Worried about Bird Flu? Maybe we should be...

Laura Rozen picked up on a Knight Ridder story by Jonathan Landay that looked at preparedness in the face of a potential pandemic.

"People at the White House are now ... starting to recognize ... that this country is not prepared," said Jerry Hauer, who directed HHS emergency preparedness for two years until he quit in 2004, charging that his superiors were foot-dragging on the avian flu threat.

Bill Hall, an HHS spokesman, denied that the department had been slow. He said that its experts have been digesting "thousands, upon thousands, upon thousands" of public comments on the draft plan.

He declined, however, to confirm any details of the blueprint.

Rex Archer, director of the Kansas City Health Department and president of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officers, said Washington should be treating preparedness "more like a Manhattan Project," the crash atomic-bomb development program of World War II.

A number of other countries are ahead of the United States in preparedness. Britain finalized its plan in March, has created a Cabinet-level coordinating office, ordered enough Tamiflu for 25 percent of its population and put in place a system for rapidly producing and distributing a vaccine once one is developed.

Critics complain that the Bush administration has ordered only enough Tamiflu to cover less than 2 percent of the U.S. population, despite a 2000 recommendation by the U.N. World Health Organization that governments cover at least 25 percent.

Swiss-based Hoffmann-LaRoche, the sole maker of Tamiflu, says that with 25 other countries ahead of it, the United States must wait until the end of 2007 to buy enough of the drug to cover 25 percent of its population.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America says even that isn't enough; it wants HHS to stockpile enough Tamiflu to treat 50 percent of the U.S. public.

As Rozen points out, this is not a case of confronting unknowns, its simply a case where the U.S. simply hasn't done the necessary work. Epidemiologists and health care experts have been warning the country for years about Bird Flu, and it appears nothing has really been done.

Given the relative state of unpreparedness, what does it say about the government's ability to deal with a biological attack?

Oh, remember the President's comment about the need for greater executive powers to help ease the establishment of military quarantine zones (read "martial law")?

Many experts dismissed Bush's suggestion that the military could be used to impose quarantines, saying it was inappropriate and probably useless to count on soldiers to use force against sick Americans going out for food or medicine.

This of course has been on the move since Katrina(scroll to the bottom):

Bush began discussing the possibility of changing the law banning the military from participating in police-type activity last month, in the aftermath of the government's sluggish response to civil unrest following Hurricane Katrina.
…
Last month, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Bush "wants to make sure that we learn the lessons from Hurricane Katrina," including the use of the military in "a severe, catastrophic-type event."

"The Department of Defense would assume the responsibility for the situation, and come in with an overwhelming amount of resources and assets, to help stabilize the situation," McClellan said.

Whatever happened to the billions that were poured into the Department of Homeland Security to deal with exactly these issues? Has nothing of substance been achieved since Sept 11? Or has the administration merely secured the safety of an expanded executive?

- Murphy

Merely training a militia?

Kevin Drum highlights an article by Tom Lasseter of Knight Ridder on the role of sectarian sentiment in the Iraqi army. It's a frightening portend for the future of Iraq.

American commanders often refer to the 1st Brigade as a template for the future of Iraq's military.... Increasingly, however, they look and operate less like an Iraqi national army unit and more like a Shiite militia.

.... Asked if he worried about possible fighting between his men and the Sunnis at Umm al Qura, the brigade's command sergeant major, Hassan Kadhum, smiled.

"Your country had to have a civil war," he said. "It will be the same here. Everything in this world has its price. In Iraq the price for peace will be blood."

As Kevin points out, this is only one example, but it is a worrisome one. If it is an indication of a larger problem, it should not be a complete surprise. Rumors and worries that we were merely training the Iraqis to fight one another have been bouncing around since before the war.

- Murphy

Conservative crackup

Howard Fineman has an article on the Newsweek website describing members of the Republican party unhooking their wagons from the President.

WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush may have no military exit strategy for Iraq, but the “neocons” who convinced him to go to war there have developed one of their own — a political one: Blame the Administration.

Their neo-Wilsonian theory is correct, they insist, but the execution was botched by a Bush team that has turned out to be incompetent, crony-filled, corrupt, unimaginative and weak over a wide range of issues.

