January 20, 2008

The Honorable John R. Edwards
410 Market Street
Suite 400
Chapel Hill, NC 27516

Dear Senator Edwards:

It was good meeting with you yesterday and discussing my father’s legacy. On the day when the nation will honor my father, I wanted to follow up with a personal note.

There has been, and will continue to be, a lot of back and forth in the political arena over my father’s legacy. It is a commentary on the breadth and depth of his impact that so many people want to claim his legacy. I am concerned that we do not blur the lines and obscure the truth about what he stood for: speaking up for justice for those who have no voice.

I appreciate that on the major issues of health care, the environment, and the economy, you have framed the issues for what they are - a struggle for justice. And, you have almost single-handedly made poverty an issue in this election.

You know as well as anyone that the 37 million people living in poverty have no voice in our system. They don’t have lobbyists in Washington and they don’t get to go to lunch with members of Congress. Speaking up for them is not politically convenient. But, it is the right thing to do.

I am disturbed by how little attention the topic of economic justice has received during this campaign. I want to challenge all candidates to follow your lead, and speak up loudly and forcefully on the issue of economic justice in America.

From our conversation yesterday, I know this is personal for you. I know you know what it means to come from nothing. I know you know what it means to get the opportunities you need to build a better life. And, I know you know that injustice is alive and well in America, because millions of people will never get the same opportunities you had.

I believe that now, more than ever, we need a leader who wakes up every morning with the knowledge of that injustice in the forefront of their minds, and who knows that when we commit ourselves to a cause as a nation, we can make major strides in our own lifetimes. My father was not driven by an illusory vision of a perfect society. He was driven by the certain knowledge that when people of good faith and strong principles commit to making things better, we can change hearts, we can change minds, and we can change lives.

So, I urge you: keep going. Ignore the pundits, who think this is a horserace, not a fight for justice. My dad was a fighter. As a friend and a believer in my father’s words that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, I say to you: keep going. Keep fighting. My father would be proud.

Sincerely,

Martin L. King, III

U2 - “MLK” (live)

A fan video of the studio version is here. There are also some great a capella choral versions of this song (I performed one years back), but none with good sound quality that I could find online.

I can see Wolf Blitzer lying. Lord knows he strays from the facts often enough! But Jack Cafferty? Now that’s a let-down! I don’t really follow John King enough to know where he stands. But the following is telling.

Per MediaMatters:

Using common sense and a little humor, Barbara Ehrenreich, (The Nation), brings clarity to our current economic situation and congress’ poor handling of it.

With all the talk about how to stimulate it, you’d think that the economy is a giant clitoris. Ben Bernanke may not employ this imagery, but the immediate challenge–and the issue bound to replace Iraq and immigration in the presidential race–is how best to get the economy engorged and throbbing again.

It would be irresponsible to say much about Bush’s stimulus plan, the mere mention of which could be enough to send the Nikkei, the DAX, and the curiously named FTSE and Sensex tumbling into the crash zone again. In a typically regressive gesture, Bush proposed to hand out cash tax rebates–except to families earning less than $40,000 a year. This may qualify as an example of what Naomi Klein calls “disaster capitalism,” in which any misfortune can be re-jiggered to the advantage of the affluent.

Reading this gave me a renewed sense of hope. And it put a smile on my face. I may have giggled a little bit too!

If the man really is guilty of everything Bush and the prosecution alleges, then they should have brought forth evidence. They didn’t though. And probably because it really doesn’t exist.

Jose Padilla Sentenced to 17 Years in Prison

Justice Dept. Pushed for Life Sentence for Alleged Dirty Bomb Plotter

Jose Padilla, who was detained as an enemy combatant for 3 1/2 years for allegedly plotting to set off a radioactive “dirty bomb,” was sentenced today to just over 17 years in prison on separate terrorism-related charges in Miami.

The sentence marks another major setback in a terrorism prosecution for the Justice Department, which had urged U.S. District Judge Marcia Cooke to sentence Padilla to life in prison for being part of an extremist cell that gave support to al-Qaeda and other Islamic militant groups.
[...]

Padilla, a U.S. citizen, was arrested returning to the United States at O’Hare International Airport in 2002 and was soon designated an enemy combatant by President Bush. The case was announced at the time with great fanfare by then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft and other Bush administration officials, who portrayed Padilla as a dangerous and high-ranking al-Qaeda operative who was working on a plot to detonate a “dirty bomb” inside the United States.
[...]

Defense attorneys said Padilla and the other defendants were working to provide humanitarian aid to persecuted Muslims in other parts of the world. Federal prosecutors, on the other hand, portrayed them as willing participants in efforts to spread “violent jihad.”

The right’s white knight just kinda fizzled out all over the place.

Fred Thompson Quits Presidential Race

NAPLES, Fla. — Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson quit the Republican presidential race on Tuesday, after a string of poor finishes in early primary and caucus states.

“Today, I have withdrawn my candidacy for president of the United States. I hope that my country and my party have benefited from our having made this effort,” Thompson said in a statement.

Thompson’s fate was sealed last Saturday in the South Carolina primary, when he finished third in a state that he had said he needed to win.

In the statement, Thompson did not say whether he would endorse any of his former rivals. He was one of a handful of members of Congress who supported Arizona Sen. John McCain in 2000 in his unsuccessful race against George W. Bush for the party nomination.

- “Separate lines for men and women at supermarkets.”
- “Supermarkets and shops fined if they let men and women use the same lines at checkout counters.”

America’s future under a Huckabee presidency? Well, not at first. But at some point, I’m sure. No, this refers to strict new rules being enforced by Malaysia’s northern state of Kelantan.

All over America Christian conservatives are green with envy.

The Federal Reserve cut a key U.S. interest rate by three-quarters of a percentage point this morning, responding to a broad global sell-off of stocks and a growing sense of crisis in financial markets with a surprise policy move.
[...]

In a press release accompanying announcement of the rate cut, the Fed said it had taken the move because “incoming information” showed that a downturn in the U.S. housing market was growing worse, unemployment had begun to rise, and the overall economy was weakening.