Conservative Activism Grips Our Supreme Court

I agree we have to do something but it is up to our Senators and Congress people and I have yet to see them grow a spine!

What can we do to lite a fire under their butts and the butts of the collective citizens of this country to finally stand up to this admin?

I am trying in my own little way but we need numbers and we need a strong movement to stand firm on what we want.

I think we are all frustrated by what is happening and what isn't happening!

The Supremes need to be removed for unconstitutional decisions. The idea that we cannot have redress in the court for the money going to relgious organizations is just unbelievable as are all that you mentioned above.

Without a questioning media that will push these issues, we are at a loss.

Keep posting these great posts and I am sure we will try our best to further the cause and demand from the media what they should be reporting.

Your little way goes a long way with me toniD.

Thanks Bill thanks toniD.

*cough*

Because the battle for the Supreme Court is not over. As Justice Anthony Kennedy remains a swing vote, conservative activists do not have complete control. Yet.

Could have fooled me.

Pray for a Cheney hunting trip.

There. Are you happy?

He never loses does he. Jason and Freddie in one.

MEMRI As Mossad Op

MEMRI Is A 'Propaganda Machine,' Expert Says And
Why You Need To Know About Them
By Lawrence Swaim
Infocus Staff Writer
6-23-7

The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) provides daily English translations of film and print media stories originating in Arabic, Iranian and Turkish media.

It also furnishes original analysis of cultural, political and religious trends in the Middle East.

It sends its daily postings to every news outlet in the United States and Europe, in addition to politicians and cultural leaders.

And it's free, which makes it a Godsend for journalists, editors and policy analysts.

But according to its critics, it is also a dangerous, highly sophisticated propaganda operation, disseminating hate and disinformation on an unprecedented worldwide basis.

"They use the same sort of propaganda techniques as the Nazis," Professor Norman G. Finkelstein, a well-known scholar on Israel/Palestine, told InFocus. "They take things out of context in order to do personal and political harm to people they don't like."
...

I'm sure I'll be able to have sex again someday after that Dicksgusting image.

to Scare Burro on MSNBC an interview about Paris was just interrupted by a female. She said "My pardon to that dog (referring to ugliest dog contest winner) I thought that was Coulter".

"The border between the Real and the Unreal is not fixed, but just marks
the last place where rival gangs of shamans fought each other to a
standstill."

The poet Muriel Rukeyser said the universe is composed of stories, not of atoms. The physicist Werner Heisenberg declared that the universe is made of music, not of matter.

And we believe that if you habitually expose yourself to toxic stories and music, you could wind up living in the wrong universe, where it's impossible to become the gorgeous genius you were born to be. That's why we implore you to nourish yourself with delicious, nutritious tales and tunes that inspire you to exercise your willpower for your highest good.

*

"The only war that matters is the war against the imagination. All other wars are subsumed by it." —Diane Di Prima, "Rant," from Pieces of a Song

*

Astrologer Caroline Casey offers an apt metaphor to illustrate how crucial it is for us to hear and read good stories. She notes that if we don't have enough of the normal, healthy kind of iodine in our bodies, we absorb radioactive iodine, which has entered the food chain through nuclear test explosions conducted in the atmosphere. Similarly, unless we fill ourselves up with stories that invigorate us, we're more susceptible to sopping up
the poisonous, degenerative narratives.

*

Novelist Ursula K. Le Guin decries the linear perspective that dominates modern storytelling. She says it's "like an arrow, starting here and going straight there and THOK! hitting its mark." Furthermore, she complains, plots are usually advanced through conflict, as if interesting action can't possibly arise from any other catalyst.

I invite you to rebel against these oppressive conventions. Wean yourself from tales that have reductive plot lines fueled primarily by painful events. Celebrate the luminous mysteries that have shaped your own life story: the meandering fascinations that didn't lead to tidy conclusions, the wobbly joys that fed your soul but didn't serve your ego's ambitions, the adventures whose success revolved around brain-teasing breakthroughs instead of exhausting triumphs over suffering.

*

How did it come to be that what we call the news is reported solely by journalists? There are so many other kinds of events besides the narrow band favored by that highly specialized brand of storytellers. Indeed, there are many phenomena that can literally not even be perceived by journalists. Their training, their temperament, and their ambitions make vast areas of human experience invisible to them.

"Ninety-six percent of the cosmos puzzles astronomers." I loved reading that headline on the CNN website. It showed that at least some of our culture's equivalents of high priests, the scientists, are humble enough to acknowledge that the universe is made mostly of stuff they can't even detect, let alone study.

If only the journalists were equally modest. Since they're not, we'll say it: The majority of everything that happens on this planet is invisible to them.

*

In the early years of Christianity, there were hundreds of books interpreting the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. But by 325 A.D., a group backed by the political and military might of the Roman Empire had determined which few of the stories about Christ would thereafter be considered the canonical New Testament, and which would be regarded as
heretical bilge. No better evidence exists for the saying, "History is a tale told by the victors."

Keep this in mind as you strategize your way through your personal War of the Stories. Your account of events may have more truth in it than everyone else's conflicting tales, but that won't carry much weight unless you obtain the power to enforce your version.

. . . To read the rest of
"THE UNIVERSE IS MADE OF STORIES," go here: http://tinyurl.com/2vx6wb

disabled by author. Here is a link. 9 min video.

Mexican Drug Policy: Internal Corruption in an Externalized War

Below you will find another in an ongoing series of articles on Latin American Drug Trafficking. In the next several weeks COHA also will issue in-depth reports on drug trafficking in Jamaica, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Previous articles in this series include Martha Lauer’s “Mexican Drug Policy: Internal Corruption in an Externalized War” (see below), Alex Sanchez’s “Mexico’s Drug War: A Society at Risk - Soldiers versus Narco-Soldiers,” and Larry Birns’ and Alex Sanchez’s “The Government and the Drug lords: Who Rules Mexico?” Please refer to our website for further installments in this series
...

Blog by Gary van Warmerdam
http://tinyurl.com/26k38r

"Here is the critical point to understand when it comes to controlling your
happiness. You can control your happiness to the degree that you can
control your attention in your mind.

"By controlling your attention you are able to determine the perspective
you choose. With choice over your perspective you can decide what
interpretations to make and which one you will believe. Choosing the
interpretation you make will determine your emotional outcome.

"It's popular today for people to try changing their thinking or beliefs in
order to create happiness in their life. However a prerequisite to changing
your thinking is that you first have to get control over your attention. If
you don't do this, your thinking will attempt to control your thinking. This
can become a circular loop in the mind.

"If you gain control over your attention, then happiness is easy. What
people may find challenging is that they were given no training in
controlling their attention or even what it is.

"A second critical element needed to control happiness is that you
expand your awareness. It is not enough to control your attention. You
must also be able to shift your perspective to points of view of
acceptance, love, compassion and respect. If you can control your
attention, but can't extend it into this range of love and laughter your
emotional experience of happiness will be limited. When you have a limited
number of ways of interpreting events your possibility for happiness is
limited as well . . . . "

To read the rest of Gary van Warmerdam's piece, go here: http://tinyurl.com/26k38r

Choose The Party Closest To You On The Issues, And Stick With It

There are about 300 million people in this country. If every one of them belonged to a party that supported them on every single issue there would be about 300 million parties in this country. None of us agree with any other person 100% of the time. And the same is true for parties.

There are people like Ralph Nader who say there is no difference between the major parties. Well, he lives in an alternate universe from the one I inhabit. I know many people think party platforms are quaint and meaningless and to a certain extent they are. But when you read them you get a real sense of how different each party views the state of the country and the role of government in improving the lives of its citizens. Here is the Democratic Party Platform and here is the Republican Party Platform In both cases I linked to summaries of the platform because they cut through the hyperbole and focus on the issues. If you have not read these I encourage you to do so and then see if Nader is right.

Link to the rest of the story

NarcoTrafficer is the same thing as Terrorist. It's a fear tactic all over the media.

Anyone passing a dimebag is a NarcoTrafficer. 10% of our teenagers fit that description.

Anonymous!

How can I ever thank you?!

the Terrorists & the NarcoTrafficers...

there should be two instead....

makes perfect sense....

Shamans fighting each other? Over what?? Good grief, that just totally blows my ideas about what Shamans are all about.

And Fernando, I second Blog Slut's feelings about sex now. I'm also reconsidering men in general.

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Published: June 26, 2007

Senate Republicans today blocked the labor movement’s top legislative priority, a bill that would have made it easier for unions to organize workers.

In a largely party line vote, supporters of the bill, the Employee Free Choice Act, failed to get the 60 votes needed to cut off debate and allow a vote on the bill. The vote was 51 for cutting off debate and 48 against.

Link

I don't write em..I just vibe em & post em...I don't know what the hell Shaman's are all about...but...I'll bet dada or muck4doo would...

What've you been up to lately?

I think I kinda know what Shaman's are all about...just from reading & listening though...I've never met a Shaman...

The problem is, if god is dead, then you lose the most important word in your language and you will need a substitute. God was one end, one extreme, and when one extreme disappears from your mental vision the necessary and inevitable is that you will fall to the other extreme, and that is what has happened... Instead of god, fuck has become the most important word in our language.

—Osho, Strange Consequences

Hiya Shell..
Been working and exercising. Lost weight, trying to lose a bit more, which actually takes time! My job is going full time, I have to apply for it, had to write a resume, etc.

I'm interested in the shaman stuff. I have a friend who is a trained psychologists, although what he does for a living is teach psychology. "Bill" refers to himself as a "Shaman."