The flight of the neocons — just read a recent Weekly Standard to see what I am talking about — is one of only many indications that the long-predicted “conservative crackup” is at hand.

Fineman's prediction may be too soon, but his breakdown of the various factions that make up the Republican party is clear and concise.

- Murphy

"Careless people"

Gideon Rose, managing editor of Foreign Affairs, wrote a review of George Packer's The Assasin's Gate: America in Iraq for the Washington Post. He generally praises Packer's reporting on Iraq and agrees with his decision to end the book without a incisive analysis, instead posing some larger questions about Iraq's future. This chapter in history is far from complete and perhaps the Iraqis can avoid the worst-case scenario and create a new nation based on authentic democratic, representative systems. No one can write the final page yet.

What Rose correctly and succinctly points out, however, is that while Iraq is still a work in progress, it is well past time to expose and address the bungled manner in which the administration prepared for and prosecuted the Iraq war:

It is not too soon, however, to return a judgment on those at the helm who took a difficult job and made it infinitely more so, dramatically undermining America's regional and global position in the process. They were "careless people," as Fitzgerald said of Tom and Daisy Buchanan, who "smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made." That, if nothing else, can stand as a lesson for future tender souls contemplating the possible benefits of liberal imperialism and mulling attempts to do the right thing with the wrong partners.

Rose may even be too kind in that assessment. The administration was not hampered by having the wrong partners, but by its own actors. It's partners, in fact, were attempting to prop up the administrations staggering policies.

The administration turned to democratic themes as a last resort; themes that are attractive to Rose and others who see a positive role for U.S. power in promoting democracy and human rights. The administration knew it would be able to soften up opposition by posing it as a major goal instead of an ancillary benefit, if that. It has allowed them to avoid some difficult questioning and has caused many liberals who see value in intervention, such as President Clinton's actions in the Balkans, to question whether they have the right to hold President Bush accountable.

Some argue that the neocons prominent role was evidence of an interest in exporting democracy to the middle-east. Yet for the neocons, democracy was a means to an end. Their vision of which was an Iraq led by a government installed by the U.S. quickly after toppling the Saddam regime. The exposure and collapse of Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress exile group as little more than modern-day carpetbaggers demonstrated the willful misunderstanding the neocons had of the situation.

With Saddam gone, all the elements of government in Iraq disassembled, U.S. companies taking over much of the infrastructure and a few empty-shirt, pro-U.S. leaders installed, the administration believed they could walk away. The necons believed not in democracy as much as pro-U.S. governments in the middle-east, regardless of their respect for democracy.

- Murphy

Rumor: Indictments in the Plame case.

The rumor mill is buzzing that there may be indictments handed down. Via Crooks and Liars,Radar magazine has the news:

The D.C. Rumor mill is thrumming with whispers that 22 indictments are about to be handed down on the outed-CIA agent Valerie Plame case. The last time the wires buzzed this loud — that Tom DeLay would be indicted and would step down from his leadership post in the House — the scuttlebutters got it right.

Can it be a coincidence that the White House appears to be distancing President Bush from embattled aide Karl Rove? “He’s been missing in action at more than one major presidential event,” a member of the White House press corps tells us.

AmericaBlog repeats Radar's notice.

- Murphy

BBC heading in Gore's direction already?

In Al Gore's speech he talked about trying to to move television into a more interactive direction. Via Romenesko, it appears the BBC may already heading in that direction, though it wasn't exactly what they intended.

Richard Sambrook, director of the BBC World Service and Global News Division, told a conference the broadcaster's prominent use of video and other material contributed by ordinary citizens signaled that the BBC was evolving from being a broadcaster to a facilitator of news.

"We don't own the news any more," Sambrook said. "This is a fundamental realignment of the relationship between large media companies and the public."

In September the BBC opened up some of their archives for free use.

Even considering that the BBC is a massive, state-run media company, they have taken some progressive steps in opening up the media and ensuring a public discourse. Check out BBC's international coverage and you will see a stark difference from major U.S. media outlets.

