Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Loose Lips Didn't Sink Ship This Time

Raw Story

Al-Qaeda leader and elusive terrorist Osama bin Laden was prepared to flee his Abbottabad hideout on a second's notice, new information shows. Bin Laden had 500 Euros cash (equal to about $740 U.S.) and two telephone numbers sewn into the clothes he was wearing when he was killed in the U.S. military raid on his compound this weekend.

CIA Director Leon Panetta told members of Congress this information in a briefing Tuesday, in response to a question of why there weren't more security personnel guarding bin Laden, according to Politico. Bin Laden had reason to believe he'd be tipped off about any U.S. attempt to capture him with plenty of time to escape, they were told.

No comment necessary.

Video of the Day

Will Ferrell spoofs Bush reaction to bin Laden’s death

Indeed he does!

Headline of the Day

DOJ plan to arrest state licensers, tax dispensaries could doom medical marijuana industry

Apparently Big Pharma has had a moment of prayer with AG Holder.

In my town there is a brand new Smoke Shop (530 587-PUFF). A far cry from the head shops of old, it's a head shop, an idea whose time has come again with the camel's nose under the tent of medical marijuana. I was in there for the first time yesterday, and folks, it's Bong Central. They don't write or fill scrips (I asked), so let's just say they can fully accessorize stress relief.

Of interest to some may be the bong that looks like or is made out of a Newcastle Brown Ale Draught Keg. Heh.

It's a nice place with nice folks and I hope the DOJ hammer doesn't hurt it.

Osama bin Laden saves America

If it's Wednesday, it must be Morford.

I'm hereby delighted to report that many on the hard right, that fantastically insane cluster of hyperclenched beerchuggers who fully believe that Obama is a not only a Muslim, but also a Nazi commie socialist Mexican immigrant robot with lasers for eyes and molten pacifism for blood, do not actually believe Osama bin Laden is dead.

Parse it as you will, but it's not every day the global symbol of all that is vile and wrong with the human animal gets taken out by the global symbol of all that is decent and right with American-style democracy.

An oversimplification? Probably. But it all points to a possible radical rethinking for (and of) Obama himself, a grand opportunity to regain both momentum and message lost. It's also a perfect occasion to reignite the entire "Change We Can Believe In" mantra for a newly electrified populace.

I think his conclusion is a little too rainbows-and-unicorny, but he's always worth a read.

Exactly ...

The Mrs. and I have been as turned off by the "Kill Osama Celebrations" as this lady:

I could hear the cheers as I got out of the taxi, two blocks away. I could hear them from right in front of Park 51, the site of a planned Islamic community centre and mosque that met ferocious opposition last year for being too close to the "hallowed ground" of Ground Zero. It was minutes after President Obama's announcement that Osama bin Laden had been killed, and I was heeding a friend's suggestion that we – both Muslims – take candles and stand in vigil where the World Trade Centre stood before Bin Laden's footsoldiers took it down.

So it was a shock to find hundreds of others had turned that hallowed ground into the scene of a home crowd celebrating an away victory they hadn't attended, the roots of which they were probably not there to experience or were too young to remember.

There was always something sickening about tourists taking pictures of themselves posing in front of that big gaping hole called Ground Zero. "Me at site of mass slaughter, NYC" as holiday photo caption is wrong in every language, surely. It didn't take 10 minutes for the frat party atmosphere to sicken me. Olympic-style chants of "USA! USA!" I could just about take as a freshly minted American, as of Friday. But "Fuck Osama! Ole ole ole!" crushed any ambitiohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifn of dignity for the thousands killed, many of whom had jumped hundreds of storeys to their deaths, their bodies shattered to pieces close to where we stood.

...


It's been disgusting here the last few days. As I said below, it's as if nothing else has gone on in NY since. Yes, Osama's dead, and it's a good thing his trace is wiped from the gene pool. It's certainly no excuse to party, not after what happened to this nation after 11 September. We should be mourning, not Osama bin Laden, but the fact we wasted 10 years and how many thousands of lives in an effort to get him. We should be mourning the fact, even now that he's dead, nothing is going to change.

