The media's newest talking point

"To the right."


God, hard to imagine a party that wants tougher security is to the right of this guy. As Bill Maher said, can you imagine if John Kerry said during the campaign that he was going to sell control of the ports to Dubai? He would have been slaughtered by the scaremongers on the right. However, Kerry did continually push for stronger port security as an issue and only now are Democrats getting attention to the ports. But, when they do, it is in the context of "to the right" of the Republicans. Very rarely have I seen/read a real discussion of the true holes in port security; the wide open access to ports and the 98% of cargo containers that don't get inspected. But, pay no attention to that... the Democarats are now to the right of the GOP... Thank God for the media, I'd have no idea how to think without them!

(Photo from the Complete 9-11 Timeline at the Center for Cooperative Reasearch)

The Case for Impeachment

Harper's Mag:
...

Conyers said: “I don't think enough people know how much damage this administration can do to their civil liberties in a very short time. What would you have me do? Grumble and complain? Make cynical jokes? Throw up my hands and say that under the circumstances nothing can be done? At least I can muster the facts, establish a record, tell the story that ought to be front-page news.”

Which turned out to be the purpose of his House Resolution 635—not a high-minded tilting at windmills but the production of a report, 182 pages, 1,022 footnotes, assembled by Conyers's staff during the six months prior to its presentation to Congress, that describes the Bush Administration's invasion of Iraq as the perpetration of a crime against the American people. It is a fair description. Drawing on evidence furnished over the last four years by a sizable crowd of credible witnesses—government officials both extant and former, journalists, military officers, politicians, diplomats domestic and foreign—the authors of the report find a conspiracy to commit fraud, the administration talking out of all sides of its lying mouth, secretly planning a frivolous and unnecessary war while at the same time pretending in its public statements that nothing was further from the truth.

...

Before reading the report, I wouldn't have expected to find myself thinking that such a course of action was either likely or possible; after reading the report, I don't know why we would run the risk of not impeaching the man. We have before us in the White House a thief who steals the country's good name and reputation for his private interest and personal use; a liar who seeks to instill in the American people a state of fear; a televangelist who engages the United States in a never-ending crusade against all the world's evil, a wastrel who squanders a vast sum of the nation's wealth on what turns out to be a recruiting drive certain to multiply the host of our enemies. In a word, a criminal—known to be armed and shown to be dangerous. Under the three-strike rule available to the courts in California, judges sentence people to life in jail for having stolen from Wal-Mart a set of golf clubs or a child's tricycle. Who then calls strikes on President Bush, and how many more does he get before being sent down on waivers to one of the Texas Prison Leagues?

(read the whole thing)

Journaliesm

Idiot boy has fun editing.

Dear God

The bombing that I pointed out below seems to be the sign that Iraq is headed toward civil war sooner rather than later. This pretty much refutes the argument that the conservative chicken hawks keep pushing that if we leave there will be chaos. The sackless dems keep saying the samew thing, even though war heroes in their own party are telling them that Iraq is unwinnable within the confines of the current war plan. Anywho, with this impending colassal failure being played out before the world, rationally thinking people are starting to realize that this war is infact unwinnable and with evidence mounting by the day that Bush was predetermined to go into Iraq it is becoming patently obvious that the whole thing was a disasterous mistake.

Jeez, it's hard to imagine how Fox News will still manage to make President Bush look good on this issue...

Wow.

Ports

Read this and this.

Not just another bombing...

This is terrible.

BAGHDAD, Feb. 23 -- A wave of sectarian strife and recrimination swept Iraq Thursday after Wednesday's bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in the city of Samarra. The Interior Ministry said that more than 100 people have been killed in the violence.

Officials in Baghdad, struggling to restore order, expanded an existing curfew in an effort to get people off the streets after dark and canceled all leaves for Iraqi security forces.

The process of forming a new government also appeared to be in jeopardy, as some Sunni politicians, protesting what they said was a lack of protection for Sunni mosques attacked overnight, said they were pulling out of negotiations with Shiite parties.

There were a great number of disturbances reported across the country Wednesday night and Thursday, too many to accurately track let alone verify.

In four separate areas around Baghdad, authorities found the bodies of 40 men shot dead, an Interior Ministry spokesman said Thursday.
...

All told, Interior Ministry officials said more than 100 people were killed.
The Muslim Scholars Association in Iraq said 168 Sunni mosques were attacked in the last 24 hours.

"I understand the consternation and concern of Iraqi Shias when they see this most holy site wantonly destroyed," President Bush told reporters Thursday, praising those in Iraq who have called for calm.
...

The stress created an even more difficult climate for the political process, in which minority Sunnis, majority Shiites and Kurds are struggling to put together a new government.
Tariq al-Hashemi of the Iraq Accordance Front, the main Sunni Muslim bloc, said his group has decided "to suspend negotiations over forming a new government." The group also boycotted a meeting of reconciliation set for Thursday with President Jalal Talabani.
...

The upsurge in violence followed Wednesday's attack in which bombers blasted the gilded dome of the Askariya shrine in Samarra into naked steel and gaping blue sky in a provocative assault that roused tens of thousands of Iraqi Shiites into angry protests and deadly clashes.

Though no casualties were reported in the blast, the bombing was the most destructive attack on a major shrine since the U.S. invasion, and Iraqi leaders said it was meant to draw Iraq's majority population of Shiites and the minority of Sunnis into war. "This is as 9/11 in the United States," said Adel Abdul Mahdi, a Shiite and one of Iraq's two vice presidents.
...

