New York's 24th District Independent

Arcuri Thinks The Goal Is For Him To Get Money

2010-10-13T17:55:00.003-04:00

The Michael Arcuri re-election team sent me yet another campaign fundraising email today. I'm getting several of these a week now, and they've really been bothering me, because Congressman Arcuri seems happy to ask for my vote, but he never tells me why I ought to vote for him. Apparently, he thinks that I'll just watch his TV commercials for information.

This afternoon's email sums up quite well what the Mike Arcuri for Congress campaign has become all about: Money. There's no policy content in the email, just this:

"I wanted to forward you this email I just received from my finance director. It looks like we're just $6,700 away from hitting our goal."

Our goal? Our goal? Does Representative Arcuri really think that I share with him the goal of helping him to collect big wads of money? No, Mr. Arcuri, it is not our goal for you to take my money. That's your goal.

You know what my goal is? It's to get a member of Congress who will support climate legislation, and support real health care reform, and oppose anti-Muslim scapegoating, and defend my constitutional rights.

Re-electing Mike Arcuri to Congress doesn't do anything to satisfy my goal. Arcuri has turned out to be a right wing Blue Dog Democrat, so consistently in league with the Republican Party in the House of Representatives that he might as well have the letters GOP tatooed on his forehead.

As far as I'm concerned, Congressman Arcuri can take his goal and shove it.

Arcuri Gives Rotten Labor Day With Opposition To Health Care Reform

2010-09-07T11:31:00.003-04:00

Yesterday, our Blue Dog Congressman, Mike Arcuri, sent out a Labor Day message in which he posed as a friend of workers:

"On today, Labor Day, I am reminded of all the sacrifices made by workers here in Upstate New York. I am proud to come from the first state to celebrate Labor Day, back in 1882, and the first state to introduce a bill to make the first Monday in September a workers' holiday. Our country has changed a lot since that first workers' parade in New York City, but the challenges that working people face remain the same..."

... which is why Michael Arcuri opposed health care reform. Sure.

How can Representative Arcuri expect us to believe that he's an ally of working Americans, when he sided with big insurance companies to try to block better access to medical care for workers?

Arcuri Isn't Helping Effort To Lower Taxes, Cut Spending

2010-05-22T11:01:00.002-04:00

Sometimes, a piece of legislation makes so much sense, it's mind-boggling that any member of Congress would withhold support for it. But then, Congressman Mike Arcuri has a special knack for withholding support for worthy causes. This week, he's at it again.

Imagine there was a bill that would:

- reduce the federal budget deficit by 16 billion dollars per year
- totally eliminate federal income tax on the first $35,000 of income for all Americans (the first $70,000 for married couples)
- reduce wasteful government spending

Sounds great, doesn't it? Well, brace yourself: Such a piece of legislation, H.R. 5353, actually exists in the U.S. Congress. It was introduced recently by U.S. Representative Alan Grayson, who's a Democrat. The bill has the support of both Democrats and Republicans, however.

Michael Arcuri is not among those who who support H.R. 5353. Why the heck not? If we can't count on Congressman Arcuri to support even a bill like this one, what on earth can we count on him for?

Arcuri Won't Oppose Offshore Drilling

2010-05-21T06:26:00.005-04:00

In 2006, Democratic voters here in the 24th congressional district of New York nominated Mike Arcuri to be their party's candidate to the House of Representatives. Of course, they didn't have a choice - national party leaders had interfered in the primary election process, pushing other candidates out of the way for the sake of Arcuri, who was supposed to be "electable".

Now, four years later, we have a long record that shows what "electable" really meant. It meant that Congressman Michael Arcuri isn't really much of a Democrat. Over and over again, when the chips were down on really important issues, such as climate change, constitutional rights, and health care reform, Representative Arcuri has voted with the Republican Party, against the wishes of Democratic voters in our district.

Now, as we watch the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico get worse and worse and worse, Congressman Arcuri is springing into inaction again. There's a great bill that's been introduced by real Democrats in the House of Representatives - Democrats who aren't afraid to protect America's coasts from environmental disaster. It's H.R. 5248, the No New Drilling Act. The authors of this legislation rationally look at the huge economic and environmental disaster caused by offshore drilling, and say, "Hey, let's not do that again. Let's put a moratorium on offshore drilling."

Mike Arcuri? He won't sign on to the bill. Once again, Arcuri won't support a good Democratic solution to a national crisis. Why should Democratic voters support Arcuri in another election?

Mike Arcuri Impotent At Passing Legislation

2010-05-20T07:11:00.004-04:00

Open Congress, a legislative social networking site, presents a disturbing statistic about our U.S. Representative Mike Arcuri. Arcuri, it seems, is legislatively impotent.

Michael Arcuri can't seem to make allies in the House of Representatives very effectively. Perhaps his membership in the right wing Blue Dog Coalition is part of the problem, alienating Arcuri from his Democratic colleagues.

Whatever the cause, even though Congressman Arcuri's own political party is in the majority, Arcuri hasn't been able to get a single bill in the current session of Congress passed into actual law.

Sure, Arcuri has offered a few procedural motions and toothless resolutions, and those have gotten votes. These are nothing but pieces of paper, however - not laws that actually help people in our district or in the USA as a whole.

For example, Representative Arcuri introduced H.Res. 692, a resolution supporting the goals of Tay Sachs Month. That sounds great, until you look at what the resolution actually does: Nothing. It doesn't provide funding, or any other form of tangible government support, to deal with Tay Sachs disease. It's just a congressional press release. That's all.

Arcuri has spent his time offering a great number of procedural bills that do nothing more than "providing for the consideration of" legislation written by other, more competent, members of Congress. It's like Arcuri is serving as bat boy to U.S. Representatives who really know how to get things done.

My favorite "accomplishment" of Congressman Arcuri in this term of Congress is his H. Con. Res. 133. It's a motion providing for an adjournment of Congress. That pretty much sums up Mike Arcuri's congressional career.

In 2010, it's time that Arcuri adjourns his stand as New York's 24th district representative for good.

Mike Arcuri Against Health Care Reform

2010-03-22T05:44:00.003-04:00

What will it take for the Democratic voters of New York's 24th congressional district to wake up and realize that Congressman Mike Arcuri is a stealth Republican? Maybe last night's vote by Arcuri to vote against Barack Obama's health care reform legislation will do the trick.

This right wing Blue Dog keeps on voting like a Republican. Why doesn't he just switch parties, and run in the Republican primary if he likes that party's policies so much?

The Working Families Party now seems ready to finally peel itself off from the bottom of the Democratic Party's boot heel, and look for a new candidate to run against Michael Arcuri. Epidemiologist Les Roberts seems like a good choice - perhaps for a Green Party line run as well?

Mike Arcuri Votes For Patriot Act Extension Without Reforms

2010-03-01T02:54:00.003-05:00

Just when you think that Congressman Mike Arcuri can't sink any lower, he... well, he sinks lower.

You didn't see anything about this in the local newspaper when it happened, but facts are facts:

Michael Arcuri has voted in favor of extending the Patriot Act without any reforms

.

There were some brave Democrats who stood against the infamous law, which enables government snooping into our private records, and surveillance of us without the protections the Constitution guarantees. Representative Arcuri was not among them.

Representative Arcuri voted to prolong some of the worst abuses begun under George W. Bush. Why not call Arcuri a Bush Democrat?

Tompkins County Green Party Meeting Tonight

2009-09-03T10:45:00.002-04:00

In terms of surface area, most of Tompkins County is in the 24th congressional district. So, it's worth noting that, tonight at the Tompkins County Public Library in Ithaca, in the Borg Warner Room from 6:15 til 8:15, the Tompkins County Green Party will be having its monthly meeting.

On the agenda:

- Candidates update
- State committee delegates news
- Antiwar activism
- GLBT activism
- Student outreach
- Voter registration

If you're a registered Tompkins County Green, or are interested in becoming one, you're welcome to attend.

Michael Arcuri is a PAC Pet

2009-08-04T14:04:00.004-04:00

Just who does U.S. Representative Michael Arcuri owe his allegiance to? The fundraising statistics for Acuri's 2010 re-election campaign so far don't look good for those of us who live in his district.

Congressman Arcuri has raised $101,555 in campaign donations from individuals so far. That may sound like a lot of money, but it's much, much smaller than the amount Arcuri has received from political action committees.

Mike Arcuri has taken $344,170 from PACs in order to fund his 2010 campaign - well over three times the amount he's gotten from individuals. The Arcuri for Congress campaign in 2010 looks to be a top-down enterprise, backed by insider interests, not the people Arcuri is supposed to represent.

Tompkins County Green Party Re-Energizes

2009-07-24T19:18:00.002-04:00

The Democrats of New York's 24th congressional district are facing the birth of a new political reality that ought to alter their calculations of their party's conceptual positioning. The question is whether they realize it's the case.

The new reality is the alienation of the political left. At the height of Democratic victory, progressives are realizing that the Democratic Party has never intended to speak to their interests. All the promises of liberal reform from the last eight years are being exposed as crass manipulation used to bring the Democrats back into the centers of power.

The Blue Dog Coalition, of which Michael Arcuri is an enthusiastic member, represents the sort of Republican-lite ideology which is alienating increasing numbers of Democratic voters. The Republicans themselves cannot gain the attention of these disenchanted voters, given the way that the Republicans have abused the public's trust so conspicuously, for so long.

So, who can step into this breach, to take advantage of this political moment? In the 24th District, the Green Party may be doing so.

This week, sensing the opportunity created by the Democrats' disappointment, the Green Party of Tompkins County has re-organized, electing new officers and endorsing two candidates for local office in 2009. Most of Tompkins County is in Mike Arcuri's congressional district.

Will the Green Party challenge Arcuri from the left in 2010? Wait and see...

Arcuri Opposes Solid Science For Mustang Management

2009-07-20T13:52:00.003-04:00

I cannot for the life of me understand why Congressman Michael Arcuri has voted against H. R. 1018, the Restore Our American Mustangs Act.

It can't be for the sake of fiscal responsibility. The fiscally responsible way to manage government programs, after all, is to conduct rigorous scientific studies, so that government spending can be applied in the most efficient way possible.

That's just what the Restore Our American Mustangs Act will do when it becomes law. Yet, Mike Arcuri voted against it.

Representative Arcuri voted against a scientific analysis to determine the most efficient method for managing America's wild horse populations. Instead, Arcuri voted to preserve the current system: Round up a bunch of mustangs, keep them in corrals for a while, and then shoot them in the head.

Tompkins County Green Party Meeting This Tuesday!

2009-07-19T20:48:00.004-04:00

The Tompkins County Green Party will be meeting this coming Tuesday, July 21 at 7:00 PM in Stewart Park in Ithaca, near the large pavilion. It's a great place for a green political meeting, given the beautiful outdoor location, and the availability of playground equipment for those Greens who might want to bring their kids.

All registered Green Party voters from Tompkins County are encouraged to attend. Those who are interested in re-registering Green are welcome as well.

The Tompkins Greens will be electing officers and setting an agenda for the coming year, which includes supporting local candidates for public office. Could it also include a Green Party challenge to Congressman Michael Arcuri in 2010?

Geographically, about 80 percent of Tompkins County is in Mike Arcuri's congressional district. Watch your left, Congressman Arcuri. Watch your left.

Mike Arcuri Helps The Rich, Votes Against The Rest

2009-07-04T19:41:00.004-04:00

Congressman Mike Arcuri talks a lot about working to help ordinary working people in our district, but talk is easy. What's the truth about the Arcuri record? The sad truth about Representative Arcuri's true priorities is shown in terms of how he dealt with two different pieces of economic legislation.

The first piece of legislation helps everyday homeowners who work for a living. H.R. 1106, The Helping Families Save Their Homes Act, has been passed by the House, but not yet by the Senate. The bill, if it becomes law, will allow bankruptcy judges to work to restructure mortgage payments so that banks can continue to get money, and people can continue to stay in their homes. The fact is that rich people have had the power to make these very arrangements for mortgages on their vacation homes, and debts on their yachts, but ordinary working Americans aren't allowed the same opportunity.

Michael Arcuri voted against the Helping Families Save Their Homes Act. Arcuri told middle class homeowners that, in the middle of a deepening economic recession, he won't give them any help.

Congressman Arcuri has a very different standard for the wealthy. A few weeks ago, Arcuri himself wrote a bill to help out wealthy investors. H. R. 2798, the Support Investment Protection for Customers Reform Act of 2009, authorizes the government to provide an extra one and a half billion dollars to wealthy investors through the Securities Investor Protection Corporation.

If you're a rich investor who's lost a some money because of the recession, Congressman Arcuri will not only cosponsor a bill for you and vote for it, he'll actually write the legislation to serve your needs. If you're an average working homeowner hit by hard economic times, Michael Arcuri won't write the bill to help you out. He won't cosponsors a bill to help you out. He won't even cast a vote for you.

Why should the homeowners of New York's 24th congressional district support the re-election of Congressman Arcuri in 2010, when he won't support them?

Mike Arcuri Orwellian About Big Oil

2009-07-03T09:57:00.003-04:00

Representative Michael Arcuri has become a master of doublespeak, and on no issue is Arcuri's Orwellian approach more evident than with the environment. Arcuri calls himself a friend of the environment, but he just voted against taking action to deal with the costly consequences of climate change. He helped Big Oil, promoting the same old dirty energy track that America took during the disastrous years of Bush and Cheney.

Arcuri's services to Big Oil are nothing new. During the previous session in Congress, Arcuri voted to help out Big Oil too, but when campaign season came along, he described himself as a brave crusader standing up against the fossil fuel giants. One of his campaign advertisements last year announced,

"For too long, big oil special interests have blocked any efforts to reduce our dependence on oil. I'm Michael Arcuri. My priority's helping middle class families, not big oil companies.... I fought to expand domestic drilling, so we can bring down these gas prices. I'm Mike Arcuri and I approve this message because you sent me to Washington to get something done for a change."

Helping middle class families? By expanding offshore oil drilling? That's not fighting Big Oil - it's exactly what Big Oil wanted.

What's Congressman Arcuri going to tell us next - that he's fighting against corrupt pharmaceutical corporations by working to keep generic drugs off the market? Michael Arcuri seems to think that his constituents can't tell when he's speaking out of both sides of his mouth. For our sake, I hope he's wrong.

Arcuri Won't Support Conyers Commission

2009-07-02T11:26:00.002-04:00

A resident of the 24th district that I know, a sincere progressive, has voted for Michael Arcuri both in 2006 and 2008. He dislikes Representative Arcuri's Blue Dog right wing slant as much as I do, but he has kept on holding out hope that adding another vote to the Democratic majority in Congress will help to bring about progressive change even as Arcuri himself resists that change.

Back in 2006, he said to me, "Can you imagine John Conyers as chair of the House Judiciary Committee, with subpoena power? Do you realize what that could do to Bush?" Actually, it accomplished almost nothing. Conyers was hobbled by the Democratic leadership of the House.

In 2008, his argument shifted to, "Can you imagine what will happen with a stronger Democratic majority in the House, and a veto-proof majority?"

We've got that Congress he wanted now, and still, that progressive agenda is not being enacted. The problem: In its pursuit for power, the Democratic Party has morphed into a timid copy of the Republican Party. Some say that the Republican Party has lost power. What I see is that the Republicans have won, by convincing Democratic politicians to act like Republicans. Mike Arcuri is part of that trend.

Consider, for example, the Conyers bill that attempted to establish a national commission to investigate President Bush's use of war powers and abuses of civil liberties. Only about one-fifth of all the Democrats in Congress support that commission. The rest support sweeping all the Bush crimes under the rug - after all, the Democrats' leader, Barack Obama, is now engaged in the use of the same extreme war powers and abuses of civil liberties that the Conyers commission would investigate.

Guess where Congressman Arcuri stands on the commission. That's right, he's among the right wing Democrats who want all the problems to be swept under the rug.

It's time that we 24th district progressives admit that the Democrats are not what we hoped they would be. It's time for us to begin organizing a true progressive challenge to Arcuri, from a true progressive party - the Green Party.

Arcuri Votes Against Videotaped Interrogations

2009-06-30T10:01:00.003-04:00

You'd have to have your head in the sand not to know that the widespread use of torture has wrecked the reputation of the United States of America. The story, which should have been over with departure of George W. Bush from the White House, has been unfortunately continued with Barack Obama's insistence that he will violate the Freedom of Information Act by concealing photographic evidence of torture. Obama's coverup is keeping America's torture in the news, proving that it's the coverup, as much as the torture itself, that damages America's position in the world.

Last week, Representative Rush Holt introduced a common sense amendment to this year's Defense appropriations bill. The amendment will, if it is included in the equivalent Senate legislation, require the military to videotape all its interrogations, excepting those tactical interrogations that take place on the battlefield and cannot be taped because of practical considerations.

This bill protects interrogators as much as it protects the prisoners being interrogated. It also ensures that the intelligence collected by the military will be accurate, protecting soldiers and government agents who will depend upon that intelligence in dangerous situations. It's for these reasons that, earlier this year, a military task force requested the policy of required videotaping of interrogations.

Yet, for Representative Mike Arcuri, that isn't good enough. Arcuri voted against the Holt Amendment, ignoring military advice and leaving interrogations in the dark ages of Bush and Cheney. Arcuri's vote was bad for American soldiers, and bad for the reputation of the USA.

Mike Arcuri Has A Short Term Mind

2009-06-27T12:15:00.005-04:00

On yet another issue, U.S. Representative Michael Arcuri has demonstrated an antiprogressive agenda this week. This time, the issue is climate change.

In 2008, people elected Democrats to Congress and the White House in large part because the Democrat promised a green energy revolution. They seemed so earnest, so honest. Yet, in 2009, we've learned that if you really want green energy, you're going to have to vote Green Party - at least in New York State's 24th district.

Yesterday Michael Arcuri voted to kill legislation promoting a green energy in order to fight global climate change, including global warming. Once again, Arcuri joined with the Republicans to support the kind of politics of pollution we saw under George W. Bush.

Why did Arcuri do it? Why did he vote with Big Oil, against the environment? Here's his excuse for opposing the legislation:

"In the short term it will have a negative effect on my district because of the high power costs."

This comment reveals why Mike Arcuri has come to be regarded as among the mental lightweights of the House of Representatives. In the short term, the bill will create higher power costs, but in the long term, it will actually lower costs. Trust Arcuri to ignore long term benefits in favor of short term thinking.

Besides that, what's the cost that this bill will actually create? According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the cost for the average American will be 48 cents per day. Low income Americans will actually gain economically from the legislation. These calculations don't even take into account the economic benefit from avoiding damage related to climate change, which is estimated in the billions per year already.

It seems that Arcuri is willing to let Planet Earth go to pot for the sake of 48 cents in short term savings. In 2010, let's make Michael Arcuri a short term member of Congress.

Mike Arcuri Not Among Those Opposing Discrimination

2009-06-26T07:57:00.004-04:00

Two days ago, H.R. 3017 was introduced to the House of Representatives by Congressman Barney Frank. The bill would prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

This is a very important bill to the LGBT voters in the 24th congressional district. Living under the fear of being fired from a job, just because of the homophobia of your boss, is a terrible burden during economic troubles like those we're currently suffering under.

Yet, as with so many important issues, Michael Arcuri is not on the job. H.R. 3017 is a strong bill, with 117 cosponsors. Congressman Arcuri is not among them.

Representative Arcuri won't protect his own constituents from job discrimination. Why should he be given another term in Congress?

Arcuri Won't Act On Marriage Equality

2009-06-25T06:23:00.002-04:00

You'd have to have your head in the sand not to know that we have a big problem of marriage inequality here in New York State. The majority of New York State residents support the legalization of same-sex marriage. The New York State Assembly has passed a law legalizing same-sex marriage. The New York Senate was about to pass such a law, until two Democrats, motivated by extreme bigotry to block the legislation, started caucusing with the Republicans. New York State government has been thrown into chaos because the anti-equality minority cannot stand the idea of gays and lesbians being given constitutionally-guaranteed equality under the law.

Here in the 24th congressional district, we have a lot of same-sex couples that are struggling under the current regime of inequality. In these economic hard times, it's especially troubling to see people suffering without health care and other benefits that they're entitled to get.

I don't know what it's like up in Utica, but in the southern part of the district, we've all got many friends and neighbors who are same-sex couples, living together as families, often with children. These people aren't a threat to anyone's heterosexual marriage. They aren't seeking special benefits. They're hard-working citizens who are only looking to be treated the same as everyone else.

But what will their representative in Congress, Mike Arcuri, do for them? Not a thing. Arcuri has neither introduced nor cosponsored any legislation to provide marriage equality to same-sex couples. As our state is brought to a standstill, Congressman Arcuri is completely inactive. Search Arcuri's congressional web site, and you'll see that he hasn't bothered to issue a press release, or make a little speech.

The LGBT residents of New York's 24th congressional district cannot depend upon Michael Arcuri to represent them in Washington D.C. For that matter, the many heterosexual allies who want equal rights for their LGBT friends and neighbors can't count upon Arcuri for representation either.

Where Representative Arcuri is lacking, the Green Party is not. The Green Party stands explicitly and forcefully in support of marriage equality, and full legal equality for homosexual Americans. The Green Party platform reads, "We support the recognition of equal rights of persons gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender to housing, jobs, civil marriage, medical benefits, child custody, and in all areas of life provided to all other citizens."

Where Arcuri refuses to act to protect the legal rights of his district's residents, a Green Party representative in Congress would not. For that reason, I'm hoping that 24th district voters have the opportunity to vote for a Green Party candidate in the 2010 congressional election.

Mike Arcuri Only 21 Percent Progressive

2009-06-24T11:51:00.003-04:00

24th district residents who have hoped that voting for Mike Arcuri would help bring about progressive change have been sadly disappointed. In the 111th Congress, Representative Arcuri has earned a progressive legislative score of only 21 out of 100 in the current session of Congress.

A 21 percent progressive? Is that what 24th congressional district voters thought they were voting for?

Representative Michael Arcuri has made himself part of the problem, not part of the solution.

24th District Green?

2009-06-21T22:03:00.003-04:00

24th District Green? There will be some who could comment that I've always been a Green, and that may be true in some sense, but I've never been registered as a member of the Green Party of New York State before. Still, looking back I can see that the Green Party was always the right place for me.

I knew I could never be a Republican. I value science, liberty and the natural world too much for that. I was a Democrat for years, at times very active within the Party, because I believed that the Democrats supported my values, and would defend them against the Republican onslaught.

In 2002, the Democrats promised resistance to the Republican agenda... as soon as the election was over. They couldn't risk losing seats, they said. In 2004, the Democrats said we needed to accept a lot of Republican rhetoric from Democratic candidates, because the elections couldn't be lost, but there would be resistance, they promised... as soon as the election was over. In 2006, the Democrats said that they would resist the Republicans, but took impeachment off the table, and said that a progressive agenda would come soon... after the election. [This was when Blue Dog Mike Arcuri came along and said that he thought that the Republican Military Commissions Act was just great].

In 2008, we heard the same thing. Accept big government spying, and more coal-burning power plants, and increased offshore drilling, and mixing church and state, and gay bashing, we were told, but just for the campaign. Change, and hope, and Yes We Can will come, they said... after the election.

Now, it's after the election, and the Democrats, true to form, are breaking the promises they made to advance a progressive agenda. They're supporting government secrecy, and lobbyist influence, and more war, and fossil fuel energy expansion, homophobia, mixing church and state. They're not retracting the Bush-era laws that hobbled our civil liberties. They're not holding anyone accountable for the crimes of the last 8 years. They're throwing obscene amounts of money to the same corrupt corporations that got our economy into trouble in the first place.

