The big announcement -- it's Tiger, not Afghanistan that leads the news

President Barack Obama is less than 24 hours from officially announcing a massive expansion of the war effort in Afghanistan and, yet, the lead story on tonights CBS news on channel 2 was about Tiger Woods (and no story on the war, whatsoever). It's as if the folks at CBS New York read Chris Hedges' Truthdig column today and wanted to prove him right.

'Waist Deep in the Big Muddy'

Reading this story on the Obama troop increase in Afghanistan, this song from Pete Seeger comes into my head:

But every time I read the papers
That old feeling comes on;
We're -- waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.

'Reality check,' an interview with Chris Hedges

Here is the link to my piece on Chris Hedges from this week's Time Off. Click here.

A Dog's Life by Hank Kalet

with the dining room table
covered in bills
and all the proofs
that responsibility requires,
the packing slips
and insurance cards,
catalogues and doctor's notes,
I think sometimes of when I was 8
and the worst I had to do
was homework and swing my bat
and miss at a slow-tossed pitch
and wonder where that time went
and, sometimes, I just
look at the dogs and think
they've got it right,
find a patch of sunlight,
crawl into a ball
and sleep, yes, sleep.

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Yes, we still have broken markets

Two quotations from a story in The Washington Post on the financial crisis coming out of Dubai make it clear that, while the recession officially has ended, the economy remains very badly broken.

Quote 1:

"Dubai is very much a reminder that the lingering effects of the credit bubble are still with us," said Barry Knapp, of U.S. equity investments at Barclays Capital. "While there no real direct linkages to U.S. markets and our direct exposure is small, we have plenty of our own bad debts in the U.S."

Quote 2:

"The actual losses out of Dubai may be fairly limited, but it shows that we're not out of the woods, yet," said Rachel Ziemba, a senior analyst at Roubini Global Economics who tracks the Middle East. "We may be out of recession, but some of the underlying fundamentals that caused the credit crisis, those still remain."

And this doesn't take into account people who are unemployed or underemployed.

The reality is that we have done nothing to address the "underlying fundamentals" of a system that had come to resemble a casino rather than a functioning, productive economy. And even if we have several quarters of growth, it appears likely that we will continue to have high unemployment and be susceptible to the kind of market volatility we've been living with for the last 18 months.

Penny wise, pound foolish

We have too long been in an emergency situation, as far as the state's budget, but the flare up over providing money to the state's food banks so they can fill their nearly empty shelves, seems -- as the cliche goes -- penny wise and pound foolish.

Gov. Jon Corzine wants to provide the money, Gov.-elect Chris Christie doesn't. The dispute illustrates the kinds of problems that crop up when a state -- or the federal government -- fails to manage the public's money wisely during good times: When bad times hit, it is left without money to do what absolutely must be done.

In this case, the state has what I think is a moral obligation to help the food banks out -- given the skyrocketing increase in the number of people who have been forced by the economy to make use of food banks and soup kitchens.

Subterranean is updated with a new poem

I've posted a poem to Subterranean, my poetry blog, called Blue Wall in Chile.

Signs of the times

We're starting to see more and more of the signs these days, as home-sellers continue to find a paucity of buyers out there, driving prices down. Call these "for rent" placards the signs of our times.

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Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie Asleep on Thanksgiving

Rosie is relaxing, listening to the Macy's parade. Sophie's asleep on the couch. Must be nice to be a dog.

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Dispatches: Opening the Fed's windows

This week's Dispatches column is on the move to subject the Federal Reserve bank to a Congressional audit.

Say it ain't so O

Any notion that President Barack Obama will be scaling back our military involvement in Afghanistan has now come to a crashing halt.

Obama, according to The New York Times, said today "it is his intention to “finish the job” that began with the overthrow of the Taliban government in the fall of 2001."

Mr. Obama, offering a tantalizing preview of what looms as one of the momentous decisions of his presidency, said he would tell the American people about “a comprehensive strategy” embracing civilian and diplomatic efforts as well as the continuing military campaign.

While he avoided any hints of the new troop levels he foresees in Afghanistan, the president signaled that he will not be talking about a short-term commitment but rather an effort muscular enough to “dismantle and degrade” the enemy and ensure that “Al Qaeda and its extremist allies cannot operate” in the region.

A round of White House meetings on Afghanistan, which concluded on Monday night, included discussions about sending about 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, administration officials said. There are about 68,000 United States troops there now.

And now there will be more -- and, despite the apparent inclusion of an "exit strategy," they are going to be there for a long, long time.

The decision to double down on Afghanistan comes at a moment when the war has lost support among the American people and it is becoming clearer by the day that continued fighting will do little more than further inflame the situation.

A piece in the Sunday Times' Week In Review by Robert Wright, author of an important
overview of religious history called The Evolution of God (I am reading it now and find it fascinating), offers a glimpse into the potential side-effects of this unnecessary remedy to our security ills.

These could include the creation of homegrown terrorists. Wright, focusing on the horrible case of "Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan and the Fort Hood massacre," says -- quoting the argument of dovish liberals -- attempting to end terrorism by killing terrorists is counterproductive. It actually does more to spread terrorism than to stop it.

One reason killing terrorists can spread terrorism is that various technologies — notably the Internet and increasingly pervasive video — help emotionally powerful messages reach receptive audiences. When American wars kill lots of Muslims, inevitably including some civilians, incendiary images magically find their way to the people who will be most inflamed by them.

