Posts by Joshua Holland

Joshua Holland is an editor and senior writer at AlterNet.

Krauthammer Commits Terrorist Act on the Opinion Pages of the Washington Post
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 20, 2009 at 1:41 PM.

Perhaps we should be concerned about Charles Krauthammer. He's been awfully stressed-out since the last election, and this week's decision by Attorney General Eric Holder to try Khalid Sheik Mohammed in New York has him in a bit of a state ...

For late-19th-century anarchists, terrorism was the "propaganda of the deed." And the most successful propaganda-by-deed in history was 9/11 -- not just the most destructive, but the most spectacular and telegenic.

And now its self-proclaimed architect, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, has been given by the Obama administration a civilian trial in New York. Just as the memory fades, 9/11 has been granted a second life -- and KSM, a second act: "9/11, The Director's Cut," narration by KSM.

Smell a bit of jealousy here? Krauthammer and Mohammed share a similar interest: instilling a profound dread of Islamic fundamentalism in the hearts of the American public -- the world public. Krauthammer's owned 9/11 for 8 years, and he'll have the final cut, not the damn director!

September 11, 2001 had to speak for itself ...

Right, the Bush bunch and all those right-wing bloggers never spoke on that day's behalf.

A decade later, the deed will be given voice. KSM has gratuitously been presented with the greatest propaganda platform imaginable -- a civilian trial in the media capital of the world -- from which to proclaim the glory of jihad and the criminality of infidel America.

We've seen terror trials. Judges have been pretty about not allowing the defendants to use them as a megaphone to promote their worldviews.

But setting aside reality for a moment -- and you have to in order to really soak in a good Krauthammer column -- I'm going to ask you to forget about politics and consider just what in the world might KSM say at that trial that has right-wingers cowering under their beds? Do you think he could -- gasp! -- accuse the U.S. of being craven imperialists? Of supporting Israeli "genocide" against the Palestinians? Might he dare suggest that we're waging a war on Islam? That we're trying to impose our decadent values on the rest of the world? My God, do you think he could accuse us of having some sort of interest in Middle East oil?!?

If KSM were permitted to utter these shocking allegations, would they come as a surprise to anyone? Is the danger here that nobody in the Muslim world has ever heard of such outlandish ideas before? Will ordinary Muslim men and women, hearing Mohammed's suggestion that America might be the Great Satan for the first time on some Al Jazeera broadcast suddenly drop whatever they're doing and strike out against the infidels?

I mean, seriously? If you're not already predisposed to al Qaeda's message (which one assumes is widely available), would you really give what Mohammed says during testimony a lot of credence (again, in the unlikely case they let him ramble)? Is he that articulate? Are we trying the scruffy dude who says he chopped off Daniel Pearl's head or Noam Chomsky here?

Whatever the risk, for Krauthammer it's just not worth it...

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

The Best Paragraph Written About Sarah Palin's "Going Rogue"
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 19, 2009 at 4:48 PM.

I'm giving the nod to va, at Whiskey Fire:

The most unbelievable thing about Going Rogue, by the author-function "Sarah Palin," is that it's supposed to be self-serving. The problem a self-serving narrative about Sarah Palin confronts is that it's about Sarah Palin, whose entire life, it appears, consists of worse and worse attempts to create self-serving narratives explaining away bigger and bigger fuck-ups. Going Rogue's burden is that it must claim to be the definitive, encyclopedic explanation, the final excuse, for a long history of failure begat by failure; it's an epic of failure, if you will, and if the goal here is some kind of ultimate vindication, well, it is monumentally unsuccessful. Going Rogue is, at bottom, the story of every one of Sarah Palin's projects ending in grotesque catastrophe; it is only self-serving in the sense that these catastrophes either prove benign or turn out to be some other schlub's fault. If everything I knew about Sarah Palin came from this book (and basically it does), I would say her life has been like a play in which a deus-ex-machina descends at the end of every act to bestow peace and harmony, except the deus forgot to put on pants and everyone's just standing around going "uhhhh..." and then the lights go out and the scene changes.

Paragraphs 2 through 5 offer some fine and fun writing as well, so I urge you to read the whole thing.

Wow, Turns Out Sarah Palin Really Is a Dumb Wingnut*
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 18, 2009 at 12:00 PM.

