Specter Crumples

like a cheap suit:

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) and conservative members of his panel have reached agreement on legislation that may determine the legality of the National Security Agency’s (NSA) surveillance program, GOP sources say.

Specter has mollified conservative opposition to his bill by agreeing to drop the requirement that the Bush administration seek a legal judgment on the program from a special court set up by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978.

Arlen Specter has no spine.

Technorati Tags: Arlen Specter, NSA, Domestic Spying

Anti-Immigrants Turn to Nazi's for Inspiration

digby catches the Republicans advocating following the example of the Nazi's in Germany for how to "rid us" of the Mexican scourge sweeping the nation:

Not only will it work, but one can easily estimate how long it would take. If it took the Germans less than four years to rid themselves of 6 million Jews, many of whom spoke German and were fully integrated into German society, it couldn't possibly take more than eight years to deport 12 million illegal aliens, many of whom don't speak English and are not integrated into American society.

I wonder if Bush and Rove are actually going to do anything, other than the tepid chastising Bush gave his right wing base this evening.

digby postulates that Michelle Malkin and her ilk are tired of the War on Terror, and need a new villain to demonize. Pretty ironic for a woman of Philippine descent, who would have supported the internment of her parents (immigrants) during WWII.

So, Bush is stuck. He has to be tough on illegal immigration. His base demands it. However, the business community wants (read: needs) its cheap labor. Most of America does not advocate the Final Solution being implemented on Mexican immigrants, illegal or otherwise, and as a result, we get a speech promising nothing, and ultimately delivering nothing.

Technorati Tags: Immigration

Cable Companies and Domestic Spying

Courtesty of Shakespeare's Sister we learn that those of us who rely on our cable companies for telephone service, as well as internet and television, are covered:

NEW YORK — Leading cable operators say a 1984 federal law would stop them from handing customer calling records to the National Security Agency the way AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth have, as reported Thursday in USA TODAY. The phone giants agreed after Sept. 11, 2001, to create a database of customer calling logs to help the NSA find terrorists, according to the report.

Comcast, the largest operator, doesn't "provide the federal government access to customer (video, Internet or phone calling) records, or the ability to monitor customer communications, in the absence of valid legal process" such as a court order or search warrant, says spokeswoman D'Arcy Rudnay. Time Warner and Cox also said that it would take such an order for them to give the government such access.

Now, this doesn't preclude cable companies from turning our information over to the feds. However, unlike AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, they are requiring a warrant.

Good on them.

Technorati Tags: NSA, Domestic Spying

"Funny 'Cause it's True"

Bird Brain Flu

Reporters Calls Being Traced?

The ABC blog, The Blotter, is reporting that they were told by a "senior federal law enforcement officer" that their calls are being traced by the NSA to root out confidential sources.

I first read this early this morning, but haven't written anything on it, due to it only being reported in that one location. It is not that I don't believe it, I actually find it quite plausible, given the current environment of illegal domestic spying. In fact, it plays back to the story a while ago about reports of the NSA tracking calls to and from Christiane Amanpour of CNN. The reason I have stayed away, is that there is too much speculation.

I realize that may seem funny to some, as I have speculated on a lot here. However, I think there is a lot more to this story that is about to break, and this report is only a drop in the bucket. As Josh wrote:

If that's true, then I think we can set aside any pretense that administration policy on all manner of electronic surveillance isn't being brought to bear on political opponents, media critics, the press, everybody.

If this is true, a new paradigm is being established by the Bush administration. One in which all bets are off.

Say one cross word about Bush or the administration, you are now fair game. Joe Wilson learned that, as have other administration critics. I makes you wonder who else is about to learn that lesson. Josh Marshall? Atrios? Kos? Me? You?

It seems that the net is being cast wider, and wider. From terrorists, to former government officials, to activists, to journalists. Are bloggers next? If this is true, how far is the administration willing to go?

Pretty far, it seems.

But I don't want to speculate. Too much, anyways.


Technorati Tags: ABC News, Brian Ross, NSA, Domestic Spying, Wire Taps

Thought for the Day

"Cabbage: A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man's head."

--Ambrose Bierce

Regulating the Internet

Those on the anti-Net Neutrality side continue to propagate the myth that the Government does not regulate the Internet. However, that is untrue:

The Internet has always been regulated. It started off as a government network designed to survive nuclear attacks (which, as everyone notes, is why it’s so good at routing around damage, including censorship) and along with government research labs its initial backbone was universities.

All through that time, and indeed through the 90’s and almost up to the current day, there was a simple rule - you couldn’t discriminate against traffic. You couldn’t give some packets priority over other packets.

That was the rule. It was the regulation.

The success of the Internet relies on this one simple regulation. Those who oppose Net Neutrality want us to believe that this rule does not exist.

Let me just pose the question to those who oppose Network Neutrality.

If this regulation does not exist, then why are the telcos so determined to fight Network Neutrality? Afterall, if there is nothing preventing them from establishing tiered access today, why don't they just do it?

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality

Militarization of the Border

Josh and others are probably right. This new program Bush is proposing to send National Guard troops (those just back from Iraq?), to the border to "augment" the Border Guard doesn't really make sense.

How the National Guard is better equipped to deal with the border rather than the Border Guard wont be explained. Bush has to be receiving an earful from business interests who rely on this cheap labor. Of course, it is the cultural Conservatives who are demanding nothing but total sealing of the border.

But am I wrong to think that the president simply couldn't square the circle between the corporate cheap-labor forces who fund his campaigns and the cultural conservatives who supply his voters? Growing out of that failure, this 'militarize the border' hokum is the policy announcement equalivent of crawling under his desk and screaming "Help!"

Probably.

However, there is a growing consensus that something big is about to happen. Whether it is this week or next, something is percolating its way up to the surface. This is merely a distraction to try and keep a lid on whatever it is.

Technorati Tags: Immigration, National Guard, Mexico, George Bush

Thought for the Day

"Don't knock the weather. If it didn't change once in a while, nine out of ten people couldn't start a conversation."

--Kin Hubbard

Cheney, Fitzgerald, Libby, Wilson

Newsweek has an article today, about Cheney's involvement in the outing of Valerie Wilson.

The role of Vice President Dick Cheney in the criminal case stemming from the outing of White House critic Joseph Wilson's CIA wife is likely to get fresh attention as a result of newly disclosed notes showing that Cheney personally asked whether Wilson had been sent by his wife on a "junket" to Africa

Josh has a scan of Cheney's handwritten notes on the op-ed.

This suggests not only that Cheney acted improperly, but again raises the issue of Bush's involvement as well.

Technorati Tags: Valerie Plame, Joe Wilson, Dick Cheney, Patrick Fitzgerald

McCurry is Dishonest

And that's putting it nicely. Matt @ MyDD does a complete takedown of the latest round of dishonesty that Mike McCurry, and his telco clients are pushing.

However, this all goes to a memo that was circulated a number of months back, and I will have to look for the link, that outlined the means to stop bloggers, and others on the Internet from waging a successful campaign against you.

The first step, after identifying your target, was not to engage them in discussion, it was to attack. It seems that Mike McCurry and his telco clients have adopted that tactic (Update: here is one link). It is clear that the telcos (and Mike McCurry) don't have the facts, or anyone of any stature in the Internet community on their side. This glaring fact is conveniently ignored. They also don't have much support from bigname bloggers, and are unlikely to do so, with their childish attack ad against them.

Afterall, those, such as myself, who were in the middle of the Internet boom of the nineties, and work in the industry, know exactly what made the Internet economy thrive. It was government regulation that ensured an equal playing field for all.

Mike McCurry doesn't want you to know that.

Mike McCurry wants you to think that the Internet was some sort of Libertarian utopia. It wasn't.

Mike McCurry wants you to think that the Internet will wither and die on the vine unless net neutrality is abolished. It wont.

Mike McCurry wants you to think that his clients desire to eliminate net neutrality is the only way for America, and American telcos to keep the Internet alive. They aren't interested in keeping the Internet, as we know it today, alive. They want to regulate it themselves, and they want the federal government to permit that regulation.

So, you can go watch their childish ad, and then you can go to Save the Internet and see what you can to to help stop Mike McCurry and his telco clients from regulating the Internet.


update: Fixed some points I had backwards. Sometimes I don't proofread enough.


Technorati Tags: Mike McCurry, Save the Internet, Net Neutrality

Thought for the Day

"Skiing consists of wearing $3,000 worth of clothes and equipment and driving 200 miles in the snow in order to stand around at a bar and drink."

--P. J. O'Rourke

The Other Republican Scandal

There are so many these days, it is hard to keep track of them all.

Remember the phone jamming scandal which the RNC was paying the legal bills for one James Tobin?

Well, when it comes to appealing his felony conviction, the RNC says "no mas".

It seem that the RNC will pay to defend a felon who interferes with an election, but to not appeal the conviction. At least there are some limits to just how far Republicans are willing to go.

Technorati Tags: Phone Jamming, New Hampshire, GOP, RNC, James Tobin

Josh on Foggo

The Dusty Foggo saga get more and more interesting as time passes, today is no exception:

The Post and the Times both have Saturday run-downs of the raids at the home and office of Dusty Foggo. Of the two, the Post's seemed more detail rich.

Some interesting tidbits.

According to the Post, Foggo was in his office at Langley as late as late Thursday evening. In his resignation email he'd given readers the impression that he'd be around for a few more weeks. By Friday morning, though, he'd been barred access to the entire CIA campus.

There is some rather interesting tidbits in both articles, and Josh has a pretty good analysis about Foggo's tenure.

Let me just add, that if, as is assumed, most of the people Porter Goss installed as CIA management, came from his legislative office, perhaps more investigation of Goss' time in Congress needs to be explored.

Technorati Tags: Dusty Foggo, Porter Goss, CIA, Hookers

Wow!

I have no words for this:

We stood with about 50 others on rte 674 and when the motorcade came by there was assault rifle OUT the window pointing at ALL of us and the cars all looked like I remember seeing in the Hitler motorcades in the movies when I was a child, all boxy and black and one had the Pres seal and American flag on the sides. It was absolutely chilling! I worked the inner city for 15 years with gangs and even with kids and families of the Bloods and Crips and have never had an assault rifle pointed my way. In my 75 years I have seen many Pres motorcades and shook many pres hands and seen many pres elects and their entourage but never anything like this with the motorcycles, big black cars and rifles were just the very last straw. It wasn't the rifle that was scary it was knowing that this madman is so insecure and scared and psychotic that this is how he must travel. AARRRRRGH! USA, Banana Republic for sure. Then to know our tax money paid for this photo op and for the fundraising luncheon at the Renaissance Club is truly the icing on the cake which will kill us all. Very depressing to say the least.

There are three other people who have said basically the same thing.

If this is true, we have entered a whole new state of affairs, with regard to the President.

I never thought I would see this sort of thing happen in my lifetime.


Update: Let me just add some thoughts here.

I know there there is ample security for the President. From the point when Air Force One lands, there is a security cordon, where there are sharpshooters scanning the area around the President. If you look for them you can probably find some, but by no means all of the security presence.

It is when that presence goes from being covert (or pretending to be covert, as the case may be) to being overt, i.e. having weapons pointing out of vehicles towards the crowds, that we move from providing security, to intimidation. If this story is true, then the President, or someone in his staff, is trying to intimidate the crowds to silence. A line has been crossed, and it is one that cannot be uncrossed.

Fake Polls

I haven't written anything about this flash poll from the Washington Post.

Why? Because I would bet that more than half of the participants really didn't even know, or understand the extent to which AT&T, Verizon, and BellSouth were violating your privacy rights.

To shamelessly steal from Stephen Colbert:

A wag of the finger to the Washington Post for taking a poll of people who didn't fully understand what the poll was about.

Technorati Tags: Washington Post, NSA, Domestic Spying

Dusty Raided

FBI agents:

Under a sealed warrant, officials searched Foggo's Virginia home and his office at the CIA's Langley, Va., campus

Less than a week after he announced his resignation.

Technorati Tags: Dusty Foggo, CIA

Thought for the Day

"There art two cardinal sins from which all others spring: Impatience and Laziness."