Today he told me he'd once seen a man levitate. Personally, knowing how much drugs and alcohol this guy has ingested in his life (he's also a blues guitarist with regular gigs) I have to wonder... but we got into a great discussion about matter/tantrics/the Universe/Big Bang, etc.

Why can't we walk through walls if we are mostly nothing? He claims we CAN walk through walls - we just don't know how. I would agree with him on this point - it's a possibility.

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

she's l'élite

(so petite)

she turned me into a frog, a dog, and a hog

Why did Sam disable the italics html?

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

I think of you, Ono. I recall once you narrowly defied death when one tried to run you down, doing all of 5 mph.

Here's one for the books... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yO2VDyvua8

Mike Leigh's "Naked"

//This is a fan based trailer//

(and it's shite; telling you nothing much about the film - however, the dialogue at the end gives you the gist of the anti-hero)

Louise: So what happened,... were you bored in Manchester?

Johnny: Was I bored?.... No, I wasn't fuckin' bored - I'm never bored. That's the trouble with everybody - you're all so bored. You've had nature explained to you... and you're bored with it, you've had the living body explained to you... and you're bored with it, you've had the universe explained to you and you're bored with it,... so now you just want cheap thrills and, like, plenty of them,... and it doesn't matter how tawdry or vacuous they are as long as it's new - as long as it's new - as long as it flashes & bleeps in forty different colors... So whatever else you can say about me, I'm not bored.

: )

I've wondered that sometimes...

Have you heard of the book called Lily Dale? It was written by a woman who was a religion columnist for some Dallas paper....While I was reading it... I thought of you...so I'm just saying you might like the writers "way..."..

Normally I might write off that chemically induced "thing"..but after Terrence McKenna & others I have to give merit to how ever somone "gets there"..but I see what you're saying too b/c I tend to give "more" merit to sober decisions no matter how I feel about altering consciousness...which I suppose one could do with breathing too..so I'm not sure when it comes to this subject..

But anyway..does this guy give off any Shaman like ways in your opinion?

FULL TIME...?...that was the kiss of death for me...I want to quit everyday now....Godspeed to you...I fucking hate it...Did you know that 100 years can it itself into 5pm - 6pm? ;)

is more than 40 too..cuz no one pays for lunch time now..so that's 45..then there's commuting...so that's 50...

or i'll bite you

How can you be bored when there's a whole fracking world out there? I don't know who Johnny is, but I have to agree with him. Almost sounds like something John Lennon would say. Crap, think about the fact that we're mostly space, and yet we can't walk through walls. If anyone is bored, come up with a way to walk through freakin' walls. Or shut up about yer being bored.

(harumph!)

I actually needed italics twice tonight & they didn't show...

it's as (toni would say) slow as molasses

i'm ringing the bastards up

(woof)
(woof)
(woof)
(woof)... and!
double woof-woof

You say you want italics ... use the cite tag.

Was this video filmed in the Vice pResident's office?

The thought of working full time at any of the other jobs I've done makes me want to puke... but I like this job. I need it anyway. It's just time. I have to do this.

My friend who's the Shaman... he can talk it, but I have a hard time not discounting what he says. I agree in principle that psychologists are the new Shamans. I agree if and only if they are the kind that draw from you your own cure.

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T2dow7ZBlY

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

hmmm, like this?

REALLY? Can you do a table?

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

My prayers been answered and italicised!

really? Refresh.

very much.

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

Don't you guys go getting into trouble while I'm gone.

with tables. :(

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

Padded cell award then.

NO TROUBLE WITHOUT CATHY

//FULL TIME...?...that was the kiss of death for me...I want to quit everyday now....Godspeed to you...I fucking hate it...Did you know that 100 years can it itself into 5pm - 6pm? ;)

»
Submitted by Alice on Tue, 06/26/2007 - 10:54pm.
is more than 40 too..cuz no one pays for lunch time now..so that's 45..then there's commuting...so that's 50...//

Alice,...

Wifeybot works 20 hours a week and gets full benefits from the library system here in Tucson,...

Is there any way to double-check to see if there's some kind of angle to do that in your neck of the woods?

Your workplace/schedule should merely be a step in your evolution. Have faith and positive expectation that better things are en route your way. I know your path does not include a job and a work routine you hate.

;) I know things will get better.

The worst work days in my life that I can remember, were my last. That was in June '04, when my supervisors at the sheriff's department frogmarched me out of the building (past a framed picture of Oliver North in the hallway, labeled "American Hero")... I wasn't intentionally trying to get canned either. I truly believe the universe intervened on my behalf.

(I think things like that happen for everybody, at times. And, I sense something's about to give regarding your workplace, work schedule, etc...)

Look for signs. :)

can be found at ...

http://www.majorityreportradio.blogspot.com/

Are we permanently italicised, or am I drinking again?

Evening everyone. :)

If we listen to the land, we will know what to do. - Terry Tempest Williams

(fuckhead)

you italicised everything @ 11:11pm

I've heard of people working 20 with full & some with partial benefits..The day of my "accident" I told my boss I needed at least to have more varied hours...She told the boss who schedules & my July schedule is the same as always...I think it was Workers Comp retribution... Be that as it may...I've decided I cannot tolerate this...So I thought my accident would break the spell..but no...so..I figure at worst at my one year review 11/27 I'm going to let them know how I feel again..& I'll either be let go cuz they want me F/T only..or not..& I'll be cool with it either way...

Besides..my mother called it a "respectable" job...so I need to hang in for some time...

p.s. -(past a framed picture of Oliver North in the hallway, labeled "American Hero").-

You're competing with Ferni for the grossest visual on this thread.. ;)

http://www.samsedershow.com/filter/tips

get it right...

it was a fork-lift

(not a dozer)

--If we listen to the land, we will know what to do. - Terry Tempest Williams--

tankies, nando
: )

I left out a backslash. My bad.

But they'll vote left. Nagourney?

June 26, 2007
Poll Shows Liberal Ideas Gaining With Young People
By ADAM NAGOURNEY and MEGAN C. THEE

Young Americans are more likely than the general public to favor a government-run universal health care insurance system, an open-door policy on immigration and the legalization of gay marriage, according to a New York Times/CBS News/MTV poll. The poll also found that they are more likely to say the war in Iraq is heading to a successful conclusion.

In a snapshot of a group whose energy and idealism have always been as alluring to politicians as its scattered focus and shifting interests have been frustrating, the poll found that substantially more Americans between the ages of 17 and 29 than four years ago are paying attention to the presidential race. But they appeared to be really familiar with only two of the candidates, Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, both Democrats.

They have continued a long-term drift away from the Republican Party, and although they are just as worried as the general population about the outlook for the country and think their generation is likely to be worse off than that of their parents, they retain a belief that their votes can make a difference, the poll found.

More than half of Americans between 17 and 29 years old — 54 percent — say they intend to vote for a Democrat for president in 2008. They share with the public at large a negative view of President Bush, who has a 28 percent approval rating with this group, and of the Republican Party. They hold a markedly more positive view of Democrats than they do of Republicans.

Among this age group, Mr. Bush’s job approval rating after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, was more than 8 in 10. Over the course of the next three years, it drifted downward leading into the presidential election of 2004, when 4 out of 10 members of young Americans said they approved how Mr. Bush was handling his job.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/26/washington/27cnd-poll.html?ei=5065&en=...

has caused my page to be infested with a [shudder] Mz. Thing ad. What the hell. I'll sign up for the newsletter, then identify it as spam to the email service.

Remember when Rudolf was the rage. Embarrassing.

I bet if we used his real name instead of tweety we might see MSNBC ads.

censorship of the most intimidating kind.

Report: U.S. lags behind other nations in broadband speeds
U.S. ranks 16th in deployment, availability of high-speed networks, CWA says
link

Nice one, GBC

It was the quote used at the end of a movie presentation about Denali National Park. Saw it at the visitor center there. Just stuck with me afterwards, ya know?

Okay, Alice.

Just remember you just wrote this (above).

If you can wait 'til the end of November, then "fine."
But, I'm a firm believer in accidents happening for a reason. I believe it is the universe trying to get your attention. And, I know you kinda believe something like this, too.

Something's in the air. Just stick to your guns.

And regarding what your mother said,...it doesn't matter. Everything you do and will do in this life will be respectable.

Abraham says something about toleration.
I'll try to find the exact quote in the near future.

But, basically "toleration" is still resisting the Stream of Well-being.

Everything is in the process of getting better.
The universe knows the bigger picture, even if you or I, or anybody else, ... doesn't.

This may sound hokey to some people reading this, but...

Sometimes it's all about the hokey. :)

Anon, but the broadband market is in demand here and it is growing.

Sam needs to do a podcast. The total available market on that is huge.

--Just stuck with me afterwards, ya know?--

kind of like when I say, "That'll do pig." to husbot just to watch him weep.. 8-)

-"toleration" is still resisting the Stream of Well-being.-

you're a sight for sore eyes

//I must go water a friends garden//

thanks for peeing on the blog

: )

who forgot to close the 'cite'?

I know

no biggie,

we've had whole threads like that. )

*Speed and Universality Matter for Internet Access
*The U.S. “High Speed” Definition is Too Slow
*A National High Speed Internet for All Policy is Critical
*The U.S. Must Preserve an Open Internet
*Consumer and Worker Protections Must Be Safeguarded

http://www.speedmatters.org/

don't walk through walls because of the strong interaction.

Here's 3 Key Principles that work for me...

(1) Lubrication

(2) Insertion

(3) Thrust

Free Democracy

What would Coulter douche?

Her toothbrush should get special compensation.

Hey Alice,...

