US personal incomes show surprise rise - Savings rate hits 14-year high
By Alan Rappeport in New York
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
Published: June 1 2009 14:05 | Last updated: June 1 2009 15:34
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3cac93f8-4eac-11de-8c10-00144feabdc0.html
US consumers curbed their spending for the second month running in April, in spite of the first rise in income this year, as they continue to cope with the recession and fears of more job cuts.
Personal consumption expenditure fell by 0.1 per cent or $5.4bn last month, less than economists expected and a smaller fall than the previous month’s 0.3 per cent.
Incomes rose for the first time in four months in April, increasing by 0.5 per cent, or $58.2bn, and dashing predictions of another drop. Much of the increase, which was the largest in 11 months, was due to lower taxes and benefits from government stimulus payments.
The commerce department’s closely-watched gauge of prices rose by 0.1 per cent in April, following a slight dip in March. Excluding food and energy, prices rose by 0.3 per cent after rising by 0.2 per cent for two consecutive months. On the year the index was up by 1.9 per cent.
Meanwhile the savings rate, which is measured as the proportion of income left after spending and taxes, rose from a revised 4.5 per cent in March to 5.7 per cent in April, a 14-year high. Economists predict that the savings rate could reach 8 per cent as household wealth has collapsed.
“US rebalancing continues and the quicker the adjustment the more promising are the prospects for consumer spending in the longer-term,” said Alan Ruskin, strategist at RBS Greenwich Capital.
Also offering promise on Monday were figures showing that US manufacturing is shrinking at a slower pace than before, adding to hopes that the worst of the recession is over. The Institute for Supply Management’s factory index rose to 42.8 per cent last month from 40.1 per cent in May, as new orders grew for the first time since November 2007.
”While employment and inventories continue to decline at a rapid rate and the sector continued to contract during the month, there are signs of improvement,” said Norbert Ore, ISM chairman.
Export orders also jumped in May, rising to the highest level since the collapse of Lehman Brothers last September.
“ISM is being lifted partly by a catching-up or rebound after the post-Lehman plunge, during which time companies seem to have slashed their spending more deeply than was sustainable, and partly by an unfreezing of world trade,” said Ian Sheperdson, chief US economist at High Frequency Economics.
Separately on Monday, commerce department figures showed that US construction spending unexpectedly rose in April on the back of stronger investment commercial construction. Construction spending grew by 0.8 per cent to $968.7bn in the month, but is off by 10.7 per cent from the same period a year ago.
Private construction climbed by 1.4 per cent in April, while public construction slipped by 0.6 per cent. Residential construction rose by 0.7 per cent, lifting hopes that the stricken US housing market could be starting to bottom.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Air France plane missing with 228 aboard
Air France plane missing with 228 aboard - Flight en route to Paris from Rio de Janeiro
By Ben Hall in Paris, Kevin Done in London and agencies
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
Published: June 1 2009 11:58 | Last updated: June 1 2009 16:46
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ed0588a4-4e98-11de-8c10-00144feabdc0.html
An Air France passenger jet with 228 people on board is believed to have crashed into the Atlantic on Monday en route from Brazil to Paris after suffering an electrical breakdown during a heavy thunderstorm.
Air France said the Airbus A330 jet flew through “severe turbulence” four hours into its flight and far off the Brazilian coast before sending out an automatic warning of an “electrical fault”. It was the last contact with the aircraft.
“It is probably a combination of circumstances that could have led to the crash,” said François Brousse, the company’s communications director, adding that it could have been hit by lightning.
The French government sent three airforce reconnaissance planes from a base in Dakar, Senegal and a naval vessel from the Gulf Guinea to search for the crash site. Brazilian aircraft were also scrambled to join the search. But the area where the Air France jet may have come down is vast.
The accident is the worst in Air France’s 75-year history and the first since a New York-bound Concorde crashed shortly after take-off from Roissy Charles de Gaulle in 2000, killing 109 people.
The Airbus A330, a twin-engined, wide-bodied jet, took off from Rio de Janeiro at 19.03 local time (22.03 GMT) on Sunday and was due to land at Roissy at 11.10 local time yesterday.
The Brazilian air force said that when the plane left its radar area at 0148 GMT it had been flying normally at an altitude of 35,000 feet and at 453 knots. It failed to make contact at the next attempt half an hour later at 0220. Air traffic controllers on both sides of the Atlantic tried in vain to re-establish contact with the aircraft.
The twin-engined plane was carrying 216 passengers, three flight crew and nine cabin staff.
Most of those on board were Brazilian, 40 to 60 were French and 25 German, according to Jean-Louis Borloo, the French transport minister who called the crash “an awful tragedy”.
Air France said relatives of people travelling on board flight AF 447 were being taken care of at Roissy Charles de Gaulle. President Nicolas Sarkozy visited a crisis centre set up at the airport.
Air France said the A330-200 entered service in April 2005 and had completed 18,870 flight hours. It had last been in heavy maintenance on April 16. It was powered by two General Electric CF6-80E engines.
The Airbus A330-200 is the most successful long-haul aircraft built by the European aircraft maker. As of April Airbus had taken 557 orders for the twin-engined aircraft and had delivered 343. According to Airbus there were 341 in operation around the world.
It is used typically on medium capacity long-haul routes and according to Airbus typically has around 250 seats in a three-class configuration with first, business and economy cabins, and as many as 290 in two-class business and economy cabins.
By Ben Hall in Paris, Kevin Done in London and agencies
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
Published: June 1 2009 11:58 | Last updated: June 1 2009 16:46
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ed0588a4-4e98-11de-8c10-00144feabdc0.html
An Air France passenger jet with 228 people on board is believed to have crashed into the Atlantic on Monday en route from Brazil to Paris after suffering an electrical breakdown during a heavy thunderstorm.
Air France said the Airbus A330 jet flew through “severe turbulence” four hours into its flight and far off the Brazilian coast before sending out an automatic warning of an “electrical fault”. It was the last contact with the aircraft.
“It is probably a combination of circumstances that could have led to the crash,” said François Brousse, the company’s communications director, adding that it could have been hit by lightning.
The French government sent three airforce reconnaissance planes from a base in Dakar, Senegal and a naval vessel from the Gulf Guinea to search for the crash site. Brazilian aircraft were also scrambled to join the search. But the area where the Air France jet may have come down is vast.
The accident is the worst in Air France’s 75-year history and the first since a New York-bound Concorde crashed shortly after take-off from Roissy Charles de Gaulle in 2000, killing 109 people.
The Airbus A330, a twin-engined, wide-bodied jet, took off from Rio de Janeiro at 19.03 local time (22.03 GMT) on Sunday and was due to land at Roissy at 11.10 local time yesterday.
The Brazilian air force said that when the plane left its radar area at 0148 GMT it had been flying normally at an altitude of 35,000 feet and at 453 knots. It failed to make contact at the next attempt half an hour later at 0220. Air traffic controllers on both sides of the Atlantic tried in vain to re-establish contact with the aircraft.
