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DNC to Canvass in all 50 States

By
John Bambenek
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Here’s the email I got from Mad Howard.


Dear John,

Are you ready to make history?

Thanks to the overwhelming support from thousands of Democrats, who donated to get the literature for the canvass printed and shipped, we’re on schedule and gearing up for the unprecedented Neighbor-to-Neighbor Organizing Day on April 29th.

On that Saturday, thousands of volunteers will recruit hundreds of thousands more Americans committed to changing the status quo this year during door-knocking events in communities across America.

Democrats have a clear vision for America, and we’re going to get the word out by making personal contact with our neighbors. And along the way we will build new relationships among volunteers on the ground, a network that will have an impact beyond a single day.

Whether you’ve never volunteered or you’re a seasoned door-knocking veteran, it is crucial that you take part in this historic organizing push.

Please RSVP for an event near you:

In many states, Democratic Party staff on the ground have already put together staging areas for massive voter contact events on the 29th. Thanks to donations from people like you, hundreds of thousands of pieces of literature are being printed and shipping in bulk to those locations right now.

If there isn’t an event near you, don’t worry. Some state parties will have canvassing events on alternate dates, or have other important events planned for that weekend.

You can still plan your own canvass in your community. Our online tool makes the planning process easy, and if you create your event before April 10th, we will get door hangers to you in time for your canvass on the 29th.

You can create your own event here:

Whether you’re attending an event or hosting your own, we have also put together materials on the web to help you make your canvass as effective as possible.

The online package includes tips on canvassing, a suggested script for when you get to the door, and the door hanger itself in various formats for you to print extras on your own.

Here is the online resource center:

Two-thirds of Americans reject this president and the Republican leadership – and they are waiting to hear from us.

We are all members of one American community and it’s up to us to make sure that our country has a government as good as its people.

Democrats have a big task in November. We will only win if every one of us takes responsibility for the outcome of the election now – while there is still time to build our operation.

Thank you for being a part of this extraordinary grassroots push.

Governor Howard Dean, M.D.

Food Nuttiness to be Restrained by the Feds

By
Dr. John J. Ray, PH.D.
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Food nuttiness to be restrained by the Feds

“The House voted Wednesday to strip many warnings from food labels, potentially affecting alerts about arsenic in bottled water, lead in candy and allergy-causing sulfites, among others. Pushed by food companies seeking uniform labels across state lines, the bill would prevent states from adding food warnings that go beyond federal law. States could petition the Food and Drug Administration to add extra warnings, under the bill. Lawmakers approved the bill on a 283-139 vote. Supporters expect a Senate version of the bill to be introduced soon.

“This bill is going to overturn 200 state laws that protect our food supply,” said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif. “Why are we doing that? What’s wrong with our system of federalism?” The bill’s supporters argue that consumers deserve the same warnings on supermarket shelves across the country. The bill would allow a state to seek a nationwide warning from FDA. “We ought to do it in all 50 states,” said Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich. “Chicken grown in Louisiana is going to end up on a plate in Michigan.” Rogers mentioned a warning his own state about allergy-causing sulfites: “If they’re bad for Michigan citizens, I think they’re bad in all of the other 49 states,” he said.

Nationwide, as many as 200 state laws or regulations could be affected, according to the Congressional Budget Office. They include warnings about lead and alcohol in candy, arsenic in bottled water and many others. The government would spend at least $100 million to answer petitions for tougher state rules, according to CBO.

Opponents of the bill scored one victory Wednesday: State warnings about mercury in fish would remain. Lawmakers amended the bill to let states keep those warnings. That amendment, sponsored by Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., passed on a 253-168 vote. About a dozen states have safety and labeling rules for fish. In California, white signs with “WARNING” in red letters tells grocery shoppers about high mercury levels in certain fish. Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., displayed the placard during debate Wednesday on the House floor. Eshoo noted the bill’s supporters have personal ties to food industry lobbyists. “This is not about consumers. This is about special interests,” she said.

California is a primary target of the legislation. There, the voter-passed Proposition 65 requires companies to warn the public of potentially dangerous toxins in food. California has filed lawsuits seeking an array of warnings, including the mercury content of canned tuna and the presence of lead in Mexican candy.

Of particular concern to the industry is acrylamide, a chemical linked to cancer that forms in starchy food cooked at high temperatures, such as french fries and potato chips. California Attorney General Bill Lockyer has sued to force Burger King Holdings Inc., PepsiCo Inc.’s Frito Lay brand, McDonald’s Corp., Wendy’s International Inc. and other companies to warn consumers that acrylamide is present. There is widespread opposition among state officials. Attorneys general in 39 states are opposed, as are the National Conference of State Legislature and the associations of state food and drug officials and state agriculture departments.

Source

Sharon Stone to Kids: If Somebody Pushes You For Unwanted Sex, Blow Them Off

By
Doug Powers
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Forty-eight-year-old Actress Sharon Stone, who’s starring soon in “Basic Instinct II: Like The First One But Three Inches Lower”, is encouraging teens to kick the oral sex up a notch, apparently even if they don’t want to:

“Young people talk to me about what to do if they’re being pressed for sex? I tell them (what I believe): oral sex is a hundred times safer than vaginal or anal sex. If you’re in a situation where you cannot get out of sex, offer a blow job. I’m not embarrassed to tell them.”

A hundred times safer? I guess Stone has never met guys who were dating women with chipped teeth or braces.

I’m betting that Sharon’s policy of “Just say blow” probably won’t go over big with parents. What’s funny is that Stone is described as an AIDS “activist”. With that advice, I’d say she’s more of an AIDS “advocate”.

BreakingNews: Sharon Stone is cornered in the produce section of the supermarket right now being “pressed for sex” by three teenage boys standing near the zucchini displayspraying their zippers with WD-40.

BonusStone tidbit: Sharonrecently said that Hillary Clinton is “too sexy” to run for president. “I think Hillary Clinton is fantastic, but I think it is too soon for her to run. Hillary still has sexual power, and I don’t think people will accept that, it’s too threatening.”

Stone said a woman should be “past her sexuality” before running for office.

Yep, you wouldn’t want tens of thousands of guys with uncontrollable erections, which of course is the natural effect Hillary has on men,running into voting booths across the country. They might punch the wrong hole and accidentally vote for Buchanan.

See you on the ticket in ’08, Hillary, you vixen you.

GOP Senators Betray Americans for Votes

By
Jim Kouri, CPP
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The Republican-controlled Senate Judiciary Committee approved election-year immigration legislation Monday that is far different from what most Americans had in mind. The bill, which goes to the full senate, paves the way for millions of undocumented workers to become US citizens without having to first leave the country or pay a fine.

After days of protests led by left-wing groups masquerading as rank-and-file illegal aliens the Senate committee’s GOP members folded like cheap cameras and voted to strip away proposed criminal penalties for residents found to be in this country illegally. The bill which passed the House of Representatives called for such penalties.

The panel’s vote now allows the bill to go before the full Senate for debate on Tuesday.
“All Americans wanted fairness and they got it this evening,” said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat who played a pivotal role in drafting the legislation along with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), approved 12-6.