This calls into question our nearly obsessive focus on Al Qaeda — the deployment of whole armies to uproot the organization and to finally harpoon America’s white whale, Osama bin Laden. If you’re a Muslim teetering toward radicalism and you have a modem, it doesn’t take Mr. bin Laden to push you over the edge. All it takes is selected battlefield footage and a little ad hoc encouragement: a jihadist chat group here, a radical imam there — whether in your local mosque or on a Web site in your local computer.

If this is the case -- and I believe it is -- then the Afghanistan war and our incursions into Pakistan and potentially other hot spots becomes a game of "Wack-a-Mole." Each time a mole pops up from its hole and we smash it, another mole pops up from another hole.

Bulking up our mission in Afghanistan, therefore, will do little to alter this and could do much to exacerbate it.

As Wright points out,

Central to the debate over Afghanistan is the question of whether terrorists need a “safe haven” from which to threaten America. If so, it is said, then we must work to keep every acre of Afghanistan (and Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, etc.) out of the hands of groups like the Taliban. If not — if terrorists can orchestrate a 9/11 about as easily from apartments in Germany as from camps in Afghanistan — then maybe never-ending war isn’t essential.

However you come out on that argument, the case of Nidal Hasan shows one thing for sure: Homegrown American terrorists don’t need a safe haven. All they need is a place to buy a gun.

I'm not arguing that we should ignore terrorism. On the contrary, we should address it using a law-enforcement model, which would require a greater reliance on intelligence gathering and investigation, while also focusing on international economic development and aid.

There is another drawback to Obama's apparent "surge": It will derail his domestic agenda, sucking dollars from the treasury while weakening support for the president at home. LBJ is the model for this, of course, as Bill Moyers reminded us last week, when he made the connection between Vietnam and Afghanistan and LBJ and Obama:

Now in a different world, at a different time, and with a different president, we face the prospect of enlarging a different war. But once again we're fighting in remote provinces against an enemy who can bleed us slowly and wait us out, because he will still be there when we are gone.

Once again, we are caught between warring factions in a country where other foreign powers fail before us. Once again, every setback brings a call for more troops, although no one can say how long they will be there or what it means to win. Once again, the government we are trying to help is hopelessly corrupt and incompetent.

And once again, a President pushing for critical change at home is being pressured to stop dithering, be tough, show he's got the guts, by sending young people seven thousand miles from home to fight and die, while their own country is coming apart.

And once again, the loudest case for enlarging the war is being made by those who will not have to fight it, who will be safely in their beds while the war grinds on. And once again, a small circle of advisers debates the course of action, but one man will make the decision.

We will never know what would have happened if Lyndon Johnson had said no to more war. We know what happened because he said yes.

I hope Obama is not following the path blazed by LBJ. That would be a tragedy for all of us.

Quote of the day

Read this quotation from Len Deo, president of the nonprofit New Jersey Policy Council -- which opposes marriage equality.

"They don’t have the votes. It would be a real tragedy if it was passed in lame-duck."

Maybe I'm misreading this, but he seems to be saying that they don't have the votes, but it could pass -- otherwise why would he be wortied about it passing in lame-duck. A bit of hyperbole? Or I'm just tired.

Wandering aimlessly is for the dogs

It's one of those lazy Sundays. sun out and a chill in the air. But I have too much to do -- grade papers. write up my interview with Chris Hedges, revise some poems. chop the leaves and cut the lawn, clean the rugs for Thanksgiving, give the dogs a bath -- to just sit here and veg.

Rosie has the right idea, just wander the yard aimlessly. I'd love to join her.

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Big or small step forward toward reform? Both

The voting has begun and, according to the reports, Democrats are going to get the 60 votes they need to keep the debate going on the healthcare bill. Call it both a big victory and a Pyrrhic victory. Big, because it keeps debate moving forward, keeps the possibility alive that we will have some level of reform; Pyrrhic, because the reform in question is likely only to have an incremental benefit while transferring a vast amount of cash from ordinary Americans into the pockets of the insurance industry.

Two new poems

A couple of new poems on The Subterranean site -- "Still Life: Graveyard on Woodbridge Avenue" and "Notes on 'En La Casa De La Casa'."

Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie A pair of mushy mutts

Sometimes they are angels, but usually only when they're sleeping.

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Oh, no! Moyers is retiring

David Sirota sums up this news in a tweet:

This is EXTREMELY bad news for the already-dying world of serious journalism

Yes, Bill Moyers is retiring, meaning the Journal will end -- at the same time that Now, the show he created and that David Brancaccio stewarded so well is being cancelled. Maybe it's time to get rid of the television.

Score one for the little guys

The Federal Reserve, as William Greider has written, thrives on secrecy, making it the perfect tool for the banking and finance industry to gin up profits. Whatever its earliest mission, it now functions as nothing more than the bankers' private government support system.

The veil, however, could be lifted if legislation that has garnered wide, bipartisan support can get through Congress with enough support -- both from members of the two houses and from the public at large -- to force the president to sign it.

The legislation, as described by Ryan Grim on The Huffington Post, is pretty straightforward.

The measure, cosponsored by Reps. Ron Paul (R-Texas) and Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), authorizes the Government Accountability Office to conduct a wide-ranging audit of the Fed's opaque deals with foreign central banks and major U.S. financial institutions. The Fed has never had a real audit in its history and little is known of what it does with the trillions of dollars at its disposal.

Critics of the bill say it will compromise the Fed's independence, opening it up to political manipulation. The problem with the argument, however, is that the Fed already is subject to political influence -- but from the banking industry, without any say from the government or the people it is supposed to represent.

That was the gist of a letter from a coalition of labor, left-leaning economists and other progressives seeking to democratize the Web, as reported by The Huffington Post earlier in the week.

