Misc. Postings (page 2)


"Regarding the "faith" based initiative, the following posting makes very interesting reading. It looks as if the progressive wing of the Christian churches are going to have to work fast to get in touch with progressives in Congress to get them to step back and take another look. Also progressives with name recognition need to get in touch with the press and let them know that this proposal does not meet with approval across the board,"

Carolyn Scarr
====================

CIA Think Tank to Head Bush Religion Initiative

"The NY Times article below describes the two men Bush is putting in charge of his religion plan, John J. DiIulio Jr. and Stephen Goldsmith. Both men are senior fellows of the CIA's Manhattan Institute and are colleagues of Charles Murray, author of the classic text of scientific racism, The Bell Curve. Most of Bush's advisors are also associated with the Bell Curve. As just one of many examples, Murray was a consultant on Tommy Thompsons' Wisconsin Welfare Reform program, which Bush will make the national model.

"Following the Times article you will find quotes from the NY Times and the Manhattan Institute's own website to substantiate the CIA origin of the Manhattan Institute, its influence on GW Bush and its very close decade-long association with Charles Murray, who wrote The Bell Curve while a research fellow at The Manhattan Institute.

"Whether you are a fundamentalist Christian, an Orthodox Jew, a devout Muslim or an atheist you might question what part the CIA rightfully has in a multi-billion dollar "religion initiative" or in any domestic US policy decisions. The best known modern example of government sponsored religion-based initiatives is Nazi Germany."

Robert Lederman, artistpres@aol.com

For numerous detailed articles expanding on the connection between GW Bush, the CIA and former Nazis see: http://Baltech.org/lederman/spray/

NY Times January 29, 2001
New Bush Office Seeks Closer Ties to Church Groups
By FRANK BRUNI and LAURIE GOODSTEIN

WASHINGTON, Jan. 28 – President Bush has selected a University of Pennsylvania professor of political science to head the first federal office intended to promote the integration of religious groups into federally financed social services, several Bush advisers said today.

The advisers said the opening of the office and the appointment of John J. DiIulio Jr. to fill it would almost certainly be announced at a White House event on Monday, and they acknowledged that it would draw heated opposition from organizations and religious groups that advocate a strict separation of church and state.

But the encouragement and government financing of faith-based programs was a signature campaign issue for Mr. Bush, who has said he reads the Bible every day. And the decision to entrust the new federal office in charge of that effort to Mr. DiIulio, a widely published expert on juvenile crime with impressive academic credentials, is an example of the political caution with which the Bush administration will proceed.

The choice of Mr. DiIulio, in fact, is only one of several ways in which Mr. Bush and his aides are trying to blunt any impression that what the president is doing amounts to an evangelical endeavor.

"John is a social scientist who believes in empirical evidence," said one Bush adviser, stressing Mr. DiIulio's focus on provable results from faith-based social programs that address problems like substance abuse, youth violence and teenage pregnancy. The adviser also emphasized that Mr. DiIulio does not see faith-based programs "as a panacea," but rather as one arrow in a quiver with plenty of others.

In addition to Mr. DiIulio, the other central figure in the effort is Stephen Goldsmith, the former mayor of Indianapolis who was the chief domestic policy adviser for Mr. Bush's presidential campaign.

Several Bush advisers said Mr. Goldsmith would be the chairman of a new national advisory board whose work will complement that of the new federal office. Mr. Goldsmith will also serve as an official adviser to Mr. Bush on the issue.

Mr. Bush and his aides do not want the proposals related to faith-based programs that they unveil to seem too driven by religion. Indeed, the president's goal is to find new ways for the federal government to encourage private charities – including but not limited to religious groups – to provide more social services.

To that end, the title of the new federal office will allude not just to faith-based programs but also to community initiatives, although several advisers said the order in which the words "faith" and "community" would be placed was under debate.

Additionally, Mr. Bush has invited not only leaders of faith-based groups but also the heads of other not-for-profit organizations to meet on Monday morning at the White House to kick off a week of events intended to describe and promote the president's vision.

