Kit Bond seems to have a penchant for playing the bullyboy.  In December I wrote about journalist Laura Rozen’s description of a tantrum Bond threw in order to intimidate James Marcinkowski, a witness who appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence to testify about Valerie Plame Wilson’s covert CIA status.  

Now a column by Barb Shelly of the Kansas City Star leads one to believe that intimidation and vengeful behavior is part of his regular repertoire.  The U.S. Justice Department’s Inspector General’s report, issued today (9/29), implicates him in the DOJ firing scandal, specifically in regard to the firing of Todd Graves, U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri.

Shelly concludes that:

Though circumstances remain a bit muddled, the inspector concludes that Bond’s legal counsel called a White House lawyer several times in 2005 seeking to have Graves removed as this area’s top federal prosecutor.

It seems that Todd Graves wasn’t willing to snap to and use his influence with his brother, U.S. Congressman Sam Graves, to get him to fire Jeff Roe, who was then Sam Graves’ Chief of Staff.

Although discussions of the efforts to fire Todd Graves have involved allegations about a no-bid contract to run a motor vehicle fee office which was awarded to his wife, Shelly notes that according to the IG report:

The inspector concludes that the feud between the Bond and Sam Graves offices, not the fee office contract, was the fuse that resulted in Todd Graves’s removal.

Bond’s involvement in Graves’ firing is not in itself news.  Compare Shelly’s account of the IG report to this earlier summary of Graves’ firing from TalkingPointsMemo’s Josh Marshall who implicates Bond.  What the IG report adds is the true motive for the firing, Bond’s vendetta against Graves.

It appears to be indisputable that Bond was directly involved in firing Graves who was, incidentally,  replaced by the reprehensible Bradley Schlozman.  And no matter how you cut it, it does seem inescapable that Bond thinks that using his influence as a congressman to settle scores in  this way is just one more perk of office.

  The national doctor’s healthcare advocacy organization, Physicians for a National Healthcare Plan, is placing ads in the “The Nations” & “New Yorker” magazines available ~Oct 7 explaining necessity & simplicity  of adopting a single payer healthcare system.  It is open letter to political candidates from medical experts that have researched & analyzed health systems for over 20 years. This is an excerpt from the press release:

Over 5,000 U.S. physicians have signed an open letter calling on the candidates for president and Congress “to stand up for the health of the American people and implement a nonprofit, single-payer national health insurance system.”

Noting that the nation’s private-insurance-based model is failing by denying needed medical care to millions, wasting resources and driving up costs, the doctors say that a publicly financed system is “the sole hope for affordable, comprehensive coverage.”

“A single-payer health system could realize administrative savings of more than $300 billion annually — enough to cover the uninsured and to eliminate co-payments and deductibles for all Americans,” they write, adding that it would also slow cost increases.

Dr. Oliver Fein, a professor of clinical medicine and public health at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York and a signer of the letter, said today, “With the sudden economic downturn, more people than ever before are worried about how to pay for health care. A single-payer system — an improved Medicare for all — would lift those worries, provide care to all who need it and require no new money. It’s the only morally and fiscally responsible approach to take.”

In their letter, the physicians express disappointment that most U.S. political leaders still cling to the private health insurance industry model of financing care and “seem intent on reprising failed schemes from the past” like mandates or tax incentives.

“The incremental changes suggested by most Democrats cannot solve our problems; further pursuit of market-based strategies, as advocated by Republicans, will exacerbate them,” they say. “What needs to be changed is the system itself.”

Signers of the letter include some of the most prominent figures in U.S. medicine, including leaders of professional societies in internal medicine, pediatrics, family medicine, psychiatry and public health. Among them are Marcia Angell, M.D., senior lecturer at Harvard Medical School and past editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, and Bernard Lown, M.D., professor of cardiology emeritus at Harvard and Nobel laureate.

Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a co-author of the letter, said, “Physicians have a responsibility to get to the root of a patient’s medical complaint, to make a diagnosis based on evidence. Only then can we confidently prescribe a cure, rather than offer a consoling placebo.

“Given the repeated failure of incremental reforms like the one under way in Massachusetts, which is already facing cost overruns and leaving many residents uncovered, and given the increasingly obvious failure of unfettered markets, it’s clear that neither of these traditional prescriptions for reform will work,” she said. “What’s needed instead is the only treatment that has proven its effectiveness — a single-payer plan.”

