Stop In The NameOf The Lord!

I still don't get what he was doing wrong.

A teenager carrying a Bible and shouting "I want Jesus" was shot twice with a police stun gun and later died at a St. Louis hospital, authorities said. In a statement obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press, police in Jerseyville, about 40 miles north of St. Louis, said 17-year-old Roger Holyfield would not acknowledge officers who approached him and he continued yelling, "I want Jesus." Police tried to calm the teen, but Holyfield became combative, according to the statement. Officers fired the stun gun at him after he ignored their warnings, then fired again when he continued struggling, police said. Holyfield was flown to St. Louis' Cardinal Glennon Hospital after the confrontation Saturday; he died there Sunday, police said. An autopsy was planned for Tuesday. The statement expressed sympathy to Holyfield's family but said city and police officials would not discuss the matter further.

Would That He Could

I don't even want to mention the "big fat idiot's" name in this post but only someone from the pits of hell would make the comments that he did. Further, it defies all logic and common sense that a person who has a disease which hampers control of one's body movements could "fake" said movements.

Actor Michael J. Fox on Thursday defended political ads he filmed for candidates who support stem cell research ahead of tight congressional elections, saying he did not want to be pitied because he suffers from Parkinson's disease.


Stark campaign ads in which Fox's body jerked uncontrollably were criticized by conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh, who accused Fox of acting or deliberately not taking his medication.


Fox responded to Limbaugh in an interview with CBS, saying: "He used the word victim and on another occasion used the word pitiable. Understand that nobody in this position wants pity.


"We don't want pity. I could give a damn about Rush Limbaugh's pity or anyone else's pity. I'm not a victim," said Fox, who twitched and rocked throughout the interview.


The 45-year-old actor, best known for his roles in "Back to the Future" films and "Family Ties" sitcom, dismissed the claim that he exaggerated his symptoms.


"The notion that you could calculate for effect ... People out there with Parkinson's are going, would that we could."


Fox, who was diagnosed with the debilitating disease in 1991, said the tremors could result from a lack of, or too much of, the medication many Parkinson's sufferers take to allow them greater mobility.

I Think I'll Pass

Truly pass!

Update: More on this ridiculous site.

Wow!

I don't know what to say.

A pee-wee football game between Hudson and Shaker Heights turned into a lesson on racism.

Shaker parents say that Hudson fans, took their team spirit too far. They say those fans became offensive, even racist, because they wore black face and afro wigs.

The parents also claim the Hudson fans beat on frying pans on the sidelines.

Some of the kids on the Shaker team even say they used racial slurs.

It was supposed to be about fun building skills and teamwork. To the seven eight and nine year olds on the Shaker team, the game ended up being about our country's racist past.

"They were calling us "n”s -- the "n" word," is what one nine year old said.

"They shouldn't say that to other people because they don't know what it means to us,” another player said.

The racial slur was enough to bother these kids but it wasn't all they faced on the field. There were Hudson fans dressed in black face.

“I can't really imagine any analysis that would allow them to say it's OK to dress kids in black face and put black wigs on and bang frying pans," coach Jeffrey Saffold said.

“For them to expose their opponents to fans with afros and black face, that's not what we bought into,” another coach, Gregory Alexander said. "One of the things that makes it so bad is it was allowed to continue."

Little kids cannot even play ball without this kind of ignorance?

Mind Your Babies

I don't even know what to say. This is in the UK but we have tasteless types here in America. I don't understand who would think this was a good idea.

Tesco has been forced to remove a pole-dancing kit from the toys and games section of its website after it was accused of "destroying children's innocence".

The Tesco Direct site advertises the kit with the words, "Unleash the sex kitten inside...simply extend the Peekaboo pole inside the tube, slip on the sexy tunes and away you go!

"Soon you'll be flaunting it to the world and earning a fortune in Peekaboo Dance Dollars".

The £49.97 kit comprises a chrome pole extendible to 8ft 6ins, a 'sexy dance garter' and a DVD demonstrating suggestive dance moves.

The kit, condemned as 'extremely dangerous' by family campaigners yesterday, was discovered by mother of two Karen Gallimore who was searching for Christmas gifts for her two daughters, Laura 10, and Sarah, 11.

Mrs Gallimore, 33, of Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, said yesterday: "I'm no prude, but any children can go on there and see it. It's just not on."

Dr Adrian Rogers, of family campaigning group Family Focus said yesterday that the kit would "destroy children's lives".

All Of The Freedom We Are Spreading

Women aren't faring well.

Women are facing increasing violence in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia, especially when they speak out publicly to defend women's rights, a senior U.N. official told the U.N. Security Council.

Noeleen Heyzer, executive director of the U.N. Development Fund for Women, called on for fresh efforts to ensure the safety of women in countries emerging from conflicts, to provide them with jobs, and ensure that they receive justice, including compensation for rape.

"What UNIFEM is seeing on the ground - in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia - is that public space for women in these situations is shrinking," Heyzer said Thursday. "Women are becoming assassination targets when they dare defend women's rights in public decision-making."

Heyzer spoke at a daylong open council meeting on implementation of a 2000 resolution that called for women to be included in decision-making positions at every level of striking and building on peace deals. It also called for the prosecution of crimes against women and increased protection of women and girls during war.

Why Partitioning Iraq Would Be A Bad Idea

This is why. No matter what the region, too many of the cities are mixed. If the signs of ethnic cleansing are appearing now, think of what would happen if they split up Iraq.

The place was empty when U.S. soldiers burst in, raiding a house in Baghdad's violent Washash neighborhood in the hopes of finding killers involved in sectarian murders. By the look of things, no one had been there for some time, even though neighbors in the area reported seeing people dragged inside in recent weeks. But apparently someone involved in the area's sectarian violence had been there recently: left behind was a leather-bound day planner that gave a disturbing picture of the systematic nature of Baghdad's bloodshed.

Though the book was largely blank, inside were several sheets of loose paper covered in Arabic writing. Back at Camp Taji, a massive U.S. Army base north of Baghdad, translators sifted through the papers and found evidence backing up what some U.S.troops who patrol Washash have come to suspect — that Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army are conducting what amounts to an ethnic cleansing campaign in Washash, a predominantly Shi'ite area with pockets of Sunni residents.

Sadr's militia, the document suggests, are systematically driving Sunni families from their homes around Washash, which some U.S. troops who patrol there have taken to calling Little Sadr City. Among the papers found in the raid is a list of 65 houses around Washash where Shi'ite families have replaced Sunni families. On other pages were drafts of threat letters clearly intended for delivery to Sunni homes. And there was a roster of "virtuous families" in the Washash area with house numbers written next to their names, so the militia relocation agents could keep track of people deemed fit to stay.

"They're very well organized," said Capt. Johnny Sutton, whose tro

Saddam didn't have these kinds of problems!

No You Back Off!

... and stop lying!

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Thursday that anyone demanding deadlines for progress in Iraq should "just back off," because it is too difficult to predict when Iraqis will resume control of their country.

During an often-combative Pentagon news conference, Rumsfeld said that while benchmarks for security, political and economic progress are valuable, "it's difficult. We're looking out into the future. No one can predict the future with absolute certainty."

He said the goals have no specific deadlines or consequences if they are not met by specific dates.

"You're looking for some sort of a guillotine to come falling down if some date isn't met," Rumsfeld told reporters. "That is not what this is about."

And The Bunny Ain't Even Cute

Some people think the ad is racist. Some think it is funny. More than anything, I think it is just plain cheesy.

With their majority in the Senate potentially hanging in the balance, Republicans were bickering among themselves over an advertisement in the particularly nasty campaign in Tennessee that even some Republicans have denounced as racist.

The dispute pitted former Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker, the GOP candidate for the seat held by Senate Republican leader Bill Frist, against his own party leadership Tuesday after it rebuffed his call to pull the ad, which lampoons Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr.’s reputation as a man about town.

In the ad, a young white actress playing the stereotype of a “dumb blonde” talks about meeting Ford, a 36-year-old bachelor who is black, “at the Playboy party.” At the end of the ad, she winks and says to the camera, “Harold — call me.”

The ad brought immediate criticism from the Ford campaign and the NAACP, whose Washington office called it “a powerful innuendo that plays to pre-existing prejudices about African-American men and white women.”

I also think it was specifically designed to create racial imagery that will appeal to the lowest common denominator. Harold Ford's double high yella looks probably don't exactly have the same impact though. You'd need a much bigger, blacker "buck" for that. Besides, that "Playboy Bunny" is straight up ugly! She doesn't have "the look."

Watch the video.

Can't Eat Just One

That nasty little pervert priest who molested Congressman Mark Foley, as expected, has another accuser.

Another former altar boy says he was sexually abused in the 1970s by the same retired Catholic priest who acknowledged fondling former Rep. Mark Foley when Foley was a teenager, the man’s attorney said Wednesday. The new allegations against the Rev. Anthony Mercieca were made by a man who lived in North Miami and was an altar boy at St. James Catholic Church, where Mercieca worked, attorney Jeffrey Herman said. Herman said he planned to file a lawsuit Wednesday against the Archdiocese of Miami. His client, now 40 and identified in the lawsuit only as John Doe No. 26, says Mercieca abused him when he was about 12 years old.

There are always more ...

One For Me. One For You.

I don't know why people act like this is such a surprise.

A BLACK mother with a white husband has given birth to twin girls of different colours in a million-to-one medical miracle.

In what is believed to be an Australian first, mum Natasha Knight, 35, of Jamaican-English heritage, and father Michael Singerl, 34, of German heritage, conceived the girls, one black and one white, naturally.

The couple also has a five-year-old daughter Taylah, who is blue-eyed with blonde hair and a light olive complexion.

The twins, Alicia and Jasmin, were born in Queensland's Caboolture Hospital in May.

Experts say the chance of twins being born with such different physical characteristics is about a million to one.

Ms Knight said she was shocked when she saw how different her daughters were.

"When they were born you could see there was a colour difference straight away. We couldn't believe it,'' she said.

"Alicia's eyes were brown and her hair was dark. Jasmin's eyes were blue and her hair was white - you could hardly see her hair or her eyebrows.

"We were joking when I was pregnant about what if one baby looked like me and one looked like Michael. We joked about one light one, one dark one, so it was amazing when it actually happened.''

That Must Have Been Some Debate!

Unhinged!

Republican Representative Barbara Cubin (R-Wyoming) threatened to slap
her libertarian challenger after a debate. That candidate, Thomas
Rankin, has multiple sclerosis and uses a wheelchair.

"My aide and I were packing up to leave the debate, and Barbara walked over to me and said, 'If you weren't sitting in that chair, I'd slap you across the face.' That's quote-unquote," Rankin said.

Rankin
said several people witnessed the exchange, although he wouldn't name
them, and that he was getting phone calls about it before he got home
Sunday night. The story was first reported Monday night on the Casper
Star-Tribune's Web site.

No Girls ... And They Mean It!

The Catholic Church is no better but here is some good old Southern Baptist sexism.

A local Baptist association voted 204 to 44 to remove Hillcrest Baptist Church as a member of its body of Southern Baptist congregations because of its decision to hire a woman pastor.

The Oct. 19 vote by the Mobile Baptist Association affirmed a recommendation from two committees that urged association members to "accept Hillcrest Baptist Church's decision to differ with the guidelines for affiliation by voting for disaffiliation."

At issue was Hillcrest's move earlier this year to hire the Rev. Ellen Sims, who was ordained through the American Baptist Churches USA. Hillcrest Baptist Church has ties to the Southern Baptist Convention, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and, until Thursday's vote, the Mobile Baptist Association.

Neither Sims, who serves as associate pastor, nor Hillcrest's pastor, Dudley Wilson, addressed the hundreds gathered for the session. Before the vote, however, a representative from Hillcrest told the delegates that the congregation would accept their decision in the matter.

While several Protestant denominations -- including some Baptist organizations -- welcome women to serve as pastors, Southern Baptists'
statement of faith stipulates that "the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture."

Not Exactly A Good Time To Visit

Why does this sound odd to me? As dangerous as Iraq is - Baghdad in particular - why would you go calling on family knowing that almost everyone is a target?

