Headlines - Thursday

 

Carrie California blames God, World War ll and the Wind 

Carrie Prejean, the Miss California who hates gay marriage and does soft porn, was pardoned by Donald Trump. She'll keep her crown! But not before she gives a teary, terrible speech.

A (Free!) speech about feelings and beliefs and freedoms and her grandpa who fought in World War II and God's divine countenance and how His divine winds blew open her shirt during a photoshoot, exposing her breast. It's hard to tell whether she's thanking Him or blaming Him for all these things. All we really know is that Donald found Carrie's speech "beautiful."

The best lines from Carrie's defense:

• "I would like to thank God with this large task."
• "I am a strong woman."
• "I am not an activist. Or anything."
• "I'm an advocate. I'm a model. I am a Christian."
• "I am proud to be an American." (Where at least I know I'm free?)
• "I had not been photographed in nude or semi-nude publication."
• "My grandfather served under General Patton in World War II. He did speak about the freedoms he fought for and taught me to [voice cracking] never back down and never let anyone take those freedoms away from you."
• "This should not happen in America. It undermines the Constitutional rights for which my grandfather fought for."
• "A windy day."

MSNBC's David Shuster's reaction is priceless: "Can I vomit right now?"

 

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Paul Begala: Mr. Cheney, you did not keep us safe:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-begala/mr-cheney-you-did-not-kee_b_203013.html

 

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I can hardly believe that Bill O'Reilly wants our opinion, but there it is, he's asking, we should deliver:

"The O'Reilly Factor wants to know what you think the WORST Entertainment TV show series of all time is. No news shows or specific episodes should be given as answers. The winning show may be featured in a new "American TV Icons" segment!"

Isn't the answer obvious? This has to be a trick question. It's got to be "O'Reilly Factor".

His restriction that it not be a news show doesn't disqualify it, since the O'Reilly Factor isn't a news show.

Go here to answer the question.

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The mantra of the Obama administration seems to be "We believe in full disclosure, except when it's inconvenient to do so"

In defiance of a judicial ruling, Obama has decided not to release torture photos

This is an unbelievable moment. Dick Cheney's PR offensive over the last month actually worked. Barack Obama just crumbled and will follow Cheney's command to not release the new set of detainee abuse pictures.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cenk-uygur/obama-makes-terrible-mist_b_203113.html

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Fighting for their right to not have their vote counted (and potable water too)

 

One out of every four ballots requested by military personnel and other Americans living overseas for the 2008 election may have gone uncounted, according to findings being released at a Senate hearing Wednesday.

 

And ....US soldiers are now being forced to steal water in Iraq. With supplies tight, and the number of trucks carrying potable water even tighter, troops have resorted to stealing water from civilian contractors. Many have also reportedly suffered from dysentery because they were forced to drink untreated water from Iraqi wells.

The shocking news aired Wednesday on Houston-based CBS affiliate KHOU. 

It gets worse. Soldiers say the situation has become so dire they were forced to raid the United States' own airbase in Baghdad for bottled water. They found the water stored in pallets held by civilian contractors, who were supposed to be distributing it.
 

Soldiers averred that they'd been given two to three liters of water per day by their commanders. But according to the Army's own field manual, the human body can lose as much as four gallons of water daily in the desert.

Two to three liters isn't enough, Robey said. "You'll see guys throw up, you'll see them pass out."

Who's supposed to be maintaining the water supply? At least in some parts of Iraq, it's the US engineering contractor KBR. KBR is a spinoff of Halliburton, which it separated from in 2007.

KBR again. Plenty of 180 volt water for the troops to shower in and be electrocuted by, but not enough water for them to drink. We keep paying them plenty for their malfeasance. Bastards.

Not only should everybody at KBR be in jail, in Iraq if there's any justice in this world, but so should everybody at the Pentagon who keeps giving them contracts.

 

You know what, Mr. Obama? Dehydration is a hell of a bigger threat to our troops in Iraq than the release of torture photos.

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Genetic Defect Speaks

 

Liz Cheney is picking up where her father left off when it comes to taking aim at the Obama administration, saying Tuesday the new commander-in-chief appears to be siding with terrorists.

