Yes, but dogs were first turned into surrogate children in the Western Hemisphere during the mid-20th century.

1792 Militia Act required all white male citizens to own a firearm. This is an example of a governmental mandate, so one to have health insurance is not exactly radical.
http://www.salon.com/news/healthcare_reform/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/03/25/militia

Man Plans Special Weekend To Reaffirm Commitment To Xbox 360

The supposed economic competition between blacks and Hispanics is reminiscent of struggles in the past centuries here in the US between native-born Americans and immigrants and between competing immigrant groups. Such struggles were a distraction from the important goal of securing better compensation and working conditions. To oppose immigration now on any grounds is the rankest hypocrisy in light of everyone's immigrant origins. The arguments against immigration we hear now (including that it takes jobs away from blacks) have been reiterated throughout the entire history of this country. Insofar as workers have an opponent, it is their employers more than other workers. All workers have the same interests fundamentally, while those of workers and employers are, to some extent, opposed. The best employers are the ones who can curtail this opposition.

"For a quarter-century after World War II, the United States made great progress against poverty. Then in the 1970s, we fumbled. Over the last 35 years, our economy has almost tripled in size, but, according to the United States Census Bureau, the number of Americans living below the poverty line has been stuck at roughly 1 in 8."
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/25/opinion/25kristof.html

"A couple of weeks ago, Limbaugh even vowed to leave the United States and move to Costa Rica if healthcare reform passed. Evidently, nobody told him Costa Rica has a government-funded, single-payer healthcare system. He has since recanted.

Neither Limbaugh nor Chicken Little had anything on Fox News' Glenn Beck, who actually compared the bill's passage to Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor! Not to be outdone, Mark Steyn, writing in the formerly respectable National Review, envisions "fewer doctors, more bureaucracy, massive IRS expansion, explosive debt, the end of the Pax Americana, and global Armageddon."

According to Steyn, America's "global military capacity" will need to be sacrificed to the ruinous expense of paying for grandpa's health insurance. Nuclear holocaust can only follow."

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/republican_party/index.html?story=/opinion/feature/2010/03/24/gop_whine

Obama advises Indonesia to investigate past crimes among politicians, but the opposite in the US.

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/barack_obama/index.html?story=/opinion/greenwald/2010/03/25/obama

We paid for bood!

A newly-released document from the CIA shows that water-boarding was much more brutal than previously imagined, infinitely worse than what some US forces undergo voluntarily as part of training.
http://www.salon.com/news/torture/index.html?story=/news/feature/2010/03/09/waterboarding_for_dummies

"Liz Cheney isn't careful about the words she throws around. She uses terrorist and killer the way normal people use words like salt and pepper."

Are Riled Bill Kristol and Big Dick Cheney's daughter Liz trying to channel the spirit of McCarthy by accusing members of the Department of Justice of being terrorists (= 1950s communists)? Are they not aware that John Adams defended the British soldiers accused of committing the Boston Massacre?
http://www.slate.com/id/2246903/

"Back in the fall of 2003, I was in London for an conference and I took a stroll around the neighborhood near my hotel. At one point I turned a corner and saw a massive, looming building, surrounded with various barriers and fences and looking for all the world like an updated version of a medieval castle. "What's that?" I wondered, and wandered over to investigate. It was the U.S. Embassy, of course, and I was struck by how forbidding and unwelcoming it was. It seemed to me to be a vivid physical symbol of a powerful Empire striving to keep the outside world at bay."
Steve Walt

Iran is not a threat, not a problem. Fear-mongering about Iran now is just the same as it was for Iraq in 2003.
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/03/05/how_not_to_contain_iran

Has the Powell Doctrine been replaced by the Mullen Doctrine?
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/03/05/this_week_at_war_the_powell_doctrine_is_dead

"My Constituents Care Way More About Political Gamesmanship Than Jobs, Health Care, And The Economy"

This is a great article on torture. It is a review of a book that defends the use of torture in protecting national security. The review makes the following points: 1) much valuable intelligence (including the locations of Saddam Hussein and Zarqawi) was gained through interrogation that did not involve torture. 2) Waterboarding KSM did not provide any useful information. 3) Captured American soldiers are instructed to resist interrogation as much as they can, so we should not be surprised that those people we have captured also resist. 4) Our use of torture makes it more likely that torture will be used on captured Americans. 5) The waterboarding inflicted on some American soldiers in training is entirely voluntary and can be stopped by them at any moment. 6) American law enforcement officers have been convicted and sentenced to prison for waterboarding prisoners. 7) Military regulations and international agreements to which the US is a party explicitly forbid torture FOR ANY REASON (including the pretext that it could save lives).
http://www.slate.com/id/2246692/

