Take a Breath Calm Down

In response to some satricialcartoons (scroll way down), depicting Mohammed in an unflattering light published in a Danish newspaper.

Moroccan Times

The Council of Europe, concerned about the developments, warned the
Danish government last week against publications provoking enmity and
an interesting protest rose from inside Denmark.

Twenty-two retired Danish ambassadors issued a joint declaration in the country's bestselling newspaper the Politiken, criticizing the Danish Premier and the newspaper Jyllands Posten and underlining that freedom of expression cannot be used in a way to offend Muslims.

Now, I think that the Mohammed cartoons are reprehensible and vile, and should not be published in any sort of newspapers, but the Danish ambassadors response to the "controversey" is plain absurd. Freedom of expression is self-explainatory, the express yourself as you see fit. Attempting to restrict freedom of expressions contradicts the very nature of the law, and renders it useless.

Bad Liberal Bad

But this is just some absolute disgusting shit, and I hope that it's just a cruel hoax. I'm absolutely no fan of Bush's gay marriage policy or his nomination of Alito, but this response is way out of line.

Today's Zen

Who else, but the greatest action hero that has graced the earth. Chuck "I'm going to deliver a round-house kick straight to your testicles if you take one step closer to me" Norris.

Ah What the Hell

I threw my damn Group Think book across my room, cause hell, I just don't want to read about the effects that "group think" has on decision-making processes. Call it laziness, call it pure boredom, call it a distaste for schoolwork this early in the week, whatever.

Here's some interesting stuff.

No one wants Hillary to run (if you had TimesSelect you could actually see all the blogs and people that just don't like her, but since you don't, just trust me), and her detractors often point to her seemingly disastrous numbers in the polls that 51% of Americans would never, cross their hearts and hope to die, vote for her. Obviously this has been widely disseminated across the political world as evidence that Hillary just plain sucks. Interesting that no one mentions the darling of the right, Condoleezza Rice's disastrous numbers, 46% of Americans would never consider voting for her. Damn fickle Americans. [update: forgot to say something to the effective that these numbers will change before '08, but I didn't. Ahh well]

You see I was going to read an article by Rush Limbaugh about what I assume was to be his opinion on Joel Stein's absolutely atrociously reasoned article on the reasons why he doesn't support American troops. But unfortunately I am not a member of Rush 24/7, and will not have the pleasure of experiencing Rush's "life-changing" words of wisdom. Shucks.

Kooky ass right-wingers love their earwax.

That's enough for now.

Hmm

I notice that readers aren't springing forth and hurling invectives at myself in the comments' section. Perhaps I will have to ratchet up my blog post productivity. Or maybe no one cares for my writing. No matter. I trudge forth and will continue my writings. Although probably not today, maybe tomorrow.

And Who Said That Politics Can't Be Fun?

2006 State of the Union, you know what it's time for a rousing patriotic State of the Union Drinking Game.

Political Suicide

I would dare any sort of mainstream politican, even you Dennis Kucinich, to accept bin Laden's call for truce.

Speaking of Last Night

It was truly an interesting night, culminating in one of my close friend's arrest and imprisonment. I was not with him at the time, so I am relying on 2nd hand info and his account of the events, which occurred around oh, 1:30. You see, he had been sucking down the Jose Cuervo and was not fully on top of his game, if you will, and he went to one of my friend's frat houses, where he proceeded to smash the house's back window in plain view of dozens of people. My friend's motivations for such an attack are unclear to me, other than his alcohol impaired judgment and general dislike of people in general, but if his motivations remain unclear to me, his absolute stupidity after the incident is crystal clear. Instead of running as any sane person who just wantonly destroyed someone's personal property, he proceeded to slowly strut, walk, whatever to the street in the back. Unfortunately for him, the frat boys had hired a rent-a-cop that evening to police the oftentimes outrageous beer and liquor induced behavior that occurs during their parties, and surprisingly Mr. rent-a-cop actually did his job and raced over and caught my friend. He was handcuffed to the fence in the back of the house where gradually the frat boys stumbled on over to, and where they proceeded to hurl invectives and obscenities to my handcuffed friend. Being drunk and having a persona generally not predisposed to calmly accepting verbal abuse, my friend proceeded to yell and curse back. As he was heavily outnumbered this probably wasn't the best idea and one of the multitude walked over and kneed my friend in the chest. By this time about 30 minutes had passed and the police finally pulled up, and proceeded to arrest my friend and then took him to the Hennepin County Penitentiary where he spent the night in a holding cell with 30 other people. Just another weekend in my life.

Hmmm

Since I created my last post before 11:00 it would be against my stated rules if I were to remove it clandestinely, so it will stay up. I can unequivocally claim that it was written after I had a few drinks, so perhaps the word choice wasn't quite what I intended. My apologies.

Oh Hell Yeah

Somehow, by the grace of God, I got the comments enabled. Now I don't expect a rush of you partisan sluuuuuters commentating on the worthless shit I have to say, but I certainly hope you do.

Hmmm

This is more or less a test post. I surely would like to see if the ol' site is up and running.

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

We

Will see how this works on the old blog. I most certainly stand by my proclaimation that no reader feedback will be allowed (at least appreciated). hoooo rahhh. And the old spell-check just ain't workin' so what eva' go's go's.

Oh Lord

It's normally Saturday Shooters at this time in the week, but today, couldn't find the link to my Rumplemintz that I am putting down. Too bad. It's most certainly a shooter drink, not a sippin' drink. Happy weekend. Until Monday, or at least until Sunday night.

From the Drudgery Dungeon

Spielberg

Spielberg: I do not claim to be providing a peace plan for the Middle East with my film. But is that a reason to leave it all to the great simplifiers? Jewish extremists and Palestinian extremists who to this day regard any form of negotiated solution in the Middle East as some kind of betrayal? Keep my mouth shut just to avoid trouble? I wanted to use the powerful medium of film to confront the audience very intimately with a subject with which they are normally familiar in an abstract sense at the most -- or only from a biased point of view.

He obviously takes creative licenses with Munich, but all in all, it's worthwhile to see.

Hamas

For the adventurous and bored, here's the Hamas Charter. A succinct analysis: It doesn't exactly allow much in the way of compromise. Hopefully, (and I am being really, really, really hopeful here) Hamas will take a much more pragmatic and moderate approach to the policies vis-a-vis Israel. I have my doubts, even with the knowledge that the PLO has modified its beliefs since 1964, and that Hamas does have a foundation in providing social services to Palestinians.

One Party Scandal

Abramoff was an unabashed Republican lobbyist whose sole purpose was to help his little corrupt Republican cornies raise money. Period. Even when Abramoff took on clients who gave money to Dems, he actively encouraged and succeeded in convincing them to lower their amount of donations to Democrats and give more, much more, to Republicans.

And yes the Post editors are still wrong about the entire Abramoff/Republican scandal.

Faux Newz

What, did you actually think that their science columnist would be anything but a paid lapdog for big corporations?

Wow

Just coming across great rational pieces today. Here's a non-psychotic take on the Chris Matthew's debacle.

Brilliant Holmes, Just Brilliant

The polling maestros at Powerline say pish-posh to all the polls which state that Americans don't like Bush and co. spying on them without warrants. They don't like the wording of the questions, the demographics of the poll, yadda yadda yadda, but they did find something in one poll that they liked. Here's a question they looove the answer to:

In order to reduce the threat of terrorism, would you be willing or not willing to allow government agencies to monitor the telephone calls and e-mails of Americans that the government is suspicious of?

70% of Americans answered yes, and this just tickles their fancy, and of course this just proves that Americans really want a police state to protect them no matter what the cost. And of course they're completely of base. This is one of the most poorly written survey questions I have seen. No shit people want the govt to monitor suspected terrorist conversations and emails, but that has absolutely nothing to do with the controversey of Bush and co. spying on Americans without warrants. Warrants. Warrants. Warrants. That is the key word to any debate about domestic spying. No mention warrants=shitty and irrelevant poll. I'm no mysterypollster, but I take care of business.

