Democracy – Page 40 – Public Intelligence Blog

2006/10/042010/05/31

Review: State of Denial–Bush at War Part III

5 Star, Asymmetric, Cyber, Hacking, Odd War, Atrocities & Genocide, Complexity & Catastrophe, Congress (Failure, Reform), Crime (Corporate), Crime (Government), Democracy, Diplomacy, Economics, Empire, Sorrows, Hubris, Blowback, Executive (Partisan Failure, Reform), Force Structure (Military), Impeachment & Treason, Insurgency & Revolution, Intelligence (Government/Secret), Iraq, Justice (Failure, Reform), Military & Pentagon Power, Misinformation & Propaganda, Power (Pathologies & Utilization), Priorities, Secrecy & Politics of Secrecy, Security (Including Immigration), Terrorism & Jihad, Threats (Emerging & Perennial), True Cost & Toxicity, Voices Lost (Indigenous, Gender, Poor, Marginalized), War & Face of Battle

Stake in the Heart of the W Presidency

October 4, 2006

Bob Woodward

Here are the highlights I drew out that make this book extraordinary and worth reading even if it leaves one with a political hang-over:

1) The Federal Government is broken, and was made worse by a President who knew nothing of foreign policy, a Vice President who closed down the inter-agency policy system, and a Secretary of Defense who was both contemptuous of the uniformed military and held in contempt by Bush Senior.

2) My opinion of the Secretary of Defense actually went UP with this book. Rumsfeld has clearly been well-intentioned, has clearly asked the right questions, but he let his arrogance get away from him. Given a choice between Admiral Clark, a truth-telling transformative person, and General Myers, an acquiescent warrior diminished to senior clerk, Rumsfeld made the right choice for his management style, and the wrong choice for the good people in our Armed Forces. I *like* Rumsfeld's Anchor Chain letter as it has been described, and wish it had been included as an Appendix. Rumsfeld got the control he wanted, but he sacrificed honest early warning in so doing.

3) This book also improves my opinion of the Saudis and especially Prince Bandar. While I have no tolerance for Saudi Royalty–the kind of corrupt debauched individuals that make Congressman Foley look like a vestal virgin–the Saudis did understand that Bush's unleashing of Israel was disastrous, and they did an excellent job of shaking up the President. Unfortunately, they could not overcome Dick Cheney, who should resign or be impeached for gross dereliction of duty and usurpation of Presidential authority.

4) Tenet's visit to Rice on 10 July is ably recounted and adds to the picture. It joins others books, notably James Risen's “State of War,” “Hubris,” FASCO” and “The End of Iraq in presenting a compelling picture of a dysfunctional National Security Advisor who is now a dysfunctional Secretary of State–and Rumsfeld still won't return her phone calls…..

5) The author briefly touches on how CIA shined in the early days of the Afghan War (see my reviews of “JAWBREAKER” and “First In” for more details) but uses this to show that Rumsfeld took the impotence of the Pentagon, and the success of CIA, personally.

6) The author also tries to resurrect Tenet somewhat, documenting the grave reservations that Tenet had about Iraq, but Tenet, like Colin Powell, failed to speak truth to power or to the people, and failed the Nation.

7) Rumsfeld recognized the importance of stabilization and reconstruction (and got an excellent report from the Defense Science Board, not mentioned by this book, on Transitions to and From Hostilities) but he vacillated terribly and ultimately failed to be serious on this critical point.

8) This book *destroys* the Defense Intelligence Agency, which some say should be burned to the ground to allow a fresh start. The author is brutal in recounting the struggles of General Marks to get DIA to provide any useful information on the alleged 946 WMD sites in Iraq. DIA comes across as completely derelict bean counters with no clue how to support operators going in harms way, i.e. create actionable intelligence.

9) Despite WMD as the alleged basis for war, the military had no unit trained, equipped, or organized to find and neutralize WMD sites. A 400 person artillery unit was pressed into this fearful service.

