Sorry, Mickey ...

But the long weekend Mrs. F and I were gonna spend at Disney World next spring is getting switched to Paris, or a B&B somewhere on the Hudson, or Las Vegas, or maybe even Sedona, but it'll be a long time (like when Lucifer starts shopping at the Burlington Coat Factory) before I patronize one of your properties again.

Yes, Disney/ABC will go ahead and run their right wing propaganda tomorrow night and Monday, no matter that the FBI backed away from it a year ago, and no matter that its director admits it is his version of events, a version that is targeted at Clinton. Folks, Disney has too much invested politically and corporately to back away from this now. The only response is to hold Disney, your local ABC affiliate, and those who support right wing propaganda on public airwaves accountable for fascism, because that is exactly what this is.

...

I presume others are of the same mind.

Update (Sunday):

Tristero @ Digby's:

I assume someone will collect and publish the list of commercials for show 2 - show 1 being broadcast without ads. I for one will take that list very seriously. Any sponsor whose products I can avoid, I will, and those that [I] can't will hear from me. [my em]

And from Blondie:

Daily Dave*

Mejias Press Secretary Gabby Adler sent me this dispatch via email on Labor Day:

FARMINGDALE - Dave Mejias, Democratic candidate for Congress in New York's 3rd Congressional District, observes Labor Day by calling for a national commitment to working families. As a Nassau County Legislator, Dave Mejias has championed labor issues; his record is in sharp contrast to his opponent Peter King's record. Mejias believes a national commitment to labor in this country is necessary for a national minimum wage increase, continued workplace safety and the protection of Social Security.

"I have stood up for hard working families, and it's time Washington does the same," said Mejias. "Peter King and George Bush have turned their backs on hard working people. Instead of increasing the minimum wage, making health care affordable, maintaining workplace safety codes and securing social security they have given tax cuts to the wealthiest and special breaks to corporations making it harder for working families to make ends meet."

Peter King's voting record proves he has turned his back on working families:

• King voted YES on HR 653, which resulted in nearly $40 billion in spending cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, student aid, child support enforcement and other working family programs.

• King votes YES on HR 3010, which would have cut critical funds for job training and employment services, college aid, elementary and secondary education programs and rural health funding.

• King voted YES on HR 525, which would exempt health plans from state consumer protection rules and offer minimal health plans to younger workers.

• King and the Republican controlled Congress have prevented an increase in the minimum wage for over 9 years. Under current law, a full time worker earning minimum wage in the United States makes $10,700 a year, almost $6,000 below the poverty line for a family of three.

• King supports of the Bush plan to privatize Social Security (The New York Sun, 3/14/05)

Dave Mejias has the voting record to match his rhetoric. Mejias authored legislation to protect the rights of domestic workers, voted for the living wage bill that increased the minimum wage to $9.50 an hour for workers doing business with Nassau County, and fought to eliminate gender based pay inequity for 911 operators in Nassau County. Mejias earned the State AFL-CIO endorsement last month in the 3^rd Congressional race; it was the first the AFL-CIO had ever endorsed King's opponent.

And the Wall Street Journal, can you believe it, thinks Eliot Spitzer's presumed gubernatorial win and Hillary's efforts can soften up traditionally Rethug seats like Peter King's in NY-03.

Vote for Dave Mejias in November. Do you live in NY-03?

Dave for America

Dave's ActBlue page.

And remember, we're also highlighting House races throughout the country. Drop me an email if you know of one you'd like us to post on. See who we've highlighted so far.

*Not so daily lately because my offline life has been nuts.

Quote of the Day

Watertiger:

FUCK YOU, CHRISTIE TODD WHITMAN and your bosses in Washington, D.C.

The American Dream

Today's 'must read' is to go listen to George Carlin.

"It's a big club. And you ain't in it."

DHS Investigates Palast

I always hear rumors last, but when I do hear one, I put it out as if I heard it first...

Yes, the rumor's true. Greg Palast is facing a criminal complaint from the Department of Homeland Security stemming from his filming the Hurricane Katrina investigation for Link TV and Democracy Now. The film's producer, Matt Pascarella, is also facing the legal wrath of Big Brother.

It appears the complaint is about filming a sensitive national security site owned by Exxon petroleum. It seems that photographing major Bush donors is now a federal offense.

Reached at an undisclosed location, Palast says, "Let's not get over-excited. They haven't measured us for our orange suits yet."

Take it from one who knows, Greg: they're pretty much "one size fits all". The latest trend is for old-fashioned lookin' black-and-white striped outfits, which is plenty enough reason fer this ol' squatty-body to stay on the straight 'n narrow. I don't mind being locked up, but they doesn't hafta make me look fat!

During questioning by Homeland Security, Palast asked, "Hey, aren't you supposed to be looking for Osama? Or for guys with exploding shoes? ... We're journalists." At Palast's request, Homeland Security confirmed that Louisiana is, indeed, still part of the USA but did not respond when asked if the First Amendment applies there.

They probably don't even know what the First Amendment is. They just know it's a felony to tell the truth about this administration.