Can't Believe the Old Eyes

Someone in blogland actually supporting John Kerry? Well I'll be.

Hail Thee

King George

In fact, the Senate hearings on NSA domestic espionage set to begin next month will confront fundamental questions about the balance of power within our system. Even if one assumes that every unknown instance of warrant-less spying by the NSA were justified on security grounds, the arguments issuing from the White House threaten the concept of checks and balances as it has been understood in America for the last 218 years. Simply put, Bush and his lawyers contend that the president's national security powers are unlimited. And since the war on terror is currently scheduled to run indefinitely, the executive supremacy they're asserting won't be a temporary condition.

Give me a Damn Break

More illegitimate whining about the media. From Peter Daou

it’s about understanding what happens when skillfully-crafted pro-GOP storylines are injected into the American bloodstream by the likes of Wolf Blitzer, Chris Matthews, Paula Zahn, Dana Milbank, Kyra Phillips, Cokie Roberts, Tom Brokaw, Jim VandeHei, Bob Schieffer, Bill Schneider, Tim Russert, Howard Fineman, Norah O'Donnell, Elizabeth Bumiller, Adam Nagourney, Bob Woodward, and their ilk, not to mention rabid partisans like Limbaugh, Coulter, and Hannity.

Now liberals have very legitimate gripes with the news media's coverage of the pre-invasion Iraq, inappropriate statements made by Russert and Matthews, and the entire WashingtonPost ombudsman fiasco, but stating that its all part of a GOP-crafted story line that our news media isregurgitatingg without question is just plain absurd. I have my problems with the news media today, from constant polls to focusing on the old-fashioned "horserace", to an inordinatee amount of time on crime stories, to the blatant slanted stories of Fox News, to reporters not knowing the specifics and the intricacies of the issues they cover, to poor questioning of our political leaders, and many many more, but not one bit do I believe that any of the journalists mentioned above are mouth-pieces for the GOP (except for the pseudo-journalists Coulter, Hannity, and Rush). Oftentimes what people fail to or just deliberately ignore is that people aren't perfect, they do make mistakes, and being on live tv you can't just go back and erase them quite so easily. As for lack of corrections or slow corrections, the world doesn't always run on blog time.

Random Thought of the Day

I would say that out of the 100 students in my last journalism class there are perhaps 20 fellow men. In the blogosphere (or at least the ones that I regularly read) the lack of female bloggers astounds me. With a few exceptions Wonkette (no more now), bitch phd and firedoglake, I cannot think of any other female blogs that I regularly read. Journalism is dominated by women at the college level where do they all go after? Because of my inherent laziness being a college student and all, I hardly have the inclination to research, ask, or in any shape or form attempt to actually find any sort of answer other than the one that seems obvious to me. Women are just much smarter than men and would rather not waste their time writing useless diatribes that few read or care about, and therefore, just don't have the inclination to post their feelings regarding such trivial matters when they could actually be participating in actual human organizations that do actual work, such as all my aspiring female friends in the j-school. No matter. Onwards I go.

Only 50?

Must be for time constraints that the Beast could only identify 50 terrible people in America.

And the #1

Its Pat.

If Pat Robertson’s local Starbucks caught fire, he would claim that God was punishing them for giving him a caramel latte when he ordered vanilla. Robertson has always been a demonic charlatan with the credibility of Miss Cleo and a lust for Armageddon in his vile, rat-toad heart, but this was really his year to shine.

Personally I would have bumped Billy O'Reillyup higher.

From the always funny in an absurd sort of waytbogg

I Am One of Those Suckers Cont.

Little did I know that the Opinionator blog has been started recently for the lucky few Timeselect readers.

The only consolation I once had with my subscription to Timeselect is that it does help fund the always astute journalism of our nation's premier paper, but then my media professor handed out to the class a widely reduced price for a year's subscription to the Times available only to teachers and students. That didn't make my day.

No Kidding...

Who would have guessed that the US funnelling $2 million to help Fatah in the upcoming Palestinian elections might not be a smart move.

Oh wait.

Snifff

People at the old corner just don't like the NY Times respective coverages of Rove and Gore's speeches. Of course they're full of shit. Once again in the Rovian world of logic, Democrats would object, would thoroughly reject, any sort of wiretapping on al-Qaeda's phone conversations. Actually what I object to is wiretapping random American citizens without judicial or congressional oversight. Not equivalent positions.

Take It For What it's Worth

Playboy bunnies better than the silk stockings at picking stocks. No comment.

And I am One of Those Suckers

Of the 156,000 web only subscribers who signed up for the overpriced NY Times columnists. Never again, never again. Damnit and had I waited I could have signed up for the special student discount of 24.95 per year instead of the 50 that I'm plunking down now.

Waaaaahhhhhaaaaa

Complaints about the less than enthusiastic response towardsfactually distorted puff pieces from right-wingers about right-wingers, and that people just don't get the inner brilliance of each book, awwww too bad.

update: And when the Conservative Book Club thinks that Barnes' book on Bush sucks, you know it just isn't that good.

Chris Matthews

Liberals in an uproar, conservative saying nothing is wrong. What to make of the entire situation of Chris Matthews comparing bin Laden's rhetoric with Michael Moore?

The damn problem with Matthews' statement is that trying to smear Democrats as being in bed with terrorists has been the strategy of the right since 9/11. Arguing over the semantics about whether Osama is channeling Dems or vice versa is irrelevant. The mere fact that Osama's statement was compared to certain Democrats (Moore) from a respected media pundit will leave an irreversible impression, however subtle, on the viewing public. To play this game of comparison statements is absurd and morally wrong. Are we supposed to compare certain right wing conservatives dislike of illegal immigration, say with the Ku Klux Klan and its immigration stance? It's just as misleading as what Matthews did. And despicable.

video

They'll Throw Flowers

So plan for the reconstruction... eh. Half-ass efforts just don't cut it. To bad that's what we get from Bush inc. and its terrible planning of the reconstruction of Iraq. 9 billion missing last year, eh, just the price of freedom.

$$$$$

Fiscal conservatism just doesn't work in BushWorld. And it really doesn't matter cause those self-proclaimed fiscal libertarian conservatives still line up in droves behind our fearless leader. With some exceptions. Mr. Sullivan I am looking at you.

Our Faithful, Strong, Handsome, Majestic, Wonderful, Strong, Heroic Leader

No tough questions for Bush at his speech attempting to explain away the illegal wiretapping scandal at KSU just lobbing up the softballs.

actual comments and questions from the "Q&A" segment

Mr. President, we salute what you have done, your aggressive stance on terrorism.

...
I would like to salute you....Please stop questioning the administration and their decision.
....

As a leader, as many of us are going to need to know here because we're going to be leaders in just a few years, what's the best way that you go about preparing yourself for attacks on your character, and how do you deal with others in those matters?
......

I thank you for making the hard decisions, for making -- not listening to the critics and keeping your campaign promise.
.....

First I'd like to say that when I was first able to cast my vote for President, it was my honor to vote for you
......

Your speech was very good. I'm a big admirer of your wife. I know that you said that your role as a President was as a decision-maker, and I would like you to comment, please, on how your wife contributes to your decision-making process, and how you confide in her.
.....

And no the worshippers did not follow up with anything resembling a pointed question.

Illegal Wiretaps: Still BullShit

Spin it, lie about it, obscure the details, no matter how the Bush Admin dresses the wiretapping scandal up, it just ends up smelling worse.

Osama=Moore, Dean, Basically All Those Cut and Run, Jihad Lovin' Democrats

That's the message one would get from those kooky ass right wingers who have the gall to compare Michael Moore (a man I don't particularly care for) with the terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden.

Tell me, does this letter from Osama in 2002 resemble anything comparable to words from Howard Dean or Moore? (the answer is no).