I am not an expert on shit.
I'm not even functional regarding most things.
But, just as Don Juan liked to bump Carlos Castaneda's "assemblage point" ...
I just wanted to say that just as progressives are being pro-active and not passively tolerating being fed shit anymore,...

It seems that life should be approached that way, too.
I don't have answers.
But, I have emotions.
And, I'm sick of the shit.
And, everything I do is geared towards finding a way that is acceptable to me. I don't take orders.
I don't put up with b.s. and/or stupid people anymore.
I don't even bother working for a paycheck in public anymore.
(Sure, I wipe a grown man's ass every now and then, as I do foster care for the developmentally disabled, but...I can be high and drunk for that. And, the symbology of wiping a grown man's ass reminds me that it's a real life metaphor, and that I have a ways to go in my evolution, in my pay scale, and in my job description.)

I just want us to ascend to higher levels in this life. And, I hope when I tell you in cyberspace that something I'm going through is "bullshit," that you'll tell me, "You're right, it's bullshit. Don't put up with it. Plot your escape. Ask the universe for clues on how to do it. Fuck anyone who says you can't..." Etc...

I'm done with tolerating crap. I'm too old.

I really hope you get fed up quickly.
And that a resolution happens even sooner than that.
And that the ascension begins...

Good night, Blog... xox

goodnight.. :)

(1) Lubrication

I did not know you could grease your intertubes!

Suddenly I'm remembering the movie, "Office Space," ...where as soon as the employee no longer gives a shit about his job, work performance, etc...

... the company promotes him.

Good Night ..... incase you come back later to read this thread ..

Reporters Without Integrity in Venezuela

Reporters Without Borders (RWB). The name, modelled on that of humanitarian organisation Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders), conjures the idea of an organisation that monitors global standards of press freedom, offers insightful and hard-hitting investigative reports on world conflict and defends the safety of courageous journalists in war-torn countries. One would imagine that such an organisation would lend its support to one of the few countries in the world that is taking major leaps in democratising the media by breaking the existing monopoly of corporate domination....

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=2079

I used to work at place kinda like that ..... they promoted the dumbass's ..... keep them away from the dangerous stuff so nobody would get hurt.

Ok I am going to finish watching the Baseball game .....

see ya blog 8-)

It's because he's a pompous jackass.

*smiles*

delivery for mr. k-man

Which sheriff's department did you work at?

And Fernando, I clearly said (note the italics) that no one was to get into any trouble while I was off watering (not peeing on - this time) a friends garden. And there you were, italicizing everything that doesn't move.

OM bhur bhuvah svah tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi dhiyo
yo nah pracodayat.

How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk?
By Garrison Keillor
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/979/

I was searching for some things and got stuck in this computer loop ::eye-roll:: all this afternoon and evening.
Yet, I am FREE now. Good Evening All! Tea Cheers;-)

...is where I worked, Cathy in Seattle.

You know that national security database they refer to on those Law and Order/CSI shows...

Well, I'd worked at the department for 4 months, but I had only been given official top security clearance for less than 48 hours before I was fired from the job abruptly for vague reasons.

I assumed it was related to a more thorough criminal background check on me, or that they had eavesdropped on my conversations with co-workers when we walked around the premises, or that things like a peace sign and "No more Bushit" bumper stickers pissed them off.
(I parked my car backwards against a wall so the bumper stickers were hard to read.)
At times, I would see cops circling around my parked car looking in. And, I had left a nasty note about Reagan that one could read if they looked in the windows. (this was right after Ronnie died)
It's possible it got out that I had admitted I passed my lie detector test by lying on every question, which resulted in it seeming like I told the truth. (that, and if you squeeze your butt cheeks together like you're clenching a marble right before you answer every question,...it supposedly throws off the test; and it worked for me.)

Since I never knew what happened, I concluded that it was divine intervention. Because, I was miserable.
And thought I was stuck at the world's shittiest job forever.
But, I didn't dare quit because of health insurance; which was why I took the job in the first place.

I don't know. It's all a learning process, I guess.

I'm just sick of the system underpaying people, treating them like shit, and forcing loyalty by instilling fear.

(dada: what was the name of the Lou Reed supergroup that you spoke of,...and who were the members? Yoko Ono? I forget the name and the members. It was funny, though. I believed you at first.)

I sure do like Lou Reed's album, "New York."
Songs like "busload of faith", "sick of you", "dirty boulevard", etc...

And, who in the Warhol crowd wasn't a pompous jackass?
Bianca Jagger? Maybe?

how has the blog survived without me?

i thought I made this blog go!!!!!

guess what? i'm part of the machine again!!!!!

:)

hee hee

hee hee

hee hee

don't mind me

i find the weirdest things funny

I said:

"Thumb-you are the most valuable part of my extremities. You get the Nobel Peace Prize. From me."

hee hee

o/course i'm not male, so I had to make do.

hee hee

you get the Nobel Peace Prize

From me to me

'Cause you been through so much

Not really.

But the important thing is:

Im part of the machine again!

Im an employee for the US of America, for freedom!!!

yay

i knew i was born for something important

and TJ Maxx seems to be it

for now

yay

yes

im an associate....

stupid crap

associate

what the hell does that mean?

do I get stalk shares?

hahahahahaha

no. i get to say im associated with TJ MAXX

oh woopie doo

this is the best part

im already breaking the rules

i can't go online and complaine about the company

not that i am complaining

its a wonderful place to work...if you don't like the finer things in life. like oh um ELECTRICITY

electricity is just out

so is Santa Clause

... is on the Late Late Show (CBS) with Craig Ferguson.
(AZ time) So for anyone in AZ or west of here reading this . ... She's on.

(conbo: i like your passion. all will be well.)

g'nite.

Okla. Executes Inmate Dying of Cancer
By Jeralyn, Section Death Penalty
Posted on Tue Jun 26, 2007 at 06:27:00 PM EST

Bump and Update: The Supreme Court has denied the request for a stay. The execution has taken place. Bland was declared dead at 6:19 pm. I hope for his sake they started late -- 19 minutes is a long time.

**********

I can only imagine how the civilized world will view this story. Jimmy Dale Bland is set to be executed at 6pm tonight in Oklahoma.

Bland has advanced lung cancer which has spread to his hip and brain. He's terminally ill and will die soon on his own.

The Oklahoma state and federal courts have denied a stay, insisting the state has the right to kill him before he expires on his own.

In a dissenting opinion, Judge Charles Chapel of Tulsa said a stay should be granted to protect "the dignity of society itself from the barbarity of exacting mindless vengeance."

A last-minute decision from the Supreme Court is expected any time now.

More...

http://www.talkleft.com/story/2007/6/26/16027/8985

i missed cathy & connie

(lost in youtube)

1. where ya from partner
2. dallas
1. dallas, texas
2. nope... dallas, washington state
1. doesn't quite have the same ring
2. no it doesn't

[the 2 men go their seperate ways, having nothing more to say]

big deal...
they snuffed someone who was dead anyway

it was a mercy killing

now...
(give your bleeding heart a rest)

Story link
Skidoo (in ten parts) on YouTube
h/t to Beware of the Blog feature on Arnold Stang

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These most recent rulings are chilling in their implications.Bastards!

I feel like their starting to spread their (evil)wings now - haven't even hit their stride yet......

by Joe Sudbay (DC) · 6/27/2007 07:17:00 AM ET

Chris Matthews just did an interview on the Today Show about Elizabeth Edwards taking on hatemonger Ann Coulter. Matthews kept saying how Coulter sells books, like that's an excuse for all her venom. He did say, "My hunch that in human terms, Elizabeth Edwards has won this round." Um, that's because in human terms, Ann Coulter isn't human. Ann Coulter is the face of the Republican party. She is their voice.

http://www.americablog.com/2007/06/wednesday-morning-open-thread_27.html

I just watched this. Mathews did say she sells books but also brought Coulter down for her hateful spewinging saying she does it to sell books. This time, after Elizabeth made her point there was applause from the audience. Made Coultur look like the bitch she is.

A decision that only Bush could think makes sense
by Chris in Paris · 6/27/2007 05:17:00 AM ET

Tony Blair as special Middle East peace envoy. The strongest international friend that Bush has, who pro actively joined the invasion of Iraq, where his troops are being charged with torture and murder yet he has made every effort possible to safeguard the alleged criminals against EU laws, he's Bush's man for the job. If the world needed yappy little pup to roll over and speak for a dog biscuit and accept a condescending little pat on the head, of course he's the guy, but the problems the world faces in the region are serious.

The reality of the Middle East today is that Blair has been an active participant of so many problems and is not viewed as a neutral player. Besides being heavily tainted by the war in Iraq, Blair has shown no results in ten years as PM that give us any indication that he will be able to bring people together now that he is outside of real political power. Do we really need Bush's poodle tripping over every other team in the region who is trying to negotiate the peace process?

Blair has no more credibility than Karen Hughes had when she was supposed to be America's great answer to problems in the Middle East. Confirming Blair for this position only shows again the lack of seriousness on the part of the Bush administration who believes the answer to every problem is another crony who everyone else outside of the White House views as just another prop with zero legitimacy who is promoting the Bush agenda.

http://www.americablog.com/2007/06/decision-that-only-bush-could-think.h...

Kucinich for President 2008, Inc.
Attn: Fundraising
P.O. Box 110180
Cleveland, OH 44111

http://tenant.net/phpBB2/

up early to greet the dawn.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/0722-02.htm

Single-payer or an Insurance Industry dominated System?
http://www.counterpunch.org/ccr06262007.html

rained all night here.

Off to work : )

Try this combination:
"john roberts" eichmann

"And the problem is that SEIU is giving cover to these Senators -- it makes them look like they are accomplishing something when in fact they are accomplishing nothing. These legislators are gutless, and the SEIU is giving them cover."

we have to keep saying those words over and over so people know where it's at...