The letter notes that during the financial crisis of the past two years, the Fed's role has shifted from simply setting monetary policy via interest rates to rapidly acquiring "a wide variety of private assets and extend[ing] massive secret bailouts to major financial institutions."

Among those bailouts, critics argue, was the Fed's funneling of cash to AIG counterparties. Earlier this week, a government watchdog issued a blistering report that blamed the Federal Reserve for withholding details of its massive rescue of AIG last fall. In particular, the report blamed the Federal Reserve for paying for botching its private negotiations regarding the price AIG's rapidly souring derivatives investments, a secret move that cost taxpayers at least $13 billion.

The issue has created what to Washington's eyes might seem like strange bed fellows -- libertarian rightwinger Ron Paul and lefties like Alan Grayson and Dennis Kucinich -- but that's only because the Washington establishment cannot see beyond the D-R paradigm. The Fed question must be viewed from a different vantage point, one that arranges the political world along the question of economic democracy.

Paul and Grayson may have different views, ultimately, of how the economy should function, but they both are concerned about the outsized and still-growing influence of the financial industry on the economy and our democracy.

This legislation is not perfect, either, but it is necessary. The fact that people like Timothy Geithner and Lawrence Summers oppose it should be enough to make us realize just how much.

Friday Five (a double five for good measure): Won't these people just leave us alone?

I don't know about anyone else, but I've had just about enough of the former governor of Alaska. With her memoir on the bookstands, she's been a painful and constant presence on the tube -- hitting Oprah and the morning shows and generally sucking all the wind out of the political sails.

It has nothing to do with her political career -- she is what she is, a staunch tea-bag conservative, an anti-intellectual and potentially popular enough to steal the GOP nomination for president in two-and-a-half years. But her star power is limited to that very narrow realm.

And yet, we are being made to pay attention, mostly because the political media on both sides of the ideological divide have lost their grip on politics and have turned coverage of Washington into the same kind of shallow celebrity-driven mush that dominates discussion of art, film and music.

Enough, I say. Palin takes the top spot on my current list of people I just wish would go away. We must allow her -- or order her -- to fade back into the snow banks of Alaska, where she can hunt and snowmobile to her heart's content. (John McCain, by the way, deserves the blame for this; anyone who might be having second thoughts about Barack Obama just needs to consider the Palin factor and the complete disregard by McCain for anything but political calculation.)

Following Palin on the list are:

• 2: Carrie Prejean. It is amazing how famous one can become for being clueless.
• 3 & 4: Jon and Kate, with or without eight
• 5: Former Bogota, N.J., Mayor Steve Lonegan and his tea-bag, anti-immigrant nonsense. Why the New Jersey press corps has started taking his invective seriously is beyond me.
• 6: Glenn Beck. Do I need to explain?
• 7: The Jackson family. Does anyone else find it creepy that the remaining Jacksons will be doing a reality show?
• 8: Rudy Giuliani. This guy may have the world's largest ego.
• 9: Dick Cheney and all the little Cheneys. As with the hate-monger Beck, do I need to explain?
• 10: Levi Johnston. Here is a guy who is famous for being the unwed father of a failed vice-presidential candidate who just won't go away. Need I say more?

Dispatches: In Washington, no deficit of hot air

Dispatches is on the bizarre logic in Washington that forces domsestic reforms to be measured against the deficit, but not military adventures.

Runner's diary, Thursday

I did three miles this morning, the second time this week I did three. It wasn't easy, but I did it. So, we go from there and see what happens, the goal being a half marathon in the spring.

First shot on Wall Street's bow

This is not a perfect bill, but it is the kind of legislation that could push us toward a more democratic central bank. What I find intriguing is the way the Republicans have signed on to legislation they never would have endorsed -- have never endorsed in the 20-some-odd years that Ron Paul has been proposing it -- mostly because Barack Obama's financial team is opposed.

Now, being on the opposite side from Larry Summers and Tim Geithner is not necessarily a bad thing, but you know that their motivation has nothing to do with policy and everything to do with politics.

In any case, why stop with an audit. Let's take it a step -- or many steps -- farther. Let's smash the current arrangement and craft a new one that will be responsive to the American people rather than the banks.

William Greider, in The Nation, offers a list of prescriptions that have merit, legislation on the table in both houses that could become law if enough lawmakers are willing to break with the banks and do their jobs. They include:

• Sen. Chris Dodd's proposal to "strip the Fed of its regulatory functions because of its 'abysmal failure' to protect the public, and to replace it with an overarching regulatory administration."
• Sen. Richard Shelby's interest in "eliminat(ing) bankers' insider influence over regulation at the Fed."
• Several plans to tax Wall Street -- including an excise tax on financial transactions to pay for the bailout, proposed by Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.).
• Breaking up the big banks so they no longer will be "too big to fail."

So, whatever happens to the Paul plan, let's hope it is the first step toward real reform of our distorted financial system.

A growing shift toward same-sex marriage

Polls are notoriously fickle and unreliable, the results often depending on what a respond thinks his or her questioner wants to hear or how the questions themselves are framed.

But the poll released today by the Rutgers Eagleton Institute of Politics is another hopeful sign that New Jersey will do something too many states in the country have been unwilling to do: Give gays and lesbians full access to the rights the rest of us enjoy. According to the poll:

Supporters of gay marriage may find New Jersey more hospitable than many other states, according to a Rutgers-Eagleton Poll released today. By a 46 percent to 42 percent margin, adults in New Jerseyans favor legalizing same-sex nuptials, with 12 percent unsure.

The survey also shows that if the state Legislature passes a bill legalizing gay marriage, 52 percent would accept the decision, while 40 percent would support a constitutional amendment banning the practice.