That's My Boy

Kobe drops 81 points on the Raptors, the second highest single game point total by a single player. He might sexually assault women and just be an all around bastard of a person, but damn I'm sure glad that he's on my fantasy team.

Incompetence and debauchery

Of course some of the more contemptible conservatives use the tape of bin Laden to viciously smear and attack Democrats. Interesting how bin Laden's appearance can possibly be used against Dems, after all weren't the American people promised bin Laden's head on a platter in the near future? Wonder what happened to that...

Runs in the Blood

Big daddy Frank Abramoff wasn't fond of George Clooney ripping on lil Jack. From TNR

We have had to endure two years of unmitigated, outrageous falsehood directed at my son and his record of achievement on behalf of his clients and friends. The blood thirsty media, guilty of untold character assassinations during contemporary times, have even outdone themselves in their lust to create a cartoon which does not come close to resembling this fine man, my son.

Snifff.

A Service to the Nation

A picture is worth a thousand words, and a picture with Bush and Abramoff together is worth thousands of dollars. Thank the Lord our intrepid journalists at the tabloids are feverishly searching for one.
Time

The President's memory may soon be unhappily refreshed. TIME has seen five photographs of Abramoff and the President that suggest a level of contact between them that Bush's aides have downplayed. While TIME's source refused to provide the pictures for publication, they are likely to see the light of day eventually because celebrity tabloids are on the prowl for them. And that has been a fear of the Bush team's for the past several months: that a picture of the President with the admitted felon could become the iconic image of direct presidential involvement in a burgeoning corruption scandal—like the shots of President Bill Clinton at White House coffees for campaign contributors in the mid-1990s.

via: Andrew Sullivan

Aid to the Palestinian Authority

The Washington Post reports that the US will spend $2 million in foreign aid on the upcoming Palestinian elections in support of the PA, which faces a challenge from the radical Hamas party. This is not a good revelation for supporters of moderate Palestinian rule. Hamas is already popular among the masses and is gaining popularity because it's an alternative to the corrupt and poorly managed ruling PA and partially because of its reputation for opposing the US and Israel. Funneling money to the PA can only fuel the perception that the party is a lackey of the US and Israel, hardly a way to assemble support among the Palestinian public.

Saturday Shooters

mmmm... mmm.

99 Blackberries is most certainly a shooter drink, very fruity, and definitely not good for mixing and sipping.

Words of Wisdom for the Day

I'm running after time and i miss the sunshine
Summer days will come happiness will be mine
I'm lost in my words i don't know where i'm going
I do my best i can not to worry about things

I feel loose
I feel haggard
Don't know what i'm looking for

Something true
Something lovely
That will make me feel alive

--Beck

Party of Pain

Republican medical strategy.

John Tierney:

1. Do not give patients medicine to ease their pain.

2. If they are in great pain and near death, do not let them put an end to their misery.

The Republicans have been so determined to become the Pain Party that they've brushed aside their traditional belief in states' rights. The Bush administration wants lawyers in Washington and federal prosecutors with no medical training to tell doctors how to treat patients.

..........

The doctors who matter are the small number of specialists in pain treatment who prescribe opioids. Ronald Libby, a professor of political science at the University of North Florida, estimates that 17 percent of those doctors were investigated during one year by the D.E.A., and an even greater number of others were investigated by local and state authorities, typically in concert with the drug agency. That means a pain specialist might have a one-in-three chance of being investigated for prescribing opioids.

Small government, states' rights conservatives need not apply for membership to the new Republican Party of Pain. Pandering to the far religious right by attempting to force a narrowly defined code of morality (evangelical Christian one) and completely disregarding conservative-libertarian belief in favor of garnering support for religious zealots, modern Republicans with few exceptions are selling their intellectual souls for cheap political gain. From Frist's attempt to amass Evangelical support with his infamous diagnosis of Terri Schiavo's medical condition via video to conservative attempting to infringe upon states' rights and end assisted-suicide laws passed by Oregon, to conservatives attempting to justify the intrusive and illegal spying on our nation's citizens, small government stay out of my business and I'll stay out of yours conservatism has gone to the wayside.

Fantastic Extrapolation

Assrocket.

I'm not about to pose as a TV critic; not only have I never seen Commander In Chief, I've never seen any show now appearing on television, other than news, sports, HGTV, What Not To Wear and American Idol. The last three reflect the influence of my teenage daughters, but, for what it's worth, I've never heard them mention Commander In Chief. Stacy London, yes; Geena Davis, no. So it looks as though, once again, the American public has sniffed out liberal propaganda and turned up its nose.

Never seen the show, don't actually know how "liberal" it is, but know that the "American people" reject Commander in Chief because of its liberal tendencies. Brilliant analysis and sums up the culmination of the rest of your work, throw a bunch of shit together that you know nothing about, and than share your brilliant insights. Fantastic.

Bill the Bastard Cont.

In an ongoing pseudo series highlighting life in O'Reilly's "No Spin Zone" land here's an interesting article about why liberals continue to go on his show even with the umbrage of outright lies, distortions, and verbal beratings that Reilly subjects his liberal guests to. And even though O'Reilly is a pompous screaming ass, liberal guests must continue to appear on his show, offer strong opposing viewpoints, and dish out as much rhetorical abuse as they receive.

Snifff

Still whining about perceived left-wing biases prevalent at the University level. And having a David Horowitz acolyte running around paying college kids $100 for finding evidence of "academic bias" is just a bunch of bullshit, and just proof that the entire attempt for a "balanced approach" whatever that is, is just a charade, a witchhunt to entrap good, quality teachers. After all what kind of objective survey can be organized by basically paying students to list any supposed instances of bias? Think there's a possibility that some students would just lie?

Please read John Cole(an actual right of the center educator at the college level) for an entirely rational take on the entire charade.

I don’t have a problem with identifying and criticizing those who use their lectern as an opportunity to berate, belittle, or otherwise abuse students. I don’t really have a problem with accountability and having outside groups look into whether or not professors are abusing their positions. But what I do fear are the kinds of kids who are going to keep Andrew Jones and his group in business. They are the kid who sat in every class with you and loudly and annoyingly recited something he heard on Rush Limbaugh, thinking this showed the professor was a left-wing crank. This is, I am betting, the kid who screamed bias because the teacher seemed to spend more time looking to the left side of the class than the right, or the kid who saw bias because the professor refused to call 1992-2000 the “Dark Years.”

Women in Saudi Arabia

They might be allowed to attend an upcoming soccer match vs. Sweden. Hooray, maybe next they will be allowed to drive, or own a business, or participate in municipal elections, or wear something other than all black or go out in public without a male accomplice....

The Tele Hamas Style

What ever your views about the Israel-Palestinian conflict, I think that we can all agree that children probably shouldn't be exposed to blatant one-sided propaganda at such a young age.
NY Times

As he[Hazim Sharawi, stage name Uncle Hazim] describes it, his television show, which begins in a few weeks, will teach children the basics of militant Palestinian politics - the disputed status of Jerusalem, Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and the Palestinian refugees' demand for a right to return to the lands they lost to Israel in the 1948 war - without showing the violence that Hamas's pursuit of those goals entails.

The show will alternate between Uncle Hazim and his animal characters in the studio taking live phone calls from children and video clips recorded outside. Mr. Sharawi said he would leaven the sober and pedantic material with fun and games, including such standards as egg-and-spoon races, eating apples on a string or "tug of war, which will show children that the more you cooperate with others, the more you win."

It's like the Mr. Rogers, Captain Kangaroo, and Seasame Street all rolled up into one!

Greatest Show on the Old Tele

Well if Arrested Development isn't the very best, it's at least a close second to Larry David's Curb Your Enthusiasm, and I have garnered a new appreciation for the much slighted comedy as I am in the process of watching both the first and second seasons over again. Fox canceling this stellar Emmy winning comedy is unfathomable to me, but ratings over quality eh? At least it found a second home on Showtime.