During the 2008 campaign, Sarah Palin earned some ignominy when Katie Couric asked her to name a publication she relied on for news and she couldn't name a single one.**

Apparently, she's not exactly shining on her publicity tour when "grilled" with soft-ball questions by friendly right-wing bloggers. John Cole (italics are his too):

This is great. Red State “interviews” Sarah Palin, although I’m not really sure you could call this an interview, because there are no real quotes, and it turns out she has been doing some book learning:

One of the criticisms leveled by the right when Palin was chosen as McCain’s nominee is that she had not shown she’d done the reading to lead, i.e. read the Hayek, Friedman, Goldwater, Bastiat, to form her thoughts. She admitted she is a gut level conservative, but also said that criticism comes mostly from “shallow people who have not delved into [her] record.”

I did not want to sound like Katie Couric and ask what she’s read, but I broached the subject and she went right into mentioning Thomas Sowell and Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism. She said she has read some of the foundational stuff, but she sees no need to focus on the old writings. She likes “the modern stuff too.” Her preference is policy and application, focusing on writers who are not just following up on foundational conservative ideas, but applying those ideas too.

I am a liberal moonbat, whose name nobody is kicking around for national office, and I've read Hayek, Friedman and Goldwater.

And... Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism? That a book like that informs the "intellect" of a person many think represents the future of the conservative movement -- the Great White Hope -- is enough to make you feel like beating your head against the desk.

Update: in the comments, Anna writes, "C'mon Josh! The secret's been out for a long time." Absolutely true -- I should have said it's surprising that after that string of public humiliations during the campaign she didn't either, A) bone up, maybe read a few books without pictures, or B) figure out how to dodge those questions without coming off like such a teenager.

*Obviously it's sexist to say so.

** But we have to take her very, very seriously and it would be a grave error to underestimate her abilities.

Priceless: Gay Rights Activists Take Over Christian Right Hate-Fest in DC
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 17, 2009 at 12:00 PM.

I guess Dana Milbank just worships power and delights in picking on the marginalized. So while I've grown to detest him for years of snarky columns cherry-picking little vignettes to make progressives -- environmentalists, anti-war activists, human rights experts -- look like hopeless geeks who should be ignored when the GOP was in power, now that the Democrats are riding high he seems to be focusing that admittedly sharp pen on tea-baggers and the religious right -- the GOP's immoderate base.

Today he tells an interesting story that could have been titled: Reverend Smith Goes to Washington ...

Conservative Christian ministers from across the land, determined to test the bounds of a new law punishing anti-gay hate crimes, assembled outside the Justice Department on Monday to denounce the sin of homosexuality and see whether they would be charged with lawbreaking.

Needless to say, no arrests were made.

No hands were cuffed. In fact, the few cops in attendance were paying no attention to the speakers, instead talking among themselves and checking their BlackBerrys.

The evangelical activists had been hoping to provoke arrest, because, as organizer Gary Cass of the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission put it, "we'd have standing to challenge the law." But their prayers were not answered. Nobody was arrested, which wasn't surprising: To run afoul of the new law, you need to "plan or prepare for an act of physical violence" or "incite an imminent act of physical violence."

But there was some drama ...

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Congressional Puppetry: Biotech Lobbyists Ghost-Write Health-Care Reform Speeches for 42 House Members
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 16, 2009 at 12:30 PM.

Robert Pear, reporting for the New York Times, discovered that the impassioned rhetoric aired by a fairly large number of law-makers during the health-care debate was drafted by corporate lobbyists.

In the official record of the historic House debate on overhauling health care, the speeches of many lawmakers echo with similarities. Often, that was no accident.

Statements by more than a dozen lawmakers were ghostwritten, in whole or in part, by Washington lobbyists working for Genentech, one of the world’s largest biotechnology companies.

E-mail messages obtained by The New York Times show that the lobbyists drafted one statement for Democrats and another for Republicans.

The lobbyists, employed by Genentech and by two Washington law firms, were remarkably successful in getting the statements printed in the Congressional Record under the names of different members of Congress.

Genentech, a subsidiary of the Swiss drug giant Roche, estimates that 42 House members picked up some of its talking points — 22 Republicans and 20 Democrats, an unusual bipartisan coup for lobbyists.

In an interview, Representative Bill Pascrell Jr., Democrat of New Jersey, said: “I regret that the language was the same. I did not know it was.” He said he got his statement from his staff and “did not know where they got the information from.”