SEIU is in the pocket of the Democrats. And they have been burned many times by that party.

Well, of course. Good Nazis always follow orders

Revoke their charters. Destroy Moloch!

May God smite the evil bastards! (Go hunt with Cheney.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aF-uLrBwvjg

i'm pretty sure the "change" people want has to start with themselves.

west coast show I never saw, apparently. Bozo (boring) and Pennywise (scary) the main clowns on my TV ....

http://kptv.home.comcast.net/Shows/rustyshour.htm

we had a shoestore mom would take me to that had clown mannequins in it.

she was suprised that i hated going in there. it was max creepy.

Wavy Gravy is my favorite clown.

maybe because I was never exposed to a decent one

(Hi, SJ...I wonder if Wavy Gravy, the Ben and Jerry's ice cream flavor, was named after your clown...)

http://kptv.home.comcast.net/Shows/wrestling.htm

Jim,

Did you see Wavy in the Country Joe Berkeley protest video yesterday?

yup, sure was.

Hugh Romney is his name.

useta show up at a lot of 'do's'.

read up on him sometime if yer into clown philosophers.

Elizabeth Edwards: Why I called Ann Coulter David Edwards and Adam Doster
Published: Tuesday June 26, 2007

On Wednesday, the Edwards campaign sent out a letter to supporters written by Elizabeth which explained "why I called Ann Coulter."

"Last night I had an important talk with Ann Coulter and I want to tell you what happened," Elizabeth Edwards wrote. "On Monday, Ann announced that instead of using more homophobic slurs to attack John, she will just wish that John had been "killed in a terrorist assassination plot."

The letter continues, "Where I am from, when someone does something that displeases you, you politely ask them to stop. So when I heard Ann was going to be on 'Hardball' last night, I decided to call in and ask her to engage on the issues and stop the personal attacks. I told her these kinds of personal attacks lower our political dialogue at precisely the time when we need to raise it, and set a bad example for our children."

"How did she respond?" Edwards writes. "Sadly, perhaps predictably, with more personal attacks. John's campaign is about the issues—but pundits like Ann Coulter are trying to shout him down. If they will not stop, it is up to us cut through the noise."

The following video is from MSNBC's Hardball, broadcast on June 26.

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Elizabeth_Edwards_confronts_Anne_Coulter_o...

http://www.wavygravy.net/

praising Ann Coulter! Makes me sick!

I'm sending an email to MSNBC that they should stop relying only on Buchanan!

If you have a chance, send an email to msnbc!!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10285339/

no! could'nt get the video to run yesterday!

enjoyed the text story though.

was fun remembering those days, years of amazing people to meet. same here in the similiar way.

Aug.10-12 - Catch Wavy at one his favorite festivals Gathering of the Vibes - new
venue: Bridgeport CT.

http://www.gatheringofthevibes.com/

stupid beyotch is a distraction...every minute of time she's on the air is one minute of time less they talk about serious issues :( grrr she aggravates me, though

and Bridgeport is a couple of hours down the road from me

if you go to the site click on the 'gallery' section.

pix of the old meets slideshows with good tunes from the grateful dead et al.

you can think about anything you want to.

Dems force Cheney flip-flop on secret docs

By: Mike Allen
Jun 27, 2007 08:47 AM EST

Dick Cheney's office is abandoning a justification for keeping the Vice-President's secret papers out of the hands of the National Archives.

Officials working for Cheney had tried to claim he is separate from the executive branch, but they will no longer pursue that defense, senior administration officials tell The Politico.

The decision follows a threat by Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), the No. 3 House Democrat, to try to cut off the office’s $4.8 million in executive-branch funding.

The dispute arose after House Oversight Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) posted an eight-page letter he had written to Cheney taking issue with what he said was an assertion by the vice president’s office last year that he is “not an ‘entity within the executive branch’ and hence is not subject to presidential executive orders.”

At issue was an executive order giving the National Archives oversight over the government’s handling of classified information. The vice president is also president of the Senate, but Cheney has asserted executive privilege in the past.

David S. Addington, Cheney’s chief of staff and counsel, wrote in a three-paragraph letter to Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) on Tuesday that the executive order on classified national security information does not give the archivists authority over the president or vice president.

Addington said that therefore it “is not necessary in these circumstances to address the subject of any alternative reasoning.”

That amounted to throwing in the towel, according to administration officials speaking on condition of anonymity. The White House has no plans to reassert the argument there is any vice presidential distinction from the executive branch, the officials said.

Two senior Republican officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the rationale had been the view of the vice president’s lawyers, not Cheney himself.

White House spokespeople have been struggling to answer questions about the argument without repeating, amplifying or embracing it.

Blogs, comics and pundits feasted on the neither-fish-nor-fowl argument, with Jon Stewart joking on “The Daily Show” Tuesday night that the vice president may be “half she-wolf.”

Now, a senior administration official tells The Politico:

http://www.rawstory.com/showarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politico.co...

It was a weird YouTube that was restricted from embedding. I don't know why it might not have played. I could have screwed up the link. The first thing you hear is Wavy yelling "Lollygaggers".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pI97m7pKZIo

A new poll finds that “liberal ideas” are gaining with young Americans, who are “more likely than the general public to favor a government-run universal health care insurance system, an open-door policy on immigration and the legalization of gay marriage.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/26/washington/27cnd-poll.html

The number of adults without health insurance jumped by 2 million from 2005 to 2006, according to a new report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/06/26/health/main2979888.shtml?sourc...

“The United States has invested $19 billion to train and equip nearly 350,000 Iraqi soldiers and police since toppling Saddam Hussein, but the ability of those forces to provide security remains in doubt, according to the findings of a bipartisan congressional investigation to be released today.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/26/AR200706...

nah, link was good,

just needed win media player 11 to watch it.

to much hassle and boogers to put it on this comp.

Bgurl had the XP laptop at work. i keep this one clean and simple.

500: Number of Christian families who have left the Dora district in Baghdad because of the “chaos.” “The flight of Dora’s Christians is an example of how the initial phase of the U.S. security crackdown here has failed to establish security and stop the sectarian ‘cleansing’ of Baghdad’s neighborhoods.”

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-christians27jun27,1,...

Dead bodies and blood contaminate Tigris River. “Iraqis used to love fried river fish, but are afraid to eat anything caught in the Tigris nowadays, since there are so many dead bodies floating in the river.” They were dumped there “during the sectarian blood-letting that has divided the capital.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/27/dead-bodies-and-blood-contaminate-ti...

Is the Spammer gone?
Hope so!
How's everyone doing?Good I hope.
What's up? :)

I. I. I. I. - INVOKE, IMPEACH, INDICT, IMPRISON - THIS PATRIOT'S REFRAIN

by Linda Milazzo

This afternoon I received an email from Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy asking me to visit
http://www.democraticmajority.com/cheney and sign a petition to remind Vice President Dick Cheney "that he can't ignore our nations's laws."

For me, a longtime advocate of impeaching and indicting President Bush and Vice President Cheney for unconstitutional acts and crimes against humanity, the Senator's request is merely a baby step or half-measure.

If Senator Kennedy truly wants to uphold the Constitution of the United States, the only true and proper action the good Senator should take is to call for the impeachment of George Bush and Dick Cheney. A "warning" is not strong enough.

It is admirable that Senator Kennedy wants to include we-the-people in his effort to warn Vice President Cheney that he is not above the law. But the good Senator and his Washington colleagues have ignored the petitions, letters, phone calls, emails, faxes, rallies, marches, panel discussions and pleas of we-the-people to impeach George Bush and Dick Cheney for far too long.

Yesterday at the White House, a group of fifty High School students gave George W. Bush a letter asking him to ensure that the United States won't participate in torture and will uphold its Democratic traditions of decency and human rights. If fifty high school students can demonstrate their love for their nation and their desire to uphold its principles of fairness and human decency by confronting the President with strength and conviction, why can't powerful Senators Ted Kennedy, Dick Durbin and Harry Reid do the same? Why can't powerful House leaders Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer follow suit?

Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich has patriotically provided all members of the House with a vehicle to impeach Vice President Cheney. Congressman Kucinich has introduced House Resolution 333 - Articles of Impeachment against Dick Cheney. It is time for members of the House to sign on to House Resolution 333 to stop Vice President Cheney from defying Congress, engaging in secrecy, and eroding the Constitution of the United States.

Is it worth our efforts as patriots to sign Senator Kennedy's petition to "warn Cheney that as Vice President he can't ignore our nations's laws"?

For me, it is not.

It IS worth my while to let Senator Kennedy know that I, a patriotic American, care too much about my nation to simply sign a petition that WARNS its destroyer. For this patriot, the only clarion call is:

I. - I. - I. - I.:
INVOKE - Articles of Impeachment against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney
IMPEACH - George W. Bush and Dick Cheney for high crimes and misdemeanors
INDICT - George W. Bush and Dick Cheney to be tried in a criminal court
IMPRISON - George W. Bush and Dick Cheney for the commission of criminal acts

Anything less is UNPATRIOTIC!!!

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_linda_mi_070626_i__i__i__i____in...

just getting into the morning here.

Ooooo... nice opener, Fernando.