The guest list, according to one of the people on it, includes the Rev. Stephen E. Burger, executive director of the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions; Sara E. Meléndez, president and chief executive officer of Independent Sector, a coalition of nonprofit organizations and foundations; and Millard Fuller, founder and president of Habitat for Humanity International, the ecumenical house-building group.

"It is about faith-based institutions, but it's also about more than that," said another Bush adviser, referring to Mr. Bush's plan to encourage private groups to administer more of the kinds of local programs often provided by government.

A more thorough integration of faith-based and other not-for-profit groups into federally financed social services is a cornerstone of compassionate conservatism, a political philosophy with which Mr. Bush has strongly identified himself.

Compassionate conservatism holds that while the government should limit the scope of the social services it provides, it should take an active role as a catalyst and source of financing for work done by neighborhood and religious groups.

Mr. Bush has said some of the groups with the best results for rehabilitating prisoners or fighting drug abuse are ones that take religious and spiritual approaches. He has also said the government should not hesitate to give money to these groups, as long as secular groups that provide similar services are also available.

There are signs that these initiatives may elicit bipartisan support. This morning, on the ABC News program "This Week," Representative Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, the House minority leader, signaled interest in Mr. Bush's approach.

The Bush administration will roll out these initiatives with the utmost care, under the guidance of Mr. DiIulio, who is Catholic, and Mr. Goldsmith, who is Jewish.

Although both are well liked by religious conservatives, neither is an ideological lightning rod like Marvin Olasky, another proponent of faith- based programs and compassionate conservatism. Mr. Olasky was with Mr. Goldsmith and Mr. DiIulio at a long meeting with Mr. Bush in Austin, Tex., nearly two years ago.

"It's not just that we're paying attention to the politics of it," one of the Bush advisers said. "We're paying attention to the pragmatics of it. I think we're doing it right, and I think we're going to be careful about it."

Mr. DiIulio's résumé makes him seem like a personification of Mr. Bush's attempts to retain the support of religious conservatives while also courting moderates and building a broad base of support.

He is a fellow at both the Manhattan Institute, which is a conservative think tank, and the Brookings Institute, which is not. In a two-month period in the summer of 1999, he wrote major articles for The Weekly Standard, a conservative publication, and for The New Democrat, a moderate one. He identifies himself as a new Democrat.

Mr. DiIulio has also done extensive work with black pastors in urban areas, and one of the Bush administration's hopes is that its advocacy of faith-based programs will be a bridge to black ministers and win some support with the Congressional Black Caucus.

Mr. Bush garnered the support of about 9 percent of black voters in the presidential election and has been reaching out aggressively to African- Americans ever since. This morning, he, his wife, Laura, and his parents attended a Methodist church here with a predominantly black congregation.

For years, Mr. DiIulio, who taught at Princeton before the University of Pennsylvania, was known more for his work on criminal justice issues than on his interest in faith-based programs. He was among the voices loudly advocating increased prison construction in the early 1990's and wrote a 1996 book about the war against crime, "Body Count," with John P. Walters and William J. Bennett, the former education secretary and drug czar.

Mr. Goldsmith, a former prosecutor, was a two-term mayor in Indianapolis who privatized everything from golf course construction to sewage treatment and showed an interest in revitalizing long-neglected inner-city neighborhoods. Late in his second term, he started the Front Porch Alliance, a group that acted as a liaison between religious congregations – mostly urban African -American churches – and government.

For his work with churches, Mr. Goldsmith, a Republican, was lauded by many evangelical Christian leaders. But some Jewish leaders said they were nervous about an approach that redirects tax dollars to churches.

"There's a lot of respect for Stephen Goldsmith," said Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. "Many in the Jewish community know him and respect him, but any time you have a formal government endorsement of religion that this faith -based office conveys, that takes us down a path that too often in our history has turned out to be disastrous for religious freedom and religious tolerance."


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NY Times Monday, May 12, 1997

Turning Intellect Into Influence Promoting Its Ideas, the Manhattan Institute Has Nudged New York Rightward.
"Currently housed in an unprepossessing warren on the second floor of a building near Grand Central Terminal, the institute was founded as a free-market education and research organization by William Casey, who then went off to head the Central Intelligence Agency in the Reagan Administration."