10) General Jay Garner is the star of this story. My face lit up as I read of his accomplishments, insights, and good judgments. He and General Abizaid both understood that allowing the Iraqi Army to stay in being with some honor was the key to transitioning to peace, and it is clearly documented that Dick Cheney was the undoing of the peace. It was Dick Cheney that deprived Jay Garner of Tom Warrick from State, the man who has overseen and understood a year of planning on making the peace, and it was Dick Cheney that fired Garner and put Paul Bremer, idiot pro-consult in place. Garner clearly understood a month before the war–while there was still time to call it off–that the peace was un-winable absent major changes, but he could not get traction within the ideological fantasy land of the Vice Presidency.

11) Apart from State, one military officer, Colonel Steve Peterson, clearly foresaw the insurgency strategy, but his prescient warnings were dismissed by the larger group.

12) General Tommy Franks called Doug Feith “the dumbest bastard on the planet,” –Feith deprived Garner of critical information and promoted Chalabi as the man with all the answers.

13) The author covers the 2004 election night very ably, but at this point the book started to turn my stomach. The author appears oblivious to the fact that the Ohio election was stolen through the manipulation of 12 voting districts, loading good machines in the pro-Bush areas, putting too few machines in the pro-Kerry areas, and in some cases, documented by Rolling Stone, actually not counting Kerry votes at all on the tallies. Ohio has yet to pay, as does Florida, for its treasonous betrayal of the Republic.

Today I issued a press release pointing toward the Pakistan treaty creating the Islamic Emirate of Waziristan as a safehaven for the Taliban and Al Qaeda as the definitive end–loss of–the war on terror, which is a tactic, not an enemy. As Colin Gray says in “Modern Strategy,” time is the one strategic variable that cannot be bought nor replaced. As a moderate Republican I dare to suggest that resigning prior to the November elections, in favor of John McCain, Gary Hart, and a Coalition Cabinet, might be the one thing that keeps the moderate Republican incumbents, and the honest Democrats–those that respect the need for a balanced budget–in place to provide for continuity in Congress, which must *be* the first branch of government rather than slaves to the party line.

It's crunch time. This book is the last straw. The American people are now *very* angry.

2006/10/032010/01/13

Review: Human Scale

5 Star, Complexity & Resilience, Consciousness & Social IQ, Culture, Research, Democracy, Economics, Education (General), Environment (Solutions), Intelligence (Public), Peace, Poverty, & Middle Class, Secession & Nullification, Voices Lost (Indigenous, Gender, Poor, Marginalized)

Should be Re-Issued, a Seminal Publication Relevant to Governance

October 3, 2006

Kirkpatrick Sale

I am finding that books written in the 1970's and 1980's a making a comeback and people realize that certain of those authors were a quarter century ahead of their times. Richard Falk is one, Kirkpatrick Sale is the other. This book could usefully be read with Leopold Kohr's “The Breakdown of Nations,” Joel Garreau's “Nine Nations of North America,” and Philip Alcott's “The Health of Nations,” on why sovereignty and the Treaty of Westphalia should be overturned in favor of more localized governance with more universal rights and protections.

The bottom line in this book is crytal clear half-way through the book: at a specific point of scale, variable depending on natural resources, technical and cultural sophistication, etc, an individual's share of earned income goes MORE toward “power” goods and services of common concrn than to their own benefit. It is at this point that “the state” has outgrown its utility and becomes a burden on the individual taxpayer.

It merits comment in this context that there are 27 seccessionist movements in the United States of America, and at least 3 in Canada. As we look at the idiocy of the elective war on Iraq, and the very real prospect that the German Pope has cut a neo-fascist deal with the Karl Roves and Otto Reichs of this world–all descendants of Nazi war criminals admitted to the US under espionage cover, we have to contemplate the possibility that our big states are *out of control* and need to be chopped back to more “human scale.” This is a Nobel Prize kind of book, quite extraordinary.

