HI Phil--
Does this Outlook 2003 error have a number and do you mind putting the exact
error up here? I ran OL 2003 opn Vista until OL 2007 Betas became available
and did not see it.
www.slipstick.com deals with a number of Outlook version errors, but if you
can tell me the error message and number I can probably nail it.
This sounds something like your error:
You receive an error message when you try to perform any editing tasks, or
you must click to enable the compose frame in Outlook Web Access
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/911829/en-us
Good luck,
CH
What could be more boring than the superficiality of Tim Russert
interviewing the dead end posturing of John McCain who hasn't a chance of an
ice cube in hell? The Republican candidates are so doomed already it's
halarious.
Saturday, May 12, 2007
FRANK RICH: Earth to G.O.P: The Gipper Is Dead
OF course you didn’t watch the first Republican presidential debate on
MSNBC. Even the party’s most loyal base didn’t abandon Fox News, where Bill
O’Reilly, interviewing the already overexposed George Tenet, drew far more
viewers. Yet the few telling video scraps that entered the 24/7 mediasphere
did turn the event into an instant “Saturday Night Live†parody without
“SNL†having to lift a finger. The row of 10 middle-aged white candidates,
David Letterman said, looked like “guys waiting to tee off at a restricted
country club.â€
Since then, panicked Republicans have been either blaming the “Let’s Make a
Deal†debate format or praying for salvation-by-celebrity in the form of
another middle-aged white guy who might enter the race, Fred Thompson. They
don’t seem to get that there is not another major brand in the country — not
Wal-Mart, not G.E., not even Denny’s nowadays — that would try to sell a
mass product with such a demographically homogeneous sales force. And that’s
only half the problem. The other half is that the Republicans don’t have a
product to sell. Aside from tax cuts and a wall on the Mexican border, the
only issue that energized the presidential contenders was Ronald Reagan. The
debate’s most animated moments by far came as they clamored to lip-sync his
“optimism,†his “morning in America,†his “shining city on the hill†and
even, in a bizarre John McCain moment out of a Chucky movie, his grin.
The candidates mentioned Reagan’s name 19 times, the current White House
occupant’s once. Much as the Republicans hope that the Gipper can still be a
panacea for all their political ills, so they want to believe that if only
President Bush would just go away and take his rock-bottom approval rating
and equally unpopular war with him, all of their problems would be solved.
But it could be argued that the Iraq fiasco, disastrous to American
interests as it is, actually masks the magnitude of the destruction this
presidency has visited both on the country in general and the G.O.P. in
particular.
By my rough, conservative calculation — feel free to add — there have been
corruption, incompetence, and contracting or cronyism scandals in these
cabinet departments: Defense, Education, Justice, Interior, Homeland
Security, Veterans Affairs, Health and Human Services, and Housing and Urban
Development. I am not counting State, whose deputy secretary, a champion of
abstinence-based international AIDS funding, resigned last month in a
prostitution scandal, or the General Services Administration, now being
investigated for possibly steering federal favors to Republican
Congressional candidates in 2006. Or the Office of Management and Budget,
whose chief procurement officer was sentenced to prison in the Abramoff
fallout. I will, however, toss in a figure that reveals the sheer depth of
the overall malfeasance: no fewer than four inspectors general, the official
watchdogs charged with investigating improprieties in each department, are
themselves under investigation simultaneously — an all-time record.
Wrongdoing of this magnitude does not happen by accident, but it is not
necessarily instigated by a Watergate-style criminal conspiracy. When
corruption is this pervasive, it can also be a byproduct of a governing
philosophy. That’s the case here. That Bush-Rove style of governance, the
common denominator of all the administration scandals, is the Frankenstein
creature that stalks the G.O.P. as it faces 2008. It has become the
Republican brand and will remain so, even after this president goes, until
courageous Republicans disown it and eradicate it.
It’s not the philosophy Mr. Bush campaigned on. Remember the candidate who
billed himself as a “different kind of Republican†and a “compassionate
conservative� Karl Rove wanted to build a lasting Republican majority by
emulating the tactics of the 1896 candidate, William McKinley, whose victory
ushered in G.O.P. dominance that would last until the New Deal some 35 years
later. The Rove plan was to add to the party’s base, much as McKinley had at
the dawn of the industrial era, by attracting new un-Republican-like
demographic groups, including Hispanics and African-Americans. Hence, No
Child Left Behind, an education program pitched particularly to urban
Americans, and a 2000 nominating convention that starred break dancers,
gospel singers, Colin Powell and, as an M.C., the only black Republican
member of Congress, J. C. Watts.
