Thursday, October 06, 2005

Al Gore on Media & Democracy

Al Gore on The Threat to American Democracy, "The subjugation of news by entertainment seriously harms our democracy: it leads to dysfunctional journalism that fails to inform the people."

[...]

"The news divisions - which used to be seen as serving a public interest and were subsidized by the rest of the network - are now seen as profit centers designed to generate revenue and, more importantly, to advance the larger agenda of the corporation of which they are a small part. They have fewer reporters, fewer stories, smaller budgets, less travel, fewer bureaus, less independent judgment, more vulnerability to influence by management, and more dependence on government sources and canned public relations hand-outs. This tragedy is compounded by the ironic fact that this generation of journalists is the best trained and most highly skilled in the history of their profession. But they are usually not allowed to do the job they have been trained to do.

"The present executive branch has made it a practice to try and control and intimidate news organizations: from PBS to CBS to Newsweek. They placed a former male escort in the White House press pool to pose as a reporter - and then called upon him to give the president a hand at crucial moments. They paid actors to make make phony video press releases and paid cash to some reporters who were willing to take it in return for positive stories. And every day they unleash squadrons of digital brownshirts to harass and hector any journalist who is critical of the President."

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

Harriet Miers SCOTUS

Take that SCOTUS!





http://harrietmiers.blogspot.com/

http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/5651534.html

"George W. Bush has just rung the death knell for his presidency.

"For the Supreme Court of the United States, a president under fire for cronyism has chosen the ultimate crony.

"For the highest court in the land, a president criticized for a lack of gravitas has chosen a woman whom the president's own former speechwriter describes as "a taut, nervous, anxious personality."

[...]

"Bush once described Miers as "a pit bull in size 6 shoes." It's worth remembering that many are the dog owners who rue the day they unleashed their favorite pit bulls."

http://www.pnionline.com/dnblog/attytood/archives/002383.html

"But she [Miers] does know better than just about anyone else where the bodies are buried (relax, it's a just a metaphor...we hope) in President Bush's National Guard scandal. In fact, Bush's Texas gubenatorial campaign in 1998 (when he was starting to eye the White House) actually paid Miers $19,000 to run an internal pre-emptive probe of the potential scandal. Not long after, a since-settled lawsuit alleged that the Texas Lottery Commission -- while chaired by Bush appointee Miers -- played a role in a multi-million dollar cover-up of the scandal.

[...]

"In 1997, Barnes was abruptly fired by Gtech. That's a bad thing, right? Well, on the other hand, they also gave him a $23 million severance payment. A short time later, Gtech -- despite the ongoing scandals -- got its contract renewed over two lower bidders. A former executive director thought the whole thing stunk:

"The suit involving Barnes was brought by former Texas lottery director Lawrence Littwin, who was fired by the state lottery commission, headed by Bush appointee Harriet Miers, in October 1997 after five months on the job. It contends that Gtech Corp., which runs the state lottery and until February 1997 employed Barnes as a lobbyist for more than $3 million a year, was responsible for Littwin's dismissal.

"Littwin's lawyers have suggested in court filings that Gtech was allowed to keep the lottery contract, which Littwin wanted to open up to competitive bidding, in return for Barnes's silence about Bush's entry into the Guard."

http://www.lightupthedarkness.org/blog/?view=plink&id=306

Miers is linked to a Bush's Guard Records/Texas Lottery/GTech Scandal:

Democrats Oppose Gonzales

"Alberto Gonzales was recommended to Bush as counsel in the Texas Governorship by Harriet Miers, who has replaced Gonzales as White House counsel. Referred to by Bush as a "pit bull in size 6 shoes'', Miers is a former President of Locke, Purnell, Rain & Harrell and former chairwoman of the Texas Lottery Commission. Locke, Purnell, Rain & Harrell have given at least $65,000 to Bush campaigns and are major backers of tort reform. One case involved a unique law - passed under former Gov. George Bush - that blocked Texas consumers from recovering $6 billion in overcharges on car loans and allowed dealers to keep kickbacks secret. Two consumer groups have called on the Texas Legislature to repeal it. Locke, Purnell, Rain & Harrell were defendants of the litigation, which included auto dealers in Texas. Miers was also Chairwoman of the Texas Lottery Commission and responsible for a chain of events involving GTech, which ran the Texas Lottery, former Lt. Governor Ben Barnes, and accusations of kick-backs and illegal contracts. Yes, that Ben Barnes, who says he helped George Bush get into the National Guard. His original deposition on that subject was given in 1999, during this Texas Lottery Commission investigation, and has been permanently sealed."

http://www.chompy.net/blogs/sarah/archives/003052.html

"It's worth noting that the Texas Lottery Commission was formerly mismanaged by the current White House Counsel, Harriet Miers during the interesting era when the Commission contracted with a firm called GTech:


"By 1998, Barnes was on top again, as a millionaire lobbyist working for GTech, the company operating public lotteries in 37 states. But lottery revenues were plummeting, and lottery-commission chair
Harriet Miers (who was also Bush’s personal lawyer and once was paid $19,000 to look into the National Guard story for a gubernatorial campaign) re-bid GTech’s contract. GTech sued, threatened to shut down the Texas lottery for a year, and hired a new lobbyist — after providing Barnes a $23 million severance package. Miers fired one lottery director who sued and settled. Then the second lottery director fired by Miers filed suit. He claimed he was taking the fall for GTech, which, he alleged, kept its contract and bought out Barnes because he had the story on Bush.

”naturally, has his own interesting connections to gambling:

"George W. Bush gave the nation's gambling industry plenty of reason to fear his presidency. He moved to shut down an Indian-run casino while governor of Texas. He declared in a widely circulated state report that ''Casino gambling is not OK. It has ruined the lives of too many adults, and it can do the same thing to our children." He wooed religious conservatives by boasting in a presidential debate about his ''strong antigambling record."

”But as president, Bush has not spoken out against gambling. After promising not to take money from gambling interests, Bush's campaign fund accepted large contributions from gambling-related sources. His 2001 inaugural committee raised at least $300,000 from gambling interests, including gifts from MGM/Mirage, Sands, and a leading slot-machine maker. Bush later appeared at a Las Vegas casino for a fund-raiser for his reelection campaign.

“In fact, according to the Boston Globe, President Bush "met with Indian gaming leaders at the White House in annual sessions over a four-year period that were arranged by antitax crusader Grover Norquist...




”...in some cases after tribes contributed to Norquist's organization." Mr. Norquist, whose organization "received $1.5 million from tribes and fought a tax on Indian casinos" is under investigation by the Senate and Justice Department along with his friends Ralph Reed, the former Christian Coalition director (who "allegedly used some money from Indian gaming tribes to fund his efforts to close down rival casinos and lotteries" and served as Southeast regional chairman to the Bush re-election campaign) and Jack Abramoff, "a top Bush fund-raiser who earned millions of dollars in fees as a consultant to gaming tribes." Mr. Abramoff, of course, is one of the "closest and dearest friends" of House majority leader Tom DeLay, who has said he is strongly antigambling yet has drawn media scrutiny because of his opposition to an Indian gaming tax.



http://www.wotisitgood4.blogspot.com/
"It's important to recognize, finally, what Karl Rove and the Bush administration, with the help of the modern Republican apparatus under Tom DeLay, Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed is all about. They are building a political machine, not a political movement. I find it very amusing that the right wing "intellectuals," from their ivory tower think tanks and millionaire supported sinecures at political magazines, have still failed to recognize that."

More from Georgia 10 blogspot:
http://g10.blogspot.com/

Georgia/Texas GTech connection, and don't forget that Georgia Lottery Services, Inc. is on the state vendor list for Diebold evoting machine contracts:

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1316/is_12_31/ai_58170287 "In Georgia, Lottery Director Rebecca Paul called a closed-door session with the company when Gtech's bid came in $50 million above the low bidder. After Gtech agreed to drop its price by just $23 million, Paul inked the deal. Did Paul cut Gtech a break because she was offered a job? Probably not, but she certainly knows that the company takes good care of lottery directors who show it consideration."

