corrente

I's so glad the holiday season isn't stressful. Otherwise, I might feel tired and irritated.

Patronizing, or what?

BUSH: Thank you very much, good job.

[IRAQI PRESIDENT AL-YAWER]: Thank you.

BUSH: We'll answer a couple of questions in the spirit of democracy.
(via White House transcript)

[Cough]

A followup to farmer's post here, via Blue Lemur. One comment on what programmer Curtis says, posted there:

“If you inspect the code, you will see it,” [programmer Curtis] states. I understand this point.

“Once the vote is flipped, you will not.” What the hell does this mean?

We need to be as clear as possible when reporting on this issue and press on Mr.Curtis for further details. We don’t need another Karl Rove worm to spoil the hard work of ALL our net community members.

Mr.Curtis,

Thankyou for your bravery in these cowardly times but please provide more details.

Alert reader bobo mentions a thread on Slashdot: Hre it is. One good quote on the "you will not see it" after the vote issue:

Some of what hes said isn't entirely true - you could certainly find any rigging from looking at the binary, it might take allot of work but it would always be possible. What you really need is to have the program stored on a memory card in the machine, you could then design it to write over the incriminating parts of itself after the election. You would need two versions of the source code - one would be the dirty original which you would want to keep secret and the other would be the 'public' version which would compile to the identical binary that was in the machine after it had over-written itself, obviously you would have to prevent inspection of the binary in the machines until after the election and the whole thing would be very difficult to design, but do-able. Come to think of it, the diebold machines stored their programs on flash didnt they?

I dunno.

Alert readers stress the tinfoil hat stories that have later been shown to be true ("Killing Castro with an exploding cigar? Pshaw!"). Alert readers here, as did those at Blue Lemur, also stress the possibility of Dan Rather-style disinformation, where a discredited version of real events ended up obliterating the entire story. (Funny how it happens when we get close...).

It would be nice if Curtis kept a backup of the code, so we could test it and inspect it. That might, at least, answer some of the technical questions....

Not all churchgoers are evil. In fact, most churchgoers are good—and that's why The Evil tend to seek out churches and join them. Like many parasites, The Evil find the protective coloration provided by their lies useful. (The theology comes from M. Scott Peck.)

One of the latest examples: Mike Hintz (via Atrios).. Mike Hintz: Bush supporter, Assembly of God youth minister, family man—and child molester.

Yeah, I'd say that's evil.

Hintz certainly goes beyond the Pharasaical hypocrisy exemplified by other Republican idols like Bill Bennett, Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart, Rush Limbaugh. (via Kos).

Remember this one? From the senior advisor to Bush?

"We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. "
(Ron Suskind in the Times here)

When the sun never set on the British empire, Britain was a creditor nation. The whole world owed them money.

But nobody has ever explained how the US can be an empire as a debtor nation. Presumably, if we're an empire, we need a strong military. And we buy our oil for our tanks, the metal for our armor, the chips for our avionics from other countries. If the dollar collapses, how are we going to continue to do that? Nobody has explained, least of all the Republicans.

Here's a frightening article on the dollar from the UK's Economist (via Josh Marshall here)

The dollar has been the leading international currency for as long as most people can remember. But its dominant role can no longer be taken for granted. If America keeps on spending and borrowing at its present pace, the dollar will eventually lose its mighty status in international finance. And that would hurt: the privilege of being able to print the world's reserve currency, a privilege which is now at risk, allows America to borrow cheaply, and thus to spend much more than it earns, on far better terms than are available to others. Imagine you could write cheques that were accepted as payment but never cashed. That is what it amounts to. If you had been granted that ability, you might take care to hang on to it. America is taking no such care, and may come to regret it.

The dollar is not what it used to be. Over the past three years [the dollar] has fallen by 35% against the euro and by 24% against the yen. ... [C]an a currency that has been sliding against the world's next two biggest currencies for 30 years be regard

A fall in the dollar sufficient to close the current-account deficit might destroy its safe-haven status. If the dollar falls by another 30%, as some predict, it would amount to the biggest default in history: not a conventional default on debt service, but default by stealth, wiping trillions off the value of foreigners' dollar assets.

The dollar's loss of reserve-currency status would lead America's creditors to start cashing those cheques—and what an awful lot of cheques there are to cash. As that process gathered pace, the dollar could tumble further and further. American bond yields (long-term interest rates) would soar, quite likely causing a deep recession. Americans who favour a weak dollar should be careful what they wish for. Cutting the budget deficit looks cheap at the price.