- Murphy

Al Gore Speech on Public Discourse

It is to bad that such important topics discussed by intelligent people like Gore are dismissed by many, especially those in the media. Gore and then Kerry were written off as cerebral bores. Not acknowledging the fact that we may want our leaders to be intelligent people who can quickly understand complex problems and deal with the enormous volume of information that flows through modern government. We expect our Supreme Court justices to be brilliant minds that excel in their field, shouldn't we expect as much from our leadership?

That said, Gore gave an excellent speech on the nature of modern public discourse and the critical role it played not only in the formation of our country, but in understanding out basic freedoms.

Gore is apparently trying to put his money where his mouth is and is part of a startup cable channel, Current TV. Current is trying to foster greater viewer/broadcaster interaction with live events and viewer-produced programming.

Here's a few excerpts from his speech:

How many of you, I wonder, have heard a friend or a family member in the last few years remark that it's almost as if America has entered "an alternate universe"?
[snip]
On the eve of the nation's decision to invade Iraq, our longest serving senator, Robert Byrd of West Virginia, stood on the Senate floor asked: "Why is this chamber empty? Why are these halls silent?"
…
But whether you agree with his assessment or not, Senator Byrd's question is like the others that I have just posed here: he was saying, in effect, this is strange, isn't it? Aren't we supposed to have full and vigorous debates about questions as important as the choice between war and peace?
[snip]
In fact there was a time when America's public discourse was consistently much more vivid, focused and clear. Our Founders,  probably the most literate generation in all of history, used words with astonishing precision and believed in the Rule of Reason.

Their faith in the viability of Representative Democracy rested on their trust in the wisdom of a well-informed citizenry.  But they placed particular emphasis on insuring that the public could be well-informed.   And they took great care to protect the openness of the marketplace of ideas in order to ensure the free-flow of knowledge.

The values that Americans had brought from Europe to the New World had grown out of the sudden explosion of literacy and knowledge after Gutenberg's disruptive invention broke up the stagnant medieval information monopoly and triggered the Reformation, Humanism,  and the Enlightenment  and enshrined  a new sovereign: the "Rule of Reason."

Indeed, the self-governing  republic they had the audacity to establish was later named by the historian Henry Steele Commager as "the Empire of Reason."
[snip]
In fact, our first self-expression as a nation - "We the People" - made it clear where the ultimate source of authority lay.  It was universally understood that the ultimate check and balance for American government was its accountability to the people.   And the public forum was the place where the people held the government accountable.  That is why it was so important that the marketplace of ideas operated independent from and beyond the authority of government.

The three most important characteristics of this marketplace of ideas were:

1)    It was open to every individual, with no barriers to entry, save the necessity of literacy. This access, it is crucial to add, applied not only to the receipt of information but also to the ability to contribute information  directly into the flow of ideas that was available to all;
2)    The fate of ideas contributed by individuals depended, for the most part, on an emergent Meritocracy of Ideas. Those judged by the market to be good rose to the top, regardless of the wealth or class of the individual  responsible  for them;
3)    The accepted rules of discourse presumed that the participants were all governed by an unspoken duty to search for general agreement. That is what a "Conversation of Democracy" is all about.

What resulted from this shared democratic enterprise was a startling new development in human history: for the first time, knowledge regularly mediated between wealth and power.

The liberating force of this new American reality was thrilling to all humankind. Thomas Jefferson declared, "I have sworn upon the alter of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."
It ennobled the individual  and unleashed the creativity of the human spirit.  It inspired people everywhere to dream of what they could yet become. And it emboldened Americans to bravely explore the farther frontiers of freedom - for African Americans,  for women, and eventually, we still dream, for all.

- Murphy

Spinning out of control

Kevin Drum comments on Abu Ardvarks analysis of Karen Hughes' "Listening Tour". Aardvark's take on the broadly panned tour:

The idea that Hughes could bond with Arabs around common humanity — "we all love children" — is deeply patronizing, infantalizing, and condescending. It also flies in the face of all available survey and focus group data, which overwhelmingly shows appreciation for American society and Americans as individuals, but hostility to American foreign policy.

What neither Aardvark nor Kevin talk much about is the fact that the rather style the Arab world reacted so badly to is merely a modified version of what the Bush administration foists daily upon the American people.

The rest of the world is not regularly subjected to the rhetoric and propaganda of the Bush administration and thus, unsurprisingly, reacted negatively.

