Sunday, August 17, 2003

Top: Embattled California Gov. Gray Davis speaks with an African-American student and a Latino student on Thursday at California State University at Dominguez Hills, where he signed legislation that will establish an African-American Political and Economic Institute at the university. Bottom: Davis speaks Wednesday at the San Francisco Women's Center, where he announced his support of five bills that would protect the reproductive rights of women. A Field Poll released on Friday puts Davis' approval rating at an all-time low of 22 percent. Geez, you'd think that his job were in jeopardy. Has California Gov. Gray Davis pandered to your special interest group yet? If not, don't worry; last week was a very busy week for him, but he'll get to you! On Monday, Davis was at the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, where he announced that he will sign legislation to add intolerance and hatred prevention training for schoolteachers. On Tuesday, Davis discussed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and its impact on California's gasoline at the USA gas station in Los Angeles. On Wednesday, Davis was at the San Francisco Women's Center, where he announced his support of five bills that would protect the reproductive rights of women. On Thursday, Davis was at California State University at Dominguez Hills in Carson, Calif., where he signed legislation to establish an African-American Political and Economic Institute at the university. This weekend, Davis pandered to my special interest group, faggots and dykes. According to The Sacramento Bee: Gov. Gray Davis announced Saturday that he would sign pending legislation giving California domestic partners most of the same legal rights that married couples have, saying the bill would ensure "fairness for all Californians." "This bill not only provides additional rights for domestic partners, it also imposes significant new obligations such as shared responsibility for debts and financial support for children," Davis said. Authored by Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg, D-Los Angeles, AB 205 passed the Assembly on June 4 and awaits Senate action. It would allow domestic partners to file joint income tax returns and give them the same tax breaks enjoyed by married couples. It would also give them the same property rights, health insurance coverage, pension access and government benefits, including public assistance. Advocates for gay and lesbian rights hailed Davis' support for the bill and praised the governor as pro-family. "The governor has affirmed his strong support for family values by recognizing that all families deserve equal recognition," said Geoffrey Kors of Equality California, a nonprofit gay rights group. "When this bill is signed, it will be a truly historic day for everyone who supports civil rights, not just in California, but throughout the country." Opponents of the measure accused Davis of pandering to gays in a bid to gain political traction by declaring his position in advance of its possible passage in the Legislature. "Gray Davis is jumping from the frying pan into the fire," said Randy Thomasson, executive director of Campaign for California Families. "(The announcement) is a desperate attempt to save his political skin by appealing to liberal activists." Davis usually keeps mum about pending legislation, but in recent weeks he has announced his support for a number of bills, including measures dealing with abortion access and driver's licenses for undocumented immigrants. That change in posture, especially as the governor's recall election looms, has opened Davis to charges that he is using legislation to curry favor with voters in a bid to save his job. "Davis is desperately trying to get liberal groups to help him stay in office," Thomasson said. "His eye is obviously not on what makes good policy, but on doing anything and everything to retain political power." I'll have to agree -- in part -- with Davis' right-wing detractors on this one. While I agree with Davis' progressive agenda, if his recent Pandering to Special Interest Groups Whirlwind Tour isn't a case of too little too late, it's at least a case of too late. In a sentence, we Californians are sick and tired of Davis. In November Californians re-elected Davis over his Republican challenger Bill Simon by not much: Davis got 48 percent of the vote and Simon got 42 percent. (That Simon, a truly awful human being even by Republican standards, got 42 percent of the vote is testament to how much Californians don't like Davis.) Davis was the lesser of two evils in an uninspiring November 2002 election that had the lowest California voter turnout (less than 45 percent) since at least 1910. (I voted for Davis in 1998, but in November I voted for the Green Party's gubernatorial candidate, Peter Camejo). We Californians are sick and tired of the uncharismatic, ineffectual Davis, but we do not want a Republican governor. We look at the "leadership" that the Republicans are providing the nation and we do not want a Republican governor. Our best bet is that Davis is replaced with Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, a Democrat who knows the governor's job and who has the charisma and the effectiveness that Davis so utterly lacks. Davis' 11th-hour attempts to save his political ass are pathetic. He's passing out the goodies to the special interest groups right now, but if he survives the recall (which is unlikely), it will be back to business as usual. California needs Cruz Bustamante. But Davis, who's never been best buds with Bustamante, isn't making it easy for him. Reports the Associated Press: "If some of the governor's minions would stop trying to undercut my efforts, I think we could have a very coalesced opportunity for Democrats ... and we have a possibility of having a win-win position on the ballot," Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante said [today] on NBC's "Meet the Press." Bustamante's chief strategist, Richie Ross, said the Davis camp was pressuring Democratic donors and activists to withhold support from Bustamante. "He's run into a pretty wide range of people as