As always, the salesmanship was brilliant. One smitten liberal columnist
imagined in 1999 that Mr. Bush could redefine his party: “If compassion and
inclusion are his talismans, education his centerpiece and national unity
his promise, we may say a final, welcome goodbye to the wedge issues that
have divided Americans by race, ethnicity and religious conviction.†Or not.
As Matthew Dowd, the disaffected Bush pollster, concluded this spring, the
uniter he had so eagerly helped elect turned out to be “not the person†he
thought, but instead a divider who wanted to appeal to the “51 percent of
the people†who would ensure his hold on power.
But it isn’t just the divisive Bush-Rove partisanship that led to scandal.
The corruption grew out of the White House’s insistence that partisanship —
the maintenance of that 51 percent — dictate every governmental action no
matter what the effect on the common good. And so the first M.B.A. president
ignored every rule of sound management. Loyal ideologues or flunkies were
put in crucial positions regardless of their ethics or competence.
Government business was outsourced to campaign contributors regardless of
their ethics or competence. Even orthodox Republican fiscal prudence was
tossed aside so Congressional allies could be bought off with bridges to
nowhere.
This was true way before many, let alone Matthew Dowd, were willing to see
it. It was true before the Iraq war. In retrospect, the first unimpeachable
evidence of the White House’s modus operandi was reported by the journalist
Ron Suskind, for Esquire, at the end of 2002. Mr. Suskind interviewed an
illustrious Bush appointee, the University of Pennsylvania political
scientist John DiIulio, who had run the administration’s
compassionate-conservative flagship, the Office of Faith-Based and Community
Initiatives. Bemoaning an unprecedented “lack of a policy apparatus†in the
White House, Mr. DiIulio said: “What you’ve got is everything — and I mean
everything — being run by the political arm. It’s the reign of the Mayberry
Machiavellis.â€
His words have been borne out repeatedly: by the unqualified political hacks
and well-connected no-bid contractors who sabotaged the occupation and
reconstruction of Iraq; the politicization of science at the Food and Drug
Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency; the outsourcing of
veterans’ care to a crony company at Walter Reed; and the purge of
independent United States attorneys at Alberto Gonzales’s Justice
Department. But even more pertinent, perhaps, to the Republican future is
how the Mayberry Machiavellis alienated the precise groups that Mr. Bush had
promised to add to his party’s base.
By installing a political hack, his 2000 campaign manager, Joe Allbaugh, at
the top of FEMA, the president foreordained the hiring of Brownie and the
disastrous response to Katrina. At the Education Department, the signature
No Child Left Behind program, Reading First, is turning out to be a cesspool
of contracting conflicts of interest. It’s also at that department that Bush
loyalists stood passively by while the student-loan industry scandal
exploded; at its center is Nelnet, the single largest corporate campaign
contributor to the 2006 G.O.P. Congressional campaign committee. Back at Mr.
Gonzales’s operation, where revelations of politicization and cover-ups
mount daily, it turns out that no black lawyers have been hired in the
nearly all-white criminal section of the civil rights division since 2003.
The sole piece of compassionate conservatism that Mr. Bush has tried not to
sacrifice to political expedience — nondraconian immigration reform — is
also on the ropes, done in by a wave of xenophobia that he has failed to
combat. Just how knee-jerk this strain has become could be seen in the MSNBC
debate when Chris Matthews asked the candidates if they would consider a
constitutional amendment to allow presidential runs by naturalized citizens
like their party’s star governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger (an American since
1983), and its national chairman, Senator Mel Martinez of Florida. Seven out
of 10 said no.
We’ve certainly come a long way from that 2000 Philadelphia convention, with
its dream of forging an inclusive, long-lasting G.O.P. majority. Instead of
break dancers and a black Republican congressman (there are none now), we’ve
had YouTube classics like Mr. Rove’s impersonation of a rapper at a
Washington journalists’ banquet and George Allen’s “macaca†meltdown.
Simultaneously, the once-reliable evangelical base is starting to drift as
some of its leaders join the battle against global warming and others
recognize that they’ve been played for fools on “family values†by the
G.O.P. establishment that covered up for Mark Foley.
Meanwhile, most of the pressing matters that the public cares passionately
about — Iraq, health care, the environment and energy independence — belong
for now to the Democrats. Though that party’s first debate wasn’t exactly an
intellectual feast either, actual issues were engaged by presidential
hopefuls representing a cross section of American demographics. You don’t
see Democratic candidates changing the subject to J.F.K. and F.D.R. They are
free to start wrestling with the future while the men inheriting the
Bush-Rove brand of Republicanism are reduced to harking back to a morning in
America on which the sun set in 1989.
posted by Total Kaos Inc at 7:11 PM 0 comments
MAUREEN DOWD: Labor’s Love Lost
LONDON
Gordon Brown’s smile does not look at home on his face. It sits there
uneasily, like an uninvited guest at a party, until his features can resume
their comfortably dour grooves.
