Friday, August 3, 2007

In Rehearsal



No postings today. But a reminder: I will be doing my annual gig at the Payomet Performing Arts Center in Truro, Massachusetts (that's Cape Cod) on Sunday night. The appearance is titled "A Night of Outrage, Gossip and Insight From D.C." As I wrote earlier, each year it's different but something of a cross between a seminar, standup, and performance art. I'll admit there's more "outrage" than "gossip"--and "insight" is for the audience to judge. Of course, I take questions and--unlike Alberto Gonzales--actually answer them. If you're nearby, come by. Click here for more info.

Posted by David Corn at August 3, 2007 08:20 AM

35 comments:

capt said...

Mr. David Corn,

How does one get to the Payomet? Practice, practice, practrice.


HA!


Kirk

capt said...

Religious Right Warmonger Claims to Speak for Most Evangelicals


Sarah Posner: John Hagee continues to insist that Armageddon doesn't inspire his deadly obsession with Iran.


Liberal and moderate evangelicals are standing up to the fundamentalist rhetoric of Christians United for Israel and its leader, John Hagee. After thousands of CUFI supporters descended on Washington last month, with the message to their members of Congress that Israel should never be pressured to give up land to the Palestinians, Evangelicals for Social Action wrote a letter to President Bush, countering Hagee's claim to represent the majority of American evangelicals. The majority of American evangelicals, says the group's leader, Rev. Ronald Sider, favor a two-state solution.

Today the BBC/Public Radio program "The World" took a look at the issue - as well as a look at whether the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's embrace of Hagee represents the view of most American Jews. I participated in the discussion, and you can listen to it here.

Not surprisingly, Hagee disingenuously maintained that the end of days scenario has nothing to do with his support of Israel, and (apparently with a complete absence of self-awareness) accused Jewish critics of "fear-mongering." He also claimed to not rule out support for a two-state solution, but of course that, along with his insistence that Armageddon is of no relevance to his policy position, is flatly contradicted by his prolific writings, sermons preached to his congregation, and the entire tenor of the CUFI summit.


Whether Sider or Hagee is right in their claim to speak for the majority of American evangelicals, one thing is clear. Hagee has an extremely effective media and public relations operation which was in place long before he launched CUFI. Along with CUFI's board, Hagee has a well-coordinated network of televangelists and mega-church pastors by his side. Every one of them has regular access to television, radio, and print media audiences. Hagee's followers, and those of his allies, are fervent in their beliefs and extremely motivated to become politically active. Whether he represents the majority of American evangelicals or not, he does have the ability to mobilize a large number of fundamentalists who are loudly on-message. As the Christian Right has proved time and time again, often that is sufficient to get the attention of the media - and elected officials.

More HERE

*****end of clip*****


The only devils in this world are those running around in our own hearts, and that is where all our battles should be fought.
~ Mahatma Gandhi (1869 - 1948)


capt

Anonymous said...

I had forgotten some of David's summer extracurricular activites. Sounds like alot of fun. That's what summer is about, a little relaxation and enjoyment.

Summer's about baseball too. Now for a little commentary I'm sure won't interest most of you.

Hank Aaron's record is about to be broken. Mighty big stuff to baseball people. ESPN has been following Bonds around the last few days televising his games. I'm there watching. Of course there is a serious question with all of this--how does this coming humongous #755 homerun by Bonds fit in with Aaron's record when it's clear Bonds took steroids?

It's convoluted. Management and owners winked at steroid use because it produced more homeruns and thus more dollar-toting fans. Bonds is guilty, yes. It is cheating. BUT, the whole game has been utterly tainted by this fascination with homeruns a.k.a. money. Big Sports is infected like everything in a cancerous capitalist system feeding upon itelf.

Bonds is one incredible creation of nature. Celebrate his record-breaking homerun with all the American pride you have. Bonds is for real and so is his athleticism.

I must note that I experienced a change of heart on this subject after listening to many players mull over their feelings about it.