Priorities

This is probably an old joke, but Sumo tells it well:

Four U.S. Presidents get caught up in a tornado...and off they whirled to the Land of Oz.

Better yet, click here and scroll down to it. She has good 'toons and commentary.

Sharpen them canines, boys...

National Journal

This is how it goes lately between the White House and the press corps -- constant sniping and gibes, a battle fought largely between the lines. "You guys are a bunch of negative, nattering, pro-terrorist pinkos." "Oh yeah? Well you're gonna lose big-time in November."

Nobody says it exactly this way, but if you had a magic decoder ring and pointed it at the daily news cycle, that would be the translation.

So let's assume the latest oracular visions are correct and the GOP suffers a major defeat, something approaching if not matching the stunning Democratic losses of 1994. That would be the political equivalent of an earthquake. But would it have any implications for the media? Would it change the dynamic between the Bush team and the journalists who cover them?

A November defeat for the Republicans will change everything. If Bush suffers a major political setback, the media will feel freed up to tear into this war as they have never done before. Again, it will not be a conscious, orchestrated decision -- there will be no covert meeting at which senior editors and producers conspire to declare Iraq an epic failure. But the pack will change direction, as it always does when it smells blood.

Journalists are dumb beasts in the main, but they have sharp teeth and there are a lot of them.

If ever an administration needed to be "catastrophically deconstructed" by a pack of snarling, previously whimpering curs who were beaten into submission, it's this one.

November.

Malice + Incompetence = Bush & Rummy's Criminal War

Kos

One of the questions that constantly comes up in looking at the myriad snafus the Bush Administration has unleashed is this: incompetence or malice? (And yes, I know, "both" is a distinct possibility.) This story furnishes some powerful ammunition for the malice alternative.

[...]

"Then, just as we were barely into Afghanistan Rumsfeld came and told us to get ready for Iraq."

Scheid said he remembers everyone thinking, "My gosh, we're in the middle of Afghanistan, how can we possibly be doing two at one time? How can we pull this off? It's just going to be too much."
...
"The secretary of defense continued to push on us that everything we write in our plan has to be the idea that we are going to go in, we're going to take out the regime, and then we're going to leave," Scheid said. "We won't stay."

Scheid said the planners continued to try "to write what was called Phase 4," or the piece of the plan that included post-invasion operations like security, stability and reconstruction.

Even if the troops didn't stay, "at least we have to plan for it," Scheid said.

"I remember the secretary of defense saying that he would fire the next person that said that," Scheid said. "We would not do planning for Phase 4 operations, which would require all those additional troops that people talk about today.

"He said we will not do that because the American public will not back us if they think we are going over there for a long war."

The Iraq clusterfuck is by design. Making a plan and not telling us would have been one thing. They're good at not telling us stuff anyway.

Knowing they needed a plan, but not making one so we wouldn't find out as part of a P.R. plan to lie us into an unnecessary war is positively criminal. Past criminal. I don't even have a word for it.

I'm beyond "get a rope". We need four ropes for each one of these criminal bastards. Four ropes attached to four Humvees going in four directions.

Good work ...

For greedy Wall Street weenies who usually don't want to part with a dime:

On September 7, 2006, New York Downtown Hospital will open The Lehman Brothers Emergency Center, a new state-of-the-art emergency facility serving all of Downtown New York. This project is critically important because Downtown Hospital is the only hospital in Lower Manhattan. It is the first responder to virtually every medical emergency in the area, providing life-saving medical care for 33,000 emergency patients each year and responds to approximately 5,000 ambulance dispatches annually.

...

The project, which will cost approximately $25 million, was made possible by a $5 million gift from The Lehman Brothers Foundation. Additional funds were raised through the support of many generous donors, including The New York Stock Exchange, The Starr Foundation, The Bank of New York, AIG, and JP Morgan Chase, each of which donated $1 million or more to the project. The Hospital is working diligently to raise the last $4 million needed for this critical project.

...

I'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt on their reasons for doing it. A lot of those folks wouldn't be alive were it not for NY Downtown, their incredible staff, and the miracles they performed on 9/11. The hospital is a fixture in NYC, serving the Lower Manhattan for over a century and a half.

...

The Hospital's first incarnation, The New York Infirmary, was founded in 1853 by a medical and social pioneer determined to provide care for the impoverished women and children of Lower Manhattan. The pioneer was Elizabeth Blackwell, M.D., the first female physician in the United States.

...

They let him live.

This idiot swore he wouldn't be taken alive. Were I the New York State Troopers chasing him down, I would have granted his wish. Would have saved me and my neighbors a nice chunk of tax money.

(Carroll, New York - WABC, September 8, 2006) - After a very tense stand off, the newest man on the FBI's Most Wanted List surrendered peacefully on Friday night.

Ralph "Bucky" Phillips is accused of a violent crime spree -- shooting three New York state troopers and killing one of them -- after escaping from prison.

...

His confidence tonight was his downfall. When unarmed and surrounded on all sides, he put his hands up and gave in.

...