At the state level, Democratic governors have been a disaster. They've missed the opportunity for a reinvestment in our state's social infrastructure because of their arrogance and corruption. David Paterson's insistence that higher income New Yorkers won't be asked to carry their share of the burden created by Wall Street's meltdown smashed his credibility. His appointment of Kirsten Gillibrand, an inexperienced Blue Dog who leans far to the right, was a confirmation that the Democrats are more interested in power than principle.

There are a few Democratic politicians I appreciate. I respect my representative in the New York State Assembly, for example, and some of the Democratic politicians in my town and county. These Democrats aren't enough to redeem their party, however. Supporting the Democratic Party has become an exercise of the delusional hope that a few worthy individuals can reform a corrupt organization.

I'm casting my lot with the Greens, because though they don't have power, they have principle. I'd rather lose trying to do the right thing than win with people who have shown that they can't be trusted with power they have already been given.

Mike Arcuri Joining Bush Republicans For Unlimited Spying

2008-06-20T09:16:00.002-04:00

What a disappointment. Congressman Michael Arcuri has done it again. He's wimped out, gone soft as a noodle, and given in to Republican demands.

George W. Bush is a lame duck, the least popular President in American history. If ever there was a time when Mike Arcuri would be able to stand up Bush and the Republicans, now would be it.

Sadly, Representative Arcuri fails.

Michael Arcuri intends to vote in favor of expanding George W. Bush's powers yet again. Just as Arcuri supported the Military Commissions Act, which was just ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court this month, Arcuri is now supporting the FISA Amendments Act, H.R. 6304.

The FISA Amendments Act allows the White House to listen to our telephone calls, read your emails, and even track people's physical movements through GPS. Additionally, physical searches of Americans' homes and businesses is allowed at the whim of the Attorney General. Electronic surveillance is allowed without a search warrant, and without any real judicial review. The Attorney General sets the spying operations in motion, and then is the only one with the power to certify that they meet the requirements of the law and the Constitution. No congressional oversight.

Then there's the issue of retroactive immunity for telecommunications corporations that broke the law by helping President Bush spy on Americans without going to the FISA courts. The D.C. office of Congressman Michael Arcuri is shamelessly claiming that H.R. 6304 is a "compromise" that does not provide retroactive immunity.

If you have actually read the bill, you can see that Arcuri's office is not being honest in this regard. The legislation clearly gives retroactive immunity to telecommunications corporations, with nothing more required than the President's approval.

Attorney Kevin Bankston of the Electronic Frontier Foundation explains, "Whatever gloss might be put on it, the so-called 'compromise' on immunity is anything but: the current proposal is the exact same blanket immunity that the Senate passed in February and that the House rejected in March, only with a few new bells and whistles."

The provisions of H.R. 6304 are unconstitutional violations of the Constitution. The Bill of Rights clearly states that any searches by government officials must be upheld by a search warrant backed by proof of valid suspicion of criminal activity. H.R. 6304 purposefully evades these requirements, and makes the Bill of Rights meaningless.

It seems that whenever there is an election coming up, Michael Arcuri will happily abandon his Oath of Office to uphold the Constitution. First, Arcuri helped to toss habeas corpus and fair trials out the window. Now, Arcuri joins George W. Bush again to help him spy against American citizens without restraint.

What a disappointment Arcuri has been. What a wasted opportunity. What a sorry excuse for a Democrat.

Michael Arcuri Relents On Military Commissions Act

2007-04-23T09:43:00.001-04:00

There's great news for the people of New York's 24th congressional district this week. Mike Arcuri, who is in his first months of representing us in the U.S. House, has relented on the Military Commissions Act.

It was a great disappointment to many people here last year when, as a candidate, Michael Arcuri said that he thought the Military Commissions Act was a great idea, and that if he were in Congress, he would have voted for it. The Military Commissions Act represents the kind of abuse of power that the Democratic Party is supposed to stand against.

It revoked the protection of habeas corpus.

It ended enforcement of the Geneva Conventions.

It legalized torture.

It replaced the authority of ordinary American courts with a new system of kangaroo courts with outrageously low standards of justice, and trials conducted in secret

It replaced the presumption of innocence with the presumption of guilt

It gave the President of the United States the power to arbitrarily imprison someone without trial, stripping people of their rights through the declaration of their status as "enemy"

The problem was that when he said he approved of the Military Commissions Act, candidate Michael Arcuri and his campaign staff had not bothered to actually read the legislation. They didn't know what a terrible thing they were supporting.

Since Arcuri has become a member of Congress, however, he has been persuaded to consider the actual contact of the Military Commissions Act. Looking at the facts of what the Military Commissions Act does, it appears that Congressman Arcuri has come to the reasonable conclusion that the Military Commissions Act's assaults on the foundations of American freedom are unacceptable.

Michael Arcuri has added his co-sponsorship to H.R. 1415, the Restoring the Constitution Act of 2007. This new legislation comes the closest of any legislation in the House of Representatives to repealing the Military Commissions Act. It was originally sponsored by veteran congressman from New York State Jerrold Nadler, though it is essentially the same bill that was written for the Senate by Christopher Dodd, who is also running for the Democratic nominaton for President in 2008 on the basis of his opposition to the Military Commissions Act.

If only it didn't take so long for Arcuri to be persuaded to reverse his position, some good might have been done. However, Congressman Arcuri seems only willing to take a principled stand when it isn't election time.

Michael Arcuri Disagrees With Surge. Now What?

2007-03-19T07:24:00.001-04:00

Readers of yore know that I am suspicious when it comes to Congressman Michael Arcuri. Representative Arcuri is the kind of Democrat who leans toward being a Republican a lot of the time. He has, as a former District Attorney, a record of pushing a law and order attitude that sometimes fails to recognize people's legal rights. Arcuri's support of the Military Commissions Act is a form of this attitude writ large.

Still, there are some areas in which Mike Arcuri could be redeemed. On the matter of Iraq, for example, Congressman Arcuri seems yet to have formed a coherent position. During the campaign last year, Arcuri fumbled and fudged, and avoided giving specifics beyond such vague promises as "benchmarks".

As last week's change of heart on the House legislation to set an end date for the war in Iraq shows, we can influence Arcuri. The change of heart came after calls from constituents who requested that Arcuri take a firm stand.

Michael Arcuri certainly did the right thing in February, when he voted for the non-binding resolution disagreeing with George W. Bush's plan for an escalation in Iraq - a plan which has failed, as this weekend's carnage illustrates. However, that was just a non-binding resolution, expressing an opinion.

The campaign is over. It's no longer time to just say what you would do, if elected, or what opinion you have about what the President is doing. It's time for clear action.

Supporting this month's legislation with a specific end date for the war in Iraq is a good start, but with the Senate's failure to pass equivalent legislation, more action will be needed.

Let's keep an eye on Congressman Arcuri, and watch how he votes.

Mike Arcuri Relents on Iraq

2007-03-16T08:43:00.001-04:00

The antiwar majority of New York State's 24th congressional district can be proud of itself this morning. As a result of pressure from our district's voters, Michael Arcuri has changed his position on the legislation to end the war in Iraq.

At first, Congressman Arcuri was standing firm with the rest of his right wing caucus of Blue Dog Democrats. Once Arcuri's pro-war position became known, however, his offices began to receive telephone calls questioning his judgment.

Now, Mike Arcuri has promised to vote in favor of the resolution to end the war.

If you called Arcuri's offices, good for you.

Michael Arcuri Wavers on Iraq

2007-03-15T08:25:00.000-04:00

It was an email from MoveOn that got me back to writing this blog.

It seems that Michael Arcuri is considering whether he will side with the Republicans, against the Democrats, on the resolution to end the Iraq War. No kidding.

From the MoveOn message:

"Dick Cheney and his allies in Congress are on an all-out assault—saying that Democrats are "undermining the troops" by trying to end the war.1 And some Democrats are wavering.

Can you call Rep. Arcuri and tell him that you want our troops home safely this year? They won't vote until next week so we still have time to affect the final plan and your call could make all the difference.

Congressman Michael Arcuri
Phone: 202-225-3665"

"Some representatives are afraid. They're nervous about taking any measures to end the war. It's a political calculation—they don't want to "own" the war, they want it to be Bush's problem. That's a failure of leadership: How do you tell our troops that they're being asked to fight and die because Democrats don't want to "own" the war?"

Could this be the same Michael Arcuri who used the aw shucks story about talking to his son about ending the war in Iraq while campaigning last year? Yup, same guy. Apparently, Arcuri is having a very different conversation with his son now: A conversation about flip-flopping.

I wonder, how do the Utica Democrats feel now about putting this guy in Congress?

If you're a Democrat who voted for Michael Arcuri, give his office a phone call at 202-225-3665, and remind him what he was elected to do.

Will Michael Arcuri Join Pelosi in Silence on Military Commissions Act?

2006-11-19T07:04:00.000-05:00

This morning, the Washington Post laments that the new Democratic leadership of the House of Representatives seems to have no intention of investigation, much less providing a remedy for, the infamous Military Commissions Act.

For those who have not paid attention to the news this autumn, the Military Commissions Act does the following:

Revokes the right of habeas corpus

Ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions

Legalizes torture

Gives war criminals legal amnesty

Sets up kangaroo courts with absurd standards of justice

Provides the President of the United States the power to imprison people without any criminal charge or proof of wrongdoing

Democrats were elected to Congress to challenge the Republican way of doing things. But, so far, Nancy Pelosi doesn't seem very interested in dealing with the most serious Republican abuses: The Republicans' attacks upon the liberty that Americans once held dear. Do Americans still hold that liberty dear?

Some clearly do. Others don't seem to care - and among those others are many Democrats. Nancy Pelosi did not vote for the Military Commissions Act, but she faces a House of Representatives in which the majority of members did, or would have, if they had been elected. New Congressman Mike Arcuri is among those who supported the Military Comissions Act. He thought it was a jim dandy idea.

When a big chunk of the Democratic Congress joins the Republicans in supporting laws like the Military Commissions Act, we may have a Democratic Party majority in Congress, but more functionally, we still have a Congress that disdains the effort to protect the freedoms guaranteed us under the Bill of Rights.

We will see, in a few short weeks, what kind of Congressman Michael Arcuri will really be. Will he work with other Democrats to take action on the Military Commissions Act? If he follows the new House leadership, it appears that he won't. Here's what the Washington Post's editorial board had to say this morning about the House Democratic leaderships apparent plan of inaction on the Military Commissions Act:

"Future House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) recently named three priorities for investigation, including private contracting in Iraq, the handling of Hurricane Katrina and the administration's formulation of energy policy. It's hard to understand why Democrats would insist on examining Vice President Cheney's first-term energy task force but would not seek to determine -- at last -- how senior military commanders and defense officials may have contributed to the prisoner abuse scandal at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere. No one but low-ranking soldiers has been criminally prosecuted for the shocking abuse at Abu Ghraib, despite evidence that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and several top generals played a role in sanctioning practices such as sexually humiliating prisoners and threatening them with dogs. Democrats now will have the opportunity -- and the duty -- to insist on accountability."

Congress Must Act to Restrain Security State Insanity

2006-11-16T22:19:00.000-05:00

What's shown, or heard, in this video may be the tipping point that finally brings America face to face with the nightmarish implications of its Homeland Security paranoia. Watch it. More than that, listen to it, because much of the action is obscured by the crowd of witnesses...

...witnesses of the repeated attacks by police against a UCLA student, using a taser stun gun. What had the student done? Had he been violent? No. He was simply reading books in his own university library, without identification. For that, the police shocked him over and over again, with the student screaming in pain each time. I count at least 5 times the student was shocked.

I'm putting this movie on this blog, because it is a sign of a serious problem that Congress needs to deal with: The security paranoia in the United States has gotten out of hand. As the Los Angeles Times reports, this is not an isolated incident. More and more, police are being caught on tape using violent force against people just for refusing to show identification in public places.

The police in this particular incident were so violent that they threatened to attack one witness, David Remesnitsky, with their stun gun simply for not leaving the scene of the brutality.

Describing the attack, Remesnitsky said, "It was beyond grotesque. By the end they took him over the stairs, lifted him up and Tasered him on his rear end. It seemed like it was inappropriately placed. The Tasering was so unnecessary and they just kept doing it."

We don't need security sweeps of police officers through university libraries, attacking students with stun guns, to keep us safe. Homeland Security has gone too far. The Democratic Congress ought to be holding hearings on this problem, and finding ways to bring the security paranoia back under control.

Well, that's my reaction, anyway, after watching a student being electrically shocked over and over and over and over again. But, as the Democrats in this district keeps on telling me, I'm just part of the liberal fringe that Congressman Arcuri wants to distance himself from.

Maybe this kind of thing is what the Democratic mainstream wants: Strong shows of force against students emperiling the security of the Homeland by reading books without an ID. Maybe most people feel safer with these kinds of security sweeps taking place. Law and order and all that.

We're all in danger, after all, right? There are terrorists lurking in every airport, just waiting for us to stop putting our shoes through the X-ray machines, right?

Don't Judge Michael Arcuri On This Vote

2006-11-14T16:37:00.000-05:00

Michael Arcuri is set to take one of his first actions as a member of Congress, voting for majority leader of the House of Representatives. There's a real contest for that seat, between Steny Hoyer and John Murtha. Steny Hoyer is the longtime Democratic Party Whip in the House of Representatives, and John Murtha gained nationwide fame recently by coming out in favor of ending the Iraq War.

John Murtha is to be thanked for supporting an end to the Iraq War, and giving cover to other Democrats on the issue. However, Murtha has a right wing voting record on many issues that makes him a troubling pick for Majority Leader in a Democratic House. Murtha voted in favor of starting the war in Iraq in the first place, for one thing. Murtha has also supported attacks on the Endangered Species Act and voted in favor of ridiculous measures such as amending the Constitution in order to ban flag burning.

Worse than John Murtha's affinity for parts of the right wing agenda is his long history of corruption. The Democrats promised to clean up corruption in the House, but that promise looks like a sham with the nomination of Murtha. Melanie Sloan, the Executive Director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, comments, "Pelosi's endorsement suggests to me she was interested in the culture of corruption only as a campaign issue and has no real interest in true reform."

Steny Hoyer doesn't have the long history of corruption that John Murtha has had, but he does share Murtha's propensity for abandoning the Democratic Party mainstream in Congress in order to vote with the Republicans on important issues. For example, Hoyer recently crossed party lines in order to vote to renew the Patriot Act in spite of serious concerns about the law's use in assembling gigantic government databases filled with information about the private, legal activities of American citizens. Hoyer's job as Democratic Whip was to make sure that as few Democratic members of the House crossed party lines as possible, so what was he doing crossing working with George W. Bush and the Republicans? Hoyer's failures as Democratic Whip, serving during a time when the Congressional Democrats became famous for their lack cohesion, suggests that he won't do a good job as Majority Leader.

Then there's Congressman Hoyer's support for the Iraq War. Like Murtha, Hoyer voted against the will of the majority of Democratic voters in 2002 when he helped George W. Bush start the war. At least Murtha eventually saw the error of his ways. Not Hoyer. Steny Hoyer has kept on supporting the Iraq War, long after any rational justifications for doing so fell away.

Who will new Congressman Michael Arcuri vote for in this election for Majority Leader? Arcuri says he supports Steny Hoyer. That's not a good choice. On the other hand, voting for Murtha wouldn't be a good choice either. Arcuri's worth as a member of Congress cannot be judged by this vote.

However, the Democrats of the House of Representatives in general certainly can be judged for this vote. Steny Hoyer and John Murtha may be powerful, but they are not at all the most qualified for the job of Majority Leader. The Democrats said they'd run things differently if they got the majority back, but the Murtha-Hoyer contest does not instill confidence.

Reason for Skepticism of Arcuri and House Democrats

2006-11-10T19:54:00.000-05:00

The Democrats have retaken the Congress, and this has been the cause of much celebrating across America. Celebrating is fun, but it doesn't actually get anything done.

Luckily, the new Democratic leadership of the House of Representatives has come out with a plan for getting things done. Unfortunately, that plan gives great cause for skepticism.

Go ahead and look at the House Democrats' legislative plan. Notice something missing? I'll give you a hint: The central issue of the 2006 congressional campaign was, for most voters, the war in Iraq.

There's nothing in the House Democrats' plan about Iraq at all. No plan for Iraq.

There's also nothing in the House Democrats' plan for dealing with the Military Commissions Act, or the new warrantless wiretapping legalization, or any of the other serious attacks on our liberty. Go ahead and search the entire website of the incoming House Democratic leadership. I did. On the entire web site, there is not a single mention of the Military Commissions Act. There isn't one mention of habeas corpus.

The House Democrats do mention torture, though - 4 times. Unfortunately, the last time they did so was in April, 2005.

At the bottom of the House Democratic leadership's 100 hours plan, there is the statement, "This new direction represents the priorities of a unified Democratic Party. This is our pledge to the American people."

Were these your priorities in voting for Democrat Mike Arcuri? No plan for Iraq? Do nothing about restoring the foundations of liberty in America?

Maybe the House Democrats have another, second, secret plan to deal with these other priorities later. Maybe, but there is good cause for skepticism.

The time for party loyalty and the election rhetoric is over. We need to look at the facts of what the Democrats say they plan to do, not what we assume or hope that they would do.

Promises by someone who has no legislative record are easy to make, and easy to break.

Michael Arcuri hasn't had the chance to actually do anything as a member of Congress. No votes yet. No cosponsorships yet. As those opportunities for action come, however, I'll be keeping track here of what Michael Arcuri actually does.

Learned from Michael Arcuri's Victory

2006-11-08T07:08:00.000-05:00

I learned a few very important things from Michael Arcuri's strong victory last night:

1. My political opinions are not representative of the opinions of the Democrats in the 24th congressional district.
2. My political opinions are not represented by the Democrats of the 24th congressional district.
3. In our district, the huge majority of Democrats will not reject the Democratic candidate for Congress
4. Independents are a major force to be reckoned with in the 24th congressional district, even though they're poorly understood, and may not really be a force so much as a collection of tens of thousands of forces that occasionally move in the same direction
5. I really ought to stop making predictions about what will happen in the future

Most Democratic voters in this district seem to have been unconcerned that Michael Arcuri supports the Military Commissions Act. Heck, they may not even know what the Military Commissions Act is, or care to know. There may even be some Democrats in this district who know what the Military Commissions Act is and are glad that Michael Arcuri supports it.

This makes me part of that "liberal fringe" that Michael Arcuri blasted earlier on in the campaign. That bothers me, that it's just a tiny fringe of the Democratic Party now that cares about things like the end of habeas corpus and the Geneva Conventions, and the legalization of torture.

There is another group of Democrats in this district than those I've already mentioned, though, a small group: They're the Democrats who know what the Military Commissions Act is, know that Michael Arcuri supports it, are disturbed about that support, but voted for Arcuri anyway. This small group voted for Michael Arcuri because they were worried that, if they didn't help Arcuri get elected, they would be responsible for the Democrats failing to take back control of the House of Representatives.

This group of Democrats made a figurative deal with the devil. As with all deals with the devil, the devil came out on top. Michael Arcuri's win was actually not at all necessary to the effort to take back the House of Representatives from the Republicans. The Democrats needed 15 seats. By my count, they got at least 27.

Some of these Democrats may harbor fantasies that Michael Arcuri will be challenged from within the Democratic Party in 2008. I'm not going to predict for certain that that won't happen, because I've learned that I'm pretty bad at making political predictions. However, I will observe that the Democratic County Committees have learned a couple of nasty lessons:

1. If they don't let the voters have a political primary, victory results.
2. With a shift toward the right wing of the Democratic Party, victory results.

Given this learning, why in the world would the Democratic County Committees in this district abandon what gave them success, and support a progressive challenger? No, the Democrats are stuck with a decidedly unprogressive Michael Arcuri now, at least until he's defeated by a Republican.

But, then, I'm not a Democrat any longer. I started out this year blogging as 24 Democrat, but now end it writing as 24 independent. Clearly, a person like myself doesn't really fit well within the Democratic Party of New York's 24th congressional district. I'm re-registered as a non-affiliated voter, though that registration won't take effect until 2008.

Let the Democrats celebrate. As for myself, I'll be watching what Congressman Arcuri actually does in Washington D.C., for good and for bad.

Read on, if you like, when the next session of Congress begins in January.

Mike Arcuri and Ray Meier Death Penalty Pander

2006-11-07T08:16:00.000-05:00

Congressional elections sort out the wheat from the chaff. True leaders respond to the pressure of campaigning by rising above the level of crass politicking and popular gimmicks to stand for what's right, inspiring voters to join them in the effort to make things better. Weak-minded politicians who cannot muster the courage or creativity necessary to make such a stand appeal instead to cheap, crowd-pleasing gestures that turn voters on without requiring them to think.

Here in the 24th congressional district of New York State, we have been stuck with a couple of big pieces of chaff this year, weak-minded politicians so obsessed with pleasing voters that they have descended into pandering to us.

Take flag burning, for example. Both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri have come out in opposition to it. But, is it a meaningful issue? Have we got a rash of flag burnings going on here in the 24th district? Can anyone remember the last time that someone burned a flag here? Would we really want to make it a crime to engage in that kind of protest, and if so, what other forms of protest should we criminalize? Flag burning isn't so much an issue as it is an opportunity for Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier to appeal to the bigoted resentment of the expression of unpopular ideas.

The pandering gets more serious when it comes to the death penalty, however. Both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri have campaigned as strong supporters of the death penalty. That's a popular position to take. It makes a lot of people happy to think of bad guys getting killed as punishment for their crimes.

The problem is that the death penalty is nothing but a crowd-pleasing gimmick. It isn't a serious policy.

Thanks to the pandering of Republican politicians in Albany, we had the death penalty in New York State for many years. But, during all that time, not a single person was actually executed. The last execution of a person in New York State was in 1963. Then, you have to back another 19 years to get the last execution before that. Although there was a death penalty in effect for most of the 20th century in New York State, only 8 people were executed during that time.

The reason for this tiny number of executions is that the death penalty just doesn't work. The legal apparatus of the death penalty has never really been worked out, and the result is that either hardly anyone is ever executed, or too many people, including a lot of innocent people, are put to death. The recent DNA proof of large numbers of innocent people put on death row ought to give any thinking person serious doubts about the death penalty.

Of course, Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri haven't shown themselves to be thinking people this year. They're politicians out pandering for votes.

Mike Arcuri and Ray Meier support the death penalty, not because the death penalty would do a thing to make our lives better here in New York, but because they want to create the impression that they're tough guys.

Tough guys are the last thing we need in Congress right now. We need smart guys, and guys with integrity. We need leaders who have the capacity to grow into statesmen.

We here in the 24th district won't what we need this year. Go out and vote today. Voting is important. Just don't have any illusions about the race for the House of Representatives. This year, you'll only have the opportunity to pick your particular preference of pander.

Just close your eyes and think of 2008.

Bob Johnson is What Integrity Looks Like

2006-11-06T22:25:00.000-05:00

24th district Democrats, Michael Arcuri has broken his promise to local Democratic elected officials. He recently tried to placate angry Democrats by promising Democratic elected officials from our district that he would come out with a public statement opposing the Military Commissions Act. Mike Arcuri said he would put that statement on his web site.

Michael Arcuri lied to them. He hasn't done it. Michael Arcuri's staff confirmed to me today that Arcuri still supports the Military Commissions Act.

Arcuri's new line would be amusing, if it weren't so darkly pathetic: Arcuri now says that if he had been in Congress this September, when the House of Representatives voted for the Military Commissions Act, he would have voted for it, and then, later at some time or another, would try to work to amend it.

Interesting idea, that: A freshman member of the House of Representatives amending a law pushed through Congress by the President of the United States. Come on, history buffs, think hard now. When was the last time that happened?

The 24th district's county Democratic committees got a real first class weasel in Michael Arcuri when then they rushed to prematurely appoint a nominee in order to prevent a primary. Oh, Mike Arcuri talks tough in his campaign speeches. He'll stand up to George W. Bush, he says. But when it comes down to actually making a stand, to showing some integrity, Michael Arcuri folds like a piece of origami paper.