Great thanks to Watertiger for the link.

And then we have ...

Our own local idiot.

FOX News, right wing operatives and grandstanding politicians like Rep. Peter King have been whipping up the idea that torture was used to get the vital bit of Intel that eventually helped lead the US to Bin Laden.

...


Between him and Rudy on my TV all the time since Monday, you'd think nothing else was going on in the NY Metro Area.

And just a little reminder. Remember when I said this:

That I have (this is through friends in dark places) is that [Raymond Davis] found an al-Qaeda installation of some sort (or proof the Inter-Services Intelligence group [Pak] was helping al-Qaeda) and the Paks wanted to shut him up (the Paks on the m/c he killed were ISI, not muggers). What I also heard is the "cleaners" who rushed from the embassy to pick him up (subsequently running over and killing an innocent [maybe] Pak) left the country on John Kerry's plane when he did, even though the Paks wanted to interview them as well. [my em]

...


I love it when all the pieces fall into place. Heh ...

No free lunch ...

For Secaucus Fats:

The next stop for New Jersey in its debt collection fight with the federal government may be federal court.

On Friday, the Transportation Department flatly rejected the state’s arguments for refusing to repay $271 million that was spent on a project, canceled last year, to build a pair of rail tunnels under the Hudson River. The message to Gov. Chris Christie was blunt: Repay now or we will collect the debt the hard way. Plus interest.

...


They've already got big holes dug and all the construction infrastructure set up. Somebody's gotta pay for it and it ain't gonna be me. Sorry, my Jersey friends, but you elected this asshole and he wasted a quarter-billion American dollars (as opposed to New Jersey dollars), this is on you.

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

“It took Obama to catch Osama"

Following up on Fixer's post:

Think Progress

Less than 24 hours after the killing Osama bin Laden, commemorative t-shirts were already being sold online and in the streets of Washington, D.C., including one popular one reading, “It took Obama to catch Osama.”



Fixer's right - The Obama campaign better pass these out to everybody! Along with coffee mugs, hats, keychains, tattoos, billboards, etc.

10 Political Messages Beamed Through “Star Trek”

Oh, absolutely! Those messages are one of the big reasons us godless commies like stuff like Star Trek and Avatar. The funny part is that this piece was written by some Bull Goose Loony Teabagger who went to an awful lot of trouble to reinforce our position.

Lay in coordinates for this post, Number One. Engage...

Live-Tweeting From Abbottabad

This is terrific! Bin Laden's next-door neighbor seems to have had no idea what was going on. He is apparently not affiliated with the Pakistani intelligence service.

From the IndiaRealtime section of the WSJ:

A man in Abbottabad, the town where Osama bin Laden was killed by the U.S. on Monday, inadvertently live-tweeted the attack as it started.

The man, who uses the Twitter handle “ReallyVirtual”, identifies himself as Sohaib Athar, “an IT consultant taking a break from the rat-race by hiding in the mountains with his laptops.”

Yo, Sohaib, how's that workin' out? Heh.

He retweeted a tweet from Munzir Naqvi: “I think the helicopter crash in Abbottabad, Pakistan and the President Obama breaking news address are connected.”

Lights on in yer head?

Mr. Athar was clearly unhappy.

“I guess Abbottabad is going to get as crowded as the Lahore that I left behind for some peace and quiet. *sigh*”

Shortly thereafter, another Twitter user confirmed the news. Mr. Athar tweeted “RT @ISuckBigTime: Osama Bin Laden killed in Abbottabad, Pakistan.: ISI has confirmed it << Uh oh, there goes the neighborhood :-/””

Ya can't make this shit up, folks!

Update:

More from Raw Story:

Little did he know it, but he was the only real-time reporter to the US military finally getting their man, the world's most wanted terrorist -- Osama bin Laden.
...

"Uh oh, now I'm the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid without knowing it."
...

"Bin Laden is dead. I didn't kill him. Please let me sleep now," he wrote on Twitter after the story went around the world.

You can sleep after your fifteen minutes is up, pal. Sleep lightly. The next knock on yer door might be ISI. Wouldn't wanta keep 'em waiting.