This guy should have a 10mm entrance wound between the eyes. What a waste of my good air. One of the reasons I'm not a cop.

Bucky ... heh ... grown man ... called Bucky ... heh ...

Know what?

There's something that pisses me off much more than anything the Chimp can do. Well, it's part of the same problem. Little men asserting what little power they do have by beating on their women. Motherfuckers.

A word of advice to you lowlife assholes. If you have the urge to pop your girl and I'm walking by at the time, you'll be eating the rest of your meals through your ass with a straw. If you want to beat on somebody, try taking a poke at me. I'll give you an education in 'anger management'.

PSM

Pauly's put all his book reviews in one place. Great if you're like me and don't have time to read shit but the newspapers and blogs.

Is it getting warm?

My boss Harry is a diver. He'd better watch his ass:

GARDEN CITY, N.Y., Sept. 8 (UPI) -- Scientists are investigating how a flamboyant tropical fish native to the Pacific Ocean is surviving in the chilly waters off New York's Long Island.

...

Todd R. Gardner, a biologist at Atlantis Marine World aquarium in Riverhead, N.Y., discovered lionfish were spawning in the Atlantic five years ago when he found one clinging to a dock piling by Fire Island. The Times said Gardner has been studying them since then along with biologist Paula Whitfield of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

...

But there's no such thing as global warming. Just ask the Long Island lobstermen how their catch has been the last few years.

9/11

You have to read the whole thing. I think most New Yorkers feel this way.

...

I don't watch any documentaries or movies about 9/11. I don't watch the ceremonies. I cringe every cloudless, perfect day, a day New Yorkers call a 9/11 day.

...

Let me explain something: they buried the last firefighter from 9/11 last year. They found a bone or two with his DNA.

...

Then the year of newspaper articles on a funeral. Seven days a week, for a year. And some girl wonders why she can't "share" in this? Share? There is nothing to share. There is grief, a sense of loss, and an understanding which you can never share. Any more than I can share what happened on Omaha Beach. I can understand, but it wasn't my friends dying there.

You want to understand 9/11, buy a fucking book and leave people to their memories. [my em]

That's why, as a New Yorker and a veteran, it makes me so angry when they use us to justify thousands of deaths in this misbegotten and illegal war, both American and Iraqi. If we are to somehow get retribution, how about the guys who planned and executed 9/11 and are still running around, now with their own production company it seems?

Quote of the Day

Daytona Beach News Journal via Maru, little Tyler Radkey:

...

"His face just started to turn red," said Tyler, now 13 and in seventh grade. "I thought, personally, he had to go to the bathroom."

For a puzzling seven minutes, the youngsters read aloud from the story "The Pet Goat" while the shaken president followed along in front of the class, trying to come to grips with what he had been told -- that a second plane had just hit the World Trade Center and the nation was under terrorist attack. [my em]

...

Your Chickenshit-in-Chief. So obvious a little kid can see it. So what the fuck is wrong with the idiots who still support the Chimp?

My Internet connection sucked monkey ass this morning before work for some reason. No I haven't fallen off the Earth completely.

Ah-nold steps on his schnitzel

LATimes

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today apologized for saying the lone Latina Republican lawmaker in California had a "very hot," fiery personality because of her ethnicity, a comment captured on audio tape last spring in his private office.

The governor made his apology in Santa Monica standing next to Assemblywoman Bonnie Garcia (R-Cathedral City), the lawmaker Schwarzenegger and his chief of staff discussed. Garcia's parents were from Puerto Rico.

On the recording, Schwarzenegger describes Republican legislators as the "wild bunch" and, referring to Garcia, casually says that "black blood" mixed with "Latino blood" equals "hot."

"I mean, they are all very hot," the governor says on the audio recording. "They have the, you know, part of the black blood in them and part of the Latino blood in them that together makes it."

Garcia said there was no need for Schwarzenegger to apologize.

Ms. Garcia is a nice lookin' gal for a Republican, and, hey, mo' hottah, mo' bettah, but ya doesn't wanna get caught sayin' shit like that even if it is true!

Gotta go now. Time for my daily Spanish lesson.

Si así es el infierno, ¡¡que me lleve el diablo!!
This is when you see a sizzling hot babe walking by. "If hell's like that, let the devil take me there"

Adios.

'Bin Laden to the rescue'

The Carpetbagger Report has a good summation of thoughts on the latest 'Vote for us or die' Rove-spin:

As you've probably heard by now, Al-Jazeera TV obtained and began broadcasting a new video yesterday afternoon with previously unseen footage of Osama bin Laden meeting with the top planners of the Sept. 11 attacks. It prompted similar responses from some of my favorite writers.

For example, The New Republic's Michael Crowley wrote, "Given the White House's current strategy to divert attention away from Iraq and back to Osama bin Laden and 9/11, this new al Qaeda video is bizarrely in sync with Karl Rove's election-season game plan. It's especially weird when you recall that bin Laden's 11th-hour video in October 2004 may have cost John Kerry the election (something I know certain of his staffers believe). I'm not suggesting any actual coordination here, something that seems almost too obvious to say. But in a weird way, you can argue that bin Laden has become a kind of political ally for George W. Bush."

Similarly, Josh Marshall added, "So al Qaida - or what's left of it - releases a five-plus year old tape of bin Laden with two of the 9/11 hijackers as well as Ramzi Binalshibh, one of the baddies just transfered to Gitmo. Right in time for the president's big kangaroo court role out. If you didn't know that bin Laden and Bush were the two polar opposites in the global battle between good and evil, you'd think the two were coordinating their media blitzes."

And Ezra Klein noted, "bin Laden seems perfectly content to release a new tape moments before each election. It's understood truth that the tighter terrorism's grip on the national agenda, the brighter the fortunes of the Republican Party. And yet bin Laden, whom the RNC would like you to believe blanches at the mere mention of their name, routinely plays deus ex machina each time their electoral outlook dims. To believe that bin Laden, whose network is largely online and reportedly sophisticated, cannot call up the New York Times and comprehend this electoral dynamic is the height of foolishness. So, for whatever reason, he appears intent on doing his enthusiastic best to improve the Republicans' prospects. Strange, given their belief that he fears them so."

I have to say, it warms the heart to know that my cynicism is shared by reasonable, levelheaded writers at widely respected outlets...

I have to say, it warms the heart to know that my cynicism is shared by reasonable, levelheaded writers at widely respected outlets...

As always, it's just a little too pat.

Army shuns system to combat RPGs

MSNBC

Rocket-propelled grenades, or RPGs, are a favorite weapon of insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. They are cheap, easy to use and deadly.

Sixteen months ago, commanders in Iraq began asking the Pentagon for a new system to counter RPGs and other anti-tank weapons.

Last year, a special Pentagon unit thought it found a solution in Israel - a high-tech system that shoots RPGs out of the sky. But in a five-month exclusive investigation, NBC News has learned from Pentagon sources that that help for U.S. troops is now in serious jeopardy.

The system is called "Trophy," and it is designed to fit on top of tanks and other armored vehicles like the Stryker now in use in Iraq.

Trophy works by scanning all directions and automatically detecting when an RPG is launched. The system then fires an interceptor - traveling hundreds of miles a minute - that destroys the RPG safely away from the vehicle.

The Israeli military, which recently lost a number of tanks and troops to RPGs, is rushing to deploy the system.

And officials with the Pentagon"s Office of Force Transformation (OFT) agree. Created in 2001 by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, OFT acts as an internal "think tank" for the Pentagon and is supposed to take a more entrepreneurial - and thereby less bureaucratic - approach to weapons procurement and other defense issues, and to get help to troops in the field more quickly. OFT officials subjected Trophy to 30 tests and found that it is "more than 98 percent" effective at killing RPGs.

An official involved with those tests told NBC that Trophy "worked in every case. The only anomaly was that in one test, the Trophy round hit the RPG's tail instead of its head. But according to our test criteria, the system was 30 for 30."

As a result, OFT decided to buy several Trophies - which cost $300,000-$400,000 each - for battlefield trials on Strykers in Iraq next year.

That plan immediately ran into a roadblock: Strong opposition from the U.S. Army. Why? Pentagon sources tell NBC News that the Army brass considers the Israeli system a threat to an Army program to develop an RPG defense system from scratch.

The $70 million contract for that program had been awarded to an Army favorite, Raytheon. Raytheon's contract constitutes a small but important part of the Army's massive modernization program called the Future Combat System (FCS), which has been under fire in Congress on account of ballooning costs and what critics say are unorthodox procurement practices.

Col. Donald Kotchman, who heads the Army's program to develop an RPG defense, acknowledges that Raytheon's system won't be ready for fielding until 2011 at the earliest.

So why would the Army block a solution that might help troops?

"There are some in the Army who would be extremely concerned that if the Trophy system worked, then the Army would have no need to go forward with the Raytheon system and the program might be terminated," says Steven Schooner, who teaches procurement law at both George Washington University and the Army's Judge Advocate General's School.

Trophy's supporters inside the Pentagon are more blunt. As one senior official told NBC News, "This debate has nothing, zero, to do with capability or timeliness. It's about money and politics. You've got a gigantic program [FCS] and contractors with intertwined interests. Trophy was one of the most successful systems we've tested, and yet the Army has ensured that it won't be part of FCS and is now trying to prevent it from being included on the Strykers" that OFT planned to send to Iraq.

Once again, the troops are getting screwed and will die for corporate profit and future fat jobs for lifer pricks.

Maybe the kids who are in the 8th grade now will get the weapon when it's their turn in the meat grinder of Iraq.

This makes me so mad I can't see straight.

Remember

9/11: Press for Truth

A Nation Remembers...

Fiore

Remember.

November.

No. 1 or not, "out of the box" is a good thing at his age...

Straight from Cursor:

The successful debut of "Modern Times" makes Bob Dylan "the oldest living person to go straight into the chart at number one" -- aided by an edgy TV ad and a dead poet -- but 'That's Not Bob Dylan!'

Speaking as a certified genuine Olde Farte (Lctp!)and one who has purchased Modern Times, I'm glad to see Dylan doing good. It's a good album.

The main difference between old folks' concerts and young folks' concerts is that at our concerts we throw Depends up on stage. Throwing our underwear is a clear violation of the Geneva Convention.

November '06, WWIII, and the end of the United States

Robert Parry at Consortiumnews.

As Americans go to the polls in two months, they should have one thought fixed in their minds: they will be voting on whether to commit the nation to fighting World War III against large segments of the world's one billion Muslims. Beyond the cost in blood and treasure, this war will mean the end of the United States as a democratic Republic.

The failure to trap or kill bin Laden at Tora Bora might rank as one of modern history's worst military blunders. But in his Sept. 5 speech, Bush instead cited other historical failures - what he called missed opportunities to eliminate Lenin and Hitler when they were living in obscurity and writing about their improbable dreams of power.

What Bush appears to be advocating is the end of free speech and free thought, or at least the regulation and punishment of speech and thought that he disdains. Bush is extending his concept of "preemptive war" - launching attacks against countries that might present a future threat to the United States - to "preemptive thought control," eliminating political opponents who might pose some future threat.

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibits the U.S. government from criminalizing speech. But Bush is indicating that he and his political followers believe that, amid the "war on terror," it is justifiable to do just that.

As Bush defines domestic criticism of his war's costs "in finances and casualties" as part of a terrorist scheme, it's not hard to imagine how Bush's devoted followers will react. Any expression of concern that Bush is charting a course toward mad destruction will be attacked as somehow acting in concert with terrorists.

Though Bush has said that his goal in waging his vague and seemingly endless "war on terror" is to defend freedom, the reality behind Bush's grim vision is the emergence of an American totalitarianism where objectionable thought will be repressed and dissent will be equated with treason.

The President has now made clear that he wants the Nov. 7 congressional elections to be a referendum on whether Americans will follow him into this dark future.

He must be stopped.

November.

The American Legion

Like Commander Huber, they've been bugging me to join. Not any time soon:

Every six months or so the American Legion sends me a letter asking why I haven't joined yet. Last week, at its annual convention in Salt Lake City, Utah, the Legion answered its own question.

It's bad enough that the Bush administration abuses its authority at every opportunity to use active duty troops as a Leni Riefenstahl style backdrop for its political rallies. The military, constitutionally under young Mister Bush's command, has no other choice but to play along. But for a so-called "veterans' service organization" to volunteer itself as a wall in the neoconservative GOP echo chamber is a particularly offensive piece of Rovewellianism.

...

I'm not one for clubs in general. I got a deal with the exclusivity thing (to me, the reason for most 'clubs' existence is to exclude a certain type of person), but that's just me. As for the American Legion, I won't be a member of something that's just another arm of the White House Propaganda Machine, I don't give a fuck what they do for veterans.

...

One of the best examples of the Legion's adherence to the Karl Rove propaganda playbook is its Resolution 169 titled "The War on Terrorism: A Guide to Building Public Awareness" that the Legion adopted during its 2005 convention in Hawaii.

...

Proposition 169 acknowledges the right of war protestors to speak out, but admonishes them to limit their activities to things like writing letters to their local newspapers, e-mailing their representatives in Congress, and voting against political candidates whose stances on the war they find objectionable. In other words, anyone who disagrees with the administration's policies and war strategies should feel free to voice their opinions as long as they do so in a way that no one can hear them.

And that fed directly into Donald Rumsfeld's speech at the 2006 Legion convention in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he accused Iraq War critics of "moral" and "intellectual" confusion.

...

Want to help vets? Help vets and don't take sides. Don't play politics. Use your influence in a bipartisan attempt to get more funding for the VA and vets' services. I won't support an organization that supports war criminals.

Wild horses* ...

Couldn't drag me away ...

Give your elected reps a call or drop 'em an email**. Granny, in toto:

Congress votes on the horse slaughter ban tomorrow [That would be today. - F]. What will they do? On one hand we have a couple of businesses raking in the dough, on the other, 65% [o]f the population opposes horse slaughter.

Oh what will they do?

Backstory here.

*Apologies to Mick and the boys.
**Use the handy form in the left sidebar in the 'Complaint Department' section.

Quote of the Day

Our pal Creature*:

How is it possible that 2 in 5 Americans still support Bush's handling of international affairs? FOX News Channel.

Over the past 6 years, I've pretty much lost faith in the intelligence and common sense of my fellow Americans. We're a nation of morons and chickenshits. To wit**:

MIAMI, Sept. 5 -- Shunned by party leaders and battered by repeated campaign controversies, Rep. Katherine Harris nonetheless held on to enough support from the state's Republican voters Tuesday to win Florida's Senate primary convincingly over three little-known candidates.

...

*Go see the cartoon.
**Link thanks to Lambert.

Sorry

Sorry about my sporadic posting and commenting lately. There's been a lot going on in my non-online world. Namely business (we've gotten really busy at the shop and I've been working late) and personal things (a very dear friend is dealing with some serious medical problems) and getting ready to be at sea for 2 1/2 weeks at the end of the month. Hopefully things are going to mellow out soon. God I can't wait for this vacation.

This Want Ad Says It All

Z's Ominous Psyops Blog

MORTUARY AFFAIRS/ LOGISTICS ASST.
Two PT temp contractor positions at Dover AFB Port Mortuary (13+/hr. thru 8/18/05). Provide logistics-related support services as members of a Serco, Inc. team of employees working for the US Army Casualty and Memorial Affairs Operations Center. Principal duties include the cleaning, sanitizing, repairing, and preparing for storage and/or reutilization the aluminum "transfer cases" that are used to transport to the Dover Port Mortuary the remains of deceased members of the US Armed Forces. HS diploma. Reliable self-starter with respect/compassion for deceased military members and families. Military and/or funeral home experience a plus.

No doubt a burgeoning field.

Serco is also a contract military recruiter.

Comin' in or goin' out, they get a check.

Bush is the Bitch

MoDo via Tennessee Guerilla Women:

W. and Katie were both on TV at 6:30 last night, trying to prove they were a man.

Katie won, by a whisker.

Heh. Go read.

Charlie Brown Update

Go read Charlie's post at Kos:

Hawkish Members of Congress who never served one day in uniform (like my opponent John Doolittle) like to equate speaking out against the mistakes and missteps of this Administration on matters of national security with "not supporting the troops." Exhibit A is Doolittle's most recent column on the subject.

Like his "stay the course" colleagues, Doolittle's hopeless strategy here is to try and distract voters from his hypocritical record on the subject by smearing his opponents. Unfortunately, no amount of taxpayer funded campaign mailers will change the fact that he voted to send our troops to war in Iraq without a plan, proper equipment, or sound intelligence. It won't change the growing tensions in Iran, North Korea, Afghanistan, Lebanon, and elsewhere that have occurred under John Doolittle's watch. And it certainly won't change the fact that he had the second worst record in the entire House of Representatives on Veterans issues in the 109th Congress (per Disabled American Veterans).

Near the close of my 26 year Air Force career, I served two rotations coordinating surveillance flights over Iraq's "No Fly Zones" (mid 1990's). I attended the General's briefings every morning, spoke with intelligence officers, and we regularly discussed what we would target if we went to war with Iraq the next day. As I've reported on many occasions, no one was worried about WMD during those times, because we knew those programs had been shut down.

Accordingly, I spoke out early and often against the false assertions used to justify the U.S. led invasion of Iraq. Now that we are there, I've consistently called for a timetable for re-deploying our troops elsewhere, turning over authority to Iraqis, and reducing the suspicion of occupation that is fueling insurgent violence and civil war. And, I support an immediate end to the "make it up as we go along" security strategy that has so dangerously isolated our country from the allies around the world that are needed to win a Global War on Terror. Most importantly, I recognize that when it comes to keeping our promise to veterans, the true measure of leadership is performance--not empty rhetoric. And the only acceptable result is "no one left behind."

"No one left behind" except Doolittle in CA-04, that is.

Charlie Brown for Congress

Veterans For Peace

Go watch this video, then check out Veterans For Peace.

God ... heh

This is why I am so anti-religion; all religion. Since the beginning of recorded history, more people have been killed, more lives destroyed, and more atrocities committed in the name of God than for any other reason. It is also obvious the people who are supposedly charged with spreading God's message are the ones usually responsible for committing the sins they so loudly rail against.

...

A woman in the group soon told a sheriff's deputy horrific stories of how the compound's leaders had molested girls as part of religious ceremonies during which they were told their bodies were being prepared for "service to God."

...

Fuck the lot of 'em. You don't have to believe in God to be a good person and wrapping yourself in the cloak of religiosity doesn't make you one. As they say in my neighborhood, 'bullshit walks'. Prove you're a good person by your deeds. Words mean nothing. Throw whatever holy book you read from away and do what's right. You shouldn't need a book or a preacher to explain it to you.

Our 'friends'

The Paks, who have received billions in U.S. anti-terror aid, who have done more to increase illegal nuclear proliferation than any 'rogue state', and who are the ones who built Iran's new hard water nuclear reactor, don't feel the need to police the worlds largest terror breeding gorund:

...

Q. ABC News: So, he wouldn't be taken into custody? He would stay there?

A. Gen. Sultan: No, as long as one is staying like a peaceful citizen, one would not be taken into custody. One has to stay like a peaceful citizen and not allowed to participate in any kind of terrorist activity.

...

Former White House counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke, an ABC News consultant, said "What this means is that the Taliban and al Queida leadership have effectively carved out a sanctuary inside Pakistan."

...

The Paks are also pulling out of Waziristan so the Taliban and al-Qaeda will have a place to plot, plan, and connive in relative sanctuary. So tell me again how we're going to bring the people who killed 3000 of my friends and neighbors (and nearly my wife) to justice?

And who says the terrorists didn't win? The leadership of this nation are nothing but greedy war criminals and the Paks are their accomplices.

Cheney bio

I got turned onto a little light entertainment by our pal Lurch.

