The WAWG Blog

In this seventh survey of the web, the WAWG index group average was up by 2.3 percent from March, 2006. Of the fourteen items tracked, 8 were down, 6 were up, and 0 were unchanged. The cumulative change for the index is up 52 percent.

As for individual trends, “election fraud” and “protected corporate power” continue their upward trend averaging another 12 percent increase. The continuous downtrend for “scapegoats as a unifying cause” and “media control” dropped another 3.6 percent. However, “obsession with national security” broke its downward trend by jumping 34 percent. With all the fuss over the Dubai Ports World deal starting in late February, this up tick for national security may be due to some delay in accumulating the information in the search database.

Let me start off with a quote from Thomas Paine, “He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.” In other words, what a country does unto its enemy can also be used against its citizens when they are seen as the enemy.

With this concept in mind consider the implications of a recent survey by Pew Research, where 46 percent of the general public answered “often” or “sometimes” to the question, Do you think the use of torture against suspected terrorists in order to gain important information is justifiable?. The survey also showed that this was in sharp contrast to the feelings of eight “elite groups,” who chose “often” or “sometimes” only 16 percent of the time.

From the other end of the responses, only 32 percent of the general public chose “never” compared to a 46 percent average for the elite respondents.

In a related article from the National Catholic Reporter, they took the survey results and separated the general public into secular and non-secular groupings. The non-secular group of Catholic, white protestant and white evangelical, chose “often” and “sometimes” by 51 percent, while 35 percent of the secular grouping made the same choice.

The choice of “never” got 29 and 41 percent from the non-secular and secular groups, respectively.

No matter how you look at the Pew Research survey results, a clear majority of Americans favor some use of torture. Where else is torture sanctioned?

According to the Reporter this public acceptance of torture “could be why Bush administration officials have been emboldened to use terms like ‘torture lite,’ referring to abuse that does not result in organ failure or death, and why international and humanitarian organizations have been outspoken about American and American-sponsored torture.”

So, torturing the enemy, whoever that is or might become, is okayed by both the general population and Bush administration officials. Add to that the denial of legal representation for accused detainees kept in a U.S. controlled territory (Guantanamo) and wiretapping of U.S. citizens without oversight that is deemed okay by President Bush and where might our country be heading as the war on terror evolves?

Could U.S. citizens misunderstood during wire tapped phone call be detained at Guantanamo? Could the U.S. government come to use torture on it own citizens as long as they think that citizen is an enemy combatant? Years from now, will we remember we approved the torture of others that eventually was used on our citizens?

Maybe on our way down this slippery slope we will see something like Section 17 of South Africa’s 1960’s General Law Amendment Act. According to an article in the LA Times by Ms. Gillian Slovo, who lived under this law in her homeland of South Africa, this act “allowed the police to detain any person suspected of a political crime and to hold them for 90 days without access to lawyers. The number of days was purely notional because prisoners could be released after 90 days and immediately rearrested.” According to Ms. Slovo, her mother was kept in solitary confinement for 117 days for being a “prominent anti-apartheid activist.”

Hopefully this historical example has a low probability of becoming a reality for us. But if we Americans continue to let our leaders lower our national standards, could a law like Section 17 creep into our war on terror?

I opened with a quote, so let me close with the following from Abraham Lincoln, our 16th President, “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”

In previous articles concerning port security and the Dubai Ports deal, I have attempted to point out other facts that have not made it into the mainstream news and still haven’t. In this article, there is some news about, believe it or not, Congressmen working a real problem – lack of customs officials.

According to an April 1, 2006, article in the Houston Chronicle, “Eight members of Congress signed the letter to Deborah Spero, acting commissioner for the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection.” In this letter they pleaded for an increase of 125 to 150 inspectors for both the Port of Houston and George Bush Intercontinental Airport. The letter included the following:

Unfortunately, the customs inspector staff shortage for the Port of Houston, nearby seaports and Bush Intercontinental Airport is limiting the ability to securely screen cargo and passengers while still allowing our regional economy to function effectively.

We ask that U.S. Customs and Border Protection take immediate and sustained efforts to improve the customs staffing levels for the greater Houston metropolitan area.

