Civil Liberties Archives

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May 09, 2008

Ever wonder why Obama, an unknown junior senator, is where he is today, vying against the Republican machine for the highest job in the land? Ted Kennedy, with the aid of Howard Dean and other white neoliberals, deliberately set out to remake the party into a bastion of neoliberalism. White neoliberals deliberately used Obama's race to draw support from Hillary Clinton. Clinton had dedicated much of her long career working on issues important to the black community, accumulating strong support along the way. The only way she could have lost this support was to a black candidate (aided by false charges of racism by the white neoliberals). Obama, the unknown junior senator, was chosen by the neoliberals specifically for this purpose. If Obama were not black, Hillary would have wrapped up the nomination long ago. But due to an inept choice of black candidate, the neoliberals endangered an election that...

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April 23, 2008

Listen to the relentless, around the clock barking of a horrible neighbor's dog in Oklahoma - You Tube video. As he says, dogs bark because they are neglected. And people suffer as a consequence. I often wonder why this happens. There is a false image from advertising (which makes lots of money from the dog products industry) that dogs have the equivalent status in our society as people. But dogs are not people, and treating them as such is a disservice to both dogs and people. Also advertising perpetuates the myth that any dog owner is automatically a dog lover. The dog left alone in the yard, for any amount of time, is utterly miserable. The dog left to bark all day in front of a screen door is similarly miserable. Dog trainer Cesar Milan said, "Look at a dog in a natural setting; she doesn’t bark and yelp. So-called...

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April 15, 2008

Read more......

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April 12, 2008

"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." ~ Henry David Thoreau I contend that people who use dogs as weapons to traumatize others are desperately miserable. But quiet? Forget about it. They want to make others miserable, too. Dogs give them the perfect opportunity - it's the society-sanctioned weapon. Such people are really dog and people haters. The irresponsible dog owner is passive aggressive. He exerts power over innocent neighbor victims, as well as weak authority figures, via his dog. Like a juvenile delinquent who misbehaves, the barking dog owner knows he can get away with it. Madison Avenue hypnotizes the masses, sanctifying dogs, so Americans will buy, buy, buy, and the dog products industry will rake in the dough. Other players in the dog money game, like apartment owners who allow multiple large dogs in a tiny one bedroom apartment, then do nothing about the noise, are...

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April 02, 2008

In the BarkingDogs.net Forum, someone describes how they had to abandon their house and move into a trailer to get away from nuisance barking dogs - and their house, still mortgaged, is not selling because of the neighbor's dogs: ...Whatever happened to common decency? If your dog is barking go out and take care of your dog. A barking dog is usually an agitated, fearful, and/or nervous dog that needs human guidance to help it understand and react appropriately to confusing stimuli. A dog is not a self sufficient creature. It is heavily dependent on humans for guidance, companionship, exercise, shelter, food, grooming, and health care. A barking dog is a dog that is not being adequately cared for. Not only is the dog in need of attention but everyone within earshot of the barking dog needs relief from the noise. A barking dog is a signal that something is...

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February 29, 2008

From David Denby in the New Yorker: As they waste time, Lazarescu lapses into semi-poetic incoherence, like Lear’s fool. The doctors’ inhuman nonsense is mocked by Lazarescu’s all-too-human nonsense as he tries to hold on to some fragment of memory and desire. Lazarescu is just a lonely man who’s going down, but we want at least a moment of recognition that a life is ending. As we watch Lazarescu’s rudely tendered drift toward extinction, our response shifts from disgust to sympathy, from bleak amusement to something like solidarity and love. Laid out, “a poor bare, forked animal,” as Lear describes himself, Lazarescu is our representative as he enters that final night. In the heartrending Romanian film “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu,” the hero—known in full as Dante Remus Lazarescu—is an unregenerate but oddly lovable mess. A retired engineer who lives in Bucharest, Lazarescu (Ion Fiscuteanu) regularly drinks something called Mastropol—home-brewed...

