2004, there would be no residual economic effects left. In any case, there is only a 30%-40% chance of that occurring. Now, if Iraq used weapons of mass destruction against Israel and other Arab/Turkish bases and oil facilities, and the Arab League used oil as a weapon against the United States, it would knock down GDP for most of 2003, what with $80 per barrel oil prices, and all. But, the chances are only 5%-10% of this occurring, they concluded.
Clinton Impeachment Honcho Henry Hyde Tied into Moonies
Henry Hyde, the Republican Congressman from Illinois who led the impeachment witchhunt against former President Bill Clinton, turns out to be tied into the Sun Myung Moon cult, a collection of sexual perverts who make the Monica Lewinsky episode look chaste by comparison.
In early October, a letter denouncing Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva (then a Brazilian Presidential candidate, now President-elect), was drafted by Moonie associate and Hudson Institute anti-Communist ideologue Constantine Menges, and released over the signatures of 12 Republican members of the U.S. House of Representatives. On Oct. 27, following Lula's victory in the first round of the Brazilian elections, Hyde, as chairman of the House International Relations Committee, issued his own public letter to Bush warning of the danger of a Lula Presidency, citing the earlier Menges-authored letter of his colleagues:
"Recently, many of my colleagues in the Congress wrote you a letter in which they expressed their concerns about the 10-year-long association of Mr. Lula da Silva with Latin American, European, and the Middle Eastern terrorist organizations.... They also expressed their concern about Mr. Lula da Silva's recent statement indicating an interest in reviving Brazil's nuclear-weapons program.... There is a real prospect that Castro, Chavez and Lula da Silva could constitute an axis of evil in the Americas, which might have nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles (which Brazil developed in 1990)."
So who did Hyde hop in bed with, on this one? The same Constantine Menges who sits on the board of directors of, and helps fund, the "Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation," a wholly owned Moonie front-group headed by former World Anti-Communist League leader Lee Edwards, currently editor of Sun Myung Moon's magazine, The World and I. Menges has taken the lead internationally in casting President-elect Lula as part of a new "nuclear axis of evil" in the hemisphere, and is acknowledged as the "intellectual author" of the Congressional letter Hyde cites.
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