--Franz Kafka

Mike McCurry Takes us for Fools

McCurry and his telco clients are putting together a thinly disguised campaign to deceive people.

I don't have any paid advertising on this site, other than the Google ad bar which so few people click on, I am probably going to drop it. But, if McCurry wants to pay me to run their ad on my site, I'll take his money. The cartoon so fundamentally misrepresents that net neutrality issue, that most people should be able to see right through it.

Fundamentally, this issue is about who controls the content on the internet. Access Providers or Content providers.

Mike McCurry and AT&T want Access Providers to decide that.

Go here for more information




Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality, Mike McCurry, Save the Internet

Oh, Snap!

29% beeyotch


Thanks to Atrios for this link.



Technorati Tags: George Bush, Popularity

That's Off the Hook

Think Progress apprises us of the financial liability telcos could face as a result of turning over our telephone records to the NSA:

In other words, for every 1 million Americans whose records were turned over to NSA, the telcos could be liable for $1 billion in penalties, plus attorneys fees. You do the math.

Each one that participated must be sued under this law, and forced to pay.

Technorati Tags: AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth, NSA, Domestic Spying

Cafferty is Outraged

Crooks and Liars has Jack Cafferty's segment from CNN's The Situation Room.

His most important statement:

Cafferty: We all hope nothing happens to Arlen Specter, the Republican head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, cause he might be all that stands between us and a full blown dictatorship in this country. He's vowed to question these phone company executives about volunteering to provide the government with my telephone records, and yours, and tens of millions of other Americans.

Thank you Jack, for saying what we on the left have been going on about for years now.

Bush is trying to seize power from Congress and the Courts. He does it by declaring that whatever he does is legal.

Even when it is not.


Technorati Tags: Crooks and Liars, Jack Cafferty, NSA, Domestic Spying

Cato Institute on USA Today Revelation

Talk Left has an email from the Cato Institute with their reaction to the USA Today article about phone records:

"It flies in the face of Fourth Amendment principles that call for reasonableness or probable cause. It is not reasonable to monitor every American's phone calling in a search for terrorists."

There is a lot more, go read.

However, it is quite telling that the negative reaction to this is coming from a very broad base. There can be no more doubt that Bush has implemented a system in which every American is being subjected to monitoring by the federal government. I wonder just how much more the American people, and by extension Congress, will tolerate?

Technorati Tags: TalkLeft, Cato Institute, NSA, Domestic Spying

Bush Responds

to NSA phone record collection story

Shorter Bush?

"I wont tell you if we spy on Americans, but if we did, I know it is legal. Because I said so."

Right.

Technorati Tags: George Bush, NSA, Domestic Spying, AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth

Thought for the Day

"I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it."

--Pablo Picasso

Bush Losing His Base

In response to this WaPo article on Bush's falling popularity with Republicans, and the nation in general, Captain Queeg Ed tries to rationalize this lack of support by attempting to pain Bush as the anti-Conservative.

This all follows the new meme sprouting up that Bush is actually a {shudder} Liberal (ahhh, run away!). From some of the commenters, it appears that Bush's base, will not accept that fact. It all points to, what has to be unsettling, reality, that the Conservative blogosphere is losing its influence. For if they cannot convince their readers that what they say is right, then what do they have left?

I Fought the Law

and the law won:

An investigation by the Justice Department ethics office into the conduct of department lawyers who approved the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program has been closed because investigators were denied security clearances, according to a letter sent to Congress on Wednesday.

The head of the department's Office of Professional Responsibility, H. Marshall Jarrett, wrote in the letter to Representative Maurice D. Hinchey, Democrat of New York, that "we have been unable to make meaningful progress in our investigation because O.P.R. has been denied security clearances for access to information about the N.S.A. program."

Mr. Jarrett said his office had requested clearances since January, when it began an investigation, and was told on Tuesday that they had been denied. "Without these clearances, we cannot investigate this matter and therefore have closed our investigation," the letter said.

Nice.

Without a doubt this program is illegal, so to prevent a proper investigation, the Federal Government denies the very agency tasked to investigate ethical breaches, the clearances necessary to conduct its investigation.

Mark Kleiman adds sheds some more light:

There are two criteria for granting someone clearance for access to any particular body of classified material: suitability, and need to know. Suitability has to do with the potential recipient's reliability in terms of keeping secrets secret. Need to know has to do with the purpose for which the information is sought. If someone has been issued a clearance showing his suitability at a given level (Confidential, Secret, or Top Secret) then the remaining question is merely whether he has sufficient need to know the information to justify the risk of sharing it with him.

Of course OPM investigators have all been through rigorous background checks. Suitability shouldn't have been an issue. Even if further investigation showed that one or more of the OPM personnel proposed for access had previously undiscovered security risks associated with them, that would justify excluding only them, not their while agency.

So this decision could only have been made on the basis of "need to know." Since the program in question was an NSA program, presumably the decision on access would have been made within the NSA. So in effect the NSA has decided that the public interest would not be served by having the means by which its program was approved reviewed by an independent set of investigators.

Now couple that with Bobby Ray Inman's flat declaration that the warrantless-wiretapping program "was not authorized" by law, and what you have isn't a security decision: it's a coverup.

Too true.

Technorati Tags: NSA, Domestic Spying, Justice Department

Yet Another GOP Washington Post Hit Piece on the DNC

Because the Washington Post can't let the fact that Bush and the Republican Party is truly unpopular go unchallenged. From page A01:

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean and the leader of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee have clashed angrily in recent days in a dispute about how the party should spend its money in advance of this fall's midterm elections.

Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), who is leading the party's effort to regain majority status in the House, stormed out of Dean's office several days ago leaving a trail of expletives, according to Democrats familiar with the session.

The blowup highlights a long-standing tension that has pitted Democratic congressional leaders, who are focused on their best opportunities for electoral gains this fall, against Dean and many state party chairmen, who believe that the party needs to be rebuilt from the ground up -- even in states that have traditionally been Republican strongholds.

First off, this reads like a tabloid. I am willing to bet that the events did not go down as written, but "an insider" told Mr. Edsall that it did.

Secondly, this is just a rehash of all the other WaPo hit pieces against Dean and the DNC that they have been running off and on for the past 5 months.

A while back, I raised the hackles of Howard Kurtz, because I dared to suggest that the Washington Post is a mouthpiece for the GOP. With the continuous articles that suggest that the Democratic Party is "falling apart", or "engaged in verbal warfare", or having "long-standing tensions" between "various factions" within the Democratic Party, what exactly was we to conclude?

As to the so-called substance of the article. There are two schools of thought as to how the party money is to be spent. However, if you look at the RNC, they spend their money in the same manner that Dean is spending DNC money. Emanuel and others want to focus on the "swing states", or what they deem important races. Dean wants to focus on all 50 states. I would like to see the DNC continue to focus on all 50 states.

As Oliver Willis says, what do these insiders who are leaking these stories, which the WaPo runs with, think they are getting? Do they think that enough people trust the Washington Post enough to have Dean ousted?

Technorati Tags: Howard Dean, Rahm Emanuel, DNC, Washington Post

NSA Data Collection Didn't Stop at AT&T

Wow, who'd a thunk it!

Except for Qwest Communications, every major telecom company has been wholesale collecting all Americans telephone call records:

The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.

The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren't suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews.

The main distinction between this program and the domestic spying that the NSA is involved in, is that this program supposedly only tracked your calls, not listening in. However, who can believe anything that the Bush administration says anymore.

Qwest, fought the NSA on allowing them access into their customer records:

Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest's lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused.

The NSA's explanation did little to satisfy Qwest's lawyers. "They told (Qwest) they didn't want to do that because FISA might not agree with them," one person recalled. For similar reasons, this person said, NSA rejected Qwest's suggestion of getting a letter of authorization from the U.S. attorney general's office. A second person confirmed this version of events.

The NSA pursued this program, unwilling to get a FISA Court Warrant, because the FISA Court might not agree with them?

Too bad!

The FISA Courts responsibility is to ensure that the Federal Government does not overstep its authority in secret operations. What is wrong with that?


Technorati Tags: NSA, Domestic Spying, AT&T, Verizon, BellSouth, Qwest

Geek Chic

As a computer geek, with years of prior experience with old SGI (Silicon Graphics, Inc.) computer equipment, I worked on the Challenge server platform.

I always noticed that it was the right size for a fridge. And better yet a fridge disguised as a computer, so you could keep your bevvies cold, while not tipping off your manager to the cold ones you kept stashed at work.

It seems that I wasn't the only one that felt that way




Technorati Tags: SGI, Fridge

The Oops Factor

It appears that bit of bragging that Alphonso Jackson did, has had some unintended consequences.

It seems that HUD may have some peripheral connection to Shirlington Limo, the limo company at the heart of the Hooker scandal.

As Matt said, this is getting very very interesting.

Technorati Tags: Alphonso Jackson, HUD, Shirlington Limo, Hookers

Conservative Nanny State

Courtesy of Max Sawicky we are pointed to an e-book by Dean Baker called The Conservative Nanny State: How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer:

In his new book, economist Dean Baker debunks the myth that conservatives favor the market over government intervention. In fact, conservatives rely on a range of “nanny state” policies that ensure the rich get richer while leaving most Americans worse off. It’s time for the rules to change. Sound economic policy should harness the market in ways that produce desirable social outcomes – decent wages, good jobs and affordable health care.

I just downloaded it. Looks like an interesting read.


Technorati Tags: Conservative Nanny State, Dean Baker

Thought for the Day

"People everywhere confuse what they read in newspapers with news."

--A. J. Liebling

Worlds Largest?

The University of Texas has a lot of things. From a Gutenberg Bible, to the LBJ archives, the first photograph, the Norman Mailer archives, and many more.

Now, UT will host (at least for now) the worlds largest High Definition display:

At 7,370 square feet, the 134-foot by 55-foot 'board being built for the school by Daktronics (who also manufactured the Miami display) has a slightly larger screen area than the current 7000-sqaure-foot title-holder, but nitpickers may argue that since the UT model will be almost a foot shorter diagonally, that it doesn't qualify as the "world's biggest." The argument may turn out to be moot, though, as a horse track in Tokyo is supposedly planning to install a ridiculous 197-foot-wide monster of a screen later this year that will overshadow all who came before it. UT's project comes as part of a multi-million dollar overhaul of their stadium, which will also include several other large displays, a new sound system, and a $150 million renovation of the north end zone meant to enable a 90,000 person capacity.

Who says things aren't bigger in Texas?


Technorati Tags: HDTV, UT, Longhorns, Texas, DKR Memorial Stadium

Heckuva Job Brownie

back in the news:

Hours after Hurricane Katrina hit, former FEMA director Michael Brown dismissed reports that floodwaters had breached New Orleans' levees, and he obsessed over media coverage of his agency, according to newly released e-mails.

The 928 pages of documents, obtained by the Center for Public Integrity watchdog group and released Tuesday, paint a picture of a Federal Emergency Management Agency keenly sensitive to public image following the Aug. 29, 2005, storm.

The rehabilitation of his image, via the testimony he gave before the Senate, was all a sham. Well, the media bought into it anyway.

However, it is comforting to know that Brownie really was as incomptetent as everyone thought.

However, it would be impolite to point out that Brownie was more interested in ensuring his hair was coiffed perfectly before his multitude of television interviews, than he was in the condition of the levees in New Orleans.

So I wont.

Technorati Tags: Katrina, Michael Brown, New Orleans, FEMA

The Secrecy President

Maintains security so well, that the trash man knows his plans:

How much do you think Osama bin Laden would pay to know exactly when and where the President was traveling, and who was with him? Turns out, he wouldn't have had to pay a dime. All he had to do was go through the trash early Tuesday morning.

It appears to be a White House staff schedule for the President's trip to Florida Tuesday. And a sanitation worker was alarmed to find in the trash long hours before Mr. Bush left for his trip.

It's the kind of thing you would expect would be shredded or burned, not thrown in the garbage. Randy Hopkins could not believe what he was seeing.

There on the floor next to a big trash truck was a thick sheaf of papers with nearly every detail of the President's voyage.

And to think, we are worried about border security, and wiretapping terrorists.

