So Bush has decided that he can open mail without a warrant. Not email. You probably already know that. We're talking about first class, postal, physical mail.
Here's my favorite part, emphasis mine:
Bush asserted the new authority Dec. 20 after signing legislation that overhauls some postal regulations. He then issued a 'signing statement' that declared his right to open mail under emergency conditions, contrary to existing law and contradicting the bill he had just signed, according to experts who have reviewed it.
Why the hell do we even MAKE laws when the President can just issue a "signing statement" that basically says he's not going to obey them? Check the record; Bush has issued more of these signing statements than, well, anybody.
Here's an interesting little example of how interconnected the world is. Today I read that OPEC appears ready to defend $60 floor on oil prices. Now, as somebody who has a 12 mile drive to the nearest grocery story -- each way -- this really bothers me, because I don't like paying $2.40 a gallon or more, but it's obvious things have been ratcheting up for a while. Prices spike until they're ridiculously high, people complain, and then they come down to where they started -- and gradually work their way up to where they were at the height of the spike, but nobody complains. (Unless you count general grumbling.)
But what I find interesting is this. High oil prices hurt the US economy, which weakens the dollar against other currencies. OK, fine. But most of that oil money OPEC is bringing in comes in as dollars, so as the dollar weakens, OPEC nations have LESS PURCHASING POWER with those dollars.
A bright spot in the discussion, I guess. :)
I do a lot of joking about Bushisms, because the mangling of the English language is one of my pet peeves. (For heaven's sake, you're the President of the most powerful nation in the free world. LEARN TO SAY NU-CLE-AR!!!!!) But maybe it's not that funny; I wondered how somebody who was so ... well ... stupid had gotten as far as he had. Maybe he's not as stupid as he looks. Maybe there's something entirely different going on.
Check out this video:
On Thursday, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Bush administration cannot try Guantánamo Bay detainees via military tribunals, in which as few as three military officers make the decisions, and the accused cannot face their accusers. Instead, the court suggested that military courts-martial, with protections similar to civil trials, would be appropriate.
in a dissenting opinion, Justice (and I use the term loosely) Antonin Scalia wrote, "'It is not clear where the court derives the authority — or the audacity — to contradict' Congress and the executive branch".
EXCUSE ME???
Reviewing, and on occasion, contradicting, Congress and the executive branch is the FUNCTION of the Supreme Court. Or at least it was when I was learning about the Constitution.
Of course, that was before September 11.
According to the article, "For now, there are about 450 detainees at Guantanamo, and 115 of them have been deemed eligible for release or transfer to their home countries. Ten, including Hamdan, [on whose behalf the current case was brought,] have been charged with crimes. The chief Guantanamo prosecutor had said about 65 more detainees were likely to be charged if the court ruled differently."
OK, let's look at this for a minute. 115 inmates have been deemed eligible for release. Why the hell are they still there? They love the food? 260 more have not been charged with a crime, and according to this are not likely to be charged with a crime. Again, why are they still there?
The answer is unfortunate, but simple. After torturing these men for four years, the Bush administration simply cannot afford to release them.
okay, maybe that'll will strong, but check out this report that the U.S. Customs and Border Protectionis under orders to notify the Mexican government of Minutemen positions. the Minutemen, as you may or may not know, our civilians who have taken it upon themselves to patrol the border and keep out illegal immigrants:
According to three documents on the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations Web site, the U.S. Border Patrol is to notify the Mexican government as to the location of Minutemen and other civilian border patrol groups when they participate in apprehending illegal immigrants -- and if and when violence is used against border crossers.
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman confirmed the notification process, describing it as a standard procedure meant to reassure the Mexican government that migrants' rights are being observed.
I should point out that the border patrol agents are just as upset about this as you probably are.
When I first read Dictatorship is the danger in The Guardian, the British newspaper, my first reaction was to check to make sure that it was a real article, rather than a hoax. Very little searching read me to the original broadcast of NPR's Nina Totenberg, who was there when Sandra Day O'Connor told a small group that the assaults on the independant judiciary are indicative of the type of interference and retaliation that can, in the long run, lead to dictatorship. Are we in danger of having jackboots in the streets next week? Probably not. But she points out "We must be ever vigilant against those who would strong arm the judiciary into adopting their preferred policies. It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship, but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings."
