Video: What We Choose To Ignore

A brief summary of presidential directives, executive orders, and congressionaly approved bills that where signed into law over the last 40ish years.

Key Bush Backers Rally To Fred Thompson

Politico.com reports:

George P. Bush, a nephew of President Bush, has contributed to the prospective presidential campaign of Fred Thompson and signed an e-mail asking friends and associates to do the same, The Politico has learned.

"In a field of candidates without a clear favorite among our fellow Republicans, my sincere hope is that you consider joining us in this effort to encourage Fred to run," the e-mail says.

The involvement of a Bush family member highlights a stream of former Bush-Cheney aides and supporters who are signing on with Thompson, in some cases quietly. Thompson, the "Law & Order" actor and former Tennessee senator, filed papers Friday that allowed him to begin raising money. Aides say he remains on track to formally announce his candidacy the week of the Fourth of July, although they say no date is set in stone.

Mary Matalin, the former counselor to Vice President Cheney, says she will be advising Thompson. A campaign source says she will be an unpaid adviser. Matalin is friends with Thompson and his wife, Jeri, and her involvement began informally, the source says.

Advisers say the head of economic policy for Thompson's fledgling team will be Lawrence B. Lindsey, who was President Bush's first economic policy adviser and an architect of his tax cuts. Lindsey was chief economic adviser to Bush's first presidential campaign and is a former member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. Lindsey will also have a hand in the campaign's broader policy formulation, sources say.

The head of domestic policy is to be David M. McIntosh, a lawyer and former congressman from Indiana who was an official in the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, according to the sources. The chief foreign policy adviser will be chosen soon, the sources say.

Adding to the Bush-Cheney ties, the campaign has said that the chief operating officer will be Thomas J. Collamore, a former aide to the older Bush when he was vice president and also an official in the Reagan administration.

And Michael Turk, e-campaign director for George W. Bush's reelection campaign, will take a leave of absence from his current job with the National Cable & Telecommunications Association to assist in getting the Thompson website off the ground. He may continue in a webmaster capacity for the campaign.

George P. Bush, the chief operating officer of a real estate development firm in Fort Worth, Texas, sent the appeal Friday afternoon along with Timothy P. Berry, the firm's president. The e-mail closes "Devotedly," then has both of their signatures.

"Friends and Colleagues," the e-mail begins. "We are writing you on behalf of Sen. Fred Thompson to ask for your support as he considers running for president. As you know, Sen. Thompson has generated buzz this election cycle because of his likable personality and approachable brand of politics, which, consequently, has attracted tremendous grassroots support of his potential candidacy. Additionally, his consistent record in public service and sincere vision to pursue a reform-based agenda in Washington, D.C., has primarily contributed to strong national polling numbers without having even announced."

George P. Bush was unavailable to discuss the e-mail, although associates confirm its authenticity. He is a son of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and was a popular surrogate for his uncle's first presidential campaign, drawing comparisons to John F. Kennedy Jr. when he spoke to the Republican National Convention. Since then, he has served as a clerk for a federal judge, married and become involved in several business and charitable groups. In March, he joined the Navy Reserve as an intelligence officer.

Using language similar to other appeals for Friends of Fred Thompson, the e-mail continues: "As a 'Friend of Fred Thompson,' your support will finance Sen. Thompson's efforts to test the political waters starting on June 4, 2007. If Sen. Thompson decides not to seek the presidency, any unspent funds that you contribute will be returned to your attention. Donations must not exceed federal contribution limits; therefore, an individual may contribute up to $2,300. If a joint checking account is used, the total can be $4,600, but both individuals must sign the check. Corporate and foreign national contributions are prohibited. It is very important that your check be dated June 4, 2007, even if you make out your check before this date."

Fear & Luxury Lure Foreign Legions To Iraq

In the week five British expatriate workers were seized in Baghdad, a look at a shadowy world where risk and reward can be equally high

The Guardian reports:
They are members of a hidden army who inhabit a curious in-between world. Tough, heavily armed private security guards who love the adrenalin buzz rub along with high-flying businesspeople and contractors. Blue collar workers trying to make a quick buck or do their bit for the cause are thrown together with poorly paid cooks, cleaners and laundry workers from across the globe.