When the heat was on, Arcuri stood with Ray Meier and George W. Bush. Whatever it takes to win an election seems to be Arcuri's motto. Of course, as soon as this election is over, if Arcuri wins, he's got the 2008 election to think about. Heck, the House of Representatives is almost constantly up for election. If a candidate for the House can't show some backbone during an election, he never will.

So, it seems that Arcuri's campaign is willing to say one thing in public, and another thing to Democratic supporters in private. Does Michael Arcuri even remember what the truth is any more? If he's willing to deceive members of local Democratic committees, why should we trust anything he says?

Bob Johnson, the Democratic candidate to the north of us, didn't get the early and constant assistance from the DCCC that Michael Arcuri, Rahm Emanuel's "recruit", got. But Bob Johnson has one thing that Michael Arcuri will never have: Integrity.

Go ahead and listen to what Bob Johnson had to say about the Military Commissions Act in the campaign commercial below. Listen, and just try to imagine Michael Arcuri getting this kind of moral strength to pass through his lips.

Yes, Michael Arcuri has a good shot at winning tomorrow, but at what cost? No matter whether Ray Meier wins or Michael Arcuri wins tomorrow, we will get a representative who is happy to support the worst right wing causes that the Republicans bring forth. That's not the choice we deserved.

Yes, Bob Johnson probably won't win, but he's standing up for something more important than victory for the sake of victory. Bob Johnson aligned himself with a noble, but dying, cause: The defense of liberty in America.

Tomorrow, will you be like Michael Arcuri, or will you be like Bob Johnson?

Has Michael Arcuri Relented on Military Commissions Act?

2006-11-06T00:01:00.000-05:00

I got a telephone call this morning from a Democratic office holder in my town informing me that Michael Arcuri has finally reversed his endorsement of the Military Commissions Act, and now opposes the law. This person told me that the Arcuri for Congress campaign has promised people to announce Arcuri's opposition to the Military Commissions Act on the Arcuri for Congress web site.

I regard this source as very credible. This source also told me that this statement promising to declare opposition to the Military Commissions Act has been made by Michael Arcuri to several different people.

Geneva blogger Jodi Dean writes that she saw Michael Arcuri say on October 30 that he has reversed his position on the Military Commissions Act. She notes that Democrats in Geneva have been up in arms against Michael Arcuri because of Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions act, writing, "there has been substantial pressure from left voices here in Geneva since his last visit".

Here's the trouble: I just called the Arcuri for Congress campaign, and was told that there has been no change in Michael Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions Act. I look on Michael Arcuri's web site, and I see that there is no statement at all indicating that Arcuri now opposes the Military Commissions Act. My source here in Ulysses also acknowledges that she has not seen any documented proof that Michael Arcuri has acknowledged his error and changed his position.

Nowhere in any place of public record, not in a newspaper or in a blog, has Michael Arcuri indicated a change in his support for the Military Commissions Act.

This issue is a vital matter in this race, because it's an indicator of whether Michael Arcuri will stand up to the Republicans in Washington D.C. or collaborate with them on the worst aspects of their legislative agenda.

The Military Commissions Act:

Revokes habeas corpus

Ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions

Legalizes torture

Provides legal amnesty to George W. Bush for any war crimes he may have committed

Sets up an alternative system of kangaroo courts with absurdly low standards of justice

Gives President Bush the power to declare someone an "enemy", and then lock them up in a secret prison without any trial, for as long as he likes

It ought to be a no-brainer for a Democrat running for Congress to be against such a horrid law, but Michael Arcuri went and declared his support for the Military Commissions Act earlier this autumn... without bothering to actually read the law first.

It seems to me that Michael Arcuri may be trying to play this issue both ways, telling Democrats in private that he'll oppose the Military Commissions Act, while maintaining his support for the Military Commissions Act in public. Or, it could be that the rumors of Michael Arcuri's change of heart are merely that - rumors.

It seems that the Democrats in our district are getting nervous, and are deciding that Arcuri may well need the support of the progressives in this district after all.

Michael Arcuri, you know what you have to do to get our support. Make a statement in public, where it's documented, that you now oppose the Military Commissions Act.

It's that simple. Do the right thing. Your time is running out.

What kind of Democrat is a Boehlert Democrat?

2006-11-05T10:47:00.000-05:00

"I always say I consider myself, to a large extent, to be the Boehlert Democrat." - Michael Arcuri

So Arcuri would have voted for the Iraq war, like Sherwood Boehlert did?

Mike Arcuri would have voted to give government-funded groups the right to fire people for not belonging to the right religion, like Sherwood Boehlert did?

Mike Arcuri would have voted to give President Bush the power to use the American military against the American people with HR 5122, like Sherwood Boehlert did?

Mike Arcuri would have voted with the Republicans to give a special tax break to millionaires like Paris Hilton, like Sherwood Boelert did?

Boehlert Democrat? Michael Arcuri sounds more like a Lieberman Democrat to me.

Look at who Michael Arcuri's campaign is taking money from, and you'll see why Arcuri is talking so much like Joseph Lieberman these days. Michael Arcuri's top ideological contributor is the New Democrat Coalition, an organization set up by Joseph Lieberman to promote right wing ideology within the Democratic Party.

Know what you're voting for on Tuesday, 24th district Democrats.

Blogs Covering Arcuri Meier Race Fell Apart

2006-11-05T08:21:00.000-05:00

Whatever happened to the CNY Underground blog? The Republican-leaning site, often criticizing Michael Arcuri but rarely praising Ray Meier, has been replaced with an automatically-generated page full of links about phentermine, home mortgages, credit cards, and the like.

The fall of CNY Underground follows the disintegration of the Weekly Democrat, the abandonment of You Go Mike, and the slowdown of Maimun Khan's blog to the pace of molasses in November.

It's a mystery to me why, the closer we've gotten to Election Day, the more election-themed blogs have fallen by the wayside here in New York's 24th district.

One possible explanation is that people feel much less personal interest in the general election than they have in the contest to see who will represent their political party. Primary season was hot with excited discussion and debate in a way that the contest of Michael Arcuri against Ray Meier has not been.

Of course, neither the Republicans nor the Democrats got a chance to vote for who would represent their party in the general election. The local parties' leadership arranged the nomination all on their own. Perhaps that set the precedent for people's feelings about the election in general.

Talking to both Republicans and Democrats in person about this election, I've noticed a complacent sort of feeling, with little attachment to either to Mike Arcuri or to Ray Meier. This election seems to have become a contest more of the political parties than a contest between the actual candidates. It's more about the Republicans vs. the Democrats than Ray Meier vs. Michael Arcuri.

Most voters don't know much about what kind of policies Ray Meier or Michael Arcuri stand for. When they think Ray Meier, they think generic Republican. When they think Michael Arcuri, they think generic Democrat. This generic perception of the candidates is so dominant that voters are inclined to reject any information that doesn't fit expectations of what a Democrat or Republican will do in Congress.

Without much specific attachment among voters to particular candidates, information about the candidates has come to seem not so important. The race has become not so much of a local affair as many campaign insiders suggested it would be. Rather, the election seems to have become just a local representation of the national contest for control of Congress. Voters seem less concerned about having a good representative than they are about which party has majority rule in the House of Representatives.

We seem to be less citizens of New York's 24th congressional district than we are citizens of the United States of America in general. Local control of this campaign was ceded long ago, with the national Republican Party and the national Democratic Party setting the beat.

So, what's a local blogger to do in this atmosphere? Repeat the party line? React to campaign commercials from the national Democratic and Republican parties? I don't blame so many bloggers for dropping out. The race has not produced much inspiring material to work with. Both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri have demonstrated more cowardice than leadership.

Then again, I don't really know what's led CNY Underground to hit the dirt, or for other blogs to call it a day. Maybe something else is afoot, leading the bloggers to fall by the wayside. Anyone have any hints?

Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri Lead America Down the Rabbit Hole

2006-11-04T09:02:00.000-05:00

Think that the Military Commissions Act doesn't have any real impact on people, that it was just a political show? Maybe this news from the Washington Post this morning will convince you otherwise:

"The Bush administration has told a federal judge that terrorism suspects held in secret CIA prisons should not be allowed to reveal details of the "alternative interrogation methods" that their captors used to get them to talk."

"Alternative interrogation methods" is put in quotes by the Washington Post because everyone knows what that phrase really means. It means torture.

The President of the United States is now asserting the power to torture people, and then to forbid people to tell anyone that they've been tortured. It's insane, but George W. Bush is right. He does have that power now, thanks to the Military Commissions Act.

Professor Joseph Margulies, who teaches law at Northwestern University, says of this implementation of the Military Commissions Act, "Kafka-esque doesn’t do it justice. This is Alice in Wonderland."

The survival of American liberty depends on the repeal of the Military Commissions Act. Does either Michael Arcuri or Ray Meier, running for Congress in our district this year, support the repeal of this unjust law? No. Both Meier and Arcuri support the Military Commissions Act.

That's despicable, but it's also understandable, given that neither Democratic voters nor Republican voters were given the chance to select their own candidates. Local leaders in both parties prevented a primary election from taking place. No primary election means no voter choice, and so the local party leaders in effect appointed these two turkeys to run for office.

You now only have the choice to vote for Turkey #1 or Turkey #2. So, why should these two candidates fret about a little thing like the Military Commissions Act? The way the political power game in our district is set up, voters don't have the chance to say no.

Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri Want Inappropriate Censorship

2006-11-03T10:33:00.000-05:00

At the recent debate between Democrat Mike Arcuri and Republican Ray Meier in Oneonta, both congressional candidates stepped over the line in their push to control negative campaign advertisements. Both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri said that they want the law to be changed so that candidates will have the ability to control what other people say about the campaigns.

We've seen a lot of negative campaign commercials this year, including commercials against Michael Arcuri accusing him of using public money to pay for calls to telephone sex numbers, and commercials accusing Ray Meier of beign responsible for high taxes. (Yes, for Republicans, taxation is equally as tawdry as phone sex.)

The thing is that these commercials have been produced and paid for by organizations other than the candidates' own campaign committees. So, Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier haven't had a darned thing to do with them. That's what campaign finance laws require. If there's coordination with the candidate that the commercials appear to support, then the financial backing of the commercials, and the organization that produces them, become subject to campaign finance regulation. Negative advertisements become, in this way, a way for powerful organizations and individuals to exercise influence over an election.

That's not an ideal situation, to be sure. However, the alternative arrangement that Mike Arcuri and Ray Meier support would be much worse.

Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri don't like it that they don't have control over public messages about this race for Congress. So what? I'm sure Wal-Mart doesn't like it when outside organizations criticize its corporate practices. Wal-Mart would like to control the public messages about its operations, but the public safety would be put at risk if such control were allowed. The same would be true if candidates were allowed to control the public messages other groups spread about political campaigns.

Free speech gives us each the right to criticize or praise whichever politicians we choose. There are some restrictions on non-profit organizations that receive tax-exempt status, but that's only because those organizations are, in effect, given a special privileged status by the government. If those organizations wish to give up that status, then they are free to communicate about political campaigns in any way they want to.

If politicians like Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier were given the power to approve or reject the broadcast of messages about the races for public office in which they are running, we wouldn't hear anything negative about any candidates at all. Why would a political candidate allow any negative advertisement about themselves to be broadcast, if they had the power to stop it? Don't think that the candidate power to censor advertisements would be restricted to negative advertisements against their opponents.

For that matter, if candidates were given the power to censor negative television or radio advertisements, what would stop them from trying to exercise this power over other media as well? What would stop Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri from claiming the power to approve or deny any given article I write for this blog?

Besides, we would be naive to believe that Arcuri and Meier really want to eliminate negative advertising. The separation between candidates' own advertisements and the the advertisements created by unaffiliated organizations allows candidates to play the Good Cop/Bad Cop game. Arcuri and Meier say that outside groups are ruining the campaign for them by going negative, and get to take on the pose of virtuous indignation. At the same time, they benefit from the persuasive power of those negative advertisements, and they know it.

Besides, what is a "negative advertisement" but a criticism of a political candidate? Do we really believe that the electoral process would become pure and refined if criticism of political candidates were outlawed?

Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier both ought to be ashamed of themselves for requesting the power to censor what other people say about this race for a seat in Congress. They're condescending to voters, as if we're fragile children who have never heard or participated in a harsh argument.

Everyone should be free to say what they want to about congressional candidates, so long as they don't engage in libel or slander. We voters are, after all, adults. Let us stop playing the game of pretending that we have virgin ears.

Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri Drowned in a Sea of Babble

2006-11-02T09:28:00.000-05:00

There really isn't that much to say on the issues of this race that will matter - or that will get through to the voters. There are few undecided voters left, and besides, the practice of Google bombing by both Republicans and Democrats from across the country has reduced the level of political blog writing to mere cut and paste.

Google bombing ought to be called blogosphere bombing, for the devastating effect that it has on online political debate. The practice involves bloggers cutting and pasting long lists of names of political candidates from the opposing party. Each one of those names is then linked to derogatory web site. The Google search engine then is supposed to note these links, and incorporate them into its algorithms, so that the top search result on Google for the candidate's name is a particular web site that has negative things to say about the candidate.

The practical effect is that these cut and paste blog entries, which don't have any actual information themselves about the candidates, and are most often posted by people who don't even live in the district where the candidates run, clog up the blogosphere. People who search for up-to-date information on the candidates through blog search engines like Technorati or Google Blogsearch end up finding only a collection of babble Google bomb entries, all the same, none of them informing the voter. Thus, online politicial discussion about candidates is nearly erased. Only those online readers savvy enough to evade the Google bombing will have much success finding blogs that rise above the cut and paste frenzy.

Besides, the Google bombs don't even really work very well. Do a Google search for "Ray Meier", for example, and the Google bomb target page hasn't even been elevated above the bottom link on the first page. One of the reasons is that the target page is a page with a video that doesn't have much in the way of text. Search engines pay a lot of attention to text content, so the video wasn't a particularly good choice for a Google bomb. Another reason the Google bomb has failed is that the Google algorithm is intelligently designed, so that web sites that pump out a lot of content that is identical to what other web sites publish tend to get demoted as spam.

That's what a Google bomb is, really - spam. The voters deserve a lot better than that for information about the candidates.

I see this morning that blogs are still doing Google bombs against Ray Meier and against Michael Arcuri, publishing the same old cut and pasted material. That shows you how unintelligent the whole Google bomb concept is - the results usually take at least a week to affect Google searches, even when they're successful. A week from now, the election is over.

Of course, the real race is already over. Unless one of the candidates is photographed biting the head off a bat, perceptions aren't going to change in the next five days. Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier will be working on getting their voter turnout machines going, and will make a few stops here and there, going through the motions.

Don't expect any fireworks. Nothing to do now but to vote, and then sit back and wait for the results.

Help Protect The Vote In The 24th Congressional District

2006-10-30T09:10:00.000-05:00

Whether we plan on voting for Ray Meier, Michael Arcuri, Michael Sylvia or none of the above, I hope that we can all agree that the integrity of the elections process is essential. If we voters cannot trust that the vote on Election Day is being administered fairly, then cannot have confidence in our government. Without that confidence, democracy fails.

The development and deployment of electronic voting machines that create no verifiable paper record of how votes are cast is undermining voters' confidence in the honesty of the electoral system. It's been proven that electronic voting machines without a verifiable paper backup can be hacked in less than one minute so that fraudulent votes replace the votes that we actually cast - and there's no way to tell that the hack has taken place. What's worse is that these hacks can be designed to spread from machine to machine, much as a computer virus does.

Given the atmosphere of uncertainty that these developments create, it becomes all the more important that we all be on the lookout for attempts at voter suppression and fraud. Write this number down: 1-888-VOTE-TIP. It's a phone number dedicated to receiving information about criminal attempts to manipulate the electoral system.

We ought not to descend into paranoia, but there is cause to maintain some suspicion. We may not have the best candidates to choose from in this election, but we should at least be sure that whichever lousy choice wins our seat in the House of Representatives does so fair and square.

Is it really all about the TV ads?

2006-10-29T09:06:00.000-05:00

News about the 24th district race reminds me of the real hype around the Superbowl. It isn't so much who wins that matters, but what happens in the commercials. All the talk about the candidates seems centered around the advertisements they, or their parties, place on television.

Most prominent of all has been the story of the aftermath of the ridiculous slur by the National Republican Congressional Committee against Michael Arcuri. In a television advertisement, the Republicans accused Mike Arcuri of asking taxpayers to pay for a phone call he made to a phone sex service. The accusation, taken literally, is mostly true, although the call may have been made by an aide to Arcuri and not Arcuri himself. However, it became clear many weeks ago that the call was a mistake which lasted less than a minute, and then the correct phone call to the New York State Department of Criminal Justice Services phone number, which had just one different digit, was made. The charge for the mistaken phone call was just $1.25 - not exactly enough to break a budget.

The story about this TV ad from the Republicans has made the national news, with coverage on national radio, television, and even in newspapers clear across the continent. Why? People read and watch stories about sex.

No story about the policy positions that relate the important decisions Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier would make representing us in Congress has received anything like this kind of coverage. Why? Most people don't read and watch stories about the public policy measures and oversight that constitute the real work of Congress.

People these days tend to regard congressional campaigns in the same way that they regard celebrity news shows like Entertainment Tonight. They look for news that indicates the personalities of the candidates instead of looking for information about the accomplishments and policy agendas of the candidates. Campaigns are treated as personal dramas rather than political discussions.

This dynamic is similar to what motivates most of our decisions. Whether we're buying a car or a computer, we're driven less by what we need than by the fantasy storylines we create in our heads about how these things will fit into our lives.

Television advertisements for congressional candidates like Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier appeal to us because they provide us with quick and easy codes for understanding who the candidates are without having to bother trying to understand the substance of what the candidates stand for. By coming to an emotional understanding of who the candidates are, we indirectly come to understand who we are ourselves.

The emotional storyline of the phone sex line advertisement appeals to people even after they know the facts of the case, because it tells voters something that they are ready to believe. The advertisement tells voters that rampant, promiscuous sex is threatening their families, and that the plainly sexless Ray Meier will protect them from the threat. The commercial isn't really about the phone sex call at all. It's about people's sexual and social insecurities.

The reason so much of the news coverage is about candidates' advertisements on television is that it's in those ads that the greatest emotional power is displayed. The combination of visual, audio and linguistic cues combine to great effect.

That people should be swayed by such messages is part of human nature. However, there's another part of human nature that these TV ads show little regard for: Our intelligent, rational minds.

It requires strength of will, but we can make decisions based upon what's right for our district and our nation, rather than what feels right. We can attend to candidates' qualifications and ideas about the business of Congress, rather than to the images and suggestions that entertain, flatter, and titillate us.

The question about Mike Arcuri and the Military Commissions Act

2006-10-26T07:22:00.000-04:00

In the pragmatic view of politics, perhaps it doesn't matter so much whether what a candidate does is right or wrong as whether what that candidate does helps or hurts the election effort. I don't cotton much to that pragmatic view, myself, but I know that a lot of other people do.

So, let's consider the impact of Michael Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions Act in a pragmatic sense. Yes, it was a betrayal of Democratic voters for Michael Arcuri to join forces with George W. Bush to support the worst law to come out of the Bush White House in six years, a law that the New York Times called, "a tyrannical law that will be ranked with the low points in American democracy, our generation’s version of the Alien and Sedition Acts." Oh, but let's not consider right and wrong. How did this decision by Arcuri to support the Military Commissions Act impact his election?

Yesterday, I discussed how Eric Massa, a Democratic candidate in the congressional district next door, who opposed the Military Commissions Act, facing a Republican incumbent, a poverty of national Democratic Party support, and a population that is further toward the right wing than in our district, is doing better than Michael Arcuri in the polls. Today, I want to ask a simple question to shed light on Mike Arcuri's own prospects in the wake of his Military Commissions Act support:

Is there one single person in New York's 24th congressional district who is now supporting Michael Arcuri because of Arcuri's support of the Military Commissions Act, who did not support Michael Arcuri until Arcuri supported the Military Commissions Act, and who would have voted against Michael Arcuri if Arcuri had opposed the Military Commissions Act?

Anyone?

If so, name yourself. Is there even one reader out there who fits this category? If not, then Michael Arcuri did not help his campaign by supporting the Military Commissions Act.

That would make Mike Arcuri not only morally vacant, but an inept politician as well.

Eric Massa and Michael Arcuri on Military Commissions Act

2006-10-25T06:39:00.000-04:00

One of the only justifications that the Arcuri for Congress campaign has been able to come up with for its support of the Military Commissions Act is the claim that, if Mike Arcuri had not supported the Military Commissions Act, the Republicans would have bashed and battered him with it.

That claim has always seen a bit absurd to me. I mean, what kind of lawyer is Michael Arcuri, if he cannot defend himself from the criticism that he failed to support a law that puts American soldiers in danger? The Military Commissions Act in fact places American troops in grave peril, because it undercuts the enforcement of the Geneva Conventions worldwide. Now that the United States of America is failing to enforce the Geneva Conventions, thanks to the Military Commissions Act, our current and future enemies have much less incentive to adhere to the Geneva Conventions themselves. American soldiers are now at much greater risk of torture, forced labor, and other forms of abuse when they are captured by rival governments.

Of course, a little thing like the facts of the actual impact of legislation has never stopped politicians from making extravagant claims. After all, Michael Arcuri supported the Military Commissions Act without even bothering to read it. So, it's not surprising that Arcuri claims that the Republicans would destroy his campaign if he did not support the Military Commissions Act.

Let us voters not join the politicians in running away from the facts. Let's take a look at a real world comparison to see what would have happened if Michael Arcuri had decided to have a backbone, and take a stand against the Military Commissions Act.

Over in the 29th congressional district, Democratic congressional candidate Eric Massa has had a more challenging campaign that Michael Arcuri. The seat isn't open. Massa is running against an incumbent Republican. The 29th district's population tends to lean more strongly toward the right wing than our own 24th district.

And then there's the fact that Eric Massa opposed the Military Commissions Act. If the campaign of Michael Arcuri for Congress were correct in its claims, the Republicans ought to have made mincemeat of Eric Massa. However, that just hasn't happened. In fact, since he opposed the Military Commissions Act, Eric Massa's campaign has become all the stronger.

In the Constituent Dynamics poll taken in October - after the passage of the Military Commissions Act - Eric Massa is doing better in his district than Michael Arcuri is doing in our district. Eric Massa has a lead that is 3 points greater than Arcuri's lead, in spite of all the additional handicaps that Eric Massa has had to overcome.

In comparison to the tough campaign Eric Massa has had to fight, Michael Arcuri has had a cakewalk. When Michael Arcuri supported the Military Commissions Act, he stepped in the cake, and tracked it all over the carpet. Voters are rewarding Eric Massa for doing the right thing. Too bad Mike Arcuri just didn't have the guts to do the same.

Michael Arcuri Loses Fred Bieling's Support

2006-10-23T21:39:00.000-04:00

I'm not the only Democrat in the 24th District who has rejected Michael Arcuri's campaign for Congress on the basis of Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions Act.

Fred Bieling, of the Mccs1977 blog writes,

"After confirming with Mike Arcuri's campaign staff, I hereby immediately drop all support of the Democratic nominee for the New York's 24th Congressional district based on his support for S.3930, the Military commission Act of 2006."

Bieling did not make his decision to support the congressional campaign of Libertarian Mike Sylvia easily. He writes, "I waited almost a week doing a dance with his campaign over the phone, holding off printing some of the good news about his run, waiting for an explaination for what I'd read."

I won't tell you how to vote in this election. The truth is that there is no good choice for voters with a conscience and a love of liberty in this election.

Myself, I'll be voting for none of the above.