Capt,

You sound relaxed. That's a good sign.

What will come of the Religious Right and its divisions, which are fundamental, will be interesting to watch. And scary.

Anonymous said...

Again I forgot. Bonds may be hitting #755 right here in San Diego!!!

I'm kinda stoked.

capt said...

"Capt,

You sound relaxed. That's a good sign.
"


Must be all of the heavy drugs and hard liquor! HA!


capt

Gerald said...

What truly concerns me is the fact that Americans are too wrapped up into "America right or wrong;" we have lost our discernment in what is right and what is wrong; and we have let Nazi Israel dictate Nazi America's foreign policies.

Is John Hagee, the Evangelical, who has a male paramour? There are so many Evangelicals and fundamentalists with male paramours that it is very difficult to determine who is bending over for who.

WHAT IS THERE NOT TO LOVE ABOUT NAZI AMERICA?

capt said...

Senate passes Bush-backed spy bill


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Democratic-led U.S. Senate, amid warnings of further attacks on the United States, approved a bill on Friday that would allow President George W. Bush to maintain his controversial domestic spying program.

On a vote of 60-28, the Senate sent the measure to the Democratic-led U.S. House of Representatives for consideration as early as Saturday as lawmakers push to begin a month-long recess.

Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell said earlier he needed the legislation "in order to protect the nation from attacks that are being planned today to inflict mass casualties on the United States."

The Senate bill was needed, congressional aides said, because of restrictions recently imposed by a secret court on the ability of U.S. spy agencies to intercept telephone calls and e-mails of suspected terrorists overseas.

Offered by Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, no relation to the national intelligence director, the bill would allow the administration to continue the warrantless surveillance but require it to describe to a secret federal court the procedures it uses in targeting foreign suspects.

The Senate defeated, on a 45-43 vote, a Democratic alternative, which would have placed tighter controls on the spying and provided for independent assessments of the attorney general's implementation of the measure.

The Senate votes came shortly after Republicans in the House rejected as inadequate a competing Democratic measure.

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid criticized the Senate-passed bill, saying it "authorizes warrantless searches and surveillance of American phone calls, e-mails, homes, offices and personal records for however long (it takes for) an appeal to a court of review."



More HERE

*****end of clip*****

Man those Democrats are really standing up to Bunnypants. Thank goodness there is a Democratic majority.



capt

capt said...

"So let us regard this as settled: what is morally wrong can never be advantageous, even when it enables you to make some gain that you believe to be to your advantage. The mere act of believing that some wrongful course of action constitutes an advantage is pernicious." Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 B.C.)

=
"A man who has in mind an apparent advantage and promptly proceeds to dissociate this from the question of what is right shows himself to be mistaken and immoral. Such a standpoint is the parent of assassinations, poisonings, forged wills, thefts, malversations of public money, and the ruinous exploitation of provincials and Roman citizens alike. Another result is passionate desire - desire for excessive wealth, for unendurable tyranny, and ultimately for the despotic seizure of free states. These desires are the most horrible and repulsive things imaginable. The perverted intelligences of men who are animated by such feelings are competent to understand the material rewards, but not the penalties. I do not mean penalties established by law, for these they often escape. I mean the most terrible of all punishments: their own degradation."Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 B.C.)

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

=
"The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do." : Samuel P. Huntington

===

Thanks ICH Newsletter!

capt said...

Is Hillary On Rupert Murdoch's Side?


Ari Berman: Sen. Clinton has been silent on Murdoch's purchase of the Wall Street Journal. Have his contributions to her campaign paid off for him?


Rupert Murdoch's takeover of the Wall Street Journal this week is drawing the ire of some Democrats running for President.

Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd called the deal "a serious threat to our democracy." John Edwards urged fellow Democrats to oppose and block the merger and refuse campaign contributions from News Corp execs.

