Olbermann had another Special Comment this week.

It fell short of the others mostly because this time Olbermann's anger got away from him and it got channeled into a special comment that was filled with buckshot - spreading out a little wider than his already wide target: Newt Gingrich.

Because Olbermann understood - but had trouble saying - that Gingrich just became the most frightening politician in the American scene, and he announced it with pride.

Special comment: Free speech, failed speakers and the delusion of grandeur
Keith Olbermann responds to Newt Gingrich’s comments about free speech

The genuine proportion of the threat is always irrelevant.

The fear the threat is exploited to create becomes the only reality.

“We will adopt rules of engagement that use every technology we can find,” Mr. Gingrich continued about terrorists, formerly communists, formerly hippies, formerly Fifth Columnists, formerly anarchists, formerly Redcoats, “to break up their capacity to use the Internet, to break up their capacity to use free speech.”

Mr. Gingrich, the British “broke up our capacity to use free speech” in the 1770s.
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“I want to suggest to you,” he said about these Internet restrictions, “that we right now should be impaneling people to look seriously at a level of supervision that we would never dream of if it weren’t for the scale of the threat.”

And who should those “impaneled” people be?

Funny I should ask, isn’t it, Mr. Gingrich?

“I am not ‘running’ for president,” you told a reporter from Fortune Magazine. “I am seeking to create a movement to win the future by offering a series of solutions so compelling that if the American people say I have to be president, it will happen.”

Newt Gingrich sees in terrorism, not something to be exterminated, but something to be exploited.

It’s his golden opportunity, isn’t it?

“Rallying a nation,” you might say, “to hysteria, to sweep us up into the White House with powers that will make martial law seem like anarchy.”

That’s from the original version of the movie “The Manchurian Candidate” — the chilling words of Angela Lansbury’s character, as she first promises to sell her country to the Chinese and Russians, then reveals she’ll double-cross them and keep all the power herself, waving the flag every time she subjugates another freedom.

- rob 1:45 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Isn't it amazing how often it is hard to tell if right wing pundits are more disgusting than pathetic or more pathetic than disgusting.

They pretty much are pathetic and disgusting in equal measure.

Read: Think Progress » Right-Wing Radio Host Fabricates Controversy To Attack First Muslim Congressman

- rob 1:34 PM - [PermaLink] -

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The need for the ability to say "Bullshit" upon encountering Bullshit.

I was never a fan of Bob Dole - I never liked his politics. But I thought he was a good voice to have in the political world. In the eighties he had the wonderful habit of getting visibly annoyed at idiots. It didn't matter what political party you were part of - if you were doing something idiotic (generally because you think it is good politically), he would one of the first (and one of the few in political power unfortunately) to say "bullshit!"

But then he decided he really really wanted to be President - and then he no longer could be angry at idiots anymore. At least that was what he thought. In fact I'm sure his advisors told him that to be President he had to join in on some of the idoicy - and he did. So what ever you might have liked about him was lost - and he lost too. He may not have won - but he certainly would have done better - if he was able to continue yelling "Bullshit!"

Dole stopped yelling bullshit out of lust for power - but what is the excuse of the media?

On Calling Bullshit

Mainstream-media political journalism is in danger of becoming increasingly irrelevant, but not because of the Internet, or even Comedy Central. The threat comes from inside. It comes from journalists being afraid to do what journalists were put on this green earth to do.

What is it about Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert that makes them so refreshing and attractive to a wide variety of viewers (including those so-important younger ones)? I would argue that, more than anything else, it is that they enthusiastically call bullshit.


Calling bullshit, of course, used to be central to journalism as well as to comedy. And we happen to be in a period in our history in which the substance in question is running particularly deep. The relentless spinning is enough to make anyone dizzy, and some of our most important political battles are about competing views of reality more than they are about policy choices. Calling bullshit has never been more vital to our democracy.

Read it all - Froomkin is letting it out.

- rob 1:28 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Posted about this yesterday (barely) - put now the story is making it mainstream:

Security Of Electronic Voting Is Condemned - washingtonpost.com

Paperless electronic voting machines used throughout the Washington region and much of the country "cannot be made secure," according to draft recommendations issued this week by a federal agency that advises the U.S. Election Assistance Commission.

The assessment by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, one of the government's premier research centers, is the most sweeping condemnation of such voting systems by a federal agency.

- rob 4:05 PM - [PermaLink] -

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That popping sound you just heard?

Oh, that's just the heads of right wing religious groups.

Abortion drug can prevent breast tumours, says study

A chemical used in the abortion pill has been found to prevent the growth of breast and ovarian cancers, scientists report today. Mifepristone is licensed as an abortion drug in the UK and is given to women to terminate early pregnancies. But research published in the journal Science reveals that by shutting down the hormone progesterone in breast tissue cells, the drug can also prevent tumours from forming.

The discovery raises hopes that the drug could be used as a new weapon against genetic forms of breast and ovarian cancer.

Great news.

- rob 12:23 PM - [PermaLink] -

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A heck of lot of electronic voting news going on today, but you wouldn't know it from reading TCS today - even though we do always find the issue of great importance - its just we're in an odd mood.

So why not go somewhere else to read about all the Electronic voting stuff that is going on today.

Try: Daily Kos: FL-13: officials unable to explain most of problems in test

and for more Florida info try: FL-13: First Day of State Run 'Audit Testing' in Sarasota Reveals 7% Error Rate in Testing on Paperless ES&S Touch-Screen Machines. Gotta love Brad Blog page titles.

Speaking of Brad Blog - that is a great place to go to for updates about electronic voting issues, and their site is almost as badly designed as ours so you gotta love that (yellow text on green baby!)

But it isn't just Florida in the news today - this story is finally getting some intelligent people to potentially do intelligent things: National Institute to recommend decertification of all touch-screen voting

So when you are done reading all that - do come back here to TCS - we'll have chips and dip waiting.

- rob 6:46 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Eric Prince is not a prince of a man.

He is the right wing billionaire with his own private army.

He runs Blackwater Security Consulting. He runs a mercenary outfit.

One of Rummy's great ideas was the extensive use of mercenaries. As he walked around his office stroking the piece of wreckage from the plane that hit the pentagon in 9/11 that he keeps as a keepsake, stroked it like the white fluffy cat he wanted as a child but never got; he thought of how best to proceed with the war he wanted so desperately to wage. And then he came up with the idea - why not spend millions and millions of dollars on "contractors" who would do what soldiers used to do, but these contractors could do it for more money, with less efficiency, and with no need to follow any of the army's silly rules!

Ahh yes, we'll miss Rummy.

So Rummy called his Mr. Prince, and Blackwater stepped in. Now while in Iraq the contractors could do things that would get an army person in trouble - but the Blackwater folks wouldn't get in trouble - they weren't army. If our military was prohibited by law, codes of conduct, or decency from doing something - Rummy would look to a contractor. In the end though Rummy went on and had our military operate outside of the law and their own codes of conduct anyway, but don't worry, his idea of wasting millions was still doing fine.

But Mr. Prince was even more ingenious - not only could his people do something the military couldn't do because they were civilians, they could also do things that would get civilians in trouble because they were part of the military.

Funny thing happened though, Mr. Prince bumped into a judge that thinks.

Do Read: Judge to Blackwater: Stand Trial for Killing Your Employees in Iraq The Huffington Post

- rob 6:38 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Good job by local TV News in San Francisco that thought it might be a good idea to get the facts behind attacks behind Pelosi.

And when they do they find out that the attack is beyond without merit - that if Pelosi did what they say she should be doing she'd be breaking the law.

When confronted with the facts Hoover Institution fellow Peter Schweizer comes back with the argument that it is on Nancy Pelosi to explain herself and that "It's not my responsibility to go and find out how every single particular circumstance is handled on the Pelosi vineyard." Yes not only is it not Peter's responsibility to figure out every single circumstance, its not even his responsibility to find out any single circumstance that backups up things he says.

I might say that Peter Schweizer has caused the deaths of billions and increases the amount of green house gases admitted. And if I'd say such a thing, by Peter's logic it is really on him to explain that everyone kills billions of bacterium by just living, and that also everyone indeed does fart. Its not my responsibility to make sure anything I say about anyone has any meaning what-so-ever. Once I state something about someone it is the responsibility of that person to justify my statement.

Isn't that right baby eating reptilian alien in disguise Cheney?

Do read: Think Progress - Right-Wing Attack On Pelosi Over "Union Hypocrisy" Systematically Debunked

- rob 6:20 PM - [PermaLink] -

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All I can think of is a scene from a Monty Python movie:

"We will never retreat!"
and then after much bloodshed the order is given:
"run away" "run away"

See... they didn't retreat.

Bush: There Will Be No ‘Graceful Exit From Iraq’

Yes, Bush is determined to make the exit from Iraq horribly ungraceful.

It'd be funny if it weren't for the fact that it isn't funny.

- rob 6:05 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Bush Administration Edumacation and Govment Summed Up:

Create a commission or just hire an Information Architect to help out your web design team for a week.

You know which way this will go...

Right Under Her Nose?

“The absence of information means we can’t answer basic questions families have during the college selection process,” Spellings said. “For example, how long will it take to get a degree? Will this institution prepare me for the field I want to work in? And how much is this education really going to cost? When my daughter applied to college two years ago, I found it challenging to get the answers I needed. And I’m the secretary of education!”

That sounds pretty damning. The secretary of education has a tough time finding out how long it would take a student to graduate or how much college costs? Spellings frequently refers to her daughter’s college search when making these points, so we decided to see what Spellings or any parent could find today.
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It turns out that a parent whose child was looking at those institutions could find out how long it would take a student to get a degree and how much college would cost — and a lot of information suggesting whether college prepares students for careers — all in one place, available at no charge: the Education Department’s Web site.

COOL, the acronym for the College Opportunities Online Locator, isn’t the best known Web site. If you type in “college information” or “college search” to Google, you get a bunch of commercial sites first. Even on the Education Department’s Web site, it doesn’t merit inclusion on the home page or the main page for parents.

Heck, do some search engine optimization and get that info up on the Google results.

Money well spent and it gets your services seen.

Or you can start a commission.

- rob 6:06 PM - [PermaLink] -

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To understand to what ridiculous levels our media has dropped to in dealing with the administration Wonkette has this wonderful example:

White House Officials Magically Become Anonymous Halfway Through Briefing

But those pesky journalists just wanted to talk about Stephen J. Hadley’s “we can’t trust Maliki” memo. Snow and Bartlett simply couldn’t comment on that…

…but White House Press Secretary Tony Snow and Counselor to the President Dan Bartlett two Unnamed Senior Administration Officials could!

Revel in the utter absurdity of the White House beat...

Read the post for an example of this "magic"

- rob 5:36 PM - [PermaLink] -

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A different set of rules about free speech?

umm.. like not free Newt?

Gingrich raises alarm at event honoring those who stand up for freedom of speech

MANCHESTER – Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich yesterday said the country will be forced to reexamine freedom of speech to meet the threat of terrorism.

Gingrich, speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a "different set of rules" may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message.

"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," said Gingrich, a Republican who helped engineer the GOP's takeover of Congress in 1994.

Hey news flash Newt - thanks to your congress and President Bush we already lost an American city.

And then your fine Congress decided it was best to use the money meant to rebuild that city by channeling funds to friends and donors.

Are do such statements break your new set of rules about free speech?

- rob 4:32 PM - [PermaLink] -

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7 weeks without break - for a vast majority of the Senate that will be the most work they've had since getting ready for "greek week" at their college. (but this time there are no streamers - and less booze)

Sen. Reid: Ethics, stem cells top agenda

Reid also said he's doing away with the "do-nothing Congress" that Democrats campaigned against this year as they ousted the Republican majority in both chambers of Congress. The Nevada Democrat, who is wrapping up his final days as Senate minority leader, will take control of the Senate agenda when the new Congress takes the oath of office in January.

"We're going to put in some hours here that haven't been put in in a long time," Reid said. That means "being here more days in the week and we start off this year with seven weeks without a break. That hasn't been done in many, many years here."

- rob 4:28 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Taking the Love out of Christianity - and putting in politics - just like Christ wanted.

Pastor Chosen to Lead Christian Coalition Steps Down in Dispute Over Agenda

WASHINGTON, Nov. 27 — The president-elect of the Christian Coalition of America, which has long served as a model for activism for the religious right, has stepped down, saying the group resisted his efforts to broaden its agenda to include reducing poverty and fighting global warming.
...
Over the last few years, Dr. Hunter, senior pastor of Northland Church in Longwood, Fla., has gained a reputation as an evangelical leader seeking to expand the agenda of conservative Christian activists from issues like abortion and same-sex marriage.

Yes the Christian Coalition's motto "once they're born the heck with them" is safe.

Why care for your neighbor? Why help others? Just make sure they get born and then let them eat from trash barrels. Very Christian guys.

I'm being unfair, its not like they completely lose interest in your well being after you are born - they want make sure you weren't born gay - and if you were you must be punished.

- rob 4:25 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Let's be clear the Bush Administration has put politics ahead of American Security over and over again.

And yet it doesn't even make news here that the Bush Administration knowingly let terrorists go free so that it could have good 9/11 PR.

US interference 'allowed terror gang to escape'

A team of suspected terrorists involved in an alleged UK plot to blow up trans-atlantic airliners escaped capture because of interference by the United States, The Independent has been told by counter-terrorism sources.

An investigation by MI5 and Scotland Yard into an alleged plan to smuggle explosive devices on up to 10 passenger jets was jeopardised in August, when the US put pressure on authorities in Pakistan to arrest a suspect allegedly linked to the airliner plot.

As a direct result of the surprise detention of the suspect, British police and MI5 were forced to rush forward plans to arrest an alleged UK gang accused of plotting to destroy the airliners. But a second group of suspected terrorists allegedly linked to the first evaded capture and is still at large, according to security sources.

The escape of the second group is said to be the reason why the UK was kept at its highest level - "critical" - for three days before it was decided that the plotters no longer posed an imminent threat.

