...
John le Carre, put it this way in a (representatively venomous) essay this month in The Times of London: "America has entered one of its periods of historic madness, but this is the worst I can remember."... Does it matter that we've somehow morphed in public perceptions from the world's only superpower to the world's super-rogue state?

Of course it matters.

The macho notion that we'll do what we choose and if the world doesn't like it, it can go [insert expletive here] is both ludicrous and dangerous. We mustn't become slaves to foreign opinion, but neither should we glibly dismiss it as we prepare to launch a war that will hugely aggravate this distemper, which will nurture more terrorism.....while the lack of allied support won't prevent us from getting into a war with Iraq, it may prevent us from getting out. The U.S. sees its role as the globe's SWAT team, but after we have ousted Saddam and whistled for the cleanup crew it's not clear that the allies will want to help. Nor will they pay the bill for this Iraq war as they did the last one. Each time Don Rumsfeld insults Europe, it costs us another $20 billion. ....

The most sensible suggestion for confronting anti-Americanism comes from one prominent American official: "It really depends on how our nation conducts itself in foreign policy. If we're an arrogant nation, they'll resent us. If we're a humble nation, but strong, they'll welcome us." That was George W. Bush in the second presidential debate. He was dead right, back then.

... The most promising solution to America's health care crisis is mandatory insurance. For the same reasons most states require drivers to carry car insurance, the federal government should require all Americans to purchase basic health insurance. Those who cannot afford the full cost should receive public subsidies. Mandatory self-insurance would provide fully portable coverage to all Americans, while lowering insurance costs, raising the quality of care, maintaining a private insurance market and offering citizens more choice.

The grand bargain underlying compulsory health insurance would be universal coverage in exchange for universal responsibility. Of the 41 million Americans without health insurance, a full two-thirds are below the age of 35. Mandating tens of millions of young and relatively healthy Americans to join the insurance risk pool would drive down the costs for everyone. Insured patients are also less likely to rely on expensive hospital emergency rooms for their basic medical care

Tony Blair headed for a council of war with George Bush yesterday with the backing of seven European countries but with EU policy towards Iraq disintegrating into bitterness and division. The Prime Minister is confident that President Bush will agree to delay a war against Iraq for more than a month during their crucial talks over the timescale for military action at the President's Camp David retreat today....But yesterday's "gang of eight" [ 1 Guardian 2 google news 'gang of eight' ]declaration shattered any pretence of consensus. Four EU countries on the United Nations Security Council – France, Germany, the UK and Spain – are in two camps.
The letter was signed by Britain, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Denmark, plus Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, which will join the EU next year. In a significant departure, the former eastern bloc countries were brought in to support the declaration, underlining the Atlanticist credentials of many of the nations that will join the EU next year.

Costas Simitis, the Prime Minister of Greece, which holds the EU's rotating presidency but was left out of the loop, declared that the letter signed by eight nations "does not contribute to a common approach". Greek officials were furious. "Prime Minister Simitis had talks with Tony Blair and [Jose Maria] Aznar [the Spanish premier] in the last few days and nobody informed him," said one official. Mr Simitis heard about the Anglo-Spanish initiative only yesterday when he held talks with one of the signatories, Peter Medgyessy, Hungary's premier.

Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, said that circumstance have changed since the Senate's earlier vote, including the current UN inspection program. Byrd said he has the support of fellow Democratic senators Dianne Feinstein of California, Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, Daniel Inouye of Hawaii, and Paul Sarbanes of Maryland. ...If the administration has evidence that Iraq is hiding weapons, ``We should share it with inspectors today, we should not wait another week,'' Kennedy said.

GWB is going down. History books will mark both Bush presidencies as one term tenures marked by war in the Middle East and crushing financial instability. There's the hard evidence: his poll numbers have been sinking (just like employment figures) and corner men like Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf are saying we need more proof if we even think about going into Iraq. But for me the "oh, damn, he's toast" moment came during a phone call with a long time friend and former roommate. Elaine is a total Sex and the City-style fashion plate who would rather read Lucky than the Week in Review. She's also a recovering Young Republican. But she called me frothing about Bush's plan to give special tax breaks to people who buy SUVs. "I've got to volunteer for the Democrats," she sputtered. "Tell me what to do!!!!"

he prospect of body bags-for-oil will alienate swing voters. So will the administration's looming battle against affirmative action, which may erode their attempts to reach Latino voters, and what the New York Times describes as a war on women--not just against abortion, but also family planning, condoms, and sex education. Then there's that pesky problem of the economy: we can't blame 9/11 forever, and we certainly aren't going to solve the problems facing working- and middle-class families by giving tax cuts to the rich. Bush eked out a victory by convincing just enough women, Americans of color, and working families that he was on their side. But his attempts to appease his religious right and corporate donors are so blatant, it'll be impossible for him to play the same aw-shucks, just-folks role next time around.