But the Democratic frontrunner, Hillary Clinton, hasn't said a peep. Perhaps that's because Clinton has been courting the Aussie billionaire since she became a New York Senator---and vice versa. Murdoch threw a lavish fundraiser for her at the News Corp tower last year. And he and son James, the heir apparent, both wrote big checks to Clinton's presidential campaign this June. Nine News Corp executives have thus far given a total of $20,900 to Clinton this election cycle.


She calls him "smart and effective." He calls her "a good Senator" and "very, very gutsy originally on the war in Iraq."

So you see, the Journal is not Murdoch's only recent prize.

More HERE

capt said...

Maliki out on his feet


DAMASCUS - Leaders worry about how history will label them. Adolf Hitler once said he wanted nothing to be written on his tombstone - the name would explain itself. Hitler might have thought he would be remembered as a great leader who brought pride and justice to Germany. Most recall him as a failed military leader who destroyed Europe.

Similarly, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki - whose days in office are surely numbered - might want to to be remembered as the man who brought democracy and justice to Iraqis; the man who rooted out terrorism and killed al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Instead, Iraqis will remember Maliki as a selfish, sectarian politician who divided the country as never before, between Shi'ites and Sunnis. They will remember the death squads that flourished under his regime, the targeted assassinations of Sunni notables, and they will see him as a stooge of the Americans who was unable to fulfill any of the promises he made when coming to power in May 2006.

Maliki's problem is that his government is not constitutional, as his cabinet no longer represents all parties that are seated in Parliament. Thirteen out of 37 ministers have walked out, and more are likely to follow soon.

The first to abandon him were six Shi'ite ministers from the Sadrist bloc in April. They objected to his relationship with the United States, and his failure to secure a timetable for US troop withdrawal from Iraq. They were followed by Sunni Justice Minister Hashem al-Shibli from the Iraqi List that is headed by former prime minister Iyad Allawi.

This week, five Sunni ministers from the Iraqi Accordance Front stepped down, along with Sunni Salam al-Zoubai, who was deputy prime minister. They claimed this was because Maliki had not responded to any of the 11 demands they had made, which included greater decision-making for Sunnis, and a political amnesty for Sunni prisoners.

Then came the resignation of nine senior officers from the Iraqi Army, including Baker Zebari, the commander-in-chief. All of them were objecting to how the prime minister is running affairs.

Adnan Duleimi of the Iraqi Accordance Front explained his party's withdrawal: "The [Accordance] Front has reached a dead end with Maliki, who takes decisions on his own without consulting with anybody. He then claims that these decisions represent everybody."

Tarek al-Hashemi, a vice president who is a member of the Front, said the withdrawal was final and it would be "an opportunity for Maliki to run his cabinet without the Accordance Front, which he says is the source of all problems". He added that the upcoming weeks will be "scandalous" for Maliki's "sectarian government".

The hammer blow for Maliki could be if Allawi's four remaining ministers on the United Iraqi List abandon the cabinet, as they have hinted they will do soon. Allawi, who has his eyes set on becoming prime minister, said his party is "studying" a walkout similar to that of the Iraqi Accordance Front.

If this happens, the Maliki cabinet will no longer have any Sunnis, any Christians, or any Shi'ites representing Muqtada al-Sadr, the strongman of the Shi'ite community who is popular among the poor and the young of Baghdad. It still has Kurdish elements, mainly because of Maliki's support for their claims in the oil-rich city of Kirkuk.

While news of the latest walkouts ripped through Baghdad this week, so did four horrendous terrorist attacks that left 109 people dead (74 of them in the capital) and ended whatever hope Iraqis had that Maliki can bring them security.

With it seemingly just a question of when, rather than if, Maliki goes, four names are already being bandied about as his replacement.


More HERE

capt said...

Honoring reporters who just can't handle the truth!



Chris Matthews

For reporting that is an embarrassment to the profession of journalism, and for being beholden to corporate paymasters rather than the citizens of America.

For our first BuzzFlash Media Putz of the Week, we had so many nominations for Chris Matthews that we had to pick one by lottery. Before we even launched MediaPutz.com, it appears Matthews is already positioned for a lifetime achievement award.