“Residents of New Jersey are more supportive of gay marriage than opposed to it, and more importantly a majority would accept a legislative decision legalizing same-sex marriages,” said David Redlawsk, director of the Rutgers-Eagleton Poll and professor of political science at Rutgers University. “While this tests opinion outside the intensity of a campaign to ban gay marriage as occurred in California, there is more of a ‘live and let live’ attitude in New Jersey than in many other states that have dealt with this issue.”

The key number, of course, is not the 46-42 support figure -- that's barely more than the margin of error and pegs support at less than 50 percent. Rather, the key is the 52 percent -- a real majority -- who say they would accept the state Legislature's decision, were it to legalize same-sex marriage.

There is no way of knowing what will happen when same-sex marriage is legalized -- and make no mistake, it will be legalized, most likely sometime next month -- but I think it's more likely we'll follow the model of Massachusetts and not California.

Christie to attack the patchworks

Talking to municipal officials as the gubernatorial election wound down, I was struck by how many of them viewed Chris Christie as an ally in their attempts to beat back the tides of change. Forget the affordable housing issue, for a second, on which he does appear ready to make suburban mayors happy. It is on consolidation -- or, to be more precise, in opposition to consolidation -- that many mayors and others were looking with optimism toward the now-governor-elect.

Talk to officials from many of the region's towns and you discover rather quickly that they think there is too much government, just not at the home office. So, they look to the state for cash, but refuse to do what is necessary to streamline the state's confusing web of government entities.

Corzine, in a small way, put the issue on the table; Christie avoided it, but sent signals that he was with the towns.

And now the former U.S. Attorney is the governor-elect, we have a better handle on where he stands on what may be the most important issue he could face. During a speech at the state League of Municipalities today,

Christie delivered a forceful speech in which he said he would use "every tool at my disposal to force change."

"The people of the state of New Jersey will no longer stand for us asking, 'What's in it for me,'" he said at the luncheon at the annual League of Municipalities convention. "I believe the message from this last election, the message to me and to (Lt. Gov-elect) Kim Guadagno, is we have to start asking what's in it for us. And what is in it for us is a period of continued pain, continued difficulty and continued challenge."

The state has become a "patchwork of 'what's in it for me'" over the years, Christie said. "That attitude is no longer acceptable to the people of this state," he said in a warning tone.

Though he never said the words "shared services" or "consolidation," that's the message the municipal leaders in the room said they heard.

"We're talking about possible layoffs and consolidations that we'd prefer not to do," said Ellen Dickson, president of Summit Common Council. "It's going to be very painful but we have to do it or else the state will be unlivable."

Are we looking at something analagous to Bill Clinton and welfare reform, or Ronald Reagan and nuclear weapons? A Republican president never could have pushed through the draconian reforms enacted by Clinton. It also is likely that a more dovish president than Reagan would have had difficulty selling anti-nuke efforts that Reagan pushed through.

In this case, Christie is perceived as a friend of the suburbs, unlike Corzine, so he might not stir up the kind of almost paranoid opposition to consolidation we've been hearing for a while. Let's see where this goes.

DeFazio is right

The Obama administration should never have turned to these guys for economic advice, and their record since January has only proven this. The president should listen to Peter DeFazio and replace them.

There are plenty of options, of course, including progressive economists like James K. Galbraith, Robert Reich, Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz, Dean Baker, who could refocus not only the Obama administration away from Wall Street but help create a new path for the economy as a whole.

The shame of the nation: More people are going hungry

Another bit of bad news that demonstrates that the economy may be in recovery, but it is not getting better.

WASHINGTON — The number of Americans who lived in households that lacked consistent access to adequate food soared last year, to 49 million, the highest since the government began tracking what it calls “food insecurity” 14 years ago, the Department of Agriculture reported Monday.

The increase, of 13 million Americans, was much larger than even the most pessimistic observers of hunger trends had expected and cast an alarming light on the daily hardships caused by the recession’s punishing effect on jobs and wages.

About a third of these struggling households had what the researchers called “very low food security,” meaning lack of money forced members to skip meals, cut portions or otherwise forgo food at some point in the year.

The other two-thirds typically had enough to eat, but only by eating cheaper or less varied foods, relying on government aid like food stamps, or visiting food pantries and soup kitchens.

“These numbers are a wake-up call for the country,” said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.

I wish it was a wakeup call, but with so many facing economic uncertainty the methods we've relied on for far too long (private and faith-based food pantries and soup kitchens) just won't cut it now (they do not have the means).

A federal response is necessary, but unlikely -- very much to our shame as a nation. In the meantime, maybe we should take Swift's sarcastic advice and just eat the poor.

Mythology of cost: Health care v. the war

Let's do some simple arithmetic: The heathcare reform legislation approved by the House of Representatives last week -- H.R. 3962 -- is estimated to cost $891 billion over 10 years, while reducing the federal deficit by $109 billion, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. That's about $90 billion a year.

Compare this with the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which the CBO estimates cost the nation $604 billion during their first six years and have been cost in the neighborhood of $100 billion a year over all.

Basically, we could pay for healthcare -- and maybe some other needs -- were we to end the disastrous military conflicts and focus our attentions on repairing the cracks in our own foundations, cracks that have been widening with every dollar spent on war.

The discussion of our budget deficit rarely gets framed this way; rather, we talk only about our domestic priorities -- heatlh care, infrastructure, the regulatory agencies -- as contributing to the ballooning deficit and debt. Money spent on war, however, is a different animal altogether.