 

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An 89-year-old deported from the US is fit to stay in jail as he awaits charges he helped herd thousands of Jews into the gas chambers, the German prison holding him said Wednesday.

"Our prison doctors have determined he is fit to remain in custody," a spokeswoman for the Stadelheim jail in the southern city of Munich told AFP, a day after John Demjanjuk, a former Nazi death camp guard, arrived in Germany.
 

The Jews are still hunting down and prosecuting WW11 criminals 60+ years after the fact, but war crimes that were committed 5 years ago in America get swept under the rug. 

 

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The Cirque du Nitwits and Their Pratfalls

People everywhere are watching the Cirque du Nitwits and either laughing or crying about their final demise. While it's grotesquely enjoyable to watch them fight like a herd of cats in a bag, here's to hoping they don't really go so far off the rails they drown in the Potomac. Although, an experience that mirrors waterboarding might not be such a bad idea.

As much as I oppose most Republican positions, there's still a place for them. Every ecosystem needs a lowly dung beetle to clean up the crap and occupy the bottom of the food chain. Without that beetle things so far out of hand the upper end grows too fat to be tolerated by anyone, even the other lions.

http://www.teambio.org/2009/05/12/the-cirque-du-nitwits-and-their-pratfalls/

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Won't Somebody Please Think of the Children?

Excerpt:

If our concern is to be for our children and grandchildren, we should question the wisdom of spending almost as much on our military as the rest of the world combined, a situation which fools our politicians into adopting belligerent foreign policy poses that we simply can't back up.  A world that doesn't trust the USA to be rational and law-abiding, let alone a force for good, is much worse for our children than the rather bland dystopia imagined by the SSA Trustees and the Peter G. Peterson Foundation.

http://www.cogitamusblog.com/2009/05/wont-somebody-please-think-of-the-children.html#more

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Jim Hightower: Look who's begging for regulation: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/05/13-9

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If you're not culturally conservative, it's because you're not dumb enough

The right wing has become so removed from the mainstream that it's begun to create its own culture. I can sum this new subculture up in one unsurprising word: dumb. Complex issues are boiled down into simple talking points (many of which don't really have anything to do with the issue), repeated ad nauseam, and digested at an entirely emotional level. In right wing world, messages are aimed straight for the gut, not the head, and the result is that those messages are accepted by people who don't use their heads to make decisions. In other words, dumb people. This is why we're finding a new species of pseudo-celebrity rising on the right -- the accidental spokesperson. Think Joe the Plumber; dumb as a stump, unwilling to learn anything, and everywhere.

The newest version of the accidental celebrity is Miss California, Carrie Prejean, who gave a painfully inelegant answer to a question by a pageant judge and celebrity news blogger. Take a moment to compare the reactions to these two D-list celebrities on the left and the right. The right embraced Carrie Prejean, whose fumbling answer has made her the spokesperson for "opposite-marriage," as practically the reincarnation of Thomas Paine. For the left, celebrity news blogger Perez Hilton is still just annoying. Where Carrie Prejean automatically became the face of the right's opposition to marriage equality, Hilton remains an online scandal sheet writer of no great consequence. We really don't care about him one way or another.
http://griperblade.blogspot.com/2009/05/if-youre-not-culturally-conservative.html

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Jesus' General writes to the Philadelphia Enquirer

I was so very gladdened in the abattoir of my heart to hear that torture advocate John Yoo is gracing your pages with his wit, reason and legal acumen. Perhaps he can take his considerable cognitive skills and advise readers as to when a mere reprimand of an insolent waitress can morph into a physical beating, or just how far to twist the nipples of an obnoxious crossing guard. The list is surely endless, and should provide reams of fodder for the keen mind of Mr. Yoo. Maybe you could have his picture alongside his words, perhaps a striking portrait of him wearing a hockey mask just to set the mood? I'll leave that up to you folks--after all, you're the professionals!

