Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Top 10 Incredible Animal Videos:





Via Wired, Watch them all here:

Top 10 Incredible Animal Videos: Readers' Choice

The List;

10. Chickens Policing Rabbits
9. The Great Beagle Escape
8. Dolphins Playing With Bubble Rings
7. Gibbon Taunts Baby Tigers
6. Lion Reunion
5. Hedgehog Eating a Carrot
4. Hamster Eats Popcorn on a Piano
3. Gin the Dancing Dog
2. Transformer Owl
1. Super Smart Dog






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Saturday, December 27, 2008

Winning Hearts and Minds in Afghanistan...With Boner Pills...Wha?


...Wanna buy some Wood?

Little Blue Pills Among the Ways CIA Wins Friends in Afghanistan


The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for a small gift.

Four blue pills. Viagra.

"Take one of these. You'll love it," the officer said. Compliments of Uncle Sam.

The enticement worked. The officer, who described the encounter, returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes -- followed by a request for more pills.

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Side Effects of Viagra

Very few drugs work perfectly, and Viagra® is no exception.

Occasional patients who take Viagra® get painful, long-lasting erections and have to see a doctor to solve the problem.

Finally, there is some concern that some men, especially younger men who take Viagra® recreationally and who don't really need it for physical reasons, may end up with a dependency on the drug. That is, they may become unable to maintain an erection without taking Viagra®.

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Sounds Like Life is going to be fun, fun, fun for the girls and boys in Afghanistan!...some "special" Viagra side effects to look forward to:

Three men rape 13-year-old girl - Girl stoned to death for adultery

The Afghan women jailed for being victims of rape

Bush, Burqas and the Oppression of Afghan Women

Afghan Woman, raped, forced to watch her child killed, and then jailed for "escaping her house" by Anti-Taliban Govt.

School Girls Acid attacks and rape: growing threat to women who oppose traditional order - Female MPs speak out as conditions worsen and Islamists gain respectability

Abused Afghan women often end up in jail
A woman fleeing domestic violence or rape often ends up guilty


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I caught this prescient quote from Mahablog:


I’m beginning to think that movement conservatism is, at base, a kind of psychological-sexual dysfunction. You know these guys are terrified of women’s sexuality. They’d have us women in burqas and condone stoning of rape victims if they could get away with it. They’d deny that, but in fact, what is the difference between denying a rape victim reproductive rights and stoning her for unchastity? It’s a difference purely in degree, not in kind, rooted in the same twisted views of women and sexuality.



Go Team USA!



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Let's not forget about The Strange Death of the Woman Who Filed a Rape Lawsuit Against Bush


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Friday, December 26, 2008

"There are things we will be doing on Election Day that haven't even been dreamt of yet."

Bush Insider Who Planned To Tell All Killed In Plane Crash: Non-Profit Demands Full Federal Investigation

Via Velvet Revolution:
Michael Connell, the Bush IT expert who has been directly implicated in the rigging of George Bush’s 2000 and 2004 elections, was killed last night when his single engine plane crashed three miles short of the Akron airport. Velvet Revolution (“VR”), a non-profit that has been investigating Mr. Connell’s activities for the past two years, can now reveal that a person close to Mr. Connell has recently been discussing with a VR investigator how to tell all about his work for George Bush. Mr. Connell told a close associate that he was afraid that the George Bush and Dick Cheney would “throw [him] under the bus.”

A tipster close to the McCain campaign disclosed to VR in July that Mr. Connell’s life was in jeopardy and that Karl Rove had threatened him and his wife, Heather. VR’s attorney, Cliff Arnebeck, notified the United States Attorney General , Ohio law enforcement and the federal court about these threats and insisted that Mr. Connell be placed in protective custody. VR also told a close associate of Mr. Connell’s not to fly his plane because of another tip that the plane could be sabatoged. Mr. Connell, a very experienced pilot, has had to abandon at least two flights in the past two months because of suspicious problems with his plane. On December 18, 2008, Mr. Connell flew to a small airport outside of Washington DC to meet some people. It was on his return flight the next day that he crashed.

On October 31, Mr. Connell appeared before a federal judge in Ohio after being subpoenaed in a federal lawsuit investigating the rigging of the 2004 election under the direction of Karl Rove. The judge ordered Mr. Connell to testify under oath at a deposition on November 3rd, the day before the presidential election. Velvet Revolution received confidential information that the White House was extremely concerned about Mr. Connell talking about his illegal work for the White House and two Bush/Cheney 04 attorneys were dispatched to represent him.

An associate of Mr. Connell’s told VR that Mr. Connell was involved with the destruction of the White House emails and the setting up of the off-grid White House email system.

Mr. Connell handled all of John McCain’s computer work in the recent presidential campaign. VR has received direct evidence that the McCain campaign kept abreast of the legal developments against Mr. Connell by reading the VR dedicated website, www.rovecybergate.com.