Call Me Skeptical

NY Times: House GOP leaders propose tighter rules on lobbying.

The GF Fired

Remember the Lord Ares saga and his declaration of his candidacy for MN governor? Well some interesting updates regarding the Satan dark priests familial situation as his girlfriend/wife/lover/high priestess was fired from her job as a school bus driver after word about her husband and her "religious" beliefs spread.

As ridiculous as this story appears at face value, I question the legality of the firing under grounds of religious discrimination. However strange the woman's religious beliefs may be, she has not tried to indoctrinate her student passengers with her beliefs and seems to genuinely enjoy her job. This whole scenario makes me leery.

Yeah Spying on Americans is Working Out Real Well For Our National Security

From the NY Times:

In the anxious months after the Sept. 11 attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month.

But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans.

F.B.I. officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency that the unfiltered information was swamping investigators. The spy agency was collecting much of the data by eavesdropping on some Americans' international communications and conducting computer searches of phone and Internet traffic. Some F.B.I. officials and prosecutors also thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents, were pointless intrusions on Americans' privacy.

...............

Aside from the director, F.B.I. officials did not question the legal status of the tips, assuming that N.S.A. lawyers had approved. They were more concerned about the quality and quantity of the material, which produced "mountains of paperwork" often more like raw data than conventional investigative leads.

"It affected the F.B.I. in the sense that they had to devote so many resources to tracking every single one of these leads, and, in my experience, they were all dry leads," the former senior prosecutor said. "A trained investigator never would have devoted the resources to take those leads to the next level, but after 9/11, you had to."

The article states that there have been a few claims from government officials that the unwarranted spying has yielded some results, namely the arrest of two men suspected of buying weapons for possible terrorist use [although whether they were found solely based on NSA is questionable], but on the whole the massive amounts of information passed on to the FBI from the NSA have yielded no results and in fact have led agents astray.

Only the terrorists have to worry. Right....

Save us from ourselves.

Oye

Spending months and months in virtual self-imposed solitude in my room just isn't my cup of tea.

Interesting items in the NY Times Magazine article about the causes of the mainly Japanese boys and men who become reculses.

"We used to believe everyone was equal," said Noki Futagami, the founder of New Start [treats the problem]. "But the gap is growing. I suspect there will be a bipolarization of this society. There will be the group of people who can be in the global world. And then there will be others, like the hikikomori [shut ins]. The ones who cannot be in that world."

.........

[Dr.] Saito, who has treated more than 1,000 hikikomori patients, views the problem as largely a family and social disease, caused in part by the interdependence of Japanese parents and children and the pressure on boys, eldest sons in particular, to excel in academics and the corporate world. Hikikomori often describe years of rote classroom learning followed by afternoons and evenings of intense cram school to prepare them for high-school or university entrance exams. Today's parents are more demanding because Japan's declining birth rate means they have fewer children on whom to push their hopes, says Mariko Fujiwara, director of research at the Hakuhodo Institute of Life and Living in Tokyo. If a kid doesn't follow a set path to an elite university and a top corporation, many parents - and by extension their children - view it as a failure. "After World War II," Fujiwara told me, "Japanese only knew a certain kind of salaryman future, and now they lack the imagination and the creativity to think about the world in a new way."

..........
In other societies the response from many youths would be different. If they didn't fit into the mainstream, they might join a gang or become a Goth or be part of some other subculture. But in Japan, where uniformity is still prized and reputations and outward appearances are paramount, rebellion comes in muted forms, like hikikomori. Any urge a hikikomori might have to venture into the world to have a romantic relationship or sex, for instance, is overridden by his self-loathing and the need to shut his door so that his failures, real or perceived, will be cloaked from the world. "Japanese young people are considered the safest in the world because the crime rate is so low," Saito said. "But I think it's related to the emotional state of people. In every country, young people have adjustment disorders. In Western culture, people are homeless or drug addicts. In Japan, it's apathy problems like hikikomori.

Interesting stuff and well worth the read.

Iran Invasion in the Making?

From IHT:

Reflecting that sentiment, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw of Britain told a security conference in London on Monday, "The onus is on Iran to act to give the international community confidence that its nuclear program has exclusive peaceful purposes - confidence, I'm afraid, that has been sorely undermined by its history of concealment and deception."

Quite similar to the pre-Iraq war speeches of Bush and Blair.

Only difference between Iraq and Iran being everyone damn well knows that Iran has the actual capability to make nuclear weapons. Logistically war with Iran seems unfeasible considering the amount of troops currently on active duty, and the only way to shore up numbers would be to re-institute the draft, which Mr. Rove I am certain would wisely council against. Diplomacy and sanctions are the only possible options, saber rattlers notwithstanding.

God Smites Thee

New Orleans's mayor Nagin also believes that that God sent Katrina as some sort of divine punishment.

Some Interesting Things I Noticed

Stanley Kauffmen has a review of Speilberg's Munich in The New Republic.

In the NY Times Magazine David Rieff rails against the concept of "conditional sovereignty" and details the problems of justifying intervention-whether for liberal or realist reasons and no matter what the situation- in the international community.

Democracy Arsenal lists some possible future actions the US might take against Iran.

Old man Brent Sowcroft from Bush I clan, writes in the Washington Post about some crucial elements needed for our venture to be a success.

There are at least two elements essential to "success" in Iraq. The first is a central government that meets the needs of the people well enough to secure their sustained support, shows sufficient consideration for minority rights to win the loyalty of those minorities and demonstrates a credible determination to live in peace with its neighbors.

The second is an effective, highly disciplined military and security establishment that gives its allegiance not to various elements within Iraqi society but solely to the central government.

Even though he wasn't a backer of the invasion Sowcroft acknowledges that the US must maintain a presence in Iraq.

MN Politics

Oye. Minnesota just won't be viewed as the same if Satanic dark priest, Sanguinarian Vampyre, Hecate Witch Lord Ares, akaJonathon "The Impaler" Sharkey, fulfills his dreams and becomes elected govornor. His website has much much more ahhh interesting information about himself and his party, VMP (Vampyres, Witches and Pagans) Party.

FYI: Lord Ares was previously a Republican and claims to have worked on helping Jeb Bush's reelection. I'm not quite sure what to make of that except that the religious right probably wouldn't support his presidential bid in 2008.

Big Brother

The Bush Administration's cry that they will never abuse NSA and will only spy on America's enemies never quite satisfied me. From the Atlantic archives if the FBI has spied on such enemies of America like MLK in the past should they really be given the benefit of the doubt this time?

The transcripts from the wiretaps on King and his advisers also answer a question that came to preoccupy President Lyndon Johnson just as it had the Kennedy brothers and J. Edgar Hoover: Was Martin Luther King Jr. any kind of Communist sympathizer? Of course not—but the FBI never passed along to Johnson or to anyone else what King said to Bayard Rustin one day in early May of 1965, when the SCLC was tussling with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee over a public statement proclaiming movement unity: "There are things I wanted to say renouncing Communism in theory but they would not go along with it. We wanted to say that it was an alien philosophy contrary to us but they wouldn't go along with it." Instead the FBI continued to distribute utterly misleading reports that declared just the opposite; as one newly released CIA summary from just a few weeks before King's death asserts, "According to the FBI, Dr. King is regarded in Communist circles as 'a genuine Marxist-Leninist who is following the Marxist-Leninist line.'"

I am not against wiretapping American citizens or having massive computers scan a suspected terrorist or accomplice's emails or cell phone conversations per se, but it must be done with appropriate Congressional and Judicial supervision, actually following FISA and not solely under Bush supervision. And the whole idea of big-brother out recording and filtering and saving every e-mail sent a la Echelon style makes me very uneasy, and I cannot possible fathom the rationale behind this massive datamining project and how it will possibly help national security [more problems with the concept at the Corner]. Having such massive amounts of information, but with not enough men and women to analyze and possibly interpret it is senseless. Such a program is ripe for abuse. Unregulated government spying has happened in the past and is happening now. Security is important, but maintaining the very essence of our democracy, liberty and freedom, is much more important in the long term than anything that terrorists or our nation's enemies ever could inflict.