Americans couldn't bring fluids on planes while terrorists got away, but Rove and company patted themselves on the back for scoring PR points about how they are "tough on terrorists."

Results don't matter. Appearances do.

- rob 10:03 AM - [PermaLink] -

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Our inability to Vote

A continuing story of a real risk to our democracy

One Race: An Electronic Canary

Supporters of new voting technologies have been patting themselves on the back, saying there were no big voting problems this year. Let them go to Sarasota.

Here's the story so far: The official vote count in the battle for -- you won't believe this -- Katherine Harris's seat put Republican Vern Buchanan 369 votes ahead of Democrat Christine Jennings out of roughly 238,000 votes cast.

But in Sarasota County, there was an "undervote" of more than 18,000 -- meaning that those voters supposedly didn't choose to record votes in the Buchanan-Jennings race.
...
The Sarasota undervote in the congressional race amounted to nearly 15 percent. Kendall Coffey, Jennings's lawyer, has pointed out that in the other four counties in the district, the undervote ranged from 2.2 to 5.3 percent. Put another way, roughly 18,000 of the 21,000 undervotes in the contest came from Sarasota County.

It's hard to believe that Sarasota's voters had a different view of the race than voters everywhere else in the district, considering that the undervote on the county's absentee ballots, cast on paper, was only 2.5 percent. The upshot: Any reasonable statistical analysis suggests that only 3,000 to 5,000 of Sarasota's undervotes were intentional, meaning that 13,000 to 15,000 votes were probably not counted.
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The U.S. Supreme Court has insisted that "[h]aving once granted the right to vote on equal terms, the State may not, by later arbitrary and disparate treatment, value one person's vote over that of another." Thousands of voters in the 13th District have an interest in demanding that the system live up to those words, which came from the decision in a little case in 2000 called Bush v. Gore.

Many races: Experts Concerned as Ballot Problems Persist

After six years of technological research, more than $4 billion spent by Washington on new machinery and a widespread overhaul of the nation’s voting system, this month’s midterm election revealed that the country is still far from able to ensure that every vote counts.
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Over the last three weeks, attention has been focused on a few close races affected by voting problems, including those in Florida and Ohio where counting dragged on for days. But because most of this year’s races were not close, election experts say voting problems may actually have been wider than initially estimated, with many malfunctions simply overlooked.
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Voting experts say it is impossible to say how many votes were not counted that should have been. But in Florida alone, the discrepancies reported across Sarasota County and three others amount to more than 60,000 votes. In Colorado, as many as 20,000 people gave up trying to vote, election officials say, as new online systems for verifying voter registrations crashed repeatedly. And in Arkansas, election officials tallied votes three times in one county, and each time the number of ballots cast changed by more than 30,000.

It goes on.

We really need to take voting seriously - or we really risk having it taken away.

- rob 4:53 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Can you say "War Crimes?"

I knew you could

Rumsfeld okayed abuses says former U.S. general

MADRID (Reuters) - Outgoing Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld authorized the mistreatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, the prison's former U.S. commander said in an interview on Saturday.

Former U.S. Army Brigadier General Janis Karpinski told Spain's El Pais newspaper she had seen a letter apparently signed by Rumsfeld which allowed civilian contractors to use techniques such as sleep deprivation during interrogation.
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"The handwritten signature was above his printed name and in the same handwriting in the margin was written: "Make sure this is accomplished,"" she told Saturday's El Pais.
...
The Geneva Convention says prisoners of war should suffer "no physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion" to secure information.

It should be noted that the Geneva Convention is not a gathering of folks wearing Spock ears - but rather a ratified treaty.

The Geneva Conventions are American laws. Not just international laws - American Laws. And, thus, Rummy can go to jail. Or he can get a medal of freedom. Its hard to tell these days.

- rob 4:06 PM - [PermaLink] -

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Turning Point: Media Starting to Describe Iraq Conflict as 'Civil War'

NEW YORK For months, the media has been torn over use of the term "civil war" to describe the descent into outright murder and torture in Iraq. Apparently the utter chaos and carnage of the past week has finally convinced some to use "civil war" without apology -- with NBC News and MSNBC joining in today in a major way -- but many still hold back, an E&P survey today shows.

The Los Angeles Times was one of the first newspapers to flatly describe the conflict as a "civil war" -- without the usual qualifiers of "approaching" or "near" -- in the first paragraph of a news report on Saturday.

Now here is the question: At what point in the past few months did the "sectarian violence" morph into "civil war?" Actually, what I'm really asking is the change in terminology not related to the events of the past few weeks in Iraq but rather the events in America on November 7th.

Does the press now feel more free to report the facts? Was GE holding NBC News back because it feared reprisals from the GOP controlled government?

What does this say for freedom of the press in America? (yes - we all know the answer to that question)

- rob 4:02 PM - [PermaLink] -

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