A U.S. soldier who went missing on Monday was kidnapped by masked gunmen while visiting a relative's house in Baghdad outside the heavily-fortified Green Zone compound, the U.S. military said on Tuesday.

It said the soldier, a linguist assigned to a reconstruction team, was handcuffed and forced into a vehicle.

The soldier was reported missing on Monday and was last seen the same afternoon at the Green Zone, which houses government offices, foreign embassies and U.S. military forces.

The soldier was not named but a U.S. Army official in Washington said the man was an American citizen of Iraqi descent.

"He was reportedly at a relative's house at the time of the abduction when three cars pulled up to the residence. The men, who were described to have dark colored rags over their noses and mouths, handcuffed the soldier and forced him into one of the vehicles," the military said in a statement.

It said the kidnappers had contacted the soldier's relatives using his cellphone.

Will It Be The Bradley Effect In Tennessee?

I think Harold Ford is a slick dude from a family of Politicians. He's no Obama but that doesn't mean that I wouldn't like to see him be the first black Senator from the south since reconstruction (doesn't that sound crazy). Unfortunately, I think this assessment may be correct. Folks may lcorrect.

Is Harold Ford Jr. really doing as well as the polls suggest? Is he conceivably on his way to becoming the first black Southern senator since Reconstruction? The answer may well be yes, but Ford can hardly take that for granted. As black candidates reaching out to largely white constituencies have discovered in the past, when it comes to measuring political popularity there are lies, damned lies—and polls, on which they rest their fate at their peril.

The phenomenon was first widely noted in 1982, when Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley lost a squeaker of a race for governor after being widely projected as the winner. Douglas Wilder also came up against the "Bradley Effect" when he barely won the 1989 contest for governor of Virginia, after leading comfortably in the polls.

Ronald Walters of the University of Maryland was at Wilder's hotel as a projected easy victory turned into a nail-biter. That is a night "I'll never forget," says Walters, who thinks it "naive" to believe that things have changed very much. He believes that some percentage of whites—perhaps 5 percent or so, intent on being seen as less biased than they may be—will claim to support a nonwhite candidate when they actually do not.

Call Lies Lies

The man said call a spade a spade.

Ray McGovern has seen the inner workings of the intelligence world and believes the United States is in desperate need of rediscovering its morality.


Former CIA analyst Ray McGovern speaks at Lancaster Church of the Brethren Sunday. (Intelligencer Journal Photo/Dan Marschka)
The former CIA intelligence officer and Iraq War critic addressed the audience at Lancaster Church of the Brethren Sunday afternoon as the feature speaker at the Lancaster Interchurch Peace Witness Fall Forum.

His speech, "Prospects for a Moral U.S. Policy in the Middle East," focused on the ethical dilemmas facing the American public and lawmakers and ways to use faith to point the country's moral compass back in the right direction.

McGovern's group, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, has spent the last three years lobbying the Bush administration to admit to what it calls the "lies" that led to the Iraq War.

He said the current presidential administration is in need of a "sanity check," a term he said goes back to his days at the CIA, when analysts consulted with each other to find the truth.

"Prevarication, disingenuousness, untruthfulness -- they won't do anymore," McGovern said. "We need to call lies 'lies.'"

Foley: Dirty Old Man

That's what he would be called if he was after young girls. It's creepy either way.

After interviewing some 40 former congressional pages, FBI agents have yet to turn up any evidence of direct sexual contact between underage pages and former Congressman Mark Foley.

Instead, according to law enforcement officials and several former pages, a pattern is emerging of seduction by Foley that began when the boys were 16 and 17. In cases where actual sex followed, it was not until the boys were at the legal age of 18.

"He spotted me when I was a page and set the hook while I was still in high school," one former page told ABC News. "He didn't reel me in until he showed up at my college campus on a congressional visit. We had sex," said the page, who has been interviewed by the FBI.

"As someone who wrote many of the laws, he presumably knew exactly what he could get away with," said one law enforcement official.

As the former co-chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, he helped enact laws that toughened penalties on Internet predators and resulted in more FBI agents assigned to Internet sex crimes.

Throughout the lurid instant messages Foley sent to current and former pages, there are repeated references to waiting until the young men are 18.

The Man Is Out Of Control!

As if we don't have enough on our plate, this idiot now wants to control space?

George Bush has staked out a bold claim to the final frontier, asserting vigorously America's right to deny access to space to any adversary hostile to US interests, it emerged yesterday.

In a muscular overhaul of policy, the US president outlines the importance of space to the national interest, saying its domination is as crucial to America's defences as air or sea power.

The order also opposes the establishment of arms control treaties that would restrict US access to space, or set limits on its use of space. It calls for the development of space capabilities to support US intelligence and defence initiatives.

The document, first reported in yesterday's Washington Post, amounted to the first overhaul of US space policy in nearly a decade, but it comes two years after the publication of an air force doctrine on protecting US satellites and spacecraft. The defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, has also favoured the development of systems to protect satellites and space stations.

"The United States will preserve its rights, capabilities, and freedom of action in space; dissuade or deter others from either impeding those rights or developing capabilities intended to do so; take actions necessary to protect its space capabilities; respond to interference; and deny, if necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities hostile to US national interests," the strategy says.

The Man Is A Fool!

He uses "the Google." Would that be "the Google" on "the Internets?
ROTFL!

HOST: I’m curious, have you ever googled anybody? Do you use Google?

BUSH: Occasionally. One of the things I’ve used on the Google is to pull up maps. It’s very interesting to see — I’ve forgot the name of the program — but you get the satellite, and you can — like, I kinda like to look at the ranch. It remind me of where I wanna be sometimes.

It's A Crying Shame

Truly. It's almost perverse for something to this popular.

The second season finale of VH1's wildly popular "Flavor of Love" drew a staggering 7.5 million viewers this past Sunday (October 15), making it the #1 non-sports telecast in all of basic cable for the entire year.

The finale, which was VH1's highest-rated telecast, scored an 18 rating/34 share among black adults aged 18-49, meaning one out of every three African Americans who watched TV on Sunday at 10 pm, were watching "Flavor of Love".

"Flavor Of Love," which debuted in 2005, put Public Enemy hypeman Flavor Flav in a house with 20 women to pick out his true love. On Sunday's finale, Flav picked Deelishis (born London Charles) over New York (born Tiffany Patterson), who he rejected in the show's first season.

The Company They Keep

George Allen can't catch a break!

It's nothing but tsuris for Senator Macaca-witz these days. George Allen, the newly Jewish and allegedly racist senator from Virginia, was supposed to skate to a re-election victory next month and promptly start posturing toward the White House; instead, owing to a series of colossal campaign missteps, he's locked in a dead heat with Democratic candidate Jim Webb.

And now comes word that among the conservative Allen's campaign contributors is, according to recently filed court documents, a porn-loving, adulterous, abusive drunk who likes to advertise on Craig's List for three-ways and anal sex and takes naked pictures of himself standing at attention.

The contributor in question is Craig T. Schelske, the latest sanctimonious Christian Republican to be outed as a wannabe Rick James. Schelske is the husband and former manager to Nashville singer and Dancing With the Stars contestant Sara Evans. He is also a failed Republican congressional candidate, the executive director of American Destiny, which seeks to teach children about "the role of God and Christianity in America's story," and chairman of CRAIGPAC, a vanity political action committee that gives to Republican candidates.

If They'd Listened

That seems to be a common theme with this administration. They don't listen to people who know what they are talking about.

There have been growing signs in recent days of mounting strain between Washington and the wobbly government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who felt compelled during a conversation with President Bush this week to seek his assurances that the Americans were not going to dump him.

Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari on Wednesday blamed American officials who ran Iraq before its own government took nominal control for bringing the country to the present state of chaos.

"Had our friends listened to us, we would not be where we are today," Zebari said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Asked which friends he was referring to, Zebari said:

"The Americans, the Coalition (Provision Authority), the British. OK? Because they didn't listen to us. The did exactly what they wanted to do. ... Had they listened to us, we would have been someplace else (by now), really."

Crazy Black Republicans

First Michael Steele of Maryland is running around with Mike Tyson as though it is going to buy him some black votes. Now it appears that Ken Blackwell from Ohio thinks because he stole the election for Bush he can steal his his own.

Voters in Ohio can be forgiven if they feel they have been beamed out of the Midwest and dropped into a third-world autocracy. The latest news from the state’s governor’s race is that the Republican nominee, Kenneth Blackwell, who is also the Ohio secretary of state, could rule that his opponent is ineligible to run because of a technicality. We’d like to think that his office would not ultimately do that, or that if it did, such a ruling would not be allowed to stand. But the mere fact that an elected official and political candidate has the authority to toss his opponent out of a race is further evidence of a serious flaw in our democracy.

Ted Strickland, the Democratic nominee, is leading Mr. Blackwell by as much as 28 points, according to one recent poll. In their panic, some Blackwell supporters have hit on the idea of trying to prevent the election from occurring. One of them filed a complaint alleging that Mr. Strickland, who is a member of Congress, does not live in the apartment where he is registered to vote. Mr. Strickland owns a condominium in another part of Ohio, and the complaint alleges that he actually lives there. If Mr. Strickland was not a qualified voter, he would be prohibited from running for governor.

The complaint itself is without merit. No one disputes that Mr. Strickland lives in Ohio, or that he is registered. The only issue is which of his two homes he chose to register from, and the law gives voters with multiple homes broad discretion in choosing among them.

What is more interesting, and troubling, is the way the complaint is proceeding. The county board that heard it broke down 2 to 2, on party lines, about whether to hold a hearing. In the case of a tie vote at the county level, complaints like these get forwarded to the secretary of state’s office to be resolved. Mr. Blackwell says he has designated his assistant secretary to handle duties that could conflict with his candidacy. But passing these matters on to a subordinate who is a political ally and owes his job to the candidate hardly removes the conflict.

What's The Bigger Tragedy?

Mike Tyson saying that he wants to box a chick?

Mike Tyson said fans should not expect much of a fight when he steps back into the ring.

But the 40-year-old former heavyweight champ promised an entertaining show Friday night when he launches the "Mike Tyson's World Tour" in Youngstown.

At a news conference at an Italian restaurant, Tyson said he would likely go just four rounds and that future stops on the tour might include bouts with women, possibly professional boxer Ann Wolfe.

Wolfe, from Waco, Texas, is 21-1 with 15 knockouts.

"She's such a prominent, dominant woman in the boxing field," Tyson said.

When asked if he was joking about fighting women, Tyson said, "I'm very serious."

Or Michael Steel and company actually thinking that an endorsement by Mike Tyson would attract any sane black voters? The only blacks likely to be influenced by Mike are probably behind bars.

At the press conference, Tyson posed for photos with fans, signed autographs and campaigned for Maryland U.S. Senate candidate Michael Steele.

Tyson, wearing a white and blue Steele for U.S. Senate T-shirt, said he used to believe black Republicans were "sellouts." But Tyson said he changed his mind after researching the Maryland lieutenant governor.

"We have to open our eyes more," Tyson said, as he pointed to his T-shirt.

(A little birdie told me that Tyson's ex-wife is Michael Steele's half sister. Somebody needs to tell Steele that there are some family members that need to be kept under wraps).

OMG! No Shame and No Honesty!

This scares me. They are playing to the base and lying like nobody's tomorrow. There are a lot of stupid people out there. They listen to the Hannities and Limbaughs on radio. Bush and Cheney lie with impunity.

CHENEY: Well, I think there’s some natural level of concern out there because in fact, you know, it wasn’t over instantaneously. It’s been a little over three years now since we went into Iraq, so I don’t think it’s surprising that people are concerned.

On the other hand, this government has only been in office about five months, five or six months now. They’re off to a good start. It is difficult, no question about it, but we’ve now got over 300,000 Iraqis trained and equipped as part of their security forces. They’ve had three national elections with higher turnout than we have here in the United States. If you look at the general overall situation, they’re doing remarkably well.

It’s still very, very difficult, very tough. Nobody should underestimate the extent to which we’re engaged there with this sort of, at present, the “major front” of the war on terror. That’s what Osama bin Laden says, and he’s right.