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Security

At This Price

Implementing the Koyoto Treaty would have been a bargain:

For the United States, the cost of the Iraq war will soon exceed the anticipated cost of the Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement designed to control greenhouse gases. For both, the cost is somewhere in excess of $300 billion.

These numbers show that the Bush administration was unrealistically optimistic in its prewar prediction that the total cost would be about $50 billion.

[...]

With respect to the Iraq war, careful estimates come from Scott Wallsten, a former member of the President's Council of Economic Advisers who is now at the American Enterprise Institute. Writing at the end of 2005, Wallsten estimated the aggregate American cost at about $300 billion. With the costs incurred since then, and an anticipated appropriation soon, the total will exceed $350 billion.

What would have implementing the Kyoto Treaty have cost?

With respect to the Kyoto Protocol, the most systematic estimates come from William Nordhaus and Joseph Boyer of Yale University. Writing in 2000, they offered a figure of $325 billion for the United States, designed to capture the full costs of compliance over many decades. This staggeringly large figure helped support Kyoto skeptics in the Bush administration and elsewhere, who argued that the benefits of the agreement did not justify its costs.

Quite a trade off there.

Engaging our military for an indefinite period of time, in a war of choice, with an as yet unknown total casualty rate, and ruining Americas reputation across the world.

Versus

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions in an effort to clean up the environment.

That's fair.



Note for the sarcasm impaired: That last line was sarcasm.

Technorati Tags: Kyoto Treaty, Iraq War, Costs

Democrats Need to do More

than just hit Republicans on one issue:

Moderate Democrats led by two potential 2008 White House contenders, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, urged the party on Tuesday to challenge Republicans on security issues and prove it can do a better job.

Democrats should embrace a security debate with President George W. Bush, who they said had been a failure in fighting terrorism, conducting the Iraq war and containing Iran and North Korea's nuclear ambitions.

"We can defeat Republicans on their own ground," said Bayh, a former Indiana governor who has called for a more muscular Democratic foreign policy approach. "They have been a lot better at national security politics than policy."

It is great that a few Democrats are starting to speak up, but the American people need more.

National Security is just one of any number of issues that Democrats should be hitting Republicans with. There are domestic issues galore, which Americans actually care about even more than foreign policy. There are plenty of foreign policy issues as well, not the least of which is attempting to restore America's image in the eyes of the rest of the world.

In short, don't stop with one issue. Hit Republicans from all sides.

Daou on the "Angry Left"

There is a reason Peter Daou, and not I, is one that many people read:

Maintaining a healthy conscience, allowing ourselves to react with appropriate emotion (whether anger or frustration or relief) is an essential trait in the face of the apathy we've seen the past six years. With all their dripping disdain for bloggers, folks like Richard Cohen and his ilk owe the netroots a debt of gratitude for helping to preserve some shred of the America we all love -- their children and grandchildren will certainly appreciate it.

This is just the last paragraph of his post at HuffPo. But it sums up exactly what people like Richard Cohen, Joe Klein, and the rest of the whiny beltway media elite have been getting from bloggers, and other individuals in response to their ignorant responses to the anger out here in netroots land.

People are getting fed up. Not only with the Republican over-reach and the scandal plague that has infested Washington, they are fed up with the way in which the media as been giving it, and bloggers the silent treatment. Time after time, on this blog, and hundreds thousands of others all across the blogosphere (Left and Right) the misdeeds of the past 6 years have been documented, analyzed, raged against, and argued ad nauseum. The media has, for the most part, ignored bloggers and their message, or like Cohen and others, dismissed them as trite, or angry, or "out of touch" with Washington, or ...

We are all sick of it. So when Cohen gets deluged with a few hundred or even a couple of thousand emails, and the majority of them take him to task for what he writes, what does he do? I'll give you one guess.

Rather than adress the substance of the bulk of those, sometimes profanity laced, emails, he lashes out. Like a 5 year old child who is told, for the fifth time that, no you cannot have candy before dinner, Cohen starts name calling.

There is a saying, that I am sure most, if not all of you have heard. "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me". To the Beltway media elite, the words evidently do hurt.



Technorati Tags: Richard Cohen, Peter Daou, WATB

Thought for the Day

"Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will have to ram it down their throats."

--Howard Aiken

The Content of your Character

When it comes to Bush cronies, that content is bad and vindictive:

That's the message U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson seemed to send during an April 28 talk in Dallas. Jackson, a former president and CEO of the Dallas Housing Authority, was among the featured speakers at a forum sponsored by the Real Estate Executive Council, a national minority real estate consortium. After discussing the huge strides the agency has made in doing business with minority-owned companies, Jackson closed with a cautionary tale, relaying a conversation he had with a prospective advertising contractor. 'He had made every effort to get a contract with HUD for 10 years,' Jackson said of the prospective contractor. 'He made a heck of a proposal and was on the (General Services Administration) list, so we selected him. He came to see me and thank me for selecting him. Then he said something ... he said, 'I have a problem with your president.' 'I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'I don't like President Bush.' I thought to myself, 'Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected. You wouldn't be getting the contract unless I was sitting here. If you have a problem with the president, don't tell the secretary. He didn't get the contract,' Jackson continued. 'Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president?'"

Why?

Because HUD does not get to use allegiance to the President as a qualification for assistance.

Jackson doesn't need to resign, he needs to be fired, and never given another job again.


Thanks to Atrios for this appalling link.


Technorati Tags: HUD, Alphonso Jackson, Loyalty Oath, Cronyism

Something to be Proud of?

I don't think so:

America may be the world's superpower, but its survival rate for newborn babies ranks near the bottom among modern nations, better only than Latvia.

Among 33 industrialized nations, the United States is tied with Hungary, Malta, Poland and Slovakia with a death rate of nearly 5 per 1,000 babies, according to a new report. Latvia's rate is 6 per 1,000.

"We are the wealthiest country in the world, but there are still pockets of our population who are not getting the health care they need," said Mary Beth Powers, a reproductive health adviser for the U.S.-based Save the Children, which compiled the rankings based on health data from countries and agencies worldwide.

People like to say that the United States has the best health care system in the world.

Yet it is statistics like this that state otherwise.

Technorati Tags: Infant Mortality, Healthcare

Richard Cohen on the Angry Left

Because the left is vile, foul mouthed cretins:

But the message in this case truly is the medium. The e-mails pulse in my queue, emanating raw hatred. This spells trouble -- not for Bush or, in 2008, the next GOP presidential candidate, but for Democrats. The anger festering on the Democratic left will be taken out on the Democratic middle. (Watch out, Hillary!) I have seen this anger before -- back in the Vietnam War era. That's when the antiwar wing of the Democratic Party helped elect Richard Nixon. In this way, they managed to prolong the very war they so hated.

I have two suggestions for Richard Cohen

1. Get a better email client. If you recognize the email addresses of those who are particularly offensive, filter the emails to another folder. Even Thunderbird has filtering capabilities. And a spam filter too.
2. Get a thicker skin. The internet has a lot of people saying things that people find offensive. Additionally, add in the remoteness and relative ease of firing off an email, and you have people who wouldn't otherwise be rude to your face, who can write the most offensive things. Get over it.

There is this new propensity for certain columnists, and even some bloggers to decry the "lack of civility of the angry left". It is really a sad thing to watch. When someone is sitting behind a computer, it is all too easy to go too far when criticizing the writing of someone else. Especially from the left, where there is alot to be angry about (domestic spying, curtailing of Civil Liberties, etc.). The real challenge is not in being offensive, but in being not offensive.

Richard Cohen needs to understand that. And grow up.


Technorati Tags: Richard Cohen, Angry Left

Another One Down

This time, Kyle "Dusty" Foggo:

His departure follows Goss' hasty resignation Friday, which some reports have linked to the broadening bribe probe centered on disgraced former California GOP Congressman Randall "Duke" Cunningham.

The White House denied that Friday. "It is simply not true that (Goss') resignation is in anyway connected with the Cunningham case," White House spokeswoman Erin Healy told UPI.

Last year, Cunningham pled guilty to taking $2.4 million worth of bribes from two defense contractors in return for steering military intelligence work their way. One of those men, Brent Wilkes, still as yet facing no charges himself, also had at least one contract with the CIA, which is now being probed by the agency's inspector general because of his decades-long friendship with Foggo.

Foggo has confirmed through the CIA's office of public affairs that he attended parties at the Watergate hotel suites maintain by Wilkes -- which federal investigators reportedly believe were also used to provide prostitutes to Cunningham and other members of Congress as part of Wilkes' corrupt enterprise.

Of course the administration is trying to spin it away.

Technorati Tags: Kyle Foggo, Randy Cunningham, Porter Goss, CIA, Hookers

Voting Against Self-Interest

Why the middle-class and poor Americans vote for the Republican party, is beyond me:

Republican lawmakers, facing the prospect that their power to cut taxes may soon be curbed, plan to extend breaks that mostly benefit the wealthy and Wall Street at the expense of reductions for middle-income households.

Six months before elections that may return a Democratic majority in at least one house of Congress, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee and House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois are focusing on extending the 15 percent rate on investments and repealing the estate tax. They won't push extensions of lower rates for all taxpayers and expanded breaks for married couples and families with children, which expire after 2010.

``In politics, timing is everything; you do what you can when you can, and this is what's queued up right now,'' says Arizona Senator Jon Kyl, the No. 4 Republican in the Senate. Given the federal budget deficit, it would ``be hard to generate public support overnight'' for making permanent the other tax cuts, he says.

Democrats say the Republicans are favoring tax breaks that do little for middle-income Americans; 50 percent of all U.S. households earn between $26,859 and $120,100, according to the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan research institution in Washington.

``Even in an election year where they are losing popularity nationwide, they've chosen to pander to their base of rich donors and leave the middle class behind,'' says Representative Charles Rangel of New York, the senior Democrat on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee.

That Republican economic policy favors the wealthy is no big story.

That they have dropped all pretense of trying to help poor and middle-class Americans is rather stunning. It seems to indicate that Republicans are ready to throw in the towel on 2006.

Technorati Tags: GOP, 2006, Elections, Taxes

Verizon Steps into Net Neutrality Fight

Of course on the side of AT&T, but with scare tactics:

Verizon Communications (VZ.N: Quote, Profile, Research) warned the financial services industry may not get the secure networks it needs if Congress adopts laws governing high-speed Internet broadband networks, according to a company memo obtained by Reuters on Monday.

The financial services industry is weighing whether to wade into a fight over legislation on broadband service, known as "Net neutrality." It fears that without safeguards on pricing for network access, the costs to financial institutions could rise.

Verizon, the No. 2 U.S. telephone company, opposes legislation for Net neutrality and sent the memo to its consultants urging them to discuss with banking industry clients the arguments against possible legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.

"They are being fed a lot of cock-and-bull, Chicken Little stories about how the future of their industry is at stake because another network industry might have the freedom to price broadband services according to market demand," Verizon's chief congressional lobbyist Peter Davidson said in the memo.

As this article subtly points out, there are services that Verizon wants to sell to the financial services sector, that are directly tied to network neutrality.

"Why in the world should broadband network providers, who have invested billions to create those networks, be denied such pricing freedom?" Davidson said.

The irony being that the success of the internet economy has been due to no such tiered access.

But, when talking about enhancing the bottom line, you don't dance with the one who brung ya'



Technorati Tags: Verizon, AT&T, Net Neutrality

GOP Panic Starts to Set In

How can it not, when Bush's approval hits 31%:

President Bush's approval rating has slumped to 31% in a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll, the lowest of his presidency and a warning sign for Republicans in the November elections.

The survey of 1,013 adults, taken Friday through Sunday, shows Bush's standing down by 3 percentage points in a single week. His disapproval rating also reached a record: 65%. The margin of error is +/- 3 percentage points.

It really has GOP Bloggers going:

So, their agenda is to destroy jobs, dismantle a prescription drug law that has helped seniors save lots of money, and raise taxes. One can only assume their "homeland security measures" include not wiretapping terrorists, and focus more protecting the civil liberties of the terrorists, rather than the lives of Americans... Real good plan. In addition to their big plan to screw this country up, their plan includes attacking Bush.

How do Democrats plan on enacting this agenda of destruction?