he's been making his phone calls, finding that many of them are being visited or called from the governor's campaign in an effort to shut him down," Ross said in an interview Sunday. Steve Smith, Davis' campaign manager, said his team was not trying to cripple the Bustamante effort. "As far as I know, and I think I would know, we're not engaged in that," Smith said. "From the governor on down, I think we've been fairly complimentary of the lieutenant governor." While it bothered me initially that Bustamante had said that he would not enter the recall race and then changed his mind, it is forgivable. Hopefully he learned an important lesson in politics: Always keep your options open, never paint yourself into a corner, because things change. It also bothered me initially that Bustamante had broken ranks with prominent Democratic California politicians and decided to run in the recall, but now it's apparent that had he not put his name on the ballot, the chances of a Gov. Schwarzenegger would be much greater. So I forgive him for that, too; it turned out to be a wise decision on his part. Davis' approval rating, according to a Field Poll released on Friday, is at an all-time low of 22 percent -- "worse even than Richard Nixon's on the eve of his departure from office," notes Reuters. Bustamante seems to be the most prominent member of the California Democratic Party who has a clue, who isn't in denial that Californians, even Democrats, hate Davis. 8:52:05 PM    Comments []

Today the U.S. military shot and killed 43-year-old Palestinian photojournalist Mazen Dana (pictured right) near Baghdad. In the past, Dana had protested the Israeli army's killing of journalists in the West Bank town of Hebron (left). The U.S. military claims it mistook Dana's camera for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. Dana's assistant, however, says the U.S. military knew that Dana was a photojournalist. Dana was married and had four children.  Another imperialist 'oopsie' From Reuters today: BAGHDAD -- U.S. troops shot dead an award-winning Reuters cameraman while he was filming [today] near a U.S.-run prison on the outskirts of Baghdad. Eyewitnesses said soldiers on an American tank shot at Mazen Dana, 43, as he filmed outside Abu Ghraib prison in western Baghdad, which had earlier come under a mortar attack. Dana's last pictures show a U.S. tank driving toward him outside the prison walls. Several shots ring out from the tank, and Dana's camera falls to the ground. The U.S. military acknowledged [today] that its troops had "engaged" a Reuters cameraman, saying they had thought his camera was a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. "Army soldiers engaged an individual they thought was aiming an RPG at them. It turned out to be a Reuters cameraman," Navy Captain Frank Thorp, a spokesman for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Reuters in Washington. Journalists had gone to the prison after the U.S. military said a mortar bomb attack there a day before had killed six Iraqis and wounded 59 others. Recounting the moments before the shooting, Reuters soundman Nael al-Shyoukhi, who was working with Dana, said he had asked a U.S. soldier near the prison if they could speak to an officer and was told they could not. "They saw us and they knew about our identities and our mission," Shyoukhi said. The incident happened in the afternoon in daylight. The soldier agreed to their request to film an overview of the prison from a bridge nearby. "After we filmed we went into the car and prepared to go when a convoy led by a tank arrived and Mazen stepped out of the car to film. I followed him and Mazen walked three to four meters. We were noted and seen clearly," Shyoukhi said. "A soldier on the tank shot at us. I lay on the ground. I heard Mazen and I saw him scream and touching his chest. "I cried at the soldier, telling him, 'You killed a journalist.' They shouted at me and asked me to step back and I said, 'I will step back, but please help, please help and stop the [bleeding].' "They tried to help him, but Mazen bled heavily. Mazen took a last breath and died before my eyes." Dana's death brings to 17 the number of journalists or their assistants who have died in Iraq since war began on March 20. Two others have been missing since the first days of the war. The Associated Press gives more eyewitness accounts: "We saw a tank 50 meters away, I heard six shots and Mazen fell to the ground," Dana's driver Munzer Abbas said. "One of the soldiers started shouting at us, but when he knew we were journalists, he softened. One of the soldiers told us they thought Mazen carrying a rocket-propelled grenade." "There were many journalists around. They knew we were journalists. This was not an accident," Abbas said. A U.S. military official said on condition of anonymity that American soldiers saw Dana from a distance and mistook him for an Iraqi guerrilla, so they opened fire. When the soldiers came closer, they realized Dana was a journalist, the official said. Whatever the U.S. military's excuse for this death of yet another innocent, the United States does not belong in Iraq in the first place. The United States never got clearance from the United Nations to invade and occupy Iraq -- indeed, the United States evaded the United Nations when it was clear that the U.N. Security Council would vote against the United States' unprovoked and illegal attack upon Iraq. The months that have followed the United States' illegal, immoral and unprovoked attack on Iraq in March have demonstrated that the Bush regime lied to the American people and to the world about its motivations for attacking and occupying Iraq. In criminal law there is the "felony murder rule," which holds that any death, even an accidental death, that results from the commission of a felony is murder. This principle holds true for the deaths of the thousands of innocent people that the United States has caused since it illegally, immorally, unprovokedly and imperialistically invaded Iraq in March. What happened today in Iraq was not an accident. It was yet another murder by the imperialist United States of America.  6:22:26 PM    Comments []