The letter’s release follows a survey in the Annals of Internal Medicine this spring that shows 59 percent of U.S. physicians support national health insurance, a jump of 10 percentage points from five years ago

Single-payer plans typically involve a single, publicly administered social insurance fund that guarantees health care coverage for everyone, much like Medicare presently does for seniors. Patients go the doctors and hospitals of their choice; health care providers largely remain private. Private health insurers are eliminated or their role is substantially reduced.

A bill in Congress, the U.S. National Health Insurance Act, H.R. 676, embodies the single-payer model. Sponsored by Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), it currently has over 90 co-sponsors, more than any other health reform proposal.

(Re-posted from Huffington Post) 

I became an environmental activist in the early 1970s just as I was completing my doctorate in ecology at the University of British Columbia. It was the height of the Cold War and the height of the Viet Nam War and we were compelled to take a very public stand against activities we thought to be catastrophic both for people and for the planet.

I joined a small committee that was meeting in the basement of the Unitarian Church. We organized a protest voyage against U.S. hydrogen bomb testing in Alaska and had tens of thousands marching in the streets. When that H-bomb was set off at Amchitka Island in November 1971, it was the last hydrogen bomb the U.S. ever detonated.

It was the birth of Greenpeace, the organization I co-founded, spending 15 years in its top committee, helping to lead environmental campaigns around the world.

But it's ironic in the extreme that, as we mark the 100th anniversary of drinking water chlorination, my old organization and other activist groups aligned with it continue to oppose this most important public health achievement.

Activist organizations like Greenpeace have access to a full century of observations on the results of water chlorination in the US, all the way back to September 26, 1908 when Jersey City, NJ became the first US city to chlorinate its public water supply.

It's true, there were those back then who vehemently opposed the use of this “poison” in public water supplies. According to one official at the time, continued chlorination to eradicate typhoid was akin to being “between the devil and the deep blue sea, for at present we don't know whether typhoid fever or the (chlorinated) drinking water is the worst.”

Thankfully from the perspective of human health, chlorination of water supplies spread rapidly. Today, chlorination is the overwhelming choice for treating public water systems.

The results are clear. This widespread adoption of chlorine disinfection across the U.S. has had very important results. Waterborne diseases like typhoid, Hepatitis A and cholera that once killed thousands of Americans each year have been virtually eliminated. Typhoid fever cases fell by more than 99 percent between 1900 and 1960. Related childhood mortality fell dramatically. And average life expectancy rose from 47 years in 1900 to nearly 78 years in 2006.

Yet, many of my old environmental colleagues continue to vilify chlorination of water by raising unwarranted fears about health risks of chlorine and disinfection byproducts. In fact, it was a Greenpeace decision in 1986 to support a world-wide ban on all chlorine use that turned out to be a breaking point between my old organization and me.

My strongly held view is that chlorine is essential for our health. It is that simple. At the time I explained to my fellow Greenpeace International directors that water chlorination was the biggest advance in the history of public health, and in addition that the majority of our pharmaceuticals are based on chlorine chemistry. As the only board member with an education in science, my words fell on deaf ears.

In short, my former colleagues ignored science and supported the ban, giving me no choice but to leave the group as I could not support such a policy. Despite science concluding no known health risks – and ample benefits – from water chlorination, Greenpeace and other environmental groups have continued to oppose its use for more than 20 years.

I believe the opposition to the use of chemicals such as chlorine is part of a broader hostility to the use of chemicals in general. I often cite Rachel Carson's 1962 book, Silent Spring, as having had a significant impact on many pioneers of the green movement. The book raised some legitimate concerns, many rooted in science, about the risks and negative environmental impact associated with the indiscriminate use of chemicals.

But the day-to-day water chlorination that occurs across America is not in the category of indiscriminate use. For Greenpeace and groups like it, the healthy skepticism learned from Carson has hardened over the years, and given way to a mindset that treats virtually all use of chemicals with suspicion.

After a century of use and the resulting eradication of waterborne diseases across the US and the world, those activists who continue, absurdly, to oppose water chlorination only illustrate the need for an alternative environmental policy based on science and logic – not misinformation and campaigns of fear.

After all, campaigns based on groundless fears distract the public from real environmental threats such as air pollution and tropical deforestation for example.

As we mark one of the key milestones in improving the public health of Americans right across the country, let's always remember we all have a responsibility to be environmental stewards. But stewardship requires that science drive our public policy, just as it did a hundred years ago in Jersey City.

( – promoted by Clark)

21st Century Democrats is running a contest to send field organizers to the top 3 Congressional candidates with netroots support. Judy Baker has made it to the 2nd (and final) round and needs your help.

Swing over to the contest and vote for Judy. It takes only moments and costs nothing.

