This week's revelation that Bush wanted to bomb Al Jazeera in 2004 is only the very latest disclosure in a seemingly endless number of reports about all the illegal, if not grossly immoral, actions and plans that have spewed from the White House since January 20th, 2001.

The wake-up call for me (besides the obviously stolen election of 2000) was the day Bush announced in 2001 that the U.S. would not consider honoring the Kyoto Protocol. That is when my deep suspicions of this Administration began. Between the inauguration and that date, there were the now-documented decisions to start preparations for invading Iraq, but that information wasn't revealed in the media until much later. I was lukewarm at best about the Afghanistan invasion until it became obvious after a couple of weeks that there was no real intention of capturing Bin Laden.

Since that time I have regretfully opposed virtually every act and decision made by the Bush Administration... "regretfully" because I despise distrusting my own government. But as a compassionate and observant human being, I know in my heart that not a single action by Bush's government since 1-20-01 has been taken in the interests of us citizens. Every act, every decision, every speech, every dollar spent, has been solely for the financial advancement of Bush and all the corporate sponsors and cronies he placed in all levels of government.

This has been clear as a bell to me for over four years now, and yet many leading Democrats in Congress, and a significant portion of the non-Right still cannot see this forest of fascism through the trees.

My sources of information are not secret. Anyone with a radio and a computer connected to the internet has access to the same information as I. Sure, Pacifica Radio occasionally veers off on a conspiracy tangent, but the majority of the news they report is factually based. NPR, although Right-leaning, is a decent source of information if you take the time and effort to study its sources. The vast majority of my information comes from the opinions and references available on the internet. I've spent a lot of time determining the validity, accuracy and reliability of my sources, and anyone with an open mind and a critical eye can do the same.

Besides the endless killing and degradation of humans brought forth by Bush et al., every day I cringe mentally and notice that pit in my stomach when I listen to anyone who speaks from the White House, because I know that everything spoken is either a lie or propaganda. Everything. EVERYTHING. Bush and his godless, fearless, thankless and compassionless cohorts have yet to prove me wrong, and for me that is the most gut-wrenching fact of all.

Sometimes I wish I was just dumb, oblivious and, hence, content and happy.

Left is Right will now take a holiday break. Happy Thanksgiving, y'all.

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You are DNA. You're a smart person, and you appear
incredibly complex to people who don't know
you. You're incomparably full of information,
and most of it is useless.


Which Biological Molecule Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

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Wizards of Winter

 

Phil Loper passed along this link to a jaw-dropping video of a house with holiday lights synchronized to music (in this case, "Wizards of Winter", by Trans-Siberian Orchestra). Please do check this out, it will make you smile. (Here's a link to just the music.)

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Proof that Oxycontin Fries the Brain

 

"But it isn't about Murtha. Murtha's irrelevant in all this. This is about our troops and our national security. Murtha's just getting his 15 minutes of fame like Cindy Sheehan got, and like Bill Burkett got. Bill Burkett got almost a year. The Jersey Girls, Richard Clarke, Joseph Wilson, you name it -- just the latest member of the endless parade of personalities around whom the Democrats can circle and support." - - - Rush Limbaugh

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November 22, 2005

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Early Week Snips

 

Reducing incarceration with improved nutrition

Possibly up to 90 detainees have been murdered by U.S. military in various detention centers (e.g. Gitmo, Iraq, Afghanistan) during the Bush Administration.

The speech John F. Kennedy was scheduled to give 42 years ago today.

Germany sells two submarines, to Israel, with ability to launch nuclear missiles

Katrina recovery efforts still in limbo

Comparing the military records of leading politicians and media pundits

V.P. Cheney's lie-filled speech Monday morning at the AEI (video)

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Taxing rude drivers:

"....I was in New York City the other day and my taxi cab driver bypassed a long line of cars exiting the freeway to cut in at the last second. As usual, I enjoyed being an innocent bystander/beneficiary to this little crime. But what happened next was even more gratifying to the economist in me. A police officer was standing in the middle of the road, waving every car that cut in line over to the shoulder, where a second officer was handing out tickets like an assembly line. By my rough estimate, these two officers were giving out 30 tickets an hour at $115 a pop. At over $1,500 per officer per hour (assuming the tickets get paid), this was a fantastic money making proposition for the city. And it nails just the right people. Speeding doesn’t really hurt other people very much, except indirectly. So to my mind it makes much more sense to go directly after the mean-spirited behavior like cutting in line. This is very much in the spirit of Bratton’s “broken windows” policing philosophy. I’m not sure it cuts down the number of cheaters on the roads in any fundamental way since the probability of getting caught remains vanishly small. Still, the beauty of it is that (1) every driver that follows the rules feels a rush of glee over the rude drivers getting nailed, and (2) it is a very efficient way of taxing bad behavior. So, my policy recommendation to police departments across the country is to find the spots on the roads that lend themselves to this sort of policing and let the fun begin."

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A Letter from Ramadi:

I wish I had the time or energy or memory capacity to describe to you how wrong this whole thing has gone. It's just as you described it a couple years ago. We *can* make a difference here, and i believe in the mission as it looks on paper. But your president and his brain-dead colleagues aren't even trying to give us what we need to do it. The add-on armor HMMWVs are a joke. The terrorists target them b/c they know they offer no protection. The M1114s have good armor, but every time we lose one (i had one blown up monday, driver had his femoral artery cut -- will recover fully -- b/c there apparently is no armor or very weak armor under the pedals) it's impossible to replace them. So now I have to send yet another add-on armored vehicle outside the wire daily. The M1114s also have certain mechanical defects, known to the manufacturer, for which there is apparently no known fix. For example, on some of them (like mine) if it stalls or you turn it off, you cannot restart it if the engine is hot. We have to dump 3 liters of cold water on a solenoid in order to start it again. Not that much fun when your vehicle won't start in indian country. I wonder if DoD is getting a refund for the contract. Speaking of contracts, KBR is a joke. I can't even enumerate the problems with their service, but I guarantee they do not receive less money based on how many of the showers don't work, or how many of us won't eat in the chow hall often because we get sick every time we do. There is so much. I could go on forever. the worst thing, which we have discussed, is that they are playing these bullshit numbers games to fool America about troop strength. If they stopped paying KBR employees $100,000 to do the job of a $28,000 soldier, maybe they'd have enough money to send us enough soldiers to do the job. As it stands we have no offensive capability in the most dangerous city on earth. General Shinseki should write an Op/Ed that basically says, "I told you so." Idiots. Where are the AC-130s? The apaches? They have them in FAR less active AOs (areas of operations). All we ever get is a single Huey and Cobra team, both of which are older than I am. it's such a joke. They're not even trying. At all. They have apaches in Tikrit but Hueys in Ramadi. I wish every american could see this for him/herself. Registering your frustration at the ballot box isn't nearly enough. There should be jail terms for this.

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Bye Bye, L.A. Times

 

As disgusted As I've been over the past few years with the L.A. Times and their skewed-to-the-right reporting and editorial policy, I've finally had enough. Last week the Times' Op Ed Publisher Jeff Johnson and Tribune Company CEO Dennis FitzSimons fired Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Robert Sheer because his support of the truth clashed with the paper's support of the Bush-war Administration's outrageous and deadly foreign and domestic policies and actions. Enough is enough. I canceled my subscription this week.

That leaves only the other right-wing papers in the area (Long Beach Press Telegram, Orange Count Register, Daily News) as alternatives, so it looks like I'll be saving a couple of trees for a while at least.

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November 21, 2005

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The Republican Party Has Gangrene

 

[CLICK IMAGE]

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November 18, 2005

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Weekend Snips

 

Bush failed to follow Rumsfeld's carefully crafted plans for the Iraq invasion.

