Oklahoma Takes Baby Step Towards (Gasp!) Gay Rights

Longtime readers of this blog know that I spent some of my formative youthful years in rural Oklahoma, so I tend to watch the goings-on in my sort-of-home-state.

Which leads me to this story: It seems that Oklahoma, like every other state, tends to open government meetings with a prayer. Yeah, big surprise there. Okay, putting aside the whole church-state issue, recently the Oklahoma House of Representatives session was opened with a prayer by United Church of Christ minister Rev. Scott H. Jones, of the Oklahoma-city based Cathedral of Hope.

The prayer itself -- which you can read here -- was one of those typically namby-pamby jobs calling on the big guy in the sky to bless the poor, help the homeless, cure the sick, blah blah blah, pretty much a by-the-numbers mainstream Xian prayer for a secular occasion. You've heard it all before.

So the ink wasn't dry, so to speak, on the prayer before several members of the Oklahoma House of Representatives started falling all over each other in a rush to keep the prayer from becoming part of the official record of the Oklahoma legislature.

Why? Well, it couldn't have been the content of the prayer itself (aside from the fact that it was one of those prayers that evoked that wimpy forgive-your-enemies Jesus, not the the Jesus of the flaming cross smiting the unbelievers...you know what I mean), so what was it?

Maybe -- and I'm just speculating here -- just maybe it was because the prayer was given by (gasp!) a gay minister!!! Who was asked to give this invocation by (another gasp!) the only openly-gay member of the Oklahoma legislature, Rep. Al McAffrey (D-Oklahoma City).

Naturally the theocrats were all over this like flies on shit, to the point of Rep. John Wright (R-Broken Arrow) calling for a vote on the prayer's inclusion in the official record. However, I am happy -- and proud -- to note that the final vote was this: 64 representatives voting to include the prayer, 20 opposing it, and 17 abstaining.

Sidebar: Of special note in all this was our old buddy, noted fundo-xian/gay basherRep. Sally Kern (R-Oklahoma City) who, naturally, voted in favor of exclusion.

Yeah, like keeping it out of the "official" written record is going to undo all the "damage" that this single prayer has done to the great state of Oklahoma.

Sorry, folks, the cat is already out of the bag, the damage has been done, and the fact that 64 Oklahoma state representatives can stick their necks out and vote for the inclusion of this prayer makes me feel good about one of the reddest states in the redstate continiuum. And about my home state.

Sunday Funny

Here's a video of notorious octomom Nadya Suleman giving birth:

Sometimes ya just gotta laugh...

Stewart 99, Cramer 0

I didn't know how else to score it. When full-time television financial guru and professional moron Jim Cramer came on The Daily Show last night to "set the record straight", Jon Stewart owned him.

Check out the full video over at The Daily Show and then ask yourself this simple question: Why does it take a comedy show host to be ask the kinds of questions that professional journalists used to ask, before they were completely co-opted by their slavemasters in the CPM*?

* * * * * *

[* CPM = Capitalist Pig Media]

SCOTUS Shocker

Regular readers know that I'm kind of a Supreme Court groupie, and that I am not a big fan of Justice Clarence Thomas.

So the shocker is this: Thomas stood up to his fellow wingnuts on the court in Wyeth v. Levine, a case dealing with the ability of victims to sue drug manufacturers, siding with the court's liberal wing and even writing the majority decision himself!

And it's not the first time that Thomas has carved his own way, distancing himself from his erstwhile mentor, Antonin "Tony Quack-Quack" Scalia. Here's hoping that we haven't seen the last of this heretofore almost hidden "liberal" streak in Clarence Thomas.

In fact, nothing would please me more than to see him come out from under that cloak of pseudo-conservatism and do what so many other SCOTUS justices have done, surprise their appointers and supporters and turn liberal when the country really needs it.

Okay, I'm not holding my breath for that to happen. But you never know.

Class Warfare

I know, it's not a pretty term, and it's been thrown around with some abandon, especially during the last presidential campaign. "Class War" is, in case you didn't know, is a code word phrase used by the wingnuttery rightwing to denote Communism. Or its little brother, Socialism. Obama is still being excoriated for his so-called "socialist" views and ideals (a Google search for "obama socialist policies" gets you 1, 430,000 hits!).

But Class War is exactly what the US Chamber of Commerce is engaged in when it comes to the Employee Free Choice Act. Somehow I managed to get on their national mailing list (best guess, probably because I'm on record as the owner of a "small business" in the state of Washington), but I'm glad that I did. It gives me a lot of insight into what they are up to.

In the last couple of days I've received emails from a couple of big-time honchos at The Chamber:

Things are really heating up in Congress.
First, U.S. Chamber President Tom Donohue appeared on This Week with George Stephanopolous to voice the Chamber's positive vision for getting the economy moving again.
Tom's positive economic outlook was brightened even further when his fellow This Week guest, Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO), announced with regard to Big Labor's dangerous "Card Check" bill, "I'm not sure that we have the votes [needed]."
That bill might be introduced as early as today - and Big Labor is desperate.
They're so desperate that they even unleashed their protesters to picket outside the U.S. Chamber of Commerce headquarters.
Big Labor's back is up against the wall - and now they're trying to intimidate the U.S. Chamber into dropping our support for their dangerous bill?
So fitting - since its "Card Check" would rob American workers of the secret ballot and allow Union organizers to force them into Union membership using coercion and intimidation.
Don't let Big Labor intimidate Americans into passing the "Card Check" bill - click here to TAKE ACTION. [-- Bill Miller, VP for Political Affairs]
...
Bill was right. The misnamed-Employee Free Choice Act (aka. Card Check) was introduced in the House and Senate yesterday.
As Randel Johnson, U.S. Chamber Vice President said in our press release, "We are pleased this legislation has finally been introduced so we can put a stake through its heart."
We need your help right now to stop Card Check. Click here to join the Chamber and support the fight. This is our #1 priority. [-- Gretchen Deo, Executive Director]

Okay, fair enough. Let's fight back and make the passage of this legislation, so important to "Big Labor" but even more so to "small labor", our #1 priority.

Contact your people in Congress and tell them that you support the Employee Free Choice Act. Don't let these anti-labor anti-worker pigs get away with putting "a stake through its heart".

Life Without Water

No, I don't have some big revelation or theory that we as a species can exist without water. I'm just whining that I have to exist pretty much without it for the next week.

We have a broken water line coming from the main into our house, and the plumber can't fix it without first getting the lay of the land, where the electrical, gas and cable are underground. We live in one of those tract-house neighborhoods where all those unsightly utilities are safely tucked away under the sod. Which means if one of them fucks up, you have to call the "experts" in from god-knows-where to plot out the location of each of them before you start digging.

That's a good thing, I guess, since I wouldn't want someone accidentally clipping my gas line -- or even worse, my television/internet cable...

And naturally it takes time to get the expert out here, and for some reason all of the plumbers in town are heavily busy.

So we go almost totally without water for a week. We can, however, take showers and flush the toilet once a day, if I go out and turn on the water at the meter, and then turn it off right away. Some water is still getting to the house through the broken line -- but who knows how long that will last?

You know that old saying, you don't miss the water till the well runs dry. So true.

Rusty Limpdick another "Hanoi Jane"?

God, I love it when the rightwing starts to devour itself -- for example see my previous post about the McCain daughter attacking mAnn Coulter.