How Did We Let This Happen?

This is not just about suspected "terrorists." This could be you!

 "The bill I sign today helps secure this country and it sends a clear message: This nation is patient and decent and fair and we will never back down from threats to our freedom," Bush said. "We are as determined today as we were on the morning of Sept. 12, 2001."
    Many Democrats opposed the legislation because they said it eliminated rights of defendants considered fundamental to American values, such as a person’s ability to go to court to protest their detention and the use of coerced testimony as evidence. Bush acknowledged that the law came amid dispute.
    "Over the past few months, the debate over this bill has been heated and the questions raised can seem complex," he said. "Yet, with the distance of history, the questions will be narrowed and few. Did this generation of Americans take the threat seriously? And did we do what it takes to defeat that threat?"
    The American Civil Liberties Union said the new law is "one of the worst civil liberties measures ever enacted in American history."
    "The president can now, with the approval of Congress, indefinitely hold people without charge, take away protections against horrific abuse, put people on trial based on hearsay evidence, authorize trials that can sentence people to death based on testimony literally beaten out of witnesses, and slam shut the courthouse door for habeas petitions," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero.
    "Nothing could be further from the American values we all hold in our hearts than the Military Commissions Act," he said.
    The swift implementation of the law is a rare bit of good news for Bush as casualties mount in Iraq in daily violence. Lawmakers are increasingly calling for a change of strategy and political anxieties are jeopardizing Republican’s chances of hanging onto control of Congress.
    Bush needed the legislation because the Supreme Court in June said the administration’s plan for trying detainees in military tribunals violated U.S. and international law.
    The legislation, which sets the rules for court proceedings, applies to those selected by the military for prosecution and leaves mostly unaffected the majority of the 14,000 prisoners in U.S. custody, most of whom are in Iraq.

War On Women

I am just going to post the WHOLE story here. We can point our fingers at other countries but we aren't too far removed.

“Who needs a brain when you have these?”

— message on an Abercrombie & Fitch T-shirt for young women

In the recent shootings at an Amish schoolhouse in rural Pennsylvania and a large public high school in Colorado, the killers went out of their way to separate the girls from the boys, and then deliberately attacked only the girls.

Ten girls were shot and five killed at the Amish school. One girl was killed and a number of others were molested in the Colorado attack.

In the widespread coverage that followed these crimes, very little was made of the fact that only girls were targeted. Imagine if a gunman had gone into a school, separated the kids up on the basis of race or religion, and then shot only the black kids. Or only the white kids. Or only the Jews.

There would have been thunderous outrage. The country would have first recoiled in horror, and then mobilized in an effort to eradicate that kind of murderous bigotry. There would have been calls for action and reflection. And the attack would have been seen for what it really was: a hate crime.

None of that occurred because these were just girls, and we have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that violence against females is more or less to be expected. Stories about the rape, murder and mutilation of women and girls are staples of the news, as familiar to us as weather forecasts. The startling aspect of the Pennsylvania attack was that this terrible thing happened at a school in Amish country, not that it happened to girls.

The disrespectful, degrading, contemptuous treatment of women is so pervasive and so mainstream that it has just about lost its ability to shock. Guys at sporting events and other public venues have shown no qualms about raising an insistent chant to nearby women to show their breasts. An ad for a major long-distance telephone carrier shows three apparently naked women holding a billing statement from a competitor. The text asks, “When was the last time you got screwed?”

An ad for Clinique moisturizing lotion shows a woman’s face with the lotion spattered across it to simulate the climactic shot of a porn video.

We have a problem. Staggering amounts of violence are unleashed on women every day, and there is no escaping the fact that in the most sensational stories, large segments of the population are titillated by that violence. We’ve been watching the sexualized image of the murdered 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey for 10 years. JonBenet is dead. Her mother is dead. And we’re still watching the video of this poor child prancing in lipstick and high heels.

What have we learned since then? That there’s big money to be made from thongs, spandex tops and sexy makeovers for little girls. In a misogynistic culture, it’s never too early to drill into the minds of girls that what really matters is their appearance and their ability to please men sexually.

A girl or woman is sexually assaulted every couple of minutes or so in the U.S. The number of seriously battered wives and girlfriends is far beyond the ability of any agency to count. We’re all implicated in this carnage because the relentless violence against women and girls is linked at its core to the wider society’s casual willingness to dehumanize women and girls, to see them first and foremost as sexual vessels — objects — and never, ever as the equals of men.

“Once you dehumanize somebody, everything is possible,” said Taina Bien-Aimé, executive director of the women’s advocacy group Equality Now.

That was never clearer than in some of the extreme forms of pornography that have spread like nuclear waste across mainstream America. Forget the embarrassed, inhibited raincoat crowd of the old days. Now Mr. Solid Citizen can come home, log on to this $7 billion mega-industry and get his kicks watching real women being beaten and sexually assaulted on Web sites with names like “Ravished Bride” and “Rough Sex — Where Whores Get Owned.”

Then, of course, there’s gangsta rap, and the video games where the players themselves get to maul and molest women, the rise of pimp culture (the Academy Award-winning song this year was “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp”), and on and on.

You’re deluded if you think this is all about fun and games. It’s all part of a devastating continuum of misogyny that at its farthest extreme touches down in places like the one-room Amish schoolhouse in normally quiet Nickel Mines, Pa.

What?

ROTFL! Please stop making me laugh!

Responding to news that the homes of Rep. Curt Weldon's daughter and a close friend have been raided by the FBI, a poster on the conservative Free Republic comments:

"It is now obvious that the FBI is an arm of the Democratic Party. It is almost as if they are attempting to disrupt the '06 elections."

Why Did It Take So Long?

It's pathetic that partisanship trumped good sense for far longer than it should have. I don't know what Bush is going to do now that so many people are speaking out against his policy on Iraq. They are starting to back him into a corner now. I wonder if he will snap.

Two leading Republican senators called Sunday for a new strategy in Iraq, saying the situation in getting worse and leaving the United States with few options.

Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and John Warner of Virginia are part of the growing list of Republicans who are speaking out against President Bush's current plan for Iraq as U.S. casualties rise.

"The American people are not going to continue to support, sustain a policy that puts American troops in the middle of a civil war," Hagel said on CNN's "Late Edition."

Hagel said he agreed with Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who said after a recent visit to Iraq that Iraq was "drifting sideways." Warner has urged consideration of a change of course if the Iraq government fails to restore order over the next two months or three months.

Warner said Sunday he stands by that assessment, and even in the week since his trip to Iraq, there has been an "exponential increase in the killings and the savagery that's going on over there."

"You can see some movement forward, but a lot of movement back," Warner said on "Face the Nation" on CBS. "We have to rethink all the options, except any option which says we precipitously pull out, which would let that country fall into a certain civil war at that time, and all of the neighboring countries would be destabilized."

Bush told reporters last week that he invites a change in strategy if the plan isn't working. But he also said the U.S. will not leave until the job is done.

Hagel said it is time to change course, but "our options are limited."

"We need to find a new strategy, a way out of Iraq, because the entire Middle East is more combustible than it's been probably since 1948, and more dangerous," Hagel said. "And we're in the middle of it."

They're right. The options are limited. I really have no idea what we can do to make it better.

We Lose Again

Our International clout is all but gone.

After five days of diplomatic wrangling at the U.N., not much has changed as a result of North Korea's nuclear "test." The Security Council finally voted on Saturday to impose sanctions on North Korea for testing a nuclear weapon. But the reason it took the Security Council this long to respond to last Monday's blast is that sharp disagreements persist among the major players over the strength of those sanctions, how they should be implemented, and what should happen next.

The U.S. and Japan have taken the lead in pushing for tough measures that would squeeze North Korea by enforcing a wide-ranging embargo, requiring that shipping entering and leaving North Korean waters be subject to search under threat of force. Japan has already instituted tough measures curbing trade and travel, and Washington and Tokyo pushed for the Security Council to pass a resolution under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter, which allows for decisions to be backed by the threat or use of force in response to threats to global security.

But Russia and China pushed back hard, warning that "extreme sanctions" would only exacerbate the crisis. China's U.N. ambassador made clear that Beijing sees interdicting North Korean shipping, for example, as likely to raise the danger of a military response from Pyongyang, sending the confrontation potentially spiraling out of control.

Last Dance

I didn't know who Sara Evans was before Dancing with the Stars. She wasn't one of my favorites but this is not the way I wanted to see her make her exit.

Sara Evans filed for divorce Thursday from her husband of 13 years, Craig Schelske, in Williamson County, alleging that he had committed adultery, verbally abused her and frequently watched pornography at home. On Thursday, Evans announced that she has dropped out of the ABC show “Dancing with the Stars” to give her family her full attention.

According to the document filed in chancery court, Schelske allegedly has on his computer at least 100 photographs of himself posing in an aroused state. There are several photographs of him having sex with other women, the filings stated.


“On his computers, husband maintains ‘Craigs Lists.’ Many of them involve requests for three party sex and anal sex. Husband’s ‘Craigs Lists’ are composed of personal ads on his personal sex engine involving him and prospective sex partners,” the documents stated.

The court document included an exhibit of nine recent “Craigs Lists’’ items stored in the temporary files of his computers.

Craigslist is an online ad service.

On Sept. 28, one of the children confronted Schelske, 43, at the couple’s Franklin home when he was watching pornography on TV, the filing stated. The couple’s children are 2, 3 and 7 years old.

Obviously her husband is a sicko and the tragedy is that she took this long to leave this freak. Her children were at risk in this marriage. The ironic part is that her hubby was a former Republican candidate for congress and was a GOP fund-raiser. The hipocrisy of the party of "family values" never ceases to amaze me. I mean this is just sordid:

A one-time “Republican BABE of the Week!” and national-anthem singer at various GOP conventions, Evans is apparently very popular with red-state voters. That she appeared to have a happy family was exploited by the party’s family values wing.

And the way you have a happy marriage in the Christian world is to submit to yer husband:

“It’s most important to keep marriage and family together. I am a child of divorce, and it’s devastating. I have a 12-year marriage. And the way I see it, the way to an amazing marriage is having sex … lots of sex. Sex keeps the marriage young. And a woman should maintain herself for her husband and stay attractive. I like to put the kids to bed, have a glass of wine on the patio or by the fireplace, and I ask Craig, ‘What do you need of me?’

I guess her need to please wasn't enough. I am officially disgusted.

Hunting Down "Turrists" on MySpace

I don't even need to rant about how ridiculous this is.

Upset by the war in Iraq, Julia Wilson vented her frustrations with President Bush last spring on her Web page on MySpace.com. She posted a picture of the president, scrawled "Kill Bush" across the top and drew a dagger stabbing his outstretched hand. She later replaced her page on the social-networking site after learning in her eighth-grade history class that such threats are a federal offense.

It was too late.

Federal authorities had found the page and placed Wilson on their checklist. They finally reached her this week in her molecular biology class.

The 14-year-old freshman was taken out of class Wednesday and questioned for about 15 minutes by two Secret Service agents. The incident has upset her parents, who said the agents should have included them when they questioned their daughter.

On Friday, the teenager said the agents' questioning led her to tears.

"I wasn't dangerous. I mean, look at what's (stenciled) on my backpack — it's a heart. I'm a very peace-loving person," said Wilson, an honor student who describes herself as politically passionate. "I'm against the war in Iraq. I'm not going to kill the president."

Her mother, Kirstie Wilson, said two agents showed up at the family's home Wednesday afternoon, questioned her and promised to return once her daughter was home from school.

After they left, Kirstie Wilson sent a text message to her daughter's cell phone, telling her to come straight home: "There are two men from the secret service that want to talk with you. Apparently you made some death threats against president bush."

"Are you serious!?!? omg. Am I in a lot of trouble?" her daughter responded.

Moments later, Kirstie Wilson received another text message from her daughter saying agents had pulled her out of class.

Julia Wilson said the agents threatened her by saying she could be sent to juvenile hall for making the threat.

"They yelled at me a lot," she said. "They were unnecessarily mean."

Can we pursue some real threats every once in a while? Please?

Why All The Mass Killings?

WTH?