[Additional note: Without net neutrality, it would be easy for a conservative ISP to block postings like this one, if they don't like it. China has (no joke) 30,000 "cyber-cops" that block access to sites with information the government doesn't like. Right now that can't happen here. The death of net neutrality would be a first step in that direction.]
AT&T was broken up for good reason. Now, with the pending merger with Bellsouth, they're just about back where they were, with one big difference. Now we have the internet. Good, right? Wrong. AT&T is one of the largest supporters of the end of "net neutrality", which means that all data traffic is treated equally. If these opponents have their way, they will be able to blackmail content providers into paying an extra fee so they don't get degraded service. In other words, if Yahoo! pays a fee to Verizon, and Verizon is your ISP, you may see perfectly good speed out of Yahoo!, but, say, slow response from Google. Or worse, no response at all. Don't Be Neutral on Net Neutrality explains this a bit better, and includes this quote:
"AT&T CEO and chairman Ed Whitacre told 'Business Week,' 'Why should they be allowed to use my pipes? The Internet can't be free in that sense, because we and the cable companies have made an investment, and for a Google or Yahoo! or Vonage or anybody to expect to use these pipes [for] free is nuts!'"
Excuse me, but if it weren't for Google or Yahoo! or Vonage or any of the other content and service providers, why would you have those pipes in the first place? You DO get paid for those pipes. Your CUSTOMERS pay for those pipes every month.
ARG.
[Additional note: Without net neutrality, it would be easy for a conservative ISP to block postings like this one, if they don't like it. China has (no joke) 30,000 "cyber-cops" that block access to sites with information the government doesn't like. Right now that can't happen here. The death of net neutrality would be a first step in that direction.]
I hate to sound cynical, but isn't it a sweet deal for Senators that they blocked the unreformed Patriot Act last year, thereby seeming to be on the side of civil liberties, but are now set to pass it almost unchanged, thereby staying on the Administration's good side? The bill still lacks basic protections for our freedom and civil liberties. Please write your Senator about it.
Never discuss religion and politics. Yeah, right. Rogers Cadenhead points out that Wikipedia is now embroiled in the mess over the Mohammed cartoons. I undestand that Muslims don't want people to make images. I understand that they don't want to see images. But when I read a comment like "Every time I enter the page I click as fastly as I can to the 'discussion' to don't see the cartoon," I have to wonder: who's holding a gun to your head and making you come to this page?
I mean, really, it's not like it's on the main page of the site, after all.
This is beautiful. From Boing Boing: Senators figure out the Broadcast Flag, curse it as an abomination!:
First MIT grad John Sununu of New Hampshire said that government mandates "always restrict innovation" and then 82-year-old Ted Stevens of Alaska talked about the iPod he'd gotten for Christmas and put the RIAA's Mitch Bainwol on the spot about whether his proposal would break Stevens' ability to move digital radio programs to his iPod and listen to them in the most convenient way (it would).
[Sununu] pointed out that "we have a whole history of similar technological innovation that has shown us that the market can respond with its own protection to the needs of the artists." And he concluded with one of the most damning depictions of the ahistorical nature of the flag (clip from Congressional RealVideo) you'll hear on the Hill:"The suggestion is that if we don't do this, it will stifle creativity. Well...we have now an unprecedented wave of creativity and product and content development...new business models, and new methodologies for distributing this content. The history of government mandates is that it always restricts innovation...why would we think that this one special time, we're going to impose a statutory government mandate on technology, and it will actually encourage innovation?"
iAbolish is collecting signatures for a petition to as the US Government to Create a Task Force to Eradicate Slavery in Sudan. Some disturbing statistics from Christian Solidarity International:
Based on interviews with 1,306 freed male and female slaves over the age of eleven:
Forced labor 95.5%
Frequent beatings 95.7%
Racial insults 95.8%
Forced conversion to Islam 59.6%
Based on interviews with 1,025 female slaves over the age of eleven:
Rape 69.7%
Gang rape 59.4%
Genital mutilation 33.5%
Based on interviews with 281 boy slaves over the age of eleven:
Rape 6.0%
Please sign the petition.