The twin-engined plane was carrying 216 passengers, three flight crew and nine cabin staff.
Most of those on board were Brazilian, 40 to 60 were French and 25 German, according to Jean-Louis Borloo, the French transport minister who called the crash “an awful tragedy”.
Air France said relatives of people travelling on board flight AF 447 were being taken care of at Roissy Charles de Gaulle. President Nicolas Sarkozy visited a crisis centre set up at the airport.
Air France said the A330-200 entered service in April 2005 and had completed 18,870 flight hours. It had last been in heavy maintenance on April 16. It was powered by two General Electric CF6-80E engines.
The Airbus A330-200 is the most successful long-haul aircraft built by the European aircraft maker. As of April Airbus had taken 557 orders for the twin-engined aircraft and had delivered 343. According to Airbus there were 341 in operation around the world.
It is used typically on medium capacity long-haul routes and according to Airbus typically has around 250 seats in a three-class configuration with first, business and economy cabins, and as many as 290 in two-class business and economy cabins.
US stocks rally on encouraging data - Cisco and Travelers surge on Dow addition
US stocks rally on encouraging data - Cisco and Travelers surge on Dow addition
By Anuj Gangahar in New York
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
Published: June 1 2009 14:14 | Last updated: June 1 2009 17:54
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9078b782-4eac-11de-8c10-00144feabdc0.html
US stocks climbed sharply on Monday as investors took the General Motors bankruptcy filing in their stride and focused on encouraging economic data.
Before the opening bell, General Motors filed for bankruptcy and a judge ruled in favour of a sale of most of Chrysler’s assets to Italian carmaker Fiat.
President Barack Obama and GM’s chief executive Fritz Henderson sought to reassure workers, suppliers, dealers and car buyers that a leaner, reinvigorated GM would emerge quickly from a court-supervised restructuring.
GM’s bankruptcy filing occurred just hours after a US bankruptcy court judge in New York approved Chrysler’s sale of most of its assets to Fiat, the Italian carmaker.
Shares in Ford rose 5.7 per cent at $6.08 after reports said it planned to increase production in the third quarter in a bid to gain market share while its rivals were bogged down in restructuring. GM shares were suspended on the New York Stock Exchange following its bankruptcy filing.
Stocks were boosted by US manufacturing data, which was better than expected and suggested the economy was bottoming out. Separate data showed the income of Americans rose unexpectedly in April. Personal income rose at a seasonally-adjusted rate of 0.5 per cent compared with the month before, according to the Commerce Department. Income fell a revised 0.2 per cent in March from an original estimate of a fall of 0.3 per cent. Personal consumption in April fell 0.1 per cent compared with March.
At midday in New York the S&P 500 index was 2.6 per cent higher at 942.88 while the Nasdaq Composite was 2.8 per cent ahead at 1,823.83. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was 2.5 per cent higher at 8,710.45.
Analysts at Schaeffer’s Investment Research said the first five months of 2009 had behaved very similarly to the first five months of 2008, pointing out that the beginning of 2008 also featured a weak market that led to a bull market rally.
“Now with June upon us, investors need to pay particular attention. June has historically been a weak month for the market and the S&P may face some risks,” they said.
Monday’s rally came as Tim Geithner, the US Treasury secretary, arrived in China on his maiden visit, with calls for China to make its currency more flexible in return for fiscal reforms by the US.
David Buik of BGC Partners, said it would be interesting to see whether there was any pullback in equities allowing investors to take stock of the situation in the next day or two.
“Mr Geithner’s visit to China is absolutely key. The US’s borrowing requirement is breathtaking in its magnitude. He will have to sweet talk the Chinese into believing that this debt can be serviced,” he said.
Dow Jones said that GM and Citigroup would be replaced in the Dow Jones Industrial Average by technology group Cisco Systems and insurer Travelers, respectively.
Shares in both Cisco and Travelers, which was spun off from Citigroup in 2002, were sharply higher. Cisco shares climbed 4.5 per cent higher to $19.33 while Travelers shares were up 4.5 per cent at $42.49.
Oil climbed by more than $2 to a seven-month high, above $68 a barrel and energy companies gained strongly.
Exxon Mobil climbed 2.6 per cent at $71.16 and Chevron 3.2 per cent to $68.81, boosted by the strong gains in oil. The S&P energy index was up 3.6 per cent while the consumer discretionary index rose 4.4 per cent and the industrial index rose 4.5 per cent.
The financial sector was in focus as Goldman Sachs activated plans to sell up to $1.9bn worth of shares in Industrial and Commercial Bank of China in the latest high-profile divestment of stock in a mainland lender.
The S&P financial index rose 2.1 per cent while the investment banking index was 1.3 per cent higher.
The technology sector also gained although the gains lagged the wider market. Shares in Google were up 2 per cent at $425.95 and Microsoft was 1.8 per cent firmer at $21.24. Microsoft and Sony are this week launching a video-game offensive against Nintendo, the clear leader in console sales.
By Anuj Gangahar in New York
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
Published: June 1 2009 14:14 | Last updated: June 1 2009 17:54
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9078b782-4eac-11de-8c10-00144feabdc0.html
US stocks climbed sharply on Monday as investors took the General Motors bankruptcy filing in their stride and focused on encouraging economic data.
Before the opening bell, General Motors filed for bankruptcy and a judge ruled in favour of a sale of most of Chrysler’s assets to Italian carmaker Fiat.
President Barack Obama and GM’s chief executive Fritz Henderson sought to reassure workers, suppliers, dealers and car buyers that a leaner, reinvigorated GM would emerge quickly from a court-supervised restructuring.
GM’s bankruptcy filing occurred just hours after a US bankruptcy court judge in New York approved Chrysler’s sale of most of its assets to Fiat, the Italian carmaker.
Shares in Ford rose 5.7 per cent at $6.08 after reports said it planned to increase production in the third quarter in a bid to gain market share while its rivals were bogged down in restructuring. GM shares were suspended on the New York Stock Exchange following its bankruptcy filing.
Stocks were boosted by US manufacturing data, which was better than expected and suggested the economy was bottoming out. Separate data showed the income of Americans rose unexpectedly in April. Personal income rose at a seasonally-adjusted rate of 0.5 per cent compared with the month before, according to the Commerce Department. Income fell a revised 0.2 per cent in March from an original estimate of a fall of 0.3 per cent. Personal consumption in April fell 0.1 per cent compared with March.
At midday in New York the S&P 500 index was 2.6 per cent higher at 942.88 while the Nasdaq Composite was 2.8 per cent ahead at 1,823.83. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was 2.5 per cent higher at 8,710.45.
Analysts at Schaeffer’s Investment Research said the first five months of 2009 had behaved very similarly to the first five months of 2008, pointing out that the beginning of 2008 also featured a weak market that led to a bull market rally.
“Now with June upon us, investors need to pay particular attention. June has historically been a weak month for the market and the S&P may face some risks,” they said.