This is the world of a foreign legion working, living, surviving, in what has become the most dangerous country in the world.
There are almost as many of them as there are American soldiers. But there is no safety in numbers here. The kidnap of four private security guards and a finance expert in Baghdad by what is suspected to have been a rogue faction of the Mahdi army this week shows just how hazardous Iraq is becoming for foreign workers. The SAS is waiting to intervene, but nothing has been heard from the kidnappers since the hostages were taken by men dressed in police uniform from the city's finance ministry.

New statistics released by the United States labour department reveal that in the first three months of this year, 146 contract workers were killed in Iraq. More than 900 have been killed since March 2003. But still they go, neither soldiers nor citizens, putting their lives on the line, hiding in secure compounds when not dodging bullets and trying to avoid deadly roadblocks and explosive devices as they go about their business.

A few may be there through feelings of duty or to try to make a difference, and some because their bosses have told them to be. But for most the lure of cash outweighs fear of injury and death. For Mike, a finance expert from south-east England who works in the London office of a multinational company, the offer of six weeks in Baghdad had two attractions: great money and adventure.

He said: "I don't want to say what I earned. Let's say it was better than my last bonus and I'm having a pool and tennis court built on the back of it."

Mike's time in Iraq earlier this year was spent largely in the secure international zone. Most meetings were held within the protected enclave. "I found it quite suffocating, really. I was living in a villa with a bunch of other guys."

He added: "I went on training courses before I went out, but I was unprepared. Being in the city was the most scary. There was this awful feeling that one false move, and that could be it."

Mark Whyte is one of those whose business it is to protect people like Mike. He is operations director of the British firm Pilgrims Group, which provides security for the media and the oil and gas sector, and has been working in and out of Baghdad since March 2003, employing 60 ex-SAS soldiers from Britain and New Zealand and 200 Iraqis.

"The typical wage for an expat special forces guy is £400 a day. An expat infantry soldier on an escort convoy, based in the Green Zone and working outside of it, maybe earns £175 a day," he explains. "But we have passed the high water mark of requirement for people. Maximum demand was 2005-2006 but the need for numbers has tailed off since because the big reconstruction projects have stopped, or never started in the first place. There has been a switch, with American companies employing a lot of third-country nationals because they are cheaper."

Pilgrims does not have a high turnover of staff, he says, and most are employed by personal referral. "We get 100 CVs a week from all over the world and almost all are unsuitable. We get our people through word of mouth."

Reverberation

The abduction of the private security guards, working for Canadian company GardaWorld, has reverberated across the whole industry. "I think there is a reduction in the number of companies expressing an interest in going into Iraq. It costs between $10,000 and $15,000 a day for an eight-man security team."

But not everyone doing the same job is on the same money. "They have got a rate for South Africans, a rate for Filipinos, a rate for Gurkhas and a rate for Colombians. Third-country nationals don't get paid as much as expats."

Some workers find it difficult to get home. In March, the International Organisation of Migration rescued five Sri Lankans who said they had been taken to Iraq to work as cleaners against their will. They told of 16-hour days, seven days a week, labouring away for as little as $100 a month. IOM rescued 17 other Sri Lankans in February.

"Although IOM has evacuated close to 7,000 migrants from Iraq over the past four years with financial support from the US government, recent developments indicate we are witnessing new patterns of exploitation emerging," said spokesman Vincent Houver.

Of those who come of their own free will, many discover the price is too high. Gordon Dreher is one of the many blue collar workers who have been servicing coalition troops. The 43-year-old from Brick, New Jersey, spent two and half years as a field truck driver based in Nasiriyah, south-east of Baghdad, helping to supply US troops. He signed up to earn money but also to serve his country in the aftermath of September 11. On Monday, he will undergo an operation for an injured back, hurt while driving a fuel truck too quickly along Iraqi roads. "I got used to being shot at. I had an improvised explosive device go off a few feet from me," he said.

Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow at the Washington thinktank the Council on Foreign Relations, found Baghdad surreal. "Everyone was carrying weapons, even in the international zone. It was a weird combination of Club Med and Mad Max. There's a big pool with tables around it. So people are in swimsuits but carrying submachine guns."