Now over at the Huffington Post, Frank Schaeffer, a former wingnut evangelical Rethug and now fulltime member of the Reality-Based-Community, tells it like it is when it comes to the current state of affairs in the Party:

How can anyone who loves our country support the Republicans now? Barry Goldwater, William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan defined the modern conservatism that used to be what the Republican Party I belonged to was about. Today no actual conservative can be a Republican. Reagan would despise today's wholly negative Republican Party. And can you picture the gentlemanly and always polite Ronald Reagan, endorsing a radio hate-jock slob who crudely mocked a man with Parkinson's and who now says he wants an American president to fail?!
With people like Limbaugh as the loudmouth image of the Republican Party -- you need no enemies. But something far more serious has happened than an image problem: the Republican Party has become the party of obstruction at just the time when all Americans should be pulling together for the good of our country. Instead, Republicans are today's fifth column sabotaging American renewal...
When your new leader Rush Limbaugh calls for President Obama to fail he's calling for more flag-draped coffins. Limbaugh is the new "Hanoi Jane."
For the party that created our crises of misbegotten war, mismanaged economy, the lack of regulation of our banking industry, handing our country to rich crooks... to obstruct the one person who is trying to repair the damage is obscene.

Go ahead and read the whole thing. It's a very telling examination of the new Rethug Party. Of course Schaeffer will be excoriated as a "traitor" himself -- it's really all they have now to fall back on.

McCain Attacks Coulter!

Okay, it's not the senator. That would be asking too much. But it's almost as good. It's Grampaw's 24-year-old daughter Meghan who has come out on the attack:

Everything about her [Coulter] is extreme: her voice, her interview tactics, and especially the public statements she makes about liberals ... Maybe her popularity stems from the fact that watching her is sometimes like watching a train wreck.. . . Does she really believe all Jewish people should be 'perfected' and become Christians? And what was she thinking when she said Hillary Clinton was more conservative than my father during the last election?

Wow, you go, girlfriend!

If the Rethugs have been wondering, by the way, why they are turning off young people in record numbers, maybe they should listen to one of their own.

Yeah, It's That God Damn Liberal Media Again!

John Yoo, author of the We Love to Torture People memos to the Bushco Maladministration, is now whining that it's all that goddam media's fault.

Taken out of context, he says. Specifically this line "First Amendment speech and press rights may also be subordinated to the overriding need to wage war successfully"... [emphasis added]

Okay, Little Johnny, why don't you tell us exactly what context that could be in so it wouldn't say what it so clearly says?

No. Instead Little Johnny is too busy singing "Poor Poor Pitiful Me" to a dwindling crowd of even his own supporters. How much longer until this fucker does the frog march before a congressional committee and is called to answer for his fascist advice to the fascist-in-chief, Baby Doc Bush?

The Chucktatorship

I'm certainly amazed at this. Thanks to Buzzflash, I've now learned that has-been "actor" and full-time-ugly man Chuck Norris is the president-elect of the Republic of Texas, and he says that we're not living in a democracy. No, it's a "Chucktatorship".

Jesus, I could have sworn when I read this that it was a spoof out of The Onion or the National Lampoon or something similar, but it's not.

So I guess we'd best prepare for an armed insurrection. Probably this Friday.

In which case, can I presume that alternate-side-of-the-street parking will be suspended?...

If This Isn't Conduct Unbecoming an Officer...

...then I don't know what could be. A lieutenant in the US Army, in Iraq, has allegedly joined a lawsuit filed in the state of California over Barack Obama's putative US citizenship.

Talk about the story that refuses to die. It's been clear since Day One on this mess that it's a non-issue, and Obama would have no reason to conceal it, had he actually been born out of the country, since his mother was, inarguably, an American citizen at the time of his birth, which automatically made him an American citizen. Just as John McCain being born in Panama to American parents made him a US citizen. Period. End of story. These fuckers on the wingnut fringe who keep bringing it up know this, but they are counting on the idiocy of the dittohead great unwashed to buy into it.

Which brings us back to this dickwad lieutenant, Scott R. Easterling, who calls the president -- and his commander in chief -- an "imposter" and a "usurper". Publicly and ferociously, it appears.

So, unless things have changed a whole lot since I was in the service, this is a textbook case of conduct unbecoming an officer, and Easterling ought to be up on court-martial charges so fast it would make your head swim. (See, for example, Article 88 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, for starters.)

Especially when you look farther into his story and discover that up until 2005 he was a KBR (i.e., Halliburton) "contractor" in Iraq, who left his undoubtedly lucrative contracting work to join the Army. Hmmm, that in itself kind of makes you wonder, doesn't it?

See that Easterling link to the Military.com story and scroll down tothe comments section. Some of them will curl your toes and straighten your hair:

· OMG hahaha. I KNEW this was gonna happen. So yep the new world order has happend [sic]. They let a black man in the building and all three branches are behind it.
· Well his grandmother said he was born in Kenya. I agree that this "poser on chief/muslim radical" is a fraud. Dad a muslim, madrasa schooled, converted to christianity because of political expediency, and said "The most beautiful thing I've ever heard is the muslim call to prayer at sunset" Osama's a muslim manchurian candidate.
· Wow, you people really disgust me. All of your rhetoric truly makes me question your morality. Some of you say that this LT needs to be reprimanded in this way or that, but what you people forget to see through your blinders is that this LT is still fighting the fight, no matter what. He still is part of the reason you have the right to say the things you do. He still believes the American way of life is still precious and should stay that way no matter what.And whether he chooses his God given freedom to voice that God given right is up to him.

And there's more. Lots more. This is a story that will be worth following, just to make sure that this asshole gets what's coming to him. Despite all of his defenders who are taking great stretches to support him (see that last comment for example) in his indefensible behavior.

Still No Justice for LaVena Johnson

A year and half ago, back in August 2007 I posted a blog entry entitled Who Was Lavena Lynn Johnson and Why Should You Care?.

LaVena Johnson, in case you don't recall, died in Iraq in 2005 and her death was ruled a "suicide". By military investigators. Who were on the scene and presumably were in a position to know better. Despite the fact that the right-handed Johnson apparently managed to shoot herself in the left side of her head, a straight-on head wound, using her left hand both to balance her M16 and pull the trigger. Despite the fact that the autopsy photos showed that she had been beaten and her body mutilated perimortem. Despite the fact that lye had been poured into/onto her vaginal area...

This death, incredibly, is still listed in official records as a "suicide".

This official story, like most of them, is of course arrant bullshit. She was murdered, and someone has gotten away with it, and someone else -- probably a whole bunch of someones else -- is guilty of covering it up.

But this a story that needs to be repeated, a story that demands justice, a story that insists on an independent congressional investigation into the incident and the subsequent coverups.

Please join me in contacting your congressional representatives and senators to demand justice for LaVena Johnson, as well as all of the other unknown victims of rape and murder in our armed forces.

And it's not too late to sign the petition over at Color of Change -- those signatures will be sent to Rep Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and it can't hurt to have a veritable avalanche of names going out to him, but I think it's always better -- and gets more personal attention -- to send your own personalized request to your representative and senators as well.

BTW, back in July '07 I noted that there weren't any news stories on LaVena Johnson in any of the media formerly known as the MSM. Sadly, that is still the case. Only AlterNet has a new story on this tragedy, but hopefully, with the help of all of us out here who still care, this story will not die until there is justice for LaVena.

See also the LaVena Johnson website for the latest news on the fight for justice.

Jon Stewart Takes on CNBC

After CNBC "reporter" Dick Rick Santelli had that famous Howard-Beale-like meltdown at the Chicago Merc, it was inevitable that he'd be the butt of humor. And sure enough, here's the Daily Show look at Santelli, CNBC and whole financial crisis in a nutshell:

It's kind of sad -- and troubling -- that a "professional financial news" network missed the financial meltdown by so much. And that we have to get our "real news" from a comedy program.

Yassuh, Toby Be Good...

In a disgusting yet telling display, newly-anointed GOP "leader" Michael Steele was forced on bended knee to kowtow to the real leader of the Rethug party, Rush Limbaugh, after he made some "unconsidered" remarks about the Fatboy Dopehead.

Jeez, given all of the racial problems that the Rethugs have had over the last forty years or so (ever since Tricky Dick's "Southern Strategy" starting circa 1970) -- and especially given Limbaugh's own problems with black people -- you'd think that this would be the last thing they'd want the American public to see.

