to Using Performance-Enhancing Drugs
Politicians of all stripes routinely invoke the word of God. In fact, it seems a requirement of the job to claim God speaks to them about every lame little thought that enters their squarish, well-coiffed heads.
Norm Coleman is the latest to answer the celestial cell phone and hear God tell him that He wants him elected. Happily, Al Franken hasn't gotten a call from the Big Guy yet, presumably because God doesn't listen to Jews, piss-ant politicians, or sensible people. Franken probably thinks a call directly from God is about as likely as a UFO landing in his backyard.
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40 years worth of thanks
In 1968, a white firefighter saved a black baby girl, touching the heart of a divided city. The two did not meet again. Until yesterday.
Aww. Go read:
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OMG.
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"I thought it would be good to have a baby."
Alfie, who is 13, became a father four days ago when his 15 year old girlfriend gave birth: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2233878.ece
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nimh over at Observationalism has a great rundown of the deal that has been struck on the stimulus bill.
It's a far better bill that came out of the reconciliation process than I imagined. And given the conservative tilt of so many Democrats coupled with the GOP's dominance of DC's conventional wisdom, it just might be the best bill possible. Or, it might have been billions of dollars better if Obama hadn't tried to create a bipartisan bill all on his own, which he then tried to sell to 533 massive, turf-defending, credit-grabbing, blame-assigning egos. As for a long term strategy in which this gives Obama the ammunition he needs to play hardball and traps the GOP into further marginalizing itself - I hope so. Fervently. But I'm certainly not convinced.
Right on cue, the Repiglicans are whining. Tough shit, Chuck.
Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, complained that despite Mr. Obama's call for bipartisan cooperation, Republicans had largely been shut out. "We didn't have a chance to negotiate," Mr. Grassley said.
Welcome to Iceberg City you bastards. Get used to it. You wanna keep saying no? Then go in the corner and play with yourselves the next two years. A popular president pushing a popular agenda doesn't really need you.
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Gaza: Death's Laboratory: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/02/12-6
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The next time that some GOP Senator tells you that they are just trying to be good stewards of the public's money or that they are standing up for the little guy or that they and only they can protect you from those megalomaniac elitists from NYC - or any such nonsense - ask them if they ever got a ride in the "Brunomobile". http://www.thealbanyproject.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=5755
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Choosing Ignorance: http://griperblade.blogspot.com/2009/02/choosing-ignorance.html
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The Fresno Police Department is investigating two officers videotaped beating a homeless man during his arrest. In the video below, the man, Glen Beaty, 52, is shown on the ground receiving hits to the head. Police Chief Jerry Dyer acknowledged that 'the initial reaction of people that view this video will be one of disbelief." http://jonathanturley.org/2009/02/12/beating-beaty-video-shows-fresno-police-repeatedly-hitting-homeless-man/#more-8014
And, cops in California kill another suspect with non-lethal taser: http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Man_dies_in_California_after_Taser_0212.html
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Damn. One less Republican in Obama's cabinet
Senator Judd Gregg, who in 1995 voted to abolish the Dept. of Commerce and who (according to CNN) initiated conversations about the position of Commerce Secretary, and was 'very clear throughout the interviewing process that despite past disagreements about policies, he would support, embrace, and move forward with the President's agenda', has withdrawn his name because I guess he can't support, embrace, or move forward with Obama's plans for the stimulus or how the census will be conducted.
Right.
It couldn't have had anything to do with the fact that it was just hours after Gregg was nominated that it became clear that Gregg's Legislative Director from 2002 to 2004, Kevin Koonce, had been trading sports and music tickets and booze for legislative favors. As the latest details on the Abramoff case make clear, Abramoff and his cronies were asking for $3.5 million earmarks and the defeat of a defense appropriations bill that would have hurt Abramoff's Native American gaming clients. Koonce's language, "[Gregg's office] had the proposed amendment 'flagged,'" "I got something for you too," "Let me know if I can return the favor," and Abramoff's language (describing a request from a potential Abramoff client), "Koonce practically lives in our various suites. We are shady," suggest Abramoff's $10,000 investment in sports tickets did not go to waste. Koonce was delivering on Abramoff's requests.
Which sort of means whether or not Gregg is a subject or a target of the investigation at the moment, his office was trading legislative favors for gifts. And those trades, whether they were made with or without Gregg's knowledge, certainly don't say much for Gregg's ability to shepherd the nation's commercial interests.
Sure, Gregg tells a nice story about how his lifetime dream was to run a census. But I suspect he's just hoping to get out of the Senate in 2010 with his honor and his clear criminal record intact.
76 year old dinosaur, Robert Bennett (R-UT) thinks Gregg withdrew because Obama was inexperienced:
"I think it is a demonstration of inexperience. You don't attract someone of Judd Gregg caliber into the cabinet and then take steps that would cause him to leave without at least talking to him and understanding that it might happen."