VR demands that the Justice Department conduct a complete investigation into the activities of Mr. Connell and determine whether there was any foul play in his death. VR demands that federal law enforcement officials place the following people under protective custody pending this investigation. Heather Connell who is the owner of GovTech Solutions, Randy Cole, the former President of GovTech Solutions, and Jeff Averbeck, the CEO of SmartTech in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Both GovTech and SmartTech have been implicated in the rigging of the 2000 and 2004 elections and the White House email scandal. Our prior request to have Mr. Connell protected went unheeded and now he is dead.


Here's a CBS - AP report: Michael Connell was a Bush Family Loyalist

Beginning as a political campaign worker and Congressional staffer, Connell became a key Republican media consultant who developed Internet strategies for the 2000 and 2004 Bush-Cheney campaigns. He was founder and CEO of Cleveland-based New Media Communications, which built Web sites for President Bush and former presidential nominee John McCain, according to the company's Web site, and he was the chief IT consultant for Karl Rove.

Connell's ties to the Bush family extend back to working on campaigns for George H.W. Bush and Jeb Bush, for whom he built the campaign site jeb.org. In 1999 he told the Cleveland magazine Inside Business, "I'm loyal to my network, I'm loyal to my friends, and I'm loyal to the Bush family."

He was also quoted as saying, when asked to predict the Internet's role in the upcoming presidential race, "There are things we will be doing on Election Day that haven't even been dreamt of yet."

Much has been written about problems at the polls in Ohio that year, where voters in many (predominantly Democratic) precincts were forced to wait hours because of a shortage of working voting machines. A lawsuit being pursued by attorney Clifford Arneback seeks to answer questions about this and other ballot problems. [For example, in Franklin County Mr. Bush received 4,258 votes in a precinct where only 638 voters cast ballots.]





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Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Advent Conspiracy,

The video





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Cheney’s Legacy of Deception




From Robert Sheer:

In the end, the shame of Vice President Dick Cheney was total: unmitigated by any notion of a graceful departure, let alone the slightest obligation of honest accounting. Although firmly ensconced, even in the popular imagination, as an example of evil incarnate—nearly a quarter of those polled in this week’s CNN poll rated him the worst vice president in U.S. history, and 41 percent as “poor”—Cheney exudes the confidence of one fully convinced that he will get away with it all.

And why not? Nothing, not his suspect role in the Enron debacle, which foretold the economic meltdown, or his office’s fabrication of the false reasons for invading Iraq, has ever been seriously investigated, because of White House stonewalling. Nor will the new president, committed as he is to nonpartisanship, be likely to open up Cheney’s can of worms.


Read more...



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The Greeks, teaching the world


again.

Some amazing shots from "The Big Picture: News Stories in Photographs"




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Sunday, December 14, 2008

I Nominate Muntadar al-Zeidi - The Shoeman

for the 2008 "Truth in Journalism Award."

Great video. I laughed so hard it hurt.Thanks!

Lame DUCKED!


President Chucklenuts ducked so quick it almost looked staged.I'm glad it didn't hit or hurt him, I want him to live a long life so he can savor the fruit of his corruption, death and destruction here in the US and Iraq.

I really want to go to DC just to throw my shoes over the WH fence.


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The GOP "Gee-Hawd" against the UAW and...

Good Morning General Hayden...


This is the absolute consequence of Reaganomics.videolink


We have gone, when Reagan came into office we were the largest exporter of manufactured goods and the largest importer of raw materials on the planet. And the largest creditor. More people owed us money than anybody else in the world. Now just twenty eight years later we're the largest importer of finished goods, manufactured goods, exporter of raw materials which is kind of the definition of a third world nation and we're the most in debt of any country in the world. This is the absolute consequence of Reaganomics.



Peter Schiff called it on the money every time. Watch it here videolink


Obama referenced Hamilton at Cooper Union


Obama may already be onto Hamilton's thinking, since he referenced it in the opening paragraphs of his speech at Cooper Union in March. Here's a link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/27/us/politics...







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Saturday, December 13, 2008

Rice: The Republican Party Brought Us To A Place Where ‘People Can Look Beyond Race"

(FBI on the case of man who says he was beaten for wearing Obama shirt)
*******************************************************


Via Think Progress:

Yesterday, Secretary of State Condelezza Rice sat for an interview with CNBC’s Maria Bartiromo.In a portion of the interview that does not appear to have aired, Bartiromo asked Rice about her “thoughts on the Republican party.” Rice claimed that the GOP has played a large role in bringing the country to a place where “people can look beyond race“:


RICE: [T]he Republican Party also has done a lot for bringing us to a place that — not that race doesn’t matter, but where people can look beyond race. If you look at the last two Secretaries of State, African Americans, they were Republican administrations, the Administration of George W. Bush that appointed them.