Of course, Sen. Kennedy’s sense of fairness has always been questionable. In fact, what he calls fair is unfair to American citizens and legal immigrants who had to endure the pain of dealing with the immigration bureaucracy.

Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-PA) voted for the bill but signaled that some of the provisions could well be changed by the full Senate, but most observers don’t buy that for a moment. Conservatives knew Sen. Specter was a liberal and therefore urged the GOP not to give him the chairmanship. Once again, he’s shown the conservatives to be right.

In general, the bill is designed to strengthen border patrol, but with more of the same, which means the borders will remain vulnerable. While polls have shown that a majority of Americans support the use of the US military on US borders to backup the Border Patrol, this will never happen even if the entire congress were Republican. However, the senators, many preparing for the November elections made great inroads with the so-called Hispanic block-voters and the new bill is passed will “create new opportunities for so-called guest workers and determine the legal future of the estimated 11 million immigrants living in the United States illegally.”

At several critical points, committee Democrats were united while Republicans splintered. In general, GOP Sens. Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, Sam Brownback of Kansas and Mike DeWine of Ohio, who is seeking reelection this fall, sided with Democrats. These backstabbing, spineless liberals posing as conservatives during elections gave Democrats a majority that allowed them to shape the bill to their liking.

A SWIPE AT THEIR BASE

During this entire debate, President Bush and many GOP leaders treated the conservative base of their feckless party as a pariah. While spouting conservative talking points, these political leaders took a huge swipe at their base and at many moderates on this issue.

For instance, just after the Senate Judiciary Committee announced their vote, a Time/Warner push poll discovered that the majority of Americans will not be happy when they discover what was really passed as opposed to what these senators and the media say they passed.

Here are the questions posed and the results of the push poll:

1. Would you support a temporary worker program?
NO 58% YES 42%

2. Would you support a security fence on the border?
YES 81% NO 19%

3. Should those who sneak into the country be treated as felons?
YES 78% NO 22%

4. Should those already in the country illegal have a path to citizenship?
NO 69% YES 31%

5. How big an issue is illegal immigration?
Very 86% Somewhat 10% Not at all 4%

One of the organizers of the California protest appeared on Fox News earlier today and stated, besides the usual litany of lies and half-truths, that the US is a terrorist country and that the Mexican illegals will make the US a better place.

The head of the so-called Border Angels also demanded a national healthcare program and other freebies, thereby revealing his socialist agenda.

He also lied and said illegal immigrants do not commit crimes but that American citizens go to other countries and torture and kill innocent people. And the feckless GOP is rewarding this man.

Remember that this November.

Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and he’s a staff writer for the New Media Alliance (thenma.org). He’s former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed “Crack City” by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several major organizations. He’s also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country. Kouri writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He’s a news writer for TheConservativeVoice.Com. He’s also a columnist for AmericanDaily.Com, NewsCream.Com, MichNews.Com, and he’s syndicated by AXcessNews.Com. He’s appeared as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and talk shows including Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox News, etc. His book Assume The Position is available at Amazon.Com. Kouri’s own website is located at

The Meaning of ‘g’ and it’s Measures

By
Dr. John J. Ray, PH.D.
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The Meaning of ‘g’ and it’s Measures

I am one of those awful people who mention IQ in public from time to time so I thought a few quick words of background on it might not go astray:

IQ tests exist because ‘g’ (general intelligence) exists. It just is a fact that people who are good at solving one sort of problem tend to be good at solving lots of other different problems. Some problems, however, are particularly good at detecting people who are generally good at solving problems. Researchers speak of such “good-predictor” problems as ones that “load highly on ‘g’”. And, pesky though it may be, the problems that load most highly on ‘g’ (i.e. the ones that are the purest measure of general intelligence) are also the ones that differentiate blacks and whites most strongly. As Charles Murray explains:

“As long ago as 1927, Charles Spearman, the pioneer psychometrician who discovered ‘g’, proposed a hypothesis to explain the pattern: the size of the black-white difference would be “most marked in just those [subtests] which are known to be saturated with g.” In other words, Spearman conjectured that the black-white difference would be greatest on tests that were the purest measures of intelligence, as opposed to tests of knowledge or memory.

A concrete example illustrates how Spearman’s hypothesis works. Two items in the Wechsler and Stanford-Binet IQ tests are known as “forward digit span” and “backward digit span.” In the forward version, the subject repeats a random sequence of one-digit numbers given by the examiner, starting with two digits and adding another with each iteration. The subject’s score is the number of digits that he can repeat without error on two consecutive trials. Digits-backward works exactly the same way except that the digits must be repeated in the opposite order.

Digits-backward is much more ‘g’-loaded than digits-forward. Try it yourself and you will see why. Digits-forward is a straightforward matter of short-term memory. Digits-backward makes your brain work much harder. The black-white difference in digits-backward is about twice as large as the difference in digits-forward. It is a clean example of an effect that resists cultural explanation. It cannot be explained by differential educational attainment, income, or any other socioeconomic factor. Parenting style is irrelevant. Reluctance to “act white” is irrelevant. Motivation is irrelevant. There is no way that any of these variables could systematically encourage black performance in digits-forward while depressing it in digits-backward in the same test at the same time with the same examiner in the same setting”.

Elsewhere

Leftists still dreaming: “Evoking other cities transformed by revolutionary leaders, like Managua, Nicaragua, in 1979, or Havana 20 years before that, Caracas is attracting students and celebrities, academics and activists, grandmothers and 1970′s-era hippies – a new generation of Sandalistas, as some call them. Some, including many Americans, have come to stay. But others come for a new brand of revolutionary tourism organized by the government or by private groups. Venezuela welcomes them all”

What a world without U.S. power looks like: “At places like Davos and Harvard, the world’s sages rarely stop fretting about the dangers of a too powerful America. Well, if you want to know what the world looks like without U.S. leadership, Exhibit A is Darfur in Sudan. Today’s leading authority on Darfur is the political philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who prophesied a world “nasty, brutish and short.” At least 200,000 civilians have been killed in the past three years and two million more have become refugees. The source of the problem is the Arab rulers in Khartoum, who have pursued an ethnic cleansing campaign against black Muslims in western Sudan. They’ve equipped the Janjaweed Arab tribesmen to do the dirty work, and that militia is now attacking civilians across the border in Chad, creating 20,000 more refugees.”

Brave new world of New Zealand (Leftist government, of course): “The Government is examining a proposal to have children tagged and numbered in a central database to stem abuse and failure at school. Personal details of every New Zealand child, including welfare and health concerns, would be entered into the database, to be shared by schools, social agencies and health authorities. It would be similar to Scottish and British initiatives, with a single ID number issued for each child, enabling authorities to be alerted to potential problems.”

The myth of water privatization failures: “Water distribution and sanitation have traditionally been a public responsibility. Currently, 97 percent of water distribution in developing countries is in the hands of governments. So the responsibility for above-described failures and fatalities lies with incompetent and negligent governments. And yet, in the few cases where the private sector has been given a role in water distribution, there have been large and sometimes violent outcries against privatization.”