House goes apeshit

Another Republican bottom-feeder gets shafted by the law

Fascinating video showing an example of how how credit cards and other forms of identity theft are bought and sold online.

American mainstream media (MSM) won't bother reporting the horrific details about detainee abuse in Iraq, so the CBC has picked up the ball.

Problems with Tamiflu?

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"...after a blocking of every avenue of debate, after questioning the patriotism of every critic, this is now the Republican War, through and through. If you're a Republican, you like this war just fine, and you don't care how long it takes, how many American troops get killed, or how incompetently the war is run. If you're a Republican, you think of the war as a vehicle of nationalist virtue, not to be questioned by the likes of fellow Americans who demand answers better than "everything is fine". If you are a Republican, you meet the calls for an exit strategy with cries of cowardice. You meet calls for investigation into prewar failures with the brazen and shallow admonishment that anyone requiring accountability for failure does not adequately "support the troops". It is raw nationalism, and raw partisanship, of the ugliest and most cowardly fashion. Men who would send the sons and daughters of others across the world to die for a still never-quite-defined principle, but lack the courage to themselves defend their own convictions and actions to their fellow Americans. So now -- faced with the real threat of a debate over the war -- they turn to whatever partisan maneuvering they can muster in order to block that debate, yet again, and attack those that demanded it. Clap Louder, they demand, or Shut Up." - - - Hunter

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FRIDAY FUN

 

Liquid Sculpture (high-speed photos)
Colored bubbles are here!
Things I can't do with a soccer ball (video)
Now Hiring VERY Temporary Workers
Greatest Wonders of the World
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria (animation)
The game of Risk online
Tattoo Face
Driving to reduce tire wear (video)
Turkey with an afro plans on surviving Thanksgiving (animation)
Heaven vs. Hell

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"It's each and every one of us, complicit by citizenship and abetting through our silence when another new abuse justified as being performed in our name is revealed. We've been fooling ourselves for years about many things, and what saddens me the most is that, while certain victories are now finally being achieved, the war within us is being lost in the ensuing hoopla. It's good that Bu$hCo is being confronted and bested by the Democrats and moderate Republicans. But that in and of itself isn't cause for celebration. I'm concerned that we are merely changing bucking broncos in the middle of a raging torrent on the edge of a tall cascade and are about to tumble onto the rocks below." - - - pessimist

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Blowhard Quote of the Week

 

"If the Democrats come into power in the United States and re-employ their vision of defense for this country, we will have 9-1-1s unabated. That's not maybe. We know what took place in the past. And I still don't understand exactly what it is that the Americans expect President Bush to do any different than he's already done..." - - - Wayne Simmons, former CIA operative, on The O'Reilly Factor

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Is it time yet to start hoping? Let's ask the ever-optimistic Mark Morford:

"Look closer: It's been over four years now that the GOP has had it all locked down tight, the stranglehold to end all strangleholds, owned Congress and stacked the courts and shut down the media and demonized all voices of dissent and ran the president the way a pimp runs a prostitution ring. No light escaped. They had masterminded one of the most brutal and mean-spirited and thoroughly effective subjugations of the American idea in 100 years, and it looked as though their power and reach knew no limits. It was astounding: No matter what atrocity or torture or war or violent abuse of nature, they would simply gloat and the media would cower and the people would merely look on, beaten and glazed and tired, and accept it as dark manna. But now something has shifted. The iron grip is slipping, sooner and more quickly than any of the right's political architects predicted, surely sooner than Rove had strategized, far sooner than the 20-year master plan the GOP had in place. What happened? Simple: The horrible policies, the lies and the lies on top of the lies (if "we do not torture" doesn't beat "I did not have sexual relations with that woman" as the impeachable BS of the century, we are lost) became just too much. The center could not hold. The atrocities are now paying their moral dividends. The GOP is now reaping what it has sown. Which is another way of saying: The system works. After all, you cannot keep pumping junk food into the body and expect it to stay upright and functional. You cannot force so many toxins into the planet and not expect it to break out in rashes and pimples and heat waves and violent storms. Eventually, the body recoils. The spirit shudders and throws off. The disease runs its course and, barring any permanent scars and mental derangement, the fever breaks. Look, I shall not argue that this hope, this light is coming from millions of people finally waking up to the progressive truth. I shall not be so foolish as to suggest that a grand anti-war pro-sex pro-intelligence happily spiritual but deeply nonreligious enlightenment is taking place. I am not so naive, and as I said, there are three treacherous years left. The reality is less pretty than that. But there is a hint of a whisper of a possibility of a deeper change, of the pendulum swinging back, finally, to humanity and love and something resembling progress, which is more than we've had in five years, and certainly more than many of us expected, given the alleged strength of the GOP choke hold. So thank you, George, for bringing such delicious sips of renewed hope. Thank you for reminding us all, through such a litany of painful and nauseating policies and lies, that the universe still repays such abuse with well-deserved slaps upside your aw-shucks head. You give us hope. Because as you and your administration careen and implode and sputter and stutter and fail, well, the world is only the better for it."

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November 17, 2005

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Midweek Snips

 

Webcam helps sons save diabetic mom who was unconscious

The number of refugees fleeing the western Iraqi town of al-Qaim and surrounding villages in the wake of US-led military offensives launched earlier this month has reached some 100,000 persons. What the hell is our President doing?!

Superspreaders... Or how a small subset of particularly infectious people can exert a powerful influence over how disease outbreaks progress.

Ouch. Cindy Sheehan sends one nasty letter to Barbara Bush. Doesn't Cindy know that Barbara is senile?

Good news for vets with PTSD claims under review

Major screw-up by mainstream media currently underway regarding Libby case. More HERE. And HERE.

The scourge of insulin resistance

Cheney refuses legitimate reimbursements for travel/lodging expenses from the private sector so that he doesn't have to report details of his trips. Taxpayers must then pick up the tab. This is just another form of secrecy by the Bush Administration, and another example of the government wasting our taxes.

Lookie here, the Neocon's first hit song: "Bush Was Right" by The Right Brothers (Real Audio format; also mp3 format). Article here.

FEMA gives 150,000 Katrina victims a two-week eviction notice.

From where do Iraq's insurgents originate? From HERE.

Comedy Central’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart wins the 2005 Thurber Prize, for the book The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Presents America (The Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy in Action.

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"In the First Amendment, the Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to fulfill its essential role in our democracy. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors. The Government's power to censor the press was abolished so that the press would remain forever free to censure the Government. The press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of government and inform the people. Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell." - - - Justice Black, NYT v. US. 403 US 7

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Wow, what a week we have going here...