Arcuri Tries to Weasel on Military Commissions Act

2006-10-22T18:53:00.000-04:00

Michael Arcuri still supports the Military Commissions Act - and it looks like he still hasn't even bothered to read the law - and neither has his campaign manager.

Arcuri's campaign manager, feeling the heat from local Democrats' anger about Arcuri's support for George W. Bush and the Military Commissions Act sent a message of attempted contrition in which he wrote, "He [Michael Arcuri] would have supported the bill because, while imperfect, it places some important restrictions on this adminstration, and then he would have moved immediately to seek legislation to deal with the Habeas Corpus problem."

The habeas corpus problem? Is that all that Michael Arcuri and his campaign manager think is wrong with the Military Commissions Act? If that's true, then they definitely have still not bothered to read the text of the law.

What about the Geneva Conventions problem, for example? Does Michael Arcuri know nothing about that? If you don't believe me that the Military Commissions Act ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, fine. You shouldn't believe something just because I say it's true. Go read the text of the Military Commissions Act yourself, and search for the following phrases in italics - oh yes, they're in there.

The Military Commissions Act gives George W. Bush the unlimited power to engage in de facto amendments to the Geneva Conventions. The text of the law includes the following provision:

"The President has the authority for the United States to interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions"

Everyone, including Senator Mike Arcuri and his campaign manager, ought to know what this means. President Bush attempts to amend laws all the time by means of such interpretation, through signing statements. President Bush has shown a willingness to interpret a law outlawing torture in such a way that it actually allows him to torture people whenever he wants to. President Bush has in the past interpreted the legislation that makes the Geneva Conventions legally binding in American law in order to claim that the President has the power to apply Geneva Conventions however he wants, or not at all. The Military Commissions Act gives that power to the President when it did not exist before.

That's one way that the Military Commisions Act ends enforcement of the the Geneva Conventions - by giving the President the power to amend it however he sees fit. Another way that the Military Commissions Act amends the Geneva Conventions is seen in another selection from the law, below:

"No alien unlawful enemy combatant subject to trial by military commission under this chapter may invoke the Geneva Conventions as a source of rights."

This part of the Military Commissions Act is certainly a dramatic amendment to the Geneva Conventions. The Geneva Conventions applies to all people on a battlefield, without distinction between alien and citizen or lawful and unlawful. Well, at least that's how the Geneva Conventions used to work. Now, thanks to the support of Democrats like Mike Arcuri, that is no longer true - not for the United States of America.

Oh, but it gets worse. If you think that you're safe because you're a citizen, well, you're plain wrong. Read the following additional clause from the Military Commissions Act:

"In General- No person may invoke the Geneva Conventions or any protocols thereto in any habeas corpus or other civil action or proceeding to which the United States, or a current or former officer, employee, member of the Armed Forces, or other agent of the United States is a party as a source of rights in any court of the United States or its States or territories."

No more Geneva Conventions protections for anybody captured by the United States. Is that what Michael Arcuri stands for, or does he just not know that this provision is in the law?

I'm guessing Michael Arcuri simply has no clue. When Arcuri and his campaign staff came to Trumansburg, he told the Democrats there that he gave the Military Commissions Act his support without bothering to read it first.

Supporting Republican legislation without even reading it beforehand - is that what we deserve in Congress? Hell, no.

I'm not going to tell you how to vote in this election, because there is no good choice. You follow your conscience. But, 24th district Democrats, don't let the Oneida County Democratic Committee tell you that this is the best Democratic choice that was available for 2006.

Give them a piece of your mind, and demand a better Democratic candidate for 2008 - whether Arcuri wins this year or not.

What Kind of Fools Does Ray Meier Take Us For?

2006-10-19T22:31:00.000-04:00

Look, I'm not fond of Michael Arcuri. I think he's a rotten leader, a rotten Democrat, and even a rotten politician. But I think Michael Arcuri is going to win this election, in spite of how rotten he is.

Here's why: As rotten as Michael Arcuri is, he at least has the brains not to try to tell us that the sun is shining when we can see that it's raining. Arcuri won't tell us it's July when there's snow on the ground. Arcuri has at least enough sense to not try to tell us we're buying a Formula One racecar as he's handing us a tricycle.

Ray Meier? He doesn't even have that much sense.

What kind of fools does Ray Meier think we are? Does he think we don't know the reality that's staring us in the face? 73 American soldiers are dead just halfway through this month. A full score may be dead just this week, and as the Republicans keep on sending our soldiers into the middle of the chaos, it only gets worse, and worse, and worse.

All this, and what does Ray Meier have to say about Iraq? "Our military and diplomatic forces on the ground can help the Iraqis establish a stable and free Iraq," he says. Just a nip here and a tuck there, and everything will be just fine, Ray Meier says. Don't worry about our American soldiers, he says. Everything's going just swell.

That's bullshit. You and I know it. Ray Meier knows it too.

But, will Ray Meier say so? No, he's more concerned with winning the election.

I can't stand the idea of Mike Arcuri serving in Congress, but even I can see that Ray Meier takes us all for fools.

Ray Meier, Mark Foley, and Mike Arcuri All Wrapped Up WIth a Kinky Bow

2006-10-19T10:44:00.000-04:00

It's time to talk about the biggest campaign issue of this election season: The Mark Foley sexy email homoerotic page-turning scandal. It's the most policy-free issue of the year, and so, naturally, the mainstream media have been talking about it non-stop.

Michael Arcuri is certainly doing his part to keep that talk going. The Arcuri for Congress campaign has been doing its darndest to connect Ray Meier to Mark Foley, and drag Meier down to defeat with the ghosts of congressional pages past hanging around Meier's neck all the way. Mike Arcuri complains that Ray Meier took donations from Republican organizations that in turn took donations from Mark Foley.

It's a two-degrees-of-separation thing. Though Mark Foley works in the Congress in Florida and in Washington D.C., and Ray Meier works as a state legislator in Utica and Albany, we're supposed to come to the conclusion that somehow, Ray Meier is partially to blame for Mark Foley's sexual advances on vulnerable teenage boys.

By these rules of guilt-by-association, Michael Arcuri has some answering of his own to do. You see, just before the scandal broke and Mark Foley resigned from Congress, he voted in favor of the Military Commissions Act.

You remember the Military Commissions Act, don't you? Sure you do. It was signed into law just two days ago. It revokes habeas corpus, ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, legalizes torture, gives the President power to imprison anyone that he declares to be an "enemy", trashes our justice system by creating an alternative system of kangaroo courts, and gives legal amnesty to war criminals. In short, the Military Commissions Act is even more kinky than Mark Foley.

Now, as Mike Arcuri has drawn the connection between Ray Meier and Mark Foley through a money trail, let's draw the connection between Michael Arcuri and Mark Foley through the legislative trail.

Political equation #1:

A. Mark Foley donated money to the National Republican Congressional Committee.
B. Ray Meier accepted money from the National Republican Congressional Committee.
C. Therefore, Ray Meier accepted "tainted Foley money"!

Political equation #2:
A. Mark Foley supported the Military Commissions Act.
B. Michael Arcuri supported the Military Commissions Act.
C. Therefore, Michael Arcuri supports a tainted Mark Foley agenda!

What, you think that this argument isn't fair? If you reject one political equation, you have to reject the other. They use the same twisted logic, after all... Or do you kind of like it twisted?

Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri Follow Boehlert's Bad Record on Liberty

2006-10-18T12:47:00.000-04:00

This election is all about retiring incumbent Republican Sherwood Boehlert, or so the two major party candidates would have us believe.

Michael Arcuri says that he will be a "Boehlert Democrat" - a Democrat who will vote like a Republican.

Arcuri's opponent, Republican Ray Meier, gives out broad boasts comparing himself to Sherwood Boehlert, such as the article that crows, "State Sen. Raymond Meier is the perfect candidate to replace U.S. Rep. Sherwood Boehlert, according to Vice President Dick Cheney." Dick Cheney's word isn't exactly as good as gold these days, of course. No, to be more accurate, Dick Cheney's word is as good as lead.

So, Arcuri and Meier have come to praise Boehlert before they bury him. That's an improvement on Julius Caesar, I guess. But what does the promise from Arcuri and Meier to follow Sherwood Boehlert suggest on the centrally important issue of defending American freedoms?

It suggests that we're in for trouble, no matter who wins.

The Progressive Patriots' Oath of Office Index gives Sherwood Boehlert only a 29 percent approval rating on voting to protect American liberty over the last two years.

Sherwood Boehlert voted to renew the Patriot Act, with almost all of its big government abuses against the freedom from unreasonable search and seizure. The government's got your flight records, your medical records your credit card records, your telephone records, your Internet records, and it's putting all these together into one big database - Total Information Awareness reborn, thanks to Boehlert's vote. Boehlert specifically refused to cosponsor legislation that would have prevented government agents from using the Patriot Act to search through your library records and bookstore receipts.

Congressman Boehlert also voted to block an amendment that would have protected religious liberty. Instead of supporting that amendment, Boehlert supported a measure that would have allowed employees of programs funded by the federal government to be fired for no other reason than that they don't belong to the same religion as their boss. No kidding.

Worst of all, Sherwood Boehlert voted in favor of the terrible Military Commissions Act, which ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, revokes habeas corpus, gives legal amnesty to war criminals, and creates a system of law that allows the President to either throw people in prison with no trial at all or to subject people to show trials with legal standards that are so low that they may fairly be compared to the Salem witch trials.

That's not the kind of record on American freedom that either Ray Meier or Michael Arcuri should be trying to replicate. Yet, Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri don't seem to worry about a little old thing like freedom very much. They both support the Military Commissions Act, just like Sherwood Boehlert.

That's a shame, because as the Progressive Patriots point out, the oath of office for everyone entering the House of Representatives commits the person to protect and defend the Constitution from enemies foreign and domestic. Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri seem more interested in defening their ability to get elected.

Is their shared disdain for the freedoms guaranteed us in the Bill of Rights likely to help them in the polls on Election Day? If so, that's a sign that the voters in this district have drifted as far away from a true love of freedom as Sherwood Boehlert has.

Mike Arcuri and Ray Meier on Constituent Services

2006-10-17T16:57:00.000-04:00

I've spent the last few days trying to wash the accumulated filth from the Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri campaigns off of me, and today comes the signing of the hideous Military Commissions Act into law - which both Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier support.

The Democratic Party leadership in our district has done nothing for us on this law. Not a peep of resistance. The Republicans have given a deep bow of gratitude in respect for the passing of our liberty, gone away...

And so, this day of disgusting weakness from both Democrats and Republicans alike leads me to examine one of the most important issues of this campaign: Constituent services.

Oh, I'm not talking about the nasty kind of constituent services that involve getting a job for your kid in return for writing big checks for the campaign of the victor. That's clearly motivated loyalists in the campaigns of both Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier from the start.

I'm talking about genuine constituent services: Meeting with constituents, listening to their concerns, and doing something about it.

First, let's get something straight about what part of this district is being represented in Congress: Oneida County. If you live outside of Oneida County, don't bet on getting many constituent services, whether it's Michael Arcuri or Ray Meier who gets elected to Congress. From the start, this race has been obsessively focused on the northeastern corner of the district, to the neglect of the rest of the district.

Both Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier say that they'll provide lots and lots and lots of constituent services. Talk is cheap. Let's look at their actual performance working with the public as candidates.

Ray Meier has shown a lot more openness in general, especially when it comes to dealing with the press. Michael Arcuri's campaign has refused contacts from people in the media wanting to ask questions about Arcuri's position on the issues. Throughout the campaign Michael Arcuri's strategy has been to say as little as possible, and to run an underground campaign that avoids scrutiny.

The attitude from the Arcuri for Congress campaign seems to have been that the less contact Mike Arcuri has with voters outside social circle of the Democratic Party Committees throughout the district, the better. Michael Arcuri's campaign shut down the discussion board on his campaign web site when constituents started asking questions that made Arcuri feel uncomfortable. Expect the same from Mike Arcuri if he's elected to Congress.

Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri both have chosen not to publicize their campaign appearances beforehand, relying on their party faithful to bring only voters who are likely to be supportive to campaign events. This approach to campaigning is disgustingly reminiscent of President Bush's tour to promote his scheme to destroy Social Security - only Republican-friendly audience members were informed of the scheduled stops ahead of time. Ray Meier has never had a campaign calendar up. Michael Arcuri? Oh, he had a campaign event calendar up, but he never put any events on it.

The Arcuri for Campaign's web development team at Quadsimia has been so pathetically clumsy that they still have a link to the campaign event calendar at the bottom of the front page of the campaign web site. Hint to anyone who wants to run for Congress in the future: Above all else, do not hire Quadsimia! They've screwed up the Arcuri for Congress web site from day one. In general, neither Mike Arcuri nor Ray Meier seem very aware or very interested in online outreach, which is a shame, given the terrible, stretched-out geography of our district. Remembering Ray Meier's prolonged "Hello World!" debut online still brings winces from area Republicans. Both Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri seem more comfortable in the old era of communications by fax, mimeograph and written memoranda, not at all equipped to work with a district that's economic hopes lie in no small part in the promises of the geographic neutrality of work in the online world.

Both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri are more connected to the national political party structures than they are to constituencies here in the district - with the exception of Utica politics, which looks like a really dirty pool. Count on both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri to vote more according to the demands of the political action groups and party congressional campaign committees than the needs of us here in New York's 24th district.

Michael Arcuri's campaign does have this to say in its favor: It has taken fewer political action committee donations than Ray Meier's campaign. Michael Arcuri's campaign has taken just 36% of its donations from PACs, while Ray Meier's campaign has taken a whopping 52% of its dollars from PACS. Of course, many of the PAC donations that Arcuri has taken are rather sinister - the big check written from Joseph Lieberman's right wing New Democrats is a pretty big stinker, for example.

All in all, don't expect much in the way of genuine constituent services from either Ray Meier or Michael Arcuri - they know where their bread gets buttered, and it isn't in your kitchen. Expect a lot of bluster about jobs and developments, but little accessibility for real discussions with your new representative, no matter who wins.

Neither candidate has shown much propensity for respect for the voters in this election, whether it comes to Michael Arcuri's failure to even show up at the agricultural issues debate and insults hurled at the NAACP or to Ray Meier's thousand-dollar-per-plate dinners.

What Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri wants to tell you is that neither of them would have much power as a freshman member of the House of Representatives. We'll experience many years of a lean pork diet here in the 24th district, until someone can establish seniority, and start a dole of the big bucks for their cronies.

Vote Your Conscience - Arcuri, Meier or Sylvia

2006-10-13T02:52:00.000-04:00

I've taken a day off to reflect on the complicated dynamics of this election, and come to one obvious conclusion: My views don't represent the views of the majority of the Democrats in this district.

To put it more plainly, my views don't represent the views of 98 percent of the Democrats in this district.

That disappoints me greatly, of course, but then, I don't think that my disappointment alone will persuade 24th District Democrats to give a damn about the issues that I care about.

Someone left a message here pointing out that I really may not belong in the Democratic Party. I'm inclined to agree, at this point, but won't make a final decision about that until after this election is through.

I don't feel the need to take back anything I've said about Michael Arcuri. I think he's a terrible candidate with an agenda of self-promotion that will lead him to betray Democratic voters here whenever he thinks that he needs to and that he can get away with it. Given the reaction of Democratic voters here to his support for the Military Commissions Act, I'd say that he'll be able to get away with it most of the time. I'm furious at Michael Arcuri about that, but even more, I'm furious at the Democrats in our district about that.

But, Ray Meier is also a terrible candidate, and he runs to support a political party that is even worse than the Democratic Party. To write all the reasons Ray Meier is a terrible candidate in a single article would be impossible. Let me just summarize. Ray Meier: Very, very, bad.

The truth is, I admire a lot of what Mike Sylvia has to say. But, am I a Libertarian? No. I believe in the power of people to come together to do good things. That means I still bellieve in the goodness of government, at least when we have a more enlightened citizenry than we do at present.

So, where does that leave this election? The two major candidates support an unforgivable law that takes away the very foundations of our freedom. Both of them believe that they can support that law without consequences, and they're both right. After all, CNN, MSNBC, and FOX News aren't covering the story of that law, and if it's not on TV, I don't think it exists as an issue in the minds of most Americans. Other issues have more sex appeal. Liberty, fair trials, and that funny Latin phrase habeas corpus are just too plain musty for most people here to get worked up about.

So, I've done what I can to bring the issue of the Military Commissions Act to light here. It must return as a vital issue, but it doesn't stand a chance now, when 30 second TV spots dominate the political debate. On this issue, I have this last warning: There are very dark times ahead for our nation if we do not repeal this law, and do so quickly.

Where does that leave this blog? Neutral and adrift of any political party structure - pre-independent, you might say. I don't support any of the candidates, but honestly, candidates are not what I've been most interested in writing about in this campaign anyway.

There are more important things than candidates. They're called issues, and they persist as important things even when candidates aren't out in our district using them as selling points.

I'll spend the rest of the short time left in this campaign season writing about the issues other than the Military Commissions Act, and where the two candidates who stand a snowball's chance in hell of getting elected stand on those issues.

I'll stop trying to tell anyone what to do with this election, because the truth is that there are no good choices. You decide which issues matter to you. You decide how you will vote. We may not have habeas corpus, and half the Bill of Rights may have been trashed, but at least we still have the vote... so long as electronic voting machines haven't been tampered with.

Democracy is all about this basic concept: We may make a rotten mess out of our country, but at least it's our mess.

Ghosts of What Could Have Been

2006-10-11T08:13:00.000-04:00

This morning's news reflects a huge tragedy in Iraq, and a smaller one here in New York's 24th Congressional District. The team of researchers at Johns Hopkins University led by Les Roberts has released the results of a new study to update its 2004 study of deaths of Iraqis resulting from the American invasion and occupation. The new study finds that approximately 650,000 Iraqis have been killed because of the war the Americans started there. When the margin of error is taken into account, the reality could actually anywhere between 426,369 and 793,663 dead.

So, let's be conservative and take the low estimate. Even at that number, this is an unprecedented slaughter that's taking place in Iraq. That's right - unprecedented. It is estimated that Saddam Hussein's government, over the space of 20 years, killed 290,000 Iraqis. That means that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has Saddam Hussein beat by 136,369 victims - at a minimum.

For you to imagine the impact this is having on Iraqis, reflect on this: The equivalent death rate from such an invasion of the United States would result in 4 million dead Americans.

This, and the Republicans are still going on about how September 11 changed everything. September 11 resulted in only 3,000 dead. That was a very bad day, but it was just one day, and it's only a grain of sand compared to the violence that's going on in Iraq.

For that violence, every American who did nothing to stand against the invasion of Iraq in the months before the war in 2002 and 2003 is responsible. That includes Ray Meier and that includes Michael Arcuri. Neither one lifted a finger to try to stop the war.

Our election this year could have been different. Instead of having a choice between unworthy candidate Michael Arcuri and worthy candidate Ray Meier, we could have had a choice between a strong Democrat and Ray Meier.

If Rahm Emanuel and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) had not come into our congressional district to interfere and push out all of Michael Arcuri's competitors, and if our Democratic County Committees had not so eagerly helped Emanuel do it, we could have had the time to properly evaluate the worthiness of both Mike Arcuri and Les Roberts. We Democratic voters could have had a choice.

We could have had an intelligent Democrat. We could have had a Democrat who actually knows something about policy issues. We could have had a Democrat who is motivated by trying to make America a better place, not by his own ambition.

We could have had a Democrat capable of talking for himself, not just repeating the talking points produced by the DCCC like a puppet. We could have had real debates based on substance. We could have had a Democrat that we believe in, not a Democrat that we have to apologize for.

Instead, we got no choice. Michael Arcuri was forced upon us. And now, he's going around the district talking about what a great thing the Military Commissions Act is.

Now, the rallying cry of Democrats across the 24th district is, "If we elect Michael Arcuri to Congress this year, at least we can get rid of him in 2008!"

The members of the Democratic County Committees in our district ought to resign their posts in December out of shame for allowing things to get this bad.

Independents Angry at Arcuri Over Military Commissions Act

2006-10-10T04:40:00.000-04:00

The following is the reaction of Jodi, a political independent in the 24th District, to Michael Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions Act:

(The Military Commissions Act is a new law soon to be signed into effect by President Bush that revokes habeas corpus, ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, gives legal amnesty to war criminals, legalizes torture, gives the President power to imprison people without criminal charge, and sets up kangaroo courts with absurd rules designed to railroad defendants into conviction without a fair trial.)

"Here is a Democrat, trying to say that electing a Democrat to Congress will make a difference. And yet he supports torture? Who needs Democrats like these?

Now, is he really a Republican? Is he a sicko? Does he hate freedom and the rule of law? Does he think the Geneva Conventions are quaint like the rest of his ilk?

Probably not. Instead, he is trying to appeal to independent voters. It's like he thinks he has the left fringe of the Democratic Party in the bag, so he is going for independents in a district that is sixty percent registered Republican (I think; I didn't look it up).

So, what is an Independent? Paul made a great point while we were at dinner last night. He said that Arcuri's fantasy of an independent is of a someone in the middle. Arcuri presumes an Independent is the split in the hair that separates Republicans from Democrats. This is a truly stupid thing to think. Why presume Independents are there? Why not guess that they are actually Independent because no party represents their views? And, why not try to give these people a reason for voting? A reason grounded in political difference, political will, an opposition to, why not, FASCISM???"

The point Jodi makes is one that I've made before. Political independents are often not at all centrist or moderate in their political opinions. They're often looking for strong, principled, intelligent voices and regard the Republicans and Democrats as disturbingly similar: Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum.

When Michael Arcuri gave his support to George W. Bush's Military Commissions Act, he didn't just make Democrats angry. He earned the wrath of independents like Jodi too. These are independents that he cannot win the election without...

... unless Mike Arcuri's strategy is to swerve so far to the right that he'll earn the votes of a group of Republicans along with Democrats too loyal to the name of Democrat to notice the difference.

Post Script:
Writer Adam Elkus reacts to what Jodi has written, saying, "It's depressing that we've gotten to the point where opposing torture and the revoking of habeus corpus automatically makes you a 'fringe leftist.'"

I agree, Adam.

Another Voice on the Military Commissions Act

2006-10-09T14:25:00.000-04:00

You've heard me talk enough about the catastrophic impact upon American liberty of the Military Commissions Act, a new law that both major candidates, Republican Ray Meier and Democrat Michael Arcuri, say that they support and would have voted for, if they were now in Congress.

It sounds too horrific to be true: Revoking habeas corpus and the Geneva Conventions, legalizing torture, allowing the President to imprison whomever he wants without explanation, show trials at which the defendant cannot even see the evidence used against him. How could Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri support such a law, you're probably asking yourself. You may well conclude that it's just not possible, and that I must be making it all up. After all, the TV news networks aren't talking about it any more, ever since that Mark Foley scandal came up...

I'm resolved to try to bring this issue to the attention of voters any way that I can, until either Ray Meier or Mike Arcuri renuciates their support for the law. But, I'll give you a break from my voice. For the next few days, I'll bring you what others are saying about the new law, adding their voices to mine in the hopes that readers will pay some attention to this historic moment that has grown so dreadfully quiet.

Today, I'll quote what Robyn Blumner, who writes for the St. Petersburg Times, has to say about the Military Commissions Act that Arcuri and Meier support:

When the people’s representatives collude to collapse the separation of powers into one omnipotent executive, our nation becomes defined by that act...

Bush will be free to determine what abuses by interrogators do not rise to the level of “humiliating and degrading treatment.” Then detainees will be barred from court to challenge that treatment.

The law is a true abomination. It is our fault. We let this happen. We allowed them to draw the false dichotomy between security and freedom. We accepted Bush’s Torture Nation and his untouchable island prison...

Americans no longer understand what liberty means. They think it has something to do with tax-free shopping and their right never to be offended by others’ opinions.