Zoning is theft: “Zoning is theft, pure and simple. In his fantastic introduction to the Austrian School, Economics for Real People, Gene Callahan correctly identifies eminent domain as a form of property theft, especially noting the use of government condemnation in order to secure rightfully owned property for commercial development. It is easy to see government as the crowbar that influence-seekers use to jimmy locks and force private property owners from their land. Here we have the clear picture of Ma and Pa Kettle and clan fighting the law and ‘progress’ armed only with shotguns, corn squeezing, chewing tobacco and shear grit. The flip side to eminent domain, zoning, is not so easily seen. But as Bastiat revealed, the unseen is as important as the seen.”

Polygamy : “The closet is now empty. Newsweek runs a story on polygamy, “Polygamists Unite!” In the wake of the gay-marriage movement, polygamy is making its move. “‘Polygamy rights is the next civil-rights battle,’ says Mark Henkel, who, as founder of the Christian evangelical polygamy organization TruthBearer.org, is at the forefront of the movement. His argument: if Heather can have two mommies, she should also be able to have two mommies and a daddy.” Charles Krauthammer has a few unsatisfying thoughts on this, once called, polygamy diversion, by so-called gay rights advocates. Things fall apart, the center cannot hold.you know the rest.”

A good article on Hollywood Leftism here. Excerpt: “To this day, Hollywood still clings to the myth of martyrdom on the Left-a Left that defended Communism and today soft-pedals the terrorist threat-as Billingsley put it-”while earning, substantial fortunes in the very country they attacked as repressive and fascist.” In Hollywood’s land of dreams, as author Richard Grenier once said, “Capitalism is evil except for the three-picture deal with Paramount, the Malibu mansion, the swimming pool, the tennis court, and the Mercedes Benz.” To which Billingsley adds, “Or, as Marx himself might have framed it: From each according to his credulity, to each according to his greed.”

LOL. This link will test your sense of humour!

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here). I also post several times a week on “Tongue-Tied”. There is an archive of my “Tongue-Tied” posts here or here

Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country’s labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and “helping” them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin’s Communism. The very word “Nazi” is a German abbreviation for “National Socialist” (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

John Edwards Chases An Economic Ambulance

By
Doug Powers
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This evening I ran across an A.P. article about trial attorney John Edwards. The former VP candidate and Senator held something called an “anti-poverty conference”. Thestory is entitled “Edwards’ poverty conference sees middle class slipping“. As soon as the middle class not only slips, but falls, they’ll be handed Edwards’ business card.

Of interest was reading about speakers at a conference hosted bya wealthy trial attorney, who has tan lines in the shape of ambulance lights,showing abject concern on the issue of the enormously high cost of, for one example, health insurance.

It’s fairly laughable, really. A trial attorney and his friends complaining about high insurance rates is like the Menendez brothers whining about being orphans.

Iraq: Third Anniversary of US-led Invasion

By
Judith Lathamas
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By Judith Lathamas the world marks the third anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, which deposed the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein, a deadly insurgency rages on and sectarian violence between Sunnis and Shi’a is on the rise, prompting some analysts to worry about the prospects of a civil war.

A. Heather Coyne, former chief of party in Iraq for the U.S. Institute of Peace, said that over the past 3 years the views of Iraqis regarding the situation have very much changed “ swinging from sheer exuberance immediately following the invasion to a profound discouragement in the aftermath of the constitutional process. Speaking with host Carol Castiel of VOA News Now’s Encounter program, Ms. Coyne said that reality has set in and Iraqis are beginning to realize there are no quick fixes in creating a functional and representative government and managing a deeply divided society. According to her, that process may take a decade, but the United States still has a critical role in helping the Iraqis consolidate a democracy.

Clifford May, president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, agreed that the difficulty of the Iraqi political transformation from a despotic regime to the first democracy in the Arab world should not be underestimated “ although it was initially. And he noted that it only takes a small minority of people to sabotage the process “ for example, last month’s bombing of the Shi’a shrine in Samara.

A. Heather Coyne said it is not yet clear whether Iraq will slide into civil war or will be able to move toward a government of national unity. Clifford May agreed that Iraqi democracy is on a slippery slope, and he noted that democracy implies not only majority rule but also minority rights, the rule of law, an independent judiciary, and a free press.

A. Heather Coyne noted that Iraqis have a pressing need to distance themselves from the U.S. government, and the appropriate U.S. role is one of behind-the-scenes encouragement of Iraqi leaders. According to Clifford May, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad is doing an impressive job in helping Iraqis form a national unity government in a society where the concept of making compromises is not well ingrained.

Whether or not the militias can become part of a national security force depends less on their training than on the political will of the Shi’a leadership, according to A. Heather Coyne. Clifford May said he doubts that the United States will be able to withdraw its troops in the next year or two and he stressed the importance of defeating al-Qaida in Iraq before leaving. Both he and Ms. Coyne agree that the long-term hope for Iraqi society depends on the strengthening of civil society.

source: voanews.com

Read Caffeine Warning Labels Now!

By
Walter Williams
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Read Caffeine Warning Labels Now!

Some call the people behind the Washington-D.C.-based Center for Science in the Public Interest busybodies, but I call them wannabe tyrants. Let’s look at their agenda, which seeks greater control over our lives. Last year, CSPI filed a lawsuit against the Food and Drug Administration to reduce the amount of salt in packaged foods. They also called for the FDA to mandate warning labels on non-diet soft drinks that consumption increases the risk of obesity, tooth decay and osteoporosis. Earlier this year, CSPI announced its intent to sue Viacom Inc. and Kellogg Company for marketing junk food to children.

CSPI has long called for excise taxes on fatty foods, cars and TV sets. Their justification is that obesity adds to Medicare and Medicaid health costs. They want some of the tax revenue used to fund exercise facilities and government fitness campaigns.

There’s no end to CSPI’s consumer-control agenda. They say, “Caffeine is the only drug that is widely added to the food supply.” Therefore, they’ve called for caffeine warning labels. To deal with teenage and adult overconsumption of alcohol, they’ve called for doubling the tax on beer. According to them, “The last thing the world needs is more drinkers, even moderate ones.”

To fight obesity among young people, CSPI calls for a fast-food advertising ban on TV programs seen by children. CSPI’s director, Michael Jacobson, said, “We could envision taxes on butter, potato chips, whole milk, cheeses, [and] meat,” adding that “CSPI is proud about finding something wrong with practically everything.”

I’m guessing that most Americans, except politicians, find this control agenda offensive. Politicians might not find it offensive because controlling lives is their stock in trade, plus there’s the promise of the higher revenues from food taxes. Most Americans who might find the CSPI agenda offensive are not motivated by principle. It’s a matter of whose ox is being gored.

You say, “What do you mean, Williams?” CSPI tyrants are following almost to the letter the template created by the nation’s anti-smoking zealots. Their fellow traveler, New York University professor Marion Nestle, says that the food industry “can’t behave like cigarette companies. . Yet there’s a lot of people who benefit from people being fat and sick, and the whole setup is designed to make people eat more. So the response to the food industry should be very similar to what happened with the tobacco companies.” .

