Demagogue

Sarah & Vinnie Suspended - The Real Answer is...

2010-01-25T12:55:00.000-05:00

The suspension of Sarah and Vinnie from Alice 97.3 Radio Show has brought listeners at an awe. Why? The Radio general manager issued an apology because Vinnie allegedly issued a negative statement against gays last Friday in their secret show. That is why Sarah and Vinnie got suspended.

Also there were many complaints issued particularly to Vinnie because he always make uncouth remarks that offended many radio listeners. So there! I hope the Sarah and Vinnie apology was more profound than cheesy!

Kelly Kulick Tops PBA Tournament of Champions

2010-01-24T15:44:00.001-05:00

No one would expect that Kelly Kulick will emerge as the top dog in the recently concluded Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) Tournament of Champions in Las Vegas today. As we all know, Kelly is a well-known as a professional woman bowler who managed to get former PBA Champion Chris Barnes to his knees. Not only that, Kelly Kulick also dominated over No. 3 ranked Mika Koivuniemi.

So with her emerging victorious from the Lumber Liquidators PBA Tournament of Champions 2010, Kelly Kulick deserves a big round of applause. We sure hope to see more of this fascinating 32 year old bowler in the future!

American Idol 2010 Spoilers - Top 24 Contestants in Photos

2010-01-21T19:59:00.004-05:00

Everybody's itching to know who's gonna be the American Idol 2010 Top 24 contestants who'll shine in the Hollywood round. Although nothing is still sure about who's already qualified for the American Idol 9 Top 24, websites and AI fanatics have already dug deep into qualifying the creme de la creme of this year's batch of aspiring singers.

Did your favorites make it? My current favorite is John Park of American Idol Chicago audition. He's the Korean guy who gave Shania Twain the giggles. How about you? Are your bets in the Top 24 for this season?

And what about Eurovision, the European version of Idol? Are your partybets.com wagers in?

Hong Kong Acid Attack 30 Injured

2010-01-10T11:07:00.001-05:00

Another spate of acid attack in Hong Kong has placed many people cautious in roaming the streets there. Investigations are now underway as a yet to be identified man in his 30s splattered two bottles of sulfuric acid to passersby in the busy Temple Street, a favorite haunt of both tourists and local for its outdoor market and shops.

In an unofficial count, there are about 30 people, including children, who suffered burned skin and were rushed to the hospital. Probers are also identifying if this is the same person who's responsible for past acid attacks. In the recent months, there have been four acid attacks in separate occasions and shoppers in the busy district of Mong Kok were often the targets.

Jim Leavitt Fired

2010-01-08T13:29:00.001-05:00

It's a shocking news today - Jim Leavitt Fired! Yes, the current University of South Florida (USF) football coach got his leaving papers after he allegedly hit one of his players while Jim was reprimanding him. In an interview, Leavitt is said to be flabbergasted at the University's decision saying that he's "disappointed" because the accusations against him were false and unfounded.

No official yet from the university could confirm about the Jim Leavitt fired news today. According to the grapevine, the student Jim Leavitt grabbed by the throat is named Joel Miller. The incident took place last November 21 last year and Leavitt hit him, not once but twice. So sad for college football fans hearing this news.

Bush Plays Limbo

2008-10-25T08:56:00.003-04:00

How low can you go? How low can you go?

Looks like he touched the pole at...

22% approval and 72% disapproval.

Think he'll hit the teens before the moving truck pulls away from the White House?

Ashley Todd is not our "October Surprise"

2008-10-24T19:35:00.004-04:00

All day long as this story unfolded I was heartsick. This story felt very personal from the first moment I heard about it yesterday because I am a Pittsburgher. The story might be a hoax but the street corner and the neighborhood and the sick racial-sexual game she was playing was very real. Scary real.

Imagine how you'd feel if this happened in your own backyard? In a city that you love and that you're proud of, a city that you recently moved back to and have a lot of hope for its future as a widely unrecognized gem?

I was deeply concerned that this was the exact kind of incident that could have serious unintended(?) consequences-- stoking racial tensions that exist in MOST cities on some level or another. It was such a viseral story, the cutting and branding of one's face. Later on she added that he molested her as well. It was such an awful racist archtype, reaching into history to conjure up a story that in another time would have gotten innocent black men lynched in retaliation. The victimization of a white woman at the hands of an angry, terrifying black man.

I know the so-called racism of western PA has been put in the national spotlight. I'm not denying that it DOES exist, however I see more interracial families here than I've seen in any other city that I've lived in. I've lived in a lot of other cities-- DC, Boston, Chicago, San Fransisco-- and Pittsburgh actually has less racial division than I've seen anywhere else.

As a Pittsburgher I am deeply OUTRAGED that she did tried to do this to us. I've been thinking a lot about what I would say to her if I could sit down with her. I would ask her if she understood the ugly, divisive history that she tapped into and ask her how she would have felt if her "attack" had driven other people to commit acts of violence against innocent people? Or that she tried to influence the election by creating an imaginary black man as a stand-in for the threat that some white people see that Obama poses to America?

I'm extremely appreciative of the Pittsburgh police for their speed and proficiency at getting to the truth of the story. Imagine if the investigation had lingered for days? a week? What if they hadn't uncovered the hoax until after the election? What might have transpired in that time? How would that have played out on the national stage? Imagine the McCain campaign ads. The mind reels.

So it's very hard to have too much pity for her considering what she tried to do-- it literally turns my stomach and makes my eyes burn. I just hope that she can learn from what she did, that she understands that in her attempt to fake a hate crime that she committed a hate crime against Pittsburgh itself.

------
Update: As of now there are over 1,400 stories about "ashley todd pittsburgh" in the news all over the world. Nice going, Ashley, you're an international celebrity! You may very well be the final push that helps a lot of fencesitters make a choice-- that they don't want anything to do with such a dirty campaign. Yes, I mean the McCain campaign because the McCain campaign has been caught pushing this story into the news yesterday before any of its facts were verified.

PA Voting-- Get Your Wonk On!

2008-10-23T12:37:00.001-04:00

A new poll today has Obama maintaining a 13% advantage in PA. But polls are just polls. However, looking at the raw registered voter numbers, I'm not sure why McCain's camp think that they can change PA from blue to red.

In 2004 Kerry won PA by a small margin-- by 143,000 votes-- BUT dems did not have a 1.1 million registered voter advantage.

PA in 2008:
Registered Dems: 4,060,647
Registered GOP: 2,917,747
Registered Indepedents: 869,707

PA in 2004:
Kerry: 2,938,095 (registered dems: 3.9 million)
Bush: 2,793,847 (registered gop: 3.4 million)
Statewide average voter turnout: 62%

For McCain to win PA he'd have to get ALL the independents AND over 20% of registered dems. Voting turnout is expected to be high, Allegheny County (Pittsburgh) alone is predicting an 85% turnout. Between 2004 and 2008 dems gained 500,000 registered votes and the GOP lost 200,000 voters.

So we'll see what actually happens on November 4th, although there are over a million reasons in PA alone to be pretty optimistic.

3rd Debate Review

2008-10-16T00:29:00.002-04:00

McCain was McSnide. Obama was his usual solid, unflappable self.

I love how Obama challenged him-- twice-- to bring up Ayers.

Although I was disappointed that when ACORN was brought up that Obama didn't point out that McCain himself has been to ACORN events-- or does anyone really believe that Mickey Mouse is going to actually vote in Florida? It's truly pathetic that ACORN is being scapegoated by the likes of Limbaugh and Hannity.

Report from Outside the Beltway: Revving Up for the Election

2008-10-15T23:54:00.003-04:00

Tonight I had yet another firsthand encounter with Obama's infamous grassroots ground game. I was invited via email to go to a "GOTV organizing meeting."

So about 500 people showed up to do Obama GOTV work for about 10 neighborhoods in the east end of Pittsburgh. The energy in the room was electric and absolutely fantastic.

You could tell that even the well-organized Obama campaign folks were surprised by the number of people in the ballroom. After a few enthusiastic speeches from local pols, they clearly outlined what Get-Out-the-Vote work is and the purpose that it serves and what is needed in exact numbers to make it happen.

They seriously had their sh*t together-- they got 500 people to each make 10 calls before they left the room. I signed up for 4 canvassing sessions and running a precinct on the day of the election. They pretty much demanded that everyone find a way to contribute any and all time that they could in the next 20 days-- in a really good way. If everything works as planned, as pointed out tonight, the road to the White House may very well go through Allegheny County.

Wow. Once again, I am incredibly impressed with the grassroots organization of the Obama campaign. In a word-- unprecedented.

The past few weeks have been nothing short of amazing. I have been volunteering throught the Squirrel Hill office and have been incredibly impressed with that office-- they put many of the "professional organizers" I've known to shame. Last Friday I went to the impromptu protest where several city blocks of downtown Pittsburgh were shut-down by a very festive, fun crowd who were there to register their contempt for Palin slinking into town to raise money at a $1000 plate fund-raiser.

Post-Debate Commentary Translation

2008-10-07T23:54:00.006-04:00

From one of the many nutty nitwits at The Corner-- apparently even Obama's mother isn't off-limits when it comes to snide talking points about health care reform.

Obama thinks health care is a right, not a responsibility. Bringing up his mother as the case study is not clever. Very sad that she died at 53 of cancer, and had to spend time arguing with insurance companies. I'm sure she was a wonderful, fascinating person. But she was not a paragon of responsibility.

Is that because she used food stamps?!? Apparently feeding your children = irresponsible. Or was it because she had more than one husband? What the hell?!? Or was about it the cancer itself? I don't get it.

Will the real Sarah Palin please stand up?

2008-10-02T02:08:00.003-04:00

The Palins are worth $1.2 million-- last year alone she and her husband crossed Obama's "wealthy" line in income. They're rich people who own a half a million dollar home, commercial fishing boats, a plane, as well as real estate investments.

So all of her aw-shucks-we're-common-folk-just-like-you stuff is a whole lot of hooey.

Why the "Bailout" Failed

2008-09-30T09:34:00.004-04:00

This financial crisis has not been adequately explained to the American public and the "bailout" is not an actual "bailout of Wall Street." Wall Street is already pretty well screwed. Banks will continue to close, investment bankers are going to lose their jobs, a lot of rich people will become substantially less rich. What the more aptly named "rescue plan" is about is trying to stop the Wall Street financial crisis-- fueled by greed and deregulation-- from crashing down on Main Street in the form of a credit crisis.

Here is what people need to know-- most companies and small businesses rely on credit to make payroll. Some businesses NEED credit for people to buy their products-- car sales, real estate (residential and commerical), student loans, etc. If credit dries up for a long period of time we're looking at widespread layoffs as businesses contract-- many businesses will close altogether. We have a economy that is driven by consumerism-- if the money dries up so does the economy in general. If the stock market tanks it will hurt the average person, either directly by shrinking their 401k or pension, or indirectly by harming the economy in general.

This could lead to systemic failure that will hurt A LOT of people in the short-term and be hard to get out of in the mid and long-term. A "rescue" from the government is intended to keep credit available so that much of this won't happen-- it won't stop the pain completely but it's the difference between a kick in the head or someone chopping your legs off at the knees.

As I see it those who are supporting the bill as a necessary evil have not done enough to educate the public. The Bush Administration royally screwed up when they introduced the "bailout" in the first place-- they failed to educate everyone about why this is needed and they completely underestimated how little trust the American public has in Bush and his administration. It goes way beyond the fact that Bush is a lame duck-- he's the least popular lame duck evah.

