Sunday, March 7, 2010

Headlines - Sunday March 7

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Thanks for this bit of great news, Dick!
 
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has left open the possibility of asking U.S. forces to stay in Iraq longer than planned, depending on the security situation and the readiness of Iraqi troops!
 
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Juan Cole injects another well-needed bit of reality into the health care debate:

The invented Republican/ Foxy News talking point du jour is that the Democrats intend to 'ram health care reform down our throats' even though 'the American people don't want it.'

Bzzz. That's just wrong! First of all, when there is a landslide triumph for a party as there was in November, 2008, for the victor to actually govern and legislate is not 'ramming' anything down anyone's 'throat.' It is doing what the people asked you to do. Obama campaigned on this issue, and presumably that fact had not escaped the electorate's notice.

Just so we don't forget, if we sized the lower 48 states according to their population, this is what the Democratic victory looked like, according to cartophilia:

statepopredblue512_8e92c_0.png

So it is that little tiny red thing that is talking about 'ramming' down 'throats.'

Second, 80 percent of Americans in a recent ABC/Post poll want to prohibit limits on pre-existing conditions, and 72 percent want to impose an employer mandate. Some 63 percent favor some form of public health care reform. The same proportion, 63%, want president Obama to keep trying to pass a reform. A majority, 56%, want everyone to be covered. The allegation that the 'public doesn't want it' is an artificial creation of millions of dollars in disinformation money purveyed by the pharmaceutical companies through the US Chamber of Commerce and their bought-and-paid-for congressmen and senators. If a pollster explains to a member of the public what is actually in the bill, Americans like most of the provisions, as Ezra Klein says.

Hmmm....so that would be 180° different from what McConnell said. What are the chances of that? Cole reminds us of what the Republicans "jammed" through on us:

  1. The illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, ending the lives of thousands of service members and millions of civilians, adding trillions of dollars to the deficit, allowing widespread corruption by private companies, some of whom benefited the administration directly;
  2. Torture, not just of terrorists but of innocent citizens too, ending habeas corpus and bringing down the reputation of the country among the global community;
  3. Warrantless wiretappings of Americans;
  4. The gutting of regulations in the financial and mortgage industries, paving way for the worst economy since the Great Depression;
  5. Massive tax cuts for the wealthy, born on the backs of the middle class--passed, by the way, through reconciliation;
  6. Abandonment of our troops in Afghanistan, allowing the leadership of the Taliban and al Qaeda to resurge.
So the question for Mitch McConnell & Friends is who do you really think is "jamming" whom?
 
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Dolphins are sophisticated, self-aware, highly intelligent beings with individual personalities, autonomy and an inner life. Scientists are looking at these guys a little differently now. Too bad the Japanese don't.
 
 
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US Defense Secretary Robert Gates is concerned about possible misconduct in Afghanistan by the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater and has promised to review the issue, the Pentagon said.
 
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Michael Moore's got a point.
 
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Is it really too much to ask that our elected officials at least be among the human species? This vote is yet another sign that this rightwing assault on basic decency toward your fellow man is inexorably defining deviancy down. If you can defend a vote to allow the continued torture of special needs children you can defend anything.
 
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Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli
 
 
Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II has not wasted time carrying out his conservative social agenda. He has sent a letter to the state's public colleges and universities to rescind policies that ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation — advising them that they have no authority to ban such discrimination.

What is wrong with these people?

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Methane worries, it's not just about cows anymore.
 
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Is there any country NOT afflicted with Catholic pederasts?

It certainly isn't the Netherlands.

This isn't news any more. News would be an official Catholic organization that wasn't a front for repressed perverts and apologists for child abuse.

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chris buttars

Chris Buttars and the Mormon Gulag.

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Justice for sale

If Rahm Emanuel is actually deciding what sort of trial KSM et. al. should get on the basis of what he calculates would be most politically convenient for the Obama administration, then the only honorable thing for Eric Holder to do is to resign. It's every bit as illegitmate for the White House to order Holder what to do in this matter as it was for Richard Nixon to order Elliott Richardson to fire Archibald Cox. Barack Obama (let alone his messenger boy Emanuel -- or is the other way around?) is not the nation's chief law enforcement officer: Eric Holder is. Holder has spent the last three months telling everyone that considerations of basic justice argued for trying KSM in our regular courts, rather than in military tribunals set up for the purpose of disposing of particularly troublesome criminal cases. More here.

