"It was really no different than the current proposals of the Obama administration - both cases really just involve the decision to discontinue extraordinary treatment."
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"Here's the party that lost and the conservative movement that was discredited over the last 8 years, setting the agenda for a Democratic Party that controls the White House, the Senate and the House. Something's wrong in that." - Bill Moyers, Link
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h/t Dick:
Following the lead of the anti-health-care-reform. And screwing over thee and me yet again.
Not to worry. I'm sure they'll figure it out ...after the herd has been sufficiently thinned.
The 'War in Afghanistan' is "still winnable"? Well now...isn't that just too profound? And coming from a 4-star general. Does he really, actually believe the U.S. military is capable of defeating a few thousand 'insurgents' in the most backward nation on the planet?
Well, of course, but only if he is allowed to run the show. Just send him a few dozen more divisions and stealth bombers and UAVs to blow those f**ks all to hell, collateral damage (read women and children and old men and homes and infrastructure) be damned.
Honest to Christ the pentagon will pin stars on just about any old bootlicker, won't they.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/world/asia/01military.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss&src=igw
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"Governor Perry, I understand Texas has been given the green light to secede from the Union, but only on the condition that it takes Oklahoma with it. Is that your understanding?"
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Murder in Texas
The state of Texas put an innocent man to death 5 years ago and knew at the time of the execution that he was innocent. It was nothing less than a state-sanctioned murder, aided and abetted by a lying jailhouse snitch and by "arson investigators" who had no idea what the hell they were doing.
Undoubtedly, judges such as Antonin Scalia and the usual band of capital punishment apologists will not be moved, saying meaningingless shit such as "the jury properly found on the evidence presented" and that "the condemned man received full due process."
But a man is still, nonetheless, dead. And he was killed by the State of Texas. He was a poor man who lost his children in a fire and the State of Texas compounded that tragedy by killing him in a most judicial fashion.
Tell you what, Texas: Leave. There won't be a war of secession, just go. We'll happily string razor wire around the new border. We'll even strap a parachute onto Glen Beck and drop his ass out over Dallas somewhere, he can be your Minister of Infomashun. You can sit there and try to run a nation on "tea-party politics".
Oh, and don't try to sneak under the wire and come back. We're adopting all of those worker verification procedures that you've always wanted, so there won't be any jobs for you. And we'll be looking for all of those "illegal Texican immigrants", you can make book on that.
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No Defense For Torture
The thing I find most disturbing about the debate over torture is that it's happening at all. There was a time when torture was unthinkable, when there wouldn't have been any debate - or even a second thought - about prosecuting people who resorted to torture. But the Bush administration's fearmongering blew the threat of terrorism out of all proportion. Yes, 9/11 was the worst terror attack in American history, but had the Bush administration been on the ball, it probably never would've happened. All the information that the White House and the president ignored was gained without torture - or even illegal wiretaps - and it would've been enough shut those nineteen hijackers down.
But the administration, in their zeal to draw attention away from their own incompetence, turned Al Qaeda - a loose-knit handful of theocratic cultists - into an even greater threat to the United States than the Soviet Union's entire nuclear arsenal. Al Qaeda, we were told, wanted to destroy America - never mind that there was no way they possibly could - and we had to stop at nothing, give up any rights the administration demanded, and throw any antiquated systems of morality or ethics out the window. If we didn't, we would all die. Guaranteed. It strikes me as a measure of the insanity of those remaining rightwingers that universal access to healthcare is tyranny, but torture and wiretaps and the abandonment of the right of habeas corpus are triumphs of freakin' liberty. I'm sorry, but if you're reading this and this describes you, you're an idiot. Hate to break it to you like this, but there's no easy way to tell someone they're stupid. You are astonishingly dumb.
Keep reading: http://griperblade.blogspot.com/2009/08/no-defense-for-torture.html
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I find it increasingly difficult to believe we will maintain first-world status for much longer....
The Smith-Cotton High School Tiger Pride Marching Band had a cute idea, to show the evolution of brass instruments from the 1960s onward in a familiar pictograph form of the ascent of man, with each ape carrying a different brass instrument, and under the apes the words "Brass Evolutions 2009." They were selling the shirts, too, as a band fundraiser, when suddenly the Xristian Xrazies put a stop to it, claiming of all things, that the school band by depicting evolution (a scientific theory) was showing a religious viewpoint.
And the school gave in. Assistant Superintendent Brad Pollitt ordered the t-shirts returned.
The heathen Darwinians who offended the Xristian Xrazy parents were Assistant Band Director Brian Kloppenburg and Band Director Jordan Summers, who were suffering under the sound notion that a scientific theory was a perfectly appropriate image for a public school. Silly men, didn't they realize that they are in Missouri?
Pollitt, trying to extricate himself from the hole that he was digging but instead dug himself in further: "If the shirts had said 'Brass Resurrections' and had a picture of Jesus on the cross, we would have done the same thing." That's good to know, but Darwin is a scientist, and Jesus (if he existed) is a religious figure.
So here we have it: the Public School Superintendent pulls the bands tee shirts (a $700 loss right there), and he accomplishes the very thing that the parents complained about: he allowed the Xristian Fundamentalists' religious world views to shape a school decision. And my guess, is that he also empowered them to do more now that they have a success under their (chastity) belts.
But here's my favorite quote in the article – which just sums it all up:
I don't think evolution should be associated with our school.
– Band parent Sherry Melby
Trust, us, Sherry, after this, it won't be.
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Arizona Pastor Steven Anderson has received national attention for dedicating an entire sermon to "Why I hate Barack Obama," and for having a parishioner who brought an AR-15 to a protest outside a speech delivered by President Obama. Calling Obama a "socialist devil" and a "murderer," Anderson declared, "I'm not gonna pray for his good. I'm going to pray that he dies and goes to hell." A CNN analyst said last week Secret Service agents had likely visited Anderson because of the content of his sermons. In the face of all the controversy, Anderson decided not to apologize or retract his remarks, but rather, he escalated his rhetoric yesterday:
I hope that God strikes Obama with brain cancer so he can die like Ted Kennedy. You know, and I hope it happens today.
Watch it: http://thinkprogress.org/2009/08/31/az-pastor-brain-cancer/
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Worst. Speaker. Ever.
Dems poised to lose 20-50 seats in the House
The Dims have sooooooo lost control of everything, momentum has screeched to a halt, and the Carebear has abandoned all of his campaign promises. Gee, Nancy, you've done a Heckuva Job.
(And the bitterest part of me says that it doesn't matter a bit: they are all bought at paid for by the corporations. The designations of party don't mean anything. Just ask the Blue Dogs.)
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Checking In On 'Chief Health Care Guy' Chuck Grassley's Good-Faith Negotiations
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