But no, there it was, for all America to see: Poor Michael Steele, looking like he just stepped out of a scene from Roots, having to figuratively -- and almost literally -- lick his master's boots.

And now I hear that there are rumblings that the Fatboy himself may be considering a run for the Offal Office in 2012.

Really? In that case, bring it on! I can't imagine a candidate on the right who would be better for the Democrats, unless it was Sarah Palin.

So imagine this: A Palin-Limbaugh ticket in 2012.

Of course that's not gonna happen. It would have to be Limbaugh-Palin -- ole Rusty just couldn't stand the thought of having a woman on top...

Rush Limbaugh Gay? (Not that there's Anything Wrong With That...)

Ah, the wonders -- the miracle -- of Stumble. Do a Google search for "Jeff Christie" and see what you get.

It seems that our ole good buddy -- and of course one of my favorite whipping boys -- professional blowhard (I use the term advisedly--read on) fat-boy drug-addict draft-dodging chicken-hawk multi-millionaire and multi-married Rush Limbaugh was once fired from Pittsburgh radio station KQL, where he worked under the pseudonym of Jeff Christie, after soliciting ... gay sex!

It's also been widely reported that he had a brief but heated "affair" in college (before poor Rusty dropped out) with a guy named Elliot Sanders, who says that Limbaugh is so gay that he didn't -- couldn't -- consummate any of his four marriages; it's also fairly common knowledge that when Limbaugh worked in Sacramento radio, his friend and "mentor" was flamboyantly gay Norm Woodruff (who later died of AIDS).

There's a lot more circumstantial evidence out there. Naturally Rusty is claiming that it's all lies, made up by "liberals" who hate him and want him to fail. You know, like it was all lies when he was first accused of being a drug addict. Like it was all lies when it became public that an ingrown hair on his ass kept him out of Vietnam. Like it was all lies when ... well, you can fill in the blanks. His whole public persona is built up from a series of lies, untruths, half-truths and prevarications.

Okay, so why am I, a person long-known for championing gay rights, coming down on criticizing this poor sexually-confused pathetically-closeted fat-assed windbag for being gay?

After all, as the Seinfeld TV show had it, "not that there's anything wrong with that"...

Unless you are Rush Limbaugh and you have built an entire -- and disgustingly lucrative -- career working the wingnut side of the aisle, denigrating and demonizing gay people, abominizing gay marriage, and sucking up (damn, there I go again) to the bible-thumping holy rollers of the world (including, dare I say it, Ted Haggard? Hmmm ... but I digress). Then it becomes the height, the very pinnacle, the textbook definition, of rank hypocrisy. Imagine what is going to happen when (or IF -- we're still dealing with the CPM* here) this story goes mainstream and his poor duped dittohead knuckledragging mouthbreathing white-guy-victim listeners find out the truth about him. If you'll recall, it almost came out back in 2006, when he was arrested for possession of Viagra after a "boys only" trip to the Dominican Republic (the western hemisphere spot notorious as a magnet for child-sex tourism).

It's kind of sad ... in a bent, twisted worm-caught-on-a-hot-sidewalk kind of way.

Okay, not really, but if he hadn't been such an arrogant fucking obnoxious lying liberal-hating asshole all these years -- and continues to be one -- then I might actually feel a little sorry for the guy.

Yeah, probably not. After all, he'd still be Rush Limbaugh.

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* CPM = Capitalist Pig Media

R U Freaking Kidding Me???? Bill-O Action Alert

I usually take the weekend off from posting, but this one really got my goat. Bill Orally, himself, is scheduled to give a speech on March 19th at the It Happened to Alexa Foundation.

The purpose of this foundation, in case you don't know:

...is to help support rape survivors through the trauma of the criminal trial, in the hopes that more survivors will go through with the prosecution in order to put these perpetrators behind bars.
Established in 2003, the foundation assists rape victims' families with travel expenses during the litigation process and is the only organization of its kind in the United States.

Sounds like a terrific idea, doesn't it? So why in the hell are they allowing Bill Orally to give a talk there? Especially given his total lack of sensitivity to women and women's issues, especially when he is on record as saying on his radio show in 2006, when speaking about another rape victim, 18-year-old Jennifer Moore, who was raped and murdered in New York:

Now Moore, Jennifer Moore, 18, on her way to college. She was 5-foot-2, 105 pounds, wearing a miniskirt and a halter top with a bare midriff. Now, again, there you go. So every predator in the world is gonna pick that up at two in the morning. She's walking by herself on the West Side Highway, and she gets picked up by a thug. All right. Now she's out of her mind, drunk.

This is exactly the kind of classic "blame the victim" mentality that women -- and enlightened men -- have been fighting against for years, and for them to turn around and invite this thug, this chauvinist pig, to speak before a fundraiser for the families of rape victims is so appalling that it's almost beyond belief.

Please join me in telling the foundation that having Bill-O as their "guest" speaker sends exactly the wrong message to the very people that they are trying to help.

Contact Information:

It Happened to Alexa Foundation
125 South First Street
Lewiston, New York 14092
Phone: (716) 754-9105; 877-77-ALEXA (25392)
Fax: (716) 754-4676
Email: info@ithappenedtoalexa.org

Barack the Antichrist?

Okay, I'll admit this one has been going around for quite a while now, but last night's Daily Show did a Jason Jones segment with two preachers, an old black dude who said Barack was Hitler, and for balance an old white dude who said he was the Antichrist.

After doing the math, I think I agree with the old white dude.

Do the math yourself and see if you don't agree:

1. Barack Hussei Nobama: six letters each = 666!
2. He was elected for a 4 year term in 2008: 8 minus 4 is 2, and 2 times the 3 names he carries = 6; if he runs for two more terms, that will make a total of three terms, and those three terms strung together with his names? = 666!
3. There are five people in the Nobama family: the parents, the children and the mother-in-law, right? But wait, you didn't count the dog. That makes 6! Three terms in the white house = 666!
4. Nobama was born on 8-4-1961. 8+4+19+61=92, and 92 divided by how many names he has = 30.666666666666666666666666666667! There are no fewer than 9 sets of triple sixes in that number, which you can clearly see if you remove the first 3 characters and the last 3 characters: 666 666 666 666 666 666 666 666 666! And those characters you removed? They add up to 49; 49 divided by 666 = 0.0735735735735735735735735735735; add those up and they come to 150, and that divided by 666 = 0.2252252252252252252252252252252. And any ASCII programmer can tell you that it is a very simple matter to arrange a nearly-infinite number of those very digits visually (on a computer screen or a printout!) to show an illustration of the face of ... Barack Hussei Nobama!

Jeez, I just don't know how it could be any clearer.

* * * *

Update: Here's the link to the video of that Daily Show segment.

Bobby Who?

If it weren't for the fact that this fucker somehow got himself elected governor of one of the most regressive states in the union and -- most importantly -- he is not himself one of those WASPy caricatures of the typical Rethug party member, you would be asking yourself, as I might be, who the fuck is Bobby Jindal?

But here we are, with Bobby Jindal giving the Rethug commentary to Obama's address last night, and the only thing that the guy has going for him is, apparently, that he has a skin tone similar to that of our president.

Out of the many blatant Rethug lies, falsehoods and truth-stretching, so reminiscent of senility-ridden Ronny Raygun, was his complaint about the budget containing money for "volcano-watching".

Obviously Little Bobby has been out of the loop for the last twenty-nine years. I happen to live in "active volcano country" out here on the NW corner (see Mt. St. Helens -- I was less than fifty miles from it when in blew in 1980), and I just want to ask Little Bobby if he'd be so up in arms over budgetary money being spent for hurricane watch on the Gulf Coast.

Yeah, I didn't think so. God help us if this is the best that the Rethugs can do for their "shining stars in ascent" in the GOP.

