Journalists or stenographers? We report. And, heck, we'll decide, too.

Over at The Washington Monthly, Kevin Drum links to a (registration-required) piece from the LA Times, from which he quotes:

Almost half of Medicare recipients dislike the new prescription drug law, and nearly 3 in 10 seniors and disabled persons say the issue will influence their vote for president, according to a national survey released Tuesday.

The survey suggests that there are "maybe a half-million seniors" who might swing their votes to Democratic candidate John F. Kerry and another "1 million to 2 million whose votes might be up for grabs on this issue," said Drew E. Altman, president and chief executive of the private, nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation.

....Only 3 in 10 of those on Medicare believe that the law's benefits — partial coverage of prescription drug costs for those who choose to participate in that program, a voluntary prescription discount card available until the drug benefit takes effect in 2006, and new coverage for some preventive health services — will help them personally.

It's that last paragraph that really, really grates on me: "Only 3 in 10 of those on Medicare believe that the law's benefits ... will help them personally." To which the only meaningful response is, "Who gives a rat's behind what the recipients think?" What's the truth behind the bill, and who does it really help?

It's no secret that the Bush administration has been incredibly dishonest in explaining the benefits of the recent Medicare "reforms". And what that means is that it's almost worthless to ask the recipients themselves what they think of it, when those recipients have been given only the most biased and distorted picture of what's in it for them. (It's like those annoying man-on-the-street interviews that news programs use to pad their time. Sorry, but I don't really care what the man on the street thinks. I want to know what the experts think -- you know, the folks who have actually taken the time to do some research.)

So, when it comes to reporting on things like Medicare reform, you find the vast majority of the media simply reporting what's handed to them, and then doing these worthless public opinion surveys. And what should they be doing? Well, gosh, wouldn't it be nice if someone actually sat down, went through the legislation carefully, crunched the numbers, analyzed the membership and the demographics, and finally wrote something like, "According to our analysis, 18% of Medicare recipients, would see a benefit, 12% would see little or no change, while the remaining 70% would notice moderate to serious cuts in their benefits." See how that works? Now that's news, and it actually means something. It's mathematical, it's objective, and it doesn't depend on a five-second sound bite from Joe Six Pack, who most likely doesn't have clue one about how his Medicare works.

But, sadly, the mainstream media, in their overwhelming obsession to be fair and balanced and unbiased, have turned into nothing more than stenographers. "The Bush administration claims this about Medicare, while Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry claims exactly the opposite. Next, a cigar-smoking dog. Don't miss that one!" And the competing claims? Who's closer to the truth? Unfortunately, this is apparently not the media's job any more since that would require, like, work.

Just this indefensible laziness was on display front and center during the 2000 presidential debates, when Al Gore made (as I recall) some budgetary claims, and then-Governor Chimpy McFlightSuit dismissed it as being just "fuzzy math". Naturally, the media had a field day repeating Bush's "fuzzy math" sound bite. And, just as naturally, few of them took the time to actually examine the competing claims to see who was more accurate. Wouldn't that have been useful information to have?

Your media. Stenography in action.

Dated, but still funny, presidential campaign humour

And while I'm working on my next "Tucker Carlson is a total slimeball" piece, something to tide you over -- a bit dated, but still good for a chuckle or two. It should bring back memories of when George W. was just a bumbling, semi-literate, inarticulate buffoon, and not the biggest menace to the free world in the history of man.

2000 Presidential Debate Transcript

Jim Lehrer: Welcome to the second presidential debate between Vice President Al Gore and Gov. George W. Bush. The candidates have agreed on these rules:

I will ask a question. The candidate will ignore the question and deliver rehearsed remarks designed to appeal to undecided women voters.

The opponent will then have one minute to respond by trying to frighten senior citizens into voting for him.

When a speaker's time has expired, I will whimper softly while he continues to spew incomprehensible statistics for three more minutes.

Let's start with the vice president. Mr. Gore, can you give us the name of a downtrodden citizen and then tell us his or her story in a way that strains the bounds of common sense?

Gore: As I was saying to Tipper last night after we tenderly made love the way we have so often during the 30 years of our rock-solid marriage, the downtrodden have a clear choice in this election. My opponent wants to cut taxes for the richest 1 percent of Americans. I, on the other hand, want to put the richest 1 percent in an iron clad lockbox so they can't hurt old people like Roberta Frampinhamper, who is here tonight.

Mrs. Frampinhamper has been selling her internal organs, one by one, to pay for gas so that she can travel to these debates and personify problems for me. Also, her poodle has arthritis.

Lehrer: Gov. Bush, your rebuttal.

Bush: Governors are on the front lines every day, hugging people, crying with them, relieving suffering anywhere a photo opportunity exists. I want to empower those crying people to make their own decisions, unlike my opponent, whose mother is not Barbara Bush.

Lehrer: Let's turn to foreign affairs. Gov. Bush, if Slobodan Milosevic were to launch a bid to return to power in Yugoslavia, would you be able to pronounce his name?

Bush: The current administration had eight years to deal with that guy and didn't get it done. If I'm elected, the first thing I would do about that guy is have Dick Cheney confer with our allies. And then Dick would present me several options for dealing with that guy. And then Dick would tell me which one to choose. You know, as governor of Texas, I have to make tough foreign policy decisions every day about how we're going to deal with New Mexico.

Lehrer: Mr. Gore, your rebuttal.

Gore: Foreign policy is something I've always been keenly interested in. I served my country in Vietnam. I had an uncle who was a victim of poison gas in World War I. I myself lost a leg in the Franco-Prussian War.

And when that war was over, I came home and tenderly made love to Tipper in a way that any undecided woman voter would find romantic. If I'm entrusted with the office of president, I pledge to deal knowledgeably with any threat, foreign or domestic, by putting it in an iron clad lockbox. Because the American people deserve a president who can comfort them with simple metaphors.

Lehrer: Vice President Gore, how would you reform the Social Security system?

Gore: It's a vital issue, Jim. That's why Joe Lieberman and I have proposed changing the laws of mathematics to allow us to give $50,000 to every senior citizen without having it cost the federal treasury a single penny until the year 2250. In addition, my budget commits $60 trillion over the next 10 years to guarantee that all senior citizens can have drugs delivered free to their homes every Monday by a federal employee who will also help them with the child-proof cap.

Lehrer: Gov. Bush?

Bush: That's fuzzy math. I know, because as governor of Texas, I have to do math every day. I have to add up the numbers and decide whether I'm going to fill potholes out on Rt. 36 east of Abilene or commit funds to reroof the sheep barn at the Texas state fairgrounds.

Lehrer: It's time for closing statements.

Gore: I'm my own man. I may not be the most exciting politician, but I will fight for the working families of America, in addition to turning the White House into a lusty pit of marital love for Tipper and me.

Bush: It's time to put aside the partisanship of the past by electing no one but Republicans.

Lehrer: Good night.

Um ... how's that again?

Following a link from atrios over to americablog, we find Republican US Senate candidate, wingnut, homophobe and unabashed fruitcake Tom Coburn:

"The gay community has infiltrated the very centers of power in every area across this country, and they wield extreme power. ... That agenda is the greatest threat to our freedom that we face today. Why do you think we see the rationalization for abortion and multiple sexual partners? That's a gay agenda."

So ... one of the driving motivations behind that militant gay and lesbian community is ... rationalization for abortion? How exactly does that work?

We're all over this, yes, we are.

In a Chicago Tribune article linked at truthout.com, we have Chimpanzee-in-Chief George Dubya, defending the wonderfully convenient terror alerts every time there's some inconvenient news out there that he'd rather no one was paying attention to:

"We have the solemn duty to follow every lead we find and share information we have with people that could be harmed," Bush said at a conference of minority journalists in Washington. "That's exactly what we've done."

Added Bush, in response to a followup question, "Um ... what August 2001 PDB?"