An excerpt from Rising Hegemon

Dick takes time off from school, working for an electrical company as a lineman. However, in reality, Dick is listening in on phone conversations involving the Kennedy Administration. Later that Year, Dick visits Hollywood and gets a job as Marilyn Monroe's housekeeper going by the name "Eunice".

Dick and his High School Sweetheart Lynne begin sending each other letters and gifts. Lynne sends Dick the heart of a local farmhand, Dick sends Lynne the pelvic bone of a vagrant who's flesh he had boiled away. Their co-dependency grows stronger. On Valentine's Day 1963 Dick sends Lynne a letter that reveals the poet in Dick Cheney's soul:

'Eunice' indeed! Please enjoy.

Dems to Bush: Wise up, Fuzznuts

Via HuffPo:

Today top House and Senate Democrats wrote President Bush to urge him to change his Iraq policy. The letter proposed four changes, which included a phased redeployment of US troops, disarming militias and positioning the US Military as a counter-terror force. The democratic leaders also told Bush that "to demonstrate you recognize the problems your policies have created in Iraq and elsewhere -consider changing the civilian leadership at the Defense Department."

The text of the entire letter is included below:

And so it is! Go read.

Rice ups the bar on stupidity

The Carpetbagger Report

Last week, top administration officials, including Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld, equated the war in Iraq with fighting Nazis in World War II. As part of this analogy, the Bush gang made its critics out to be Neville Chamberlain - as if troop redeployment in Iraq is the moral equivalent of appeasing Hitler.

As if that weren't quite offensive enough, Condoleezza Rice has upped the ante a bit, suggesting that opponents of the war are the moral equivalent of those who would tolerate slavery in 19th century America.

[...]

"I'm sure there are people who thought it was a mistake to fight the Civil War to its end and to insist that the emancipation of slaves would hold," Rice said in the new issue of Essence magazine.

"I know there were people who said, 'Why don't we get out of this now, take a peace with the South, but leave the South with slaves?'" Rice said.

Now, I know that Rice, like much of today's Republican Party, is desperate. I realize that this appears to be a challenging campaign cycle for the GOP, and they're willing to engage in whatever demagoguery necessary to survive the next 10 weeks.

But to suggest, out loud, on the record, that critics of the war in Iraq are similar to those who would approve of slavery is perhaps the most breathtakingly stupid remark ever uttered by a Bush administration official. And given the competition, that's no easy feat.

And she's supposed to be the smart one in that outfit!

What's next? Are we to analogized to the people who nailed Jesus up?

I'd rather think of us as analagous to the folks who tried to tell the Skipper of the Titanic to maybe steer a little to the left of the iceberg, and bitched at him while we sank after he didn't.

Propaganda

It was Clinton's fault! It was Clinton's fault!

There's a 9/11 movie to be aired on the Mickey Mouse channel on 9/10 and 9/11 which blames the Clinton administration for 9/11. His Republican congress had a lot to do with his failure as a president. As you will recall, for the past 6 years, everything wrong with the world has been blamed on Clinton. And if I recall, practically nothing could get past Clinton's Republican house at the time unless it was clearly in the best interest of fascists (but not the "Islamo-fascists". You know and I know that EVERYTHING in DC is political. You would have to be blind to not see it.

Let's take a trip down memory lane shall we? When Clinton wanted the executive powers and legislation to fight terrorism 10 years ago, Trent Lott and Orin Hatch didn't want to know about it. They were more interested in going on recess. Why not read the CNN report from July, 30 1996?

...

Who knew the Mouse was a card-carrying Repuke and part of the right wing propaganda machine? This 'docudrama' is nothing more than another way to frame the issue in the Repukes' favor just before Election Day. How many idiots will believe this is unadulterated fact? ABC wouldn't air it if it weren't true, right?

Hel-lo! 6 August is not just the anniversary of the Hiroshima nuking.

Labor Day

Or, what American Dream*?

...

Were that all that Wal-Mart did, of course, the answer would be "nothing." But as business writer Barry Lynn demonstrated in a brilliant essay in the July issue of Harper's, Wal-Mart also exploits its position as the biggest retailer in human history -- 20 percent of all retail transactions in the United States take place at Wal-Marts, Lynn wrote -- to drive down wages and benefits all across the economy. The living standards of supermarket workers have been diminished in the process, but Wal-Mart's reach extends into manufacturing and shipping as well. Thousands of workers have been let go at Kraft, Lynn shows, due to the economies that Wal-Mart forced on the company. Of Wal-Mart's 10 top suppliers in 1994, four have filed bankruptcies.

For the bottom 90 percent of the American workforce, work just doesn't pay, or provide security, as it used to.

...

This nation has turned into Gordon Gekko's Paradise. Benefits? Raise? Vacation? Shut up and get back to work** or find another job. American Dream, my ass.

*Thanks to C&L for the link.
**Thanks to Atrios.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Bush Warns Iran
Threatens it with undermanned invasion, inept occupation, incompetent reconstruction.