Also, I am tired of the disparaging attitude toward "Cadillac" insurance plans. Everyone wants such a plan. In other developed countries, "Cadillac" insurance plans are just called health care. Here, Medicare is a perfect example of "Cadillac" insurance. Why are even the Democrats vilifying what everyone not so secretly wants? Furthermore, just because an insurance policy is expensive, it is not necessarily good. People, especially old people, who buy individual coverage must pay tremendous fees for often inadequate coverage. If we need to finance health care reform (and we do), we should do it buy raising income tax levels to what they were before the Bush cuts of 2001 and 2003 that affected only the richest people. There is absolutely no correlation between the highest income tax level and GDP growth. Some of the fastest development in this country occurred when the highest level was 91%. Taxes were never lower than they have been during this past decade (supposed wartime), and yet this has been a lost decade, with a decline in median household income from $52,000 to $50,000 and no job growth at all.

"The 'Nam vet went from forgotten man to a grizzled, flashbacking cliché practically overnight."

Great article about the mess is Afghanistan and why the offensive in Marjah is meaningless. Also, a great quote: "So here we are in the AfPak Wonderland, complete with a Mad Hatter (the clueless and complacent media), Tweedledee and Tweedledum (the military, endlessly repeating itself and history), the White Rabbit (the State Department, scurrying to meetings and utterly irrelevant), the stoned Caterpillar (the CIA, obtuse, arrogant, and asking the wrong questions), the Dormouse (U.S. Embassy Kabul, who wakes up once in a while only to have his head stuffed in a teapot), the Cheshire Cat (President Obama, fading in and out of the picture, eloquent but puzzling), the Pack of Cards army (the Afghan National Army, self-explanatory), and their commander, the inane Queen of Hearts (Afghan President Hamid Karzai). (In Alice in Wonderland, however, the Dormouse is "suppressed" by the Queen of Hearts, not the White Rabbit or the Cheshire Cat, so the analogy is not quite perfect.)"
The situation in Afghanistan is just like Vietnam, only worse for us. Karzai has become "erratic" and is showing chutzpah in bringing the electoral commission under his own control, after he obviously stole the last election. Is this what our soldiers are fighting and dying for and what were borrowing and spending billions of dollars to finance?

This article equates Alan Grayson (D-FL) with Michelle Bachmann (R-MN) as the paragons of insanity in either party. I reject the analogy. Both have made very controversial statements about the other parts (or members of it), but here is the important difference: Grayson makes a point by exaggerating what is fundamentally true (that Republicans are not serious about addressing the actual, serious problems in health care), while Bachmann says things that have no basis in reality (Obama is anti-American, death panels, etc. ad nauseam). The former is a rhetorical strategy. The second is deceit and lying.
http://www.salon.com/news/michele_bachmann/index.html?story=/news/feature/2010/03/03/bachmann_grayson
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/03/01/down_the_afpak_rabbit_hole?page=0,0

This American Death

Best headline ever: "Why is Chile So Long and Skinny?"
http://www.slate.com/id/2246516/

Bill Kristol and the daughter of Big Dick Cheney (and Les Whinin) make a commercial in which the call the current Department of Justice the "Department of Jihad" because it employs nine lawyers who formerly defended Guantanamo Bay inmates. Here are the facts: 1) Bush asked us to trust him that those locked up in Guantanamo were the "worst of the worst," but since then most people who have been held have been released because there was NO evidence that they had committed any crime at all. 2) Are we not accustomed to the idea that all people accused of a crime, regardless of the later outcome of the trial and of the nature of the charges, deserve legal representation (in addition to a civilian trial)? 3) During WWII, some Germans were tried by military tribunals, but at that time we were actually at war. Congress declared war. Everyone knew we were at war, everyone felt it, everyone participated. None of that is true now. We are not at war because we do not want to pay the price of being at war. We want someone to think of the children.
http://www.salon.com/news/liz_cheney/index.html?story=/opinion/greenwald/radio/2010/03/03/hafetz

"he had all the cocky exuberance of an Italian cardinal who's just seem a plume of white smoke with his name on it"

Issue: In NYC between 2004 and 2009, 3 million people were stopped and checked out (frisked) by the police. 90% had not committed any crime. The vast majority were poor and either black or Hispanic. Is this the price of keeping crime rates low? Is it a price (great harassment and embarrassment for a part of the community) that we, as a society, are willing to pay? What do the black and Hispanic communities think? Do they feel singled out, or do they see this as useful, since they are frequently the victims of crime? The article does not address the issue of probable cause.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/opinion/02herbert.html?hp

The current situation in Greece shows the problem of several countries' having the same currency, without having a common budget.

