Freedom Of Speech: Use It or Lose It
Mood:  sharp
Topic: Bill of Rights
Charley Reese | November 29, 2004

Years ago, when I was in the Army, I got stuck in a typing pool. I typed a memo for a captain that contained several erasures. When I gave it to him, he said: "That's pretty (expletive) typing, Private. I hope you don't have to make a living at it."

I said nothing, but I watched him, and when he put another handwritten memo into the box, I grabbed it. I typed it perfectly and then walked over to his desk with the typed copy and his original.

"That's pretty (same expletive) handwriting, sir. I hope your livelihood doesn't depend on anybody being able to read it."

His jaw dropped, but he didn't say anything. Captains are not used to being talked to that way by privates. The beauty of being a private, however, is that there is very little the Army can do to you that it is not already doing.

I recount that anecdote from my checkered past to tell you that free speech is meaningless if you don't use it. If being an American means anything, it means that you don't have to tolerate personal insults from anybody under any circumstances. At least that's the way we are taught in the South.

When Lithuania was still part of the Soviet Union, a little girl came home crying. She told her mother that her teacher had stood her up in front of the class and ridiculed her Christian beliefs. Now, this mother was in a totally powerless position. She lived in a dictatorship. The government could do anything it wanted to do with her, and she would be defenseless.

Nevertheless, this brave lady marched down to the local Communist Party headquarters and gave the people there verbal hell. Many, many men and women who live under tyranny nevertheless demonstrate great courage.

Some Russians believe that Alexander Solzhenitsyn did as much as anyone to bring down the Soviet Union. His books about the gulag ripped the facade off the Soviet Union so that not even American liberals could deny anymore what an evil tyranny it was.

After being released from prison, Solzhenitsyn was ordered not to attend the funeral of another Soviet dissident. The great man not only attended the funeral, but he marched up to the casket and kissed the forehead of the dead man. Even though he lived in the one of the world's worst tyrannies, Solzhenitsyn always acted like a free man.

There are good Americans who show the same kind of courage. In one Central Florida elementary school, the children were told they could bring holiday cards to exchange with their classmates. One little girl affixed stickers to her cards that said "Jesus loves you." When the teacher saw this, she ordered the little girl to take back all of her cards. The child was humiliated.

An attorney friend of mine heard about this, contacted the parents and then informed the school board that it owed the little girl a public apology. The school-board attorney said: "You'll never get it. I can tie you up in court, and it will cost you $30,000."

"Well," my friend said, "I just happen to have $30,000, and if that's what it takes, so be it, but the board is going to give this child a public apology." And that's exactly what happened, because one man decided he would not tolerate an injustice. He didn't charge the girl's family a penny.

The government would like us all to spy on our neighbors to detect terrorists. What we really should do is keep our eyes open for injustices, and when we find them, we should speak out.

Many people in this country are powerless. They don't have much money. They don't have influential friends. And quite often, because they are powerless, they suffer injustice. What a wonderful country this would be if the powerless knew they were not alone, if they knew that there are other Americans willing to use their voices and their resources to protect them from injustice.

Freedom is a wonderful thing if used properly, but wasting freedom on selfish pursuits is probably a sin God will have a hard time forgiving.

Original

The Map Referred to Below
Mood:  chillin'
Topic: Save Democracy

Stages of Grief
Mood:  energetic
Topic: Save Democracy
Views > November 22, 2004
Stages of Grief
By Susan J. Douglas

Democrats and progressives need to focus on state legislatures, congressional races, and get some Secretaries of State on our side next time around.

It is on refrigerators throughout the land: the map of California and the West Coast, the upper Midwest and the Northeast annexed to and named ?The United States of Canada,? the red states below labeled ?Jesusland.?

The red-and-blue, them-versus-us iconography so beloved by the press?imposed on us four years ago?makes our divisions seem dramatic indeed. Of course, it visually overstates the strength of evangelicals in our country. Nonetheless, when coupled with Cheney?s immediate claim of a ?mandate? (not to mention Bush?s idiotic ?political capital? boast), the sea of red sent many of us into a deep depression.