Rice’s rosy picture of race relations in America is puzzling. In March of this year, Rice more credibly argued that “America doesn’t have an easy time dealing with race.” Rice noted at the time how prevalent the after effects of our national “birth defect” — slavery — continue to be:

RICE: [T]hat’s not a very pretty reality of our founding, and I think that particular birth defect makes it hard for us to confront [race], hard for us to talk about [race], and hard for us to realize that [race] has continuing relevance for who we are today. … [D]escendents of slaves, therefore, did not get much of a head start. And I think you continue to see some of the effects of that.


More puzzling, however, is her crediting the Republican party with the significant progress that has been made with regard to race and racism in America. In recent years, the party has blocked attempts to protect civil rights. Additionally, Republican power brokers have spouted xenophobic and racist rhetoric, while members of the conservative movement cheer them on. In particular, Republican presidential candidates have a history of exploiting racial and ethnic divides for electoral benefit.

The Republican party’s failure to include minorities is evident by the lack of diversity in the congressional Republican caucus. Of the 247 members in the caucus, none are African-American and just five are Hispanic. Similarly, at the 2008 Republican National Convention, just 2 percent of the delegates were black.

In fact, as former Bush speechwriter David Frum put it in criticizing his party on NPR this morning, the Republican Party is the “party of white America.”



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Senator David Vitter (R Pampers.) would rather pay Hookers to diaper him than pay American Auto workers

Morgan Johnson, president of the United Auto Workers local representing General Motors workers in Shreveport, said Friday that Sen. David Vitter's role in blocking an auto bailout indicates "he's chosen to play Russian roulette" with Louisiana jobs and the national economy.

"I don't know what Sen. Vitter has against GM or the United Auto Workers or the entire domestic auto industry; whatever it is, whatever he thinks we've done, it's time for him to forgive us, just like Sen. Vitter has asked the citizens of Louisiana to forgive him," said Johnson, president of Local 2166. Otherwise, Johnson said of Vitter, it would appear, "He'd rather pay a prostitute than pay auto workers."
Link

Madam: Vitter a client at Canal Street brothel
U.S. Senator David Vitter visited a Canal Street brothel several times beginning in the mid-1990s, paying $300 per hour for services at the bordello after he met the madam at a fishing rodeo that included prostitutes and other politicians, according to Jeanette Maier, the "Canal Street Madam" whose operation was shut down by a federal investigators in 2001.


Vitter has a diaper fetish?.... makes sense, these hypocrites are full of shit.



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Thursday, December 11, 2008

Da Pope...decked out in priceless jewels and


carrying a staff made out of solid gold...

condemns the global financial system as "self-centered, short-sighted, and lacking concern for the poor. Hookay!

Have you seen the new "Catholic credit card" that gives a donation of 1% of purchases to the Vatican every time you use it.No?...Check it out here.

The Vatican Phone Card requires a 50 Euro minimum deposit.

insert date rape joke here---> When in Rome, don't forget to stop by the Piazza del Belvedere, to see the Vatican Pharmacy.Closed all Sundays and religious holidays in accord with Vatican calendar.

David Peel and The Lower Eastside couldn't make this stuff up...NSFW

you know you want more.


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Hugh Made A List...because there are just too many scandals to remember

Introduction

George Bush, the Connecticut cowboy, the good old boy from Yale is a man of mediocre intelligence, little imagination, and great stubbornness and vindictiveness. He may be the Decider but his handlers have long known how to manipulate him. The key is to hook him with short, simple sells. Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and Condoleezza Rice knew that once he has consulted his gut and perhaps his higher father his decision is forever. So whoever gets to him first is likely to carry the day because he doesn’t like to be challenged and is, quite simply, too lazy to change his mind. The Bubble is a natural consequence of this decision making process where logic, reason, and facts have little or no role.

Bush’s Presidency began in the shadow of a contested and likely stolen election and promised to be unsuccessful in a largely forgettable and unremarkable way. 911 changed all that and transformed a plodding, and essentially AWOL one termer into an accidental hero. Enormous power flowed to his office but Bush had no idea how to use it. He liked to campaign, not govern. In those around him, he prized loyalty over competence and honesty. A believer in the notion of "to the victor go the spoils," he was the perfect mark for every conniver, bumbler, bungler, hack, hanger on, and would be crony that Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and their friends could find. In the normal course of things, this would have spelled failure. Post-911, it was catastrophic.

At this critical juncture in our history we needed an adult but got an adolescent. Instead of responsibility, we got a truant. In place of flexibility we got obduracy. In the face of great and complex challenges, we got strawmen, a black and white universe, my way or the highway, regurgitated stump speeches, and a steadfast refusal to compromise not just with opponents but with reality.