Actually, now that I think of it, having Bobby Jindal (like having Governor Wolf Killer) in the ascendancy of the GOP can only be a good thing for the Dems, and for the rest of the country. Who on the left would not like to see a Palin-Jindal ticket in 2012? Alas, their pathos is our victory.

The Non-Story That Won't Die

Jesus, I thought this whole Obama birth certificate flap would be over and done with by now. How many times is the wingnuttery going to beat this dead horse?

Not enough yet, apparently. Now no lesser an august personage than Alabama's Senator Richard Shelby (a Rethug, of course, do I have to say it?) scooping up some local headlines by trying to resurrect the belief that Obama is not a US citizen and therefore not entitled to be president.

Never mind that this has been settled long before, that Obama posted a copy of his birth certificate on his campaign website, that even if some long-term and tremendously complicated conspiracy was at work to try to make it appear that he was born in the US when he wasn't, it's still a moot point since his mother was, undeniably, an American citizen, and therefore US law deems that he is also an American citizen, regardless of where he was born.

Note that there aren't any major news organizations on that list. Well, obviously, that's because all the major news guys are northing more than a bunch of atheistic commie-symp crypto-socialists bent on the destruction of this country at the hands of our non-citizen non-christian sucking-up-to-islamo-fascists president.

Seven Aphorisms Out - Ten Commandments Next?

In a surprisingly unanimous verdict, the Supreme Court agreed with a small Utah community that the quirky quasi-religious group Summum cannot place one their granite "Seven Aphorisms" markers next to a similar display of the Ten Commandments.

Which is fine with me, in the big-picture view of things. We need to get all religious symbols off of OUR property, and that's the long-term goal. To allow Summum to put up their own monument next to the Ten Commandments would just mean one more thing to remove from the lawn when we finally wake up and realize that we do not need the government sponsoring a religion -- any religion -- in this country.

The Mojave Cross

In a case that is sure to set precedent for the lawsuit brewing over that huge ugly cross at the National Cemetery in San Diego, the Supremes have agreed to hear a case stemming from the erection of a smaller cross in the Mojave Desert east of LA.

Because it's on public land, it's an issue, and this will give us our first look at where a Roberts Court is going to come down when it comes to church-state issues.

And frankly, I'm not at all optimistic, given the current makeup of the court. Recall that it was Sandra Day O'Connor just four years ago who cast the deciding fifth vote in the 5-4 Kentucky Ten Commandments decision (McCreary County v. ACLU of Kentucky).

Since then O'Connor made her precipitous -- and in my opinion nearly-fatal-for-civil-liberties -- departure from the court, to be replaced by our old buddy, "Stripsearch Sammy" Scalito. And I think it's pretty clear how he'll stand on church-state issues.

This will bear watching. Arguments will be heard in October of this year, so here's hoping that we have some changes on the court before then. While I'm not wishing for anything bad to happen to any of the Fatal Five (Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, Alito, Kennedy) so that Obama can appoint a liberal to the court in their place...

Oh, bullshit, of course I'm wishing for that. It's a long time to October, and anything can happen.

Attack on the Second Amendment

For years, whenever the whole "Democrats want to confiscate all of our guns" topic came up, I would ask the (usually) right-wing Limbaugh-listening Hannity-channeling blowhards making the claim if they could picture a situation in which the Democrats could confiscate every firearm in the country.

The answer was always no, and that's how I was able to shift the conversation back to things that were truly important.

Now I'm not so sure. After enduring eight years of Constitution-shredding rights-revoking road-warrior decimation by the Rethugs, now there's an attack from the left. It's something called the Blair Holt Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009, and it has some troubling provisions: It defines all gun dealings as interstate commerce, which automatically makes them subject to federal restrictions and it requires that all persons who even possess a "qualifying" firearm be licensed by the feds as a "gun dealer". There's more. Take a look at the article.

As usual, the intent behind this bill is a noble one: Reduce gun violence. Fair enough, I guess, but, as the NRA has argued all these years (and Jesus, do I ever hate being in line with those fascists on this), guns don't kill people, people kill people. And those who don't think that this registration can be the first step to confiscation...well, all you need to do is take a look at Great Britain and Australia to see that this is exactly what took place there.

Making it illegal to possess a firearm without all this rigamarole will not stop "gun violence". Even if they were somehow successful in rounding up every single handgun and semi-automatic rifle in the country (a physical impossibility), the criminals and crazies would just switch to sawed-off double-barrel shotguns -- easy to conceal, easy to reload, and deadly effective within their working range. And also, because of the spread pattern, more likely to injure or kill "innocent bystanders", i.e. those who are not the intended victim of the attack.

But of course not everyone will give up their guns willingly, and I believe that millions of people will just ignore the law, not get the license, and take their chances rather than give in.

Haven't our previous forays into banning things (alcohol and drugs are the two signal examples) been lesson enough for us? When you ban something, all it does is drive the trade underground and make it more profitable for the "bad guys".

It's ironic: All this time the NRA was squawking that when "they" take away our rights under the Second Amendment, then they will be able to take away all of our other rights. They were wrong about that -- the got it backwards. Who knew that "they" would successfully take away all of our other rights first?

Please, we have enough problems in this country already to deal with. We don't need the "smoke and mirrors" magic tricks in this bill to divert our attention from those problems.

But then I think you all ought to know that my friends tend to call me a "gun-totin' meat-eatin' redneck liberal" so I may be a little biased here. But believe me, it really does pain me to be on the same side of the table with the NRA.

Scaring the Shit Out of You and Me

I'm talking about the documentary film Jesus Camp. It's definitely a must-see movie, even though it will be upsetting to those of you with half a brain who dwell over here in the Reality-Based Community.

It's absolutely frightening to see the brainwashing that goes on, convincing children that they will become "Soldiers for Christ", at a pentecostal summer camp located in, believe it or not, Devil's Lake, Minnesota.

Also, believe it or not, this camp is called the "Kids on Fire School of Ministry". Brainwashing? Yep, in full measure. Anywhere else, in any other context, and this would be called what it really is, child abuse.

Of special note is a conversation that takes place between 12-year-old wannabe preacher Levi and now-disgraced religious-right-homophobe/secret-sodomite Ted Haggard. It makes you wonder what was really going on in old Ted's head (heads?) during the course of that interaction...

Anyway, these children represent the next generation of Soldiers for Christ, and we ignore them at our peril. Remember the admonition from Voltaire that now graces the left column of this blog: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

In just a few years, these little zombies will be taking up their weapons in their "war" against us infidels. While they may claim that their weapons are "Jesus" and "The Truth", blah blah blah, how long will it be before one of the little soldiers takes the whole weapon thing a little too literally?

You Go, Greta!

And I mean that literally. Faux News's famous Face-Made-For-Radio Greta Van Sufferin Susteren is going all frothy at the mouth over the wasteful travel spending of Barack Obama:

If you read the prior two blog entries, you know that I am stunned that the President and VP have such a tin ear — that in this time of great economic terror they flew to Denver to sign a bill that former Presidents signed outside the Oval Office in the Rose Garden. And, making it all the more stunning, they did not “jet pool” — they flew separately at great cost to taxpayers for a trip that simply did not have to be….so what is the White House explanation for the $$$$$$$$ EXTRAVAGANZA? (yes, YOUR $$$)

I'm not providing a link to that quote (I don't want to add to her Google rating), but it's on Greta's blog, which you can look up for yourself.

The most important part of that is her suggestion that Obama and Biden "jet pool". Greta, you poor moronic mouthpiece of the Far Right, the reason that the President and Vice President never travel on the same plane is obvious to the most dull-witted third grader: If the plane crashes, we lose both of them!

So, girlfriend, where was that concern during the last eight years, when your two fantasy beloveds, Baby Doc and Darth Cheney, never flew on the same plane? No where, that's where.