But why stop there when you have a theme just crying out for more thorough coverage? I think it would be worth it to devote many sections of your newspaper to like-minded idealists, thereby dovetailing the disparate features and news stories you cover on any given day and giving the whole enchilada a little spice. Perhaps Hannibal Lector could dish out some recipes for the Food Section, Vlad the Impaler could provide ideas for staking out that special backyard garden, and John Wayne Gacy could answer questions ranging from child psychology and clown costuming to how to build a truly scary basement for Halloween!
Keep reading: http://patriotboy.blogspot.com/2009/05/letter-to-philadelphia-inquirer.html

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You can't insult Jimmy like that!!: http://www.kiav.net/?p=1973

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From the Moonie Times:

The photo accompanying the headline "36 Chicago Area Students Killed Sets Record" shows Malia and Sasha Obama. How tasteful. 

And it's not just a Web glitch - here's the page with the full story (a story that, it should be noted, doesn't mention the Obama girls at all).

I understand that it's a succesful business strategy for wingnut media outlets to play on both racist anti-Obama anger and anger at Obama's perceived elitism. I expect that. But come on - imagining the daughters dead? Isn't this crossing a line?

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There's been so much written about and spoken about in the mainstream media and in the anonymous blogosphere world, that this will be a wonderful, refreshing chance for me to get to tell my story, that a lot of people have asked about, unfiltered. Being a voracious reader, I read a lot today and have read a lot growing up. And having that journalism degree, all of that, will be a great assistance for me in writing this book, talking about the challenges and the joys, balancing the work and parenting, and, in my case, work means running the state. I've read a variety of books, and that helps shape my opinions and my views.

— Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R-voracious reader that couldn't name one newspaper) on writing a memoir that will be published in spring 2010 — the year she is up for re-election, according to the AP.

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Digby is busy beating up on the idiotic "ticking time bomb" scenario that populates the television sets and wet dreams of wingnut torture supporters, but is strangely absent from the real world (there's that darned reality again, interfering with wingnut fantasies). One point that seems to escape notice, though, is the time line. If the clock was ticking, why did the torture take place so many weeks and months after the prisoners were captured, eh Liz Cheney? Riddle me that.

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Although no further evidence is needed that the GOP is the party of No (new ideas), they are offering some up anyway. Apparently the RNC will have an unusual 'special session' next week that is being called so they can approve a resolution rebranding the Democratic party as the "Democratic Socialist Party. Presumably they were thwarted in their attempts to rebrand themselves by Herr Limbaugh, but damnit, they are in the mood for a rebranding so they will go ahead and rebrand the other guys. As Socialists.

I seem to recall a campaign that was taking place this time last year, and an unctuous little guttersnipe running around calling everyone to the left of Mussolini a Socialist and accusing the guy who went on to win the presidency of "pallin' around with terrorists" even though she is the one with actual ties to a secessionist, terrorist movement and the nasty little harridan who flung the most poo governs (and I use the term in the loosest possible sense) a welfare state.  

Yet in spite of screaming "socialist!" every other word, the term lost it's ka-pow along about September, and the fear-factor associated with the word "socialism" continued to weaken to the point that about a month ago Rasmussen released a poll that showed Americans are actually wrming up to the idea of socialism rather than being put off by it.  

Keep reading: http://theygaveusarepublic.com/diary/2779/because-it-worked-so-well-during-the-campaign

Fun fact: Repukes are using taxpayer money for their non-listening "rebranding" tour.

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Calm down everyone  Fixing Social Security is easy - raise the damned cap so someone like Bill Gates pays Social Security tax on all of his annual income instead of just the first $102,000 dollars. Medicare isn't quite that simple, but overall healthcare reform will go a long way toward fixing that, too. And get Americans back to work who have lost their jobs and therefore aren't paying into the funds.   