But, as the Shirelles reminded us, the darkest hour is just before dawn. So it?s time to review the stages of post-Kerry-defeat grief so we can heal ourselves and, indeed, move on.

Stage 1: Shock Many of us were barely functional on Wednesday, wondering how could it be that a guy so obviously and patently incompetent and deceptive, as documented by so many sources?and a faith-based zealot to boot?got reelected?

Stage 2: Shock and Awe We were sickened, but awestruck, that Cheney had the chutzpah to claim a mandate with only 286 electoral votes and a 130,000-vote margin of victory in Ohio, which various reporters and investigators already find very suspect. We were awed that Bush insisted that what you do with political capital is spend it right away?although we shouldn?t have been, given what this thinking has done for the deficit.

Stage 3: Alienation So maybe we accepted that the nation is not dominated by a bunch of Bible-banging Neanderthals. But depression returned when we kept thinking it was dominated by ignorant dunces. Bob Herbert and Bob McChesney, both citing a University of Maryland poll, reported that nearly 70 percent of Bush supporters believed there was ?clear evidence? that Saddam Hussein was working closely with al Qaeda; a third were convinced WMDs had been found in Iraq. What part of the 9/11 hearings, the bestseller list for the last six months and extensive news coverage did these people miss?

Of course, most of them were probably watching Fox News, whose viewers have been demonstrated to be more ignorant about current affairs than viewers of other news sources.

Stage 4: Wait a Minute By Friday, even Republicans were in on this one. Lyn Nofziger, Former Reagan adviser, David Brooks, Garry Wills and of course, Paul Krugman, Bob Herbert, Mark Crispin Miller, and many others were challenging the ?mandate? claim and debunking the notion that ?moral values??e.g., homophobia, opposition to abortion and belief in the virgin birth and creationism (not to mention ?the rapture,? which, fortunately, always makes me think of the hit song by Blondie)?prompted the majority of Republicans to vote for Bush.

As Gary Langer, director of polling for ABC News noted, ?moral values? can mean a lot of things; 15 percent of non-churchgoers and 12 percent of liberals chose it as the most important issue to them. Exit polls documented that 55 percent of voters said abortions should be legal and a whopping 60 percent supported either gay marriage (25 percent) or civil unions (another 35 percent).

Stage 5: Defiance and Assertion This phase is really building steam, and it is where we need to be, ASAP. Both NPR and ABC news, the day after the election, featured stories about ?moral values,? which included counterpoints from religious leaders and everyday people who asserted that the discussion should focus, centrally, on the dubious morality of war and bombing innocent people, on issues of economic justice, on the environment, on the lack of health insurance for 45 million, and on the staggering rate of child poverty in the United States. These are moral values, and the Democrats must claim them. Now.

Defiance and assertion also mean redefining ?the mandate.? The Republicans are determined to cast the electorate as primarily a group of faith-based anti-government conservatives. The Democrats must produce another representation. This is not to dismiss the disturbing rise of people who are determined to bring fundamentalism into government policy. But it is to assert the truth: Bible bangers are not the new majority.

Stage 6: Mobilize The Democrats and progressives need to do what the Republicans started doing back in the late 1970s: Focus on the state legislatures, congressional races and, hey, let?s get some Secretaries of State on our side next time around. Young women, and women of all ages, are going to need to fight like never before in the face of a guaranteed assault on Roe v. Wade. And the previous four years and this election emphasize how important media reform is, particularly the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, which the Reagan Administration abolished in 1987. We see the results of too much Rush and O?Reilly without any balance: voters who don?t have the facts.

This is our country; it is not a revival tent. We must continue to fight to save it.

Arctic Nations Agree to Fight Glacial Melting (Kind of...)
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Environmental Politics
Deferring to US, Group Stops Short of Backing Steps

By Juliet Eilperin, Washington Post | November 25, 2004


WASHINGTON -- Eight nations with Arctic territory agreed yesterday to fight glacial melting and other effects of climate change in the region, though they declined to endorse any new steps to counter global warming out of deference to the Bush administration.

