Where's the Outrage? By Arlene Getz Newsweek Wednesday 21 December 2005 Bush's defense of his phone-spying program has disturbing echoes of arguments once used by South Africa's apartheid regime. Why Americans should examine the parallels. Back in the 1980s, when I was living in Johannesburg and reporting on apartheid South Africa, a white neighbor proffered a tasteless confession. She was "quite relieved," she told me, that new media restrictions prohibited our reporting on government repression. No matter that Pretoria was detaining tens of thousands of people without real evidence of wrongdoing. No matter that many of them, including children, were being tortured - sometimes to death. No matter that government hit squads were killing political opponents. No matter that police were shooting into crowds of black civilians protesting against their disenfranchisement. "It's so nice," confided my neighbor, "not to open the papers and read all that bad news."

I don't think the horror of the Bush power abuses have sunk in with the public yet. Weekly revelations of not just Administration power grabs, but of behaviors that defy the Constitution, have become common enough that even those on the left simply shake their heads and mutter; "Here we go again..." It's no surprise, then, that the mainstream American, in the thick of the Hoilday Season, gives only a casual glance at headlines, snorts, and continues on the mission of locating the latest X-box innovation. Even the latest Wash Post/ABC polling, conducted Thursday 12/15 through Sunday 12/18/05, indicated improved numbers for Bush. (The New York Times article revealing that Bush authorized warrantless wiretaps on US citizens was published Friday 12/16.)

Note from KC: Concerned over offending self-described moderates? Worried that the Party will lose middle-of-the-road voters if it too adamantly criticizes the treachery (Yes, I said treachery) of the right? Specific issue polling indicates that the testy "moderate," may niether be all that moderate, nor vulnerable to the incantations of the right... please read on....... Dec. 14, 2005 11:12pm CBSNews.com The Web Moderate Voters Aren't So Moderate Quote In every presidential election since 1988, the Democratic candidate has won more votes among moderates than the Republican candidate.

washingtonpost.com > Columns By Harold Meyerson Thursday, November 3, 2005; Page A21 Amid all the self-inflicted disasters that befell the Bush White House last week, it was easy to miss the fact that the president had to cave to a group of disgruntled Republicans who had not made trouble for him before. I don't mean the conservatives in revolt over Harriet Miers. I mean the moderates in revolt over Bush's suspension of the Davis-Bacon Act, the law that mandates payment of prevailing wages on federally funded construction projects. In an apparent attempt to ensure that nobody rebuilding the Katrina-damaged Gulf Coast made much more than minimum wage, Bush had suspended the 1931 statute. But last week a group of 35 moderate Republican members of Congress -- hailing disproportionately from Northeast and Midwest states where building-trades unions still have political clout -- told Andy Card that they couldn't support Bush's edict. With a congressional vote on overturning Bush's order scheduled for next week, the president backed down.