Here's an intersting little mystery. (Or non-mystery, really.) It seems that ABC cancelled a reality show in which a gay couple convinces white, conservative, Christian neighbors they should win a house. The question that remains: was the company worried that early gay-bashing comments would turn people off, or did parent company Disney do it to prevent Christian groups from returning to their boycotts just before they released The Chronicles of Narnia?
I understand that you need to save some data in order to make sure your business functions. For example, I can understand why Google needs to log what searches are performed and so on. But it makes me nervous that Google (and Yahoo, and probably many of the other search engines) associate that data with a particular person. Kudos to Google for fighting an attempt by the Feds to get their logs. But if they hadn't collected the information in the first place, there wouldn't be a problem. Yahoo and AOL say they complied iwth the subpoena, but didn't provide personally identifiable information. MSN just talked about what law abiding citizens they were in abiding by lawful requests. I guess we know what that means.
The Senate has passed an amendment to a defense appropriations bill that removes the ability of the courts to rule on whether or not an individual is being held illegally at Guantánamo Bay.
The relevant text:
(d) Judicial review of detention of enemy combatants --I can't even begin to tell you how bad I think this is. And before you think "I don't have to worry about that, I'm an American citizen," I direct you to the fact that the administration tried to pass legislation allowing the Justice Department to strip citizenship from ANYONE thought to be a member of a group the Attorney General deemed as a terrorist organization. Let me further remind you that that could apply to groups as diverse as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and the National Rifle Association (NRA).(1) in general -- section 2241 of title 28, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:
" (e) No court, Justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for writ of habeas corpus call by or on behalf of an alien outside of the United States (as that term is defined in section 101(a)(38) of The Immigration and Naturalization Act (8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(38)) who was detained by the Department of Defense at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba."
Technorati tags: freedom | habeas corpus | justice | politics | Senate | Guantánamo | Guantanamo | Guantánamo Bay | Guantánamo Bay
First, sorry for the incendiary headline. Just seemed appropriate.
Someone very close to me insists that the 9/11 attacks were planned and supported, if not actually executed, by the Bush administration. I keep telling that person they're going a bit too far. But now I'm wondering.
I'm not going to analyze this ABC News report because I want you to make up your own mind. But here's the lead:
"In the early 1960s, America's top military leaders reportedly drafted plans to kill innocent people and commit acts of terrorism in U.S. cities to create public support for a war against Cuba."
Note the date. This report was published on May 1, 2001. So it's not a response to the 9/11 attacks.
I often listen to so-called "liberal" radio -- sort of the anti-Rush-Limbaugh kind of thing -- where they usually describe the people setting off bombs in Iraq as "insurgents", rather than "terrorists". Whenever I hear it, I do think about labels and how we apply them. Here's an interesting 80/20Rule: definition of the difference between "rebels" and "terrorists". Not sure I'd agree with his specific examples, but he does, nevertheless, have an excellent point.
Make a difference.
Thanks to Troy Worman for the link. (And he's also got other great stuff there. Check it out. You won't be sorry.)
Check out Human Rights Watch: Campaigns for links to things you can do to make a difference in this crazy world.
Here's an interesting notion. The pervasiveness of cameras and recording devices that will steal our privacy can also work to protect us from abuse. Check out WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: The Rise of the Participatory Panopticon.
Here's an interesting fact, culled from How the Mafia Works:
In the early 1900s, organized crime had so thoroughly infiltrated Sicilian life that it was virtually impossible to avoid contact with the Mafia. Dictator Benito Mussolini cracked down on the Mafia using harsh, often brutal methods. But when U.S. troops occupied Sicily during World War II, they mistook the many jailed criminals for political prisoners and not only set them free, but also appointed many of them as mayors and police chiefs. Before long, the Mafia had a firm grasp on Italy's Christian Democrat party.
I'm glad to see that the issue of modern-day slavery is beginning to get addressed. Tomorrow survivor Beatrice Fernando testifies at a hearing on "Combating
Human Trafficking", being held by the House International
Relations Committee at 11 a.m.
Technorati tag: slavery
Let's see, you live in America, and you're an American citizen, so you think that things are ultimately fair. Oh, you're not naive, you know that there are people who are not entirely fair, or maybe some that are corrupt, or maybe some that don't have the public's best interest at heart. Maybe there are even some that will ignore your fundamental rights as an American. You might find yourself wronfully imprisoned. But it's OK, because ultimately, someone, somewhere, will set it right, even if your case has to go to the Supreme Court.