NY Times June 12, 2000
Bush Culls Campaign Theme From Conservative Thinkers 3Gov.

George W. Bush has said his political views have been shaped by the work of Myron Magnet of the Manhattan Institute.2


From the MI website: Books That Influenced Gov. George W. Bush Myron Magnet's The Dream and the Nightmare: "Referring to this book, Gov. Bush has said, other than the Bible, that it was the most important book he had read..."


"Education and Welfare: Meeting the Challenge
A Message from CCI Chairman, Mayor Stephen Goldsmith
 [CCI is a division of Manhattan Institute]
America is in the midst of an urban renaissance...CCI1s April conference 3Next Steps in Welfare Reform2 highlighted just how far we1ve come. The conference brought together public officials like Wisconsin Governor Tommy Thompson and scholars like Dr. Charles Murray to discuss how governments and private groups have reduced dependency and increased self-sufficiency ...Fifteen years after the Manhattan Institute published Charles Murray1s landmark study of American welfare policy, Losing Ground, the presentations showed that ideas once seen as radical now form the mainstream of the welfare debate."


From an announcement on the MI website, http://www.manhattan-institute.org/
Center for Civic Innovation Welfare Conference Held at the Manhattan Institute Topic: 3Next Steps in Welfare Reform.2 Participants: [a partial list] Charles Murray (Author of Losing Ground; American Enterprise Institute), Jason Turner (Commissioner, NYC Human Resources Administration) April 14, 1999 New York, New York


[Among the panelists alongside Murray and Goldsmith was Jason Turner, former head of Wisconsin's welfare program. Turner later became infamous as head of NYC's abusive workfare system after quoting the motto over the gates of Auschwitz – "Arbeit Macht Frei – work shall make you free" [see: NY Times 6/27/98].


"Thus inwardly armed with confidence in God and the unshakable stupidity of the voting citizenry, the politicians can begin the fight for the 'remaking' of the Reich as they call it." –Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf Vol. 2 Chapter 1


"Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion must be derived from faith . . . we need believing people." [Adolf Hitler, April 26, 1933, from a speech made during negotiations leading to the Nazi-Vatican Concordant of 1933]


"We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don't want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members." –From Margaret Sanger's 12/19/39 letter to Dr. Clarence Gamble, Milton, Massachusetts. Original source: Sophia Smith Collection, Smith College, North Hampton, Massachusetts. Also described in Linda Gordon's Woman's Body, Woman's Right: A Social History of Birth Control in America, Grossman Publishers, 1976. Also, see Sanger's Birth Control Review, http://www.hli.org/issues/pp/bcreview/index.html


Village Voice 8/8/2000
Uncle Shrub's Cabin

"Absent in the sticky Philadelphia heat was the drumbeat of the fire-breathing, nay-saying Christian Right. In its place, singing the praises of the Jesus -influenced candidate and following a script laid out by the Manhattan Institute...the social scientists from the Manhattan Institute rolled out their charts and reported that kids who go to church in poor neighborhoods do fewer drugs and thus, churches, mosques, and synagogues "should be supported as uniquely qualified agencies of social control that matter a great deal in the lives of adolescents in America's most disorganized and impoverished communities."


Manhattan Institute, http://www.manhattan-institute.org/

Bell Curve, http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45/049.html, http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45/022.html

Robert Lederman

For articles about Bush, West Nile Virus, Mayor Giuliani, The Manhattan Institute and Eugenics see: http://Baltech.org/lederman/spray/


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 9, 2001
CONTACT: Andrew Lichterman or Jackie Cabasso (510) 839-5877

U.S. PLANS FOR NEW, WARFIGHTING
USES OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS REVEALED

Documents Obtained under Freedom of Information Act Show
National Ignition Facility to Host "laser/fireball" Tunnel Tests

OAKLAND, CA — Department of Defense (DOD) plans obtained by the Western States Legal Foundation through the Freedom of Information Act reveal that the U.S. is conducting research to make nuclear weapons more useable against a variety of targets. This work is continuing despite U.S. claims in international treaty fora that it is de-emphasizing its nuclear arsenal.