Wednesday, after the mosque bombing, President Bush, as well as top U.S. military and civilian representatives here, appealed for calm. He repeated that appeal Thursday

"I appreciate very much the leaders from all aspects of Iraqi society that have stood up and urged for there to be calm. . . . The voices of reason from all aspects of Iraqi life understand that this bombing is intended to create civil strife, that the act was an evil act. The destruction of a holy site is a political act intending to create strife," Bush said.
...

In Baghdad, Shiite boys and men abruptly abandoned classrooms, homes and jobs to muster outside the headquarters of the influential Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the heart of Sadr City, the slum named for the cleric's father.

"This is a day we will never forget," said Naseer Sabah, 24, who had left his job at a pastry factory without changing clothes to join the black-clad Shiite militia fighters clutching pistols, Kalashnikov assault rifles and grenade launchers outside Sadr's headquarters.

Thousands converged on the Sadr offices, on foot or in buses and pickup trucks packed with armed men hanging out the windows.

"We await the orders of our preachers," teenagers around Sabah cried.

"We are the soldiers of the clerics," Shiite protesters chanted in Karrada, another of Baghdad's Shiite neighborhoods. Demonstrators there shouted a warning to their enemies: "If they are up to it, let them face us."

Other protests were reported in the predominantly Shiite cities of Najaf, Karbala, Basra and elsewhere.

Sunni political leaders said retaliatory attacks hit more than 20 Sunni mosques across Iraq with bombs, gunfire or arson. Authorities reported at least 18 people killed in the aftermath, including two Sunni clerics. In one incident, in Basra in southern Iraq, police said gunmen in police uniforms broke into a jail, seized 12 Sunni men and later killed them, according to the Reuters news agency.

Many of Baghdad's millions shuttered shops and left work early, rushing home to tense neighborhoods where gunfire rang out overnight. In one neighborhood, families lay on the floors of their houses to evade bullets as militiamen loyal to Sadr confronted Iraqi troops backed by U.S. military helicopters outside a Sunni site.
...

Early in the last century, Shiite faithful paid to cloak the mosque's graceful, onion-shaped dome in gleaming gold. On Wednesday, every vestige of the dome was destroyed, the tiled and gilt facade stripped down to mud brick.

Police said two bombs that had been planted at the mosque overnight exploded at dawn. Some local officials in Samarra said the bombers were dressed in the uniforms of Iraqi security forces.
Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jafari, in one of several televised news conferences and appeals by Iraqi and U.S. leaders, said preliminary investigation into the bombing pointed to "infiltration" of Iraqi security forces.
...

There was no immediate assertion of responsibility for Wednesday's attack. Mowaffak al-Rubaie, Iraq's national security adviser, told al-Arabiya television that he believed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's al-Qaeda in Iraq organization may have been the culprit. "The main aim of these terrorist groups is to drag Iraq into a civil war," Rubaie said.

"Violence will only contribute to what the terrorists sought to achieve by this act," Bush said in a written statement in Washington. "I ask all Iraqis to exercise restraint in the wake of this tragedy."

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the American military commander in Iraq, issued a joint statement calling this a "critical moment" for Iraq. The top U.N. envoy here, Ashraf Qazi, said he would ask the country's political and religious leaders to hold a dialogue under the auspices of the United Nations, which has taken a back seat to the United States in the conflict.

Iraq's most influential Shiite religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, called on Shiites to take to the streets, but peacefully. Sistani, who avoids the news media, allowed himself to be shown on television consulting on Wednesday's crisis with the country's other leading Shiite ayatollahs. His unprecedented appearance with the three other clerics underscored the gravity with which they viewed the near-destruction of their shrine.
...

In Sadr City, representatives of Sadr called for restraint and sought to deflect blame from Iraq's Sunnis. Followers came running late Wednesday when a Sadr preacher took up a bullhorn outside Sadr's offices to give the direction that the armed, angry crowds were waiting for. The mosque attack was the work of "occupiers," or Americans, "and Zionists," said the cleric, Abdul Zara Saidy. In Iran, Shiite leaders echoed the accusation. (my bold)

God, so much to say here. O.K. first, this is just awful, and it proves the Congressman Jack Murtha was right. Iraq is headed to a civil war. We cannot stop it. It is going to happen whether we are in the country or not. So now what to?

We can either triple the amount of troops or we can get out of there. But, as is seen above, even though the US was not responsible, we are still being blamed. We're the "occupiers" who will be stuck in the crosshairs of this upcoming civil war. We don't have even close to enough troops to stop this civil war and Bush knows it.

For Bush to call this violence a political act is true, but it is a hauntingly ironic thing for him to say considering this whole war was a predetermined political act of sheer recklessness and a complete abuse of his posistion.

Also, Bush has some fucking balls saying "Violence will only contribute to what the terrorists sought to achieve by this act."

Yeah, no shit. But apply "9-11" to "this act" and "invading Iraq" to "violence will only contribute to what terrorist sought to achieve" and you are damn right. Can anyone honestly say that Osama Bin Laden isn't licking his chops right now?

Also, Bill Press is right.

As of right now, we have 2,284 U.S. soldiers dead and 17,430 casulties. Since the moral crusaders at the Pentagon have not counted the dead Iraqis, that number (around 30,000) is just an estimate. And it has cost a whopping $243 billion and counting.

For WHAT?????