Obama's revenge: vows not to count Judd Gregg in 2010 census
"I've had it up to here with these GOP back-stabbing weasels - now it's time for me to make them literally disappear."
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I see that George W. Bush plans to give his first major post-presidential speech in Canada.
I'm not sure how that's going to work out, but I can't help suspecting that he chose a venue in that country rather than this one because in the U.S. he can no longer rely on a full (and fully politicized) president-size security detail that's committed to banishing all dissenters to a point miles away from his precious self. In Canada, by contrast, he still has a close ally in Prime Minister Stephen Harper (a fellow Guantanamo apologist). So I'm guessing Harper will see to it that Bubble Boy's bubble is properly reconstituted. I'm sure Bush wouldn't venture off his own property if he thought a discouraging word might upset his delicate sensibilities.
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Banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. — Thomas Jefferson, 1802
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The Evolution of Life in 60 Seconds: http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2009/02/the_evolution_of_life_in_60_se.php
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*Foul language alert* The Rude One: They're losing their f***ing minds, part 4: Jesus doesn't need a stimulus: http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2009/02/theyre-losing-their-fucking-minds-part.html
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GOP celebrates Lincoln's birthday by celebrating John Wilkes Booth
"Not only was he a champion of state's rights, but he also taught us to keep on shooting even after we lost."
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Paul Krugman has said we are living in a "Macroëconomic dark ages" where knowledge of the past is "being lost." Specifically he points out how long exploded fallacies are being offered up as deep scholarly truths. To be a classicist for a moment, there was, in fact, a Dark Ages during the Bronze Age when the greeks lost their knowledge of writing. It was during this post-literate era that Homeric poetry came into being. It was part of a larger transition to the iron age. The fall of Rome hasn't been the only fall from light. http://firedoglake.com/2009/02/12/up-out-of-a-macro-economic-dark-age/
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Why does Gallup Polls act like a protector of the Beltway Establishment? They did a poll that showed that 71% of the people support investigations of Bush's corruption of the Justice Department, 63% support investigations of warrantless wiretapping, and 62% support investigations of the treatment of detainees (torture). What headline does Gallup use?
No Mandate for Criminal Probes of Bush Administration
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Republicon math
Ben Smith finds some minor discrepancies in job creation estimates from the stimulus package, and Rep. Cantor, um, pounces:
A White House estimate of the number of jobs stimulus legislation will create includes some sharp discrepancies between state and local jobs claims.
Those differences—which the document suggests are large rounding errors—was spotted by the office of House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, which assembled the chart above. It comes as the White House is seeking to define the stimulus
......
A spokesman for Cantor, Brad Dayspring, emails, "I don't think that the 4600 people in Nevada or 1900 people in Wyoming – not to mention thousands of other Americans – will understand not getting a job due to a 'rounding error.'"
You are probably right, but considering your boss wants to vote against the package, any job creation is greater than the number you intend to create. Unless, of course, there is a Republican alternate math that goes along with their alternate reality, in which zero is greater than 4600. Coming from the party that argued that the Iraq war would pay for itself, this is very possible.
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"The Drive-Bys are all over the place talking about how wonderful Obama's presser was. It was a bomb! It was a bomb of a press conference! You could definitely tell the difference between Obama on a prompter and Obama impromptu." the vulgar Pigboy
You're right, Rush. Obama often took a moment to think before speaking. That's something Bush never did because he always knew the questions ahead of time - and even then he struggled.
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It's pilgrim killing time again in Iraq - the country that never had WMD:
HILLA, Iraq (AFP) — A woman suicide bomber dressed in a black abaya blew herself up in a crowd of Shiite pilgrims south of the Iraqi capital on Friday, killing 32 worshippers, mostly women and children, officials said.It was the third straight day of killings that have targeted Shiites heading to Karbala.
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Executive pay limits don't make it into stimulus bill - Washington Post
I really have no problem with executives getting bonuses when they do a good job. But when they apply for government assistance, by definition they aren't perfoming up to standards that merit extra pay. It's really not a tough concept to understand, but apparently it's over the heads of our elected representatives.
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Gotta love those "centrists"!
Sen. Susan Collins, the Maine GOP dealmaker who's been in the limelight this week for helping to pass a watered down stimulus, has been talking a good game about the need to avoid wasting taxpayer money. But it looks like Collins also worked today to strip from the final bill a measure that's crucial to exposing that waste.
Yesterday, 20 members of the House, from both parties, sent a letter to House negotiators urging them to ensure that the protections for federal whistleblowers remained.
But, according to a person following the bill closely, Collins used today's conference committee to drastically water down the measure, citing national security concerns as the reason for her opposition. In the end, the protections were so weakened that House negotiators balked, and the result was that the entire amendment was removed.
According to the person following the bill, Collins was the "central roadblock" to passing the protections.
But wait, here's the good part!