Three high school girls and their parents were found dead Saturday morning at their home in eastern Iowa, and the couple's son was arrested in Illinois and considered a suspect, officials said.

The victims were found shot at about 4 a.m. near Bonaparte, according to the Van Buren County sheriff's office. It was not immediately clear what prompted the slayings.

Shawn Bentler, 22, was arrested Saturday in Quincy, Ill., on an unrelated charge of possession of drug paraphernalia, the Van Buren County sheriff's office said. The Iowa Department of Public Safety said he is a suspect in the slayings.

Quincy is about 57 miles southeast of the family's home.

Parents Michael Bentler, 53, and Sandra Bentler, 47, were found dead with their daughters Sheena Bentler, 17, Shelby Bentler, 15, and Shayne Bentler, 14, Van Buren County authorities said.

The Harmony school district confirmed three of its female high school students — a freshman, sophomore and senior — and their parents were killed.

The slayings shocked residents of this eastern Iowa town, located about 145 miles southeast of Des Moines.

"The whole town knew the family," resident Marilyn Thomas said. "This is only a town of 465 people."

School officials said they will have counselors available Monday to speak with grieving students.

Say Bye Bye Rickey

No mas!

The national GOP isn't giving any money to help GOP Senator Rick Santorum hang on to his seat against Dem Bob Casey, raising questions about whether national Republican strategists have privately given up on the incumbent's campaign. Today's Patriot-News reports that neither the RNC nor the NRSC has reserved any air time at Pennsylvania TV stations for "independent expenditure ads for Santorum or against Casey. Though an NRSC spokesman denied to the paper that the committee had given up on Santorum, recent polls show Santorum trailing badly behind. And while the RNC isn't really helping Santorum, it's investing heavily in Senate races in Tennessee, Missouri and Ohio.

Nobody Knows What Goes On Behind Closed Doors

Quoting Digby below, this makes me wonder what kind of lives these Republicans live at home. If they can brush off the inhumane treatment at Abu Ghraib as mere "sex", they must be doing some wild and wicked things at home.

What in the hell is wrong with these people? That's not torture? That stuff is over and above the things we've all seen with the forced masturbation, simulated fellatio, smearing feces on prisoners and forcing them to wear women's underwear while chained in stress positions to their cells or beds.

Characterizing what happened at Abu Ghraib as a "sex ring" is bizarre enough but he defends his comment the next day which means it wasn't a slip of the tongue or a badly worded phrase. He's thought about this and he believes it.

He said he looked at all those pictures and saw sex. Did you? I sure didn't. But then we libertine lefties base our belief that people should be able to do whatever they like in their private lives on the bedrock principle of individual freedom, agency and rights. It's the coercion that makes all this stuff so wrong. When somebody is coerced or forced into doing "sexual" things against their will, it can most certainly be torture. (I can't believe I even have to make that argument.)

Furthermore, in the case of Abu Ghraib, it's well known that what we saw in those pictures were techniques that were developed and shipped in from Guantanamo when General Geoffrey D. Miller was brought over to "straighten out" the prison and get actionable intelligence. They believed that these sexual techniques were a particularly potent way to break conservative Muslims. This stuff was common and it was pervasive --- if it was a "sex ring" it was a mighty big one that went all the way to Rumsfeld and probably Bush and Cheney too.

This is exactly why you draw bright lines on torture. Chris Shays is pretty much telling the world that the only problems with what went on at Abu Ghraib were matters of inappropriate sex and, therefore, don't violate the Geneva Conventions prohibition against torture. I'll be anxious to hear him explain to the families of American troops in the future that they shouldn't sweat it when their relatives are repeatedly raped or paraded around naked and forced to perform sex acts for cameras. (Hell, even being bitten by dogs or beaten with chairs isn't torture according to him.)

Chris Shays is losing his job and he is delirious.

This Is Not America

I remember hearing about this woman on public radio before her conviction. I cannot believe we do things like this now.

The case of a New York attorney convicted of aiding terrorism has prompted debate among U.S. lawyers about whether the Bush administration wants to scare them away from representing terrorist defendants.

Lynne Stewart was convicted in February 2005 of helping a client smuggle messages to militant followers and is to be sentenced on Monday. She faces more than 15 years in prison.

"Her case is an example of the way in which the government is equating individuals who represent terrorists with terrorists themselves -- that language of 'if you're not with us you're against us'," said Rachel Meeropol of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

"It's a scare tactic," she said. "It is worrisome that attorneys might become less able to represent out of fear of being prosecuted."

But Fordham University Law Professor James Cohen says Stewart "unquestionably broke the law" and the case would not deter other lawyers representing terrorism-related suspects.

Tagged as both heroine and radical leftist, Stewart, 67, is the only U.S. lawyer to be indicted on terrorism charges.

Since her 2002 indictment, she has spoken at rallies, endured a seven-month trial, been convicted, undergone treatment for cancer and become the subject of a documentary called "Who's Afraid of Lynne Stewart?"

Stewart says the case was brought as a message to lawyers.

"This case also has a bigger meaning - about how the Bush administration uses every opportunity to wave a terrorism flag and frighten people into subservience," she told Reuters in a telephone interview.

A Department of Justice spokesman declined comment.

Contrary To Popular Opinion

This is the deal!

In contrast to the rap about African-American youths – that they’re likely to wind up in prison, be killed by a peer or get pregnant – there’s new evidence that they are trying harder than most to make a difference.

“Consistent with previous research, African Americans are generally the most politically engaged racial/ethnic group,” says a survey released last week by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement.

African-American young people are “most likely to vote regularly, belong to groups involved with politics, donate money to candidates or parties, display buttons or signs, canvass and contact the broadcast media or print media,” says the study. Black people between the ages of 15-25 were also most likely to raise money for a charity, tying with Asian Americans.

Bush Running With Racists and Abusers

I guess it's desperation. But, I don't know if touring with Bush will help. It may hurt them further. On the morning of November 8, I hope it's over.

In Pennsylvania, Republican Congressman Don Sherwood was caught in a very public scandal where it was discovered he had a mistress for 5 years. This was discovered because he tried to strangle her, she locked her self in his bathroom and called 911. After being rescued from the abusive Republican Congressman, she sued him, furthering the scandal.

In Virginia Republican George Allen has been publically using racial slurs and apparantly has been using them since at least college. He is also thought to have past connections with white supremicists.

These are the two people George Bush is going out of his way to campaign for. From Salon.com.

UK General Wants Out Of Iraq

Everyone can see it except George W. Bush.

"I think history will show that the planning for what happened after the initial successful war-fighting phase was poor, probably based more on optimism than sound planning.

...."The hope that we might have been able to get out of Iraq in 12, 18, 24 months after the initial start in 2003 has proved fallacious. Now hostile elements have got a hold it has made our life much more difficult in Baghdad and in Basra."

....Sir Richard adds, strongly, that we should "get ourselves out sometime soon because our presence exacerbates the security problems". "We are in a Muslim country and Muslims' views of foreigners in their country are quite clear. As a foreigner, you can be welcomed by being invited into a country, but we weren't invited, certainly by those in Iraq at the time. Let's face it, the military campaign we fought in 2003 effectively kicked the door in."

No Tax Credits For Charities

Buscho not only dismissed evangelicals as nuts, they truly didn't care about their mission either.

In fact, Christians who voted for Mr. Bush based on his religion, may have ended up hurting the very people Jesus sought to help: the poor.

But when Senator Chuck Grassley tried to rewrite Mr. Bush's 1.7 trillion dollar tax cut to include six billion in tax credits for groups helping the poor — tax credits that Mr. Bush himself had publicly proposed — Kuo says Bush's assistant told Grassley to drop the charity tax credits. The White House had no interest.

The cuts Mr. Bush did want made things worse for charities.

Kuo claims that the estate tax cuts discouraged charitable giving, costing charities an estimated 5 billion dollars.

The ultimate impact of Mr. Bush's tax cuts, he says, was to brutalize the very charities Mr. Bush once identified as his top priorities. After only a year, charitable donations were down dramatically, and some charities had shut down.

Kuo says the White House was more concerned with the appearance of doing something.

He says the Faith-Based office wasn't even set up during the 2001 transition until Mr. Bush took office and Karl Rove gave a transition volunteer less than one week to roll out the entire Faith-Based Initiative.

The volunteer asked how he should do that, without staff, without an office, or without even a plan.

According to Kuo, "Rove looked at him, took a deep breath, and said, "I don't know. Just get me a f–ing faith-based thing. Got it?"

After that, it was easier to push faith-based legislation, rather than faith-based funding, because legislation was a cheaper way to show the president was supposedly doing something.

Bush assistant Margaret Spellings, now the Education Secretary, asked Kuo for legislation and said she didn't care what kind, any kind of faith bill would do, he writes.

That's right! I forgot! Tax cuts are only for the richest Americans and corporations.

A License To Breed

Why don't you need one?

Police said an Iowa woman wanted a wedding gown so badly that she would have traded her child for it.

Davenport, Iowa, police charged 31-year-old Marcy Gant with one felony count of sale of an individual. She is accused of trying to sell her 4-year-old son.

They said Gant bought a wedding dress from a local street vendor, paid part of the tab, and offered her son to make up the rest of the balance.

"During negotiations for the payment of this wedding dress, on at least two occasions, Ms. Gant offered her 4-year-old son as collateral," Capt. Dave Struckman of the Davenport Police Department.

Neighbors said they were shocked.

"(There is) something very mentally wrong with her to think that that is OK," said Angie Bruce, Gant's neighbor. "(If) those children go back to her they're in danger. That's just not acceptable if the state lets her have those children back."

If convicted, Gant could face 10 years in prison.

Gant's 4-year-old son and her 10-year-old son have been taken into protective custody.

Foley Between A Rock And A Hard Place

I think Foley's boyish antics were known about at much higher levels in the GOP. First the snub him.

"Have I done something to offend the White House? ... I am always getting the shaft," Foley wrote to Gov. Bush on September 29, 2004.

The Republican former congressman said in that message he had not been allowed to accompany the president on post-hurricane visits to Foley's district in Florida, although other local lawmakers had been invited.

"I can't quite figure what I have done, but this is a continuing pattern of slights. ... I have constantly put the president in the best possible light," Foley wrote to the governor.

The governor responded, "I will try to help. I know it is nothing you have done."

Then they all but force him to run.

Christians Are Just Plain Goofy

I hope the church bells are ringing loud enough to wake those folks up.

More than five years after President Bush created the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, the former second-in-command of that office is going public with an insider’s tell-all account that portrays an office used almost exclusively to win political points with both evangelical Christians and traditionally Democratic minorities.

The office’s primary mission, providing financial support to charities that serve the poor, never got the presidential support it needed to succeed, according to the book.

Entitled “Tempting Faith,” the book is not scheduled for release until Oct. 16, but MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” has obtained a copy.

“Tempting Faith’s” author is David Kuo, who served as special assistant to the president from 2001 to 2003. A self-described conservative Christian, Kuo’s previous experience includes work for prominent conservatives including former Education Secretary and federal drug czar Bill Bennett and former Attorney General John Ashcroft.

Kuo, who has complained publicly in the past about the funding shortfalls, goes several steps further in his new book.

He says some of the nation’s most prominent evangelical leaders were known in the office of presidential political strategist Karl Rove as “the nuts.”

“National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as ‘ridiculous,’ ‘out of control,’ and just plain ‘goofy,’” Kuo writes.

Is This All They've Got?

If you've got to go digging back two lifetimes to find a scandal to compare to one where a man is grooming children as future lovers when they grow up, you are grasping at straws.

Republican Rep. Christopher Shays defended the House speaker's handling of a congressional page scandal, saying no one died like at Chappaquiddick in 1969 when Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy was involved.

"I know the speaker didn't go over a bridge and leave a young person in the water, and then have a press conference the next day," the embattled Connecticut congressman told The Hartford Courant in remarks published Wednesday.

"Dennis Hastert didn't kill anybody," he added.

He didn't kill anybody? Ted Kennedy didn't kill anyone. That woman died in an accident ... just like the guy that Laura Bush "accidentally" killed with her car.

They must know it's over! All they can come up with are decades old stories that everyone has long forgiven and forgotten. I'm crushed!