According to a representative from the Port of Houston Authority, this request does not include the additional inspectors needed for the new Bayport container terminal that will open this summer.

In this sixth survey of the web, the WAWG index group average dropped by 6.5 percent from February, 2006. Of the fourteen items tracked, 10 were down, 4 were up, and 0 were unchanged. The cumulative change for the index is up 50 percent.

Despite the overall decrease for the month, “election fraud” and “protected corporate power” continue their upward trend averaging a 19 percent increase. On the other hand, using “scapegoats as a unifying cause”, “media control” and “obsession with national security” have consistently been decreasing and averaged an 18 percent drop. The drop for national security seems odd after all the fuss over Dubai Ports World.

Imagine living Afghanistan where vengeance is a part of life. Add to that terrorists and their supporters mingling with your neighbors, familiar with your local traditions, acquainted with some of the local leaders, and hiding from the U.S. The U.S. doesn’t understand local customs, can’t tell you from the terrorists or their supporters, but can offer significant rewards to anyone who provides information on “enemy combatants.”

Next, imagine that your government is an ally of the U.S. Imagine too that they are anxious to please the U.S. and demonstrate their support by finding those enemy combatants.

Who might be turned over to the U.S. by your government? Enemy combatants? You? Will the U.S. get the ones they are seeking, but can’t recognize? Or will they be misled by greed and hidden alliances and imprison mostly innocent bystanders with a few real terrorists?

What if you and your brother were arrested and ended up at Guantanamo for telling a satirical joke – not for being on “the battlefield” as stated by President Bush and VP Cheney? What if you are denied access to legal counsel? What if it took three years before the U.S. finally let you free? What could you tell us about your experience that would give us great concern?

For the full details about these two brothers and others released from Guantanamo, listen to the extended, over an hour, report at This American Life. Go to the archives for 2006 and click on the link for Habeas Schmabeas. From there click on the RealPlayer icon.

Here is some background information for Habeas Schmabeas from This American Life:

The right of habeas corpus has been a part of this country’s legal tradition longer than we’ve actually been a country. It means the government has to explain why it’s holding a person in custody. But now, the war on terror has nixed many of the rules we used to think of as fundamental. At Guantanamo Bay, our government initially claimed that the prisoners should not be covered by habeas – or even by the Geneva Conventions – because they’re the most fearsome terrorist enemies we have. But is that true? Is it a camp full of terrorists, or a camp full of our mistakes?

Prologue. Joseph Margulies, a lawyer for one of the detainees at Guantanamo, explains how the detention facility there was created to be an ideal interrogation facility. Any possible comfort, like water or natural light, are entirely controlled by the interrogators. (3 minutes)

Act One. There’s No U.S. in Habeas. Jack Hitt explains how President’s Bush’s War on Terror changed the rules on prisoners of war, and how it is that under those rules, it’d be possible that someone whose classified file declares that they pose no threat to the United States, could still be locked up indefinitely – potentially forever! – at Guantanamo. Jack Hitt reports. (24 minutes). Clarification: When Seton Hall Professor Baher Azmy discusses the classified file of his client, Murat Kurnaz, in this Act, he is referring to information that had previously been made public and published in the Washington Post. That material has subsequently been reclassified.

Act Two. September 11th, 1660. Habeas Corpus began in England, and 175 members of the British Parliament filed a “friend of the court” brief in one of the Supreme Court cases on habeas and Guantanamo, apparently the first time that’s happened in Supreme Court history. In their brief, the MP’s warn about the danger of suspending habeas: “During the British Civll War, the British created their own version of Guantanamo Bay and dispatched undesirable prisoners to garrisons off the mainland, beyond the reach of habeas corpus relief.” In London, reporter Jon Ronson, author of Them, goes in search of what happened. (6 minutes)

Act Three. We Interrogate the Detainees. Although over two hundred prisoners from the U.S. Facility at Guantanamo Bay have been released, few of them have ever been interviewed on radio or television in America. Jack Hitt conducts rare and surprising interviews with two former Guantanamo detainees about life in Guantanamo. (20 minutes)

A Seton Hall study of the Guantanamo detainees provided the following details:

1. Fifty-five percent (55%) of the detainees are not determined to have committed any hostile acts against the United States or its coalition allies.