Not, of course, that we would ever claw back any of the money we gave the super-rich for the tax cuts they don't need, and which haven't stimulated jobs...

Can Bush believe that the US is "too big to fail?" I certainly hope we don't get the chance to test his theory.

Maybe without an empire we can be a Republic again... But it sounds like the collapse of the dollar is a very heavy price to pay for that. But then, reality therapy is often painful

Pump me up mister programmer...

Via Blue Lemur

In sworn affidavit, programmer says he developed vote-rigging prototype for Florida congressman; Congressman’s office silent. [corrente ed note: Republican Tom Feeney's office]

In a sworn affidavit (pdf file) Monday, a former programmer for a NASA contractor said that he developed a vote-rigging prototype at the request of a then-Florida state representative who is now a member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

RAW STORY acquired the affidavit from The Brad Blog, which has been in contact with the programmer in Washington.

[...]

The programmer, Clinton Curtis, said that he was told the program needed to be "touch-screen capable, the user should be able to trigger the program without any additional equipment, [and that] the programming was to remain hidden even if the source code was inspected."

Thanks to The Dark Backward for the heads up on this story.

UPDATE: More details from Wayne Madsen

UPDATE2: Yang family $$$ contributions to Feeney campaign - 2004:

[1] Yang, Tyng Lin Yang Enterprises Inc./president 1,250 06/23/2003 Merritt Island FL 32952

[2] Yang, Li-Woan Yang Enterprises Inc./ceo 2,000 03/23/2004 Merritt Island FL 32952

[3] Yang, Li-Woan Yang Enterprises Inc./ceo 2,000 09/05/2003 Merritt Island FL 32952

*

Easter Sunday, April 16, 1933:

A state that once again rules in God's name can count not only on our applause but also on enthusiastic and active cooperation from the church. With joy and thanks we see how this new state rejects blasphemy, attacks immorality, promotes discipline and order with a firm hand, demands awe before God, works to keep marriage sacred and our youth spiritually instructed, brings honor back to fathers of families, ensures that love of people and fatherland is no longer mocked, but burns in a thousand hearts.... We can only plead with our fellow worshipers to do all they can to help these new productive forces in our land reach a complete and unimpeded victory. ~ Official blessing of Nazism - endorsed and delivered by Bavarian Protestant pastors - Germany, 1933.

*

Via AP:

Speaking on the 63rd anniversary of Pearl Harbor, Bush was to express appreciation for the troops' service and their families' sacrifice, especially during the holiday season. He also was to suggest ways Americans can actively support the troops.

Several options include a Defense Department program called "America Supports You," designed to showcase support for the military from individuals, businesses and groups as a way of encouraging others to do the same.

Media control. Support our troops. Danger all around us. Be afraid. Wait! Look, a nurse handing out condoms to teenagers!

...Let me begin by counter-posing two different conceptions of democracy. One conception of democracy has it that a democratic society is one in which the public has the means to participate in some meaningful way in the management of their own affairs and the means of information are open and free....

An alternative conception of democracy is that the public must be barred from managing of their own affairs and the means of information must be kept narrowly and rigidly controlled. That may sound like an odd conception of democracy, but it's important to understand that it is the prevailing conception....

Duh! I read this from Chomsky ten years ago. How could I forget?

The bewildered herd is a problem. We've got to prevent their rage and trampling. We've got to distract them. They should be watching the Superbowl or sitcoms or violent movies. Every once in a while you call on them to chant meaningless slogans like "Support our troops." You've got to keep them pretty scared, because unless they're properly scared and frightened of all kinds of devils that are going to destroy them from outside or inside or somewhere, they may start to think, which is very dangerous, because they're not competent to think. Therefore it's important to distract them and marginalize them.

When you have total control over the media and the educational system and scholarship is conformist, you can get that across... The picture of the world that's presented to the public has only the remotest relation to reality. The truth of the matter is buried under edifice after edifice of lies. It's all been a marvelous success from this point of view in deterring the threat of democracy, achieved under conditions of freedom, which is extremely interesting. It's not like a totalitarian state, where it's done by force. These achievements are under conditions of freedom. If we want to understand our own society, we'll have to think about these facts. They are important facts, important for those who care about what kind of society they live in. Media Control

Wow--there's a lot in there. This is the model of democracy we are exporting under the gun. Support the troops—nevermind the policy. Look, over there—it’s a (insert scare du jour). But as malleable as this “democracy” is to the regime, aWol himself said that a dictatorship is easier.