We Don't Have Larger Issues?

This pathological fixation on Cuba just mystifies me. It's a tiny place. Why MUST we have control of it? We cannot keep illegals out of the country but we can "agressively pursue" people who want to go to Cuba or violate these silly embargo rules? It makes no sense!

The US government has announced that it will aggressively pursue those who violate the decades-old US trade embargo with Cuba.

A new task force has been set up to police the sanctions and those breaking them will face large fines.

The chief federal prosecutor in Florida said anyone who travelled illegally or traded with Cuba would be punished.

But critics say the move is an attempt to strengthen the Republican Party's vote ahead of congressional elections.

Miami-based US Attorney Alexander Acosta said the measures would allow the US to better enforce its sanctions against Cuba.

"The purpose of the sanctions is to isolate the Castro regime economically and deprive the Castro regime of the US dollars it so desperately seeks," said Mr Acosta.

Can't Put Humpty Together Again

It's pretty apparent that "staying the course" isn't going to render a "unity" government. You'd need a Saddam for that. But, splitting up Iraq along sectarian lines will cause more problems and violence and upset other parts of the region.

The Shiite-dominated Parliament passed a law Wednesday allowing the formation of federal regions in Iraq, despite opposition from Sunni lawmakers and some Shiites who say it will dismember the country and fuel sectarian violence.

In Parliament, the Sunni coalition and two Shiite parties tried to prevent a vote on the federalism bill by boycotting the session Wednesday. They hoped to prevent the 275-seat body from reaching the quorum of 50 percent.

But the quorum was reached with 140 lawmakers, who voted on each of the bill's roughly 200 articles individually, passing them all unanimously.

"This is the beginning of the plan to divide Iraq," said Adnan al-Dulaimi, leader of the Sunni National Accordance Front, which boycotted the vote along with the radical Shiite cleric Moktada Sadr's party and the Shiite Fadila party. "We had hoped that the problems of sectarian violence would be resolved. We hope there won't be an increase in violence."

The bloodshed showed little sign of easing Wednesday, when at least five bombs exploded in different sections of Baghdad, killing at least six people and wounding more than a dozen, and the authorities discovered more bodies.

Also, the U.S. Army chief said that it planned to keep the current level of soldiers in Iraq through 2010, a later date than officials from the Bush administration or the Defense Department had previously mentioned. (Page 5)

The comments by the army chief of staff, General Peter Schoomaker, come as Iraq has become a central issue in the U.S. midterm elections in November. It was the latest acknowledgment by a Pentagon official that a significant withdrawal of troops from Iraq was not likely in the immediate future.

The law passed Wednesday includes a provision that regions cannot be formed for another 18 months, a concession to Sunni concerns.

The federalism law sets up a system for allowing provinces to join together into autonomous regions that would hold considerable powers of self-rule, a right given to them under the Constitution adopted last year in a national referendum.

Some Shiites want to create an autonomous zone in their heartland in the south, much like the self-ruling Kurdish region in northern Iraq.

But Sunni Arabs oppose the federalism measures, fearing that they will divide Iraq into sectarian mini-states, giving Shiite and Kurds control over oil riches in the south and north, and leaving Sunnis in an impoverished central zone without resources. Some Shiite parties, including the faction of al-Sadr, also oppose the measures for nationalistic reasons.

That's Because No One Wants To Be Accused of Being a Terrorist!

Who would subject themselves to Bush's spying and interrogation methods? You'd call yourself serving your country one minute and the next thing you know they'd be calling you terrorist!

Five years after Arab terrorists attacked the United States, only 33 FBI agents have even a limited proficiency in Arabic, and none of them work in the sections of the bureau that coordinate investigations of international terrorism, according to new FBI statistics.

Counting agents who know only a handful of Arabic words—including those who scored zero on a standard proficiency test—just 1 percent of the FBI’s 12,000 agents have any familiarity with the language, the statistics show.

The numbers reflect the FBI’s continued struggle to attract employees who speak Arabic, Urdu, Farsi and other languages of the Middle East and South Asia, even as the bureau leads a fight against terrorist groups primarily centered in those parts of the world. The same challenge is facing the CIA and other agencies as the government competes with the private sector for a limited number of applicants with foreign-language proficiency, according to U.S. officials and experts.

GOP's Olympia Snowe Doesn't Want To Stay The Course

Another one leaves the fold.

-U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe on Tuesday joined a growing list of Republicans calling for a reassessment of America's strategy in Iraq.

Snowe said in a statement that as conditions in Iraq continue to worsen, "there must be no question among the (Bush) administration, the Congress and the Iraqi unity government that staying the course is neither an option nor a plan."

The second-term senator, who is seeking re-election Nov. 7, said she agrees with Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner, who has called for a reassessment of the U.S. strategy in Iraq.

On Sunday, James Baker III, a former secretary of state with a long-standing reputation of caution and service to Republican presidents, also joined the list of prominent Republicans lobbying for change in President Bush's Iraq policy.

In her statement Tuesday, Snowe noted that last December the Senate passed an amendment by Warner calling 2006 a year of transition for the United States in Iraq.

"Yet, with fewer than three months remaining, I am deeply disturbed that 2006 has become a period marked by increased sectarian violence, as opposed to an increased ability of the Iraq government to secure its own nation," Snowe said.

"The message must be loud and clear: The Iraqi government does not have unlimited time to seize control of their country and their security by firmly confronting the sectarian violence and disarming the militias before their country reaches a point of no return," the statement said.

Snowe said Congress and the administration should be open to alternative plans for the U.S. role in Iraq. One option, she said, could be convening an international summit of international stakeholders to set a path forward in Iraq.

Oh Yeah, They Are Willing To Tolerate Violence ...

I don't know if the entire country has to be in flames before Bushco will acknowledge a civil war or what. But this is unacceptable.

Over 1,000 Iraqis are fleeing their homes each day because of rampant violence, and revenge killings are "totally out of control", the U.N.'s top humanitarian official said on Wednesday.

Jan Egeland, U.N. Under-Secretary General, told a news conference that sectarian violence and military operations had forced over 315,000 to flee their homes in the past eight months. "Some 9,000 have been displaced every week ... even worse, perhaps 100 people are killed every day," he said.

The violence was related to sectarian killings, with Sunni Muslims being forced to flee Shi'a Muslim areas and Shias fleeing Sunni strongholds, he said.

"Revenge killings seem now to be totally out of control. Many of those killed have been killed by gunshots or tortured to death," Egeland said.

The U.N.'s emergency relief coordinator appealed to ethnic and cultural leaders to see that "this has spiralled totally out of control...It has to stop."

Does He Know How Stupid He Sounds?

He's clueless!

Today in his press conference, President Bush applauded the courage of Iraqis, stating that he is “amazed that this is a society which so wants to be free that they’re willing to — you know, that there’s a level of violence that they tolerate.” Watch it:

In reality, 890,000 Iraqis have moved to Jordan, Iran and Syria since Hussein’s fall and more than 300,000 have fled to other parts of Iraq to escape the violence. Additionally, 71 percent of Iraqis want U.S. forces to leave Iraq within a year, saying “they would feel safer if U.S. and other foreign forces left Iraq.”

He sounds like his insensitive mother on the Katrina residents. He doesn't get that those who are still there probably cannot afford to leave and have no place else to go?

Seriously Though

What the heck is Kim Jong-Il going to do and to whom? George Bush has got every nut in the world talking as crazy as he does.

North Korea will view US pressure to rein in its nuclear programme as "a declaration of war", the isolated communist regime said today in its first official statement since announcing it had carried out a nuclear test.

Separately, the country's number two leader also warned that it would conduct a second test unless Washington softened its stance.

"If the US keeps pestering us and increases pressure, we will regard it as a declaration of war and will take a series of physical corresponding measures," Pyongyang's foreign ministry said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

How Many People Did Saddam Kill?

Of the many random excuses we've been given for invading Iraq, the number of people that died at the hands of Saddam's regime was a big one. Well, in three years, it looks like we've topped his decades of rule.

War has wiped out about 655,000 Iraqis or more than 500 people a day since the U.S.-led invasion, a new study reports.

Violence including gunfire and bombs caused the majority of deaths but thousands of people died from worsening health and environmental conditions directly related to the conflict that began in 2003, U.S. and Iraqi public health researchers said.

"Since March 2003, an additional 2.5 percent of Iraq's population have died above what would have occurred without conflict," according to the survey of Iraqi households, titled "The Human Cost of the War in Iraq."

The survey, being published online by British medical journal The Lancet, gives a far higher number of deaths in Iraq than other organizations. (Read the full report -- pdf)

Researchers randomly selected 1,849 households across Iraq and asked questions about births and deaths and migration for the study led by Gilbert Burnham of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland.

They extrapolated the figures to reflect the national picture, saying Iraq's death rate had more than doubled since the invasion. (Read the report's appendix, including methodology and charts -- pdf)

Let the lying and spinning begin!

First He Was Shaking Hands With Saddam

... then he was shaking hands with the corporation that sold North Korea the nukes!

Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, sat on the board of a company which three years ago sold two light water nuclear reactors to North Korea - a country he now regards as part of the "axis of evil" and which has been targeted for regime change by Washington because of its efforts to build nuclear weapons.

Mr Rumsfeld was a non-executive director of ABB, a European engineering giant based in Zurich, when it won a $200m (£125m) contract to provide the design and key components for the reactors. The current defence secretary sat on the board from 1990 to 2001, earning $190,000 a year. He left to join the Bush administration.

Why I Don't Watch Fox News

Exactly!

An NBC reporter in Iraq refutes those, like Fox's Brit Hume, who try to minimize Iraqi violence by saying it's just like any American city.

I'm more puzzled by comments that the violence isn't any worse than any American city. Really? In which American city do 60 bullet-riddled bodies turn up on a given day? In which city do the headless bodies of ordinary citizens turn up every single day? In which city would it not be news if neighborhood school children were blown up? In which neighborhood would you look the other way if gunmen came into restaurants and shot dead the customers?

An Exercise In The Ridiculous

Tony Snow is such an arrogant tool! His FoxNews style spinning the unforgivable is in full effect during his press briefings. Those meetings have been reduced to nothing beyond an excercise in the ridiculous.

When a foreign power claims to have detonated a nuclear weapon -- when that foreign power is one that the president of the United States singled out as a member of the "axis of evil" four years ago -- it might strike you as not entirely unreasonable to wonder whether the president's strategy for dealing with that foreign power has been the right one.

Unless you happen to be Tony Snow, that is.

A reporter asked the White House press secretary today if there's anything the president thinks he should have done differently with respect to North Korea. "Oh, my goodness," Snow responded. "It's a silly question."

As members of the White House press corps howled in protest, Snow said that any answer he might give would be translated into headlines saying that the Bush administration had admitted to making mistakes. "I have said this repeatedly from this podium," Snow said. "You need to give presidents the benefit of the doubt when national security is involved."

An incredulous David Gregory asked Snow if he really thinks it's unfair "to ask for some accountability as to what happened." Snow's response: "David, the accountability lies in North Korea, not in Washington."

Funny, but that's not how John McCain sees it. He says it's all Bill Clinton's fault.

Mission In Iraq Has Substantially Failed

Fareed Zakaria throws his hands up on Iraq too!

When Iraq’s current government was formed last April, after four months of bitter disputes, wrangling and paralysis, many voices in America and in Iraq said the next six months would be the crucial testing period. That was a fair expectation. It has now been almost six months, and what we have seen are bitter disputes, wrangling and paralysis. Meanwhile, the violence has gotten worse, sectarian tensions have risen steeply and ethnic cleansing is now in full swing. There is really no functioning government south of Kurdistan, only power vacuums that have been filled by factions, militias and strongmen. It is time to call an end to the tests, the six-month trials, the waiting and watching, and to recognize that the Iraqi government has failed. It is also time to face the terrible reality that America’s mission in Iraq has substantially failed.

Go Tucker?

I saw this segment on The Chris Matthews Show on Sunday and I, too, was surprised at how blunt honest and harsh Tucker was. However, I'm not as convinced that enough evangelicals are finally realizing that they've been used and are now useless.