E Pluribus Unum be damned. Here’s America’s new motto: If we can’t pronounce your name, we don’t care what happens to you. Now let us get back to our Happy Meals.

Is Ray Meier Worse Than Michael Arcuri?

2006-10-09T08:12:00.000-04:00

A Democrat reader left a comment here today, asking if I could please get back to writing about the problems with Ray Meier - the Republican opponent to Michael Arcuri. As I've made plain in the past, I'll get back to criticizing the many bad things about Ray Meier - but only after Michael Arcuri repudiates his support for the Military Commissions Act.

I want to explain why.

The essential question in this matter is whether whether, in spite of Michael Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions Act, Ray Meier is still a more dangerous choice than Michael Arcuri. My answer to that question is that Michael Arcuri is, in fact, more dangerous than Ray Meier, if you understand where the most pressing danger lies.

Does Ray Meier present a danger through his sure contribution to a Republican majority in Congress? Yes. However, Michael Arcuri presents an even worse danger: Contributing to a Democratic Party that gives in to the worst aspects of the Republican agenda.

There Republican Party is completely out of reach for reform. The Democratic Party, on the other hand, is the subject of an intense battle. That battle is over the ideological identity of the Democratic Party.

One group, led by the likes of Harold Ford Jr. and Joseph Lieberman, wants the Democrats to be like the Republican Party - and believes, in fact, that progressive idealism is a problem. They'll do whatever it takes to win, including going along with legislation that rips the Constitution to tatters.

The other group, led by the likes of Senator Russ Feingold, believes that the Democratic Party has to be different from the Republican Party. They want the Democratic Party to stand up for basic progressive values such as keeping the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution intact. These Democrats are not willing to sacrifice those freedoms in order to win - because they regard such a victory as the most terrible kind of loss.

Michael Arcuri is in the first group.

I'm in the second.

I am no more willing to vote for Michael Arcuri just because he's a Democrat than I would be to vote for Joseph Lieberman just because he's a Democrat.

If Lieberman and Arcuri's group of Democrats win,and convert the Democratic Party to their vision, the Republicans will be out of power, but it won't make a lick of difference, because the Democratic Party will have become just like the Republican Party - and Americans will no longer have a real choice. The only thing we'll be able to choose between is right wing political party #1 and right wing political party #2. Such a result would be much worse even than the present circumstance, which is to have a minority party that stands up for what's right at least some of the time.

I don't favor having the Republicans retain control of Congress, but I favor the Democrats losing their progressive political identity even more.

This choice is especially important in elections such as the one here in New York's 24th congressional district this year. Our Democratic candidate, Michael Arcuri, has joined forces with George W. Bush himself, to support the most unjust legislation in America since the South's Jim Crow laws.

It's not a great thing to withhold a vote from Michael Arcuri. However, it's better than the alternative, which is to have a morally corrupt Democrat representing our district. Mike Arcuri would not represent us Democrats well, but if he's elected this year, he'll become the default establishment Democratic pick in our district in every election to follow, and it could be decades before we have even the hope of a Democratic primary again.

Are you willing to have Michael Arcuri represent the name of Democrat for our district for the next 20 years?

Michael Arcuri Issue Advertisement: On Liberty

2006-10-09T04:14:00.000-04:00

Bloggers love to comment on the advertisements that congressional candidate make to promote their campaigns - as if it's the advertisements that really matter. Oh well, if you can't beat them, join them, right?

So, here I am joining them - with a twist. Instead of commenting on the insipid and patronizing advertisements created by both Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri, I'll create my own Michael Arcuri advertisement, seen below.

Oh, it's not an advertisement for Michael Arcuri. Rather, it's an advertisement for American liberty, asking you and Mike Arcuri to give a damn about it again.

By the way, FEC watchdogs, it's not an advertisement for Ray Meier either. I oppose Ray Meier's campaign as much as I oppose Michael Arcuri's (Ray Meier says he'll supports the Military Commissions Act too). Consider it an issue ad by an independent voice unaffiliated with any campaign - namely, me.

Why the Military Commissions Act Trumps All Other Issues

2006-10-08T19:19:00.000-04:00

Some Democrats are having a hard time understanding why I, a 24th district Democrat, am opposing both the campaign of Democratic congressional candidate Michael Arcuri and the campaign of Republican candidate Ray Meier.

Although I disagree with Michael Arcuri on many issues, and am generally concerned with Michael Arcuri's arrogant attitude toward voters, my oppositon to Mike Arcuri is ultimately based on one issue: The decision by Michael Arcuri to support George W. Bush's Military Commissions Act.

The Military Commssions Act is more important than any other issue in this campaign, because the Military Commissions Act is a grave threat to America's Democracy. The Military Commissions Act gives the power to imprison people without any official legal recognition of their imprisoned status - because the act takes away habeas corpus protections. The Military Commissions Act also sets up outrageously unfair standards for criminal conviction (including the ability to start a trial before a full investigation of the alleged crime has even been committed).

In practice, the Military Commissions Act will give the President of the United States the powers of a dictator. When the President of the United States can imprison people just because he says that they've committed crimes, Americans are no longer free to speak out against the President without fear of being thrown into prison for doing so.

Maybe the President will use this new power, and maybe he won't. The trouble with the Military Commissions Act is that we'll never know if the President is using his new power - because the law also allows for the imprisonments, torture, and convictions according to new low standards of justice to remain secret from the American people forever. Once this new law goes into effect, we will never know when the President is using his new powers. People could start disappearing into the secret prisons run by the President without us ever finding out about it.

This makes the Military Commissions Act a more important issue than any other - more important than the Iraq War, more important than the environment, and more important than a woman's right to choose. The reason is that with the Military Commissions Act, we will have no assurance of an ability to freely counter the President on any of these issues. Without the ability to exercise free dissent, all issues are at risk.

To promote Democratic issues, we first have to have the freedom to do so without fear of punishment for our dissent from the Republican position. The Military Commissions Act makes it possible for the Republican government to punish us for dissent. Therefore, the Military Commissions Act must take priority over all other issues.

Michael Arcuri either doesn't understand this, or he doesn't care. Michael Arcuri's support for the Military Commissions Act is a mistake of the highest order. To preserve our right to dissent, we need Democrats to stand united against the Military Commissions Act. For that reason, we need to oppose Democrats like Michael Arcuri who defect from the Democratic Party mainstream and support the Military Commissions Act.

Michael Arcuri Wants To Make Beatings Legal

2006-10-07T06:45:00.000-04:00

Democrats, how far are you willing to go in supporting Michael Arcuri?

How about this far:

"One such story Bo told involved him taking a detainee by the head and hitting the detainee's head into the cell door. Bo said that his actions were known by others."

"From the whole conversation, I understood that striking detainees was a common practice. Everyone in the group laughed at the others' stories of beating detainees."

These statements are from a legal affadavit signed by a member of the United States Marine Corps. That Marine alleges that she sat among a group of guards from the American gulag at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and listened to them brag about how they abused prisoners there.

Michael Arcuri says that this kind of treatment of prisoners should be legal.

Are you with him on that, Democrats?

The Military Commissions Act legalizes the beating of prisoners. The new law allows the use of extreme pain against prisoners, so long as it doesn't threaten to kill them. The new law also prevents any prisoners of war from gaining protection under the Geneva Conventions, which explicitly forbid this sort of thing. Until the Military Commissions Act came along, the Geneva Conventions held the power of United States law. Now, they might as well exist.

Until last week, this group of guards would have been considered war criminals. Now, the Military Commissions Act gives them retroactive amnesty from prosecution. As soon as the President of the United States signs the Military Commissions Act into law, the guards will be legally untouchable, and that means that, in Guantanamo Bay, anything goes.

Is that what we want for America?

Michael Arcuri says it's what he wants.

Will you give it your endorsement by casting your vote for Arcuri?

Michael Arcuri: A DA who supports the MCA - scary

2006-10-07T01:30:00.000-04:00

Over in Oneida County, Michael Arcuri is in the awkward position of having the NAACP being so angry that it has withheld its support for his congressional campaign. In large part, the NAACP's opposition to the Arcuri for Congress campaign has to do with many allegations of police brutality and a lack of fair trials under Michael Arcuri's watch as Oneida County District Attorney.

Now, I'm not a resident of Oneida County, so I don't know what the truth is about these allegations. I can talk about the perception of this problem, however - and when Michael Arcuri decided to declare his support for George W. Bush's pro-torture, anti-freedom Military Commissions Act, boy did Mike Arcuri make the perception of this problem worse.

Put two and two together, now. As District Attorney, Michael Arcuri has been accused of using unfair and dishonest tactics to get people convicted. Michael Arcuri has also been blamed for excessive brutality in several arrests.

How do you think it looks, now that Michael Arcuri has endorsed a new law that legalizes torture as a tool for law enforcement interrogations? How do you think it looks, now that Michael Arcuri has endorsed a new law that destroys the constitutional standards that ensure a fair trial?

I don't know if the accusations against Michael Arcuri are accurate, but I do know this: Michael Arcuri's support for George W. Bush's Military Commissions Act makes these accusations against Arcuri a bit more credible.

By supporting the Military Commissions Act, Michael Arcuri proved that he's the kind of guy who thinks that torturing criminal suspects and interfering with the procedures that guarantee a fair trial is a good idea.

Think about this, Oneida County. Is that really the kind of guy you want serving as your District Attorney? Is that the kind of guy that should have the responsibility of prosecuting you if you're accused of a crime?

Trust Michael Arcuri to do the right thing? No, I don't think so.

How Many Arcuri Democrats Turned Out For Protests Yesterday?

2006-10-06T09:14:00.000-04:00

There were protests against Bush and the Republican agenda across the nation yesterday. I went to a demonstration where I'm working - in Chicago.

So, I'm just curious...

All you Democrats who say that you don't like how Michael Arcuri has joined forces with George W. Bush to support the pro-torture anti-freedom Military Commissions Act, did any of you bother to attend one of the gatherings?

Have you actually done anything to speak out against the new low standards for liberty and justice in America?

Arcuri Supporters Should Thank Me

2006-10-06T07:26:00.000-04:00

Democrats who still support Michael Arcuri, in spite of Arcuri's move away from the mainstream of the Democratic Party to embrace George W. Bush and the Republican agenda of torture, unrestrained presidential power, and the disintegration of the Bill of Rights, say that Arcuri had no choice but to support the Military Commissions Act.

These Democrats say that Michael Arcuri had to support the Military Commissions Act because the voters of the 24th congressional district like the law. They say that voters here appreciate the legalization of torture, the end to enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, the withdrawal of habeas corpus rights, and the institution of the power of arbitrary imprisonment by the President of the United States.

Well, if that's really true, then why are these Arcuri supporters so angry with me for pointing out that Michael Arcuri supports these measures.

If the voters of the 24th congressional district really support these attacks on America's freedoms, then Arcuri supporters ought to be coming here to thank me. After all, if they're right about our district's voters, then every time I write the truth that Michael Arcuri supports torture, I should be winning him more voters and helping his campaign.

Yet, Michael Arcuri's Democratic supporters aren't thanking me. They're coming here and telling me time after time that I'm making Michael Arcuri look bad by pointing out that he is on the record supporting revoking habeas corpus, legalizing torture, and abandoning the Geneva Conventions.

The way they write, you'd think that these positions are liabilities for Michael Arcuri. Why, you might even suspect that these Arcuri Democrats actually believe that 24th district voters are upset at Mike Arcuri for supporting George W. Bush and the Military Commissions Act.

Will these Arcuri Democrats please make up their minds? Either the people love the Military Commissions Act and I'm helping the Arcuri campaign, or the people hate the Military Commissions Act and I'm doing the Arcuri campaign great harm.

So which is it, Arcuri supporters?

24th District Democrats Accept The Rove Frame

2006-10-05T15:04:00.000-04:00

I feel foolish about it, but I'm surprised at the reaction of other 24th District Democrats to the news that Michael Arcuri supports the Bush Administration's grab for dictatorial power through the Military Commissions Act. That reaction: If the Democratic candidate supports it, don't criticize him for it.

What are we working for, anyway? Just to get our team in power, no matter what it takes to do so?

The hunger to win this election has twisted the identity of the 24th District Democrats into something downright ugly. The 24th District Democrats have now accepted the ideological frame of Karl Rove.

In this new way of Democratic thinking, defending America's fundamental freedom takes a back seat. The Geneva Conventions aren't so important any more. Neither are habeas corpus, the separation of powers, and the Bill of Rights. Most Democrats now seem to believe that these things can be sacrificed, so long as it helps a Democratic politician win election.

It appears that I'm in the minority in the Democratic Party on this issue. I think that sacrificing American liberty in order to help politicians get elected is unacceptable. I'm different that way, I guess, in having limits beyond which I'm not willing to go.

Oh, I'm not saying that the Democrats who continue to support Michael Arcuri like torture, or that they don't care about the Bill of Rights or habeas corpus. I'm just saying that they've made plain that they're willing to go along with the sacrifice of these things, in the pursuit of electoral victory.

I didn't think that Democrats were like that. What a terrible way to find out that I was wrong.

The sad thing is that these Democrats will complain on and on and about George W. Bush and Karl Rove, even though, all the while, they've accepted the Bush/Rove frame. They have accepted the idea that voters will reject a political candidate unless the candidate embraces a totalitarian security agenda. They have accepted the idea that Americans will respond more strongly to fear than hope and an appeal to fairness. They have also accepted the idea that ideas and values matter less than winning. That's pure Rove.

We didn't get a primary this year, so it's in the congressional general election that we will have to make a statement about what we want the Democratic Party to be. We'll see, the morning after Election Day, whether Democratic voters are in it for the team, or are motivated by the idea that America can still be as it has been promised to us.

Continued Support for Mike Arcuri is Irrational

2006-10-05T07:23:00.000-04:00

I understand that it's difficult for Democrats to not vote for a Democrat in times like these. Many Democrats feel that "they" have been out of power for too long, and they yearn to see someone from "their" team representing them in government. I understand. I've felt that way for years.

But, is Michael Arcuri really on your team? Are you willing to say that you're part of the team to legalize torture, to revoke habeas corpus, to end enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, to give amnesty to war criminals, and to allow the President of the United States to imprison anyone he wants?

Many Democrats rationalize their continued support for Michael Arcuri by saying that, once Arcuri is elected, he will return to the mainstream of the Democratic Party, and will end his support for President Bush and the Republican agenda.

I know it's hard to give up hope on Michael Arcuri, but hopes like these are irrational. The difficult truth is that, in the House of Representatives, the campaigning never stops. As soon as one election is over, members of the House begin positioning themselves for the next election, two years later.

So, if you say that it's an intelligent campaign move for Michael Arcuri to help the President of the United States and the Republican Party to dismantle the Bill of Rights, and you vote for him with that excuse in hand, get ready. Get ready, because you will have taught Mike Arcuri a bad lesson - that to win elections, he needs to cave in to the Republicans.

This won't be the last time Arcuri betrays your values. He'll do it over and over again, secure in the belief that you would never ever vote against him. He'll take you for granted, while he sets his sights on winning the affection of Republican voters.

If Arcuri is willing to sacrifice habeas corpus to get elected this time, what will he sacrifice next time? The right to a free press?

If you don't think there will be a next time, you're fooling yourself. Democrats who keep on supporting Michael Arcuri in spite of his betrayal of us are like women who stay with men who hit them. They make excuses, and say that it was just a one-time thing. No matter how many times they're hit, they say it was justified.

Allow Michael Arcuri to strike out and break your freedom now, and it won't be the last time. Your rational mind knows this to be true. Emotionally, you've built up a connection with the Arcuri for Congress campaign. That's understandable, but you have to have the moral strength to end this dysfunctional relationship.

Women who have children with violent husbands have a moral obligation to their children to leave their husbands, because it isn't just the women who get hit. The kids get hit too.

It's the same thing with Michael Arcuri. Maybe you're willing to give up your freedom. Maybe you're willing to risk it that you won't yourself be greeted at the door by Homeland Security agents ready to take you off to one of Bush's gulags on a trumped up charge.

If that's true, you need to stop thinking about yourself. You need to start thinking about the people who are more vulnerable than you. It's not just your freedom that has been taken away. You need to start thinking about others who, though innocent of any crime, will suffer the extreme consequences of the Military Commissions Act.

We already know of innocent people who have been picked up in the United States, flown off to prisons in undisclosed locations overseas, and tortured. These people never lifted a hand against the United States of America. Michael Arcuri supports the continuation of the program that abused these people.

If you support Michael Arcuri in this election, you're supporting that program too.

A Democrat came here last night and suggested that it's okay for Michael Arcuri to support this program of arbitrary imprisonment and torture, because it's what's needed to get elected.

What will be needed next time?

Getting a Democrat elected is not worth it. I am a Democrat, but I vote for freedom first.

Will Michael Arcuri admit that he was wrong?

2006-10-04T21:47:00.000-04:00

Many 24th district Democrats are starting to fret that I am openly denouncing Michael Arcuri's candidacy. Tonight, one wrote in with the complaint that my little blog here is giving the Republicans the victory that they want.

Well, that's flattering, but realistically, that's not how it works. It's the voters that will deliver the election to one candidate or another. I'm just giving out information to the voters. Lately, that information is damning to Michael Arcuri, but is that my fault?

I'm not a party hack. I'm nobody's shill. Nobody pays me to write this blog, and I'm not about to give up my independent voice to serve someone else's agenda. I set up this blog to promote the ideals that I think ought to be represented in the House of Representatives. I value those ideals over any political party, and over any political candidate.

I'm willing to be somewhat pragmatic, which is why I supported the candidacy of Michael Arcuri until last week. Michael Arcuri takes many wrong stands, and some right stands. He's a lousy campaigner, and he's an arrogant politician who takes pains to restrict communication with his constituents. On the other hand, a Democratic majority is important.

However, as I see it, the Military Commissions Act trumps everything else. The Military Commissions Act, HR 6166, is so devastating to the foundations of American democracy that I feel morally obligated to oppose any politician who supports it.

The Military Commissions Act legalizes torture, ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, allows war criminals to walk free, allows the President to round up and imprison people in secret merely by naming them "enemy", revokes habeas corpus in defiance of the clear standards of the Constitution, and establishes a new system of courts with rules so overwhelmingly slanted against the accused that anyone could be convicted of anything - and put to death - even without evidence of guilt.

This is not just wrong. It is a threat to our very civilization. It is not an issue that I will compromise. I will oppose any politician who supports the Military Commissions Act. Period. No exceptions.

Now, if Michael Arcuri's campaign is feeling the heat and is threatened by this stand that I take, then it's up to Michael Arcuri to do the right thing. Every Democrat who comes to read this blog knows that Michael Arcuri did the wrong thing when he gave his support to the Republican Military Commissions Act.

If Mike Arcuri wants me to lay off, then all he has to do is what he should do anyway. All Michael Arcuri has to do is admit that he made a mistake when he endorsed the Military Commissions Act.

Just a little mea culpa, Mr. Arcuri, and then I'll lay off your campaign and I'll start pounding away at Ray Meier. It's that easy.

You know Michael Arcuri made a mistake. I know Michael Arcuri made a mistake. Now, will Michael Arcuri admit that he made a mistake?

It's his choice, not mine.

No One Says Michael Arcuri Is A Great Choice Anymore

2006-10-04T08:47:00.000-04:00

I've noticed something remarkable about Democratic supporters of Michael Arcuri over the last week. Ever since Michael Arcuri decided to abandon the mainstream of the Democratic Party and join forces with George W. Bush to promote HR 6166, the Military Commissions Act, Arcuri supporters have stopped being Arcuri supporters. They have become Arcuri apologists.

It's no wonder, when you think about it. Here Mike Arcuri is, telling Democrats that he would vote for a bill that legalizes torture, revokes habeas corpus, gives the President the power to imprison anyone without criminal charges, provides amnesty to war criminals, and replaces the right to a fair trial with secret courts that can convict people of crimes and sentence them to death even before a proper investigation of the alleged crime is taking place (I'm not kidding - it's in the law that Arcuri supports. READ IT.)

Even longtime cheerleaders of Michael Arcuri have stopped coming to this blog to say what a great choice Arcuri is. They used to say that if we just got to know Michael Arcuri, we'd want him representing us in Congress. They used to say that Mike Arcuri was a brilliant politician. They don't say that any more.

Now all these last few dogged Arcuri loyalists have to say in Michael Arcuri's defense is that, although Michael Arcuri is a bad choice for Congress, Ray Meier is worse. I don't hear anyone pretending anymore that Arcuri is the best candidate the Democrats could have had this year.

The Arcuri for Congress campaign knows that it's in trouble over its allegiance with George W. Bush and the Republican Party to support the new pro-torture law. Maimun Khan, who works on the Arcuri campaign, has released a half-hearted attempt to explain why it's really not so bad that habeas corpus has been revoked, and that Bush can arbitrarily throw people in prison without a trial, and that people can now legally be tortured even within the United States. I have sympathy for her. It must feel terrible to have to defend a Democrat for supporting what the New York Times calls a low point in our democracy, "our generation's version of the Alien and Sedition Acts".

Even old Bob Hyde, who stopped blogging in favor of Michael Arcuri a long time ago, stirred himself for a couple of days to try to write about how bad the Republicans, including Ray Meier, are. But Hyde can't seem to bring himself to praise Michael Arcuri.

The Arcuri for Congress campaign is reacting in typical fashion, by becoming even more defensive and secretive, trying to cut back on opportunities for Democratic voters to interact with the campaign. They even took down the link on the Arcuri for Congress web site to MoveOn's online endorsement contest. Apparently, Michael Arcuri is afraid that web site visitors might start going there to vote for Ray Meier instead of for him.

Anyone can see that it was a colossal blunder for Arcuri to support the infamous Military Commissions Act without bothering to read it first. However, it seems that Michael Arcuri just can't admit that he was wrong.

There's been nothing on the Arcuri for Congress web site about this issue. Instead, what's the news we get out of the Arcuri campaign? Michael Arcuri's "breaking news" is that uncut sheets of the Arcuri for Congress trading cards are now available.

Does that make up for Arcuri's support for George W. Bush's failed agenda?

I don't think even Michael Arcuri's last dogged defenders could say such a thing.

We Democrats deserve better than this.

Did Michael Arcuri Support the Iraq War or Not?

2006-10-03T06:01:00.000-04:00

An entire election season has come and gone, and throughout it all, Michael Arcuri has refused to answer this basic question:

Did you support the Iraq War when it began in 2003?

There is no absolute evidence either way, but the clues are all there to suggest that, in fact, Michael Arcuri did support the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

There is, for one thing, no proof that Michael Arcuri did anything to try to convince Sherwood Boehlert to vote against the legislation authorizing the start of the Iraq War.

There is also the curiously consistent argument used by Mike Arcuri's defenders that, as a District Attorney, Arcuri could not have done anything in public to oppose the war. That's an absurd argument, given that as Attorney General of all of New York State, Eliot Spitzer took a public stand on the war.

Then there's the fact that Michael Arcuri calls himself "a Boehlert Democrat". Sherwood Boehlert voted for the war. So, when Arcuri embraces Boehlert's positions, he's embracing support for the Iraq War too. What is a Boehlert Democrat, if not a Democrat who thought that going to war in Iraq would be a great idea?

It seems that Michael Arcuri only started to criticize the Iraq War recently, when it became the popular thing to do.

This isn't just Monday morning quarterbacking, dwelling on the past. The positions that politicians took on starting the Iraq War are a good indication of what they would do in similar situations in the future. Given another reckless rush to war, we have every reason to believe that Mike Arcuri would jump on the pro-war bandwagon.

Michael Arcuri is a moral jellyfish, drifting to whatever positions the prevailing political currents take him. Instead of moving for himself, Arcuri takes the easy way out, and just hangs out with all the other flotsam. He doesn't even hope to be a leader. Arcuri's greatest policy ambition is to blend in with the water all around him, so that no one can see how little substance he actually has.

