From CNN's Jessica Rummel
"Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell predicts his party will hold most, if not all, of their seats.
"(CNN) — Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) gave a bleak outlook on the prospects for a Republican-led Senate in 2009.
"During an interview with CNN’s Late Edition, McConnell told guest host Candy Crowley that the numbers were not in the GOP’s favor.
“We are not going to be back in the majority in the Senate next year,” said McConnell. “The numbers make that impossible.”
Republicans in the Senate have been gearing up for the elections in November despite grim conditions. Five GOP senators are retiring this year: Sen. Wayne Allard (CO), Sen. John Warner (VA), Sen. Pete Domenici (NM), Sen. Chuck Hagel (NE), and Sen. Larry Craig (ID). Other Republicans are running in competitive elections, such as Norm Coleman (MN), who faces well-known comedian and outspoken Democrat Al Franken in November.
"Each party holds the same number of members in the Senate (49-49), but the Democrats hold a slim majority with two independents, Sens. Bernie Sanders and Joe Lieberman, caucusing with their party. However, many are predicting that the Democrats could pick up as many as six seats in the fall, giving them a clear majority.
"Despite the GOP’s troubles, McConnell remains hopeful about his party’s chances and predicts they will hold most, if not all, of their seats. “I'm optimistic we can stay roughly where we are,” he told Crowley. “We have a robust minority.”
Let's Ditch Mitch.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
My plans.
I have been asked what are my plans, now that I am no longer in the running for the U.S. Senate seat for Kentucky. First, I endorse, and plan to vote for, Bruce Lunsford, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, Kentucky in the general election. Second, I expect to endorse and vote for the eventual Democratic nominee for President of the United States in the November election. I will make that endorsement after the national Democratic convention. I plan to stay a part of the Ditch Mitch movement--running and re-running editorials and news articles in favor of Ditching Mitch, and in favor of the Party's choice Bruce Lunsford. Finally, I plan to remain active in support of those issues that were the key part of my campaign: Bring the troops home from Iraq; end warrantless wiretapping of American citizens; outlaw torture by U.S. citizens--even in "black hole" areas alleged to be beyond any court's jurisdiction such as Guantanamo Bay; have college for everybody; and have full public university college and university undergraduate tuition paid by the government. I noticed during the Senate candidate debates, after I had been the only candidate speaking in support of the "gas tax holiday" plans to suspend the Federal gasoline tax collection for part of this summer, Bruce Lunsford joined me and said he supports the "gas tax holiday" also. It makes me feel good when an opponent adopts my position on an issue. I plan to vote for Bruce Lunsford this fall and I hope you will, also. I plan to keep on hammering away at what I consider to be the important issues. Let's Ditch Mitch. Kenneth Stepp.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Another Kentucky man killed in neverending war in the MId-East.
Another service member from Kentucky has died fighting the War on Terror.
Captain Eric Terhune of Lexington was killed in Afghanistan Thursday.
Military officials say he was killed in action while conducting a security patrol.
Captain Terhune was a helicopter pilot for the Marines.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
TOP-LEVEL TORTURE
TOP-LEVEL TORTURE
By
Becky Akers
[first published in The New American, June 9, 2008, pp. 25-29]
“The Bush administration admits to condoning acts that most people would deem torture. Now we know that the administration determined how the tortures were to be carried out. [p. 25].
* * *
“Torture fails in other ways, too. The country condoning it loses its soul as the unspeakable becomes ordinary and terror stalks the land. But even if torture worked, even if it alone could wring the truth from its victims without savaging society, it is still and always wrong. Under any circumstances, no matter what. There can be no debate. Those who argue otherwise leave morality, humanity, decency, and civilization far behind.
“Torture obviously violates the Golden Rule. We can presume that a president who brags about his Christianity should obey that divine law, unless he asks Muslims to shackle him and pour water up his nose, we can also presume that what he does unto others is not what he wants others to do unto him. Indeed, the Victim of an earlier empire’s torture commanded His followers to bless--not waterboard--their enemies. One can be a torturer or a Christian but not both.
“Torture inevitably leads to more sins, notably lying and murder. Bush, Cheney, Rice, et al. continue to insist that America does not torture though the CIA waterboarded at least three suspected terrorists and abused hundreds more. These politicians lie about the nature of the agonies they inflict, preposterously pretending that excruciating pain is not torture. The’ve lied about the accuracy and importance of the information their victims revealed; for example, they claimed that waterboarding Abu Zubaida wrung secrets from him he would have otherwise withheld. But ‘former FBI officials privy to details of the case continue to dispute the CIA’s account of the effectiveness of the harsh measures,’ as the Washington Post noted last December.
“Torturers almost always murder, too--and we’re not talking just ‘accidental’ deaths from too many beatings. Hurting a man makes an implacable enemy of him, so governments often execute victims rather than free them to seek vengeance or justice.
“Torture is as anti-constitutional as it is anti-Christian. It mocks everything the Founding Fathers sought to achieve, in spirit and in letter. The Constitution’s entire purpose is to restrain government, to stymie its endless quest to control us, to neutralize the world’s deadliest and most destructive force. Imbuing government with the virulent power of torture, then, defeats the Constitution’s rationale.