Monday’s rally came as Tim Geithner, the US Treasury secretary, arrived in China on his maiden visit, with calls for China to make its currency more flexible in return for fiscal reforms by the US.
David Buik of BGC Partners, said it would be interesting to see whether there was any pullback in equities allowing investors to take stock of the situation in the next day or two.
“Mr Geithner’s visit to China is absolutely key. The US’s borrowing requirement is breathtaking in its magnitude. He will have to sweet talk the Chinese into believing that this debt can be serviced,” he said.
Dow Jones said that GM and Citigroup would be replaced in the Dow Jones Industrial Average by technology group Cisco Systems and insurer Travelers, respectively.
Shares in both Cisco and Travelers, which was spun off from Citigroup in 2002, were sharply higher. Cisco shares climbed 4.5 per cent higher to $19.33 while Travelers shares were up 4.5 per cent at $42.49.
Oil climbed by more than $2 to a seven-month high, above $68 a barrel and energy companies gained strongly.
Exxon Mobil climbed 2.6 per cent at $71.16 and Chevron 3.2 per cent to $68.81, boosted by the strong gains in oil. The S&P energy index was up 3.6 per cent while the consumer discretionary index rose 4.4 per cent and the industrial index rose 4.5 per cent.
The financial sector was in focus as Goldman Sachs activated plans to sell up to $1.9bn worth of shares in Industrial and Commercial Bank of China in the latest high-profile divestment of stock in a mainland lender.
The S&P financial index rose 2.1 per cent while the investment banking index was 1.3 per cent higher.
The technology sector also gained although the gains lagged the wider market. Shares in Google were up 2 per cent at $425.95 and Microsoft was 1.8 per cent firmer at $21.24. Microsoft and Sony are this week launching a video-game offensive against Nintendo, the clear leader in console sales.
Homophobic alderman? Possibility stirs rage
Homophobic alderman? Possibility stirs rage
BY LAURA WASHINGTON
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
June 1, 2009
http://www.suntimes.com/news/washington/1600747,CST-EDT-laura01.article
The City Council may soon have its first openly homophobic alderman. If Mayor Daley decides to appoint the Rev. Wilfredo De Jesus to replace 26th Ward Ald. Billy Ocasio, Chicago's GLBT activists might go ballistic. Then again, they might just punt.
Ocasio, who has resigned his seat and has signed on as a top adviser to Gov. Quinn, has asked Daley to appoint De Jesus, senior pastor of New Life Covenant Ministries, to replace him in the Humboldt Park ward.
De Jesus, an influential evangelical minister with 4,000 church members, has taken stands and uttered words that infuriate many in the city's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.
His megachurch belongs to the Assemblies of God sect, which believes that "homosexual behavior is a sin because it is contrary to God's created order for the family and human relationships."
De Jesus opposed the proposed Pride Campus, a high school that would cater to GLBT students, telling the Booster newspaper, "What about that girl who is a virgin, who is being harassed by lesbians and guys to have sex, and yet you're going to build a gay school?" he said. "It's not fair."
The possible appointment has unleashed a torrent of behind-the-scenes hubbub and hand-wringing. GLBT activists and leaders are pushing back.
"The mayor has been made aware of the concerns of our community," said 44th Ward Ald. Tom Tunney.
As the city's only openly gay alderman, Tunney said, it is his "responsibility to make sure that the mayor knows about the concerns," which he has shared with Daley's staff.
"I think some of his rhetoric is pretty hateful," Tunney said, adding, "Our community feels pretty strongly about it."
Carlos Mock, a Puerto Rican gay activist and Uptown resident, penned one of several angry letters published in the May 27 Windy City Times.
"I am appalled and completely oppose that such a person could represent me in any city business," wrote Mock, a board member of Equality Illinois, a GLBT rights group. "I encourage every pro-choice and pro-gay member of the 26th Ward to write to Mayor Daley and complain."
On Friday Rick Garcia, Equality Illinois' director of public policy, wrote that "we have serious concerns" about De Jesus. In an interview, Garcia told me, "We are very inclined to oppose his appointment because of his public statements about gay people, our civil rights and our relationships."
De Jesus denies that he is a homophobe and says his personal and religious beliefs won't impact his public service.
"As an alderman, my job [would be] to uphold the Constitution of the United States," he told me Thursday. "It is a separate issue, and I want it to stay that way. I continue to say that for the 26th Ward, I will support and fight for everyone's rights, whether they be gay or straight."
Ocasio and others defend De Jesus as a champion for children and families, the homeless and others among the disadvantaged.
Daley "has received numerous calls and letters" about the aldermanic vacancy, spokesman Lance Lewis acknowledged, but has made no decision.
We'll see.
De Jesus, 44, is a mayoral appointee to the Chicago Zoning Board of Appeals with City Hall clout. The GLBT community relies on Daley for city funding, endorsement and legitimacy. They have to do a delicate dance, criticizing the mayor on pivotal issues, while retaining their access to City Hall.
When decision time comes, I'm betting the GLBT honchos are more likely to stroke, than poke, the mayor (with a sharp stick).
Whomever the mayor picks, the City Council confirms. That has happened more than 30 times during the Daley reign. Tunney himself was a Daley appointee. Would he vote for De Jesus? I asked.
"I haven't made that decision," Tunney said. "I hope I don't have to make that decision."
BY LAURA WASHINGTON
Copyright by The Chicago Sun-Times
June 1, 2009
http://www.suntimes.com/news/washington/1600747,CST-EDT-laura01.article
The City Council may soon have its first openly homophobic alderman. If Mayor Daley decides to appoint the Rev. Wilfredo De Jesus to replace 26th Ward Ald. Billy Ocasio, Chicago's GLBT activists might go ballistic. Then again, they might just punt.
Ocasio, who has resigned his seat and has signed on as a top adviser to Gov. Quinn, has asked Daley to appoint De Jesus, senior pastor of New Life Covenant Ministries, to replace him in the Humboldt Park ward.
De Jesus, an influential evangelical minister with 4,000 church members, has taken stands and uttered words that infuriate many in the city's gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.
His megachurch belongs to the Assemblies of God sect, which believes that "homosexual behavior is a sin because it is contrary to God's created order for the family and human relationships."
De Jesus opposed the proposed Pride Campus, a high school that would cater to GLBT students, telling the Booster newspaper, "What about that girl who is a virgin, who is being harassed by lesbians and guys to have sex, and yet you're going to build a gay school?" he said. "It's not fair."
The possible appointment has unleashed a torrent of behind-the-scenes hubbub and hand-wringing. GLBT activists and leaders are pushing back.
"The mayor has been made aware of the concerns of our community," said 44th Ward Ald. Tom Tunney.
As the city's only openly gay alderman, Tunney said, it is his "responsibility to make sure that the mayor knows about the concerns," which he has shared with Daley's staff.
"I think some of his rhetoric is pretty hateful," Tunney said, adding, "Our community feels pretty strongly about it."