Palin's Couric Interview

2008-09-25T21:16:00.004-04:00

In a word-- scary. Some other words come to mind as well, like mindbogglingly ignorant. Palin actually believes that she's qualified and ready to be VP so that makes her kneenockingly arrogant as well. Palin's interview was like watching a 7th grader do a book report and they haven't read the book. They stand there, visibly frustrated, trying to bs their way through it and failing miserably. She wasn't even coherent in most of her answers. She doesn't even have the most rudimentary political skills-- if you don't know the answer STOP TALKING. Say something vague and change the subject to something you do know something about.

If Obama doesn't win I am prepared to secede individually. I will declare my house and its land a foreign, independent nation. Seriously.

Bailout = Ransom?

2008-09-23T18:52:00.007-04:00

Why do I feel like the Bush-Paulson "bailout" plan is nothing more than a 3-page ransom note for $700,000,000,000 from the very people who helped to kidnap the economy-- and if we don't pay up they're going to kill it for good? Can they be believed or trusted? Is it overly hyperbolic to call what is going on "economic terrorism"?

So much more needs to be done to make sure that this isn't just a totally INSANE power grab by the Bush Administration. It's the most arrogant request by a lame duck president in the history of lame duck presidents.

Simply McCain

2008-09-21T19:31:00.002-04:00

Whenever I turn on the teevee and see McCain or one of his minions one word instantly and incessantly pops into my mind:

McDouchebag.

McCain has NO credibility left whatsoever. It's as if he has electrodes attached to his private man parts that shock him every time he tells the truth or says anything based on reality. His surrogates know this as well. That's really the only explanation left.

The Most Dishonest Presidential Campaign EVAH

2008-09-13T10:14:00.002-04:00

McCain is blatantly lying REPEATEDLY right out of the gate. He lies about his own record, Sarah Palin's, and he lies about Obama's. Not to mention that Palin is lying as well. But not regular stretch-the-truth kind of lies. BIG BOLD-FACED ONES. The MSM is actually talking about some of them and Dems are talking about them. Writers in newspapers-- both editorial and on the AP-- are writing about the lies. Does it matter?

It's a pretty amazing strategy, actually, because it's much harder to argue with someone who is completely and shamelessly making shit up. It leaves your oppoenent bewildered and slackjawed and stuttering-- "but, but, none of that is true!" It's much harder to forumulate your own argument because you're standing their in a sort of stunned righteous anger.

What the campaign is betting on is that McCain has the whole honorable POW thing to innoculate him. They seem to think that convincing others that he is lying will be especially difficult-- especially after 8 years of Bush we all expect some level of distortion and spin.

I fully expect that McCain's next stage of his strategy will be to spend a lot of time talking about the importance of truth and honesty in government-- because that means he's truthful and honest, right?

The bottom line is this-- we have never seen a campaign quite like this so a lot of people don't seem to recognize what is going on. Here's to hoping that they do catch on. My one hope is that at this rate of lying he has to make up a real doozy that could seriously catch up with him. Something so obvious that it doesn't look like spin against him. That's the problem with lying-- you have to keep track of all the lies because eventually you're lying about the lies in a way that increases your chances of exposure.

Palin Pays for Her Popularity in Alaska-- Literally

2008-09-08T22:36:00.002-04:00

A lot of republicans have repeated the claim that "she's the most popular governor in the country!" whenever talking about Governor Sarah Palin.

Well, I'd love my governor too if he wrote everyone in my family a check for $3,200! I wish that dems were as half as organized as the GOP when it comes to repeated responses-- it would make a great talking point whenever some GOPer says it like it means Palin is the best governor in the country.

It would also help illuminate just how *differently* Alaska functions from every other state in the country. You know, like the fact that no one there pays income or sales tax. Because they get most of their money from oil company revenues or federal tax dollars from the lower 48. Frankly her experiences as governor might even be less germaine than any other state and makes her especially woefully unprepared to run the country.

How to Undo McCain/Palin

2008-09-08T17:30:00.002-04:00

It's all about the "maverick."

McCain/Palin are branding themselves with the SAME BRAND. It is the hollow label they are both using to separate themselves from the GOP and Bush. It's the key to taking them BOTH out with the same attack. They're NOT mavericks, they're both full of crap.

That "maverick" brand is a fake and needs to be shredded-- neither one of them are mavericks. They're just packaging-- like when a product stays the same but calls itself "new and improved" to pretend it's something new. Don't fall for it, Mavericks = Pretenders

Obama needs to push them on that label, something along the lines of this:

A simple McCain v. McCain ad. The Daily Show already did a preview of it last week, showing how McCain has taken polar opposite views between now and 2000. First he was against overturning Roe, now he wants it overturned and so on.

Attack Palin on her bridge to nowhere garbage and her love of pork. The maverick label is meaningless. She's just more of the McSame.

Palin is a Proud Puppy Killer!!!!

2008-09-08T08:19:00.003-04:00

Just when I thought I couldn't like Sarah Palin less I read stuff like this.

In early 2007, Palin's administration approved an initiative to pay a $150
bounty to hunters who killed a wolf from an airplane in certain areas, hacked
off the left foreleg, and brought in the appendage. Ruling that the Palin
administration didn't have the authority to offer payments, a state judge
quickly put a halt to them but not to the shooting of wolves from aircraft.
...
The controversy over Palin's promotion of predator control goes beyond animal rights activists recoiling at the thought of picking off wolves from airplanes. A raft of scientists has argued that Palin has provided little evidence that the current program of systematically killing wolves, estimated at a population of 7,000 to 11,000, will result in more moose for hunters. State estimates of moose populations have come under scrutiny. Some wildlife biologists say predator control advocates don't even understand what wolves eat.
...
Last year, 172 scientists signed a letter to Palin, expressing concern about the lack of science behind the state's wolf-killing operation. According to the scientists, state officials set population objectives for moose and caribou based on "unattainable, unsustainable historically high populations." As a result, the "inadequately designed predator control programs" threatened the long-term health of both the ungulate and wolf populations. The scientists concluded with a plea to Palin to consider the conservation of wolves and bears "on an equal basis with the goal of producing more ungulates for hunters."

Apparently Palin wasn't fazed. Earlier this year she introduced state legislation that would further divorce the predator-control program from science. The legislation would transfer authority over the program from the state Department of Fish and Game to Alaska's Board of Game, whose members are appointed by, well, Palin. Even some hunters were astounded by her power play.

Palin-- The GOP Swoons After the First Date

2008-09-05T22:51:00.002-04:00

The GOP just had their first date with Sarah Palin and they are SWOONING. So much that they seem to be happy to ignore all the red flags-- you know, like the fact that she's currently under investigation for ethics violations and has not been cleared of them. (Imagine if Obama or Biden had this hanging over their heads?) On top of that she's seriously monkeying around with the investigation, refusing to cooperate while saying that they're happy to do so.

The only person I'm finding surprisingly honest about his "anxiety" about her selection is none other than David Frum. Although he represents the more wonky wing of the GOP-- not to mention a member of the arugla-eating, latte-drinking "elite" crowd is sounding like someone who feels like his party is officially being taken over by people whom he doesn't admire very much-- namely, the religious right.

I think Palin might actually scare me more than John McCain does. So far what has come out since the annoucement is a lot of pretty bad stuff. Although the more I read the more they do sound like "soul mates." Palin has been described as "brittle" and McCain's temper is infamous. They both seem to define "maverick" the same way-- tough, uncompromising, intolerant of opposing views, and quick to judgement.

Also, just saw an interview with Mike Wooton and Walter Monegan on "Anderson Cooper 360. " At first blush it appears that their stories seem pretty credible and Wooton in particular says he's only granting an interview this time so he can set the record straight.

Playing the Refs?

2008-09-03T19:41:00.004-04:00

After watching Palin's speech-- surprise, surprise-- she's taking on the "press" for attacking her and her family.

Nice new strategy there, let's declare a pre-emptive war on the press for asking basic questions about who she is, her background and McCain's vetting process. That also serves an additional purpose --it could work to minimize the negative reports from Alaska about her record of trying to ban books, firing anyone who gets in her way, as well as a reputation for being "brittle." Apparently being a "maverick" means you doing whatever the hell you want and getting pissed when someone questions you about it.

I really hope that is something they keep up-- it makes them look weak and certainly won't help them get them kind treatment from the press. I always worried that the press's deep affection for McCain "the Maverick" would hurt Obama-- looks like they might be getting ready to trash that relationship by playing the "victim card." Ironic, eh?

Well, unless the press then bends over backwards to try and make McCain/Palin feel like they're being treated "fairly" by the "liberal media." Although Chris Matthews-- who usually bugs me-- just had a nice rant about how she's attacking the press for doing its job. Matthews just accused McCain/Palin of "ginning up" this fight to garner sympathy and fight back against questions about Palin.

So not only are they attacking the Dems as elitists but now they're going after the whole "Washington elitist establishment." I know this has worked in the past, let's see if it works again.

Just an aside, it's nothing short of HILARIOUS to see Mittens Romney attack the "east coast elite." I suppose he forgot that he was the governor of MASSACHUSETTS or that he has an MBA/JD from Harvard. I think it's funny that in their attempt to appeal to "regular people" they are attacking the educated, successful republicans in their own party.

Awakening From a Long Slumber

2008-09-02T20:34:00.005-04:00

(snort, snort, cough, cough, ahem)

I think this blog just woke up. Or at least I have.

There have been so many things over the past year (and more) that have nearly prompted me to start blogging again. Yet somehow I managed to get through the whole Dem primary without picking it up again. I came close many times but managed to get no futher than just logging in.

Then the Bristol Palin story happened.

I am incredibly pissed off.

I also feel as though I am having a reaction to this story that no one else seems to be expressing. I'm 32 (almost 33) but my inner 17-year old is RAGING on Bristol's behalf.

There is something deeply unsettling about the way the campaign and Palin herself handled the news. I'm pissed on that her mother told the world about this-- why didn't her mother try to protect her a little? Why did they voluntarily put Bristol in the spotlight this way? Why didn't she respect her daughter's privacy and leave her back in Alaska instead of putting her on stage holding her little brother to conceal her "baby bump"? Why not leave her in Alaska to quietly get married ASAP and then announce that she's married and having a kid soon?

To me the answer to these questions are one-- Palin herself appears to be exploiting the young woman's pregnancy to score points with the "pro-life" crowd. The GOP talking heads are already claiming that it makes Sarah Palin seem like a "regular" person. It's all about Sarah Palin and not at all about treating her daughter and her life with a little diginity, with a little respect. I think it makes Sarah Palin seem like a pretty shitty mother, frankly. She seems to treat her kids like political props in ways that are above and beyond the way that most pols do.

The McCain campaign and Sarah Palin propped Bristol up there and put out a press release about her pregnancy and then have the nerve to say that the media is invading their privacy. Seriously? They did it first. They can call it a "pre-emptive strike" against the media all they want but they could have handled it completely differently.

I find the whole thing truly sickening.

Naptime

2007-03-07T23:24:00.000-05:00

Demagogue is taking a bit of a nap. We started this blog in March 2003, so it's possible at this point that we've just slipped into a temporary coma or it might be the big sleep.

So, until further notice, zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

10 Things You Might Not Know About Iran

2007-02-26T11:51:00.000-05:00

As the war of words between the Bush administration and the regime in Tehran continues, how much do you really know about Iran? For example, did you know that until recently, 15-year-olds could vote in Iran? I didn't.

This article in Sunday's Chicago Tribune provides some interesting tidbits.

What Bush Policies Have Inspired

2007-02-26T06:43:00.000-05:00

Holy Gary Bauer, Batman! A new gay porn movie has drawn its storyline from a Bush White House creation? Please say it ain't so.

'Fraid it's true. According to the porn-lovers portal of Fleshbot.com:

Usually we wouldn't have reason to associate the war on terror (or anything else coming from the White House) with a XXX throwdown — but when it comes to rough sex and prison fantasies, the boys at Dark Alley Media have created something that deserves its own set of headlines.