These days, you just do NOT mess with the blogosphere

(An amusing story of right-wing, back-stabbing duplicity with some interesting repercussions on how news is going to be delivered in the near future.)

Right now, the hot blogosphere story is about a team of right-wing hatchet men, "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth", who are making the talk show circuit, slagging John Kerry's war record in Vietnam. The impression you get from the introduction of any of these individuals is that these are men who "served" with Kerry in Vietnam, on Kerry's own Swift boat. What's generally not mentioned is that none of them were actually on Kerry's own boat -- when they say they "served with Kerry," all they're apparently referring to is that they were in Vietnam at the same time, perhaps on another Swift boat, or perhaps on the same boat as Kerry was on, but before or after he was actually there. All very clever, all well done and deliberately misleading to leave just the right mistaken impression.

But here's the kicker, as described by both atrios and DCBlues over at dailykos: one of those Swift Boat lying sacks of ... uh, one of those alleged Kerry compatriots, Larry Thurlow, was a guest on Inside Politics, being interviewed by yet another worthless CNN talking head, Judy Woodruff. Thurlow was criticizing Kerry's Bronze Star, claiming that, on the day Kerry earned it for alleged bravery in action, they were never in any danger and were never under fire.

According to the interview transcript,

THURLOW: ... My thought is that since no mine was detected on the other side of the river, no blast was seen, no noise heard, there's two things that are inconsistent with my memory ... Our boats immediately put automatic weapons fire on to the left bank just in case there was an ambush in conjunction with the mine. It soon became apparent there was no ambush ... I distinctly remember we were under no fire from either bank.

Seems pretty clear -- Thurlow is downplaying the danger of the whole thing to cast suspicion on Kerry's medal. But (and here's the good part), Thurlow himself was awarded the same Bronze Star for bravery for exactly the same mission. Fascinating. So if Kerry never deserved his medal, well, clearly neither did Thurlow. But that little tidbit never came up in conversation. How convenient. And there's no record of Thurlow being in any hurry to give back his medal as a sign of protest. Isn't that special? But that's not where this is going.

All of the above has already been done by the other, big-time bloggers, so it's not like I'm adding anything to the story. But if you read the followup over at dailykos in the comments, there's a sudden rush of comments along the lines of:

For what it's worth, I just sent the link to Inside Politics, along with the quote about Thurlow's bronze star. We'll see if they bother to do anything with it...

I sent the link to Judy Woodruff and Wolf Blitzer's email accounts, too...

Wolf Blitzer, Aaron Brown, Paul Krugman, Jodi Wilgoren, Adam Nagourney, news-tips at the New York Times, Chris Matthews and a few others...

And you can see how this changes the entire dynamics of news, particularly the absolute crap that passes for the political pundit talk shows. Now, as one of these right-wing hacks is telling a totally bogus story, they should be thinking in the back of their minds that there are some deadly serious observers, listening, recording what they're saying, downloading the online transcripts, and heading out into cyberspace to find the actual facts.

And, within minutes, the truth (you know, the real truth, not what you get from Fox or CNN) is hitting the big blogs, and the readers are making their annoyance known via direct email to the show's hosts, producers and directors. Sometimes, perhaps, before the show is even off the air.

This really does change everything, and it's going to be interesting to see if any of Big Media, having given Thurlow and his reprehensible colleagues all of this face time, will follow up with how they've been thoroughly suckered. It's not like they haven't been handed the story on a silver platter, is it?

And now, for something a little different

As a bit of a digression from beating up on Republicans, we turn our attention to the animal kingdom, to another similarly ugly, bottom-dwelling, parasitic species with no discernible social value: the northern snakehead fish.

It's just another depressing story of how an imported species is now threatening North American waterways. From this article in the Globe and Mail:

Since the first northern snakehead fish turned up in a pond in Maryland two years ago, fisheries officials across the United States have been attempting to stop the spread of a fish that is a favourite in some Asian restaurants and popular among some tropical fish owners...

... The worry is that if snakeheads get a firm foothold in U.S. waterways, they will upset the ecological balance. "They would eat bass. They would compete for habitat and they would eat the same food that bass would eat and they could bring in ailments and parasites," ...

Ouch. When it comes to protecting and preserving the environment, it seems it's just one damned thing after another.

The Barack Obama smackdown sweepstakes. And our next contestant is ...

Desperately looking for a candidate to be pounded into a grease stain by Barack Obama in Illinois, the Repubs have dredged up Alan Keyes and Andrea Grubb Barthwell.

Good choices, both. I mean, it's not like there are any skeletons in Barthwell's closet.

UPDATE: And the apparent winner is ... right-wing dingbat Alan Keyes. Kevin Drum has his typically amusing perspective on it here. Note well, though, that Keyes has only been offered the Republican candidacy -- he hasn't officially accepted it yet, and I think he's going to find it difficult to defend his running for U.S. Senate in what is not his home state, after he publicly criticized Hillary Clinton for doing exactly that. If the media do their job (hahahahahaha! oh, man, sometimes I crack me up), he should have to explain this ... what's the word I'm looking for ... um ... saying one thing, then saying exactly the opposite ... flippity ... something or other. (Apologies to Jon Stewart for the shameless plagiarism.)

Anyway, if I was a betting man, I'd bet that Keyes will have an attack of common sense and back away from this. I mean, this candidacy has already chewed up and spit out a number of pretenders. Who in their right mind wants to go down in history as losing a U.S. Senate race by the largest margin ever?

Well, OK, that would be Keyes.

Is it safe? No, really, is it safe?

Maybe:

"... America is safer because of your service at Oak Ridge ... Today, because we acted to liberate Afghanistan, a threat has been removed, and the American people are safer. (Applause.) ... Today, because we're working with the Pakistani leaders, Pakistan is an ally in the war on terror, and the American people are safer. (Applause.) ... Today, because Saudi Arabia has seen the danger and has joined the war on terror, the American people are safer. (Applause.) ... Today, because America and our coalition helped to end the violent regime of Saddam Hussein, and because we're helping to raise a peaceful democracy in its place, the American people are safer. (Applause.) ... Today, because the Libyan government saw the seriousness of the civilized world, and correctly judged its own interests, the American people are safer. (Applause.) ... We have ended one of the most dangerous sources of proliferation in the world, and the American people are safer. (Applause.) ... Today, because America has acted, and because America has led, the forces of terror and tyranny have suffered defeat after defeat, and America and the world are safer. (Applause.) ..."

Maybe not:

"We are a nation in danger," said President George Bush, after the nation's state of alert was raised to "orange" (high) on Sunday evening. "We are doing everything in our power to confront the danger. [This alert is ] a solemn reminder of the threat we continue to face".

Flip. Flop.

Warning: Bush twins sighting alert raised to orange level.

And if you can't get enough of the 12-step sisters, Jenna and Barbara, well, they now have their very own political blog. You too can savor the in-depth campaign wisdom of:

We met many great people as we stopped in local campaign offices and W Stands for Women events. It was incredible to see so many people excited about reelecting our Dad.

Note to (aptly-named) J&B -- technically, you can't really help "re-elect" your Dad, as he was never elected the first time. Just being pedantic.

UPDATE: Whoops, apparently I'm being unfair. Seems like the Dewar's duo have graduated from the bottled stuff, and have moved on. What would we do without conservative, family-values role models?

It's official: new CNN quick vote proves 49% of random Americans are idiots.

From the latest CNN quick vote here: "Do you agree with Howard Dean's suggestion that the latest terror alert may be politically motivated?"

Now, read that question carefully: it's asking whether the alerts may be politically motivated, nothing more. And given that this is asking only whether it's possible, the answer would seem to be a no-brainer: of course it's possible. It might not be true, the evidence might not be overwhelming or, for some, even persuasive. But there's no possible way to deny that it may be related to nothing but politics.

Which is, of course, why 49% of those responding said no. Lord, I wish I had a snappy punchline for this, but it's just too depressing.

