Mad Percolator's MessageStream

Fwd: Obama administration can act quickly to restore openness, according to new transparency proposals

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-11-12T13:12:46Z

This is friggen awesome!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: National Security Archive <axxxx@xxxcom>
Date: Nov 12, 2008 3:57 PM
Subject: Obama administration can act quickly to restore openness, according to new transparency proposals
To: Nxxxx@xxxcom

National Security Archive Update, November 12, 2008

Obama administration can act quickly to restore openness, according to new transparency proposals

Dozens of groups sign on to recommend openness from Day One

For more information contact:
Thomas Blanton/Meredith Fuchs - 202/994-7000

http://www.nsarchive.org

Washington, DC, November 12, 2008 - The Obama administration can act quickly after taking office in January to reverse the secrecy trend of the last eight years and restore openness in the executive branch, according to a set of new proposals posted online today by the National Security Archive. More than 60 organizations joined the recommendations, which call on President-elect Obama to restore efficiency and openness to the Freedom of Information Act process, reform the classification system to reduce overclassification and facilitate greater declassification, and ensure that presidential records are handled in accordance with the law and Congress' intent.

"President-elect Obama can make a difference on Day One in the way his administration relates to the public," explained the Archive's general counsel Meredith Fuchs. "Secrecy got out of control in the last eight years, but a few focused directives will go a long way towards reopening the government."

A diverse coalition of groups convened by the National Security Archive developed the three proposals. If adopted, the recommendations would establish the needed framework for accountability, integrity, and greater effectiveness in the federal government. The proposals call on the president-elect to take the following actions during his first days in office:

* Issue a memorandum on the Freedom of Information Act that establishes a policy of maximum possible public disclosure of government records and directing an attorney general memo that reinstitutes the presumption of openness under FOIA, calls on agencies to use technology to engage with and inform the public, and commits to creating a more collaborative and less adversarial relationship with the public on issues involving access to information.

* Revoke President Bush's executive order on the Presidential Records Act, which undermined the PRA by purporting to create new constitutional privileges for the family members and descendents of former presidents and for former vice presidents; commit to working with NARA and Congress to ensure necessary oversight for the transfer and processing of the Bush presidential records; and establish a policy for the new administration to preserve all presidential records of administrative, historical, informational, or evidentiary value.

* Issue a presidential directive rejecting prior abuses of the classification system and tasking the relevant executive branch agencies to develop a new executive order on classification that will reduce overclassification, add internal mechanisms to prevent classification abuses, ensure consideration of the public interest throughout the lifecycle of classified information, and improve the declassification process and information sharing.

Visit the Web site of the National Security Archive for more information about today's posting and to read the full text of the new proposals.

http://www.nsarchive.org

Conceding,

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-11-05T04:21:55Z

That race was not the secret factor I thought it would become last night... And happy to see change entering the White House. Now we have the possibility, at least, of something good happening to this country.

Really disappointed in the FL gay marriage ban an amendment I view as just purely mean.

Also, later, Sarah Palin. Later Elizabeth unexpectedly late shit-talking Dole.

Now, I anticipate and fervently hope there is a serious reckoning for the out-of-control media, who has been tugging candidates and constituents along with preformatted talking points. We ought to be able to elect leaders for our nation's mainstream media.

Seriously, TruTV,

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-11-03T17:53:54Z

What's with the VH1-styled "I Love the Law Enforcement Zany Videos?" I'd rather watch a marathon of lame COPS episodes (Xmas Cops, that episode with the 80's chick cops from Michigan who were also in a synth band...) than one second of Leif Ericson or Danny Bonaduce tell me what, in arsenal of personal knowledge and experience, makes each particular arrest comically special...

DUKE is Tweeting, People!

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-10-15T16:30:48Z

Yes, you crave debate, don't you! I, myself, am still totally full of info from yesterday's totally brilliant Frontline on PBS, which gave comprehensive biographies of our candidates. And, while I acknowledge it's kind of irrelevant, the footage of McCain being interviewed while still a POW was pretty amazing. The one thing I was certain of, which is kind of controversial, I guess, is that I was TOTALLY prepared to vote for McCain for president in 2000. Can you imagine if he were our president on September 11? If there were no Rove sucking up the balance of powers into a secretive Executive cabal? Not gonna vote for him now that I know far too much about him, but hindsight, yo....

Anyway, you want the tweets? http://www.twitter.com/dukestjournal

Go there. Read it as it happens.

DUKE's NewsRants: This is getting sad.

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-10-14T12:25:10Z

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Duke
Date: 14 Oct 2008 15:12:51 -0400
Subject: This is getting sad.
To: madpercolator

So Stanley Kurtz has put it all together!