Morning everyone. :)

If we listen to the land, we will know what to do. - Terry Tempest Williams

Putting Hillary Clinton in the White House would shatter an enormous glass ceiling, yet many feminists aren't cheering at that prospect. Here's a look at how some of Clinton's most ardent supporters became her biggest resisters. Tools

"I love [Hillary Clinton] so completely that, honestly, she would have to burn down the White House before I would say anything bad about her!" exclaimed Nora Ephron in a 1993 Newsday interview. Three years later, she told the Wellesley class of 1996, "Understand: Every attack on Hillary Clinton for not knowing her place is an attack on you." Come late 2006, however, Ephron was the one on the attack as one of the self-described "Hillary resisters" -- those who believe that "she will do anything to win, who believe she doesn't really take a position unless it's completely safe," as she wrote on her Huffington Post blog, "who believe she has taken the concept of triangulation and pushed it to a geometric level never achieved by anyone including her own husband, who can't stand her position on the war, who don't trust her as far as you can spit."

I noticed Alice didn't drop tunes real fast. I like it when Alice does that.

He says this is old news. To him and many of us older people it is...however, there are people that weren't around then and the people that were, need a reminder.

Revisiting the Family Jewels
by
Larry C Johnson

Today's release of the "Family Jewels"--a record of CIA misdeeds in the fifties, sixties, and seventies--provided a further reminder that most of the media, especially the electronic variety, are woefully ignorant. Breathless newcasters announced the release of the documents as if the Ark of the Covenant stashed by Indiana Jones had been discovered in a warehouse. Look folks, the CIA did some bad things back then that were first uncovered and reported as a result of an internal investigation. Congress subsequently was briefed and the CIA's dirty laundry was aired before the public by Senator Frank Church.

The report highlighted the following major crimes and misdeeds:

1. The use of the mafia in a failed attempt to assassinate Fidel Castro.
2. The illegal wiretapping of American newsmen.
3. Analysis of domestic groups and political protestors.
4. Unauthorized opening of mail of U.S. Citizens.
5. Drug and behavior-alteration testing that probably resulted in the suicide of at least one U.S. citizen.
6. Imprisonment of a Soviet defector without due process for more than two years.

The records are historically important but there is no significant "news" in these documents in the sense of reporting something we did not previously know. These events were fully reported thirty years ago and the CIA's shame exposed. I make no apologies nor excuses for the past CIA abuses. The records do help explode some myths, e.g. that the CIA successfully assassinated foreign leaders. They were authorized to do so and tried in several cases but never succeeded. Castro, in case you have been living in a cave, is still alive and giving the United States the finger.

The real news that the media is ignoring is the new "Family Jewels". I am certain the CIA has a report somewhere detailing who was involved with extraordinary renditions and torture. I would not be surprised if we find CIA officers like Michael Scheuer, Cofer Black, Hank Crumpton, John McLaughlin, and George Tenet facing war crimes charges in the International Court at the Hague within the next four years. I am making no claims about the guilt of these individuals, but their role in extraordinary renditions almost certainly will be investigated by foreign governments (Italy, for example, is currently prosecuting other CIA officers and contractors for their role in kidnapping a muslim cleric) and charges could very well be filed. At a minimum these gents probably will not be traveling outside the United States for the foreseeable future.

But torture in the war on terror shares a pedigree with the misdeeds of the past. The CIA was not a rogue elephant acting on its own. It was an obedient dog carrying out the order of political masters. As the Washington Post has detailed in a series of excellent reports this week, Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld were leading the charge in authorizing the use of torture proscribed under international law. It is the responsibility of intelligence officers to maintain their integrity when ordered to do illegal and immoral acts. The lessons of the Nuremburg trials of the Nazis is that the claim of, "I was only following orders", is not a valid nor acceptable defense. Government officials, regardless of their place in a government bureaucracy, are expected to follow the law and do the right thing.

http://noquarter.typepad.com/my_weblog/2007/06/revisiting-the-.html

Check the comments also!

in the 70's we had cheney and rumsfeld doing it, and guess who's behind it 35 years later. seems like a pattern to me.

U.S. Economy: Orders for Durable Goods Drop in May (Update1)

By Joe Richter

June 27 (Bloomberg) -- Orders for U.S. durable goods fell more than forecast in May, the first report to cast doubt on the strength of the rebound in business investment.

Demand for goods meant to last several years fell 2.8 percent, the first drop in four months, after a revised 1.1 percent gain in April that was larger than previously estimated, the Commerce Department said today in Washington. Excluding transportation equipment, orders dropped 1 percent.

The decline, which was led by fewer orders for aircraft, metals, and machinery, spurred some economists to cut forecasts for economic growth this quarter. Federal Reserve policy makers, who predict a pick up in the pace of economic expansion later this year, are forecast to keep interest rates unchanged when their two-day meeting ends tomorrow.

``The optimism about business spending maybe was a bit overdone,'' said Kevin Logan, senior market economist at Dresdner Kleinwort in New York. ``The economic rebound will be pretty modest.''

Treasury notes extended gains after the report. The yield on the benchmark 10-year note fell about 4 basis points to 5.04 percent at 10:18 a.m. in New York.

Economists forecast durable goods would fall 1 percent after an initially reported 0.8 percent rise in April, according to the median of forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey.

Excluding transportation equipment, orders were forecast to rise 0.2 percent, according to the survey median, after a previously reported 1.9 percent gain.

`Risk Averse'

``It's clear that businesses are still somewhat risk averse and that they are being cautious in light of the softness in the economy,'' said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at Global Insight Inc. in Lexington, Massachusetts. ``Capital spending is not moving forward with the strength we had hoped.''

Economists prefer to track the durable goods figures excluding transportation because orders for aircraft and automobiles tend to be volatile from month to month, obscuring underlying trends in spending.

Total orders have never been up for four months in a row since comparable records began in 1992. The last time bookings for durable goods rose for three consecutive months was from April through June 2005.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=aTrwpifVf3CY&refer=e...

Sorry,been giving a Irishman a piece of my mind!Thanks to toniD.
Good to see the spammer has left.He was spamming away upthread.
Do you know how to work Fernando's jukebox?I hadn't tried it before now,and it doesn't bend to my will.Haha.
How's the weather up North?Good I hope. :)

and it plays. Does it not do that for you? It's just a flash player.

Fed Policy Makers Split With Staff, Wall Street Over Economy's Speed Limit Federal Reserve policy makers disagree with their own staff economists, and a growing chorus on Wall Street, who say the U.S. economy can't expand as fast as it used to without pushing up prices.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=aySi9vdWbuB8&refer=e...

Bernanke Stumbles as Lawmakers Bash Fed for Inaction on Consumer Lending Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is a hero on Wall Street; the same isn't true in Washington.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=arWF9wLmlSlU&refer=e...

Lacker Says Fed Should Keep Eye on Inflation, Not Stemming Economic Shocks Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond President Jeffrey Lacker said central bankers should leave the economy to respond to shocks rather than attempt to protect growth by allowing faster inflation.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=a1Z6MZCMJkKI&refer=e...

Thank You!
By Christy Hardin Smith on Wed Jun 27, 2007 at 08:25 am

Yesterday’s rally in DC for the Day Of Action To Restore Law and Justice had some great speakers. You can watch speeches online here — I highly recommend the above speech from Sen. Chris Dodd (already attached here as a YouTube as well), the one from Sen. Pat Leahy — which has some of his great snark, and the ones from Rep. Jerry Nadler and Sen. Tom Harkin, along with David Keene, the chairman of the American Conservative Union and Rep. Dennis Kucinich. (You can find video of a number of the other speakers here as well!)

Standing up for the Constitution and the rule of law is a must to gain political support from folks in this country who are fed up with the Bush Administration’s outright hostile treatment of the laws of this nation and their utter disregard for human rights. So I want to commend Sen. Dodd and Rep. Kucinich for standing up yesterday and speaking so plainly about this issue — and to challenge the rest of the Democratic Presidential candidates to follow suit. (And, when they do, if the speech is recorded, send me a link and we’ll try to get it up here. It is that important to me.)

I heard from a number of people on the Hill yesterday that all of the calls and faxes got noticed and then some. It was much appreciated by everyone who has been trying to build more momentum on this issue. So, thank you — all of you – for all of the work that you did yesterday on the nation’s behalf.

http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/06/27/thank-you-3/

Just lost post.Arrr...
Your jukebox is working fine now.must have been stuck.
Must have been my damn wireless!Dosen't download page all the way sometimes.
Are you at work?Throw some Hendrix on that puppy when ya get a chance.Thanks.
:)

Who’s that little chatter box?
The one with pretty auburn locks?
Whom do you see?
It’s Little Anorexic Annie.

She and Hannity make a pair,
They never seem to have a care!
Cute little she,
It’s Little Anorexic Annie.

Bright eyes cheeks a healthy glow,
Adam’s Apple, Where did her wanker go?
Mite-size, dresses like a ho,
If you want to know - “Arf”, goes Hannity.

Always wears a sunny smile,
Now, you too could make a pile,
If you could be,
Like Little Anorexic Annie?

The following is an excerpt from Glenn Greenwald's new book, Tragic Legacy: How a Good vs. Evil Mentality Destroyed the Bush Presidency. The book is available now at Amazon.