This is the point David Sirota makes today in his OpenLeft blog post, commenting on a weekend New York Times story on the costs of an expanded Afghan war:

Kudos, of course, to the Times for even reporting on the unfathomably large costs of intensifying militarism and adventurism. But as you'll see in the story, there's no attempt to put the costs into any context - specifically, there's no mention that an escalation in Afghanistan would mean outlays for the one-year Pentagon budget is approaching the total outlays of the entire 10-year health care bill.

Earlier, in his syndicated column, Sirota sums up a contradiction that blames domestic spending -- specifically spending that has a liberal or progressive goal, like eradicating poverty, ameliorating poverty's impacts or making sure everyone has health coverage -- for pushing the federal budget into deficit.

When the House considered a health care expansion proposal that the CBO says will reduce the deficit by $11 billion a year, tea-party protesters and Congress' self-described "fiscal conservatives" opposed it on cost grounds. At the same time, almost none of them objected when Congress passed a White House-backed bill to spend $636 billion on defense in 2010.

The hypocrisy is stunning — lots of "budget hawk" complaints about health legislation reducing the deficit and few "budget hawk" complaints about defense initiatives that, according to Government Executive magazine, "puts the president on track to spend more on defense, in real dollars, than any other president has in one term of office since World War II." And that estimate doesn't even count additional spending on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

Sirota blames "skewed reporting" and the lying liars like Sen. Joe Lieberman, who cherry-pick numbers and ignore what might be inconvenient to their argument.

I can but agree, though the failures of the news media are due not to any skewed motivation but rather to a flaw in how journalism is now practiced in Washington and the state capitals. Journalists have become stenographers to power -- or boomboxes for the powerful, if you're talking about broadcast/cable -- who do nothing more than regurgitate what they are told by disingenuous politicians.

Add to this the ingrained desire to chase conflict and you have a recipe for lies and distortion becoming accepted wisdom -- afterall, to paraphrase a quotation attributed to Vladimir Lenin, tell a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.

Grassroots: Blow up the Senate (not literally)

Grassroots -- on the undemocratic nature of the U.S. Senate -- is on The Progressive Populist Web site.

Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie Sleep like a dog

Rosie is sound asleep -- it's amazing how she can go from being a ball of craziness to "Sleeping Beauty" in seconds.

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The good, the bad and the ugly

The immigration plan outlined by Janet Napolitano yesterday at the Center for American Progress can best be summed up by the title of a Sergio Leone spaghetti western: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

The plan is good in that it creates a pathway toward legalization for the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants currently in the United States and focuses most of the law-enforcement efforts on employers who use undocumented workers and the coyotes who smuggle them into the country.

The bad is the specifics of the pathway, which include requiring

illegal immigrants who hope to gain legal status ... to register, pay fines and all taxes they owe, pass a criminal background check and learn English.

This raises the question of what kind of fines and whether they will act as an impediment toward bringing the undocumented out of the shadows.

The American Immigration Council calls for a relatively simple process that could include small fines and avoids onerous requirements and other rules designed to minimize the number of people who can be legalized. It has offered a blueprint that seems to make sense. Basically, it includes:

1. Covering as many people as possible, which "makes sense from a humanitarian perspective" and gives the program its best chance of succeeding.


2. Creating a "straightforward process that measures prospective, rather than retrospective, eligibility" and does not include "overly onerous, politically motivated initial requirements." This "will maximize the likelihood of success," the organization says.


3. Avoid large fines and focus on "Basic proof of identity and a criminal background check(s)."

Minimize the impulse to punish people. There is likely to be considerable political pressure to impose high fines, require people to leave the country before applying, limit the ability to bring in immediate family, or complete other requirements in exchange for legal status. While these measures sound tough, they are counterproductive. In order to achieve the broadest possible legalization, the eligibility criteria and evidentiary standards must be achievable by a maximum number of people.

4. Focus on "integration into the community and a commitment to becoming a lawful permanent resident."

Upon registration, applicants should be a on a path that leads to a green card, provided they meet specified criteria. The criteria that most seem to measure commitment—paying taxes, learning English, working hard or going to school, staying out of trouble—can be built into the requirements for successful completion of the program, but the trade off must be legal status that can eventually lead to citizenship. Without the promise of a green card, legalization is nothing more than an expanded temporary worker program, running the risk of creating a second-class citizen with the right to work, but with no incentives to put down roots and no opportunity to remain lawfully. Newly legalized immigrants must not be granted a distinctive status that singles them out from other legal immigrants, inviting discrimination and abuse.

And then there is the ugly -- the continued heavy focus on enforcement and the "fence," which she praised and which the administration does not appear ready or willing to abandon.

Sunday Poetry at the South Brunswick Library

Tomorrow's reading -- Nov. 15 at 2 p.m. -- will feature my friends from the Edison Literary Review, Gina and John Larkin and Tony Gruenwald, and whoever else might show up. I'll be MCing and reading in the open session at the end.

And a reminder, I'll be the feature poet along with Renee Ashley on Dec. 13.

The readings start at 2 p.m. at the library, 110 Kingston Lane in Monmouth Junction.

Please bring a nonperishable food item to be donated to the South Brunswick Food Pantry.

Let them eat ... somewhere else

Stories like this leave me shaking my head:

A judge has ruled that a church in Phoenix, where homelessness is on the rise, cannot feed the homeless. Crossroads United Methodist Church lost a court battle that began after neighbors complained about its weekly pancake breakfast and the hungry riff-raff turning up for it. Zoning, says the court.

The pastor, on the church's blog, sums up the contradictions and biases implicit in the ruling, ones that only increase the dangerous economic divide in our society, a chasm that threatens to rip us apart.