The first story is a good confirmation of the American stereotype of Europeans. The second story sets up a good image.
http://www.slate.com/id/2246393/

Is it a good idea to have the next (2014) Olympics in Sochi, the only part of Russian without snow?
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/03/01/interview_boris_nemtsov

Very good suggestions of how to reform American politics to the advantage of the majority.
http://www.salon.com/news/politics/republican_party/index.html?story=/opinion/feature/2010/03/01/gridlock

The US is unique in the world in denying civilian trials to terrorists suspects. Even Pakistan does this. Pakistan is making us look bad.
http://www.salon.com/news/terrorism/index.html?story=/opinion/greenwald/2010/03/02/due_process

Both Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert have used the word "apartheid" in describing Israel's treatment of Palestinians. If Israelis can use the term, why can't Americans without being called anti-Semitic?
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/ (second article)

"Senator Dikembe Mutombo Blocks Record Amount Of Legislation"

No new bank regulations are better than the watered-down Senate version.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/01/opinion/01krugman.html?hp

Could Gov. Mitch Daniels of IN be a good Republican? If he managed to be fiscally prudent during good times in preparation for bad times, he accomplished quite a feat (and just what all politicians should do).
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/01/opinion/01douthat.html?hp

The torture lawyers got off the hook (wrongly). What about the torture doctors?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/01/opinion/01xenakis.html?hp

"The Liberal Democrats, a far-right nationalist party that holds seats in the State Duma" FP

Wonderful Book: "Great American Hypocrites" by Glenn Greenwald. It exposes the discrepancy between GOP talk and reality. A similar book could be written about the Democrats, but it would be less extreme, since the Democrats are guilty of the same fault to a lesser degree. It is also a vocal critique of the establishment / mainstream media for their preference to depict and comment on the meaningless realm of politics, at the expense of treatment of policy, which actually is important.

Here is an interesting editorial from Frank Rich. He describes: 1) How Republicans have "condemned" in very uncertain terms the deliberate plane crash at the IRA building, which differs from the OK City bombing only in the number of victims. 2) The estrangement between the Republican Party and the Teabagger movement, which is essentially libertarian. 3) The disturbingly violent anti-government comments that are increasingly common in GOP and Teabagger discourse.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/28/opinion/28rich.html

A thought recently occurred to me: Sarah Palin is the logical conclusion of George W. Bush. She is everything he is, but more so.

The increasingly beneficial role of religious organizations in 3rd world relief and development. The flipside is adoption farce in Haiti. The woman who organized it had no experience with adoption, let alone international adoption, and she was being sued for back wages from former employees. The road to hell is more quickly paved with the good intentions of idiots.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/28/opinion/28kristof.html

Don't thank me. Thank the knife.

HC: Budget reconciliation process was used to pass both of the Bush tax cuts, at a total cost of $1.8 billion, about twice the cost of Obama's health care reform. Despite what the GOP says, budget reconciliation is a commonly used political tool. Republican "proposals" do nothing to remedy the problem of coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. This is not a problem in countries that have national health care, since the risk pool is the entire population. The private sector cannot provide good health care as we have come to expect it as a basic right of American citizenship. Social Security, of course, and Medicare are not mentioned in the Constitution, but today we regard those as basic rights of citizenship. That's what entitlements are: what we, as citizens, have a right to expect from the government. We do not have the right to a fancy car or an expensive house, but we should not worry about how we can afford to take care of our health.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/26/opinion/26krugman.html

Malpractice insurance is NOT a significant factor in the cost of health care. The insurance is high, but malpractice is inherent in practicing medicine. It is part of the cost of doing business. For every instance of someone who receives what is perceived as excessive compensation for malpractice, there are probably a dozen instances of people who did not sue in the first place, though the could deservedly have done so. The fundamental fact is that most malpractice settlements are rewarded to people who have been injured by malpractice.
http://www.salon.com/news/healthcare_reform/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/02/25/summitry

Report card for health care reform summit: Dick Durban does the best, Obama very high. A- for Paul Ryan (see yesterday's post), who apparently defended well his bad proposal. At least he has one.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2010/02/25/healthcare_summit_slide_show/slideshow.html

Does it sound like I'm ordering a pizza?

HC: Procedural hypocrisy of Democrats vs. policy hypocrisy of Republicans:
http://www.slate.com/id/2245893/

Is NATO relevant in the post-Soviet world? Do we need NATO in Afghanistan more to show that NATO is still relevant than for any other reason?
http://www.slate.com/id/2245900/

HC: Paul Ryan (R-WI) is as much a moron as Paul Broun (R-GA). Ryan wants to replace Medicare with vouchers to buy health care, knowing that the value of the vouchers will be less in time than Medicare benefits would be. Are the Republicans trying to defend Medicare from Obama, or replace it with vouchers? Are they trying to have their political cake and eat it, too?
http://www.salon.com/news/healthcare_reform/index.html?story=/opinion/conason/2010/02/24/medicare