Despite the cold, hard numbers issue that’s staring Republicans in the face, I never expected that Tucker Carlson of all people would pull back the curtain and admit the truth—the Republican party thinks their base of religious wingnuts are a bunch of dupes. Shush, Tucker, everyone knows it but no one says it.

CARLSON: It goes deeper than that though. The deep truth is that the elites in the Republican Party have pure contempt for the evangelicals who put their party in power. Everybody in…


MATTHEWS: How do you know that? How do you know that?


CARLSON: Because I know them. Because I grew up with them. Because I live with them. They live on my street. Because I live in Washington, and I know that everybody in our world has contempt for the evangelicals. And the evangelicals know that, and they’re beginning to learn that their own leaders sort of look askance at them and don’t share their values.


MATTHEWS: So this gay marriage issue and other issues related to the gay lifestyle are simply tools to get elected?


CARLSON: That’s exactly right. It’s pandering to the base in the most cynical way, and the base is beginning to figure it out.

Evangelicals aren't the only ones who've been had. Ohio's Kenneth Blackwell, the black Republican Secretary of State who helped steal the election for Bush (and is currently running for Governor), probably didn't know that Bush thinks he's a nut.

Does Fiddy Need A Hug Or A Slap?

Did I Mention I Am Sick Of This Man? Why is he still whining about not being invited on Oprah?

In usual 50 Cent fashion, the rapper has once again decided to pick a fight. This week, 50 Cent has decided to go after Oprah again. In an exclusive interview while backstage at 106 & Park last Thursday, 50 said, "Oprah's great. I just think the only misconception is that she's a Black woman. They say Oprah Winfrey's a Black woman, but she's [been] catering to a demographic of a middle-aged White woman for so long that I believe she's a middle-aged White woman."

These comments stem from a beef that 50 Cent had with Oprah earlier this year after rumors began to circulate that the talk show host refused to have certain rappers on her show.

"Oprah will have a rapist on her show and have a discussion about why they do it, but won't have a rags to riches story on her show," 50 said. He went on to even throw rapper/producer Kanye West in the fire. "She'll have Kanye West on her show. I think middle America would rather have they kids be gay, than have them aggressive." (source)

Listen up Curtis Jackson! She doesn't want you on her show. She doesn't respect you or what you do. Making "riches" from "rags" does not make you worthy of everyone's attention. Get over yourself. Stop being a big titty baby because Oprah won't give you the time of day and won't acknowldge your beef!

The Axis of Evil Comes Home To Roost

Bush sold all of his woof tickets and the world has gone wild!

Nearly five years after President Bush introduced the concept of an "axis of evil" comprising Iraq, Iran and North Korea, the administration has reached a crisis point with each nation: North Korea has claimed it conducted its first nuclear test, Iran refuses to halt its uranium-enrichment program, and Iraq appears to be tipping into a civil war 3 1/2 years after the U.S.-led invasion.

Each problem appears to feed on the others, making the stakes higher and requiring Bush and his advisers to make difficult calculations, analysts and U.S. officials said. The deteriorating situation in Iraq has undermined U.S. diplomatic credibility and limited the administration's military options, making rogue countries increasingly confident that they can act without serious consequences. Iran, meanwhile, will be watching closely the diplomatic fallout from North Korea's apparent test as a clue to how far it might go with its own nuclear program.

"Iran will follow very carefully what happens in the U.N. Security Council after the North Korean test," said Robert J. Einhorn, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). "If the United Nations is not able to act forcefully, then Iran will think the path is clear to act with impunity."

I'm not quite sure I believe that Korea really did explode a nuclear weapon. They may be bluffing. Whatever the case, the US is looking rather stupid because we can't do anything credible to stop them from going further.

You Know It's Bad When ...

Another one of Bush's daddy's friends is trying to inject some coherence into the MESS this President has made in Iraq and across the globe.

James Baker, the Republican co-chairman of a bipartisan panel that is reassessing Iraq strategy for President George W. Bush, said he expected the panel to depart from Bush's repeated calls to "stay the course," and suggested that the White House enter direct talks with countries it has so far kept at arm's length, including Iran and Syria.

"I believe in talking to your enemies," he said Sunday in an interview on ABC television, noting that he made 15 trips to Damascus while serving Bush's father as secretary of state.

"It's got to be hard-nosed, it's got to be determined," Baker said. "You don't give away anything, but in my view, it's not appeasement to talk to your enemies."

Bush had refused to deal with Iran until last spring, when he declared that the United States would join negotiations with the country if it suspended enriching nuclear fuel. Iran has declined. Contacts with both Syria and North Korea have also been sharply limited.

But Baker's "Iraq Study Group," created last March with the encouragement of some members of Congress to come up with new ideas on Iraq strategy, has already talked to some representatives of Iran and Syria about Iraq's future, he said.

His comments on Sunday offered the first glimmer of what other members of his group, in interviews over the past two weeks, have described as an effort to find a face-saving way for Bush to slowly extract the United States from the war.

But you know the "boy in the plastic bubble" won't listen.

I Guess He Doesn't Like Her

I watched Larry King last night and was rather stunned that Donald Trump ripped Angelina Jolie apart. What was that about?

Last week, Donald Trump complimented Brad Pitt for finding a good way to stay single by saying he wouldn't marry Angelina Jolie until same sex marriage is legal. "This guy is smarter than I thought," Trump wrote on his website.

Larry King asked Trump about Pitt on Larry King Live Monday night. The real estate tycoon took the opportunity to skewer Angelina Jolie for treating her father "like a dog," finally adding, "I just don't even find her attractive"...

If you watch the video, he also pulls the slut card. So she doesn't get along with her dad. What does that have to do with the number of men Angelina has been through and how the heck does he even know?

Why Are These People So Damn Crazy?

This fool doesn't make a lick of sense!

Now Baldwin has released a memoir, "The Unusual Suspect," a reference to the one critically acclaimed film for which he's known. The book, the "Gospel according to Stevie B.," is part testimonial and part evangelical manifesto, a cocktail of anti-intellectualism and a biblical interpretation that would have Jesus spinning in his grave, had he stayed there. Baldwin preaches that free will is a lie of Satan -- we must shut off our brains, he says, and be led by what God tells our hearts. Furthermore, he writes, efforts to end global poverty and violence are just the sort of "stupid arrogance" that incur God's wrath, which we'll be feeling any day now in the coming apocalypse. I suppose when the star of "Bio-Dome" is advising the president and converting kids by the thousands to his gnarly brand of faith, the end is, indeed, nigh.

"The Unusual Suspect" features an open letter to Bono, lambasting him for lobbying for debt relief for developing countries instead of preaching the gospel on MTV. Bono must be in league with Satan, whom Baldwin spends a lot of time thinking about. "I am smart enough to know that Satan is alive and well today," he writes. "Satan has all kinds of power, and he is able to control the minds of anyone whose mind isn't controlled by God." Baldwin's theology -- and criticism of secularists and Christian poseurs like Bono -- is written with remarkable confidence for someone who can only recite six of the Ten Commandments and four of the Twelve Apostles.

All of this might seem like the easily ignorable ravings of a Hollywood has-been if the book wasn't climbing bestseller lists. Baldwin writes that "God has called me to go and make disciples of the youth of America. That is what I am going to try to do, and if you try to stop me I am going to break your face." Most frightening of all, Baldwin is succeeding. All of his dude-speak is actually speaking to the dudes. Thanks to his book, videos and live sermons, he continues to draw thousands of young people across the country into his church of celebrity and absolutism.

The youngest of Hollywood’s famous and infamous Baldwin brothers, Stephen was best known for a host of mediocre movies and his passion for blow before Sept. 11, 2001, the day he got religion. His wife had already been born again, converted by a Brazilian housekeeper. Baldwin says the housekeeper was sent into their service not to clean their toilets but to save their souls. Every morning, Baldwin says, he would wake to his wife lying prostrate next to the bed, her head pressed against the floorboards, deep in prayer for an hour. "If you want to love Jesus, great, but can you cook my breakfast now?" was his response. Then two jets smashed into the World Trade Center.

"For Stephen Baldwin, September 11th was clearly the demonstration of the impossible becoming reality," he writes. He was now prepared to believe that Jesus died for his sins and was resurrected, that the Bible was the inerrant word of God.

Things Fall Apart

George Allen can probably not only forget his Presidential dreams, it looks as though he can forget being re-elected to the Senate.

For the past five years, Sen. George Allen, has failed to tell Congress about stock options he got for his work as a director of a high-tech company. The Virginia Republican also asked the Army to help another business that gave him similar options.

Congressional rules require senators to disclose to the Senate all deferred compensation, such as stock options. The rules also urge senators to avoid taking any official action that could benefit them financially or appear to do so.

Those requirements exist so the public can police lawmakers for possible conflicts of interest, especially involving companies with government business that lawmakers can influence.

Allen's stock options date to the period from January 1998 to January 2001 when Allen was between political jobs and had plunged into the corporate world.

Between the Macaca, the hidden "Jewish" background, the "N" word and now his unimportant stock options, he really just appears to have an immense character flaw: he's a liar.

(More evidence that he had a love affair with the "N" word.)

Worst Since Fallujah

More "Progress" ...

The number of US troops being wounded in Iraq is now at its highest level for two years as American forces are confronted by increasing sectarian violence and a continuing insurgency.

Figures released by the Pentagon show that 776 soldiers were wounded in action in Iraq last month.

The September figure represents the fourth largest casualty rate since the US and UK invasion in the spring of 2003 and the largest since November 2004 when US forces were involved in a major offensive to clear the city of Fallujah. Some experts believe the number of wounded provides a better insight to the nature of the conflict in Iraq than the figure of 2,700 killed because - in relation to previous wars - many more wounded troops survive.

The ratio of wounded to killed is 8 to 1, compared with 3 to 1 during the Vietnam War. Anthony Cordesman, of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, told The Washington Post: "These days wounded are a much better measure of the intensity of the operations than killed."

Take That Thing Off!

Most people do not get what racism really is. But, it includes scenarios like this.

This week, British politician Jack Straw let us know that most Muslim women are are just itching to tear off their veils, if only someone would bother to ask. Straw, who is the Leader of the House of Commons, has asked that Muslim women consider removing their veils when meeting with him. And he says his constituents are fine with that! "Most seem relieved I have asked," he wrote in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph. This is an impressive display of cultural arrogance. Someone may have to tell Straw that disappointing truth that while women may wear the veil for many reasons, it's unlikely that those reasons include keeping up with a non-Muslim's expectations of them.

The veil is a complex, culturally loaded issue, prompting debate --both within and outside Islam -- about the oppression, empowerment and protection of women. But Straw doesn't seem too interested in that. Instead, he asks women to consider his feelings. He says he made his comments "above all...because I felt uncomfortable about talking to someone 'face-to-face' who I could not see," according to Reuters.

And he imagines the rest of the U.K.'s non-Muslim population feels the same way; Straw suggested that "wearing the full veil was bound to make better, positive relations between the two communities more difficult."
So, rather than pushing for discussion and tolerance, let's homogenize, homogenize, homogenize! (Try to say that three times fast.)

Straw's comments, which have unsurprisingly triggered a political storm, are an unusually candid expression of what I suspect is at the root of most arguments against women voluntarily wearing the veil: Unfamiliar customs make some people uncomfortable. Rather than examining his own discomfort, though, Straw's intolerant remarks place the burden of cross-cultural understanding solely on Muslim women.

This Sounds Like A Wicked Plot

They can call it sectarian violence if they want to but this sounds like all out war!

Hundreds of Iraqi policemen fell sick from poisoning Sunday at a base in southern Iraq after the evening meal breaking their daily Ramadan fast, and officials said they were investigating whether the poisoning was intentional.

An official with the Environment Ministry said 11 policemen had died. However, the governor of Wasit province - where the poisoning took place - denied any deaths, though he said some of the victims were in critical condition. There was no immediate explanation for the contradictory reports.

Some of the policemen began bleeding from the ears and nose after the meal, said Jassim al-Atwan, an inspector for the Environment Ministry, who was serving as a liaison in the investigation between the Health Ministry and the base, located in the town of Numaniyah.

