Bush Chooses Rice to Replace Powell
Mood:  vegas lucky
Bush Chooses Rice to Replace Powell
By Tom Raum
The Associated Press

Monday 15 November 2004

Washington - President Bush has chosen national security adviser Condoleezza Rice to replace Colin Powell as secretary of state in his second term, a senior administration official said Monday.

Powell, a retired four-star general who often clashed with more hawkish members of the administration on Iraq and other foreign policy issues, resigned in a Cabinet exodus that promises a starkly different look to President Bush's second-term team.

The White House on Monday announced Powell's exit along with the resignations of Education Secretary Rod Paige, Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. Veneman had said last week she wanted to stay.

Stephen Hadley, deputy national security adviser, will replace Rice, the official said on condition of anonymity.

Combined with the resignations earlier this month of Commerce Secretary Don Evans and Attorney General John Ashcroft, six of Bush's 15 Cabinet members will not be part of the president's second term, which begins with his inauguration Jan. 20. An administration that experienced few changes over the last four years suddenly hit a high-water mark for overhaul.

Known for his moderate views and unblemished reputation, it was Powell who went before the United Nations in February 2003 to sell Bush's argument for invading Iraq to skeptics abroad and at home. But Powell's case was built on faulty intelligence that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.

Still, the former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman remained the most popular member of the administration, more so than even Bush.

In a resignation letter dated Nov. 12, Powell told Bush that, with the election over, it was time to "step down ... and return to private life." The Army man for 35 years said he would stay on "for a number of weeks, or a month or two" until his replacement was confirmed by the Senate.

Asked what he plans to do next, the 67-year-old Powell said, "I don't know."

In a statement, Bush called Powell "one of the great public servants of our time."

Most of the speculation on a successor to Powell has centered on Rice, who is generally seen as more hawkish and is one of Bush's closest advisers. She is widely considered the president's first choice for the top diplomat job despite reports that she intends to return to California - she was provost at Stanford University - or was hoping to replace Donald Rumsfeld as defense secretary.

Aides to Rice declined to comment. In Ecuador for a meeting of defense ministers, Rumsfeld gave no indication that he is on the verge of stepping down. "I have not discussed that with the president," he said when asked if he planned to resign.

Also mentioned as a possible Powell replacement was U.N. Ambassador John Danforth, the former Republican senator from Missouri. Danforth described Powell as "a great person" and "an outstanding public servant." As to whether he might succeed Powell, Danforth said, "It hasn't been mentioned by me or to me."

Powell, one of the architects of the 1991 Persian Gulf War in the administration of Bush's father, often sparred in private with hard-line administration officials such as Vice President Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld over how to proceed in Iraq and the role of the international community.

In his most memorable presentation, Powell soldiered on and delivered the administration line before the United Nations and a world audience on the rationale for ousting Saddam Hussein.

"Secretary Powell's departure is a loss to the moderate internationalist voices in the Bush administration," said New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a former U.N. ambassador in the Clinton administration. "Hopefully, his replacement will be a pragmatist rather than an ideologue."

The resignations come as Bush faces major challenges on both the foreign policy and domestic fronts. Internationally, the threat of terrorism looms, the fighting in Iraq continues with upcoming January elections in doubt and the Middle East landscape has shifted with the death of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

On the home front, Bush has called for ambitious second-term legislative priorities, including overhauling the tax code and Social Security.

Paige, 71, the nation's seventh education secretary, is the first black person to serve in the job in which he oversaw Bush's signature education law, the No Child Left Behind Act. The leading candidate to replace Paige is Margaret Spellings, Bush's domestic policy adviser who helped shape his school agenda when he was the Texas governor.

Abraham, 52, a former senator from Michigan, joined the administration after he lost a bid for re-election, becoming the nation's 10th energy secretary. Abraham struggled to persuade Congress to endorse the president's broad energy agenda.

Sources said that Abraham intends to stay in Washington, where he plans to work in private law practice.

Veneman, 55, the daughter of a California peach grower, was the nation's first woman agriculture secretary. Speculation on a potential replacement has centered on Chuck Conner, White House farm adviser; Allen Johnson, the chief U.S. negotiator on agricultural issues; Bill Hawks, undersecretary for marketing and regulatory programs, and Charles Kruse, president of the Missouri Farm Bureau Federation.