2. Only 8% of the detainees were characterized as al Qaeda fighters. Of the remaining detainees, 40% have no definitive connection with al Qaeda at all and 18% are have no definitive affiliation with either al Qaeda or the Taliban.

3. The Government has detained numerous persons based on mere affiliations with a large number of groups that in fact, are not on the Department of Homeland Security terrorist watchlist. Moreover, the nexus between such a detainee and such organizations varies considerably. Eight percent are detained because they are deemed “fighters for;” 30% considered “members of;” a large majority – 60% — are detained merely because they are “associated with” a group or groups the Government asserts are terrorist organizations. For 2% of the prisoners their nexus to any terrorist group is unidentified.

4. Only 5% of the detainees were captured by United States forces. 86% of the
detainees were arrested by either Pakistan or the Northern Alliance and turned over to United States custody. This 86% of the detainees captured by Pakistan or the Northern Alliance were handed over to the United States at a time in which the United States offered large bounties for capture of suspected enemies.

5. Finally, the population of persons deemed not to be enemy combatants – mostly Uighers – are in fact accused of more serious allegations than a great many persons still deemed to be enemy combatants.

Related to habeas, a federal judge in Washington ruled on December 23, 2005, that the continued detention of two ethnic Uighurs at the U.S. prison facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is “unlawful,” but he decided he had no authority to order their release.

“If you think of the people down there, these are people, all of whom were captured on a battlefield. They’re terrorists, trainers, bomb makers, recruiters, financiers, [Osama bin Laden’s] bodyguards, would-be suicide bombers, probably the 20th 9/11 hijacker.” — Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, June 27, 2005. The National Journal used this quote to introduce a recent cover story on detainees in Guantanamo.

Nina Totenberg, NPR legal affairs correspondent, attended a speech by retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, at Georgetown University.  This speech was not available for broadcast, but Nina covered the high points. 

Nina quoted Justice O’Connor:

Attacks on the judiciary by some Republican leaders pose a direct threat to our constitutional freedoms.

Our effectiveness is premised on the notion that we [judges] won’t be subject to retaliation for our judicial acts. 

The nation’s founders wrote repeatedly that without an independent judiciary to protect individual rights from the other branches of government, those rights and privileges would amount to nothing. 

Nina then reported that Justice O’Connor took aim at former GOP House leader Tom Delay, “She didn’t name him, but she quoted his attacks on the courts at a meeting of the conservative Christian group Justice Sunday last year, when Delay took off after the courts for rulings on abortion, prayer and the Terri Schiavo case.”   Nina quoted Justice O’Connor:

This was after the federal courts had applied Congress’s one time only statute about Schiavo as it was written, not as the Congressman might have wished it were written.  The response to this flagrant display of judicial restraint was that the Congressman blasted the courts.  

It gets worse.  Death threats against judges are increasing. 

Next Justice O’Connor went after U.S. Senator Cornyn from Texas and his comments on the Senate floor on April 4, 2005.

It doesn’t help when a high-profile senator suggests that there may be a connection between violence against judges and decisions that the senator disagrees with.

Nina closed with this final quote from Justice O’Connor:

There have been a lot of suggestions lately for so-called judicial reforms.  Recommendations for the massive impeachment of judges, stripping the courts of jurisdiction and cutting judicial budgets to punish offending judges.   Any of these might be debatable, as long as they are not retaliation for decisions that political leaders disagree with.  I am against judicial reforms driven by nakedly partisan reasoning.  

We must be ever vigilant against those who would strong-arm the judiciary into adopting their preferred policies. It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings.

For a historical perspective on judicial impeachment, refer to Why the Founding Fathers Would Be Appalled at Tom DeLay’s Call to Impeach Judges at the History News Network.

To listen to Nina’s complete report, refer to O’Connor Decries Republican Attacks on Courts.