Right Wing Noise Machine Spins Up

We knew it would and it's ludicrous.

Hillbilly Report

With the news that America had finally brought terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden to justice one thing could be easily predicted. Despite the fact that George W. Bush failed for so long in doing just that you knew that every right-wing blowhard in America would be somehow calling this a vindication of his failed policies and misled agenda. Well, welcome to right-wing fantasy land. Today the right-wing lunatics at the Heritage Foundation are crediting George W. Bush and the Patriot Act for the killing of Osama bin Laden.

First, the notion that George W. Bush somehow deserves any credit for this is simply ludicrous. Instead of doing his duty to the American people and bringing this man to justice long ago, he abandoned the attempt to bring him to justice allowing him to run free until last night. His "counterterrorism tools" were simply one thing. A vicious attempt to conceal his own incompetence while stealing away real Constitutional rights from Americans. Protections the right-wing have long tried to vanquish.

They did pretty good at it too.

It will be funny to watch the rest of their spin in the coming days. However this time I believe most of America will see the fact of the matter. That fact is that Conservative leadership completely dropped the ball in the months after 9-11. Instead of seeking justice they used it as a propoganda campaign to get a war in Iraq and the stealing of Constitutional protections from Americans. Their only success was doing that and bringing huge war profits to a very few at the cost of us all.

So while some of President Obama's middle-east strategy has disappointed me it is not hard to successfully follow a legacy of failure and idiocy.

Say what they will about the Bush maladministration, as any mechanic can tell you about crapcans, you can't make chicken salad outta chicken shit.

A Few More Random Observations Regarding the Death of a Rich Terrorist

The Rude One has two posts about bin Deaden. From the first one, possibly the most serious thing he's said lately:

One last note: the Rude Pundit finds it sadly funny that, after a trillion plus dollars spent on the wars, after thousands of soldiers killed, that what it took to get Osama bin Laden was a criminal investigation and an intelligence operation followed by a quick strike. As we ponder our dead, all our dead, as we remember and make silly statements about "closure," let us wonder what might have been for the United States had that been our approach all along.

There's The Cowboy Way, which is good, and the Wannabe Phony Cowboy Way, which is not. Wrong President, wrong choice. Choices have consequences and we will be paying for that choice for a generation or more.

From the second:

2. The Rude Pundit doesn't give a fuck about conspiracies on the left and right that say that bin Laden's been dead for years and they're just now bringing out the body (if so, the timing sucks - the White House could have at least waited until next summer) or that bin Laden's not really dead. If you've got some evidence, pony it up. Otherwise, let's just say the fucker's dead and died the other day. You can come up with all kinds of suspicions (the same date that the U.S. was informed that Hitler was dead? The same date as Bush's "Mission Accomplished" debacle? During Celebrity Apprentice?) but considering the number of Bush administration officials who are going along with the story, it'd have to be a huge fucking conspiracy. Let's just go with the easiest answer.

6. Man, bin Laden was just a pampered pussy. Like every con artist TV preacher, he just lived in a huge house while his followers groveled in the dirt, releasing tapes about jihad and battle while he stayed close to his dialysis machine and his private chef, getting his balls washed daily by his servants. If nothing else crushes the remnants of al-Qaeda, the image of Osama bin Laden sitting on a toilet in his climate-controlled bathroom ought to destroy the spirit of even the most hardened Muslim extremist. Well, that and the fact that all that bin Laden cash just dried up real fast.

7. It's kind of pathetic to see Republicans sputtering, "But, but, Bush...no, Bush good." You know what? Obama sealed the deal. It's like when a lover tells you that you're the best fuck she's ever had. Other lovers laid the groundwork, sure, through their fumbling fucks and their decent fucks. But why should she thank them when you're the one who got her off so damn good?

Because there must be something wrong with it if Obama did it. Or something that can be made up to be wrong with it that the Dead End Quarter will fall for in a hot second. The Repugs could conjure up something bad to say about God making it rain hunnert dollah bills during the reign of The Other.

If the Dems don't use this ...

As a campaign slogan, they deserve to lose. Overheard in conversation when I went to pick up the pups yesterday:

"Obama got Osama!"