"In the winter of 1996, the Coalition for Improved Education in [Chicago's] South Shore (CIESS) announced that it had received a $200,000 grant from the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. That made CIESS an 'external partner,' i.e. a community organization linked to a network of schools within the Chicago public system. This network, named the 'South Shore African Village Collaborative' was thoroughly 'Afrocentric' in orientation. CIESS's job was to use a combination of teacher-training, curriculum advice, and community involvement to improve academic performance in the schools it worked with. CIESS would continue to receive large Annenberg grants throughout the 1990s." http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YTQ0YjhlOGVhYjQ0OWRhZjI2MmM4NTQ4NGM5Mjg0MzU=

The rest of the article talks exclusively abt the SSAVC, who hosted some fairly out there guys as keynoters for some of their events. Some these guys had met(met!) Jeremiah Wright. But, um, he doesn't seem to show that any money went to them. Isn't this just guilt by...wait there isn't even any association. The Chicago Annenberg Challenge issued a grant to an organization that used " a combination of teacher-training, curriculum advice, and community involvement to improve academic performance" in Chicago public schools. A fringe element existed in these schools. So clearly Barack Obama had been a charter member of this fringe group and he and Bill Ayers and Rev. Wright got together to set the agenda once a week over a round of banana splits at the corner diner. Can't you see? It all makes sense!

Here's what the Google kicked out on the CIESS ( http://improvededucationinsouthshore.org/aboutus.php ) seeing how Kurtz's slice of grotesque hackery doesn't mention them after the paragraph, the article's third, reproduced here. I agree with Jason Zengerle at tnr.com (who actually overestimates Obama's involvments by the way) that Bill Ayers Really Wrote Obama's Book theory ( http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OTlkMTdmNDRkMTM1ODZkNGNkZmRiNDFjMDE4YzRjMjg= ) is the more plausible way to go here. Yikes.

He Read the Rove Playbook Out Loud

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-09-30T15:48:01Z

When you're feeling unpopular, re-state your ideas in a more user-friendly soothing propagandist manner. The People are learning, methinks. Learning to know better and look for the substance behind the pretty veneer.

via Google News on 9/30/08

Voice of America

McCain urges Bush action on crisis
USA Today - 3 hours ago
By Thomas Beaumont, The Des Moines Register Republican presidential nominee John McCain said in Des Moines that he urged President Bush today to direct the US Treasury to take action to back more financial services to stave off "a crisis of confidence.
McCain, Obama Urge Lawmakers to Keep Working on Plan (Update1) Bloomberg
McCain urges Treasury to take further actions Chicago Tribune
eTaiwan News - The Associated Press - Los Angeles Times - MSNBC
all 418 news articles

Normal People Interpret the Economy

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-09-30T13:06:42Z

New tumblr crush on "keeping a notebook." Post from that Tumblr.

via keeping a notebook on 9/29/08

So that’s where I’m coming from on this whole financial crisis.

Anyway, a few months ago I ended up spending some time in the Murray Hill apartment of this young investment banker who had his undergraduate diploma in Economics framed and hanging on his bedroom wall. His lease was up soon and one of his roommates wanted to move to Gramercy, but he vetoed the idea because that area was ‘too freaky’.

So when I first heard about this bailout I was like, ‘Fuck that. I want that guy to pay for being a gross person’. But now I kind of agree with this bald dude on CNN who said something along the lines of, ‘You have every right to be pissed off that your neighbor’s kid set the block on fire, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to put it out.’

Also, that Murray Hill guy sucks but has pretty much nothing to do with what’s going on.

Remember "Political Capital?"

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-09-30T05:22:33Z

Our leaders have spent ALL of it. Isn't that appropriate? They can't afford our trust, so they have to beg for it, like Bush in his national address last Friday. The people are tired of blindly trusting, and so we find ourselves closer than ever to a revolution with (1) a foreign unpopular war and (2) no money to fund it or anything else.

via memeorandum on 9/30/08

David Brooks / New York Times:
Revolt of the Nihilists — In 1933, Franklin Roosevelt inherited an economic crisis. He understood that his first job was to restore confidence, to give people a sense that somebody was in charge, that something was going to be done. — This generation of political leaders is confronting …

Phenomenal Weejend Read

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-09-28T11:21:54Z

Not a very long read... or even form this weekend... but still phenomenal. :D

via fourfour by Rich Juzwiak on 9/19/08

Lately, my experience with pop culture has been like a nonstop merry-go-round. It's all a blur and there's always a chance to grab a ring - it's just a matter of actually doing it, and who knows if it'll be brass, anyway? I set up my life to maximize my pop-cultural intake, and yet I fall behind, if not in actual consumption then in the response that should result. For example, I haven't so much as found the hour I need to sit down to really, really listen in order to organize my thoughts on the lovely new Ne-Yo album or on exactly why Young Jeezy's latest disc reminds me so much of a drag show (in sum, since I'll never write the latter post: the desperate, sometimes sad need prove realness over an increasingly antiquated musical backdrop).