• Raising the minimum wage
• Fixing Bush's prescription drug fiasco
• Rolling back the deficit creating tax cuts
• Stopping the illegal domestic spying program
• Respecting civil liberties
• And the most egregious of plans, stopping and investigating the corruption and wrongdoing that Bush and the Republicans endorse

Quelle Horrible!



Technorati Tags: George Bush, GOP, GOP Bloggers, Approval, DNC, Elections, 2006

Thought for the Day

"Realism...has no more to do with reality than anything else."

--Hob Broun

Hayden Linked to Cunningham

Sometimes I have a hard time believing that this is the real world, and not a fiction:

While director of the National Security Agency, Gen. Michael V. Hayden contracted the services of a top executive at the company at the center of the Cunningham bribery scandal, according to two former employees of the company.

Hayden, President Bush's pick to replace Porter Goss as head of the CIA, contracted with MZM Inc. for the services of Lt. Gen. James C. King, then a senior vice president of the company, the sources say. MZM was owned and operated by Mitchell Wade, who has admitted to bribing former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham with $1.4 million in money and gifts. Wade has also reportedly told investigators he helped arrange for prostitutes to entertain the disgraced lawmaker, and he continues to cooperate with a federal inquiry into the matter.

It seems that everyone connected to Bush, is corrupt.


Technorati Tags: MZM, Michael Hayden, Randy Cunningham, Mitchell Wade, James King, CIA

Press the Meat

More than a few people have been making hay over the performance of Pumpkinhead Russert on Press the Meat this past Sunday.

First off, I need to start with a comment about Nancy Pelosi's performance. She was in over her head, or at least that is the impression I got from her wide-eyed, deer in the headlights expression she had all too often. For being the head of the Democratic House Caucus, she was far too unprepared for the fact that Russert would throw GOP talking points at her from the outset, and in defending her Democratic colleagues.

When Russert expressed concern that a Democratic majority would, horror of horrors, investigate the wrongdoings of Bush, his administration and the Republican party, she froze. When Russert all but demanded that she shut John Conyers site down, she waffled with the "John Conyers will do what he wants" line. Even more egregious, when Russert tried to link Abramoff to Democrats, she didn't even respond!

The fact is, that Pelosi should have been a) prepared for Russert's hostility towards her, b) forcefully corrected Russert's misinformation attacks against her, and c) gone on the offensive and demanded to know why Russert feels that investigating wrongdoings is bad.

Second, if there was any remaining doubt about Russert's complicity in enabling the Republican party, Sunday's performance should have ended that. Unlike Republican and Conservative guests, Pelosi was asked hard questions, with hard followups. Russert spun GOP talking points so smoothly and effortlessly, that it was as if he wrote them himself. Russert also advanced the meme that investigating the President and the Republican party is more damaging to America, and more dangerous to America than terrorism.

The Bush administration has made National Security a low priority item, despite their rhetoric. From the Dubai ports deal, to screening cargo, to port security, to ... This adminstration is all talk and no action (except when it comes to curbing Constitutional rights and civil liberties). Russert knows this, and tacitly approves.

Technorati Tags: Tim Russert, Nancy Pelosi, Meet the Press, GOP

The Sad, Pathetic State of the Republican Party

George Bush is now a Liberal?

That has a kind of familiar ring to it doesn't it? Get used to this new permutation of a very old trope. It's about to enter the lexicon. Predictably, like the Trotskyites about whom the fathers of the modern conservative movement obsessed, (and the fathers of the neocons were) the modern conservatives are reaching the point at which that sad rationalization is all they have to hang on to.

There is a very interesting discussion taking place all over the left blogosphere about how the conservatives have discovered that the entire Republican establishment, particularly the George W. Bush administration, are liberals. Glenn Greenwald has been directly taking on Jonah Goldberg on this subject (which is something like my cat "taking on" his toy mouse), Hunter at DKos has written a lengthy and fascinating explication of the process, and Kevin Drum, in a different vein, discusses political Lysenkoism as the consequence of conservative loyalty over policy.

Typical Republican belief structure. When things don't go right, it is obviously somone elses fault.

George Bush's Conservative ideals are, by most objective measures, a total failure. So rather than do an honest self-examination of why Bush and his brand of Conservativtism, adopted by Republicans everywhere, has been such a failure, Jonah Goldberg and his ilk try to label Bush an evil Liberal.

If that were the case, then that makes Republicans of all stripes the most gullible people in the world. Republicans have been touting Bush, and his cronies in the administration, and in Congress as the saviours of the Republican Movement. And now they want us to believe that every single one of them have been duped?

That is really just sad and pathetic.


Technorati Tags: Republican Movement, Jonah Goldberg, Failure, GOP

Thought for the Day

"Well, if I called the wrong number, why did you answer the phone?"

--James Thurber

Cunningham/Wilkes Hooker Scandal

Today the NY Times wades into the hooker/poker/limo scandal that seems to be engulfing Washington now:

The inspector general of the Central Intelligence Agency, the agency says, is conducting an inquiry into Kyle Foggo, its executive director, who said this week that he attended some of the parties over the years.

Mr. Foggo, the C.I.A.'s third-ranking official, is a longtime friend of Brent R. Wilkes, one of the military contractors whose role is described in the indictment against Mr. Cunningham. Mr. Wilkes has not been charged, and his lawyer did not return calls on Friday.

Mr. Wilkes is a business associate of Mitchell Wade, a military contractor who pleaded guilty in February to providing more than $1 million in bribes to Mr. Cunningham. Mr. Wade's lawyer declined Friday to discuss his client's role in the investigation.

Names are being named, and with the sudden resignation of Porter Goss, it looks like the news media is finally recognizing that this is something big.

However, with the article below, from the Washington Post, it is probably fueled by a bit of "blood in the water" syndrome.



Technorati Tags: Cunningham, Wilkes, Foggo, Wade, Goss, Republican Hookers

It's Hard Out There for a Bush

For all intents and purposes, the failure that has been the Bush administration is dead in the water:

The recent White House shake-up was an attempt to jump-start the administration and boost President Bush's rock-bottom approval ratings, but have those efforts come too late to salvage the presidency? A prominent GOP pollster thinks that may be the case.

"This administration may be over," Lance Tarrance, a chief architect of the Republicans' 1960s and '70s Southern strategy, told a gathering of journalists and political wonks last week. "By and large, if you want to be tough about it, the relevancy of this administration on policy may be over."

I want to feel bad that Bush is such a failure, that 2 years out, he is finished.

But I don't



Technorati Tags: George Bush, Failure

Thought for the Day

"Sanity is a madness put to good use."

--George Santayana

More Political Hacks in Sensitive Positions

The replacement for Porter Goss?

Gen. Michael Hayden:

Gen. Michael Hayden refused to answer question about spying on political enemies at National Press Club. At a public appearance, Bush’s pointman in the Office of National Intelligence was asked if the NSA was wiretapping Bush’s political enemies. When Hayden dodged the question, the questioner repeated, "No, I asked, are you targeting us and people who politically oppose the Bush government, the Bush administration? Not a fishing net, but are you targeting specifically political opponents of the Bush administration?" Hayden looked at the questioner, and after a silence called on a different questioner. (Hayden National Press Club remarks, 1/23/06)

My prediction is that the media will either call him supremely qualified, or that Bush made a "bold choice".

The only thing that is guaranteed, is that this will further enable Rumsfeld to destroy the CIA, and get his own DIA promoted as the primary intelligence agency. That and keep spying on Americans illegally.

Political hackery at its finest.


Technorati Tags: Porter Goss, Michael Hayden, CIA

Note to Spineless Democrats

What Oliver said.


Technorati Tags: Democrats, 2006, Elections, Porter Goss, Michael Hayden

Porter Goss News

Some more details surrounding the resignation of Porter Goss.

The official line, so far, is that Goss was clashing with Negroponte. Even going so far as to accuse Negroponte of damaging Goss' reputation in the eyes of Bush.

However, one bit of information that is related to the Bribery/Hooker scandal came from Kyle 'Dusty' Foggo, Executive Director of the CIA:

After Goss's announcement yesterday, Foggo told colleagues that he will resign next week.

It is apparent that there is more to this story than Dafna Linzer and Walter Pincus have revealed in this article. However it will probably take a little time for that information to come out.

The next few weeks should be rather interesting, to say the least.


Technorati Tags: Porter Goss, John Negroponte, Kyle Foggo, Republican Hookers, Randy Cunningham

Right Wing Wankfest

If there is one thing that people like Glenn Reynolds, Charles Johnson and their ilk are very good at, it's sliming people who disagree with them. They will latch onto anything, no matter how petty or ridiculous, and hold it up as proof that this person is the most evil person ever to have walked the earth.

Witness the attacks on retired CIA analyst Ray McGovern.

For those that aren't familiar with Ray McGovern, he was the person who challenged Donald Rumsfeld on his lies and exaggerations surrounding the WMD's in Iraq.

Let's go to Greenwald:

Today, Glenn "Instapundit" Reynolds praises and links to an investigation into McGovern's "background" which was undertaken by The Gateway Pundit. Reynolds asks: "Why don't the Big Media do this kind of thing?"

What is it that Gateway Pundit's investigation revealed about McGovern that prompted Reynolds' admiration, along with his lament that "Big Media" failed to issue a similar report? To begin with, in the headlines of Gateway Pundit's post, we learn right away that McGovern is a"nutjob," as in: "Nutjob Ray McGovern Heckles Rummy."

But that revelation is just the beginning. Gateway Pundit also informs us that McGovern is a "certified nutcase" who "has a trail of lunatic behavior a mile long." G.P. also uncovered evidence conclusively demonstrating that McGovern is a "moonbat." I agree with Instapundit- what right does the MSM have to keep this important information from us?

This "background investigation" revealed that McGovern shares the same opinion of approximately 60% of Americans. He is against the Great Iraqi Adventure.

This excercise gives us a small peek into the twisted world of those that continue to support George Bush.

These people see conspiracy everywhere.

It is right up there on par with the black helicopter types from the Clinton era. Probably many of the same people as well. Today the conspiracy is the evil anti-semitic, liberal, hate America firsters.

Because McGovern dared to stand up to the liars who are in charge, he is a part of some secret cabal out to destroy George W. Bush. And George W. Bush is more important than America to these people.

Technorati Tags: Glenn Greenwald, Glenn Reynolds, Charles Johnson, Little Green Footballs, Instapundit, Ray McGovern, George Bush, Gateway Pundit

Economy Hurting the Email Scam Business

Received in my email just now:

Goodday Sir/Madam,

I am pleased to introduce a business opportunity that will be beneficial to both you and me. It involves transferring to your overseas account the sum of ($7.5;US Dollars) Seven Thousand, Five Hundred Dollars, from one of the Fidelity Finance & Security Company here in Dakar-Senegal.

I am Jamil A. Troure the Auditor General in the Fidelity finance & Security Company here in Dakar Senegal west Africa, During the course of our auditing , I discovered a floating fund in an account opened since 1982 and till date no body has operated or filed papers to claim the fund.

After going through the records I discovered that the owner of the account, Engr. Mahmoud Al-Salem Shafiq an Iraqi oil merchant, died in the month of October 2005 in an auto crash. Since there was not infomation concerning additional members of his family, next of kin or known relation, the fund has been declared floating and if nobody comes forward for it, will be forfeited to the government.

Since I hardly know any foreigner,I am only contacting you as a foreigner to stand and apply as his next of kin because this money can not be approved to a local person here as his next of kin.

I need your full co-operation to make this work fine because the management is ready to approve this payment to any foreigner who has correct information of this account, which I will give to you upon your positive response and once I am convinced of your capability and assurance that you will never never let me down.

At the conclussion of this project ,we may proceed into an investment as equal partners with you in charge, pending my resignation from the company, but method of sharing profit should be based on 15% for you and rest for me and my colleague.

Regarding moral justification of the fund ,i wouldn't want you to consider it sinful. If you had being the victim ,Certainly you wouldn't be happy having your hard earned fund shared among government as an unclaimed deposit I believe they are many other aspects of life we may contribute with this fund to help the less priveledged and the needy in our society .

Furnish me with your direct telephone & Fax number for easy comminucation and please reply to me on this emails:

Only $7,500?