We Democrats deserved to have a candidate with a spine, not a moral invertebrate like Michael Arcuri. We got no primary, of course, because local party bosses didn't want to give Democratic voters a say. The result? We're left with the quivering mass of slipperiness that is Michael Arcuri.

In 2008, let's support the candidate that we don't feel that we have to apologize for.

Michael Arcuri Supported Torture Law Without Reading It

2006-10-02T09:07:00.000-04:00

More news on Michael Arcuri's decision to abandon the Democratic Party mainstream and join George W. Bush and the Republicans on HR 6166:

Yesterday, Mike Arcuri admitted to an audience of Democrats that he didn't bother to read the pro-torture law before he announced that he supports it.

Yes, you're reading that correctly. Michael Arcuri told everybody last week that he supports HR 6166, the Republican law that will...

Revoke habeas corpus

Legalize torture

Allow George W. Bush to declare anyone an "enemy" and then throw those people into prison for the rest of their lives, without ever charging them with any criminal charge

Set up kangaroo courts in which trials can begin even before an investigation into the alleged crime has been conducted...

... but when Michael Arcuri made that announcement at last week's debate, he hadn't even bothered to read the bill!

What's more, a week has gone by now since the text of the legislation was available, and Michael Arcuri still hasn't read it!

You want a congressman who doesn't bother reading a law before he votes on it? Then Michael Arcuri is your man.

Michael Arcuri came to that meeting and promised that he would not be a rubber stamp for George W. Bush. But what's the reality?

The reality is that Michael Arcuri was told to support HR 6166, and he did what he was told, without asking questions, without reading what he was being asked to sign onto.

That's the definition of a rubber stamp.

The worst thing of all: If elected to Congress, Michael Arcuri won't be a rubber stamp for the Democrats. Michael Arcuri will be a rubber stamp for George W. Bush and the Republican Party.

Why doesn't Michael Arcuri just cut to the chase and switch his party affiliation to Republican now, and be honest about it?

Michael Arcuri Denies Press Requests For Interviews

2006-10-02T07:01:00.000-04:00

What we saw of Michael Arcuri today in interview was high in sound bites, but frighteningly low in details. It was more of the rule than the exception for Michael Arcuri to not really know much about the subjects he was asked about.

The word has gotten around that Michael Arcuri is trying to speak as little in public in possible because he's afraid that his ignorance will cause embarassing gaffes.

That would explain why Mike Arcuri has, for so long, ignored attempts by the press to help give him coverage through interviews.

Take Eric Kuhn, for example. Eric Kuhn interviews plenty of politicians for the radio, like Eliot Spitzer and Cindy Sheehan. Michael Arcuri could have gotten plenty of attention for his campaign with an Eric Kuhn interview, but he has refused to sit for an interview.

Here's what the Eric Kuhn web site has to say about Michael Arcuri:

'Kuhn and Company' strongly believes in giving both sides a chance to come onto the show. We have used numerous channels to bring Democrat Michael A. Arcuri on, but he has denied all requests thus far.

Incompetent, lazy, campaigning. That's what we Democrats in New York's 24th congressional district got as a reward for not putting Michael Arcuri through a primary contest.

Note for 2008: Let's have a primary, and let the Democratic voters decide who should represent them. The County Democratic Committees seem not to be able to make a competent choice.

Michael Arcuri Reaffirms He Supports Torture Law

2006-10-01T17:09:00.000-04:00

I just came back home from a meeting of the Ulysses Democratic Committee, not even a quarter mile away from my home. Even I, who have been covering this campaign all year, have trouble believing the duplicity of the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign.

There Michael Arcuri stood in the kitchen of some of my neighbors, and talked about how important it is to elect himself to Congress so that we can defend liberty from George W. Bush. He even uttered the words "habeas corpus".

But, just a few minutes earlier, when he was asked by Ulysses Democrats if he indeed supported HR 6166, he said yes, because it's important to protect American soldiers. HR 6166, which will signed into law by the President of the United States any day now, does the following:

1. Revokes habeas corpus
2. Allows torture to create "extreme pain", and even the use of sex as a form of torture
3. Allows the President of the United States to declare any person to be an enemy, and thereby to take away every one of that person's rights
4. Allows the President to throw people into jail for the rest of their lives without charging them with a crime
5. To set up kangaroo courts in which
a- defendants do not have the right to see the evidence against them
b- neither defendants nor their representatives cannot cross examine people who testify against them
c- defendants can be banished from the courtroom at any moment, even if they do not disrupt the proceedings
d- the trial can begin BEFORE an investigation into the alleged crime takes place
e- evidence that is the product of torture and other forms of coercion is allowed
f- defendants have no 5th Amendment right against self-incrimination
g- defendants do not even have to be told the nature of the crimes of which they are accused
h- records of the trial can be kept secret from the American people forever

Michael Arcuri reaffirmed at this very same meeting that he supports everything that you see above, yet he has the audacity to come into my village and tell people that he will defend liberty?

Has he no shame?

Michael Arcuri is either a scoundrel or an idiot. Quite likely he is both.

Does Michael Arcuri Endorse The Use of Rape?

2006-10-01T10:38:00.000-04:00

"The bill would effectively eliminate the idea of rape as torture."
- New York Times, September 28, 2006

The bill that the New York times is talking about here is the bill that Michael Arcuri supports.

Consider that.

I think Mike Arcuri should explain to us all why he supports a bill that eliminates the idea that rape of prisoners of war is a form of torture.

I also want to hear from all the Democrats here in New York's 24th congressional district who say that we ought to overlook this issue.

I want to hear from those Democrats why we should vote for a man who says that using rape against prisoners of war is a good idea.

By endorsing HR 6166, Michael Arcuri endorsed the use of rape. That's not just something I made up. That's the judgment of the editors of the New York Times.

Come on. Tell me why it's okay to vote for the pro-rape candidate.

Republicans can join in on this one too, because Ray Meier supports the torture-by-rape law too.

When will you allow your political party loyalty to give way to your sense of shame?

Is Mike Arcuri's Failure on HR 6166 Just One Issue?

2006-10-01T08:22:00.000-04:00

In a comment to an earlier article, a reader asked how I could oppose the candidacy of Michael Arcuri just because of "one little issue".

That so-called "one little issue" is Mike Arcuri's support for HR 6166, the law that gives President Bush the powers of a dictator.

Is that just one little issue?

Well, it certainly isn't little.

The impact of HR 6166 is worse than McCarthyism, because instead of happening in a committee hearing that's open to the public, it all goes on behind the scenes, in secret, where there is no chance to bring it under control. This law represents an unprecedented threat to our democracy. Think on the scale of Jim Crow, on the scale of slavery, and you'll get a good idea of the huge size of the problem. America will have to work for a generation to overcome the impact of this one law - if we ever overcome it at all.

It isn't one issue either.

The danger of HR 6166 is that it deals with so many issues at one time. It's a comprehensive bill that attacks American liberty in a huge number of ways, making it impossible for America's traditional standards of decency and fairness in the legal process to withstand the onslaught.

The following are just some of the many serious issues related to Michael Arcuri's support for HR 6166.

Establishing kangaroo courts

Allegations of Michael Arcuri's disregard for civil rights as District Attorney

Torture

Revoking habeas corpus

Scapegoating foreigners

Secret CIA prisons

War Crimes

The integrity of Internet communications

The Bill of Rights

Conviction and punishment without any trial

The future of freedom in America

Voting against the will of the majority of Democratic voters, and the majority of Democrats in Congress

Privacy in our own homes

Legal amnesty for war criminals

A Democratic politician supporting George W. Bush

Rape of prisoners

Bringing the suspicion of dishonor to American soldiers (you know, the "troops")

The Iraq War

America's tarnished reputation in the world

Michael Arcuri's servitude to the DCCC

The equation of dissent with terrorism

Imprisonment without any trial at all

An end to the presumption of innocence

Unrestrained presidential power

By supporting HR 6166, Michael Arcuri has put himself on the wrong side of all these issues... and more.

One little issue? Not by half.

Michael Arcuri Would Ruin a Democratic Majority

2006-09-30T08:21:00.000-04:00

I'm a Democrat. So, I understand why people write here saying that, even though Michael Arcuri is scum, we should vote Arcuri. They're saying that, above all else, we should help the Democrats get a majority in Congress.

I understand why people make that argument, but that argument relies upon an unstated premise. That unstated premise is this: That a Democratic majority in Congress would have voted against HR 6166, the pro-torture, anti-freedom bill that Michael Arcuri supports.

That unstated premise is false.

Do the math: Even if the Democrats had 25 more seats in the House of Representatives to gain a clear majority, HR 6166 would have passed. 34 Democrats crossed party lines to vote for HR 6166.

The reality that these Arcuri-loyalists don't want to admit is that the Democratic majority will not be able to change very much, if enough of those Democrats keep on supporting the Republican agenda, as Arcuri would do.

Mike Arcuri told us that if he gets into Congress, he will vote with the Republicans. If he gets in Congress Mike Arcuri will help George W. Bush. That's what Mike Arcuri told us this week.

Michael Arcuri is a Lieberman Democrat. He is part of the problem.

This Democrat Stands Against Michael Arcuri

2006-09-29T12:55:00.000-04:00

Michael Arcuri has been a terrible candidate from the start, but what he did last night is unforgiveable.

Michael Arcuri has announced that he supports George W. Bush on torture. Mike Arcuri has announced that he supports George W. Bush on revoking the right to habeas corpus. The Arcuri for Congress campaign confirmed to me on the telephone today that Michael Arcuri would gladly help President Bush dismantle the Bill of Rights.

Michael Arcuri said last night at a debate that he would have voted for HR 6166, a law passed by Congress this week that effectively rips the guts out of our democracy.

What does that mean, practically speaking?

1. I cannot support the candidacy of Michael Arcuri any longer.
2. Michael Arcuri will not get my vote.
3. I feel duty bound as an American citizen to oppose the campaign of Michael Arcuri for Congress.

Let me be clear: I do not support the campaign of Ray Meier. Ray Meier also supports this terrible law.

I will be doing as much as I can between today and Election Day to convince Democrats in the 24th Congressional District to do one of two things:

A. Abstain from casting a vote for any candidate in this race.
B. Cast a protest vote in favor of the third party candidate.

The third party candidate does not support the new law. I just spoke to Mike Sylvia, the Libertarian candidate for Congress in our district, and he said that he is against the torture bill, without equivocation. "I am horrified by the abuses of the Bill of Rights contained in this new law," he said to me. That's a word-for-word quote.

The Republican blogger who calls himself "Biggus Dickus" doesn't think that we Democrats are going to lift a finger in protest against this. He doesn't think that we'll oppose Michael Arcuri on this matter. He writes, "the truth is the far-left voters are going to be pulling the lever for Arcuri anyway. It's just amusing to watch them get all indignant before the inevitable happens."

Dick, you couldn't be more wrong.

Unlike the Republicans, we Democrats have more principles than partisanship. Michael Arcuri doesn't deserve our support, and he won't get it.

I don't want a Republican majority in Congress, but this is more important than party loyalty. This is about doing the right thing. Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri both stand for the wrong thing. So, the only right thing to do is to stand against them both.

Michael Arcuri Supports the Bush Torture Law!

2006-09-29T11:42:00.000-04:00

Last night, Mike Arcuri threw the election to Ray Meier.

I called the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign just a few minutes ago, and they confirmed that, at the debate last night, Arcuri announced that if he were in Congress, he would have voted in favor of HR 6166.

Yesterday, that same legislation, under the bill number S 3930, was approved by the United States Senate.

More on this to come.

Much more.

Sherwood Boehlert Betrayed Our Trust with 6166

2006-09-28T19:58:00.000-04:00

Sherwood Boehlert betrayed the citizens of New York's 24th Congressional District yesterday. He voted for the HR 6166, the bill that revokes a large number of our freedoms.

Maybe you don't know what HR 6166 does. After all, the name HR 6166 seems pretty harmless - just a bunch of boring paperwork, right?

Wrong.

Here's what the legislation will do if the Senate passes its version, S 3930, today:

If it becomes law, this legislation will:

1. It will revoke habeas corpus
2. It will create a secret committee appointed by Bush and Rumsfeld that has the power to declare any person - even a US citizen - to be an enemy, instantly depriving them of their legal rights. There will be no appeal allowed.
3. It will allow police to search your home without a search warrant
4. It will revoke protection of prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions
5. It will give George W. Bush amnesty for any war crimes he has committed
6. It will allow for people to be put on trial in front of a kangaroo court military tribunal, even if they aren’t in any military, and have not engaged in military attacks against the USA
7. It will allow the government to convict people of crimes on the basis of secret evidence that the accused never sees
8. It will make it legal for the government to use testimony extracted through torture
9. It will end the legal right to be protected from forced self-incrimination
10. It will allow the government to imprison people without telling them what crimes they are being charged with
11. It will remove the right to cross-examine witnesses
12. It will allow for the records of trials to be kept secret from the American public
13. It will enable trials to begin even before a thorough investigation of the alleged crime has taken place
14. It will take away the right to a speedy trial

If you say that the law won't do these things, it tells me you haven't even read the law. Many members of Congress haven't read the law. Did Sherwood Boehlert bother to read it before he voted yes?

This is a betrayal of the most basic American values. Sherwood Boehlert has lost forever the ability to be fairly called a moderate. This is not a moderate law. This is extremism of the worst kind.

This isn't the kind of issue that wins or loses elections. This is about what's right and what's wrong.

I don't care if you're a Republican, Democrat, or independent voter. We all ought to be able to see that legislation is a serious threat to the American way of life. Our freedom is on the line.

Please, call Senator Schumer this morning. Call Hillary Clinton. Ask them to vote AGAINST S 3930.

Is Unreasonable Search And Seizure Okay Or Not?

2006-09-27T12:31:00.000-04:00

News about the John McCain torture bill gets worse. I already knew that the legislation would strip habeas corpus rights, allow testimony obtained through torture, and deprive us of the right to a fair trial. Now, I'm reading through it again, and seeing that the newest version of this legislation allows for prosecutors to obtain evidence from people's homes without a search warrant.

No, I'm not kidding. Yes, it's wild. It's outrageous. It's so out of hand that I needed to check my own reading on the matter to make sure I wasn't just seeing things. I'm not. Read this article yourself. Catch the part where it informs us that "prosecutors could ignore American legal standards on search warrants" under this new legislation? Catch the part where it says that, over the weekend, the Republicans in the White House and Congress purposefully removed the provision that would have protected these warrantless searches of people's homes within the United States?

Catch the part where it says that the Democrats aren't sure yet whether they're going to oppose this?

Am I living in some kind of crazy nightmare? If our politicians won't stand up against this insane legislation, if they won't stand up for our basic Constitutional rights to a fair trial, to freedom from self-incrimination, to the right to due process, and to the right of protection from unreasonable search and seizure, then what the bloody hell will they stand up for? This legislation rips away half of the protections of the Bill of Rights, for goodness sakes!

Don't believe the excuse that only the Constitutional rights of foreigners will be taken away. The President of the United States will get the power, through his own secret committee, to declare ANYONE an enemy combatant, seized here in the United States or not, and then all the Constitutional rights of that person get taken away instantly - because there is no more habeas corpus right for the prisoner. If you aren't recognized by the legal system as even existing, you have no access to lawyers, no contact with the outside world, and no opportunity to do anything about it. They get to do anything to you that they want - and you never ever get the right of appeal, or even the right to a trial.

These freedoms that the Republicans are trying to take away are the freedoms that we Americans won way back in the Revolution of 1776. Senator Patrick Leahy is right. This legislation is downright unAmerican... if you believe that an essential part of being an American is having freedom. If all that you believe is that being an American is about waving the flag, don't worry. They're not taking away your right to wave the flag.

Where are the Republicans on this issue? Why aren't they jumping up and down and screaming about how this expands the power of big government? Are the Republicans for big government now?

How about you, Biggus Dickus, the only other blogger who is covering this race between Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier any more? Why aren't you writing about this? How come all you can write about is how sad you are that you couldn't see Laura Bush? Are you not paying attention?

I'm grateful that Michael Arcuri spoke out against this terrible legislation last week, though he did so in meek, uncertain language - and in the Rome Sentinel, which is neither widely read on paper nor easily available online.

The last we heard from Ray Meier, he supported the fake "compromise" that's the foundation of the terrible legislation now being proposed. Since then, Ray Meier has been busy in an ideological embrace with George W. Bush's wife, who supports the attempt to take our freedoms away through this new law.

If Ray Meier stands against this totalitarian legislation, then he needs to say so - loud and clear. We need to hear from both Mike Arcuri and Ray Meier in a way that this grave issue merits - in clear, official statements released to all area newspapers, and published online where everyone can see them.

This issue ought to be above partisan politics, something that Republican and Democratic voters alike can agree upon. No mealy-mouthed half answers and evasions. You now either stand up for freedom or you sit down and watch American freedom being torn apart. Which is it? Are for freedom, or are you against it?

Ray Meier Supporters Love Rick Santorum

2006-09-27T08:44:00.000-04:00

Reason #12 to Not Vote for Ray Meier: Ray Meier Supporters Love Rick Santorum

Ray Meier tries to portray himself as moderate, but the nature of his supporters belies the radical nature of his campaign.

Consider this: Ray Meier's supporters are avid fans of Rick Santorum. Consider what our local far right wing blog, Sounding the Trumpet, has to say about Ray Meier and Rick Santorum:

On Ray Meier: "Boehlart was probably one of the most liberal Republicans in Congress. He voted several times against the ban on partial birth abortion, and got a %100 rating from NARAL for 2005 and 2006. Club for Growth tried unsuccessfully to oust him during a primary by supporting his opponent David Walrath the last two elections. However, now we finally have a candidate that conservatives can be proud of — Ray Meier. He’s prolife, been endorsed by the Republican Study Committee and New York’s Conservative Party."

On Rick Santorum: "Rick Santorum has been one of the strongest voices for family, traditional values and the war on terrorism in the Senate. As one of the top three leaders of the Senate, he has not only articulated conservative values but also been able to effectively advance the conservative cause."

There you have it from a Republican voice itself: Ray Meier is no Sherwood Boehlert. On the contrary, the right wing activists are excited because Ray Meier promises to be more like Rick Santorum. Rick Santorum is the extremist Senator from Pennsylvania who has proposed sending gays and lesbians to prison - just for being gay. Santorum takes anti-government hatred to such an extreme that he's proposed a bill that would forbid the National Weather Service from offering free weather forecasts to Americans - because he thinks that doing so would be too socialist.

The same right wing blogger who praises Rick Santorum and Ray Meier is also an enthusiastic proponent of Intelligent Design, a new form of Creationism that denies the reality of biological evolution through natural selection. It seems that if you support making science education into a prop for religious instruction, Ray Meier is the candidate for you.

That extremists of this sort are itching for Ray Meier to be elected to the United States House of Representatives ought to give us pause. We don't need another Rick Santorum on Capitol Hill, and that's reason #12 to NOT vote for Ray Meier.

Vote Online To Help Mike Arcuri Get MoveOn Attention

2006-09-26T19:56:00.000-04:00

I'm breaking my pledge to not write about Mike Arcuri tonight, because there's a chance to offer easy online assistance to the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign... and the Arcuri campaign, true to form, isn't helping anyone find it.

MoveOn is holding an online ballot on whether to endorse Ray Meier or Michael Arcuri in the 24th District campaign.

This should be a no-brainer for MoveOn, a progressive organization, but well... those of you who have been paying attention to this campaign will understand what MoveOn is doing. They're looking for proof that Michael Arcuri has some degree of online support.

If Michael Arcuri fails to get at least 2/3 of the online votes, he doesn't get their endorsement. With that endorsement comes a lot of "attention" to our district - meaning support in the effort to prevent Ray Meier from getting elected, though of course not coordinated with the Arcuri campaign itself.

The Arcuri for Congress campaign web site won't give a link to this important opportunity to promote its own standing. So, you'll have to follow the link from here.

Please, go over to the MoveOn site and pick up Michael Arcuri by his own bootstraps - give him a vote.

Don't Believe The Hype On McCain - Bush Torture Law

2006-09-26T13:47:00.000-04:00

Republican congressional candidate Ray Meier has come out in favor of the Bush / McCain torture legislation. What does that mean? Oh, good question.

The Republicans want you to believe that this legislation is a "compromise" that's reasonable and in accordance with the Constitution of the United States. They want you to believe that, but frankly, it's a load of bull. It's a shell game. It's a scam.

Pay attention to what the law proposed by John McCain and George W. Bush actually would do, and you'll be terrified.

1. The law would remove the right of habeas corpus. That means that, whatever laws are in place protecting the other legal rights of people imprisoned by the federal government, they have no practical effect. After all, if a prisoner does not have the right to be legally acknowledged by the judicial system of the United States, then that prisoner has no legal access to any legal protections at all. This measure endorses the international system of CIA prisons established by George W. Bush.

2. The new version of the legislation actually provides fewer legal protections for people than the earlier version proposed by Bush did. Don't believe me? Believe the Washington Post, which runs the story on its front page this morning: Detainee Legislation to Have Fewer Restrictions.

3. The legislation takes away the right to a speedy trial.

4. The legislation removes the freedom to choose not to incriminate oneself. That freedom is guaranteed to all people, citizen and non-citizen alike, in the 5th Amendment to the Constitution in the Bill of Rights.

5. The legislation would deprive people of the right to know what why they are being imprisoned, including what criminal charges are being made against them. Section 810, article 10 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice states that "When any person subject to this chapter is placed in arrest or confinement prior to trial, immediate steps shall be taken to inform him of the specific wrong of which he is accused and to try him or to dismiss the charges and release him." The McCain - Bush legislation would nullify Section 810, article 10 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

6. The McCain / Bush legislation would permit the use of testimony that was forced from prisoners through the use of torture. That's currently prohibited, even in military trials, by the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Section 831 d, which reads, "No statement obtained from any person in violation of this article, or through the use of coercion, unlawful influence, or unlawful inducement may be received in evidence against him in a trial by court-martial." The new law removes this protection. Torture away!

7. Under the new law, prisoners could be put on trial on criminal charges even before an investigation into the charges took place! Section 832 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice makes this guarantee: "No charge or specification may be referred to a general court-martial for trial until a through and impartial investigation of all the matters set forth therein has been made." What kind of criminal trial could you have before an investigation into the charges has been made? the trial of a kangaroo court, that's what. A kangaroo court is just what John McCain, George W. Bush and Ray Meier have proposed.

8. Under the new law, prisoners will not have the right to cross-examine witnesses against them. In the new system, someone can testify against you and you'll never have the opportunity to question or refute what the witness claims.

9. Have you heard that the new "compromise" legislation guarantees protection under the Geneva Conventions? John McCain says it does. John McCain is lying. Here's verbatim text from the new law: "Geneva Conventions Not Establishing Source of Rights- No alien unlawful enemy combatant subject to trial by military commission under this chapter may invoke the Geneva Conventions as a source of rights."

Think you're safe from this new law? People who were found to have nothing to do with terrorism were seized in the United States and thrown into those secret CIA prisons, where they were tortured while being interrogated. Why couldn't it happen to you? If you're thrown into one of those CIA prisons, under the law pushed by George W. Bush, John McCain and Ray Meier, you wouldn't even have the right to be recognized by a court of law. They could keep you there for the rest of your life, and torture, you, and no one would ever know what happened to you.

Yes, you.

The law allows a special government committee, with members appointed by George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld, to declare you an enemy combatant - and neither you nor your family will have the right to appeal this decision.

Don't just believe what the Republicans and the people on the TV tell you about this law. Read it yourself.

Ray Meier thinks that's okay. Are you willing to go along with it?