Much of the the Bush-led Republican agenda has been papered over in "down-home" rhetoric and simplistic appeals to faith and family. The rhetoric itself is not unusual, but the fact that it conceals the actual policy so well is revolutionary. The administration has been able to redirect and deflect much of the attention and criticism as a result.

Supporters of Bush's plan aren't ignorant of the game plan, but they let the administration keep up the facade because, in general, it is in their interest. Those who oppose the administrations policies, however, have to hack through an incredibly densely-layered propaganda campaign. The administration has also had the good fortune of a press that tends to give deferential treatment to those in power; until they stumble enough to give them a good story (President Clinton's history of sexual peccadilloes ensured a continuing narrative for the press to write easy-sell news).

The main controversy regarding the Bush administration at home, as it is in the middle-east, is their flawed policies. With few exceptions, no one hates Bush or his people on spec, their policies, however, do infuriate.

Now that the administration's self-centered policy objective has pushed their base off the edge, the "aw-shucks, git 'er done" Bush style has worn thin, even for his supporters.

Many are now seeing the administration in the light his non-supporters, both domestic and international, have seen him since day one. It is not the enemies of the U.S. who hold many of these views, but those who support and care for the U.S. and its people. The enemies want to destroy the U.S., its supporters criticize because they want to see it do better.

- Murphy

George Will: Bush an ot e trusted with the Constitution.

A sub-par Supreme Court nominee would not normally be expected to raise the level of vitriol among the the party of the President. A full-throated opposition is usually reserved for the opposition party. Yet in this second Bush term, the tables have flipped and the President is facing an uncomfortable reality; the base is pissed.

When even mild-mannered conservative George Will calls on the Senate to reject the President's nominee - a move he would soundly denounce if proposed by the Democratic leadership - especially with such finality, the Mylanta and scotch deliveries to the West Wing are bound to increase.

Will calls for her rejection because he sees White House Counsel Harriet Miers as unqualified for the position of Supreme Court justice.

Furthermore, there is no reason to believe that Miers's nomination resulted from the president's careful consultation with people capable of such judgments. If 100 such people had been asked to list 100 individuals who have given evidence of the reflectiveness and excellence requisite in a justice, Miers's name probably would not have appeared in any of the 10,000 places on those lists.

Not only that, Will rejects the President's qualifications to chose a Supreme Court nominee:

It is not important that she be confirmed because there is no evidence that she is among the leading lights of American jurisprudence, or that she possesses talents commensurate with the Supreme Court's tasks. The president's "argument" for her amounts to: Trust me. There is no reason to, for several reasons.

He has neither the inclination nor the ability to make sophisticated judgments about competing approaches to construing the Constitution. Few presidents acquire such abilities in the course of their pre-presidential careers, and this president particularly is not disposed to such reflections.

[snip]

In addition, the president has forfeited his right to be trusted as a custodian of the Constitution. The forfeiture occurred March 27, 2002, when, in a private act betokening an uneasy conscience, he signed the McCain-Feingold law expanding government regulation of the timing, quantity and content of political speech. The day before the 2000 Iowa caucuses he was asked -- to ensure a considered response from him, he had been told in advance that he would be asked -- whether McCain-Feingold's core purposes are unconstitutional. He unhesitatingly said, "I agree." Asked if he thought presidents have a duty, pursuant to their oath to defend the Constitution, to make an independent judgment about the constitutionality of bills and to veto those he thinks unconstitutional, he briskly said, "I do."

These are all points that critics of the Bush administration has been making for years. Bush has most often chosen the path that is post politically profitable irrespective of its adherence to philosophy or concepts of good governance.

Despite Bush's elevation as the "CEO President", continued negative fallout from his management decisions - think Iraq, Katrina, corruption in the leadership of his party (the President is still the head of the party), the general economy - reveals the lies of the propaganda his protectors have thrown up to protect him. If Bush were to run his company in the way he manages the country, the stock would be in the tank and there would be several investigations going on. Come to think of it, that may not be far from the truth.

The President played to his base promising that he would deliver unto them a more conservative, more Christian nation. All he asked was a little patience. As has been pointed out elsewhere, the Supreme Court picks were supposed to be their payoff. They were promised the appointment of justices who would overturn Roe and would finally vanquish the false concept of a separation between Church and State.

