Saturday, February 25, 2006

Foreign Affairs - Intelligence, Policy,and the War in Iraq - Paul R. Pillar

In case you missed it. More evidence of deception and lies. We need to keep pummelling the Bushevics with these testimonies. When the scales fall from their eyes there will be impeachment:

Foreign Affairs - Intelligence, Policy,and the War in Iraq

by Paul R. Pillar: "Summary: During the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, writes the intelligence community's former senior analyst for the Middle East, the Bush administration disregarded the community's expertise, politicized the intelligence process, and selected unrepresentative raw intelligence to make its public case.

PAUL R. PILLAR is on the faculty of the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University. Concluding a long career in the Central Intelligence Agency, he served as National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and South Asia from 2000 to 2005."

Thursday, February 23, 2006

Capitol Hill Blue: Secret Service agents say Cheney was drunk when he shot lawyer

Secret Service agents say Cheney was drunk when he shot lawyer:

"According to those who have talked with the agents and others present at the outing, Cheney was drunk when he gunned down his friend and the day-and-a-half delay in allowing Texas law enforcement officials on the ranch where the shooting occurred gave all members of the hunting party time to sober up."

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

The Rude Pundit

The Rude Pundit is a busy prayin'

Monday, February 20, 2006

The White House Addresses a Threat

The Blog | David Mamet | The Huffington Post

TIME.com -- Joe Klein: Cheney's Thousand-Yard Stare

Cheney's Thousand-Yard Stare:

"One valuable metaphor emerged last week. The New York Times described the possible legal charges that could be brought in a hunting accident. 'Mr. Cheney could be charged with negligence, defined as failing to understand the dangers involved and disregarding them, or recklessness, defined as understanding the dangers and disregarding them.' Which is perhaps the neatest summary I've seen of the public debate surrounding the Bush Administration's war in Iraq. Absent further evidence, the Administration seems guilty of negligence—a cavalier insensitivity to the unimaginable calamities that attend the use of lethal force."

Sunday, February 19, 2006

Dick Cheney accidentally goes for the biathlon gold

Dick Cheney accidentally goes for the biathlon gold:

By John Kenney
Special to the Los Angeles Times
Salt Lake Tribune

Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot documentary filmmaker Michael Moore yesterday as Moore was walking out of a Manhattan Denny's.
A spokesperson for the vice president said that it was a ''complete accident'' and that Cheney felt ''horrible.'' The White House released a statement saying that the shooting was ''just bad timing. Vice President Cheney, who is well-versed in firearms safety, was merely sitting in a shrub, wearing camouflage, outside of a Denny's frequented by Mr. Moore.''
The statement went on to say that Cheney had been in the shrub for ''several days.'' Moore is said to have suffered only minor injuries and was released from the hospital.
--
In another bizarre accident, Cheney mistakenly shot every Democratic member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. A White House spokesman said that the vice president feels ''bad, but not that bad.'' An aide to Cheney said that the vice president ''happened to be in the committee chambers, under a chair, when he stood up to put on a pair of chaps, accidentally shooting the committee members, stopping to reload three times.''
Remarkably, the committee members were largely unhurt and are expected to make complete recoveries.
--
The White House was put on the defensive again today when Air Force Two was forced to make an emergency landing 25 miles west of New York City after a loss of cabin pressure because of the accidental shooting of former FEMA Director Michael D. Brown and U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.
Both men have recently come under criticism for their handling of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina. Cheney was said to be ''laughing, but also deeply concerned'' when he was awakened from a nap after accidentally shooting the men at close range.
Typically, shotguns are not allowed on either Air Force One or Two, but Cheney is, the statement said, ''a seasoned hunter and also planned to accidentally shoot both men.'' Both Brown and Chertoff are expected to make complete recoveries, although it remains unclear as to why Brown was duct-taped to the wing of the plane.
A White House spokesman later added that the vice president had been on his way to New York City to accidentally shoot New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd.
--
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton miraculously escaped injury today after Cheney accidentally ran up to her motorcade and accidentally shot at her car. The White House said the vice president ''tripped.''
''These things happen,'' a White House spokesman said. ''Guns, while completely safe, are also dangerous.''
A member of the vice president's staff said Cheney apologized to the former first lady and potential presidential candidate in a handwritten note.
''I'm sorry I almost shot you. But know that I will try again and will also be sorry then, too. I like the sound a gun makes and the smell of the gunpowder. 'Flint' is a neat word.''
---
John Kenney has just finished his first novel.

Saturday, February 18, 2006

Cheney's Victim Sings | The Huffington Post

The song that's sweeping the nation...

onegoodmove: In The Park

Pretty funny: Bill Maher on Jay Leno talking about Cheney and the shooting...