Come on, I won't give you my bank account number for anything less than $1 Million.

Springtime in Texas

Wild (reg req'd):

More storms could be on the way Friday afternoon, according to KVUE Storm Team Meteorologist Mark Murray.

The National Weather Service placed most of Central Texas under a flash flood watch until 7 a.m. Saturday. More storms were expected to begin developing Friday afternoon.

"There's a moderate to severe risk west of us... a slight risk here in the Austin-area," he said.

Murray said any storms that develop Friday may not be as bad in Austin as they were Thursday night. But a line of storms could form just to the east of Austin and continue moving southeast.

Thurday's storms caused significant damage in Central Texas and left thousands of customers without power.

At the storm's peak, more than 52,000 Austin Energy customers were left without electricity.

About 16,000 remained without power at midday Friday. Austin Energy estimated repairs were needed at more than 400 locations. They had 30 crews and 19 tree trimming crews out across the area.

Barton Hills and Lee Elementary, as well as McCallum High School, are closed because of power outages.

A friend, part of my Friday lunch group, had to leave early to go get a very large branch off of his house from the storms last night.

Brace yourself for more.


And I bet you thought this was going to be a picture thread.

Technorati Tags: Central Texas, Spring

More on Goss' Resignation

Josh Marshall has some rather interesting info on the Cunningham/Wilkes Hooker/Bribery scandal which appears to be bubbling up to the surface today:

The hookers in Hookergate are, of course, the sizzle. But there's a bigger story. It stems directly from the Randy "Duke" Cunningham bribery scandal, which many had figured was over. But it's not. You may have noticed that while Duke Cunningham is already in jail and Mitchell Wade has already pled guilty to multiple charges, Brent Wilkes has never been touched. Wilkes is the ur-briber at the heart of the Cunningham scandal, you can see pretty clearly by reading the other indictments and plea agreements. Wade was Wilkes' protege.

Now, on the surface one might surmise that the prosecutors are just taking their time, putting together their best case.

I hear different.

Wilkes has deep ties into the CIA. The focal point of those ties is to Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the man Porter Goss appointed to the #3 position at CIA when he took over the Agency last year. Remember, Wilkes' scam was getting corrupt contracts deep in the 'black' world of intelligence and defense appropriations, where there's little or no oversight. Foggo was in the contracting and procurement field at the CIA. So you can see how he and Wilkes, who have been friends since high school, had plenty to talk about

The timing is rather convenient, notwithstanding the willingness of Bush to stand alongside Goss to announce his resignation.

There appear to be connections between Goss and the Cunningham/Wilkes scandal that have not been fully realized at this point. Perhaps the article that Dana Priest of the Washington Post has promised will make those connections.

Goss himself is giving no hints.

Technorati Tags: Porter Goss, Brent Wilkes, Randy Cunningham, Republican Hookers, Mitchell Wade

Ending the Speculation

On two things.

First Rep. Patrick Kennedy to seek treatment for an addiction to prescription pain medication. Hopefully that will end the "was he drunk" speculation the media has been on.

Second, from Atrios tomorrows Washington Post is promising the real reason Porter Goss suddenly resigned as CIA director.

Technorati Tags: Patrick Kennedy, Porter Goss

Thought for the Day

"Progress isn't made by early risers. It's made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something."

--Robert Heinlein

While the Cat's Away ...

I go off with my usual Friday lunch group, and what happens?

CIA Director Porter Goss resigns.

Maybe the Hooker scandal hit a bit too close to home?

Technorati Tags: Republican Hookers, Porter Goss

Enjoy the Silence?

Josh asks a a very relavent question regarding the seemingly excessive coverage of the Kennedy incident, and the lack of coverage of the hooker scandal:

So, we're on the Kennedy case. But why the silence on the much bigger scandal bubbling up out of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee?

My theory is the same that many others have. Kennedy is a Democrat, and those who were doing hookers with taxpayer money are Republicans.

This was made really evident when Miles O'Brien on CNN this morning said:

See how he [Patrick Kennedy] is parsing his words.

What words was Kennedy parsing?

I did not ask for special treatment, and I am cooperating with the investigation.

Technorati Tags: Patrick Kennedy, Republican Hookers

Falling, Falling

33%:

- Just 33 percent of the public approves of Bush's job performance, the lowest of his presidency. That compares with 36 percent approval in early April. Forty-five percent of self-described conservatives now disapprove of the president.

- Just one-fourth of the public approves of the job Congress is doing, a new low in AP-Ipsos polling and down 5 percentage points since last month. A whopping 65 percent of conservatives disapprove of Congress.

- A majority of Americans say they want Democrats rather than Republicans to control Congress (51 percent to 34 percent). That's the largest gap recorded by AP-Ipsos since Bush took office. Even 31 percent of conservatives want Republicans out of power.

Ooof. That's got to hurt.

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Poll

USA Today Founder Goes for Jugular

And he's a Republican:

How low can Bush's approval rating go? My hunch is it's at or near the bottom. That 34% represents mostly unshakeable far-right wingers. Like Bush, Vice President Cheney and company, they are in denial. As were the 24% in the polls who still approved of President Richard Nixon before he resigned in disgrace.

What happened to the 37% who have switched from pro-Bush to anti-Bush? They finally realized they were suckered by Bush and his buddies back then about Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction, his tie to terrorists and his threat to the USA.

President Abraham Lincoln was right when he said: "You may fool all of the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time."

Technorati Tags: USA Today, Al Neuharth

Kennedy and the Swarming Media

I am watching CNN, and talking head Dana Bash is working very hard to linke Kennedy to alcohol. Nevermind that his office issued a statement about what happened. The news media is so desparate to "get a Democrat" that they will latch onto everything.

*sigh*

Now Dana Bash is pushing the meme that the alcohol angle was brought up by Kennedy, and not Wolf Blitzer earlier today, or every news reader who was covering this story.

Technorati Tags: CNN, Whores

Grand Prix on DVD

After more than 7100 signatures on the online petition to get the move Grand Prix with James Garner released on DVD, Warner Home Video relented.

A 2-disc 40th Anniversary Edition DVD will be available 11 July.

To anyone who signed the petition, thanks.

You can place an advanced order at the link above or wait until it is available in July.

Technorati Tags: Grand Prix, James Garner

"The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated"

The New York Journal exposed the art of speaking too soon.

Panhandle Truth Squad shows us some more moments in speaking too soon.

Thanks to Capitol Annex for the link.

Technorati Tags: Mission Accomplished, Mark Twain

Thought for the Day

"I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."

--Douglas Adams

McCurry Just Doesn't Get It

Net Neutrality isn't a partisan issue, and no one is treating it such.

Net neutrality is about ensuring that everyone has a level playing field on the Internet.

AT&T is not interested in maintaining that level playing field. They are interested in improving their bottom line by charging for tiered access rates.

And, despite your insistence to the contrary, I am old enough to know who you are. What the age of the participants in this discussion are is irrelevant.

Technorati Tags: Mike McCurry, Net Neutrality, AT&T

Richard Cohen really is a Wanker

After reading today's anti-Colbert screed by Richard Cohen I really have to agree with Atrios and others.

Richard Cohen is deserving of the top prize in wankery.

Especially with this:

I am a funny guy. This is well known in certain circles, which is why, even back in elementary school, I was sometimes asked by the teacher to "say something funny"

Nothing worse than a self-important wanker.

Technorati Tags: Richard Cohen, Wanker

Hannity versus Phelps

It is a rare day that I agree with Sean Hannity, however, this interview with one of Fred Phelps' spawn is one of those days.

If there is any doubt that the Phelps family is batshit crazy, this should put it to rest.

Technorati Tags: Fred Phelps, Westboro Baptist Church

The Fallacy of the Faith Based

Time Gilroy properly explains what is wrong with today's Republican party:

It was under Reagan that the whole religious 'Great Awakening' began, which wasn't so much an embracing of religion as it was a repudiation of the social advances of the 60's, with Donald Wildmon peddling his pre-Focus on Family 'Promise Keepers,' (where men rule the household), Phyllis Schafly screaming equal rights for women undermines 'family values,' and Charles Schaar Murray declaring--with a straight face--blacks do worse in America simply because they're stupid. It was an awakening, all right.

Suddenly, the 'ostracized' religious right were 'rejoining' the national debate under the 'revolution' of faith---spearheaded by a president who rarely set foot in a church during his reign, lied regularly and outrageously to the public, and illegally funded nun-killing death-squads in Central America.

[...]

What the Reagan years really ushered in was the start of 'The Great Hypocrisy,' the GOP's twisting of religion to create a class of disgruntled zealots so blinded by hate they'd rush to vote into office the very thieves, liars and torturers who would not only screw them at every turn, but would decades later deliver George W. Bush to our doorstep with his Faith Based Everything.

And 'the national debate'---where is it? There is no debate, just ideologues screaming at each other to see whose one-dimensional faith-based sound byte can 'win'--nonsense like 'God Hates Fags' and Rick Santorum's equating homosexuality with bestiality.

It used to be that Christians were known to all by their good deeds, but after almost four decades of the GOP's cleaving the populace into warring sects to be manipulated at the polls, 'being Christian' is no longer defined by doing good deeds, it's defined by an arrogant mission to tell others how they must live---who they can marry, who they can adopt, what they can say in public, what they must teach in schools---all the way down to what kind of medicine they should have access to.

[...]

s it a coincidence that our most pro-faith president is also our biggest law-breaking president, presiding over our most scandalized administration in history? You tell me.

Is it coincidence that our pro-faith vice president has a gay daughter he'd prevent from adopting a child or marrying her lover, a great Christian whose wife converts from writing lesbian romance novels to ethics primers for kids in the blink of a presidential campaign, a soldier of Christ who tells a senator on the Senate floor to go fuck himself? You tell me.

[...]

This is why the Founding Fathers--Christians all--were smart enough to keep religion out of government. They knew the power appealing to a people's spirituality could have, that faith could be invoked while hiding great violations of it's very tenets, encouraging otherwise docile people to do and say despicable things, to hate each other, to threaten the very fabric of a progressive, democratic, rational society.

Ironically, what Bush, Rove and the rest of the Fourth Reich have shown us is that putting more religion into government doesn't make it more moral; what it does is allow every cut-rate thief, liar and hypocrite to hide behind the cloak of morality while committing immoral acts around the globe and at home that would shame any real person of faith.

It's not a coincidence that the most 'faith-based' government we've had in over a century is also the most corrupt, secretive, murderous, lying, and law breaking in history. In the name of 'reawakening' Christianity in government, Bush, et al, have shown us why it should be locked out. As soon as a politician starts quoting the Bible and going on about his faith, we should run him out of town.

Go read the whole thing. Gilroy says exactly what has been troubling me about this "faith based administration".

There is nothing Christian about it. Sure the President and his supporters profess the strength of their faith. Many people actually believe that the hatred they preach really is the teachings of God and Jesus.

They are lying to themselves.

As Gilroy starts out, May Day (1 May) is The International Day of the Worker. It is a day where most other western nations recognize the people who make their economic engines work. In the United States, however, it is just another day. In the US, we don't recognize the people at the bottom. We recognize the people at the top. Jesus was not known for throwing the poor out of the temples. Jesus did not care for the wealthy and powerful.

However, the Religious Right act as if that is what he preached.

Technorati Tags: Ronald Reagan, May Day, Christianity, Religious Right, Republican, GOP

Thought for the Day

"It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument."

--William G. McAdoo

Coincidence?

Oil plummets on surprise build in supplies:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - Oil prices fell Wednesday after a government report said gas and oil inventories rose unexpectedly.

U.S. light crude for June delivery fell $1.01 to 73.60 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Crude was trading down 16 cents just prior to the report, within striking distance of its all time trading high of $75.35 set April 21.

In its weekly stockpile report, the Energy Information Administration said crude supplies rose by 1.7 million barrels, while closely watched gasoline inventories swelled by 2.1 million barrels. Analysts were looking for a 100,000 barrel decline in crude and a 700,000 barrel drop in gasoline supplies, according to Reuters.

Only one day after Hastert's meeting with the ExxonMobil CEO?