In the March 8, 2006, issue of Personal Finance, there is an article that discusses a change in federal regulations at the Environmental Projection Agency (EPA). The PF article stated:

In the early 1990s, the EPA came to the conclusion that key cities and counties around the US needed to change gasoline blends to cut damaging emissions from automobile usage.

This changed the blends of gasoline to include a higher concentration of oxygenating agents, led by ethanol. While modern cars with fuel injection and other on-board engine management devices already make adjustments to compensate for fuel, temperature and load demands on engines, ethanol— for other reasons—became the EPA’s mandated choice.

To make everything more challenging, the EPA enabled local and state jurisdictions to make their own mandates as to the exact recipes for their local gasoline blends utilizing ethanol and other similar chemical additives.

The result: a crazy quilt of gasoline blends with individual states having as many as three to seven different blend recipes.

The fallout is that prices for gasoline at the pump have been soaring, independent of crude oil costs. With refiners working to meet local demands, any unanticipated changes have resulted in shortages or pricing spikes.

The EPA is getting tired of hearing complaints from refiners, distributors and consumers. Quietly it eliminated the mandated inclusion of the oxygenating-agent blends in our gasoline supplies.

How does this jive with what President Bush said on August 8, 2005 at the signing ceremony for the Energy Policy Act? President Bush stated, “The bill also will lead to a greater diversity of fuels for cars and trucks. The bill includes tax incentives for producers of ethanol and biodiesel. The bill includes a flexible, cost-effective renewable fuel standard that will double the amount of ethanol and biodiesel in our fuel supply over the next seven years. Using ethanol and biodiesel will leave our air cleaner. And every time we use a home-grown fuel, particularly these, we’re going to be helping our farmers, and at the same time, be less dependent on foreign sources of energy.”

And do you really believe that the Energy Policy Act is particularly “helping our farmers?” Wouldn’t the real beneficiaries be the ethanol producers and the companies selling the reformulated gasoline (RFG)?

You might wonder what lead to the EPA making this change in February. According to their background information, “Recently, Congress passed legislation which amended Section 211(k) of the CAA to remove the RFG oxygen requirement.” Well guess what? That change was enabled by the same Energy Policy Act the President signed last August. Here is the language from Title XV: Ethanol and Motor Fuels – Subtitle A: General Provisions of the Energy Policy Act, “(Sec. 1504) Amends the Clean Air Act to repeal general requirements governing the oxygen content of both gasoline and of reformulated gasoline.” So which is it? Are we increasing the use of ethanol or not?

Here are some other related sections of the Energy Policy Act that might clarify(?):

(Sec. 208) Establishes in the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) the Sugar Cane Ethanol Pilot Program. Directs the Administrator of EPA to establish a pilot project in multiple states to study the production of ethanol from cane sugar, sugarcane, and sugarcane byproducts.

(Sec. 1501) Amends the Clean Air Act to establish a renewable fuel program consisting of cellulosic biomass and waste-derived ethanol, and biodiesel. Directs the EPA Administrator to promulgate regulations to implement a renewable fuel program to ensure that gasoline introduced into commerce in the United States contains the applicable volume of specified renewable fuel (except in noncontiguous states or territories).

Directs the Administrator to study and report to Congress on the effects of ethanol content in gasoline on permeation, the process by which fuel molecules migrate through the elastomeric materials (rubber and plastic parts) that make up the fuel and fuel vapor systems of a motor vehicle.

Requires such study to include estimates of the increase in total evaporative emissions likely to result from the use of gasoline with ethanol content in a motor vehicle, and the fleet of motor vehicles, due to permeation.

(Sec. 1510) Directs the Secretary to establish a program to provide guarantees of loans by private institutions for the construction of facilities for the processing and conversion of municipal solid waste and cellulosic biomass into fuel ethanol and other commercial byproducts.

(Sec. 1511) Amends the Clean Air Act to: (1) authorize funds for certain loan guarantees to implement commercial demonstration projects for cellulosic biomass and sucrose-derived ethanol; and (2) direct the Secretary to issue loan guarantees for up to four projects to commercially demonstrate the feasibility and viability of producing cellulosic biomass ethanol or sucrose-derived ethanol (including use of cereal straw and municipal solid waste as a feedstock).