Guess what. Your mother was right.
Sometimes life just isn't fair.
Take Jose Padilla, the alleged "dirty bomber". (Please.) He's been sitting in solitary confinement for more than two years. Now, I'm not saying he's innocent. He might be guilty as hell. But he's been sitting in prison for all this time WITHOUT BEING CHARGED WITH ANYTHING.
Twice now, courts have ruled that he should either be charged or released. Reasonable, no? But he's still sitting in jail with no charges. And now the Supreme Court has declined to hear the case (via Building a Pyramid).
Scary, scary stuff.
I've been thinking for a while -- especially after being reminded by a post of Bruce Sterling's -- that soon, if it hasn't happened already, there will be more Chinese speakers online than English speakers. (Which might explain all the Chinese-language spam I keep getting.) Scott Nance brings up the point again in a commentary on the rising Chinese juggernaught. He also reminds us of all the Chinese slang in Firefly, which as you know I loved. Interesting, I was just re-watching it this weekend, so I wish that I'd had Scott's pointer to the Firefly Chinese Pinyinary beforehand. It translates all of the Chinese in the series, which is pretty cool.
But seriously, I need to find me a good Chinese audio course for the car. I took German in high school and Russian in college, but I don't remember much of either. I've done the audio-tape route for Spanish more recently, and if I go to Mexico I'm probably at the level that I won't think everyone around me is plotting against me, but that's about it.
But if I'm going to stay competitive in this market, I suspect Chinese is the way to go...
Looks like Bill Clinton has finally discovered the environment. As quoted in Grist Magazine, he told an audience "'[T]he decisions we make or fail to make in this area may have a bigger impact on America and the world than virtually all the things that were debated' in the recent presidential campaign, Clinton told a crowd of 900 students and business execs gathered at New York University last week at an energy and global-warming conference." What's more, "The event was convened by the William J. Clinton Presidential Foundation, an organization established by the former president to help people worldwide deal with the challenges of global interdependence."
Environmental concern wasn't exactly a hallmark of his Presidency, so why the change? "'It basically took him until his second term to get serious about these issues,' a former Clinton staffer told Muckraker. 'I think it was a combination of four years of lunches with Al Gore, who schooled him hard, and pressure from the international community to make some moves on climate change that brought him around.'"
AJ Kim points out this musings of a social architect: Timely Quote. Oh, if only there was a way to beam it into people's brains.
Sigh.
Finally, a mainstream journalist, Keith Olbermann, picks up the voting irregularities story. Too many to mention, and too depressing to list.
Here's an interesting little map of election results. And as we begin to have enough numbers to analyze, the inevitable musing about whether the election was hacked begins.
I have strong opinions, but fortunately, none of them involve violence. But I'm always careful about what I say when it comes to politics, even though I'm not some wacko who's going to take a gun over to the White House.
See, now there I was tempted to add "no matter how tempting it may be," but even though it's not tempting and it's just a joke, I worry about saying it, because we've learned from years of email misunderstandings that when people can't see your facial expressions, they tend to misinterpret what you're saying. And I don't want anyone to think I would take a gun over to the White House. I wouldn't. (See, now there I was going to make another smart-ass remark, but I won't.)
Why bring it up? 'Cause apparently a joke on LiveJournal has brought the Secret Service to the author's house. No need to panic, she said they were very nice, and realized right away she wasn't a threat, and they even laughed along with her.
But she pointed out that now she has an FBI file. That means, in today's climate, that she could, conceivably, be put on the "no fly" list. Because of a joke.
And that's scary.
For those who just can't live with the results, check out Electing to Leave, a (somewhat humorous) guide to renouncing (or rather, replacing) your American citizenship. One hint: just burning your passport won't do it.
My wife is still mumbling about how she doesn't understand why results don't match the exit polls. (She also says "Nobody I know says they voted for Bush. How could he have won?" I won't touch that one.)
Anyway, Mystery Pollster has a terrific explanation of how exit polls work. It's brutally honest about what's good about them and why they're pretty well useless in a state like Florida or Ohio.