Members of Congress submit statements for publication in the Congressional Record all the time, often with a decorous request to “revise and extend my remarks.” It is unusual for so many revisions and extensions to match up word for word. It is even more unusual to find clear evidence that the statements originated with lobbyists.

The piece is headlined, "In House, Many Spoke With One Voice: Lobbyists’". But it might as well have read: "Sloppy Staffers Offer Peek Into Everyday, Legal and Perfectly Ordinary Washington Corruption."

Because  what makes this a featured story -- the only thing really unusual about it -- is that "so many revisions and extensions match up word for word," which left rather "clear evidence that the statements originated with lobbyists."

Otherwise, it's dog bites man. Congressional staffers constantly rely on lobbyists for information, political help and, yes, talking-points. Advocates send lawmakers draft text to be included not only in speeches delivered on the House floor, but in legislation as well -- they do it all the time. (And I should note that it's not just corporate lobbyists pushing stuff through the worst lawmakers in Congress; labor, environmental, consumer groups and other advocates do the same thing for progressive law-makers. In this case it may be a pack of lies from a biotech firm in an effort to kill health-care, but ...)

And, of course, it's unusual for this kind of endemic distortion of the legislative process to be seen as anything but routine by the political class. So it's a story that's also note-worthy simply for the fact that the New York Times decided to treat it as such.

Anyway, a little peek into the sausage-making.

Takes a Serious Contrarian to Go After Captain "Sully" Sullenberger's Heroic Image
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 16, 2009 at 3:17 AM.

Russ Buettner, NY Times:

In America today, the half-life of newly minted hero status seems to end the moment that Oprah’s jaw drops. No sooner does someone amaze us than someone else seeks to diminish their splendor.

But Sully?

In a new book, “Fly by Wire,” William Langewiesche takes a run at knocking down the hero rank of Capt. Chesley B. Sullenberger III, the US Airways pilot who in January glided a powerless Airbus A320 to an emergency landing in the Hudson River, according to a review published in The New York Times on Wednesday.

Mr. Langewiesche argues that Captain Sullenberger’s landing did not display “unusual skill.” Instead, he posits that perhaps the real hero was Bernard Ziegler, a former Airbus executive credited with helping the airline develop what is known as a fly-by-wire control system, which eased the difficulties of handling an aircraft.

“Like it or not, Ziegler reached out across the years and cradled them all the way to the water,” writes Mr. Langewiesche, who is himself a former professional pilot.

I can't offer a review of Langewiesche's book -- haven't read it. And while I can't see how it could be anything other than an act of unusual skill to land a loaded jetliner without thrust on a narrow river in the middle of a densely packed city without injury, I won't try to dispute his argument. William Langewiesche is a pretty brilliant writer and, as the excerpt indicates, he, unlike myself, is a former professional pilot.

But I've got to ask why? Why bother writing a book to muddy Sully's heroic image?

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Will Immigration Foes Keep Families of Foreign-Born U.S. Armed Service Members from Getting Papers?
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 15, 2009 at 11:50 AM.

Conservatives are facing a tough issue with the Military Families Act. The bill, introduced by Senate Dems, would allow the immediate family of foreign-born, active-duty members of the armed forces to apply for permanent resident status, "even" if the service member was killed in the line of duty. (It seems bizarre to say "even" if he or she was killed given that the greatest sacrifice a person can make for one's country is to give one's life for it, and, philosophically speaking, you'd think their families would have a greater claim to a green card than anyone else.)

According to The Hill:

A report released this month by the Immigration Policy Council cites a high, continuing need for immigrants in the U.S. military, not only for basic recruitment needs but also for translators and interpreters.

As of June 30, the report notes there are 114,601 foreign-born individuals serving in the armed forces, or almost 8 percent of the 1.4 million total military personnel on active duty. In the current fiscal year, the report notes more than 10,500 military service members were granted U.S. residency.

So far, no Republican has signed onto this or previous bills that would grease the wheels for military families. And if you expected that their base might be flexible, or at least pragmatic, on this issue because of the context: these aren't people who snuck across a border in the middle of the night -- we're talking about extending legal status to the kin of active service members in the midst of two occupations and at a time when our armed forces are stretched thin and suffering from the strain of repeated deployments.