The Rise of the Mercenary

At Harper's, Scott Horton writes:

How is the Iraq War unlike every other war fought in America’s history? Among other things, in that it is a war pursued by the United States with private soldiers – an enormous number of them, though thanks to that massive fog-machine at the Pentagon, we still can’t say exactly how many. But it reflects a massive change in philosophy about how to wage a war. It reflects a conscious downgrading of the role and importance of the citizen-soldier, the classic mainstay of American defense-doctrine. It’s not the patriotic call to defend country that will sustain us in this new age, it shouts out, but money, fancy weapons technology and mercenaries.
How is the Iraq War unlike every other war fought in America’s history? Among other things, in that it is a war pursued by the United States with private soldiers – an enormous number of them, though thanks to that massive fog-machine at the Pentagon, we still can’t say exactly how many. But it reflects a massive change in philosophy about how to wage a war. It reflects a conscious downgrading of the role and importance of the citizen-soldier, the classic mainstay of American defense-doctrine. It’s not the patriotic call to defend country that will sustain us in this new age, it shouts out, but money, fancy weapons technology and mercenaries.

New statistics released by the United States labour department reveal that in the first three months of this year, 146 contract workers were killed in Iraq. More than 900 have been killed since March 2003. But still they go, neither soldiers nor citizens, putting their lives on the line, hiding in secure compounds when not dodging bullets and trying to avoid deadly roadblocks and explosive devices as they go about their business.

A few may be there through feelings of duty or to try to make a difference, and some because their bosses have told them to be. But for most the lure of cash outweighs fear of injury and death. For Mike, a finance expert from south-east England who works in the London office of a multinational company, the offer of six weeks in Baghdad had two attractions: great money and adventure.

But of course, above all it’s the money

“The typical wage for an expat special forces guy is £400 ($820) a day. An expat infantry soldier on an escort convoy, based in the Green Zone and working outside of it, maybe earns £175 ($365) a day,” he explains… There has been a switch, with American companies employing a lot of third-country nationals because they are cheaper.”

This piece by Steven Morris and Audrey Gillan in this morning’s Guardian caught my eye on several points, but the first was Steven Biddle’s description of life in the Green Zone, which struck me as original and smack on:

“Everyone was carrying weapons, even in the international zone. It was a weird combination of Club Med and Mad Max. There’s a big pool with tables around it. So people are in swimsuits but carrying submachine guns.”

Yes, that’s the Green Zone I know. Perhaps the time has come to study the policy pluses and minuses of using an army of mercenaries to fight a war. Some of them are ruthless and efficient; others are foolhardy and not long to last. But above all, using money as the sole motivation for a fighting force has its drawbacks. Consider, for instance, Sacchetti’s famous tale of the great condottiere Sir John Hawkwood – the subject of a great fresco by Paolo Uccello who lies buried in the Duomo of Florence which is reproduced as the Quote for the Day. Hawkwood sold his services to the high bidder and transformed the nature of warfare as Italy emerged from the Middle Ages and entered the Renaissance. He brought efficiency and brutality. And in the end he opted to become a good Florentine. Still the life of Hawkwood stands for some distasteful propositions, including this: when discipline is lacking and money is the sole motivator, horrible things are likely to happen.

Food Prices Rising Faster Than Gas

Ethanol-driven demand for corn is just one of the causes.

While food prices are rising pretty much across the board, items related to corn are affected the most. That's because increasing demand for ethanol, made from corn, is driving up corn prices, which farmers use to feed their poultry and cattle. The high price of corn is also affecting prices of everything from cereal and other products with corn as an ingredient to the oils used to make potato chips.

The Star Tribune reports:

Rising gasoline prices have been getting all the attention, but the cost of another, more-important staple is actually rising even more: food.

In the past year, food prices have increased 3.7 percent and are on track to jump by as much as 7 percent by year's end. The current increase is more than double the 1.8 percent jump seen the year before, according to the consumer price index.

Meanwhile, gas prices rose 2.9 percent. Only the cost of health care rose more, and then just slightly.

While companies up and down the food chain see the increases, they're only beginning to pass them on to consumers. But with the start of grilling season -- meat prices particularly hurt -- some consumers are already tweaking their spending habits.