I’d be interested to know just how many Americans would like to see done to our food industry what was done to the tobacco industry: massive multibillion-dollar lawsuits against food companies, massive suits against restaurants that serve too large a serving, and confiscatory taxes levied on foods and snacks deemed non-nutritious.

Consumers will pay for all of this in the form of higher food prices and fewer choices. There’s also the possibility that food zealots in some cities, emboldened by the success of the anti-smoking zealots in Calabasas, who are concerned about smokers passing on bad habits to our youth, might call for an ordinance banning public appearance of obese people so as not to pass bad eating habits on to our children.

More here

The Latest Bit of Pseudo Science from Berkeley

By
Dr. John J. Ray, PH.D.
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>THE LATEST BIT OF PSEUDO SCIENCE FROM BERKELEY

I suppose I should comment on the latest version of an old Leftist tune – summarized here for the general reader.

Starting in 1950, psychologists have been trying to prove that conservatives are psychologically maladjusted –an effort that was summarized by Jost et al. and demolished here. They never give up trying, however, and the study of 95 children from Berkeley, California by Jack Block and his wife is the latest episode. It’s a bit like shooting fish in a barrel to demolish the “research” concerned so I will just mention a few basics.

What the authors found was that Berkeley children who were rated as unhappy in their kindergarten years turned out as adults to be conservatives. So what do we conclude from that? Do we conclude that conservatives are intrinsically unhappy people? Hardly. The opinion polls repeatedly show conservatives to be the happiest (e.g. here). So what DO we conclude? How about saying that conservatives in ultra-Leftist Berkeley feel uncomfortable in that environment and pass on some of that discomfort to their children? But the children (as most children do) grow up to share their parents’ politics so they turn out conservative in later life too. So conservative parents who were SITUATIONALLY unhappy have conservative children – big deal!

But that is actually putting the best face on the study. It is not nearly as good as that:

1). The children concerned were not a representative sample of any known population. They may not even have been representative of Berkeley, let alone anywhere else. And if you don’t sample, you can’t generalize.

2). The correlation between personality and ideology was often very weak (e.g. .27 or 7% shared variance for the rating “Is self-reliant, confident”) so there were nearly as many confident children who turned out Rightist as Leftist. The reported correlation could in fact have turned on the responses of just one child. That certainly weakens ALL causal inferences from the study. And many of the stronger correlations involve obvious value judgments. For instance “Is visibly deviant from peers” is said to characterize conservatives but why not turn the value judgment around and conclude that conservatives tend to be independent?

3). The measure of conservative ideology is suspect. Block does not list the actual attitude statements he used but, as I have shown elsewhere, Leftist psychologists in general don’t have a blind clue what conservatism is – and what they regard as a measure of conservatism is usually a caricature of the real thing – generally a collection of ignorant and aggressive statements that very few real-world conservatives would assent to. That it was a caricature in this case is suggested by the fact that it showed conservatives as less intelligent. In the general population it is Leftists who are less intelligent.

I could go on to mention the Rosenthal effect etc. but what’s the point? Michelle Malkin has links to various other comments on the study.

Elsewhere

There is an incredible outpouring of Hillary mockery here. A small excerpt: “Listening to Hillary’s views about Israel is like reading Hitler’s email. Consequently she has made herself as welcome in Tel Aviv as a Scud missile. Any Jew that supports her for President is road testing the next generation of gas ovens. The inestimable W. Somerset Maugham said, “Hypocrisy is the most difficult and nerve-racking vice that any man can pursue; it needs an unceasing vigilance and a rare detachment of spirit. It cannot, like adultery or gluttony, be practiced at spare moments; it is a full-time job”. Remarkably, Maugham diagrammed that judgment without ever having met Hillary Clinton, in whom hypocrisy is more profound than just characteristic. It is her signature. She ricochets from one false image to another – wife, mother, do-gooder. Doting liberals are always enraptured when they receive a syrupy Christmas card with a picture of the Clintons gathered at the hearth with Hillary reading excerpts to Chelsea from A Girl’s Life of Ilse Koch. None of this masks the essential Hillary. As a colleague observed of her – if it walks like a bitch and talks like a bitch, it’s not a duck”.

Bureaucracy under attack: “Corporate executives, faced with greater regulatory scrutiny and demands in the wake of corporate scandals like Enron, have for some time moaned that new compliance rules are costing them profits and manpower, as well as cumbersome and probably not that effective. Now a new lawsuit’s adding another criticism: They’re unconstitutional.. “Sarbanes-Oxley is a classic example of government overreaction,” said Mallory Factor, chairman of the Free Enterprise Fund which recently hired former special prosecutor Kenneth Star as one of its attorneys. “We don’t have a problem with transparency but we’ve created a class of people that are just professional bureaucrats that want a larger bureaucracy that’s extraordinarily expensive and cuts down innovation.” A recent study conducted by the Securities Industry Association estimated that the cost of compliance has nearly doubled in the past three years to an estimated annual total of more than $25 billion in 2005, up from $13 billion in 2002.. Factor said costs associated with Sarbanes-Oxley are prohibitively high for small and mid-sized companies that are trying to compete with larger players, creating a barrier of entry for these firms.”

Some Muslim intellectuals get it: “After having overcome fascism, Nazism, and Stalinism, the world now faces a new global totalitarian threat: Islamism. We – writers, journalists and public intellectuals – call for resistance to religious totalitarianism. Instead, we call for the promotion of freedom, equal opportunity and secular values worldwide. The necessity of these universal values has been revealed by events since the publication of the Muhammad drawings in European newspapers. This struggle will not be won by arms, but in the arena of ideas. What we are witnessing is not a clash of civilizations, nor an antagonism of West versus East, but a global struggle between democrats and theocrats.”

One size does not fit all in diplomacy : “Hooray, I finally found something on which I can agree with the Bush administration: The ‘nucular’ cooperation deal signed recently with India. In cutting the deal, the administration displayed some uncharacteristically nuanced thinking: A one-size-fits-all nuclear policy isn’t sustainable in today’s world, and when it comes to nuclear arms, India is not the same as Iran and North Korea, or for that matter, Pakistan. As someone of Indian origin, I probably don’t surprise you with my thinking on this.”

No Muslim dress privilege in Britain any more: “A young Muslim girl yesterday failed in her two-year legal battle to force every school in Britain to allow pupils to decide their own dress code according to their religious belief. Britain’s highest court ruled to uphold the right of all schools to set uniform rules provided that they consult their local community. The Law Lords ruled that the human rights of Shabina Begum had not been breached when her school refused to allow her to wear a full-length Islamic dress to class and that Denbigh High School had not acted unlawfully. The ruling, which overturned a previous Court of Appeal decision, was welcomed by head teachers.

An interesting piece of hate-speech here from a “defender” of homosexuality.

