Headlines - Friday

Last week, outgoing United Nations World Food Program chief James Morris reminded us that 18,000 children die every day from hunger and malnutrition. Morris called the situation "a terrible indictment of the world in 2007." http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,253899,00.html

 

In this Xmas season, if you need to be reminded why George Bush is despised around the world, then take a gander at this press release from the UN General Assembly, which contains this eye-opener:

Another resolution that would strengthen the normative frameworks of positive rights was one on the right to food, adopted by a recorded vote of 184 in favour to 1 against ( United States), with no abstentions (annex XIV).

Can anyone explain to me why the Bush Administration thought it necessary that the United States be the sole nation on the face of the fucking planet to vote against a right to food?

I wasn't going to blog today. I was just going to take the day off. But this; this was too much to let pass by without comment. The inalienable rights to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" do not mean jack shit if one is starving.

I have to wonder what sort of Christian George W. Bush thinks that he truly is, for he truly is one of the most cold-hearted uncaring inhuman leaders that this nation has had the misfortune of having foisted upon us by those corrupt goons in the Party of Hoover.

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This should be mandatory viewing at churches, in schools, and on street corners: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qv4rkUj6a8&eurl=http://www.teambio.org/

 

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Because tinfoil is almost like tinsel

And a shiny hat looks so festive on Christmas.

Larisa Alexandrovna updates what we know about the plane crash "accident" in which Republican operative Mike Connell died. Connell, who was Karl Rove's IT guru and at the center of the curious case of Ohio vote counts being shut down in 2004, gave a deposition on November 3 as a key witness in the King-Lincoln v. Blackwell lawsuit regarding fraud in the 2004 Presidential Election in Ohio. She finds it just a wee bit curious that:

Connell knew the Bush family very well. He knew members of Congress very well. He has been a staple of the GOP IT scene for ages. He even worked on the McCain camp. So what is wrong with this sorry lot of people, that not a single one of them issued a public condolence to this man? Not even the head of the RNC for crying out loud. Connell has worked with the RNC for years. He has worked with the Chamber of Commerce for years. He was friends with and knew very important people. He dies a few days before Christmas, leaving 4 kids and a widow behind and NOT ONE person could find the time to issue a public condolences to his family?

The President has time to pardon turkeys and pardon criminals, but not to issue even a single sentence of condolence to a man he has known for years? Rove? Where is he at? John McCain? Anyone? I don't understand how no one thought to issue a statement of support for the family, especially since a father of four won't be there for Christmas?

Cliff Baxter, the Enron executive who "committed suicide" in January 2002 was also a major player in the Republican party and was tight with Bush friend "Kenny Boy" Lay. The Bushistas and the GOP had no statement to make about that one either.

 

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FYI: Astonomers determine Xmas should be in June: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/christmas/3687843/Jesus-was-born-in-June-astronomers-claim.html 

 

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An updated version of The House that Jack Built: http://agonist.org/stirling_newberry/20081224/the_house_that_jack_built

 

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WaPo Notices a Fed Bank Regulator Was Too Busy Deregulating Banks to Notice Bank Failures Due to Bank Deregulation! http://casadelogo.typepad.com/factesque/2008/12/wapo-notices-a-fed-bank-regulator-too-busy-deregulating-banks-to-notice-bank-failures.html

 

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Israel tells its victims to stop attacking Israel

Seriously, you can't make this stuff up:

Olmert, speaking directly to Gaza residents during an interview Thursday on the Arab satellite station al-Arabiya, told viewers, "I say to you in a last minute call, stop it," The Jerusalem Post reported.

"Stop it, you the citizens of Gaza, you can stop it," Olmert said. "I know how much you want to get up in the morning to quiet, to take your children to kindergarten or school, the way we do, they way they want to in Sderot and Netivot."

What Olmert doesn't note is that there was a long cease-fire, during which Israel kept blockading Gaza, so that they don't have enough food or water.  He's been starving them because he doesn't like their democratically elected government.  Not launching missiles hasn't worked for citizens of Gaza.  From their point of view there's little reason not to fire missiles at Israel.  Being shot by Israeli soldiers probably doesn't seem like a much worse way to go than starving... or watching their children starve. 

Christmas lack of self-awareness award to Olmert. People being starved to death should just take it.

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The recession in the U.S. has just racked up another casualty, the tradition of giving decent gifts for the holidays, with many Americans reporting that they have received the shittiest Christmas gifts in recent memory.

With fewer holiday dollars in their wallets, cash-strapped consumers are resorting to giving such unwanted holiday gifts as shoddy homemade crafts and crumbling baked goods. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andy-borowitz/recession-resulting-in-cr_b_153173.html

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First he admits his involvement in the waterboarding at Gitmo, and now we have Cheney's disclosure that he worked on the Plame press talking points.

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The last and longest pause: RIP Harold Pinter: http://needlenose.com/wp/2008/12/25/the-last-and-longest-pause/

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At Saddleback Church, women must be submissive, but despite biblical admonition, are allowed to speak: http://www.pensitoreview.com/2008/12/23/at-rick-warrens-church-women-must-be-submissive-but-are-allowed-to-speak/#more-6280

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Awesome! Now we're wooing warlords with Viagra!                                                                                            http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/25/AR2008122500931.html?hpid=topnews 

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Screwged

I have to admit- only the Bush administration can raise incompetence to an art form:

President Bush changed his mind on Christmas Eve, pulling back a pardon he had extended a day earlier to a Brooklyn developer at the center of a Long Island real estate fraud case and adding a bizarre twist to the episode.

The developer, Isaac R. Toussie, who was listed Tuesday as one of the beneficiaries of the president's constitutional power to wipe away a criminal record, is not being pardoned "based on information that has subsequently come to light," the White House said late Wednesday afternoon.

During the middle of an economic disaster brought on in many ways due to fraud and greed involving real estate and home loans, it takes talent to make me sympathetic towards someone who engaged in the fraud, but Bush is just the kind of lout to pull it off. There is just something wrong about pardoning someone and then unpardoning them.

I really don't think there was ever any excuse to pardon this guy, and he certainly does not deserve one, but to tell them they are pardoned and then yank it out from under them just seems to be wrong. Reminds me of the Sarah Jane Olson nonsense earlier this year. They made the mistake, not her. She should have just remained free.

Oh, well. Leave it to Bush to ruin both the holiday spirit and the notion of the unquestioned pardon power. What a damned moron. There really isn't anything this man can not screw up, and it really clarifies how he almost choked to death on a pretzel.

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