Rep. Charles Stenholm, D-Texas, who lost his bid for re-election, said he was flattered that his name had been mentioned as a possible Veneman successor, but he has "not been contacted by anyone that counts."

In an appearance at the daily State Department midday briefing, Powell said he had a full end-of-year agenda. The most popular member of Bush's Cabinet in international circles, he was often viewed as a voice of moderation in an administration that many foreign leaders, particularly in Europe, regarded as too willing to work unilaterally.

Powell's resignation drew expressions of praise and regret overseas.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair described Powell as "a remarkable man and ... a good friend to this country over a very long period." German Defense Minister Peter Struck called Powell's retirement "regrettable" and described him as "a reliable partner in conversation in the area of defense policy."

In his resignation letter, Powell said, "I am pleased to have been part of a team that launched the global war against terror, liberated the Afghan and Iraqi people, brought the attention of the world to the problem of proliferation, reaffirmed our alliances, adjusted to the post-Cold War world and undertook major initiatives to deal with the problem of poverty and disease in the developing world."

The resignations are on a par with what other presidents who have won second terms have experienced.

In 1984, President Reagan named a new attorney general and new Treasury, Interior, Labor, Energy, Education and Health and Human Services secretaries. In 1996, President Clinton tapped new secretaries at State and Defense as well as Commerce, Labor, Transportation, Energy, and Housing and Urban Development.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said none of those who are resigning would leave before successors were chosen.

Meanwhile, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, attending a meeting in Hawaii, declined to say whether he, too, would resign - but told reporters he has not submitted a letter of resignation. "The couple elements of this decision are if and when," Ridge said. "And when those decisions are made, I'd prefer to share it with the president first."

Ten Reasons Not to Move to Canada
Now Playing: Eminem - Mosh
Published on Wednesday, November 3, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
Ten Reasons Not to Move to Canada
by Sarah Anderson

Ready to say screw this country and buy a one-way ticket north? Here are some reasons to stay in the belly of the beast.

1. The Rest of the World. After the February 2003 antiwar protests, the New York Times described the global peace movement as the world's second superpower. Their actions didn't prevent the war, but protesters in nine countries have succeeded in pressuring their governments to pull their troops from Iraq and/or withdraw from the so-called "coalition of the willing."Antiwar Americans owe it to the majority of the people on this planet who agree with them to stay and do what they can to end the suffering in Iraq and prevent future pre-emptive wars.

2. People Power Can Trump Presidential Power. The strength of social movements can be more important than whoever is in the White House. Example: In 1970, President Nixon supported the Occupational Safety and Health Act, widely considered the most important pro-worker legislation of the last 50 years. It didn't happen because Nixon loved labor unions, but because union power was strong. Stay and help build the peace, economic justice, environmental and other social movements that can make change.

3. The great strides made in voter registration and youth mobilization must be built on rather than abandoned.

4. Like Nicaraguans in the 1980s, Iraqis Need U.S. Allies. After Ronald Reagan was re-elected in 1984, progressives resisted the urge to flee northwards and instead stayed to fight the U.S. governments secret war of arming the contras in Nicaragua and supporting human rights atrocities throughout Central America. Iraq is a different scenario, but we can still learn from the U.S.-Central America solidarity work that exposed illegal U.S. activities and their brutal consequences and ultimately prevailed by forcing a change in policy.

5. We Can't Let up on the 'Free Trade' Front Activists have held the Bush administration at bay on some issues. On trade, opposition in the United States and in developing countries has largely blocked the Bush administrations corporate-driven trade agenda for four years. The President is expected to soon appoint a new top trade negotiator to break the impasse. Whoever he picks would love to see a progressive exodus to Canada.

6. Barack Obama. His victory to become the only African-American in the U.S. Senate was one of the few bright spots of the election. An early opponent of the Iraq war, Obama trounced his primary and general election opponents, even in white rural districts, showing he could teach other progressives a few things about broadening their base. As David Moberg of In These Times puts it, 'Obama demonstrates how a progressive politician can redefine mainstream political symbols to expand support for liberal policies and politicians rather than engage in creeping capitulation to the right.'

7. Say so long to the DLC. Barry Goldwater suffered a resounding defeat when he ran for president against Lyndon Johnson in 1964, but his campaign spawned a conservative movement that eventually gained control of the Republican Party and elected Ronald Reagan in 1980. Progressives should see the excitement surrounding Dean, Kucinich, Moseley Braun, and Sharpton during the primary season as the foundation for a similar takeover of the Democratic Party.

8. 2008. President Bush is entering his second term facing an escalating casualty rate in Iraq, a record trade deficit, a staggering budget deficit, sky-high oil prices, and a deeply divided nation. As the Republicans face likely failure, progressives need to start preparing for regime change in 2008 or sooner. Remember that Nixon was reelected with a bigger margin than Bush, but faced impeachment within a year.

9. Americans are Not All Yahoos. Although I wouldn't attempt to convince a Frenchman of it right now, many surveys indicate that Americans are more internationalist than the election results suggest. In a September poll by the University of Maryland, majorities of Bush supporters expressed support for multilateral approaches to security, including the United States being part of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (68%), the International Criminal Court (75%), the treaty banning land mines (66%), and the Kyoto Treaty on climate change (54%). The problem is that most of these Bush supporters weren't aware that Bush opposed these positions. Stay and help turn progressive instincts into political power.

10. Winter. Average January temperature in Ottawa: 12.2?F.

I Smell A Rat
Mood:  irritated
Topic: Voting
I Smell a Rat
By Colin Shea
FreezerBox.com

Friday 12 November 2004

I smell a rat. It has that distinctive and all-too-familiar odor of the species Republicanus floridius.

We got a nasty bite from this pest four years ago and never quite recovered.

Symptoms of a long-term infection are becoming distressingly apparent.

The first sign of the rat was on election night.

The jubilation of early exit polling had given way to rising anxiety as states fell one by one to the Red Tide.

It was getting late in the smoky cellar of a Prague sports bar where a crowd of expats had gathered.

We had been hoping to go home to bed early, confident of victory.

Those hopes had evaporated in a flurry of early precinct reports from Florida and Ohio.

By 3 AM, conversation had died and we were grimly sipping beers and watching as those two key states seemed to be slipping further and further to crimson.

Suddenly, a friend who had left two hours earlier rushed in and handed us a printout.

"Zogby's calling it for Kerry."

"He smacked the sheet decisively.

Definitely.

He's got both Florida and Ohio in the Kerry column.

Kerry only needs one."

Satisfied, we went to bed, confident we would wake with the world a better place.

Victory was at hand.

The morning told a different story, of course.

No Florida victory for Kerry - Bush had a decisive margin of nearly 400,000 votes.

Ohio was not even close enough for Kerry to demand that all the votes be counted.

The pollsters had been dead wrong, Bush had four more years and a powerful mandate.

Onward Christian soldiers - next stop, Tehran.

Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

I work with statistics and polling data every day.

Something rubbed me the wrong way.

I checked the exit polls for Florida - all wrong.

CNN's results indicated a Kerry win: turnout matched voter registration, and independents had broken 59% to 41% for Kerry.

Polling is an imprecise science.

Yet its very imprecision is itself quantifiable and follows regular patterns.

Differences between actual results and those expected from polling data must be explainable by identifiable factors if the polling sample is robust enough.

With almost 3.000 respondents in Florida alone, the CNN poll sample was pretty robust.

The first signs of the rat were identified by Kathy Dopp, who conducted a simple analysis of voter registrations by party in Florida and compared them to presidential vote results.

Basically she multiplied the total votes cast in a county by the percentage of voters registered Republican:

this gave an expected Republican vote.

She then compared this to the actual result.

Her analysis is startling.

Certain counties voted for Bush far in excess of what one would expect based on the share of Republican registrations in that county.

They key phrase is "certain counties" - there is extraordinary variance between individual counties.

Most counties fall more or less in line with what one would expect based on the share of Republican registrations, but some differ wildly.

How to explain this incredible variance?

Dopp found one over-riding factor:

whether the county used electronic touch-screen voting, or paper ballots which were optically scanned into a computer.

All of those with touch-screen voting had results relatively in line with her expected results, while all of those with extreme variance were in counties with optical scanning.

The intimation, clearly, is fraud.

Ballots are scanned; results are fed into precinct computers; these are sent to a county-wide database, whose results are fed into the statewide electoral totals.

At any point after physical ballots become databases, the system is vulnerable to external hackers.

It seemed too easy, and Dopp's method seemed simplistic.

I re-ran the results using CNN's exit polling data.

In each county, I took the number of registrations and assigned correctional factors based on the CNN poll to predict turnout among Republicans, Democrats, and independents.

I then used the vote shares from the polls to predict a likely number of Republican votes per county.

I compared this 'expected' Republican vote to the actual Republican vote.

The results are shocking.

Overall, Bush received 2% fewer votes in counties with electronic touch-screen voting than expected.

In counties with optical scanning, he received 16% more.

This 16% would not be strange if it were spread across counties more or less evenly.

It is not.

In 11 different counties, the 'actual' Bush vote was at least twice higher than the expected vote.

13 counties had Bush vote tallies 50 - 100% higher than expected.

In one county where 88% of voters are registered Democrats, Bush got nearly two thirds of the vote

- three times more than predicted by my model.

Again, polling can be wrong.

It is difficult to believe it can be that wrong.

Fortunately, however, we can test how wrong it would have to be to give the 'actual' result.

I tested two alternative scenarios to see how wrong CNN would have to have been to explain the election result.

In the first, I assumed they had been wildly off the mark in the turnout figures

- i.e. far more Republicans and independents had come out than Democrats.

In the second I assumed the voting shares were completely wrong, and that the Republicans had been able to massively poach voters from the Democrat base.

In the first scenario, I assumed 90% of Republicans and independents voted, and the remaining ballots were cast by Democrats.

This explains the result in counties with optical scanning to within 5%.

However, in this scenario Democratic turnout would have been only 51% in the optical scanning counties

- barely exceeding half of Republican turnout.

It also does not solve the enormous problems in individual counties.

7 counties in this scenario still have actual vote tallies for Bush that are at least 100% higher than predicted by the model

- an extremely unlikely result.

In the second scenario I assumed that Bush had actually got 100% of the vote from Republicans and 50% from independents

(versus CNN polling results which were 93% and 41% respectively).

If this gave enough votes for Bush to explain the county's results, I left the amount of Democratic registered voters ballots cast for Bush as they were predicted by CNN (14% voted for Bush).

If this did not explain the result, I calculated how many Democrats would have to vote for Bush.

In 41 of 52 counties, this did not explain the result and Bush must have gotten more than CNN's predicted 14% of Democratic ballots

- not an unreasonable assumption by itself.

However, in 21 counties more than 50% of Democratic votes would have to have defected to Bush to account for the county result

- in four counties, at least 70% would have been required.

These results are absurdly unlikely.

The Second Rat

A previously undiscovered species of rat, Republicanus cuyahogus, has been found in Ohio.

Before the election, I wrote snide letters to a state legislator for Cuyahoga county who, according to media reports, was preparing an army of enforcers to keep 'suspect' (read: minority) voters away from the polls.

One of his assistants wrote me back very pleasant mails to the effect that they had no intention of trying to suppress voter turnout, and in fact only wanted to encourage people to vote.

They did their job too well.

According to the official statistics for Cuyahoga county, a number of precincts had voter turnout well above the national average:

in fact, turnout was well over 100% of registered voters, and in several cases well above the total number of people who have lived in the precinct in the last century or so.

In 30 precincts, more ballots were cast than voters were registered in the county.

According to county regulations, voters must cast their ballot in the precinct in which they are registered.

Yet in these thirty precincts, nearly 100.000 more people voted than are registered to vote

- this out of a total of 251.946 registrations.

These are not marginal differences

- this is a 39% over-vote.

In some precincts the over-vote was well over 100%.

One precinct with 558 registered voters cast nearly 9,000 ballots.

As one astute observer noted, it's the ballot-box equivalent of Jesus' miracle of the fishes.

Bush being such a man of God, perhaps we should not be surprised.

What to Do?

This is not an idle statistical exercise.

Either the raw data from two critical battleground states is completely erroneous, or something has gone horribly awry in our electoral system

- again.

Like many Americans, I was dissatisfied with and suspicious of the way the Florida recount was resolved in 2000.

But at the same time, I was convinced of one thing:

we must let the system work, and accept its result, no matter how unjust it might appear.

With this acceptance, we placed our implicit faith in the Bush Administration that it would not abuse its position:

that it would recognize its fragile mandate for what it was, respect the will of the majority of people who voted against them, and move to build consensus wherever possible and effect change cautiously when needed.

Above all, we believed that both Democrats and Republicans would recognize the over-riding importance of revitalizing the integrity of the electoral system and healing the bruised faith of both constituencies.

This faith has been shattered.

Bush has not led the nation to unity, but ruled through fear and division.

Dishonesty and deceit in areas critical to the public interest have been the hallmark of his Administration.

I state this not to throw gratuitous insults, but to place the Florida and Ohio electoral results in their proper context.

For the GOP to claim now that we must take anything on faith, let alone astonishingly suspicious results in a hard-fought and extraordinarily bitter election, is pure fantasy.

It does not even merit discussion.

The facts as I see them now defy all logical explanations save one

- massive and systematic vote fraud.

We cannot accept the result of the 2004 presidential election as legitimate until these discrepancies are rigorously and completely explained.

From the Valerie Plame case to the horrors of Abu Ghraib, George Bush has been reluctant to seek answers and assign accountability when it does not suit his purposes.

But this is one time when no American should accept not getting a straight answer.

Until then, George Bush is still, and will remain, the 'Accidental President' of 2000.

One of his many enduring and shameful legacies will be that of seizing power through two illegitimate elections conducted on his brother's watch, and engineering a fundamental corruption at the very heart of the greatest democracy the world has known.

We must not permit this to happen again!

Powell Said Poised to Leave Bush Cabinet
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Politics
Powell Said Poised to Leave Bush Cabinet
By George Gedda
The Associated Press

Monday 15 November 2004

WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Colin Powell has told top aides he intends to resign from President Bush's Cabinet, high-ranking State Department officials said Monday.

Powell, who long has been rumored planning only a single term with Bush, told his aides that he intends to leave once Bush settles on whom to succeed him, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Word of Powell's imminent departure kicked off a new week of Cabinet shuffling for Bush, who is planning his second term.

"I do expect some announcements shortly regarding members of the Cabinet," White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters at the White House Monday morning. "There are a few resignation. I expect four today."

McClellan said he did not expect any announcements Monday on replacements, however.

The White House was preparing an announcement to confirm Powell's resignation. According to one official, Powell expects that his departure date will be sometime in January. It was not immediately clear whether he would leave before Bush's second inauguration, on Jan 20.

Most of the speculation on a successor has centered on U.N. Ambassador John Danforth, a Republican and former U.S. senator from Missouri, and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice.

Powell has had a controversial tenure in the secretary of state's job, reportedly differing on some key issues at various junctures with Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld. Powell, however, has generally had good relations with his counterparts around the world, although his image standing has been strained by the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

Powell, a former chairman of the military Joint Chiefs of Staff, led the Bush administration argument at the United Nations for a military attack to oust Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, arguing a weapons-of-mass-destruction threat that the administration could never buttress.

Powell submitted his letter of resignation to the President on Friday. He will go about his usual schedule and will continue at full speed until a successor is named and in place, a senior administration said.

Powell was scheduled to meet later Monday with Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom and was to attend a meeting of Asian in Chile Wednesday and a mutinational conference on Iraq next week.

He told some two dozen staff members of his projected departure at the start of the day.

For many months, Powell had been viewed as a one-term secretary of state but he has always been vague about his intentions. He had said repeatedly in recent weeks that he serves at "the pleasure of the president."

One senior official said that Powell's departure was part of a much broader Cabinet shakeup, details of which should be disclosed soon.

There had been speculation that Powell might elect to stay on until after the Iraqi elections at the end of January, but the senior official made no reference to that possibility.

Iraq has dominated Powell's attention during his nearly four years as secretary of state. Powell will perhaps be best remembered for that U.N. Security Council appearance on Feb. 5, 2003, during which he argued that Saddam must be removed because of its possession of weapons of mass destruction.

There is no evidence that those claims had any foundation. Powell has maintained all along that the use of force of by the American coalition in Iraq was justified.

Boycott America
Mood:  don't ask
Now Playing: Eminem - Mosh
Topic: WWWII: Hitler Resurrected
As a child of this colonial republic, a veteran of its military, a keeper of the flame of rebellion, I now see no hope of recovery for a dead horse poisonously floating down stream. America has been infected, subverted, polluted, corrupted, plundered, stolen by corporate raiders and warmongers. Its elections have been hacked, hijacked and sidetracked with partisan smears and lies, failed technology, and corrupted media. It has become mired in manipulations of terror, invasions and occupations of distant lands, and endless bloody warfare. It has been seized by the most hated men in history, with designs on running it into the ground while swindling the last of its treasure.


Therefore, I encourage the people of the world to resist this deadly corrupted regime at every turn. Challenge its false preachments of democracy. Boycott its bloody dollars. Invade it with music, media and magic. Shame us the way we deserve to be shamed. Do not allow your executives to support this war machine and its campaigns of extermination. Testify to the true Christian values opposed to murder, torture, theft and arrogance, which is what keeps the Bush regime afloat.


To my fellow Americans, I ask you to hold on to your principles, your power, your ideals. Do not sell your soul to the devils of terror and murder, regardless of how patriotically it is packaged. Do not see me as your enemy, but as your most idealistic countryman. I am not an alien occupying your outlands, I am not stealing your children's inheritance, I am not setting the world on fire in your name. I am telling you that this experiment called "America" can only exist with truth, justice, and inalienable power vested in the People. When elections fail utterly, impeachment must be carried out. It is our civic duty, and the last hope for survival.


-- B.Z. Bywyd, Volcano, HAWAI'I
http://burnbush.blogspot.com


George W. Bush Must Answer to the People:
Send Your Vote to Impeach to your Representative!
Impeach Bush

George W. Bush Must Answer to the People

- adapted from Ramsey Clark's address to the half a million demonstrators at the January 18th National March on Washington to Stop the War on Iraq organized by International A.N.S.W.E.R. (Act Now to Stop War & End Racism).

The U.S. Constitution provides the means for preventing George W. Bush from engaging in a war of aggression against Iraq, and from advancing a first strike potentially nuclear preemptive war. It's called impeachment.

High Crimes and Misdemeanors
Impeachment is the direct constitutional means for removing a President, Vice President or other civil officers of the United States who has acted or threatened acts that are serious offenses against the Constitution, its system of government, or the rule of law, or that are conventional crimes of such a serious nature that they would injure the Presidency if there was no removal.

A Constitutional Imperative
Impeachment appears six times in the U.S. Constitution. The Founders weren't concerned with anything more than with impeachment because they had lived under King George III and had in 1776 accused the king of all the things that George W. Bush wants to do: Usurpation of the power of the people; Being above the law; Criminal abuse of authority.

Power Remains in the Hands of the People
Impeachment is the means by which We The People of the United States and our elected representatives in Congress can prevent further crimes by the President and the human catastrophe they threaten and force accountability for crimes committed.

Save the Constitution, the U.N., and Countless Human Lives
Congressional proceedings for impeachment can bring about open, fearless consideration of the most dangerous acts and threats ever committed by an American President. If courageously pursued, they can save our Constitution, the United Nations, the rule of law, the lives of countless people and leave open the possibility of peace on earth.

The Time for Action is Now
Each of us must take a stand on impeachment now, or bear the burden of having failed to speak in this hour of maximum peril.

More VA Benefit Cuts
Mood:  sad
Topic: Support Your Troops
In the last few weeks the Portland, Oregon VA hospital has been sending a letter to veterans informing them that their non-"life-or-limb" surgery has been cancelled or postponed. The Portland VA facility, with a satellite campus in Vancouver, Washington, serves veterans in Oregon, southwest Washington and parts of Northern California.

It all boils down to dollars, or lack of them. The Portland VA, like every VA facility, is caught in a funding crisis with no end in sight. Funding for the VA has increased every year, Internet myths aside. But the dollars have not kept up with the number of veterans seeking health care. While VA funding has increased about 50 percent in the last eight years, the number of veterans applying for benefits has increased nearly 150 percent in the same time frame.

Who are these veterans? There are two major groups. The first is veterans who, because of a sagging economy, are now unemployed or under-employed, have no health care benefits, have never used the VA system before, and are now applying for VA benefits for the first time. The second is veterans on Medicare who have never used the VA for health care, but find the savings offered by the VA system necessary to maintain a decent standard of living. Simple math shows that the $7 VA co-pay for prescriptions can be a great savings compared to Medicare prescription costs. One veteran interviewed for this article stated he is saving over $400 a month because he no longer uses Medicare for his prescriptions.

Patricia Forsyth, Public Affairs Officer for the Portland, Oregon VA hospital, cites "a dramatic increase in the number of veterans" who now seek health care as the reason surgeries are being cancelled or postponed. "Some examples of surgeries that might be postponed are arthroscopies (diagnostic or treatment), total joint replacements and hernia repairs," she said.

Ms. Forsyth could not give exact figures as to how many veterans are having surgeries postponed or cancelled, but stressed that no surgeries for service-connected conditions are being affected. It is important to note that there is no such thing as elective surgery at the VA. Every surgery has been scheduled by a medical doctor who has ascertained that the veteran has a debilitating condition that can only be remedied by a surgical procedure.

Ms. Forsyth cannot anticipate when the cancelled or postponed surgeries might be rescheduled other than to say it would be as soon as possible. When asked for an estimate as to what time that would be, Ms. Forsyth said, "I would guess until spring [2005]." It is a difficult situation, as 2004 monies have thinned to the point where the Portland VA cannot keep its operating rooms up and running. Currently there is no 2005 budget and everyone is holding their breath, hoping for the best. A document leaked from the White House indicated a $910 million cut in the 2006 VA budget (although the administration has backed off on this number).

Secretary of State Powell Expected to Resign
Mood:  d'oh
Now Playing: My Brother and Boyfriend Babbling About PMS
Topic: Politics
Secretary of State Powell Expected to Resign
By Mike Allen and William Branigin
The Washington Post

Monday 15 November 2004

Resignations from heads of Agriculture, Education, and Energy also expected.

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, who has sparred for four years with the more hawkish members of President Bush's war Cabinet, plans to announce his resignation today, administration officials said.

Powell's departure - along with the previously announced resignation of Attorney General John D. Ashcroft - signals a transformation of Bush's national security team.

Says he's VERY disappointed with the way things have been handled in Iraq....

The resignation of Powell, 67, a 35-year veteran of the Army who rose to become chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is among four that the White House plans to formally announce today, adding to a growing list of departures from the Bush administration as the newly reelected president prepares to begin his second term.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan refused to be specific about the latest resignations, but administration officials said Powell submitted a letter of resignation to Bush Friday and told top aides this morning that he would be leaving.

Among the other Cabinet officials resigning is Education Secretary Rod Paige, who informed the president of his wishes last week. News services reported today that Agriculture Secretary Ann M. Veneman and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham also will be leaving. Abraham - like Powell - intends to stay on until his successor is found, the news services reported.

In addition to Ashcroft, Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans has already submitted his resignation.

Administration officials said the departures would be staggered.

The exodus - including the previously announced departure of Ashcroft, who is in charge of several aspects of the fight against terrorism - raises questions about whether Bush will have the continuity that his staff has said he wanted.

Bush is launching the most ambitious legislative agenda of any of his years in office, and his aides are constantly cognizant of the possibility of having to respond to a terrorist attack.

"That's doesn't mean they're leaving today," McClellan said of the officials involved in the latest resignations. "They'll continue to do their job."

The resignation letters carry a variety of dates, indicating that the White House has received a stream of them since the election and has been packaging the announcements.

Administration officials said the list includes Paige, who wanted to stay but was not invited to remain. He will be succeeded by Margaret Spellings, Bush's domestic policy adviser, administration officials said.