Oh, man, this is priceless. The bogosity of the recent terror alerts.

From this New York Times article, the salient excerpt:

Much of the information that led the authorities to raise the terror alert at several large financial institutions in the New York City and Washington areas was three or four years old, intelligence and law enforcement officials said on Monday. They reported that they had not yet found concrete evidence that a terrorist plot or preparatory surveillance operations were still under way.

Three. Or. Four. Years. Old.

But at least everyone reacted with the appropriate alarm and caution:

Despite the new terror warnings, the stock market gained ground, denting expectations that it would drop with the heightened security alert. The Dow Jones industrial average was up 39 points.

Apparently, someone at the markets has this all figured out. Good for them.

Another week, another terror alert.

Here we go again.

Oh, yawn.

CNN's Tucker Carlson: Political analyst or pilonidal anal cyst?

It's amusing to watch CNN's Crossfire co-host Tucker Carlson, unabashed right-wing hack, toady, lackey and simpering whore, cover the Democratic convention as if he actually had anything worthwhile and objective to say, rather than regurgitating the standard Repub talking points.

Case in point: his inane commentary here:

My overall feeling is that [John Edwards'] basic premise that America is more unfair than it used to be just isn't true.

Now, take note, you pundit wannabes -- Carlson doesn't actually present any evidence to back up his "overall feeling", 'cuz that would take, like, you know, work. Instead, we have this nebulous vibe on Carlson's part which, in mainstream media circles, sadly passes for commentary for these days. Ignore, of course, the overwhelming unfairness of the economy towards the have-nots or have-littles. Ignore, of course, the outrageously out-of-control increases in CEO pay, while those at the bottom are watching their jobs vanish in a blizzard of overseas outsourcing. And ignore George Dubya's own admission of the circles he swims in, when he described his loyal supporters as the "haves and have-mores". Luckily for Carlson, he can ignore all of this actual evidence since he has this, well, you know, "feeling."

Carlson continues:

Society is more fluid and more meritocratic than it's ever been.

Which no doubt explains why qualified but needy college applicants can't get financial help to go to school, but how a lazy, semi-illiterate, party-animal, service-avoiding, AWOL frat boy can become president of the United States. Naturally, it was all based solely on merit.

There are more sons of mill workers going to college now in America than have ever gone. It's not a perfect country but to say that it's gotten less fair or that there's less opportunity is just factually untrue.

And, once again, you budding pundits, note how Carlson can dismiss Edwards' position as "factually untrue" without providing any, you know, actual facts. Right-wing, conservative punditry. Is that a great gig or what?

Homeland security now targeting terrorist candy bars

From this article at CNN, we have the heartwarming, uplifting story of government employee Stephanie Willett who was "arrested, handcuffed and detained for three hours by transit police" for apparently eating a candy bar in a subway station where eating is prohibited. But here's the best part -- after being told by a transit officer to finish the bar before entering the station:

Both Willett and police agree that she nodded and put the last bit into her mouth before throwing the wrapper into a trash can.

That's right, you read that correctly -- Willett accommodated the request by quickly eating the remainder of the bar ... and was still arrested.

Your law enforcement and homeland security tax dollars at work. Don't you feel safer already?

The ultimate power couple

From the local Toronto star, this piece on the Clintons. Doesn't matter what you think of them, there's no doubt that, in terms of star power, no other couple is even in the room.

Someone else taking a whack at George W. Chimpster

Man, how reprehensible and pathetic a human being do you have to be to get a smackdown from Jimmy Carter?

The breathtaking wisdom of Tucker Carlson

From the blog of Tucker Carlson, right-wing co-host of CNN's Crossfire, and all-round cheap-shot artist, hack, toady, Republican sycophant and flat-out slimeball, writing about the current Democratic convention in Boston:

You can learn a lot about a party from wandering among its faithful, as I did this afternoon for a few hours at the FleetCenter in Boston. Here's what I learned:

Democrats don't like Bush.

And now you know why he's a famous, talking head on CNN, making gajillions of dollars, and you're not.

Oops, my bad. U.S. pilots bomb the wrong people. Again.

From this article in the New York Times (linked to at truthout to avoid the annoying registration), we have that:

"Eight Afghan soldiers have been wounded in an erroneous aerial bombardment by U.S. forces in central Afghanistan, a Defense Ministry spokesman said on Sunday."

And, as a Canadian, I'm sure I speak for many of us that we're still a bit miffed about the U.S. propensity for dropping bombs on the wrong folks.

You know, I hear there's some serious evildoers holed up on a ranch somewhere around Crawford, Texas. Why don't you go drop a few bombs on them?

New Bush military records found. Dog didn't eat them after all.

From CNN, we have the amusing flip flop of "We'll turn over all of the president's military records ... whoops, sorry, they were accidentally destroyed ... whoa, hang on, we found them after all."

In explaining the difficulty in tracking down the documents in question,

Defense Finance and Accounting Service spokesman Bryan Hubbard said the microfilm payroll records were found in a Denver facility.

"We're talking about a manual process for records that are over 30 years old," Hubbard said.

OK, you have to admit, Hubbard has a point. After all, who the heck would be interested in mucking around, digging through someone's past 30 years ago?

"Jenna Bush". "Tongue". The perfect Google search combination.

From over at Wonkette, we have a mind-numbing, alleged online chat session with the Bush bimboes, Barbara (the underage-drinking one) and Jenna (the binge-drinking one), in which the twins do their best to channel Mr. Spock, or perhaps Constable Benton Fraser from the Canadian TV series Due South:

Susan Kildow from Holly Springs NC wrote: As young women who embody the future of our nation, how important do you believe character to be when choosing a candidate and how does your dad stack up?

Barbara and Jenna Bush answered: Well, Susan, to us character is the most vital part of being an excellent leader. While we may be a little biased because he is our dad, we think - well, we KNOW -- that our Dad is a man of strong and principled character. If he says he is going to do something, he will do it. When we were kids, if dad said he was going to come to one of our soccer games, he would be there! And now even his critics can't argue that he is a steadfast leader who means what he says and acts with resolve. At the same time, he always treats everyone he meets with dignity and respect.

Yessir, the women who embody the future of our nation. As you can see here, Jenna already appears ready for the Oval Office, in a Bill Clinton, oral kind of way. You go, girl.

P.S. Oh, and about Daddy treating everyone with dignity and respect ...

GOP to black voters -- drop dead. No, wait, come back ...

Previously, we had Michigan State Rep. John Pappageorge (R-Too Many Black People):

"If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election."

Followed shortly thereafter by Preznit George W. Chimpster:

"I'm going to ask African-American voters to consider some questions. Does the Democrat Party take African-American voters for granted? It's a fair question. I know plenty of politicians assume they have your vote, but do they earn it and do they deserve it?"

Well, gee, that's a toughie. Let's see ... here, we have John Kerry, announcing the creation of 'a nationwide legal SWAT team of election lawyers to combat the kind of voting irregularities that occurred in Florida four years ago ... [that] would take "tough action" to prevent the kind of voter "intimidation and harassment" that kept an estimated 1 million African-American voters from the polls in 2000 and prevented some 57,000 African-American voters from casting votes in Palm Beach County, Fla.'

And here, again (just cuz you can't give this inanity too much press), we have Pappageorge:

"If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election."

Yeah, it's a tough call. Grapple, grapple ... What was the question again, George?

GOP to black voters -- drop dead.

Yes, it's already been linked to from truthout, among others, but this just can't get enough coverage -- a Republican lawmaker quoted as saying, "If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election."

You have to admit, he has a point, although he probably could have rephrased it as, "If we can't disenfranchise and discourage those pesky left-leaning darkies, we're in deep shit."

See how much better that reads? Far bolder and punchier.

One man's freedom fighter is another's hypocritical Republican hack

From this article, we have the adorable story of "young conservatives gearing up to protest the protestors" at the upcoming GOP convention in NYC.