Vote on Review

2006/10/032010/09/19

Review: The Average American–The Extraordinary Search for the Nation’s Most Ordinary Citizen

5 Star, America (Founders, Current Situation), Biography & Memoirs, Civil Society, Consciousness & Social IQ, Culture, Research, Democracy, Intelligence (Public), Peace, Poverty, & Middle Class, Politics, Voices Lost (Indigenous, Gender, Poor, Marginalized)

One Extra Star for Cool Idea That is Also Uplifting

October 3, 2006

Kevin O'Keefe

If you are an Amazon buyer you are probably not average, and Amazon reviewers even less so. I was compelled to buy this book simply on the premise that it would be interesting to learn what “average” was. I was NOT expecting an uplifting book that inspired reflection about what it means to be a good man, a good citizen, a good husband and father, and that is what this book is.

Yes, it would have benefitted from maps as well as a statistical table and a calendar of the search, and I would normally have given it four stars for lacking those “visualization & closure” elements, but I simply cannot get over the fact that this book made me feel good about America and good about the standard run of the mill American.

The idiocy and mendacity of our leaders aside, this is a great Nation, and I have tears in my eyes as I conclude the book, where the man chosen by the author as the average American, informed on the 4th of July, properly concludes that it is a great honor. Honor indeed. This is a superb book.

2006/09/162011/02/17

Review: State of Emergency–The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America

5 Star, America (Founders, Current Situation), Congress (Failure, Reform), Consciousness & Social IQ, Culture, Research, Democracy, Executive (Partisan Failure, Reform), Politics, Priorities

Patrick Buchanan is the Paul Revere of Our Time

September 16, 2006

Patrick Buchanan

Patrick Buchanan is much more serious, much more relevant, than either Newt Gingrich or the current illiterate President of the United States (illegally, through two stolen elections), George “Bring It On” Bush.

He opens the books with quotes from Teddy Roosevelt and from Wilson that set the context perfectly: you cannot have a Nation if there is, as Alexander Hamilton warned us, a tyranny of minorities that do not buy into the proposition of citizenship and loyalty to the flag.

The author is clearly very well read and historically grounded. He noted that Nations dye when they have dying populations, disintegrating cultures, and unresisted invasions.

His most important point, across the book, is that the Mexicans are invading deliberately and in massive force, and the federal government is failing to fulfill its constitutional responsibility for protecting states from invasion. He specifically suggests, and I agree, that Bush Junior is impeachable for failing to protect (and indeed inciting) illegal immigration.

According to the author:

1) We have gone from 5 to 57 million Asians and Hispanics;

2) There is moral rot in both parties;

3) 1 in 12 of the illegal aliens is a proven criminal

4) Aliens are 12% of the population and 30% of the incarcerated;

5) US allows foreign governments, e.g. China, to refuse returns;

6) Local police are hand-cuffed and not allowed to arrest and depot illegal aliens;

7) Illegal immigrants are a major vector for disease and potential pandemics.

8) Mexico, at 6 to 1, is the primary offender, and 58% of Mexicans believe that the US Southwest belongs to them and they are simply taking it back (to the Guadalupe-Hidalgo line);

9) CORPORATIONS are demanding the importation of poverty by supporting illegal immigration; CORPORATIONS are passing on to the individual taxpayer the social, cultural, and economic costs of accepting millions of poor, uneducated illegal aliens.

10) The churches and the film industry have become propagandists for illegal immigration.

11) America has lost its Christian characters, and is now a mélange of disloyal self-serving religions of all kinds, including Wahabbism which has since the 1990's had imams preaching the murder of Americans from pulpits on American soil, to individuals NOMINALLY U.S. citizens.

12) The emergence of the Minutemen (now spreading across America, not just at the border) is reflective of the fact that illegal immigration is the “crisis of the age.”

12) Babies born in America should NOT be automatically accorded American citizenship unless one of their parents is American; nor should dual citizenship be allowed. RIGHT ON!!!!

This is a tremendous book. I respect the author very much, and believe that he merits the full support and attention of every loyal American that believes that one should speak the language of America–English–and honor the flag of America. The illegal immigrants that displayed the Mexican flag during the recent demonstrations should all be deported.