Wounded U.S. Troops Describe Massive Insurgent Firepower in Fallujah
Mood:  blue
Topic: Impending Draft
Wounded U.S. Troops Describe
Massive Insurgent Firepower in Fallujah
By Tony Czuczka
The Associated Press

Monday 15 November 2004

Landstuhl, Germany - Fallujah's masked fighters have been fighting house to house, firing from rooftops and mosques with a seemingly unending supply of firepower, wounded U.S. servicemen said Monday, recounting tough urban combat in the Iraqi insurgent stronghold.

"They were ready to fight to the death," Lance Cpl. Travis Schafer, a rifleman with a Marine battalion, told a news conference at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, where he was being treated for a shrapnel wound in his right hand. A rocket-propelled grenade had exploded 15 yards to his right in a deserted marketplace.

"It's house-to-house fighting," he said. "Rooftop-to-rooftop."

About 70 wounded soldiers have been arriving daily at the military hospital in Germany since the week-old offensive in Fallujah began - about twice the normal number of casualties from Iraq.

The troops said the insurgents appeared well-organized and heavily armed.

"They had their own little plan of what they were going to do, a pretty set idea of where they were going to fight," said U.S. Army Spc. Kris Clinkscales, 22, of San Antonio, Texas, his right arm in a sling with shrapnel wounds.

Schafer, of Puyallup, Wash., was surprised by the fighters' firepower.

"It seemed like they have a pretty unlimited amount of RPGs and mortars. They seemed to fling those about wildly," he said.

Schafer, with the 1st Marine Regiment, said his unit had only pushed 400 yards into the city before it took heavy fire from small arms, mortars and RPGs.

"They were locking on us with RPGs and mortars from buildings all around us," the 20-year-old said. "Even from mosques they were firing - from all over the place."

Lance Cpl. Ryan Chapman with the 1st Marine Regiment, had an ugly scar over his left eye - a reminder of his encounter with a sniper.

As his unit came under sustained fire, Chapman had been tracking a sniper with the telescopic sight of his wire-guided missile launcher. But he was hit first, with bullet striking his forehead just below the edge of his helmet.

Chapman, 22, of Lawrence, Kansas, acknowledged he had been lucky, but he said he was eager to get back into action.

"It's nothing too serious. It cracked my skull, but I think it looks worse than it is," he said. "I want to go back - my buddies are out there."

He was among 419 patients admitted to Landstuhl in the last week, 233 of whom had combat-related injuries, according to doctors. The most common wounds have been from bullets or blast injuries from rocket-propelled grenades.

While most the recent casualties in Landstuhl are from Fallujah, officials do not have a precise breakdown.

Another 46 wounded troops from Iraq were en route to the hospital Monday, Landstuhl spokeswoman Marie Shaw said.

The offensive in Fallujah has killed at least 38 American troops and six Iraqi soldiers. The number of U.S. troops wounded is now 275, although more than 60 have returned to duty. U.S. officials estimated more than 1,200 insurgents have been killed.

No estimate of civilian casualties has been given.

US Death Toll Rises in Fallujah
Mood:  blue
Now Playing: Halo 2 - We Just Beat It Again - Round 3
U.S. Death Toll Rises in Fallujah
Reuters and Agence France-Presse

Monday 15 November 2004

The US military says 38 US soldiers have died in the week-long offensive to recapture the Iraqi city of Fallujah from rebels and 275 had been wounded.

The toll includes three non-combat deaths.

In a statement, the military said 60 of the wounded had already returned to duty.

More than 10,000 US and 2,000 Iraqi soldiers took part in the assault to take the city ahead of elections due in January.

The US military says about 1,000 insurgents have been killed and 450 to 550 captured.

There is no word on civilian casualties, but residents say many people have died.

A hospital spokeswoman says 419 US soldiers wounded in Iraq have been treated at a US military hospital in Germany.

She says more than 220 of the soldiers were wounded in combat, either by bullets or burns and most had been involved in the major assault on the rebel city of Fallujah.

Just under 200 of the wounded have already been sent on to the United States for further treatment, she said.

The Landstuhl Regional Medical Centre in south-west Germany is the largest US military medical facility outside the United States.