And while we're on the topic of tone-deaf wastrels squandering public dollars in unnecessary travel, where's your concern for your newest BFF, Governor Wolf Killer, and the many thousands of dollars in public money she scarfed up so her daughters could go with her to various "official" (i.e., not official) events?

If you weren't so enthralled in your pathetic schoolgirl crush on Sarah Palin, you might be asking those kinds of questions yourself.

To get back to the title of this post: You go, Greta! And, yes I do mean that literally. Get the fuck outta here. Maybe you and your new BFF can snuggle up in an igloo on the North Slope after you've poached some tasty caribou and baby polar bear for dinner.

New NBC Program: "Catch a Cheney"

No, it's not the truth, although I'd love it if it were.

Over at Consortium News, media critic Jeff Cohen suggests that NBC could raise its flagging ratings by doing to big-name politicos like Cheney what they have capitalized with on with their "Catch a Predator" type shows:

Here’s my idea: A series of NBC News primetime specials featuring spectacular ambushes of big-time criminals lured into what they expect to be pleasurable surroundings.
But, with hidden cameras whirring, the startled villain is dramatically confronted with the evidence of his massive crimes as millions of viewers look on in scorn and righteous amusement.
If it sounds familiar, it’s because NBC News has scored huge ratings with its “To Catch a Predator” sleaze-fest – in which potential sex offenders by the bushel were lured via the Internet to what they thought would be sex with kids and instead got caught by NBC cameras and cops in hiding.
But my proposal doesn’t involve sex abusers. I’m talking about men who’ve launched illegal war, mass murder, torture, dictatorship. And they’re household names.

Like Cheney, Kissinger, Rumsfeld, Libby, Wolfowitz, and -- the biggest fish of all -- Baby Doc Bush. Hell, not only would I watch this show, I'd pay good money to see it.

Xe? WTF?

The infamous Blackwater Security firm is changing its name, apparently in a move to distance itself from all the bad press (goddam liberal media) it's gotten from slaughtering unarmed Iraqis and generally acting like a swarm of lawless desert bikers from Road Warrior.

So I can see why a little plastic surgery might be needed, but "Xe"? What the fuck is that, and who even knows how to pronounce it? Or, if you heard it pronounced, how to spell it? That question will always come up, and the answer obviously will be something along the lines of "we used to be Blackwater".

If you want to refurbish your image, especially one that is as tarnished as Blackwater's, you ought to consider going another way. Something like "We Love Puppies (and Will Provide Security)" would be a better name.

Just a suggestion. Of course since the Prince family, the fascist founding fathers of Blackwater, are deeply fundo-religious, they could have gone with "Jesus Security" or something like that. Corporate motto: If Jesus had chosen us for his security, he'd still be here"...

More From Our "Who Knew?" Department

Jeez, is this a terrific day for oddball news or what?

Little Bristol Palin throws her mother -- and abstinence-only sex education -- under the bus.

After two campaigns -- one for governor of Alaska and one for the Rethug VP job -- during which she flogged so-called abstinence only sex education as the only way to approach the problem of teenage sexuality and teenage pregnancy, Sarah Palin's daughter Bristol appeared on Faux News to say that abstinence is "not realistic at all":

Bristol scheduled an interview with mom's pandering BFF Greta Van Susteren of Fox News. But she didn't tell mom until 24 hours before, probably because she was planning to personally insult Jesus, and the former Republican vice presidential nominee would not like it.
After describing the difficulty of being a teen mom, Britsol told Van Susteren abstinence is the best policy, but is not realistic because it's not the 19th Century any more, not even in Alaska.
She said she didn't "want to get into detail about" other reasons abstinence is unrealistic, though we're guessing it might be because Bristol failed to control her teenaged hormones and, being without ready access to condoms, got pregnant at 17 to an ill-tempered failed hockey player who has yet to finish high school or, judging from what Bristol told Fox, secure employment of any sort, other than doing odd jobs for his father.

Like I always say, you can't make this shit up. But I'm of two minds about this little display: One, I'm glad that one of the more prominent victims of abstinence-only sex-ed is speaking out and maybe this will carry a little weight in Rethug circles (yeah, okay, I'm a dreamer--give me a break), but Two, I'm a little apprehensive that this might keep Lady Wolf Killer from running for president next time, and those of us over here in snarky Left Blogistan need a ready-made comic relief candidate.

I Was Surprised, Too, Dick

Also in the news today is a report that Darth Cheney was furious when Baby Doc refused to fully pardon his boy, Scooter Libby.

Apparently the Veep launched an all-out two-week assault on his boss to try to get him to pardon Libby. I guess it wasn't enough that he didn't have to do any fucking jail time at all for his crimes, eh Dickster? So when Baby Doc got so stingy with the pardons there at the end, it apparently caused a rift between him and his puppet master.

The unsuccessful full-court press left Cheney bitter. "He's furious with Bush," a Cheney source told The News. "He's really angry about it and decided he's going to say what he believes."
He did just that the day after becoming a private citizen. In an interview with The Weekly Standard, Cheney heaped praise on Libby and denounced his conviction. "He was the victim of a serious miscarriage of justice, and I strongly believe that he deserved a presidential pardon," Cheney said. "Obviously, I disagree with President Bush's decision."
The vehemence of Cheney's last-minute onslaught has struck some Bush loyalists as excessive. "At some point you have to accept the decision of the guy who appointed you," one of them said after learning the details. "I think Cheney was over the top."

Wow, it surprised me as well. I figured all this time that Shooter would pardon Scooter, with the sock-puppet pResident in between, who always did what he was told. Who knew?

Of course, we are dealing with a malignant narcissist here, who never met a death penalty that he didn't want to carry out when he was governator of Texas, so I guess that the whole "quality of mercy" thing in back of the law is just a quaint and outmoded reminder of how things used to be. You know, like the US Constitution.

Maybe It's Just Me...

... but I really don't think this is the best way to get your point across.

From the news today, it appears that one Muzzammil Hassan, 44, of upstate New York, a man who founded his own television station to counter the "negative stereotypes" of his fellow Muslims in the media, beheaded his own wife after she filed for divorce!

Like I say, if you're trying to change peoples' minds about Muslims, going with the whole "off with her head" thing is not the way to do that.

Brainwashed: The Movie

Here's an absolutely horrifying (and not in a good way) clip from a documentary movie that is apparently making the rounds on its own "road show":

This woman was interviewed about the apparently then-upcoming 2004 election, and just listen to her justification as to why she is voting for Bush. As one YouTube reviewer of this clip said, "I threw up in my mouth a bit".

I don't know what the current status of this film is or where it can be seen -- a Google search doesn't come back with much. But from what I see from this small clip, this is definitely a film worth watching.

Will Petraeus Betray Us (Again)?

Way back a year and a half ago I used the headline "Will Petraeus Betray Us?" Less than three months later Moveon.com used almost the same phraseology: General Petraeus or General Betray Us?.

Back then it was a fun and games, of course, but now comes the alarming news that Petraeus is something more than a silly political rhyme.

Gareth Porter over at IPS News has the story US-IRAQ: Generals Seek to Reverse Obama Withdrawal Decision.

If you don't want to read the whole story, Consortium News has a capsule summary, The Petraeus Plot Against Obama:

President Barack Obama already appears to be the target of a well-organized strategy directed by senior military officials -- and aided by their allies in the Washington press corps -- to force Obama to renege on his campaign pledge to bring U.S. combat troops home from Iraq in 16 months.

I don't want to go all Seven Days in May here. At least not yet, but it is troubling when a general is apparently trying to subvert the will -- the orders -- of his Commander-in-Chief.

I Think I'll Live...

...but those "toxic grandchildren" who gave me this goddam cold are out of the will!

At least the worst is over now, thanks to regular cocktails of Airborne fizzies, Full Sail Ales, hot buttered rums, nostril blasts of 4-Way, periodic boosters of acetominophen w/codeine and a nightly dose of Lorazepam. While I can't recommend this particular regimen to everyone, it worked for me -- at least what I can remember of it...