"Gaytanamo" is Owen Hawk and Matthias von Fistenberg's uber-horny look at life in a certain detention camp where rehabilitation isn't exactly the goal as "a German tourist is mistaken for a terrorist and abducted to the sexiest secret military prison ever."

I don't know which is more amusing — the fact that the White House helped to inspire a gay porn video or the fact that there is a gay film producer named von Fistenberg.

The "PowerPoint President"?

2007-02-26T06:34:00.000-05:00

At Washington Whispers, Paul Bedard writes:

(Mitt) Romney is the first-ever presidential candidate to haul out a PowerPoint presentation at campaign events. He did it recently while addressing the Detroit Economic Club, and the audience went nuts for it.
"It was amazing," an auto exec tells us. "I mean he didn't just make claims. He had the graphs to back him up!"

It now shocks us when a political figure makes claims that actually have some basis in fact. How sad.

Bedard continues:

The idea was the candidate's and was a textbook presentation outlined in classic fashion: It opened with the "Intro," wrapped up under the title "Close," and finished with an "End" on Page 21. In between were graphs that Romney tried to soften with descriptions of lines like "squiggle."

PowerPoints, says spokesman Kevin Madden, "speak to the competency that [Romney] exudes and the authoritative nature of his understanding of the issues." Plus, he says, the boss just digs them — and is a great presenter.

"He's the PowerPoint president ..."

Now there's a moniker to trumpet.

Ross Perot had lots of charts and graphs too, but most of us who watched him on TV felt he was only one stammer away from lunacy.

I have sat through dozens of PowerPoint presentations over the past several years, and I can tell you from my own experience that the ability to throw together a PP presentation is no assurance of a person's "authoritative" understanding of the issues.

What Makes the Terrorists So Vile

2007-02-23T09:16:00.000-05:00

This is one of the more provocative and eloquent statements I've read or heard about what it is that makes al Qaeda, the Taliban and other terrorists so abhorrent:

The terrorists have adopted the pretense of an aggrieved party, claiming to speak for the powerless against modern imperialists. The fact is they're at war with practically every liberal ideal — and in their vision, everyone would be powerless except them.

Their ideology rejects tolerance and denies freedom of conscience. They would condemn women to servitude, gays to death, minority religions to persecution. An ideology so violent, so hateful, can take hold only by force or intimidation, and so those who refuse to bow to the tyrants face brutalization or murder — and no person or group, not even fellow Muslims, is exempt.

It's a line of argument that is much more sophisticated than the typical Bush line about an "enemy that can't stand the thought of somebody being able to live a peaceful life, a life of hope ..."

And it's the kind of statement that I would hope all Americans — regardless of their ideology and regardless of whether they support a "surge" in Iraq — could agree with.

So who delivered this statement? Would you guess it was him?

Reading over the transcript, I also wondered if this was a first. Is this the first time someone from the Bush administration has publicly declared that one of the traits Americans should abhor in the al Qaeda and Taliban terrorist cells is their extreme hostility toward gay people?

Of course, this statement was uttered by the vice president more than a dozen time zones away.

Even so, I take my hat off to the person who drafted these words and to Cheney for speaking them. I still consider Cheney to be a repugnant human being, but he's slightly less of a repugnant human being at the moment.

Putting Cheney's Worries in Context

2007-02-23T08:58:00.000-05:00

Earlier today, halfway around the globe, Vice President Dick Cheney told an audience he was deeply worried about China. Cheney said:

China has played an especially important role in the six-party [talks with North Korea] . . .

. . . Other actions by the Chinese government send a different message. Last month's anti-satellite test, and China's continued fast-paced military buildup are less constructive and are not consistent with China's stated goal of a "peaceful rise."

These words were delivered, of course, by someone who played an instrumental role in the U.S. decision to invade a country that posed no imminent threat to us. But I digress.

Cheney is right. China has rapidly increased its military spending in recent years. In 2006, it was estimated that China spent $36 billion on the military.

For fiscal year 2006, the U.S. spent $441 billion on military weapons, equipment, personnel and research. In other words, we spent $12.25 for every $1 the Chinese government spent.

I'm no fan of the Beijing regime, which continues to violate the fundamental human rights of its people. But, as far as military spending is concerned, a little context is in order.

Jerry Falwell Just Spilled His Coffee

2007-02-23T08:37:00.000-05:00

The anti-evolutionists of the Scopes era morphed into the Christian-Scientists of the 1970s and '80s and then, more recently, into the "intelligent design" crowd of the 1990s. But whomever they are and whatever they're calling themselves these days, I'm willing to bet at least some of them are in a pretty sour mood if they've read this WaPo story:

Chimpanzees living in the West African savannah have been observed fashioning deadly spears from sticks and using the tools to hunt small mammals — the first routine production of deadly weapons ever observed in animals other than humans.

... The new observations are "stunning," said Craig Stanford, a primatologist and professor of anthropology at the University of Southern California. "Really fashioning a weapon to get food — I'd say that's a first for any nonhuman animal."

And there was this interesting tidbit:

The landmark observation also supports the long-debated proposition that females — the main makers and users of spears among the Senegalese chimps — tend to be the innovators and creative problem solvers in primate culture.

Gravitas Ain't Her Strong Suit

2007-02-21T15:32:00.000-05:00

As the WaPo reported today, Kos and some other liberal bloggers are putting the heat on Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.). They are unhappy with some of her votes and her willingness to "play nice" with moderates and the Bush administration.

I confess that I don't know a lot of specifics about Tauscher's voting record, but this paragraph of the WaPo article doesn't cast her in the best light:

[Tauscher] was once the only California Democrat to oppose Pelosi's campaign for leadership, but she now marvels that the speaker's performance has been "absolutely perfect -- and she looks so beautiful doing it!"

Not a lot of gravitas in a phrase like that. But Britney Spears and Ryan Seacrest would be proud.

The Armenian Genocide Resolution

2007-02-21T10:43:00.000-05:00

I haven't been posting much here lately, but thanks to this shockingly moronic Washington Times editorial, I've decided that I am going to try and follow developments related to Congressional efforts to pass a resolution declaring the death and displacement of some 2 million Armenians between 1915 and 1923 to be genocide.

This resolution comes up just about every year, and just about every year Turkey makes a huge fuss and this year is no different

The speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi has scheduled a vote in April on a resolution that accuses Turkey's Ottoman Empire of perpetrating "genocide" resulting in the death or displacement of nearly 2 million Armenians between 1915 and 1923. Turkey is one of America's closest allies in the Islamic world and is also a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

Turkish-Americans have launched a campaign against the resolution saying that it ignores most experts on the Ottoman Empire who reject the Armenian allegation of genocide. They say that the resolution is an attempt to pass judgment on a controversial piece of history and it unfairly defames an entire people on discredited evidence.

The resolution never passes, thanks primarily to Turkey's willingness to make a variety of threats

Turkey’s prime minister said the US Congress would harm bilateral ties if it backs a resolution recognising the 1915 mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks as a genocide, the state Anatolian news agency said on Sunday.

The Democratic-controlled Congress is widely expected to back such a resolution in April, but the Bush administration is opposed to it, fearing the impact on relations its Nato ally.

Ankara strongly denies claims by Armenia and others that its forces committed a systematic genocide against Armenians during World War One. But many parliaments around the world have backed similar resolutions recognising the killings as genocide.

‘We do not expect Congress to make such a decision. But if it surprises us, I am worried this would cast a shadow over our strategic partnership in the future,’ Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as telling American businessmen.

He did not say what Turkey might do in such a case. In the past, it has temporarily frozen trade and other ties with countries that backed the genocide claims.

Since, literally, no US papers seem to be covering this, I'm going to have to rely on foreign sources and whatever I can find on Google News as I try and keep track of developments and watch to see whether the Democrats in Congress will finally manage to pass this.

If you are interested in this issue, you might want to check out The Burning Tigris: The Armenian Genocide and America's Response or A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility.

You can read the resolution here.

Romney and the Heckler

2007-02-21T08:34:00.000-05:00

A number of bloggers have posted on GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney's confrontation on Friday with a heckler in Florida who criticized his religious views.

What bothered me most about the incident is that judging by some of the media reactions — and certainly by the crowd of seniors at the campaign event — Romney is viewed (unjustifiably) as if he were Mr. Tolerant. In case you missed it, here is what transpired:

[Romney] showed poise when a heckler attacked him for being a Mormon: "You, sir, you are a pretender. You do not know the Lord."

The audience booed the heckler.

''One of the great things about this land is that we have people of different faiths and different religions, but we need to have a person of faith lead the country,'' he said, as the audience gave him a standing ovation.

In reality, Romney is only slightly more tolerant than the man who heckled him. Romney is willing to be tolerant of people who have religions that are different from his, but you must have a religion.

In other words, contrary to the U.S. Constitution's language, Romney thinks there should be a religious test for public office — every candidate must subscribe to a religious faith.

McCain's Change of Heart

2007-02-20T07:19:00.000-05:00

Three months isn't a long time, but it was long enough for John McCain's attitude toward Donald Rumsfeld to change significantly. Last November, as Rummy resigned, McCain said:

"While Secretary Rumsfeld and I have had our differences, he deserves Americans' respect and gratitude for his many years of public service. He has mine."

But yesterday in South Carolina, candidate McCain said:

"I think that Donald Rumsfeld will go down in history as one of the worst secretaries of defense in history."

And this is the guy who deserved our "respect and gratitude"?

Is It Gore's Time?

2007-02-20T07:14:00.000-05:00

At Huffington Post, Bob Cesca says it's time for Al Gore to enter the presidential primary stage. He writes:

. . . we need a president who will make the climate crisis his or her number one priority.

The time is now for this person and, no offense to the other Democratic candidates, that person is naturally Al Gore. He has the charisma, sense of urgency, the knowledge . . . .

Hold on a second. What was that c-word I heard?

No Wonder Americans Are Nearly Brain-Dead

2007-02-19T12:06:00.000-05:00

Moments ago, this website listed 12 items under the heading "LATEST NEWS." Four of these so-called news items were the following:

I-Report: You and the presidents say, 'Cheese!'

Crying woman reveals shame of no electricity

The price of fame is high -- bring your wallet

Stylist: I tried to halt Britney shaving head

No, this wasn't the website for the Weekly World News or The Star or some other tabloid. It was from the home page of CNN.

It's good to know they're staying on top of such critical events in our world.

Slowly but steadily, celebrity gossip and novelty blurbs are intruding into the space that was once reserved for genuine news.

A Rescue on Mt. Hood? Is This "Groundhog Day"?

2007-02-19T11:06:00.000-05:00

After daybreak this morning, rescue teams were scheduled to resume searching for three mountain climbers who fell from a ledge on Mount Hood in Oregon. If this sounds familiar, it's because this isn't the first time this has happened on Mt. Hood.

On Sunday, five other climbers were rescued from Mt. Hood. But in December, after a long search, rescuers were unable to find a party of three climbers who went missing on Mt. Hood.

How smart was it for anyone — even an experienced climber — to venture more than 8,300-feet up Mt. Hood during winter when gusting winds, bitter-cold temperatures, snow avalanches and white-out conditions magnify the existing hazards of mountain climbing? "Terrible" was the word used by the rescue teams' coordinator to describe weather conditions.

According to this Mt. Hood publication, "During winter months the climbing routes are not patrolled regularly" so there is no way to know the extent of avalanche or rockfall hazards.

A coordinator for the rescue teams told CNN, "We have teams from all over the Northwest up here. Right now there's probably 50, 75 people ready to deploy all over the mountain." Up to two feet of snow could hit that area in the next 24 hours, according to CNN, meaning the rescuers themselves could be risking their own lives.