A recent study shows that more consumers are using coupons. Marilyn Pearson just resorted to clipping them again, though she hasn't changed what she buys. On a recent evening, the St. Paul resident's shopping cart was filled with collard greens, meat and other supplies for a barbecue. She's noticed the price of meat, some vegetables and dairy going up, but figures, "You gotta eat, you gotta buy."

While food prices are rising pretty much across the board, items related to corn are affected the most. That's because increasing demand for ethanol, made from corn, is driving up corn prices, which farmers use to feed their poultry and cattle. The high price of corn is also affecting prices of everything from cereal and other products with corn as an ingredient to the oils used to make potato chips.

But corn is only one culprit. Higher labor, packaging and fuel costs all play a role. Bad weather in California and Florida was the main contributor to a 20 percent spike in citrus fruit prices as well as higher prices for some vegetables. A drought this summer could cause prices to rise even more than current projections.

"We should all hope we have a really good growing season this year," said Ben Senauer, co-director of the University of Minnesota's Food Industry Center.

Eggs up almost 19 percent

Prices are rising in each grocery aisle. In April, eggs cost 18.6 percent more than a year ago. Whole chicken prices increased 7 percent. Bread is up nearly 6 percent and beef steaks up 5.5 percent.

Even watermelons cost more, according to a spokesman for Lund Food Holdings Inc., the Edina-based owner of the Lunds and Byerly's chains. High corn prices pushed farmers to devote record acreage to corn this summer, leaving some crops in short supply.

Senauer said many price increases haven't made their way to all stores yet, and many stores are absorbing the costs rather than passing them on to customers. "Right now the margins are simply being squeezed," he said.

"But that's not going to last forever," said Wells Fargo & Co. agricultural economist Michael Swanson, predicting no end in sight to food inflation. Swanson forecasts that food inflation will have risen at a rate not seen since 1990, when prices ended the year 5.8 percent higher.

Consumers have responded to higher fuel prices by grouping trips or leaving the car at home, and economists predict that Americans similarly will tweak their food habits -- reallocating some food dollars from eating out to buying groceries, choosing to eat less meat and cooking smaller portions to reduce waste.

Janet and Sam Nelson just purchased a stand-alone freezer so they could buy in bulk on sale. On a recent trip to Cub Foods on University Avenue in St. Paul's Midway area, the St. Paul couple was stocking up on $1 frozen dinners. Janet Nelson, a veterinary technician, said they eat fewer meals out now because of small increases on many items, even ramen noodles. The couple has also buckled down their spending on discretionary items. "There's no spare money for fun shopping," lamented Sam Nelson, who is self-employed.

More increases coming

In recent quarterly earnings conference calls, Target Corp., Supervalu Inc. and Hormel Foods Corp. each cited increased food prices as a factor to contend with. Target described food-price inflation as "fairly aggressive," and said it would need to fight it by increasing productivity at stores and distribution centers. Supervalu expects corn prices to affect the year's overall inflation levels, although the company declined to say whether customers will see rising prices at its stores, such as Cub Foods.

Hormel said the quarter's only disappointment was "that Jennie-O Turkey Store was not able to pass on higher grain costs through pricing as quickly or as thoroughly as we had hoped." The company expects to increase prices further for the rest of 2007.

Mike Oase, vice president of operations for Kowalski's Companies, said the company has had to pass on some of the price increases to consumers because profit margins in the grocery business are always "pretty thin." He characterizes Kowalski's current strategy for dealing with food-price inflation as a "50-50" approach -- the company is absorbing half of the increases and passing the other half along to consumers, who may have noticed the price of milk go up by "a few cents a gallon" in recent months.

Because food is a category that consumers can't cut from their budget, it's the cups of coffee, the entertainment dollars, and the clothes-and-jewelry budget that are scaled back first. In April, retail sales fell 0.2 percent, the first decline in seven months, according to the Commerce Department. Yet consumer confidence rebounded in May, mainly because of to consumers' cautiously optimistic view of business conditions. Still, a stew of high gas prices, food costs , a slumping housing market and adjusting mortgages could be a recipe for trouble for strapped Americans with little wiggle room in their budgets.

