Necessary News

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After 7 Years, We’ve Got 99 Problems

• As President Bush’s days of power draw to a close, one thing is clear: We’ve got a lot more problems now than we did seven years ago.
• We started to think about it and came up with 99 of them, everything from less money to more war and a planet in crisis. Check out our new doc, “We’ve Got 99 Problems, But A Human-Animal Hybrid Ain’t One.”
• Here’s a sneak peek:

• Problem: Surge Failure —

  In January 2007, President Bush announced a plan to send a 20,000-troop “surge” to Iraq to quell the violence and provide military cover while the Iraqi government took over the ruling of its own nation. Today, the Iraqi Minister of Defense says the government will be unable to take over its own security until at least 2012. [Chicago Tribune] [The Guardian]

• Problem: Starvation-

  According to the USDA, the number of hungry families in the United States rose 26 percent between 2001 and 2006. Worse, the number of families with the least access to enough food rose 32 percent. That’s 1.3 million American families, not including the homeless. [USDA]

• (Problem: Sorry, We Meant to Say “Low Food Security”- In 2006 the U.S. Department of Agriculture attempted to sugarcoat the hunger issue by banning the word “hunger” from official documents, replacing it with the more opaque “very low food security.”) [Washington Post]
• Problem: Expensive and Inefficient Health Care — In 2006, America’s health care costs spiraled to an all-time high of over $2 trillion (or $7,026 per person). In a report by the World Health Organization, America ranks 37th in health care quality, despite spending more per person than any other country in the world. [LA Times] [WHO]
• Problem: Toxic Lack of Prosecution of Polluters — Under the current administration, the EPA sharply decreased the prosecution of criminal cases against polluters. New prosecutions, new investigations, and total convictions all plummeted by a third. [Washington Post]
• And that’s just five. Hey, we know it’s not a comprehensive list, so we have one question for you: What’s Your Problem? Write in and let us know at miccheck@americanprogressaction.org.

Don’t worry — five had a pretty sweet ride during the Bush Years. Check out the page to find out who the big winners were.

Look Ahead To State Of The Union

• President Bush, entering the last year of his presidency, will give his 7th State Of The Union address tonight. Here’s what to expect.
• According to reports, President Bush will focus on four key themes: “fixing the economy, renewal of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), recent successes in Iraq and ratification of trade agreements.” [The Hill]
• He’ll also do a “legacy push” to nail down No Child Left Behind and his tax cuts. [Baltimore Sun]
• He has a tough audience. President Bush has a 32% approval rating, the lowest rating going into a State Of The Union speech of his presidency.
• (Background alert): In 2001, his approval rating was 62%. In 2002, 84%. In 2003, 60%. In 2004, 53%. In 2005, 51%. In 2006, 43%. In 2007, 36%. [AP]
• The White House seems to realize the president’s weak position going into the speech. Friday, the AP reported, “In a bow to political reality, President Bush’s final State of the Union speech will skip bold proposals in favor of ones the country has heard before, a modest approach for a White House that prides itself on big ideas.” [ABC News]

We have only one question — who’s going to be sitting by Laura? Vote now!

State Of The Union: FISA

• President Bush is going to talk about FISA tonight. He wants Congress to make a temporary law passed last August, the Protect America Act, permanent.
• Vice President Dick Cheney started the talk earlier this week at a speech at the Heritage Foundation. Attorney General Mike Mukasey took up the chant Friday at his press conference.
• It is a bad idea. A very bad idea.
• Don’t just listen to us. Here are clips from news editorials in the days after the passage of the Act last August.
• Protect America Act: “Instead of just fixing that glitch, the White House and its allies on Capitol Hill railroaded Congress into voting a vast expansion of the president’s powers. They gave the director of national intelligence and the attorney general authority to intercept — without warrant, court supervision or accountability — any telephone call or e-mail message that moves in, out of or through the United States as long as there is a ‘reasonable belief’ that one party is not in the United States. The new law all but eviscerates the 1978 law. The only small saving grace is that the new statute expires in six months.” [NY Times]
• Protect America Act: “Congressional aides and others familiar with the details of the law said that its impact went far beyond the small fixes that administration officials had said were needed to gather information about foreign terrorists. They said seemingly subtle changes in legislative language would sharply alter the legal limits on the government’s ability to monitor millions of phone calls and e-mail messages going in and out of the United States.” [NY Times]
• Protect America Act: “Instead, it allows executive-branch agencies to conduct oversight-free surveillance of all international calls and e-mails, including those with Americans on the line, with the sole requirement that the intelligence-gathering is “directed at a person reasonably believed to be located outside the United States.” There is no requirement that either caller be a suspected terrorist, spy, or criminal.” [Boston Globe]
• Protect America Act: “THE DEMOCRATIC-led Congress, more concerned with protecting its political backside than with safeguarding the privacy of American citizens, left town early yesterday after caving in to administration demands that it allow warrantless surveillance of the phone calls and e-mails of American citizens, with scant judicial supervision and no reporting to Congress about how many communications are being intercepted. To call this legislation ill-considered is to give it too much credit: It was scarcely considered at all. Instead, it was strong-armed through both chambers by an administration that seized the opportunity to write its warrantless wiretapping program into law — or, more precisely, to write it out from under any real legal restrictions.” [Washington Post]

The fight will continue.