Well, apparently to cause a civil war, to do everything Bin Laden said we would do, to bankrupt our kids, to kill and injure our own, to kill tens of thousands of innocent people, to run various torture facilities around the world, and, overall, to make us less safe.

And if you think we're spreading freedom and its all going to be an easy six month campaign of roses and candy and it is only going to cost $1.7 billion, than you are not only A) a member of the Bush administration, B) on LSD, but C) you also need to watch Frontline's "The Insurgency." Watch that, read the Washington Post article, read what Jack Murtha has been saying for months, and then if you still think we can win over there, enlist. If not, call you member of congress and tell them to do as much as they can to get our guys out of there.

One lie leads to another

This is great.

More great news!

Wow.

Who feels safer?

You know, when I logged into my mail today, I saw this little headline and thought, "Thank God Kerry wasn't elected." Are we seriously living through this, or is the Matrix malfunctioning?


Just laugh it off. Just laugh it off. It will all be better soon. (via Altercation)

Ha Ha

I saw Dave Chappelle twice last night. Once at the Warfield were he had erica badu and mos def play with him and once at the Punchline (a real small club out here that Chappelle calls his favorite in the country) which was just a treat to say the least. Both shows were great and both pretty much were like looking at a guy going to therapy, but not in a bad way. It was just great watching him get all this stuff off his chest and using stand up to do it. Some really funny bits that he was just practicing. A real expoerience to watch one of the funniest men in America just practice doing standup.
Also, I got to meet Kevin Nealon this week when he played the club. That was surreal. He was hysterical too, and a giant who also wears a size 15!
So anyway, a busy long weekend, hope all enjoyed the E.T. video.

E.T. the video game...

I have huffed far too many paint fumes since my childhood to remember E.T. the video game. But, I was shown a music video this morning that tells the absolutly hilarious story of E.T., which is widely considered the worst video game ever made. Watch the video by the band Wintergreen and have a a trip down memory lane.

They had to bury 5 million copies! That's not only a horrible yet humorous story, but also just an incredibly moronic business plan. Imagine the decision being made...

Overpayed Atari Exec. 1: "Wow, this game sucks, people keep returning it... What are we gonna do with all these plastic cartridges?"

Overpayed Atari Exec. 2: "Well, I think the best thing to do would be to bury them in Mexico and forget about this whole incident. Oh yeah, and lets fire a bunch of people."

And with that thought about putting millions of pieces of plastic into the ground in another country, check out this article about how we are in effect, making the planet unlivable for my kids and grandkids.

What's the big deal?

I love how the right-wing crybabysphere is trying to spin this as A) Nothing Happened, B) Cheney's the Victim, and C) The Media Are Blowing This Out of Proportion. Fortunately for my own sanity, even pinheads like Chris Matthews seem to get it and are continuing to at least mention the mere fact that the questions that are being asked- and of course were not asked by Brit Hume- should be asked. The "Oh never mind the shooting, isn't Howard Dean a meanie" crowd is, forgive the expression, shooting themselves in the foot every time they attempt to minimize this or blame the press. My prime example was Tony Blankley on yesterday's Hardball. He looked like a kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar and just got blasted by Matthews, Tom DeFrank and even Byron- my hair is made of a chocolate sculpture - York.

Pathetic.

Well, with the exception of maybe pure jest and sarcasm, I couldn't have said it better than this:

The scramble to paint Cheney - the shooter - as the traumatized victim of what he called "one of the worst days of my life" knows no bounds. And when you have a shameless propaganda campaign underway, can there be any doubt who is orchestrating it? (read the whole post)

And make sure you read this Post-Kopple Nightline evaluation by Bush's Brain author Jame's Moore: "The News Is What They Say It Is."

Vice-President of the United States Breaks Four Day Silence Over Face/Heart Shooting

(The Scallion)

February 15, 2006, Washington D.C.: The Vice President of the United States, four days after shooting a 78-yr-old man in the face and heart has finally talked to the media. The "media" was a friendly environment, the Fox News Channel, which will air the interview tonight on Special Report with Brit Hume. Excited about the exclusive interview, Fox producers, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of being shot by the VP, said Cheney comes out "guns blazing" against his critics in the interview. “You know something Brit, if this was the Senate floor, I’d tell all my critics to go fuck themselves,” the trigger happy Veep said.

In keeping with that spirit, Cheney kept his middle finger raised and pointed at the camera throughout the interview. His other hand was remained on the trigger of a shotgun that rested on his lap.

The fiery Vice-President did seem a little apologetic about the hunting accident, albeit for a slightly different reason than the obvious, even calling the day "The Worst Day of My Life." A fawning Brit Hume, who seemed confused that this “minor incident” (Hume’s words, as dictated by the White House) could overtake Cheney's previous "Number 1 Worst Day" - the day his daughter brought home her first girlfriend- asked Cheney why this was in fact the worst day in his life. “How could this be sir,” Hume nervously asked, suddenly becoming aware that he was drooling. Wiping the drool from his chin with his tie, he continued: “How could it be worse then realizing that you raised a ‘gay’ who will undoubtedly burn in an eternal hellfire for her Godless “choice?”

Cheney, grunting at the mere mention of his daughter, Richard “Dyke” Cheney, answered only, "Because he didn't die."

Asked if he was going to charge his almost-dead friend for the wasted birdshot that now is clogging the 78-yr-old's face and heart, Cheney admittedly said "Of course I am." Adding only, "Doesn't Howard Dean seem angry?"

Agreeing, and losing almost all composure, Hume heartily laughed, peppering the VP with more drool.