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February 12, 2008

From Wired: The Senate overwhelming voted Tuesday evening to legalize President Bush's warrantless wiretapping program and grant amnesty to the phone companies that helped out with the domestic spying.. The 68 to 29 vote is a major step in radically re-configuring 30 year-old limits on how the nation's spying services operate inside America's borders. The vote also deals a severe blow to civil liberties groups that are suing companies such as AT&T and Verizon for turning over millions of American's phone records to the government, and for helping the government wiretap American's phone and internet communications without a court order. The bill, which expires in six years, allows the government to install permanent wiretapping outposts in telephone and internet facilities inside the United States without a warrant. However, if those wiretaps are used to target Americans inside or outside of the country, the government would have to get a court...

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Barack Obama is not now, nor has he ever been, progressive. From Paul Krugman in the New York Times: If Mrs. Clinton gets the Democratic nomination, there is some chance — nobody knows how big — that we’ll get universal health care in the next administration. If Mr. Obama gets the nomination, it just won’t happen. The principal policy division between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama involves health care. It’s a division that can seem technical and obscure — and I’ve read many assertions that only the most wonkish care about the fine print of their proposals. But as I’ve tried to explain in previous columns, there really is a big difference between the candidates’ approaches. And new research, just released, confirms what I’ve been saying: the difference between the plans could well be the difference between achieving universal health coverage — a key progressive goal — and falling far...

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February 09, 2008

From Michael Moore: Friends, I just wanted to drop you a note to let you know (if you didn't already) the good news that "Sicko" has been nominated for this year's Academy Award for Best Documentary. It was a pleasant surprise when we got the news on Tuesday. Of course, every reporter who's called me in the past few days wanted to know if I plan on giving an "anti-war" or "anti-Bush" speech, should "Sicko" win, as I did when we won the Oscar for "Bowling for Columbine" in 2003. (As you may recall, it was the 5th day of the war when those Oscars were held, and I said from the stage that, while I enjoy making nonfiction films, we live in fictitious times with a man of fiction in the White House. A ruckus ensued with a loud roar of cheers and boos, then someone cued the band...

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January 27, 2008

Keys has said: "I would call it spirituality because I think religion gets very sticky. I think it’s beautiful to have a belief in something and that’s where religion comes in. It’s perfect in the sense of believing in something bigger and greater and having faith and hope... As much of a 'free society' as we are, we are much more censored than ever before, and worse than the '60s and '70s, when we may have been censored but stepped out against it. Now it's like we're censored and don't even search to find a way to say how we really feel. Except maybe Michael Moore." No room for religion No room for morals Creating false celebrities To be the spokesperson for their beliefs and products Don’t anyone else see it? Sadness festers Intuition nonexistent Democracy is just a trick for capitalism to win Get everyone involved Not to acquire...

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January 21, 2008

Tom Cruise Craig Ferguson on Tom Cruise Jerry O'Connell on Tom Cruise...

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January 12, 2008

Say your tooth hurts - cold, heat, air - it all bothers you so much that you stop eating on that side of your mouth. If only it would stop! You make an appointment, wait, take off work, and finally the dentist takes a look. If your dentist, even one you have been going to for many years, tells you that you need a root canal, say you need to think about it. Maybe he is distracted for whatever reason, and isn't making the best decision that day. Don't give in to the urge to just get it all over with as soon as possible. Make an appointment with a specialist (an endodontist). It's going to cost you $200 for the consultation and X-rays, but is well worth it to avoid getting an unnecessary root canal and crown (this can run you about $2,000) on the wrong tooth. It could...

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January 05, 2008

I say there is no darkness but ignorance. ~ Twelfth Night In Maryland, a woefully ignorant elections administrator named Linda Lamone has steadfastly opposed efforts to restore a transparent and properly functioning voting system to the citizens of Maryland. Lamone is such a cheerleader of the Diebold corporation's civil liberties-robbing voting machines, she was featured in their advertising brochure! At least this dark period for civil liberties in Maryland will have served one purpose - it must be clear to all that, unlike Lamone, the next appointee to this office must understand technology, or at least be willing to listen to the top computer scientists in the nation when they tell them a voting machine is crap. Thanks in no small part to the efforts of True Vote MD (and their legal efforts that have demonstrated the unconstitutionality of Lamone's positions), Governor Martin O'Malley and the Maryland legislature are poised...