Carlos Mock, a Puerto Rican gay activist and Uptown resident, penned one of several angry letters published in the May 27 Windy City Times.
"I am appalled and completely oppose that such a person could represent me in any city business," wrote Mock, a board member of Equality Illinois, a GLBT rights group. "I encourage every pro-choice and pro-gay member of the 26th Ward to write to Mayor Daley and complain."
On Friday Rick Garcia, Equality Illinois' director of public policy, wrote that "we have serious concerns" about De Jesus. In an interview, Garcia told me, "We are very inclined to oppose his appointment because of his public statements about gay people, our civil rights and our relationships."
De Jesus denies that he is a homophobe and says his personal and religious beliefs won't impact his public service.
"As an alderman, my job [would be] to uphold the Constitution of the United States," he told me Thursday. "It is a separate issue, and I want it to stay that way. I continue to say that for the 26th Ward, I will support and fight for everyone's rights, whether they be gay or straight."
Ocasio and others defend De Jesus as a champion for children and families, the homeless and others among the disadvantaged.
Daley "has received numerous calls and letters" about the aldermanic vacancy, spokesman Lance Lewis acknowledged, but has made no decision.
We'll see.
De Jesus, 44, is a mayoral appointee to the Chicago Zoning Board of Appeals with City Hall clout. The GLBT community relies on Daley for city funding, endorsement and legitimacy. They have to do a delicate dance, criticizing the mayor on pivotal issues, while retaining their access to City Hall.
When decision time comes, I'm betting the GLBT honchos are more likely to stroke, than poke, the mayor (with a sharp stick).
Whomever the mayor picks, the City Council confirms. That has happened more than 30 times during the Daley reign. Tunney himself was a Daley appointee. Would he vote for De Jesus? I asked.
"I haven't made that decision," Tunney said. "I hope I don't have to make that decision."
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Gay marriage opponents to rally in Calif. after hundreds march in support of same-sex couples
Gay marriage opponents to rally in Calif. after hundreds march in support of same-sex couples
By GARANCE BURKE
Copyright 2009 Associated Press
6:26 AM CDT, May 31, 2009
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-ap-us-gay-marriage,0,5810976.story
FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — Hundreds of gay marriage supporters marched in rural, conservative California, but before the dusty roads could clear, opponents of same-sex couples planned to take to the streets to renew their resolve.
The outfits that helped persuade voters to ban gay marriage in the state Constitution in November will on Sunday celebrate weddings between men and women at Fresno City Hall, while nearly a dozen religious and social conservative groups planned a similar rally in San Diego.
Just a day earlier, gay marriage advocates marched along dusty roads, saying they wouldn't be dissuaded the state Supreme Court's decision to uphold Proposition 8, which enshrined the ban on gay marriage in the state Constitution.
The gay marriage supporters pledge to put a new initiative before voters to overturn the ban — perhaps as soon as next year — and to take their message to Washington in October.
California Court upholds Prop. 8 gay marriage ban but 18,000 couples remain wed
But there were skeptical residents, some of whom showed up Saturday just to see what all the commotion was about.
Tom Johnson, 57, a disabled Vietnam veteran from Clovis, a Fresno suburb, said voters already made their choice.
"I'm against people coming into our community with those viewpoints. I just can't accept it," Johnson said. "People already voted yes on Prop. 8. That's the law and we should follow it."
The event attracted veteran activists and celebrities, including Academy Award-winning actress Charlize Theron and Eric McCormack. It was organized by a lesbian mother in Fresno who was removed from the parent-teacher association at her son's Catholic school after she spoke out against banning same-sex weddings.
"Fresno represents middle America values, and we can start changing our neighbors' feelings about gay marriage beginning right here in the Central Valley," said lead organizer Robin McGehee, a 36-year-old college professor who married her longtime partner last year. "We're doing exactly what the freedom riders would do in the South in the 1960s, which is reaching into communities that are different from us so we can all live in equality."
Paying homage to the 1965 marches in Selma, Ala., that marked the peak of the civil rights movement, the "Meet in the Middle 4 Equality" protest began Saturday morning in Selma, Calif., the self-proclaimed raisin capital of the world.
Hundreds of spirited marchers were escorted by the California Highway Patrol along an aging highway to Fresno, a city of more than 450,000 and the largest in the agricultural San Joaquin Valley. On the lawn adjacent to City Hall, organizers flew a massive rainbow flag on loan from San Francisco's Castro District, the nexus of the city's gay and lesbian community.
Some wore wedding dresses or carried rainbow flags, a symbol of support for gay rights.
Many gay activists now believe their campaign against Proposition 8 focused too much on liberal urban enclaves along the coast, failing even to reach out to the state's rural regions. The measure passed with nearly 69 percent of the vote in Fresno County, compared to 52 percent statewide.
"We aren't here to impose our beliefs on anyone. We are here to begin a dialogue on civil rights," said Cleve Jones, a pioneer activist and protege of Harvey Milk, San Francisco's first openly gay leader who was slain in 1978. "Harvey said we can't win unless we open up our hearts to connecting with people who appear to be very different from us."
The campaign's next phase will train thousands of volunteers and faith leaders to canvass door-to-door to talk about the issue with neighbors, said Rick Jacobs, chair of the Courage Campaign. Representatives from all 50 states will march on Washington on October 11 to coincide with National Coming Out Day, Jacobs said.
"We're not doing what we used to do, which is meet in West Hollywood," Jacobs said. "We want people from all 435 congressional districts to tell their stories in Washington."
By GARANCE BURKE
Copyright 2009 Associated Press
6:26 AM CDT, May 31, 2009
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-ap-us-gay-marriage,0,5810976.story
FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — Hundreds of gay marriage supporters marched in rural, conservative California, but before the dusty roads could clear, opponents of same-sex couples planned to take to the streets to renew their resolve.
The outfits that helped persuade voters to ban gay marriage in the state Constitution in November will on Sunday celebrate weddings between men and women at Fresno City Hall, while nearly a dozen religious and social conservative groups planned a similar rally in San Diego.
Just a day earlier, gay marriage advocates marched along dusty roads, saying they wouldn't be dissuaded the state Supreme Court's decision to uphold Proposition 8, which enshrined the ban on gay marriage in the state Constitution.
The gay marriage supporters pledge to put a new initiative before voters to overturn the ban — perhaps as soon as next year — and to take their message to Washington in October.
California Court upholds Prop. 8 gay marriage ban but 18,000 couples remain wed
But there were skeptical residents, some of whom showed up Saturday just to see what all the commotion was about.
Tom Johnson, 57, a disabled Vietnam veteran from Clovis, a Fresno suburb, said voters already made their choice.
"I'm against people coming into our community with those viewpoints. I just can't accept it," Johnson said. "People already voted yes on Prop. 8. That's the law and we should follow it."