Salmonella Cases Linked to Peanut Butter Top 600

Centers for Disease Control: 628 cases of salmonella illness in 47 states linked to tainted peanut butter

• Outbreak traced to ConAgra Foods plant; all company's peanut butter recalled
• CDC: Reported new salmonella cases dropped substantially after recall
• ConAgra plans to reintroduce Peter Pan brand in July

Out of Omaha, Nebraska, the AP reports:
The number of people sickened since August by peanut butter tainted with salmonella has grown by more than 200, according to a new federal report.

The outbreak, first reported in February, now includes 628 cases in 47 states, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday. It is the first update on the number of cases linked to the outbreak since early March, when officials said 425 cases had been confirmed in 44 states.

ConAgra Foods Inc. recalled all its peanut butter after government investigators linked the bacteria outbreak to the Omaha, Nebraska-based company's Peter Pan and Great Value peanut butter.

The CDC said the number of new salmonella cases dropped substantially after the peanut butter was recalled.

The states with no illnesses reported are Hawaii, New Hampshire and Utah, the CDC said.

Wal-Mart has continued selling Great Value peanut butter -- its store brand -- that is made by different suppliers, but Peter Pan has yet to return to stores.

ConAgra plans to reintroduce Peter Pan in July. Initially, another company will produce the peanut butter because ConAgra does not expect to be able to resume production at its Sylvester, Georgia, plant until sometime in August, after renovations.

ConAgra officials have said they believe moisture in the plant most likely helped bacteria to grow and later infect the finished product.

Consumers who had jars of Peter Pan and Great Value peanut butter with a product code on the lid beginning with "2111" were urged to throw out the peanut butter. The jars or their lids can be returned to the store where they were purchased for a refund.

White House Follows New Path To Secrecy

The AP reports:
In the past year, lawyers for President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney directed the Secret Service to maintain the confidentiality of visitor logs, declaring them to be presidential records.

The drive to keep secret the lists of visitors to the White House complex and Cheney's home, the administration says, is essential to ensuring the president and vice president receive candid advice to carry out their duties. The decision made the logs exempt from a law requiring their disclosure to whoever asks to see them.

The latest part of the strategy emerged this week when the government disclosed a letter from Cheney's counsel placing visitor logs for his personal residence on the Naval Observatory grounds in the category of presidential records.

Lawsuits are bringing to light new details about the White House push to make sure the public doesn't learn who has been meeting with top Bush administration officials.
Cheney's counsel wrote the Secret Service last September, instructing the agency not to preserve copies of visitor data for the vice president's personal residence. The Secret Service has been giving the originals to the vice president's office since the start of the Bush administration.

A week ago, the government filed court papers stating that the Secret Service is retaining copies of the visitor logs because of pending lawsuits, and that Cheney's office agrees with the decision.

A private group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, has filed two lawsuits under the Freedom of Information Act seeking Secret Service visitor logs. But the FOIA does not apply to presidential records.

The Bush administration has exploited that different treatment of records between the two laws, which prompted the fight in federal court. The administration is seeking dismissal of the lawsuits.

In trying to get the cases thrown out, the Justice Department has filed documents in court outlining a behind-the-scenes debate over whether Secret Service records are subject to public disclosure. The discussions date back at least to the administration of President Bush's father and involve the Justice Department and the National Archives as well as the White House and Secret Service.

The government's court filings show that the Bush White House focused on the issue in the months before Election Day 2004.

Discussions moved into high gear when the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal prompted news organizations and private groups to demand that the administration release Secret Service records of visitors to the White House complex and the vice president's residence.

There was precedent for the demands.

During the Clinton administration, Republican-controlled congressional committees obtained Secret Service visitor logs while conducting investigations of the president and first lady.

Christopher Lehane, a former special assistant counsel to President Clinton and press secretary to then-Vice President Al Gore, points out the political implications of the Bush administration campaign to close off access to the records.

``The question it raises is 'What are these guys hiding?''' said Lehane, now a Democratic consultant. ``They can live with it because they've only got a year or so left, but it doesn't do a lot for public confidence in open government.''

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said Thursday, ``I can't comment on a case in litigation, and I can't speak to the decisions made by other administrations.''

The Bush administration says it is standing on principle.