Text Messaging

A wonderful way to run up a cell phone bill. And it's evil, figuratively speaking.
Washington Post

In a recent survey, more than 60 percent of U.S. adults used text messages to tell others they missed or loved them, according to a survey by Tegic Communications, a company that makes predictive-spelling software used on most U.S. cell phones. In the same survey, 27 percent said they used them to flirt, 7 percent to ask someone for a date, and 2 percent to break up. Two percent percent proposed marriage via text.

And they say romance is dead.

al-Qaeda's Membership Pledge

An excerpt from Peter Bergen's book at Vanity Fair

The pledge of God and his covenant is upon me, to listen and obey the superiors, who are doing this work, in energy, early-rising, difficulty, and easiness, and for his superiority upon us, so that the word of God will be the highest, and His religion victorious.

From a Vanity Fair interview with Bergen:

I don't think he's dead. If bin Laden had died, the people around him wouldn't be hiding it, because then he would finally be a shahid—he'd be martyred—and they'd make a big song and dance about it. So in the absence of any evidence that he is dead, I'm presuming he's alive. And I don't think he's in poor health. There was some discussion that he maybe had kidney problems, but I don't think that's true—and most of the people I talked to in the book don't think that's true. But in the last videotape he looked about as good as I've seen him look in a long time. I also don't think he's living in a cave. In the last videotape he was well dressed, it's well lit, he's sitting behind a desk. Clearly he was in a place that had electricity, with basic access to news via the radio, the Internet.

....................

[Q]Do you think there's a danger that he's been hiding for the past year, planning another attack against the U.S.?

[A]I'm sure they'd want to do it, but I don't think they have the capacity right now for two reasons. First of all, the United States is in a different posture. It's much more security-conscious. Secondly, al-Qaeda has been disorganized by the post-9/11 attacks on it. In Karachi recently, a Kentucky Fried Chicken blew up, killing three people. In Indonesia, a bomb went off and killed 23 people in October, in Bali. They can do things like that very easily—these are undefended targets. One of the kind of unsung stories of the post-9/11 world is that American Muslims have really rejected this al-Qaeda ideology completely. I don't think they have sleeper cells here.

The real story is what's going on in Europe, which is not a reason to say, Hey, now it's just a European problem. Because people with European passports can visit this country pretty easily. Mohammed Atta, the hijacker, for instance, was radicalized in Hamburg, Germany. Richard Reid, the shoe bomber who tried to blow up the American Airlines jet after 9/11, is a British citizen. The fact that the problem is mostly in Europe doesn't mean that there aren't problems potentially for the United States. If one of those British people in the London bombing decided they would do a suicide bombing in the United States, that is certainly possible. But something like 9/11? I don't think so.

Craigslist: Threat to Newspaper Industry

Craigslist, basically an online classified database for anything from listings for apartment rentals to afternoon sex hook ups, is threatening the very core of newspaper business, sucking away profitable classified advertisements and cutting into revenue.

You would never think that a shulp like Craigslist founder Craig Newmark would have the power fundamentally hurt the newspaper industry.

Among media mandarins, the list began to resonate a year ago, after a business study in the Bay Area showed that local newspapers were losing as much as $50 million a year in revenue to Craigslist. The awareness of the trend has since avalanched. Classifieds make up as much as 50 percent of big-city newspaper ad revenues, explains newspaper analyst John Morton, and at a time when the newspaper industry is in crisis, with circulations going down by as much as 2.6 percent a year as readers die off and the young go elsewhere for their information, Craigslist has gotten a reputation as the newspaper killer.

At the convention of the American Society of Newspaper Editors last spring, two panelists at a session on the crisis in the industry flashed a slide of Newmark and asked the editors how many of them knew who Craig Newmark was. A faint show of hands. Craigslist? A few more.

“The shocking thing is that this was someone who was not only a threat to steal their business but was in the process of doing it,” says Jay Rosen, a blogger (the name of his blog is PressThink) and professor of journalism at NYU. “What industry could survive in which you don’t know the name of the person who is taking away your business? They’re mystified. They don’t know who this guy is and where he came from. And it just shows—that it’s easier for Craig to learn journalism than it is for these guys to learn the Web.”

Medicare

This Washington Post Headline makes me feel reeeaal comfortable with Bush's perscription drug plan.

The States Step In As Medicare Falters
Seniors Being Turned Away, Overcharged Under New Prescription Drug Program
...........

Yesterday, Ohio and Wisconsin announced that they will cover the drug costs of low-income seniors who would otherwise go without, joining every state in New England as well as California, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, New Jersey, North Dakota, South Dakota and New Jersey.

Wal-Mart Still Sucks

But other big retailers aren't that much better. And Ezra Klein explains.

Defeat of Terrorism

I have always wondered how an entity can ever be defeated. Some say it can.

Not Very Liberal Eh?

I profess my ignorance about Russia's internal politics and cannot say whether Russia's Liberal and Democratic Party is a bastion of progressive minded people, I would cautiously say no after hearing its leader Zhirinovsky speak about Condi Rice.

"If she has no man by her side at her age, he will never appear," Zhirinovsky ranted on. "Condoleezza Rice needs a company of soldiers. She needs to be taken to barracks where she would be satisfied.

"Condoleezza Rice is a very cruel, offended woman who lacks men's attention," he added. "Such women are very rough. … They can be happy only when they are talked and written about everywhere: 'Oh, Condoleezza, what a remarkable woman, what a charming Afro-American lady! How well she can play the piano and speak Russian!'

"Complex-prone women are especially dangerous. They are like malicious mothers-in-law, women that evoke hatred and irritation with everyone. Everybody tries to part with such women as soon as possible. A mother-in-law is better than a single and childless political persona, though."

Oye.

FDA Speeds Up Testing

LA Times:

Trying to increase the number of new drugs that make it to market, the Food and Drug Administration issued guidelines today allowing investigators to test minute doses of experimental drugs on people, to see if the results are promising enough to warrant full-scale clinical testing.

The FDA action was welcomed by scientific researchers and the industry, but some agency critics said they were concerned that it could increase hazards for volunteers, or facilitate the approval of drugs before their risks are fully understood.

Anything to speed up the molasses-like approval drug approval process that takes an average of 12 years and at a cost of $359 million for a company to get a new drug to market. (Although how much of that $359 million involves marketing and advertising I do not know)

Political Rhetoric

Glenn Greenwald:

Is it really necessary to chronicle the Republicans’ grotesque rhetorical excesses over the last 15 years in order to remind people how they have turned vile character assassination into a sport and, in the process, have dragged our political dialogue into the lowest and most odorous depths of the sewer?

These Paragons of Civility who are oozing sermons today about how such attacks prevent "good people" from entering public service are the same political lowlifes who spent the 1990s screaming that Hillary Clinton had Vince Foster murdered in order to cover up their affair (even though she’s a lesbian) and that Bill Clinton is a serial rapist who oversaw a drug-running operation from an Arkansas airstrip. They spent many years and tens of millions of dollars investigating Bill Clinton’s penis, semen stains on dresses, and Henry Cisneros’ mistress.

They routinely depict political opponents (such as Al Gore and Howard Dean) as being mentally unstable lunatics, and insinuate that war heroes like John Kerry and Jack Murtha are cowards who shot themselves on purpose in order to get their medals. Those who criticize the war policies of the Commander-in-Chief are traitors and subversives, and are deemed to be "on the other side." Rush Limbaugh has spent the last 20 years pumping into the heads of 20 million followers overtly eliminationist rhetoric directed at anyone who deviates from their ideology. He has been joined by a cadre of hate-mongers who do the same.

Hear, hear.