"We are the right-wing freedom fighters — we are out there and are just as animated as the protesters can be," said member Jason Sager, of Brooklyn.

Hey, Jason, here's a suggestion: why don't you go fight for the freedom of all of those anti-Bush protestors who've been rounded up, herded into "free speech zones" or just plain arrested for simply exercising their First Amendment rights to criticize your chimpy preznit? I think that would be a laudable example of fighting for ... hey, Jason ... where you going? Come back here. Jason!

Politics, sure, but not *those* politics.

From this online piece at CNN (new motto: "Hex, Fox! Can't touch this!"):

LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Singer Linda Ronstadt was thrown out of the Aladdin casino in Las Vegas on the weekend after dedicating a song to liberal filmmaker Michael Moore and his movie "Fahrenheit 9/11," a casino spokeswoman said Monday...

"Ms. Ronstadt was hired to entertain the guests of the Aladdin, not to espouse political views," the casino said.

Although I imagine, if Ronstadt had dedicated her encore to, say, the memory of Ronald Reagan and the principles of compassionate conservatism that made the United States great, the Aladdin would probably have looked the other way. Funny how that works.

P.S. I am reminded of how the baseball hall of fame once cancelled an event celebrating the film "Bull Durham" because of the proposed participation of vocal Bush critics Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon. So while Robbins' and Sarandon's political views were deemed unacceptable for the HoF, apparently blatant Republican shilling was cool.

Is it great to totally own the media and, well, just about everything else? Or what?

Jeebus H. Christ, here we go again!

So ... the U.S. has 100,000+ troops mired in Iraq, many being held there against their will by the Pentagon's "stop loss" orders, the punishingly hot summer season bearing down on them, electricity currently a sporadic, hit-or-miss proposition, foreign insurgents flooding into the country, having a field day blowing up ... well, pretty much everything that looks blowable-uppable, the vast majority of the Iraqi population simmering with anger against the invaders for the unspeakable atrocities committed against civilians in various detention centres and prisons, and George Dubya's solution to all this is ... wait for it ... wait for it ... here it comes ...

Invade Iran.

No, I am not making this up. I could not possibly make up something this inconceivably bone-headed, but here you go, online at CNN: "Bush: U.S. probes possible Iran links to 9/11." An excerpt from that article, which should fill you with a powerful sense of deja vu (from the Latin, "stupid, arrogant imbecile"):

"On Monday, Bush accused Iran of harboring suspected al Qaeda members and developing nuclear weapons."

Yeah, and I think we all remember what happens to mideast countries that harbor terrorists and evildoers, and might be working on weapons of mass destruction. Think hard, it'll come to you. As kos pointed out, this idea is so bizarre, the only proper response is to make fun of it, as in this Tom Toles cartoon.

But perhaps the unintentionally funniest part is George's sudden appreciation for human rights:

"I have long expressed my concerns about Iran. After all, it is a totalitarian society where free people are not allowed to exercise their rights as human beings."

Yeah, the idea that some totalitarian regimes might squelch dissent, and trample on the rights of free speech of their citizens. That really has to suck.

Iraqi PM Allawi personally executes prisoners. No highlights at 11.

For almost a day now, the blogosphere has been pretty much frantic with the news that the U.S. appointed and approved new Iraqi prime minister Iyad Allawi personally executed several handcuffed and blindfolded prisoners by shooting them through the head from close range with a pistol. (Meet the new boss, same as the old boss, apparently.)

Holden over at Eschaton has posted a timeline of the developments. A few of the initial URLs:

The original article in the Sydney Morning Herald.
General article on Allawi, also from SMH.
An interview with the author Paul McGeough.


Holden also mentions (no surprise here) the absolutely deafening silence from the mainstream US media (go ahead, check out CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS or Faux News -- wall-to-wall Martha, with a smattering of Bush twins, but nary a reference to the new butcher of Baghdad, at least right now at 6:29 am Saturday morning.)

But here's where it gets interesting (yes, I really do have something original to contribute).

Holden does give credit to The Washington Times for this breaking story. What's odd is that, while you can read the story given the exact URL, that page is apparently unavailable from either the front page of the Washington Times, or even from the UPI breaking news page (again, as of 6:30 am this morning). In other words, it's as if the Times posted the story, then thought better of it and dropped all of the links to it, but left the actual page in place. Down the memory hole. It remains to be seen how long the exact link will last, or whether it too will mysteriously vanish.

UPDATE: More down the memory hole? Kevin Drum also has a posting on the Allawi controversy, and buried in the midst of comments to it is a reference that Matt Drudge linked to the story. In itself, not a big deal, but a quick trip over to http://www.drudgereport.com shows absolutely no mention of the story. Am I missing something? Or did another link just disappear?

UPDATE 2: For more breaking developments on this story, apparently, you still have to go overseas here.

UPDATE 3: Based on a private e-mail I just got, apparently, Matt Drudge really did have a news piece up at his web site, but it was taken down sometime late last night. My, but these news pieces have a short shelf life, don't they?

Um ... could I rephrase that?

From this article in the July 16 Globe and Mail, we have U.S. Ambassador to the Philippines Francis Ricciardone chiding the Filipinos for deciding to withdraw from Iraq their overwhelming military force of 51 troops, warning them that:

"... in a time of testing, when enemies demand that you kneel, please don't confuse your enemies or your friends."

That's right. It's, like, totally different when your friends demand that you kneel.

P.S. To be honest, if you read Ricciardone carefully, it's not clear what the hell point he was trying to make. But I figured I'd slap him down, anyway.

Bush campaign aide makes ass of himself -- highlights at 11.

An online CNN article, reporting on the resounding and humiliating blockage in the Senate of the anti-same-sex marriage amendment, describes how, since the measure was clearly headed to overwhelming defeat:

Both Kerry and Edwards were on record opposing the measure but decided not to return for the procedural vote since their votes weren't needed to defeat it. They were the only senators not voting.

Not surprisingly, this didn't stop a Republican aide from acting like a total dipstick:

A Bush campaign aide responded, "It takes a special kind of senator to attack others over a vote that they don't show up for."

Riiiiight. And this from an aide whose president has yet to show up for any memorial of any kind for any of the U.S. service personnel killed in Iraq. It really is true that some peoples' mouths work way faster than their brains.

Bush twins not a big hit here in Canada. Quelle surprise.

I never mentioned it, but yesterday's edition of the Globe and Mail had a large, color photo of the Bush twins, Barbara (the brunette one) and Jenna (the alcoholic one), front page, above the fold. Apparently, the Globe's powers-that-be figured that stuck-up, obscenely rich, binge-drinking American debutantes were just what Canadians wanted to know about.

Wrongo.

Letters to the editor in today's Globe:

Burnaby, B.C. -- Thanks for featuring the lovely pictures of George Bush's two military-aged daughters on the front page. It's heartwarming to know that they, too, are ready to sacrifice themselves for the war on terrorism, enduring the discomforts and dangers of nail polish and strapless evening gowns.

Toronto -- A slow news day? An intellectual vacuum in your boardroom? What on earth could cause The Globe to publish a full colour photo of U.S. President George W. Bush's daughters on the front page, as if it were newsworthy?

Halifax -- Linking a huge cover photograph of pretty twins with a lightweight article buried in the middle pages, you flatter Playboy magazine by imitation. Fine. But where's the foldout?

Canadians, God bless 'em, every one. There may be hope for us yet.

The power of the blog

No, not this one, but there's a terrifically uplifting story over at dailykos, specifically a posting entitled Corrections.

kos links to an original article which discusses an online CBS news story about a couple who are just adorably enthused about George Bush's tax cuts. Turns out that the gentleman is, unbeknownst to the reading audience, the president of the New York Young Republicans Club. Oops. That's generally the kind of thing that readers have a real right to know. kos supplied a link to CBS' online complaint form and I, like I imagine many others, gave CBS a stern talking-to.