Authorizes appropriations for FY2005-FY2007 for a resource center to develop bioconversion technology using low-cost biomass for the production of ethanol at the Center for Biomass-Based Energy at the Mississippi State University and the Oklahoma State University.

Authorizes the Secretary to provide grants to merchant producers of cellulosic biomass ethanol to build eligible production facilities for the product.

(Sec. 1512) Authorizes the Secretary to provide grants to merchant producers of cellulosic biomass ethanol, waste-derived ethanol, and approved renewable fuels in the United States to assist them in building eligible production facilities for the production of ethanol or approved renewable fuels. Authorizes appropriations for FY2006-FY2008.

(Sec. 1514) Directs the EPA Administrator to: (1) establish an Advanced Biofuel Technologies Program to demonstrate advanced technologies for the production of alternative transportation fuels; (2) give priority to projects that enhance the geographical diversity of alternative fuels production and utilize feedstocks that represent 10% or less of domestic ethanol or biodiesel fuel production during the previous fiscal year; and (3) fund demonstration projects to develop conversion technologies for producing cellulosic biomass ethanol, and for coproducing value-added bioproducts (such as fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides) resulting from biodiesel fuel production. Authorizes appropriations for FY2005-FY2009.

(Sec. 1516) Authorizes funds for, and authorizes the Secretary to issue, loan guarantees to projects to demonstrate commercially the feasibility and viability of producing ethanol using sugarcane, sugarcane bagasse, and other sugarcane byproducts as a feedstock.

So, is there still a contradiction? The EPA has eliminated the requirements for using ethanol. The Energy Policy Act, which lead to the EPA changes, promotes getting ethanol from sources other than corn.

In my first article on the Dubai Ports World business deal, I made reference to the Container Security Initiative (CSI).   As reported by U.S. Customs Today: 

The CSI consists of four core elements. These are: (1) establishing security criteria to identify high-risk containers; (2) pre-screening containers before they arrive at U.S. ports; (3) using technology to pre-screen high-risk containers; and (4) developing and using smart and secure containers.

The fundamental objective of the CSI is to first engage the ports that send the highest volumes of container traffic into the United States, as well as the governments in these locations, in a way that will facilitate detection of potential problems at their earliest possible opportunity. 

The second core element, pre-screening, is conducted by U.S. Customs and Border Security Department officials located at the port of origination.  As of December, 2005, there were 42 ports in 23 countries/city states, including UAE’s Dubai Port, that have implemented CSI and allow on-site inspection by U.S officials.

Now for the new agreement with Pakistan, that was signed at the conclusion of President Bush’s recent visit to Pakistan. According to the Daily Times of Pakistan, Pakistan and the U.S. have signed a Declaration of Principles on Integrated Cargo Container Control (IC3) for Port Qasim.  Prior to this agreement, Port Qasim containers were diverted to and scanned at ports in Hong Kong, Colombo, Sri lanka, and Salalah, Saudi Arabia before they are shipped to the U. S.  Two of these ports have implemented CSI and on-cite inspections.

So, how is this Port Qasim IC3 agreement different from CSI? First of all, Pakistan will be able to reduce its export costs to the U.S by avoiding a short stop at a CSI port. Secondly, and far more important,  just like the Pakistan government won’t allow our troops in their country, they have refused to “allow the posting of at least two officials of US Customs and Border Security Department at Port Qasim for monitoring of [the] scanning process of the cargo containers.”   Instead, Pakistan “has managed to convince the US authorities on the scanning supervision by via[sic] live video link by the customs authorities of Pakistan and the US.” 

How is this IC3 agreement good for our national security? We are going from on-site inspections at CSI compliant ports to remote video?

In my effort to get past the political grandstanding and trying to point out the real issue with local national security, I have found another perspective for you to consider.

Former labor secretary Robert Reich concludes his Marketplace commentary on the UAE’s Dubai Ports World terminal management issue with:

“The real issue here is not about nationality.  It’s about what we are prepared to pay for our security.  And whether we pay mostly for a war in Iraq or we finally get serious about security here at home.” He prefaced this statement with the following specifics, which I have restated.