A Jewish soldier witnesses Nuremberg: "We found it in ourselves to give the worst of men due process."

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A prominent evangelical figure and Republican donor says he will end his contributions to the organized Republican Party in reaction to the leaked fundraising presentation that advised using "fear" to solicit contributions and displayed an image of President Obama as the Joker from Batman.

Good for him.

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A Plan to battle climate change skeptics: http://mariopiperni.com/climate-change/a-plan-to-battle-climate-change-skeptics.php

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In case you forgot ...

Why we went to war in Iraq:

(Bloomberg) -- BP Plc and Exxon Mobil Corp. took the best deal they could get in Iraq last year when they won the largest oil contracts since addam Hussein was toppled in 2003. Oil companies may wait a long time to get a better one.

...

Western producers haven't had access to oil fields in southern Iraq since 1972, when the country nationalized production including concessions owned by the companies now known as BP, Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Exxon.

...
Any other excuse is just so much bullshit.

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Morford: Radical homosexuals ate my baby!

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Paul Krugman: Senator Bunning's Universe

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                                       Vatican Hit by Red Hat Society Scandal

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(From the Washington Post, about how AIG employees feel about being asked to not accept their bonuses, voluntarily… anyway, one unidentified AIGer lets 'er rip:)

"To be honest with you, I really hope it blows up. I think the U.S. taxpayer deserves to lose a trillion dollars over this thing for the way they have behaved." …And then he turned on politicians who had joined the anti-AIG posse. "They only care about the next election, just like we only care about the next bonus. Well, none of them cares about the country, none of us cares about the institution," he said, adding: "They really don't care, and I really don't care. And frankly, if a trillion dollars gets lost, fine."

OK, big boy. If you think that you are such hot stuff and deserve a multi-million dollar bonus and retention package, then shop your resume around and see who wants to hire you. Because talent like yours, destroying the global economy and bringing ruin to your company is probably exactly what most firms are looking for in an employee.

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And in the non-hating corner, we have Louisville Episcopalians

On the same weekend Kentucky's Southern Baptists launch their Hate, Fear and Money tour, we learn that last year, Louisville Episcopalians brought out the big guns of love, acceptance and progress.

A Louisville congregation has quietly become the first in the Episcopal Diocese of Kentucky to begin blessing same-sex relationships.

St. Matthew's Episcopal Church conducted its first such blessing late last year, for two male members of the congregation, after voting last April to approve such ceremonies.

The move, while not reflecting diocesan policy, is a milestone in one of the state's denominations that generally has been the most accepting of gay members and ministers. But it also has complicated efforts to maintain unity, given that some churches and members oppose homosexuality.

The Rev. Lucinda Laird of St. Matthew's stressed that the ceremony was not presented as a civil or sacramental wedding - since neither Kentucky nor the Episcopal Church recognizes same-sex marriages.

Nor, she said, was it presented as any other type of official rite of the national church. The church adapted a same-sex liturgy used by an Anglican diocese in western Canada.

St. Matthew's approved a policy allowing blessings of same-sex relationships in April 2009 after two years of study. The church also took affirmation from the denomination's main legislative body - the General Convention - which in July 2009 called for "a generous pastoral response" toward same-sex couples.

"We believe that committed Christians can differ in their interpretation of Scripture" on homosexuality, Laird said. "We see in Scripture a constant demand for justice and the radical love and inclusivity of Jesus."

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They would never get away with this in Vegas."Armed robbers have stormed a luxury hotel in central Berlin where a poker tournament was taking place, German police say. One report said the gang - armed with assault rifles and hand grenades - made off with the tournament jackpot of 800,000 euros ($1.1m; £726,000). Several people were injured in the ensuing panic, although none of them seriously. About 1,000 poker players are taking part in the five-day tournament. "Several masked, armed individuals entered the Grand Hyatt Hotel and fled with a haul of money," police spokeswoman Heidi Vogt said. She declined to say how much had been taken but Berlin's Tageszeitung newspaper reported on its website that the gang had taken 800,000 euros."

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h/t Dick: There's a whiff of the lynch mob or the lemming migration about any overlarge concentration of like-thinking individuals, no matter how virtuous their cause. P. J. O'Rourke

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Angry 'patriots' attack working people to vent their rage - just like al Qaeda.

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