After immediately airing a clip of Howard Dean screaming, Hume, still laughing, then high-fived the V.P., and the interview came to a close.

Neither Fox, nor the Vice President’s office will confirm whether the sudden high five set off Cheney’s shotgun. Although as of the printing of this report, Fox News cameraman Brian Hoeller is still missing.

More From the "Our Feelings Are More Important Than Our Freedoms" Crowd

What a bunch of crybaby pussies these guys are. Jesus, you'd think they forgot about Monica.

"But Dick is at a sensitive time right now, you guys, he needs our support. Stop asking questions. Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"

"Have I told you lately how much I hate these people?"

My brother Michael sent me this the other day. It is from a mutual hero of ours, Mike Malloy:
Katrina Aftermath
All of it, lies. All of it, incompetence. The lies are being made public for every American to see if he or she chooses to. "In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Bush administration officials said they had been caught by surprise when they were told on Tuesday, Aug. 30, that a levee had broken, allowing floodwaters to engulf New Orleans. But Congressional investigators have now learned that an eyewitness account of the flooding from a federal emergency official reached the Homeland Security Department's headquarters starting at 9:27 p.m. the day before, and the White House itself at midnight." The Bush Crime Family's ongoing, never-ending incompetence -- this time surrounding the single greatest natural disaster in US history -- is being displayed in the hearings being held today before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. Nothing terribly revealing where it concerns the inability of this collection of dunces to govern. Not really. Just another rotund, polished Bush Crime Family functionary -- this time former FEMA head Michael "Brownie" Brown - sitting at the witness table, telling the tale of his and his superiors' stupidity, unpreparedness, inability to communicate, false intelligence, missed signals, non-concern, arrogance, toxic narcissism, need to blame someone else, and on and on. Not unlike the way these thugs have mishandled two completely unnecessary wars. Not unlike the way these criminals have mishandled critically unraveling domestic issues such as Medicare/Medicaid, budget deficits, national debt, environmental and energy issues, defense, all of it spiraling totally out of control, blasting the country into a morass of Gordian-knot-like conditions that will take decades (and near-genius leadership) to unravel. The stance this criminal administration takes on every issue -- lie; continue to lie; do not stop lying -- is also once again being revealed. As also were the lies told about Iraq's WMD, the need to "reform" Social Security, the wondrous blessings to flow from the hatefully misnamed No Child Left Behind act, the lies about energy policy, tax policy, all of it, these new lies being told about the disaster that crushed New Orleans are flowing from the mouths of men who could not sit successfully on a rural county commission. And yet, the American public continues to allow them to remain in positions of unchecked power and in charge of the most formidable country ever in the history of the human species, answerable to no one, listening to nothing other than their own crazed voices, moving the country inexorably toward the next disaster, the one that will bring martial law and an end to the democratic experiment. And every time this cowardly, stupid man, George W. Bush, rises in a carefully selected and vetted crowd to crow yet again like a banty rooster strutting through the excrement and slime of a factory fram chicken shed, the lie that contains the greatest danger to the citizens of this country is repeated: "My most important duty is to protect the American people." How much longer do we allow this destruction to continue?

As if that wasn't brilliant enough...

Malloy on the recent hunting accident:
Dick Cheney likes to kill things. Usually things that can't escape, don't have a chance, that are snared or caught in some manner that puts them at Cheney's mercy. Dick Cheney doesn't go "hunting" like a normal hunter. He goes murdering. For the most part, he seems to enjoy shooting game birds that have been made defenseless either by being raised in a completely benign and protected environment -- and therefore unable to respond quickly to a threat -- or by having certain of their wing feathers removed at birth thus leaving them unable to fly efficiently as they age. These birds (and other animals) are kept on ranches in Texas, ranches owned for generations by wealthy Republicans (this one owned by the family of Katharine Armstrong) who understand the perverse needs of their fellow Conservatives: the need to kill without personal risk; the lust for complete power, including that of life or death over other living creatures, all living creatures, including human beings. (See: Iraq, invasion of.) In this context, Cheney, Supreme Court Justice "Mad" Anthony Scalia, and other puffy, slow-moving, Republican killers are let loose on private ranches in order to periodically -- and safely (for them) -- satiate this craving. On these private preserves the cowardly, unsportsmanlike killing can proceed at will, offstage, out of the public eye, unseen. On Saturday last, according to news reports and a very strange article in the New York Times , Cheney and one of his companions -- the hapless 78-year-old corporate lawyer Harry Whittington - were stalking birds from their vehicles, cruising the backwoods roads and trails, shooting through the open windows of their Range Rover or Hummer or Escalade when Whittington got out of the vehicle to retrieve one of the birds he had just shot from the padded comfort of the rear seat. Moving on down the road, Cheney and the rest of his "hunting" party were focused on another covey of deliberately handicapped birds when Whittington came walking up on Cheney's blind side. At that point Cheney turned and pulled the trigger, mistakenly thinking Whittington was a dove, or a pheasant, (or perhaps Donald Rumsfeld.) Or maybe Cheney opened fire fully realizing Whittington was a man. Who will ever know? After filling the victim's cheek, neck, chest and right side, with what is described cavalierly as "little bitty pellets," Cheney's ever-present medical team covered the man in blankets and waited for the rescue crew. Cheney continued his "hunt." The incident is over. No comment. No White House report for more than 24 hours after the shooting. And, certainly, no investigation. Unless poor Mr. Whittington should die. Even then a quick investigation -- by a carefully selected panel of experts -- will conclude it was his age that did him in, not a few "little bitty pellets" from Dick Cheney's shotgun and any argument to the contrary will come only from those who truly hate the United States and are doing everything they can to support the terrorists. I have a suggestion, one that might settle once and forever Cheney's interest in killing and death. Arm him and armor him to the extent that our finest soldiers are armed and protected in Iraq. Surround him with one of those well-trained, combat-ready Iraqi units Cheney tells us is ready to "step up" so American soldiers can "step down." Put him in a standard Humvee and send him and his Iraqi unit to, oh, say, Fallujah. Let him go "hunting" there.