Fitzgerald Investigation gets second wind as Bob Woodward reveals another Plamegate leak

Senior Democrat calls for U.S. troops to leave Iraq

Education, health spending bill rejected by "Democratic controlled" House

FEC ruling supports internet free speech

Bush popularity now equal to that of used car salesmen

Bush's Justice Dept tries to restrict Georgia voters' rights

Bush Administration's lies are increasing in intensity

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November 16, 2005

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"The White House wants a firefight with Democrats, and assumes that Democrats will wither after a few days. With the Senate GOP now showing its true colors that it has no intention of actually pressing the White House for deliverables on Iraq, and with Pat Roberts stonewalling the Phase Two inquiry of how the White House used all the available intelligence, Democrats should give the White House the firefight it wants. But while they are at it, Democrats should go ahead and expand the firefight to raise the stakes into an overall attack against the credibility of the Administration on a variety of fronts. Democrats could not only go after the lies that led up to the March 18, 2003 letter to Congress that started the war. They could also talk about how the Administration lied to Congress about the Medicare drug benefit. They could talk about the lies told to sell the country on the upper income tax cuts. They could talk about the lies told by the administration about who leaked Valerie Plame’s name. They could talk about the lies told by the administration about Social Security. They could talk about the lies told by the administration about how much the Iraq would, and continues to cost the taxpayers. You get the idea. By returning fire on an issue of weakness, which is a signature Rovian tactic, the White House now invites a full-scale attack by Democrats on the issue of this administration’s pattern of deceit and lies to the American people. The Democrats should welcome this door opening by Rove, and drive a truck right through it." - - - Steve Soto

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Letter from Linda

 

Republicans' Latest Attack on Middle Class America by Congresswoman Linda Sánchez The Republican leadership in Congress is yet again abusing its power to get its way, this time at the expense of America's middle class. Last week, Congress was supposed to consider an amendment to the budget resolution that would have included $50 billion in mandatory cuts to many crucial government services, targeted at health care and student aid, while maintaining $70 billion in tax cuts, mostly for the wealthiest Americans. But suddenly, the House GOP leadership had to pull the budget amendment from the schedule because they didn't have the necessary 218 votes. It is clear that a majority of Members in Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, realize the negative impact such a budget would have on all Americans. House Republicans are expected to go forward with their budget, cutting essential services for America's working families and at the same time giving $70 billion in new tax giveaways for the wealthy. While the Republicans claim that their $50 billion cuts to critical government programs are needed to pay for costs related to Katrina and Rita, those cuts will actually have to cover the $70 billion in tax giveaways for America's wealthiest. As if they weren't content enough having squandered the largest budget surplus in our nation's history, the Republicans' new plan would actually increase our national debt by an additional $20 billion dollars! In other words, rather than ask all Americans to sacrifice a little to help our fellow Americans hit by natural disaster, the Republicans are going to shower the richest individuals with tax giveaways and make working families carry the burden. At a time when our nation's wages are stagnant and gas prices are stuck at nearly $3 a gallon, now is not the time to cut critical government services that millions of Americans rely on. Republicans are planning to cut Medicaid, while the number of people without health insurance has increased for four years in a row. Republicans are planning to cut student loans, while college tuition costs continue to rise faster than household incomes. Republicans are also planning to cut food stamps, while more American families are struggling to put food on the table, including thousands of families still trying to recover from Hurricane Katrina. As we rebuild the Gulf Coast region we must also look to methods that will restimulate our economy, but the answer is not in cutting essential services. Rather, we should look to the $70 billion in tax breaks that the Republicans are giving to the wealthiest Americans. In April, House Democrats offered a strict pay-as-you-go budget with much-needed middle class tax cuts and a balanced budget. Yet, the Republicans forged ahead with their plan of tax breaks for the rich and adding to the national debt paid for on the backs of America's working class. This latest charade by this Republican Congress is fiscally irresponsible and needs to be stopped. America deserves better. My Democratic colleagues and I are ready to get this country back on the right fiscal track.

Congresswoman Sanchez is the Representative from my district. Although a relative novice in the realm of national politics, she is rapidly becoming a significant voice for Progressives in eastern L.A. County and a champion of obtaining federal funding for local programs that assist the underprivileged. Her sister is Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez of neighboring Orange County.

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November 15, 2005

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What's Next on the Bush-war Itinerary

 

What keeps most Americans (who think about this) on edge, is wondering what crisis the Bush Administration is going to cook up next in order to deflect attention from the myriad scandals currently brewing. Michael T. Klare gives very reasonable descriptions of three of the most likely scenarios, barring a terrorist attack within our borders.

See also: Syria: The Next Cambodia?

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"Saddam, facing a possible death sentence, is accused of mass murder, torture, false imprisonment and the use of chemical weapons. He is certainly guilty on all counts. So, it now seems, are those who overthrew him." - - - George Monbiot

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My email to O'Reilly

 

In response to Bill O'Reilly's promise to create his own "enemies list", as reported here by Hunter, I went ahead and sent the following email to O'Reilly this morning:

To: oreilly@foxnews.com Subject: enemies list Please add me to your enemies list. I am a pinko atheist tree-hugging, war-hating, Gore-supporting, Progressive LIBERAL who actually enjoys sex and the truth and who doesn't think the existence of a married gay couple will cause my family to disintegrate. Sincerely, Mike of LEFT is RIGHT

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Early Week Snips

 

Better proof of U.S. military use of chemical weapons (i.e. "White Phosphorous") in Iraq, especially in Fallujah.

Why Indeed Did the WTC Buildings Collapse?

*** Former U.S. Army Interrogator Describes the Harsh Techniques He Used in Iraq

How using Microsoft Word can be dangerous

Arianna dines with Chalabi (and doesn't vomit)

Wondering about the sudden drop in gas prices recently? Steve Soto has the answer, and it has nothing to do with supply-and-demand.

The fiscal hurricane: coming soon to a U.S. economy near you

Senate Republican leaders steal Democrat's plan for Iraq withdrawal and claim it as their own

Hybrid car buyers: More perks on the way for us environment-friendly drivers

Why Rioting Actually Works to cause social change. See also: Riots are a class act

The HDTV scam

How Bush stole the 2004 election and jump-started Armageddon

Some necessary corrections to Bush-war's Veterans Day speech 11/11/05 (short video)

In support of Howard Dean as DNC Chair and saviour of the donkey

Why Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrators (nuclear bunker busters) won't work (animation)

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The short version of Bush's Veterans Day speech:

It's Congress's fault for believing my Administration's deceptions.

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The importance of the debate about bogus WMD intel

 

"...in the late 1950s, many senators thought President Dwight Eisenhower was either a knave or a fool for denying the existence of a "missile gap." U.S. Air Force Intelligence estimates—leaked to the press and supplied to the Air Force's allies on Capitol Hill—indicated that the Soviet Union would have at least 500 intercontinental ballistic missiles by 1962, far more than the U.S. arsenal. What the "missile gap" hawks didn't know—and Eisenhower did—was that the Central Intelligence Agency had recently acquired new evidence indicating that the Soviets couldn't possibly have more than 50 ICBMs by then—fewer than we would. (As it turned out, photoreconnaissance satellites, which were secretly launched in 1960, revealed that even that number was too high; the Soviets had only a couple of dozen ICBMs.) So, yes, nearly everyone thought Saddam was building WMDs, just as everyone back in the late '50s thought Nikita Khrushchev was building hundreds of ICBMs. In Saddam's case, many of us outsiders (I include myself among them) figured he'd had biological and chemical weapons before; producing such weapons isn't rocket science; U.N. inspectors had been booted out of Iraq a few years earlier; why wouldn't he have them now? What we didn't know—and what the Democrats in Congress didn't know either—was that many insiders did have reasons to conclude otherwise. There is also now much reason to believe that top officials—especially Vice President Dick Cheney and the undersecretaries surrounding Donald Rumsfeld in the Pentagon—worked hard to keep those conclusions trapped inside. President Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, said today that the arguments over how and why the war began are irrelevant. "We need to put this debate behind us," he said. But the truth is, no debate could be more relevant now. As the war in Iraq enters yet another crucial phase—with elections scheduled next month and Congress finally taking up the issue of whether to send more troops or start pulling them out—we need to know whether the people running the executive branch can be trusted, and the sad truth is that they cannot be." - - - Fred Kaplan

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November 14, 2005

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L.A. Progressives invite you to protest tomorrow at noon in front of L.A. Times building for the corporate-sanctioned firing of highly respected columnist Robert Sheer.