The event attracted veteran activists and celebrities, including Academy Award-winning actress Charlize Theron and Eric McCormack. It was organized by a lesbian mother in Fresno who was removed from the parent-teacher association at her son's Catholic school after she spoke out against banning same-sex weddings.
"Fresno represents middle America values, and we can start changing our neighbors' feelings about gay marriage beginning right here in the Central Valley," said lead organizer Robin McGehee, a 36-year-old college professor who married her longtime partner last year. "We're doing exactly what the freedom riders would do in the South in the 1960s, which is reaching into communities that are different from us so we can all live in equality."
Paying homage to the 1965 marches in Selma, Ala., that marked the peak of the civil rights movement, the "Meet in the Middle 4 Equality" protest began Saturday morning in Selma, Calif., the self-proclaimed raisin capital of the world.
Hundreds of spirited marchers were escorted by the California Highway Patrol along an aging highway to Fresno, a city of more than 450,000 and the largest in the agricultural San Joaquin Valley. On the lawn adjacent to City Hall, organizers flew a massive rainbow flag on loan from San Francisco's Castro District, the nexus of the city's gay and lesbian community.
Some wore wedding dresses or carried rainbow flags, a symbol of support for gay rights.
Many gay activists now believe their campaign against Proposition 8 focused too much on liberal urban enclaves along the coast, failing even to reach out to the state's rural regions. The measure passed with nearly 69 percent of the vote in Fresno County, compared to 52 percent statewide.
"We aren't here to impose our beliefs on anyone. We are here to begin a dialogue on civil rights," said Cleve Jones, a pioneer activist and protege of Harvey Milk, San Francisco's first openly gay leader who was slain in 1978. "Harvey said we can't win unless we open up our hearts to connecting with people who appear to be very different from us."
The campaign's next phase will train thousands of volunteers and faith leaders to canvass door-to-door to talk about the issue with neighbors, said Rick Jacobs, chair of the Courage Campaign. Representatives from all 50 states will march on Washington on October 11 to coincide with National Coming Out Day, Jacobs said.
"We're not doing what we used to do, which is meet in West Hollywood," Jacobs said. "We want people from all 435 congressional districts to tell their stories in Washington."
A Red State Booster Shot
A Red State Booster Shot
By Alec MacGillis
Copyright by The Washington Post
Sunday, May 31, 2009
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/29/AR2009052901548.html
Those in the red states still smarting over Barack Obama's election victory can perhaps take solace in this: The Democrats' No. 1 domestic policy initiative, universal health care, is likely to help red America at the expense of blue.
Health-care reform may be overdue in a country with 45 million uninsured and soaring medical costs, but it will also represent a substantial wealth transfer from the North and the East to the South and the West. The Northeast and the Midwest have much higher rates of coverage than the rest of the country, led by Massachusetts, where all but 3 percent of residents are insured. The disproportionate share of uninsured is in the South and the West, the result of employment patterns, weak unions and stingy state governments. Texas leads the way, with a quarter of its population uninsured; it would be at the top even without its many illegal immigrants.
Then there is the matter of paying for universal health care. The plan picking up steam on Capitol Hill is to cover much of the $1.2 trillion cost over 10 years by taxing employer-provided health benefits. And who has the highest benefits? People in the North and the East, thanks to pricier health care markets, higher state standards for health coverage and stronger labor unions. Depending on how such a tax were designed, it could land hard not only on corporate executives but also on union workers whose compensation gains show up as health benefits instead of wages.
It would not be the first time that the historically more affluent part of the country has subsidized the less prosperous one. Long before jobs flowed to Mexico and China, they flowed from Massachusetts and Michigan to North Carolina and Tennessee, where unions were weaker and employers could pay less and provide fewer benefits.
The people followed, moving to a Sun Belt where taxes were lower because states offered less in the way of safety nets -- nets that the North and the East will now pay to stitch up via universal health care.
"The cost of health care benefits was very much a factor in plant relocations in the eighties," said Gary Chaison, a professor of industrial relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass. "And now we end up paying for [Sun Belt health care] anyway? It's incredible."
So far, though, the health-care debate is not talked about much in regional terms. In the fight over regulating carbon emissions, regional self-interest is plain, with Republican and Democratic lawmakers from coal-dependent Midwestern and Southern states trying to blunt the legislation. But pushing universal health care are Northeasterners such as Ted Kennedy and Chuck Schumer, and pushing against it are Sun Belters such as John Cornyn and Jon Kyl.
It is a rare triumph of principle over parochialism -- or maybe no one is looking at the numbers.
Nationally, about 15 percent of Americans lack health insurance. But in the North, many states in addition to Massachusetts have less than 11 percent uninsured. They include Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Michigan, New Hampshire, Ohio, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota. In the South and the West, where small businesses dominate, many states other than Texas have more than 17 percent, including Arizona, Florida, California, Louisiana, Georgia, Arkansas, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Nevada and New Mexico.
The disparities extend to the value of employer-provided benefits. It is highest in the Northeast and the Midwest, lowest in the South and the West.
That means a big regional slant if the plan raises money by ending the tax exemption for employer health benefits or by taxing the value of above-average benefits, which is what Congress is leaning toward. Critics have long argued that exempting employer-provided benefits from taxes is unfair to self-insured people who have to use after-tax dollars to buy coverage, and that the exemption drives health costs higher by encouraging generous benefits plans.
But opponents of taxing health benefits say that it would hit many middle-class families whose packages are worth more than average simply because they live in high-cost markets. They argue that much of the Northeast has high health-care costs partly because the cost of living there is high, not because medical spending is out of control. Indeed, when it comes to Medicare spending, some of the top spending areas are in the South and the West, such as Miami and McAllen, Tex., while some of the most efficient areas are in the North. Better, some say, to raise revenue through other routes -- reducing tax deductions for the wealthy, taxing sugary sodas, raising the capital gains tax or expanding the Medicare tax to unearned income.
"There's a big regional backdrop to this," said Harvard health policy professor Robert Blendon. "Those who are the beneficiaries of all this money that's going to be floating around is one group of states, and who's going to have to pay for the taxes if they lift this exemption is another group."
For example, he said, if you're a New York policeman married to a nurse and your combined salaries are $80,000, your health insurance will be taxed to pay for a family in Mississippi. "I'm trying to figure out how Chuck Schumer can raise his hands and say this is a good thing if New York workers are going to be such losers based on taxes," he said.
Now, if national reform really does restrain health-care costs over the long run, it would help employers and consumers in the Northeast and the Midwest just as it would those elsewhere. And to lessen its effect on the middle class, the plan could limit taxes on employer benefits to wealthier taxpayers, or it could adjust the subsidies for the uninsured to reflect the higher cost of health care in certain areas. But that would complicate the tax code, cut into the needed revenues and arguably undermine the effort to reduce health-care costs.
Meanwhile, not everyone in a state such as Texas will gain from health-care reform. Larger employers will face a mandate to cover workers or pay a fee. Residents will probably face a mandate to buy coverage and not all will qualify for subsidies to do so. New federal standards for health benefits will mean that self-insured residents of states with loose standards will get easier access to coverage and better benefits, but they'll have to pay more.