The brooding Scot ended his decade-long run as a hefty Heathcliff to Tony
Blair’s chatty Cathy, stepping out of the shadows Friday with visible relief
to begin a campaign for prime minister that he has already won.
Grumpy Gordon is an enigma compared with Captain Showbiz, as the glib Mr.
Blair is called by a morning TV host here. The 56-year-old son of a
Presbyterian minister, with hooded eyes and frugal charm, will be hard
pressed to compete on the European stage with Iron Frau Angela Merkel and
Nicolas Sarkozy, dubbed “Thatcher without petticoats.â€
Mr. Brown’s school friends came on TV to say he was more fun than he looked.
“He enjoys a good glass of wine,†said his pal Bill Campbell.
The chancellor has been striving to move beyond his reputation as a man so
obsessed with the budget that he wouldn’t even share the details in advance
with Tony Blair. He traded the green eyeshade for pastel ties. He told a
women’s magazine that he liked the rock band Arctic Monkeys, but later
couldn’t name any of their songs.
Mr. Brown was considered the uncool half of the Cool Britannia team that
swept into power on a wave of Champagne, celebrities and Cherie Blair’s New
Age guru. But thanks to his role as W.’s interlocutor and translator, Tony
Blair is uncool, too.
The first boomer prime minister got a blazing start in trying to make
Britain more modern and tolerant. But he fell in with an American crowd of
bullies who were turning back the clock on modernity and tolerance, and Tony
abused Britons’ trust.
Growing fearful that he would inherit a bankrupt franchise, Grumpy decided
this was his “nobody puts Baby in a corner†moment. The frowning apprentice
gave the drowning prime minister a shove out of Downing Street. Maybe the
last straw was the movie “The Queen,†chronicling Mr. Blair’s political
finesse after Princess Diana’s death. It mentions Mr. Brown in passing, when
Tony is too busy to take Gordon’s call and tells an aide to put him on hold.
Grumpy let Tony take the lead 13 years ago, believing Tony would hand off
power to him eventually. While Mr. Brown felt intellectually superior, he
knew his media skills were wanting. They still are. His debut was, as the
BBC put it, “a bit of a hash.â€
He got an uninspiring £100 haircut, which was “lost on everyone,†as one
reporter dryly put it. Arriving for a photo-op breakfast at a supporter’s
home in Southgate, the door slammed and locked on him, leaving him ringing
the bell as cameras rolled. Once inside, he tried to talk to a blond little
girl, but initially she froze him out. During his big speech, a teleprompter
obscured his face, and he faded into a bland beige background. On top of
that, Tony Blair chose that hour to attend a ceremony unveiling a statue of
a soccer star, so news channels had to split the screens for part of Mr.
Brown’s speech — a visual reminder of their tortured Lennon-and-McCartney
partnership.
The Odd Couple had periods of not speaking, and Mr. Brown’s disdain for Mr.
Blair’s style showed. “I have never believed presentation should be a
substitute for policy,†he said. “I do not believe politics is about
celebrity.†He dropped the New Labor logo from the Labor Web site. He
promised to restore power to Parliament to rebuild trust in democracy — a
knock on the way Mr. Blair ignored public opinion to invade Iraq — and to
give more protection to civil liberties.
Mr. Blair’s defensive yet defiant resignation speech was elaborately
stage-managed, with spinners fanning out afterward to puff up his legacy,
even though, despite the remarkable achievements of Kosovo and Northern
Ireland, his legacy will be buried in the blood and sand of Iraq with W’s.
The speech set off a torrent of contempt about the era of spin he had
introduced, with critics saying it had rotted discourse. The expert spin
that helped him win three elections was also used to raise fears over Saddam’s
phantom W.M.D. TV played the clip over and over in which Mr. Blair said
Saddam had W.M.D. that could be activated in 45 minutes, but the former
Blair consigliere Peter Mandelson asserted that Tony didn’t want an ally to
have to go to war alone.
On Friday, the commentators began to fret that Mr. Brown needed more spin.
How would he fare against the young conservative David Cameron, known as
Blair Lite, if he couldn’t get the teleprompter out of his face, or keep his
pant leg out of his sock?
Was he too old? Could he wear the bottoms of his trousers rolled?