The Arctic Council, which includes the United States, Russia, Canada, and several Nordic countries, issued a seven-page policy report asking countries to adopt ''effective measures" to combat climate change without elaborating on what that would entail.

The group's cautious statement, which did not call for mandatory curbs on greenhouse gas emissions linked to warming but noted ''with concern" that the Arctic is facing historic temperature increases and glacial melting, reflected the difficulties in forging an international consensus on climate change.

Representatives from eight countries and several indigenous tribes worked behind the scenes over the past week at a conference in Reykjavik, Iceland, to draft a response to the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment released two weeks ago.

In that document, more than 300 scientists concluded after four years of study that melting sea ice, abrupt weather changes, and rising temperatures in northern latitudes have far outpaced climate change in other regions over the past few decades. Several nations pushed for a more aggressive policy statement backing limits on carbon dioxide emissions, said participants in the talks who asked not to be identified for fear of angering the United States, but Bush administration officials resisted that effort.

One negotiator said the final product ''while not good, could have been much worse," adding that the administration recognizes ''there's a global concern about climate change."

US negotiators agreed to wording stating that climate changes in the Arctic have global implications and that countries should take the assessment's findings into account when drafting climate policy. Both provisions had been sought by European nations.

Paula Dobriansky, the undersecretary of state for global affairs who led the American delegation, said the United States is investing in renewable energy as well as technologies to store carbon dioxide underground to address climate change.

''We base our policies on science and we will take the findings [of the report] into account," she said.

Environmentalists said they were disappointed with the council's policy recommendations.

''Climate change is a fact in the Arctic, it has implications for the globe and it deserves a strong response," said Samantha Smith, who directs the World Wildlife Program's Arctic program and served as a council observer. ''What we got instead was basically no response on cutting emissions."

Some Europeans said they still hoped to use the report and the scientific assessment to push for stricter climate policies in other international negotiations.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Arctic nations had no choice but to act soon. ''We all need to intensify efforts against pollution in the Arctic," he said.

Kevin Knobloch, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said it is ''irresponsible in the extreme for the United States not to commit to an aggressive campaign to reduce greenhouse gas emissions" in light of the recent scientific findings and the prospect that American companies could reap profits by selling energy-efficient products in overseas markets.

New Freedom Initiative/Mandatory Mental Health Screening of American Children Passes
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Protect Your Children
Infowars.com | November 23, 2004

On Monday morning, Alex talked to Jeff Diest from Congressman Ron Paul's office.
Diest confirmed that Ron Paul's amendment requiring parental consent prior to government psychological testing/mental screening of all school children was not added to the bill.
The New Freedom Initiative passed sans amendment, as it stood.
Congress Funds Mandatory Psychological Tests for Kids

Newsmax | November 23 2004

One of the nation's leading medical groups, the Association of American Physicians & Surgeons (AAPS), decried a move by the U.S. Senate to join with the House in funding a federal program AAPS says will lead to mandatory psychological testing of every child in America ? without the consent of parents.

When the Senate considered an omnibus appropriations bill last week that included funding for grants to implement universal mental health screening for almost 60 million children, pregnant women and adults through schools and pre-schools, it approved $20 million of the $44 million sought, Kathryn Serkes, public affairs counsel for AAPS, told NewsMax.

This $20 million matches a like amount already approved by the House, Serkes advised.

While the funding cut of some $24 million was a little good news, suggested Serkes, whose organization has zealously opposed the the measure, she said the organization was most worried about the failure of Congress to include ?parental consent? language sought by the AAPS.

Last September, AAPS lifetime member Rep. Ron Paul, M.D., R-Texas, tried to stop the plan in its tracks by offering an amendment to the Labor, HHS, and Education Appropriations Act for FY 2005. The amendment received 95 ?yes? votes, but it failed to pass.

According to Serkes, Paul is now mulling offering stand-alone legislation in the next session to once again try and get a provision for parental consent.

The federal bill on its face does not require mandatory mental health testing to be imposed upon states or local schools, explained Serkes.

However, the HHS appropriations bill contains block grant money that will likely be used ? as is often the case with block funding ? by the various states to implement mandatory psychological testing programs for all students in the school system.