The county sheriff's office, American Medical Response, Portland Mountain Rescue and Mountain Wave Communication Specialists are involved in the search. Some, if not all, of these agencies are taxpayer-funded.

Am I the only one who sees a bit of a disconnect here?

On the one hand, as a society, we are unwilling or unable to fund the costs of basic health insurance for all of our people — as a result, 46 million Americans currently don't have it.

On the other hand, we're willing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars recruiting and outfitting search teams, purchasing expensive rescue equipment, using aircraft, etc., to try to find a handful of young people from mostly affluent families who were dumb enough to try to climb Mt. Hood in winter time.

I don't expect this to change because the brainless anchors on the morning TV programs love these kinds of stories. It's a made-for-TV moment to watch and hear Mildred Watson of Belle Chute, Oregon, be interviewed — blinking back tears as she recounts the day her son, Blake, last spoke to her before heading off to Mt. Hood.

You just don't get the same level of drama from a single mom explaining why her job doesn't offer health insurance.

Reid's Son Chooses Hillary

2007-02-19T10:17:00.000-05:00

The AP reports:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has not endorsed a Democratic presidential candidate, but his son has.

Rory Reid is signing on as Nevada chairman for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential bid. He will be senior adviser on Western issues including public lands, transportation, resources and conservation, growth and affordable housing, the New York senator's campaign said in a statement Sunday.

Reid, 44, is chairman of the Clark County, Nev., Commission and a former chairman of the Nevada State Democratic Party.

McCain Throws Red Meat to the Right

2007-02-19T10:13:00.000-05:00

This past weekend, John McCain said what religious conservatives wanted to hear. According to the AP:

Republican presidential candidate John McCain, looking to improve his standing with the party's conservative voters, said Sunday the court decision that legalized abortion should be overturned.

"I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned,'' the Arizona senator told about 800 people in South Carolina, one of the early voting states.

... The landmark 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade gave women the right to choose an abortion to terminate a pregnancy. The Supreme Court has narrowly upheld the decision, with the presence of an increasing number of more conservative justices on the court raising the possibility that abortion rights would be limited.

... McCain is trying to build support among conservatives after a recent rebuke from Christian leader James Dobson, who said he wouldn't back McCain's presidential bid.

Most leading conservative politicians agree with what McCain said, but very few of them have been willing to be as honest and direct as McCain was on Sunday. In that respect, at least, I give him a little credit.

Sure, McCain knows this declaration will help him a lot in the GOP's 2008 presidential primaries, but he also has to recognize that it could come back to haunt him in a general election.

A Good Weekend for Obama

2007-02-19T10:08:00.000-05:00

Mike Allen of The Politico reports:

At the annual Jefferson-Jackson Dinner of the Democratic Party of Virginia on Saturday, the Hillary Clinton signs and bumper stickers were free, as were “I’m in to Win” buttons featuring the New York senator. But “Obama ’08 Gear” was for sale – T-shirt, $20; button, $10; sign, $5. And he had a lot more takers than she did . . .

Party officials say their previous record for the dinner was 1,400 seats. But after Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois was announced as the keynote speaker, sales ballooned and the party kept expanding the dinner until it had space for 3,200 at the Greater Richmond Convention Center.

A few hours before the dinner, Obama and Gov. Tim Kaine met reporters on the front porch of the Executive Mansion .... Obama had campaigned for Kaine, who was now returning the favor by becoming the first governor outside of Obama’s home state of Illinois to endorse his presidential candidacy.

What Does the First Letter in CPSC Stand for?

2007-02-19T09:58:00.000-05:00

It's a question worth asking in the wake of this revelation by the AP:

In 2005, when government scientists tested 60 soft, vinyl lunchboxes, they found that one in five contained amounts of lead that medical experts consider unsafe — and several had more than 10 times hazardous levels.

But that's not what they told the public.

Instead, the Consumer Product Safety Commission released a statement that they found "no instances of hazardous levels." And they refused to release their actual test results, citing regulations that protect manufacturers from having their information released to the public.

The original test results didn't come to light until the AP filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act.

"I don't think the Consumer Product Safety Commission has lived up to its role to protect kids from lead," said Dr. Bruce Lamphear, a lead poisoning specialist at the Children's Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, Ohio. "As a public agency, their work should be transparent. And if one is to err on the side of protecting children rather than protecting lunch box makers, then certainly you would want to lower the (lead) levels."

Anti-Surge Resolution Is Approved

2007-02-16T15:23:00.000-05:00

The final vote in the House was just announced: 246-182. Seventeen Republicans supported the resolution criticizing Bush's so-called "surge" plan.

The Bogus Lincoln Quote

2007-02-16T14:55:00.000-05:00

In this recent post, I commented on columnist Frank Gaffney's reference to a quote from Abraham Lincoln:

“Congressmen who willfully take action during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs, and should be arrested, exiled or hanged.”

It's a quote that has been used by conservatives to oppose a House resolution against the White House "surge" plan for Iraq.

Well, now it turns out that the quote is completely bogus — there is no evidence that Lincoln ever said such a thing.

So have Gaffney and Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) agreed to issue a correction or clarification? No. Get the details from the Carpetbagger Report.

And this isn't the first time Gaffney has been unable or unwilling to acknowledge the truth.

This Stuff Is No Longer Surprising

2007-02-16T11:42:00.000-05:00

From today's N.Y. Times:

Federal authorities are investigating gifts and payments that Gov. Jim Gibbons of Nevada received as a congressman from an executive of a software company that got millions of dollars in federal contracts, government officials said Thursday.

Investigators are examining whether the gifts and payments to Mr. Gibbons, a Republican, were in exchange for his help as a member of the House Intelligence and Armed Services Committees.

The payments were from Warren Trepp, owner of eTreppid Technologies, based in Reno.

... Mr. Gibbons took office as governor last month after serving five terms in the House. .... Mr. Gibbons and Mr. Trepp have said they are friends, and have denied any wrongdoing.

... Some of the company’s no-bid contracts were classified, which meant that the size of the contract and its purpose were hidden in a budget process that was not made public.

How convenient.

More Delusional Comments

2007-02-16T11:37:00.000-05:00

About 20 minutes ago, Rep. John Culberson (D-Tex.) voiced opposition to the anti-surge resolution, delivering remarks that would have made Archie Bunker sound like a Brookings scholar.

What's at stake if we don't support a "surge" in Iraq? To hear Culberson tell it, "American civilization" and whether we are "proud" of our troops. About the only good thing I can say about Culberson's remarks is that he spoke for less than one minute.

Culberson's website has this strange headline on it — strange because he serves in a national, not state, office: "Texans Should Always Run Texas."

Sounds good to me. Let them run Texas, and not set policy for the other 49 states.

"Appeasement" Nonsense

2007-02-16T10:21:00.000-05:00

Well, it's official — Rep. Vito Fossella (R-N.Y.) has drunk the Koolaid.

Congressman Fossella just left the House floor after delivering his 5-minute speech on House Concurrent Resolution 63, the anti-Iraq surge resolution. But the remarks he delivered a few minutes ago left me wondering whether he was speaking to the Munich accord of 1938.

"Appeasement does not work," Fossella said. And your point would be . . . . what?

According to Fossella's twisted way of thinking, for Congress to oppose the so-called Iraq war "surge" — this would be the 5th surge, actually — would "break the promise" we made to 9/11 victims. Huh?

Which promise was that? Who the hell promised the victims of 9/11 a "surge" four years into the Iraq war?

I cannot see how 9/11 victims would be comforted to know that we invaded a country with no meaningful link to the al Qaeda terrorists who killed them.

And, even if such a promise was made by Fossella or anyone else, no individual's off-the-cuff promise should dictate how a nation conducts its foreign or military affairs.

Franken is Franken -- Not Wellstone

2007-02-15T11:39:00.000-05:00

In the most recent issue of The Nation, John Nichols has written an article entitled "For Paul's Seat," about Al Franken's decision to seek the U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota next year.

Nichols writes:

Franken's challenge to Republican incumbent Norm Coleman, who took Wellstone's place in the Senate after the popular incumbent was killed in a fall 2OO2 plane crash, was expected. What was intriguing was Franken's signal with the broadcast announcement that his will be a certain kind of candidacy, run very much in the Wellstone tradition.

... "Your government should have your back," the man who has spent the last three years serving as the voice of liberal talk radio said in a video produced for his campaign.

I wish Franken the best of luck, but I hope he runs a campaign that is right for him, as opposed to a campaign "in the Wellstone tradition." Invoking Wellstone's name or his values is one thing, but Franken could go too far. As Al Gore reminded us, candidates who try too hard to be someone else risk looking like a caricature.

When he first ran for office, Paul Wellstone was an outsider in every sense of the word, unknown to nearly all of the state's electorate when he announced he was challenging GOP Sen. Rudy Boschwitz.

It's silly to think that Franken can present himself to voters in the same way. Contrast Wellstone, the political science professor at a small liberal arts college, with Franken, who is a "Saturday Night Live" alum, a well-known author, and, until just recently, had his views broadcast around the country on the "Air America" national radio program.

Along these lines, it's really hard to imagine Wellstone writing a book with the screed-like title of "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them."

I have some radical advice for Franken as he embarks on this campaign for the Senate. Franken should be . . . . Franken. After all, this is Minnesota, not Mississippi. Who knows? Liberalism with a dose of sarcasm might go over pretty well.

Any Regrets at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

2007-02-15T08:54:00.000-05:00

From Tuesday's White House press briefing:

REPORTER: "John Bolton is up on [Capitol] Hill, and he just said that the agreement — firstly, that he's not a fan of the (recently announced North Korean) agreement, and that the North will be re-writing it every day it's in existence, it's a fantasy, it's rewarding the North and sending a horrible message to the world about the U.S.'s stand on weapons of mass destruction."

When Press Secretary Tony Snow gets hit with a question like this, you wonder if the White House regrets having gone out on a limb to fight for Bolton's nomination as U.S. ambassador to the U.N.

Those NASCAR Values

2007-02-15T08:29:00.000-05:00

A few years ago, the term "NASCAR dads" entered the political lexicon, an appropriate counter for the Dem-leaning "soccer moms." Soon thereafter, political writers and commentators began using the words "NASCAR values."

But the term "NASCAR values" is likely to lose some of its potency in the wake of a major scandal on the eve of NASCAR's "Super Bowl" event. The AP reports:

The Daytona 500 is a wreck before it even gets started.

A cheating scandal that had already brought down four teams now has ensnared another — that of two-time winner Michael Waltrip — tarnishing NASCAR's signature race and Toyota's highly anticipated debut.

... Waltrip lost his crew chief and team director ... The two were suspended indefinitely after an illegal substance was found during inspection for the season-opener.

... NASCAR officials would not reveal what they found in Waltrip's intake manifold, but a person with knowledge of the investigation told The Associated Press it was a property contained in jet fuel.

A Nice Piece of Candor

2007-02-15T08:21:00.000-05:00

The political-diplomatic world is laden with verbal nuance and emptiness. And that's why I appreciate the words spoken yesterday by the foreign minister of Chad. Both Chad and the Central African Republic have accused Sudan of attacking their nations. From Reuters:

Violence in Sudan's western region of Darfur has spilled over into neighboring Chad and Central African Republic, both of which blame Khartoum for the attacks.

A source close to French President Jacques Chirac said the three countries' presidents were likely to meet at a French-African summit in the French seaside resort of Cannes.

"This same meeting is useless because it is aimed at distracting international public opinion and moving it away from the real problem, which is that Sudan is attacking Chad," said Chad's Foreign Minister Ahmat Allam-Mi. "We are not in Cannes to entertain the crowd."