Winning nominator, Marjorie Swanson of Kenosha, Wisconsin, writes of just one Chris Matthews Media Putz moment: "Matthews pretends to hold a serious discussion on environmental issues using noted, and well informed, environmentalist Bobby Kennedy and then counters him with talk show ranter Melanie Morgan. We need honest discussions on the environment so that people know the facts.


"Why use someone like Morgan, who has no expertise on environmental issues including global warming? Matthews should know that a discussion must be comprised of two people who know something about their subject. This discussion contained one expert and one female capable of nothing more than lies, distortions and Conservative Talking Points."


Good point, and why did Matthews have Ann Coulter on just after she wished that a terrorist would kill John Edwards? Because Matthews is running a freak show disguised as a pundit program. Coulter's violent shock statements seemingly boost his ratings, or so he and his producers must think.


But Elizabeth Edwards showed grace and courage in calling into the Matthews program to politely and firmly ask Coulter to stop her vile personal attacks on Democratic political figures and their families. It's well worth listening to the dignity of Elizabeth Edwards, the defensive counterattacks by Coulter, and the circus ring leader comments by Matthews.


As one BuzzFlash reader queried Chris Matthews in an e-mail forwarded to BuzzFlash, "Why do you even have Ann Coulter on when she has no news value only shock value? Anyone advocating the assassination of any political candidate shouldn't be given any airtime by anyone.


"I no longer waste time with your program, but I did see this one. Chris, if your ratings are so low you have to have someone on who advocates killing candidates then you need another line of work.

"Maybe you can have Ann do cancer jokes since making fun of the deaths of children is getting old. Ann has absolutely nothing of value to say and is only good to show off her skinny legs and cleavage, what there is of it."

Chris Matthews, you are indeed a trailblazing Media Putz -- and more than merit being named the first recipient of this dubious BuzzFlash distinction.


Every week, you remind us how easy it is to separate journalism from the truth.



More HERE

*****end of clip*****


Good old tweety. A mediaputz no doubt.


capt

capt said...

America, it’s the new French!




Scandal after scandal heaped on top of more scandal and we still do not have the courage to impeach?

At this point, anyone who is terrified of the impeachment process (unless you are IN the Bush Administration) should just admit you are not willing to fight for our democracy, and that includes Nancy Pelosi.

What’s the meme this week? We don’t have enough votes? Big deal. I say we have the US House go through the evidence process (and NO, Gonzales ain’t what I am talking about) and present the laundry list of BushCo’s “high crimes and misdemeanors.” Plus, hold those hearings during Prime Time and have Nancy do her job and oversee the proceedings. Let the Republicans spend all their time supporting Bush and defending his crimes. Let it go on for hours and hours. Let is stretch on into week. Hell, start this during the “recess,” they got nothing else to do.

Let the process continue just to remind everyone what all we have lost, where our money went, how it was really stolen.

Then vote.

Do you not prosecute a murderer just because he has a great lawyer? No, even though you might lose, you still prosecute the case. You do the right thing.

And if we lose, we lose, but we will have tried Bush in Congress and in the Court of Public Opinion. Now let the GOP try to distance themselves from Bush for the 2008 elections. They will have publicly forgiven and sitting President of treason, war crimes and fraud just for their political gain.

With Bush’s 25% approval rating, you can’t go wrong… unless you are French.



More HERE

capt said...

At US Base, Iraqis Must Use Separate Latrine


FORWARD OPERATING BASE WARHORSE, Iraq - The sign taped to the men’s latrine is just five lines:

“US MILITARY CONTRACTORS CIVILIANS ONLY!!!!!”

It needed only one: “NO IRAQIS.”

Here at this searing, dusty U.S. military base about four miles west of Baqouba, Iraqis - including interpreters who walk the same foot patrols and sleep in the same tents as U.S. troops - must use segregated bathrooms.