Maybe someone smarter than me and less academic than Chomsky can frame this in a more useful way.

Funny how AQ blowing up the American embassy in Saudi Arabia is just another yawner now that the election is over, isn't it?

Digby. Go read.

Thanks, George!

ember nations of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries have cut the proportion of their deposits denominated in dollars by more than 13 percentage points in the past three years, mainly to the advantage of the euro, the Bank for International Settlements said Sunday.
(via Times)

Let's hope the dollar just keeps sliding, and doesn't crash, eh? After all, that would leave millions of Japanese and Chinese widows, whose governments bought our bonds, holding the bag!

Oh, but wait! Paying for our SUVs and our wars with funny money! That's a cute trick! What will those Republicans think of next?

This I like. Guess I went nucl-ee-ar on Reid too soon. Typical Lambert. Sorry, guys. Good message here:

MR. RUSSERT: Private accounts for Social Security--the president has made that a priority of his domestic agenda. Will you work with him in privatizing part of Social Security?

SEN. REID: Tim, I can remember as a little boy my widowed grandmother with eight children. She lived alone, but she felt independent because she got every month her old age pension check. That's what this is all about. The most successful social program in the history of the world is being hijacked by Wall Street. Yes, Social Security is a good program. And if the president has some ideas about trying to improve it, I'll talk to him, and we as Democrats will, but we are not going to let Wall Street hijack Social Security. It won't happen. They are trying to destroy Social Security.

MR. RUSSERT: No private accounts?

SEN. REID: They are trying to destroy Social Security by giving this money to the fat cats on Wall Street, and I think it's wrong.

MR. RUSSERT: But, Senator, there are now 40 million people on Social Security. In the next 20 years, there's going to be 80 million. Life expectancy used to be 65 years old. It's approaching 80. If you have twice as many people on these programs for 15 years, you've got to restructure them in some way, shape, or form. What is your solution?

SEN. REID: Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: What is your alternative?

SEN. REID: Tim, all experts say that Social Security beneficiaries will receive every penny of their benefits that they're entitled to--100 percent of them--until the year 2055. After that, if we still do nothing, they'll draw 80 percent of their benefits. I want those beneficiaries after year 2055 to draw 100 percent of their benefits. But this does not require dismantling the program. For heaven's sakes, they're crying wolf a little too regularly here. There is not an emergency on Social Security. We can do this. The president should not try to jam this private accounts in an effort to destroy Social Security.
(via MSNBC)

One idea that is implicit in what Reid is here is that the Republicans have a very narrow notion of family values. Never mind the gay marriage stuff—the wingers don't have a notion of an extended family that can stretch across several generations, which is what Social Security does. Reid made me think about something that I never thought of before: That since Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program, I've been paying for my Mother's retirement, in the expectation that I too, would be taken care of. And now that I think about it, I'm proud to have given my Mother that money. Certainly it was better to give her a guarantee too, which is what the payroll tax does, or would do if the Republicans weren't trying to steal it.

So, ownership society? Screw that! I'm taking care of my Mom.

UPDATE The Howler has more.

OK, I was wrong (here) to trash Reid. The material AP left out of the story is underlined:

MR. RUSSERT: Let me turn to judicial nominations. Again, Harry Reid on National Public Radio, November 19: "If they"--the Bush White House--"for example, gave us Clarence Thomas as chief justice, I personally feel that would be wrong. If they give us Antonin Scalia, that's a little different question. I may not agree with some of his opinions, but I agree with the brilliance of his mind."

Could you support Antonin Scalia to be chief justice of the Supreme Court?

SEN. REID: If [SCalia] can overcome the ethics problems that have arisen since he was selected as a justice of the Supreme Court. And those ethics problems--you've talked about them; every people talk--every reporter's talked about them in town--where he took trips that were probably not in keeping with the code of judicial ethics. So we have to get over this. I cannot dispute the fact, as I have said, that this is one smart guy. And I disagree with many of the results that he arrives at, but his reason for arriving at those results are very hard to dispute. So...
(via MTP)

OK. So it was part of a "clever plan" Crafty Reid is setting up the counterpunch. Too bad he thinks the SCLM still reports the news....

Just asking.

You know. The one that details the VWRC and its funding sources (Kos, today, and back)

Just asking.

I mean, maybe ordinary Democrats should be able to see it?