NSA Your Neighbors

$100 and you can find out other people's cell phone records. Elected officials, old lady Marge down the block, your kids, your parents. Creepy stuff.

Perhaps this would be a good time for some government regulation, no?

Condoms Don't Kill

= ?

Fr. Velasquez sees a similarity.

In a northern Colombian village boys over the age of 14 are required to carry condoms at all times, under the threat of punishment (3 hour class or small fine) to prevent the transmission of STDs. I strong disagree with the statute, but comparing making men carry around condoms as the equivalent of "selling guns in the street" is a bit overblown to say the least.

via: Andrew Sullivan

Where It Stops No One Knows

Abramoff collected over $80 million in fees from his Indian gaming clients. Where did it go? Josh Marshall asks.

In something completely unrelated: Slate asks can a Can a lush run a country. Hell yeah. Churchill did it, and damnit, if it helped one of the great Western leaders lead the world against the Nazis, it can help anyone with their day to day routine.

... Nixon's martini: "vermouth into the shaker of ice, swing it around once, and ceremoniously empty it before adding the gin."

Tally Hoo

RedState leads the charge against pork, which even those red bloods acknowledge has not abated even with Republican control of both the Congress and the Executive. Ah well... as long as the Republicans keep sending Ted " I want to waste millions of taxpayer dollars building a bridge to nowhere" Stevens back to the Senate every six years I don't see much hope for change.

Heheh... Porn Oscars

Here's the award for best feature film.

That went to "Pirates," a relatively high-budget story of a group of ragtag sailors who go searching for a crew of evil pirates who have a plan for world domination. Also, many of the characters in the movie have sex with one another.

Evan Stone, the stage name of the man who won the award for best actor as the good ship's captain, said a crucial component of the movie's success was its authenticity. A consultant instructed the cast on proper ship etiquette, he said, like never letting the captain steer the vessel, a job that belongs to the first mate.

"Take the sex out of this movie, and it's Walt Disney,"said Mr. Stone, who declined to give his real name.

right....

MMMMmmnm... Margarita

Delicious lunchtime drink. Some tequilla, triple sec, margarita mix, ice, piece of lime. Perfect way to begin an afternoon of not doing anything.

Milwaukee Voter Fraud

Malkin has more on the Milwaukee voter fraud scandal, but I have just one qualm dealing with her characterization of Milwaukee DA E Michael McCann as being "accused of partisan foot-dragging." Considering that McCann and his office were waiting for the Feds to finish conducting interviews and issue a report, which was requested on Nov. 19, before proceeding with the case that began yesterday the WI Republican charges are false and misleading.

Red to Blue

The Economist take on mid-term elections. For the Dems picking of Republican governorships appears most promising, as Congress will probably stay Red, although in 10 months who knows what will happen, especially in the Abramoff scandal.

IEDs Changing Strategy

Since we can't arm our troops vehicles with sufficient armor, and the insurgents are continually coming up with new and improved roadside bombs, our troops tactical strategy might be changing. From the Atlantic.

The growing use of IEDs is forcing America's military strategists to rethink centuries of military doctrine holding that in warfare, mobility equals dominance. Votel told me that given the success that IEDs have had against America's fleet of motor vehicles, the Pentagon may need to switch to more foot patrols. An intelligence analyst working on the IED problem agreed, saying, "The answer to the IEDs is to leave the vehicles. It's obvious. It's the only choice." But such a move would expose U.S. soldiers to other risks, including snipers. And the December detonation of an IED in Fallujah, killing ten Marines on foot patrol, shows that soldiers will remain vulnerable to IEDs whether on foot or behind the wheel. As long as the insurgents can use IEDs to inflict damage on U.S. soldiers without ever engaging them directly, they will have a tactical advantage. "Our whole military is based on the idea of overwhelming firepower put on targets," says William S. Lind, a noted military theorist who has written extensively on asymmetric warfare. "But that doesn't work in this type of conflict. We are fighting an enemy that has made himself untargetable." Therefore, Lind says, the insurgents can continue fighting the American military in Iraq indefinitely—regardless of how many U.S. troops are deployed or how quickly they are massed.

Attack Journalists

Some must be miffed that journalists aren't writing more about the good that happens in Iraq, and focus instead on suicide bombing, troop casualties, insurgents, but attack them?

I know it's unlikely that the raid was specifically targeted at the journalist in question and very well could have been a mistake (after all who wants the bad press of killing journalists), but it is precisely these botched and mistaken raids that create resentment against American troops. Especially when your firing shots into a guy's bedroom while he's sleeping with wife and kids.

Klein

Uber-Time columnist just doesn't quite get it.

Health Care Cont.

From Ezra Klein's site, here's a nice snarky take on Bush's drug plan.

Roveioso

His magical drug plan won't crack those AARP lovin' old people and their infactuation with the Democrats, Novak writes.

This program looks less like a bump in the road than a major pothole on Rove's highway to permanent majority status for the Republican Party. As Bush's principal political adviser, Rove has a brilliant strategic mind and can take credit for crafting the 2000 and 2004 presidential election victories. The drug plan was an audacious effort to co-opt the votes of seniors, reflecting Rove's grand design of building on the electoral majority by adding constituency groups. By failing to win new supporters while alienating old ones, the drug plan betrays a flaw in Rove's strategic overview and points to potentially disastrous consequences.

........

Just before Christmas of 2003, the White House and the House Republican leadership forced the drug benefit down the throats of unhappy conservatives. In a memorable pre-dawn session, resisting Republican House members were threatened with dire consequences and offered rich rewards as the roll call was held open for more than an hour to erase a 12-vote deficit.

Rove's aim was to entice low-to-middle income seniors who vote heavily Democratic and complain about the cost of prescription drugs. That political maneuver was translated by bureaucrats and health-care technicians into a government program so difficult to understand that someone now receiving any prescription drug care would be inclined to stick with the present program even if it seems inadequate. For many whose existing insurance does not help pay drug bills, the Bush program is only a disappointment.

Keep those buses running to Canda, fellow citizens of the great Northern states.

ID-iots

Intelligent Design=Sexed up version of creationism.

Election Fraud 2004

5 men who worked for the Kerry-Edwards campaign accused of slashing GOP operative tires in Milwaukee. Court TV will be covering the trial which beings today.

Fantasy NBA

Nothing irritates me more than my current fantasy basketball team. From my oft-injured centers, big stiff Yao, Tyson Chandler, to my underproducing PG Star-bury, to the general exasperation I feel everytime I look at the previous nights NBA games and find that Jason Williams knee tendinists flared up and caused him to miss the Heat's game. The only player keeping me out of last place in the league would be that sexual devient and generally bad person, Kobe Bryant- at least when he actually plays and isn't sitting out for throwing vicious elbows at Mike Miller- who continues to fill up the box score, even if his shooting percentage makes me cringe. Damn fantasysports.

Conspiracy Theory

Shorter version of DeLay defense. Its the partisan Democrats who control the entire Texas judicial system who are purporting these trumped up charges.

Showdown in Tehran

NY Times:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran confirmed it would resume research on nuclear fuel on Monday and the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog warned that the world was running out of patience with Tehran in the dispute over its nuclear program.

..................

The EU and the United States suspect Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons, but Iran strongly denies this and says it wants only to generate electricity.

Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik said Iran's decision was ``the wrong step in the wrong direction and a cause of very serious concern,'' though her Chancellor, Wolfgang Schuessel, said it was too soon to discuss sanctions.

Germany, France and Britain have been trying for more than two years to persuade Iran to scrap its enrichment project.

French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy urged Iran to back down immediately.

His German counterpart, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, told reporters there would be repercussions. ``It would be a breach of the agreements we reached in Paris,'' he said, referring to the November 2004 accord in which Iran agreed to freeze its enrichment program while in talks with the EU trio.

In Washington, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said of Iran's nuclear program ``they have a history of concealing their activities from the international community and not abiding by their international obligations.''