Support Grows for Dividing Afghanistan Into 3 Regions
One each for Taliban, warlords, opium farmers.

U.S. Military Puts Out $20 Million Contract for Positive News From Iraq
Having already shelled out $200 billion for negative news.

Be sure to go to page 3 for the Time Chart of WWII v. Bush's War and Occupation of Iraq.

Keepin' us safer ...

Yeah, right. Link via C&L:

Terrorism prosecutions have fallen back to pre-9/11 levels. A new report notes, "In the eight months ending last May, Justice attorneys declined to prosecute more than nine out of every 10 terrorism cases sent to them by the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies."

... Nearly 4 in 10 of the rejected cases were scrapped because prosecutors found weak or insufficient evidence, no evidence of criminal intent or no evident federal crime ... [my em]

Just sayin'.

New Site Alert

Go see Evil GOP Bastards. Have fun.

Live by the sword ...

Die by the sword.

They Think We're Stupid

So this morning,as I do every weekend(ok it's Monday,and I'm a little behind on chores),I'm changing the feline's litter box.I'm not one to buy fancy cat litter,unless some unbelievably great deal comes along.The grocery store was discontinuing Arm and Hammer clumping cat litter at 60% off,so I picked up a box to blend with the el cheapo clay stuff I usually buy.

On the top of the box,I shit you not,it says:

Safe for use around pets.

Well,I would fucking hope so,seeing as how I buy it FOR the family pets.I personally don't use the litter box,neither do the rest of the humans around here.(and if they were to start,someone would be on the recieving end of my foot in their ass.I'd also assume,that if it's safe for pets,humans should be covered too)

Of course this isn't the first time I've found a ridiculous message sprawled on a common household item.For instance,my curling iron has warnings not to use it while sleeping or bathing/showering.I can't tell you the number of times I personally have done my hair while asleep.And taking a shower while operating an electrical appliance is a sure fire waker upper in the morning,better than coffee or even a double expresso.Damned if I knew you weren't supposed to do either of those things.

Plastic bags are NOT a toy for infants,read it,learn it,live it.

And please,for the love of GOD,don't drink bleach or eat laundry detergent,no matter how hungry or thirsty you find yourself.

This public service announcement has been approved by An Angry Old Broad specifically for you morons out there that can't find your ass in the dark with both hands and a laser beam.

39

It sucks being #2 I guess.

Tip o' the Brain to Pauly.

Election Day

You know Election Day is almost upon us when the price of a gallon of gas drops 15 cents and we get a weekly tape from al-Qaeda.

Honky-tonkin' fer truth

From azcentral.com:

NASHVILLE - The songwriters hunched over hamburgers and sweet iced tea at Brown's Diner allowed that a cut titled I'm Takin' My Country Back by the Honky Tonkers for Truth sounded like a hit to them.

But they don't expect it to get any airplay on country music radio stations, mainly because of lyrics like these:

"And I'm takin' my country back/Boys you ain't been doin' her right/Oh, I've been watching you and I don't like/How you been treating my Stars and Stripes.

"You took our jobs and sent 'em overseas/Now we owe billions to the Red Chinese/You blew the budget and you botched Iraq/So I'm taking my country back."

The song is one of 20 on a CD released online by the Music Row Democrats, an organization of country music songwriters, singers, executives and promoters dedicated to helping oust the Republican majority in Congress in the November elections.

Conservative Christian Right-Wing Republican Straight White American Male is another cut on the CD by Todd Snider, an artist who arrived in Nashville after stops in Austin, Texas, and Atlanta. Or, as Snider describes himself "a tree-huggin,' peace-lovin', pot-smokin', porn-watchin' . . . hippie."

Not your typical county music song or singer.

While conceding that country music is widely perceived as a bastion of conservative politics, the Democratic group claims a membership of about 1,200 in "the industry," including a slew of down-home liberals.

In their mission statement, the Country Music Democrats say their founders "were fed up with feeling as if they had to apologize for being Democrats."

About fuckin' time! It was time to come out of the closet years ago, but I understand about radio airplay and making a living in country music. I'm glad they're doing it at last.

I guess when Hag comes out, the rest of 'em feel it's safe.

When the country DJs, and more importantly, the radio station owners, wise up that their listeners ain't buyin' Bush's bullshit any more, it'll all be over.

On men ... again

Texas Jaye with some words of advice:

...

Remember that the next time, women, you go to bed with someone whose middle name you don't know. And how much fun is it to go to bed and perform sexually for a man who thinks your sole purpose in life is to clean up after him and stroke his ego by being his doormat, trapped in his house, with no credit, no real job, and no way out and no way in your own life.

...

As the Mrs. and I get older, we've noticed more of our friends whom we thought had great marriages are dealing with this problem now that the kids are out of the house. It's the women who are realizing they are the ones who've been doing everything for the last 20-odd years and they've had enough of being a maid, cook, and servant for guys who just want to sit on the couch and watch TV or go play golf.

Note to journalists ...

Or, life imitating art. If you want to learn something, buy this or watch the reruns. Regardless of the schtick, you might pick up something about ethics and principle.