Oh, if only everyone were this honest. Jon Stewart was on Crossfire and told it like it was. That shows like Crossfire are not really about debate.
And he called Tucker Carlson a dick.
A long time ago, life got me really, really down, to the point where I asked my doctor for antidepressants. Within months, my wife was complaining that I just wasn't myself. "Sure," I thought, "myself is depressed, angry and miserable." But I got off the meds anyway. A couple of months later, I went to get a haircut and the guy who cuts my hair, who is normally quite friendly, told me he was on Prozac. By the time he started cutting my hair, I understood what my wife meant; he just wasn't himself. It was as though he was just a shell of his former self. Sure, he wasn't being compulsive-obsessive anymore, but was the alternative really that much better?
So what does that have to do with George W. Bush? According to Capital Hill Blue -- the accuracy and/or veracity of which I cannot verify, by the way -- he was prescribed powerful anti-depressants after a July 8 incident in which he stormed offstage after refusing to answer questions about his relationship with Enron CEO Ken Lay:
"Keep those m*therf*ckers away from me," he screamed at an aide backstage. "If you can't, I'll find someone who can."
So are things better now that he's on the drugs? Well, apparently he's, well, just not himself.
"[T]here are concerns," a top Republican political advisor admitted privately Wednesday. "The George W. Bush we see today is not the same, gregarious, back-slapping President of old. He’s moody, distrustful and withdrawn."
Unfortunately, there's a big difference here. When my hairdresser isn't himself, I don't enjoy my haircut. When the President isn't himself, it's a whole other story.
White House aides say Bush has retreated into a tightly-controlled environment where only top political advisors like Karl Rove and Karen Hughes are allowed. Even White House chief of staff Andrew Card complains he has less and less access to the President.
(In an interesting side-note, the same article claims that Donald Rumsfeld has fallen out of favor, and that the "real political power" in Washington is not Dick Cheney, but still-in-good-with-Dubya John Ashcroft, who, along with Bush, is referred to as the "Blues Brothers" because they both think they're on a mission from G-d.)
This kind of thing has the ability to make me strangely sympathetic; I know what it's like to get to the point where you just can't take it anymore -- but you have to. On the other hand, one of the most common observations about Saddam Hussein was that he was insulated from everyone and that's how he developed the way he did. And Washingtonians are starting to refer to Ashcroft as "Bush's Himmler". (If you don't understand that reference, you desperately need to look it up.)
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
I can't even comment on this analysis of the legal twisting and turning of reality with regard to the torture of Iraqi (and Afgani) prisoners. Consider the notion that:
In order to prove 'severe mental pain or suffering,' the statute requires proof of 'prolonged mental harm' that was caused by or resulted from one of four enumerated acts... [T]he development of a mental disorder such as posttraumatic stress disorder, which can last months or even years, or even chronic depression... might satisfy the prolonged harm requirement... [I]f a defendant [interrogator] has a good faith belief that his actions will not result in prolonged mental harm, he lacks the mental state necessary for his actions to constitute torture. A defendant could show that he acted in good faith by taking such steps as surveying professional literature, consulting with experts, or reviewing evidence gained from past experience... Because the presence of good faith would negate the specific intent element of torture, good faith may be a complete defense to such a charge.
It makes me physically ill.
I've been listening to the supposedly liberal press falling all over themselves to appear conservative for a whole week now, I have to ask: we are talking about Ronald Reagan, right? President of the United States between 1980 and 1988, right? That Reagan? 'Cause you'd be hard pressed to know it watching the obsequeous coverage on all the networks this week. Maybe the media is the one suffering from Alzheimers. I mean, we keep hearing about "the Great Communicator" and how he was so "idealistic" and stuck to his principles and all that. I've heard him described as "the Republican party's JFK." So tell me, why aren't we being reminded of:
What else did I miss?
With all of this talk about Iraq, it's interesting to go back and listen to the real radio broadcasts of World War II. And I'm not just talking about broadcasts you've heard a gazillion times in retrospectives. I'm talking about weekly "world news updates" -- sponsored by Admiral radios, which regrets that because of defense orders, they can't make consumer radios until the war is won, but see your Admiral dealer to keep your radio in tip-top shape for the duration, no matter what brand it is -- in addition to British news, and perhaps the most interesting, English-language German propoganda broadcasts.
