history: October 2004 Archives

Today's NYTimes editorial, Dangerous Territory, hasn't yet made the list of "most requested articles in the last 24 hours", which I find disturbing and counter to the editorial's optimistic conclusion:

"If the company is thinking about seriously changing course, it should do it quickly. Sinclair is in dangerous territory. If television companies force their local stations to campaign blatantly, it will not be long before the administrations that have the power to grant licenses begin expecting such favors as a quid pro quo. And the public will question whether it can afford to allow such concentrations of power in the hands of huge media corporations."

"The public" appears willing to overlook such concentration and misuse of power, and - given recent events with the FCC and FBI, the US government already feels entitled to grant and deny licenses wherever it sees fit.

David says, "This is absolutely frightening. There is a mounting global protest."

from http://indymedia.org/en/2004/10/111999.shtml

Thursday morning, US authorities issued a federal order to Rackspace
ordering them to hand over Indymedia web servers to the requesting agency.
Rackspace, which provides hosting services for more that 20 Indymedia sites at
its London facility, complied and turned over the requested servers, effectively
removing those sites from the internet.

I think the Times is now pitching for Kerry. They offer quite a critique on the Bush campaign's miscalculations in the first debate, comparing it with Nixon-Kennedy.

And then there's the long feature in the Sunday magazine, Kerry's Undeclared War:

"Kerry, a former prosecutor, was suggesting that the war, if one could call it that, was, if not winnable, then at least controllable. If mobsters could be chased into the back rooms of seedy clubs, then so, too, could terrorists be sent scurrying for their lives into remote caves where they wouldn't harm us. Bush had continually cast himself as the optimist in the race, asserting that he alone saw the liberating potential of American might, and yet his dark vision of unending war suddenly seemed far less hopeful than Kerry's notion that all of this horror -- planes flying into buildings, anxiety about suicide bombers and chemicals in the subway -- could somehow be made to recede until it was barely in our thoughts."

"Briankle will be sad." So said one of my colleagues at a party last night. Donna got the news out via email...

Here is a brief announcement.

Hmm, here's another one. They characterize deconstruction quite differently!

This slightly longer piece from The Guardian is better.

Kerry gains the upper hand in a debate as significant for its substance as for what it revealed about Bush.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Sidney Blumenthal for salon.com.

After months of flawless execution in a well-orchestrated campaign, President Bush had to stand alone in an unpredictable debate. He had traveled the country, appearing before adoring preselected crowds; delivered a carefully crafted acceptance speech at his convention; and approved tens of millions of dollars in TV attack commercials to belittle his opponent. His much-touted charisma was a reflection of the anxiety and wishful thinking of the people since Sept. 11. In the lead, Bush believed he had only to assert his superiority to end the contest once and for all.

But onstage the incumbent president ran out of programmed talking points. Unable to explain the logic for his policies, or think on his feet, he was thrown back on the raw elements of his personality and leadership, and he revealed even more profound issues than the policies being debated.

Every time he was confronted with ambivalence, his impulse was to sweep it aside. He claimed he must be followed because he is the leader. Fate in the form of Sept. 11 had placed authority in his hands as a man of destiny.