Another sign, in a dining hall, warns Iraqis and “third-country nationals” that they have just one hour for breakfast, lunch or dinner. American troops get three hours. Iraqis say they sometimes wait as long as 45 minutes in hot lines to get inside the chow hall, leaving just 15 minutes to get their food and eat it.

It’s been nearly 60 years since President Harry Truman ended racial segregation in the U.S. military. But at Forward Operating Base Warhorse it’s alive and well, perhaps the only U.S. military facility with such rules, Iraqi interpreters here say.

It’s unclear precisely who ordered the rules. “The rule separating local national latrines from soldiers was enacted about two to three rotations ago,” Maj. Raul Marquez, a spokesman for the 3rd Brigade Combat Team of the 1st Cavalry Division, from Fort Hood, Texas, wrote in an e-mail. That was before his brigade or the 3rd Stryker Combat Brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division, from Fort Lewis, Wash., the other major combat force here, was based at Warhorse.

There’s also disagreement on the reason.

Marquez cited security. “We are at war, and operational security (OPSEC) and force protection are critical in this environment,” Marquez wrote. “We screen all our local nationals working and living in the FOB, however, you can never know what’s in their mind.”

Other soldiers traced the regulations to what they called cultural differences between the Iraqis and the Americans.
“We’ve had issues with locals,” said Staff Sgt. Oscar Garcia, who mans Warhorse’s administrative hub. “It’s not because we’re segregating.”

Garcia said some Iraqis squatted on the rims of unfamiliar American-style toilets or had used showers as toilets, forcing private contractors who maintain the facilities to clean up after them.

Another soldier at the administrative hub who declined to give his name or rank cited conflicts over hygiene habits. “We can’t accept people washing their feet where I brush my teeth,” he said.

“It’s to keep problems from happening,” said Army Capt. Janet Herrick, a public affairs officer. “It’s a preventive measure . . . so no one gets belittled.”

But the Iraqis who’re paid $80,000 to $120,000 a year for their interpreting services are offended.

“It sucks,” Ahmed Mohammed, 30, said of the latrine policy. He called the signs - in English and Arabic - “racist.”

He’s worked as an interpreter for the U.S. military since 2004. He’s college educated and well versed in the ways of Western plumbing. He said Warhorse was the only American base where he’d encountered U.S.-only signs on latrines and country-of-origin restrictions on dining hours.

“I live in the same tent with 80 Americans,” he said.

Mohammed works for L-3 Titan Group, a unit of New York-based L-3 Communications. He declined to have his picture taken for publication. He fears for his life. He said his brother was killed last year in Baghdad for working for an American company.

Mohammed has sold his house and has squirreled away enough money to buy visas for his family of four. He said he intended to quit soon and emigrate to Germany. The latrine policy is part of the reason, he said.

L-3 officials didn’t respond to a request for comment.

“On one hand we’re asking Iraqis to help us,” often at great risk, said Laila al Qatami, spokeswoman for the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in Washington. “But at the same time we’re saying, ‘We want to keep you at a distance.’ It’s a mixed message we’re sending.

“I don’t understand having separate bathrooms. It seems to go against everything that the United States stands for.”


More HERE

*****end of clip*****

They hate us for our freedom?


capt

Gerald said...

The Illegal and Immoral Option

Gerald said...

In fact, Iran is now generally acknowledged – by the Arab League, the Gulf Cooperation Council, the China-Arab Cooperation Forum, the Non-Aligned Movement’s Ministers, and the Organization of the Islamic Conference – to be a principal defender of the NPT, at the 2005 NPT Review Conference, and in pleadings made before the UN Security Council and at quarterly meetings of the IAEA Board of Governors.

Who is generally acknowledged to be the principal enemy of the NPT and the associated IAEA and Nuclear Suppliers Group nuke proliferation-prevention regime? We are, especially since Bush became president.

Gerald said...

America has been the world's bully

Gerald said...