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January 01, 2008

From a letter to the editor in the New York Times: Election results will always be suspect if private industry’s proprietary technologies underlie what must be a public and open process. It’s time to heed the lessons of the open-source software industry, where the Linux operating system is robust and secure and transparent. That is because thousands of technologists reviewing the public code have made it so. Colorado has a jumble of systems because counties were allowed to select their vendors, each with their own defects and vulnerabilities. Are the physical needs of voters so different across a state or the country that we need such a hodgepodge? It’s long past time for states and the nation to standardize one publicly reviewed open-source hardware and software design....

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December 29, 2007

From Eckhart Tolle in "The Power of Now": All evils are the effect of unconsciousness. You can alleviate the effects of unconsciousness, but you cannot eliminate them unless you eliminate their cause. True change happens within, not without. If you feel called upon to alleviate suffering in the world, that is a very noble thing to do, but remember not to focus exclusively on the outer; otherwise, you will encounter frustration and despair. Without a profound change in human consciousness, the world's suffering is a bottomless pit. So don't let your compassion become one-sided. Empathy with someone else's pain or lack and a desire to help need to be balanced with a deeper realization of the eternal nature of all life and the ultimate illusion of all pain. Then let your peace flow into whatever you do and you will be working on the levels of effect and cause simultaneously....

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December 20, 2007

I liked this message, from Alec Baldwin: I wish everyone a Merry Christmas, a Peaceful Holiday and a Happy New Year. And I wish those things, especially, to all American forces in Iraq and elsewhere, to all of their families back home, and to the suffering, innocent citizens of Iraq, who I believe seek peace as much as most of us do....

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December 14, 2007

Mark Hamill was in a bad car accident that required plastic surgery on his nose after the first (A Hew Hope - 1977) and before the second (The Empire Strikes Back - 1980) Star Wars movie. The emergency room plastic surgeon did a seriously bad job repairing Mark Hamill's nose - poor Luke went from hot to not. Adding height to the bridge of his nose would have restored much of his original appearance. So why didn't director George Lucas say, hey, wait a minute, let's fix this properly, instead of rushing to film the second movie with his star looking like a completely different person?...

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November 21, 2007

From Will Durst in Funny Times: As we witnessed at the UN when both Presidents Bush and Ahmadinejad got to exercise their rights on the same day. Think of it: on one hand you got a religious fanatic who sponsors secret prisons and has antagonized the entire world, and on the other hand you got an Iranian. After all the brouhaha in New York this week, this seems like a good time to have us a little chat about free speech. Not restricted free speech. Not partial free speech. Not pseudo-semi-counterfeit-limited-free speech. Not free speech on Wednesdays between 2:00 and 3:00 p.m. EDT. Not free speech zones, and not free speech reserved for the people we like and kept from the ones we don’t. No, my friends, I’m talking about your total, unfettered, full throated, in your face, front row death metal rock concert, spitting in the wind, 24/7, every...

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November 07, 2007

To write a successful biography or documentary about an artist, you must genuinely appreciate the work they did. How can you capture the essence of someone in any meaningful way if you don't understand them? Two new attempts to present the life of Charles Schulz, creator of Peanuts, fail miserably for this reason. The reader/viewer is left feeling empty and wondering, who was that all about? If you have read Peanuts through the years, you know Charles Schulz, because he poured his heart and soul into being a cartoonist, his life's ambition and life's work. And you know the new book by David Michaelis and the PBS American Masters documentary based on the book missed the mark badly. The premise for the book is Michaelis' pedestrian thesis of Charles Schulz as Charles Foster Kaine in Citizen Kaine - he lost his mother as a boy, he longed for romance but...

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November 01, 2007

Teresa Chambers...

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October 31, 2007

From James Sandler at Salon: After 9/11, the administration feared terrorist attacks on high-profile U.S. landmarks, and ordered Chambers to double the number of officers standing guard at icons like the Statue of Liberty and those on the National Mall in Washington. But the Park Police force already faced staffing shortages, and Chambers was forced to pull officers who were patrolling other national parks, leaving those areas vulnerable. Drug dealers soon moved in, and rapes more than tripled. In August 2002, when one of Chambers' patrolmen was handling a traffic accident with insufficient backup, he was run over and killed.In the fall of 2003, when a Washington Post reporter contacted Chambers for a story about the growing peril in the parks, she responded candidly. The Park Police, she told the Post, needed twice as many officers and millions of dollars to cover overtime expenses. She said officers had been working...