Link to excerpt

by digby

There must be something in the air. First, Matthews feels the need to give Ann Coulter a full hour to spew genocidal vomit and now I find that PBS has hired the notorious fraud Frank Luntz to analyze "public feedback" on the Democratic debate. I don't know whether to laugh or cry. He is one of the architects of the Republican Revolution and along with Newt Gingrich is the man most responsible for the distorted, propagandistic political discourse we spend our lives on the blogs trying to unravel. He has no business "interpreting" Democratic voters' reaction to Democratic candidates based upon his political affiliation alone. But the fact that he has been completely discredited as a pollster and analyst by his own profession should make him radioactive for any respectable news organization. I can't imagine what is wrong with PBS that they don't know about this man.
He is obviously rooting for his former client Giuliani, although he says he isn't advising him --- and perhaps he's not. He just goes all over television telling anyone who will listen that Giuliani is the only candidate who "says what he means and means what he says" and that just happens to be the quality everybody most wants in a candidate. (The Democrats, sadly, just don't have anyone who does that.)
Something odd is going on at PBS lately. They also invited that Coulter wannabe Melanie Morgan on Lehrer recently, apparently under the misapprehension that she was a sane spokeswoman of the right, and she proved to be a complete disaster. Now they have hired straight up right wing political operative Luntz to "interpret" the impressions of Democratic voters. Are they getting their bookers from the Heritage Foundation web site too?
This isn't difficult. There are plenty of pollsters and social scientists who aren't dishonest and aren't partisan hacks. Some of them are even Republicans. This guy isn't one of them. He's been a very important cog in the machinery of the right wing noise machine for years, manipulating the political language of our country to favor the Republican party and he's very, very good at it. He's the last person anyone should hire to "analyze" Democrats fairly. They might as well have hired Karl Rove.
Media Matters has put out an action alert if you care to send a little note to PBS and ask them not to hire Republican operatives so they can sandbag the Democratic presidential candidates on their airwaves. **Action Alert**
Link

By Jo Becker and Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, June 27, 2007; Page A01
Sue Ellen Wooldridge, the 19th-ranking Interior Department official, arrived at her desk in Room 6140 a few months after Inauguration Day 2001. A phone message awaited her.
"This is Dick Cheney," said the man on her voice mail, Wooldridge recalled in an interview. "I understand you are the person handling this Klamath situation. Please call me at -- hmm, I guess I don't know my own number. I'm over at the White House."

Enlarge PhotoThe vice president has intervened in many cases to undercut long-standing environmental rules for the benefit of business. Here, Cheney is photographed during an August 2004 family vacation in Moose, Wyoming. Getty Images
More photos >>Wooldridge wrote off the message as a prank. It was not. Cheney had reached far down the chain of command, on so unexpected a point of vice presidential concern, because he had spotted a political threat arriving on Wooldridge's desk.

In Oregon, a battleground state that the Bush-Cheney ticket had lost by less than half of 1 percent, drought-stricken farmers and ranchers were about to be cut off from the irrigation water that kept their cropland and pastures green. Federal biologists said the Endangered Species Act left the government no choice: The survival of two imperiled species of fish was at stake.

Law and science seemed to be on the side of the fish. Then the vice president stepped in.
First Cheney looked for a way around the law, aides said. Next he set in motion a process to challenge the science protecting the fish, according to a former Oregon congressman who lobbied for the farmers.
Because of Cheney's intervention, the government reversed itself and let the water flow in time to save the 2002 growing season, declaring that there was no threat to the fish. What followed was the largest fish kill the West had ever seen, with tens of thousands of salmon rotting on the banks of the Klamath River.

Characteristically, Cheney left no tracks.
Con't Reading

came across like a pompous ass on the blog last night, Alice.

Sometimes my passion for wanting friends to be in a good place ... comes across poorly, especially in typed word form.
I talk a lot less in person.

Anyway. I'm real sorry. I hope you have a great day.

And I hope everyone reading this has a great day, too.

(If dada thinks Lou Reed is a pompous ass,...well, then I'm like Lou Reed, but without the skill-set.)

Isn't this the site that used to be majority report radio? What the hell happened?

Rumsfeld Shopping Memoir On Iraq Failures For ‘Large Cash Advance’
The ever-shrinking group of Americans who believe invading Iraq was a good idea may soon receive some support, in the form of a memoir by one of its key architects, Donald Rumsfeld.

The former defense secretary has the publishing world “abuzz” over the possibility that he may write a book “justifying the military strategy for the war in Iraq.”

While a deal has not yet been struck, Mr. Rumsfeld has toured New York publishing houses with an outline of his book in an effort to gauge how much information he would have to disclose in the memoir in order to justify a large cash advance. […]

[T]he Web site Galleycat reported a sighting last month of Mr. Rumsfeld visiting Penguin books, whose Sentinel imprint specializes in conservative subjects, and he is believed to have spoken with five or six other New York-based publishers to test the waters and learn more about the process.

Rumsfeld’s memoir is unlikely to be deeply revelatory or candid about the administration’s failures. When Bush’s former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill authored a highly critical account of the White House, Rumsfeld called him to complain. “‘What is this business? Someone tells me you’re going to write a, you know, one of those’ — what do you call them? Sour grapes or — you know, one of those insider things,” Rumsfeld said he told O’Neill.

Moreover, Rumsfeld — who once authored “Rumsfeld’s Rules,” a manual that encouraged presidential aides to quickly address mistakes — has suggested he won’t concede any mistakes in the Iraq war strategy. Rumsfeld said last year, “Of course the implication that there was something wrong with the war plan is amusing.” Indeed, “amusing” appears to be the best description for Rumsfeld’s forthcoming memoir.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/27/rumsfeld-memoir/

Giuliani's 9/11 Conspiracy Theory
During a speech yesterday at Pat Robertson's Regent University, former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani indirectly blamed President Clinton for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Echoing arguments offered frequently by Bush administration officials, Giuliani claimed that Clinton treated the 1993 World Trade Center bombing "as a criminal act instead of a terrorist attack," which "emboldened other strikes" on the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, Kenya, and Tanzania, and later on the USS Cole. "The United States government, then President Clinton, did not respond," Giuliani said. "Bin Laden declared war on us. We didn't hear it." The claim that Clinton "did not respond" to global terrorism during his administration is demonstrably and flagrantly false. (Giuliani himself knows this. Just last year, before he became a presidential candidate, he said, "The idea of trying to cast blame on Clinton [for the 9/11 attacks] is just wrong for many, many reasons, not the least of which is I don't think he deserves it.") Giuliani's fundamentally misguided approach to counterterrorism is evidenced not only by his dishonest smears of President Clinton, but by his embrace of the same national security strategy as President Bush, under whom global terrorism is rising, Osama bin Laden is resurgent, the Middle East is deeper in violent unrest, and the U.S. military is in the midst of a readiness crisis.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/13/giuliani-defended-clinton-terror-rec...

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,286849,00.html

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/04/27/terrorism-attacks-expected-to-rise-n...

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/07/bin-laden-resurgence/

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/18/snow-iraq-stability/

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/08/murtha-extension/

"majority report radio? What the hell happened?"

Why don't you bore a hole in yourself and let the sap run out.

h/t Cliff

i object to the idea that republicans are objecting.

Oops, I guess I hit a bruised spot. I was just fishing around the old Air America spots.

You know I could rent you out as a decoy for duck hunters?

Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.

I just noticed a great change. Then I get flamed for asking. I guess that says it all.

Live in the South? Ann Coulter thinks you're illiterate.

Submitted by Rick Perlstein on June 26, 2007 - 7:56pm.

Ann Coulter appeared for an hour on Hardball. Elizabeth Edwards called in and said it does American politics no good to serially insult people. Coulter "responded" by called the juries before which John Edwards argued his cases "illiterate."

The Cowboy-Poet-and-Large-Animal-Veterinarian wing of the Democratic Party keeps saying liberals patronize Dixie. But I've never heard a liberal say an entire Southern state's jury pool can't read.

LINK

I can see this is an unhappy place now. Maybe you have heard this all before. Sorry for you losses. I hope you can learn to deal with it.

Bitch!

--Sorry, if I...
Submitted by Sir Real--

You don't even know how helpful you were! Ya nut.. :)

Oddly, I put on my mp3 thingie this morning & since I let it load up the songs randomly I was surprised when an Esther mp3 started playing first thing.... *spooky* ;)

i just love the smell of burning trolls in the morning.

.

Anon who's been coming around being Debbie about stuff. I won't remember who said it was that dog in heat.

& when showing them (on a projection screen) the http://lii.org site..I stumbled on this article on http://usinfo.state.gov about Third Parties...it's from 2004... I got hyped for a sec & opened the article by reflex...then I tried fast to close the window & only maximized it.... Ooops... ;)

latest gallup poll on the mood of the country:

www.galluppoll.com

OPEC head warns U.S. lawmakers on anti-OPEC bill

We will see.

from jerusalum post:

Sanctions and diplomacy have failed and it may be too late for internal opposition to oust the Islamist regime, leaving only military intervention to stop Iran's drive to nuclear weapons, the US's former ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday.

Worse still, according to Ambassador Bolton, the Bush administration does not recognize the urgency of the hour and that the options are now limited to only the possibility of regime change from within or a last-resort military intervention, and it is still clinging to the dangerous and misguided belief that sanctions can be effective.

As a consequence, Bolton said he was "very worried" about the well-being of Israel. If he were in Israel's predicament, he said, "I'd be pushing the US very hard. I am pushing the US [administration] very hard, from the outside, in Washington."

http://www.thisnation.com/question/042.html

Report: ‘Shadow Goverment’ Of Private Contractors Explodes Under Bush
A new report by the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform concludes that, under the Bush administration, the “shadow government of private companies working under federal contract has exploded in size. Between 2000 and 2005, procurement spending increased by over $175 billion dollars, making federal contracts the fastest growing component of federal discretionary spending.”

But while private contractors — such as Halliburton and AshBritt — have been reaping huge profits, “billions of dollars of taxpayer money have been squandered.” Some highlights from the report:

– Halliburton has been the “fastest growing contractor.” Under the Bush administration, federal spending to Halliburton “increased over 600% between 2000 and 2005.” The Government Accountability Office recently found that the government has wasted at least $2.7 billion to Halliburton on “overpriced contracts or undocumented costs.” At the end of 2005, Cheney’s stock options were valued at more than $8 million, a 3,281 percent gain from 2004.