Our entire vision of the world is skewed. We are always searching for the antagonists, as if they must be there all of the time. We are either rewarding other nations or punishing them. It never stops and unless we change our mindset, it never will stop. Look at the Middle Eastern countries. These people have been carved up into artificial States, they have constantly been raped of their resources by corporate controlled governments and Big Oil Companies since the day the Ottoman Empire fell. We have been the cause of these terrorists. We are the ones that set up al Qaeda to fight the Russians. We supplied the Taliban. As long as they were on our side against the Russians, we didn’t give a damn what they did. Now it’s us they are after, and we wonder why. We are so morally opposed to these people now. We know why, we all do.

When the Shah was in power, we turned a blind eye to the way he treated his people. Is it any wonder that when they deposed this make-believe American imposed Shah that they attacked his benefactor? Not once did we take responsibility for what we did to the Iranian people. We were the ones that made Saddam a military power. The Iraqi people have NEVER benefited from the sale of their own oil. How long did we let that go on? In almost every case we ourselves are to blame for our bad relations with other nations. It comes out of our mindset of either play the game we want you to play, or we will punish you. This is how America has operated since the end of the Second World War. It’s about time that this way of doing business stops. We can always, like Theodore Roosevelt said, “speak softly but carry a bug stick”. The only time that stick should be used however, is when American lives are at stake. At the moment though, not ten years down the road. That’s fodder for another pre-emptive war. We must understand that we are but a member of this community of nations, not the world’s dictator. We need to replace suspicion with compassion. We need to replace ignorance with understanding. We must change who we are and what we stand for. This isn’t a very nice country in the eyes of the world. Not only is our infrastructure collapsing around us, so is our attempt to shape the world in our image. What makes this world such an interesting place is because of the differences among nations. We are not the first great civilization, nor will we be the last great civilization (unless we destroy this planet). We need to be a part of this world again, not the principle player in our own playbook.

Gerald said...

What one can do

Gerald said...

We have lost control of our lives, our liberties, our labor, and our destiny. We have indentured ourselves to the Corporatocracy – the Corporate Warfare State (as coined by John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man). We have allowed ourselves to degenerate into cannibals, consuming the lives of others. Rapidly now, we kill off and consume whole species of animals, birds, fishes, trees and plants. We are shredding every living being in the way of our greed. Coerced and manipulated by the Corporatocracy, we are killing ourselves in a mad scramble for diminishing resources, instead of learning to share. The life of our own human species has now become "the tragedy of the commons."

The corporations make more money designing, building and employing the machinery of murder than they can by enhancing the true beatitudes of life such as wisdom, restraint, compassion, kindness, respect, and nurturance. We are the market to whom they sell. Our young are the cannon fodder sent to die, presently as volunteers openly recruited on the steps of our schools. The market for murder is there, and we are selling ourselves into it. On the scale of the Corporate State, murder is no crime, it is just another business deal. Life itself has become a consumable, bought and sold in the marketplace.

Mindlessly, as programmed machine robots, 24x7 we kill, moving to the war drum’s dirge of death. The dead eat the living. We leave behind rivers of blood and poison as our effluent. As the inheritance of our grandchildren, we leave these.

Gerald said...

Hypocrisy, thy name is Bush

Gerald said...

The dictionaries can revise the definition of hypocrisy with one entry that covers everything. Hypocrisy: -see George Bush.

Gerald said...

Praying Each Day: August 4

Gerald said...

Praying Each Day: August 4

Gerald said...

Sorry about the double post of August 4!

Gerald said...

Let’s Be Honest

“Creeping crookedness” is what Rev. Eugene Laubach called the attitude that everybody should just look out for themselves. How should a person of faith view honesty?

While serving at New York’s Riverside Church, the minister said that a person of faith believes that he or she “lives in a moral universe where a lie will not endure forever and where trust and integrity are the real name of the game.”

A person of faith, Rev. Laubach adds, “believes that the goal of life in not just to get, but to give, that people are responsible for one another under the one God who is Father of all, that there are some objective truths that cannot be brushed aside. …Perhaps the first question we need ask about mass dishonesty is whose world we really think we’re living in.”