Idiots

Scalia thinks people who disagree with his judicial philosophy are idiots. (via Think Progress)

I wonder what he thinks of his hunting partner mistaking a man in his seventies for a bird? Genius!!!

It's remarks like this that make me wonder, when's the next duck hunting trip?

Happy Valentine's Day

Please read this fantastic post, with my love to you all. God she's good!

Duck!!!!

If you missed the Daily Show last night, you missed a whole lot more than just a farm-raised wingless quail. Another fantastic video here.

More On Scooter's Boss, Shooter

Dear God, Scott McClellan sucks at his job.

Dr Evil Strikes Again

This man has so much evil and so much balls, he's literally just shooting people.


Allison had this take upon seeing the headline:
(Laughter) "Oh my God... Can you imagine being his press secretery?"

And on that note, I can not wait to see how the White House talks about this.

Maybe they'll be too busy talking about how Senators now want an investigation into Cheney's role in exposing a CIA agent for political gain.

Update: Hilarious as all this is, you almost knew that this White House would make it even funnier. I can't wait for McClellan's "Press Conference" or the Daily Show.

Faux News Scaremongering

Media Matters brings us the clip of Keith Olbermann's "Worst Persons In the World" Awards...

Keith Olbermann:
... This morning, after the president's tale about breaking up a terror plot to destroy the Library Tower in L.A., Fox illustrated its coverage by showing clips from the 1996 movie, Independence Day, which simulated the destruction of the Library Tower by intergalactic aliens. Look, if you're going to whore out your channel to scare people on the president's behalf, at least save the Independence Day clips for when he claims he's only been eavesdropping on terrorist calls from outer space.

This is almost as funny as calling the weather report the FoxCast. But, it brings up an interesting question. Before I get to that, I think this needs to reviewed. (I posted it below, but I wanted to continue to use the context that Keith used it in.) Again, it is from Fox News, but from reading the Media Matters post about Olbermann, I became horrified...

Olbermann:
At Mrs. King's funeral, after Reverend Lowery made his remarks that "we now know there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq," those in attendance gave him a 23-second standing ovation. When Fox News Channel ran the tape of Lowery's remark, it cut the applause to nine seconds, and then Fox commentator Morton Kondracke came on and said: "The crowd did not go as wild as you -- as it sounded as though it did at the time and as various people have represented." He was surprised there was not more applause after they edited out the applause. Come on! It's journalism. Look it up in a dictionary. Fox News Channel: today's worst persons in the world. (my bold)

O.K., so we all know that Fox News lies consistently, 24 hours a day. Now here we have evidence of fearmongering and another example of the use of fantastical special effects, and another of lieing and another of editiing out crucial elements of a story and then lying about it.

Of course, its Fox, so people who say... think, we just laugh it off. But here's what horrified me...

What happens when Fox News starts using their own Industrial Light and Magic-type special effects to scare, lie, edit, whore out themselves for this criminal GOP mafia? I mean, can you think of the possibilities?

Here's an example:

FOX NEWS ALERT......... Today In the Scary Black Neighborhood of Harlem Former President Bill Clinton Was Seen Walking Into A Cheap Motel With Monica Lewinski, Who Was Wearing That Famous Blue Dress, While Howard Dean Was In The Background Delivering His Scream Speech While Stepping On the Throat of a Latino Republican Woman Who Was Having An Unwanted Abortion Administered By Another Howard Dean...

And then they'd have the video of it. And then they would comment on it with, oh, say, Ronald Reagan, who, along with the video, would be magically placed back in the studio by the wonders of digital effects.

This is what is coming....

Go See This Show

Hey folks. I was just posting this as an annouuncement for my buddy Dan and his friend Ryan Montbleau. Dan helps out the band in a variety of capacities and is pretty much one of the biggest supporters of this blog.

Anyway, Ryan's band is fantastic and so is pretty much any show at the Somerville Theater. This is one of those moments that I regret not being in Cambridge. Anyway, Dan wanted all the loyal (10, maybe 12) Sandwich readers to know that this show is going down and to try to go and check it out. Ryan is not only a great musician, but he is genuinely a great guy and much deserving of all of his and his band's success. They will surely blow up in years to come, so do me, Dan, the Band, and yourself a favor and go check them out in this intimate venue while you still can.


Also there's this from Dan:
All the pertinent info is [on RyanMontbleau.com] except for one thing: you can bypass TicketBastard and their ridiculous fees by ordering tickets directly through us. There is a payment button on Ryan's main page for doing so, and and major credit card will work in addition to PayPal.


Here's more on the band:
Without a label, without radio play, without a major multinational conglomerate behind them or a slick PR campain, Ryan Montbleau Band have quietly become one of the Northeast's bands to watch, and they have done it the old fashioned way... mile-by-mile, song-by-song, show-by-show. When these up-and-comers sold out the 600-capacity Paradise Rock Club in their hometown of Boston in November of 2004, it was a watermark of achievement for the 27-year-old singer-songwriter and his band. His first words to the raging crowd (but unfortunately not the 200 that got shut outside in the rain): “I used to play at TGI Friday’s.”

The 'Montbleau Band', as they are affectionately known by some closest to the movement, is building a bridge between 70’s soul, ragtime, blues-folk-Americana, and the contemporary singer-songwriter vibe of artists as varied as Martin Sexton, Ben Harper and Ray LaMontagne. Having begun his career playing Boston's coffee shops and folk venues as a solo artist with an infectious, percussive, fingerpicking guitar style, the charismatic Ryan Montbleau has evolved into the front man for the dynamic, eclectic ensemble that bears his name. In addition to Ryan, the band is comprised of Matt Giannaros (acoustic upright bass, electric bass, vocals), Laurence Scudder (viola), Jason Cohen (piano, organ, clavinet, Rhodes) and James Cohen (drums). The sound that emerges is akin to a cross between Van Morrison, Stevie Wonder and The Band.
While the arrangements and intriguing instrumentation bring about this alchemic transformation in the music, it is all anchored firmly in Montbleau’s meaningful lyrical content and an unmistakable voice that carries it to the audience. Rest assured, the audience responds.

Part of Ryan Montbleau Band’s appeal is simply great song-writing and honest performances that vary from night to night, oftentimes taking the stage without a setlist. Another part is Ryan’s heartfelt humility, honesty and sincerity, which resonates with music lovers of all types and stripes. This combination of art and personality creates that magical bond between performer and audience that inspires masses of people across generational boundries and demographic lines. It has sustained them over the last two years as they toured incessantly, virtually living on the road. As a result of their efforts, the 'Montbleau Band' has already established a large, passionate following throughout the Northeast, and is developing strong fan bases in the Southeast and Midwest. There is grass-roots demand from Colorado and the West Coast, and the band will surely make their way there in the next year as they tour in support of their debut album, "One Fine Color".

Eat it, Stupid

More from our wonderful media, and this time, it is truly priceless. (Via atrios)
More here.

Depression

This sucks. If I could collectively slap an entire party I would. A big, giant, sighing WTF??????!!!!!!!!!?!?!?!??!?!??!?!?!?????????

Reform in Fat Tony's Party

If you were a criminal, and the justice department was investigating a confessed felon and his financial dealings with you, and you were forced to step down from your leadership post, what's the next best place you'd want to be? How about being in charge of money and justice?

Yeah, that's the ticket. That's how the mafia would do it.

But would the mafia be blatant enough to rent an apartment from a lobbyist? No, I don't think so. That takes a certain kind of criminal smugness. A smugness that says, "Sure my name is Boner and I promised reform, but we all need a place to sleep, right?"


(Image from the Simpsons, via Duffgardens.net)

Call the Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaambulence

Jeez, it was hysterical to watch the crying from the GoOPers yesterday about how Coretta Scott King's funeral actually reflected the things she stood for. The fact that those things stood in staunch contradiction to everything this administration advocates was missed by the majority of the talking heads and the "our feelings are more important than our freedoms" crowd.
Unreal.

Here's more:

"Wingnut crybabies are whining that W got dissed at Coretta King's funeral. What did they expect -- praise for his civil rights record? Honor for his warrantless wiretapping? Encomia for widening the gap between rich and poor? Heckofajob!s for his post-Katrina promise-keeping?"
- Marty Kaplan (read the whole post)

And, always a treat, Tucker Carlson gets slammed by the Rev. Lowry. (watch it here)

Carlson (paraphrase): "Why are you a meanie with bad manners?"
Lowry: ...I certainly didn’t intend for it to be bad manners. I did intend for it to — to call attention to the fact that Mrs. King spoke truth to power. And here was an opportunity to demonstrate how she spoke truth to power about this war and about all wars.

And I think that, in the context of the faith, out of which the movement grows, we have always opposed war. We’ve always fought poverty. And we base our — our argument on — on the faith, on the fact that Jesus taught us. He identified with the poor. “I was hungry; you didn’t feed me. I was naked; you didn’t clothe me. I was in prison; you didn’t see about me.” He talked about war. He talked about he who lives by the sword.

So I’m comfortable with the fact that I was reflecting on Mrs. King’s tenacity against war, her determination to witness against war and to speak truth to power. ...




(baby picture from the EHP)

So there I was....

... masturbating to gay porn on MSGOP. And then all of the sudden I thought, wow, I didn't know I was gay. I also didn't know MSGOP aired unedited gay porn either. Hmmmm.... I'll have to alert Allison to both developments.

In all seriousness, I never masturbate to gay porn. But, I do masturbate to Hardball, and yesterday I just couldn't take it. I found yesterdays "interview" about as perverted as it gets. It was like watching a spoof reel for the end of semester party for "Balanced Journalism 101."

Living Wage

"How many other issues are there where progressives have been this successful? I can't think of one."

Great point in a fairly good piece. (Subs. req. just use propagandasandwich @ yahoo . com/redsox)

This is a moral issue and is one the progressives of the past championed, and modern day Democrats should be championing.


I found the Times piece via rj eskow, who incidentally has a great list of conservative/progressive goals on HuffPost right now.

Irony

"It is more than a bit ironic that George W. Bush rightly announces that we should decouple from our addiction to foreign oil -- yet his administration fiercely opposes rules on the gas mileage of vehicles. No less ironic is his call for science education when his administration is probably the all-time leader in misrepresenting sound science on topics like climatology, cosmology and stem cell research." (more)

And (via Kos) some more outright contradictions...

The day after...

Finally out of my haze. This is pretty funny. And so is this.

Republicans Try To Get It Up, Finally Elect Boner

Or is it Boehner? Anyway, the Republicans had to hold TWO elections because the first time around, there were too many votes than there were Republicans present. That's right, the people that brought you voter fraud in Ohio and Florida, can't even keep their internal elections straight!!!
More here.

The State of the Union

Allison does a few things that infuriate me to no end. One of those things is pictured above. She has stopped taking the last piece of paper and just not replacing it- which is great - but she has a habit of now just replacing the toilet paper roll with another on top. She knows the proper way to do it, but she chooses her own way, retarded as it is. Out of pure stubbornness, I refused to fix the above problem just to see how long it took her to recognize her laziness and remedy the issue by taking an extra 1.7 seconds to do it the right way. I knew it would be a while and then, because photographic evidence is so sweet, I took this picture. Anyway, would you believe it if I told you that she did not fix this for the entire roll?

Well, she didn't. Unreal right?

And yet, it gets better.

She actually repeated this lazy fix TWO more times (TWO!!! more rolls sitting on top of the cardboard center) before I finally exploded in frustration.

Now, I love Allison. I love her more than anything really, but this behavior needs to stop. And it has stopped- at least with Allison. You wanna know why? Because she spoke to a rational person (me) and she was presented with the facts on the ground (A. That is not where the toilet paper goes, B. you know how to properly replace it, C. it is quite easy, you've done it before, D. it has been a long, long time to figure out how to change course - three rolls total!! - and yet, you stubbornly refuse to fix your egregious mistake, E. Why are you killing me softly?) and promised she'd take the time to do the right thing. I am sure W loves this country, but his behavior has done nothing but help to destroy it, and clearly that behavior needs to stop.

Well, anyway, this brings me to yesterday's State of the Union. I watched it on TiVo and actually had to check to see if I had infact recorded the 2004 State of the Union or maybe any other of Bush's speeches. Nothing new. Same old lies, falsehoods, empty promises and basically a lot of grand ideas (replacing the toilet paper!) with poor execution (quick-fix, not really replacing it) and outright lies (what does toilet paper wipe?).

What the President did was to have, as ThinkProgress called it, a one hour argument with himself. Most of his grand ideas and promises go directly in the face of what he actually does. His examples of Katrina, the "addiction to oil," NSA spying, Iraq- all bullshit. All opportunities to do the right thing, and all examples of where the President says one thing and does another.

He needs to get away from all of these people that tell him what he wants to hear. He needs to get away from the idea that Iraq is "winnable" in the way he thinks it is. He needs to listen to the American people. to generals like Shinseki, to environmentalist, to Democrats, and to scientists instead of religious fanatics and fix real problems that we have right now instead of living in a fantasy world where putting a roll of toilet poaper on top of a problem and believing that it is fixed is ok. Of course he won't do that, and next year's State of the Union will probably be more of the same rehashed empty rhetoric.

The Democratic response was pretty weak too (what was with that guy's eyebrow?) but in the setting (speaking to a majority conservative audience) I guess it was appropriate. But for me, it was a major disappointment. There was no challenge to the President's speech, just a canned appeal to doing things a "better way." I doubt Gov. Kaine won many people over, and it was a real opportunity to go after the president on his biggest weakness -Iraq. On a night where Cindy Sheehan was arrested for wearing a protest T-Shirt, the Democrats could have really made an appeal that this man is out of control. Take Murtha for example, I would have liked to have heard this as the response.

Murtha:
... Spreading democracy does not equate to or ensure stabilization. A safe world is a stable world. STABILITY is what is key here. Is the world safer today with the gains of Hamas in Palestine and Hezbollah in Lebanon? Is the world safer with an emboldened Iran? Is Iraq or the region more stable as a result of our military intervention in Iraq? What proof to we have that the President's policies are working? ...

We have no proof, all we have is an unsecure homeland and a fiasco in Iraq. Nice job failing to drive that point home last night Democrats.

Update: Thursday, 1:06 a.m. ... Watching Lou Dobbs' rant ... He's talking about the Preznit's SOTU and a day after speech where the president tried to drive home a less-"moderate", more conservative message that the White House was afraid was absent from the SOTU. The speech was all bullshit of course, but what struck me was the signs behind the president that read
"Americans Win When Americans Lead."

Now, call me a "fulthy Amurrrica-hatur" if you must, but I laughed (got that, ,NSA, laughed) out loud when I saw the sign. A few random thoughts ran through my head, here they are:

1.) Do American's Win If An American President Leads American Straight Into A Toilet?

2.) What If A 40 Year Alcoholic Cokehead Leads America On An 8 Year Bar Binge On A Search For An Eightball That Is Never Found? Do Americans Win Then?

3.) Was America "Leading" When An American "President" Dodged the Draft When He "Enlisted" With the National Guard?

4.) If You Had to Guess, Was Louisiana the "Leader" of Party Towns You Got Fucked Up In When You Were AWOL From the National Guard?

5.) Is America the Leader in science anymore?

6.) How about schools?

7.) How about manufacturing? Do Americans Win If America Was A Manufacturing Leader?

8.) How About Respect from the other 6 Billion People in the World? Are we a serious global "leader" anymore?