– Growth in federal contracting exceeds inflation rate. In 2000, the value of federal contracts totaled $203 billion. By 2005, the value was $377.5 billion, an 86 percent increase. The new report notes that this “growth in contracting was over five times faster than the overall inflation rate and almost twice as fast as the growth in other discretionary federal spending over this period.” A record level of “nearly 40 cents of every discretionary federal dollar now goes to private contractors.”

– Noncompetitive contracts skyrocket. Sole-source and noncompetitive contracts grew by “an even faster rate than overall procurement spending, rising by 115% from $67.5 billion in 2000 to $145 billion in 2005.” Many of these no-bid contracts during the Iraq war and Katrina reconstruction went to Bush administration cronies who wasted money and performed shoddy work.

In the report’s review of 500 contracts, 118 contracts worth $745.5 billion “experienced significant overcharges, wasteful spending, or mismanagement over the last five years.” A recent report by American Progress Senior Fellow Scott Lilly has more details about the Bush administration’s procurement process problem and what Congress can do to clean up the mess.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/27/waxman-contracts/

I believe that all progressive liberal self loving Americans HAVE to inundate Washington in large groups (car pool, buses) and camp out if necessary. Anyone out of work or off for summer should contact Code Pink or any other favorite anti war organization in Washington and find out where to go. Or if that's impossible, camp out in front of you congress person's home office. Anyone who has gone to anti war protests should try to do this. This is the only thing that will work. We need to stop the insanity and get these guys impeached and our soldiers home. It is that important. We will all feel better that we did something. I spent three days with Code Pink and I will go back as long as I'm out of work.

Two of them

The Open mic

Iran protest:

http://www.samsedershow.com/node/665

And my blog: Cheney - Environmental Enemy

These insurgent groups, while bolstered by foreign funding and logistical support from al-Qaeda, are dominated by fighters loyal to America's nemesis Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, say both Afghan and Pakistani sources.

Who is Gulbuddin Hakmatyar? Why does everyone know where Osama is but George?

Asia Times

It's not uncommon for people caught depressed state to become antagonistic. It can be very difficult to be confident when your world is crumbling around you. I wish you only the best. Perhaps your next effort in the political arena will be more to your liking.

Do Dems Lack Strategery, Or Are They Avoiding It?

By David Sirota

Though Will Ferrell famously ridiculed George Bush's "strategery," Republicans in Washington were pretty good legislative strategists when they controlled Congress. They often employed the very basic method of attaching something they wanted that was politically unpopular to something politically popular that enough Democrats would be forced to vote for to get it through the Senate (where 60 votes are often needed). You could always tell how much Republicans really wanted something by looking at the vehicle they were attaching it to. The more popular/necessary that vehicle, the more you knew the GOP wanted it. If they attached something to, say, a must-pass government spending bill, you knew they really wanted to pass what they were attaching.

I bring this up because I was sad to see what I think was this week's not-necessarily-inevitable Senate defeat of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) - the most important labor law reform in decades.

The EFCA is a bill that helps workers avoid Wal-Mart-style intimidation efforts when they dare to consider forming a union to collectively bargain with their employer. Not surprisingly, it is a bill that Corporate America despises and that thus unifies the bought-and-paid-for Republican Party in opposition.

Why, then, would Democratic leaders bring up the Employee Free Choice Act as a standalone bill? By doing that while knowing this was a bill the GOP would be so adamantly against, they engineered a legislative situation that allowed that GOP opposition to occur with the minimum amount of political consequences.

Consider the alternative. Imagine that Democrats attached EFCA to another piece of legislation that is very popular and non-controversial - a bill that Americans would be appalled to see anyone vote against. That would increase the likelihood that some Republicans would peel off for fear of voting against the very popular vehicle, and would embarrass the remaining Republicans who voted against the overall package. These Republican opponents would be left making an argument about the technicalities of labor law while Democrats were battering them for opposing the attached bill. We've seen this very thing happen, in fact. Remember the 2002 debate over the bill creating the Department of Homeland Security. Democrats were arguing about union rights while Bush was hammering them for delaying a bill that he said would protect America's national security. Bush ended up getting his version of the bill while drubbing Democrats in the 2002 mid-term election.

So again the question is why? Why would Democratic leaders bring up EFCA as a standalone bill - that is, in a form that is most politically easy for the average Republican to oppose? Is it just that Democrats have no sense of "strategery?" Or is it something more insidious?

more here:

http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/do_dems_lack_strategery_or_are....

As far as companies sending our jobs overseas- Boycot the @$%^%$ No more Hanes crap for me! I'll go back to the 60's and wear no underwear at all! Does anyone have a list of the companies that are sending jobs out so we can boycot?

The original Randy Rhoads...

Each man questioned the other's sanity. Nixon told a top aide to keep a file on Mr Kissinger's mental health. For his part, Mr Kissinger, obsequious in the presence of Nixon, in conversations with journalists would refer to Nixon as a “madman”, “maniac” or “meatball mind”. The insults went further. Nixon called Mr Kissinger his “Jew boy” behind his back and, occasionally, to his face. Mr Kissinger would remain silent or even support Nixon's anti-Semitic outbursts. For both men, secrecy and deceit were the modus operandi.

http://www.economist.com/books/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9184379

I read a very similar article in Vanity Fair a few months ago. Fun stuff.

THEIR GRAVES!
Blow Me Anon!

Gulbuddin Hekmatyar (born 1947 in Imam Saheb, Kunduz province, Afghanistan) is an Afghan warlord and former Prime Minister of Afghanistan. He is a Ghilzai Pashtun of the Kharoti tribe.[1] Hekmatyar speaks several languages (including English), has two wives. His second wife is his brother's widow.

He served as prime minister twice in the 1990s.

Gholam Serwar Nasher, Khan of the Kharoti, thought of Hekmatyar as a bright young man and sent him to a military school and then to Kabul University's engineering department in 1968, where Hekmatyar earned the nickname of "engineer Hekmatyar" frequented among his followers.

However, he started his political life against the Soviet influence and opposed Daud Khan's government and escaped to Pakistan.

In Pakistan, he founded the Hezbi Islami party (1975). He is well known for his measures in fighting Soviet occupation and as well building hundreds of schools for both men and women in different provinces of Pakistan and was favored by Pakistani leader Zia ul Haq. He actively participated in the war against U.S.S.R., got injured several times and lost many family members. He was well known for protecting the rights of ordinary Afghans in Pakistan by one way or the other.

[edit] Soviet Invasion and Civil War
During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Hekmatyar received billions of dollars from the CIA through Pakistan's ISI. Hekmatyar has two wives not four, so he got married with his brother widow when his brother was killed. The ISI decision to allocate the highest percentage of covert aid to Hekmatyar was based on his record as an effective anti-Soviet military commander in Afghanistan. However, as the war began to appear increasingly winnable for the Mujahedeen, Islamic fundamentalist elements in ISI became increasingly motivated by their desire to install the fundamentalist Hekmatyar as the new leader of a liberated Afghanistan.

Even during the Soviet occupation, Hekmatyar ordered frequent attacks on other rival factions to weaken them in order to improve his position in the post-Soviet power vacuum. An example of his tendency for internecine rivalry is his involvement in arranging the 1976 arrest of Ahmed Shah Massoud in Pakistan on spying charges.[2]

The Hizb-i Islami of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar espouses Islamic ideology. At various times it has fought and allied itself with almost every other group in Afghanistan. Hizb-i Islami received some of the strongest support from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and attracted thousands of foreign mujahideens to Afghanistan. On the role of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and the emergence of the Taliban, see Human Rights Watch, Backgrounder on Afghanistan: History of the War, October 2001.[3]

After the fall of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan Hekmatyar signed a peace agreement with Ahmed Shah Massoud on May 25, 1992, which made him Prime Minister. However, the agreement fell apart when Hekmatyar was blamed for a rocket attack on President Mujaddidi's plane.[4] The following day, Burhanuddin Rabbani's and Ahmed Shah Massoud's Jamiat and Abdul Rashid Dostum's Junbish forces resumed fighting against Hekmatyar's Hezb-i Islami forces. In 1994 Hekmatyar would shift alliances, joining with Dostum as well as Hizb-e-Wahdat, a Hazara Shi'a party.[5] Together they laid siege to Kabul, fighting Rabbani and his Defense Minister Massoud mainly to prevent the country from division.

From 1992 to 1996 the warring factions destroyed 70% of Kabul and killed at least 50,000 people, most of them civilians during the Afghan civil war. This devastation and factionalization discredited the warlords in the eyes of most Afghans. Nonetheless, in June of 1996, Rabbani and Hekmatyar finally formed a power-sharing government in which Hekmatyar was prime minister. This lasted only a few months before a new fundamentalist warlord force, the Taliban, took control of Kabul in September. Hekmatyar then fled to Iran where he continued to lead the Hezbi Islami party.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulbuddin_Hekmatyar

White House, Cheney's office, subpoenaed By LAURIE KELLMAN, Associated Press Writer
7 minutes ago

The Senate Judiciary Committee subpoenaed the White House and Vice President Dick Cheney's office Wednesday for documents relating to President Bush's warrant-free eavesdropping program.

Also named in subpoenas signed by committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., were the Justice Department and the National Security Council.

The committee wants documents that might shed light on internal squabbles within the administration over the legality of the program, said a congressional official speaking on condition of anonymity because the subpoenas had not been made public.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070627/ap_on_go_pr_wh/eavesdropping_subpoen...