Come vote for Judy!

It’s going to be an exciting week in St. Louis, with the Vice Presidential debates at WashU on Thursday and a lot of related programming.  Before getting to this week’s events, I wanted to mention a couple things that might be of interest to people.

First, a bus will be heading down from St. Louis Nov. 21 -23 to join with the annual protest outside of the School of the Americas, a combat training school for soldiers that has been linked to atrocities across Latin America.  To find out more about the School of the Americas, go to http://www.soaw.org/ , and to sign up for the St. Louis Bus go to http://www.ifcla.net/soa.php .

Second, St. Louis Amnesty International  has a call for artists out on the theme Art for Humans Rights.  ‘Amnesty is pleased to announce the “Art for Human Rights” exhibit at the Midwest Regional Conference October 24-26, featuring artists from around St. Louis. We invite local artists of all levels to submit your human-rights themed art for this exhibit. Your art will be displayed throughout the conference, and participants in the conference will have a chance to vote on the piece that inspires them the most.  The winner will be honored as the Amnesty Artist of Conscience.  Artists please contact Tarah Demant at tarahdemant@hotmail.com for more information.’

This week’s events:

Monday, Sept. 29 at noon, Al Rojas, who together with Cesar Chavez organized the United Farm Workers Union in the 60s, will be speaking at the Sunnen Lounge at Webster University (in the Student Center on Edgar road).  You can get the full details at  this link.  Sorry for the short notice, but the good news is that there will be another chance to catch Mr. Rojas on Wednesday (see below).

Tuesday Morning. Organizers from Jobs with Justice will be on KWMU at 11 AM to discuss “community organizing” in relation to the presidential campaign.  Remember how Republicans sneered at the RNC at the fact that Obama was a community organizer in Chicago?  Yeah, that’s what this is about.  

Tuesday, Sept. 30. The Doerr Center for Social Justice Education and Research at SLU will hold its annual Social Justice Night celebration on Tuesday, September 30, 2008 from 5:30 to 9:00 pm at Monastero Hall, 3050 Olive Blvd. A light supper will be served from 5:30 to 6:30 pm. The keynote speaker for the evening will be Sarah Anderson, Director of the Global Economy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, DC. A series of action oriented workshops will follow the keynote address. Admission is free and free parking is available on site.

Also Tuesday, sadly, it looks like we might have reached the end of Webster University’s film series for the International Year of Human Rights.  The last film screening this Tuesday at 7 PM will be “A Killer Bargain,” a film about the largely unspoken human and environmental costs of cheap consumer goods.  You can find more info here.

Wednesday, Oct. 1.  There’s a second (and third) chance to catch Al Rojas while he’s in St. Louis; he’s going to be at Legacy Books & Cafe (5429 Delmar) at 7 PM for a panel discussion on “Immigrant Rights are Worker Rights.”   He will describe his experiences in the fields of California and his time working with Cesar Chavez.  More details are at http://www.insteadofwar.org/si… .  Mr. Rojas will also be speaking earlier in the day at SIUE at 1 PM; more details and an RSVP are at http://www.new.facebook.com/ev… .

Also Wednesday, Invisible Children St. Louis is screening a full-length documentary about the plight of children in Uganda.  It will be at 7 PM in Kelly Auditorium at SLU.  The facebook page is here .

Thursday Oct. 2.  Local citizens are holding a “Take back the debate” rally at Northmoor Park to urge a focus back on substance rather than spectacle.  An Iraq veteran, a Gold Star father, an Iraq war refugee, a foreclosed homeowner, a person suffering from lack of healthcare and a local school board member will all be speaking at the rally.  Parking will be tricky as Big Bend will be closed to auto traffic, so check here for more details on how to get to the site.  The rally starts at 5 PM; afterwards, many people will be heading over to Bread and Roses.  

Speaking of which, also Thursday, is the annual collaboration of artists and workers known as Bread and Roses.  This year’s theme is “Critical Condition: Health Care in America.”  It starts at 7 PM at the Regional Arts Commission at 6128 Delmar.  Check out the site for more details because “Hearts starve as well as bodies.”  

And also Thursday, the ONE campaign at Webster University will be holding a VP debate watching party.  The event starts at 7 PM (the debate starts at 8), and location details will be up soon at http://www.ONEstl.org/vpdebate .    