We know the answer: this is God’s world and He invites us to live our lives honestly and honorably.

If you choose, you can keep the commandments, and to act faithfully is a matter of your own choice. (Sirach 15:15)

Spirit of Truth, fill me with Your wisdom and grace so that I will choose what is right.

capt said...

Pablo on Politics

capt said...

Democrats' responsibility for Bush radicalism


It is staggering, and truly disgusting, that even in August, 2007 -- almost six years removed from the 9/11 attacks and with the Bush presidency cemented as one of the weakest and most despised in American history -- that George W. Bush can "demand" that the Congress jump and re-write legislation at his will, vesting in him still greater surveillance power, by warning them, based solely on his say-so, that if they fail to comply with his demands, the next Terrorist attack will be their fault. And they jump and scamper and comply (Meteor Blades has the list of the 16 Senate Democrats voting in favor; the House will soon follow).

I just finished a discussion panel with ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero which was originally planned to examine his new (superb) book about the work his organization has done for years in battling the endless expansion of executive power and presidential lawbreaking. But the only issue anyone in the room really wanted to discuss -- including us -- was the outrage unfolding on Capitol Hill. And the anger was almost universally directed where it belongs: at Congressional Democrats, who increasingly bear more and more responsibility for the assaults on our constitutional liberties and unparalleled abuses of government power -- many (probably most) of which, it should always be emphasized, remain concealed rather than disclosed.

Examine virtually every Bush scandal and it increasingly bears the mark not merely of Democratic capitulation, but Democratic participation. In August of 2006, the Supreme Court finally asserted the first real limit on Bush's radical executive power theories in Hamdan, only for Congress, months later, to completely eviscerate those minimal limits -- and then go far beyond -- by enacting the grotesque Military Commissions Act with the support of substantial numbers of Democrats. What began as a covert and illegal Bush interrogation and detention program became the officially sanctioned, bipartisan policy of the United States.

Grave dangers are posed to our basic constitutional safeguards by the replacement of Sandra Day O'Connor with Sam Alito, whose elevation to the Supreme Court Congressional Democrats chose to permit. Vast abuses and criminality in surveillance remain undisclosed, uninvestigated and unimpeded because Congressional Democrats have stood meekly by while the administration refuses to disclose what it has been doing in how it spies on us. And we remain in Iraq, in direct defiance of the will of the vast majority of the country, because the Democratic Beltway establishment lacks both the courage and the desire to compel an end to that war.

And now Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, with revealing symbolism, cancel their scheduled appearances this morning at Yearly Kos because George Bush ordered them to remain in Washington in order to re-write and expand FISA -- a law which he has repeatedly refused to allow to be revised for years and which he has openly and proudly violated. Congressional Democrats know virtually nothing about how the Bush administration has been eavesdropping on our conversations because the administration refused to tell them and they passively accepted this state of affairs.
The intense rush to amend this legislation means that most of them have no idea what they are actually enacting -- even less of an idea than they typically have. But what they know is that George Bush and Fox News and the Beltway establishment have told them that they would be irresponsible and weak and unserious if they failed to comply with George Bush's instructions, and hence, they comply. In the American political landscape, there have been profound changes in public opinion since September of 2001. But in the Beltway, among our political and media establishment, virtually nothing has changed.

More HERE

capt said...

Senate Gives in on Wiretapping. 16 Dems Go Along.

The following Democrats voted for it:

Evan Bayh (Indiana);
Tom Carper (Delaware);
Bob Casey (Pennsylvania);
Kent Conrad (North Dakota);
Dianne Feinstein (California);
Daniel Inouye (Hawaii);
Amy Klobuchar (Minnesota);
Nancy Mary Landrieu (Louisiana);
Blanche Lincoln (Arkansas);
Claire McCaskill (Missouri);
Barbara Mikulski (Maryland);
Bill Nelson (Florida);
Ben Nelson (Nebraska);
Mark Pryor (Arkansas);
Ken Salazar (Colorado);
Jim Webb (Virginia).

capt said...