But what's really interesting to me is the scale of things. We have, what 125,000 troops in Iraq? The D-Day invasion involved 4 and a half MILLION allied troops. The war touched every part of American life, right on down to (unless I didn't hear it correctly) the edict that all able-bodied men between 20 and 45 were to receive military training. And factories taken over by the defense department because they weren't producing material fast enough.
The complete broadcast is 60 hours, and covers the whole war chronologically. I recommend trying to catch the early war, when the Axis was winning. It's quite a perspective changer. Especially the Germans saying that the fact that they were so technologically advanced that they conquered France in 6 weeks should tell the British they couldn't possibly stand up to Germany. And we all know how that ended.
Interesting lessons history teaches, if we pay attention.
This is cool. Michael Moore Hates America is not meant as a hatchet job of the "documentary" filmmaker, but almost as a rebuttal of his "America is awful" philosophy. In a bizarre-ly Roger and Me-like way, Michael Wilson tries to get an interview with Moore, and also looks at how the little guy can still make it in this country. But along the way, he looks at the documentary process, and from the trailer, that looks fascinating. But then, I've always been a documentary junkie.
This is kind of a difficult one for me to take sides on. I don't like Michael Moore, because I feel like he's an opportunist who'll stir up trouble wherever he can.
On the other hand, I hate Bush more.
Moore's new film, Fahrenheit 9/11, about the censorship that took place after the terrorist attacks, is clearly not going to be a pro-Bush piece. It's also the winner of the top prize at this year's Cannes Film Festival. Apparently that's not enough to avoid Disney from prohibiting Miramax from distributing the film.
Disney says it would violate campaign finance laws. Moore says it would anger Florida Governor Jeb Bush and endanger Disney's tax breaks.
We'll see how it plays out.
I guess that being in your 80s gives you the perspective to see what the rest of us would see if we ever slowed down enough to pay attention. And being a famous author gives you some license to say it out loud. Kurt Vonnegut is both, and proves it with Cold Turkey, a piece about peace, kindness, power, addiction, and fossil fuels. Interesting.
I'm not a Democrat.
Oh, it's not that I don't agree with a lot of the things the Democrats stand for, it's just that I see them as (mostly) just as corrupt as the Republicans, when you come right down to it.
Trouble is, I don't quite know WHAT I am. For a couple of years, I was a member of the Reformed Silly Party of Florida, but they seem to have disappeared, so I don't know what the story is there. (I'm told they're still out there.) My wife thought I was carrying nonconformity a little far there, but I explained that it was my way of protesting the domination of the two-party system.
But it's an election year, so I'm thinking about it more than I used to. What, really, DO I believe?
This past weekend Eric and I set up a table at a local gun show -- selling dog tags, not guns -- and not surprisingly, I suppose, there was a table for the Libertarian Party. Now, if all you know about the Libertarians is the whole "abolish drug laws" thing, you're probably as surprised as I am to find out that there's much, much more to this party.
The basic philosophy is that government should protect us "from force and from fraud" both at home and abroad, and that other than that, they should basically stay out of people's lives.
Now, that's a position I can respect, I suppose, but the more I thought about it, the more troubled I became. I mean, OK, I understand the idea -- note I said "understand," and not necessarily "agree with" -- that people should be able to medicate themselves as they like, own guns, do what they want, and generally be responsible for themselves. OK, this last part I do agree with.
But as I talked to the rep, we got into other areas of discussion, such as the Department of Education. Apparently the thinking here is that it's not in the US Constitution, and the Federal Government should stay out of education. Why do we need national educational standards? Why should my tax money be used for programs across the country?
The rep pointed out that he'd home-schooled his kids, and that he and his wife had had to make the decision for one of them to stay home to do that. Funny thing, though, when I asked what a single parent should do about it, he changed the subject.
He changed the subject a lot in that conversation, actually, and finally invited me to continue it via email, since we were apparently disturbing the surrounding vendors. (I can respect that.)
But here's the notion that I'm left with. It seems to me that the Libertarian Party is either a wimpy version of anarchy -- no government, except to keep the bad people from hurting us -- or the most selfish philosophy I've ever seen. The community should decide what it's going to support, but there's no notion, as far as I can see, that taking care of other people is in any way required, or even desirable.