But compromise does not a hard-liner make, regardless of the issue in question. Predictably, F.A.I.R., the hard-line anti-immigrant group, calls the measure "military amnesty "; Numbers USA warns of the uncontrollable "chain migration" that would result from its passage (the two groups are connected).

But What Does That 'Get a Brain Morans' Dude Think About All This?
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 14, 2009 at 9:54 AM.

I've had this nagging question bouncing around the old brain-pan for the past day or two.

It's about this dude:

You know him, you love feeling superior to him, he's clearly a superstar among liberal bloggers and their readers.

Booman referenced the iconic tea-partier* the other day, and something one of his commenters wrote got me thinking:

I am almost starting to feel sorry for that guy in the picture. Poor bastard.

He's probably too stupid to have a computer, but his kids will see their dad forever.**

Of course, an enormous number of stupid people own and use computers. Yet studies suggest that in terms of the websites we browse and the news media we consume, we are a deeply polarized nation. According to a Pew study, online users tend to "find and join groups that share their ideological, cultural, and lifestyle preferences."

And that widely-cited study of the political blogosphere during the 2004 elections (PDF):

... we found that liberal and conservative blogs did indeed have different lists of favorite news sources, people, and topics to discuss.... The division between liberals and conservatives was further reflected in the linking pattern between the blogs, with a great ma jority of the links remaining internal to either liberal or conservative communities.

We're also sorting ourselves out in the real world, living in communities of increasingly like-minded people. Who travels in moran-dude's circles? Well consider this: it's not just the hilarious misspelling that makes the image so rich, but also the knowledge that none of the people around him noticed. (You just know he proudly carried that sign around all morning as he anticipated sticking it to those smug hippie liberals.) So I think it's safe to assume that he and his pro-war fellow-travelers probably aren't big readers of Daily Kos or Talkingpoints Memo.

Which raises an interesting question: could a viral internet sensation like 'get a brain morans' dude -- a sensation only on our side of the information divide -- be splashed all over hundreds of thousands of web-pages and not even know it? Is he living his life, listening to Rush's soothing stream of grievances as he drives to and from his crappy mcjob, completely oblivious to the fact that he's brought countless smiles to the lips of millions of progressives across the country?

Is it possible in this wired era of social segregation to get your 15 minutes of fame and just miss them entirely?

I mean, surely that guy's as well known as this one ...

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

ACORN Suing U.S. Gov Over Defunding Law Pushed by GOP
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 12, 2009 at 9:51 AM.

Remember that whole 'separation of powers' dealio? Congress writes the laws, and the courts punish those who break 'em. Neat system; worked OK so far.

If Congress passes a law punishing someone for doing something it thinks wrong, it's usurping the role of the courts, and the Constitution frowns on it! Legislators aren't empowered to punish wrong-doers, both because the "Founders" appreciated the value of a good trial and because they understood that politicians are often motivated by considerations other than the rule of law (shocking, I know!).

So they prohibited the passage of "bills of attainder" -- laws singling out specific groups or individuals for retribution. Which is double-plus good today, when our Congress includes frothing-mad right-wingers shouldering massive grievances and not a few members who are dumb-as-the-proverbial-box-of-rocks.

Speaking of which, you'll recall that the GOP pushed hard back in September to pass a bill that prohibited any federal funding from going to ACORN, the right-wing bogeyman-of-the-day [correction: the bill passed in the House but is still in committee on the senate side). Perhaps sensitive to the Constitutional issue, they wrote the law so broadly that it could apply to just about any contractor, and some suggested at the time that in theory it could, if applied consistently, lead to the entire military-industrial-complex being "defunded." Proponents said it passed Constitutional muster because it applied to everyone.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Dogs Going Crazy as Their Soldiers Return Home
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 11, 2009 at 8:41 AM.

Honestly, I got all weepy watching these videos of dogs welcoming soldiers home after long deployments [from MentalFloss, via John Cole].

Look at the little nibblets jump!

Still dry-eyed, you heartless bastard? OK, good luck with the little children greeting their fathers!

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

At Least 5 Need Government-Run Health-Care at Bachmann's Angry Protests Against Government-Run Health-Care
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 6, 2009 at 1:27 PM.

I find Dana Milbank annoying. Actually, I think he's the living, breathing incarnation of everything wrong with the Beltway media.

Today's column is just as cynical, superficial and snarky as the rest. The argument he makes is typically obtuse.