Misrepresent, Cloud Up the Issue etc.

Some still cannot get over the basic fact that Saddam was not a threat to the United States. And yes I understand Saddam is and was a terrible man, who has a special place in hell, but that still does not provide a reasonable rationale to justify an invasion of a nation that posed no threat to US, even if the Weekly Standard believes otherwise.

No WMDs, no connections with al-Qaeda, no threat to our national security, no war.

Very Simple

An inverse proportion if you will, rise in internet=decrease in newspaper subscriptions. Kinsley has more.

Cold Outside

In our great Northern states this is nothing. Fools walk around Minnesota's campus in sub-freezing temperatures sporting nothing more than cargo shorts. And in the morning on a weekday, so you know alcohol isn't warming their tummy. Fools.

It's Pat

His defenders.

Roses and Love from Iraq to US

From a Jordan think tank. Interesting dichotomy, although somewhat expected, between the Arab "street's" views on attacks on US civilians in America and US led allies in Iraq.

While the majority of opinion leaders sampled, 83.4 per cent, view the 9/11 attacks on the US as a terrorist acts, and 82.8 per cent of respondents said they consider armed military operations against the US-led allied forces in Iraq to be non-terrorist acts.

Could our failure to implement basic security measures to protect Iraqis from looting, the lack of electricity, health care problems, and basically inept planning have something to do with the anger and ambivalence towards our men and women serving in Iraq? Perhaps.

Much more in depth look at the study at Abu Aaardvark. (and where I found the study)

Amen

Howard Kurtz

Sure, the bum information came from West Virginia's governor, and the coal company shamefully refused to correct the record for hours. But the fault lies with the journalists for not instinctively understanding that early, fragmentary information in times of crisis is often wrong. You don't broadcast or publish until it's absolutely nailed down, or at least you hedge the report six ways to Sunday. This was, quite simply, a media debacle, born of news organizations' feverish need to breathlessly report each development 30 seconds ahead of their competitors.

But do journalists blame themselves? Many, you will not be shocked to hear, don't. Here's Associated Press Managing Editor Mike Silverman: ""AP was reporting accurately the information that we were provided by credible sources -- family members and the governor. Clearly, as time passed and there was no firsthand evidence the miners were alive, the best information would have come from mine company officials, but they chose not to talk."

But the "credible sources" didn't know what they were talking about, and the reporters didn't press them hard enough. Remember that another credible source, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, said all sorts of things about violence and so on in the aftermath of Katrina that turned out not to be true. Just quoting someone who's giving you bum information doesn't let you off the hook.

Journalists are not supposed to be mouthpieces regurgetating the official party line and reporting it as "news."

Still Not Good Enough

Stuart Taylor Jr.

I don't think so. First, McCain seems to acknowledge that in an extreme (and highly improbable) scenario, such as the capture of a suspect who is known to have a nuclear bomb hidden in New York City, the power of the commander-in-chief would trump any congressional ban. "You do what you have to do," McCain told Newsweek. "But you take responsibility for it."

More important for real-world purposes, the McCain amendment and the 1994 Senate reservation allow for fairly rough interrogation of suspected high-level terrorists. As noted in my November 12 column, the "shock-the-conscience" test codifies the sensible principle that—short of torture—the law permits more-coercive interrogation methods as the importance and urgency of the information sought increases.

The McCain amendment's wink-wink proposal-condemn torture unilaterally, but allow it for the "ticking time bomb scenario"- won't change a single aspect of United States interrogation methods. Torture is already banned as a form of punishment or interrogation in the United States, and the proposed amendment only acts to reaffirm an already existing ban. The detainees at Gitmo and Abu Gharib were not subjected to waterboarding and other forms of torture because they are currently allowed, no they were tortured because nguidelineses or regulations exist for the use of coercive interrogations or torture.

If the US does not acknowledge the possibility that yes a ticking time bomb scenario, however unlikely, must be planned for we are doomed to repeat the failures of Gitmo and Abu Gharib. Banning torture outright, but still allowing coercive interrogations and torturing individuals in certain extreme situations without oversight from congress or the judicial branch is absurd. You can't have your cake and eat it to, either ban torture outright in all circumstances and threaten criminal prosecution for any and all violators (even in "ticking time bomb scenarios") or craft guidelines, regulations, and oversight committees that will allow torture for suspects whose knowledge say, can prevent a nuclear attack on a US city, and spell out when precisely torture is acceptable and when it isn't.

No Defense

For Bush spying on US citizens without a warrant.

Bush's most extreme defenders actually concede that he violated the law, but they insist that the president has inherent authority to ignore or break any law that restricts his authority as commander-in-chief under Article II of the Constitution. This is a radical extension of the arguments about unilateral presidential power championed by former Justice Department official John Yoo, a defender of the Bush surveillance program, and David Addington, Dick Cheney's chief of staff. But no court has ever suggested that the widely respected FISA law might be an unconstitutional infringement on the president's constitutional authority, and no president before Bush has had the audacity to press such an absurd claim.

County Courtroom

Maybe instead of adding a waterpark to the Milwaukee Zoo, Milwaukee County executive Scott Walker (R) can focus on rebuilding our crumbling court system.

The state's busiest county courthouse runs much as it did decades ago. Case files exist entirely on paper and are often either locked in shut-down courtrooms or lost somewhere in transit. Computers are on desktops, mainly through state funding, but they seem to have little direct effect on courtroom proceedings.

"We are so in the dark ages," Milwaukee County Chief Judge Kitty Brennan said, shaking her head. "We have broken copiers we can't fix. We're down to things like that."

Budget woes and a long history of neglecting capital expenditures on technology - in a court complex so lacking basic repairs that some elevators remain out of commission for months - have resulted in a system that is a couple decades out of time.

"For a county this size, in all honesty, how do you expect technology when you can't even - honestly - keep the courtroom clean?" said veteran defense attorney Marty Kohler in a November interview. "It's a joke."

Wisco Politics

Josh Marshall calls out congressional staffer Mark Graul for shady connections to lobbyists. Thing is the politician in Marshall's scope, Mark Green (R) and his congressional staffer former Chief of Staff and current campaign manager Mark Graul, haven't really done anything out of the ordinary, just a few tickets to basketball game. Only difference is for some reason they continue to cover it up. In the grand scheme of things, as Marshall puts it, not that big of a deal, but why not admit it and move on.

Chuck Norris

One step away from God. Some of the great Chuckisms curtosey of Ezra Klein and his commentators

Outer space exists because it's afraid to be on the same planet with Chuck Norris.

Chuck Norris doesn't wear a shirt, he just brushes his luxuriant chest and back hair into the plaid configuration he desires.

Chuck Norris once ate three 72 oz. steaks in one hour. He spent the first 45 minutes having sex with his waitress.

Chuck Norris' tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried.

More about the great American hero here.

Miners

Via Crooks and Liars:

ALAN COLMES, CO-HOST: Joining us now on the phone is the former director of the National Mine Safety and Health Academy, Jack Spadaro. In terms of safety, Jack, what do we know about this mine and its relative safety in how it should have been operating?

JACK SPADARO, FORMER DIRECTOR, NATIONAL MINE ACADEMY: We know from the record that the mine, in particular in the past year, has been cited over 180 times for violations of federal mine health and safety law and regulations. And about 90 of those violations were called serious and substantial violations of the law. So we know that it was a very unsafe mine and that there were serious problems with mine ventilation and roof control.

COLMES: Are you saying that these men should not have been allowed to go down there?

SPADARO: Yes, sir.

COLMES: You're saying this mine should not have been open?

SPADARO: This mine should have been closed. And there were too many serious violations. And the record is very clear.

COLMES: Why was it open then? If you, as a safety expert, feels it should not have been, why was it open?

SPADARO: I think it's because of the current Bush administration's policies toward mine operators and their reluctance to take the strong enforcement action that's sometimes necessary. And that often involves closing a mine.