Thanks, Dan. I was hoping that jerk would disappear in the disgrace that he is. Want another chill? Read the comments to the article. Brrrr.

AP | IEVA M. AUGSTUMS | June 27, 2007 11:35 AM

Hanesbrands Inc. announced Wednesday it will cut 5,300 jobs and close nine sewing and assembly operations in five countries.

The underwear and apparel maker will close plants affecting nearly 5,000 employees in Canada, the United States, Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico as it moves production to lower-cost operations in Asia and Central America.

i disagree with most of his politics but lou dobbs at cnn has been championing keeping jobs here for a long time.

You are great!

During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Hekmatyar received billions of dollars from the CIA through Pakistan's ISI.

Sounds more like an old Bush family friend rather than foe.

Afghanistan: war crimes amnesty prepares further atrocities
US invaded Afghanistan and backed the militia of the Northern Alliance, it brought back into political prominence many figures from the country's brutal civil war of the 1990s
Harvey Thompson

The US-backed political elite in Kabul have recently made a series of judicial rulings with grave implications for democratic rights that has received little comment in the international media

http://www.rawa.org/temp/runews/2007/05/30/afghanistan-war-crimes-amnest...

The comprehensive guide to IT & Business outsourcing

This is the Best I could find..

http://www.stratfor.com/products/premium/read_article.php?id=277998

Abu Zubaydah

The wizard-fingers never rest,
The purple brook within the breast
Still chafes its narrow bed;

Still rears the East her amber flag,
Guides still the sun along the crag
His caravan of red,

Like flowers that heard the tale of dews,
But never deemed the dripping prize
Awaited their low brows;

Or bees, that thought the summer’s name
Some rumor of delirium
No summer could for them;

"what was the name of the Lou Reed supergroup that you spoke of"

Brian Eno and Steve Vai were the other two members.

Chairman Leahy issued subpoenas to the Department of Justice, the Office of the White House, the Office of the Vice President and the National Security Council for documents relating to the Committee’s inquiry into the warrantless electronic surveillance program. […]

“Over the past 18 months, this Committee has made no fewer than nine formal requests to the Department of Justice and to the White House, seeking information and documents about the authorization of and legal justification for this program,” Chairman Leahy wrote in letters accompanying the subpoenas to Bush Administration officials. “All requests have been rebuffed. Our attempts to obtain information through testimony of Administration witnesses have been met with a consistent pattern of evasion and misdirection.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/06/27/senate-committee-issues-subpoenas-fo...

That hurts. I bought a lot of Hanes and Champion but no more and I just wrote them about it. They were a part of SaraLee until recently.

From Dorothy Snarker: Welcome back, Janeane Garofalo

This came from what seems to be a site where there are a lot of bloggers who are lesbians...o the comments are fun... :)

Batiste: Let's Not Conflate al-Qaeda and Iraqi Insurgents
By Spencer Ackerman - June 27, 2007, 1:10 PM
At an acrimonious hearing underway of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs on the surge, retired Major General John Batiste, a former division commander in Iraq turned critic of the war, got on the administration's case for recently attributing most violence in Iraq to al-Qaeda. The audio gets a little screwy, but bear with us:

I also believe we cannot attribute all the violence in Iraq to al-Qaeda. There's a tendency now to lump it all together, and call it al-Qaeda. We have to be very careful with that. This is a very complex region. al-Qaeda is certainly a component. But there's larger components. al-Qaeda is a worldwide organization. It recognizes no national boundaries. And it's in areas where we ought to be focused.

For this and his other skeptical remarks about the surge -- Batiste said the current effort in Iraq is "destroying our military, with little to show for it" -- Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN) questioned Batiste's credibility, attacking commercials he made for VoteVets, an antiwar military PAC, calling it an effort to "elect Democrats." Batiste replied that he is a "die-hard Republican," and made VoteVets "bipartisan" by joining it. His participation in the group, he said, is "a wake-up call to some Republicans who don't understand the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan."

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/003537.php

Did you know that Dick Cheney is so hardcore about secrecy and security that he won't let the White House officials in charge of security into the West Wing? No that's not a Daily Show joke. It's actually true. Maybe that's why he's already had one (now convicted) spy caught working out of his office. And, no, I'm not talking about Scooter Libby.

We run through all the comically ridiculous details in today's episode of TPMtv ...

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/014858.php

"And, who in the Warhol crowd wasn't a pompous jackass?"

Come on now, let's not drag poor Andy into this.

Subpoenas!!!

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Today's Must Read
By Spencer Ackerman - June 27, 2007, 9:33 AM
Dana Perino, the White House spokeswoman caught in the Dick Cheney information-security scandal, relies on the fact that she's not a lawyer to deflect questions on Cheney's claims to be outside both the executive and the legislative branches of government. What's David Addington's excuse?

Addington -- who served as Cheney's chief lawyer before becoming his chief of staff after Scooter Libby was indicted -- wrote a letter (pdf) to Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) yesterday defending Cheney's asserted exemption from review by the National Archives' Information Security Oversight Office. He's got two options: either argue that the Office of the Vice President is outside the scope of the executive order governing review of how executive branch agencies are supposed to handle classified material, or return to the claim that the veep is a unique branch of government and is exempt by default. Addington, somewhat surprisingly, chooses Option One.

The executive order on classified national security information -- Executive Order 12958 as amended in 2003 -- makes it clear that the Vice President is treated like the President and distinguishes the two of them from "agencies." The executive order gives the ISOO, under the supervision of the Archivist of the United States, responsibility to oversee certain activities of "agencies," but not of the Vice President or the President.

As TPMmuckraker highlighted yesterday, that amended order, known as Executive Order 13292, doesn't just deal with "agencies," it also deals with Executive Branch "entities." Former Justice Department lawyer Marty Lederman explains that because both the President's office and the OVP "are 'entities' within the Executive branch, they are 'agencies' covered by the E.O. (see section 6.1(b)) under a plain reading of the E.O."

This "plain reading" is the most likely explanation for why Addington concocted the theory that Cheney's office is a fourth branch of government -- after all, the only way not to be an "entity" within the executive branch, thereby avoiding ISOO scrutiny, is to be, well, outside the executive branch. That theory (pdf) is what prompted Kerry's letter in the first place, and a lawyer as confident of his reasoning as Addington is might be expected to stand his ground. Alas, no:

Constitutional issues in government are best left for discussion when unavoidable disputes arise in a specific context instead of in theoretical discussions. Given that the executive order treats the Vice President like the President instead of like an "agency," it is not necessary in these circumstances to address the subject of any alternative reasoning, based on the law and history of the legislative functions of the vice presidency, and the more modern executive functions of the vice presidency, to reach the same conclusion that the vice presidency is not an "agency" with respect to which ISOO has a role.
When a bit of constitutional "alternative reasoning" is too much for even David Addington to defend, chances are others won't exactly "reach the same conclusion."

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/003534.php

Operation Arrowhead Ripper has thus far had a very successful media run. Little has been discussed beyond the occasional 'success'. We learn nothing, and they will tell us nothing that doesn't immediately jar as an obvious propaganda piece.

http://leninology.blogspot.com/2007/06/it-will-have-blood-they-say-blood...

later

That boy is going to die laughing!! And the H and the A on his keyboard are going to fall off.

And, the ramifications are just beginning.

Lugar's speech finally made the front pages today of the Washington Post and the New York Times. Both articles highlighted the major split between the stalwart, steady reliable Republican from Indiana and George Bush.

The Washington Post
The harsh judgment from one of the Senate's most respected foreign-policy voices was a blow to White House efforts to boost flagging support for its war policy, and opened the door to defections by other Republicans who have supported the administration despite increasing private doubts.
The New York Times:
Senator Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, the ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee and a steadfast supporter of the president, has conspicuously broken ranks with him on the Iraq war, warning that the United States’ standing in the world could be irreparably eroded if the White House does not change strategy soon.
The questions is whether harsh judgments and conspicuously breaking ranks will have any impact on George Bush.

Nothing else has had an impact.

that's right

Yoko Ono, Lou Reed, Steve Vai, Brian Eno (but, he did co-produce all of the best U2 records,...and was involved with Devo...)

as for Andy Warhol: he's dead, he's free, he's a knucklehead,

what the fuck, let's drag him up :)

New thread

Sodium Pentothal couldn't pull a straight line out of anyone in the White House.

Key Republican senators, signaling increasing GOP skepticism about President Bush's strategy in Iraq, have called for a reduction in U.S. forces and launched preemptive efforts to counter a much-awaited administration progress report due in September.

In an unannounced speech on the Senate floor Monday night, Sen. Richard G. Lugar (Ind.), the ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, said the U.S. military escalation begun in the spring has "very limited" prospects for success. He called on Bush to begin reducing U.S. forces. "We don't owe the president our unquestioning agreement," Lugar said.

The harsh judgment from one of the Senate's most respected foreign-policy voices was a blow to White House efforts to boost flagging support for its war policy, and opened the door to defections by other Republicans who have supported the administration despite increasing private doubts.

Just saw the new Nader movie and I would encourage you to do so as well.

As for your post. There are many here among us who think of the issue of corporate personhood and the resultant hijacking of our democracy as being orchestrated by both of the major political parties. That being said, I would encourage you to make up your own mind. Read Gangs of America by Ted Nace and Unequal Protection by Thom Hartmann.

I look at Pelosi and the trade issues just as an example of the great pool of money thwarting a movement toward renewables, sustainability and social justice.

Maybe congress should start talking about impeaching a supreme court judge or 4. The truth is that certain people see things in a more balanced way if they know that they are about to be held acountable for their sick behvior.

Part 1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llIiNOFJ1NU
and Part 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25wISP8-TVw