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October 27, 2007

From Divorce Magazine: Belarus 68% Russian Federation 65 Sweden 64 Latvia 63 Ukraine 63 Czech Republic 61 Belgium 56 Finland 56 Lithuania 55 United Kingdom 53 Moldova 52 United States 49 Hungary 46 Canada 45 Norway 43 France 43 Germany 41 Netherlands 41 Switzerland 40 Iceland 39...

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October 20, 2007

This will give the holy rollers even more to freak out about. From The Leaky Cauldron: Q - Did Dumbledore, who believed in the prevailing power of love, ever fall in love himself? A - My truthful answer to you... I always thought of Dumbledore as gay. [ovation.] ... Dumbledore fell in love with Grindelwald, and that that added to his horror when Grindelwald showed himself to be what he was. To an extent, do we say it excused Dumbledore a little more because falling in love can blind us to an extend, but he met someone as brilliant as he was, and rather like Bellatrix he was very drawn to this brilliant person, and horribly, terribly let down by him. Yeah, that's how i always saw Dumbledore. In fact, recently I was in a script read through for the sixth film, and they had Dumbledore saying a line to...

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October 15, 2007

There are safer alternative drugs that are not made by torturing animals. Read more about it at PMURescue.org... Angel Horse Rescue saves tortured horses - donate here...

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October 14, 2007

From the Boston Globe: Senator Hillary Clinton said yesterday that if she is elected president, she intends to roll back President Bush's expansion of executive authority, including his use of presidential signing statements to put his own interpretation on bills passed by Congress or to claim authority to disobey them entirely. "I think you have to restore the checks and balances and the separation of powers, which means reining in the presidency," Clinton told the Boston Globe's editorial board. Although Bush has issued hundreds of signing statements, declarations that accompany his signature on bills approved by Congress, Clinton said she would use the statements only to clarify bills that might be confusing or contradictory. She also said she did not subscribe to the "unitary executive" theory that argues the Constitution prevents Congress from passing laws limiting the president's power over executive branch operations. Adherents to the theory say any president...

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October 10, 2007

"I can't believe that we live in a world where doctors are able to lie to people and do these kinds of things to them. I can't live like this anymore!!!" ~ Lasik patient "The population with post-lasik vision and comfort issues is growing dramatically. God only knows how many people there are world-wide suffering from significant vision loss." ~ Opthamologist Some people will tell you how wonderful their experience with Lasik has been, but they are trying to convince themselves they didn't just make the biggest mistake of their lives. I remember one friend telling me how wonderful it was not to have to wear glasses anymore - a typical success story for the statistics, right? But in later conversations, the truth came out. He said his eyes were often dry, he saw halos around lights at night, and he didn't see contrast as well as before. Don't buy...

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September 29, 2007

Lighthouse Woods...

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September 17, 2007

From the AP: Former Vice President Al Gore took home an Emmy on Sunday night for creative achievement in interactive television for Current TV, his youth-oriented television channel. "We are trying to open up the television medium so that viewers can help them make television and join the conversation of democracy and reclaim American democracy by talking about the choices we have to make," Gore said as he accepted the award. Current TV reaches about 40 million homes in the United States. Earlier this year, the best documentary Oscar went to "An Inconvenient Truth," which chronicles Al Gore's campaign to educate people on the dangers of global warming. Gore joined the producer in accepting the award....

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September 16, 2007

You have many enemies, that know not Why they are so, but, like to village curs, Bark when their fellows do. ~~~ King Henry VIII A neighborhood dog (that we all considered "our dog") saved my life once, from a vicious, barking dog that used to roam the neighborhood. I loved "my" dog dearly - she had the sweetest temperament, despite being largely neglected by her owner. And she never barked, the only time I ever heard her bark was when she saved me. And boy, did she bark then - she squarely stood facing the other dog, and barked loudly at him, challenging him to leave me alone. Hollywood and Madison Avenue has sold Americans the bill of goods that we must have a dog to be cool - and continually pay them for it. We must care about the welfare of all living creatures. The domestication of dogs...

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From Julie Pierce, wife of the father whose death was heartbreakingly featured in Michael Moore's SiCKO: ... I just read your Wall Street Journal article written on Sept. 13, 2007, titled "Sick Sob Stories." You begin by talking about Tracy's role in 'SiCKO,' and claim the bone marrow transplant denied by our insurer would not have saved him. You also accuse me of "sneering" over our situation. In your 'reporting' of this story, you did not contact me, and you did not contact my husband's doctors. I cannot believe that a publication like the Wall Street Journal would print such an accusation without talking to anyone involved — especially in such a personal matter, which resulted in the death of my 37-year-old husband and the father of my child. If you had contacted me, I would have told you that bone marrow transplants became a last option, only after our...

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September 13, 2007

Colbert Report WristStrong Bracelet......

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September 08, 2007

"The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. He is, more likely, one who likes his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair.” ~ H. L. Mencken...

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September 01, 2007

There is a site devoted to the significant quality of life problem of nuisance barking: barkingdogs.net. The founder, Craig Mixon, explains: As an educational psychologist with a doctorate in behavior modification, managing the behavior of canines is one of my areas of specialty, which led to my decision to create this website... Having noise force-fed into your living quarters can be a devastating, debilitating experience. I hope that by saying so I do not alienate those many loud people who have managed to delude themselves into believing that the sound they are projecting into the homes of others is harmless, but it is time that someone set the record straight in no uncertain terms. If it is difficult for you to understand how something as seemingly trivial as the sound of a barking dog could so thoroughly traumatize a person, just click here for an in-depth explanation of how that...

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August 20, 2007

From Jonathan Turley in USA Today: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has continued his campaign to survive at any cost in the face of allegations ranging from false statements to violations of federal surveillance law. Despite persistent calls for Gonzales' removal or impeachment, his allies dismiss the possibility he committed crimes while emphasizing that he is tough on crime. It is a defense that leaves many lawyers chuckling. The fact is that Gonzales is the best thing to come along for criminal defendants since Ernesto Miranda. Gonzales' appetite for unchecked power has served to undermine prosecutions and alienate courts. The latest example can be found in the recent ruling against the government in the prosecution of Rep. William Jefferson, D-La. In May 2006, Gonzales approved the FBI raid of Jefferson's office in an investigation of bribery and corruption charges. The raid violated a couple hundred years of precedent. In the past,...

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August 03, 2007

If you haven't seen Michael Moore's Sicko yet, see it this weekend! From the AP: The Senate passed legislation Thursday to add 3 million lower-income children to a popular health insurance program in bipartisan defiance of President Bush's threatened veto. The 68-31 vote, one day after the House passed a more ambitious and expensive version over bitter Republican opposition, handed Democrats a solid achievement to trumpet as they leave Washington for a summer break. It also gave Democrats, who secured a veto-proof margin, a chance to draw a stark distinction between their priorities and Bush's on an issue that resonates with voters. “For the life of me, I can't understand why the president would want to veto this legislation,” said Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., the Finance Committee chairman. “It's moderate, it's bipartisan, it helps low-income kids. ... It's just the right thing to do for the country.” Bush has proposed...

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June 29, 2007

From The Nation: About forty minutes into Sicko, Michael Moore's excellent, frustrating new documentary about the American healthcare industry, Ronald Reagan makes his first and only appearance. It's surprising, if only because, unlike in his previous film Fahrenheit 9/11, Moore focuses relatively little attention on the villains in his story, choosing instead simply to allow their victims to tell their tales. It's a montage of hard luck and innocence. But after introducing us to the horror stories all too typical among even the 250 million Americans fortunate enough to have health insurance, Moore takes a few moments for a brief history lesson. How, he asks, did we get here? And it's in this time warp that we encounter the Gipper. This is not Gipper the Governor or Gipper the President or even Gipper the B-list actor. This is Gipper, silver-tongued shill for the interests of capital. It's a little-studied chapter...

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June 27, 2007

Get over it already, Paul Simon. Art Garfunkel has a better voice than you. Unbelievable that Simon wouldn't let Garfunkel sing Bridge Over Troubled Water on PBS just now - Simon just had to sing the second verse himself (unlike on the hit record, where Garfunkel sang all three verses). Garfunkel had the grace to show up for a show honoring Simon, and responded to a nasty introduction by Simon with a hug. Most songwriters, especially those with mediocre voices like Simon's, are honored when a singer with a beautiful voice like Garfunkel turns their song, especially a so-so song like this one, into something special. You don't even have to like Simon and Garfunkel to admire Garfunkel's performance on the record - critics have called it the performance of his career. So instead of letting his old friend sing his signature song, Simon just had to take it away...

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June 16, 2007

From the Washington Post: A long-awaited national study has concluded that abstinence-only sex education, a cornerstone of the Bush administration's social agenda, does not keep teenagers from having sex. Neither does it increase or decrease the likelihood that if they do have sex, they will use a condom. Authorized by Congress in 1997, the study followed 2000 children from elementary or middle school into high school. The children lived in four communities -- two urban, two rural. All of the children received the family life services available in their community, in addition, slightly more than half of them also received abstinence-only education. By the end of the study, when the average child was just shy of 17, half of both groups had remained abstinent. The sexually active teenagers had sex the first time at about age 15. Less than a quarter of them, in both groups, reported using a condom...

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June 02, 2007

Bush, Cheney, and Condoleezza...

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May 21, 2007

From Andrew O'Hehir in Salon: "I know the storm awaits me back in the United States," Michael Moore told a wall-to-wall throng of reporters here after the Saturday morning press premiere of his new film, "Sicko." Then he heaved a deep breath and added, "But this is just so pleasant." It was indeed another gorgeous, summery morning on the French Riviera, but the real heat was indoors. There wasn't a single empty seat inside the Grand Théâtre Lumière -- which holds more than 2,000 people -- for "Sicko," and dozens of stragglers were locked out on the sidewalk. Moore's screed against the outrageous state of American healthcare was received with uproarious affection, but one might argue that Cannes provided the softest possible crowd. An American left-wing populist, attacking America's profit-motive, private-sector ideology before a roomful of international intellectuals, at least half of them Europeans. May I introduce a new phrase...

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April 22, 2007

Speaking of paid Republican hack Amy Holmes, watch her tout torture on Paula Zahn Now. Rachel Maddow is brilliant, and she responds to Holmes' unAmerican BS with this fabulous statement: "You can't say it doesn't matter what we're doing cause we're trying to get Al Qaeda. It matters what we do. We're America. That's more important than Al-Qaeda." Video from Crooks and Liars......

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April 15, 2007

If George Lucas could get his destructive paws on other movies, like Singin' in the Rain, he'd have ruined them like he did the original Star Wars Trilogy... check out the "Special Edition" of Singin' in the Rain......

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March 28, 2007

Their Veggie Burgers are good. They aren't always on the picture menu, but ask for them, they have them. From the AP: Animal rights advocates praised Burger King for its new commitment to begin buying eggs and pork from suppliers that do not keep their animals in cages or crates. "We certainly hope that people will order the BK Veggie Burger when they go into Burger King," said Matt Prescott, spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. "But the fact that Burger King has made positive changes for some of the animals killed for its restaurants will send a ripple effect through the fast food industry and show other companies that animal welfare cannot be ignored." PETA has been critical of the fast food giant in the past. Burger King Corp. product safety manager Steve Weiffenbach sent PETA two letters, dated March 14 and 20, outlining the company's...

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March 18, 2007

From Real Time with Bill Maher: Liberals must stop saying President Bush hasn't asked Americans to sacrifice for the war on terror. On the contrary, he's asked us to sacrifice something enormous. Our civil rights. Now, when I heard George Bush was reading my emails, I probably had the same reaction you did: George Bush can read?! Yes, he can. And this administration has read your phone records, credit card statements, mail, Internet logs. I can't tell if they're fighting a war on terror or producing the next season of "Cheaters." I mail myself a copy of the Constitution every morning just on the hope they'll open it and see what it says. So -so when it comes to sacrifice, don't kid yourself. You have given up a lot. You've given up faith in your government's honesty, the goodwill of people overseas, and six-tenths of the Bill of Rights. Here's...

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March 10, 2007

From the AP: The Justice Department's improper and illegal use of the USA Patriot Act has Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in trouble. Lawmakers already were seething at the Justice Department for the firing of eight federal prosecutors and Gonzales' dismissive response to critics. It is too soon to tell whether Gonzales, a close Texas friend of Bush, might be forced to leave. Even his ouster, however, would do little to change a perception that the Bush administration is unraveling amid declining public support and trust. Another day, another scandal. The Justice Department's improper and illegal use of the USA Patriot Act has Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in trouble, an all-too-familiar circumstance for President George W. Bush's inner circle. The last thing a troubled president needs is another friend in trouble. "This strikes me as another blow for the administration," said Republican consultant Joe Gaylord. He was not the only Republican...

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February 26, 2007

This really made me stop and think. Here is the You Tube video, and I wrote down the words: It's a great day for Americans. Happy President's Day! It's a great day to celebrate this great country and the freedom of speech, for which we are so rightly famous. Because I'm going to talk about something tonight that's a little bit different. I want to talk about something that's been bothering me for a little while now. You know if you've ever seen this show before, I know that's not everybody, but... If you've ever seen this show before you know that I make fun of people on this show. I make fun of a lot of people on this show. Now a couple months ago, Kevin Costner got himself into some kind of bother, and I made fun of him in the monologue. And then, a couple of weeks...

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January 19, 2007

From Senator Patrick Leahy: ...With the Congress finally adjourning early Saturday morning, I want to take this opportunity to look forward to the next Congress and some of the priorities that will help restore balance to our system and better protect the rights and serve the interests of the American people. I came to the Senate during the ebb tide of Watergate and Vietnam. In my 32 years since then in the Senate, I have never seen a Congress so willfully derelict in its duties as during this Administration. This has been an unfortunate chapter in Congress’s history, a time when our Constitution was under assault, when our legal and human rights were weakened, when our privacy and other freedoms were eroded. This election was an intervention. The American people rose up to take away Congress’s rubber stamp, and to demand a new direction with more accountability... As a Democratic...

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January 14, 2007

From Feminist Weekly News: The US House of Representatives voted yesterday to approve a bill that expands research on embryonic stem cells. The bill, known as HR 3 or the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007, amends the Public Health Service Act to fund human embryonic stem cell research with cells that were originally created for fertility treatment. Under the bill passed by the House, individuals seeking fertility treatment would be able to donate to researchers those embryos that were in excess of their clinical need. Many are hopeful that, by researching stem cells that can generate any tissue in the human body, scientists may be able to find new cures for cancer and other serious diseases. Many Representatives shared their personal stories of disease and illnesses to promote the measure on the floor yesterday. According to the Associated Press, Rep. Zack Space (D-OH) spoke of his 16-year-old son's...

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January 08, 2007

From Jonathan Turley in USA Today: Presidents such as John Quincy Adams, Theodore Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover opted not to use the Bible (Adams used a legal book). Franklin Pierce declined to take a sworn oath at all and instead simply affirmed. The newest member of the Minnesota delegation, Keith Ellison, would appear to be the very model of a god-fearing congressman whom conservatives have longed for. Yet Ellison has been denounced as a constitutional blasphemer after discussing his upcoming oath of office. The problem was not with Ellison's oath, but with his god — Ellison is Muslim (our nation's first in Congress) and intends to use the Quran today to pledge to serve faithfully before Allah. Judging from the outcry, one would think that Ellison wanted to use the January edition of Penthouse. America's permanently angry class of religious zealots has organized protests. Some have called for a law...

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January 07, 2007

Check out the list at TPM Muckraker......

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From the New York Daily News: President Bush has quietly claimed sweeping new powers to open Americans' mail without a judge's warrant, the New York Daily News has learned. The president asserted his new authority when he signed a postal reform bill into law on Dec. 20. Bush then issued a "signing statement" that declared his right to open people's mail under emergency conditions. That claim is contrary to existing law and contradicted the bill he had just signed, say experts who have reviewed it. Bush's move came during the winter congressional recess and a year after his secret domestic electronic eavesdropping program was first revealed. It caught Capitol Hill by surprise. "Despite the president's statement that he may be able to circumvent a basic privacy protection, the new postal law continues to prohibit the government from snooping into people's mail without a warrant," said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the...