If it's entertainment they want, they can always attend the city's film festival.

The Right's Global-Warming Denial

2007-02-14T07:27:00.000-05:00

It's as stubborn as ever. Consider this National Review column by Thomas Sowell, who writes:

Whether the globe really is warming is a question about facts — and about where those facts are measured ...
Yes, Virginia, there are skeptics about global warming among scientists who study weather and climate. There are arguments both ways — which is why so many in politics and in the media are so busy selling the notion that there is no argument.

If you heard both arguments, you might not be so willing to go along with those who are prepared to ruin the economy, sacrificing jobs and the national standard of living on the altar to the latest in an unending series of crusades, conducted by politicians and other people seeking to tell everyone else how to live.

This is my favorite part:

What about all those scientists mentioned, cited, or quoted by global-warming crusaders? There are all kinds of scientists, from chemists to nuclear physicists to people who study insects, volcanoes, and endocrine glands — none of whom is an expert on weather or climate ....

Y'mean, people like him? Sowell is a Hoover-based economist who, to my knowledge, has no special training or expertise in climate change or the earth sciences in general.

Out: Flowers and Chocolates ... In: Zoo Sex Tours

2007-02-14T07:14:00.000-05:00

From the AP:

Among the things (Genevieve) Chandler, 30, and her date learned on their “Wild at Heart” zoo tour: Male pigs have a unique corkscrew endowment and impressive, um, output; manatees have orgies and don’t really care if their partners are male or female; and a male porcupine has only one four-hour window a year to mate — very carefully, of course.

Valentine’s Day is the time of year when zoos around the nation seek to woo a new adult audience with risque tours that couple champagne, chocolate-covered strawberries and candlelight dining with impressive facts about how animals do the wild thing.

... San Francisco calls it “Woo at the Zoo.” New York City’s Central Park Zoo calls it “Jungle Love.” Zoo marketing folks in Boise, Idaho, named the tour “Wild Love at the Zoo.”

Kansas Board Changes Direction -- Again

2007-02-14T07:07:00.000-05:00

From the AP:

The Kansas state Board of Education on Tuesday repealed science guidelines questioning evolution that had made the state an object of ridicule.

The new guidelines reflect mainstream scientific views of evolution and represent a political defeat for advocates of “intelligent design,” who had helped write the standards that are being jettisoned.

... The state has had five sets of standards in eight years, with anti- and pro-evolution versions, each doomed by the seesawing fortunes of socially conservative Republicans and a coalition of Democrats and moderate Republicans.

Empty-Headed Analysis

2007-02-13T10:38:00.000-05:00

Through this article posted on a religious-conservative news portal comes a silly theory for Barack Obama's popularity:

The national spokesman for the black conservative organization Congress of Racial Equality says he believes he knows why the Democrat Party has gone bonkers over the presidential candidacy of Illinois Senator Barack Obama.

... "They were scared to death that unless they started promoting a high-profile African-American into the highest ranks of the Democratic Party — which they had not done before — then they were going to lose their monopoly on the black vote," says (CORE spokesman Niger) Innis.

Innis names several black Republicans who have come up through the ranks over the past several years that he believes have put the Democrats back on their heels — Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Justice Clarence Thomas, Michael Steele, Lynn Swann, Ken Blackwell.

"And that is, I think, what makes up more than anything else the Barak Obama 'phenomenon,'" Innis concludes.

This analysis is way off base on at least two levels.

First, three of the six black Republicans mentioned by Innis have never run for national or statewide elective office. And how the hell did Lynn Swann "come up through the ranks"? Because he played a pro football or because he chaired the President's Council on Physical Fitness?

Second, the notion that Dem leaders are pushing Obama because it will pacify black voters is weakened significantly by a recent poll showing that black Democrats prefer Hillary Clinton over Obama by a 3-to-1 margin.

Hang Anti-War Congressmen? Not Yet

2007-02-13T08:57:00.000-05:00

Townhall columnist Frank Gaffney, Jr., wants you to know that he's not as much of a reactionary nutjob as you might think. Even though Abe Lincoln said during the Civil War that congressmen who take actions damaging morale and undermining the military "are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled, or hanged,” Gaffney says he's not quite there yet.

As Congress debates the Iraq war resolutions, Gaffney writes:

... it is time to reflect on what constitutes inappropriate behavior in time of war.

Scarcely anyone seems to consider the conduct of the Congress at the moment inappropriate, to say nothing of a hanging offense.

At least not "at the moment."

Now there's a compassionate conservative for ya.

Gaffney also wants us to know there was "a wealth of evidence ... that indicated a relationship existed between Iraqi agents and al Qaeda operatives, spanning more than a decade." Gaffney adds: "Doug Feith is an old friend of mine." Surprise, surprise.

North Korea, Fuck Yeah!

2007-02-13T08:40:00.000-05:00

I guess everyone has a price — even the North Koreans. This story was just posted by the N.Y. Times:

North Korea agreed today to close its main nuclear reactor in exchange for a package of food, fuel and other aid from the United States, China, South Korea and Russia. The breakthrough, announced by the Chinese government after intense negotiations, came four months after North Korea tested a nuclear bomb.

The partner nations agreed to provide roughly $400 million in various kinds of aid in return for the North starting a permanent disabling of its nuclear facilities and allowing inspectors into the country.

Perhaps equally important, the United States and Japan agreed to discuss normalizing relations with Pyongyang. The United States will begin the process of removing North Korea from its designation as a terror-sponsoring state and also on ending U.S. trade and financial sanctions.

We'll agree to this with a Stalinist government that hastened mass starvation among its own people, but we wouldn't dare enter into talks with Syria or Iran. Am I the only one who thinks this is crazy?

Will Mexico Say "Si" to Decriminalization?

2007-02-13T08:31:00.000-05:00

From Reuters:

Mexican President Felipe Calderon's government wants to decriminalize first-time possession of small amounts of drugs in a move likely to draw criticism from U.S. anti-narcotics officials.

Under the proposed legislation, users found for the first time with 2 grams (0.07 ounces) or less of marijuana and small amounts of other drugs ranging from cocaine to methamphetamine would not be prosecuted.

The bill passing through Mexico's Senate on its way to Congress is a toned down version of legislation Calderon's predecessor, Vicente Fox, pushed through last year but later vetoed after angry objections from Washington.

... the legally punishable amounts of drugs found on a first-time user are smaller than under last year's bill ...

What Are Your Mutual Funds Financing?

2007-02-12T06:24:00.000-05:00

In Sunday's N.Y. Times, Nicholas Kristof has a question for you:

So is your Fidelity account underwriting genocide in Sudan? Is your pension fund helping finance the janjaweed militias that throw babies into bonfires in Darfur and Chad?

The answer to both questions is complicated but may be yes, and that's one reason a divestment campaign is gaining strength around America and abroad.

... Five (U.S.) cities have divested ... A bill before Congress would bar certain companies active in Sudan from receiving federal contracts.

... More than other money managers, Fidelity has resisted the pressure and clung firmly to Sudan-related investments. So Darfur campaigners are urging investors to avoid Fidelity mutual funds: more information is at https://fidelityoutofsudan.net/signpetition.

The White House's Condescension

2007-02-12T06:21:00.000-05:00

With the president's poll numbers still in the tank, one might think the White House would at least pretend to be watching the debate over the Iraq war resolutions and talking with undecided members of the House and Senate. But no.

This was the incredibly condescending way in which Press Secretary Tony Snow characterized the Congressional debate during last Thursday's White House press briefing:

SNOW: ... this is an expression of opinion on the part of members of Congress. And therefore, it is appropriate to let them go ahead and express it. You don't want to — this is not something where you negotiate and say, Senator, that's not your view. It doesn't work that way. I mean, a lot of times when you're dealing with a piece of legislation, you can sit down and you can try to work with folks. As a matter of fact, we made it clear to members of the House and Senate that we do want to work with them and share our views. But on something where they're trying to express their views, they're their views.

REPORTER: But every vote is an expression of opinion. I mean, by that argument you could say —

SNOW: Come on, Jennifer, no —

REPORTER: — we should never try to convince someone to vote a way that they don't —

SNOW: I'm sorry, but when you're talking about the difference, for instance, on Social Security, or health care, or energy, you're dealing with specific provisions that have policy implications where an administration will be called upon to enact that law. This is different. It's a non-binding resolution that we think members ought to look at carefully to see what kind of message they're sending, but on the other hand, we don't think that it's appropriate to say, don't express your views. They've decided to do so, and it's appropriate.

In other words, the White House — or Snow at least — views Congress as sort of a highly paid debating society that is so irrelevant that it's not even worth trying to influence them as they prepare to "express their views."

Putin’s Weekend Whining

2007-02-12T06:16:00.000-05:00

Speaking this past weekend at the annual Munich Conference on Security Policy, Russian President Vladimir Putin. According to the AP:

... [Putin] dismissed suggestions that the European Union and NATO had the right to intervene alone in crisis regions.
"The legitimate use of force can only be done by the United Nations; it cannot be replaced by EU or NATO," he said.

So how many times during Putin’s tenure in office has Russia supported a proposal to authorize an armed U.N. force to be deployed somewhere in the world?

Even in the case of the genocide in Darfur, Russia has frustrated U.N. efforts to take any multilateral action.

The truth is that countries like Russia helped to create the monster they publicly criticize. The Bush administration found it much easier to build domestic support to invade Iraq because of the unwillingness of countries such as France, China and Russia to offer any multilateral alternative.

For example, Russia is one of only two countries that has consistently opposed taking the issue of Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear program to the U.N. Security Council for consideration of sanctions.

Russia has done even more than the United States has done to make the U.N. an increasingly irrelevant organization. Putin almost makes Bush look honorable.

I will agree with one observation made by Putin this weekend. At one point, the Russian prez said:

“The process of NATO expansion has nothing to do with modernization of the alliance.”

In my opinion, Putin is absolutely correct. But if I had to choose between an Eastern Europe brought under greater influence of Russia or the U.S., I would easily choose the latter (even if that influence is extended via the Bush admin.).

When the House Dems Make a Promise

2007-02-12T06:03:00.000-05:00

Is the House Democratic leadership taking a page from the GOP leaders it toppled last November? I hope not, but at least one incident worries me they may follow down that path. During this Sunday's "Meet the Press," host Tim Russert asked House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) about the debate over resolutions concerning the so-called Iraq war "surge":

RUSSERT: Now, on Thursday, you said this: “The Republicans will be given either a substitute or a motion to recommit so that they can propose whatever substantive alternative that they choose. That will also be debated.” Is that still your plan?

HOYER: Not necessarily our plan, at this point in time, and let me tell you why. As we discussed this, we saw the problems that the Senate was confronted with, where the whereas clauses and the therefore clauses confused the issue. We believe the American public want a straightforward answer to the question ....

Yes, a straightforward answer would be nice, congressman.

If House Dems aren't prepared to follow through on a promise, they shouldn't make it in the first place.

The Blogger Dilemma

2007-02-09T11:56:00.000-05:00

At Slate.com, John Dickerson writes:

John Edwards' campaign had a little fire in the basement this week. Two bloggers hired by the former North Carolina senator, Melissa McEwan and Amanda Marcotte, were labeled anti-Catholic by the Catholic League for writings about the church's positions on abortion and homosexuality. Conservative bloggers also targeted the pair ...

In the end, after a few days of contemplation, the campaign issued a three-a-culpa: a tri-part statement in which Edwards scolded the bloggers for their past writings, and they each apologized for offending anyone. No one was fired.

... Edwards has put a lot of money into Web outreach, to build netroots support and raise money, so he had to tread with particular care for fear of undoing that work. But all campaigns are likely to face a version of his troubles this week. The major candidates are trying to do two conflicting things: channel the authenticity of the blogosphere while simultaneously maintaining the rigid image and message control that is crucial to any presidential campaign.