The Magic BB Theory

Jesus' General explains how Cheney could fire 30 yards and have the pattern so tightly grouped that nearly all the BBs landed within 18 inches.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Media Matters Comprehensive Analysis of "Liberal Media" phenom

Media Matters - If It's Sunday, It's Conservative: An analysis of the Sunday talk show guests on ABC, CBS, and NBC, 1997 - 2005: "The Sunday-morning talk shows on ABC, CBS, and NBC are where the prevailing opinions are aired and tested, policymakers state their cases, and the left and right in American politics debate the pressing issues of the day on equal ground. Both sides have their say and face probing questions. Or so you would think.

In fact, as this study reveals, conservative voices significantly outnumber progressive voices on the Sunday talk shows. Media Matters for America conducted a content analysis of ABC's This Week, CBS' Face the Nation, and NBC's Meet the Press, classifying each one of the nearly 7,000 guest appearances during President Bill Clinton's second term, President George W. Bush's first term, and the year 2005 as either Democrat, Republican, conservative, progressive, or neutral. The conclusion is clear: Republicans and conservatives have been offered more opportunities to appear on the Sunday shows - in some cases, dramatically so."

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

The Cult of Bush eloquently examined

Unclaimed Territory: Do Bush followers have a political ideology? by Glenn Greenwald:

"Now, in order to be considered a 'liberal,' only one thing is required – a failure to pledge blind loyalty to George W. Bush. The minute one criticizes him is the minute that one becomes a 'liberal,' regardless of the ground on which the criticism is based. And the more one criticizes him, by definition, the more 'liberal' one is. Whether one is a 'liberal' -- or, for that matter, a 'conservative' -- is now no longer a function of one’s actual political views, but is a function purely of one’s personal loyalty to George Bush."

Sunday, February 12, 2006

The Effectiveness Thing

Paul Krugman:

"We are ruled by bunglers. Every major venture by the Bush administration, from the occupation of Iraq to the Medicare drug program, has turned into an epic saga of incompetence. In retrospect, the Clinton years look like a golden era of good government."

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Walmart top 12 Wines

Dvorak Uncensored posts Walmart's Top 12 Wines.

Cheney Authorized Libby to Disclose Classified Documents

Juan Cole has a good sequence of events outlining the Plamegate scandal. It's not that complicated. Cheney and crew trumped up the intelligence (read:lied) and the Repug political machine attempted to crush all dissent (read:truth).

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American Rhetoric: Top 100 Speeches by Rank

American Rhetoric: Top 100 Speeches by Rank

(Don't see any by GWB!)

Guantanamo's Grip

As an American I find this troubling and not in line with American principles. We are no longer the "good guys". An excerpt from the National Journal: Guantanamo's Grip

"Like many of the men who came handcuffed to Cuba, Detainee 032 has never been accused of fighting against America. He fell into U.S custody far away from any battlefield. But today, after four years of interrogations and investigations, he is still an 'enemy combatant,' even though he was never an enemy or a combatant. He is something else: something that might be dangerous or might not. But he's securely in our custody, and raise your hand if you want to be responsible for releasing the man who next flies an airplane into a skyscraper.

In some other world, one where the earth still turned west to east instead of inside out as it did on September 11, 2001, Detainee 032 would be finishing college this year, like his brother, father, and uncle before him. In this world, he's beginning his fifth year in prison, with neither charges nor freedom in sight."

No Bravery

Huffington Post Contagious Festival has some good polictical flash flicks.

Here's the best one: No Bravery

Thursday, February 09, 2006

Connecting the Dots

Part II of an interview with Mark Crispin Miller: author of Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election & Why They'll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them)

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

Lair of the Spirit Bear Preserved

Hartley Bay, British Columbia - In this sodden land of glacier-cut fjords and giant moss-draped cedars, a myth is told by the Gitga'at people to explain the presence of black bears with a rare recessive gene that makes them white as snow.

The Raven deity swooped down on the land at the end of an ice age and decided that one out of every 10 black bears born from that moment on would be bleached as "spirit bears." It was to be a reminder to future generations that the world must be kept pristine.

On Tuesday, an improbable assemblage of officials from the provincial government, coastal Native Canadian nations, logging companies and environmental groups will announce an agreement that they say will accomplish that mission in the home of the spirit bear, an area that is also the world's largest remaining intact temperate coastal rain forest.

Secret Worlds: The Universe Within

View the Milky Way at 10 million light years from the Earth. Then move through space towards the Earth in successive orders of magnitude until you reach a tall oak tree just outside the buildings of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory in Tallahassee, Florida. After that, begin to move from the actual size of a leaf into a microscopic world that reveals leaf cell walls, the cell nucleus, chromatin, DNA and finally, into the subatomic universe of electrons and protons.

Monday, February 06, 2006

The last 31 days in Iraq

Think things are going fine in Iraq?

Scar Run, Colorado Springs

Click on the picture for more photos of Saturday and Sunday runs up "the Scar" and Williams Canyon: Feb 4th and 5th
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