Campaign Blogging

Senator Edwards comments on the loss of high-tech jobs at Lawrence Lessig’s blog. His suggestions: increased emphasis on science education; extending broadband access; increased investment in research and development; fair trade deals; and revamping the tax code to encourage corporations to keep jobs here.
I guess that’s about all the government can do. But with the huge wage differential between domestic and foreign labor, I’m not sure if that will be enough. America needs to remain on the forefront of technological innovation to maintain a robust high-tech sector. And I wish the candidates would talk a little more about that.

Time to Raise the Color-Coded Terror Alert?

FOXNews:

An Al Qaeda Web site is running a warning issued to Muslims to leave Washington D.C., New York City and Los Angeles because of implied imminent terrorist attacks, according to the Middle East Media Research Institute.
Titled “A Warning to Muslims in America,” the directive was issued by the previously unknown “Islamic Bayan Movement” and first ran on the Global Islamic Media Web site on Monday, according to MEMRI, which translated the communiqu�.

I’ve heard reports about these so-called Al Qaeda websites before, but have never dug any up. So going the extra investigative mile, I clicked over to the MEMRI news alert to see the alleged warning.
The alert links to this Yahoo! Group. A Yahoo! Group? Is that the secret pipeline for terrorist communication? Anyway, everything is in Arabic, but according to the MEMRI translation the communiqu�, published November 3, 2003, reads:

“Our Muslim brothers in America, we ask you to immediately leave the following cities: Washington, DC, New York, and Los Angeles. We are serious in our warning. The next few days will prove to you the truth of this warning� To the oppressive rulers of America we say: expect our terms following the first strike of Allah�s believing soldiers” [Koran, Chapter 59, Verse 2-3]

I’m not an expert in these matters, but it seems to me that it would be counterproductive for supposed terrorists to provide a public warning on an imminent attack. On the other hand, it has been over two years since 9/11. And based Al Qaeda’s historical patttern, that suggests we may be due for another terrorist attack–sooner rather than later. We can’t take warnings too lightly these days.

Democratic Candidates on the Death Penalty

The Village Voice’s James Ridgeway summarizes the Democratic candidates’ positions on capital punishment. A rough ranking of the candidates by stated opposition to the death penalty is as follows:

  1. Dennis Kucinich; Carol Moseley Braun; Al Sharpton: oppose it in all circumstances.

  2. Wesley Clark: uneasy about capital punishment, has misgivings about how it’s used.

  3. John Kerry: in favor of capital punishment only in limited cases, such as terrorism; would honor state preferences.

  4. Howard Dean: favors capital punishment only for extreme crimes; would seek a federal Innocence Protection Act.

  5. John Edwards: generally supports the death penalty; favors tightening protections to eliminate wrongful convictions.

  6. Dick Gephardt: has voted against making it easier for death row prisoners to file appeals.

  7. Joe Lieberman: has voted to restrict death row appeals; has voted to enlarge the class of criminals eligible to receive the death penalty.

Via TalkLeft.

A Big Brouhaha

Whew. Maybe we won’t need that Republican National Committee censorship review after all:

Drawing Republican fire over the accuracy of its upcoming mini-series “The Reagans,” CBS appears ready to present a kinder, gentler portrait of the ailing former President Ronald Reagan than originally produced — if the network airs it at all.
Sources close to the production said on Monday CBS is considering canceling the docudrama, slated to air Nov. 16 and 18, under mounting criticism from political conservatives that the two-part series unfairly depicts Reagan and his wife.

I don’t really care about this movie, but it’s interesting observing how people respond to current issues.
Our country recently launched an unprovoked invasion of another nation costing thousands of lives and billions of dollars. And many Americans have raised nary a question about it, even though we’ve found no evidence supporting the alleged justification for the war.
But when a T.V. network proposes to broadcast a partially-fictitious movie on a former president, you’d think from the volume of howling that the entire nation was teetering on the verge of collapse.
A revealing insight into some people’s priorities.