State Of The Union: The Economy

• Tonight, during his State of the Union address, President Bush is set to talk about America’s slumping economy. Per usual, we’re expecting some fancy rhetoric to distract the public away from how bad the news really is. Luckily, we’re here to lift the curtain.
• Last week, the President announced a new stimulus package that was created to pump some energy into America’s economy (which, depending on who you ask, is teetering on recession). The meat of the package deemed that American’s can look forward to a tax rebate: People filing tax returns will get $600; joint filers will get $1,200 in a tax rebate check. [CBS NEWS]
• The House has agreed on the President’s package. The Senate, though, has yet to. [USA Today]
• On Sunday, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson upped the pressure for the Senate to pass the package. “I don’t think the Senate is going to want to derail that deal,” he said. “And I don’t think the American people are going to have much patience for anything that would slow down the process.”
• An estimated 16 million families will receive checks (including 35 million of the working poor.). The total Cost? $150 billion. That’s around $100 billion in rebates for families and $50 billion in tax cuts for businesses. [MSNBC]
• And while the news was good that the President decided on a stimulus package (he was initially opposed to the idea) — the cold, hard truth is that he’s still posing roadblocks to a long-term, economic rebound. We’re guessing he’s going to leave that helpful fact out of his state of the union address
• Namely, the White House blocked measures to get help to the people who need it the most. No increased unemployment benefits. No increase in food stamp help. No temporary boost to state health care programs. [American Progress]
• In fact, experts say that many of the proposals left on the cutting room floor—expanded unemployment benefits, expanded food stamp programs, temporary federal aid for states’ health insurance programs—are among the best ways to pump money quickly into the economy.
• And then there’s the mortgage crisis. As foreclosures increase and real estate tanks, a clear solution to America’s loan disaster is needed as part of a stimulus package. Yet, nothing in the president’s package provides relief to the growing number of homeowners who now have negative equity in their homes as a result of declining real estate markets.

Our glasses aren’t so rose-colored.

Good News, Bad News

Chicken Little Was Right

NASA has announced that they have lost control of a satellite orbiting earth, leaving its orbit to decay, and sending it hurtling towards earth where it smash into the ground sometime in February or March. “Appropriate government agencies are monitoring the situation,” said Gordon Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council. “Numerous satellites over the years have come out of orbit and fallen harmlessly. We are looking at potential options to mitigate any possible damage this satellite may cause.” Still, we’re concerned. [AP]

BAD NEWS

The satellite “could contain hazardous materials, and it is unknown where on the planet it might come down.” Oh, swell.

GOOD NEWS

Maybe it will hit something we don’t like.

Quote Of The Day

Howie Kurtz: But in a sense, the Bush administration has been very, very good for Keith Olbermann.

Keith Olbermann: Honestly? No. I’m an American citizen, I think this has been a disastrous presidential administration. I would have given what I have, in terms broadcasting success in the nature of this newscast, I would have easily said…if I were given the choice of this or some responsible presidency in the last four years or eight years? I would have taken a responsible presidency.

— Keith Olberemann, CNN Reliable Sources on Sunday, on giving it all up for a good president.

Speed Round

SOUTH CAROLINA

Democrat Barack Obama took South Carolina this weekend in the state’s primary with 55% of the vote. He was followed by Hillary, with 27% and Edwards with 18%. [CNN]

CALIFORNIA COOLNESS

The EPA may be trying to squash California’s efforts for cleaner air, but this state isn’t ready to give up yet. This week, California is voting on a bill to impose hefty fees on people who drive gas-guzzlers and give sweet rebates to those who drive more fuel-efficient cars. [LA Times]

NYPD BLUES

“The New York Police Department produced a detailed analysis in 1998 opposing plans by the city to locate its emergency command center at the WorldTradeCenter, but the Giuliani administration overrode those objections. The command center later collapsed from damage in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack.” [NY Times]

DEAD

The brutal former dictator of Indonesia, Suharto, who was responsible for up to a million deaths died this weekend. He was 86. [AP]

TORTURED DOUBLESPEAK

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t answer it...I didn’t say that I would.” — — Attorney General Mike Mukasey gets cute about whether or not he’ll weigh in on whether he considers waterboarding torture. [NY Times]

CITIZEN’S ARREST

Brattleboro, Vermont votes to place President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney under arrest for “war crimes, perjury or obstruction of justice if they ever step foot in Vermont.” [Rutland Herald]

NO LONGER THE LEADER

Welcome to the new world order, folks: “rather than bestriding the globe, we are competing — and losing — in a geopolitical marketplace alongside the world’s other superpowers: the European Union and China.” [NY Times]

HOW HE DID IT

The French trader who stole $7 billion from Societe Generale, “misappropriated other people’s computer access codes, falsified documents to enter fictitious trades and employed other methods to cover his tracks helped by his years of experience working in offices that monitor traders.” [NY Times]

CHENEY’S PICK

Dick Cheney’s daughter is working to elect Mitt Romney. [Salon]

MORE VIOLENCE

Violence spreads into western Kenya, a bloody continuation of the aftermath of last month’s bitterly contested election. [BBC]