The upshot: a revised version of that story online which now clearly points out the political affiliation of Mr. Adorable. The moral: sometimes, I guess the squeaky wheel really does get the grease. Better moral: Do not fuck with the blogosphere. They have many eyes, and have run out of patience with this kind of crap.

Kerry campaign smackdown!

Kerry-Edwards campaign manager Mary Beth Cahill slaps Ken Mehlman upside the head. You go, girl!

John Edwards -- disingenuous, unaccomplished liberal?

You bet, at least according to this GOP web site, which describes Edwards as "unaccomplished and inexperienced."

You have to admit, they have a point. I mean, it's not an easy thing to measure up to the achievements of George W. Bush.

Condi Rice -- stupidest human being ever?

Or just a lying sack of crap? We report; you decide.

From an article in the LA Times (also available here with no need for registration), we have Rice:

"Let me just be very clear: I don't know where the idea that there might be some postponement of elections comes from," she said on CNN.

Golly gee, I just have no idea where folks could be getting these absurd notions from. I don't know, could it be here?

Federal election officials will meet next week with officials of the Department of Homeland Security to discuss whether and how they would delay the November presidential election in the event of a catastrophic terrorist attack, a top elections official told MSNBC on Monday.

The official, DeForest B. Soaries Jr., chairman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, denied in an interview on MSNBC’s “Countdown” that federal officials had any plans to postpone the election, but he confirmed a report in the new edition of Newsweek magazine that the panel was seeking to establish a process to do so should it become necessary...

Why does this woman still have a job?

When you need your daily Bush news, turn to BNN.

Top headlines from today's cnn.com:

MORE TOP STORIES
• Saudis: Bin Laden associate surrenders
• Gay marriage ban expected to die in Senate
• Political fund-raiser faces prostitution charge
• Bush twins describe Camp David karaoke...

followed by:

American Morning (7 a.m. ET)
Join us for a rare look at President Bush's daughters.

I'm assuming that what they really meant was a rare look at President Bush's daughters sober.

Andrew Sullivan makes an ass of himself. Again.

Only the strong can stomach reading Sully's bizarre, paralogical rants, but I figure I have to do it so you don't. And it doesn't get more idiotic than a recent post of his, "The Case for War", which doesn't seem directly linkable at Sully's site. Let's follow the bouncing Sully, shall we?

To my mind, the war to depose Saddam is still justifiable, morally important, and will, if we stay the course, eventually be regarded as an important milestone in the war against terror.

OK, so the war was a good thing. Faithfully toeing the party line, that's our Sully.

Flip.

But at the same time, it seems to me that there's no denying that the actual case made by the Bush administration for war was built on false information.

Whoa, so maybe the war wasn't really justifiable given that it was based on (how to put this delicately) a pack of lies.

Flop.

Quoting Senator Pat Roberts (R-Lying Toady), Sully continues:

So if we had had accurate intelligence, the war would not have taken place.

Still, flop.

I reiterate: I'm still glad we fought it.

Whoops. Back to flip.

But this remains one of the biggest government screw-ups in recent history. It has made future pre-emption based on intelligence close to impossible. And President Bush is ultimately responsible for this. Tenet has taken the fall, but it will take years and years before the U.S. regains the reputation for credibility that this president has destroyed. Even if you believe that Bush is still the best man to fight this war, you also have to concede that his record includes at least one massive error, and one that will cripple our ability to fight the war in the future.

Flop. I mean, really, flop. And he thinks John Kerry has a problem with waffling?

The Barbara Ehrenreich pool

Given Ehrenreich's wicked take on the Bush administration and their abject horror of the possibility of gay marriage, one wonders how long Barbara will last at the New York Times (new motto: "OK, we really suck.").

Perhaps it's time to start a pool to predict her last installment before she steps down for ... for ... health reasons. Yeah, that's it, health reasons. Or maybe to spend more time with her family.

Sycophantic, butt-kissing CNN

From this CNN web page, "A flyboy's story: George Bush in World War II", you can get the scoop on the upcoming "CNN Presents" special on George Bush I's military history.

Read the thrilling story. Check out the interactive section. View the gallery. Take the quiz. And see just what kind of pathetic, right-wing, Republican-worshipping suck-ups CNN have become. Watch out, Fox News -- there's a new kid in town.

Oh, fer Chrissake, here we go again

The terrorists are coming! The terrorists are coming! From this article, we have:

Al Qaeda plans a large-scale attack on the United States "in an effort to disrupt the democratic process" before November's elections, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said Thursday.

Holy elective disruption, Batman! That's pretty specific stuff, and Ridge lets you know it in no uncertain terms:

Ridge cited "recent interdictions" for the new warning.

Wow! Apparently, the anti-terrorist intelligence network is finally doing its job, and getting the real goods on those nefarious evildoers. Details, dammit! We need details!

[Ridge] said U.S. officials have no precise knowledge of the time, place or method of attack, but said they are "actively working to gain that knowledge."

Um ... what? But ... but ... OK, but you're going to beef up the security protocols, anyway, right? Right?

Ridge did not raise the national color-coded threat level beyond its current yellow, or elevated, level.

Ooooooookay. And just in case you thought that, maybe, there might have been cause for alarm, we have:

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Cat Killer, speaking before the briefing, said the intelligence was "very non-specific" and there was "no reason for panic, no reason for paralysis."

And, apparently, no reason for alarm. Or concern. Or, for that matter, much interest. Actually, just forget we brought it up, OK?

A press conference I'd like to see ...

Journalist: "Scott, just the other day, the president was asked how he'd compare VP candidates Dick Cheney and John Edwards. His response: 'Dick Cheney could be president.'"

Scott McClellan: "And your question is?"

Journalist: "Well, there was a pretty clear implication that John Edwards just didn't have the experience, or perhaps maturity, call it what you will, to take on the position of president if circumstances called for it."

Scott: "And?"

Journalist: "Well, given that George Bush is, by all accounts, a pampered, former secretary chasing, party animal, frat boy, service-dodging, cocaine using, former alcoholic, inarticulate, mediocre Yale C student and single-term governor, isn't it fair to say that he's already lowered the bar considerably for being president?"

Ah, well, I can dream, can't I?

... and you don't mess with the CIA

From a Ken Fireman Newsday piece, discussing various Bush administration screwups:

One error that stands out as especially costly is the decision last year to blame the CIA for the president's inaccurate claim that Iraq sought to buy uranium in Africa. Picking a fight with the agency is never a good idea given its capacity for self-protective retaliation, and the administration has paid a stiff price. The latest installment came last month when the CIA cleared a new book by a senior official calling the Iraq war a blunder.

Yessir, you just don't fuck with the CIA. You do and ... and ... darn it, they'll get their director to resign. And if they get really pissed, they'll ... they'll ... well, they'll just clear a book.

And God help you if you expose one of their covert operatives. Holy shit, they'll just ... uh ... they'll ... beats me, what the hell did they do about that?

Even more Republican ethics ... or lack thereof

Just another crooked Republican caught breaking the law:

The former head of a Republican consulting group has pleaded guilty to jamming Democratic telephone lines in several New Hampshire cities on Election Day two years ago... Allen Raymond, former president of the Virginia-based GOP Marketplace, pleaded guilty Wednesday in federal court to conspiring to make harassing phone calls. The charge carries up to five years in prison. He will be sentenced in November.

The funniest part of this article is right down at the bottom, where Repub chairwoman Jayne Millerick says, "These allegations have been extremely troubling and we are happy that it appears they are coming to a just conclusion."

Not so fast. I don't think we can say this is a "just conclusion" until we see Raymond's sorry ass in prison for a year or two. Any bets that he gets slapped with some sort of community service? Go ahead. Take the bet. Make my day.