“Torture also specifically violates the Eighth Amendment: ’Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.’ Hoping to circumvent this, the administration appealed to the Department of Justice (DOJ) for advice. Attorneys Jay Bybee and John Yoo complied. In a memo dated March 14, 2003, they freed the federal government from the Eighth’s constraints with facile, specious reasoning: the amendment ’applies solely to those persons upon whom criminal sanctions have been imposed.’ It ’thus has no application to those individuals who have not been punished as part of a criminal proceeding, irrespective of the fact that they have been detained by the government. . . . The detention of enemy combatants can in no sense be deemed ’punishment’ for purposes of the Eighth Amendment. Unlike imprisonment pursuant to a criminal sanction, the detention of enemy combatants involves no sentence judicially imposed or legislatively required. . . . Accordingly, the Eighth Amendment has no application here.’
“Yoo and Bybee also defined ‘torture’ (torture becomes torture only when ‘equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily functions, or even death’). They capped this tour de force by shrugging that it doesn’t matter anyway because national defense justifies anything; besides, the president is omnipotent in time of war. That leads to some scary stuff. Someone asked Yoo, “If the president deems that he’s got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person’s child, there is no law that can stop him?’ Yoo answered, ’No treaty.’
“Yoo and Bybee’s memos sailed so far over the top that even the DOJ eventually disavowed them--but not before prisoners at Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, and the CIA’s secret gulags suffered agonizingly. And not before torture’s evil genie escaped its bottle to haunt America.
“Can we wrestle it back inside? Not easily. Torture is one of the state’s favorite tools. Governments throughout history have wielded it mercilessly because pain is the simplest means of controlling people. As the United States cuts more of its constitutional moorings, as Congress continues to legislate against our interests in favor of the American empire, it will increasingly need to force compliance. And the easiest way to do that is to threaten us with severe pain. The administration has already gulled too many Americans into endorsing torture so long as the government hurts only bad guys and only to protect us. That reasoning will allow rulers to bring their tortures home, to our shores. After all, drug dealers endanger us. So do child abusers, rapists, executives of companies that pollute or discriminate, tax resisters, political protestors, etc.
“Trying to justify torture in 2005, the president blustered, ’There’s an enemy that lurks and plots and plans and wants to hurt America again.’ Sadly, it’s the Bush administration.” [pp. 28-29]
I said it during the 2008 U.S. Senate for Kentucky campaign, and I’ll say it again, “Let’s outlaw torture!”
By
Becky Akers
[first published in The New American, June 9, 2008, pp. 25-29]
“The Bush administration admits to condoning acts that most people would deem torture. Now we know that the administration determined how the tortures were to be carried out. [p. 25].
* * *
“Torture fails in other ways, too. The country condoning it loses its soul as the unspeakable becomes ordinary and terror stalks the land. But even if torture worked, even if it alone could wring the truth from its victims without savaging society, it is still and always wrong. Under any circumstances, no matter what. There can be no debate. Those who argue otherwise leave morality, humanity, decency, and civilization far behind.
“Torture obviously violates the Golden Rule. We can presume that a president who brags about his Christianity should obey that divine law, unless he asks Muslims to shackle him and pour water up his nose, we can also presume that what he does unto others is not what he wants others to do unto him. Indeed, the Victim of an earlier empire’s torture commanded His followers to bless--not waterboard--their enemies. One can be a torturer or a Christian but not both.
“Torture inevitably leads to more sins, notably lying and murder. Bush, Cheney, Rice, et al. continue to insist that America does not torture though the CIA waterboarded at least three suspected terrorists and abused hundreds more. These politicians lie about the nature of the agonies they inflict, preposterously pretending that excruciating pain is not torture. The’ve lied about the accuracy and importance of the information their victims revealed; for example, they claimed that waterboarding Abu Zubaida wrung secrets from him he would have otherwise withheld. But ‘former FBI officials privy to details of the case continue to dispute the CIA’s account of the effectiveness of the harsh measures,’ as the Washington Post noted last December.
“Torturers almost always murder, too--and we’re not talking just ‘accidental’ deaths from too many beatings. Hurting a man makes an implacable enemy of him, so governments often execute victims rather than free them to seek vengeance or justice.
“Torture is as anti-constitutional as it is anti-Christian. It mocks everything the Founding Fathers sought to achieve, in spirit and in letter. The Constitution’s entire purpose is to restrain government, to stymie its endless quest to control us, to neutralize the world’s deadliest and most destructive force. Imbuing government with the virulent power of torture, then, defeats the Constitution’s rationale.
“Torture also specifically violates the Eighth Amendment: ’Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.’ Hoping to circumvent this, the administration appealed to the Department of Justice (DOJ) for advice. Attorneys Jay Bybee and John Yoo complied. In a memo dated March 14, 2003, they freed the federal government from the Eighth’s constraints with facile, specious reasoning: the amendment ’applies solely to those persons upon whom criminal sanctions have been imposed.’ It ’thus has no application to those individuals who have not been punished as part of a criminal proceeding, irrespective of the fact that they have been detained by the government. . . . The detention of enemy combatants can in no sense be deemed ’punishment’ for purposes of the Eighth Amendment. Unlike imprisonment pursuant to a criminal sanction, the detention of enemy combatants involves no sentence judicially imposed or legislatively required. . . . Accordingly, the Eighth Amendment has no application here.’