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here. On Social Security see Dick McDonald and for purely Australian news see Australian Politics (mirrored here). I also post several times a week on “Tongue-Tied”. There is an archive of my “Tongue-Tied” posts here or here

Practically all policies advocated by the Left create poverty. Leftists get the government to waste vast slabs of the country’s labour-force on bureaucracy and paperwork and so load the burden of providing most useful goods and services onto fewer and fewer people. So fewer useful goods and services are produced to go around. That is no accident. The Left love the poor. The Left need the poor so that they can feel good by patronizing and “helping” them. So they do their best to create as many poor people as possible.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin’s Communism. The very word “Nazi” is a German abbreviation for “National Socialist” (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

Sen. Reid’s Political Props: Soldiers, Police, Firefighters and Flags

By
Jim Kouri, CPP
-

by Jim Kouri, CPP

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) sent out a memorandum to Democrat lawmakers about how they should spend their spring vacations: Using soldiers, police officers, firefighters and others as props in order to demonstrate that members of his party are gung-ho when it comes to national security and to highlight their claim that President Bush is not keeping Americans safe.

According to Rowan Scarborough of the Washington Times, Senate Democrats are planning to use the March congressional recess to “stage press events with active duty military personnel, veterans and emergency responders to bash President Bush on virtually every one of his national security policies.”

The idea is to try to distance themselves from what they’ve been doing in Washington to undermine the war effort, to stop the Patriot Act, and to show the American people they are the party of strength when it comes to terrorism, war and homeland security, while continuing their insane attacks on the Commander-in-Chief in a time of war.

However, some critics say this memo may backfire since Sen. Reid, for example, is heard in a TV soundbite saying “We killed the Patriot Act,” and video footage may be used to counter his sudden pro-war, pro-military message.

In a six-page memo provided to Scarborough by a congressional staffer titled “Real Security,” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid encourages his minions to stage events at “military bases, weapons factories, National Guard units, fire stations and veterans posts.” By way of instruction, Reid demonstrates his party’s deaf ear:

“Ensure that you have the proper US and state flags at the event, and consider finding someone to sing the national anthem and lead the group in the Pledge of Allegiance at the start of the event.”

Don’t expect the mainstream news media to blow the whistle on this sudden adoration of the military and cops for political reasons. In fact, look for their assistance in this politically motivated scam. Truth be told, had the GOP issued such a cynical memo it would be plastered on the frontpage of every major newspaper in the nation and would be the lead for every news broadcast on TV or radio.

Hopefully most clear-thinking Americans, especially in the Red States, will condemn these flagrant attempts to use America’s protectors and symbols as political props for feckless politicians who are willing to call soldiers Nazis on the floor of the senate or accuse law enforcement of torture, and then try to portray themselves as supporters of the military and law enforcement.

Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) recently activated The Reid Con on an audience when she stood between a former commandant of the US Military Academy at West Point and the former commander of the US War College.

Suddenly the First Lady who didn’t want to see one military uniform in the corridors of the White House, discovered a newfound love for all things military, hoping she can wink at the antiwar left in her party just to make them know she’s putting on an act so she can con the so-called Red State dwellers into voting for her for Commander-in-Chief. She even stole a page from her husband’s playbook. While he promised 100,000 more cops on the streets, she’s promising 100,000 more soldiers, sailors and airmen.

So if your state or district is represented by Democrats in the House or Senate, be prepared to see more patriotism and flag waving than you’ve ever seen before. And remember what these people have said and done to undermine the very people they claim they support.

Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and he’s a staff writer for the New Media Alliance (thenma.org). He’s former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed “Crack City” by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several major organizations. He’s also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country. Kouri writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He’s a news writer for TheConservativeVoice.Com. He’s also a columnist for AmericanDaily.Com, NewsCream.Com, MichNews.Com, and he’s syndicated by AXcessNews.Com. He’s appeared as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and talk shows including Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox News, etc. His book Assume The Position is available at Amazon.Com. Kouri’s own website is located at

Lord of the Fleiss: Charlie Sheen the New Leader of 9/11 Conspiracists

By
Doug Powers
-

Up until recently, I was beginning to think that Charlie Sheen wasn’t the son of Martin Sheen. The first clue was that he had the same last name, and what child of Martin Sheen has the last name “Sheen”? Not many.

The second clue was that Charlie seemed to have confined his exploits to prostitutesand general debauchery like booze and cocaine. Chuck’s arrests weren’t like his dad’s, such as when Martin was busted in1995 for hisfive-decade-late protest of the dropping of Fat Man and Little Boy on Japan.

(note to liberal youngsters: when we say “Fat Man and Little Boy” we’re not talking about Michael Moore and George Stephanopoulos)

But all good things must end. Charlie can’t fight the Martin Sheen genes anymore,as he’s now saying that 9/11 couldn’t have happened the way the government tells it. The collapse of the World Trade Centers looked like a “controlled demolition” to him, and he doubts a plane actually hit the Pentagon.

Of course,Charlie was baked on Acapulco red and had a whore sitting on his face at the time, but dammit, he knows what he saw!

And just when I thought a Sheenhad risen ‘high’ enough to escape the moon bat vacuum.

Et tu, Chuck?

For the other side, research comments for those who are defending Charlie’s take. Questions for those who are pro-conspiracy: What did the government, or whoever was responsible, do with all the people who were ticketed on the plane that didn’t hit the Pentagon? Was it shot down over the water? Are they being held captive in the same hangar where the moon landing was faked? (theories abound, but most I’ve heard about are quickly shaved by Occam’s Razor)

And the biggest question of all: How many people would it have taken to pull off this enormously deceptive operation, and how is it possible to keep them all quiet?That’s even more amazing than all the other parts of these theories put together.

More late stuff.your help needed.

I’m working on a column about this. Not really on Sheen, but more on the accusation of conspiracy.My opinionis clear, but I’m open to considering things such as,if this was an “inside job”, then who is responsible, and what is the hard evidence against these people. I’m looking for facts, not just wishful “Bush did it to jack up oil prices.”talk, with ghosts running around planting explosives everywhere.

“WTC 7 was a controlled demolition, and so were the towers”.. great, then who did it? You can’t indict a stick of dynamite. Where are the passengers from the plane that didn’t hit the Pentagon? Evidence please, not theories that were spelled out in Oliver Stone’s bong water.

In the absence of any of this information, the entire debate is running around in circles, and this is relegated to “perfect crime” status, and there is no such thing, meaning there was no such perfect crime, just the crime that exists as we know it is terrorism.

Do Pacifist Hostages Appreciate The Violence That Freed Them?

By
Doug Powers
-

Almost four months ago, four people described as “Christian peace activists” were taken hostage while in Iraq by a group calling itself the “Swords of Righteousness Brigade” (much to their chagrin, “Legion of Doom” was already taken).

Not long ago, Tom Fox, one of those hostages, was found dead. Last week, I wrote a column revolving around this for The American Spectator entitled “Peace at Any Cost“.

Well, fortunately for the three remaining hostages, British Special Forces weren’t pacifists, because they have stormed the place where the members of the “Christian peacemaker team” were being held and freed them. The pacifist peace activists protested loudly, denouncing the violence that was taking place in order to save their lives. Just kidding.

Release-by-force the “worst case scenario” for the peace-at-any-cost movement?