More Repub family values: at least she was of legal age

From this article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

U.S. Senate candidate Jack Ryan pressured and tricked his then-wife [actress Jeri Ryan] into going to sex clubs with "cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling" and tried to get her to have sex in front of others, she alleged in 4-year-old court records released Monday.

Hey, at least an intern wasn't involved. God knows that makes all the difference.

No Child's Behind Left Behind: More Republican family values

Another smug, right-wing, conservative radio talk show host gets caught with his hand in ... well, let's not go there, shall we?

Conservative radio talk show host Jon Matthews gets busted for indecency with a child.

More annoying than the hypocrisy is the fact that, although the charge is a third-degree felony with a range of punishment from two to 10 years in prison, we read that:

According to court documents, Matthews is to be placed on deferred adjudication for seven years.

Criminal defendants who successfully complete the terms of deferred adjudication avoid final conviction, but the fact that they were charged remains a part of their record.

So ... he doesn't even get convicted, is that it? Yessir, the GOP -- the law and order party. Does it get any funnier than this?

Family values, Republican-style

Right-wing sleazebag Rush Limbaugh announces his third divorce.

Sorry, what was all that right-wing frothing about the "sanctity of marriage"?

American GIs now beating the crap out of each other?

From this article, we have the jaw-dropping excerpt describing one Sean Baker, who got the tar beaten out of him while he was just posing as an uncooperative detainee at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba:

... Mr. Baker, 37, a former member of the 438th Military Police Company, said he played the role of an uncooperative prisoner and was beaten so badly by four American soldiers that he suffered a traumatic brain injury and seizures. He said the soldiers only stopped beating him when they realized he might be American.

The term "friendly fire" takes on a whole new meaning here, don't it?

You want semantics? I'll give you semantics.

It's amusing to see Republicans, having had conniptions over Bill Clinton's "It all depends on the definition of the word 'is'", taking semantic distortions to whole new heights, a good example being the current controversy over whether the detainees at Abu Ghraib were really "tortured".

Naturally, some are saying, well, it's not really, you know, "torture" per se -- just, um, well, mistreatment, with a little abuse thrown in for good measure. But not "torture". No way, not that.

And in a June 8 article in the New York Times (new motto: "The worst newspaper ever."), available here, we have more semantic tap-dancing:

"If you walked down through the wing of the prison where they were being held, they would have them strip down naked. Sometimes they would stand on boxes and would hold their arms out. That happened almost every night - having them naked. I wouldn't say it's abuse. It's definitely degrading to them."

Ah, so it's not even abuse, just degrading. If you close your eyes, you can just see these people, poring over their thesauruses.

When they start quibbling over the definition of the word "is", you'll know things have reached rock bottom.

Just when Republicans run out of minorities to persecute ...

... give them credit -- they'll just find another group against which to discriminate. The serious part of this depressing story is here, while Gen JC Christian's hilarious sendup on it is here.

The party of law and order?

Yeah, that would be the Republicans.

UPDATE: There was so much possible commentary on the sheer hypocrisy of this article that I thought it was just best to supply the link and let others figure it out for themselves.

But there's one point that might not be that obvious. From the article:

"The pardons released today are those that were issued by the governor but did not go through the Board of Pardons and Paroles.

Janklow sealed the most pardons - 91 - in 2002 during his last term as governor, records show. Sixty-one of those pardons came in his last four months as governor.

450 pardons were filed with the Secretary of State during this time period. 232 of these pardons will remain sealed as allowed by law and ordered by the governor who issued the pardon. Those are pardons that followed the proper channels of public notification when they were signed."

Pardons that "did not go through the Boards of Pardons and Paroles"? Under the circumstances, then, doesn't that make them technically worthless? The consequences for the allegedly pardoned could be devastating. Of course, all of this could have been avoided had Janklow not been such an ignorant incompetent:

"I've been a lawyer since 1966, and I had never, ever looked at the (pardon) statutes," [Janklow] said.

What a complete dipshit. I wonder if those folks have the grounds for a class-action lawsuit.

Whose fault is it? Why, it's Saddam's fault!

In the true Republican spirit of blaming someone else -- anyone else -- for the ongoing chaos and carnage in Iraq, we have conservative blogger and consummate whacked-out dingbat Andrew Sullivan who writes of Bush's recent speech here:

"... The critical point that the swift victory over Saddam paradoxically made the occupation more difficult - because Saddam's minions were able to escape, melt into the population and fight another day - was made early on. Bush could have made more of it ..."

So there you have it. It's all that scoundrel Saddam's fault. Why, the absolute cunning of the man to allow himself to be soundly and thoroughly defeated, and in such short order! Does his deviousness know no bounds? Truly, a mad genius.

Ahmed Chalabi -- a true Republican

From this online CNN article, "Chalabi blames Tenet for feud with U.S.":

"Ahmed Chalabi, the former Iraqi exile who worked closely with the White House before the Iraq war, blamed CIA Director George Tenet Sunday for recent allegations that have apparently caused his standing with the Bush administration to plummet."

Shifting the blame and passing the buck. Well, you can't say he didn't learn from the best.

When hard-nosed political investigation crosses over into stalking

A number of other blogs have covered one of the more amusing and recent tasteless Republican political escapades: the virtual stalking of Illinois U.S. Senate Democratic candidate Barack Obama by a videophotographer working for his Republican opponent, Jack Ryan.

According to that initial article,

"For the past 10 days, U.S. Senate candidate Barack Obama hasn't been able to go to the bathroom or talk to his wife on his cell phone without having a camera-toting political gofer from his Republican rival filming a few feet away ... Justin Warfel, armed with a handheld Panasonic digital camcorder, follows Obama to the bathroom door and waits outside. It means Warfel follows Obama as he moves from meeting to meeting in the Capitol. And it means Warfel tails Obama when he drives to his campaign office."

Eventually, Ryan's campaign got enough heat for this that they finally apologized and pulled Warfel back a bit. But it still makes one wonder -- what would have been the proper response by Obama's campaign? Even though what Warfel was doing was probably technically legal, there comes a point where you really have crossed the line into bad taste. And then what? Well, it seems that there three possible responses from Obama's perspective.

First, he could have arranged for the same treatment for Ryan -- what I call the "tit for tat" treatment, very predictable, very generic and very boring. And it would have given Ryan the ammo to poke fun at Obama: "Whoa, dude, what a clever comeback. Did you think of that all by yourself? Man, talk about a bottomless pit of originality." In short, a pretty feeble comeback and almost certainly not worth the trouble.

The second option would have been the "sort of tit for tat" response, with humor thrown in. Obama could have arranged for close-quarters surveillance of photographer Warfel. Now wouldn't that have been amusing? Warfel stalking Obama, and someone stalking Warfel. It's not clear it would have solved anything, but it would definitely have made the news and made Obama's point in a way that would have everyone chuckling and realizing what sort of dork Ryan was to start this in the first place. But there's a third response, and it's one not to be considered lightly.

Obama could have, as they say, "gone nuclear". Ryan wants to play with video surveillance? Fine, responds Obama, and sets observers to follow Ryan's family members -- his wife and kids. Photographers stake out positions outside the childrens' school and outside the wife's place of work. They film video, they take pictures, they follow slowly along in cars as the kids walk down the sidewalk, and so on. All perfectly legal, and all totally unnerving.

Tasteless? You bet. Frightening? Almost certainly. Effective? Without question. While this is obviously an extreme reaction, its advantage is that there is no rebuttal in terms of a similar but slightly-stronger reply. It's not like a slowly escalating arms race, in which each side ups the ante just a bit each time. Doing it that way just drags things out as one side after the other ratchets the response up a single notch at a time.

Going nuclear, on the other hand, ends it. Immediately. It's an absolutely blunt and unambiguous way of saying, "You want to screw around like this? Let me show you just where this is going to lead. Now, do you still want to play this game?"

It's a drastic approach and, as I said, not one to be considered lightly. But given the Republicans' generally sleazy approach to, well, pretty much everything, sometimes it's the only language they understand.