Still, the regional tilt is clear. One of the likeliest options for reform is to increase coverage among the working poor by expanding Medicaid eligibility in Southern and Western states that now limit it, even though, with their lower per-capita income, they receive a higher federal match to cover the cost. Texas, for instance, has not updated the Medicaid eligibility rules for parents of poor children in 23 years -- most working parents qualify only if they earn less than $308 per month.
But to persuade stingier states to expand eligibility, the federal government may cover the full Medicaid cost of their newly eligible residents for at least a few years. This will draw howls from states that long ago expanded their eligibility rules and have been paying a large share of the cost of having done so. Again, the plan could try to mollify these states with extra aid, but that adds to the price tag.
"Do you penalize those that have been good in the past by only putting the new federal dollars into where the problem exists, or do you try to equalize the playing field to help the states that have been the best?" asked Diane Rowland, executive vice president of the Kaiser Family Foundation.
To conservative health-care experts, a westward and southward wealth transfer is welcome and long overdue. Exempting health benefits from taxes, they say, has meant a big tax break for employers and workers in the wealthier and more unionized regions. And for union members to complain about being taxed for their good benefits just shows that they, too, have been hurt by the system, because health care absorbs too much of their compensation.
"No one should assert that what we have now produces some grand equitable solution," said Joseph Antos of the American Enterprise Institute. "We're going to be moving from imperfect to imperfect."
Then there are staunch advocates for universal health care, like Anne Dunkelberg of the Center for Public Policy Priorities, who reject outright the regional point-scoring mindset, arguing that health-care reform is a national need. "We should be motivated by the fact that [the current system] is unsustainable for the whole country," she maintained.
Of course, that's easy for her to say: She's in Austin, Texas.
macgillisa@washpost.com
Alec MacGillis is a reporter on the Post's national staff. He will be online to discuss this article on Monday at 11 a.m. ET. Submit your questions and comments before or during the discussion.
By Alec MacGillis
Copyright by The Washington Post
Sunday, May 31, 2009
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/29/AR2009052901548.html
Those in the red states still smarting over Barack Obama's election victory can perhaps take solace in this: The Democrats' No. 1 domestic policy initiative, universal health care, is likely to help red America at the expense of blue.
Health-care reform may be overdue in a country with 45 million uninsured and soaring medical costs, but it will also represent a substantial wealth transfer from the North and the East to the South and the West. The Northeast and the Midwest have much higher rates of coverage than the rest of the country, led by Massachusetts, where all but 3 percent of residents are insured. The disproportionate share of uninsured is in the South and the West, the result of employment patterns, weak unions and stingy state governments. Texas leads the way, with a quarter of its population uninsured; it would be at the top even without its many illegal immigrants.
Then there is the matter of paying for universal health care. The plan picking up steam on Capitol Hill is to cover much of the $1.2 trillion cost over 10 years by taxing employer-provided health benefits. And who has the highest benefits? People in the North and the East, thanks to pricier health care markets, higher state standards for health coverage and stronger labor unions. Depending on how such a tax were designed, it could land hard not only on corporate executives but also on union workers whose compensation gains show up as health benefits instead of wages.
It would not be the first time that the historically more affluent part of the country has subsidized the less prosperous one. Long before jobs flowed to Mexico and China, they flowed from Massachusetts and Michigan to North Carolina and Tennessee, where unions were weaker and employers could pay less and provide fewer benefits.
The people followed, moving to a Sun Belt where taxes were lower because states offered less in the way of safety nets -- nets that the North and the East will now pay to stitch up via universal health care.
"The cost of health care benefits was very much a factor in plant relocations in the eighties," said Gary Chaison, a professor of industrial relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass. "And now we end up paying for [Sun Belt health care] anyway? It's incredible."
So far, though, the health-care debate is not talked about much in regional terms. In the fight over regulating carbon emissions, regional self-interest is plain, with Republican and Democratic lawmakers from coal-dependent Midwestern and Southern states trying to blunt the legislation. But pushing universal health care are Northeasterners such as Ted Kennedy and Chuck Schumer, and pushing against it are Sun Belters such as John Cornyn and Jon Kyl.
It is a rare triumph of principle over parochialism -- or maybe no one is looking at the numbers.
Nationally, about 15 percent of Americans lack health insurance. But in the North, many states in addition to Massachusetts have less than 11 percent uninsured. They include Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Michigan, New Hampshire, Ohio, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota. In the South and the West, where small businesses dominate, many states other than Texas have more than 17 percent, including Arizona, Florida, California, Louisiana, Georgia, Arkansas, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Nevada and New Mexico.
The disparities extend to the value of employer-provided benefits. It is highest in the Northeast and the Midwest, lowest in the South and the West.
That means a big regional slant if the plan raises money by ending the tax exemption for employer health benefits or by taxing the value of above-average benefits, which is what Congress is leaning toward. Critics have long argued that exempting employer-provided benefits from taxes is unfair to self-insured people who have to use after-tax dollars to buy coverage, and that the exemption drives health costs higher by encouraging generous benefits plans.
But opponents of taxing health benefits say that it would hit many middle-class families whose packages are worth more than average simply because they live in high-cost markets. They argue that much of the Northeast has high health-care costs partly because the cost of living there is high, not because medical spending is out of control. Indeed, when it comes to Medicare spending, some of the top spending areas are in the South and the West, such as Miami and McAllen, Tex., while some of the most efficient areas are in the North. Better, some say, to raise revenue through other routes -- reducing tax deductions for the wealthy, taxing sugary sodas, raising the capital gains tax or expanding the Medicare tax to unearned income.
"There's a big regional backdrop to this," said Harvard health policy professor Robert Blendon. "Those who are the beneficiaries of all this money that's going to be floating around is one group of states, and who's going to have to pay for the taxes if they lift this exemption is another group."
For example, he said, if you're a New York policeman married to a nurse and your combined salaries are $80,000, your health insurance will be taxed to pay for a family in Mississippi. "I'm trying to figure out how Chuck Schumer can raise his hands and say this is a good thing if New York workers are going to be such losers based on taxes," he said.
Now, if national reform really does restrain health-care costs over the long run, it would help employers and consumers in the Northeast and the Midwest just as it would those elsewhere. And to lessen its effect on the middle class, the plan could limit taxes on employer benefits to wealthier taxpayers, or it could adjust the subsidies for the uninsured to reflect the higher cost of health care in certain areas. But that would complicate the tax code, cut into the needed revenues and arguably undermine the effort to reduce health-care costs.
Meanwhile, not everyone in a state such as Texas will gain from health-care reform. Larger employers will face a mandate to cover workers or pay a fee. Residents will probably face a mandate to buy coverage and not all will qualify for subsidies to do so. New federal standards for health benefits will mean that self-insured residents of states with loose standards will get easier access to coverage and better benefits, but they'll have to pay more.