The preference for the peace-at-any-cost movement clearly would have been for the terrorist captors to employ a humane “catch and release” policy for captured pacifists. This would have offered an opportunity for the anti-war movement to point to their release as proof-positive of the effectiveness of simply taking the time to talk to those with whom you have disagreements.

As a matter of fact, it’s just been reported that more U.S. citizens than ever are studying the Arabic language, perhaps partly out of a sense of anticipating the need for similar negotiations.

If only the peace activists had been released, all unharmed and unaided by outside force,this would have demonstrated the importance of learning about these victims of society who some wrongly refer to as “enemies.”

This would teach future captives to learn about the terrorists as individuals– flip through their family albums,appreciate their sylish hesitance to wear white belt bombs after Labor Day,provide them a much needed opportunity to talk out some childhood issues, and discover the best brand body bag to retard seepage during long waits at security checkpoints.

The freed “abductees” would have spent the next several months as media darlings. But all that ended when British Special Forces stormed the building and rudely disrupted the Swords of Righteousness Brigade gathering. My guess is that the next SRB meeting will be able to be held in a phone booth.

Of course,the abduction or violent rescue wouldn’t have been necessary had Bush and Blair listened to the peace activists in the first place, right? And that question brings us to this.

Late add:

Here’s a press release by the Christian Peacemaker Teams. Read it and shake your head. They’re glad the hostages were “released” (your captors tend to lose their grip once they get a bullet through the head), and there is not a single mention in the lengthy statement of the British Special Forces troops who risked their lives to get these misguided people out alive. Not surprising.

Even later add:

As news concerning the rescue operation continues to flow in, Damien, in the comments section, says the following:

It was a joint coalition rescue. There was no shots to the head or Swords of Righteousness Brigade gathering. The hostages were alone when the rescue took place. Gratitude would be good except that all the family members seemed to think that the hostages had just been released by their captors. As in “let go willingly”.

The search and rescue operation, according to some accounts, took well over a dozen days, so how do we know that no shots were fired? Maybe not right at that moment, but there may have been some Swords of Righteousness Brigade charter members who inexplicably didn’t make it home for dinner on some given night. There could be a very good reason that the hostages were in the place alone.

That said, if the hostages families were told they were simply “released”,then we’ll eagerly await the “thank you” to those in the coalition who spent a couple of weeks tracking where the hostages were being held and risked their lives coming to get them. At the same time, we’ll also wait for credible evidence of the existence of the abominable snowman.

One would think that an organization that is sickened by the invasion of Iraq by foreign troops who are there illegally and killing innocent civilians would have, especially since they were apparent lyin the house by themselves, demanded to be left alone by the meanie occupiers.

The Incorrectness of Salt

By
Dr. John J. Ray, PH.D.
-

The Incorrectness of Salt

Since our blood has about the same saltiness as seawater, the claim that our bodies cannot handle salt safely is absurd. We are in fact very good at it. Salt has been implicated in raised blood pressure but if that were really a concern, a much more constructive approach would be to add potassium (which lowers blood pressure) to food rather than removing salt. Both are natural food components. Also see the research report following the article immediately below – a report which shows that a low salt diet is actually BAD for you. So it is really a puritanical desire to reduce people’s pleasures that motivates the anti-salt brigade. They only look at evidence that suits them

Britain’s food watchdog was accused last night of endangering the lives of 15,000 people a year after backing down on strict guidelines designed to limit the amount of salt in food. Health campaigners were furious at the decision by the Food Standards Agency to publish revised targets to cut salt in 85 types of food products by 2010. In many cases the agency raised levels after feedback from companies which claimed that they were unable to cut salt in certain products for technical or safety reasons.

Increases in permitted levels recommended by the agency included: Raising the salt allowed in crisps such as Quavers and Skips from 1.4g to 3.4g per 100g; Ketchup up from 1.8g to 2.4g; Savoury biscuits up from 1.3g to 2.2g.

The agency said that it still hoped to cut the overall intake of salt per person per day from 10g to 6g within four years. But medical experts said that the new targets meant this would not be met, especially as the targets cannot be imposed on the food industry. If salt intake were cut to 6g per day, it would prevent 70,000 heart attacks and strokes a year, of which 35,000 are fatal. If intake fell only to 8g a day, 15,000 people would die unnecessarily.

“Products like Quavers and Wotsits are still going to be allowed to contain more salt than in seawater,” Professor Graham MacGregor, head of cardio-vascular medicine at St George’s Hospital, in Tooting, southwest London, said. “If by 2010 we only get salt consumption down to 8g a day then that will result in another 30,000 strokes and heart attacks and some 15,000 will be fatal. The new targets reflect the naked power of the food industry that is just not interested in the health of the people it feeds.”

The National Heart Forum also expressed concern about “laggards” in the food industry who were failing to tackle salt reduction. Paul Lincoln, its chief executive, said that the firms resisting change should be “named and shamed”. He pointed the finger at manufacturers of children’s foods such as crisps, pizzas, bread, processed cheese and biscuits for making slowest progress in reducing salt. “The problem is these targets are voluntary,” he said. “Some companies have demonstrated that it is possible to make significant and rapid reductions. However, without the threat of any sanctions or penalties some sectors are clearly unwilling to press ahead with healthy reformulations.”

Malcolm Kane, an independent food safety consultant, said: “The new targets reveal a food industry still defending the use of excess salt in processed foods based upon weak arguments referring to technical reasons or food safety which are largely irrelevant to contemporary food processing conditions.”

The FSA said that its targets were realistic. The agency also said it was pleased with the efforts made by manufacturers and supermarkets to cut salt. Salt in bread was already down by 30 per cent, in breakfast cereals reduced by 33 per cent, and down a third in Kraft cheese spreads and snacks. Manufacturers were also committed to reducing salt in soups and sauces by 30 per cent.

However, some campaigners believe that the agency is running scared of the food industry after a recent rift over the need for red warning labels on junk food. Only Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Asda have endorsed “traffic light” alerts that will show levels of salt, sugar, fat and saturated fat. Gill Fine, the agency’s director of consumer choice, said: “We believe that the salt levels set out represent a realistic rate of reduction which will have a real impact on consumers’ intakes.”

She said that the targets would be reviewed in 2008 to ensure people were on track to achieve a 6g maximum daily intake of salt by 2010. The targets mean that Stilton cheese has been granted a reprieve. The FSA had originally wanted to cut its salt content from 2.5g per 100g to 1.9g.

Cheesemakers argued that salt reduction could threaten the viability of the 33 million pound a year industry which employs at least 500 people.

Salt is Okay for Health

By
Christian Scarborough
-

Salt is Okay for Health

Salt gets a shake in a large study, reinforcing previous research which questions the value of a low salt diet – and suggests it might even be harmful. I know. One day they’re telling you one thing and the next the opposite. The trouble is that with salt, doctors and dieticians have assumed because a low salt intake may help blood pressure, that it saves lives.

A 13 year follow up of 7000 people has found that in most groups, the lower the salt intake, the higher the risk of dying from a heart attack or stroke – independent of other lifestyle factors. The study wasn’t a trial; it observed people’s health rather than tested a proposition, so had potential problems. But the authors say that applies to almost all the studies which supposedly justify reducing salt and that none, they claim, show that a low salt diet saves lives.