Anyway, I'm back now and ready to go, more or less.

And the first order of business is to refer everyone over to Len Hart at The Existentialist Cowboy, for his spot-on summary of what we're up against with the church-state crowd, Religion Under a 'False Flag':

During the Bush regime, a GOP constituency of religious fanatics, fundamentalists, and deniers of science mounted a full-court press against the principles of Democracy and the enlightenment. They put forward a dark age agenda: 'Intelligent Design', a stealth religious ideology cooked up by right wing focus groups --not scientists. It is religion under a false flag.

There's a lot more. This should be required reading for high school students, teachers, school board members, taxpayers -- everyone.

And be sure to watch the videos. I don't know how he finds the time.

Tomorrow is "Darwin Day"...

...but today I seem to be coming down with a killer cold that I picked up from my "toxic grandchildren" on Sunday, so I may not be in any shape to post anything on what should be a national holiday.

So, given that, here's a YouTube video from PBS's Nova entitled "Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial", about the now-famous landmark Dover School Board trial:

It's an hour long and normally, with my short attention span, I'm not capable of watching anything on the computer longer than the average 1930s/40s-vintage Warner Bros cartoon, but this is well worth the time spent.

Hypocrisy? That's Too Mild a Term

Who knew that the Rethugs would be THIS hypocritical? It wasn't that long ago when they were in the majority in congress and demonized the Dems for being "obstructionist" and threatening the use of the filibuster in order to prevent the Rethugs from getting their own way.

Remember when the shrill call by the majority party in the senate was for a "straight up and down vote" for every fucking piece of fascist legislation or Supreme Court "justice" that Bushco Inc. tried to ram through?

Remember that????

Okay, I know that you do and I do, but apparently the CPM* has such a short attention span that they can't recall a single thing about it. Now it's all of those nasty Dems who are trying to push their radical liberal agenda off on the American people, and it's only the time-honored and sacred power of the filibuster that is saving this nation from a descent into the maelstrom.

Like I say, you can never go broke underestimating the ability of the GOOPers to raise hypocrisy to new heights. They will always exceed even the most lavish expectations. I think we need a new word, since the old meaning of hypocrisy is way too mild, too neutral, too wussy to describe what these assholes are showing us.

And you Dems: Stop with the goddam enabling already, and let's all join together in relegating the Rethug Party to its well deserved final destination, that well-known and well-deserved "dustbin of history".

[* CPM = Capitalist Pig Media]

Heretical Quotes, Part One

Just to kind of counterbalance the previous post, here are some heretical quotations that I've managed to pick up along the way:

1. The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread. - Anatole France
2. The more you can increase fear of drugs and crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all the people. - Noam Chomsky
3. Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. - Seneca the Younger
4. Heresy is only another word for freedom of thought. - Graham Greene

I'll be posting some more of them as time goes by.

Wonderful World

We might lose sight of its meaning at times, especially with all that's happened over the last eight years, but the old Louis Armstrong song Wonderful World still speaks to us. And here's a little video, set to the song, that will surely warm the cockles of your heart (whatever "cockles" are...):

Warning: The "Awwwwwwwwwww Factor" is way off the scale... And if your cockles get too warm, try rubbing them with a little dry ice.

Bipartisanship -- Still a No Starter

On the one hand President Obama deserves at least some credit, I guess, for his attempt to reach out to the Rethugs and at least try to be bipartisan, on the theory, I guess, that it's better to have them inside the tent pissing out than outside pissing in.

The only problem with that is that those Rethugs in Congress are not housebroken. You can let them inside, but they end up shitting on your floor, pissing in your beer and trying to monopolize your remote control.

You know, kind of like your IBIL* did last Xmas at the family get-together.

Okay, now that he's made the effort, it's time to let the American people know that the hand of friendship that was extended to the Rethugs came back with some bite marks on it, and the next time that hand is extended, it might draw back a bloody stump or two where there used to be fingers.

Give it up and shove those fuckers to the curb. And what the fuck is up with appointing a Rethug to the cabinet? Okay, I know that I argued for Rethug cabinet appointments a while back, but that was with the idea that Obama would take Rethug senators from states with Democratic governors, who would in turn appoint Democrats to the empty slots, thereby guaranteeing that all-important 60-vote filibuster-proof majority.

Memo to Barack Obama: So WTF were you thinking when you cut that deal with New Hampshire to get their Rethug senator -- who BTW doesn't even like you and doesn't believe in the kinds of things you believe in -- by forcing the Democratic governor to appoint another Rethug in his place? What would the Rethugs do if the shoe were on the other foot and their president were to appoint a Democrat to the cabinet (okay, I know I'm stretching a bit here), but only if the Rethug governor of that state were to appoint another Dem?

Okay, trick question: That scenario would never happen.

It's beyond me why the Dems want to play that bipartisan game anyway. Didn't they get enough over the last how-many-years that the Rethugs were on top, and crushed the Dems under the hobnailed heels of their jackboots? What is this, some kind of weird political Stockholm Syndrome?

President Obama, in the words of the late and not lamented Baby Doc, you've got political capital and you need to spend it.

And memo to Harry Reid and the Dems in the senate: If the Rethugs threaten a filibuster, call their bluff, make them actually filibuster, and show the American people who is being obstructionist and who isn't. The average member of the Moron-American Voting Bloc needs to see -- really see -- who wants to get this country moving again and who is stopping that progress.

[* IBIL = Idiot Brother-in-Law]

I'm Back ... Again

When you get to "a certain age" it seems that your inner clock seems to slow down, and consequently external time -- "reality time" -- speeds up accordingly.

I had fully intended to finish up the projects I had been working on so I could get back to the important stuff full time, so to speak. But of course that didn't happen.

But I'm back anyway. Thanks for reading, and thanks also for missing me.

I'll Be Back...

...on Monday. It's taken me a little longer to do what I had to do on my other projects, including cleaning up the yard after the winter storms. I was surprised at how much damage there was after our lengthy blizzard and freezing temperatures.

Plus I still haven't finished with the photo slideshows and stories about my Vietnam trip, and that was so long ago that I'm having trouble remembering that I went there.

Not really, but I am getting to that age where every little memory lapse starts to present itself as incipient Alzheimers...

Anyway, She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed and I are going to spend the weekend in Portland (Oregon -- Maine is too far to drive) and I'll be back in Left Blogistan come Monday.

In the meantime, thanks again to all of you in the "teeming millions", and everyone have a safe but happy weekend.

I'm Okay -- I'm Just Taking a Break

For all of the teeming millions of you out there who dote on their daily dose of One Pissed Off Veteran, don't worry. I'm just taking a short break while I finish up some other projects that have been hanging fire.

I'll be back soon.

--The F Man

Some Saturday Fun Stuff

I am sumultaneously a devotee of classical music and a fan of street performers. So it's with great satisfaction that I present this video, which combines the two of them:

Glasses Concerto

Enjoy.

Non-Theists Are Also Americans

All but lost in President Obama's (jeez, I love saying that!) inaugural address was this line:

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus and non-believers. [emphasis added]

Maybe it's just me, but I really can't recall another incident in which a high-power politician even bothered to acknowledge that we are out here.

As skeptical as I am about most things, I can't help but think that -- given that President Obama's speech was carefully constructed, deliberately worded and expertly delivered -- this signals some kind of major shift in the wind, a sea change (or whatever hackneyed cliché you want to apply) in the way that we non-theists (atheists, agnostics, skeptics, humanists, etc) will be viewed in the future.

Yeah, okay. I'm a dreamer. Give me a break... But I'm hoping that this really is a change we can believe in, and that those of us out here in Skeptic Land won't have to feel like second-class citizens any longer.

Because I Just Can't Help Myself

Jesus, the dumb fuck isn't even on the ground in Texas yet and I already miss him.

