At noon on Wednesday, Gordon Smith will finally get a challenger for his seat in 2008.  Steve Novick will be announcing his candidacy in Portland at the ILWU Local 8's hall at noon, and then will be off for another announcement at 3:30pm in Eugene at the Wayne Morse Free Speech Plaza.

I know there's been a lot of excitement about DeFazio running, and there's no question that he would be a great candidate.  But I think Steve Novick deserves a good long look from the netroots--especially considering he's the only one currently in the race.  I think Steve says why he is running best on his website:

I'm running because while George Bush has been taking our country to hell, Senator Gordon Smith had his hand on the handbasket every step of the way.  I'm running because Gordon Smith represents government of the rich, by the powerful, and for the special interests, and I believe in government of the people, by the people and for the people.

How bad is Iraq?  I've been trying to read up on it lately to gain a better understanding of what is happening in the country and what our options might be.  At this point, I'm quickly solidifying my tentative feelings of late that we will never be successful in Iraq.  I don't see any other option than pulling out.  I hate to say that, but I'm getting to the point that I simply cannot see any way that we will make things better in the country.  I believe it will only get worse the longer we are there.  That has been the trend so far and nothing I have read indicates it will get better, even with elections held in January.

I don't even see how those elections can be held and be considered legitimate.  There are a number of reasons why, but we can start with one right off the bat:  Marshal Law.  Marshal Law has been imposed in Iraq for 60 days, which means it will be in effect up until just a few weeks before the elections.  How the hell do you hold a legitimate election a few weeks after having been under Marshal Law for two months?  How does one campaign during that time?  How will anyone know who they are voting for?

But more disturbing to me is this post over at Empire Notes.  The U.S. did not just violate the Geneva Conventions in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.  We are doing it as a matter of policy right now in the fighting in Fallujah.  Go read the post; it's worth the few minutes of your time.

The short of it is that we are violating the Geneva Convetion in the following ways:

I'm sick and tired of being told that businesses simply can't afford to pay workers decent wages and still make a profit. I'm sick and tired of workers being sacrificed to increase "shareholder value" or pad the pockets of CEOs. I'm so goddamn sick and tired of corporations shitting on workers in the pursuit of a couple of extra dollars profit.

About two weeks ago, it was announced that Fred Meyer would be outsourcing their cleaning crew work. Basically, every store has an overnight cleaning crew consisting of a few people who clean the store and prepare it for the next day. In many cases, these people have worked for the company for years. They're good workers and they do a fine job.

As of September 12, it appears most of them will be fired. It sucks. I work with these guys and I find this disgusting. What's worse is the way they found out about this. No boss bothered to come around, sit them down and explain the situation. No, they found out through a goddamn newspaper article. The cleaning crew workers read about their future termination in the newspaper. No one from the company bothered to tell them beforehand.