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Blogger is planning a two-hour outage tonight at 9 p.m. Pacific Time. I guess I'll instead be sprawled in front of the TiVo, watching the Lakers lose to the Memphis Grizzlies. Ahhh well...

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Filthy Republicans in Democrats' Clothes

 

Five Democratic Senators voted in favor of a Republican-backed measure that would deny prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, the right to challenge their detention in federal courts. The five mind-numbing traitors of the Democratic Party, and of all things humane, whose votes accounted for the margin of victory, are:

Joe Lieberman, Connecticut
Kent Conrad, North Dakota
Mary Landrieu, Louisiana
Ben Nelson, Nebraska
Ron Wyden, Oregon

If you voted for any of these scumbags the last time they ran for office, I truly hope you reconsider next time. If these five had instead voted the way their constituents had expected, the measure would have failed, 47-44.

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"Last Tuesday, Harry Reid demonstrated wonderful signs of life. The question now is, are they going to build on this, or is it going to be an isolated episode that doesn't lead to a fundamental shift? Will enough Democrats now be willing to admit that voting to authorize the war was a mistake? Whether they were genuinely misled, they bought into it, or they were too cowardly to vote for what they believed was true, it was a mistake. Will they now have the courage to say, "This was wrong, and that we need to get our brave troops out of Iraq now." Are the Democrats going to offer an alternative plan to get us out of Iraq? Are they going to fill this vacuum created by the chaos in Iraq and a scandal-plagued administration in tatters, or are they going to wait for the Republicans to do it their way, reap the political dividends, and leave the Democrats sniping outside the palace gate?" - - - John Cusack

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"One of the biggest changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in Washington. Theology asserts propositions that cannot be proven true; ideologues hold stoutly to a worldview despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality. The offspring of ideology and theology are not always bad but they are always blind. And that is the danger: voters and politicians alike, oblivious to the facts." - - - Bill Moyers

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November 13, 2005

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Weekend Snips

 

A catastrophic collapse in sea and bird life numbers along America's Northwest Pacific seaboard is raising fears that global warming is beginning to irreparably damage the health of the oceans.

The Great Ohio Election Scam of November, 2005

The case against impeachment

"We do not torture," says the president. I can remember when that went without saying.

An ultra-Rightwing site has made a "patriotic" song "Thank You, America" available for download. Well, leave it to SadlyNo to make an anti-war music video out of it.

Proof that Bush's speechwriter quit two months ago

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Communication

 

Michael Noer and David M. Ewalt of Forbes.com have assembled a stellar collection of articles and interviews, all related to human communication. Subjects include: the internet, symbolic gestures, I.M., invention of language, interspecies communication, nonsence, blogging, video games... There are many fascinating subjects, opinions and facts. Highly recommended by LEFT is RIGHT.

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November 12, 2005

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"The argument for going to war with Iraq was based on intelligence that we now know was inaccurate. The information the American people were hearing from the president -- and that I was being given by our intelligence community -- wasn't the whole story. Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war. George Bush won't accept responsibility for his mistakes. Along with Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, he has made horrible mistakes at almost every step: failed diplomacy; not going in with enough troops; not giving our forces the equipment they need; not having a plan for peace. Because of these failures, Iraq is a mess and has become a far greater threat than it ever was. It is now a haven for terrorists, and our presence there is draining the goodwill our country once enjoyed, diminishing our global standing. It has made fighting the global war against terrorist organizations more difficult, not less. The urgent question isn't how we got here but what we do now. We have to give our troops a way to end their mission honorably. That means leaving behind a success, not a failure. What is success? I don't think it is Iraq as a Jeffersonian democracy. I think it is an Iraq that is relatively stable, largely self-sufficient, comparatively open and free, and in control of its own destiny." - - - JOHN EDWARDS

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"Hey, you know, if you want to ban military recruiting, fine, but I'm not going to give you another nickel of federal money. You know, if I'm the president of the United States, I walk right into Union Square, I set up my little presidential podium, and I say, "Listen, citizens of San Francisco, if you vote against military recruiting, you're not going to get another nickel in federal funds. Fine. You want to be your own country? Go right ahead." And if Al Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you, except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead." - - - Fox News host Bill O'Reilly

"Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Michael Savage, Michelle Malkin. This new brand of distinctly anti-American hate speech, this "new" non-conservative conservatism has been working its way in a moist clump down America's pant leg for a while now. Eventually, we'll be rid of it, but in the meantime it's still going to stink like hell." - - - HUNTER

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Condi Rice and Karen Hughes failed to advance any of the U.S.'s agenda at the first Forum for the Future, assembled by the Bush Administration and hosted by Egypt at the suggestion of the Bush Administration, as Steve Soto explains:

In other words, not a damn thing has changed, no matter what country we invade and get tied down in, no matter how ineptly we help Al Qaeda spread in the region, no matter how many times Bush walks hand in hand with the Saudis, no matter how many times Laura Bush tells the Egyptians how great they are for democracy and the rights of women, and no matter how many different clothes and hair styles Condi wears. In fact, can anyone point to a single major accomplishment by Condi Twin Mirrors since she was all-too-willing to push her mentor out of Foggy Bottom, aside from her wardrobe, her ability to shop for new shoes while people were dying from Katrina, and her ability to garner great press coverage while seemingly getting nothing done in North Korea, China, Europe, and now the Middle East?

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Fun Images for Saturday

 

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November 11, 2005

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Friday Fun

 

Strange Japanese game show involving pork chop hats and lizards (video)
Rap Snacks
Kids' birthday parties never used to be like THIS!
Mane Man (video)
Some unusual uses for your laptop computer
Steven Colbert gives bad dating advice (video)
Loser Babies
Questions for your boss
Dancing Robots (video)
100 Greatest Internet Moments
McGriddle Song (video)

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November 10, 2005

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36 and No Bottom in Sight

 

If Fox News' latest poll puts Bush's approval rating at 36%, I wonder what it really is. Remember when it dipped below 50 and we were rubbing our eyes in disbelief? If I had fallen into a coma eight months ago and woken today....

Wow, nearly TWO-THIRDS of Americans now DISAPPROVE of George Bush. I wish they would ask, in these polls, how many of us truly hate him.

Often the public may disapprove of a leader's job when that leader makes unpopular and difficult-to-understand decisions that later turn out to be deft. During the past five years I cannot think of even one deft decision by Mr. Bush-war. Every single thing he has touched has been transformed into death, destruction, misery of suffering for everyone except for those fortunate wealthy Republicans. The only positive thing he ever accomplished was making people of below-average intelligence think that they can one day also become President.

U.S. History textbooks will have to devote entire chapters to his horrific Administration. The Bush II Presidential Library will have to be located on an offshore haven and will only contain children's fairy tales. The name "Bush" will forever be used only in negative context. Bush has effectively put the finishing touches on the conversion of a respectable (albeit conservative) political party, without whose existence would not have driven the Democrats to force so many social advancements during the past four decades, into a group of money-craving, values-starved, compassionless subhumans. I find it so hard to understand how an educated, intelligent middle class American can associate him/herself with such a decadent political congregation.

Bush and his merry band of amoral misfits have unintentionally changed the appearance of the current dead-in-the-water jellyfish Democratic Party into an attractive alternative for political change. I know that Dick Cheney is the mastermind behind Bush, but in any organization the leader, by default, must accept the responsibility of the consequences.

Bush will forever be reviled by Muslims and Arabs (and now Blacks, for that matter). For the rest of our lives the remainder of the world will always doubt our intentions as a nation, no matter how honorable. Today we American citizens are morally screwed. Tomorrow our children will be financially screwed. We have met the enemy and they are not us, but they sure as hell look like us and speak our language.