Friday, Oct. 3. A lot of people will probably be recovering from the VP festivities today, but there is one interesting event I could find, at least for one segment of the population.  Periwinkle Bloom, a new design studio in U-City that uses natural materials, will be launching a new collection of 100% organic cotton baby clothes at City Sprouts on the Delmar Loop.  Details at http://www.saucemagazine.com/c… .  Maybe a good chance for some early Christmas shopping?

Saturday, Oct. 4.  St. Louis’s Community Arts and Media Project (CAMP) is hosting a bike shop for anyone who wants to learn new skills, teach others new skills (including kids), or just hang with other bike enthusiasts.  The event is from 1 to 4 PM, and you can get the details at the CAMP calendar.  

And don’t forget that every Sunday at 7 PM at St. Francis Xavier (College) Church on the corner of Grand and Lindell, there’s a vigil to remember the human toll of the war.  Find out more at http://www.insteadofwar.org/si… .

Have a fun and meaningful week,

Adam

     Ever since the much anticipated on again off again debate between the two Presidential candidates, there has been a lot of concern from Democrats and pundits concerning the performance or lack thereof from Senator Obama. Many people feel that the debate was full of “moments loss” for the Senator to “take it to” McCain. Many felt that after the disastrous week McCain had that he was prime for a final knockout blow. It’s funny because I remember the week prior to the debate I was visiting my parents and jokingly said that if I were Senator Obama I would do something deliberate to anger John McCain and show that he was temperamentally unfit to be President. I had even jokingly and somewhat cruelly suggested that I would mention McCain’s adopted daughter that Bush had used to derail the McCain candidacy in 2000.

     For the many people who feel that Senator Obama needs to go after McCain during the debates, I would just like to interject some thoughts from my own experience of being a black man working in a white world. The first thing that I would remind all of those people who are calling for Senator Obama to get tough with McCain is that they are already going to vote for Obama. What a supporter looks for in a candidate may not be what an undecided voter might find appealing. What many supporters don’t understand is the fine line that Senator Obama has to walk; despite all the pronouncements to the contrary we are still living in America where blacks are expected to carry themselves in certain ways when it comes to interacting with whites. While many people want to use Senator Obama’s historical candidacy as the death knell to our racist past there are many others who are not so willing to put our racist history to bed.

    The latitude that many whites accord each other in interactions is not the same they accord minorities during those same interactions. Senator Obama could in fact dissect McCain very easily with facts that are surfacing daily about the ruthlessness, incompetence, and gimmickry of the McCain campaign in the news media. But what many don’t understand is that even if he were to undress McCain publicly during the debates he could still be viewed as the loser by many of the undecided voters. We must not lose track of what this election and many elections in this country have boiled down to; about 20% of all eligible registered voters. Who can gauge the mindset of these voters? I mean think about it; anyone with all that has gone on in this country the last 8 years who has not made a decision about what direction they want this country to go in at this late date how can you expect to know what is going on in their minds. The worse thing that Senator Obama could do is to offend those voters by being seen as picking on this poor old white man who has sacrificed so much for his country. Whether you agree or disagree with this narrative it is the one that many Americans accept as the truth.

    This election despite the pundits and media talking heads pronouncements to the contrary is Senator Obama’s to lose. Would we rather he win the debate and lose the election? Wouldn’t it be a better strategy to let the news media continue to pound the McCain campaign with daily charges of incompetence and collusion with lobbyist? While I agree that if it were me I would do more to tie McCain to the current economic crisis and the past policies of the Bush administration during the debates, but despite his seeming ineptitude Senator Obama is rising in the polls; all polls. Many of Senator Obama’s supporters would like to believe that he will be judged by the electorate based entirely on his character and his competency. I beg to disagree. We must not mistake our own judgments for the judgments of others. There are some voters who are looking for a reason not to vote for Obama. They will vote for him, albeit reluctantly. As we get closer to Election Day the McCain camp will become more desperate and will begin to try more and more gimmicks and take even more risks, as they do so they will make bigger mistakes. These mistakes will not only derail their campaign but hopefully will take down other Republicans in the process.

    To all of those who are watching every twist and turn of this election through the media’s microscope I would just like to suggest you “GET OUT MORE”. Turn off the television or the computer and go out to dinner or go to a movie. The media is not going to let this election become a landslide even if is. Think about it if people begin to view this election as being over the public’s interest goes down and media outlets lose advertising dollars. They will continue to try and peak the public’s interest in this election until the final vote hoping to capture every advertising dollar they can get their greedy hands on. Keep tuned to the future debates and watch how Senator Obama methodically exposes McCain for the fraud that he is, but remember how Mondale tried to expose Reagan and those results.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. – Daniel Patrick Moynihan

The Disputed Truth