Welcome to Thieresenstadt. Form a line over here, please, to enter the "model city…"

Returning Fallujans will face clampdown

By Anne Barnard / Boston Globe

FALLUJAH, Iraq -- The US military is drawing up plans to keep insurgents from regaining control of this battle-scarred city, but returning residents may find that the measures make Fallujah look more like a police state than the democracy they have been promised.
Under the plans, troops would funnel Fallujans to so-called citizen processing centers on the outskirts of the city to compile a database of their identities through DNA testing and retina scans. Residents would receive badges displaying their home addresses that they must wear at all times. Buses would ferry them into the city, where cars, the deadliest tool of suicide bombers, would be banned.

Badges, huh? I guess armbands and patches would be so, well, you know… I mean, it’s been done. Oh, and in case you were wondering why… I mean, the overall strategy:

"You have to say, 'Here are the rules,' and you are firm and fair. That radiates stability," said Lieutenant Colonel Dave Bellon, intelligence officer for the First Regimental Combat Team, the Marine regiment that took the western half of Fallujah during the US assault and expects to be based downtown for some time.

Bellon asserted that previous attempts to win trust from Iraqis suspicious of US intentions had telegraphed weakness by asking, " 'What are your needs? What are your emotional needs?' All this Oprah [stuff]," he said. "They want to figure out who the dominant tribe is and say, 'I'm with you.' We need to be the benevolent, dominant tribe.

"They're never going to like us," he added, echoing other Marine commanders who cautioned against raising hopes that Fallujans would warmly welcome troops when they return to ruined houses and rubble-strewn streets. The goal, Bellon said, is "mutual respect."

See, you just have to understand how these people THINK. For the record, I am not a member of your “benevolent, dominant tribe.” Although I suspect that this may just be a dress rehearsal for when they come after me with the retina scanners and benevolent cavity searches, and so forth… for non-compliance, of course. Failing to understand my own best interests. No! They would never do that!

Oh, that liberal media!

Clear Channel Communications Inc., the nation's largest radio station operator, has picked FUX News Radio to be the primary source of national news for most of its news and talk stations, officials announced Monday.
(via AP)

Doyle Davidson - 'Muriken Kook

Pastor Decried After Child's Arms Severed
Sun Dec 5, 5:49 PM ET U.S. National - AP
By LISA FALKENBERG, Associated Press Writer

PLANO, Texas - Long before Dena Schlosser took a blade to her baby's arms, her parents had begun to worry. In the years after she moved to Texas with her husband and children, their gentle, dependent daughter had become increasingly isolated. And, according to her stepfather, she was dangerously consumed by a self-described prophet and his church.

Dena's stepfather, Mick Macaulay, said that although he blames mental illness for Schlosser severing the arms of 10-month-old daughter Margaret and leaving her to die, he believes the teachings of Doyle Davidson also played a role.

"I don't think there's any question that what we saw happen here is postpartum psychosis," Macaulay said in a telephone interview. "But that doesn't mean there aren't dynamics in force to push the person toward the psychotic break."

Schlosser was charged with capital murder after police found the 35-year-old mother on Nov. 22 covered in blood in her living room, still holding a knife.

[...]

Schlosser received psychiatric treatment for postpartum depression and the agency determined she was stable in August.

By then, though, Schlosser's association with Davidson's church had intensified, Macaulay said.

He said Davidson used violent imagery and told women they possessed a rebellious "Jezebel" spirit, and that they should submit to their husbands, he said.

"I'm not saying that anybody suggested 'Go cut your baby's arms off,'" said Macaulay, a mental health counselor who lives with Schlosser's mother, Connie, in Canada. "This diminishing of women, this diminishing of women's powers, women's importance, referring to women as jezebels, I think, further undermines an already fragile ego state that Dena's experiencing."

That's absurd, the 72-year-old minister said.

"I'm an apostle and I'm a prophet," Davidson said. "I only teach what's in the Bible and that's what makes them mad."

Davidson, a former veterinarian, said God told him to start Water of Life Ministries in suburban Dallas in the early 1980s. His sermons, based on literal interpretations of the Bible, are available on his Web site and broadcast on TV and radio in several states.

He refers to Methodist, Catholic and Baptist denominations as cults and believes the Ten Commandments apply only to the disobedient, not the righteous.

Davidson doesn't deny his teachings are unconventional. He said he avoids violent imagery, but he does teach that women are weaker and should submit to their husbands.

He also said he isn't well-liked by much of the religious community, and he was removed from the Daystar Television Network, a major Christian broadcaster, after his sermons offended top officials.