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A Letter from the Hofstra Community to Bill and Hillary

 

Hofstra University of New York is hosting the The 11th Presidential Conference, William Jefferson Clinton: The "New Democrat" From Hope. The Hofstra Community has formally requested that Bill Clinton (and his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton) take a stand, as leading representatives of the Democratic Party, by ending the silence by the Dem. party leadership and begin opposing the Bush Administration's pro-Iraq War policies. Here is an excerpt of the letter that will be presented to the Clintons and the attendees at the conference:

....We, the undersigned, believe the Democratic Party has a moral obligation to stand firm in opposition to the reckless and destructive policies of the Bush administration in Iraq. And, since you are the face of that party, we believe you have the obligation to articulate that opposition on behalf of Democrats and patriotic Americans of all political persuasions. We therefore call upon you to meet your moral obligations to a country which has so warmly embraced and so greatly entrusted you, to make a clear and unequivocal statement of opposition to the madness of George Bush's adventure in Iraq, and to do so now, before even greater damage can be done to that country and to ours. Americans are dying by the thousands in Iraq. Iraqi civilians are being slaughtered by the tens of thousands. America, once a beacon of human rights ideals in a hard and cold world, descends today into a moral bankruptcy which matches its fiscal condition, both caused in large part by this war based on deceit. Polls show that most Americans now understand the utter foolishness of this foreign policy tragedy, and yet most politicians remain silent while the carnage continues and magnifies in scope. It is time for our political leadership to become just that. America stands today teetering upon a precipice perhaps as grave as any since 1865. We believe you understand this better than anyone, having been haunted for over a decade by the dark forces of the radical right, who seek to destroy this country while hiding behind a mask of piety and patriotism. We implore you now to call forth from yourselves the courage, patriotism and leadership America so sorely needs at this grave moment, and to lead us away from the abyss, before it is too late. The Iraq war is a tragedy and a disaster. It must end now, and - with the exception of one man in the Oval Office - no other Americans have a greater capacity to hasten that outcome than do you....

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Re: "Germ Boys and Yes Men"

 

Following is an excerpt from an upcoming article in Nation by Jeremy Scahill. It details how Bush cronyism, which was responsible for the disasterous consequences of FEMA's response to Hurricane Katrina, is now set to repeat itself (via Stewart Simonson, Assistant Secretary for Public Health Emergency Preparedness at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) with possibly even greater impact when the bird flu strikes the U.S.

....Even within the "war on terror" community, Bioshield has proved controversial. That's because more than 80 percent of the nearly $1 billion allocated under the program has gone to a scandal-plagued company that has never successfully produced an FDA-licensed vaccine. In November 2004 California-based VaxGen was handed one of the largest government vaccine contracts in history. The company is largely known for its failed AIDS vaccine, and just a few months before VaxGen won the Bioshield contract, the Nasdaq took the unusual step of delisting it from trading because of financial irregularities. So why did it get the contract? "I have no idea why VaxGen was selected," admits Henderson, who remains chair of the influential Secretary's Advisory Council at HHS. "It's not for me to decide whether it's a good idea or not." But it was for Simonson and his staff. And as with many Bush Administration contracts, several signs point to cronyism as the deciding factor--among them: VaxGen CEO Lance Gordon is a longtime associate of one of Simonson's top deputies on Bioshield, Dr. Phil Russell, former chief of Army medical research....

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Midweek Snips

 

***FLASH*** House Democrats, inspired by Dem. Senators, rediscover their own testicles

U.S. Senate REPUBLICANS trying to get pro-discrimination amendment added to the U.S. Constitution

Three reliable indicators that the housing bubble is on the verge of bursting, big-time

The evolution of Moqtada al-Sadr

Bush-war White House flatly refuses to give up torture

Retrograde Kansas

Background on the French Riots, by Juan Cole

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November 9, 2005

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FTCR Summary About Groperzenegger's Election

 

Below is the statement of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights which nicely summarizes yesterday's California election:

"Californians rejected Governor Schwarzenegger's measures, his unnecessary election and the governor himself when they defeated every one of the measures on yesterday's ballot. The election was a denunciation of the concept of governor as celebrity marketer. It was the repudiation of corporate campaign cash and a dramatic rejection of corporations' and politicians' attempts to steal the initiative process from the people. "Schwarzenegger needs to apologize to Californians. Not just for wasting $50 million of the taxpayers' money, but also for claiming he did not need anyone else's money and then collecting $70 million in corporate contributions. He needs to apologize for accepting cash from interest groups who had business on his desk and for flying around the country to fundraise when he should have been governing. He has to apologize for turning into the politician he encouraged Californians to throw out two years ago. "Governor Schwarzenegger rose and fell based on the power of populism. The nurses, cops, teachers, and firefighters beat Arnold by displaying their humanity. Californians didn't buy the Governor's attacks against public servants. Instead Californians said these public servants are the true action heroes who protect the public. Voters weren't willing to relinquish power to a celebrity governor with a grudge and 70 million dollars in corporate cash. "In turning back Schwarzenegger's initiatives, Californians also denied the corporate and ideological conservatives an opportunity to claim popular allegiance to their agenda. Both the Chamber of Commerce and national right-wing activists hoped to use this election as a galvanizing tool for initiatives throughout the country and further rollbacks of citizen, consumer and worker rights. With a resounding 'no,' big industry was told that even a hundred million dollars can't sell their out-of-the-mainstream agenda. "Now, a real reform agenda must be embraced. And the Governor as well as Democrats and Republicans in the statehouse, must address the issues that Californians actually care about, but the politicians are afraid to talk about: the need for getting money out of politics and publicly financing elections; the high cost of healthcare and the lack of universal health coverage; gas prices; the real problems with public education and our broken energy system. "If Governor Schwarzenegger walks away from the election to more world-record fundraising and cash-register politics, then it will be clear he does not understand what the voters said in the 2003 recall and reiterated last night."

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I apologize for the slow-loading today. From what I can tell, the hit meter site (Sitemeter) is down and causing very slow page loading as Blogger tries to connect. I may just inactivate it if the problem persists.

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Kill the Messenger

 

"If accurate, such an egregious disclosure could have long-term and far-reaching damaging and dangerous consequences, and will imperil our efforts to protect the American people and our homeland from terrorist attacks."

This was the message released yesterday by Sen. Bill Frist of Tennessee (R), the Senate majority leader, and Rep. Dennis Hastert of Illinois (R), the House speaker, in response to another Republican Senator leaking classified information to the Washington Post about secret torture prisons at undisclosed locations in eastern Europe and other nations.

Funny, they seem concerned about the leak, but NOT ABOUT THE PRISONS! Liberal Oasis agrees.

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Flip-flopping the head-shaking

 

Here is a complete list of the Propositions Californians passed yesterday:
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That's right, none passed. In essence and in principle, Groperzenegger has been soundly defefeated. Here's a link to the results.

Thank you, California. I've temporarily stopped shaking my head at you for electing a B-rated movie actor to live in the governor's mansion. Now, let's continue this new tradition of common sense and take back our state in '06.

$250M was spent by political groups to defeat or support the propositions, along with the $50M to hold the election. What an incredible, mind-boggling waste of money. Whoops, I'm shaking my head again...

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November 8, 2005

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From Union of Concerned Scientists (emphasis added):

Victory on Reducing Diesel Pollution From Sleeping Truckers! Thanks to thousands of emails from UCS activists like you, and support from other residents across the state, the California Air Resources Board voted unanimously to set a 5-minute idling limit for diesel trucks that typically idle overnight! Trucking companies will now equip their sleeper cabs with cleaner, smaller engines or non-diesel alternatives to power air conditioning, heating, and other amenities for sleeping truckers. Thanks to this new rule, California will save over 100 million gallons of diesel fuel a year, prevent more than 700,000 tons of global warming emissions and thousands of tons of toxic and smog-forming air pollution from being emitted every year, and save truckers a small fortune in fuel costs.