What all this comes down to is that George Bush should never have become our President. He is not just a bad President but the worst one we could have had, the worst our country has ever seen. This is a judgment that many Americans have come to but which our political establishment and media, even after 7 years, have yet to acknowledge, accept, and act on. This is the tragedy and crime of our times.


it's a l o n g list.....here is just the beginning...

1. Patient neglect at Walter Reed Army Hospital

2. US Attorney firings

3. Libby/Plame Affair (Outing a CIA agent)

4. Iraq war

5. Afghanistan (leaving before the job was done)

6. Iran saber rattling

7. North Korea (mishandling nuclear issue)

8. The War on Terror (failure to capture Osama bin Laden, dubious allies)

9. Civilian contractors in Iraq (poor service for big bucks)

10. Military Commissions Act (torture, kangaroo courts, indefinite detention, and loss of habeas corpus)

11. Hurricane Katrina and the drowning of New Orleans

12. NSA warrantless wiretapping

13. SWIFT (international money transfers)

14. Black sites and rendition

15. Department of Homeland Security (a massive boondoggle)

16. K Street lobbyists (for government you can buy)

17. Dusty Foggo (No. 3 at the CIA)

18. Duke Cunningham (a corrupt politician)

19. Tom Delay (another corrupt politician)

20. Mark Foley and the House pages

21. Cheney Energy Task Force (and hiding info about it)

22. Tax cuts for the richest of the rich

23. Global warming (denial and stalling)

24. Terri Schiavo and the attempted trashing of family privacy rights

25. Budget deficits and a greatly increased national debt


click here...ahem...for the last 372 (and growing) scandals



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Saturday, December 6, 2008

Buh Buh Buttt ... Bush Kept Us Safe



Afterward, of course, then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told the press: "I don't think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center, take another one and slam it into the Pentagon; that they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile." (As a matter of fact, just such a scenario had been foreseen by intelligence officials in 1998, as Rice later admitted.)

Then there was the Aug. 6, 2001, presidential daily briefing titled "Bin Laden determined to strike in US," which concluded:

" We have not been able to corroborate some of the more sensational threat reporting, such as that from a ---- service in 1998 saying that Bin Laden wanted to hijack a U.S. aircraft to gain the release of "Blind Sheikh" Omar Abdel Rahman and other U.S.-held extremists.

Nevertheless, FBI information since that time indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.

The FBI is conducting approximately 70 full-field investigations throughout the U.S. that it considers bin Laden-related. CIA and the FBI are investigating a call to our embassy in the UAE in May saying that a group or bin Laden supporters was in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives."

We also remember that New York Times report, summed up by Eric Alterman:

"Tenet briefed Condi Rice about a potentially catastrophic terrorist attack on the United States on July 10, 2001. Rice ignored the briefing, just as she and Bush both ignored the August 6 "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US" memo, when Bush told the CIA briefer who delivered the memo to him that he had "covered his ass" and then went fishing for the rest of the day. Rice not only ignored the briefing, but also misled the 9-11 Commission and then lied when confronted with the evidence by Bob Woodward."

Rice and the Bush administration also went to great measures to cover up their own incompetence, too.

Then there was the Hart-Rudman Commission report, which warned the White House in May 2001 that it needed to take serious steps to prevent a terrorist attack. The report was ignored.

So was Richard Clarke's memo of January 2001 warning of the terrorist threat.


Via C&L read on...


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Monday, December 1, 2008

Torture has cost nearly as many lives as 9/11


Via Think Progress

Former interrogator slams torture: Torture has cost nearly as many lives as 9/11.»

In a Washington Post op-ed today, a former Special Operations interrogator who worked in Iraq in 2006 sharply criticizes American torture techniques as ineffective and dangerous."Torture and abuse cost American lives,” he writes:

I learned in Iraq that the No. 1 reason foreign fighters flocked there to fight were the abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Our policy of torture was directly and swiftly recruiting fighters for al-Qaeda in Iraq. … It’s no exaggeration to say that at least half of our losses and casualties in that country have come at the hands of foreigners who joined the fray because of our program of detainee abuse. The number of U.S. soldiers who have died because of our torture policy will never be definitively known, but it is fair to say that it is close to the number of lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001. How anyone can say that torture keeps Americans safe is beyond me — unless you don’t count American soldiers as Americans.


The writer, who used a pseudonym for the article, adds that when he switched his team’s techniques to a rapport-building method, they found enormous success. One detainee told the author, “I thought you would torture me, and when you didn’t, I decided that everything I was told about Americans was wrong. That’s why I decided to cooperate.”

The author, who is writing a book on his experiences as an interrogator, notes that the Pentagon tried to redact non-classified information and block parts of his book. "Apparently, some members of the military command are not only unconvinced by the arguments against torture; they don't even want the public to hear them," he writes.


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Saturday, November 29, 2008

Native American Pie...