``It is important that the president be able to receive candid advice from his staff and other members of the administration,'' Fratto said. ``To ensure that he receives candid advice, it is essential as a general matter that the advice remains confidential.''

In a declaration filed in court a week ago, Cheney's deputy chief of staff, Claire O'Donnell, said that ``systematic public release of the information regarding when and with whom the vice president and vice presidential personnel conduct meetings would impinge on the ability of the OVP (office of the vice president) to gather information in confidence and perform its essential functions, including assisting the vice president in his critical roles of advising and assisting the president.''

In May 2006, the Secret Service and the White House signed a memorandum of understanding designating visitor records as presidential.

They are ``not the records of an 'agency' subject to the Freedom of Information Act,'' says the agreement that was not disclosed until months later, in late 2006. The records are ``at all times under the exclusive legal custody and control of the White House.''

Four months after the memorandum of agreement, Cheney's counsel wrote to the Secret Service, stating that visitor records for the vice president's personal residence ``are and shall remain subject to the exclusive ownership, custody and control of OVP.''

The Sept. 13, 2006, date on the Cheney letter coincides with requests by The Washington Post seeking records on the vice president's visitors under the Freedom of Information Act.

The law enforcement agency ``shall not retain any copy of these documents and information upon return to OVP,'' said the letter to the Secret Service's chief counsel.

``If any documents remain in your possession, please return them to OVP as soon as possible,'' the letter added.

The Justice Department filed the Cheney letter last Friday in one of the lawsuits brought by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, which is invoking the FOIA law in seeking the identities of conservative religious leaders who visited the White House complex and the vice president's residence.

The group, which represents Valerie Plame and her husband in their lawsuit against Cheney and other key administration figures in the leak of Plame's CIA identity, also is seeking White House visitor logs in the Abramoff scandal.

According to government documents, the Secret Service routinely destroyed five of eight categories of information relating to visitors to Cheney's residence. Of the records it retained, the Secret Service regularly turned over handwritten visitor logs to Cheney's office.

The Secret Service stopped the destruction in June 2006 because of lawsuits by various groups, according to the court papers. The law enforcement agency also is retaining copies of the material, contrary to the directive in the September 2006 letter from Cheney's counsel.

The court filings by the government show that:

-On three occasions late in the administration of the first President Bush and during the first term of President Clinton, the Secret Service proposed treating copies of White House visitor documents as non-presidential records. In its court filings, the current Bush administration opposes releasing details of the Secret Service proposals, saying this ``poses a substantial risk of creating public confusion'' because the proposals were never adopted.

-In January 2001, as Clinton prepared to leave office, White House lawyers proposed the transfer of visitor records from the Secret Service to the White House. The proposal was entitled ``Disposition of certain presidential records created by the USSS,'' or the Secret Service. The records are now at the Clinton library in Little Rock, Ark., the National Archives confirmed Thursday.

-In September 2004, a lawyer for the Bush White House and a special assistant to the director of the Secret Service proposed ``informal views on one way to address the disposition'' of visitor records, according to court documents. The unnamed associate White House counsel and the Secret Service assistant jointly authored a July 29, 2004, document bearing the same title as the Clinton administration document from 3 years earlier.

-In July 2005, the Secret Service gave a presentation on the issue to the White House counsel's office, the Justice Department and the National Archives.

-On May 11, 2006, the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel provided a legal opinion on the issue, which is among the many documents the government is refusing to disclose. Six days later, the White House and the Secret Service signed the agreement designating the records as presidential.

Presidential records are released starting five years after a president leaves office. Under the Presidential Records Act of 1978, nonclassified material is disclosed first, with classified documents and advice to the president released later after review by federal agencies, the White House and the former president.

Under an executive order President Bush signed in 2001, the archivist of the United States cannot unilaterally release the records without the permission of the current president, former presidents and their representatives.

``The scary thing about this move by the vice president's office is the power grab part of it,'' said Tom Blanton, head of the National Security Archive, a private group that uses the FOIA law to pierce government secrecy.

``We're looking at a huge problem if the White House can reach into any agency and say certain records have something to do with the White House and they are presidential from now on,'' Blanton said. ``This White House has been infinitely creative in finding new ways and new forms of government secrecy.''