The spending bill has its roots in the recommendations of the New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, created by President Bush in 2002 to propose ways of eliminating waste and improve efficiency and effectiveness of the mental health care delivery system.

Although the report does not specifically recommend screening all students, it does suggest that ?schools are in a key position to identify the mental health problems early and to provide a link to appropriate services.?

The bottom line, explained Serkes, is that a state receiving money under this appropriation will likely make its mental testing of kids mandatory ? and not be out of synch with the federal enactment.

The other telling point, said Serkes, is that although the relatively minimal funding at this point is certainly not enough to fund mandatory mental testing for kids countrywide, it's an ominous start:

?Once it's established and has funding, a program exhibits the nettlesome property of being self-sustaining ? it gets a life of its own. More funding follows.?

Officials of the AAPS decry in the measure what they see as ?a dangerous scheme that will heap even more coercive pressure on parents to medicate children with potentially dangerous side effects.?

One of the most ?dangerous side effects? from antidepressants commonly prescribed to children is suicide, regarding which AAPS added, ?Further, even the government's own task force has concluded that mental health screening does little to prevent suicide.?

Meanwhile, Rep. Paul says the mental testing scheme is a looming feature of "Big Brother" that if unchecked will push parental rights out of the picture:

?At issue is the fundamental right of parents to decide what medical treatment is appropriate for their children. The notion of federal bureaucrats ordering potentially millions of youngsters to take psychotropic drugs like Ritalin strikes an emotional chord with American parents, who are sick of relinquishing more and more parental control to government.

?Once created, federal programs are nearly impossible to eliminate. Anyone who understands bureaucracies knows they assume more and more power incrementally. A few scattered state programs over time will be replaced by a federal program implemented in a few select cities. Once the limited federal program is accepted, it will be expanded nationwide. Once in place throughout the country, the screening program will become mandatory.

?Soviet communists attempted to paint all opposition to the state as mental illness. It now seems our own federal government wants to create a therapeutic nanny state, beginning with schoolchildren. It's not hard to imagine a time 20 or 30 years from now when government psychiatrists stigmatize children whose religious, social, or political values do not comport with those of the politically correct, secular state.

?American parents must do everything they can to remain responsible for their children's well-being. If we allow government to become intimately involved with our children's minds and bodies, we will have lost the final vestiges of parental authority. Strong families are the last line of defense against an overreaching bureaucratic state.?

Bush to Screen Population for Mental Illness
Mood:  incredulous
Topic: Protect Your Children
WorldNetDaily.com | June 21, 2004

President Bush plans to unveil next month a sweeping mental health initiative that recommends screening for every citizen and promotes the use of expensive antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs favored by supporters of the administration.

The New Freedom Initiative, according to a
progress report, seeks to integrate mentally ill patients fully into the community by providing "services in the community, rather than institutions," the British Medical Journal reported.

Critics say the plan protects the profits of drug companies at the expense of the public.

The initiative began with Bush's launch in April 2002 of the New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, which conducted a "comprehensive study of the United States mental health service delivery system."

The panel found that "despite their prevalence, mental disorders often go undiagnosed" and recommended comprehensive mental health screening for "consumers of all ages," including preschool children.

The commission said, "Each year, young children are expelled from preschools and childcare facilities for severely disruptive behaviors and emotional disorders."

Schools, the panel concluded, are in a "key position" to screen the 52 million students and 6 million adults who work at the schools.

The commission recommended that the screening be linked with "treatment and supports," including "state-of-the-art treatments" using "specific medications for specific conditions."

The Texas Medication Algorithm Project, or TMAP, was held up by the panel as a "model" medication treatment plan that "illustrates an evidence-based practice that results in better consumer outcomes."

The TMAP -- started in 1995 as an alliance of individuals from the pharmaceutical industry, the University of Texas and the mental health and corrections systems of Texas -- also was praised by the American Psychiatric Association, which called for increased funding to implement the overall plan.

But the Texas project sparked controversy when a Pennsylvania government employee revealed state officials with influence over the plan had received money and perks from drug companies who stand to gain from it.