It's a ready-made car wreck because bloggers are tough to domesticate. They want to demonstrate they haven't sold out once they get onto a politician's payroll. Their regulars readers will be turned off if they tame themselves, and if they don't, they're likely to be coarse and brash.

A Former NBA Player Comes Out

2007-02-09T11:31:00.000-05:00

Washington Post columnist Michael Wilbon:

Just as it would be a relief to arrive at the place in time when the color of the coaches in the Super Bowl matters not one bit, it would be fabulous to reach the day when a male athlete in a team sport doesn't have to worry about the reaction of declaring his homosexuality.

But that day isn't here just yet, as we found out this week now that John Amaechi has become the first former NBA player to publicly say he's gay. The reaction to Amaechi's announcement in advance of his soon-to-be-released autobiography, "Man in the Middle," is all over the place, from appropriate indifference to utterances that border on homophobic to, well, stock ignorance.

... The fact that a great number of heterosexual male athletes actually believe they don't already share locker rooms and showers with gay teammates is laughable.

Charles Barkley, who played in the NBA for 16 seasons, said yesterday: "It shouldn't be a big deal to anybody. I know I've played with gay players and against gay players and it just shouldn't surprise anybody or be any issue."

... If we're lucky, the men and women who are both enlightened and emboldened will not only be supportive but will drown out the knuckleheads and Neanderthals and everybody who wants to slow the march of progress. Even one step away from tolerance, whether we're talking about race, gender, religious beliefs or sexuality, simply slows the march to the day when none of this stuff matters.

Lieberman and Dodd

2007-02-07T15:56:00.000-05:00

Connecticut Senators Joe Lieberman and Chris Dodd used to be the best of friends. But now? Jeffrey Goldberg offers this assessment in The New Yorker:

... few relationships are as unhappy as the one between Connecticut’s two senators.

A wall in Lieberman’s office is covered with photographs of the two men together. One is inscribed, by Dodd, “To Joe, our first appearance together as Senators! You obviously have forgotten the first rule of a junior senator. They should be seen and not heard!”

Lieberman has, in past years, described Dodd as his “best friend” in the Senate. When I asked him if this was still true, his eyes narrowed, and he said, “I have so many good friends in the Senate. John McCain is a very good friend.”

These days, most of Lieberman’s closest friends in the Senate are Republicans.

... Neither Lieberman nor Dodd was eager to discuss the unravelling of their relationship, in particular its most painful episodes: Dodd’s decision to endorse Lamont the morning after the Lieberman primary defeat, and his appearance in a Lamont television advertisement, in which he said, “People want different leadership in Washington.”

Lieberman’s friends were, of course, upset by Dodd’s infidelity. “I found that whole thing almost unbelievable,” Warren Rudman, the former New Hampshire senator, told me. “I can’t imagine why Chris Dodd did that.”

Dodd justifies his endorsement of Lamont as one of principle over friendship. “I’m the senior Democrat in the state,” he said. “What do I tell a twenty-year-old, what do I tell someone who wants to be a Democrat and join the process? ‘I’m sorry, the primary doesn’t count, it doesn’t make a difference’? It was painful. I didn’t like it. But I wasn’t going to turn around and tell people this doesn’t mean anything.”

Dodd was right.

Stop Making (Non)Sense

2007-02-06T12:38:00.000-05:00

The Rev. Ted Haggard is cured! Well, at least he is according to one of the 4 ministers who just spent 3 months de-gaying him.

''He is completely heterosexual,'' (Rev. Tim) Ralph said. ''That is something he discovered. It was the acting-out situations where things took place. It wasn't a constant thing.''

What does that mean exactly? It wasn't constant and it was only "acting-out situations"?

Apparently this is the new definition of American male heterosexuality, after all, what married straight man hasn't intentionally sought out and repeatedly paid for sex with a male prostitute? It's a perfectly manly straight thing to do.

Sen. Collins: We've "Surged" Before

2007-02-06T06:14:00.000-05:00

Are you listening, Joe?

Susan's making a lot of sense

The new issue of Newsweek has this interview with Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine) that focuses on the Senate's consideration of anti-Iraq surge resolutions. At one point, Collins tells Newsweek:

"I pointed out (in hearings recently) that there have been four surges since the initial invasion, and they’ve been of similar sizes — one was like 30,000 troops around one of the elections. None of them produced a lasting change in the dynamic."

Looking at the Fine Print

2007-02-06T06:04:00.000-05:00

What do you really know about Bush's new Pentagon budget? Probably not as much as Slate's Fred Kaplan, who passes along observations like these:

It's not $481.4 billion, as the Defense Department is claiming. No, a squint through the fine print of the White House and Pentagon budget documents reveals that the true request for new military-spending authority comes to $739 billion.
... The budget requests $3.1 billion for a new aircraft carrier, $2.7 billion for a new Virginia-class submarine, and $3.4 billion to complete construction of two new DDG-1000 (formerly "DDX") cruisers.
It's hard to leave the cruisers half-built, but do we really need another nuclear-powered carrier and submarine? The U.S. Navy is not stretched beyond its capacity (unlike, say, the Army); there is no maritime mission it can't fulfill; no other country has a navy that's remotely threatening.

Fox News Will Probably Claim He's Obama's Brother

2007-02-06T06:01:00.000-05:00

"On Thursday, Iraqis will meet their fourth milestone. And when they do go to the polls and choose a new government under the new constitution, it will be a remarkable event in the Arab world. .... Early next year, Iraq's new parliament will come to Baghdad and select a prime minister, and a presidency council, and a cabinet of ministers. .... The terrorists know that democracy is their enemy ..."

PRESIDENT BUSH, Dec. 12, 2005

On the contrary, at least one terrorist living in Iraq has found that democracy is a vehicle for power. According to CNN:

A man sentenced to death in Kuwait for the 1983 bombings of the U.S. and French embassies now sits in Iraq's parliament as a member of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's ruling coalition, according to U.S. military intelligence.

Jamal Jafaar Mohammed's seat in parliament gives him immunity from prosecution.

Now there's an idea for House Republicans to file away for the next time they control Congress -- grant immunity to all incumbents.

... U.S. military intelligence in Iraq has approached al-Maliki's government with the allegations against Jamal Jafaar Mohammed, whom it says assists Iranian special forces in Iraq as "a conduit for weapons and political influence."

... A Kuwaiti court sentenced Jamal Jafaar Mohammed to death in 1984 in the car bombings of the U.S. and French embassies the previous December. Five people died in the attacks and 86 were wounded.

" 'Cause I'm the Taxman ..."

2007-02-05T12:24:00.000-05:00

Which country is now a favorite tax shelter for the wealthy -- a nation whose tax rules have attracted corporations such as Coca-Cola, Nike, and Gucci? The answer may surprise you. Picture canals, not white sand beaches.

Second Thoughts

2007-02-05T11:52:00.000-05:00

Remember a few weeks ago when Vice President Cheney acted like a real Dick? He got pissy when CNN's Wolf Blitzer asked him about Focus on the Family's public criticism of the decision by Cheney's lesbian daughter to have a child without a husband.

Initially, the blogger at The Rational Republican sympathized with Cheney's reaction. Later on, RR reconsidered and, to this blogger's credit, was willing to change his mind about it:

First, the real offense was created by Focus on the Family, not Wolf. I will condemn their statement. Wolf merely asked whether Cheney had a reaction he'd like to share.

Second, Cheney will have been at Bush's side for eight years when they leave, much of which Bush will have spent condemning homosexuality and working to marginalize gays and lesbians. What has Cheney done to stop this?

Good points, both of them.

The Cheneys' hypocrisy shows when you consider the fact that Lynne Cheney had no problem answering questions about Mary's pregnancy when they were asked by Chris Wallace during the Dec. 24 edition of "Fox News Sunday." Wallace specifically asked, "What do you make of all the fuss about this?"

If I have any complaint with how Blitzer handled this, it was his attempt to render opinions that he seems to be in no position to render. During the interview:

BLITZER: "Your daughter Mary, she's pregnant. All of us are happy ...."

Obviously, all people weren't happy, given the statements made by various Christian conservative groups. I suppose it's possible that Blitzer's "all of us" referred only to CNN employees, but I can't quite picture Miles O'Brien and Rob Marciano giving each other high-fives over the news that Mary Cheney is pregnant (although Marciano would look cute smiling about anything).

Moments later, Blitzer was at it again:

BLITZER: "Do you want to respond to [FoF's comments]?

CHENEY: "No, I don't."

BLITZER: "She's obviously a good daughter --"

CHENEY: "I'm delighted ...."

Obviously "a good daughter"? Why did Wolf Blitzer make himself a character reference for the veep's daughter? How well does he know Mary Cheney?

Wow! Condi Made an Accurate Prediction

2007-02-05T06:48:00.000-05:00

Condoleezza Rice has never had much success issuing predictions. In June 2005, for example, according to this news report:

Rice predicted to (then-NBC's Katie) Couric that the December (2005) elections in Iraq would show "that the Iraqi people are not supportive of this insurgency." And, "an insurgency cannot last without the support of the population," she said.

Well, Rice has finally made a prediction that came true. On Friday, according to the AP:

... a reporter asked (Secretary of State Condoleezza) Rice to forecast the Super Bowl outcome.

"I really like both Chicago and Indianapolis, but I think Indianapolis is going to win it," she said.

If only her predictive skills were this good in the arena of foreign affairs.

America Is Peyton Place

2007-02-05T06:31:00.000-05:00

I know, I know -- if you're an American, you're supposed to love Peyton Manning. Advertisers seem to think so because you can't watch a sporting event on TV without seeing at least seven commercials featuring Indianapolis quarterback Peyton Manning.

But the fact that Madison Avenue adores Peyton's marketing potential may be the best explanation for the highly questionable decision to name him the Super Bowl's Most Valuable Player (MVP).

How does a quarterback earn the MVP by producing a passing rating that is nearly 20 points below his regular-season average?

The only really long pass that Manning completed last night (a 53-yard touchdown pass to Reggie Wayne) was one that my 13-year-old nephew could have thrown. There was no Chicago defender within 10 yards of Wayne. Disregard that TD pass "gift" by the Chicago Bears and Manning's numbers look pretty ordinary: 186 passing yards, even less than Indy's 190 rushing yards.

The thing that makes this decision such a farce is that Manning was basically picked as the MVP before the Super Bowl even began. Consider what Sports Illustrated's Andrew Perloff wrote on his blog:

I thought before the game Peyton Manning would have to have a sub-par game for him not to win MVP. He's become such a focal point for the Colts.

Yeah, that sounds like a fair standard -- one player out of 44 starters on both teams wins the MVP award by default unless he has "a sub-par game."

Yet, even by Perloff's standard, Peyton Manning didn't deserve the MVP award. Par for Peyton during the regular season was a TD-to-interception ratio of better than 3-to-1, passing yards of 275 per game, and a passing rating of 101. In the Super Bowl, Peyton's numbers fell below each of these measures.

On the other hand, Indianapolis' Dominic Rhodes turned in an MVP performance by rushing for 113 yards, scoring one of the Colts' two offensive TDs and spearheading Indy's surprisingly robust running game.

If you really think Peyton Manning is highly talented (and he is), then it's tough to argue that he delivered an MVP performance last night.

More Proof That McCain Is the Ultimate Phony

2007-02-05T06:22:00.000-05:00

Each week seems to bring additional evidence that John McCain's much ballyhooed "straight talk" persona is a complete facade. From Sunday's N.Y. Times:

Senator John McCain, intent on succeeding where his freewheeling presidential campaign of 2000 failed, is assembling a team of political bruisers for 2008. And it includes advisers who once sought to skewer him and whose work he has criticized as stepping over the line in the past.