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Pontiac sold to Amish entrepreneurs - h/t Dick: http://cherdecor2.blogspot.com/2009/05/pontiac-sold-to-amish-entrepreneurs.html 

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h/t Dick: AIG says it needs about 3-5 years to carry out its restructuring plan and fully repay the taxpayer bailout money (or, hand it all out in bonuses before it bails) 

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Members of Congress once again screw over the little guy in favor of bankers

21 Dems join Repukes in voting against capping credit card interest rates at 15%.  

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Let's hope Geithner's stress tests took commercial real estate into consideration along with the credit card defaults and the rapidly increasing housing foreclosure rates. If history is a guide, then all of this was probably negotiated out of the tests because real world problems have consistently been ignored or undervalued during this recession. Is this the next banking meltdown?

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Now Norm Coleman is asking the FEC to let him use campaign money to pay the legal costs from that lawsuit. Joe Bodell at MN Progressive Project asks a key question:

Is this what donors thought they were funding when they wrote a check to Norm Coleman's campaign for the recount and legal challenge?

And, let's not forget who was out there raising money for Norm's campaign account -- even after it was clear Norm was losing. That would be almost the entire GOP leadership. No wonder Norm won't get out of the race. The Republican leaders want him to stay in so he can keep Franken out of the Senate. Norm gets to keep raising money for his personal needs. It's good to be Norm Coleman. He can use other people's money to pay his bills. 

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Repugs set to block Dawn Johnsen's nomination: http://alterx.blogspot.com/2009/05/repugs-set-to-block-dawn-johnsens.html

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An English chemist has found the hidden gateway to the RNA world, the chemical milieu from which the first forms of life are thought to have emerged on earth some 3.8 billion (not 6,000) years ago: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/science/14rna.html?_r=1&hp

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Eric Cantor, who has the best health care coverage in the country (courtesy of the US taxpayers) says there's a health care crisis, but Washington shouldn't solve it: http://thinkprogress.org/2009/05/13/cantor-luntz-health/

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In continuing "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" news, President Obama might opt to keep terrorism suspects in the US indefinitely, without trial. Wall Street Journal

 

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Wasn't Lindsey "Grahamnesty" one of those Republicans who hated torture so much? It was "Grahamnesty" and John Warner and John McCain. "Waterboarding, under any circumstances, represents a clear violation of U.S. law," they wrote in 2007. But Graham has since determined that hmm, nevermind, Dick Cheney says on the teevee that torture works, and it's worked for "500 years," so why do all of these liberals refuse to acknowledge Torquemada for keeping America safe these past eight years? YouTube

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Man, we litter everywhere --

"This computer generated image, supplied by NASA, shows objects that are currently being tracked in Earth orbit. Approximately 95% of the objects in this illustration are orbital debris, i.e., not functional satellites. The dots represent each item." Not to scale.

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GOP icon declares his party "brain dead"

This is priceless: Federal judge Richard A Posner - the first judge appointed to the bench by Saint Ronnie in 1981 - is feeling all verklempt:

My theme is the intellectual decline of conservatism, and it is notable that the policies of the new conservatism are powered largely by emotion and religion and have for the most part weak intellectual groundings. That the policies are weak in conception, have largely failed in execution, and are political flops is therefore unsurprising.

The major blows to conservatism, culminating in the election and programs of Obama, have been fourfold:

1. The failure of military force to achieve U.S. foreign policy objectives;

2. The inanity of trying to substitute will for intellect, as in the denial of global warming;

3. The use of religious criteria in the selection of public officials, the neglect of management and expertise in government;

4. A continued preoccupation with abortion; and

 

Well, okay, five. Make that six.....

 

5. Fiscal incontinence in the form of massive budget deficits, the Medicare drug plan, excessive foreign borrowing, and asset-price inflation.

By the fall of 2008, the face of the Republican Party had become Sarah Palin and Joe the Plumber. Conservative intellectuals had no party. 

 

Your tears. They are so sweet. So very, very sweet.

 

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Good news for jobless people who have nothing to think about but sex!

 

Pfizer Inc. is unveiling a new program Thursday that will let people who have lost their jobs and health insurance keep taking some widely prescribed Pfizer medications - including Lipitor and Viagra - for free for up to a year.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/14/free-lipitor-viagra-other_n_203408.html

 

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Boy Scouts being trained to confront terrorism, illegal immigration and escalating border violence.