Allen Jones, an employee of the Pennsylvania Office of the Inspector General says in his
whistleblower reportthe "political/pharmaceutical alliance" that developed the Texas project, which promotes the use of newer, more expensive antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs, was behind the recommendations of the New Freedom Commission, which were "poised to consolidate the TMAP effort into a comprehensive national policy to treat mental illness with expensive, patented medications of questionable benefit and deadly side effects, and to force private insurers to pick up more of the tab."

Jones points out, according to the British Medical Journal, companies that helped start the Texas project are major contributors to Bush's election funds. Also, some members of the New Freedom Commission have served on advisory boards for these same companies, while others have direct ties to TMAP.

Eli Lilly, manufacturer of olanzapine, one of the drugs recommended in the plan, has multiple ties to the Bush administration, BMJ says. The elder President Bush was a member of Lilly's board of directors and President Bush appointed Lilly's chief executive officer, Sidney Taurel, to the Homeland Security Council.

Of Lilly's $1.6 million in political contributions in 2000, 82 percent went to Bush and the Republican Party.

Another critic, Robert Whitaker, journalist and author of "Mad in America," told the British Medical Journal that while increased screening "may seem defensible," it could also be seen as "fishing for customers."

Exorbitant spending on new drugs "robs from other forms of care such as job training and shelter program," he said.

However, a developer of the Texas project, Dr. Graham Emslie, defends screening.

"There are good data showing that if you identify kids at an earlier age who are aggressive, you can intervene ... and change their trajectory."

Zogby Vs. Mitofsky (Keith Olbermann)
Mood:  loud
Topic: Voting
NEW YORK - It was a spectacular irony - a Republican senator using the word ?fraud? about the presidential election. More spectacular still, he was visiting his condemnation of apparent election manipulation on the incumbent party. And beyond all that, he and others based their conclusions largely on the incredible disparity between the last exit polls and the vote count itself. Of course, Indiana?s Richard Lugar was talking about the presidential election in the Ukraine. But in so doing, he underscored that once again, the exit polls appear to have fulfilled the time-honored international tradition of the canary in the mine shaft. If only we could have used them in that way here.

?I don't think that exit polls can be used as a barometer for the accuracy of an election itself,? noted pollster John Zogby explained to me on last night?s Countdown, in what we think was his first full-scale television interview since the election. ?At least until we find out if there's something broken with this round of election polls? I think that the gentlemen who are responsible for the exit polls should be fully transparent, release their data, discuss their methodology. Let us see what exactly it is that happened, and why it happened.?

It turns out one of those gentlemen doesn?t think anything happened.

In an unsolicited e-mail to Countdown, Warren Mitofsky wrote that he was ?struck by the misinformation? in our program. He heads Mitofsky International, which along with Edison Media Research, conducted the election night exit polling for the television networks and the Associated Press. I referred to the variance among the early and late exit polls, and the voting. Insisting ?there were no early exit polls? released by his company or Edison, Mr. Mitofsky wrote ?the early release came from unauthorized leaks to bloggers who posted misinformation.?

Mitofsky compared those leaks to ?the score at half time at a football game? and said the ?leakers were reading complex displays intended for trained statisticians. The leakers did not understand what they were reading and the bloggers did not know they were getting misinformation.?

His defense of his work grew more strident. ?The presidential exit polls released at poll closing time when they were completed had an average error of 1.9 percentage points. There were no mistaken projections by Edison/Mitofsky or any of the NEP members.? One more thrust: ?All the professionals correctly interpreted the numbers.?

While Zogby spoke of a ?blue ribbon panel? to investigate both the voting irregularities and the exit polling, Mitofsky asked rhetorically, ?Did anyone really think that 51% in an exit poll two hours before voting was finished in the western states gave Kerry a lock on the presidency??

John Zogby, meanwhile, was more concerned about the short end of another poll this week -- one that indicated that about four in five Americans thought President Bush had been legitimately elected three weeks ago. ?But, Keith, 20 percent don?t think the president is legitimate. And worse yet, if you take the other half, those that didn?t vote for him, about half of the other side doesn?t think the president is legitimate. That just hasn?t existed for a long, long time in our system. We need to restore, I think, some semblance of legitimacy and honor to the system.?