... In 2004, Mr. McCain said the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth advertisement asserting that Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts had not properly earned his medals from the Vietnam War was “dishonest and dishonorable.”

Nonetheless, [McCain] has hired the firm that made the spots, Stevens Reed Curcio & Potholm, which worked on his 2000 campaign, to work for him again this year.

So I guess it's not surprising that the so-called Bush insiders feel so comfortable joining McCain's camp.

Dick is Funny?

2007-02-03T15:23:00.000-05:00

Who knew Dick Morris could be funny?

While commenting on the the top four 2008 GOP candidates-- McCain, Guiliani, Romney and Gingrich-- Morris has a toss-away line that made me laugh out loud, "the only one of these guys who hasn't had multiple wives is the Mormon."

Although maybe it wasn't Dick who penned that line, as the piece was co-authored.

Regardless, it cracked me up.

What is Chuckie Smoking?

2007-02-03T14:24:00.000-05:00

And can I get some? From the looks of it it's some really strong stuff.

The latest, not-so-greatest, from Charles Krauthammer, subtly titled "The civil war in Iraq is not our fault; the Iraqis are to blame."

Yeah, I didn't want to read beyond the title either, but I did. Here are the highlights.

America comes and liberates [the Iraqis] from the tyrant who kept everyone living in fear, and the ancient animosities and more recent resentments begin to play themselves out to deadly effect. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have died, the overwhelming majority of them killed by Sunni insurgents, Baathist dead-enders and their al-Qaida allies who carry on the Saddamist pogroms.
...
Iraqis were given their freedom and yet many have chosen civil war.
...
We have made a lot of mistakes in Iraq. But when Arabs kill Arabs and Shiites kill Shiites and Sunnis kill all in a spasm of violence that is blind and furious and has roots in hatreds born long before America was even a republic, to place the blame on the one player, the one country, the one military that has done more than any other to try to separate the combatants and bring conciliation is simply perverse.

It infantilizes Arabs. It demonizes Americans. It willfully overlooks the plainest of facts: Iraq is their country. We midwifed their freedom.

They chose civil war.

We midwifed their freedom?!?!

Blaming Iraq is the last refuge of the absurdly, painfully desperate-- or the very, very high.

It's not as though this is the butterfly effect, Chuckie-- we invaded their country, took out their government, thus destabilizing the country, and we had no real plan to do anything beyond our original objective of taking out Saddam. It's not exactly a surprising outcome, it's the very outcome many people have worried about since before the first bomb was dropped. Many of us continue to worry that destabilizing Iraq could lead to further destabilization of the Middle East-- maybe even an all out regional war. Which, to some degree, would also be our fault. Why? We kicked the beehive.

Civil war in Iraq is the direct, forseeable consequence of our actions. We need to take some personal responsibility for taking a bad situation and making it far, far worse.

Three Cheers for Governor Perry

2007-02-03T10:14:00.000-05:00

This development is amazing.

Bypassing the Legislature, Republican Gov. Rick Perry signed an order Friday making Texas the first state to require that schoolgirls get vaccinated against the sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer.
...
Beginning in September 2008, girls entering the sixth grade -- meaning, generally, girls ages 11 and 12 -- will have to get Gardasil, Merck & Co.'s new vaccine against strains of the human papillomavirus, or HPV. (Vaccine meeting roadblocks nationally. )

Perry, a conservative Christian who opposes abortion and stem-cell research using embryonic cells, counts on the religious right for his political base. But he has said the cervical cancer vaccine is no different from the one that protects children against polio. "The HPV vaccine provides us with an incredible opportunity to effectively target and prevent cervical cancer," Perry said in announcing the order.

While there are good reasons to be skeptical about the vaccine-- mainly that it's new-- this is certainly an unexpected move from a staunch conservative. Although Perry's ties to Merck do cast a certain pall on his motivations.

Perry has several ties to Merck and Women in Government. One of the drug company's three lobbyists in Texas is Mike Toomey, Perry's former chief of staff. His current chief of staff's mother-in-law, Texas Republican state Rep. Dianne White Delisi, is a state director for Women in Government.

Perry also received $6,000 from Merck's political action committee during his re-election campaign.

If we give him the benefit of the doubt, Perry is doing this because he believes that preventing HPV is good public health policy, not just to help line Merck's pockets. I'm sure there will be some parents who will op-out, as they have the right to do, overall this is certainly a move in the right direction as far as women's health is concerned. If I had a young daughter I'd get her in line for the vaccine.

However, I've read in various places that the vaccine isn't covered by a lot of health insurance plans and costs $360. So I'm curious as to how this is going to be paid for, if there will be state money made available to assist low-income families, as it is different from most mandatory vaccines that are inexpensive and are made available to children without health insurance.

Nothing Says I Love You...

2007-02-02T21:14:00.000-05:00

like a decapitated kitten.

(shudder)

The White House's Cost Estimate

2007-02-02T06:43:00.000-05:00

According to CNN:

A report from the Congressional Budget Office says President Bush's plan for a troop increase in Iraq could cost up to $27 billion for a 12-month deployment.

The report estimates that a four-month deployment of the additional troops — both combat and support — could cost $9 billion to $13 billion and a 12-month deployment could cost $20 billion to $27 billion.

The White House estimated that the troop increase would cost $5.6 billion.

In other words, the Bush gang underestimated the "surge" cost by at least 60% and as much as 382%.

When the White House throws out numbers that are this far off, it isn't hard to figure out why the administration has virtually no credibility with Congress or the American people.

Why Are Vladimir Putin’s Opponents Dying?

2007-02-02T06:25:00.000-05:00

That is the pull-no-punches subhead of an article in the last issue of The New Yorker. In the article, Michael Specter writes:

Since 1999, when Vladimir Putin, a career K.G.B. officer, was, in effect, anointed as President by Boris Yeltsin, thirteen journalists have been murdered in Russia. Nearly all the deaths took place in strange circumstances, and none of them have been successfully investigated or prosecuted.

... (for example) the investigative reporter Yuri Shchekochikhin ... died of what doctors described as an “allergic reaction.’’ Shchekochikhin, who became famous in the Gorbachev era with his reports on the rise of a new mafia, had been investigating allegations of tax evasion against people with links to the F.S.B., the post-Soviet K.G.B. Nobody ever explained what Shchekochikhin was allergic to, and his family is convinced that he was poisoned.

... The attacks have not been limited to journalists. In September of 2004, Viktor Yushchenko, a candidate for President of Ukraine who helped lead the Orange Revolution, and who was vigorously opposed by Putin, barely survived a poisoning.

... (Last year) Alexander Litvinenko, a little-known former K.G.B. agent who had been imprisoned by Putin and had then defected to England, fell gravely ill in London. ... Litvinenko had accused the Russian President of creating a pretext for the Second Chechen War in 1999 by blowing up buildings in Moscow and then blaming Chechen separatists for the attacks.

... “Reform of the K.G.B. never really happened,’’ Evgenia Albats, a professor of political science at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics, said a few weeks ago ... "the secret services are now in full power.”

... Vladimir Putin’s relationship with democracy is not ambiguous: in December of 2004, he signed a bill that effectively eliminated the election by popular vote of Russia’s eighty-nine governors. The President now nominates them himself — and then waits for regional legislatures to confirm his choices (as they always do).

In another change that nobody protested and few people noticed, Putin also assumed the power to appoint the mayors of Moscow and St. Petersburg. Last November, again at the President’s behest, the Duma abolished any requirement that a minimum number of voters must participate in order for an election to be valid.

Religion's Influence

2007-02-02T06:22:00.000-05:00

According to a Gallup poll taken in January 2001, just before George W. Bush was inaugurated:

Would you like to see organized religion have more influence in this nation, less influence, or keep its influence as it is now?

More 30%
Less 22%
As It Is Now 45%
Other/Unsure 3%

But when this same question was asked a few weeks ago:

Would you like to see organized religion have more influence in this nation, less influence, or keep its influence as it is now?

More 27%
Less 32%
As It Is Now 39%
Other/Unsure 2%

It's interesting that what used to be a +8% gap (More vs Less) is now a -5% gap, even when the poll question doesn't connect religion's influence specifically with politics.

Aloha!

2007-02-01T14:21:00.000-05:00

Hawaii is considering passing a civil union bill.

Biden Didn't Think Jesse Jackson Was a Hottie

2007-02-01T08:24:00.000-05:00

Obviously, Bill Clinton felt otherwise

Senator Joe Biden is reportedly planning to formally enter the presidential race. But his campaign seems to be imploding before it can even launched. CNN reports:

In [a New York Observer] article published Wednesday, Biden is quoted evaluating presidential rivals [Clinton, Edwards and Obama]. His remarks about Obama, the only African-American serving in the Senate, drew the most scrutiny.

"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," Biden said. "I mean, that's a storybook, man."

Biden issued a statement Wednesday afternoon, saying: "I deeply regret any offense my remark in the New York Observer might have caused anyone. That was not my intent and I expressed that to Sen. Obama."

A Letter of Platitudes and Empty Phrases

2007-02-01T08:21:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, the Washington Post published this letter-to-the-editor by a top official at AARP:

Steven Pearlstein's candid assessment of the political climate in his Jan. 24 column was refreshing. He's right. Enough of the partisanship: It's time to embrace the opportunity to start a serious debate on health-care reform.

While President Bush's proposal to cover what may be as many as 48 million uninsured leaves many questions unanswered, it is one idea among many that can help us move toward meaningful solutions.

No suggestion is above constructive criticism, but we will never solve our nation's pressing health and long-term financial security problems if we don't start looking beyond partisanship and begin to collectively debate new ideas. Working together, we can accomplish so much. Divided, we will fail.

Mark Kitchens
Director of Media Relations and Strategy
AARP

That's one eloquent dude. But I think he left out some equally eloquent one-liners. He could have added:

Reaching out, we will build bridges.
United, we will succeed.
Handcuffed to a coffee table, we won't be able to make another martini.

After reading a banal letter like this one, any senior who belongs to AARP should be asking why the largest, most powerful advocacy organization for seniors has nothing more provocative to say than merely urging the nation's leaders to "start a serious debate on health-care reform."

This debate has been going on for many years. If it hasn't yet reached the "serious" stage, it's because AARP is more interested in lining its pockets than it is in actually representing the millions of American retirees.

Arizona is Slightly Red -- Her Neck Is "Very Red"

2007-02-01T07:48:00.000-05:00

Last night on "The O'Reilly Factor," Bill O'Reilly asked Ann Coulter to handicap the GOP presidential hopefuls.

When asked about Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Coulter stressed McCain's pro-life views and added, "He is from a very red state." (her emphasis)

Ann, are we talking about Arizona? Only three months ago, that "very red state" re-elected a Democratic governor with 63% of the vote, was the only state to defeat a same-sex marriage ban, and saw two of its eight U.S. House seats flip from R to D.

Priests Often Deviate From Vatican's Doctrine

2007-01-31T11:39:00.000-05:00

The Vatican is furious. But is it really because of intrusive journalism or is it because Catholic church officials are forced to recognize that even many priests are not buying into the Vatican's neanderthal doctrines?

It all started when the current issue of the Italian magazine L'Espresso hit the newsstand. According to Reuters:

To write the cover story in this week’s L’Espresso, reporter Riccardo Bocca visited 24 churches in five large Italian cities and confessed sins he never committed or invented ethical dilemmas for the priest.

In one confessional in Naples he told the priest he felt guilty over his father’s death after the family allowed a doctor secretly to detach a respirator. The father had for years been paralysed, confined to a bed and unable to breathe autonomously.

