BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - Is it possible that the corrupt Bush administration will lose its focus and run the train of democracy off the track so violently that the Democratic Party will have a chance to elect some smarter, more progressive candidates in 2006 and 2008 and move the country in a different direction?

That is the hope of a group of frustrated liberals, Democrats and progressives who gathered at the 22nd Street Jazz Cafe on the Southside of Birmingham, Alabama, Saturday night to debate the Downing Street Memos and the Bush administration's questionable policies, which took the U.S. to war in Iraq based on a rumor that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.

We now know that the administration "fixed" the intelligence to support the policy dreamed up by the neo-con think tanks to invade Iraq and attempt turning it into a capitalist democracy - thanks to the leaked Downing Street memos.

The only good news to come out of it in retrospect, according to Ben Mazzara, one of the local event organizers, is this: "When Bush runs the train off the rails, we'll be there to put it back on the track."

Kathy Day, another organizer, told a group of about 15 that it is time to be "objective" and "honest" for a change and help the public get acquainted with the facts, move forward in action against the lies and pressure the media to be more responsible.

The situation reminded her of the cartoon which shows President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney watching a line of flag-draped coffins go by. Bush says to Cheney, "I guess they didn't know the right people."

Ouch!

David Gespass, an attorney and activist and the featured speaker, criticized the "lapdog press" for not reporting the truth about the situation in Iraq in the run-up to war. He echoed the point made by Noam Chomsky in the book Manufacturing Consent, which says that the corporate American press conglomerates only report views in a narrow range of mainstream opinion, what he called "safe logic."

We should "go where the silence is, not where the power is, to find balance," he said. "It's time for the truth to be the news."

He suggested that the lies exposed by the Downing Street Memos show definitively that "the Bush administration lies - which should be their unraveling."

John Crenshaw of the Over the Mountain Democrats said it is time for liberals, progressives and Democrats to come out of the closet and admit who they are in the schools, churches and the work place.

"We must change and adapt or die," he said of the entrenched Alabama Democratic Party, controlled by special interests, including the trial lawyers, the teacher's lobby and the African-American community.

He said the group from the moneyed part of town will host a series of events focusing on issues and causes people can agree on, such as the fact that "poverty exists in Alabama."

Sharron Williams, one of the organizers from the Progressive Democrats of America and Democracy for America said it is time to get the word out that a lot of people disagree with the president, "not just a bunch of liberals."

"It's time for some grassroots action," she said. "It's time for solidarity."

The event was sponsored by the group AfterDowningStreet.Org. A version of this story was published on the group's Web site under the headline Report from Birmingham, AL.

Post comments here or e-mail them to fast2write at charter dot net.