Denied.

Bush's base, the conservative christians, took some body blows when it came to small-government conservatism. The payoff would come, they told themselves. When Robert was appointed, the right was happy, not ecstatic, but he was generally "one of them". The next pick was supposed to be their pick. If Roberts was the consesus conservative, O'Connor's replacement was to be the christian conservative, the one they could shove in the face of liberals, modernists and Democrats. The pick that would help the U.S. shoulder its proper mantle of one nation under, of and for God.

Instead they got taken.

Bush is finished. Soon other conservative politicians will woo away the support of the base and try to consolidate it enough for a run in 2008. Yet after the decades of work bringing the christian right into the political system, might this send them back into the wilderness? They held Bush up as the embodiment of their values and he, time and again, took their support and went the other way. If they couldn't achieve their dreams with a two-term President that made Reagan look like a moderate, what is left for them?

Perhaps more importantly, now that Bush has revealed his true colors, can we get back to the business of responsible governance?

- Murphy

Justice who? Or, Can I be a nominee too?

Crony seems to be a word in frequent use since the announcement this morning of White House Counsel Harriet Miers' nomination to the Supreme Court.

While crony is certainly a mean-spirited term, the implication that she has worked very closely with President Bush is spot on.

She has gone from his choice of Texas Lottery Commission Chairman in the mid-'90s to the White House Counsel in 2004. Along the way she has rarely been too far from the President's side.

She served as a personal lawyer for Bush and did exploratory opposition research on his record to dig up any embarrassing details before the 1994 Governor's race and again in 1998. The 1998 research was in part a prep for his potential 2000 Presidential run; Bush was seen as the front-runner after his 1998 reelection.

After President Bush's 2000 victory, Miers came on as Staff Secretary in 2001. As White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card said,

"There is not a piece of paper that goes into the Oval Office or that comes out of the Oval Office that doesn't go through Harriet's hands." - Dallas Morning News March 22, 2001.

She later moved on to Deputy Chief of Staff for policy and then replaced Alberto Gonzales as White House Counsel after he was appointed Attorney General, a position her name was floated for back in 1998 (Washingtonian Magazine, July 1998) when he was seen as a potential front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination.

It was from her post as White House Counsel that Miers led the search for the next Supreme Court nominee and spearheaded Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts' nomination process. She will now follow in the path she laid out for Roberts.

Miers' most commented upon quality seems to be her ability to "fly under the radar". While that would seem to help deflect criticism from the Democrats (it's hard to criticize a record that doesn't exist) her unobtrusive record might also be seen as undistinguished by conservatives who have, so far, been the most vocal criticizing her. From distinguished conservative journal the National Review Online's The Corner:

THE GOOD NEWS ON MIERS [Rick Brookhiser]
It's not as bad as Caligula putting his horse in the Senate.

And from the NR's editorial board, a more measured evaluation.

These things are either not present, or are present to a smaller degree, in Miers’s case. Being a Bush loyalist and friend is not a qualification for the Supreme Court. She may have been the best pick from within Bush’s inner circle. It seems impossible to maintain that she was the best pick from any larger field. It seems highly unlikely that she will be the kind of justice who, in combination with Roberts, Scalia, and Thomas, will attract additional votes by the sheer force of her arguments. This nomination was a missed opportunity.

If this is the reception Bush's nominee is receiving on the first day, it is likely that the next few weeks will be tumultuous for her.

In general Democrats on the left have said little. One exception that stands out, however, is Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) who, inexplicably, had this to say:

"It appears the President has made a sound choice in Harriet Miers. From every indication it seems that she has the qualifications and experience to serve on the Supreme Court. Based on her background and experience, if confirmed, she would undoubtedly bring a new perspective and balance to the Court."

Despite Miers' nearly blank visage if there is one thing she is not bringing to the table is is qualifications to serve as a Supreme Court Justice.

She has argued no major cases, never served on a bench and spent most of her recent professional life as as advisor to President Bush. She is a loyalty pick, plain and simple.

I am not the first to point this out but if I were a part of the "party of values" that delivered for President Bush in 2004, I would ask for my money back.

- Murphy