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"Iraq War was a war of choice." - - - Richard Haass, President of the Council on Foreign Relations

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Fallujah - The Hidden Massacre

 

This online documentary shows evidence of the Nazi-like and Vietnam-like tactics used by U.S. Military during the annihilation of Fallujah a year ago. Show it to your Bush-supporting friends. Show it to anyone who thinks the Iraq war is honorable. There is documented use of chemical weapons (white phosphorus, MK77 (napalm-like), and others), the very same types of agents mentioned by Pres. Bush-war as one reason for invading Iraq.

WARNING: this is definitely for mature viewers only. The final sequence is particularly galling, when sharpshooters gun down Iraqi truck drivers with total dispassion. Thanks to Tom Feeley of Information Clearing House for making this film available online.

Here is a related article by Peter Popham of the Independent Online. Democracy Now! also has the story and some related links.

UPDATE: Here is another, slightly better quality version of the documentary.

UPDATE II: Here are some photos showing the effects of the white phosphorous. (Same warning as above).

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JOHN GARAMENDI'S SPECIAL ELECTION VOTER GUIDE Tuesday, November 8, 2005 Prop 73 - NO! Puts Teen Girls at Risk Prop 74 - NO! Punishes New Teachers Prop 75 - NO! Paycheck Deception Act Prop 76 - NO! Cuts School Funding and Ends the Balance of Power Prop 77 - NO! Arnold’s Reapportionment Power Grab Prop 78 - NO! The Drug Companies’ Bad Prescription Initiative Prop 79 - YES The Cheaper Prescription Drugs for Californians Act Prop 80 - YES The Affordable Electricity and Prevent Blackouts Act In Los Angeles VOTE "YES" on LAUSD Measure Y

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Early Week Snips

 

A glimpse into the power structure of the Office of the Vice President

The case for reparations to Iraqis.

The latest concern about avian flu: Eggs.

If you support Bush, you support torture. Also: Bush's History of Iraq

Design your own gas-efficient auto (interactive animation)

Bush-war and his Administration commit the Seven Deadly Sins

To help you understand and follow the complex issues involved with the Niger Uranium Forged Documents scandal, Talking Points Memo has created a regularly updated TIMELINE of events.

Americans' wages fail to keep up with inflation over the last two years.

Demleft has some good posts about the California propositions for tomorrow's money pit of an election.

Great example of Republican dirty tricks. This has got to be illegal somehow. And now there's this even worse tactic.

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November 7, 2005

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When a preacher/minister/rabbi/priest leads us in prayer for victory in battle, this is what in essence is the true request, as penned by Mark Twain:

"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it -- for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen."

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"There's an enemy that lurks and plots and plans and wants to hurt America again. So you bet we will aggressively pursue them but we will do so under the law. We do not torture." - - - Pres. Bush, today

"Oh, and there are WMD in Iraq, where we're making progress. And, I care about Black People. And my Administration will follow only the highest ethical standards."

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California Voters: Your Voting Guide is Here

 

Here is a handy voting guide for the California propositions that you can print out and take to the polling place or give to friends/neighbors/family. Click the image for larger, readable version. You can also download the entire, 2-page document (PDF format), which has additional information, HERE.


[CLICK IMAGE]

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November 6, 2005

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Riot, Anyone?

 

Maybe the wake-up call we need to get us permanently off our lazy, fat asses is a good old-fashioned riot. I think we've all proved that these peace marches we've been having since 2002 have done squat for the anti-war movement. These A.N.S.W.E.R. marches take place on the same streets in the same cities, have the same, tired signs (e.g. "No Blood For Oil", "Some Village in Texas is Missing Its Idiot", etc.) Does anyone even care anymore, except those who go to feel superior to others, or "teach" their kids all about liberal protesting, or to meet chics? Some horn honks from passing cars, some speeches from the same liberal civil rights leaders / Hollywood celebs / Black Congresswomen (notice how they're always the same ones?) and then we all go home to rest our marched-out butts on our cushy sofas and return our signs to the garage until the next "assigned" march.

Have a good riot, with tear gas, water cannons, some arrests, scuffles, traffic disruptions, cherry bombs, a few broken storefront windows, and so on, and you're now getting a lot of attention. There are always some fringe liberals willing to get arrested overnight to make a point. Let's put 'em to good use.

Everyone else in the world seems good at it. Lately the French and South Americans have been in the streets and everyone is paying attention. Why can't we? Every time we hold marches, the only controversy that results is the differing (and always underestimated) counts of marchers by the media.

Why can't we push a march into a nice little riot next time? Okay, so you 'll stop bringing your kids with you because of the less-safe conditions. Big F-ing deal. The kids don't really understand what's happening anyway.

A nice mixed-race riot on Wilshire Blvd, or Pennsylvania Ave, or Market Street. THAT will get everyone's attention. Trust me. If all you spoiled liberals are too friggin' lazy to start a desperately needed revolution, then how about a nice weekend riot? Oh come on...

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"Find out just what people will quietly submit to, and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress." - - - Frederick Douglass

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November 4, 2005

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Weekend Snips

 

Chinese get jump-start on future with "Eco-cities".

Will the HYDRINO shove oil, coal and natural gas into the history books?

Yeah, as if we didn't know it by now.... Vietnam War was started by Pres. Johnson on a lie

Rocco the Forger

For many months the Bush-war Administration has claimed that the U.S. military and Iraqi army continue to achieve "significant progress" in their war against the insurgency. Here's a 1-page chart that highlights the "progress".

Drug Firms Gave Money to Some Who Endorsed Proposition 78.

In this CBS poll, Bush's approval may be a gutter-scraping 33%, but Cheney's is only 19%!

Vatican: Faithful Should Listen to Science (Yo, Catholics, please make up your minds!)

The shocking revelations of health care benefits for U.S. politicians

Good news: FEMA extends aid application deadline for (all) hurricane victims

25 of the worst quotes about Iraq by the Bush-war Administration

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"I'll never understand the Republican fascination with screwing the poor at every opportunity. Countless numbers of American middle class families are one month, one week, or one very bad day away from being poor, indebted, or homeless, or at the very least not having enough food for the kids during one particular week. While my Catholic family was indeed, sigh, unalterably Republican, watching the Reagan years it didn't take much to demonstrate just how much Republicans loathed the middle class -- the average folks who had paychecks, not trusts, and whose most sizable long-term investments consisted of the savings account at their bank, not stock market portfolios. And I'm not talking "ignored", or "were indifferent to", but absolute hatred. The idea that some poor person, somewhere, might be sucking a dime too many out of the system is largely used as the reason to carve, gut and bury whatever safety-net welfare programs the party sets its eyes on. Rather screw a thousand people, than to have the children of some undeserving "welfare queen" get milk today. But God Help Us All if we don't pass, in the middle of all of this apparently urgent pain, yet another business-humping, morality-punching tax cut for the folks with greens fees to pay. Even some Republicans are recognizing that there's going to be some political hell to be paid, in reconciling the Senate and far more draconian House measures, and there are going to be a great many good people in America squeezing that intramural fight for all it's worth, as yet another demonstration of how Republicans would rather dump your grandmother in a ditch by the side of the road than give up a day of shoe-shopping or withstand the Satanic Fucking Communism of having to pay that extra one percent here or there. Whatever. My tolerance for these pretenders of morality has been pegged at zero for a decade. I can't wait to hear the Fox News spin on how those nasty children on Medicare or those bastards taking advantage of the school lunch program are hurting the God given economic competitiveness of the investor class." - - - Hunter, commenting on the latest attempts by the Republican Congress to reduce the federal budget on the backs of government social programs

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Get Real, Democrats

 

Just a quick reminder... Everyone (who's not a moron/Republican) seems to be getting excited about the prospect of taking back the H of R and maybe even the Senate next year (2006). Did all of you already forget that the Republican party still controls the vote counting??? Do you REALLY think that they aren't, right now, finalizing plans to steal all the necessary votes, and disenfranchise all the necessary eligible voters, in order to pull off more Floridas and Ohios??? Exactly how naive are Democrats becoming these days?