The reason for the possible risk is that a low salt diet may increase artery damaging hormones. So while it’s not carte blanche for salt, it’s probably okay to enjoy the taste of food again.

For reference see: Cohen HW et al. “Sodium intake and mortality in the NHANESII follow-up study”. American Journal of Medicine 2006;119:275.e7-275.e14

Source

There is a further comment on the scandalous ignoring of science by the anti-salt fanatics here

The Winning Agenda for Republicans in 2008: “When Marriage Is Important”

By
David R. Usher
-

When Marriage Is Important

  • Poverty of women and children will decrease by about seventy-five percent
  • Health care will be a manageable problem
  • The national deficit and debt will no longer be out of control
  • We can have a balanced budget while fighting the war on terror, rebuilding New Orleans, and handling other costly national disasters
  • We will no longer need to move the living room into the board room
  • Strong marriages equal a strong, stable, available, productive work force
  • Child abuse and neglect will become comparatively minor problems
  • Abortion no longer be “necessary”
  • Welfare and child support problems will greatly decrease
  • Crime and violence will decrease tremendously
  • Personal bankruptcy will abate substantially
  • Boys will stop dropping out of school and society
  • Same-sex marriage will no longer have political traction
  • The cycle of poverty and illegitimacy will be broken, allowing black families to finally succeed in large numbers and finally achieve true equal rights and economic success

During the first decade of Republican leadership, social indicators that Republicans promised to improve did not improve. There are few Americans who do not have a loved family member greatly harmed by divorce or entitled non-marriage. The vast majority of Americans know they have been seriously harmed by anti-family federal policies that continue destroying their loved ones and leave them in inevitable poverty and social disenfranchisement.

The vast majority of Americans are unhappy with both political parties. Both parties have pursued anti-marriage policies for decades. Republicans are now at the crossroads: we must deliver what we promised in 1994 or risk losing both the Congress and the Presidency to liberals who will blame all of Americas social problems on Republicans in 2006 and 2008.

The first Republican revolution failed because anti-family Democrat policies were left in place or magnified by Republicans who placed smooth-talking liberals in charge of welfare reform and the Marriage Movement. Renaming welfare to child support did little but to create millions more broken indentured families consisting of poor mothers and children, and criminalized disenfranchised husbands who cannot possibly support two households.

Social indicators measuring the well-being of single mothers and children have not improved on the Republican watch. Just as many women and children live in poverty today as in 1964, substantively due to predatory federal laws that break up families on the false promise that it is somehow possible make the economics of two broken households work on the same amount of income.

The second Republican revolution can and will succeed providing it establishes a real Marriage Movement wherein economic conservatives allow knowledgeable social conservatives to roll out true pro-marriage policies. Congress has been unable to deal with health care and poverty because these problems are largely caused by non-marriage. These social disasters continue to drive the very federal deficits, and the national debt, that preclude affordability of these largely-reactive programs.

There is only one way to give everyone what they want and need. Anti-family federal programs must be ended and replaced with low-cost policies that expect marital responsibility of husband and wife, that will end entitled abortion of the American family and positively help spouses work through the normal processes and common problems of marriage and aging when help is asked for by a responsible spouse.

For example: family break-ups often involve abuse of drugs or alcohol by a family member. Most spouses do not want a divorce. They just want a decent marriage. Federal policy should fund state programs that help the responsible spouse get the troubled spouse into treatment when they ask for help. We can reduce federal expenditures by hundreds of billions, reduce divorce rates by half, and substantially improve marriage rates, by this simple change alone. But if the marriage issues are serious, then you have to seek help from Glen Burnie MD Divorce Lawyers.

75% of American women no longer believe that feminism is a good thing. Few men believed it in the first place. Why coninue funding radical feminist pork such as VAWA, and entitle permanent non-marriage, when feminists will never vote for Republicans? Why not fund policies that voters want and need, real marriage movement policies that will win millions of votes across all voting groups, restore the economically-stable two-parent heterosexual family, and make a balanced budget entirely possible?

The New Republican Contract for America:
Marriage is important!

David R. Usher is President of the American Coalition for Fathers and Children, Missouri Coalition

Coffee Correctness

By
Dr. John J. Ray, PH.D.
-

Coffee Correctness

Like all socialism, socialist coffee is good only for its own chosen elite. But it’s a cheap ego-boost for the parlour pinks

Fair Trade certification, intended to raise the living standards of coffee farmers in Nicaragua and elsewhere, has grown into a complex bureaucracy and an industry in itself. Starbucks, the longtime Enemy No. 1 of the Fair Trade crusaders, agreed to purchase a limited amount of Fair Trade certified coffee days before a planned protest in 2000. The company bought 10 million pounds in 2005. In 2003 Dunkin’ Donuts agreed to make all of its espresso drinks certified. Nestle, one of the biggest coffee companies on Earth, launched a Fair Trade line in October 2005; the same month, McDonald’s agreed to test Fair Trade in 658 outlets. High-end specialty coffees are the fastest growing sector of the industry, and Fair Trade is the fastest growing specialty coffee; demand for it has ballooned by around 70 percent annually for the last five years.

You’d think this confluence of social responsibility and double lattes, good business practices and lefty politics, would make Katzeff a happy man. But he and a growing number of roasters say the Fair Trade movement has lost its way. The movement has always aroused suspicion on the right, where free traders object to its price floors and anti-globalization rhetoric. Yet critics from the left are more vocal and more angry by half; they point to unhappy farmers, duped consumers, an entrenched Fair Trade bureaucracy, and a grassroots campaign gone corporate.

The Fair Trade label was born in the Netherlands in 1989 under the brand name Max Havelaar, taken from the title of a 19th-century novel about oppressed Javanese coffee plantation workers. When the company came to the U.S. a decade later, the American branch billed itself TransFair USA. TransFair’s stated goal is simple: to ensure that farmers get a decent price for their beans, and to let consumers know it. By cutting out predatory middlemen and selling a clear conscience at a premium, coffee idealists hoped to achieve humanitarian goals by capitalist means.

TransFair USA certifies Fair Trade products and audits the chain of custody from producer to finished product. The organization charges between $2,000 and $4,000 to check out a cooperative, plus annual recertification fees and a small percentage of the price of each pound of coffee. The benefits, for those that pass muster, are not insignificant: a guaranteed price floor of $1.26 a pound to Fair Trade retailers-more than double the going rate for beans globally-and a stable price in a famously volatile market.

The Fair Trade apparatus is intended to mitigate a system that seemed especially cruel just as the movement was gaining steam. Until 1989 the price of coffee was relatively stable, held in place by an international agreement that imposed both import and export quotas. That year, as the Cold War ended and stability in producing countries was less of a priority in consuming ones, the pact-known as the International Coffee Agreement-dissolved completely. When supply and demand kicked in, new producers from Vietnam to Papua New Guinea were free to try their hand at the coffee game, drastically redrawing the java map. The resulting glut sent prices spiraling downward. By autumn 1992 coffee cost 50 cents a pound-a level, according to Fair Trade marketer Global Exchange, that’s comparable to prices in the 1930s.