Who knew?
The Ethnic Group Most Disproportionately Represented in the Military is...

Native Americans.


"Native Americans make up barely one percent of the population, but 1.6% of our military forces.

Yesterday - November 28th, 2008 - was Native American Heritage Day. A day set aside by federal legislation to "honor the contributions American Indians have made to the United States"

Contributions like, you know, losing their land so we could have a nation.

If you had zero idea that today was a special day, don't get panicky and self-conscious. The legislation creating the day was only signed last month and only covers 2008.

Insult to injury. An afterthought that's not even an annual afterthought.

Tribal reps, however, are pushing to make the day a regular calendar event. Though, probably not the day after Thanksgiving as Thanksgiving's like a big, flipped middle finger to a lot of Native Americans.

And reason #2 that I bring up the stat about Native Americans serving in the military? It's another opportunity to remind people that, ironically, it seems those most historically disenfranchised by the government often have the least reluctance to step up and serve their country. Blacks. Japanese-Americans. Gays. When it comes to fighting for freedom, those who are willing to fight should not be limited by our bigotry. Only rewarded with our gratitude.

No, you didn't know about Native American Heritage Day - neither did I - and it might not be around next year. But while it's on our minds, and while we're giving thanks for those willing to protect our country, let's take a moment to recall the sacrifices past and present of Native Americans.

via J Ridley




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Monday, November 24, 2008

Get your money for nothin...global destruction for free

Via: Alternet's "The 10 Worst Corporations of 2008"

#1. A I G
Through credit default swaps, AIG was basically collecting insurance premiums and assuming it would never pay out on a failure - let alone a collapse of the entire market it was insuring. It was a scheme that couldn't be beat: money for nothing.


#2. Cargill: Food Profiteers
The world's food system is broken. Or, more accurately, the giant food companies and their allies in the U.S. and other rich country governments, and at the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, broke it.

For this food regime to work," Raj Patel, author of Stuffed and Starved, told the U.S. House Financial Services Committee at a May hearing, "existing marketing boards and support structures needed to be dismantled.
"The result of these interventions and conditions," explained Patel, "was to accelerate the decline of developing country agriculture.

Thirty years ago, most developing countries produced enough food to feed themselves [CHECK]. Now, 70 percent are net food importers.


#3. Chevron: "We can't let little countries screw around with big companies"

#4. Constellation Energy: Nuclear Operators

#5. CNPC: Fueling Violence in Darfur

#6. Dole: The Sour Taste of Pineapple

#7. GE: Creative Accounting

#8. Imperial Sugar: 13 Dead

#9. Philip Morris International: Unshackled

#10. Roche: Saving Lives is Not Our Business

The financial meltdown and economic crisis illustrated that corporations will destroy even themselves in search of profit.



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Saturday, November 22, 2008

The Sucktastic Mark Halperin said...

via: Politico

Media bias was more intense in the 2008 election than in any other national campaign in recent history, Time magazine's Mark Halperin said Friday at the Politico/USC conference on the 2008 election.

"It's the most disgusting failure of people in our business since the Iraq war," Halperin said at a panel of media analysts. "It was extreme bias, extreme pro-Obama coverage."


reply #3 from Pennsykid2000:

So the media did a better job in the 2004 campaign, in highlighting Bush's failures? going public with the warrantless wire-tapping? calling out the Swiftboat Liars smears of Kerry? following up on the truthfulness of Bush's dubious record in the Texas Guard (rather than on the narrow authenticity of a letter about Bush) in avoiding service in Vietnam? in evaluating the economic impact of Bush's tax cuts for the rich and his exploding deficits? in pressing Bush on who authorized torture at Abu Ghraib? on communicating to the public the total failure of Bush to plan for the occupation of Iraq? If it had done even a half-assed job on any of those, Bush would have lost in 2004. So, don't tell me the "bias in the 2008 campaign was worse than any other in living memory". That's crap.


Mark Halperin's sad little crusade for right-wing blessings

Mark Halperin the prognosticator:
In the run-up to the 2006 Congressional elections, Halperin predicted that George W. Bush would be "back over 53% any day now" and warned "If I were them [Democrats], I'd be scared to death about November's elections". In fact, the Democrats regained control of both houses of Congress and George W. Bush's approval rating remained in the 30s.



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Tuesday, November 18, 2008

#25 "Why the Bush Administration ‘Watergated’ Eliot Spitzer”

From the Top 25 Censored Stories for 2009

Student Researchers: Rob Hunter, Elizabeth Rathbun, and Rebecca Newsome

Faculty Evaluator: Mickey S. Huff, MA

The exposure of New York State Governor Eliot Spitzer’s tryst with a luxury call girl had little to do with the Bush administration’s high moral standards for public servants. Author F. William Engdahl advises that, “in evaluating spectacular scandals around prominent public figures, it is important to ask what and who might want to eliminate that person.” Timing suggests that Spitzer was likely a target of a White House and Wall Street operation to silence one of its most dangerous and vocal critics of their handling of the current financial market crisis.