"Hundreds of soldiers were poisoned after taking food and water in the iftar," Wasit Gov. Hamad al-Latif told the Associated Press, referring to the meal that breaks the sunrise-to-sunset fast during the Islamic holy month. "Investigations are under way to determine the cause."

Samples of the food and water were being tested "to determine the substance in them" and will be sent to Baghdad for further tests, al-Latif said.

Desperate Lies

In lock step with Rice and Rumsfeld, the President is desperately spinning his own version of the truth regarding Iraq. It's so bad that he is now lying on the Democrats.

Olbermann: And lastly tonight, a Special Comment, about — lying. While the leadership in Congress has self-destructed over the revelations of an unmatched, and unrelieved, march through a cesspool… While the leadership inside the White House has self-destructed over the revelations of a book with a glowing red cover…

The President of the United States — unbowed, undeterred, and unconnected to reality — has continued his extraordinary trek through our country rooting out the enemies of freedom: The Democrats.

Transcripts below the fold


Yesterday at a fundraiser for an Arizona Congressman, Mr. Bush claimed, quote, "177 of the opposition party said 'You know, we don't think we ought to be listening to the conversations of terrorists."

The hell they did.

177 Democrats opposed the President's seizure of another part of the Constitution*.

Not even the White House press office could actually name a single Democrat who had ever said the government shouldn't be listening to the conversations of terrorists.

President Bush hears… what he wants.

Tuesday, at another fundraiser in California, he had said "Democrats take a law enforcement approach to terrorism. That means America will wait until we're attacked again before we respond."

Mr. Bush fabricated that, too.

And evidently he has begun to fancy himself as a mind-reader.

"If you listen closely to some of the leaders of the Democratic Party," the President said at another fundraiser Monday in Nevada, "it sounds like they think the best way to protect the American people is — wait until we're attacked again."

The President doesn't just hear what he wants. He hears things, that only he can hear.

It defies belief that this President and his administration could continue to find new unexplored political gutters into which they could wallow.

Watch the clip!

More Denial

I was just about to post on these divergent views about the status of Iraq but Mother Jones beat me to it.

This week Condoleeza Rice insisted that Iraq is "making progress"? Even as she arrived in Baghdad amidst mortar fire and met with President Jalal Talabani in the dark, due to electricity outages throughout the city, she emphasized that the country is on course.

But a course toward what? Senator John Warner (R-Va.), who too sojourned recently to Iraq, says the country has taken "steps backwards," referring to the "steady increase in the level of violence" and the "'unacceptable level' of killings and 'heavy casualties' among U.S. forces there." He concluded that the administration may need to abandon its exhausted "stay the course" messaging.

Perhaps she isn't deliberately lying about "progress" in Iraq. Perhaps the reality that they've set Iraq, Afghanistan and possibly the entire Middle East on fire is too hard to face so they keep repeating a mantra that everything is going well to soothe their own psyches. Pathetic is what it is. Pathetic, angering and really sad.

What Kind Of Democracy Is This?

The "decider" is at it again.

President Bush, again defying Congress, says he has the power to edit the Homeland Security Department's reports about whether it obeys privacy rules while handling background checks, ID cards and watchlists.

In the law Bush signed Wednesday, Congress stated no one but the privacy officer could alter, delay or prohibit the mandatory annual report on Homeland Security department activities that affect privacy, including complaints.

But Bush, in a signing statement attached to the agency's 2007 spending bill, said he will interpret that section "in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to supervise the unitary executive branch."

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said it's appropriate for the administration to know what reports go to Congress and to review them beforehand.

"There can be a discussion on whether to accept a change or a nuance," she said. "It could be any number of things."

The American Bar Association and members of Congress have said Bush uses signing statements excessively as a way to expand his power.

These People Are Gangsta!

I guess there is no free speech in Russia!

Anna Politkovskaya, a prominent Russian journalist known as a fierce critic of the Kremlin's actions in Chechnya, has been found dead in Moscow. The 48-year-old mother of two was found shot dead in a lift at her apartment block in the capital. A pistol and four bullets were found near her body and a murder investigation has been launched. Ms Politkovskaya's murder has all the hallmarks of a contract killing, says the BBC's Emma Simpson in Moscow. The award-winning journalist became ill with food poisoning on her way to report on the Beslan school siege in 2004, which some believed to be an attempt on her life. Ms Politkovskaya, who worked for the newspaper Novaya Gazeta, was known for exposing rights abuses by Russian troops in Chechnya.

Kaiser For Dogs

I once saw a story on a dog in a small town who was hit by a car and he found his way to his vet's office. But how this dog decided to take himself to Kaiser is beyond me!

An injured 6-year-old German shepherd mix walked himself into a hospital emergency room after apparently being struck by a car, according to animal control officials.

Buddy the dog limped into emergency at Kaiser Permanente Hospital in Bellflower, Calif., Wednesday and laid down in the waiting area at about 1 p.m., security officer Daniel Carrillo told the Whittier Daily News.

Hospital officials called the Southeast Area Animal Control Authority in Downey, and agency officials picked up Buddy and brought him to the shelter for treatment of a fractured leg, Capt. Aaron Reyes, SEAACA's director of operations.

"We don't know where he got hit by a car, but we're happy he chose the right place to get help," Reyes said.

Through an identifying microchip implanted in Buddy's skin, SEAACA officials were able to locate his owner, who adopted him from the animal shelter about five years ago, Reyes told the newspaper.

Fabian Ortega, Buddy's owner, owns a construction equipment rental business about a block from the hospital, according to the paper.

Ortega said he had been scouring the area for his dog since he ran away about two weeks ago from the yard of the business while the fence was being repaired.

Don't Fence Me In

I think this fence idea is totally ridiculous. I'm not sure I believe it will ever be built. If it does, who do you think is gonna build it? Illegals! LOL!

US President George W Bush has signed a controversial bill into law that will pay for a 700-mile fence (1,125km) fence along the border with Mexico.

The barrier, equipped with hi-tech surveillance equipment, will be built in areas where many illegal immigrants cross over into the United States.

Mr Bush has also suggested a temporary guest worker programme to allow immigrants to work legally in the US.

But Republican congressmen have argued against the idea.

They said it would be an amnesty that would give illegal immigrants a route to citizenship.

Under the new law, around $1.2bn will be spent over the coming year on the border, which will be built on remote and inhospitable border areas in the south west of the country.

Comprehensive reform

Speaking at the signing of the bill in Arizona, Mr Bush said the fence alone was not enough to curb illegal immigration.

"The funds that Congress has appropriated are critical for our efforts to secure this border and enforce our laws, yet we must also recognise that enforcement alone is not going to work," he said.

"We need comprehensive reform that provides a legal way for people to work here on a temporary basis."

There are an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants living in the US.

An estimated 1.2 million illegal immigrants were arrested last year trying to cross into the US along the border states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

Supporters of the fence have said it will be a crucial tool to fight illegal immigration - which is expected to be a key issue in November's mid-term elections.

But critics of the scheme say it will force illegal immigrants to cross somewhere else.

Mexico has also said the fence will badly affect relations with the US.

The outgoing Mexican President, Vicente Fox, has called the fence shameful, and compared it to the Berlin Wall.

I'm gonna NEED Vicente Fox to shut up. Shipping his poor people here is part of his domestic policy.

The Death Squads Are The Police

Did they honestly think they'd have a valid police force? No surprise here:

Iraqi authorities have taken a brigade of up to 700 policemen out of service and put members under investigation for “possible complicity” with death squads following a mass kidnapping earlier this week, the U.S. military said Wednesday.

Meanwhile, a series of bombs went off in rapid succession in a shopping district in a mainly Christian neighbourhood of Baghdad, killing 16 people and wounding 87, police said. The dead were among 26 people killed in attacks across Iraq.

The U.S. military also announced the death of two soldiers — the latest in what has been one of the bloodiest stretches of days for U.S. troops this year. At least 17 have been killed in combat since Saturday, including eight soldiers who died in gun battles and bomb blasts on Monday in Baghdad – the most killed in a single day in the capital since July, 2005.

The Iraqi police officers were decommissioned following a kidnapping Sunday when gunmen stormed a frozen food plant in the Amil district, abducted 24 workers and shot two others. The bodies of seven of the workers were found hours later but the fate of the others remains unknown.

A Long, Long Time

Somebody knew!

An Atlanta man told a local television station and newspaper that former U.S. Rep. Mark Foley sent him sexually suggestive messages after he served as a congressional page 10 years ago.

Tyson Vivyan, 26, of Buckhead told WAGA-TV in a Wednesday interview that Foley began sending him instant messages about a month or two after his nine-month stint as a page ended in June 1997

Vivyan told the station that when he was a congressional page in 1996 and 1997 he barely spoke to Foley. But after he left the program - when he was 17 years old - Vivian says they had contact via e-mail about things he says where inappropriate.

"He somehow got ahold of my online identity on AOL and began sending me sexually illicit ims," Vivyan said in the TV interview.

Vivyan said he became upset when he learned that the messages were from Foley.

"The fact that here is a member of Congress soliciting some type of a sexual relationship from a minor," he said.

"The conversations he started were almost sexual in nature," Vivyan said in a separate interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "I would try to steer it to things he was doing on (Capitol) Hill."

Speaking of Dictators ...

Why does the Republican majority allow this?

President Bush, again defying Congress, says he has the power to edit the Homeland Security Department’s reports about whether it obeys privacy rules while handling background checks, ID cards and watchlists.

In the law Bush signed Wednesday, Congress stated no one but the privacy officer could alter, delay or prohibit the mandatory annual report on Homeland Security department activities that affect privacy, including complaints.

But Bush, in a signing statement attached to the agency’s 2007 spending bill, said he will interpret that section “in a manner consistent with the President’s constitutional authority to supervise the unitary executive branch.”

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said it’s appropriate for the administration to know what reports go to Congress and to review them beforehand.

“There can be a discussion on whether to accept a change or a nuance,” she said. “It could be any number of things.”

The American Bar Association and members of Congress have said Bush uses signing statements excessively as a way to expand his power.

The Senate held hearings on the issue in June. At the time, 110 statements challenged about 750 statutes passed by Congress, according to numbers combined from the White House and the Senate committee. They include documents revising or disregarding parts of legislation to ban torture of detainees and to renew the Patriot Act.

Privacy advocate Marc Rotenberg said Bush is trying to subvert lawmakers’ ability to accurately monitor activities of the executive branch of government.

“The Homeland Security Department has been setting up watch lists to determine who gets on planes, who gets government jobs, who gets employed,” said Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

He said the Homeland Security Department has the most significant impact on citizens’ privacy of any agency in the federal government.

Charges Dropped Against This Creep Of The Week

These people didn't have anything on this Captain Strango!

A judge has dismissed child pornography charges against a former suspect in the killing of US child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey.

Prosecutors in Santa Rosa, California, said they did not have enough evidence to proceed against John Mark Karr.

Mr Karr was recently investigated over the 1996 death of JonBenet Ramsey after he claimed to have killed her, but DNA tests cleared him of the crime.

Mr Karr, 41, was extradited to the US from Thailand in August.

Judge Rene Chouteau has now ordered Mr Karr's immediate release.

A Living Wage Is a Moral Value

This election cycle, can we please get back to what Jesus would really do?

Call them the Religious Left: Church leaders are seeking to rally ''values voters'' ahead of next month's elections in a nationwide crusade to raise the minimum wage.

The Let Justice Roll campaign, a congregation of some 80 religious and community organizations including the National Council of Churches USA, said in a statement it plans to hold hundreds of rallies, workshops, religious services, and prayer breakfasts across the country to urge state and federal officials and candidates to boost working families' fortunes.

So-called Living Wage Days events this month will seek to pass minimum wage ballot measures in Arizona, Colorado, Missouri, Montana, and Ohio.

"A job should keep you out of poverty, not keep you in it," said Rev. Paul Sherry, anti-poverty program coordinator at the National Council of Churches and former president of the United Church of Christ.

The issue appears to be gaining political traction. October's events come on the heels of state minimum wage increases in Arkansas, California, Massachusetts, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.