The point (surprise: there is one!) is that I did grab onto a brass ring Tuesday night and I'm just getting around to talking about it. Sue me! Actually, that's an understatement: brass permeated my existence for I found myself in Madison Square Garden, assaulted aurally and visually by one Céline Dion.

Chance led me there -- someone I barely knew (but now know a little better) had an extra ticket but when offered it, I said "Duh." The show was, in a phrase, impossible to ignore. Aside from a stretch in the middle that showcased brand-new tracks, I was never bored and quite often hysterical. I shot some video, but I don't think I can say differently what I already have said: the woman is amazing and the fact that my interest in her actual music hasn't increased a bit since I became obsessed with her is testament to how awestruck I am by her persona. I don't care what she sings just as long as she looks determined, comes thisclose to tears and collapses in the throes of melodrama when she's done.

It was a two-hour spectacle of moving platforms and emotion bedazzled to match her bell bottoms that confirmed what I already knew. What was new, however, was the crowd experience. A Céline Dion show is, simply, where dorks can be dorks. I heard a collective gasp rush through the stadium when she sang her first words of the night, acapella: "The whispers in the morning..." During that song, "The Power of Love," I also witnessed fist-pumping. People in my vicinity clapped to what they perceived was the beat of "Taking Chances," while those lucky enough to sit stageside waved at her as she (literally) made the rounds. Her fans were so animated, it was as though charades was their second language and they were showing appreciation for their teacher. I saw a woman with a La Famiglia box in her lap feeling the fuck out of "It's All Coming Back to Me Now." Everyone was, really, (including me -- I am not immune to the charms of that mini piece of pseudo-gothic musical theater) -- the excitement that the opening tympani brought on alone was palpable. During "Because You Loved Me," an elderly black woman with an Adelaide bun raised the roof. She would later burst out of her seat when Céline implored the room to during the set closer "Love Can Move Mountains," because she'd clearly been waiting all night. It hit me during "Because" that I could sing along as loudly as I wanted...if only I knew the words. A cover of "All By Myself" netted a standing ovation for no good reason other than nostalgia (perhaps the only force more powerful to this crowd than Céline's voice -- the combo was lethal, for sure). Pageantspeak broke out during the extended acapella intro to "My Love" ("Go guuurl!"). I don't remember what the crowd's reaction was to her cover of "We Will Rock You" because at that point, I lost all sense of...sense. Finally, it all came back to me at the top of the very last encore, when acapella vocalizing stood in for the pan flute that normally opens "My Heart Will Go On." Céline's butthole could have performed it and people would have recognized it immediately and been just as thrilled. The force of the shrieking that came with the instant recognition was nothing short of exhilarating.

It was all a nice distraction from the woman who stood next to me the whole night. Per the jeans that reached above her navel, she was a mom. Her mousy hair was pulled back in a scrunchie and she seemed particularly moved and unafraid to show it, despite her being by herself. God, why was she by herself? Were it not for the sincerely constructed emotion emanating from the stage, I might have gotten sad. But no, I was out of my league: my sappy would have just been pithy compared to Céline's. This woman's focus is impeccable.

Liberty Rabbits!

Mad Percolator (madpercolator) — 2008-09-27T08:53:08Z

via Disapproving Rabbits by nxxxx@xxxcom (Cinnamon) on 9/25/08

Sharon got the following message in her blog:

Oh, Birdchick. Now that I've delurked (um, not sure if we've ever met...allow me to introduce myself...friend of Lorraine and company from ever so long ago) anway, I've been meaning to tell you for AGES that your Disapproving Rabbit fiend, er, friend has a bit of a following amongst troops stationed in Iraq.

About a year ago (not sure exactly when)Stars and Stripes published an article (from AP, I think) just inside on top second page. We got our copies printed small size (to save paper) so the cover pic didn't come out that well, but some of us got access to the online version and printed it out. The many versions I saw (recaptioned) from the operating base in Kirkuk in the North to Camp Victory in Baghdad were highly entertaining.

Cinnamon and company were great Morale, Welfare and Recreation (MWR) bunnies!

Which reminds me, we also got a picture from Natalie:

I hopped all the way over here for pellets?

Hi! My brother is a Marine stationed in Al Anbar province, Iraq. He and his fellow Marine buddies found this VERY disapproving bunny at the outskirts of their base and gave him some food. You can just tell that this is NOT a happy bunny.

Astonishing. The idea that this silly little blog of frowning rabbits has brought some joy to people as far away as soldiers in Iraq makes all of us deliriously happy. Stay safe over there!

-Bill and Sharon

Addendum: If you're interested in sending books to soldiers, you should check out (hey hey!) Books For Soldiers!