So when, in the coming months, conservatives start jumping up and down over the fact that money from the stimulus bill is being wasted, as they surely will, it's worth remembering that a key measure designed to help expose that waste was removed from taken out of the bill -- and by a senator said to be a champion of fiscal discipline.
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You can't join the Army today
Nothing is going to change until the military lifts the stigma of seeking counseling for mental health issues. Until they do that, all of the safety stand-downs and suicide prevention training sessions will not be worth a crap.
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What do the bankers who bankrupted the country (and possibly set off a world-wide depression) with literally trillions of dollars of bad schemes, Bernie Madoff who ripped off around $50 Billion, and the salmonella peanut company that has killed 12 and sickened hundreds have in common?
They all benefited from the deregulation policies of Chimpy McStagger and were given incentives through tax cuts to keep on ripping everyone off.
The next time anyone tells you that policy is boring or it doesn't matter, think about these three cases.
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US jobless claims remained at a high level in the past week, with 620,000 new filings, government data showed Thursday in a sign of severe stress on the economy and labor market.
The thing to note here is that this is 620,000 people layed off IN A WEEK.
Oh, and about being too big to fail (as the US banks are all claiming as they waddle up to the trough), Wells Fargo's CEO John Stumpf is a member of the National Republican Congressional Committee, an organization that tries to help Republicans running for national office. I think you can do the math here about how big you have to be in order to get help.
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Pentagon officials censor letter to Obama detailing Gitmo detainee's rendition and torture (genital slicing): http://thinkprogress.org/2009/02/12/letter-censored-mohamed/
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Peak wingnuttia is upon us
This is not from The Onion. Save yourselves now!
Never mind that Tipsy McStaggers left a deficit of a trillion dollars, started two wars he couldn't finish, doubled the national debt, presided over an economic crash, and left office with the lowest approval ratings ever; the gift that keeps on giving, the deluded, kool aid drunk Reich-Wingnuts have declared judgement on the new administration, and unsurprisingly, it's not pretty, but hemmorhoidal secretions never are.
Really, what took them so long?:
This stimulus bill is huge, so disastrous, and so harmful to our country that even though Obama has been in office for less than a month, I think it's already fair to label him as one of the worst Presidents in American history. – John Hawkins, Right Wing News
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Lindsey Graham hates the stimulus, but he'll take the money anyway for South Carolina: "I'm not crazy." http://thinkprogress.org/2009/02/12/graham-stimulus-crazy/
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This is a fine way to wake up. In an interview with the WaPo's Lois Romano, Obama top advisor David Axelrod politely yet firmly hands Cheney and Rove their STFU papers:
ROMANO: Can I get a reaction on Dick Cheney's comments that there will be a high probability of a terrorist...that terrorists will attempt a catastrophic nuclear attack in the next ten years?
AXELROD: Well, those...there's no doubt, I think we all live with the reality that there's a threat and it's a grave threat. It existed during the years of the Bush Administration. We're living with it now - it's something that the President is completely focused on and meets every day on these threats.
I was disappointed with the Vice President's comments, not because he said...stated the obvious which is that there are threats that are grave, but that he suggested that somehow the president's decisions on torture and Guantanimo would increase the likelihood of that.
You know, one of the things that I've been impressed by is the graciousness that President Bush has shown during this transition period and the first weeks of this administration. When he left, he wished us the best - and I believe that he meant that.
Apparently the memo didn't circulate around the White House, because I've seen...you know...what I consider tasteless comments by the Vice President.
Amazing comments by Karl Rove. You know, the last thing that I think we're looking for at this juncture is advice on fiscal integrity or ethics from Karl Rove. I mean, anyone who's read the newspapers for the last eight years would laugh at that.
David also said, "I mentioned Andy Card saying that we were somehow denigrating the Presidency because people were wearing short sleeves in the Oval Office. We're wearing short sleeves because we have to roll up our sleeves and clean up the mess that we inherited."
Ooooooh...snap! Love it when Axelrod decides to throw an elbow.
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David Vitter unloads his diaper
Apparently his brand is not Pampers:
After quoting comments from President Obama suggesting that he'd like his judicial nominees to be able to empathize with the downtrodden, Vitter declared that demanding empathy in a judge was something you'd expect in a "dictatorship."
Apparently Vitter thought "1984" ended, like much of Vitter's life, with a "happy ending".
Yes, all of history's dictatorships and all their George Winston marching songs, the interrogations where they almost burn your skin with lit clove cigarettes, the attempts to "help out" Poland (they never forgot them). Everybody knows Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Saddam, Pinochet, Amin, both Papa AND Baby Doc DuValier -- all people persons -- all caring nurturers -- all touchy-feely -- never trod upon anyone.
They were not cold, calculating, uncaring bastards like say Abe Lincoln and Jesus, what with their, "judge not, that we be not judged"?
What kind of a empathetic a-hole would say that?
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Rare photo of the end of the rainbow/leprechaun driving an SUV in Southern California:
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