Spitzer had become increasingly public in blaming the Bush administration for the subprime crisis. He testified in mid-February before the US House of Representatives Financial Services subcommittee and later that day, in a national CNBC interview, laid blame squarely on the administration for creating an environment ripe for predatory lenders.

On February 14, the Washington Post published an editorial by Spitzer titled, “Predatory Lenders’ Partner in Crime: How the Bush Administration Stopped the States From Stepping In to Help Consumers,” which charged, “Not only did the Bush administration do nothing to protect consumers, it embarked on an aggressive and unprecedented campaign to prevent states from protecting their residents from the very problems to which the federal government was turning a blind eye.”

In this editorial, Spitzer explained:

The administration accomplished this feat through an obscure federal agency called the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The OCC has been in existence since the Civil War. Its mission is to ensure the fiscal soundness of national banks. For 140 years, the OCC examined the books of national banks to make sure they were balanced, an important but uncontroversial function. But a few years ago, for the first time in its history, the OCC was used as a tool against consumers.

In 2003, during the height of the predatory lending crisis, the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative. The OCC also promulgated new rules that prevented states from enforcing any of their own consumer protection laws against national banks. The federal government’s actions were so egregious and so unprecedented that all 50 state attorneys general, and all 50 state banking superintendents, actively fought the new rules.

But the unanimous opposition of the 50 states did not deter, or even slow, the Bush administration in its goal of protecting the banks. In fact, when my office opened an investigation of possible discrimination in mortgage lending by a number of banks, the OCC filed a federal lawsuit to stop the investigation.”


The editorial appeared the day after Spitzer’s ill-fated rendezvous with the prostitute at the Mayflower Hotel. With that article, some Washington insiders believe, Spitzer signed his own political death warrant.

On March 4, 2008, Spitzer furthermore proposed legislation that would have imposed penalties for mortgage fraud and predatory lending.1

Curiously, Spitzer, who had been elected governor in 2006, defeating a Republican by winning nearly 70 percent of the vote, has been not charged with any crime. His case went into the hands of Washington and not those of New York State authorities, underscoring the clear political nature of Spitzer’s “offense.” New York Assembly Republicans immediately announced plans to impeach Spitzer or put him on public trial if he were to refuse resignation. Although prostitution is illegal in most US states, clients of prostitutes are almost never charged, nor are their names typically released while a case is in process.

Spitzer’s editorial concluded, “When history tells the story of the sub-prime lending crisis and recounts its devastating effects on the lives of so many innocent homeowners, the Bush administration will not be judged favorably . . . it will be judged as a willing accomplice to the lenders who went to any lengths in their quest for profits. The administration was so willing, in fact, that it used the power of the federal government in an unprecedented assault on state legislatures, as well as on state attorneys general and anyone else on the side of consumers.”

Citation

1. “Governor Spitzer Proposes Legislation to Address Sub-prime Mortgage Crisis,” New York State website, March 4, 2008.
_____________________________________________________________________

24 more to go...

# 1. Over One Million Iraqi Deaths Caused by US Occupation
# 2 Security and Prosperity Partnership: Militarized NAFTA
# 3 InfraGard: The FBI Deputizes Business
# 4 ILEA: Is the US Restarting Dirty Wars in Latin America?
# 5 Seizing War Protesters’ Assets
# 6 The Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act
# 7 Guest Workers Inc.: Fraud and Human Trafficking
# 8 Executive Orders Can Be Changed Secretly
# 9 Iraq and Afghanistan Vets Testify
# 10 APA Complicit in CIA Torture
# 11 El Salvador’s Water Privatization and the Global War on Terror
# 12 Bush Profiteers Collect Billions From No Child Left Behind
# 13 Tracking Billions of Dollars Lost in Iraq
# 14 Mainstreaming Nuclear Waste
# 15 Worldwide Slavery
# 16 Annual Survey on Trade Union Rights
# 17 UN’s Empty Declaration of Indigenous Rights
# 18 Cruelty and Death in Juvenile Detention Centers
# 19 Indigenous Herders and Small Farmers Fight Livestock Extinction
# 20 Marijuana Arrests Set New Record
# 21 NATO Considers “First Strike” Nuclear Option
# 22 CARE Rejects US Food Aid
# 23 FDA Complicit in Pushing Pharmaceutical Drugs
# 24 Japan Questions 9/11 and the Global War on Terror

Go Team USA!


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Monday, November 17, 2008

is The Mormon Church...

ready for their close up ?

after reading these reports...