Mandela urged the people of the United States to join massive protests against Bush. Mandela called on world leaders, especially those with vetoes in the UN Security Council, to oppose him. "One power with a president who has no foresight and cannot think properly, is now wanting to plunge the world into a holocaust," Mandela told the International Women's Forum. Mandela also criticized Iraq for not co-operating fully with the weapons inspectors and said South Africa would support any action against Iraq that was supported by the United Nations ... "Why is the United States behaving so arrogantly?" he asked. ``All that (Bush) wants is Iraqi oil," he said. He accused Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair of undermining the United Nations and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, who is from Ghana. "Is it because the secretary general of the United Nations is now a black man? They never did that when secretary generals were white," he said...[Mandela] condemned Blair for his strong support of the United States."He is the foreign minister of the United States. He is no longer prime minister of Britain," he said. .

In his speech Tuesday night, President Bush laid out compelling and perhaps even irrefutable proof that Saddam Hussein continues to defy the United Nations and continues to conceal weapons of mass destruction. As the president knows, though, that alone does not warrant war. The only justification for an invasion likely to end in the deaths of thousands -- or even tens of thousands -- of people, many of them innocent women and children, would be self-defense.

And when the president again attempted to make that case Tuesday night, he again faltered.

"IMAGINE those 19 hijackers with other weapons and other plans -- this time armed by Saddam," the president told the American people. "It would take one vial, one canister, one crate slipped into this country to bring a day of horror like none we have ever known. We will do everything in our power to make sure that that day never comes." [emphasis added]

For the president, that chilling paragraph [above] represents the core of his argument for going to war against Iraq. I do not doubt the sincerity of his conviction in that regard. The events of Sept. 11 hit every American hard, but by all accounts the president found them particularly painful, because in his mind they had happened on his watch and were in some way his responsibility....any case for war that relies so heavily on the word "imagine" is fatally flawed.

Imagine.

"If war is forced upon us, we will fight in a just cause and by just means," the president said Tuesday. But the sad truth is, war is not being forced upon us; we are forcing war.

...According to The New York Times, a group of distinguished retired military officers is preparing a legal brief supporting Michigan's affirmative action policies. The military officers have entered the fray because they understand that an adverse Supreme Court ruling in the Michigan case could also force the service academies to dismantle their affirmative action programs. The service academies use the same logic to defend their use of affirmative action in admissions that other major colleges and universities use: They want a diverse student body that reflects the nation. Each year, West Point aims for a class that is 10 to 12 percent African-American but ends up, despite its affirmative action policies, with only 7 to 9 percent African-American representation, Jones said. The service academies have an additional reason for supporting diversity in admissions: With enlisted military ranks disproportionately dependent on racial minorities -- from an Air Force whose enlisted personnel are 28 percent minority to an Army with 44 percent -- an all-white officer corps would hurt morale, military experts say.

Though crowded with proposals for new domestic initiatives, President Bush's State of the Union address Tuesday night underscored how thoroughly his presidency is being shaped and driven by the fierce engine of war....In some ways, the speech had a déja vu quality. Almost all of its themes -- from the focus on tax cuts, Medicare reform and energy independence at home to the warnings to Hussein -- echoed priorities and promises from last year's State of the Union speech.

In the year between, Bush's political strength, though still substantial, has eroded on several fronts.

Though Bush's energetic campaigning helped the GOP widen its lead in the House and seize control of the Senate in last fall's election, the president's approval rating has fallen from more than 80% in January 2002 to 60% or less in a flurry of polls released over the last 10 days.

.... Democrats were scornful, arguing that Mr. Bush was promising the impossible: a war without sacrifice."We're paying for this war by enlarging the deficit, cutting back on health care, cutting back on education, jeopardizing the Social Security and Medicare trust funds," said Representative Charles B. Rangel of New York, the ranking Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee."The economic sacrifice," Mr. Rangel said, "is disproportionately borne by seniors, working Americans and future generations who will have to deal with our debts."
... Mr. Bush might face his greatest political challenge on Medicare, an issue sure to figure prominently in next year's Congressional and presidential elections. His philosophical position, in favor of market-oriented solutions, was not new, but he indicated he would spend more political capital in pushing them through a divided Congress.
He will need to do so: Combining prescription drug benefits with fundamental structural changes in the popular 38-year-old health insurance program makes the task of enacting legislation far more difficult, lawmakers in both parties said.

"Health care reform must begin with Medicare, because Medicare is the binding commitment of a caring society," he said. Mr. Bush said that "seniors happy with the current Medicare system should be able to keep their coverage just the way it is." But at the same time, he said, "all seniors should have the choice of a health care plan that provides prescription drugs." ...

Critics assert that the traditional Medicare structure is too costly to be sustained after baby boomers begin to hit the retirement rolls in 2011. These critics also argue that managed care plans would do a much better job of coordinating care for the elderly. Whether they would do a better job of controlling costs is not clear from the available evidence, researchers say.

But efforts to push Medicare in that direction have, in the past, touched off political firestorms, most memorably in 1995 and 1996, when Democrats used the issue to devastating effect against Speaker Newt Gingrich and other Congressional Republicans.

Opponents maintain that Medicare is a fundamental social pact with the American people, a promise of benefits guaranteed by the government.