You can help yourself a little bit by knowing your rights as a voter (in California):

VOTER BILL OF RIGHTS You have the right to cast a ballot if you are a valid registered voter. A valid registered voter means a United States citizen who is a resident in this state, who is at least 18 years of age and not in prison or on parole for conviction of a felony, and who is registered to vote at his or her current residence address. You have the right to cast a provisional ballot if your name is not listed on the voting rolls. You have the right to cast a ballot if you are present and in line at the polling place prior to the close of the polls. You have the right to cast a secret ballot free from intimidation. You have the right to receive a new ballot if, prior to casting your ballot, you believe you made a mistake. If at any time before you finally cast your ballot, you feel you have made a mistake, you have the right to exchange the spoiled ballot for a new ballot. Absentee voters may also request and receive a new ballot if they return their spoiled ballot to an elections official prior to the closing of the polls on election day. You have the right to receive assistance in casting your ballot, if you are unable to vote without assistance. You have the right to return a completed absentee ballot to any precinct in the county. You have the right to election materials in another language, if there are sufficient residents in your precinct to warrant production. You have the right to ask questions about election procedures and observe the elections process. You have the right to ask questions of the precinct board and election officials regarding election procedures and to receive an answer or be directed to the appropriate official for an answer. However, if persistent questioning disrupts the execution of their duties, the board or election officials may discontinue responding to questions. You have the right to report any illegal or fraudulent activity to a local elections official or to the Secretary of State’s Office. If you believe you have been denied any of these rights, or if you are aware of any election fraud or misconduct, please call the Secretary of State’s confidential toll-free Voter Protection Hotline at 1-800-345-VOTE (8683).

Other than that, you're pretty much up sh*t creek.

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"It's like there's been a gigantic, smelly hair clog in a karma pipe somewhere (Frist probably flushed down one too many kittens) that's just now come loose, down in the sewers of Washington, and at long last it's flooding the city. Republicans will no doubt continue to wail about the criminalization of politics, faced with a truly remarkable array of investigations, indictments, and, well... felons. But if you don't want politics to become criminalized, the answer would seem to be transparently obvious -- don't commit crimes. Not really sure why that never occurred to them." - - - Hunter

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Attention, Wackos Christian Fundamentalists:

 

"The wackos get their information through the Christian right, Christian radio, mail, the internet and telephone trees. Simply put, we want to bring out the wackos to vote against something and make sure the rest of the public lets the whole thing slip past them." - - - Michael Scanlon, former business partner of lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and former aide to Rep. Tom DeLay

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FRIDAY FUN

 

2005 Japanese Yo-Yo Champion (video)
No, you can't use a mannequin as your carpool passenger
How the Death Star works
Falipornia Speak Therapy Institute (video)
Gravitas (video)
Tangram (puzzle)
World's 10 Tallest Buildings
Grid Game
Hip-hop Yoda (short video)
San Francisco in Jello

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November 3, 2005

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"The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing...." - - - Albert Einstein

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Propositions for the next CA special election

 

From ArnoldWatch:

California newspapers are reporting today that Arnold has a slew of new initiatives in the works regardless of how voters respond to his slate next Tuesday. ArnoldWatch has secretly obtained a list of the first ten initiatives Arnold will propose: 1. Eliminate legislative branch 2. Reduce pay of teachers, nurses, cops and firefighters to minimum wage 3. Require journalists to pay royalty for interviews with Governor and staff 4. Make bodybuilding the state sport 5. All schools required to play governor's movies in rotation on weekly basis (and, of course, pay royalties) 6. Ban contributions by special interests but allow unlimited contributions from everyone else 7. Governor designates who is a "special interest" 8. Require monthly elections 9. Upon reelection to second term, gubernatorial term limits are suspended and coronation is held 10. Build a palace and a horse-drawn carriage

Sounds about right. God bless imbeciles like Groperzenegger and Bush; without them we would often have no reason to get out of bed in the morning.

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Midweek Snips

 

Neener neener

Strike one against Alito

Bush-war's approval rating continues to plummet. But, as Josh Marshall says, "By one measure you have to concede that the joke is really on the 65% of us who think [Bush] blows. Because no matter how unpopular he is, he's still president."

Tought questions for a Wal-Mart executive (video)

Bush-war Administration has secret torture prisons in Eastern Europe.

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"So Karl Rove remains in the White House on a daily basis, in spite of his now known role in the leak. Whether or not the President knew anything of the leak while it was happening, it's clear he knows about it now, and continues to choose to support the leakers. Even some die-hard conservatives like Trent Lott are alarmed at the implications for the presidency." - - - Hunter

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November 2, 2005

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How Smart is Your Right Foot? This is so funny it will boggle your mind. And if you are anywhere near as stubborn as I am, you will keep trying at least a few more times to see if you can outsmart your foot, but you can't. 1. While sitting at your desk, lift your right foot off the floor and make clockwise circles. 2. Now, while doing this, draw the number "6" in the air with your right hand. Your foot will change direction.

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I came across this survey quote at the UC Berkeley site:

'All the things you just mentioned are smoke screens by the liberal media and the left wing of the Democratic Party. There are some reasonable Democrats, but the party seems to have been hijacked by MoveOn.org, Michael Moore, and Cindy Sheehan. The FEMA response to Katrina was no different than its response to any other catastrophe: you heard the same complaints after Hurricane Andrew. Valerie Plame [the reason behind Libby's indictment] wasn't a covert operator; if she was, her husband Joe Wilson shouldn't have been writing op-eds for the New York Times. The Harriet Miers nomination — whoever Bush nominates is going to get a fight, it's a no-win situation. The 2,000-deaths marker in Iraq? Not to marginalize people dying, but this number pales in comparison to a single Civil War battle. Two thousand is a number: you can make a milestone out of any number you want. If you're committed to an action, you have to be prepared to take casualties.' - - - Richard Ogar, Library Technical Services

This guy works at the Berkeley library, so if this is any indication, Democrats really still have their work cut out before the next election cycle.

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Just a reminder... These are the co-signers of the Statement of Principles for the PROJECT FOR THE NEW AMERICAN CENTURY. See any familiar names?