Warren Mitofsky seemed to disagree. ?The exit polls have been better in the past. They were far from perfect, but nowhere near as bad as your broadcast made them sound.? He never mentioned Zogby in his e-mail, but he did blast others. ?Only the unauthorized leakers and bloggers were misled - a fate they richly deserved.?

Mitofsky?s pride in his efforts is understandable. But the so-called ?early waves? of exit polling information were disseminated in generalized form to all the networks as darkness fell in the east on November 2nd. They were intended as background, as material that could be used to anticipate patterns and results. Those who characterized them loaded them heavily with caveats and disclaimers, and kept numbers virtually out of their characterizations. But the effect was impossible to misinterpret. Merely in their intended spheres, they helped shape coverage and tone, on-air and off.

And they, along with the voting irregularities so thoroughly chronicled on the net (and still just seeping into the mainstream media), created an atmosphere that Zogby thinks requires broad remedy: ?I think it's in the interests of the nation that we study what happened in this election and widen that, let's study what happened with the exit polls, and let's come out with a definitive conclusions by a blue ribbon panel to restore the legitimacy of this election.?

Zogby thinks he knows the steps to take to do that. The first is for those who are raising questions, to keep doing so. ?I can reassure them they?re not crazy for asking. It?s not just those who are far out, it is indeed many respectable, responsible people.? The pollster says he?s heard from thousands of them, asking him to get involved in their various causes and investigations, so many he can?t answer them all.

But he used Countdown as his mass e-mail reply. ?I?ll take this opportunity right now to say I think that it?s in the interest of healing this country and restoring some unity to this country for us to have a thorough investigation of what happened both to the election and with the exit polls.? Zogby called for the proverbial blue-ribbon commission into the voting irregularities, and the full release of the exit polling data.

And he encouraged the recounts, even when, as they have in the first three of the nine precincts in New Hampshire, they have varied by just fifteen votes from the original count. The second tally in Ohio, Zogby says, ?certainly is useful, but I don't think its enough?I called this election for months the Armageddon election, and in that context, one of the things that we discovered throughout our polling was the fact that there were going to be significant numbers, on both sides who were not going to accept the legitimacy of the other guy winning, especially if it was close election.?

Do they have reason? With three weeks? reflection, he?s not convinced there was an altered vote - accidental or otherwise - at least not on ?a grand scale.? But Zogby says the ?system is not geared for a close election like this? and if ?many millions of people? don?t think that their vote was counted accurately,? the results are almost as bad as if an election was rigged, or decided by static charges in a thousand computers.

Zogby says he?s at peace with his own Election Night forecast - made not with the Mitofsky or Edison exit polling, but with his own polls. He saw Florida and Ohio both ?trending? towards Kerry, and producing a triple-digit victory for the Democrat. Within the pollster?s margin of error, he made no mistakes. But he may not be as thoroughly sanguine as he suggests. Off-air, in the preparatory interview standard for all guests, his November 2 forecast was mentioned.

?Thanks,? he said, ?for reminding me.?

Which reminds me that it was mildly encouraging to see some focus given to this entire topic Tuesday night by my old CNN cohort Aaron Brown. A carefully-worded segment included a laundry list of the problems we?ve been reporting on Countdown for the last three weeks, and compared them to ?the kind of dumb mistake that ruined the Hubbell telescope.? Brown referenced the UC Berkeley study on the prospect of 130,000 phantom votes in Florida (though he didn?t mention its conclusion that all of them went to President Bush), and even had about fifteen seconds of Blackbox?s Bev Harris and her slog through the computer printout records in Florida.

Such as they are.

Thoughts? Email me at KOlbermann@msnbc.com

Help Us Get 100,000 People to Take the Pledge by Inauguration Day ? January 20th
Mood:  energetic
Topic: Bill of Rights
Today our most fundamental freedoms are in jeopardy. Only a bold, spirited movement of people like you who refuse to surrender your freedoms can protect our civil liberties.