Still, the regional tilt is clear. One of the likeliest options for reform is to increase coverage among the working poor by expanding Medicaid eligibility in Southern and Western states that now limit it, even though, with their lower per-capita income, they receive a higher federal match to cover the cost. Texas, for instance, has not updated the Medicaid eligibility rules for parents of poor children in 23 years -- most working parents qualify only if they earn less than $308 per month.
But to persuade stingier states to expand eligibility, the federal government may cover the full Medicaid cost of their newly eligible residents for at least a few years. This will draw howls from states that long ago expanded their eligibility rules and have been paying a large share of the cost of having done so. Again, the plan could try to mollify these states with extra aid, but that adds to the price tag.
"Do you penalize those that have been good in the past by only putting the new federal dollars into where the problem exists, or do you try to equalize the playing field to help the states that have been the best?" asked Diane Rowland, executive vice president of the Kaiser Family Foundation.
To conservative health-care experts, a westward and southward wealth transfer is welcome and long overdue. Exempting health benefits from taxes, they say, has meant a big tax break for employers and workers in the wealthier and more unionized regions. And for union members to complain about being taxed for their good benefits just shows that they, too, have been hurt by the system, because health care absorbs too much of their compensation.
"No one should assert that what we have now produces some grand equitable solution," said Joseph Antos of the American Enterprise Institute. "We're going to be moving from imperfect to imperfect."
Then there are staunch advocates for universal health care, like Anne Dunkelberg of the Center for Public Policy Priorities, who reject outright the regional point-scoring mindset, arguing that health-care reform is a national need. "We should be motivated by the fact that [the current system] is unsustainable for the whole country," she maintained.
Of course, that's easy for her to say: She's in Austin, Texas.
macgillisa@washpost.com
Alec MacGillis is a reporter on the Post's national staff. He will be online to discuss this article on Monday at 11 a.m. ET. Submit your questions and comments before or during the discussion.
The Trauma of 9/11 Is No Excuse
The Trauma of 9/11 Is No Excuse
By Richard A. Clarke
Copyright by The Washington Post
Sunday, May 31, 2009
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/29/AR2009052901560.html
Top officials from the Bush administration have hit upon a revealing new theme as they retrospectively justify their national security policies. Call it the White House 9/11 trauma defense.
"Unless you were there, in a position of responsibility after September 11, you cannot possibly imagine the dilemmas that you faced in trying to protect Americans," Condoleezza Rice said last month as she admonished a Stanford University student who questioned the Bush-era interrogation program. And in his May 21 speech on national security, Dick Cheney called the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, a "defining" experience that "caused everyone to take a serious second look" at the threats to America. Critics of the administration have become more intense as memories of the attacks have faded, he argued. "Part of our responsibility, as we saw it," Cheney said, "was not to forget the terrible harm that had been done to America."
I remember that morning, too. Shortly after the second World Trade Center tower was hit, I burst in on Rice (then the president's national security adviser) and Cheney in the vice president's office and remember glimpsing horror on his face. Once in the bomb shelter, Cheney assembled his team while the crisis managers on the National Security Council staff coordinated the government response by video conference from the Situation Room. Many of us thought that we might not leave the White House alive. I remember the next day, too, when smoke still rose from the Pentagon as I sat in my office in the White House compound, a gas mask on my desk. The streets of Washington were empty, except for the armored vehicles, and the skies were clear, except for the F-15s on patrol. Every scene from those days is seared into my memory. I understand how it was a defining moment for Cheney, as it was for so many Americans.
Yet listening to Cheney and Rice, it seems that they want to be excused for the measures they authorized after the attacks on the grounds that 9/11 was traumatic. "If you were there in a position of authority and watched Americans drop out of eighty-story buildings because these murderous tyrants went after innocent people," Rice said in her recent comments, "then you were determined to do anything that you could that was legal to prevent that from happening again."
I have little sympathy for this argument. Yes, we went for days with little sleep, and we all assumed that more attacks were coming. But the decisions that Bush officials made in the following months and years -- on Iraq, on detentions, on interrogations, on wiretapping -- were not appropriate. Careful analysis could have replaced the impulse to break all the rules, even more so because the Sept. 11 attacks, though horrifying, should not have surprised senior officials. Cheney's admission that 9/11 caused him to reassess the threats to the nation only underscores how, for months, top officials had ignored warnings from the CIA and the NSC staff that urgent action was needed to preempt a major al-Qaeda attack.
Thus, when Bush's inner circle first really came to grips with the threat of terrorism, they did so in a state of shock -- a bad state in which to develop a coherent response. Fearful of new attacks, they authorized the most extreme measures available, without assessing whether they were really a good idea.
I believe this zeal stemmed in part from concerns about the 2004 presidential election. Many in the White House feared that their inaction prior to the attacks would be publicly detailed before the next vote -- which is why they resisted the 9/11 commission -- and that a second attack would eliminate any chance of a second Bush term. So they decided to leave no doubt that they had done everything imaginable.
The first response they discussed was invading Iraq. While the Pentagon was still burning, Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld was in the White House suggesting an attack against Baghdad. Somehow the administration's leaders could not believe that al-Qaeda could have mounted such a devastating operation, so Iraqi involvement became the convenient explanation. Despite being told repeatedly that Iraq was not involved in 9/11, some, like Cheney, could not abandon the idea. Charles Duelfer of the CIA's Iraq Survey Group recently revealed in his book, "Hide and Seek: The Search for Truth in Iraq," that high-level U.S. officials urged him to consider waterboarding specific Iraqi prisoners of war so that they could provide evidence of an Iraqi role in the terrorist attacks -- a request Duelfer refused. (A recent report indicates that the suggestion came from the vice president's office.) Nevertheless, the lack of evidence did not deter the administration from eventually invading Iraq -- a move many senior Bush officials had wanted to make before 9/11.
On detention, the Bush team leaped to the assumption that U.S. courts and prisons would not work. Before the terrorist attacks, the U.S. counterterrorism program of the 1990s had arrested al-Qaeda terrorists and others around the world and had a 100 percent conviction rate in the U.S. justice system. Yet the American system was abandoned, again as part of a pattern of immediately adopting the most extreme response available. Camps were established around the world, notably in Guantanamo Bay, where prisoners were held without being charged or tried. They became symbols of American overreach, held up as proof that al-Qaeda's anti-American propaganda was right.
Similarly, with regard to interrogation, administration officials conducted no meaningful professional analysis of which techniques worked and which did not. The FBI, which had successfully questioned al-Qaeda terrorists, was effectively excluded from interrogations. Instead, there was the immediate and unwarranted assumption that extreme measures -- such as waterboarding one detainee 183 times -- would be the most effective.
Finally, on wiretapping, rather than beef up the procedures available under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the administration again moved to the extreme, listening in on communications here at home without legal process. FISA did need some modification, but it also allowed for the quick issuance of court orders, as when President Clinton took stepped-up defensive measures in late 1999 under the heightened threat of the new millennium.