However, there’s still a lot of questions to be answered. Questions like, How hungry? What about our potlucks? What about our Christmas dinner or Easter Sunrise breakfast? When I eat that, I am pretty hungry…is that allowed? What about the coffee and donuts we serve on Sunday mornings? Can we eat that if we are hungry? And then there is the other question, “How poor?” How poor do we have to be to be considered a “charity?” Federal-poverty-guidelines-poor? Not-able-to-make-the-house-payment-poor? Or, how about not-able-to-pay-off-the-credit-card-poor?

Or, are we just discriminating against people who are poor and who don’t have homes, because we don’t like what we feel when we see them? The real issue, is not that there are hungry people out there, or that we serve food in church, the real issue is that we are afraid. Afraid to reach out a helping hand; afraid to see what the economy could do to us; afraid to face our worst fears…

We can minister to the poor…that’s a given. We can hold a worship service for them out on the front lawn. We just can’t feed them. We can’t fill their bellies with warm food. …We might as well just go to the street corners and start handing out money, in hopes they will make their way to some food, because you are not allowed to do it at church!

And since, when we give food to the hungry and poor, that somehow redefines us as a “charity dining hall”…who among us can eat at church? Can we put a donut or a sip of coffee in our mouths when we can’t do the same for the poor? In good conscience, can we eat anything on church property if we can only give food to the well-off and wealthy?

The decision was rendered in Arizona, but it seems consistent with the kinds of battles we see over zoning everyday -- battles of affordable housing rules, for instance. As the pastor says, our opposition to many of these things stems from our discomfort with what they say about our society and our fear of the other, especially of those who are poor or darker skinned.

Accident of fate and dysfunction

I can just see the comments we're going to get on this story -- ugly, racist comments that always seem to end up being appended to anything we write about the issue of immigration.

But that would be unfair to the undocumented immigrants who now face longterm incarceration and deportation -- all because they were involved in a car accident on the N.J. Turnpike caused by an elderly driver heading the wrong way.

The accident just points out something that one of the lawyers I interviewed back in May -- I believe it was Princeton attorney Roger Martindell: That the smallest quirk of fate can have terrible consequences for the undocumented.

I know nothing about the men traveling in the truck that was hit on the Turnpike, but three are now in the county lockup and two have escaped back into the shadows -- a sad ending that was completely out of their control.

I know they were not supposed to be here. But they are and they were just minding their business and now face the brunt of what our dysfunctional immigration system has to offer. It just points up the arbitrary and completely inhumane manner in which the system functions -- treating men and women whose only crime was wanting to improve their lives as if they were the most hardened of criminals.

Dispatches: The right to happiness

This week's Dispatches column focuses on the consitutional issues surrounding the marriage-equality debate.

Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie Crazy about the Knicks

Although I often feel this way about the Knicks, I rarely take it out on inanimate objects like the dogs did this morning to my hat.

Then again, given that they tore into the couch and have been in maniacal mode since about 5:45, I don't think it had anything to do with basketball.

There is a lesson in this, I think, having to do with puppies, energy and attention, but I'm too tired at the moment to figure it out.

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Putting his foot down?

I'm watching the Rachel Maddow Show and listening to Seymour Hersh talk about the AP report that President Obama has rejected all Afghanistan war options currently on the table. Hersh says the president has finally put his foot down, after having given the generals carte blanch to create a plan -- which meant big war plans were likely to be pushed.

The AP report says that the "main sticking points appear to be timelines and mounting questions about the credibility of the Afghan government" and that the president "wants to make clear that the U.S. commitment in Afghanistan is not open-ended."

This is better news than I -- and many others who oppose an expanded war and who want the U.S. to scale back its military presence -- expected. But it is not enough.

We continue to approach the Afghanistan question with an imperial mindset, one that starts with war and ends with war and dismisses any options that do not involve war. We're not deaf to other possibilities, but actively and aggressively dismissive -- including to complaints by the people on the ground we say we're trying to help.

And in doing so, we ensure that the rest of the world distrusts us.

Toodleloo, Lou, not sad to see you go

Lou Dobbs ... don't let the door hit you in the buttocks on the way out.

Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie Trouble-making tricksters

Sophie may look angelic, at least sitting by the front door before we leave for work, but don't let it fool you. She and her sister have been in rare form.

They've been digging in the yard and rolling in the loose dirt, spreading the soil around the house and forcing to strip the bed. It seems like we do that at least twice a week these days -- why did we ever let them up there?

And they've learned to open the closet, which they've done a half dozen times today, stealing an umbrella and using it as a chew toy.

So, don't let those big eyes fool you.

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Illusory matters

Chris Hedges, author of the important Empire of Illusion, spoke tonight at Labyrinth Books in Princeton, offering a somewhat dark outlook on the direction of the nation, which he views as steeped in illusion and unwilling to face the reality of what has happened and is happening.

The national meltdown -- the erosion of the working class and destruction of our manufacturing base, the gambling by the financial sector which packaged and repackaged debt, sold it and created an ugly and unstable Ponzi scheme, our decaying environment and the growth of corporate power and American empire -- has created conditions that are ripe for fascism.

The cracks in the illusion can "propel people into this level of desperation" and a "profound personal and economic despair sits at the center of fascist and totalitarian movements," he said.

Our corporate culture -- which "perpetuates a never-ending childishness, an infantilism" -- robs everything of its moral value. We have a cult of self, have lost all sense of community or shared sacrifice or understanding that we are all heading toward the same ends. Everything is commodified and, "when everything is commodified, a society commits collective suicide."

the price of fame

What's brand worth? Apparently quite a bit. The purses are on sale for $149 -- regularly $329, That's obscene.