Although euthanasia is officially condemned by the Church, the priest told him not to worry too much because God would be the ultimate arbiter.

“If I had a wife, a father or a son who for years was alive only because of artificial life support, I would pull the plug too,” said the priest, who then gave him absolution.

In another confessional box he faked being HIV positive and was told by a priest that whether or not he used a condom in order not to pass the virus to the woman he loved was “a very personal matter of conscience”.

The Church teaches officially that abstinence and monogamy — not condoms — are the best way to stop the spread of AIDS.

... An editorial in the Vatican’s newspaper, l’Osservatore Romano, said the report had “profaned” the sacrament of Penance ...

Bocca said it was not his intention to show disrespect for the Catholic church or its sacraments.

“What I wanted to show was the difficulties facing these priests as they try to carry out their duties in good conscience,” he told Reuters. “The differences I found were shocking even to me.”

On homosexuality, one priest told him: “Well, homosexuality is a tendency which is a valid human expression. There are even homosexual priests and lesbian nuns.”

Ya think so?

Asked if he should openly declare his homosexuality, the priest told him: “Generally the best thing to do is to be yourself. Come clean. Do what the English call 'coming out'.”

Yeah, and who knows? Someday, you might even be knighted.

A Republican Whose Legacy Lives On

2007-01-31T07:17:00.000-05:00

At their national conventions, Republicans often quote or refer to the legacy of Abe Lincoln, but a more appropriate symbol of the Republican Party's honor and integrity may be the GOP's very first presidential nominee: John C. Frémont.

On this date in the year 1848, Frémont — who was then a U.S. Army Major — was found guilty by a court martial on the grounds of mutiny and disobeying orders.

Although this decision was later reversed by President James K. Polk, Frémont chose to resign his military commission. Frémont was chosen as the Republican Party's presidential nominee in June 1856.

Like Richard Nixon, Frémont abused his power. Like Dick Cheney, he used his political connections to become a multimillionaire.

At least Frémont was an abolitionist. There, I said something nice about him.

After the GOP's Defeat, Is Britain's Labor Next?

2007-01-31T06:51:00.000-05:00

Just as the majority party in the U.S. lost both houses of Congress in the most recent election, the majority party in Britain may be heading for an equally sobering defeat. According to The Independent newspaper:

The Conservative Party has opened up a five-point lead as Labour's core supporters desert the party, according to the latest monthly poll for The Independent.

CommunicateResearch found there has been a sharp rise in support for the Liberal Democrats, mainly at Labour's expense. The Tories are on 34 per cent (down two points on last month), Labour on 29 per cent (down eight points), the Liberal Democrats on 21 per cent (up seven points) and [minor] parties on 16 per cent (up three points).

... It will increase fears among Labour MPs that the Government is "drifting" as Tony Blair completes his final months as Prime Minister amid bad publicity ...

Fidel: He's Not Dead (Yet)

2007-01-31T06:41:00.000-05:00

State-controlled TV in Cuba is doing all it can to reassure the masses. According to the BBC:

Cuban television has shown its first pictures for three months of ailing leader Fidel Castro. Mr. Castro, 80, was seen standing during a meeting with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, which was said to have taken place on Monday.

[Mr. Castro] appeared frail but stronger than three months ago. Mr. Castro has not been seen in public since undergoing gastric surgery in July, prompting speculation that he had cancer or was terminally ill.

The pictures show Mr. Castro drinking orange juice and joking with Mr. Chavez ...

But was that really Castro, or was it colorized, bedside footage of Family Affairs' Mr. French?

The Anti-War Rally Altercation

2007-01-31T06:36:00.000-05:00

Have you been following the story about the altercation between a military vet and anti-war protesters this past weekend? According to Alternet.org's Dave Johnson:

The media interest surrounding Private Joshua Sparling's claim that he was spit at during the Washington, DC protest merits skepticism considering that his previous claims of victimhood have turned out inaccurate, and that he's been a frequent associate of right-wing figures such as Sean Hannity and Oliver North.

... In December, 2005, as reported on the Fox news show Fox & Friends Sparling supposedly received a Christmas card with a death threat Sparling claimed not to have kept the envelope, just the note inside.

Sparling also appeared on right-wing radio host Sean Hannity's radio show to talk about this incident. It later turned out the Christmas card death threat was sent by a white supremacist.
Sparling also found fame as a featured Republican guest at the 2006 State of the Union address, introduced by the GOP representative from his home district ...

When the Prez Said the "Democrat Majority"

2007-01-30T07:06:00.000-05:00

Many Dems were pissed when President Bush referred in his SOTU address to the "Democrat majority" in Congress, even though his prepared text read "Democratic majority." Bush was asked about this in his Monday interview with NPR's Juan Williams, and this was his reply:

PRESIDENT BUSH: "Yeah. Well, that was an oversight then. I mean, I'm not trying to needle. Look, I went into the hall saying we can work together and I was very sincere about it. I didn't even know I did it."

Our president is such a verbal blunderhead that I'm inclined to believe him.

Juan Williams Gets It Wrong

2007-01-30T06:57:00.000-05:00

It makes me wonder if Juan Williams has spent too much time working as a Fox News commentator when he is this wrong about the facts. This was one of the questions that Williams asked President Bush during his exclusive interview with President Bush yesterday:

WILLIAMS: "One last thing, Mr. President, with the Democrats. You asked the Democrats on a bipartisan basis to form an advisory council and monitor the war, work with you. They haven't responded at all. What do you take from that?"

Not true. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid responded promptly with a joint letter to Bush on Jan. 19.

Excerpts of the Pelosi-Reid letter:

We believe that Congress already has bipartisan structures in place, like the committee system and other Congressional working groups such as the Senate’s National Security Working Group, that could produce the result you described in your speech.

We look forward to working with you within these existing structures, in a bipartisan and fully consultative way, to make progress on efforts against terrorism and other important matters.

Is "Brownie" NYC's School Transportation Director?

2007-01-30T06:43:00.000-05:00

I'm beginning to wonder after reading this N.Y. Times article:

George A. Bonanno, a Manhattan professor, was startled to learn that under New York City’s new school bus routes that took effect today he would have to deposit his two children at separate bus stops about a mile apart, at different times, only so they could be ferried to the same elementary school.

... Parents throughout the city offered up similar tales today, complaining of chaos, confusion, crowding and lateness.

... In Queens this morning, a group of parents who had received conflicting messages about whether their children would continue to receive school bus service staged a news conference at their bus stop; three city council members showed up, but the bus never did.

In Brooklyn, a bus to a middle school for gifted children was so crammed that some students were forced to stand in the aisle; one of them clocked Isabella Cipriano, 11, in the face with his book bag.

... The changed routes were the New York City Department of Education’s latest effort to cut costs; earlier this school year, officials said they hoped to save $20 million by consolidating routes.

Fomenting Genocide Has Its Penalties

2007-01-29T15:13:00.000-05:00

The president of Sudan had been promised the chairmanship of the African Union, but today officials of the 53-member confederation voted to pass him over and, instead, name Ghana's president, John Kufuor, as its chairman.

Given what has transpired in Darfur, it would have added insult to injury to give this role to Sudan's leader.

D'Souza Tries to Backpedal

2007-01-29T10:52:00.000-05:00

Taking a page from Jerry Falwell's playbook, conservative writer Dinesh D’Souza argues in his new book that the cultural liberalism in America deserves some of the blame for the 9/11 attacks.

D'Souza believes the negative reaction to his argument has been “a little hysterical.” But the Carpetbagger Report wonders in this post "what kind of response D’Souza expected" to his ridiculous argument.

In Serbia, They Prefer Their Fatalism Well Done

2007-01-29T10:32:00.000-05:00

In this portrait of two Serbian towns whose textile industry has collapsed, Nicholas Wood reminds us that the Slavs are an undaunted, resilient and optimistic people. Wood quotes a resident of one of the dying towns:

“This is the Balkans,” said a forlorn Ljubisa Svetanovic, 55, who lives in Babicko. “God has said good night. Life stopped here a long time ago.”

The books of Norman Vincent Peale must not be read widely in Serbia.

Guess Who's Citing Wikipedia?

2007-01-29T10:06:00.000-05:00

As it turns out, a lot of judges. According to today's N.Y. Times:

When a court-appointed special master last year rejected the claim of an Alabama couple that their daughter had suffered seizures after a vaccination, she explained her decision in part by referring to material from articles in Wikipedia, the collaborative online encyclopedia.

The reaction from the court above her, the United States Court of Federal Claims, was direct: the materials “culled from the Internet do not — at least on their face — meet” standards of reliability. The court reversed her decision.

However:

A simple search of published court decisions shows that Wikipedia is frequently cited by judges around the country, involving serious issues and the bizarre — such as a 2005 tax case before the Tennessee Court of Appeals concerning the definition of “beverage” that involved hundreds of thousands of dollars ...

[Judge Richard A. Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit] recently cited a Wikipedia article on Andrew Golota, whom he called the “world’s most colorful boxer,” about a drug case involving the fighter’s former trainer, a tangent with no connection to the issues before his court.

[Posner] did so despite his own experience with Wikipedia, which included an erroneous mention of Ann Coulter, a conservative lightning rod, as being a former clerk of his.

“I have never met Ann Coulter,” he said, but added that he was heartened that the friend who spotted the error could fix it then and there.

The New Shame of New Orleans

2007-01-26T07:58:00.000-05:00

President Bush didn't mention the city of New Orleans even once in his SOTU address. Perhaps there's a good reason why he didn't.

First, some quick background. In the year after Hurricane Katrina, 34 New Orleans public schools were taken over by the state-run Recovery School District (RSD). Due to poor planning and a dumb decision to fire virtually all teachers, the RSD has not been able to recruit enough teachers to fill classrooms and teach kids.

By the start of December, the RSD schools were still 45 teachers short of what they needed.

Could things get any worse? The sad answer is "yes." As Matt at the NCLBlog explains, the New Orleans public schools are literally turning children away.

Several GOP Senators Leave to Open Shoe Store

2007-01-25T08:31:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 12-9 to approve a resolution calling President Bush's plans to increase U.S. troops in Iraq "not in the national interest."

Voting on the resolution was basically along party lines — Senator Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) was the lone Republican who supported the resolution. Perhaps Hagel sensed that some of his GOP colleagues also believed that Bush's plan is misguided, but were too gutless to actually vote that way.

In his remarks during the debate, Hagel offered this advice for his politically nervous colleagues:

"Why are you elected? If you wanted a 'safe' job, go sell shoes."

Fair and Balanced, and Remarkably Unchanged

2007-01-25T08:23:00.000-05:00

Last night on the Daily Show, host Jon Stewart noted that Fox News gave its viewers a chance to rate President Bush's SOTU address. The final numbers — 85% of Fox News' viewers rated Bush's speech "excellent," 4% of them rated it "average" and 10% rated it "poor."

I would have expected a majority of the network's viewers to rate the SOTU "excellent," but 85%? "Those are Stalin (approval) numbers," Stewart jokingly told his viewers.

It's hard to believe that even Fox News viewers are that conservative.

The most bizarre thing, Stewart said, was the fact that the percentages — tracked "live" by Fox News on the bottom of the TV screen — remained virtually unchanged all night long. The numbers only changed when the "excellent" percentage climbed slightly from 84% to 85%.

Boehner: 60-90 Days to See If "Surge" Works

2007-01-25T08:09:00.000-05:00

Courtesy of The Carpetbagger Report, I learned that House Minority Leader John Boehner has told CNN he's willing to give Bush's "surge" plan in Iraq three months. Boehner told CNN:

"I think it'll be rather clear in the next sixty to ninety days as to whether this plan's going to work."

Boehner didn't say exactly what he would do if the "surge" happens and 90 days go by with no genuine progress.