Campaign members cited a recent poll that they said showed nine out of 10 Americans support a higher minimum wage. They added that they would lead efforts next year to pass state wage hikes in New Hampshire and Tennessee.

Congressional Democrats also are seeking to capitalize on the minimum wage among a raft of bread-and-butter issues they say the Republican-controlled legislature has neglected.

''We haven't had time to increase the minimum wage, to cut the cost of student loans for America's college students, to lower prescription drug prices, to roll back tax breaks for big oil," Nancy Pelosi, the House minority leader, was quoted as saying Friday before legislators broke for an intense period of campaigning ahead of the Nov. 7 midterm election.

To be sure, members of Let Justice Roll have voiced outrage at the meager earnings of millions of Americans at the bottom end of the labor market. But their campaign also seeks to present faith-based voters with an alternative to the Religious Right agenda.

I Cannot Keep Up With The Predators

I also cannot understand their logic. If you molest children as a youth, you grow up and massacre a room full of little girls.

The gunman who killed five girls in an Amish schoolroom confided to his wife during the siege that he molested two relatives 20 years ago when he was boy and was tormented by dreams of doing it again, authorities said Tuesday.

Investigators also said that Charles Carl Roberts IV, 32, plotted his takeover of the school for nearly a week and that the items he brought - including flexible plastic ties, eyebolts and lubricating jelly - suggest he may have been planning to sexually assault the Amish girls before police closed in.

"It's very possible that he intended to victimize these children in many ways prior to executing them and killing himself," State Police Commissioner Jeffrey B. Miller said. But Roberts "became disorganized when we arrived," and shot himself in the head.

If you get molested by a priest, you grow up to have perverted conversations with underaged boys?

Disgraced former Rep. Mark Foley said through his lawyer Tuesday that he was sexually abused by a clergyman as a teenager, but accepts full responsibility for sending salacious computer messages to teenage male pages.

Attorney David Roth said Foley was molested between ages 13 and 15 by a clergyman. He declined to identify the clergyman or the church, but Foley is Roman Catholic.

Makes no sense!

Tea With The Taliban

After all that talk about evil doers and the brutal regime that supposedly is hiding Osama, Bill Frist wants to bring them into the fold?

US Senate majority leader Bill Frist (R) of Tennessee said Monday that the war against the Taliban can "never" be won militarily and that it was time to include "people who call themselves Taliban" in the Afghan government.

The Associated Press reports that Mr. Frist said he had learned from military reports that the Taliban were "too numerous and had too much popular support" to be defeated in a military campaign.

"You need to bring them into a more transparent type of government," he said during a visit to a military base in the Taliban stronghold of Qalat. "And if that's accomplished, we'll be successful."

Afghanistan is suffering its heaviest insurgent attacks since US-led forces ousted the fundamentalist Taliban regime in late 2001 for harboring Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

Sen. Mel Martinez (R) of Florida, who was traveling in Afghanistan with Frist, said that negotiations with the Taliban were not "out of the question." But he added that he thought Taliban fighters who did not want to be a part of the political process would have to be defeated militarily.

Does Bush know about this?

You Go In. You Cast A Ballot. You Leave. What's The Problem?

I used to live near a synagogue and, come voting day, if I it turned out to be my polling place, I would have gone in, cast my ballot and left. What religion says you cannot set foot in another religion's house of worship? Sorry, this time I think these Orthodox Jews need to get over themselves and decide if they want to be "uneasy" or if they want to vote.

Orthodox Jews in an enclave near Cleveland are being told by county officials their voting place will be in a Christian church in November elections.


The Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that the flap over a polling place arose after the Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Board of Elections moved a local voting place in Cleveland Heights, a predominately Orthodox Jewish suburb, to a nearby church.


Some Jewish voters branded the move as "anti-Semitic" and because some Jewish voters would be uneasy about going into a Christian church and so would be denied the right to vote, the Plain Dealer said.


Cleveland Heights, Ohio, Mayor Ed Kelley, a Roman Catholic, reportedly wants to find a more suitable place for the Orthodox Jews to cast their ballots but County Election Director Michael Vu told the newspaper the board's decision could not be changed by before the November election.

I'm a non-practicing Catholic and, for most elections, my polling place is at the church next door to me. It's Presbyterian. Trust me when I say that I prefer that site to the other one they sometimes send me: a raggedy skating rink that smells like stinky feet! I'd pick a synagogue, a mosque or a Buddhist temple over that place.

CondoLIESzza

You know when someone claims they "don't recall," they are avoiding the question and lying. God! I HATE that she really is one of them.

A review of White House records has determined that George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, did brief Condoleezza Rice and other top officials on July 10, 2001, about the looming threat from Al Qaeda, a State Department spokesman said Monday.

The account by Sean McCormack came hours after Ms. Rice, the secretary of state, told reporters aboard her airplane that she did not recall the specific meeting on July 10, 2001, noting that she had met repeatedly with Mr. Tenet that summer about terrorist threats. Ms. Rice, the national security adviser at the time, said it was “incomprehensible” she ignored dire terrorist threats two months before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Mr. McCormack also said records show that the Sept. 11 commission was informed about the meeting, a fact that former intelligence officials and members of the commission confirmed on Monday.

When details of the meeting emerged last week in a new book by Bob Woodward of The Washington Post, Bush administration officials questioned Mr. Woodward’s reporting.

Now, after several days, both current and former Bush administration officials have confirmed parts of Mr. Woodward’s account.

Officials now agree that on July 10, 2001, Mr. Tenet and his counterterrorism deputy, J. Cofer Black, were so alarmed about an impending Al Qaeda attack that they demanded an emergency meeting at the White House with Ms. Rice and her National Security Council staff.

According to two former intelligence officials, Mr. Tenet told those assembled at the White House about the growing body of intelligence the Central Intelligence Agency had collected pointing to an impending Al Qaeda attack. But both current and former officials took issue with Mr. Woodward’s account that Mr. Tenet and his aides left the meeting in frustration, feeling as if Ms. Rice had ignored them.

The Katrina of Foreign Policy

I wanted John Kerry to win the election with every fiber of my being in 2004. I think he needs to sit this one out but he is totally right about Bush's disasterous foreign policy.

"If they want to have a debate on security, I've always said let's have the debate," Kerry said. "With the new facts we now have available, I think Americans are going to be realizing that this is the Katrina of foreign policy."

Kerry was referring to Hurricane Katrina that struck the Gulf Coast in 2005. The administration was widely criticized for its handling of the aftermath of the devastating storm.

"I think as you go into '08, all these people who have been jumping up and down about this policy and ignoring the truth have misled America, and they have misled us into the most costly, disgraceful and unnecessary use of American might," Kerry said.

Kerry is considered a potential presidential candidate in 2008. He was in Iowa campaigning for Michael Mauro, the Democratic candidate for secretary of state.

"It is disgraceful what this administration has done to mislead America and denigrate legitimate dissent," Kerry said. "To me it one of the most serious, catastrophic moments of irresponsibility in the conduct of American security policy that I've ever seen."

Hiding In Rehab

How totally random! Now he's gonna blame booze and try to hide in rehab.

Former Republican U.S. Rep. Mark Foley, who resigned in disgrace last week over sexually explicit messages, plans to enter a rehabilitation center for "alcohol and emotional difficulties," according to a letter faxed to a Florida television station.

Foley, a six-term Congressman from Florida, quit his seat after the comments he sent by instant message to an underage Congressional page, or "gofer," were made public.

The letter's authenticity could not be immediately verified but CNN said Foley's lawyer, who was named in the fax, had confirmed it was genuine. CNN said Foley had entered the clinic, without giving details.

"Painfully, the events that led to my resignation have crystalized recognition of my longstanding significant alcohol and emotional difficulties," said the letter, which was faxed on Sunday evening to WPBF television in West Palm Beach and posted on its Web site on Monday.

"I strongly believe that I am an alcoholic and have accepted the need for immediate treatment for alcoholism and related behavioral problems," the letter said. "I deeply regret and accept full responsibility for the harm I have caused," it said.

The letter, signed "Mark Foley," said he had made arrangements to enter a rehabilitation center, but did not identify it.

Is rehab the new safehouse for creeps and crooks?

This Is Getting Deeeeeep!

They knew this man was a pervert a long time ago! This is just nasty!

This is officially a huge coverup now. ABC

A Republican staff member warned Congressional pages five years ago to watch out for Congressman Mark Foley, according to a former page. Matthew Loraditch, a page in the 2001-2002 class, told ABC News he and other pages were warned about Foley by a supervisor in the House Clerk's office. Loraditch, the president of the Page Alumni Association, said the pages were told "don't get too wrapped up in him being too nice to you and all that kind of stuff.

There's no way for the Republican leadership to feign ignorance or miscommunication any longer. Hastert and Co. should be held accountable.

Meanwhile, Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-NY) accepted $100k from Foley in back July.

Ben Smith:

Reynolds's personal PAC, TOMPAC, wrote Foley a check for $5,000 on May 10, 2006. (You can see the filing here.)

According to the AP, Reynolds was told of the allegations against Foley "sometime this spring." I put in a request to NRCC spokesman Carl Forti for a more precise date.

UPDATE: Also: On July 27, 2006, the NRCC, which Reynolds chairs, accepted an unusually large contribution of $100,000 from Foley. Hard to imagine something of that size just slipping past the chairman.

Bush Canned Colin

He fired the one man on his team with some sense!

“The president would like to make a change,” Card said, using a time-honored formulation that avoided the words “resign” or “fire.” He noted briskly that there had been some discussion of having Powell remain until after Iraqi elections scheduled for the end of January, but that the president had decided to take care of all Cabinet changes sooner rather than later. Bush wanted Powell’s resignation letter dated two days hence, on Friday, November 12, Card said, although the White House expected him to stay at the State Department until his successor was confirmed by the Senate.

After four long years, Powell had anticipated the end of his service and sometimes even longed for it. He had never directly told the president but thought he had made clear to him during the summer of 2004 that he did not intend to stay into a second term.

There had been public speculation as the election drew near that the president might ask the secretary of state to reenlist, at least temporarily. Powell was still the most popular member of Bush’s team, far more popular with the public than the president himself. Senior Powell aides were convinced that the secretary anticipated an invitation to stay, and they were equally certain that he intended to accept. The approaching elections in Iraq, hints of progress in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and the rumored departure of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, a principal Powell nemesis, made the next six months look like a rare period of promise for diplomacy.

I know it won't happen until Bush leaves office but Colin needs to speak up!

But They Can Vote ...

September 23, 2006 | Afghan girls look out from their mother's burqa as they beg outside a mosque on the first day of Ramadan in Kabul, Afghanistan. Safia Hama Jan, a leading women's-rights advocate and outspoken critic of the Taliban, was killed in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar on Monday. The attack follows scores of others by the Taliban, who are now waging an increasingly deadly insurgency in the war-battered nation.
(Photo: Rodrigo Abd / AP)

Rumsfeld Won't Resign

Why should he? He's doing a heck of a job

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, coming under renewed fire for his management of the Iraq war, said Sunday he is not considering resigning and said the president had called him personally in recent days to express his continued support.

Speaking to reporters en route to Nicaragua for a meeting of defense ministers, Rumsfeld said he was not surprised by reports in a new book that White House staff had encouraged President Bush to fire him after the 2004 election.

"It's the task of the chief of staff of the White House - and having been one, I know that - to raise all kinds of questions with the president and think through different ways of approaching things," Rumsfeld said. "So it wouldn't surprise me a bit if that subject had come up."

Asked by reporters if he had recently considered resigning, Rumsfeld said, "No."

No, No, No He Didn't!

Why do these people do this? How could this man have criticized Bill Clinton when he was attempting to cavort with minors?

For more than a week, members of Congress said they would avoid partisan politics when they got Kenneth Starr's report on President Clinton. But when they finally saw it Friday, they split along party lines.

Republicans were aghast at Clinton's behavior, with many saying it showed he had lied and abused his power.

"It's vile," said Rep. Mark Foley, R-West Palm Beach. "It's more sad than anything else, to see someone with such potential throw it all down the drain because of a sexual addiction."

Can someone explain this pot kettle disease to me?