In September, Davidson was arrested on a public intoxication charge after a couple, longtime members of his church, called 911, alleging the minister attacked them at their home. Davidson said he was only trying to cast the devil out of the wife, who had become rebellious and rejected his teachings. He said he entered the home with the permission of her husband.

The couple told police Davidson choked the woman. The couple declined to press assault charges and several calls by the AP to their home went unanswered.

Davidson said he believes the incident was a "setup of Satan himself to try and destroy my ministry."

Davidson claimed he's had little interaction with Dena since the Schlossers began attending his roughly 200-member church in 2002.

Look, over there, a lesbian!

*

Great revelations:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq was a mistake that has made the world a more dangerous place, but a swift withdrawal would make matters worse, Pakistan's president said this weekend.

"I think it's less safe," Gen. Pervez Musharraf said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer." Asked whether he considered the invasion a mistake, the Pakistani leader said, "With hindsight, yes. We have landed ourselves in more trouble, yes."

Musharraf was in Washington on Saturday for a brief meeting with President Bush. The two discussed the issue of terrorism, bilateral concerns, relations between India and Pakistan and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. more via CNN

Media WOWsers past: Dec. 05, "Somewhere in the Middle...", via Atrios

*

'under attack'...:

The US consulate in Saudi Arabia is 'under attack' officials say and gunfire can be heard echoing around the compound.

Two plumes of black smoke can be seen pouring from the building and officials say it is an "emergency case".

Link: Sky News

*

Aargh!

Please, please tell me this is part of some clever plan:

Reid suggested he may be open to the possibility of Justice Antonin Scalia as a replacement for ailing Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

"This is one smart guy," said Reid. "I disagree with many of the results that he arrives at, but his reason for arriving at those results are very hard to dispute."
(via AP)

"Hard to dispute"? Isn't number two supposed to try harder?

More of the same:

Payrolls grew by just 112,000 workers in November, far below the 200,000-job gain many economists had expected.

And, yet again, the economists are surprised that the jobs market sucks! Why not outsource them, not us? And get this:

Also, the government revised significantly downward the job gains for the previous two months.

And of course it's only a coincidence that that one of those months was right before the election, right?

COULD 2005 BE BETTER? Some analysts believe stronger job growth will occur as companies exhaust their ability to squeeze more work out of existing employees and finally begin sustained hiring.
(via AP)

Yeah, a touch of the lash (back) never hurt anyone... Especially a wage slave... In fact, it's Bush's plan!

RDF, for some absurd reason—self-deprecation??—left his answer in comments. Here it is:

1. Take back the party, one county at a time.

2. If you don't have a record, run for office.

3. Write letters to papers, congresscritters, etc. Be shrill.

4. Demonstrate.

5. Have house parties, block parties.

6. Watch how you spend your money. No GOP coffers.

7. If you don't mind jail, don't pay taxes.

8. Join the ACLU, NOW, and etc. Memberships in ACLU, NOW, NAACP, etc. make great holiday gifts.

9. If you live where you can make it, don't forget to attend the coronation in January.

10. Join a union.

I know, I know—"Man bites dog." But the numbers tell the tale:

Bottom line:

When all was said and done, after close to 675,000 votes cast in the city, here is the number challenged as potentially invalid by Republican lawyers:

Ninety-two.
(via Inkwire)

Can Ohio say the same? I wonder why not?

Insightful comment from Pandagon's Ezra:

In a winner-take-all system, being principled and powerless is, for those you want to help, no better than being unprincipled and powerless. You can keep your purity, I want universal health care. And the road to that leads through a concerted effort to drag the religious right over to the left.
(via Pandagon)

Discuss.

Bush Fuck-The-Blues policies have only just started

As President Bush lays the groundwork for a possible overhaul of the U.S. tax code, one option under consideration would deal its biggest financial blow to citizens of blue states such as California and New York.

Some conservative activists are urging the Bush administration to scrap the federal deduction for state and local taxes as part of a broader plan to revamp the nation's tax system.

Although the proposal would hurt some taxpayers in nearly every state, it would hit hardest in states with higher-than-average income levels and bigger-than-average state and local tax burdens. High on the list are a number of blue states — those that were carried by Democrat Sen. John F. Kerry in last month's presidential election.

Taxpayers in California and New York, for example, which have top state income tax rates of 9.3% and 6.5% respectively, would be highly affected; residents of Florida and Texas, which have no state income taxes, much less so.

"There's no question this effort would punish blue states," said Rep. Robert T. Matsui (D-Sacramento), a member of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. Over time, he said, it could force state and local governments to cut expenditures.