I should note here that in the "political spectrum quiz" they were handing out, I was the one and only "liberal" at the show, but I'd like to make it clear that I think there's a line between helping people and crippling them. If you're capable of working, then you need to get up and work. Period.
But if you can't -- and I mean really can't -- then I think the rest of us who are fortunate enough to be able to earn a living have an obligation to help out. We're all in this together, and that seems to be missing from the Libertarian philosophy.
Or have I missed something here?
It's interesting what you can find when you pay attention. I don't know how much of Bush Family Skeletons is accurate, but a lot of the later items I remember. What's interesting is that the page doesn't mention the alleged fact that George H. W. Bush is part owner of the Carlyle Group -- along with members of the Bin Laden family.
I'm tremendously heartened by the fact that people finally seem to be noticing -- and more importantly, pointing out -- unethical, or downright illegal actions by the Bush administration. Just received in tonight's update from ABC News and World News Tonight:
Federal officials are investigating television segments produced by the Bush administration in which people posing as journalists tout the benefits of the new Medicare law. Officials at the General Accounting Office say the Department of Health and Human Services may have violated a law that prohibits the use of federal money for "publicity purposes" without Congress' permission. Lisa Stark has more tonight on the investigation and the GAO's concern that the spots may mislead viewers.
Can't wait to see that one...
Does your company have a life insurance policy on you? No, I'm not talking about that $10,000 "benefit" in your compensation package. I'm talking about a much larger policy that provides a tax break to the company while you're alive -- and tax free benefits for the company when you die. Even if you die years after you leave the company.
Kind of makes me wonder what kind of policy my last employer had on me...
I knew that Jerry Springer had once been mayor of Cincinatti. What I didn't know is that he's ... well ... really, really good. I'd vote for him in a heartbeat, for anything he was running for. Maybe I'm just crazy, but listen to this episode of This American Life. They have a 31 minute piece on Springer, with about 2 minutes about the show. Turns out the Springer was not just a successful politician in Cincinatti. He was good. He was, and still is, progressive, but not in a Dennis Kucinuch way. He's a gifted attorney, and a heck of a speaker.
And he wants to get back into politics.
I'll be keeping an eye on http://runJerryRun.com, even though I'm not in Ohio anymore.
So apparently Comcast wants to buy Disney. It just boggles my mind so much that I don't even have anything to say at this point.
The accusation is that George W. Bush never completed his National Guard service in the early seventies, and that he was only in the Guard in the first place because his family pulled strings to get him there. He says that he got in because the other people ahead of him on the waiting list didn't want to commit to 2 years of pilot training. Considering that there were more than SEVEN HUNDRED people ahead of him and all of them were trying to avoid going to Vietnam, I personally find that a little unlikely, but OK. Thing is, nobody can prove that he actually finished serving his time, especially after he transferred from the Texas Air National Guard to the Alabama Guard. The White House has released his pay records from that time, but that doesn't prove he actually served, just that he got paid. Even those who were supposed to be providing evaluations of him during that time -- including a friend of his -- wrote that they couldn't evaluate him because they hadn't actually seen him. (Both of them are now dead, unfortunately.)
I doubt this will cost him the election, but it does give one more reason for the Pants On Fire Tour.
Wizbang! has an interesting piece explaining how one of Senator Kerry's constituents got contrasting letters, one explaining how Kerry opposed the war, the other how he supported it. It also explains why I wrote to my Senator about the Patriot Act and got a response thanking me for my support for letting drug felons get Student Aid funding. (Truthfully, I hadn't considered that particular issue.) And here I thought there was a conspiracy afoot.
No conspiracy, just a typo.
I don't think I'd agree with the assertion that "bloggers rely almost exclusively on well established, credible sources for their information," judging from all of the things I found about the Federal Reserve Bank, but The Blogosphere: Progressive Echo Chamber? makes some good points that I've been musing about for some time.
Basically, with conservatives in control of mainstream media, it's no wonder that they can pretty much put out whatever they want, and it gets repeated to much that eventually people think it's the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. When the corrections come out, they're only seen and heard by a small portion of those who heard the lie. And the liars win.
But with the blogosphere -- can't we find a different name?!? -- people can get the word out and pass it around.