I don't think the direct responsibility for this disaster goes quite that high up on the food chain.

Are Reporters Being Spied On By the Government?

Heard about it yet? Here's some info. Wouldn't surprise me.

Strike Him Down With Bolts of Lightning

Pat Robertson, one of the nuttiest of them all (by all I refer to segment of Christian fundamentalists who are truly wackos), saying that PM Sharon's stroke is God's punishment for withdrawing from the Gaza Strip. Does this change his plans for the Christian theme park in Israel? If God strikes down those who disobey Him, He will hardly show mercy to the men who associate with the heathens. Pat Robertson, you may be next.

Good But Not That Good

Hillel Halkin:

But the Ionian islands meant Ithaca, and Ithaca meant The Odyssey, and The Odyssey is a book I have cherished. Several years ago I made a list of the things I most wanted to do before I died. One of them was learning Greek to read The Odyssey in the language Homer wrote it in. Poetry, not just as language heightened, but as language transformed, its particles fused into rare new elements, begins with Homer. The winedark sea! The rosyfingered dawn! No book has lovelier phrasing. How could I have been so foolish in college as to major in English, which I needed no instruction to read, when I could have been studying Greek? How not sail to Ithaca now?

Having read the book a number of times, experiencing a teacher who studied the epic poem in the original Greek, I can safely say that I don't intend on every looking at the Odyssey ever again, its place as the foundation for all other works of literature notwithstanding. And I have no hungering to retrace the steps of Odysseus either.

Dobbercke

Thank the Lord for Dobson's Focus on the Family to keep me informed about the vile underworld of videogame makers. I will never again be conned into believing that Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is something like this.

Joltin' Joe Lieberman

Beinart takes a swing at Lieberman's critics.

Yet, if Lieberman's view is one-dimensional, so is that of his critics. If he only sees Bush through the prism of war, they only see the war through the prism of Bush--which is why they can muster so little anger at America's jihadist enemies and so little enthusiasm when Iraqis risk their lives to vote. Kos and MoveOn have conveniently convinced themselves that the war on terrorism is a mere subset of the struggle against the GOP. Whatever brings Democrats closer to power, ipso facto, makes the United States safer. That would be nice if it were true--but it's clearly not, because, sometimes, Bush is right, and because, to some degree, our safety depends on his success. National security will never be reducible to the interests of the Democratic Party.

For better or worse, views of politicians today have and will be shaped by their response and attitudes towards the Iraq war and in the greater sense on national security in general. No matter how liberal Liberman is on domestic and most foreign policy issues, and by all accounts he is fairly liberal, people who oppose the war and believe that our presence in Iraq is doing nothing to help resolve the situation will not support him because of his belief that Iraq is salvageable. Hanging our once nominated VP out to dry is not good politics.

Appropriate

From Minneapolis City Pages, Corey Anderson's blog. Hot and heavy thriller.


Gotta love the Minnesotan humor.

via: Wonkette

Harsh Words

For a corrupt Republican leadership, from David Brooks:

But Republicans need to do more than bump DeLay. They need to put the entire leadership team up for a re-vote. That's because the real problem wasn't DeLay, it was DeLayism, the whole culture that merged K Street with the Hill, and held that raising money is the most important way to contribute to the team.

Interesting...

Hot babe valets.

Man I Dislike

Has this to say. Chomsky:

[Bush]He's more or less a symbol, but I think the people around him are the most dangerous administration in American history. I think they're driving the world to destruction. There are two major threats that face the world, threats of the destruction of the species, and they're not a joke. One of them is nuclear war, and the other is environmental catastrophe, and they are driving toward destruction in both domains. They're compelling competitors to escalate their own offensive military capacity—Russia, China, now Iran. That means putting their offensive nuclear missiles on hair-trigger alert.

I would say that threat of nuclear annihilation was probably greater during the whole Cold War deal, andenvironmentall catastrophe business isn't going to hurt the human species greatly in the short term (long term different story). While I dislike the Bush administration greatly, the notion that they are somehow "driving the world to destruction" is just plain absurd and laughable, and sadly, I wouldn't expect anything less from the most-simple minded "intellectual" the world has to offer.

FISA, NSA, and President Spying

Yglesias arguing how the Dems need to handle the illegal intelligence surveillance in the political realm.

As with Social Security, what's needed is a strategy for stripping the debate of mumbo-jumbo. As with Social Security, yes, this will be a loser for Democrats if and only if massive deception is allowed to pervade the public discourse. And as with Social Security, such deception will work if and only if Democrats refuse to challenge it. If, by contrast, the public can be made to understand the issue, then grants of dictatorial power and an effort to place the White House above the law will not prove popular. The task of Democratic politicians is to take a stand--some things simply cannot go unchallenged by the opposition, however risky opposition may be. The task of the strategists is to find a way to make opposition effective. It's been done before, and it can be done again.

Only problem with this comparison being that people are not nearly as worried or concerned with Social Security returns in the far future. Terrorism and national security concerns loom over our nation's collective heads in a completely different fashion then budgetary and specifically Social Security concerns. Bush won the last election based on fostering fear in our nation's citizens. He very well could win this battle over the expansion of Executive Powers, no matter how unconstitutional and wrong his actions are.

Miners Did Not Survive

That certainly wasn't the headline and story on my Milwaukee Journal Sentinel paper edition today. Running a story using unconfirmed sources and information, sometimes it comes back to bite you.

More on this horrible tragedy from a West Virginian John Cole.

Reading Material

Currently am working on Robert Fisk's massive 1000 page long tome, The Great War for Civilisation. I only have read the first chapter, but it did leave me breathless. He met with Osama bin Laden a number of times, and his accounts of the meetings are phenomenal. Bin Laden describing his plans, hopes, ambitions, his recollections of the history of the Middle East, his view on American state relations demonstrate all at the same time his religious fervor, his disregard for non Muslims, both his ignorance and thorough understanding of world affairs, and his zealous determination to carry out his goals.

I cannot comment on the book in its entirety yet, reading 1000 pages is a tough chore, so I am hesitant to recommend it, but just the opening passage is unexplainable.

So True, but Not Really Entirely Accurate

Kathleen Parker:

Schadenfreude - pleasure in others' misfortunes - has become the new barbarity on an island called Blog. When someone trips, whether Dan Rather or Eason Jordan or Judith Miller, bloggers are the bloodthirsty masses slavering for a public flogging. Incivility is their weapon and humanity their victim.

Forgetting MSM fascination with Clinton fiasco and OJ, it's not like blogs are the only one's leading the charge sniffing out and slathering for any sort of insidious scandal.

Corruption

Abramoff pleads guilty to three felony accounts. He faces max of 10 years, and will be used as a "cooperating witness." More from Ballon-Juice. Up the Republican food chain it goes.

Vacation

It's some obscene hour in wee hours of the morn (that stupid timer on the bottom is wrong it's at least 3), and here I am sitting at my house's computer, not my beloved powerbook, too far away, listening to Def Leppard's Armageddon It, and staring at Arrested Development's title screen. What could be better? I cannot think of anything. Except for maybe some more of Tanqueray #10... Nothing like a TnT to pass the time.

Hell. Here's a link to pass your way, my dear reader. Mr. Assrocket himself has won World of Crap's 2005 wingnut of the year. Certainly Bill O'Reilly must have been excluded, for if all the crazed wacked out shit that has been uttered from his loathsome jowls was tallied up he would be winner year in and year out, hands down. A fantastic New Year to all. Back to listening to hits from the 80s.

Well Then

Been gone for awhile, and the statcounter reflects my lack of "blogging" activity. Just wanted to check in and state how much I truly despise fast food buffets. On my way back from the great Northern State, I and my fellow comrades stopped at a KFC, bad decision. Almost as bad as eating at the horrid cesspool Pizza Hut, for their lunch buffet. Most certainly the worst trip back from Minnesota ever. Never eat KFC lunch buffet. Your stomach will thank you.