A Vote for Ray Meier is a Vote for Bush

2006-09-26T08:14:00.000-04:00

Reason #11 to Not Vote for Ray Meier: A Vote For Meier is a Vote For Bush

I've said it before, but not as part of this list of 30 reasons to not vote for Ray Meier, so I'll say it again: A vote for Ray Meier is a vote for Bush.

Everyone knows what's going on with the visit of Laura Bush to hold an elitist soiree fundraiser with Ray Meier, with tickets going at $1,000 and $2,000 a pop. The numbers show clearly that a huge majority of likely voters in our district think that George W. Bush is a terrible President and has taken America in the wrong direction. Yet, Meier's base still adores Bush.

Ray Meier can't have President Bush himself here, or he'll lose the independent and moderate Republican swing vote that is essential to his campaign. He can, however, have Bush's wife come into town. It's not polite to criticize the President's wife (though Republicans did it throughout the 1990s). Heck, even I won't carp on Laura Bush here.

However, I will point out what the visit makes clear: Ray Meier is George W. Bush's man. That's the message Meier is sending to his political base with the visits of Laura Bush and Dick Cheney: Don't worry, I'm one of Bush's Republicans.

Vote for Ray Meier, and you vote for a man who will vote to support Bush's agenda of failure in Congress.

Vote for Ray Meier, and you might as well be voting for Bush. We've seen that mistake made two times too many already. We must not repeat it this year. That's reason #11 out of 30 to NOT vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

Ray Meier Is Part of A Disintegrating Ideology

2006-09-26T07:03:00.000-04:00

Reason #10 to Not Vote for Ray Meier: Ray Meier is Part of a Disintegrating Ideology

The events of the last few days in Washington D.C. have been remarkable, but they are not the most remarkable we shall see. The government of George W. Bush is on the verge of falling apart as the result of its own radical ideology.

The Bush Republican ideology says that the law doesn't matter, that the Constitution doesn't matter, that the Bill of Rights can be chucked right on out the window whenever the President of the United States deems it necessary. This ideology makes the President into a dictator who is above the law.

Ray Meier is a part of this ideology. He supports Bush, and he has refused to distance himself from Bush's pro-torture, anti-freedom legislation.

George W. Bush and John McCain have performed a very clever shell game to come to their "compromise", but the plain fact is that their proposed legislation still changes the law to make torture legal (just so long as it doesn't kill the prisoner or cause major permanent harm to the body) and still provides amnesty for war criminals.

The Bush-McCain torture legislation also takes away our right to habeas corpus protections - the foundation of all our other freedoms. That outrage was pointed out by the Republican chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday. Senator Arlen Specter called this attempt to rip the bottom out of American democracy "inexplicable", and pointed out that it is in clear violation of the Constitution, which only allows habeas corpus to be temporarily suspended in the case of a rebellion against the government or an invasion by a foreign power.

As Senator Specter pointed out, there is no invasion and there is no rebellion. Yet, George W. Bush is asking Congress for a permanent revocation of habeas corpus rights.

It's not just me, some blogger off in an Upstate New York village, who's saying that this legislation is a threat to our democracy. United States Senators, Republican and Democrat, are coming together to denounce the McCain-Bush proposal on the grounds that I cite here. Senator Patrick Leahy made the following statement yesterday, for example:

"This provision would perpetuate the indefinite detention of hundreds of individuals against whom the Government has brought no charges and presented no evidence, without any recourse to justice whatsoever. That is un-American, and it is contrary to American interests.

Going forward, the bill departs even more radically from our most fundamental values. It would permit the President to detain indefinitely – even for life – any alien, whether in the United States or abroad, whether a foreign resident or a lawful permanent resident, without any meaningful opportunity for the alien to challenge his detention. The Administration would not even need to assert, much less prove, that the alien was an enemy combatant; it would suffice that the alien was “awaiting [a] determination” on that issue. In other words, the bill would tell the millions of legal immigrants living in America, participating in American families, working for American businesses, and paying American taxes, that our Government may at any minute pick them up and detain them indefinitely without charge, and without any access to the courts or even to military tribunals, unless and until the Government determines that they are not enemy combatants.

Detained indefinitely, and unaccountably, until proven innocent. Like Canadian citizen Maher Arar. As the Canadian Government recently concluded in a detailed and candid report, there is no evidence that Mr. Arar ever committed a crime or posed a threat to U.S. or Canadian security. Yet, while returning home to Canada from a family vacation, he was detained, interrogated, and then shipped off to a torture cell in Syria by the Bush-Cheney Administration While the Canadian Government has now documented that the wrong thing was done to the wrong man, the Bush-Cheney Administration has, as usual, evaded all accountability by hiding behind a purported state secrets privilege."

The so-called "compromise" of George W. Bush and John McCain is falling apart because it isn't a compromise at all. It's the same old pig, dressed up in a hat and lipstick.

Republicans and Democrats are coming together to say no to Bush's anti-freedom ideology. Bush's ideology is on the verge of disintegration. Yet, Ray Meier still holds on to that ideology, standing with Bush no matter how crazy Bush gets.

Ray Meier doesn't have enough sense to step away from a destructive ideology, even while it's crumbling before his very eyes: That's reason #10 out of 30 to NOT vote for Ray Meier for Congress

Ray Meier Approach Makes Terrorism Worse

2006-09-25T05:52:00.000-04:00

Reason #9 Not to Vote for Ray Meier: Ray Meier's Plan Makes Terrorism Worse

The Ray Meier plan for the Iraq War is easy to understand: Let President Bush do whatever he wants.

The problem with that plan? It makes terrorism worse.

That's not some claim made just by antiwar progressives. That's the claim made by the 16 government intelligence agencies who put together the National Intelligence Estimate. The National Intelligence Estimate is a report on the threats to the USA that the nation's top intelligence experts regularly send to the President of the United States.

Sometimes George W. Bush reads it, and sometimes he doesn't bother. It's classified, so we citizens can't read it for ourselves, but we ought to pay attention to what information about it comes our way.

Why? Well, this weekend, we learned that a National Intelligence Estimate sent to President Bush this year informed the President that the Iraq War was making terrorists stronger and thus, increasing the danger of terrorist attacks against the United States.

Has Ray Meier made any comment about this? Of course not. He's pretending the problem doesn't exist.

That's reason #9 out of 30 not to vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

Ray Meier Is Poison For the Environment

2006-09-25T03:41:00.000-04:00

Reason #8 To Not Vote For Ray Meier: Ray Meier Is Poisonous For The Environment

In its coverage of the 2005 political year, the Environmental Advocates of New York profiled Sherwood Boehlert's work for the environment in a special section on their web site entitled "Green Courage: Representative Sherwood Boehlert".

Ray Meier has earned no such praise. There's a reason for that. Last year, Ray Meier was the lone vote against legislation that required that public schools use cleaning chemicals that don't poison the environment. Not mixing kids with poisons is a no-brainer for most of us, but on this issue, Ray Meier just didn't get it.

Ray Meier has cast many other anti-environmental votes in recent years. Meier supported legislation to help build a huge garbage incinerator practically in the back yards of New York State residents. Meier supported a bill that limits the power of local communities to oppose out-of-control land grabs. When Ray Meier had the chance to support a bill that would have ended the use of a poisonous substance in our clothing and bedding, Ray Meier voted against it.

In a gimme to the railroad industry, Ray Meier opposed a bill that would have banned the incineration of creosote in our neighborhoods, and would have put rules in place to protect kids from improper creosote disposal. Creosote contains nasty chemicals such as alkylnaphthalenes, naphthalene, diphenyl, acenaphthalene, fluorene, diphenylene oxide, quinoline base and indole. You don't want your kids breathing that stuff after it's been burned near where they play? Exposure to creosote is known to cause cancer. Ray Meier didn't care about that.

Ray Meier is no Sherwood Boehlert. Ray Meier's environmental record is full of filth. That's reason #8 to NOT vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

We Cannot Trust Ray Meier With Future Wars

2006-09-21T08:08:00.000-04:00

Ray Meier Cannot Be Trusted With Future Wars: Reason #7 to Not Vote for Ray Meier

The disaster that was the decision to invade and occupy Iraq is not just a mistake of the past. It was also a demonstration of what particular politicians will do in similar situations.

There never was any evidence that Iraq was a serious threat to any other nation, much less to the United States. Yet, most politicians in Congress didn't pay any attention to that huge gap. They voted to give George W. Bush the power to invade Iraq. They did it in spite of the fact that huge numbers of Americans begged them to look at the facts. In one day alone, one million Americans marched, peacefully and lawfully, in the streets to ask Congress not to help Bush start the Iraq War.

The politicians who supported the idea of starting a war in Iraq didn't listen to the 50 percent of Americans who said that invading Iraq would be a mistake.

Now, those politicians like to pretend that they were either tricked into giving that support, or were working with the best information available. That's a load of bull. All the signs were there pointing to a series of grave problems that would result from an invasion of Iraq. Those politicians who supported the war just chose to ignore the warning signs, and to do what was politically convenient instead.

Ray Meier was one of those politicians. Oh, he wasn't in Congress at the time, but he gave his support to the push to go to war as a politician loyal to George W. Bush. Ray Meier made a big mistake, and he still won't admit it.

His record on Iraq shows that we cannot trust Ray Meier to make decisions about war and peace. Yet, that's the duty he would have if he were sent to Congress. The Constitution makes it clear: It is the role of Congress to declare war.

Ray Meier is not up to the job. Ray Meier has shown that he supports using war as a political tool. Ray Meier's mistake with Iraq proves that he does not have the sufficient moral and ethical judgment to serve in the United States House of Representatives. That's reason #7 out of 30 to not vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

Ray Meier is an Inconvenient Corporate Stooge

2006-09-20T06:45:00.000-04:00

Reason #6 to Not Vote for Ray Meier: Ray Meier is a foot soldier for dirty old big oil

Democrats like Al Gore have been sounding the alarm about global warming for years, but it's only now that Republicans like Ray Meier have grudgingly accepted what we Democrats have been saying all along. Ray Meier has always played it politically safe on this issue, never stepping out further than what national Republicans say the truth is. Now, Ray Meier is copying George W. Bush's energy talk - and we all know how little that talk has done for America in the last six years.

I can't find anywhere where Ray Meier even acknowledges that global warming exists, although science has thoroughly proven that it does. Look on Ray Meier's campaign web site, and you won't find the term global warming or climate change. It's as if Meier just doesn't think there's a problem. Certainly, Ray Meier's talk on agricultural issues fails to address the issue, even though farmers know that it's already affecting their livelihood.

Practically speaking, Ray Meier is stil hanging on to the shreds of the fossil fuel industry's old talking points - which even the fossil fuel industry is going to have to abandon soon. Ray Meier supports Big Oil in its push to suck every last drop of oil out of the ground as fast as it can - including up on the ecologically sensitive North Shore of Alaska. Ray Meier also supports the corporate talk of "clean coal technology", although any truly clean coal technology is as elusive as the technology to make ethanol a sustainable solution.

Ray Meier won't support the Apollo Alliance Energy Initiative. He won't support Al Gore's plan to fight global warming either.

It's no wonder that Ray Meier is still pushing the ideas of the oil industry - the oil industry has eagerly made contributions to Ray Meier's campaigns, seeing the opportunity to get a congressman who's more open to low standards for protecting America from pollution than Sherwood Boehlert has been.

Accepting that money is a slick move on Ray Meier's part, but it's the wrong thing to do. We need a real representative, not just a corporate stooge. That's reason #6 out of 30 to NOT vote for Ray Meier.

Ray Meier Ignores Reality In Iraq

2006-09-19T07:42:00.000-04:00

Reason #5 to Not Vote for Ray Meir for Congress: Ray Meier Ignores the Reality of the War in Iraq

Ray Meier says of the Iraq War, " I am still most influenced by the views and actions of our troops... I am impressed by their strong belief in the mission and their conviction that our military and diplomatic forces on the ground can help the Iraqis establish a stable and free Iraq."

Ray Meier has had that statement up for months. The problem with it is that it doesn't at all reflect what America's soldiers in Iraq are actually saying.

A poll this year revealed that "72% of American troops serving in Iraq think the U.S. should exit the country within the next year, and more than one in four say the troops should leave immediately".

A large number of American generals who have been in Iraq are reporting that the situation there is deteriorating, not getting better.

A assessment by the Marines that was kept secret from the American people until uncovered this month stated of Iraq's Anbar province, "there is almost nothing the US military can do to improve the political and social situation there".

Ray Meier's happy talk on Iraq is not in accordance with what the military's leaders are saying about Iraq, and contradicts what soldiers themselves believe. We need a congressman who is in touch with reality, not someone who keeps on repeating a partisan distortion of the truth. Ray Meier won't speak the truth about Iraq, and that's reason #5 out of 30 not to vote for Ray Meier for Congress this year.

Ray Meier Will Not Cut the Size of Government

2006-09-17T18:56:00.000-04:00

Reason #4 Not to Vote for Ray Meier: Ray Meier Will Not Cut the Size of Government

Republicans love to make campaign promises about how they're going to cut the size of government. But this year, the promises aren't being made so much as they're being merely suggested.

Take, for example, the following passage from Ray Meier's announcement speech:

"Everyday hard working New Yorkers have to watch their expenses and spend the money they earn carefully. They expect government at all levels to do the same. They know that a federal budget grown to $2.77 trillion and counting and growing deficits are a drain on themselves and a huge mortgage on their children’s future. As a state senator, I’ve focused on reforming entitlements like welfare and Medicaid, and shown that policies that provide for greater accountability for government bureaucracies and responsibility and independence for individuals can yield savings without hurting people. In Washington, I will always remember that every single dollar spent by government had to first be earned by a hard working taxpayer."

Wow! The federal budget has grown to $2.77 trillion dollars and counting? Federal budget defecits are a drain? Well, golly, it's a good thing that Ray Meier recognizes that, but is Ray Meier the kind of guy we can count on to help solve the problem in Congress?

Don't bet on it. Ray Meier will make the problem worse.

The reason is simple. The record size of the federal government was created by Republicans in Congress. The immense budget deficits that are draining our economy dry and creating a mortgage on our children's future were created by Republicans in Congress.

Do you notice how, in that passage from Ray Meier's speech, he doesn't promise to work to shrink the size of the federal government, and doesn't promise to reduce government spending? There's a reason for that. Ray Meier knows he can't make those kinds of promises - or, at least, he can't make those promises and keep them.

The Republican Congress and the Republican President have expanded the federal government to such an extent that they've broken all previous records. So, if you believe in small government, why would you vote to send another big government Republican to Congress?

The Republican Congress and the Republican President took budget surpluses and turned them into record-breaking budget deficits. So, if you're against big government spending, why would you vote to send another borrow-and-spend Republican to Congress?

Send Ray Meier to Congress, and he'll be part of the problem. He'll help to make the government bigger, and put our kids in debt with big budget deficits.

Ray Meier will not help to cut the size of the federal government. Period. That's reason #4 out of 30 to not vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

Even Republicans Cannot Praise Ray Meier

2006-09-17T09:43:00.000-04:00

Reason #3 to Not Vote for Ray Meier: Even Ray Meier's Republican Supporters Cannot Praise Him

If a candidate's supporters cannot bring themselves to praise him, why should we vote for him? Such is the case with Ray Meier. Oh, sure, Ray Meier's supporters love to talk about Michael Arcuri, and how much they hate him. However, when it comes to Ray Meier, they don't have much of anything to say.

At this late date, there still is not one single blog or web site particularly dedicated to supporting Ray Meier's campaign for Congress, other than Ray Meier's own campaign web site. Not one.

There are sites, like CNY Underground, operated by people who support Ray Meier's campaign, but the people who run these sites don't write about Ray Meier, and what a great congressman he would make. Instead, all they can do is criticize Mike Arcuri.

Don't get me wrong: These people should be free to write whatever they want. If they want to criticize Michael Arcuri instead of trying to write about what makes their own candidate a good choice, that's their business.

I just think it's worth noting that Michael Arcuri's supporters are different from Ray Meier's supporters in this regard. Michael Arcuri's supporters criticize Ray Meier, sure. But, Arcuri supporters also write positive articles about their own candidate. They have lots to say about what makes Arcuri a good choice.

Heck, people who are at all familiar with this blog know that I am not Michael Arcuri's biggest fan, but even I have written many articles praising Arcuri.

The negativity of Ray Meier supporters ought to serve as a warning to voters in New York's 24th congressional district, because the character of a candidate's campaign is an indication of what the character of the candidate's performance in office would be like.

We don't need a right wing representative who will spend all his time trying to pull other people down. Yet, Ray Meier's supporters only know how to attack. They don't know how to build anything positive. That's reason #3 out of 30 to not vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

Ray Meier is Soft on War Criminals

2006-09-16T21:10:00.000-04:00

Reason #2 Not to Vote for Ray Meier: Ray Meier is Soft on War Criminals

I want to talk about a basic test of moral values in this campaign. It shouldn't even be an issue, but there are some very radical ideas being tossed around in the offices of the Republican power elites in Washington D.C. these days.

I'm a Democrat, but I'm not so partisan as to deny that there are plenty Republican politicians who are basically decent human beings, and try to do the right thing, even if they are misguided in their ideology. This week, Republican Senators John Warner, Lindsey Graham, John McCain and Susan Collins showed good moral character when they joined the Democrats in the Senate to support a bill that opposes a plan proposed by George W. Bush.

Bush's plan proposes an end the right to a fair trial in America and would make torture a legally sanctioned part of law enforcement in the United States. No kidding. On Friday, Bush actually threw a tantrum before television cameras and said that if he couldn't torture prisoners in secret prisons, he wouldn't be able to do his job any more. That's a claim that no President has made before - not Roosevelt during World War II, and not Lincoln during the Civil War.

I wish I could say that's as far as President Bush's proposal goes. However, it gets even worse. Part of Bush's proposal is to coddle war criminals. Bush says that Congress should pass a law giving permanent amnesty to people who break the laws of war to abuse prisoners of war.

We Americans ought to take a moment to step back and remember why the laws of war were created. They were put in place because regimes like that of Nazi Germany were using war to do terrible things to human beings. Americans were among the victims.

Now, George W. Bush is saying that America ought to let its standards slip. Bush is saying that if people behave like Nazis during war time, that's just the way things go, and nobody should make a big deal about it.

This is a simple moral issue that George W. Bush has presented all Republicans with. I don't mean that to say that all Republicans are responsible for Bush's effort to go soft on war crime. Rather, I'm saying Republicans around the country are now being challenged to show what kind of Republicans they are. Will they stand with John McCain or will they stand with George W. Bush?

Here in New York's 24th congressional district, we have the right to ask this question of Ray Meier. What kind of Republican is Ray Meier? Is he a Bush Republican or a McCain Republican? Does he support Bush's proposal, or does he support McCain's proposal?

Does Ray Meier support George W. Bush's plan to coddle war criminals?

The people of the 24th congressional district have spoken. They don't agree with this vision of going easy on war criminals. A huge majority of people in our district reject the Bush agenda's plan to allow standards of basic moral decency fall apart.

However, on this matter, Ray Meier is silent. Can you believe that? Ray Meier wants to be elected to the United States House of Representatives, but he refuses to say whether he thinks that the Geneva Conventions ought to be abandoned or not - even though Congress is working on the issue right now!

If a Republican candidate for Congress disagrees with the positions put out by the leader of his political party, in this case the President of the United States, it is the responsibility of the candidate to speak up and say so.

Ray Meier's silence is its own answer.

While the government is working on a plan to offer unconditional and permanent amnesty to criminals, Ray Meier does nothing. He says nothing. He doesn't even ask any hard questions. He just stands on the sidelines, letting other people take responsibility.

Ray Meier fails this moral test. Ray Meier is soft on war criminals.

That's just reason #2 out of 30 not to vote for Ray Meier.

Actresses Are Not the Problem With America

2006-09-15T09:38:00.000-04:00

Reason #1 Not To Vote For Ray Meier: Actresses are not our biggest problem

Oh, this is an easy one to start with. Republicans like to say that they care about local issues, but what line has Ray Meier's campaign come out with this week? They say that Barbara Streisand is a plague on New York's 24th congressional district.

Michael Arcuri got a check from Barbara Streisand, and the Republicans instantly whipped themselves up into an outraged frenzy. Here's what the National Republican Congressional Committee has to say on the matter:

"Maybe receiving the backing of Babs doesn't raise eyebrows in Hollywood, but Streisand's positions are way out of the mainstream in Upstate New York."

Do the Republicans really believe this bull?

Right now, Republicans in Congress are preparing to pass legislation that makes people who torture prisoners immune from prosecution, and takes away our right to see the evidence against us when accused of a crime. The Republican Congress is preparing to take away the right of habeas corpus, for goodness sakes. The Iraq War is getting ever deeper into disaster. The war in Afghanistan too, which was once seen as a great success, has disintegrated so far that it is now teetering into failure. The Republicans have failed to capture Osama Bin Laden. They've ignored global warming, which is already causing huge damage to our economy and threatening human lives. The Republicans have brought us high gas prices combined with no minimum raise increase in an entire decade. The Republicans have made government bigger than ever before, and pushed the burden of government services to the local level, forcing property taxes to rise. Republican spending is out of control, and corruption in Congress runs rampant.

All these things are having a real impact on the lives of people in the 24th District. But did Ray Meier address any of these problems this week? No. Instead, Ray Meier's attack dogs are going after a singer and actress who doesn't even live here.

Instead of dealing with the real problems we're having, Ray Meier's people are busy trying to convince everyone that the biggest problem we have is Barbara Streisand.

I don't know what kind of crazy, out-of-touch world the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee lives in, but I can tell them that Barbara Streisand does not raise eyebrows here in the 24th district. If you go up to someone on the street here, and ask them, "What is your opinion about the Barbara Streisand problem?", they'll just look at you funny and walk away. If you ask them, "Isn't it outrageous what Babs did?", they won't have any idea what you're talking about.

When was the last time you saw groups of citizens across our district organize to fight against the threat of Barbara Streisand? It hasn't happened. There are, however, many groups of citizens organized throughout our district because of their concerns about problems ignored by the Republican government in Washington, D.C.

We have real problems to deal with. We don't need a congressman who thinks that it's his number one priority to fight Barbara Streisand. That's reason #1 not to vote for Ray Meier for Congress.

The Second-Choice Path to Victory is Against Ray Meier

2006-09-14T12:21:00.000-04:00

So, where do we go from here? With Michael Arcuri dropping the ball with the no show at the debate in Herkimer, it's become ever more clear that the Democrats cannot win this seat in Congress by convincing people to vote for Mike Arcuri.

It's also clear that Arcuri has no intention of changing his ways, and running a campaign to inspire Democrats to turn out to vote. Perhaps Arcuri is incapable of changing. Perhaps he's so insulated from what Democrats are saying about him throughout the district that he still doesn't realize that there's a problem

Michael Arcuri is a rotten campaigner, and he's got a very bad attitude about being open to the voters. Probably, that's due to his position as District Attorney. The only elected office he's ever had is one in which he's accountable to the law, not to the people. So, it kind of makes sense that his idea of what elected officials do is to make decisions about what's best on their own, and not pay attention to what the public has to say about it.

What it comes down to is this: Arcuri is lousy politician with lousy people skills, but he's on the right side of the political debate. Ray Meier, on the other hand, is a skilled politician with slick people skills, but he is a part of a dangerously radical failed political agenda.

Even though I don't like Michael Arcuri's campaign, and I don't think he'd be accessible to constituents as a member of Congress, he's still my pick in this race. Better the idiot to add his voice to a larger cause than the smart guy who wants to lend his skills to the destruction of the foundational democratic values that have made America great.

The only option here is to stop trying to swim against the current. I'll put it on the record right here and now that I think Arcuri is a crass bumbler, but no one needs any more proof of that. What we need is to prevent right wing Ray Meier from getting elected to Congress.