On January 20th, George Bush will pledge to uphold the Constitution. Our goal is to recruit 100,000 new ACLU supporters by that day to proclaim "I REFUSE TO SURRENDER MY FREEDOM" by taking this simple pledge:

"I pledge to join with over 400,000 ACLU members and supporters to help ensure that the President, his administration, and our leaders in Congress fulfill their duty to preserve, protect, and defend our Constitution.

By reaffirming my commitment to the American values of justice and liberty for all, I am enlisting in a powerful movement to defend our freedoms against assaults on our civil liberties."

Let's make it clear to those who seek to take away our freedoms that they are on the wrong side of the law . . . the wrong side of core American values . . . and the wrong side of history. Take the pledge now and stand strong in support of freedom.

Take the pledge

Thousands of Students Cut from Pell Grant Program in Final Federal Budget
Mood:  not sure
Topic: Financial Woes

WASHINGTON -- November 23 -- Last-minute changes to the federal spending bill approved by Congress this weekend will cause 90,000 low-income students to lose their Pell Grant eligibility this upcoming year. More than 1 million other students face reductions in their Pell Grant awards under this change.

House Republicans, with the support of the Bush administration, struck a provision from the FY05 Senate appropriations bill that postpones changes in the Department of Education's federal financial aid formula that helps determine Pell Grant eligibility. The Pell Grant program is the country's largest source of federal aid for college students.

"Behind closed doors, Congress decided to pay for budget shortfalls out of the pockets of students," said Luke Swarthout, higher education associate for the State Public Interest Research Groups.

The federal spending bill that Congress passed this weekend left out language written by Senator Corzine to maintain current Pell Grant eligibility rules. The Department of Education claims that without such language they will be forced to change the formula used to calculate the expected family contribution (EFC) in financial aid forms. According to the American Council on Education, the new calculation will cut 90,000 college students out of the Pell Grant program, and reduce Pell awards for more than a million students.

Congress included language in last year's final federal spending bill to postpone changes to Pell Grant eligibility rules until the issue and its effect on students' aid packages was further examined. "By making this change, Congress is reneging on its promise to students and families," said Swarthout. The language was included in last year's spending bill with bipartisan support, and was included in this year's Senate appropriations bill until final negotiations between the House and Senate this week resulted in the provision being stripped from the bill.

The change comes as students are already struggling with skyrocketing college costs and declining grant funding. Students are facing tuitions that are 10.5 percent higher at four-year public institutions this year,
according to a recent report by the College Board. The FY05 budget also freezes funding for the maximum Pell Grant at $4,050, and level funds numerous other higher education programs.

Pell Grant article

In Response to the Costs of War - My Thanks
Mood:  blue
Topic: Support Your Troops
{To my friend who sent this bulletin to me}Thank you. This brought tears to my eyes.

Most people really don't understand that it is the military families that are paying the price. Support Our Troops ribbons are now just a twisted fad - bringing on the sickening sight of copies of random causes, such as Breast Cancer awareness magnetic ribbons - while I don't have a problem with them having their ribbons - it's just another sign of companies cashing in on a situation that actually HAS A CAUSE. Wait a while? Have some respect. None of the proceeds from any of those magnets are actually going to the troops. And my brother's ribbon - stolen off of his jeep. How's that for supporting our troops?

My brother is a Reservist with an MP company. They were deployed to Iraq for 17 months. SEVENTEEN MONTHS. His tour of duty was extended twice - the second time, when they were packed up, with their bags on the boat. Another company unloaded their gear and replaced it with their own. At one point in time shortly afterwards, during a phone call to our mother, he said that they had better get them out of there soon, that while he was fine, he said that there were going to be suicides. Because while they could not say it as they could be reprimanded, there were tremendous feelings of complete abandonment.

A couple of Senators and many parents (including my own) of this MP company made the trip to Washington DC - to the Pentagon - there they met up with Generals in charge of the operations over in Iraq. Finally, my brother and his comrades would get the armor on the side of their humvees. Armor that if provided twelve months prior, would have prevented a situation like one mentioned below: shrapnel from an IED lodging itself behind one of the kid's eyes. This kid was much more lucky - he retained most of his sight. Had the humvee been armored then...it would not have even reached him.