America has lost its integrity. We need a new leadership team that can protect our borders, protect our middle class, protect our economy, and protect our culture. George Bush is a much greater threat to America than Bin Laden, because he is busy selling America out to the Saudis for oil, to the Mexicans for migrant labor, and to the Colombians for drug profits.

Pat Buchanan is a bright shining light, and this book is a very important contribution to the dialog needed to save the Republic.

2006/06/262009/12/04

Review: Speaking Freely–Trials of the First Amendment (Paperback)

5 Star, Censorship & Denial of Access, Civil Society, Democracy, Information Society

Amazon Page

From Pentagon Papers to NSA Wiretapping: NYT and Freedom of the Press,

June 26, 2006

Floyd Abrams

As I write this revieThe One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11w, CNN is reporting that the Bush Administration is threatening the New York Times with prosecution for revealing the NSA wire-tapping program that by-passed the FISA court, which has the EXCLUSIVE mandate to review all such intrusions. The Bush Administration is evidently ungrateful about the fact that the NYT stupidly held back on the story until after Rove could steal the election from Kerry by encouraging the Ohio State Secretary committing criminal acts in twelve districts. At the same time, there is also a moronic proposed amendment to the Constitution to prohibit the burning of the American flag in protest.

“Speaking Freely” is an extraordinary book that documents, over and over again, why our national security lies not only in force of arms but also in, quoting Judge Murray Gurfein (June 1971), a “cantankerous press, an obstinate press, a ubiquitious press (that) must be suffered by those in authority in order to preserve the even greater values of freedom of expression and the right of the people to know.”

The Cheney-Bush Administration is moving toward totalitarianism, and appears seriously stupid (another of those ideological fantasies) in believing that they can cover up their ineptitude by censoring the press.

See my reviews of The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11; How Would a Patriot Act? Defending American Values from a President Run Amok and The Case for Impeachment: The Legal Argument for Removing President George W. Bush from Office to better understand what other authorities are saying about the lunacy of this position. These two guys are a combination of impeachable (mostly Cheney) and laughingstock (mostly Bush) who have leveraged the extremist Republican machine to steal two presidential elections and violate so many international and domestic laws as to be richly eligible for a public tarring and feathering.

This book, “Speaking Freely,” is a massive vaccination for the public against the disease of “state secrecy” that is used to cover up incompetence, inpropriety, and high crimes and misdemeanors richly deserving of impeachment.

Please note that the law suit of the New York Times for “blowing” NSA's capabilities is actually a cover-up for the fact that we are going deaf and blind because Al Qaeda is not stupid–they have been moving “offline” since 9-11, and the Administration is preparing to pretend that their failure to be effective against Al Qaeda is the fault of the New York Times.

Floyd Abrams may well be one of the most valuable Americans in modern history. He defended the NYT in the Pentagon Papers, and won. Today, the NYT should rely on the sensibility of the people to defend them. Deep in his book, Counselor Abrams makes the point that journalists MUST have the freedom to listen to sources “off the record,” and he places the burden for protecting secrets on those who choose to leak them for whatever reason.

I am reminded that the incumbent President is the “leaker in chief” who seems to make the law suit his needs. As one Constitutional lawyer has stated, he has the power neither to interpret the law nor make the law. It is George Bush, and his string puller Dick Cheney, who are “out of bounds” and richly deserving of impeachment.

For additional perspective:
Vice: Dick Cheney and the Hijacking of the American Presidency
Running on Empty: How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do About It
The Global Class War: How America's Bipartisan Elite Lost Our Future – and What It Will Take to Win It Back

2006/06/042015/01/05

Review: Stand for Something–The Battle for America’s Soul (Hardcover)

5 Star, Consciousness & Social IQ, Democracy, Education (General), Peace, Poverty, & Middle Class, Politics

Quick Read, Somewhat Bland, Best of Intentions,

June 4, 2006

John Kasich

I certainly do not regret buying and taking the time to read this book. It is a relatively quick read (lots of white space between and around the lines). For me the best and most important chapter dealt with the corruption of politics, and I include some memorable quotes from there below.The books reads rather blandly and inoffensively (typical of Presidential Hopefuls writing “please get to know me” books but I have to say that after putting down this book, I felt that the author had indeed made his point: he is a decent man who stands for core values, and believes in a balanced budget to boot.Memorable points from the political chapter, alone worthy of buying and reading the book:

Reagan Republican who echoes President Carter's “malaise” concerns by saying “there's a feeling of hopelessness out there.”

p 21. “Good politics shouldn't be about us or them”

On page 75, after starting off by saying that politics should be about saving the world, he says “We haven't seen middle ground for so long I am no longer certain it exists.”

Both these comments tie in very well with the newly launched Unity08 movement to use the Internet to field a split party presidential team for 2008, and the new non-rival Citizens-Party (wing for each existing party to have “dual membership”) which will be launched shortly to field not just a mixed party presidential team, but a coalition cabinet committed to electoral issue as the non-rival issue for all, and a balanced transparent budget with public intelligence and dialog driving public policy in the future, instead of party line politics or special interest money (the author addresses both).

On page 77 he directly slams the Bush II administration is noting rather pointedly that we need leaders who represent our core values and are not simply committed to winning and holding power at any cost.

On page 94 he specifically identifies one of the times when Dick Cheney broke his word, and one gets the feeling that the author is intimately familiar with the propensity of the sitting Vice President to lie and break his word to one and all.

The books by Tom Coburn on Breach of Trust: How Washington Turns Outsiders Into Insiders and by Joe Klein on Politics Lost: From RFK to W: How Politicians Have Become Less Courageous and More Interested in Keeping Power than in Doing What's Right for America as well as Norman Cousins on The Pathology of Power – A Challenge to Human Freedom and Safety are much more detailed and sophisticated than this book, but in his own way the author has told a simple elegant personal story about politics lost to party corruption and special interest money, and I respect him all the more for this chapter.

In comparison with the chapter on politics the chapters on sports, business lack of ethics, loss of religion to Paris Hilton and sex on TV, loss of discipline in education, and the loss of culture as celebrities fail to walk the wholesome road, are straight-forward.

The book ends with a general but rather bland “call to arms” asking each of us to believe in the greater good and act accordingly.

Bottom line: good guy, leader, “must have” on any coaltion ticket to save America from the Republican and Democratic extremists that are killing the Republic.

2006/05/312011/10/22

Review: Politics Lost–How American Democracy Was Trivialized By People Who Think You’re Stupid (Hardcover)

5 Star, Democracy, Politics

Pages of Notes on This Book–Other Reviews Largely Worthless,

May 31, 2006

Joe Klein

Edited to remove opening at suggeastion of earnest Amazonian, and to add several books and recommend my list of transpartisan books based in part on Reuniting America's list.

I have five pages of notes on this book, which is my 708th book of non-fiction pertaining to national security and competitiveness, and in the context of the other 707 books (okay, three on MGBs and three on menopause), this is, without question, a five star book.

There are several key points that I take very seriously, and I believe that this book could usefully be read with moderate Republican Clyde Prestowitz's ROGUE NATION, and Senator Edward Kennedy's AMERICA: Back on Track. Readers interested in my recommendations might also look at my lists, especially my lists of Democracy and on Collective Intelligence.

Key point #1: AUTHENTICITY is lacking in politics, and could be what wins the 2008 election for either John McCain, if he can avoid the “born again Bushophile” slander, or Mark Warner, if he can bring himself to field the moderate Republican from Maine Susan Collins as a Vice President, and a coalition cabinet committed to electoral reform. McCain is especially attractive to me because he could–as author Joe Klein notes–fix the military by ending military-industrial-congressional corruption and putting a stop to corporate welfare. Warner, on the other hand, could field a credible coaltion government that ends both the corruption of special interests and the corruption of the Republican and Democratic party leadership who force their party members to vote the party line instead of their conscience (see Tom Coburn's superb BREACH OF TRUST).