Technorati Tags: Oil, Gas, Prices

Fuel to the Fire

Bite me anti-immigrant freaks:

"Yo prometo lealtad a la bandera
de los estados Unidos de America,
y a la Republica que representa,
una Nacion bajo Dios,
entera,
con libertad y justicia para todos."

---

"Ich gelobe Treue auf die Fahne der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika, auf die Republik, die eine Nation unter Gott ist, vereinigt durch Freiheit und Gerechtigkeit fur alle."

---

"J´engage ma fidelité au drapeau des États-Unis d´Amérique et à la République qu'il répresente, une nation sous Dieu, indivisible, avec liberté et justice pour tous."

Thanks to Dave Neiwert

New Orleans

Ignored by the news media, but not sportswriters.

There is no point in excerpting this. Go read the whole thing.

Technorati Tags: New Orleans, Sports Illustrated, Peter King

The Politics of Gas Prices

Dennis Hastert holds secret meeting with ExxonMobil CEO.

His office claims there was a press availability session afterwards.

I wonder what they really talked about.

Maybe gas prices going down until after the election?

Technorati Tags: Dennis Hastert, ExxonMobil, Gas, Oil

George Bush Then and Now

2000 Campaign:

When visiting cities like Chicago, Milwaukee, or Philadelphia, in pivotal states, he would drop in at Hispanic festivals and parties, sometimes joining in singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” in Spanish, sometimes partying with a “Viva Bush” mariachi band flown in from Texas.

18 January 2001:

The opening ceremony reflected that sentiment. A racially diverse string of famous and once famous performers entertained Bush, soon-to-be First Lady Laura Bush, Vice President-elect Richard B. Cheney and his wife, Lynne, who watched on stage from a special viewing area.

Pop star Jon Secada sang the national anthem in English and Spanish.

28 April 2006:

"I think the national anthem ought to be sung in English, and I think people who want to be a citizen of this country ought to learn English and they ought to learn to sing the national anthem in English."

Hypocrite or flip-flopper, you decide.

Technorati Tags: Nuestro Himno, Immigration, National Anthem, George Bush

Thought for the Day

"He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met."

--Abraham Lincoln

Net Neutrality Legislation

Via Atrios we are pointed to the first attempt to fight back against Joe Barton's anti-net neutrality action:

Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) threw down the gauntlet just moments ago, introducing the Network Neutrality Act of 2006 [full text HERE], which "[offers a] choice between favoring the broadband designs of a small handful of very large companies, and safeguarding the dreams of thousands of inventors, entrepreneurs, and small businesses. This legislation is designed to save the Internet and thwart those who seek to fundamentally and detrimentally alter the Internet as we know it."

However, unless Markey can get some significant Republican support, this will be largely a symbolic move.

However, I believe that with the support for protecting net neutrality coming from many different sectors, rounding up that support may be easier than normal for Democrats.

Hopefully those Democrats who feel it is OK to betray the democratic nature of the Internet will have a change of heart.

Technorati Tags: Ed Markey, Net Neutrality, Network Neutrality Act of 2006

NY Times on Net Neutrality

At least someone gets it:

One of the Internet's great strengths is that a single blogger or a small political group can inexpensively create a Web page that is just as accessible to the world as Microsoft's home page. But this democratic Internet would be in danger if the companies that deliver Internet service changed the rules so that Web sites that pay them money would be easily accessible, while little-guy sites would be harder to access, and slower to navigate. Providers could also block access to sites they do not like.

That would be a financial windfall for Internet service providers, but a disaster for users, who could find their Web browsing influenced by whichever sites paid their service provider the most money. There is a growing movement of Internet users who are pushing for legislation to make this kind of discrimination impossible. It has attracted supporters ranging from MoveOn.org to the Gun Owners of America. Grass-roots political groups like these are rightly concerned that their online speech could be curtailed if Internet service providers were allowed to pick and choose among Web sites.

Hopefully the Senate will act in the best interests of Internet users, and not access providers.

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality

Crybaby

Who knew the President Bush was such a sensitive soul:

"Colbert crossed the line," said one top Bush aide, who rushed out of the hotel as soon as Colbert finished. Another said that the president was visibly angered by the sharp lines that kept coming.

"I've been there before, and I can see that he is [angry]," said a former top aide. "He's got that look that he's ready to blow."

Boo hoo.



Thanks to Holden for the link.


Technorati Tags: George Bush, WATB, Stephen Colbert

Muddling the Net Neutrality Issue

The Washington Post publishes some tripe from the Brookings Institute on Net Neutrality.

The problem with this, is that it was written by the telecom industry. Telcos want us to believe that the over abundance of dark fiber out there, is all being used.

Telcos want us to believe that wave division multi-plexing doesn't exist.
Telcos want us to believe that there is a bandwidth shortage on the scale of the gas crisis in the 70's.

The fact is the Telcos want to create a tiered, class based system. If Google or Yahoo! want access to the internet to serve their multitude of visitors, then AT&T, Verizon, and others are demanding that you or I pay more to get to that site at speeds we are accustom to today, or risk being shunted off to the slow lane.

New startups which deliver new content to internet users, or new businesses trying to make it in the online world are being told, that they have to pony up, or be marginalized by telcos that want more, more, more.

Unfortunately Congress is all too willing to let the telcos get what they want.

We, the American consumer, get screwed so that AT&T can increase their profits.



Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality, Brookings Institute

Falling, Falling

33%:

With gas prices sky-high and no end of the Iraq war in sight, President George W. Bush's approval rating hits an all-time low in a new CBS News poll.

Only 33 percent approve of his job performance, Mr. Bush's lowest approval rating yet in CBS News polls. A majority – 58 percent of those polled – say they disapprove of the president. Mr. Bush appears to be losing support from his own party. His approval rating among Republicans has dropped to 68 percent.

How low can he go?

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Opinion, Popularity

Plame Investigating Iran

Via RawStory we learn that when Valerie Plame's identity was revealed by someone in the White House, she was undercover investigating nuclear proliferation in Iran:

"INTELLIGENCE SOURCES SAY VALERIE WILSON WAS PART OF AN OPERATION THREE YEARS AGO TRACKING THE PROLIFERATION OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS MATERIAL INTO IRAN. AND THE SOURCES ALLEGE THAT WHEN MRS. WILSON'S COVER WAS BLOWN, THE ADMINISTRATION'S ABILITY TO TRACK IRAN'S NUCLEAR AMBITIONS WAS DAMAGED AS WELL."

So, the current track we are headed on, potentially war with Iran, is a direct result of the actions taken against Valerie Plame by the White House.

Thanks Mr. Bush.



Thanks to Atrios for the link.

Technorati Tags: Valerie Plame, Joe Wilson, CIA, Iran, Nuclear Proliferation, George Bush

Austin and Municipal Wi-Fi

Today Austin Mayor Will Wynn did what AT&T (as SBC) tried to get the state legislature to prevent. Activate a municipal wi-fi network:

Mayor Will Wynn pressed the big white button that activated downtown Austin's free wireless Internet network Friday morning. The permanent network is a first-of-its-kind gift to the city for hosting the World Congress on Information Technology.

The mayor kicked off the weeklong conference with the CEO of the WCIT, Glyn Meek, at Jo's coffee shop.

"Academically, it benefits our citizens to help our wireless industry company grow and continues to promote Austin as a technology hub. Business travelers are going to have a pretty easy time now," Wynn said.

SBC opposed municipal wi-fi, because they claimed that their charter made them the defacto internet provider, and this was creating governmental competition. For a while, it looked like SBC was going to get its way.

Well, no longer.

Right now the network covers a relatively small area of downtown, but where most of the business occurs. There are plans to expand the network south and east of the current coverage area in the near future, with plans to expand west to Zilker Park and presumably further over time.

As the network (hopefully) expands across the city, it will present a great opportunity for lower income individuals and families to gain access to the internet. Let's hope the city keeps it up.

Technorati Tags: Austin, Municipal Wi-Fi, WCIT, Will Wynn

The True Cost of High Fuel Prices

School closings:

The high price of diesel fuel for school buses meant children in one Tennessee school system got a holiday Monday — their second in a row.

Some 3,800 youngsters got Friday and Monday off because of the action taken by Dallas Smith, superintendent of Rhea County schools in east Tennessee, to ease transportation spending.

"That kind of situation is probably the most extreme I have heard," said Mike Martin, executive director of the National Association for Pupil Transportation, based in Albany, N.Y., and a spokesman for the Washington-based School Bus Information Council.

Martin described the price of diesel, which has risen above $2.80 in the East and to more than $3 a gallon on the West Coast, as a "huge problem for not only public sector but private sector operators as well."

So, this will be going on for years, huh?

Technorati Tags: Gas, School Closings

Thought for the Day

"Never let your sense of morals get in the way of doing what's right."

--Isaac Asimov

Do you think we are prostitutes?

This is the type of response Republican members of Congress have been receiving to the idea of a $100 rebate for gas:

The Senate Republican plan to mail $100 checks to voters to ease the burden of high gasoline prices is eliciting more scorn than gratitude from the very people it was intended to help.

Aides for several Republican senators reported a surge of calls and e-mail messages from constituents ridiculing the rebate as a paltry and transparent effort to pander to voters before the midterm elections in November.

The plan does nothing to help people who are feeling the effects of rising gas prices. As usual the only thing Republicans are proposing is a fake solution. Oil companies are raking in record profits, and the solution is to try and buy Americans silence on the issue.

You have to think that even when Rush Limbaugh, and Brit Hume feel the proposal is bad, that would be a sign for Republicans to back off. However Bill Frist is nothing if not deaf to the real issue:

Still, Eric Ueland, chief of staff to Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the Republican leader, whose office played a main role in pulling the proposal together, said the rebate was an important short-term step in a broader array of measures that began with last year's energy bill. Constituents "believe government ought to step up to the plate rather than loll around in the dugout," Mr. Ueland wrote in an e-mail message on Sunday.

Let's see what the next silly proposal from Republicans is.

Technorati Tags: Gas, Oil, Frist, Limbaugh, Hume

Ignoring Colbert

So I've been waiting to read what the media has had to say about Stephen Colbert's performance at the White House Correspondents Association dinner.

Nothing.

The media has been playing up the "skewering" Bush gave of himself. The "light-hearted banter" he and a look-a-like did at the podium.

Of course you can go to Crooks and Liars to see Colbert's performance, however, leave it to our timid media to run away with their tails tucked between their legs when it comes to someone who does an artful performance of tearing down the President in front of him.

Maybe it was that the media didn't like having their own sycophantic behavior put up before all to see. Whatever it was, fear of Bush or fear of themselves, the fact that they ignored Colbert and offered praise of Bush is the most telling.

They are pwn3d by the White House.

Technorati Tags: Stephen Colbert, WHCA, George Bush

Thought for the Day

"Any fool can tell the truth, but it requires a man of some sense to know how to lie well."

--Samuel Butler

George Bush's America

Not the America I grew up in:

President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ''whistle-blower" protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research.

Does this mean that the President of the United States is above the law? Is we headed to The Divine Right of Kings again?

Where does it end?

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Laws

Vince Young to Tennessee

So the NFL draft is going on today. Texas Longhorn QB Vince Young was picked by the Tennessee Titans.

I suppose since the Titans are the former Houston Oilers, I can reluctantly support them. At any rate, good luck Vince.



Technorati Tags: Vince Young, NFL, Draft, Titans

Thought for the Day

"The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do."

--B.F. Skinner

Here's To You, Mr. Fighting With a Keyboard Man

At some point, one has to realize when one is not in anyway funny or witty.

Those "war bloggers", who furiously defend Bush's Iraq folly, and wage battle after battle against those who don't, from the safety and security of their computer keyboards have been given the appelation of the "101st Fighting Keyboardists". These people are all gung ho for war, and will defend America using the almighty keyboard, while cheerfully watching other young men and women go and give the ultimate sacrifice. These brave defenders of America will sacrifice their arteries, eating Cheetos and Doritos by the bucketful, while typing out screeds that put the fear of God into those who would dare challenge Bush on his policies.