Bush can stand there and be proud of our military men and women. Pray for the families to his God in the Oval office. And pray for them as he watches the cash roll in. Going in to Afghanistan? Sure - I agree. Iraq? Who does he think that he is? He ignored (and fired) his advisors who said that the numbers of troops needed were grossly underestimated. Ignored (and fired) advisors that said the the financial costs upon our country were grossly underestimated. Do we see a trend here? He didn't ask his father for advice - why? Because what his father would have said is that we had no viable exit strategy - just as he wrote in his book.

He had nowhere near the resources necessary to man this war, or even fund it. While I write this, there is a new Reserve Center being built - literally a mile up the road from my house. Rumors of the draft coming back around are well-founded. I personally believed that both Bush and Kerry lied through their teeth. I think that there will be a draft - and it will come along with an apology - saying that the military resources required to "rebuild" Iraq were "underestimated". They weren't underestimated - the people who spoke the truth without regard for the hidden agenda were ignored and eliminated. Why else would it have been necessary to keep my brother overseas and extended twice? Because it wasn't the cakewalk Bush thought that it would be. He doesn't listen to people tell him that he is wrong. Just as one of the mothers below realized with despair. He doesn't care about anything but his agenda.

If we need a draft. So be it. Without additional troops, more will die. A draft will save the lives of already over-extended troops. I can accept that. It scares the crap out of me. It scares the people who will potentially be drafted (although not enough to get them to vote - so they probably already know that either way, that is not going to change.) It scares the crap out of the parents of all who are eligible to be drafted.

So many troops are overseas without the armament and equipment required to do their job effectively. Bush is blatantly disrespecting these soldiers and their families by not providing the necessary armor and other equipment to ensure that they come home safely.

And while he is putting all of our loved ones in harm's way... He is cutting their Veteran's Benefits. How's that for supporting your troops? Makes me want to jump up and volunteer.

Bush had an agenda. He used 9/11 as an excuse. Why else would Kerry have overwhelmingly won NYC? They have been most effected by the situation out of all of us - lost the most loved ones. They're not buying the bullshit. Why is everyone else?

When 9/11 happened. Sure, Bush did a stand up job handling the crisis. Who in their right mind would have done anything differently? What was he going to do - commit political suicide and say, eh well, fuck the victims, fuck the families... shit happens. ???????? OF COURSE NOT! People say that he is a great leader and they are loyal to him because of that. It makes me sick. It frustrates me. It fills me with hatred and rage - I understand completely the woman who wrote that she cannot even look at his face without being physically ill. For I see nothing but lies and deception dripping off of every smug patronizing word that he utters.

Now all of the Bush supporters can sit there and say that my brother's situation was a mistake, and that not all of the troops feel like this. That (what was it - 70% of the overseas ballots?) were for Bush - that the troops voted for Bush? Because they are BRAINWASHED.

My brother came back and was all for Bush - it took a lot of long talks and REAL EVIDENCE put in to his hands for him to realize what types of lies and deceptions were going on. Long talks from my mother, father and myself. His away message now says: if there is anyone i hate as much as Bush - he just changed my opinion of him http://www.guerrillanews.com/content/eminem_mosh.html

When my brother enlisted, (before 9/11) my mother pointed at him, and said "Bush is in office, we're going to war." And he shrugged and said, no...

Bush doesn't care about our boys overseas. He doesn't care about my brother. He doesn't care about our domestic issues. He doesn't care about you, he doesn't care about me. He cares about money and the facade of religion. Because that veil of religion buys him the votes necessary to complete the agenda at hand for himself and his buddies. World domination and oil.

1996
"...sort of behavior is left to the psychotic, dogmatic, fundamentalist believers you see on your T.V. everyday letting off bombs and killing people in the name of God. Beliefs are dangerous. Beliefs allow the mind to stop functioning. A non-functioning mind is clinically dead. Believe in nothing..."