What an unbelievable klutz

Good God, he really can't walk and chew gum at the same time, can he?

When, dear Lord, oh, when will the Democrats grow a spine?

So the hot news over at CNN is that House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi publicly called George W. McFlightSuit "incompetent".

Well, no, actually, not quite. In the Democratic spirit of dodging, weaving and tap dancing, you can see what really happened in this excerpt from the article:

"The situation in Iraq and the reckless economic policies in the United States speak to one issue for me, and that is the competence of our leader," Pelosi said. "These policies are not working. But speaking specifically to Iraq, we have a situation where -- without adequate evidence -- we put our young people in harm's way."

So did Pelosi actually call Bush incompetent? Absolutely ... sort of, kind of, maybe:

Asked specifically if she was calling Bush incompetent, Pelosi replied:

"I believe that the president's leadership in the actions taken in Iraq demonstrate an incompetence in terms of knowledge, judgment and experience in making the decisions that would have been necessary to truly accomplish the mission without the deaths to our troops and the cost to our taxpayers."

Apparently, in the Democratic universe, this rates as a real up-front, in-your-face, kick-butt smackdown. Of course, a real smackdown would have been Pelosi coming back with, "Of course he's incompetent! How much more evidence do you need?!?! Failed economy. Failed war. Yeesh. The guy's a moron. Even his own advisers admit they have to summarize anything over two pages long to him."

But we all know that's not going to happen. Even as the Republicans have honed their nasty attack strategies over the years, the Dems are still mind-numbingly incompetent at this game. It's just purely depressing to watch.

"Hypocrisy" doesn't begin to describe this ...

For some eye-rolling, knee-slapping humor, you have just got to read this online CNN article, in which Secretary of State (and, sad to say, house niggah) Colin Powell gets his panties in a bunch about how the Arab world should be showing far more outrage over the videotaped beheading of American Nick Berg.

According to Powell, "I would like to have seen a much higher level of outrage throughout the world, but especially in the Arab world, to this murder", and "What we saw with this horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible murder should be deplored throughout the Arab world."

Uh ... yeah, right, Colin -- this from an emissary of a country that, let's see here, invaded Iraq on totally trumped-up pretenses, killed over 10,000 civilians already and, most recently, has been caught imposing a clearly official policy of abuse, humiliation and torture against Iraqi prisoners, the majority of which even the U.S. military admits were arrested by mistake. And let's not even get into what the "Arab world" (a deliciously racist and condescending description) thinks of the whole-hearted U.S. support for Israel, as that country systematically wipes out the Palestinians, little by little.

One would think that even Powell, the gutless weasel that he is, might have twigged to the fact that he doesn't really have the moral high ground here.

And, in the wake of the seemingly endless evidence of torture of prisoners both in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and Cuba's Guantanamo Bay, try, just try to believe that Powell could say,

"Arab leaders need to look at what's happening in their own societies," he added. "They need to reform their own societies. Torture is torture is torture. It is unacceptable. It is not the way you treat human beings."

Republicans developing a conscience. Aren't they just adorable?

From this CNN piece, we have Republicans opposed to the release of any more images of abuse and humiliation of Iraqi prisoners:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Top GOP leaders said Wednesday they oppose the release of hundreds of fresh images showing the abuse of Iraqi prisoners, saying they could compromise the prosecution of those soldiers implicated in the acts and further inflame tensions in Iraq.

Ah, yes. We wouldn't want any more of these pictures to get out. That might make the Iraqis, like, really mad at the U.S. And we wouldn't want that, would we?

Oh, and let's not forget that these current voices of restraint are pretty much the same ones who, during the Clinton impeachment debates, couldn't leak private details about Clinton's dalliances fast enough. Seems there was no end to the salacious details of what Clinton to whom, where, when and with what, prosecutorial integrity be damned. And now, all of a sudden, they find that box of morals and good taste that's been packed away in the attic all these years? Talk about timing.

Perhaps the funniest part of the article; Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky: "Take our word for it. They're disgusting."

Apparently, Mitch has forgotten that trusting him and his political band of right-wing thugs is what got the United States embroiled in an unwinnable war in Iraq, with 700-plus Americans dead already. One might think that the concept of trust is not something folks like McConnell should be suggesting lightly.

More than we really needed to know

In dissecting the right wing's excuses for the torture and atrocities at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, Michelangelo Signorile writes:


... That got Limbaugh thinking and making some lurid confessions: "If you look at these pictures, you cannot deny that there are elements of homoeroticism …I've seen things like this on American websites. You can find these if you have the passwords to these various porn sites, you can see things like this."

Added Limbaugh quickly, "Um ... or so I've heard."

Dear George:

Dear President Bush:

Regarding our recent videotaped beheading of American contractor Nick Berg, are we sufficiently "bringing it on" for your satisfaction?

Yours sincerely,
Al-Qaeda and friends

Unintentional humor, I'm sure

From this CNN piece, we have:

"Our mission in Iraq will continue," Bush said in his weekly radio address... "We have no intention of leaving the nation at the mercy of thugs and murderers."

Please tell me you appreciate the irony.

Calling Tim Russert ... calling Tim Russert ...

At the incomparable Bob Somerby's Daily Howler site, there's an amusing example of exactly what kind of utter media whore Tim Russert can be, and why that's suddenly relevant all over again.

As you can read here, back in 2003, Russert was interviewing then presidential candidate Howard Dean. At one point, Russert sprung a trivia "gotcha" question on Dean, asking him how many troops were actively on duty in the U.S. military. Never mind that Dean was a Democrat, and the administration at the time was Republican. Never mind that Dean wasn't involved in military planning. In Russert's mind, it was somehow unconscionable that Dean didn't have this tidbit of information right then and right there:

DEAN: For me to have to know right now, participating in the Democratic Party, how many troops are actively on duty in the United States military when that is actually a number that's composed both of people on duty today and people who are National Guard people who are on duty today, it's silly. That's like asking me who the ambassador to Rwanda is.

RUSSERT: Oh, no, no, no. Not at all. Not if you want to be commander in chief.

Russert continued his helpful instruction:

RUSSERT: If somebody wants to be president of the United States, have a sense of the military-

DEAN: I do have a sense of the military.

RUSSERT: -of how many people roughly-

DEAN: I know there are roughly between a million and two million people active duty. I know that we don't have enough people in Iraq.

At the time, there were in fact 1.4 million active members, so one can certainly accept that Dean was accurate, even if he wasn't painstakingly precise. And what does that have to do with the price of tea in China?

Check out this recent CNN online article describing how Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz (yes, the Deputy Defense Secretary, and someone who should know) wasn't even remotely close to stating how many U.S. servicepeople had died in Iraq thus far:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Asked how many American troops have died in Iraq, the Defense Department's No. 2 civilian estimated Thursday the total was about 500 -- more than 200 soldiers short.

Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was asked about the toll at a hearing of a House Appropriations subcommittee. "It's approximately 500, of which -- I can get the exact numbers _ approximately 350 are combat deaths," he responded...

American deaths Thursday were at 722 -- 521 of them from combat _ since the start of military operations in Iraq last year, according to the Department of Defense.

Apparently, trivialities like dead American soldiers are just not a big issue with the Department of Defense, who clearly can't be bothered to even count them. And Wolfowitz's subsequent defense of this?

"He misspoke," spokesman Charley Cooper said later. "That's all."

Uh, yeah, I'll say. And we can expect Russert to go ballistic on Wolfowitz ... when exactly?

The "Abu Ghraib Iraqi torture" drinking game

One shot of your favorite alcoholic beverage every time someone says or writes "systematic" when they really mean "systemic". Hic ...