9.) Are We A Christian Nation? Maybe so, but If This Man Is "their" Leader, does that show that the President is perverting Christianity, or that modern Christianity in itself is perverted? Maybe both. Should All of America Be Lead By People That Subscribe To Such Perverted Fantasy?

9.) Saw Bob Casey on Matthews tonight. I hate Matthews more by the second, but his on-air "phone-sex-type" panting over his lover, the President, and everything he does, his high praise for the President's speech and the President in general and pretty much all Republican criminals (Santorum and Delay, back to back- wow) is the only funny part of the Bush presidency. It's like watching Joe Izuzu trying to sell cars. And then when a Democrat like Murtha goes on and owns him like a sick comic trying to silence an ignorant heckler, he just crumbles like when a kid finally succumbs to the realization that Santa isn't real. It's like this crushing blow when Matthews briefly revisits reality and then *poof* it disappears in Russertonian style with "Do you think John McCain Would Be A More Or Less Handsome President Than Rudy Guiliani?"

10.) Anyway, back to Casey. He was on during the tolerable David Shuster's report. Casey snippet, Santorum comeback, Santorum snippet, Casey comeback. Typical formula for cable. So I go to change it to my DVR when all of the sudden Casey goes (paraphrase) "Well, some of Mr. Santorum's comments haven't passed the hysterical laughter test."

Exactly.

Game. Set. Match. Argument over.

I have never heard anything more precisely sum up a person, a party, and even that party's supporters and their Christo-fascist corporate agenda, than "they don't pass the hysterical laughter test."

On all the lies, spin, and distortions.
On every issue Bush talks about.
On all the bullshit talking points.
On the saying the opposite of what I am saying code to the Christian right.
On Falwell.
On Robertson.
On the Contract With America.
On Abramoff.
On Abramoff talking points and excuses and stonewalling.
On Iraq.
On the goose stepping gestapo propagandists at Fox News.
On the President waiting seven minutes to react to 9-11.
On torture.
On religious fundamentalists.
On religious fundamentalism in our country.
On the President waiting three days to fly over Katrina's after he was vacationing for his record time.
On the excuses, the stonewalling, and the talking point political pretzel the President and all his supporters make and twist themselves into to explain the President's delayed reaction to 9-11 and Katrina.
On Terry Schiavo's right to magically unbraindead herself.
On refusing to further stem cell research.
On diagnosing from a television set.
On being "fiscally conservative."
On domestic spying.
On cutting food to welfare mothers and children the week before Christmas.
On the attorney General lying during his confirmation.
On the English language.
On Our President's DUI.
On the latest Supreme Court Justice and his lying during confirmation.
On missing OBL in Tora Bora.
On Saying "Fuck You" to A Senator on the Floor of Congress.
On our strategy for "winning" in Iraq.
On the White Houses attempts to connect Iraq to the Global Wall on Terror.
On Why We Need to Make Tax Cuts For Billionaires.
On Why We Need to Make Tax Cuts For Billionaires permanent.
On Harriet Myers.
On Saudi Arabia.
On the Border.
On Science.
On ignoring science.
On Exxon Mobile and the Biggest Profits In the HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES and an ex-oil tycoon telling US that we are too "addicted to oil" on the same day.
On that very same company's profits, and the percentage of which that is spent on that very same President. And also on what is spent on a concentrated attempt at muddying the water on global warming.
On a President who still thinks evolution is 'still on the table.'
On "smaller government."
On "Tax and Spend" Being Worse in the Mind of the Public Than "Borrow On the Backs of Your Children and Spend."
On paying scientists to write bullshit science on a scientific and environmental catastrophe that companies with record-breaking profits and their President's policies are helping to accelerate to disastrous level.
On marijuana being illegal.
On no Democrat leading legislation to legalize mariuana.
On firing Generals who try to educate a chickenhawk on troop levels.
On refusing the suffering the right to die with dignity.
On state-sponsored murder.
On all of it with this lazy corporate-own, for-profit media, and those in and out of control of news, information, and government right now.
... it all really doesn't pass the hysterical laugh test.

But I laugh anyway. It's One ofthose Laugh Because It Hurts Laughs But Still.

I Laugh At the Fact That Progressives Don't Have A Party. We Have Very Small Numbers in One Party and Almost Nobody in the Media. We Have One Party That Constantly Screws and Bullshits the Public, and Another That Constantly Fears to Call Bullshit- Bullshit- and Loses On Message Every time.

I Laugh Because We As A Nation Are the Laughing Stock of the World On An Increasing Number of Points (Education, Honesty, "Free" Press, Borrowing Money, Civil Liberties, Science, Our "Freedom," etc.)

I Laugh Because the Democrats Continue to Ignore Public Opinion of the War, and Their Own Service Hero Jack Murtha, and Picked Tim "Crazy Eyebrow" Kaine to Deliver a Speech That Was Boring, and Incidently, Plagiarized From the Film "The Candidate," a movie about a man With No Ideas Who Uses Canned Speech Like "There's A Better Way."

I Laugh Because Fans of the President Packed the Grand Ol' Opry Today to Listen to A Man Explain the Fascinating Topic of "America Wins When America Leads" and They Loved It.

And I Sigh Because I Only Think Americans Will "Win" When One Party Finds A Message, Finds A Voice, And Shows Them That The Other Party Doesn't Pass the Hysterical Laugh Test. Then Maybe We Can Lead the World Forward, Instead Of Down the Toilet.

(I have no idea why I am so fixated on the GooPers and/or bathroom humor today. Sorry About the spllin.)