I suppose, after a few years, they have decided that being labeled "chickenhawk" and the "101st Fighting Keyboardists" was a badge of courage. Enter Capitain Ed:

I've thought about that for a while, wondering what exactly about both epithets appear so fascinating to left-wing bloggers. As a middle-aged grandfather supporting a chronically ill wife, I have few options for doing my part in the war on terror. After 9/11, I spent weeks looking into different options for service while trying to balance my family obligations. Our family found out just three weeks after the attack that the Little Admiral would soon join us, and the implications of terrorism and war weighed heavily on my mind. I resolved to use the skills I had -- writing -- to make the case for fighting a forward strategy against terrorists. Eventually that led me to this blog, but in the interim I argued for a continued muscular offensive against the Islamofascists that had murdered thousands of our fellow Americans.

Now, the jolly Captain seems to have a somewhat legitimate reason to sit behind his desk, waging war. However, he doesn't seem at all concerned about the young healthy members of the 101st who choose to wage war with a keyboard, rather than go to Iraq and fight for what they believe.

So, denizens of the blogosphere, tremble before the mighty chickenhawk, and fear the coordinated clicking of keyboards from the 101st Fighting Keyboardists!

Hoo-Rah!

Technorati Tags: Captain's Quarters, Chickenhawk, 101st Fighting Keyboardists

Defending AT&T's Spying

The Federal Government steps in to defend AT&T from the EFF and their suit to force AT&T to divulge the manner in which the company diverted all internet traffic to the NSA for Bush's domestic spying program:

The lawsuit, accusing the company of illegally collaborating with the National Security Agency in a vast surveillance program, was filed in February by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group.

The class-action suit, which seeks an end to the collaboration it alleges, is based in part on the testimony of Mark Klein, a retired technician for the company who says Internet data passing through an AT&T switching center in San Francisco is being diverted to a secret room. There, Mr. Klein says, the security agency has installed powerful computers to eavesdrop without warrants on the digital data and forward the information to an undisclosed place.

The foundation has filed documents obtained by Mr. Klein that ostensibly show detailed technical information on N.S.A. technology used to divert Internet data. He has also said in a deposition that employees of the agency went to the switching center to oversee special projects.

The fact that the federal government has decided to step in, indicates that the EFF is correct, and the NSA was wholesale spying on potentially all Americans with the willing assistance of AT&T.

The EFF has more

Technorati Tags: AT&T, EFF, Domestic Spying, NSA,

Limbaugh's Burden

Rush Limbaugh turned himself into the police yesterday:

Talk radio icon Rush Limbaugh surrendered to authorities Friday on a charge of committing fraud to obtain prescription drugs, concluding an investigation that for more than two years has hovered over the law-and-order conservative.

According to his lawyer, admitting guilt, is not the same as admitting guilt.

Rush says he wasn't doctor shopping to obtain the fraudlent prescriptions.

Why is it that when these "personal responsibility" Republicans actually are put in the position where they have to accept responsibility for their actions, they don't? People like Limbaugh are the worst kind of hypocrite. They embody the IOKIYAR (it's OK if you're a Republican) spirit to the fullest. From Bill Bennet and his gambling, to Limbaugh and his drug abuse, these "personal responsibility" Republicans refuse to practice what they preach.

Not only that, but most of their Republican supporters will defend their actions, while simultaneously attacking someone else for the same thing.


Technorati Tags: Rush Limbaugh, Fraud, Personal Responsibility

Friday Jamaica Blogging

I took this picture on Monday at around 6:30pm from the spot where the wedding was held:

Protecting Friends, not America

How anyone can continue to think that George W. Bush places the safety of America in very high regard, is beyond me:

President George W. Bush approved Dubai's $1.24 billion takeover of Doncasters, a British engineering company with U.S. plants that supply the Pentagon, the White House said on Friday.

The decision, announced by White House spokesman Scott McClellan, followed a congressional uproar over security fears that scuttled another Dubai state-owned company's plan to acquire operations at major U.S. ports.

The Bush administration seems all too willing to hand over operations of just about everything to anyone, regardless.

Technorati Tags: Dubai, George Bush, Doncasters, National Security

Thought for the Day

"Sometimes I think we're alone. Sometimes I think we're not. In either case, the thought is staggering."

--R. Buckminster Fuller

Republicans doing Hookers

Since I was out of pocket for the first part of the week, I have just been getting caught up on the hooker scandal.

It figures that most of the parties involved are "family values" Republicans



Technorati Tags: Family Values, Republicans, Hookers

Bush Says ...

... America is English only.

In response to a question of whether or not people should be permitted to sing the national anthem in Spanish, Bush said if you want to be an American, you must learn english.

Last I check, America does not have an official language. Is Bush going to be proposing legislation to make english the official language of America?

Technorati Tags: Immigration, George Bush, Official Language

Bush on CNN

Right now I am listening to Bush on CNN talk about Taxes, and the unfair burden America and Americans are placing on oil companies.

Shorter George Bush: What is good for ExxonMobil is good for America. ExxonMobil wants you to pay $4.00/gallon of gas, George Bush wants you to pay $4.00/gallon of gas. ExxonMobil should not be taxed.


Technorati Tags: George Bush, Oil, Taxes

Congressional Idiocy

Rather than deal with the real problems of rising gas prices, Republicans in Congress want to create another problem with this idiocy:

Most American taxpayers would get $100 rebate checks to offset the pain of higher pump prices for gasoline, under an amendment Senate Republicans hope to bring to a vote Thursday.

And because Republicans hate the environment, they are going to try yet again, to tie opening ANWR to oil drilling to this ridiculousness.

If Bill Frist and the Republican party actually cared about the pain Americans are feeling at the pump, how about dealing with ExxonMobil's record quarterly profits. How about repealing the tax breaks Republicans have been giving to oil companies, and using that money to offset the taxes on gas at the pump.

And no doubt, if this plan passes, each person who receives the "rebate" (good for only one or two tanks of gas), will be hit with extra taxes next April.

*sigh*

Technorati Tags: Republican, Gas, Oil, Exxon

More on Net Neutrality

I was wondering which Democrats decided that setting up a tiered internet was a wise thing.

Vince at Capitol Annex found a letter on Yahoo! Groups which he excerpted to the Democrats who support ending neutrality:

I know how much you enjoy getting campaign contributions from telecommunications interests, and I hope that you find yourself swimming in contributions. I mean, you’ve earned it, since voting against freedom on the internet isn’t going to get you many fans. I’m also glad you’re so accessible to your constituents, and I’ve taken the liberty to list the amount of money you received from cable and telephone interests, as well as your office’s phone number.

[...]


It’s hard work to make hundreds of thousands of internet users really really mad. But you persevered, and in all likelihood your reelection campaigns will be that much richer. Congrats, guys, you made Santa’s naughty list.

Of course two of the Democrats are from Texas. After all, Texas politicians like to be bought and sold.

Apparently some calls have been made to some of these Congress members offices. Hopefully we will soon hear their reasons for voting to kill the internet

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality

Thought for the Day

"If we were to wake up some morning and find that everyone was the same race, creed and color, we would find some other cause for prejudice by noon."

--George Aiken

The Information Turnpike

It looks like Joe Barton and AT&T may just get what they want. The House Energy and Commerce Committee, headed by Joe Barton of Texas voted 42-12 to allow companies like AT&T to charge people tiered rates to access the Internet:

Joe Barton, R-Tex., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, supported the Internet carriers' right to charge Web sites extra as long as they follow basic principles such as allowing users access to all online content and making it possible for them to connect online using any device.

"If they spend billions and billions of dollars to put these networks in place under these principles, they have the right to charge a fee," he said.

Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Atherton, called the prospect of a tiered Internet anathema to the openness that has allow it to blossom during the past 10 years. Companies that will be hurt the most are startups, she said, because they will be unlikely to afford the extra fees and therefore be at a disadvantage to more-established players that can pay.

"Make no mistake about it, this will be the most profound change on the Internet if we don't have what has come to be known as network neutrality," Eshoo said in comments before Wednesday's vote on the failed network neutrality amendment, which she co-sponsored.

There is a similar bill being proposed in the Senate which, if passed (and most likely signed by Bush), which will make this a reality. This is a play by access providers to kill off the content providers who aren't owned by companies like AT&T.

I am curious to see which Democrats support this new tiered, class based system.


Technorati Tags: Network Neutrality, Joe Barton, AT&T

I'm Back

I am back from the wedding. If you have the opportunity to go to Jamaica, I highly recommend it. I stayed at Tensing Pen which is a rustic resort in Negril, about an hour west of Montego Bay. The cottage I stayed in, with my family, The Long House, over looks the cove the resport is built around, and straight out into the Caribbean.

Right now the buildings are not air conditioned, so summertime will be extremely uncomfortable, but in the winter, and early spring the temps are in the 70's Farenheit, and should be perfect for sleeping with the windows and doors open. By this winter most if not all of the sleeping rooms should have air conditioning, so if you cannot abide hot humid air while sleeping, you can make yourself comfortable.

The Caribbean air (and lots of Guiness) seem to have some magical curative powers. As I am nearly back to 100%, eventhough I felt I shouldn't have even gotten on the plane to travel. The food is great with fresh fish, and jerk chicken everywhere. I also recommend trying the callaloo. It is seasoned greens boiled in a pot, very good.

Gone for a Few Days

I am heading out for a few days to attend a wedding. I will be returning Wednesday evening, though I don't know when.

The wedding is in Jamaica and the resort we are going to does not have internet access, so I will be off the grid until I return.

While you are here, check out the archives for my wit and wisdom from the past year. Don't forget the blogs in my blogroll.

Let them know David sent you, and you will get a discount.

"Talk" to you when I get back.

Cheers,

David

Letters to George

From flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers:

sitting in a car driving to the airport
we are on our way to bilbao spain where we are gonna play in front of
the guggenheim museum
i am looking forward to that
to be next to beautiful art and architecture
and to put some art of our own into the open air

george w bush should definitely be impeached
he is a liar
and his lies have bought misery to millions of people
and bought no good to anyone except for the corporate oil
billionaires who are making huge profits
they are profiting during wartime
that is unscrupulous and terribly sad
w bush has made the world a much less safe place
before the war iraq was not a place for terrorists
saddam hussein, brutal dictator that he was was secular and had
nothing to do with al queda
and was sanctioned to death and had no power outside of his country
now it is a breeding ground for terrorism and anti-americanism is at
an all time high all over the world
and the people of iraq are no better off at all
all those people want is for the americans to leave
decent families and people like you and i who never wanted america
there in the first place
goerge w bush has sent american soldiers over there to be maimed and
killed
only to serve his selfish oil company needs and for his ego
american soldiers who are loyal to each other and who only want to
have a good job get an education and support their country are being
used for an unjust cause
i support the troops
they, like all americans are being betrayed by george w bush
he has betrayed his country he should be impeached

the administration's line that they were over there because they
wanted to spread democracy and freedom
is nothing else besides a lie
if they had any interest at all in the well being of other human beings
they would be doing what they could for people who desperately need
and would love help in africa

i pray to god that george w bush and his administration does not
invade iran
it would be a bloodbath
why dont they just leave the iranians alone
and go through the united nations
and work on making the united nations as strong and as just as possible
an invasion of iran would be the worst possible thing that could happen
i pray to god that it does not happen

i am just another guy sitting in the car on the english motorway

More, including a link to getting their new album here



Technorati Tags: Red Hot Chili Peppers, George Bush, flea

Thought for the Day

"There are people I know who won't hurt me. I call them corpses."

--Randy K. Milholland

Steve Bell

Steve Bell on Bush and Hu:




Technorati Tags: Steve Bell, George Bush, Hu Jintao

Jonah Goldberg is Now a Scientist

Babbling on about things he knows so little about.

To summarize, before subjecting yourself to Jonah's latest column:

1. Global warming is fake because a total of 60 climatologists worldwide disagree with the notion that global warming is real.
2. And Al Gore is a poopy head.

I'm glad that Jonah is out there to tell us how things really are.

Technorati Tags: Jonah Goldberg, LA Times, Global Warming, Doughy Pantload

Falling, Falling

Fox News:

More Americans disapprove than approve of how George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld and Congress are doing their jobs, while a majority approves of Condoleezza Rice. President Bush’s approval hits a record low of 33 percent this week, clearly damaged by sinking support among Republicans.