            According to the DOD’s “Defense Science and Technology and Strategy and Plans,” dated February 2000, the U.S. is actively pursuing research to develop lowyield nuclear weapons effective against underground targets. A stated goal for 2001 is to “Demonstrate the effectiveness of nuclear weapons capabilities in defeating deep structures using precise, lowyield attacks by HE [High Explosives] simulation.”

            The documents were made public by the Western States Legal Foundation (WSLF), an Oaklandbased public interest group critical of U.S. nuclear weapons policy. WSLF Program Director Andrew Lichterman explained: “These plans make clear that the U.S. ‘Stockpile Stewardship’ program, portrayed to the public as designed solely to preserve the existing stockpile, is part of a continuing effort to expand the role of nuclear weapons in warfare.”

            One project DOD plans is to “conduct laser/fireball test in National Ignition Facility (NIF) to improve understanding intunnel airblast.” The NIF is also slated to be used for “nuclear effects xray testing.” Now under construction at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, the NIF has been criticized for its multibillion dollar price tag and questionable scientific merit.

            Lichterman concluded: “The opportunity to escape the constant threat of nuclear destruction, which arrived with the end of the Cold War, is slipping away. The U.S. is preparing to continue the nuclear arms race into the 21st century. It’s time for a real national debate on these issues before it is too late.”

            The U.S. committed itself to “a diminishing role for nuclear weapons in security policies to minimize the risk that these weapons will ever be used and to facilitate the process of their total elimination,” earlier this year at the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference. That commitment was reaffirmed in a November 20, 2000 United Nations General Assembly vote.

            Citations and additional details from DOD’s “Defense Science and Technology Strategy and Plans” are available from Western States Legal Foundation on request.

# # #



Institute for Public Accuracy
915 National Press Building, Washington, D.C. 20045
(202) 347-0020 * * E-mail

___________________________________________________

For Immediate Release:
1 PM Eastern Time -- Friday, December 22, 2000

Critics Blast Treasury Secretary
For Comments on Debt Relief


            WASHINGTON -- Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers faced criticism today for derogatory comments about a U.S. congressional commission's call for the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to use their resources to cancel 100 percent of their debt claims against poor countries.

            Speaking at the National Press Club on Thursday afternoon, Summers said that full implementation of recommendations made by the bipartisan Meltzer Commission -- which urged cancellation of all the debts of the world's poorest countries -- "would do very serious damage to the economic and financial interests of the United States, and would in a meaningful and important way undermine the prospects for successful economic development around the world."

            But today, some analysts blasted the treasury secretary's comments as a smokescreen for policy prescriptions that continue to give low priority to reducing global poverty.

            "The majority of the poor countries that have been approved for 'debt relief' under the initiative supported by Secretary Summers will still pay more in debt service than they will spend on health care," said Robert Naiman, senior policy analyst at the Center for Economic and Policy Research. "At least one country, Zambia, will pay more in debt service after 'debt relief' than it was paying before."

            The limited debt-relief plan favored by Summers "won't actually deliver the benefits which have been promised in terms of ending the debt crisis, reducing poverty, and increasing access to primary health care and education," Naiman said. He faulted the Clinton administration for "defending the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to the hilt, supporting their disastrous interventions in Asia, Russia, Brazil, Turkey and Argentina, so New York banks could collect on their bad loans."

            Institute for Public Accuracy communications director Sam Husseini, whose questions about debt relief at Thursday's briefing prompted Summers' remarks, said today: "It was obvious from his responses that, at the end of the Clinton administration, U.S. policies continue to give much higher priority to maximizing the profits of Western bankers than reducing global poverty, contrary to the generous veneer of 'debt relief.'"

***


For further information:

* Robert Naiman, E-mail, Website

* Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020, E-mail, Website

A transcript of the Summers briefing is posted at: www.accuracy.org

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