They assert that Mr. Bush's plan is a first step toward replacing that promise of guaranteed benefits with a voucher to use in the private health insurance marketplace. Representative Pete Stark of California, the senior Democrat on the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Health, said: "It is clear that President Bush intends to privatize Medicare. He's cleverly using the promise of a meager drug benefit as a bribe to push Medicare beneficiaries into second-rate, low-quality health plans, putting seniors at the mercy of health maintenance organizations and the big drug companies."

``America clearly cannot have economic recovery unless there is economic recovery among everyone of the 50 states,'' ...

Locke ... a preview[ed] ... the Democratic reaction to Bush's address and highlight the party's strategy of criticizing the president's fiscal policy as being too focused on wealthy citizens while doing too little to boost an sluggish economy. U.S. states from California to Maine are suffering the worst fiscal crisis since World War II, according to the National Governors Association. The American Legislative Exchange Council, ... estimates that states are facing a combined budget shortfall of $92 billion through fiscal 2004. ``People are obviously worried about terrorism and Iraq. But those concerns should not overshadow important needs of people here at home,'' Locke said. ``To be strong abroad, we have to be strong at home.''

The general who commanded U.S. forces in the 1991 Gulf War says he hasn't seen enough evidence to convince him that his old comrades Dick Cheney, Colin Powell and Paul Wolfowitz are correct in moving toward a new war now. He thinks U.N. inspections are still the proper course to follow. He's worried about the cockiness of the U.S. war plan, and even more by the potential human and financial costs of occupying Iraq.
And don't get him started on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. "The Rumsfeld thing . . . "When [Rumsfield] makes his comments, it appears that he disregards the Army," Schwarzkopf says. gives the perception when he's on TV that he is the guy driving the train and everybody else better fall in line behind him -- or else." That dismissive posture bothers Schwarzkopf because he thinks Rumsfeld and the people around him lack the background to make sound military judgments by themselves. He prefers the way Cheney operated during the Gulf War. "He didn't put himself in the position of being the decision-maker as far as tactics were concerned, as far as troop deployments, as far as missions were concerned."

... anyone who takes the trouble to look at the numbers knows that the thrill is gone. Mr. Bush's approval ratings have plunged over the last two months. A year ago he was, indeed, immensely popular; right now he's not significantly more popular than he was before Sept. 11.
Other polls suggest that the public is particularly disenchanted with Mr. Bush's economic policy. Most voters no longer believe that his tax cuts are effective at creating jobs, and many also believe that his policies favor the wealthy and large corporations, rather than people like themselves. (Class warfare!) [We've heard much about this term, and it seems to have been eliminated from Bush's current
vocabulary.]
Still, [says Krugman,] polls can shift as they did, suddenly, after Sept. 11. Can tonight's speech do the trick? ...There are several reasons to doubt whether he can pull it off. ... economists outside the administration, even those who always find ways to praise whatever he proposes, can't see what this tax cut has to do with the economy's immediate problems. This has led to a striking dissonance between what administration officials say on TV; where it's still all about jobs; and what they say when speaking to knowledgeable audiences. In background briefings for reporters, at the Davos conference this past weekend and wherever else they encounter people who might actually know something about the numbers, officials now pooh-pooh concerns about the state of the job market. Never mind that, they say, our plan is all about increasing long-run growth. Um, but what about "economic security"?

When President Bush finishes the State of the Union address Tuesday, the Democrats will nudge to center stage a relatively obscure governor from the West to say that the drums of war should not drown out the worst economic crisis in a half-century for state governments.The governor, Gary Locke of Washington, already has a small niche in history as the first Chinese-American to hold a state's highest office. Now he will become one of few governors chosen to give the nationally televised response to the president's message to Congress. .... Governor Locke, the son of Chinese immigrants, grew up in public housing in Seattle and went to Yale, in part, on affirmative action scholarships. So his biography may be more powerful than the message he plans to deliver in a bit more than 10 minutes Tuesday night. Mr. Locke said in an interview that he planned to contrast President Bush's proposal to cut dividend taxes with Democratic plans to "help out everyday people who are struggling."

"Quota."Announcing his opposition to affirmative action policies at the University of Michigan, President Bush used that word several times to describe those policies.The president ought to be ashamed. Michigan's policies are nothing of the sort, and he knows that. ... There are few other matters as delicate or as crucial to the well-being of this democracy as racial equality and harmony across lines of color and ethnicity. A president who would divide the nation in order to stay in power can hardly claim principle as his highest value. ...In his duplicituous dismissal of Michigan's policies, the president huffed that a perfect SAT score only counts for 12 points in a total of 150. What he didn't say is that grades count for 80 points, and that athletic talent gets as many points as being black or Latino -- 20 points. That seems to track the 1978 Bakke ruling, which allows consideration of race as long as it is not a significant factor....By that logic, the U.S. Senate and the Oval Office have a quota of zero for African-Americans. If you analyze the history of both institutions, you will find that the Oval Office has never had a black occupant and the U.S. Senate usually does not. Who will file the lawsuit protesting the quota system in the highest levels of national politics?

Ridiculous? So is the president's claim that the University of Michigan uses a quota system.