No more nagging of Michael Arcuri. He's too dense to hear it. For the few remaining weeks in this race, I'll follow the path that Michael Arcuri himself has gone down: Hiding in the background as a generic and unspecific Democrat while hoping that people will simply vote for him instead of Ray Meier because they're sick of the Republicans.

Mike Arcuri wants to win this race by just being a Democrat. He seems to figure that just being a Democrat, even if no one knows who he is, will get him to win so long as people know that Ray Meier is a Republican.

I'll be focusing on that aspect of the campaign - what's the matter with Ray Meier. There's no use trying to argue that Arcuri is great. I can, however, try to make the honest argument that Ray Meier would be a terrible choice.

It's time for my last long list of the campaign season: For the remaining time, I'll be working on a list of 30 reasons not to vote for Ray Meier. It's the most I can stomach.

Fury At Arcuri: The Candidate Skips School

2006-09-14T08:15:00.000-04:00

I was up late last night working when word came to me about what Mike Arcuri did yesterday. I wrote a long, furious article as a result, and just then, through some quirk, my browser quit mysteriously. It's probably a good thing, as that article may have been a little bit over the top. Now, in the morning, I can't quite remember, but I think I called Michael Arcuri the son of some kind of farm animal. I'm glad now that , in the light of day, I have the chance to try again, and be a bit more fair this time.

After all, I don't think it's right to insult farm animals.

You don't know what happened yesterday? Well, yesterday, Michael Arcuri was supposed to go to Herkimer to take part in a debate. What actually happened is that Michael Arcuri never showed up.

The Arcuri for Congress campaign has known for four months that this debate was coming. Michael Arcuri had confirmed that he would attend. He had time to prepare. He had time to clear his schedule. Rumors are that he was in Washington D.C. meeting with Democratic Party insiders. I haven't seen any official news sources confirming that yet. Arcuri had a representative say that he had a "previous commitment".

This is something that Michael Arcuri has never understood: When it comes to running for Congress, there is no such thing as a previous commitment. All other commitments go out the window.

Not showing up to a political debate is like not showing up to a job interview. What's amazing to me is that Michael Arcuri has the chutzpah to not show up - and then still ask for the job. When you don't show up to a debate, you don't just insult the debate organizers. You insult the voters, especially the Democrats who have been sticking up for you.

Imagine if, during the 2004 presidential election, John Kerry had simply decided, with no warning, not to go to one of the debates he had against George W. Bush. The election would have been over with then and there.

So, is this election over with here and now? Can Michael Arcuri possibly win?

The only way that Arcuri can win this election is if he proves that he is willing to change his ways. So far, Michael Arcuri has been outlandishly lazy, acting as if he can win just by being a Democrat, and not doing much. He has tried to simply ride the wave of anti-Republican sentiment in our district, supposing that people will vote for him even if they don't know who he is.

Now, people know who Michael Arcuri is. They know that Michael Arcuri is the guy who didn't bother to show up. That's a pretty good description of the entire Arcuri for Congress fiasco, come to think of it. Michael Arcuri is the candidate who never bothered to show up.

If Michael Arcuri were a strong candidate in other areas, he wouldn't be in trouble. But, Arcuri has no particular strengths to fall back on when he so tremendously screws up.

1. Michael Arcuri has alienated groups in the Democratic base
2. Michael Arcuri has no strong online campaign with which to get support from outside the district
3. Michael Arcuri has demonstrated an inability to work with the media to get his story out
4. Michael Arcuri appears invisible in the district, even when he goes out campaigning, keeping his campaign calendar secret so that few people show up to his events
5. Michael Arcuri has still not communicated a coherent message about his political identity

Honestly, I don't think that the Arcuri for Congress campaign will read this article. His campaign has been dangerously insulated from outside voices from the start. But, if someone from Mike Arcuri's campaign did happen to come on by, here's what I'd advise.

1. Take a leave of absence from your job as District Attorney, or quit the race.
2. Personally visit each and every Democratic County Chair, and anyone else that can be brought together from each county committee on short notice. Apologize. Grovel. Explain to them how you're going to make it better
3. Do the same, with a bit more dignity, for the Democratic voters of the 24th district. We all deserve an apology, and a damned good explanation, from you, Mr. Arcuri.
4. Shake up your campaign committee. It has not served you well. Put new people on the committee from around the district, and make sure the people from outside Oneida County are at least equal number in number to the people from inside Oneida County.
5. Organize a real online campaign. Put someone on the committee who will be devoted to coordinating work on the web.
6. Fire Quadsimia, and get a corps of 10 Cornell University students who can put up a new web site by themselves, as a team, and make changes at a moment's notice.
7. Reach out to the Democratic base groups that you've alienated, like the NAACP, and local antiwar activists.
8. Hold a one-day intensive brand seminar with a group of political, policy, and marketing veterans from around these parts. Use this brand seminar to develop a clear identity for the Arcuri campaign, a central theme that is relevant and motivating to the voters around which everything else will be organized. No more of this "When you know Michael Arcuri, you'll want him representing YOU in Congress!" garbage. This new Brand Arcuri has to be a based upon a credible point of differentiation from Ray Meier, as well. Saying that you'll work to create jobs isn't good enough. Everyone running for Congress says that.
9. Get out on the road, every day, to meet with voters. Let them know well ahead of time that you're coming. Put it in your new online campaign calendar. And then SHOW UP!

Why Won't They Send President Bush?

2006-09-13T13:42:00.000-04:00

So Laura Bush is coming to campaign for Ray Meier. Big whoop. Sure, the move will bring in some money for Ray Meier, with two thousand dollar tickets for a couple to have their picture taken with the President's wife.

But why aren't they sending George W. Bush himself?

The race for New York's 24th district seat in the House of Representatives is one of the 20 closest races in the country. Typically, a strong President will go out to campaign for the candidates in the districts where the races are tight.

Yet, so far, there has been no indication that Bush will come here to help out Republican Ray Meier.

The reason is pretty clear. Our district's voters overwhelmingly think that George W. Bush has been a failure as President. 63 percent of likely voters in our district disapprove of the job that Bush has done.

Our district's Republicans can read the tea leaves. They see that the Bush Republican policies they've been pushing on us for years now are not approved of our district's voters.

If Ray Meier is regarded as a Bush-style Republican, he loses. If Meier can convince voters that, in spite of his long years supporting failed Bush policies, he'll be an independent, Lincoln Chafee sort of Republican, he can win. Likewise, Michael Arcuri can win if he convinces Democrats here that he's more like Ned Lamont, a Democrat with a spine who opposes Bush's failures, than Joseph Lieberman, a Democrat who will help Bush whenever it's convenient.

It's hard to get 63 percent of our district to agree on anything, so 63 percent agreement that Bush is bad for America shines out as the key to the election. 89 percent of Democrats, 63 percent of independent voters, and almost 40 percent of Republicans disapprove of Bush.

For Democrats, clear victory can come if Mike Arcuri figures our how to communicate the following basic message:

A vote for Ray Meier is a vote for Bush.
Michael Arcuri will stand up to Bush.

All the rest is a distraction.

Who Should I Vote For Today? Arcuri, or...

2006-09-12T13:44:00.000-04:00

It's an exciting primary election day here in New York's 24th congressional district. Today is the day when ordinary Democratic voters get to head out to the polls and choose for themselves who will represent them in the General Election this year. Yes, in other countries, people only have the chance to support the candidates that corrupt insiders and power brokers choose for them in behind the scenes dealing. Not here in America!

Yes, there's a reason I'm a member of the Democratic Party, and not just like one of those unaffiliated voters out there who don't belong to any political party at all. True, the Democrats aren't perfect, but by registering to vote as a Democrat, I get to have a say in the direction of the party, by voting in the primary for the candidate who represents my interests and ideals the best.

I'm about to head out the door myself, going to the town hall where our local elections are being held. But I'm not really sure who I'll vote for to represent the Democrats this year. Will it be Michael Arcuri, or... uh...

And who will my Republican neighbor turn out for? Will it be Ray Meier or... uh...

Hm.

Whe the choice is between voting for a candidate or not voting at all, is that really a democratic election?

Since Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri forced their competitors to end their primary campaigns, this congressional race has become positively tepid. It seems that the lesson of this year's congressional campaign is that it's important to avoid contentious primary battles...

... because that way everyone in the district can go back to sleep.

Ray Meier Second Highest in Right Wing Competition

2006-09-10T05:41:00.000-04:00

Republican Ray Meier likes to say that he'll be like Sherwood Boehlert, but Ray Meier is no moderate. A practical demonstration of Ray Meier's ideological extremism is found in his participation and performance in a competition for money through a right wing political action committee that runs the Rightroots program. It's called Rightroots for a reason - and it's not because its candidates are moderate.

Rightroots describes Ray Meier's position along with its other favorites by saying, "these candidates represent our best chance to retain control of Congress and to enact a conservative agenda." Conservative is a nice word for it. These are people who believe that Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum represent the mainstream. They're endorsed by publications like Right Wing News and Ankle Biting Pundits.

Do we really want our next Congressman to be the guy endorsed by Ankle Biting Pundits?

Guess how Ray Meier performs among this group of right wing political radicals? He's their second most successful fundraiser. I don't think that's something Ray Meier ought to be proud of.

Ray Meier doesn't represent New York's 24th district's values. He's out there on the radical fringes of a failed ideology of fear. This year, we need to put Ray Meier's Rightroots kind of extremism behind us.

Dangerous Numbers for Michael Arcuri: 7.6 and 7.6

2006-09-10T02:26:00.000-04:00

7.6 and 7.6 - these are the Voter Motivation Index scores Constituent Dynamics found in their poll of New York's 24th congressional district - for Democrats and for Republicans, respectively (or not respectively, come to think of it).

These numbers are the same. Should they be?

Here we are in a year when the Democrats have the first reasonable chance in living memory of gaining the congressional seat of the 24th district, when the Republican agenda is at its most exposed and reviled since Watergate, when the Republican President is disapproved of by most voters in the district, when the Democrats have had two frustratingly close yet unsuccessful presidential bids in a row, and when the national Democratic Party is giving unprecedented levels of support.

Democratic motivation to vote should be much, much higher than Republican motivation. It's not. Why?

Let me put out a wild idea for an explanation: It could have something to do with the fact that the Democratic candidate for Congress won the nomination through behind-the-scenes maneuvering, not through an appeal to the voters, has created the impression that he takes the Democratic vote for granted, and in general has been extremely slow and weak in communicating a compelling message to Democratic voters.

I know. It's a crazy explanation - especially when it's so easy to blame the Utica Observer-Dispatch for not getting the message out about both candidates in an equitable manner.

Remind me again: Why are we in the position where the Democratic candidate relies upon the whims of newspaper reporters to get out his message?

Why Won't Arcuri Run Against Bush?

2006-09-09T14:11:00.000-04:00

In late August, MSNBC quoted our Democratic congressional candidate, Michael Arcuri, as saying, "I'm a moderate. I’m not here to run against George Bush." I've been thinking about that statement for the last couple of weeks, wondering what in hell would lead Arcuri to say such a thing.

In our district, only 30 percent of likely voters say they approve of George W. Bush. 63 percent disapprove of Bush. 7 percent aren't sure. With numbers like this, if you make the election a referendum on the Bush Administration, the most credibly anti-Bush candidate wins in a landslide.

Connecting this House campaign to the record of the Bush Administration isn't just politically convenient. It's a valid link, given that the Republican Congress has helped George W. Bush in just about every terrible mistake of the last six years. Ray Meier would perpetuate that problem, and in doing so, continue the mess that George W. Bush has made of our government.

Why would Michael Arcuri be concerned about losing the small bloc of pro-Bush voters, when he could gain a huge 63 percent majority?

The answer is pretty sad. It seems that Michael Arcuri is listening to the outdated advice that the only way a Democrat can win in this district is to act like a Republican. Arcuri is not looking at the facts. The facts clearly show that the best way to lose a race for Congress in this district is to act like a Republican.

These poll numbers come from the Constituent Dynamics poll conducted August 27-29.

In the Mud With Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri

2006-09-09T08:37:00.000-04:00

To say that I'm disappointed is like saying that a rattlesnake bite can itch. This week was full of opportunities for our congressional candidates, Republican Ray Meier and Democrat Michael Arcuri, to raise the level of debate to deal with issues of great importance, not just to our district, but to the entire American nation. What's at stake are matters as basic as whether we get to keep the liberty guaranteed us in the Bill of Rights. The next Congress will either protect that liberty or allow it to be destroyed - so it's important what Ray Meier and Mike Arcuri have to say on the matter.

Unfortunately, the campaigns of Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier aren't talking about these kinds of things. They're talking about opinion polls. They're talking about themselves.

It gets worse than that. Michael Arcuri, Ray Meier, and their supporters in Utica have spent the last few days arguing about a local drug bust, whether it involved pornography, and whether excessive force was used. Those are all important local issues, but they're only relevant to the congressional campaign in as much as both candidates have failed to discuss the larger issues that the United States House of Representatives deals with. Instead of calling us to a higher road, Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier are wallowing in the mud of local politics.

In that mud fight, it appears that Michael Arcuri is losing, and may be doing so through his own alarming political clumsiness, not through any brilliant maneuvers on Ray Meier's part. Less than two months before Election Day now, and Mike Arcuri has chosen to do battle with the NAACP.

Michael Arcuri was recently quoted in the Utica Observer-Dispatch, calling leaders of the NAACP "silly", and saying their complaint of police brutality "doesn't even dignify a response". I've heard rumors that this move will soon be added to the Encyclopedia Brittanica's entry on "political insanity".

First, allegations of police brutality always dignify a response. The proper response is "We take such matters very seriously, and will investigate these allegations thoroughly to ensure that everyone is being treated with the respect that they are due."

Second, the NAACP should be a political ally of the Democrats in this campaign. Michael Arcuri should be working with the NAACP, not against them. There should be no room even for the perception that Michael Arcuri would target black people for prosecution for the sake of political gain.

Third, Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier both need to get their heads out of the local political game, regardless of whatever petty rivalries they've built up with different groups over the years. Our congressional candidates need to work to unite our district with an appeal to our better selves and our higher ideals.

The 24th district ought to be filled with a good debate about issues like Iraq, protection of our constitional liberties, about the democratic process, about protecting Social Security, dealing with global warming, and finding solutions to the energy crisis. Instead, we're getting a contest that looks more like a competition for County Sheriff.

Disappointment doesn't begin to cover my reaction to the way this race has developed.

Are You For The Bill of Rights, Or Are You Against It?

2006-09-08T10:17:00.000-04:00

There is value, in political communication, to stating issues in simple terms that are easy to understand. So, let me phrase this issue in terms of a simple question, one that Ray Meier and Michael Arcuri ought to answer: Are you for the Bill of Rights, or are you against the Bill of Rights?

If you're for the Bill of Rights, then you must be against the proposal put forth by George W. Bush this week. President Bush has asked Congress to give him the power to put people on trial without allowing them to see the the evidence against them. Bush wants to convict people of crimes and punish them on the basis of secret evidence that the accused, and the accused's lawyer, never gets to see. Why will the evidence be secret? Well, Bush wants to keep that information secret too.

So, what will this new kind of trial look like? You can boil it down to three steps.

1. The government accuses you of a crime.
2. The government says that it has evidence that proves your guilt, but that evidence has to remain a secret, so no one can see it.
3. You're convicted and sentenced to pay a fine, spend time in prison, or even be put to death.

This is not the American way. I'm don't mean that abstractly. I mean that, as a matter of law, this procedure is not the American way of holding a trial. It's the way they held trials in Nazi Germany, or the Soviet Union. The Constitution of the United States of America says that what Bush is asking to do is strictly forbidden.

The Sixth Amendment to the Constitution, part of the Bill of Rights, reads:

"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense."

A couple days ago, a smart aleck came on this blog and declared that the Constitution only gives rights to American citizens. Everybody else has no rights, this person claimed. It's amazing what a bold assertion, given under the cover of ignorance, can do. The plan fact is that this person was dead wrong. The Constitution of the United States regulates the American government completely, including its dealings with all people under its powers. Everybody under the jurisdiction of the US government - including all its prisoners, foreign and domestic - have the same constitutional rights.

Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier are lawyers. They know what the historical standard has been. They know what rights the Bill of Rights guarantees us. They also know very well what George W. Bush has proposed.

If Bush's request is put into law, it will be through the Congress. Mike Arcuri and Ray Meier are asking to represent us in Congress. So, it seems to me quite appropriate that Michael Arcuri and Ray Meier address this issue. Do they support the Bill of Rights or not?

So far, Arcuri and Meier have both been silent about the extraordinary revelation that President Bush personally ordered the creation of an illegal system of CIA prisoner of war camps in which torture methods like waterboarding are being used against prisoners who have had their habeas corpus rights and Geneva Conventions protections denied to them.

This silence is shocking, given the gravity of the situation. It should not be compounded by a silence in response to the attempt by Bush to overturn the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution.

Stuart Rothenberg Concurs About Our District's Weak Democrats

2006-09-07T21:31:00.000-04:00

Finally, the inside-the-beltway political pundits are starting to pay attention to the problems in the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign. I've been jumping up and down, waving my hands frantically for months now (metaphorically speaking - perhaps literally jumping up and down would have helped) desperately trying to get the people at the Arcuri for Congress campaign to pay attention to the voters and stop trying to coast their way to victory. So, it's nice to see that Stuart Rothenberg is concurring with my judgment about the way this campaign is being handled by the Oneida County Democrats. Today, Rothenberg writes:

"Are there any places where Democrats may not catch a wave that they once expected to build? Try upstate New York.

So far, there is precious little evidence that the Democrats’ “perfect storm” — which is based on Democratic landslides in the state’s races for governor and the Senate, as well as President Bush’s low poll numbers in New York — is helping many Democrats in upstate New York.

The 24th district remains a bit of an oddity, a place where each party insists its candidate is ahead. Incumbent Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R) is retiring, and both District Attorney Michael Arcuri (D) and state Sen. Ray Meier (R) are appealing. The district leans Republican, and Democrats seem a bit too optimistic for my taste."

Too optimistic? That's putting it mildly. We Democrats outside of Oneida County have spent the summer being told not to worry about Michael Arcuri's appearance of inaction. Don't worry, they said to us. Any minute now, the Mike Arcuri phenomenon would spring into devastating action, like a hungry tiger... and we waited... and waited. It's two months now until Election Day. We're still waiting.

They said that if we Democrats didn't have a primary, we would be the stronger for it, standing united and all that. Instead, it now looks as though the lack of a September 12 primary for the 24th district Democratic voters has taken all the steam out of this election. Michael Arcuri has had no motivation to keep campaigning hard. The 24th district's voters haven't had any reason to notice that a congressional race even exists. Our district's newspapers haven't had anything other than piddling little nonsense stories to report on - nothing that would really fire up the majority of voters. So now, on September 7, it's as if the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign is starting from square one. Most Democrats in the district still don't know who he is.

Today, the National Journal downgraded our district's congressional race from 11th place in the nation to 17th place. With an open seat in a district that is trending toward the Democrats, we ought to be surging forward, not falling back.

I'm not happy to see this happening. Although I've been a gadfly buzzing around the ear of the Arcuri for Congress campaign all year long, that's not because I want to see a Republican elected - as some conspiracy theorists in our district seem to believe. No, I actually want Michael Arcuri to win. However, wanting something is not going to make me shut my eyes and ignore all aspects of reality that do not concur with my wishes.

As I see it, Mike Arcuri already has plenty of sycophants telling him what a great guy he is, and what a great job he's doing as a congressional candidate. They may join in a Yes Man chant, saying, Gee, Mike. If everybody just knew you like we knew you, they'd all want you as their congressional representative, but that's not the way I think.

The way I see it, the Arcuri for Congress campaign will be best served by honesty. Michael Arcuri seems to desperately need someone to sit down with him and have the hard conversation that he doesn't want to hear. Arcuri will best be served not by cheerleaders, but by sober voices speaking truth to his power.

Some people believe that it's the job of voters to idolize the candidates that their political parties put forward, to offer unconditional support for the good of the team. I don't agree. I think that's thinking backwards.

It's the job of our party's candidate to work for us, and if that candidate wins the seat, it becomes the candidate's job to work for the entire district. We the people don't serve our congressional representatives. They're supposed to serve us, and they need to start that attitude of service with the way they run their campaigns - open, accessible, and responsive.

When a congressional candidate makes the mistake of running a closed, unresponsive, and secretive campaign, as Michael Arcuri has done, it is not the job of that candidate's party members to look the other way and pretend that there isn't a problem, chanting rah, rah, rah all the time. It is our job as Democrats to nag, cajole, and coerce our candidate into running the kind of campaign that we deserve.

Some people say that I just don't get it, that this is about doing whatever it takes to win. I say that we the citizens of the 24th congressional district cannot possibly win if our next representative in Congress doesn't care to listen to what we have to say - even if that representative is a Democrat.

Ray Meier is the wrong choice for the House of Representatives. That much is crystal clear. It is far from clear, however, that Michael Arcuri is the right choice.

Rothenberg is right. It's time to cut the happy talk. Arcuri needs to work like hell to earn our trust if he wants to win.

Recognition from Squidoo on Mike Arcuri Lens

2006-09-07T20:59:00.000-04:00

It's no secret that the Democrats in Oneida County aren't too fond of me. They took early exception this year to my independent writing on the congressional election here in New York's 24th congressional district. In response to my critical writing, urging Michael Arcuri to do a better job in reaching out to voters outside of Oneida County (advice that still needs to be heeded), I got all sorts of threats and insults. I was going to be exposed, they told me.

Since then, most of those who aimed rhetorical buckshot my way have faded from the scene. But, I still get some satisfaction at the recognition that comes from outside the district every now and then. Today, that came in the form of earning Lens of the Day distinction over at Squidoo - just for putting up a lens focusing on the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign.

Megan Casey of Squidoo had this to say on her blog today.

"Lensmaster Jonathan Cook is a self-described New York State Democrat who lives in the 24th District, in the village of Trumansburg, in the town of Ulysses, in Tompkins County, in the Finger Lakes.

And he's quite a smart political thinker.

I don't say that because I'm a supporter of Michael Arcuri for Congress (my political persuasions shall remain a mystery!), but because I'm a supporter of people who get that lenses are incredible tools for grassroots politics.

I especially like the advantages v. liabilities breakdown on this lens. http://www.squidoo.com/arcuri.

What candidates are you supporting? What do you want from your party? What infuriates you about the issues? One by one, lenses contribute to online political opinion. And you better believe the candidates are watching."

Thanks, Megan. I do wonder, however, if the candidates are watching, in this case.

The presence of supporters of Michael Arcuri on the Internet has faded, not increased, as Election Day gets nearer. From the beginning, many close to Mike Arcuri have been steadfastly insisting that the Internet doesn't matter to congressional campaigns... and then watched as other Democratic candidates outcompeted Arcuri and got rewarded for their online activism by groups like Democracy For America and the Progressive Patriots, 2008 presidential candidates like John Edwards, and even the DCCC, which so proudly held up Michael Arcuri as a favorite recruit earlier this year.

It's flattering to get positive attention of the sort that Squidoo provided me with today, and so I'll toot my own horn like an obnoxious ass tonight, but the truth is that I really haven't done anything that requires any particular political smarts at all. In the 2006, online campaigning should be an obvious choice, because it provides scope and control of outreach at an outrageously small cost.

Yes, I put up a lens about Michael Arcuri's candidacy on Squidoo. That's no big deal, really. It's easy to do, and it's free. The important matter to consider is why the Michael Arcuri for Congress campaign didn't do it, and why they're still not doing it.

I really, truly, honestly don't get it. Why won't the Arcuri campaign people, or even his volunteer supporters, use the power of the Internet to help Arcuri's candidacy? Do they consider the Internet to be beneath them, or something?