Technorati Tags: George Bush, Popularity

Thought for the Day

"Don't try to solve serious matters in the middle of the night."

--Philip K. Dick

Josh Asks a Question

Josh Marshall:

Can you think of any policy-decision or action President Bush has taken in his five-plus years in office that didn't enjoy its greatest popularity on day one and then become more or less consistently less popular over time?

Good question.

Everything. Even policies that sound good on the surface, as details emerge, become less popular to the point of abandonment.

Clear Skies. Sounded good. Initially popular, now a joke.

NCLB. Good plan, to improve schools. Initially popular, now we know that school districts are hiding results to meet failed requirements.

And on, and on.




Technorati Tags: Bush, Unpopular

Bush Administration Epitath

China "must know that this Bush administration is good at controlling crowds for themselves, and the fact that they couldn't control this is going to play to their worse fears and suspicions about the United States, into mistrust about American intentions toward China."

This was the comment from Derek Mitchell, a former Asia adviser at the Pentagon and now an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, on the lone protestor at the speech with Bush and Chinese President Hu.

Bush wants the crowds controlled. And not just to impress the Chinese government.


Technorati Tags: Bush, China, Hu Jintao

But Who Are the Adults in Charge?

Stoller on the shuffling of the deck chairs:

We have a man frightened to be President clinging desperately to the comforting adults who tell him what to do. These 'adults' happen to be vicious ideologues bent showing the world their manliness no matter how weak they transparently are. In other words, this isn't a real shake-up, because at this point Bush can't shake up the White House staff.

The problem with these adults, beyond their faux manliness, is that their priorities are not America's priorities.

As Matt says, the only real change wont occur until November. That is when Congress must be changed, to force the White House, and George Bush to confront reality.

Technorati Tags: Bush, 2006

Boo Hoo, Michelle

Michelle Malkin saw fit to publish the names and contact information of some students who organized a protest against military recruiters on the U.C. Santa Cruz campus. After those students started receiving death threats from supporters of Michelle Malkin, she received a request to remove their contact information from her website.

Malkin's response? Publish them again.

Now Malkin thinks she is all tough because she will stand up to those to play tit-for-tat.

Most people had the decency to remove her contact information as soon as it was published on their blog.

However Malkin has no such sense of decency. She is a person with no morals. For her sake, she had better hope no harm comes to the individuals for whom she cares so little, and is willing to endanger so quickly.

Note to Michelle Malkin: And it is about you Malkin. You made it about you.

Technorati Tags: Malkin

Glenn Reynolds is an Ass

Any man who is such an idiot that he doesn't know how war is declared, yet continues to claim he does, after having been instructed in the actual process, deserves no respect.

And then that same person, approves of the swift boating of military commanders just because he doesn't agree with them, has to be the leader of the 101st Fighting Keyboarders.

Glenn Reynolds is that man.

I am sure that such a person would support the swift-boating of a soldier who, after fighting in a war he didn't agree with, chose to protest the same war after coming back from the war zone wounded. Probably even if that person left limbs in the war zone.

Technorati Tags: Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit, Iraq War

I Always Feel Like ...

... somebody's watching me:

The new Open Source Center (OSC) at CIA headquarters recently stepped up data collection and analysis based on bloggers worldwide and is developing new methods to gauge the reliability of the content, said OSC Director Douglas J. Naquin.

"A lot of blogs now have become very big on the Internet, and we're getting a lot of rich information on blogs that are telling us a lot about social perspectives and everything from what the general feeling is to ... people putting information on there that doesn't exist anywhere else," Mr. Naquin told The Washington Times.

[...]

"I can't get into detail of what, but I'll just say the amount of open source reporting that goes into the president's daily brief has gone up rather significantly," Mr. Jardines said. "There has been a real interest at the highest levels of our government, and we've been able to consistently deliver products that are on par with the rest of the intelligence community."

So, in addition to the President, who else might have access to this data?

"But now our customer base literally ranges from the president to local police departments," Mr. Naquin said. The Fairfax County police use OSC products, as do police departments in San Diego, New York and Baltimore. The center also provides support to the U.S. military.

So, let me give a big shout-out to the Austin P.D.

Just in case they are getting this information through the CIA's OSC

Technorati Tags: OSC, Blogging, CIA

Thought for the Day

"Those who speak most of progress measure it by quantity and not by quality."

--George Santayana

The Realization of Disastrous Policies

I have a feeling that if this investigation goes forward, no one will like what they find:

This morning local leaders want to know what happened, and are even calling for an investigation into what left parts of South Austin powerless Monday.

Senator Troy Fraser of Horseshoe Bay asked the Public Utility Commission (PUC) to fast track an investigation surrounding the rolling blackouts.

In a letter to the PUC chairman, Senator Fraser said, "ERCOT made no attempt to contact appropriate members of the legislature and the executive branch,” and "local law enforcement and emergency services were not notified" either.

I'll give Mr. Fraser a hint as to what your investigation will reveal.

Electricity deregulation is a bad thing.

Of course, Texas Governor is truly concerned about this issue:

While Senator Troy Fraser is calling for such an investigation, Gov. Rick Perry said yesterday that he is pleased with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas's response to the crisis.

"We feel comfortable that ERCOT handled it correctly," Perry said. "I think it's important that the public understand what happened. Yesterday was an absolute freak of nature, if you will."

A freak of nature?

How odd an occurrence that hot weather would occur in Texas in springtime?

Unlike the planned maintenance which had 15% of the capacity down.

Technorati Tags: Texas, Electricity, Deregulation

Rove Being Pushed Aside?

In addition to McClellan resigning, there was the announcement that Karl Rove is being repurposed:

Karl Rove, the chief adviser to President Bush, is to give up his role in formulating policy as the shake-up continued in President Bush's White House team today.

Mr Rove, referred to by political commentators as the President's Brains, will instead focus more on politics with the approach of the mid-term elections this autumn, said a senior administration official.

Mr Rove took up the post of deputy chief of staff in charge of most White House policy co-ordination about a year ago. The new portfolio came on top of his existing title as senior adviser and role of chief policy aide to Mr Bush.

Joel Kaplan, currently the White House’s deputy budget director, will take over the job of deputy chief of staff for policy, said the official.

This will allow Rove more time to work with Republican candidates this year, to run some more dirty campaigns, so this isn't necessarily the best thing.

Technorati Tags: Karl Rove

Because We Need To See It More

Yes, this is a blatant copy from Atrios, but this Rolling Stone magazine cover needs to be seen everywhere:



Technorati Tags: Bush, Rolling Stone

The Kalifornication of Texas

Having lived here in Texas during the migration of many people from California to Texas, people here were deathly afraid that in addition to the high tech jobs being imported to Texas, much of the California culture that Texans don't like would be imported as well.

However, the one thing that no one really anticipated, was that we would be Enronned:

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which runs the state's power grid, said the statewide shortage was caused by record-breaking heat striking at a time when as much as 15 percent of the state's power supply was already off-line for seasonal maintenance. Then four power-generating plants shut down unexpectedly, ERCOT spokesman Paul Wattles said.

We had rolling blackouts throughout most urban/suburban areas in Texas yesterday because of this "record-breaking heat", in Texas, in April, when this sort of thing happens.

It would have been too much to expect that the "seasonal maintainence" that had 15% of the states power supply offline, to have been conducted when the statewide power demands were, you know, low? Say November/December/January timeframe?

The Texas electric market is already unregulated, and the Texas lege is pretty much bought and paid for by lobbyists, particularly from the energy industry. I suppose I should start preparing for $600+ electric bills this summer.



Technorati Tags: Texas, Energy

Falling, Falling

Is he unpopular yet?

President Bush's job-approval rating slipped for the third consecutive month and remains near the lowest mark of his presidency, according to a new Harris Interactive poll.

Thirty-five percent of 1,008 U.S. adults surveyed in the telephone poll think Mr. Bush is doing an "excellent or pretty good" job as president, down from 36% in March and significantly lower than 43% in January. This compares with 63% of Americans who said Mr. Bush is doing an "only fair or poor" job, down from 64% in March.

Good news, his disapproval rating dropped to 63%!

Technorati Tags: Bush, Unpopular

Scottie's Out

Watching CNN right now, Scott McClellan announced his resignation.

I am surprised he was able to last as long as he did.

Technorati Tags: Scott McClellan

The "Fetishizing Young Girls Virginity" Ball

How else would you describe a dance in which a seven to eleven year old girls recite this to their fathers:

I pledge to remain sexually pure...until the day I give myself as a wedding gift to my husband. ... I know that God requires this of me.. that he loves me. and that he will reward me for my faithfulness.

With the response:

I, (daughter’s name)’s father, choose before God to cover my daughter as her authority and protection in the area of purity. I will be pure in my own life as a man, husband and father. I will be a man of integrity and accountability as I lead, guide and pray over my daughter and as the high priest in my home. This covering will be used by God to influence generations to come.

These fundamentalist Christians have a real sickness when it comes to sex.


Thanks to Atrios

Technorati Tags: Sex, Christian Fundamentalism

Thought for the Day

"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of."

--Ogden Nash

The Central Committee for Media Manipulation

Oh was a deluded world Donald Rumsfeld lives in:

There have always been people who have opposed wars…I think we just have to accept it, that people have a right to say what they want to say, and to have an acceptance of that and recognize that the terrorists, Zarqawi and bin Laden and Zawahiri, those people have media committees.

They are actively out there trying to manipulate the press in the United States. They are very good at it.

I wonder if the heads of the major media outlets know about this manipulation?



Technorati Tags: Rumsfeld

Lieberman Must Go

The future depends on it.

Ned Lamont is the only non-Texan I am soliciting contributions for. People like Joe Lieberman are bad for the Democratic Party, and bad for America. We absolutely do not need war with anyone, let alone a war with Iran.

Thanks to Atrios for this link.

Technorati Tags: Lieberman, Lamont, Iran

Trying to Move Too Fast

I thought I was well on my road to recovery. Maybe I am, but from the way I feel right now, you wouldn't know it.


Continued light blogging.

Thought for the Day

"The goal of all inanimate objects is to resist man and ultimately defeat him."

--Russell Baker

AT&T: Your World: Tapped

The case against AT&T by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is proceding. An editorial appeared in the NY Times today:

A former AT&T employee has come forward with documents suggesting that there may be a lot more domestic spying going on than President Bush has admitted. The AT&T documents suggest that telephone companies may be helping the government engage in wholesale interception of telephone calls, e-mail messages and Web surfing. If AT&T is violating its customers' privacy rights, it should come clean, and stop immediately.

According to Mark Klein, a longtime AT&T technician who is now retired, AT&T maintained a room at its San Francisco Internet and telephone hub where its customers' data could be mined by keywords, e-mail addresses and other attributes. Mr. Klein says the National Security Agency was given access to the room and the data. He says other technicians have reported to him that similar rooms exist at other AT&T sites.

Based on the court filings, detailed at the EFF.org website, AT&T has made no effort to deny that they in fact were providing the NSA total access to their network to facilitate illegal wiretaps of all customers of AT&T (formerly SBC).

The original filing by the EFF was that the EFF was going to release all information it had about AT&T opening its network to wiretapping, unless it could prove why that information should remain secret.

AT&T is adopting the "it should remain secret" path.


Technorati Tags: AT&T, EFF, Domestic Spying, NY Times

Thought for the Day

"I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own -- a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty. Neither can I believe that the individual survives the death of his body, although feeble souls harbor such thoughts through fear or ridiculous egotisms."


-- Albert Einstein, obituary in New York Times, 19 April 1955

I'm Back

I'm now able to sit up and move about without much effort. I think I have kicked off the worst of this infection.

I think, contrary to my protestations to Mrs. David, I will in fact survive. My head will most likely not explode from the pressure, and the likelihood of one of my lungs being coughed up, is probably nil.



But at least it gave me something other than George Bush and the Republican Party to complain about for a week.

Inside the Mind of a Bush Supporter

"We have too much privacy, and those who govern us have too little."

Scary.


Technorati Tags: Stuntz, George Bush, Privacy, Stuntz

Editorial Bitch Slap

The editorial board of the NY Times, bitch slaps the Washington Post.


Technorati Tags: NY+Times