When will citizens and Congress be willing to pay for more:

• gamma ray monitors, 
• radiation scanners, 
• shipping container inspectors, and
• security checks, special ID cards, fingerprints and other biometrics for workers at the ports and border crossings?

When will businesses be willing to support implementing the above and accept:

• slower commerce at the borders, and
• reduced corporate profits?

When will we all ante up and pay the additional cost for all this – $7,000,000,000 a year according to Mr. Reich. Compare that to the hundreds of billions that are now spent on Defense and Homeland Security.

In the following article from the Seattle Post Intelligencer, Joel Connelly reported:

How much money is proposed for port security grants in President Bush’s budget for the coming year? Zero.

Deep down, the Washington, D.C., press corps can be awfully shallow. Coverage of the Dubai deal has focused on Democrats seizing a security issue and a split between Republican lawmakers and a Republican president.

“We’re spending billions at our airports with the TSA, but this administration has really put very little in the pot for the ports,” said Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., dean of the state’s congressional delegation.

In a bipartisan letter to Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thomas Collins, Sens. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., this week wrote, “It is extremely difficult to maintain the security of our borders and ports with the minuscule resources provided by the Coast Guard to conduct its port security mission.”

In a nationwide review, under the Maritime Security Act, the Coast Guard identified $7.4 billion in port security upgrades needed in the next decade.

Our congressional delegation and other coastal lawmakers have fought hard to appropriate at least $400 million a year to meet these needs.

They managed to get $175 million last year — a drop in the bucket compared with even the weekly cost of the war in Iraq.

Don Gonyea of NPR interviews both Dr. Donald Kennedy, Editor-in-Chief of Science Magazine, and Dr. John Marburger, President Bush’s Science Advisor, and provides this summary:

One of the top domestic priorities for the Bush administration this year has been promotion of scientific research and education as a way to ensure American competitiveness in the world.

The president unveiled the campaign in his State of the Union Address, vowing to “double the federal commitment to the most critical basic research programs in the physical sciences over the next 10 years.”

The push for more funding comes after years of strong criticism of his administration’s approach to scientific research. The basic complaint is that the Bush White House puts political ideology over science when writing policy or when determining who sits on advisory panels set up to provide expert input into decision making.

In 2004, the Union of Concerned Scientists issued a petition formally making that charge. It has now been signed by more than 8,000 scientists, including 49 Nobel laureates and 63 National Medal of Science recipients.

This past week, Francesca Grifo, the executive director of the organization’s Scientific Integrity Program, reiterated the view, saying: “We have reports that stay in draft form and don’t get out to the public. We have reports that are changed. We have reports that are ignored and overwritten.”

In the Feb. 17 issue of Science Magazine, editor-in-chief Dr. Donald Kennedy wrote an editorial critical of the White House. He focused on two recent incidents: Top NASA climate expert James Hansen was told not to talk to the media about his findings that voluntary measures proposed to deal with climate change won’t be sufficient, and that the problem is getting worse. NASA has since said a 24-year-old Bush appointee who told Hansen not to talk no longer works there.

The other episode cited in the editorial deals with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which Kennedy says has told its scientists not to do interviews about a study linking increased water temperatures to hurricane intensity.

Dr. John Marburger has been the president’s Science Advisor for just over four years. He says the new proposals for increased science funding are not a response to critics of the president’s science policy. And he describes criticism from the science community itself as “irrelevant.”

There’s no apparent sign of a political warming trend.

Marburger says he thinks the relationship between policy makers and scientists is made more difficult by the rapid pace of scientific progress. Kennedy says he does think there’s no reason to see any real change in the current tensions, and both see this kind of debate playing a more prominent role in politics in the future.

To listen to the detailed interviews, visit NPR. 

See if you can identify the arrogant interviewee.  Hint: He’s the one that thinks when it comes to policy, someone needs to protect the public from controversial information.

Do you suppose the controversy could be minimized if each study were prefixed with statements linking the results of the study to “Intelligent Design?”