Yes, Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice may have been surprised by the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 -- but it was because they had not listened. And their surprise led them to adopt extreme counterterrorism techniques -- but it was because they rejected, without analysis, the tactics the Clinton administration had used. The measures they uncritically adopted, which they simply assumed were the best available, were in fact unnecessary and counterproductive.
"I'll freely admit that watching a coordinated, devastating attack on our country from an underground bunker at the White House can affect how you view your responsibilities," Cheney said in his recent speech. But this defense does not stand up. The Bush administration's response actually undermined the principles and values America has always stood for in the world, values that should have survived this traumatic event. The White House thought that 9/11 changed everything. It may have changed many things, but it did not change the Constitution, which the vice president, the national security adviser and all of us who were in the White House that tragic day had pledged to protect and preserve.
rclarke@hks.harvard.edu
Richard A. Clarke, the national coordinator for security and counterterrorism under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, is the author of "Against All Enemies" and "Your Government Failed You."
By Richard A. Clarke
Copyright by The Washington Post
Sunday, May 31, 2009
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/29/AR2009052901560.html
Top officials from the Bush administration have hit upon a revealing new theme as they retrospectively justify their national security policies. Call it the White House 9/11 trauma defense.
"Unless you were there, in a position of responsibility after September 11, you cannot possibly imagine the dilemmas that you faced in trying to protect Americans," Condoleezza Rice said last month as she admonished a Stanford University student who questioned the Bush-era interrogation program. And in his May 21 speech on national security, Dick Cheney called the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, a "defining" experience that "caused everyone to take a serious second look" at the threats to America. Critics of the administration have become more intense as memories of the attacks have faded, he argued. "Part of our responsibility, as we saw it," Cheney said, "was not to forget the terrible harm that had been done to America."
I remember that morning, too. Shortly after the second World Trade Center tower was hit, I burst in on Rice (then the president's national security adviser) and Cheney in the vice president's office and remember glimpsing horror on his face. Once in the bomb shelter, Cheney assembled his team while the crisis managers on the National Security Council staff coordinated the government response by video conference from the Situation Room. Many of us thought that we might not leave the White House alive. I remember the next day, too, when smoke still rose from the Pentagon as I sat in my office in the White House compound, a gas mask on my desk. The streets of Washington were empty, except for the armored vehicles, and the skies were clear, except for the F-15s on patrol. Every scene from those days is seared into my memory. I understand how it was a defining moment for Cheney, as it was for so many Americans.
Yet listening to Cheney and Rice, it seems that they want to be excused for the measures they authorized after the attacks on the grounds that 9/11 was traumatic. "If you were there in a position of authority and watched Americans drop out of eighty-story buildings because these murderous tyrants went after innocent people," Rice said in her recent comments, "then you were determined to do anything that you could that was legal to prevent that from happening again."
I have little sympathy for this argument. Yes, we went for days with little sleep, and we all assumed that more attacks were coming. But the decisions that Bush officials made in the following months and years -- on Iraq, on detentions, on interrogations, on wiretapping -- were not appropriate. Careful analysis could have replaced the impulse to break all the rules, even more so because the Sept. 11 attacks, though horrifying, should not have surprised senior officials. Cheney's admission that 9/11 caused him to reassess the threats to the nation only underscores how, for months, top officials had ignored warnings from the CIA and the NSC staff that urgent action was needed to preempt a major al-Qaeda attack.
Thus, when Bush's inner circle first really came to grips with the threat of terrorism, they did so in a state of shock -- a bad state in which to develop a coherent response. Fearful of new attacks, they authorized the most extreme measures available, without assessing whether they were really a good idea.
I believe this zeal stemmed in part from concerns about the 2004 presidential election. Many in the White House feared that their inaction prior to the attacks would be publicly detailed before the next vote -- which is why they resisted the 9/11 commission -- and that a second attack would eliminate any chance of a second Bush term. So they decided to leave no doubt that they had done everything imaginable.
The first response they discussed was invading Iraq. While the Pentagon was still burning, Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld was in the White House suggesting an attack against Baghdad. Somehow the administration's leaders could not believe that al-Qaeda could have mounted such a devastating operation, so Iraqi involvement became the convenient explanation. Despite being told repeatedly that Iraq was not involved in 9/11, some, like Cheney, could not abandon the idea. Charles Duelfer of the CIA's Iraq Survey Group recently revealed in his book, "Hide and Seek: The Search for Truth in Iraq," that high-level U.S. officials urged him to consider waterboarding specific Iraqi prisoners of war so that they could provide evidence of an Iraqi role in the terrorist attacks -- a request Duelfer refused. (A recent report indicates that the suggestion came from the vice president's office.) Nevertheless, the lack of evidence did not deter the administration from eventually invading Iraq -- a move many senior Bush officials had wanted to make before 9/11.
On detention, the Bush team leaped to the assumption that U.S. courts and prisons would not work. Before the terrorist attacks, the U.S. counterterrorism program of the 1990s had arrested al-Qaeda terrorists and others around the world and had a 100 percent conviction rate in the U.S. justice system. Yet the American system was abandoned, again as part of a pattern of immediately adopting the most extreme response available. Camps were established around the world, notably in Guantanamo Bay, where prisoners were held without being charged or tried. They became symbols of American overreach, held up as proof that al-Qaeda's anti-American propaganda was right.
Similarly, with regard to interrogation, administration officials conducted no meaningful professional analysis of which techniques worked and which did not. The FBI, which had successfully questioned al-Qaeda terrorists, was effectively excluded from interrogations. Instead, there was the immediate and unwarranted assumption that extreme measures -- such as waterboarding one detainee 183 times -- would be the most effective.
Finally, on wiretapping, rather than beef up the procedures available under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the administration again moved to the extreme, listening in on communications here at home without legal process. FISA did need some modification, but it also allowed for the quick issuance of court orders, as when President Clinton took stepped-up defensive measures in late 1999 under the heightened threat of the new millennium.
Yes, Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice may have been surprised by the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 -- but it was because they had not listened. And their surprise led them to adopt extreme counterterrorism techniques -- but it was because they rejected, without analysis, the tactics the Clinton administration had used. The measures they uncritically adopted, which they simply assumed were the best available, were in fact unnecessary and counterproductive.
"I'll freely admit that watching a coordinated, devastating attack on our country from an underground bunker at the White House can affect how you view your responsibilities," Cheney said in his recent speech. But this defense does not stand up. The Bush administration's response actually undermined the principles and values America has always stood for in the world, values that should have survived this traumatic event. The White House thought that 9/11 changed everything. It may have changed many things, but it did not change the Constitution, which the vice president, the national security adviser and all of us who were in the White House that tragic day had pledged to protect and preserve.
rclarke@hks.harvard.edu
Richard A. Clarke, the national coordinator for security and counterterrorism under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, is the author of "Against All Enemies" and "Your Government Failed You."
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