Mobile Phone Ringtone: "Brownie, You're Doing a Heckuva Job"
(via BoingBoing.net) Dubya's chummy words of praise for former FEMA director Michael Brown in the form of a mobile phone ringtone. Reminds me of that great remix/mashup from a while back that splices Dubya quotes (in the form of Lou Reed's "Take a Walk on the Wild Side") set to the tune of John Lennon's "Imagine." Must be heard to be believed-- find that one here: ThePartyParty.com. See also: Ring tones--the new protest songs

- Edoc 11:20 PM - [PermaLink] -

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FBI: Financial Gain Drove Uranium Forgery

The FBI has determined that financial gain, not an effort to influence U.S. policy, was behind the forged documents that the Bush administration used to bolster its prewar claim that Iraq sought uranium ore in Niger.
...
FBI spokesman John Miller did not say what led the FBI to its conclusion or identify the perpetrators of the hoax.

Okaaaay, so the original forger did it for money. And what bearing does that have on anything?!? Hey-- here's a thought: How about following that money trail? Y'know, maybe focus on the people who laid out the cash for the forgeries, eh? Maybe, just maybe, that will lead to some bad guys that actually did want to influence U.S. policy. See where I'm going with any of this, Sherlock?

- Edoc 9:35 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Yeah the hell with the constitution it allows other people besides Republicans to vote -- let's just start gutting it.

GOP mulls ending birthright citizenship

- rob 6:14 PM - [PermaLink] -

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While many in the religious right were busy canonizing Bush and the GOP, the GOP was snickering at the gullible goobers.

Abramoff-Scanlon School of Sleaze

Consider one memo highlighted in a Capitol Hill hearing Wednesday that Scanlon, a former aide to Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas, sent the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana to describe his strategy for protecting the tribe's gambling business. In plain terms, Scanlon confessed the source code of recent Republican electoral victories: target religious conservatives, distract everyone else, and then railroad through complex initiatives.

"The wackos get their information through the Christian right, Christian radio, mail, the internet and telephone trees," Scanlon wrote in the memo, which was read into the public record at a hearing of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. "Simply put, we want to bring out the wackos to vote against something and make sure the rest of the public lets the whole thing slip past them." The brilliance of this strategy was twofold: Not only would most voters not know about an initiative to protect Coushatta gambling revenues, but religious "wackos" could be tricked into supporting gambling at the Coushatta casino even as they thought they were opposing it.

- rob 6:04 PM - [PermaLink] -

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In the post below we talk about bad sci-fi now...

Out of a Bad Spy Novel

The men from the pages of a bad spy novel throw people they don't like into secret prisons that officially do not exist, snug little dungeons hidden away in undisclosed countries. These spy-novel men keep to the shadows; if a ray of sunlight happens to fall upon one of their lairs, they scurry away to some other dark corner. They make their "high-value" prisoners simply disappear -- no charges, no hearings, no exit.

They tell us that we shouldn't worry, that every one of these prisoners is evil beyond redemption. And, anyway, what prisoners?
...
As reporter Dana Priest revealed in The Post this week, the Bush administration has held dozens of al Qaeda prisoners in secret prisons, with no regard to due process. It was a "small circle of White House and Justice Department lawyers and officials" who approved this archipelago of "black-site" detention centers, The Post reported.

These CIA-run prisons have been operated in eight countries, The Post said -- Afghanistan, Thailand, the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba and "several democracies in Eastern Europe." Officials prevailed upon The Post not to disclose the names of the European countries, citing national security concerns. The real reason, no doubt, was that if citizens of those countries knew their governments were hosting secret American prisons, they would surely object.
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It matters because the United States draws its strength and its moral authority in the world from its ideals. We preach about due process, we preach about the rule of law, we preach about humane treatment -- and now we're ignoring our own pronouncements.

But there's more at stake than American standing in the world. Our ideals are the heart and soul of this nation. We are not an ancient nation united by language or blood. Our ideals, rather than ethnicity or even territory, hold us together and make us a nation. When we betray those ideals, we weaken America.

- rob 5:57 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Cheney torture

Another Thunderbolt from Wilkerson

Another shocking accusation by former administration insider Lawrence Wilkerson appears to be going under the media radar today.

On NPR yesterday, the former chief of staff to the secretary of state said that he had uncovered a "visible audit trail" tracing the practice of prisoner abuse by U.S. soldiers directly back to Vice President Cheney's office.

Never a fan of Cheney but if you listen to Cheney of say the seventies and eighties he's not the guy who'd sell his country to Saudi Arabia while putting out a cigar butt in a prisoner's arm. But now you got a guy who just needs his torture reports. He's jonseing for another kick in America's moral standing.

Its like we're living in a bad science fiction novel where a man whose body has failed him is replaced with more and more artificial parts until his humanity is gone. Cyborg's don't have problems with torture. Humans do.



(thanks to whomever originally created that graphic)

- rob 5:44 PM - [PermaLink] -

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I decided to post a link to this book because it was a great way to introduce a train of thought I had recently.