“Yoo and Bybee also defined ‘torture’ (torture becomes torture only when ‘equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily functions, or even death’). They capped this tour de force by shrugging that it doesn’t matter anyway because national defense justifies anything; besides, the president is omnipotent in time of war. That leads to some scary stuff. Someone asked Yoo, “If the president deems that he’s got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person’s child, there is no law that can stop him?’ Yoo answered, ’No treaty.’
“Yoo and Bybee’s memos sailed so far over the top that even the DOJ eventually disavowed them--but not before prisoners at Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, and the CIA’s secret gulags suffered agonizingly. And not before torture’s evil genie escaped its bottle to haunt America.
“Can we wrestle it back inside? Not easily. Torture is one of the state’s favorite tools. Governments throughout history have wielded it mercilessly because pain is the simplest means of controlling people. As the United States cuts more of its constitutional moorings, as Congress continues to legislate against our interests in favor of the American empire, it will increasingly need to force compliance. And the easiest way to do that is to threaten us with severe pain. The administration has already gulled too many Americans into endorsing torture so long as the government hurts only bad guys and only to protect us. That reasoning will allow rulers to bring their tortures home, to our shores. After all, drug dealers endanger us. So do child abusers, rapists, executives of companies that pollute or discriminate, tax resisters, political protestors, etc.
“Trying to justify torture in 2005, the president blustered, ’There’s an enemy that lurks and plots and plans and wants to hurt America again.’ Sadly, it’s the Bush administration.” [pp. 28-29]
I said it during the 2008 U.S. Senate for Kentucky campaign, and I’ll say it again, “Let’s outlaw torture!”
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Yarmuth over Northup by 17%
The Democrats are expected to hold our latest U.S. House seat in Kentucky by a large margin according to the latest SUSA poll, as it shows:
"Results of SurveyUSA Election Poll #13983
"Northup Starts Well Behind in Bid to Re-Take KY3 Seat From Yarmuth: In an election for the US House of Representatives from Kentucky's 3rd Congressional District today, 06/09/08, 148 days from the November general election, Democratic incumbent John Yarmuth defeats former Republican representative Anne Northup in a rematch of the 2006 KY3 election, according to this exclusive WHAS-TV poll conducted by SurveyUSA. Today, it's Yarmuth 57%, Northup 40%. Northup runs 8 points weaker today than she did in 2006, when she lost to Yarmuth 51% to 48%. Yarmuth runs 6 points stronger than he did in 2006. In between 2006 and today, Northup run for Governor of Kentucky and lost in the GOP primary to then incumbent Ernie Fletcher. Today: Yarmuth leads among young and old, male and female, white and black. 15% of Republicans cross over and vote for Democrat Yarmuth; 16% of Democrats cross over and vote for Republican Northup. Independents split. Northup represented the district for 5 terms, first elected in 1996. In 2004, Northup won with 60% of the vote. The district is watched nationally as a barometer of how other districts may vote. In SurveyUSA's release today, 33% of likely voters are Republican, identical to the 33% who said they were Republican in SurveyUSA's final 2006 pre-election poll. But the number of likely voters who say they are Democrats is up from 54% in SurveyUSA's final 2006 pre-election poll to 60% today."
Maybe this is part of a larger trend in favor of the Federal Democratic candidates in Kentucky. Let's Ditch Mitch.
"Results of SurveyUSA Election Poll #13983
"Northup Starts Well Behind in Bid to Re-Take KY3 Seat From Yarmuth: In an election for the US House of Representatives from Kentucky's 3rd Congressional District today, 06/09/08, 148 days from the November general election, Democratic incumbent John Yarmuth defeats former Republican representative Anne Northup in a rematch of the 2006 KY3 election, according to this exclusive WHAS-TV poll conducted by SurveyUSA. Today, it's Yarmuth 57%, Northup 40%. Northup runs 8 points weaker today than she did in 2006, when she lost to Yarmuth 51% to 48%. Yarmuth runs 6 points stronger than he did in 2006. In between 2006 and today, Northup run for Governor of Kentucky and lost in the GOP primary to then incumbent Ernie Fletcher. Today: Yarmuth leads among young and old, male and female, white and black. 15% of Republicans cross over and vote for Democrat Yarmuth; 16% of Democrats cross over and vote for Republican Northup. Independents split. Northup represented the district for 5 terms, first elected in 1996. In 2004, Northup won with 60% of the vote. The district is watched nationally as a barometer of how other districts may vote. In SurveyUSA's release today, 33% of likely voters are Republican, identical to the 33% who said they were Republican in SurveyUSA's final 2006 pre-election poll. But the number of likely voters who say they are Democrats is up from 54% in SurveyUSA's final 2006 pre-election poll to 60% today."
Maybe this is part of a larger trend in favor of the Federal Democratic candidates in Kentucky. Let's Ditch Mitch.
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