Counter-intuitively, as prices were plunging for coffee farmers, middle-class Americans were learning to pay double or triple what they once had for a single cup of joe. The major coffee companies-Sara Lee, Kraft, Procter & Gamble, and Nestle-were paying less than they had for years, and the quality of their products, connoisseurs complained, was getting progressively worse. Around the same time, specialty companies such as Green Mountain started buying high-quality beans and pitching coffee as a luxury good rather than a commodity. A “specialty revolution”-the Starbucksification of America, driven by latte-toting yuppies-spawned a massive market for pricey brewed java. By 1998 Starbucks could plan on opening a store a day, and the satirical newspaper The Onion ran a story headlined “New Starbucks Opens in Rest Room of Existing Starbucks.”

As they grew in numbers and influence, it was the small, quality-obsessed specialty roasters who absorbed and perpetuated the Fair Trade ethos, thus distancing themselves from the big four, which continued to pay rock-bottom prices for low-quality coffee. Against the backdrop of schizophrenic prices, in the face of a glaring gap between impoverished Third World farmers and affluent First World consumers, Fair Trade advocates sold a vision of socially just consumption. Men like Katzeff began to travel abroad to source beans, and the industry’s inequities started to emerge: Farmers were being squeezed by middlemen, known as coyotes, so that even the dismal profits from cheap mass-produced coffee failed to reach them. Growers lacked basic information about what their crop was worth, how to maximize production, and how to market their beans, and it was to the coyotes’ advantage to keep it that way. Fair Traders, by contrast, sought a direct relationship between coffee farmers and coffee drinkers: clean, just, transparent transactions.

Fair Trade’s pioneers sought the one best way to reform this culture of abuse, and they settled on a bucolic vision of small farms working for the collective good. The system would serve growers who formed cooperatives of small family farms. Such organizations represent only a very narrow swath of the world’s 25 million coffee farmers, but as the Fair Trade brand has grown, the eligibility requirements have not budged. The result is a marketing machine meant to spread wealth across class divides that in practice draws sharp lines between winners and losers.

Gregorio Martinez grows coffee on 30 hectares of land in Lepaera, Honduras, where he lives with his wife and four children. In 1998 Hurricane Mitch destroyed his crop, leaving him deep in debt; by 2004 he was set to lose his farm to foreclosure for lack of $800. That same year, he sent a bag of beans to the Princess Hotel in San Pedro Sula, where a U.S. nonprofit was hosting a contest known as Cup of Excellence. Martinez took top honors, attracted attention from buyers, and auctioned off his crop for $19,500. In his acceptance speech, he expressed relief that he would be able to pass his farm on to his family rather than the bank.

Martinez owns a small family farm and produces a high-quality coffee, but none of his beans carry the Fair Trade label. His farm isn’t part of a cooperative, a Fair Trade non-negotiable that disqualifies small, independent farmers, larger family farms, and for that matter any multinational that treats its workers well. “It’s like outlawing private enterprise,” says former SCAA chair Cox, who now serves as president of a coffee consulting company. “What about a medium-sized family-owned farm that’s doing great, treats their employees great? Sorry, they don’t qualify.” In Africa, many coffee farms are organized along tribal, not democratic lines. They’re not eligible either, a problem that has prompted some roasters to charge cultural imperialism..

Specialty coffee roasters have always paid above-average prices, but that hasn’t stopped activists from launching smear campaigns against high-end retailers who resist the Fair Trade model. In 2000, activist groups including Global Exchange launched an attack on Starbucks that has left the company stained with a reputation for mistreating farmers. Yet given its size, Starbucks likely has done far more than the Fair Trade movement to improve the lot of coffee growers in the 25 countries from which it purchases coffee. Starbucks buys 2.2 percent of the world’s coffee production, and its infamous growth fuels demand for high-priced specialty coffees. In 2004 it bought that coffee at an average price of $1.20 a pound, slightly below the $1.26 Fair Trade pays but more than twice the average price for beans on the global commodity market.

Among the litany of complaints roasters voice about TransFair, cost is most resented. Roasters and retailers must pay the company to be registered as legitimate purveyors of Fair Trade goods. Organic labels cost about two cents per pound of coffee; TransFair demands ten, and there are controversies about how the money is being spent..

It may have a corporate image in the coffee industry, but Fair Trade still cultivates an aura of grassroots revolution on college campuses, where hundreds of student groups have formed to hold rallies and promote the brand. This past November, Vanderbilt undergraduate Blake Richter and 20 fellow students stood outside a Tennessee Starbucks and handed out free Fair Trade coffee while explaining to passers-by their beef with the company: Only a small percentage of Starbucks’ purchases are Fair Trade Certified. The demonstration, he tells me, was a “first step” toward more equitable exchange in the area. If handing out free stuff sounds like a pretty mild protest, consider the result: “A lot of people would come by and say, `I appreciate what you’re saying, but I still need my latte.” Richter adds, “I think we probably increased Starbucks’ business that day.”

Richter’s experience wouldn’t surprise many specialty roasters. Since the early days of Fair Trade, many of them have argued that customer loyalty hinges on quality, not the perception of social justice. Fair Trade consumers, in other words, tend to be dabblers who are happy to pay extra for conscience-soothing coffee today, but will eventually go back to the beans they like best no matter what the social pedigree. That may be for the best: The specialty revolution, with its $4 lattes and emphasis on growing methods, has probably jacked up prices for farmers far more than the Fair Trade movement has. Starbucks buys more coffee each year than gets Fair Trade certified. When consumers become coffee snobs, prices rise, and some of that increase makes it back to growers..

The range of prices between high- and low-quality coffees is still minuscule compared to what you’ll find with a highly branded beverage like wine, but it is growing, and consumers have consistently demonstrated that they’re willing to pay more for better beans. The best hope for farmers lies with consumers demanding better coffee, not just from Starbucks but from the supermarket shelf. This may be inevitable; a generation weaned on high-quality lattes is not going to turn to instant Nescafe as it grows more affluent. But there are signs that Fair Trade, with its predilection for uniformity, is retarding, not accelerating, that process.

“Fair Trade does not incentivize quality,” explains Geoff Watts of Intelligentsia Coffee, who has spent the last nine years training coffee farmers in Africa and Central America. Fair Trade co-ops are composed of hundreds of farmers producing vastly different qualities of coffee. Often their output is blended together for sale to roasters, masking any quality improvements one farmer may have felt motivated to implement. Money then flows back to the co-op, not the individual farmer, and is distributed equally among the members. “There is no reward for the guy who works harder than his neighbor,” says Watts. Nor is there much motivation for individual farmers to learn better farming techniques, experiment with new types of coffee, or seek new markets.

The system thus breeds anonymity and mediocrity in a business that desperately needs to focus on branding and identity. Ironically, this mimics the problems brought on by multinationals: Treating coffee as a single commodity, in large undifferentiated lots, prevents any single farmer from excelling and advancing.

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