Holocaust survivors to Mormons: Stop baptisms of dead Jews
snip:
NEW YORK (AP) -- Holocaust survivors said Monday they are through trying to negotiate with the Mormon church over posthumous baptisms of Jews killed in Nazi concentration camps, saying the church has repeatedly violated a 13-year-old agreement barring the practice.

Leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints say they are making changes to their massive genealogical database that will make it more difficult for names of Holocaust victims to be entered for posthumous baptism by proxy, a rite that has been a common Mormon practice for more than a century.


"Beside the usual and customary idea of Corporate Malfeasance,I've always wondered where else all those "stolen laptops full of gov data" were going to pop up.This whole affair sounds ridiculous and mean spirited..yes/no?...how bad could it be... how many Jews are we talkin 'bout here?"

Church spokesman Otterson said the church kept its part of the agreement by removing more than 260,000 names from the genealogical index.

But since 2005, ongoing monitoring of the database by an independent Salt Lake City-based researcher shows both resubmissions and new entries of names of Dutch, Greek, Polish and Italian Jews. Gulp..Wha?


Via: AMERICAblog

The unholy Catholic-Mormon alliance isn't limited to gay bashing. They share a history of covering up sex abuse of children.

Yesterdays NY Times piece documented the major role played by the Mormon church in Proposition 8, included this tidbit.

First approached by the Roman Catholic archbishop of San Francisco a few weeks after the California Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in May, the Mormons were the last major religious group to join the campaign, and the final spice in an unusual stew that included Catholics, evangelical Christians, conservative black and Latino pastors, and myriad smaller ethnic groups with strong religious ties.

Shortly after receiving the invitation from the San Francisco Archdiocese, the Mormon leadership in Salt Lake City issued a four-paragraph decree to be read to congregations, saying “the formation of families is central to the Creator’s plan,” and urging members to become involved with the cause.

“And they sure did,” Mr. Schubert said.


AMERICAblog:

So, the Catholic hierarchy in California decided to cut a deal with a group who most Catholics don't really consider a religion, but, when it comes to gay bashing, nothing is off-limits. The Catholics don't have much spare cash these days because they've spent hundreds of millions to settle sex abuse cases. The Archdiocese of Los Angeles paid out $660 million in 2007.


But, that also got me thinking of things the Catholic hierarchy has in common with the Mormon leaders. They're both very aggressive when it comes to covering up the sex abuse of children, of course. The Mormons and the Catholics both have gone to great lengths -- and great expense -- to hide this problem.

We know how widespread the Catholic problem is. But, the Mormons have done a better job of hiding abuse. Last year, the PBS show, Expose: America's Investigative Reports, did a show on Peter Zuckerman, a reporter in Idaho Falls, Idaho, who busted open a scandal involving sex abuse, the Boy Scouts and the Mormons. Apparently, the Mormons pretty much control the Boy Scouts in several Western states. The perp involved in the case molested a lot of young kids and a lot of adults in the Boy Scouts and the Mormon Church knew what was going on and did nothing to stop it. In fact, they kept putting the perp in positions where he was in contact with kids. They went to great lengths to cover it up. After Zuckerman exposed the scandal, he was attacked personally. And, that included going after him because he was gay. Yeah, surprise. Supporters of the Boy Scouts and Mormons played dirty and launched homophobic attacks on the reporter. According to Zuckerman, there were times when he was actually fearful for his life.




...I think not.
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Sunday, November 16, 2008

Snarkenfreude + A Gushing Greta = Happy Sunday


Mark Foley Speaks

The story of Mr. Foley’s relationship with the young pages unfolded as high drama during the fall of 2006 in the run up to that year’s mid-term elections when the Democrats took control of both the House and Senate.

Mr. Foley, who served more than a decade in Congress, was never charged with a crime. In the House, he was a leading proponent of legislation cracking down on child pornography and served as the chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children.

In the interview he denied that his relationship with the male pages went beyond the inappropriate messages and sought to explain how he views his actions now:

(add a dash of hypocrisy)

“There was never anywhere in those conversations where someone said, ‘Stop,’ or ‘I’m not enjoying this,’ or ‘This is inappropriate’ … but again, I’m the adult here, I’m the congressman,” Foley said. “The fact is I allowed it to happen. That’s where my responsibility lies.”

Mark Foley and Larry Craig should start a consulting business.

**************************

Greta Gushes Over Palin

Via News Hounds

"FOX News “liberal,” Greta Van Susteren ought to consider opening a chapter of the Sarah Palin fan club. Come to think of it, maybe she already has. On last night's (11/14/08) On The Record, Van Susteren gushed about how Palin “stole the show” at the Republican Governor's Association convention earlier in the week in Miami. But Van Susteren neglected to note that Palin's popularity did not extend to her fellow governors who were not only reluctant to back her as a future presidential candidate, they also left her out of RGA's new leadership lineup. In another Palin story, Van Susteren falsely claimed that Palin had been cleared of “all wrongdoing” in Troopergate. With video.