The Republican War on Science by Chris Mooney

Now I was thinking of how it is funny that we give a teacher an apple (well no one does really, but it is iconic) when the reason for the apple is to symbolize the tree of knowledge. But it was receiving the apple that not only gave humanity the knowledge of good and evil but got humanity kicked out of Eden.

Now, unlike most folks, the fundamentalists take the bible absolutely literally. So for them is giving a teacher an apple an accusation? Something like "you are taking us away from God [Eden]." The knowledge is the evil.

Knowledge is what has taken us away from being in the garden with God. Science and the accumulation of knowledge is a bad thing.

Thus a war against science is simply an attempt by the fundamentalist right to get back into Eden (where they'll then go for the other tree - that one's got the power!)

- rob 5:20 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Three Strikes and We're Out: Destroying America
According to Arthur over at PowerofNarrative.com, "Every single element is almost in place to end individual liberty for all time in the United States. Very few people know it." So while we're busy attacking Buschco, over in the courtroom, democracy is on the gallows. How can that be?

• Strike 1: Renewal of the Patriot Act
• Strike 2: Confirmation of John Roberts to SCOTUS
• Potential Strike 3: The administration's appeal of the Jose Padilla Case

The Jose Padilla appeal could be an inflection point for the unraveling of democracy. Arthur makes the following critical point:

If the Supreme Court hears the current appeal (which I am almost certain it will), and if the Supreme Court upholds the president's "right" to throw any American in jail for the rest of his life simply on the president's word, then liberty and freedom in this country are dead. The rest is simply a matter of time. The president will have the same fundamental power that any other absolute dictator has: the only questions will be whether he chooses to use it, and whether he chooses to use it against you.

If you're not familiar with the Padilla case, it's critical that you do some research and make sure your local member of congress knows about it.

- Edoc 9:56 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Bush is still crony happy

In the Company of Friends

President Bush last week appointed nine campaign contributors, including three longtime fund-raisers, to his Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, a 16-member panel of individuals from the private sector who advise the president on the quality and effectiveness of U.S. intelligence efforts.

I think I'll post my resume at CronyJobs, they will get you work.

"Apply" now to secure a lucrative career both decrying and luxuriating in the spoils of Big Government! No experience necessary! Don't miss your chance to suckle greedily at America's soon-to-be-bankrupt bureaucracy teat!

- rob 5:58 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Well this is a fun way to look at it:

Cheney now 2 points behind cheating on your wife

Dick Cheney, in the same poll, has a 19 percent approval rating.

How low is 19 percent?

According to previous surveys (scroll down in the link), that’s two points less popular than cheating on your spouse and seven points behind corporal punishment in schools.
...
Dick Cheney is now 18 points behind the number of people who believe alien beings have secretly contacted the U.S. government.

Bush, similarly, now trails the number of people who think astrology is scientific by five points.

- rob 5:25 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Bush - who loves ya baby?

(oh only the most extreme 35% of Americans...)

CBS Poll Finds Public Takes Plamegate Seriously

- rob 5:22 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Interesting Bush would visit Argentina this week as it seems he loves the idea of deseparacedos - something Argentina was able to get away from when it moved to a democracy... something we must be moving away from if Bush is so fond of the methods of dictators.

Rebellion Against Abuse

LAST MONTH a prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay military base excused himself from a conversation with his lawyer and stepped into a cell, where he slashed his arm and hung himself. This desperate attempted suicide by a detainee held for four years without charge, trial or any clear prospect of release was not isolated. At least 131 Guantanamo inmates began a hunger strike on Aug. 8 to protest their indefinite confinement, and more than two dozen are being kept alive only by force-feeding. No wonder Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has denied permission to U.N. human rights investigators to meet with detainees at Guantanamo: Their accounts would surely add to the discredit the United States has earned for its lawless treatment of foreign prisoners.
...
As The Post's Dana Priest reported yesterday, the CIA maintains its own network of secret prisons, into which 100 or more terrorist suspects have "disappeared" as if they were victims of a Third World dictatorship. Some of the 30 most important prisoners are being held in secret facilities in Eastern European countries -- which should shame democratic governments that only recently dismantled Soviet-era secret police apparatuses.

Reagan used to use examples like this to call the Soviet Union an evil empire. And Bush is supposed to be the Christian President?

Does Bush have a special love of Argentina? First he said about destroying America's economy in much they way Argentina did decades ago (and which it is still struggling with) and now he is making people simply disappear something Argentina stopped when it became free. Since America is now doing this is America no longer free?

- rob 5:19 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Cheney Didn't Clean House, He Rearranged Some Furniture
Rawstory prints a letter sent to Cheney today by Senators Reid, Durbin, Schumer and Stabenow. Democrats are angry that Cheney promoted Hannah and Addington in the wake of Scooter Libby's resignation. And rightly so-- Hannah and Addington are part of the same brood of reptiles responsible for Plamegate, Nigergate and numerous other despicable offenses.