BUT, it's directed at those annoying Tea-Baggers, so it amuses me!

Technically, Thursday's GOP-sponsored rally at the Capitol was a "press conference" (a Capitol Police spokeswoman explained that the lawmakers didn't have a permit for a demonstration). The speakers took no questions at this news conference, instead calling, at least a dozen times, for the Pelosi bill's death.

"Remember some of the other battles: Lexington and Concord, Hamburger Hill, Pork Chop Hill?" said Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa). "We're not going to leave this hill until we kill this bill!"

[...]

But, as with a similar rally by Democrats a week before, unpredictable things tend to happen in the wide-open spaces of the Capitol's West Front. Minutes into the rally, a breeze toppled the American flag from the stage.

More ominously, a man standing just beyond the TV cameras apparently suffered a heart attack 20 minutes after event began. Medical personnel from the Capitol physician's office -- an entity that could, quite accurately, be labeled government-run health care -- rushed over, attaching electrodes to his chest and giving him oxygen and an IV drip.

This turned into an unwanted visual for the speakers, as a D.C. ambulance and firetruck, lights flashing, pulled in just behind the lawmakers. A path was made through the media section, and the patient, attended to by about 10 government medical personnel, was being wheeled away on a stretcher just as House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) stepped to the microphone. "Join us in defeating Pelosi care!" he exhorted. A few members stole a glance at the stretcher. Boehner may have been distracted as well. He told the crowd he would read from the Constitution, then read the "we hold these truths" bit from the Declaration of Independence.

[...]

By the time it was over, medics had administered government-run health care to at least five people in the crowd who were stricken as they denounced government-run health care. But Bachmann overlooked this irony as she said farewell to her recruits.

Read the whole thing. Might amuse you too.

Report: Hasan Snapped Under Weight of Bullying, Anxiety Over Deployment
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 6, 2009 at 8:36 AM.

It goes without saying that the usual suspects would view the tragic events at Fort Hood as an act of terror inspired by "jihadism." A soldier, a Muslim of Palestinian descent, reportedly shouted "God is great!" before opening fire on soldiers awaiting deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan.

If one is already inclined to see terrorists lurking beneath one's bed, naturally that's a neat end to the story, and supports whatever simplistic notions about Islam and terrorism one might hold.

Yesterday, as the first sketchy reports started filtering in, I thought that an organized act of political terror was about the least likely scenario to have gone down. (This didn't prevent me from thinking, 'oh, this is not going to go well' when the Major's name was released.)

And as it turns out, unless you're reading Right-wing blogs this morning, it does in fact  appear to be a case of an individual snapping under a variety of stresses.

ABC:

Fort Hood shooting suspect, Major Nidal Malik Hasan, wanted out of the Army after being constantly harassed by others in the military and was called a "camel jockey," his family said.

As Hasan was about to be deployed to Iraq, he was suffering from some of the same stresses that he was trained as an Army psychiatrist to treat.

Although the 39-year-old had just been promoted to major in May, his family says he had hired a lawyer to help him get out of the Armed Forces.

"Apparently became very disgruntled in the mission in Iraq and Afghanistan and voiced that to a lot of his colleagues," said Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX)...

...After the 9/11 attacks, his cousin says he was the target of constant harassment from others in the military. His tormentors called him a "camel jockey," said his cousin, Nader Hasan. He wanted out of the Army, so he paid back his military student loans and hired an attorney.

While the bullying irritated Hasan, Nader Hasan believes his upcoming deployment is what set him off. The cousin said, "My mom is his mom… and we didn't know he was being deployed until we heard it on the news today."

The whole thing is obviously an incredible tragedy. But as Mark Ames -- who wrote the book about this kind of rage-killing -- points out on the front, this was anything but an isolated incident. All kinds of people "go postal."

That this one happened to be a Muslim and a soldier with strong feelings about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan only gives those who were already so inclined an opportunity to use a profound tragedy to impugn an entire faith.

Who's Been Held Accountable for the Crimes of Bush's "War on Terror"? Four Italians ... Sort of
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 5, 2009 at 11:53 AM.

I may be wrong, but setting aside a handful of low-level prison guards convicted for brutalizing or killing detainees, I think that despite many well documented violations of both international and various countries’ domestic laws committed in the “war on terror”, the total number of people who have been prosecuted -- not counting those tried in absentia -- is now 4 (correct me in the comments if I’m overlooking something!).  