For $150, I could get a new Blackberry or a DVD player.

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Busy day at the outlets

We're at the Coach outlet in Jackson browsing -- thanks to a coupon -- and it's packed. I know everything is on sale, but this seems crazy for a pre-Thanksgiving Saturday during a painful recession.

Job numbers released yesterday were terrible -- highest unemployment rate in nearly three decades with many, many more working, but "underemployed" (i.e., working part-time or at jobs below their qualifications because nothing else is available).

I can only assume this is a good sign, or all these people are shopping to fight depression

I think I'll cross my fingers.

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Doggie diaries: The story of Rosie and Sophie Reintroducing the Nylabone -- s

We gave the dogs Nylabones for the first time since their major fight to see how they'd react.

Sophie got hers first, while Rosie was outside. Rosie got one when she came in.

They had then for about 15 uncomfortable minutes, both looking up from their bones with what appeared to be mistrust. I kept close watch.

The experiment ended when Rosie went over to Sophie and stood over her -- a dominance/territorial move that signaled potential trouble.

That's when the bones went away. We'll try again later or tomorrow, supervised, of course.

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Doggie diary: The story of Rosie and Sophie Exercise and television

We took the dogs for a long walk earlier, which we need to do more frequently. What I've noticed is that they tend to be better on their walks when they get out more frequently. So, that's what we need to do.

Now, of course, we're watching "The Dog Whisperer," Rosie quite intently.

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Too much celebration could result in a hangover

Part of me knows that Mets fans and the Mets organization would have put together the same kind of celebration, but it was difficult to watch this morning, sitting with Annie in the waiting room while my sister-in-law had some routine tests done.

It wasn't so much the players, but the people on NBC that made the entire spectacle difficult to listen to (I was trying to read and not watch), along with some of the peripheral folks. The introduction of all players, including those like Xavier Nady and Chien Ming Wa, who spent the bulk of the year on the DL, as if they were integral parts of the journey, just prolonged it.

It is over for now, but this a well-constructed team at its core -- Sabathia and Burnett in the rotation, perhaps the best infield in baseball, some solid outfielders, though some of the cogs are aging -- so we may have to endure the same thing next year.

My only hope is that the Mets rebound, get healthy and find the missing pieces to surround David Wright, Jose Reyes, Carlos Beltran and Johan Santana and get back to the playoffs and make a run a world title.

It's time to move on same-sex marriage

I am sure there is a majority in both houses of the state Legislature that supports same-sex marriage, but too many have failed to step up, moderates like state Sens. Bill Baroni and Jen Beck, who have stood up for gay rights and other socially liberal positions in the past, but have remained silent on the issue until now.

Assemblyman Reed Gusciora and state Sen. Loretta Weinberg have sponsored legislation -- with 11 Assembly co-sponsors and five Senate co-sponsors -- that deserves a hearing, and soon.
(There is a competing bill in the Assembly, voiding same-sex marriages, that is unlikely to get traction.)

The bills, both called the "Freedom of Religion and Equality in Civil Marriage Act," were introduced in June 2008, but remain dormant in both Judiciary committees. Sen. Paul Sarlo, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, told Tom Moran that he remains undecided.

"These are people I go to church with," he said. "I’m leaning towards not supporting it. But I’m an open-minded person."

Let's hope so. It's his ballgame for now.

Dispatches: It was all about Jersey

Dispatches is up -- on the election. The column already has generated a comment, disagreement from the right (from someone calling himself MotherRedDog).

And after all of that spin.........Obama did campaign for him often and yes the
money was big, and 25 percent of the voters said it WAS a referendum on
Obama.....spinning until you puke won't change these facts.

I am willing to admit that this is not a good thing for the Obama administration, but to think that 25 percent of voters -- not sure where the number comes from, but it's what he offers -- means much is absurd. That is fewer than voted for McCain last time.

In fact, fewer people voted for Chris Christie on Tuesday than voted for John McCain last year. The issue was turnout -- a complete lack of faith in the incumbent, mostly deserved, suppressing turnout in urban areas at a time when suburban Democrats bailed on the party.

The evidence just doesn't support the anti-Obama theory, at least not in New Jersey, where the president continues to poll well.

Define mandate

I'm not a big Mulshine fan, but this column pretty much covers it -- at least as far as Christie is concerned.

Voters held Corzine accountable; they will hold Christie accountable, too

The New Jersey electorate held Jon Corzine to his word and held him accountable for the mess the state is in, even if he was not responsible for a good portion of the mess.

That said, it will be interesting to see how Chris Christie, the new governor elect, can pull off his agenda without budget gimmicks and what might happen when it becomes obvious that we cannot lower both state and local taxes, cannot promise to cut waste and shrink government without hurting someone, without angering some constituency that he will need down the road.

Who gets hurt is the question that awaits. Who gets hurt? Because someone will get hurt. It is the only way to bridge an $8 billion gap.

Christie wins, but appears to lack coattails

AP has called it for Chris Christie and the TV news is trumpeting it, but it appears that he has few coattails. Democrats look like they are going to keep their seats in the Assembly, Republicans theirs and, of the handful of local results I've seen, only South Brunswick flipped, so we'll see.

And yet we're starting to hear the nonsense about how this shows a groundswell for the GOP, something I guess was inevitable.

Painting the Christie win as startling is startling in and of itself, given that Christie was ahead by 20 or so points early, saw the poll-lead evaporate and hung on. By rights, it shouldn't have been as close as it was.

I suspect the New Jersey vote has little to say what will happen nationally. Consider these numbers from the exit polling:

Obama made himself a major factor in the race by campaigning for Corzine twice in the final weeks of the race — including at two rallies on Sunday. The majority of voters said that their feelings about Obama were not a factor in their vote in the race for governor.

But voters' feelings about Obama were in sync with the what they did in the voting booths Tuesday. Christie voters strongly disapprove of Obama's performance; Corzine voters overwhelmingly approve of the president.

Two-thirds of Daggett voters said they approved of the president — perhaps a hint that Daggett's presence on the ballot hurt Corzine more than Christie.

The New Jersey Republican revolt of the early 1990s didn't prevent Bill Clinton from winning in New Jersey. And I suspect that the anti-Corzine revolt -- which is what this was, an anti-property tax, anti-Corzine vote -- will have little impact on the congressional races, as little as they appear to have had on the Legislature.

Results are in our hands, apparently

Patrick Murray of the Monmouth University Polling Institute offers an interesting overview, county by county, of how today's results may play out -- and it appears that Central Jersey is in the driver's seat.

Another area worth watching is the Route 1 corridor counties (Mercer, Middlesex, Union), especially Middlesex. Corzine won Middlesex by 32,000 votes in 2005. Florio only won it by 1,300 votes in 1993. Voters in this region tend to be independent minded but vote Democratic in most elections. Polling indicates that Corzine is performing nowhere near as well in this region as he did four years ago. [In the past month, both Joe Biden and Bill Clinton have held rallies in Middlesex County.] While all regions of the state have their part to play in this race, this is the one I’m keeping my eye on to tell which way the wind is blowing.

These are Democratic Counties. But, as Murray points out, the gubernatorial race has a different dynamic, due I think to the more diverse mix here -- racially, to be sure, but it also is a hodge-podge of rural, urban and suburban towns and poor, working class and rich communities.

If the turnout is large and the Democrats can convince the people not to jump ship as they move up the ballot, Chris Christie may have problems closing the deal.

On a side note, the national coverage of this race seems to have forgotten that it was just a few months ago that Christie was up by more than 20 in some polls and that Corzine was dead in the water. Shouldn't that factor into the national media's reading of the results?

Runner's diary, Tuesday

Yes, that's two days in a row at the gym, though I kept it to a mile on the treadmill again. I did hit the weights pretty hard -- leg work -- and finished with the stair climber. Now, I just have to stay consistent.

Runner's diary, Monday

I made it back to the gym after what seems like months -- I guess it's literally been months. I taught this morning, then hit the office, managed to get quite a lot done and split early to get in a work out. I've been in excuse mode for too long and could see the results around my waist and in the quantity of clothing that no longer fits. I needed to just suck it up and hit the gym.

So I did today, running a mile on the treadmill and then hitting the weights and the elliptical machine. It was a good hour-plus and I feel good. I've got the bag packed for the morning already.

Is the hope running out?

A story in today's issue of The New York Times offers a glimpse into the dangers the Obama administration faces as he attempts to move forward, as many in the nation begin to lose faith in the promise he offered.

While I believe he remains popular, his standing with the public has been in flux, dependent not only on what has been awful coverage of the political moment and the bad faith of the opposition party, but also some of his own flaws -- his cautiousness, his commitment to bipartisanship at the expense of action.

His willingness to leave the healthcare debate in the hands of Congress -- more specifically, in the hands of so-called Blue Dog Democrats and conservative Democrats like Max Baucus -- left liberals negotiating from a position of weakness, with the more progressive reforms being taken off the table before negotiations started.

We are still at war and it appears that we may soon see an escalation in Afghanistan, a move that would shatter his connection to the progressive wing of his party and those elements of the left that had signed on. Escalation also would drive away many independents, leaving his coalition in tatters and his presidency looking far too much like the last months of the Johnson administration.

There is time to turn this around, to act boldly and move the nation in a more humane direction, but he's got to act quickly. There already is a palpable sense out there that the promises he made cannot be kept.

The

Eric Idle for governor?

I love this story, especially because it's not clear if it is anything more than a prank.

Chris Christie, the Republican candidate for Governor of New Jersey in Tuesday's knife-edge gubernatorial election, has been called out as a copyright thief. The 47-year-old lawyer, who was controversially appointed by George W. Bush as a U.S. Attorney in 2001 on Karl Rove's recommendation after being a top Bush fund-raiser in the 2000 election, has created an election commercial that steals copyright-protected material from British comedy troupe Monty Python -- without permission or credit.

The official campaign advert -- titled "Deja Vu" -- attacks incumbent New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine by using scenes from a famous skit on the "Monty Python's Flying Circus" TV show that features Michael Palin. The ad is on Christie's official YouTube campaign site, and has already aired on national TV.

But neither Christie -- a lawyer for 22 years -- nor anyone in his campaign bothered to seek any permission for using the copyrighted material in his election spot.

Alerted to the theft of their copyright, members of Monty Python are most unhappy. Michael Palin, who appears in the clip pirated for the advert, is especially displeased that his likeness is being used by the Republican candidate without permission.

"I'm surprised that a former U.S. Attorney isn't aware of his copyright infringement when he uses our material without permission. He's clearly made a terrible mistake. It was the endorsement of Sarah Palin he was after -- not that of Michael Palin."

Monty Python's Terry Jones says that the troupe is strongly considering suing the Republican for his copyright infringement:

"It is totally outrageous that a former US Attorney knows so little about the law that he thinks he can rip off people. On the other hand -- another of Bush's legal appointees was Alberto Gonzales and he didn't seem to know much about the law either...," Jones said.

The New Jersey race already was surreal, but introducing Monty Python takes it to a whole new level.