- Edoc 3:53 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Newsweek with the two Best headlines of the day:

• Is Rove a Security Risk?
  Because he disclosed Plame’s CIA identity to reporters, the Bush aide could lose his clearance.
  
  
• Remember Anthrax?
  While the government goes into high alert over bird flu, an old plan to develop an anthrax vaccine remains unfinished.

- rob 3:40 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Keep your eye on this.

It looks like Alito is the kind of judge Frist would love

Plaintiff alleges Alito conflict

Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. ruled in a 2002 case in favor of the Vanguard mutual fund company at a time when he owned more than $390,000 in Vanguard funds and later complained about an effort to remove him from the case, court records show -- despite an earlier promise to recuse himself from cases involving the company.
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In 1990, when Alito was seeking US Senate approval for his nomination to be a circuit judge, he said in written answers to a questionnaire that he would disqualify himself from ''any cases involving the Vanguard companies."

After Alito ruled in Vanguard's favor in the Maharaj case, he complained about her efforts to vacate his decision and remove him from the case, writing to the chief administrative judge of the federal appeals court on which he sat in 2003: ''I do not believe that I am required to disqualify myself based on my ownership of the mutual fund shares."

The White House, asked about the seeming contradiction between Alito's two statements, said that Alito was put on the case due to an error by a computer system that should have warned that he was taking a Vanguard-related case, because the investments were listed in the database.

Asked why Alito did not recuse himself after learning that it involved Vanguard, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino criticized those who are raising questions about Alito's actions.

Moderate pro-choice Republican looking for a way to save face with your Republican buddies and vote no on Alito - you've just been given a very nice gift.

Looks like Bush is 0 for 2 for this Supreme Court vacancy.

- rob 3:22 PM - [PermaLink] -

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FEMA Director Rolled Up the Sleeves for Katrina (.pdf)
Former FEMA Director Michael D. Brown's emails from the Katrina disaster were made public recently. Some of these emails are downright wacky. For example, a (staffer?) wrote him: "Please roll up the sleeves of your shirt... all shirts. Even the President rolled his sleeves to just below the elbow. On this crises and on TV you just need to look more hard-working... ROLL UP THE SLEEVES."
CNN.com reports on the story.

- Edoc 2:42 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Billmon: The Dirty War
(via JuanCole.com) Billmon revisits the post-9/11 options to prosecute islamic terrorism, and the paths chosen by the Bush administration.

"... my best guess was that the war would follow one of two other paths. One would plunge the CIA and the other covert agencies into a filthy, brutal, subterranean campaign to root out Al Qaeda's networks, track down its top operatives, and kill or capture them -- efficiently and ruthlessly. I understood that kidnapping, torture, assassination and "extraordinary rendition" (although I hadn't yet heard the term) would be the weapons of choice. I realized that innocent people, as well as guilty ones, would die; that wives and children would be used as hostages, or tortured in front of their husbands and fathers; that prisoners without names would be buried alive in cells without numbers; that battered corpses would be quietly buried, or dropped out of helicopters into the sea. And I knew that even if Americans didn't do these things themselves, they would find or hire others who would.

And God help me, I supported that war. Because the other path I saw -- the one that haunts me still -- led to an ever-expanding counterinsurgency war in the Middle East, against a constantly growing number of enemies.
...
It would be a war in which whole cities would be razed in order to chase out a few hundred guerrilla fighters, in which 500-lb bombs would be dropped on alleged terrorist safehouses that turned out to be filled with women and children, and in which GIs trained to respond to snipers or suspected car bombers with overwhelming fire would kill hundreds and eventually thousands of innocent civilians."

You can guess which path the administration took: both.

- Edoc 1:41 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Another post from Michael (with his bolding):

The Prison Puzzle

The rigid ideologues blocking this reform say the Geneva Conventions banning inhumane treatment are too vague. Which part of no murder, torture, mutilation, cruelty or humiliation do they not understand? The restrictions are a problem only if you want to do such abhorrent things and pretend they are legal. That is why the Bush administration tossed out the rules after 9/11.

It's a terrifying thing when the people who devote their lives to protecting our national security feel that the civilians who oversee their operations are out of control. Dana Priest reports in The Washington Post that even the Central Intelligence Agency's clandestine operators are getting nervous about the network of secret prisons they have around the world - including, of all places, at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe.

Mr. Cheney, a prime mover behind the attempts to legalize torture, is now leading a back-room fight to block a measure passed by the Senate, 90 to 9, that would impose international standards and American laws on the treatment of prisoners. Mr. Cheney wants a different version, one that would make the C.I.A.'s camps legal, although still hidden, and authorize the use of torture by intelligence agents. Mr. Bush is threatening to veto the entire military budget over this issue.

When his right-hand man, Lewis Libby, resigned after being indicted on charges relating to team Cheney's counterattack against Joseph Wilson, Mr. Cheney replaced him with David Addington, who helped draft the infamous legalized-torture memo of 2002. Mr. Addington is now blocking or weakening proposed changes to the prison policies. The Times said he had berated a Pentagon aide who had briefed him and Mr. Libby recently on the draft of the new military standards for handling prisoners. (The indictment of Mr. Libby said he had done the same thing to a C.I.A. briefer in 2003 when agency officials questioned the intelligence on Iraq.)

So we can only conclude that President Bush has decided to expend the minimal clout remaining to his beleaguered administration in a fight to put the full faith and credit of the United States behind the concept of torture.

- rob 1:34 PM - [PermaLink] -

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From TCS regular Michael who has been missing of late:

Guilty, with no chance of innocence

This should worry the shit out of you:

The House's Abuse of Patriotism

But the increasingly out-of-control House of Representatives has made the threat to our system of justice even greater by inserting a raft of provisions to enlarge the scope of the federal death penalty.

In a breathtaking afterthought at the close of debate, the House voted to triple the number of terrorism-related crimes carrying the death penalty. The House also voted to allow judges to reduce the size of juries that decide on executions, and even to permit prosecutors to try repeatedly for a death sentence when a hung jury fails to vote for death.

Any move to weaken the American jury system in the name of fighting terrorism is particularly egregious. But the House voted to allow a federal trial to have fewer than 12 jurors if the judge finds "good cause" to do so, even if the defense objects. Under current law, a life sentence is automatically ordered when juries become hung on deciding the capital punishment question. But the House would have a prosecutor try again - a license for jury-shopping for death - even though federal juries already exclude opponents of capital punishment.

Judge Upholds Conviction in Terror Case

A federal judge in Manhattan refused yesterday to overturn the 2001 convictions of a former aide to Osama bin Laden in a major terrorism case, but he sharply criticized the United States Marshals Service for suppressing evidence and then trying to hide what it had done.

Judge Duffy had held hearings over the past year about how the Marshals Service made 28 hours of video recordings of prosecutors' interviews with a crucial government witness that were then not given to the defense before the trial.

"Through a mixture of inaction, incompetence and stonewalling to cover up their mistakes," Judge Duffy wrote, "the United States Marshals Service and the Department of Justice's Office of Enforcement Operations have seriously jeopardized the convictions of Al Qaeda terrorist Wadih El-Hage."

The judge, in his decision, carefully analyzed the suppressed evidence, which included 647 pages of transcripts. Mr. El-Hage's lawyers argued that they could have used the material to try to impeach Mr. Fadl when he testified.

The judge also criticized what he suggested was the agency's failure to train its employees in their legal obligations with respect to prisoners, witnesses and defendants.

"On the whole," the judge added, "the hearings did not paint the Marshals Service as an entity that understood its mistake, let alone an organization working actively to prevent similar debacles in the future."

Emphasis added by Michael

- rob 1:25 PM - [PermaLink] -

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GOP to Take-over Knight Ridder?
A pro-GOP investor group stands poised to scoop up a chain of key newspapers around the country.

A Florida-based investment group -- with zero fanfare -- has bought up 19% of the stock of Knight Ridder, Inc., the owners of the Daily News and the Philadelphia Inquirer, not to mention the Miami Herald, the San Jose Mercury News, and a bunch of other big names...

Hopefully this deal doesn't go any further. I know conservatives will claim I've got this backwards, but I'll say it anyway: Does the public really need any more conservative, pro-big-business coverage?

- Edoc 1:08 PM - [PermaLink] -

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GAO Report Supports Possible Ohio Fraud in 2004 Prez Election
The Government Accounting Office, the leading congressional investigative agency, recently found miserable standards and vulnerabilities in the electronic voting systems in Ohio. (download .pdf GAO Report)

... the GAO report now confirms that electronic voting machines as deployed in 2004 were in fact perfectly engineered to allow a very small number of partisans with minimal computer skills and equipment to shift enough votes to put George W. Bush back in the White House.

If you recall, the CEO for Diebold, makers of the electronic voting machines, pledged before the 2004 campaign to come through in Ohio for Bush. The margin of victory in Ohio was 118,700 votes out of 5.6 million cast.

- Edoc 12:50 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Today's example of a bad teacher (many are good - but what would be fun about posting that to a site with the word sucks in the URL):

Child disciplined for wearing Halloween costume to school

Crystal Harris says her 5-year old son was forced to take off his costume, and go through the entire school day with only his underwear on.

The incident happened Monday at Walt Disney Elementary.

A school named Walt Disney Elementary would rather have children in their underwear then in Halloween costumes. I don't know what to say beyond that.

- rob 11:41 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Cenk Uygr on Torture: Is This What We've Become?
With reports of secret "gulags" resurfacing in the news, and a vice-president who openly pushes for legalizing CIA torture, it's time to stop and reflect on the insanity of this administration. Over at the HuffingtonPost, Cenk nails it with another great opinion piece-- this time on turture.

So, I have to ask this bothersome question again – is this what we have become? Are we comfortable with our Vice President actively lobbying for torture, converting old Soviet prisons into US dungeons, being above international law, abusing our authority and the trust of our allies, running secret prison systems throughout the world and denying people we capture humane treatment. Are we comfortable getting rid of our justice system for a system of secret detentions? Is this what we have become?
...
If you're a Republican who still supports these actions, you will live to regret what you have said exactly as the racists of the Old South did. You will claim you never really said those things and never really supported what this administration did. You will one day go to an event honoring Captain Ian Fishback or Joseph Darby, or maybe even Richard Clarke, and you will pretend you were always on their side.

I emphasized two sentences in the quote because I already see some of this happening today. I see neighbors, coworkers and others who are finally starting to see that they were wrong about supporting the Iraq war, and wrong about trusting this president. There is a palpable feeling among people I talk to, one that suggests that staying the course with the Bush administration means continuing to sink deeper into disgrace and shame-- and regret.

- Edoc 10:11 AM - [PermaLink] -

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The location of the last 100 visits to TCS:



Check out that one visitor from the middle of the ocean - - cool.

- rob 9:31 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Student Walkouts Across US Protest Bush Administration
I didn't even know this was going on, but it's an inspiring thing. As part of the World Can't Wait movement, on November 2nd, high school students in Chicago, Seattle, LA, San Francisco, New York, Washington DC and Atlanta.
On DailyKos, a diary is calling for a national strike for peace on Wednesday Dec 7th. Hmmm. I'm already scheduled for a vacation for that day-- does that count?

- Edoc 7:21 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Movie Pick - Uncovered: The Whole Truth about the Iraq War
Now that the Dems are pushing an investigation, now is a great time to refresh your memory regarding the climate of intelligence filtering that led up to the Iraq war. Don't be turned off by the title-- this is a documentary-- essentially a reel of interviews with senior officials, military leaders and career CIA agents who offer a countering view of the rationale for the Iraq war. More than 25 experts in total!! Sobering and highly recommended. A .pdf transcript can be downloaded here. Amazon.com reviews here.

- Edoc 4:24 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Yes it is Carter, but it still means something when a former President accuses a sitting President of something so criminal.

Carter: White House Misled U.S. on Iraq

The Bush Administration's prewar claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction were "manipulated, at least" to mislead the American people, former President Jimmy Carter said Wednesday.

It also makes one go: "no duh." But some Americans still really need to hear this, of course those are the same folks who won't listen to a word Carter says.

- rob 3:03 PM - [PermaLink] -

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I step out yesterday and the Democratic Senators start acting like they are willing to fight for America. Wow.

Luckily Edoc posted about it. Here's some more info:

• Democrats Force Senate Into Closed Session Over Iraq Data

  WASHINGTON -- Democrats forced the Republican-controlled Senate into an unusual closed session Tuesday, questioning intelligence that President Bush used in the run-up to the war in Iraq and accusing Republicans of ignoring the issue.
  
  "They have repeatedly chosen to protect the Republican administration rather than get to the bottom of what happened and why," Democratic leader Harry Reid said.

• U.S. Senate Closed Session Yields Intelligence Accord

  Nov. 1 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Senators reached an agreement to monitor a congressional investigation into the Bush administration's use of intelligence about Iraq after Democrats forced an unusual closed session on the Senate floor to draw attention to the issue.
  
  The closed session began about 2:15 p.m. today Washington time when Democratic Minority Leader Harry Reid invoked a rule forcing the session, which required the chamber to be cleared of visitors and cameras to be turned off. It ended about 4:35 p.m. with Majority Leader Bill Frist announcing the creation of a six- member task force to monitor progress of the probe.

  Who would have thought that standing up for what is right gets results? Maybe the Democratic Senators will learn to do stand up for what is right more often. Actually if any Republican Senator wants to stand up for what is right more power to them. I'm sure many of them hate that they are letting their souls die just to be in party line.
  
  
• Here's what Reid said :

  SEN. HARRY REID: America deserves better than this. They also deserve a searching and comprehensive investigation into how the Bush administration brought this country to war. Key questions that need to be answered include:
  
  – How did the Bush administration assemble its case for war against Iraq? We heard what Colonel Wilkerson said.
  – Who did the Bush administration officials listen to and who did they ignore?
  – How did the senior administration officials manipulate or manufacture intelligence presented to the Congress and the American people?
  – What was the role of the White House Iraq Group, or WHIG, a group of senior White House officials tasked with marketing the war and taking down its critics? We know what Colonel Wilkerson says.
  – How did the administration coordinate its efforts to attack individuals who dared to challenge the administration’s assertions? We know what happened to them — I listed a few.
  – Why has this administration failed to provide Congress with the documents that would shed light on their misconduct and the misstatements?
  
  Unfortunately, the Senate committee that should be taking the lead in providing these answers is not. Despite the fact that the chairman of Senate Intelligence Committee publicly committed to examine these questions more than a year and a half ago, he has chosen not to keep that commitment. Despite the fact that he restated the commitment earlier this year on national television, he has still done nothing. …
  
  Mr. President, enough time has gone by. I demand on behalf of the American people that we understand why these investigations aren’t being conducted, and in accordance with Rule 21, I now move that Senate go into closed session.

• Crooks and Liars have the videos that you must see (even you poor dial up folks... just grab a sandwich while you wait): Harry Reid's Press Conference (and another good one below it).

- rob 2:55 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Thanks to Bush China now has more transparency when it comes to the Human Rights of prisoners

Guantanamo Visit Rules Set by U.S. Called Unacceptable by UN

Oct. 31 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. agreed after four years of negotiations to allow United Nations human rights officials to visit its Guantanamo Bay prison facility, while setting ground rules for interviews with detainees that would prevent the trip.
...
The Department of Defense said in an Oct. 27 letter that three human rights officials invited to Guantanamo Bay wouldn't be allowed to conduct private interviews with suspected terrorists, according to Manfred Nowak, UN rapporteur on torture and other degrading treatment of prisoners. That's a ``non- negotiable'' requirement for the visit, he said.
...
There has been no agreement with the U.S. authorities on a visit to facilities in Afghanistan or Iraq, Nowak said.

Nowak said China has given the UN permission to conduct private interviews during a visit next month.

``We cannot accept lower standards for the U.S. than China,'' Nowak said. ``We won't go to Guantanamo for the sort of guided tour given to members of Congress and the media.''

- rob 2:43 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Looking up an old link in TCS for the below post I just scanned the posts of the week ending May 13th of this year. A fascinating slice of life that seems so long ago and yet sounds so familiar: This Century Sucks

Other site shop talk. There has been talk around the TCS water cooler of ending the 2.5 year TCS tradition of having a difficult to read template and move to... wait for it... black text on a white background. I think this is pretty darn radical and an end to the tradition of user interface assault that we are so proud of. But let us know what you think - leave us a comment.

But no matter what the outcome of this: have no fear my poor grammar and spelling and sometimes outright unintelligible postings will continue. I'll leave the good English to Edoc, Michael, the other Michael, B, the cookie making guy in Japan, and the others.

- rob 1:58 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Shakespeare's Sister asks something we've asked here before:

What the hell is wrong with conservatives?

With all the bloviating we hear about moral values from conservatives on a regular basis, you’d think that maybe they’d make some vague attempt to actually live up to their rhetoric, but time after time, it’s conservatives who prove to be the most corrupt, the most deviant, the most disturbed.
...
Anyway, The New Yorker introduces a 1996 novel called The Apprentice">The Apprentice by none other than recently indicted scumbag, Scooter Libby, as another in a series of questionable novels by prominent conservatives...
...
Perhaps the most disturbing, however, is this passage:

At age ten the madam put the child in a cage with a bear trained to couple with young girls so the girls would be frigid and not fall in love with their patrons. They fed her through the bars and aroused the bear with a stick when it seemed to lose interest.

What kind of mind comes up with this shit, dreams up scenarios where children are raped by animals to train them in prostitution? Oh, right. A conservative one. One that has toiled under a lifetime of repression, and spent its time dreaming up legislation designed to control the sexual freedom of women and gays.

This reflects our post from 2004 (and repeated again this spring):

Conservatives want many religious mores to become law. Why? Because if they are not law the conservatives will break them. Thus you have the religious moral conservative drunks gambling away their child's college money at a sleazy casino. "but... sniff... if only things like that were illegal. Then I wouldn't do it."

The whole "Personal Responsibility" line is the greatest projection in political history. Liberals are saying "make it legal, if you don't like it don't do it." Conservatives say "I don't like it, make it illegal." But what they don't say, but in their hearts they know it to be true, "I don't like it, make it illegal, make it stigmatized or I will do it."

Even when things are fine and decent, but their teachings have hang ups about it (say like homosexuality), the conservatives get angy and liberals get confused. When the right fights against gay marriage and says things like "it'll lead to people marrying animals." Liberals look at them like they are insane. But the religious right is very concerned, like most homophobes they are insecure of their sexuality, and want to keep homosexuality stigmitized (and better yet, wouldn't it be great if it was illegal) so they can keep themselves on the straight and narrow (as they see it). They are so self-unaware, so without personal control (relying on social, religious, and legal control) that as far as they know they themselves might marry dogs.

Hypocracy is the sin to teens, when they are filled with rightious power. Hypocracy to adult conservatives is a way of life; it is because they are fearful of themselves. They say we are above animals but in their dark hearts they think of themselves as horribly base, needing laws and peer pressure to keep them inline.

Its all so horribly sad.

- rob 1:56 PM - [PermaLink] -

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If only lies left semen stains - Jon Stewart

What the 'Shield' Covered Up

Has anyone noticed that the coverup worked?

In his impressive presentation of the indictment of Lewis "Scooter" Libby last week, Patrick Fitzgerald expressed the wish that witnesses had testified when subpoenas were issued in August 2004, and "we would have been here in October 2004 instead of October 2005."

Note the significance of the two dates: October 2004, before President Bush was reelected, and October 2005, after the president was reelected. Those dates make clear why Libby threw sand in the eyes of prosecutors, in the special counsel's apt metaphor, and helped drag out the investigation.

I don't think Fitzgerald is done yet.

- rob 12:41 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Hey, enjoy our new template - well actually its just broken somewhat. Maybe I'll get to fixing it today (or maybe not).

But in the meantime we're still in business... pardon our dust.

Fixed - it was easy.

- rob 11:12 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Harry Reid Forces War Rationale Discussion on the Senate Floor
Yes Harry!! That's it!! Today the republican-controlled Senate was taken off guard by minority leader Harry Reid, who forced a closed-session on the issue of manipulated pre-war intelligence. This is a great turnaround from the meek behavior I saw from Reid over the weekend. See-- it is possible for the democrats to make the headlines instead of being eclipsed by the republican/white house agenda. If this sort of thing weren't such a rarity, I'd be much more optimistic about the future of the democratic party.

UPDATE: Holy schmaltz! The democrats actually threatened to go into a closed session every single day until they get closure on the requests for investigations into the pre-war intelligence. More information at Seeing the Forrest and Crooks and Liars.

- Edoc 4:01 PM - [PermaLink] -

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The Bush Administration: Actively NOT Keeping America Safe Since 2001

Fed Plan on Protecting Ports Is Delayed

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has missed dozens of deadlines set by Congress after the Sept. 11 attacks for developing ways to protect airplanes, ships and railways from terrorists.

A plan to defend ships and ports from attack is six months overdue. Rules to protect air cargo from infiltration by terrorists are two months late. A study on the cost of giving anti-terrorism training to federal law enforcement officers who fly commercially was supposed to be done more than three years ago.

They don't even have plans yet?

- rob 12:24 PM - [PermaLink] -

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America's Religious Right = Religious Extremists

Debate rages on use of cervical cancer vaccine / While almost 100% effective, some contend use condones teen sex

Washington -- A new vaccine that protects against cervical cancer has set up a clash between health advocates who want to use the shots aggressively to prevent thousands of malignancies and social conservatives who say immunizing teen-agers could encourage sexual activity.

We are talking about something that will prevent people from dying and they're worried about teen sex? I tell you what: they show as much interest in their own teens as they do in mythical teens having orgies and they would do more to stop teen sex then preventing this drug going to market would.

I'm not being snarkish. What is the difference between this and Saudi Arabian religious extremist letting girls die in a fire rather than break a religious taboo. Is it only a matter of immediacy?

Saudi police 'stopped' fire rescue

Saudi Arabia's religious police stopped schoolgirls from leaving a blazing building because they were not wearing correct Islamic dress, according to Saudi newspapers.
In a rare criticism of the kingdom's powerful "mutaween" police, the Saudi media has accused them of hindering attempts to save 15 girls who died in the fire on Monday.

- rob 12:12 PM - [PermaLink] -

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The Rude Pundit has a write up about Samuel Alito.

It is rude, it also has some interesting information.

Again, only if you don't mind rude humor (and I suspect you don't): The Rude Pundit on Samuel Alito

- rob 12:07 PM - [PermaLink] -

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If you see the gas prices and are wondering if you are getting scamed.

You are - and not just by the big oil companies (who are raking it in).

State's gasoline retailers cash in

Arizona gasoline retailers are taking in their largest profits of the year, with station owners collecting nearly 35 cents for every gallon sold.

The gross profit margin, which is about three times the retailers' typical profit of 12.5 cents per gallon in the region, reflects the current wide spread between what retailers are paying for gasoline from their wholesale sources and what they are charging their customers.

- rob 12:05 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Bush and Cheney: Waterboys for Iran

Are the neocons just marks for an Iranian con, or more likely are they in on it. Either way America is hurt as long as they are in government.

MORE FROM LA REPUBBLICA

Twenty men are gathered around a large table, covered by maps of Iraq, Iran and Syria. Those who count are Lawrence Franklin and Harold Rhode of the Office of Special Plans, Michael Ledeen of the AIE, a SISMI station chief accompanied by his assistant (the first is a balding man between 46 and 48 years of age; the second is younger, around 38, with braces on his teeth), and some mysterious Iranians.
...
....The bogus Italian dossier on the Niger uranium turns up [at the meeting] also — and we don’t know exactly why — because Chalabi is in possession of it.

Ah Chalabi the love of Judy Miller and the Pentagon neocons (and Cheney's office). Chalabi is now Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister and also suspected Iranian spy: Reports: Chalabi tipped Iran about codes

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Ahmad Chalabi, a former Iraqi exile who recently lost his standing as a special friend of the Bush administration, told Iran that the United States had broken the code of its intelligence service, according to broadcast and published reports.

For some reason I can't find the original CNN article.

But you know, Iran has been good to Cheney's Halliburton, maybe Cheney was returning the favor.

Halliburton Subpoenaed Over Unit's Iran Work

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A U.S. grand jury issued a subpoena to Halliburton Co. seeking information about its Cayman Islands unit's work in Iran, where it is illegal for U.S. companies to operate, Halliburton said on Monday.[July 2004]

Maybe they love Iran so much because the values of Iran mirror so much the values and priorities of America's religious right:

City tackles titillating mannequins

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Police in northeastern Iran are launching a new morality drive by confiscating alluring mannequins from boutiques and clothes stalls in the bazaar, authorities in the city of Bojnourd said on Monday.

A spokesman for the city's judiciary, who asked not be named, explained the drive would tackle problems of "public chastity". Sixty five mannequins have been impounded so far.

- rob 12:00 PM - [PermaLink] -

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It is almost a parody

On Patrol in Vt., Minutemen Are the Outsiders

DERBY LINE, Vt. -- Somewhere near this spot -- where five men with lawn chairs and binoculars were watching the woods -- runs the long and mostly invisible border between the United States and Canada.

The New England Minutemen were here to guard this border.

They just weren't precisely certain where it was.

"That's west, so I believe the border is that way," said Jeffrey Buck, the group's leader, as he made an expansive gesture in the direction of a nearby home on Saturday. "It's not really clear to me."

Actually the Canadian border is quite well guarded with strict requirements as to who can enter the United States. For example they let in this man:

BOSTON (AP) -- On April 25, Gregory Despres arrived at the U.S.-Canadian border crossing at Calais, Maine, carrying a homemade sword, a hatchet, a knife, brass knuckles and a chain saw stained with what appeared to be blood. U.S. customs agents confiscated the weapons and fingerprinted Despres.

Then they let him into the United States.

Thanks to D for bringing my attention to the Washington Post article.

- rob 11:45 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Read: Think Progress : Samuel Alito"s America

- rob 4:51 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Harry Reid: Take Off the Gloves Already!
Prof. Juan Cole admonishes Harry Reid over his soft-spoken demand for apologies from the White House. I also watched Reid on This Week with George Stephanopoulos, and I thought the same thing. Reid's vocal tone was that of a baby-sitter reading a bedtime story. He feigned heartfelt sadness and disappointment, and warbled on with talking points instead of answering the host's questions with precision and conviction. Here's some of the video from CrooksAndLiars.com.

C'mon Harry, on political shows, you can talk to us as though we have higher than a 2nd grade reading level! The country has a right to vent some anger and indignation over the current treasonous mess, and you missed an opportunity to represent that majority.

- Edoc 4:02 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Why Bush is Unimpeachable
In case you've been dreaming of the ultimate presidential smack-down, check out Ted Rall's thought-provoking piece on impeachment.

Unfortunately for ... the United States, impeachment is a political process, not a legal one. Nixon and Clinton faced Congresses controlled by the other party. Because Bush belongs to the same party as the majorities in the House and Senate, nothing he does can get him impeached.

Rall also delivers a sobering picture of the status of checks and balances in our goverment:

Because the Founding Fathers never anticipated the possibility that the nation's chief executive would treat its final judgments with the respect due an out-of-state parking ticket issued to a rental car, the Supreme Court has been rendered as toothless as a gummy bear.
...
The more you look, the more you'll find that our Constitution has been subverted to the point of virtual irrelevance. The legislative branch has abdicated its exclusive right to declare war to the president, who was appointed by a federal court that undermined the states' constitutional right to manage and settle election disputes. Individuals' protection against unreasonable searches have been trashed, habeas corpus is a joke, and double jeopardy has become routine as those exonerated by criminal court face second trials in civil court.

Hopefully we'll hear some of these issues discussed openly as SCOTUS nominee Alito is scrutinized in public discourse.

- Edoc 1:31 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Kos Weighs In on Supreme Court Nominee Samuel Alito
Here are a few blog-bites from the original kossack:
Quick profile of Samuel Alito:

• Overturn Roe v. Wade
• Allow race-based discrimination and discrimination based on disabilities
• Opposes the Family and Medical Leave Act
• Has no problem with unauthorized strip searches

...this is the best possible scenario for Democrats as well. We now have a vehicle upon which to showcase the differences between us and Republicans, between liberalism and conservatism. This is a golden opportunity, and one wisely denied by Bush and Rove with the Robers and Miers nominations.

Check out kos' diary yourself over at DailyKos.

- Edoc 1:23 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Bush Nominates Samuel Alito for Supreme Court
Democrats and moderates: as predicted, the battle of all battles is coming. The status "nuclear" option raises to DEFCON 1. Samuel Alito is a well-known arch-conservative who is very likely to redefine and/or restrict the context in which a woman can exercise her right to choose an abortion. If you are a woman, you should be very very alarmed by this development. Citizens of the USA: Are you truly ready to accept a roll-back of certain critical rights? I'll publish more as the opinions start to roll-in this morning.

- Edoc 8:39 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Document Shredder Manufacturer Sponsors Fox News Segment
I don't normally watch Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace, but I caught a few minutes of it today. Toward the end of the program they had a segment called "Player of the Week", which was sponsored by Fellowes Inc., a maker of office paper and document shredders. The irony did not slip by me unnoticed-- a biased and rigged news program (carried by the most dishonest network!) with a corporate sponsor specializing in destroying records. Seemed like a parody that would fit well on an episode of the Simpsons.

- Edoc 8:34 PM - [PermaLink] -

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