All were Italians. Two were convicted yesterday in an Italian court and sentenced to three-year terms for kidnapping a man named Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr off the streets of a liberal democracy, depriving him of any semblance of due process despite its fully functional judiciary and sending him to a country that would torture him for information they believed he was holding. 

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

What Tuesday's Election Results Mean for the Bigger Political Picture: Nada
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 4, 2009 at 10:56 AM.

Partisans spin, and obviously political reporters have an interest in fabricating compelling "national story-lines" during dull off-year elections. So with this first supposed "test" of the Obama administration, the tea-leaf reading -- navel-gazing is probably a better metaphor -- is in high gear this morning. Is the right on the rebound? Has the GOP gotten its groove back? Was it all a referendum on the new president's policies? Oh dear, what is going on?

Below, Addie does a nice job following all the bouncing balls of yesterday's races, and I agree with her conclusion that the results signal that the Right is "organizing up a storm."

But I don't live in Jersey, Virginia or some rural NY district on the Canadian border, and I'm not interested in marrying some dude in Maine. So I find no meaning in these races, and there are plenty of good reasons why you shouldn't either (unless, of course, you're from Virginia or want to marry a person of the same sex in Maine -- in NY-23, Owens, a conservative Dem, will vote more or less like the mainline Republican Scozzafava would have had she been elected (he does support health reform, however), and New Jersey politics are so perennially screwed up that George Washington couldn't have governed the state effectively).

Let's look at some of the buzz floating around ...

The "red tide" of falling governorships is a referendum on Obama!

Nonsense. Here's the deal: University of Minnesota political scientist Eric Ostermeier went back and crunched some numbers from previous gubernatorial races in those states. He found that going back to 1989, New Jersey and Virginia have voted the same way in every election, and in every case, it was for the party that didn't control the White House. And over those past two decades, those votes have in no way correlated with various presidents' approval ratings.

Ostermeier:

Democrats swept the 1989, 2001, and 2005 elections in these two states - and were able to do so both when Republican Presidents were popular (George H.W. Bush at 57 percent approval on Election Day in 1989; George W. Bush at 84 percent in 2001) as well as unpopular (Bush at 42 percent approval in 2005).

Republicans, meanwhile, swept the 1993 and 1997 gubernatorial contests in the two states while Bill Clinton was in office - at both unpopular (in 1993, at 48 percent) and popular (in 1997, at 57 percent) periods of his presidency.

According to exit polls, 57 percent of New Jersey voters held a favorable opinion of Obama even as the electorate sent Christie to the Governor's mansion (and it was a less-than-apocalyptic 48 percent in VA). Let's also not forget that Corzine had been unpopular for a long time. Here's a report from April of 2008 -- just a few months into the Democratic presidential primaries -- headlined, "Study Says Corzine Popularity is Sinking", which found that only 38 percent of New Jersey voters approved of the job he was doing at that time.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

"America's Toughest Dictator"? FBI Investigating Joe Arpaio for Using Office to Bully Opponents
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 3, 2009 at 12:27 PM.

Fox News' show-boating Sheriff Joe Arpaio is a thuggish right-wing clown with aspirations to higher office and a police force of his own (he's reportedly weighing a run to become Arizona governor next year). His use of the latter to advance the former may just prove to be his undoing.

According to local CBS affiliate KBHO (via TPM):

The FBI is looking into accusations that Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is using his position to settle political vendettas.

Over the past year, 5 Investigates examined more than two dozen complaints against the sheriff from business owners, government workers, mayors and law-enforcement officials.

They claim they spoke out against Arpaio, and shortly after, deputies paid them unwelcome visits.

Arpaio has gotten into hot water before as a result of his harsh, publicity-grabbing campaign against undocumented immigrants. There was a very public fracas with then-Governor Janet Napolitano in 2007, and his office lost a chunk of funding as a result. Earlier this year, in a high-profile spat with the DHS, he lost some of his federal immigration enforcement powers.

But this is different -- here he's charged not only with abusing the powers of his office to go after marginal groups like unauthorized immigrants, but citizens who dare criticize his actions, including political opponents and the media -- influential members of the community. As such, this might not end as well for the sheriff as his earlier controversies.

Consider a few of the people on whom he's reportedly sicced his deputies ...

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »