8:38am: Intimidation
I don't understand why no one here asked politicos like Bolton questions like these long, long ago.  Now that it is far too late everyone is jumping on the bandwagon.

7:30am: Let 'em sue

How do we make America's 2008 presidential campaign more honest? With lawsuits – lots of libel lawsuits, to be specific.

An editorial From the Christian Science Monitor advocates loosening the legal restrictions upon political candidate's ability to sue one another and the thing reads like a dream come true.

Politicians seeking the White House would mind their own mudslinging if they knew they could be sued.

Imagine that John McCain, or one of the ads he approves, says something particularly disparaging about Barack Obama. We would get Obama v.McCain – in a court, under oath. Or suppose Hillary Clinton, or one of her ads, says something especially critical of Rudy Giuliani. We would get Giuliani v. Clinton in court, under oath. Or we might get Edwards v. Romney in court and under oath.

I'm sure that the PACs and the other slime covered "friends of" organizations would take over in the mud slinging, but at least the politicians wouldn't be able to lend their name to it, lest they be dragged into court.

Unfortunately, we'll never see it. They seem to think we enjoy it - Do we? I'm beginning to wonder.

8:13am: Trust the Blogger

I caught this story on Secular Blasphemy and followed through with some of the links because it looked interesting.

Zogby Poll: Most Americans say bloggers and citizen reporters will play a vital role in journalism's future.

I have to say that I think the American people are right, although sorting the wheat from the chafe will be difficult.  Bloggers are notorious for being very wrong.  It's always when they are right that we remember, eh?  We forget the numerous times that they are wrong.  Just like the psychics.

Again, I agree.  I think that bloggers keep the traditionals on their toes and keep them from being too complacent.  That's the good part.

Unfortunately, I think there's a negative side to non-traditional media. 

Bloggers have made traditional news sources too quick to jump on stories and run with sensational headlines before checking things out thoroughly. 

Dan Rather, anyone?  (Although... I suspect Dan was correct and went through the Buzzsaw.  He still should have seen it coming.)

I think that a steady diet of reading blogs has made readers look for spin above fact.  I know that it's done that to me in many ways.  It's just so easy to seek out things that do not contradict your point of view and so simple to become confident that you are completely and utterly correct.  There's always plenty of bloggers and people to sing the Amen Chorus in unison with you.

I thought this was an interesting watermark:


The Neo-Con Pod-People/Theocrats have long held sway over AM radio in what I  would refer to as a market of spin and hate.  There's nothing in that world that gives them any sort of unbiased news or in-depth coverage.  No one there challenges their opinions or tries to make them think that they might be wrong about something.  They are going to think whatever the AM radio personalities (Rush, Falwell, etc.) tell them to think.

 The really interesting part of AM hate radio is that the personalities rail on the mainstream media all day.  Naturally the listeners will absorb that mistrust and view every outlet with a jaded eye except for the ones who fill them with the mistrust.  Even though the mainstream media is where they are absorbing and developing that mistrust. 

Irony.  Gotta love it.

Anyway, read the rest of the article.  It's interesting.

9:55am: Oh! The Places You'll Go
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton Announces White House Bid

Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has made it official, announcing "I'm in" the 2008 presidential race on her website. She's taking the first step of forming a presidential exploratory committee.

Well, I was wrong. I didn't think she'd be that stupid. She's got zero chances of winning.

The next two years are going to be a nightmare of spitting and hissing from the very loud, poisonous, half-wit NeoCons, the other "Conservatives" who were willing to check ethics and decency at the doorstep in 1992. Thanks, Hillary. Thanks for giving them something to revive the movement that the Incompetent Chimp was so effectively killing. The currently alienated Goldwater Conservatives who hate them for their social engineering and miscellaneous legal fuckery really appreciate this loads and loads.

9:52pm: Run, Ron, Run!
Ron Paul (R-Tex) filed incorporation papers in Texas on Thursday to create a presidential exploratory committee that allows him and his supporters to collect money on behalf of his bid.

I've been a huge fan of Ron Paul for a long time. I don't always agree with him, but he minds his own damn business and he thinks government should do the same.

Paul limits his view of the role of the federal government to those duties laid out in the U.S. Constitution. As a result, he sometimes casts votes that appear at odds with his constituents and other Republicans. He was the only Republican congressman to vote against Department of Defense appropriations for fiscal year 2007.

The vote against the defense appropriations bill, he said, was because of his opposition to the war in Iraq, which he said was "not necessary for our actual security."

Now you know who in Congress was actually opposed to the war from the beginning, folks.

9:58am: 300 terabits
It's enough to hold the uncompressed contents of the Library of Congress

It's kind of a mind boggling article about the future of nano technology at Wired. Well, kind of mind boggling. I suppose it really isn't all that surprising when one really thinks about it in terms of the way tech has increased over the last forty years. Where we were in 1967 and where we are now is on the mind-bending side, but not all that amazing if you think of it in terms of where we were in 1007 as compared to 2007. It's actually kind of slow when you think of it that way.

What both interested and amused me were the comments below the article. They are talking about the technology in terms of "reliability" and "storage" and, of course, in the terms of business and engineering terms.

The first question that popped into my mind was this: What does this mean to the world of yaoi?

Seriously. How can this overwhelming new computing technology be applied in the real world? How are people going to use it and make it affordable and democratic, thus making it useful? The same way it made the PC affordable and the Internet democratic. Sex, money, and social interaction. Porn. Gambling. Social networking.

Pornography sites will use the increased memory to run better live shows, store movies, and they will do things that I can't even begin to imagine right now. All I can think of is virtual reality. If there was ever an industry with a pent up demand for virtual reality, it's the porn world. They will be at the forefront along with the gaming industry. Sexuality has been the world's biggest reason for innovation in the world from the beginning.

Gaming will be running a close second. Gamers are already drooling over this. I can see why. Even one terabit represents the world of their dreams right now. WoW will never be the same. God, they must be having orgasms at the forums there. Please see previous paragraph.

Social networking. I don't know how this can be applied. No idea. But human connections drive nearly all of us. The first two would be meaningless without this. Without this the technology will be meaningless. It will be valuable for some things, like storage, in the case of the Library of Congress, large Corporations, etc. But, that's not the application of the technology. That isn't what will make it exciting or affordable. It's not what Seagate or any other company worth its bytes will reach for.

This is pretty cool.

3:04pm: Damn, this makes me smile.
The 43-acre property is a down-market relic of old Florida surrounded by multi-million-dollar homes and splashy high-rise condos.

Residents of this coastal trailer-park town sitting on beach front property have voted overwhelmingly to sell their community to a developer for more than $510 million, which could make most of them millionaires. Some residents bought their homes for as little as $35,000.

I just adore stories like this one. They make me so happy. Little bit of luck, little bit of smarts, little bit of scrappiness. Lots of happiness. I wish everyone there the best and salute them.

Then I just want to scream:

The Nannies Have Arrived, Sir.

Can't we have a government that will just leave both our pcketbooks and our personal lives the hell alone? The Republicans want to take all of our money and shift it around to their pockets and let the Jesus fandom run our personal lives. The Democrats want to micromanage our lives like we are all five year olds. Well, at least they don't rob us blind and kill us while they are doing it. Still. They are only hurting themselves. People do not like to be smothered.

9:39pm: Cheese Is Now Junk Food
Yes, cheese.

Under regulations coming into force this month,broadcasters will be banned from advertising cheese during children'stelevision programmes or in shows with a large proportion of childviewers, such as The Simpsons and Hollyoaks.

The ban is part of a government drive to crack down on junk food adverts ontelevision, which is designed to reduce the exposure of children tofoods high in fat, salt and sugar.

Okay, so it's the UK. It'll be here soon, folks.

Watch out dog owners.

On the 1st of January a five-year old girl was killed by a dog and the locals went on a hysterical "outlaw dog roundup" binge for dangerous dogs such as this one:



These were the dogs that were on the 1991 banned "dangerous dogs" list. It didn't matter that the dogs rounded up had done nothing. Apparently it did not matter that the owner of the dog who killed the little girl was a convicted drug dealer who'd been feeding his dog steroids and training it to fight. No, all dogs of that type are to blame for the acts of a very human individual.

Just in case. It might happen again, you know.

We must live in a world devoid of all risk, you know.

I'm amazed that people of the baby boom generation even made it to adulthood with all this incredible danger. We should all be dead.

( A bit of myself )

3:21pm: Shocker
‘Inconvenient politically’

"We were always playing on the white man's court . . . by the white man's rules," he writes. "If the principal, or the coach, or a teacher . . . wanted to spit in your face, he could, because he had the power and you didn't. . . . The only thing you could choose was withdrawal into a smaller and smaller coil of rage.

"And the final irony: should you refuse this defeat and lash out at your captors . . . they would have a name for that too. Paranoid. Militant."

Obama has not expressed any regrets for his candor. In a preface to the new edition, he says that he would tell the same story today "even if certain passages have proven to be inconvenient politically."

In the book, Obama acknowledges that he used cocaine as a high school student but rejected heroin. "Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow when you could afford it. Not smack, though," he says.

In an interview during his Senate race two years ago, Obama said he admitted using drugs because he thought it was important for "young people who are already in circumstances that are far more difficult than mine to know that you can make mistakes and still recover.

"I think that, at this stage, my life is an open book, literally and figuratively," he said. "Voters can make a judgment as to whether dumb things that I did when I was a teenager are relevant to the work that I've done since that time."

*blinks*

OMG. That almost sounds something like the truth. How can this be? A politician is speaking.

9:06am: The Real Path to 9-11
This vid is around 20 minutes long, but it is concise and fascinating. If you have a few minutes to spare, it's a fantastic history lesson. The original air date was 1987.

"The Secret Government" on Google Video
Bill Moyers, the respected TV journalist, analyzes the threats to constitutional government posed by an illegitimate network of "superpatriots", spies, profiteers, mercenaries and ex-generals. His documentary gives a fascinating overview of what has actually happened in the last 50 years regarding the CIA and the Cold War (including Iran, Guatamala, Cuba, Vietnam and Chile). He features such people as Ralph McGeehee and Phil Retinger (both former CIA agents), Rear Admiral Gene La Rocque (Ret. U.S.N.), Theodore Bissell (active in the CIA at the time), Sen. Frank Church and many others.

This entry was moved from authenticpoppy to this journal. I've decided to begin posting here again.

10:18pm: Rowdiness, Drunken Debauchery
( Ah, Christmases Past )

I think we need to return to the days of Christmas past. All this "Christmas is for Children" is nonsense. Christmas is for taking time to have fun and enjoying yourself before the long, hard days of winter to set in. Really. Stop.

Just to all the madness and overdoing it. Say yes to drunken debauchery if that's your thing. Say yes to shipping the kids off to Grandma's house if she can't think of a holiday without them. Say yes to kicking back to peace and quiet. Say yes to doing absolutely nothing. I'll post this again next year at Thanksgiving. I'll remind you to ditch the complicated recipes that day too, okay? This madness can stop, you know.

We really have only ourselves to blame when we go mad.

Updating 1/3/07 with a link shared in antitheism:

The war on Christmas, and Christ, is real

4:29pm: First official GOP Presidential contender throws his hat into the ring.
And what a candidate he is.

From Politics 1 - He is listed right below possible candidate George F. Allen (Virginia) and before possible candidate "Sam" Brownback (Kansas):

Michael Jesus Archangel (Michigan)

STATUS: ANNOUNCED CANDIDATE. This gadfly candidate -- who also uses the name "Saint Michael Jesus the Archangel" (and was formerly named Philip Jesse Silva until he legally adopted the Archangel moniker in 1996) -- appears rather delusional. "From the time I was a little boy I knew I was God and Michael the Archangel, but I didn't dare tell anyone, not even anyone in my family because I knew that the devil, Satan, was going to try to murder Me, and indeed he did try, four separate times," he explains. He also writes a lot about "My Big Brother, Jesus Christ, Whose parents, My spouse the Blessed Virgin Mary Michelle and her guardian spouse, Saint Joseph." Archangel Michael wrote he was a Vietnam War veteran who attempted suicide when, he explains, he suffered from depression and paranoia; and later became a "a volunteer Secret Agent for the Central Intelligence Agency without pay." A former janitor, he is a self-employed "writer" these days. As for politics, he describes himself as a "Reagan Republican" -- but adds he has also briefly drifted in and out of the Libertarian Party twice over the years. Michael the Archangel says he is a "radical conservative Republican" who recognizes "the fact that America is an official Theocracy." I'll just let him explain it in his own words: "The cultural/educational struggle going on between liberals and conservatives ... will decide whether the liberals are allowed to take this nation further and further down the road to socialist destruction or whether the conservatives will take our country back for God and the people. As a 2008 election Republican Presidential candidate, I hope all you Libertarians become Christians. Your support for the pro-choice position vis-a-vis abortion is just as destructive as the Communazis' position on that subject. The Democrats are complete Socialists, that is, Communazis." He also wants tougher enforcement of narcotics laws, a total ban on tobacco sales, opposes any gay rights laws, supports a total ban on abortion, etc. In a major setback for his campaign, Archangel was arrested on attempted murder and other felony charges in March 2006. "As a matter of fact, he is crazy. Anyone in their right mind can see that," said the Sheriff who arrested Archangel. You can find lots and lots of very long pages of writing like this -- all of which proclaim this candidate to be God -- on his official website: ArchangelMichael.info (you've got to scroll down very far on the homepage to find the link to his Presidential campaign and his autobiography).

...

I'd vote for him over Santorum. At least this guy would be semi honest.

...
(Shamelessly stolen from one of my comms.)

1:35pm: The Usual Suspects - Moonbats and Guns
David Kuo on why Bush's faith-based initiative has floundered -- Beliefnet.com:

Sen. Rick Santorum spent endless hours alone lobbying Senate Leadership to give some floor time, any floor time to get a bill to help charities and the poor - even after 9/11 when charities were going out of business because of a decline in giving. He was stiff-armed by his own party.

At the end of the day, both parties played to stereotype -- Republicans were indifferent to the poor and the Democrats were allergic to faith.

Yeah, I figured in the long run that Kou's book would be just more of the same bullshit.

Santorum spent most of his time on K-Street or figuring out ways to re-word "TEH GEH IS COMING! TEH GEH IS COMING!"

I've been thinking about this. The media is playing up the parts of this book that point to the usual suspects - Cheney, Rove, and Rumsfeld. Wow. They aren't Good Christians and sometimes they make fun of them. Whoa. There's a big surprise for ya kids. Wake me when the election is over.

The protection is there for the "right" people, like Bush (Who, I might remind everyone, ridiculed a woman about to be sent to her death - I will never get that bit of conservative compassion out of my brain.) and a few of the other radical wing nuts that aren't hiding anything or aren't going to get named in connection with any Abramoff scandal. (For those of you who don't know, The K-Street project was founded by DeLay, Santorum, Abramoff, and Norquist to purge Democrats from the ranks of the 40,000 lobbyists with offices on K Street in downtown Washington.)

Yeah, the Democrats will take back Congress this time. Great. They will take back Congress just at the right time for the Neocons. We are awash in debt with no way out for the next two years, we are in a war that is getting bloodier by the second and have no way out of that for at least a year or more, there is a growing constitutional crisis because of a President who's shown nothing but contempt for standing laws and procedures, and worst of all, after ten years of constant abuse at the hands of the Neocon Slime Machine, the Democrats are thirsty for blood at a time when the populace is fed up with all the crap. They will get rid of the shit for the GOP and look like the bad guys doing it.

The Neocons are playing chess while the Democrats are play Tic-Tac-Toe. Idiots.

Just remember. A paranoid is a someone who knows a little about what's going on.


( Meanwhile, the *real* Moonbats are crawling out of the closet. )

I hate being a homeless Libertarian.

David Kuo, Santorum, politics, religion, libertarian

6:07am: Methods - Distortions - Chicken Feed

The sampling "is solid. The methodology is as good as it gets," said John Zogby, whose polling agency, Zogby International, has done several surveys in Iraq since the war began. "It is what people in the statistics business do." Zogby said similar survey methods have been used to estimate casualty figures in other conflicts, such as Darfur and the Congo.

Well, that settles the accuracy question for me. I disgust myself for even wanting to know. In the long run it doesn't matter if the Lancet study figures are right or the Bushie figures are right.

( Dead is dead. )

I've made some statements on this blog lately that have been distorted. Things that I wish I could retract because I later found background on the players.

( Distortions )

I've been having a lot of thoughts and I've sort of been suspicious of Kou for a couple of days now. I don't like the way that the information is being presented about his book. It's too "divided" and he doesn't really hit hard on the people who matter. It was driven home this when I watched Keith Olberman's interview with John Ashcroft.

It seems I'm not the only one who is nervous about this.

( The Grand Delusion )

technorati tags:politics, religion

Blogged with Flock

6:45pm: Condi - Goebbels - Dawkins
Rice says U.S. ready to defend Japan

The United States is willing to use its full military might to defend Japan in light of North Korea's nuclear test, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday as she sought to assure Asian countries there is no need to jump into a nuclear arms race.

( I don't think I've ever nodded so strongly when reading a story about American military strength and diplomacy )

The world is nuts. I feel old right now.

White House photo from New York Times shows Bush with Mike Gallagher, Neal Boortz, Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity and Michael Medved.

So, uh, where's Joseph Goebbels? I wonder if O'Reilly cried.

I watched Richard Dawkins on Colbert last night. Dawkins wasn't brilliant this time, and Colbert couldn't get an edge with Dawkins. Dawkins isn't humourless, but he's tough to get to from the angles that Colbert is used to. It was odd watching them parry.

I think Sam Harris or any American anti-theist would do better with Colbert's brand of humor. I don't think that Dawkins was accustomed to the subtle way in which Colbert needles the Religious Right. I doubt he's ever seen Colbert's "God" machine on The Daily Show either. Dawkins spoke to Colbert cautiously, as if he were waiting for Colbert to begin the Inquisition of the Intelligent Design folks, even though he knew that the Colbert Show wasn't that sort of show. It was a mildly amusing watch, however.

technorati tags:international, politics, media, religion

Blogged with Flock

10:09am: A Loss of Faith
If you didn't catch 60-Minutes last night take a few and watch the A Loss of Faith (QT mov - will open in a new window. See below for other formats) segment. It isn't long. The segment is actually mis-named, I think. It should have been entitled "In The Name of Politics" or something. There is no loss of faith on the part of the author. His faith brought tears to this atheist's eyes, as often happens when I see someone who actually lives a personal faith for themselves rather than uses their faith and certainty in a religion as a mechanism for controlling others.

Kou is sincere and going through life with his eyes wide-open. Kuo is not the child-like noob being painted by the current administration. It's easy to see where they get the stereotype from; he has an innocent face and an easy smile. What they miss is his intelligence and obvious devotion. He is not going to be easily Swift-Boated. Kou seems to be someone who tried to play a political game in order to live his life according to his faith rather than a get-elected-now game.

Ultimately he felt politics sullies religion, spirituality, and faith. Many American political thinkers felt that way, which is why it is so important that religion and government do not intertwine.

Click here to watch the segment at CBS or read the transcripts.

7:19am: Compassion - Sex - Ridicule

Nonprofits laundered cash for Abramoff: Senate panel

The five groups named in the report are Americans for Tax Reform, headed by influential conservative activist Grover Norquist; the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, which was founded by Gale Norton before she became Secretary of the Interior; Citizens Against Government Waste, which fights "pork barrel" spending; the National Center for Public Policy Research, a think tank; and Toward Tradition, a religious group.

Check your local candidates and see how deep the hole in this one goes.

Shays Says Abu Ghraib Abuses Were Sex Ring, Not Torture

Republican Rep. Christopher Shays says the Abu Ghraib prison abuses weren't torture but instead involved a "sex ring" of National Guard troops.

"Now I've seen what happened in Abu Ghraib, and Abu Ghraib was not torture,"

Shays said at a debate Wednesday."It was outrageous, outrageous involvement of National Guard troops from (Maryland) who were involved in a sex ring and they took pictures of soldiers who were naked," added Shays. "And they did other things that were just outrageous. But it wasn't torture."

I know.  Stunning, isn't it?

Hillary Clinton Has Invited You to Ridicule Her Facebook Profile

New York’s Junior Senator Hillary Clinton tags “Chappaqua, NY” as her hometown, Democratic Presidential hopeful Evan Bayh’s “interests” include “Middle Class,” “War On Terror” and “Grater’s Black Raspberry Ice Cream,” while Pennsylvania’s politically doomed senatorial incumbent Rick Santorum lists and sporadically capitalizes his favorite campaign issues like “Stay in Iraq until the Job is Done,” “Free Trade IS Fair Trade,” and “Build a fence to protect our borders!” Ali G himself could not have done a better job sapping the self-respect away from our nation’s top-ranking dignitaries.

Haven't they learned their lesson with YouTube?  They need to learn how to use the Internet before they actually use it, or it will continue to come back to bite them in the ass.  Politicians seem to think the Internet is a one-way communication medium.  Dolts.

It's a shame that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert ruled out a run for the White House in '08.  They would kick ass and probably do a better job than any of these idiots.  Seriously.  Opie and Anthony would do a better job than Bush/Cheney.

technorati tags:politics

Blogged with Flock

10:11am: Codes - Crime - Columbia
Has anyone else been glued to the latest revelations?

Just get me a fucking faith based thing.

( comments )

I'm not hopeful that Bush is going to be talked about in the honest terms that I'd like to see ala Sam Harris, but at least this is a start.

The other part of this story that worries me is the extreme edge. What extremes will gain steam from this? There are all sorts of predictions that people will stay home from the polls, etc. I don't think so. Maybe from this election. I think that this is going to be very bad in the long run. The extreme factions in this country, mostly the Dominionists, want an American Nation that is fighting for the second coming and trying to make it happen within their lifetimes. People scoff at the idea, but that's precisely what's going on. There are more than a few people who have been warning about this.

The Dominionists/Evangelicals are a powerful group, even if they are being called "nuts" by the powers that are in DC now. They can still deliver votes that someone will gladly take. If the GOP isn't going to help them attain the laws they want, they will find a party or candidates that will. They have always operated by stealth and they might just be doing that now. That worries me. I don't think that people realize the great lengths that they will go to attain and hold power. All rational discussion of the problem is impossible because of the "Good Christian" = "Good Person" sum.

Yeah, I get called paranoid, but I'll stick with my Burroughs on this one, “A paranoid is someone who knows a little of what's going on.”

My paranoia so far has just been intuition.

And from the other side - Columbia WTF?

I've watched the video of the incident at Columbia University a couple of times now. My opinion on the rally speakers (Minutemen) and the counter-demonstration is this:

*eyeroll* Asshats.

( comments )

1:37pm: Jesus Camp
Everyone is saying that these people are the extremes.  Sadly, they aren't.  In fact, people who've been there, done that, and left the fold are saying that the film shows us a great deal of moderate behavior from the people running the camp.

There are a lot of people shouting a warning right now and it would really be a good idea to listen to us, folks - It CAN happen here.  These people have numbers and not only do they vote,  run for office, and involve themselves heavily in the political process, they are preparing for a revolution now and in the near future.  They also have numbers that are very scary.

Okay, it's not loading on my journal for some reason.  Here's links to Jesus Camp previews and the ABC report.

Preview

Report

Sam Harris - Some sanity amidst the chaos.  This is 23 minutes long, but it is fantastic.  I just finished reading his book Letter to a Christian Nation and cheered through the whole thing.

1:28pm: Reproduction - Putin - Fiction
From the wacky Catholic group Human Life International (Right Wing Watch had the link):

If his claim that he was the victim of sexual molestation by a clergyman, it only further proves that known homosexuals should not be admitted to the priesthood. Foley’s actions were that of homosexual predator, not a pedophile. Homosexuals reproduce sexually by molesting children. This creates a cycle of violence and disordered behavior that creates future generations of abusers and predators.

I don't need an LJ cut for my reaction to this gem.

Wha...?

( extended play version )

I am deeply disturbed by the murder of Anna Politkovskaya.

( comments )

Regal Cinemas has decided to nix showings of Death of a President

( comments )

6:39am: Intifada - The Amish
Muslims are waging civil war against us, claims police union

Radical Muslims in France's housing estates are waging an undeclared"intifada" against the police, with violent clashes injuring an averageof 14 officers each day.

As the interior ministry said that nearly 2,500 officers had beenwounded this year, a police union declared that its members were "in astate of civil war" with Muslims in the most depressed "banlieue"estates which are heavily populated by unemployed youths of northAfrican origin.

( comments )

Which brings me to the Amish.

Investigators said Charles Carl Roberts, 32, called his wife by cellphone minutes before he shot the girls at point-blank range and toldher that when he was a boy he had molested two female relatives - whowere 3 to 5 years old at the time - and had "dreams of molesting again."

Authorities also say that seven days before Roberts stormed into theschoolhouse and barricaded himself inside with about a dozen students,he purchased sexual lubricant, flex-ties and eyebolts. "It's verypossible that he intended to victimize these children in many waysprior to executing them and killing himself," State Police CommissionerJeffrey B. Miller said. But Roberts - who police say appeared to beprepared for a long siege - "became disorganized when we arrived," andshot himself in the head.

( comments )

The world is a random place.

10:46pm: Ah, the Fooley Scandal
This whole thing has kept me amused quite nicely. I've been keeping my eyes on other things and I've been busy as all get out. But... I noticed something tonight in the blogosphere. I don't know how closely folks are following this story, so I'll give a bit of background. The original AIM conversation between Foley and the Page appeared at this blog.

The comments left on StopPredatorsNow were pretty ugly. Anonymous Dude deleted all of them. Huh. Seems he doesn't like all of the attention. Wonder if Google is gonna give him up. Doubt it.

The wing-nut blogger who caught the "mistake" on ABC and did the track-down on the kid's AIM ID thinks he's a special little snowflake now.

ABC is playing the entire blogosphere for fools in this, methinks.

9:11pm: Foley - Drudge - Viqueira
I can't stop laughing.

I'd say that Captain Ethics left the building, but I don't think he ever landed in the land of Matt Drudge.

Some loverly Pedogate quotes from Matt:

And if anything, these kids are less innocent — these 16 and 17 year-old beasts…and I've seen what they're doing on YouTube and I've seen what they're doing all over the internet — oh yeah — you just have to tune into any part of their pop culture. You're not going to tell me these are innocent babies. Have you read the transcripts that ABC posted going into the weekend of these instant messages, back and forth? The kids are egging the Congressman on! The kids are trying to get this out of him. We haven't got the whole story on this.

You could say "well Drudge, it's abuse of power, a congressman abusing these impressionable, young 17 year-old beasts, talking about their sex lives with a grown man, on the internet." Because you have to remember, those of us who have seen some of the transcripts of these nasty instant messages. This was two ways, ladies and gentlemen. These kids were playing Foley for everything he was worth. Oh yeah. Oh, I haven't…they were talking about how many times they'd masturbated, how many times they'd done it with their girlfriends this weekend…all these things and these "innocent children." And this "poor" congressman sitting there typing, "oh am I going to get any," you know?

( comments )

8:59am: Trucks - Eggs - Torture
Nasty little man Sean Hannity has a gig pimping GM cars in a giveaway contest.

GM's VP of Sales and Marketing responds to the flood of calls and letters against him:

We did it for the attention, folks. Thanks for noticing. :)

( comments )

Ova for sale is a whole lotta TL; DR, even to someone who was intimately involved in the whole reproductive technology industry. The woman writing the article seems like she is biting a bitter pill.

In 1970, Princeton theologian Paul Ramsey railed against in vitro technologies in a sobering book titled Fabricated Man; a year later, The Atlantic Monthly ran a story headlined “The Obsolescent Mother.” Editorialists spun visions of a world in which women would exchange each other’s ova and rent each other’s wombs, creating all manner of tangled familial relations. White couples would implant strange ova and give birth to mixed-race children. Parents would select and breed for genetic matches for siblings in need of replacement tissues. University of Chicago Professor Leon Kass, a prominent conservative who would later serve as head of the President’s Council on Bioethics, emerged as an in vitro fertilization (IVF) opponent before most people had heard of the technology. A social philosopher with a knack for expressing visceral social anxieties in academic prose, Kass could not keep a tinge of hysteria out of a 1972 essay on the topic. He posed a sarcastic question to readers: “And why stop at couples? What about single women, widows, or lesbians?”

The right held no monopoly on test-tube trepidation; the sky was falling from all quarters. Left-wing feminists feared the new technologies would create new means by which to exploit women and entrench the patriarchy. In 1985 Gena Corea predicted that rich couples in the West would send ova to poor women in the Third World, who would endure the pain of pregnancy at bargain rates. She warned of a market for “breeders” who would be valued for the reproductive potential of their component parts.

IVF advocates could be forgiven for dismissing the righteous panic of Christian conservatives, alarmist feminists, and academic Luddites. But much of what has been prophesied has come true.

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Good Deal? What does it allow? Precisely? Are they still allowed to force detainees to listen to hours of Laura Schlessinger's radio show while looking at the uncensored version of her nudie picture a'la Alex de Large?


*thegogglestheydonothing!*
Compared to this, waterboarding is completely humane.

In the end, the caterwauling of McCain & Co. over the administration’s supposed desire to reinterpret the Geneva Conventions may serve a useful function in public diplomacy. The whole world has now seen the administration supposedly bow to McCain’s desire to “preserve” our Geneva obligations, but the CIA program will continue anyway. That’s not such a bad outcome.

Caterwauling? Any time you see that word used in an editorial, you can be certain that it is someone who is trying to appeal to a "common-man" base and they are cutting of any further discussion. It's a grandmotherly dismissal word. It means that the opposition is being silly.

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10:06am: Arts - Enablers - Stereotypes
Letters at 3AM

USA Today published a survey recently (May 23, p.1D). Young people, ages 12 to 17, were asked what career they were most seriously considering. The survey tallied their first and second choices: 13%, communications; 21%, science; 23%, business; 24%, law; 26%, engineering; 28%, medicine/health – and 30%, "the arts." Nearly a third are considering a career in the arts!

Who's been lying to these children?

What has led them to expect the arts to provide a career? If "career" means "earning one's livelihood," then somebody warn these kids: It ain't so.

I know many dedicated artists. After decades of barely making ends meet, a few finally make art pay – usually in late middle age. But as a rule, it's most unusual to make a living as an artist.

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The Enablers

The House and Senate vote to ban flag-burning and gay marriage but never quite find the time to slow the rising costs of health care or raise the minimum wage or mandate fuel efficiency standards lest the polar ice cap melt. Chafee, Snowe, and DeWine readily admit that a melted polar ice cap would be troublesome; they will fight it tooth and nail. But come time to vote for majority leader, they always vote for a leader of a party in thrall to big oil.

Problem is, Chafee and his moderate band are an ever weaker force in a party whose very essence is extreme, whose electoral strategy is solely to mobilize its base, whose legislative strategy is never to seek votes across party lines. And unless these moderates boldly go where they have not gone before and cast their vote for majority leader (and I don't mean in caucus, I mean on the Senate floor) for someone other than the nominee of their party caucus, they are not moderates at all. They are loyal and indispensable foot soldiers in the Republicans' continuing campaign to drag the nation rightward and backward.

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Most uninsured children's parents work

Most of the 9 million uninsured children in the U.S. live in homes where at least one parent works full time. In more than one-quarter of the cases, there are two working parents.

The advocacy group Families USA, which promotes universal health coverage, says that finding goes against the stereotype that many people have of the uninsured.

"I think they believe these are low-income people who don't work, who are very different from themselves," said the group's executive director, Ron Pollack. "These are people who work, who are doing the right thing."

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10:01am and I am outta here.