Two specialists on the political dynamics of neo-Confederate and white nationalist groups in the United States today commented on aspects of racial politics and John Ashcroft, the nominee for attorney general. DEVIN BURGHART Burghart is director of the Building Democracy Initiative at the Center for New Community. The initiative works to counter the white nationalist movement in a 10-state region across the Midwest. “Sen. John Ashcroft gave an interview and legitimacy to one of the leading white nationalist groups in the country,” Burghart said today. “The Senate Judiciary Committee should focus on Sen. Ashcroft’s endorsement of Southern Partisan.” Burghart added:…

John Ashcroft, whose nomination for attorney general will be considered by the Senate later this month, “has a history of reaching out to white supremacist groups,” a longtime researcher in his home state of Missouri said today. “An examination of Ashcroft’s recent record shows that he has actively cultivated ties to white supremacists and extreme hate groups,” said John Hickey, executive director of the Missouri Citizen Education Fund. In a 1998 interview with the quarterly Southern Partisan, Ashcroft praised that publication, saying: “Your magazine also helps set the record straight. You’ve got a heritage of doing that, of defending Southern…

WILLIAM HARTUNG Senior research fellow at the World Policy Institute and co-author of the recent report “Tangled Web: The Marketing of Missile Defense, 1994-2000,” Hartung said today: “Donald Rumsfeld has a reputation as a moderate, dating back to his days as secretary of defense in the Ford administration in the mid-1970s, but during the 1990s he has become a darling of right-wing Republicans and a member in good standing of the Star Wars lobby. As Newt Gingrich and Trent Lott’s handpicked chairman of a congressionally-mandated commission on Third World ballistic missiles that bore his name, Rumsfeld grossly exaggerated the ballistic…

WASHINGTON — Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers faced criticism today for derogatory comments about a U.S. congressional commission’s call for the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to use their resources to cancel 100 percent of their debt claims against poor countries. Speaking at the National Press Club on Thursday afternoon, Summers said that full implementation of recommendations made by the bipartisan Meltzer Commission — which urged cancellation of all the debts of the world’s poorest countries — “would do very serious damage to the economic and financial interests of the United States, and would in a meaningful and important…

ELLEN FRANK Professor of economics at Emmanuel College in Boston, Frank said today: “The rapid upsurge in business and consumer spending of the past few years has been heavily debt-financed. Consumer debt doubled over the last decade. Corporate indebtedness stands today at over $10 billion, while our $400 billion trade deficit requires unprecedented levels of international borrowing. In this context, even a slight downturn could set off mounting bankruptcies and snowball rapidly.” More Information MARK WEISBROT Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Weisbrot said today: “The Federal Reserve’s decision to move from a bias towards raising interest…

MANNING MARABLE Director of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University, Marable said today: “The election in Florida represented a gross abrogation of voting rights for African Americans. There were widespread examples of local police harassing African Americans going to the polls, of polling machinery that didn’t work in largely African-American precincts. Gore played to the right wing by avoiding putting forward the issues of racial disenfranchisement.” More Information ALEXANDER KEYSSAR Author of The Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States and professor of history and public policy at Duke University, Keyssar…

DAVID COLE Professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center, Cole said today: “The U.S. Supreme Court has done what we all feared — it has decided the election itself, and has done so by a single vote. While the per curiam attempts to mask this fact, only five Justices — the five who likely voted for George W. Bush on November 7 — voted to bar any further recounts. That they did so on grounds that there was insufficient time — after their own intervention had delayed matters — raises serious questions about the Court’s legitimacy. In addition, it…

DAVID COLE Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center, Cole is a leading specialist in constitutional law and the U.S. Supreme Court. MIKE GRAVEL A former two-term member of the U.S. Senate, Gravel used his position as a senator to officially release the Pentagon Papers and facilitated full publication as The Senator Gravel Edition, The Pentagon Papers (Beacon Press). He is author of Citizen Power and is currently leading Philadelphia Two, a group which works to bring about direct democracy. Gravel said today: “The situation in Florida shows that the polity is controlled by the factions or parties, which…

DEBORAH TOLER A policy analyst with the Institute for Public Accuracy, Toler said today: “Although, with the notable exception of Ralph Nader, trade was a ‘non-issue’ in the recent U.S. presidential election, trade issues are extremely hot in virtually every other country, particularly in Third World countries that suffer the most from World Trade Organization regulations. The Seattle demonstrations brought more Americans’ attention to the myriad ways the secretive and fundamentally undemocratic WTO functions on behalf of corporate global interests to the detriment of the economic, social and political interests of the world’s working and poor majority.” LORI WALLACH Director…

This week, government representatives and non-governmental organizations are meeting at the Hague in the Netherlands for what many are calling a “make or break” summit on global warming. The following analysts are available for interviews: ROSS GELBSPAN Author of The Heat Is On: The Climate Crisis, the Cover-up, the Prescription, Gelbspan said: “Despite increasing climatic instability, the Clinton administration continues to insist the United States can meet its carbon-cutting obligations by planting more trees and using the deeply-flawed mechanism of international carbon trading. Given the growing diplomatic fatigue, the current round of climate talks at the Hague may finally buckle…