“In his new book, Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory, (Long Island lawyer Michael) Carroll raises a disturbing question: Is there a connection between outbreaks of Lyme disease and West Nile virus and Plum Island research? Old Lyme, Conn., the location of the disease’s initial 1975 outbreak, is close to Plum Island. While the case for the lab being the source isn’t cut and dry, many scientists have had a hard time finding a conventional explanation for the sudden emergence of the debilitating disease in Connecticut, which is spread though ticks. Carroll makes a strong case that the lab is the only logical source. The story of the West Nile virus, which also suddenly appeared in close proximity to Plum Island, is not as clear. But Carroll proves how the connection between the lab and disease outbreaks cannot be ignored, though most journalists and activists who have touched the story have been labeled ‘conspiracy theorists.'” —Guerrilla News Network

It’s My Right to Run: “(Ralph Nader’s decision) marks a fundamental shift from an ethic of responsibility to one of damn the consequences, no matter how much populist precedent he tries to dress it up with.” —Paul Loeb, author of Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time. AlterNet Nader’s assertion, as I heard in an interview with NPR yesterday, that he will draw more heavily from disaffected Republicans is self-serving and fatuous if not frankly delusional! In any case, some disenchanted Republicans are considering crossing over to defeat Bush this time.

Nader may, as his supporters claimed in 2000, not steal as many votes from the Democrats as claimed if he mostly draws on people who would othewise have boycotted the big-party contest. But that may be a vanishingly small number this time around, given the difficulty of getting on the ballot in a significant number of states and especially if the Green Party does not support his run, as indications suggest. I suspect (and hope) that, after four years of W, most of those who would “otherwise have stayed home in 2000” may have long since decided they have to hold their noses and go for Kerry or whomever the Democrats front this time. Although they may consider the two-party system an obscenity, it is the reality in the 2004 election. As I have said here before, I used to be holier-than-thou, proclaiming that the outcome of the Presidential contest could not make enough of a difference to justify the quadrennial passion it provokes. I was somewhat surprised and ashamed at the energy I spent thinking about the 2000 election. In 2004, while I am not sure the country can be governed well, it is desperately clear after the first Bush dysadministration how poorly it can be governed, to our collective detriment and jeopardy.

“George W. Bush is different, very different. Other presidents have misled, deceived, even lied. When Ike was asked his worst mistake, he candidly said, ‘The lie we told [about the U-2].’ LBJ and the Gulf of Tonkin were examples of both deception and self-deception.

The problem today is not simply that ‘Bush is a liar.’ While only he knows whether he’s intentionally saying untrue things, it is a provable fact that he says untrue things, again and again, on issues large and small, day in and day out. The problem is not ’16 words’ in last year’s State of the Union but 160,000 words on stem cells, global warming, the ‘death tax,’ the Iraq-9/11 connection and the Saddam-al Qaeda connection, the rise of deficits, cuts to Americorps, the air in downtown Manhattan after 9/11. On and on. It is beyond controversy that W ‘has such a high regard for the truth,’ as Lincoln said of a rival, ‘that he uses it sparingly.’

Why this penchant for falsehoods?” —Mark Green, co-author (with Eric Alterman) of The Book On Bush: How George W. (Mis)leads America (Viking 2004), AlterNet

“In his new book, Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory, (Long Island lawyer Michael) Carroll raises a disturbing question: Is there a connection between outbreaks of Lyme disease and West Nile virus and Plum Island research? Old Lyme, Conn., the location of the disease’s initial 1975 outbreak, is close to Plum Island. While the case for the lab being the source isn’t cut and dry, many scientists have had a hard time finding a conventional explanation for the sudden emergence of the debilitating disease in Connecticut, which is spread though ticks. Carroll makes a strong case that the lab is the only logical source. The story of the West Nile virus, which also suddenly appeared in close proximity to Plum Island, is not as clear. But Carroll proves how the connection between the lab and disease outbreaks cannot be ignored, though most journalists and activists who have touched the story have been labeled ‘conspiracy theorists.'” —Guerrilla News Network