Is there ever an On The Record show without at least one segment showcasing Palin? Only if she were to disappear in Aruba could the former Miss Wasilla get more sympathetic attention from Van Susteren."

*********************

Utter Deliciousness from The Weekly Standard's...
only rational sometimes sober conservative humorist

We Blew It
A look back in remorse on the conservative opportunity that was squandered. by P.J. O'Rourke

snip:


Let us bend over and kiss our ass goodbye. Our 28-year conservative opportunity to fix the moral and practical boundaries of government is gone--gone with the bear market and the Bear Stearns and the bear that's headed off to do you-know-what in the woods on our philosophy.

An entire generation has been born, grown up, and had families of its own since Ronald Reagan was elected. And where is the world we promised these children of the Conservative Age? Where is this land of freedom and responsibility, knowledge, opportunity, accomplishment, honor, truth, trust, and one boring hour each week spent in itchy clothes at church, synagogue, or mosque? It lies in ruins at our feet, as well it might, since we ourselves kicked the shining city upon a hill into dust and rubble.

...Read on.


******

Thursday, November 13, 2008

TTOW New York Times Edition

I want one of these...

THE IRAQ WAR ENDS

November 12, 2008

"SPECIAL" NEW YORK TIMES BLANKETS CITIES WITH MESSAGE OF HOPE AND CHANGE
Thousands of volunteers behind elaborate operation

* The New York Times responds

Hundreds of independent writers, artists, and activists are claiming
credit for an elaborate project, 6 months in the making, in which 1.2
million copies of a "special edition" of the New York Times were
distributed in cities across the U.S. by thousands of volunteers.

The papers, dated July 4th of next year, were headlined with
long-awaited news: "IRAQ WAR ENDS". The edition, which bears the same
look and feel as the real deal, includes stories describing what the
future could hold: national health care, the abolition of corporate
lobbying, a maximum wage for CEOs, etc. =There was also a spoof site.

"Is this true? I wish it were true!" said one reader. "It can be true,
if we demand it."

"We wanted to experience what it would look like, and feel like, to
read headlines we really want to read. It's about what's possible, if
we think big and act collectively," said Steve Lambert, one of the
project's organizers and an editor of the paper.

"This election was a massive referendum on change. There's a lot of
hope in the air, but there's a lot of uncertainty too. It's up to all
of us now to make these headlines come true," said Beka Economopoulos,
one of the project's organizers.

"It doesn't stop here. We gave Obama a mandate, but he'll need mandate
after mandate after mandate to do what we elected him to do. He'll need
a lot of support, and yes, a lot of pressure," said Andy Bichlbaum,
another project organizer and editor of the paper.

The people behind the project are involved in a diverse range of
groups, including The Yes Men, the Anti-Advertising Agency, CODEPINK,
United for Peace and Justice, Not An Alternative, May First/People
Link, Improv Everywhere, Evil Twin, and Cultures of Resistance.

In response to the spoof, the New York Times said only, "We are looking
into it." Alex S. Jones, former Times reporter who is an authority on
the history of the paper, says: "I would say if you've got one, hold on
to it. It will probably be a collector's item."

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

News Round up




On this Veterans day...
Don't forget to thank a Veteran for their service, especially this one.

********************************************************************




Prescription Drugs Kill 300 Percent More Americans than Illegal Drugs

snip:
"The abuse has reached epidemic proportions,” said Lisa McElhaney, a sergeant in the pharmaceutical drug diversion unit of the Broward County Sheriff’s Office. “It’s just explosive.
******

The
Economic Tsunami


Coming Sooner Than You Think

April 8, 2005
By MIKE WHITNEY

It seems that there are a growing number of people who believe as I do, that the economic tsunami planned by the Bush administration is probably only months away. In just 5 short years the national debt has increased by nearly 3 trillion dollars while the dollar has continued its predictable decline. The dollar has fallen a whopping 38% since Bush took office, due largely to the massive $450 billion per year tax cuts. At the same time, numerous laws have been passed (Patriot Act, Intelligence Reform Bill, Homeland Security Bill, National ID, Passport requirements etc) anticipating the need for greater repression when the economy takes its inevitable nosedive. Regrettably, that nosedive looks to be coming sooner rather than later.

You should know.... this Economic Tsunami was NO accident.

...And if you've never read--> driftglass

You don't know what you're missing.

******

Monday, November 10, 2008

Because Pink Improves My Mood, Dammit.

25 Ways to improve your Mood.

1. Remind yourself that Obama Won and the GOP Death Cult is in a cannibalistic frenzy.

2.Repeat this 24 times.


Watch this cuz it's getting Be-tter all the time.

For all my republican friends and family:
Cannibals Anonymous

****