So do a lot of people in the world:

The Sydney Morning Herald complained about Bush's "singular lack of curiosity in international matters" in an editorial titled "Farewell to a flawed and unpopular commander-in-chief."
...
Le Monde: "It's hard to find a historian who won't say that Bush was the most catastrophic leader the U.S. has ever known," the French daily wrote. "One success: since September 11, 2001, there was no attack on U.S. soil. But this sits alongside an interminable list of failures, starting with the war in Iraq."
...
"Bush leaves a country and an economy in tatters," wrote the Sunday Times in London. It said America's national debt and unemployment nearly doubled on his watch.

Buh-bye Mister pResident. So long it's been good to know ya -- NOT!

Well, That Didn't Take Long

I'm talking about how John Roberts fucked up the presidential oath and stumbled around in it. I knew at the time that the wingnuttery would pounce on that like flies on shit. They couldn't get any traction with the phony birth certificate non-story, so sure enough, now Chris Wallace over at Faux News just busted his butt to be the first on the air with, "Well, again, we're wondering here whether or not Barack Obama in fact is the president of the United States."

Well, wonder away, Chrissy-Boy. You fuckers just can't let it rest, can you?

Memo to Faux News and the rest of the wingnuts out there who just can't stand that Barack Hussein Obama is now your president, too: There's a quaint little document called the Constitution of the United States, and if you ever bothered to actually read it, you'd find something called the 20th Amendment, ratified way back in 1933:

1. The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin [emphasis added] ...

So there you go. Even though the constitution specifies the wording of the presidential oath ("I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States" -- BTW, note that there is no "so help me god" in there anywhere), the simple fact that the clock on the East Coast ticked past noon meant that Obama was automatically president. Period. End of story.

Except it won't be the end of the story. Fatboy Drug Addict Rush Limbaugh and Slanthead Hannity are sure to be pumping this non-event for all it's worth (which is less than nothing, but that won't stop them).

Oh, and little Chrissy-Boy also rhetorically speculated that, "It's just conceivable that this will end up going to the courts."

Just conceivable? Yeah, on the planetoid Pluto, maybe. And what would John Roberts do if that case every happened to come before the Supremes? Agree with the so-called plaintiffs (whoever they might be) that he fucked up and Obama isn't president?

Uh-huh.

The New Coinage

Just in time, before the last gasp of the BFEE in office, here's your chance to collect some pocket-change pieces of history:

[Edit 1-20-09: I just couldn't make this embed work without it playing automatically, which got to be a major annoyance every time I reloaded the page. So here's the link where you can see it in its own window.]

I'm glad I stumbled on this over at The Candid Blogger, before it was too late.

Thanks, CB!

The 40 "Know Bush" Facts from 2004

Over at OpEdNews, Barbara Bellows-TerraNova has a lengthy and detailed series dating from 2004 about the then-future legacy of Der Monkey Fuehrer, A Legacy Review: My Original 40 'Know Bush' Facts from 2004, (Part One, Part Two -- Part Three is inexplicably missing -- and Part Four) that is well worth the time it will take to read the whole thing.

Excerpts:

Former FBI Deputy Director John O'Neill was in charge of the investigations into:
• the bin Laden-connected bombings of the World Trade Center in 1993
• the destruction of an American troop barracks in Saudi Arabia in 1996
• the African Embassy bombings in 1998, and
• the attack upon the USS Cole in 2000 . . .
told French researchers in the summer of 2001, "The main obstacles to investigate Islamic terrorism were U.S. oil corporate interests, and the role played by Saudi Arabia in it...All the answers, everything needed to dismantle Osama bin Laden's organization, can be found in Saudi Arabia."
In a tragic irony, O'Neill quit the FBI two weeks before 9/11 in disgust over the Bush Administration's refusal to investigate Saudi ties to Al Qaeda and went to work as head of security at the World Trade Center, where he was killed in the attack.
. . .
Three weeks after the 2000 election, while the results were still up in the air, Greg Palast, an American reporter for the BBC and the Guardian of London, reported that in the months leading up to the November 2000 balloting, Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris (who was also George Bush's Florida campaign manager), in coordination with Governor Jeb Bush (George's brother), ordered local elections supervisors to purge 57,700 names from voter registries.
These names were removed because they were supposedly felons who, according to Florida law, may not vote. However, in review, 90.2% of the voters purged from this list were innocent. Their names were listed in error, and never verified. It should be noted that 54% were Black and Hispanic voters, and 90% were Democrat.
Remember, Bush supposedly won Florida, and thus the country, by only 537 votes.

If the continual paging forward on the OpEdNews site annoys you, you can always go to Barbara's blog, Know More, and read the whole thing on one page. Plus there you can read the mysteriously missing Part Three (Facts #27 through #34, which includes Fact #30, an exposé of the "Republican Riot" at the Florida's Dade County elections office in late 2000).

All of these facts are verified and validated truths. But that doesn't mean that the CPM* was going to report on them, neither at the time nor now. No, they're too busy being lapdogs to the BFEE in its pathetic attempt to rewrite history and burnish the tarnished "Bush Legend". Assholes.

[* CPM = Capitalist Pig Media]

Whitewashing History

I'm the first to admit that I did not watch Baby Doc's "Farewell to the Nation" address the other night, but I've seen enough clips and read enough about it to know that he is anarrogant and self-delusional reality-denier to the end.

Yeah, big surprise there.

Over the last several weeks we've seen a media blitz on the part of Bush apologists trying like hell to shore up his crumbling reputation and engage in outright denial, in the face of facts, about the record of the BFEE. Last night's address was the crowning touch, the capstone, the little groom on the wedding cake, if you will, of that attempt.

Unfortunately it won't be the last attempt. For the next umpteen years you're going to see more of the same, the insane repetition of The Big Lie by everyone in sight, by everyone who ever held an appointive office in the BFEE, in hopes of allowing history to give the little fucker a pass on the destructive policies of the last eight years.

It's now up to the incoming Obama administration to not only try to undo all of the damage, but to demand accountability from the prime architects of the Baby Doc Maladministration who have caused this country to go in a spiraling freefall, circling the drain (to mix metaphors) of economic, political and international polity.

So far I haven't had a good feeling about what exactly Obama is going to do about it. While I'd like to see Baby Doc, Darth Cheney, Karl Rove, et al., frog-marched before the International Court of Justice at the Hague, I don't really think that's going to happen. But we should still, at the very least, hold open hearings on the crimes of the BFEE and make goddam sure that the judgment of history will be that we, as a society, were willing and able to actually do something to make the bastards accountable.

That's not too much to ask.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4177 4180 4185 4186 4189 4197 4204 4209 4217 4221 4223 4226

Total coalition forces dead: 317
Total Iraqi Dead: 900,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2684
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 2112
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 2087
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 1070
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 911

It is still 3 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

---

Note: This will be the last "Friday by the Numbers", at least for a while. I'm willing to cut Obama some slack and let him have some time to turn the rushing current of the BFEE around and head our nation in the right direction. But if doesn't rise to the occasion, look for this regular feature to return.

Not Pro-Sodomy, Scout's Honor

From our "I swear you can't make this shit up" department comes the news that former Arkansas governor, erstwhile presidential candidate, Baptist minister and evolution denier/Intelligent Design flack Mike Huckabee swears that he is not "pro-sodomy".

Here's an interchange between him and mAnn Coulter:

HUCKABEE: I am not, as you characterized me in one article, pro-gay, pro-sodomy. That is so not me.
COULTER: Yes, there was a Supreme Court decision. You said you agreed or disagreed with. Yes, I got you on that Mike Huckabee.
HUCKABEE: Nope. You didn't. I am definitely not pro-sodomy. I promise, scout’s honor.

"Scout's honor"? Maybe he could have chosen a less ... felicitous ... phrase.