Key point #2: Consultants have drained democracy dry and actually driven voters away. This is almost a no-holds barred indictment of the consultants and polling firms that grew from the 1970's. The author is especially pointed and strong on Patrick Caddell and on Bob Shrum, with Joe Trippi getting honorable mentions. On the one hand, the author slams polling and consulting for distorting both what the people think, and for vacating the value of real leadership–he is compelling in suggesting that the people want leaders to lead with vision and authenticity, rather than follow the numbers like sheep.

Key Point #3: Politics, in its highest form, was Bobby Kennedy in Indianapolis on the night of Martin Luther King's murder by assassination. The author opens with this vignette, the rest of the book is about politics at its lowest form.

Key Point #4: Television has changed how we select our leaders, and this is generally a very very bad thing. In turn, the cost of television advertisements has fueled massive corruption within both parties. Since the airwaves are part of the public broadcast spectrum, it is certainly clear to me that we have to eliminate the cost of television advertising, and demand equal free time for all validated candidates, at all levels. This is a non-negotiable condition for democracy in the multi-media era.

Key Point #5: Witch hunts and negative politics are the stock of the mediocrities that populate both the Republican and the Democratic parties (I am a moderate Republican and consider both parties to be equally corrupt, the Democrats are simply more inept).

Key Point #6: Here the author is supported by Henry Kissinger (see my review of DOES AMERICA NEED A FOREIGN POLICY?), as both consider the speed of politics and the speed of the real world to have dramatically out-paced the sources and methods by which we acquire, evaluate, and act on information. Government–and the U.S. Intelligence Community and the general inter-agency policy deliberation process are, in one word, INCOMPETENT. We desperately need to harness collective intelligence through new open source software and open source intelligence capabilities that are widely and freely available to citizens as well as their elected or appointed representatives.

As a side note, the author documents the very early and heavy engagement of Saudi Arabia in sponsoring sophisticated and sustained polling of American views and concerns. It can be safely suggested that the Saudi Royal Family has funded sufficient polling to know America as well, or better, than most US politicians.

The author believes that the Reagan era killed concepts of civic duty and long term strategic sacrifice, and that a climate of intellectual cowardice and political correctness led to a shutting out of those who would speak plainly or serioiusly.

John Kerry is slammed as a banana peel politician who uses slippery words, Dick Morris is slammed as a charlatan, the Republicans are slammed for slease, anti-society, pro-market (that is to say, pro-already wealthy Wall Street), and for having no policy process (something moderate Republican and former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill supports in the book PRICE OF LOYALTY). The author slams Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and General Tommy Franks as delusional and unprofessional. As the recent chorus of generals including General Tony Zinni might suggest, the author is probably on solid ground with this assessment.

On a nuanced note, the author considers Shrum to be off-base in advising Senator Edwards to focus on class warfare, as he finds that this mantra is not effective with either the bi-partisan “common guy” or the social conservative “leave me alone” group. Everything I read in this book confirmed my view that the next congressional election needs to be about personal integrity and indepedence and authenticity, and the next presidential election needs to be about electoral reform–about re-engaging and honoring the votes of every citizen, and keeping those who are elected honest after the fact of election.

I may have read a different book than that which has been so demeaned by the other reviewers to date, but I can certainly say that I did read every word of this book, and I found the author to be thoughtful, authentic, and worth every minute that I spent absorbing his views.

Running on Empty: How the Democratic and Republican Parties Are Bankrupting Our Future and What Americans Can Do About It
Who Will Tell The People? : The Betrayal Of American Democracy
Democracy's Edge: Choosing to Save Our Country by Bringing Democracy to Life
Escaping the Matrix: How We the People can change the world
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
The Tao of Democracy: Using Co-Intelligence to Create a World That Works for All
All Rise: Somebodies, Nobodies, and the Politics of Dignity (Bk Currents)
The Two Percent Solution: Fixing America's Problems in Ways Liberals and Conservatives Can Love
The Radical Center: The Future of American Politics
THE SMART NATION ACT: Public Intelligence in the Public Interest