Bill O'Reilly -- spinning hard in the no-spin zone

Would anyone expect Faux News' resident blowhard Bill O'Reilly to do anything but try to spin the current stories of torture of Iraqis in Abu Ghraib prison? (Rhetorical question, don't answer that.) To see just how desperately O'Reilly is looking for that pony in the pile of manure, you have to read this partial transcript of O'Reilly's interview with New Yorker journalist Seymour Hersh.

To give you a taste of just how much of a suck-up apologist O'Reilly is for the Bush administration and the military, I've cherry-picked some of the funnier nuggets from the interview, but you should read the whole thing anyway.

O'REILLY: All right. But there's a difference between being a poor administrator, as this -- your -- and knowing about torture and looking the other way...

O'REILLY: All right. Well, the damage to the country obviously is just immeasurable. But reading your article in "The New Yorker." I just get the feeling that the Army, when they heard about it, started action almost immediately. It wasn't a cover-up situation. Or did I read your article wrong?...

O'REILLY: OK, but Sanchez the commander put him in charge fairly quickly. They mobilized fairly quickly...

O'REILLY: No, there's no question about it. And there's no question. There's no justification for it. But how do you wind up in a prison if you're just innocent and didn't do anything? See, our commanders and our embedded reporters tell me that they're way too busy to be rounding up guys in the marketplace and throwing them into prison.

So I'm going to dispute your contention that we had a lot of people in there with just no rap sheets at all, who were just picked up for no reason at all. The people who were in the prison were suspected of being either Al Qaeda or terrorists who were killing Americans and knew something about it...

And on, and on, and tediously on. Is there a more pathetic excuse for a journalist than Bill O'Reilly? (Again, rhetorical question.)

Isolated cases of torture, my foot

After hearing that the atrocities committed at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison were just the result of a few bad apples, no big deal, just some isolated incidents, well, the truth will out, as they say.

From this AFP story,

The US military knew troops had abused Iraqi prisoners for months before graphic, humiliating photographs surfaced last week, a journalist who read a US army report says. (emphasis added)

Just in case there's any ambiguity:

"Specifically, Taguba found that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous instances of 'sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuses' at Abu Ghraib," a US-run prison in Baghdad.

Hersh said the abuses went far beyond those portrayed in the widely broadcast photographs of sexual abuse, nudity and humiliation that have angered the Arab world. They were first shown on CBS television's "60 Minutes II."

One is reminded of the comical police chief from the film Casablanca: "Shocked, shocked I am that torture and mistreatment has been happening here. Ah, my cattle prod, thank you."

Oh, look -- like you didn't see this coming

From CNN, the U.S. denies the charges of widespread torture in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. According to the article:

"[Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff] said the military's theaterwide investigation has suggested the abuse apparently depicted in the photographs was isolated.

"There is no -- no -- evidence of systematic abuse in this system at all. We've paid a lot of attention, of course, in Guantanamo, as well," Myers said, referring to the U.S. detention facility in Cuba for suspects captured in connection with the war on terror. "We review all the interrogation methods.

"Torture is not one of the methods that we're allowed to use and that we use. I mean, it's just not permitted by international law, and we don't use it."

In other news, Myers went on to claim that poverty does not exist and that homeless people are lucky since they don't have to pay property tax.

Seymour Hersh on the Iraqi torture atrocities

Star investigative journalist Seymour Hersh has weighed in on the recent Iraqi torture reports and, as with the online photos, you might want to steel yourself before reading it. Consider the following excerpt from a 53-page report written by Major General Antonio M. Taguba, and obtained by Hersh's The New Yorker; Taguba's report was not meant for public consumption and, given some of its contents, you can understand why as Taguba documents some of the abuse inflicted on Iraqi detainees:

Breaking chemical lights and pouring the phosphoric liquid on detainees; pouring cold water on naked detainees; beating detainees with a broom handle and a chair; threatening male detainees with rape; allowing a military police guard to stitch the wound of a detainee who was injured after being slammed against the wall in his cell; sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and perhaps a broom stick, and using military working dogs to frighten and intimidate detainees with threats of attack, and in one instance actually biting a detainee.

Just read the article.

More Canadian perspectives on Bill O'Liely ... uh, O'Reilly

And the Globe and Mail continues to beat O'Reilly soundly about the head and shoulders. Just when you think O'Reilly can't possibly make a bigger ass of himself ...

Iraqi torture and double standards

As I mentioned earlier, it's almost impossible to know what to say about the recent revelations of torture of Iraqi prisoners in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. In order for anything written about this to make any sense, you absolutely need to see the pictures, as disturbing as they are. You can find them here -- take your time, really burn them into your memory -- the humiliation, the obvious sexual assaults, the glee on the faces of the American personnel as they inflict this abuse, the laughter and thumbs up gestures. So, where to begin?

First, appreciate that the Iraqis held at Abu Ghraib were not necessarily captured on the field of battle. There's nothing to suggest that they were combatants; in many cases, they were simply part of a massive round-up of civilians by the U.S. military when the Americans decided it was time to kick some butt and show some strength. In short, many of these prisoners were guilty of nothing more than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. That should be enough to give you serious pause. But it gets worse.

While these pictures have provoked worldwide outrage and disgust, the reaction in the United States is much more subdued. In some cases, it's almost defensive. In this online article, we have two family members of some of the servicepeople identified in those pictures, and their absolutely jaw-dropping justifications:

The Baltimore Sun's Friday editions identified two other soldiers facing court-martial. The newspaper cited unidentified Army officials in naming Sgt. Javal S. Davis, 26. His wife, who also spoke to the newspaper, defended her husband.

"We really don't know how those prisoners are behaving," said Zeenithia Davis, who is in the Navy in Mississippi. "There's a line between heinous war crimes and maintaining discipline."

A Sun reporter on Thursday showed a photo of one of the nude prisoner scenes to Terrie England, who recognized her daughter, reservist Lynndie R. England, 21, standing in the foreground with her boyfriend.

The alleged abuses of prisoners were "stupid, kid things pranks," Terrie England said. "And what the (Iraqis) do to our men and women are just? The rules of the Geneva Convention, does that apply to everybody or just us?"

Let's compare and contrast, shall we, with a story we're thoroughly familiar with -- that of Pfc. Jessica Lynch. Lynch, an actual soldier was injured in Iraq when her vehicle overturned in an accident. She was taken, by Iraqis, to an Iraqi hospital, and cared for by Iraqi medical personnel, who risked their lives to return her to her unit. In short, she was treated, by Iraqis, with the utmost respect, even though she was an official military combatant. In exchange, American military personnel are now humiliating, sexually assaulting and torturing, in many cases, innocent Iraqi civilians.

And yet, given the staggering difference in the above accounts, try to believe that anyone can know this and still say something as unspeakably stupid as, "And what the (Iraqis) do to our men and women are just? The rules of the Geneva Convention, does that apply to everybody or just us?"

The mind reels. It absolutely reels.

Looking for that American compassion

There's so much to write about the recently-revealed torture of Iraqi prisoners by the U.S. military and civilian "contractors," it's impossible to know where to start (but we'll be doing some of that in the near future anyway). However, a frightening beginning might be to take a quick look at some of the reactions of Americans back home, excerpts from this Boston Globe article.

The article, entitled "Town turns against conduct of the war," contains such delectable excerpts as:

'In the Corner Lunch, John Fox, who joined the Air Force back in 1958, looked at three fellow retirees and said, "They're doing today what they should have done two weeks ago -- take out that whole town, that whole 'Fallu' over there.'

and

' ... across the room, Sheril Brambach responded fiercely: "You ask me, we should blow that whole side of the map off.'

Lovely -- the kinds of attitudes guaranteed to win hearts and minds. And recent surveys worldwide show respect for the United States and Americans in general to be at pretty much an all-time low. Gee, isn't that a puzzler? Go figure.

That "picture being worth a thousand words" thing

So what exactly is Canadian prime minister Paul Martin thinking here?

Rumsfeld appoints another leader for Iraq

Uncomfortably good satire.