Elliott Abrams
Gary Bauer
William J. Bennett
Jeb Bush
Dick Cheney
Eliot A. Cohen
Midge Decter
Paula Dobriansky
Steve Forbes
Aaron Friedberg
Francis Fukuyama
Frank Gaffney
Fred C. Ikle
Donald Kagan
Zalmay Khalilzad
I. Lewis Libby
Norman Podhoretz
Dan Quayle
Peter W. Rodman
Stephen P. Rosen
Henry S. Rowen
Donald Rumsfeld
Vin Weber
George Weigel
Paul Wolfowitz

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"It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or driving underground all heretics." - - - Robert A. Heinlein

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So.... Iraq is now, as the Bush-war Administration claims, a fledgling democracy? Let's see:

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said Tuesday before the United Nations: "I categorically refuse the use of Iraqi soil to launch a military strike against Syria or any other Arab country . . . "But at the end of the day my ability to confront the US military is limited and I cannot impose on them my will." So let's get this straight. The president of Iraq elected six months after the US "turned over sovereignty" on June 28, 2004 is saying before the United Nations that George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld decide whether his country can be used as a base to attack other countries, and he is unable to influence such decisions-- even though he categorically rejects any such action. For all those "Bush's Iraq" boosters who laud the "democratic" elections of January 30 and the recent constitutional referendum, this clear admission that Iraq remains under American military occupation, and that its government is helpless before American decisions about the fate of Iraq, is a rather strong refutation. After all, no country is a "democracy" where the military calls the shots, overruling the civilian president-- how much less so if it is a foreign military! Talabani is saying that Iraq is more like Burma, Pakistan or the Sudan than it is like democracies such as India or Brazil.

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$300M wasted

 

In a totally unnecessary Special Election called by Groperzenegger, huge amounts of money have gone to waste:

$300 million price tag on initiative battles - Unions, drug firms biggest spenders - John Wildermuth, Chronicle Political Writer - Wednesday, November 2, 2005 Thirty contributors have bankrolled nearly two-thirds of the estimated $300 million that will be spent on Tuesday's special election. The high rollers include unions, drug companies, business groups and individuals that have pumped $1 million apiece or more -- often much more -- into the initiative battle called by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Led by the $56.6 million spent by the California Teachers Association, these contributors have raised more than $189 million for an off-year election no one expected. "It's an unprecedented amount of money that violates the intent of all the campaign spending laws," said Joe Cerrell, a longtime Democratic consultant. "It's just crazy." .........

And that doesn't even include the cost to the counties of hosting the election.

What a stupid, senseless waste of citizens' hard-earned cash, all because Governor Groperzenegger's balls are so tiny from so many steroids. On the other hand, most of these same citizens voted for him in the first place, so someone like myself can only shake my head in disgust at the entire State. Who ever thought Gray Davis would, in retrospect, look so good?

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November 1, 2005

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Early Week Snips

 

U.S. Military slaughters dozens of innocent Iraqis using air strikes.

Uh oh.... Look out, Republicans. Democrats just rediscovered their testicles.

DCCC has a new video/ad about Plamegate. (You'll need to enter your email address in order to play it.)

SPECIAL TREAT: Segment of 1956 interview with Rosa Parks, where she describes the famous day when she refused to relinquish her bus seat to a White man. Make sure your kids listen too; the idea of segregated seating is a totally foreign concept to them. The recording is just a couple of minutes long, and then it loops. You can also hear another segment by clicking "Hear Another Clip" in square #1 in the lower left corner.

EPA Proposes Reducing Information on Toxics Release

Wal-Mart (WMT) and its founding Walton family have emerged as big backers of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, giving about $1 million in the past year to his favored causes as he vetoed legislation aimed at the company.

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"A sovereign nation which was no threat to the United States of America lies in ruins and tens of thousands of its innocent citizens have been slaughtered just for the hell of it. When are we going to stand up as a country and yell a collective: 'bull-shit?!!' I have been screaming this until my voice is getting hoarse and people are getting sick of hearing it." - - - Cindy Sheehan

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As Juan Cole emphasized in the following post yesterday, this subject should be in the crosshairs of every Progressive blogger:

Libby Replaced by Scandal-Ridden Aides Vice President Richard Bruce Cheney replaced his indicted chief of staff, Irving Lewis Libby on Monday with two problematic figures-- David Addington and John Hannah. As Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel note, Addington is the author of legal memos justifying torture of prisoners held by the US abroad, in direct contradiction of US treaty obligations under international law. I guess Cheney thinks the authors of the US constitution were appalled by cruel and unusual punishment only if American authorities committed it in North America. In reference to Addington, the Washington Post published an editorial recently calling Cheney the Vice President of torture. Hannah was a point man in spreading the disinformation produced by Ahmad Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress about Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction. So, the Veep showing his deep disdain for the American public with these appointments of Libby's replacements. Both of them have so disserved it that they should be made to resign, not promoted. John Stewart was brilliant Monday night on the attempt of the Bush administration to take the spotlight off Libby's damage to national security with its next supreme court nominee. I hope the blogosphere keeps its eyes on the Libby story. And I should think this is an issue that should concern all bloggers, whether on the left or the right. Cheney's and Bush's aides damaged our national security for petty political purposes, and they are making an assault on key provisions in the US constitution.

[CLICK IMAGE]

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After reading the following bit by Atrios, I realized that this is the first realistic prediction of the next few years that makes sense:

Something I think is just about undeniable at this point is that we have a president who has decided that "leaving Iraq=losing." Even aside from whatever reason we're really there for, or what our long term ambitions in the region are, he's settled into this little narrative that can't be broken. Iraq is the central front in the war on terror. The terrorists are attacking us there. The terrorists want us to leave. If we leave the terrorists win. We are not going to see significant troop withdrawals in '06, '07, or '08 absent a major rebellion by Republicans in Congress, which I can't see happening. Even a Democratic sweep in '06 won't help end this thing. All the talk of benchmarks, timetables, withdrawal, whatever is somewhat moot. There's nothing which will cause Bush to call for withdrawal. It's his mission, his purpose, his raison d'etre. It's all he's got, and he's not going to let go no matter how many people die.

Forget the hurricanes, indictments, supreme court nominations and so on. The one constant of the Bush Administration until the Democrats win back the White House in 2008 is the Iraq War. The war will continue to provide a huge revenue source for Bush/Cheney-connected contractors. It will keep Americans depressed, angry and fearful, thus insecure and reliant on any kind of government-declared action that claims to improve their lives (fight terrorism; the "ownership society"; privatization of retirement savings, health care, education and public utilities) which will provide Bush a constant base of support. At the end of his term, Bush et al. will escape from town with their million$/billion$ and damn-the-consequences, leaving the war in the lap of the Democrats.

They won. They fucking won. They won when they hijacked the Ohio vote in 2004. As soon as you heard the election results, and then Kerry's premature deference to Bush as victor, you knew in your heart that the chance to completely reverse the damage to the country during the first four Bush years was forever lost. You suddenly realized that the '90s would end up being the best years of your (and maybe your kid's) life. You know in your gut that the Democratic Party Leadership really is essentially, gently Republican, and that any successful attempt to move it towards Progressive ideology will take many years, which are many years that we just can't afford. You grudgingly accept the fact that an in-the-street revolution, South American style, is the only solution unless we end up nuking ourselves into oblivion, which actually is now a much higher risk than at any time in history.

It's just that we're all too fat and lazy to make the effort to start the revolution. All the blogging, activism, environmentalism, punditry, and bumper stickers won't change the results; in the end it's all just an elegant form of bullshitting ourselves. Hillary and Obama won't save us. MoveOn, Code Pink and MediaMatters won't save us. We are all alone in this, folks, and we are the only ones who can save us.

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Well the weight of the world is FALLING And on my back I've been CRAWLING The state of affairs is APPALLING And the 6 o'clock news keeps CALLING Well I've been trying to see the world through their eyes Where black is white and day is night Left is Right Left is Right Left is Right, For me Well negotiations keep STALLING The United Nations keeps CALLING The Skeletons you're HAULING Won't hold when you're FALLING Put your head in the sand and you'll never know What's waiting for you in the depths below (below) Don't believe everything that you read Take what you want and keep what you need TWISTED NIXON

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CHICK HEARN, THANKS SO MUCH FOR ALL THE MEMORIES.

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