Sarah Palin: Kitten With a Whip

Thanks once more to the enormously-talented "anonymous blogger" Blue Gal, who just treated us to this new video:

Those of us out here in the sad-state-of-affairs Anonymous Bloggerland just can't seem to get enough of this stuff. Palin was just the perfect VP candidate for those of us with a sense of humor. She was -- and remains -- a freakin' gold mine of material. We can only hope that she's stupid enough to try to make a run for the presidency in four years. And it looks like she might just do that. If I weren't so cheap, I'd send her campaign a few bucks just to keep her in the public view.

Call me selfish, but I like having an easy target once in a while.

An Unanticipated Refund from the IRS? Lucky Me.

In this morning's email I received the following "official" notification from the IRS:

After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund under section 501(c) (3) of the Internal Revenue Code. Tax refund value is $120.50. Please submit the tax refund request and allow us 6-9 days in order to IWP [???] the data received. If u [sic] don't receive your refund within 9 business days from the original IRS mailing date shown, you can start a refund trace online.
If you distribute funds to other organization, your records must show wether [sic] they are exempt under section 497 (c) (15). In cases where the recipient org. is not exempt under section 497 (c) (15), you must have evidence the funds will be used for section 497 (c) (15) purposes.
If you distribute fund to individuals, you should keep case histories showing the recipient's name and address; the purpose of the award; the maner [sic] of section [sic]; and the realtionship [sic] of the recipient to any of your officers, directors, trustees, members, or major contributors.
To access the form for your tax refund, please *click here* [Note: This generously-provided link goes not, as you might expect, to a "masked" URL, but directly to <mydisco-dating.de/orca/log/refund/> -- these guys have absolutely no imagination or computer-geek skills]
This notification has been sent by the Internal Revenue Service, a bureau [sic] of the Department of the Treasury.

The link, as you can see, goes to some "disco dating" website in, of all places, Germany. Given the misspelled words and the tone (it was obviously written by someone whose native language is not English), it's hard to believe that anyone would actually fall for this. But the Nigerians seem to still be making a killing -- sometimes literally -- on their particular area of scam expertise.

BTW, when I was in Saigon last September I met a couple of guys from Nigeria. Their very first question to me? "What's your email address?"... Really. I had to laugh while they, of course, had to pretend that they didn't get the joke.

But at least with the Nigerians, some people, like Scam-O-Rama: The Lads from Lagos and 419 Eater, are fighting fire with fire. Read some of the case histories on both of those sites about the ridiculous lengths some of those poor Nigerian saps will go to in trying to keep their "phish" on the line. I especially like the stories wherein the putative victim actually turns the tables and gets money from the scammers.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4177 4180 4185 4186 4189 4197 4204 4209 4217 4221 4223>

Total coalition forces dead: 317
Total Iraqi Dead: 900,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2677
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 2105
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 2080
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 1063
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 904

It is still 9 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

Blakely Lauren -- RIP

Longtime readers will recall that last summer we went to Alaska to meet my son's girlfriend, who was carrying our next grandchild.

Little Blakely Lauren was born on Christmas Eve, and died of apparent crib death on Saturday, January 3rd. Her parents, Bob and Almarie, are grieving their loss, as are Susan and I.

Here's to you, Little One. I'm sorry we never got to meet in person.

I'll be back to blogging ... in a while.

The Biggest Drawing in the World

Now for some fun stuff. Check this out. A Stockholm artist sets out with a GPS receiver and apparently an almost unlimited amount of money, to use global shipping company DHL to create, using the entire world as his canvas, the world's largest self-portrait:

Biggest drawing in the world
Uploaded by erikbjgn

It's a really clever bit of melding of technology to art and it's fascinating to watch it all come together.

Bristol & Levi's Advice to New Parents

After that fateful school "camping trip" wherein Bristol Palin and her main squeeze Levi Johnston found out firsthand about the evils of condoms, they've written a guest column on the snarky political satire site 23/6.

Some gems of their advice:

· BABY WON'T SLEEP: A common problem, not just for babies but for everyone in Alaska, considering there's always, like, 36 consecutive hours of daylight or darkness. If baby is fussing, try licking your hand and running it through the child's hair...
· BABY IS HORNY: There's no better time than the first days of infancy to start teaching your child about abstinence. Remember, the sooner you can start informing your kid about the evils of pre-marital sex, the less likely they'll be to get themselves in some kind of embarrassing, unexpected situation. This may also be a good time to start teaching your baby about irony.

Who knew that these two could turn out to be the dispensers of such sage advice? I certainly was caught in shock and awe...

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4177 4180 4185 4186 4189 4197 4204 4209 4217 4221

Total coalition forces dead: 317
Total Iraqi Dead: 900,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2670
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 2096
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 2073
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 1056
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 897

It is still 16 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

It's an Ill Wind etc.

You know the old saying, "It's an ill wind that blows nobody good"? How about "Every cloud has a silver lining"?

One of the few bright spots coming out of the tanking economy is this: Fewer death penalty cases in the courts and way fewer executions. In 1999 there were 98 people put to death in this country; in 2008 that number plummeted to 37, which comes out to a 62% drop.

Moreover, prosecutors are increasingly loath to ask for the death penalty. In many instances, it comes down to a choice for local and state governments: Cut the number of cops on the beat, or save roughly one million dollars per case by not pursing a death penalty.

It seems that what simple humanity couldn't do, simple economics took care of.

And BTW, here's an interesting statistic for all you knuckledraggers out there who think that the potential imposition of the death penalty results in fewer murders: The national "murder rate" has stayed very nearly constant between 2000 (which saw a rate 5.5 per 100,000 people) and 2007 (which saw a rate of 5.6 per 100,000 people).

That's what's called in the math biz a statistical dead heat.

The Alternative Invocation

Here's a terrific video put together by my friend Blue Gal;, which appears in its "official location" over at Alternative Invocation:

Watch it. It's totally awesome. Way to go, Fran!

[And while we're at it, congratulations to Blue Gal for making into the finals for the 2008 Best Liberal Blog award. BTW, it was from Blue Gal's blog that I learned that bloggers could drive up their readership by embedding key search phrases in their blog posts, phrases such as lesbian vampires, felafel sex and panties. Hmmmm, we'll see...]

More on Billo

I really have to quit stumbling around in YouTube. It's taking up way too much of my time...

That said, here's another one, this time with Richard Dawkins on the Bill Orally show.

Watch for this exchange about halfway through:

Billo: It [belief in god] is true, for me.
Dawkins: What do you mean, "true for you"? ... Something's got to either be true or it's not.
Billo: No, no.

And there you have it, folks. Billo agrees that he's full of shit and that he is not part of the Reality-Based Community.

Why Rush Limbaugh Left Television

Aside from the fact that he has a face and a body built for radio, that is...

Speaking of YouTube, watch this -- it's an oldie but a goodie from Rush's television show in 1990, wherein the notorious bully gets it handed right back to him:

It's kind of long, but worth watching.

I just love it how the fucker starts squirming when the audience starts calling him out, and then he finally has to kick the entire studio audience out before he closes.

Bill Orally Gets "Owned" -- by a HS Kid, No Less

One of the rewards of poking around in YouTube is that I tend to come across stuff like this:

Watch a high school student refuse to back down while calling Billo out on his bullshit.

Priceless.

A New "Follower"

One of the more interesting features about Blogspot is the "following" -- other bloggers and regular citizens can sign up to follow your blog. And I just noticed that I have a new follower, Controversy.

It's not a regular blog -- instead Ghostwriter, the blog owner, conducts a number of ongoing polls, wherein you can vote your opinion on a number of controversial issues (e.g., "What is the responsibility of the US in the Israel-Palestine conflict" is the Poll of the Day).

Go ahead and check it out. The poll results are not, of course, scientific in any way, but still illuminating as to what the blogger community in particular collectively feels about certain issues.