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December 23, 2006

From Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann in the New York Times: In a democracy, transparency in government has to be honored and protected. To classify information for reasons other than the safety and security of the United States and its interests is a violation of these principles. HERE is the redacted version of a draft Op-Ed article we wrote for The Times, as blacked out by the Central Intelligence Agency’s Publication Review Board after the White House intervened in the normal prepublication review process and demanded substantial deletions. Agency officials told us that they had concluded on their own that the original draft included no classified material, but that they had to bow to the White House. Indeed, the deleted portions of the original draft reveal no classified material. These passages go into aspects of American-Iranian relations during the Bush administration’s first term that have been publicly discussed by Secretary...

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December 16, 2006

I enjoyed listening to him......

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December 12, 2006

From Atlanta Progressive News: From mushroom clouds to African yellow cake to aluminum tubes, the American people and this Congress were not presented the facts, but rather were presented a string of untruths, to justify the invasion of Iraq. When President Bush signed an executive order authorizing unlawful spying on American citizens, he circumvented the courts, the law, and he violated the separation of powers provided by the Constitution. Once the program was revealed, he then tried to hide the scope of his offense from the American people by making contradictory, untrue statements. US Rep. Cynthia McKinney yesterday became the first US Congresswoman to introduce Articles of Impeachment against President Bush, as well as Vice President Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice. Atlanta Progressive News has obtained the following remarks prepared by the Congresswoman, and has learned she was not allowed to read them on the US House Floor....

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December 01, 2006

Authored by scientists at MIT and Harvard, TellMeAboutStemCells.org......

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October 29, 2006

Because adult cells are already specialized, skin cells will only become skin and cartilage cells will only become cartilage. Adults do not have stem cells in many vital organs, so when those tissues are damaged, scar tissue develops. Only embryonic stem cells, which have the capacity to become any kind of human tissue, have the potential to repair vital organs. And unlike embryonic stem cells, which have a capacity to reproduce indefinitely in the laboratory, adult stem cells are difficult to grow in the lab and their potential to reproduce diminishes with age. And just as with global warming, science be damned. For Republicans, whatever it takes to get money and votes from either corporations or relgious zealots trumps ethics, because they quite simply could not get elected if either group withdrew their support. If you google "stem cell adult embryonic", you have to wade through pages of search results...

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October 25, 2006

The latest "scandal" from the party that spent millions of taxpayer dollars making Bill Clinton's sex life everyone's business - the party that kept George Bush on his throne by vilifying gay marriage. Hypocrisy, thy name is Republican. From the Broward - Palm Beach New Times: A young rising star in the Republican Party has boasted to witnesses of his sexual relationship with Charlie Crist, the frontrunner in the Florida governor's race who has repeatedly denied that he is gay. The GOP staffer, 21-year-old Jason Wetherington, told friends at separate social functions in August that he had sex with Crist, according to two credible and independent sources who heard Wetherington make the claim first-hand. Wetherington, who recently worked as a field director for U.S. Senate candidate Katherine Harris and currently works for state representative Ellyn Bodganoff's reelection campaign, also named a man whom he said is Crist's long-term partner, a...

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I can't think of words vile enough to describe Limbaugh. The story on Think Progress: Rush Limbaugh is sticking to his claim that Michael J. Fox is exaggerating the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease — by “acting” or “not taking his medications” — in an advertisement promoting stem cell research. The media falsely reported that he “apologized” to Fox. On his radio show today, Limbaugh said he regrets nothing. Watch it: Transcript: I stand by what I said. I take back none of what I said. I wouldn’t rephrase it any differently. It is what I believe; it is what I think. It is what I have found to be true....

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October 13, 2006

From the ACLU: It is an abuse of power and an abuse of trust for the military to play any role in monitoring critics of administration policies. Documents released today by the American Civil Liberties Union reveal new details of Pentagon surveillance of Americans opposed to the Iraq war, including Quakers and student groups. The documents show that the Pentagon was keeping tabs on non-violent protesters by collecting information and storing it in a military anti-terrorism database. "There is simply no reason why the United States military should be monitoring the peaceful activities of American citizens who oppose U.S. war policies," said ACLU attorney Ben Wizner. "When information about non-violent protest activity is included in a military anti-terrorism database, all Americans should be concerned about the unchecked authority this administration has seized in the name of fighting terrorism." The documents come in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit...

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October 07, 2006

The all star team lost to a real team. Poetic justice. New York lost to a team with less than half of their payroll - Detroit....

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