[...]

"Other prominent Gtech lobbyists have included William Daley (now secretary of commerce) and William Broadhurst, an extremely close political advisor to the governor of Louisiana when Gtech was fighting for that state's contract. Broadhurst, of course, first came to the public's attention when he chartered the "Monkey Business" and introduced Donna Rice to his close friend Gary Hart. Hubert Plummer, the former president of one of Gtech's competitors famously once said, "We'd go out to dinner with the lottery director and find that Gtech had hired a yacht and taken out the whole goddamn legislature."

"But if many of the company's critics are to be believed, Gtech doesn't just buy and schmooze with people, it intimidates them--charges that Gtech emphatically denies. When Bruce Mayberry, the Arizona lottery director in 1993 (now an employee of one of Gtech's competitors) got into a dispute with the company, he soon found a crate of rotten mutton on his doorstep with a note attached: "Enjoy" A gruff Gtech spokesman explained that the meat was, of course, a goodwill present gone bad through a combination of Arizona heat and DHL's slow service. As he said later in a terse interview, "It's a rough business." Indeed.

[...]

"An aide to Henry Hyde was covertly offered $10 million by Primadonna Resorts (see Memo of the Month) in return for landing them a casino license in Illinois; the plan was only foiled when a man chasing an unrelated conspiracy theory stumbled upon the critical files in a trash can. Senate Minority Whip Harry Reid (D-Nev.) unabashedly admits that he owes his career to gambling interests; Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss) is deeply involved in the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) that, according to the non-profit watchdog Public Citizen, received $1.26 million from the gambling industry in 1997-98. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the man commanding the jihad against campaign finance reform, has raised at least $1 million for the GOP in the last three years from the gambling industry.

[...]

"State lotteries spend more than half a billion dollars a year on advertising on television, radio, posters, and in any other rewarding medium. The Maryland state lottery, for example, bought well over $1 million worth of ads with major television stations in the first nine months of 1999. As with all media advertising, there is scant direct proof that the purchases influence coverage, but commercial television producers know where every dollar their station or network gets comes from.

[...]

"Unfortunately, the propaganda is getting through to Americans. According to a July 1999 poll by the Consumers Federation of America and Primericam, 27 percent of Americans believe that winning the lottery is their "best chance to obtain half a million dollars or more in [their] lifetime." This is a grim statistic which would surely change if states were to cancel their lottery ads and instead publicize the wonders of compound interest: $50 invested weekly with a 9 percent return would yield over $1 million in 40 years.

http://tennessean.com/special/lottery/archives/04/03/41139723.shtml?Element_ID=41139723

"When Georgia lottery officials requested proposals for a contract to run online games — games in which players choose numbers for a future drawing — two companies responded. GTECH of West Greenwich, R.I., offered to do the job for 3.4% of gross ticket sales; New Jersey-based Automated Wagering International asked for 2.25%.

"Paul negotiated with GTECH, and the company subsequently lowered its bid to 2.99% of sales. Paul told The Tennessean that she talked to GTECH about reducing its bid ''to save money for scholarships.''
"But even after the negotiations, GTECH's services looked to cost up to $6 million a year more than AWI's, based on sales projections.

"GTECH got the deal, however, as lottery board members explained that they were more confident in the company's ability to start the games on time, which they said would make up part of the difference in cost.
"AWI officials said they were never asked if they could meet the same deadline. They protested the decision, claiming Paul was biased.

"Paul had told lottery employees who were evaluating the bids of problems with AWI's performance in Florida when she worked there, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. But Florida's lottery renewed its contract with AWI in 1992, two years after Paul was fired.

"During a hearing on the protest, AWI attorney Richard Sinkfield produced notes that showed Paul had said in a meeting with GTECH that the ''huge difference'' in the bids ''needs to be addressed and justified.''