They'd better shove that up the Republicans' ass at every opportunity.

Monday, May 2, 2011

Trump's lunacy reveals core truth about the Republicans

This is great! Today's 'must read'! Means nothing, but it's fun.

The Independent (UK)

Since the election of Barack Obama, the Republican Party has proved that one of its central intellectual arguments was right all along. It has long claimed that evolution is a myth believed in only by whiny liberals – and it turns out it was on to something. Every six months, the party venerates a new hero, and each time it is somebody further back on the evolutionary scale.

That wasn't enough. I half-expected the next contender to be a lung-fish draped in the Stars and Stripes. But it wasn't anything so sophisticated. Enter stage (far) right Donald Trump, the bewigged billionaire who has filled America with phallic symbols and plastered his name across more surfaces than the average Central Asian dictator. [...]

The second trend is towards dog-whistle prejudice – pitched just high enough for frightened white Republicans to hear it. [...]

The Republican Party today isn't even dominated by market fundamentalism. This is a crude Nietzscheanism, dedicated to exalting the rich as an overclass and dismissing the rest. So who should be the Republican nominee? I hear the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse were considering running – but they are facing primary challenges from the Tea Party for being way too mild-mannered.

Do not miss this!

Headline of the Day

Fox News congratulates Bush for bin Laden

Well of course they did. Yeesh.

And, following President Obama's announcement of the Al-Qaida leader's death, an anchor for New York-based Fox 5 said "President Obama is in fact dead" before correcting himself after some prompting.

Un-fucking-believable. Correction, all too fucking believable.

Update:

Right Rushes To Praise Bush For Obama’s Order To Kill Bin Laden

I give up. Who could have known Bush's brilliant plan to catch bin Laden involved a) getting a brotha in the White House, and b) ten years?

Also, we have a new group called 'deathers' (guess who!) and wingnuts who think Obama's base didn't want OBL caught. Yeesh some more. Hey, Joe, when did Obama ever do anything his 'base' wanted?

The shit is flyin' hot and heavy from the wingnut soreheads today. Hilarious and pathetic.

Obama, Meyers roast Trump at Correspondents Dinner

Funny. The Donald was not amused.

So, Osama walks into this bar...

Greg Palast posted this 'recommended read' yesterday before the "we got his ass" news broke.

Last ¶:

Oh, hey, you never got the punch line. So Osama walks into this bar, see, and George Bush says, “Whad’l’ya have, pardner?” and Osama says, “Well, George, what are you serving today?” and Bush says, “Fear,” and Osama says, “Fear for everybody!” and George pours it on for the crowd. Then the presidential bartender says, “Hey, who’s buying?” Osama points a thumb at the crowd sucking down their brew. “They are,” he says — and the two of them share a quiet laugh.

On us.

"Nine Toes Nucks" is on a roll

Just go read this tragic story of gainful employment. Heh.

Update:

Nucks freaked out everybody involved with this, so DHS or somebody threatened him with Gitmo and he took it down. Too bad.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

BIN LADEN DEAD
Trump takes credit.

Oklahoma House Votes “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” Official State Gospel Song
Official State Education Song: “Don’t Know Much About History.”

Majority of Internet Users Never Click on Ads
Most say they're afraid to be sucked into a hellish nightmare by a computer worm that steals their identity, robs them blind and leaves them begging for food through the barred windows of a debtor's prison.

7 in 10 Feel Country Headed In Wrong Direction
But no two of those seven can agree on right direction.

REMINDER
Wear a cheap suit for the Rapture.

Puh. I don't even own a suit and I ain't goin' nowhere anyway.

Since ...

There's no other news but the flogging of Osama's corpse, I got my post up from Vigo, Spain. Gotta do some laundry and pay the ransom pick up the dogs in a little while. I'll try to have some pics up from Lizzie later on.

Update:

Can't get the monsters until noon so I finished my post from the ship.

And for those of you who follow football/soccer like I do and want a place to argue and talk the game, I started a blog where I can vent. Nothing but football. I might be biased but I like the blog format better than arguing with people on the team Facebook pages.