FINAL VOTE RESULTS FOR ROLL CALL 836

A total of 41 Democrats voted in favor.


More HERE

*****end of clip*****

What a party.





capt

Anonymous said...

Isn't this vote on wiretapping special?

Separate bathrooms. That pretty much symbolically sums it up, doesn't it? "We want democracy in Mesopotamia!" Yeah, right.

Interesting links. Thank you Capt. and Gerald.

Clinton should be brought to task for her Murdoch connection. She must cut it completely off. Absolutely. She's too blatantly hypocritical if she doesn't and it's one of the things that might bring her down.


Now a joke for everyone. This might have already been published here by Pande.


The other night, in Memphis, Tennessee, the owner of a great dane, you probably saw this on the news. The guy puts his gun on the table. His dog jumps up on the table, hits the gun, it goes off, and shoots the guy in the back.

It's Michael Vicks worst nightmare--a dog that can defend himself.

Jay Leno, Aug. 2

Anonymous said...

Chris Matthews should never, ever have given Ann Coulter that hour interview. Totally crossed the boundaries.

Gerald said...

Carey, you are absolutely right but Chris Matthews is a loyal Nazi American, like we all are.

Please read my letter!

Encore Drama

Dear Nazi Americans:

For this post I have addressed my letter as Nazi Americans. Yes, we are all Nazi Americans. I was watching Encore Drama. I do not know if it was East or West. We had a new television delivered after a twenty-nine year love affair with our old television. All that I can say is what a difference!!! I was watching, “Why We Fight?”

We fight now in our American culture to promote and sustain Imperialism. We are no longer fighting to promote Democracy. Richard Perle, the high ranking Nazi, said that we have changed as a people. Even with a regime change Nazi America will never go back to her former American idealism of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. America, as we have known it, has changed forever. I believe that Richard Perle is absolutely right. Yes, we are all Nazi Americans.

We can all go to worship on a particular day but after church we will revert back to our Nazi American and evil ways, regime change or no regime change.

Our continuing state of denial as to whom we are as a people will never change. We, as Nazi Americans, live for mass murders, torture, continuing and endless wars, and war crimes. We are a blood-sucking breed of people. We are truly evil and we will never change, church or no church. Hypocrisy is deeply rooted into our psyches. We are who we are, “Born to kill, rape, and plunder against humanity.” We are a greedy and a selfish people.

WE ARE ALL NAZI AMERICANS FOREVER!!!!!

Your fellow Nazi American,
Gerald

Gerald said...

What is truly sad that someday I will die and I will go to my grave as a Nazi American. How will God judge a Nazi American? That is a truly frightening thought!!!

capt said...

DNA Evidence Frees Man From Zoo
(satire)



PHOENIX—Years of controversy were finally settled Monday after DNA tests conclusively proved that Duane Panovich, an attraction at the Phoenix Zoo for the past 11 years, was indeed a human being, and not a reticulated giraffe from southwestern Kenya.

"This is truly a day of jubilation and vindication," said Panovich's attorney, Frank Hablis, who successfully argued in a federal court in June that the zoo should permit a DNA test to determine whether Panovich was genetically closer to a Homo sapiens or a Giraffa camelopardalis. "We're deeply grateful that science has advanced enough over the years to finally uncover the truth and clear his name of the allegations of giraffehood that have been such a burden to him and his family."

Shortly after the findings were revealed, Phoenix Zoo staff tranquilized, crated, and transported Panovich by helicopter to his Mesa, AZ home, where he was released into his front yard and reintroduced to his mate and two young.

"It's good to finally be home, but more than anything I'm looking forward to wearing clothes again," a still-groggy Panovich told reporters as an oxpecker bird sat on his shoulder and fed on ticks.



More HERE

capt said...

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