"Jack P. Etheridge, a former judge who heard the protest, said the lottery's decision to go with GTECH was appropriate.

"He ruled in May 1993 that the quasi-governmental Georgia Lottery Corp. could hire a higher bidder if that vendor offered ''a decidedly better product given the relevant specifications.''

"A Fulton County Superior Court judge upheld the ruling a year later, and AWI dropped the case.

"Sinkfield said a confidentiality agreement prevented him from talking about the case now."

http://tennessean.com/special/lottery/archives/03/10/41113020.shtml

"Massachusetts returned $140 per capita in proceeds to the state in 2002, compared with $86 per capita in Georgia, Tennessean calculations show.

''We have the highest payout structure in the industry and we think that contributes to our success,'' said Joseph C. Sullivan, the new executive director of the Massachusetts lottery.

Lest we forget, from the AJC Stacks, Zell backs Bill, now Zell backs Bush…

SPECIAL REPORT: Helping out in political fund-raising: Miller, GTECH affiliate came to Clinton's aid

"This is a sidebar to a Special Report on Georgia Lottery funds and where they're going.

"Early in 1992, Bill Clinton's quest for the presidency was threatened by news reports that he had dodged the draft and cheated on his wife.

"Amid speculation that Clinton might quit the race for the Democratic nomination, Georgia Gov. Zell Miller came to his aid, along with a company called Integrated Strategies of Georgia.

"The teamwork illustrated how private companies that lobby for public contracts can be involved in political campaigns, sometimes by giving cash but often in more subtle ways.

"Miller helped line up supporters for a $500-a-head luncheon in Atlanta that raised more than $42,000 for Clinton's faltering campaign. A staffer in Miller's office reserved the Fireplace Room in a state-owned building near the Capitol for the luncheon, held Feb. 21, 1992.

"The chief fund-raiser for the event was Hubert Riley, son of Richard Riley, a former governor of South Carolina who is now secretary of education in Clinton's Cabinet.

"Hubert Riley, who had moved to Atlanta in the fall of 1991, worked for Integrated Strategies of Georgia also known as I.S. GA. He said he got the job after Edgar Sims, whom Miller had named as chairman of the state Democratic Party, introduced him to L. Rogers Wells Jr., who is now president of the company.

"Integrated Strategies of Georgia had a contract to lobby for GTECH Corp., a company that hoped to win a multimillion-dollar contract running the computers for the Georgia Lottery. But although GTECH was the firm's only client, Riley said he didn't do any lobbying.

[...]

"It is unclear what I.S. GA does for the money.

"GTECH, the world's largest lottery contractor, has a history of hiring well-connected lobbyists. Federal investigators have alleged that some of these lobbyists in four states kicked back a portion of their receipts to J. David Smith, a former GTECH executive who has been convicted of fraud for such transactions in New Jersey.

"- In New Jersey, Smith was convicted in October of accepting $169,500 in kickbacks from a lobbyist whose partner was related to the governor's chief of staff.

"- In New York, a consultant of GTECH's paid Smith $132,613, according to federal prosecutors in New Jersey. No charges have been filed in the New York case.

"- In Texas, a federal grand jury is investigating a lucrative contract between GTECH and former Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes, and Barnes' subsequent payment of more than $500,000 to Smith.

"- And in Kentucky, Smith and Wells were indicted by a federal grand jury in 1994 on charges of fraud and money laundering. The charges were dismissed at trial.

"According to federal authorities, payments to Integrated Strategies of Georgia place it among GTECH's highest-paid consultants in the United States.
[...]
"In Georgia, a federal grand jury investigation of the Georgia Lottery's contract with GTECH ended last fall with no indictments. Prosecutors would not discuss the case.

"In Texas, in addition to the federal investigation, lottery officials have been stung by revelations that Barnes, the former lieutenant governor, signed a contract after leaving office that paid him 4 percent of GTECH'S earnings from the Texas lottery, and that GTECH had once employed the boyfriend of Texas lottery director Nora Linares.

"Federal prosecutors in New Jersey allege Barnes Paid Smith more than $500,000 in kickbacks from the proceeds of his contract, but no criminal charges have been filed. Barnes, who has said he paid Smith for non-lottery consulting, declined to comment.

"Smith's attorney, Larry Lustberg, denied any wrongdoing by his client in Texas. "They have never been the subject of any charge and he's obviously been convicted of no wrongdoing in . . Texas," Lustberg said.

"Linares, meanwhile, was fired in January after GTECH's employment of her boyfriend for a period several years ago was disclosed.

"The revelations have prompted two of the three members of the Texas Lottery Commission to recommend rebidding GTECH's contract there. "

http://www.ajc.com/sunday/content/epaper/editions/sunday/
news_34f3d871d49151ac0077.html


Reed fought ban on betting
Anti-gambling bill was defeated
Jim Galloway, Alan Judd - StaffSunday, October 2, 2005

"Ralph Reed, who has condemned gambling as a "cancer on the American body politic," quietly worked five years ago to kill a proposed ban on Internet wagering --- on behalf of a company in the online gambling industry.
Reed, now a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor of Georgia, helped defeat the congressional proposal despite its strong support among many Republicans and conservative religious groups. Among them: the national Christian Coalition organization, which Reed had left three years earlier to become a political and corporate consultant.

"A spokesman for Reed said the political consultant fought the ban as a subcontractor to Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff's law firm. But he said Reed did not know "the specific client" that had hired Abramoff: eLottery Inc., a Connecticut-based company that wants to help state lotteries sell tickets online --- an activity the gambling measure would have prohibited.

[...]

"It flies in the face of the kinds of things the Christian Coalition supports," said the Rev. Cynthia Abrams, a United Methodist Church official in Washington who coordinates a group of gambling opponents who favored the measure.

"The eLottery episode echoes Reed's work against a lottery, video poker and casinos in Alabama, Louisiana and Texas: As a subcontractor to two law firms that employed Abramoff, Reed's anti-gambling efforts were funded by gambling interests trying to protect their business.

"By working against the Internet measure, Reed played a part in defeating legislation that sought to control a segment of the gambling industry that went on to experience prodigious growth.

"Since 2001, the year after the proposed ban failed, annual revenue for online gambling companies has increased from about $3.1 billion worldwide to an estimated $11.9 billion this year, according to Christiansen Capital Advisers, a New York firm that analyzes market data for the gambling industry.

[...]

"Speaking at a National Press Club luncheon in Washington in 1996, for instance, Reed called gambling "a cancer" and a "scourge" that was responsible for "orphaning children ... [and] turning wives into widows."
But when the online gambling legislation came before Congress in 2000, Reed took no public position on the measure, aides say.

[...]


"It slips over being disingenuous," said the Rev. Tom Grey, executive director of the National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling, who worked for the gambling ban. "Jack Abramoff was known as 'Casino Jack' at the time. If Jack's doling out tickets to this feeding trough, for Ralph to say he didn't know --- I don't believe that."

Monday, January 31, 2005

Harry Reid on Harriet Miers

And what's up with Harry Reid?

http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1128416712027

"But Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada took to the Senate floor after Bush's speech to praise Miers.

"With so much at stake, we shouldn't rush to judgment about this or any other nominee, but even at this early stage of the confirmation process, I will say that I am impressed by what I know about Harriet Miers," said Reid, who recommended her to the president.

"Ms. Miers has not been a judge, but I regard that as a strength, not a weakness," said Reid, a former trial lawyer himself. "In my view, the Supreme Court would benefit from the addition of a justice who has real experience as a practicing lawyer, a nominee with relevant nonjudicial experience."

You'ld expect this from Hatch:

"A lot of my fellow conservatives are concerned, but they don't know her as I do," said Hatch, a former Judiciary Committee chairman. "She's going to basically do what the president thinks she should, and that is be a strict constructionist."