Supporters of the change insist the disproportionate effect on blue states is a coincidence, but they acknowledge that the proposal could hurt most in states that voted against Bush.

"Let me put it like this: It certainly isn't something that's a discouragement," said one prominent conservative. "Yes, we talked about this. The fact that it hits blue states is not something that's been missed among Republicans."

But in a political complication, some blue states that would be hit hardest by the tax change are led by Republicans. If the White House adopts the proposal, it could create a rift with some of the GOP's biggest stars in those states, such as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and New York Gov. George E. Pataki, among others.

Right. Let's give Bush the benefit of the doubt.

It remains unclear whether the administration will adopt the proposal. Some administration and congressional advisors said they believed the idea had been floated as a trial balloon to see how much support or opposition it attracted.

Bush has said one of his top second-term priorities is to revamp the tax code so that it is simpler, fairer and more pro-growth. He also has said he would be guided by the recommendations of a bipartisan commission he planned to appoint by the end of the year.

Right. Hey, I'm with Norquist on this one—"bipartisanship is date rape." Why on earth would any Democrat participate in an effort designed to fuck their own party and their own constituents?

Bush has hinted strongly that his proposal would preserve two popular tax breaks: the deductions for mortgage interest and charitable contributions. That [Bush] has not mentioned preserving the state and local tax deduction has been interpreted by some as a signal that it is fair game as the administration looks for ways to finance other tax changes.

"This is very real," said one congressional staffer close to the tax discussion. "They need the money desperately…. It's one of the only things they can attempt to do to finance tax reform."

When a Republican says "reform," keep your hand on your wallet!

Last year, 5.5 million California households, or 37% of all tax filers in the state, claimed deductions for state and local income taxes. In New York, 3.2 million households, or 37%, did.
(via LA Times)

So, the citizens that actually use their taxes to provide services for their citizens (unlike, say, Texas) are going to get penalized. Nice! Now the whole country can be like Texas!

49% of the country has no effective representation.

It's taxation without representation.

What is to be done?

NOTE I'm writing "Blues" instead of "Blue States" because it's clear that the all-too-seductive Blue/Red state meme is designed to force Democrats into the corner of being a permanent minority, by making it impossible to reach out to the "purples." So when I say Blue, I mean, essentially, Democratic voters—predominantly concentrated in the cities and around the ("blue") coasts, lakes, and rivers. And I'm guessing that the Bush taxes will hit Blue cities just as badly, if not worse, than Blue states.

UPDATE Alert readers Nancy and flory point out that even though the Blues are fucked relatively more than the Reds, the Reds are getting fucked too.

flory:

No Texas taxpayer is going to look at relative fuckedness and think this is a good idea. Trust me - I know a few people who recently moved from CA to TX and think their taxes have skyrocketed because of the property tax bills they have to write.

I almost hope Bush does try this. Any red state Rethug Congresscritters who went along with it would be in a world of hurt electorally. If they opposed it, Bush's man date would be a thing of the past.

Nancy:

I read the article in LA Times and although it will hit the blues the hardest, it will hit me in a red state as well. I will no longer get to deduct from my federal income tax the money I pay for taxes on my house. I will be able to take the mortgage interest so far but without the taxes deduction I will be back in the standard deduction. Trust Bush to screw up anything he touches!

A little more "obstruction" and maybe 1260 (and counting) American soldiers and unnumnbered thousands of Iraqis wouldn't be dead.

A little more "obstruction" and maybe the nominee for DHS head would be someone other than a cop who looks good on TV and leaves a trail of fraud and administrative fuckups behind him whereever he goes.

A little more "obstruction" and maybe the man who briefed Bush saying that the executive has the "inherent authority" to set aside the law wouldn't be the nominee to head the "Justice" Department.

A little more "obstruction" and maybe Philly wouldn't be breathing poison from upwind power plants.

A little more "obstruction" and maybe we can save employer-supplied health insurance in 2005.

A little more "obstruction" and we wouldn't have been left with an IOU when generations's worth of payroll taxes were handed to the superrich in the form of tax cuts.

If this be obstruction, let us make the most of it!

NOTE This post is an implicit response to some thoughtful remarks by alert reader hadenough, in comments.

UPDATE Employer-supplied health insurance is better than nothing, eh? Especially if you need it now. Oh, but don't worry! I'm sure the employers will raise your salary enough so that you can get your own insurance, when Bush eliminates the tax structure that supports health insurance today...

Especially since Rummy is an unindicted felon?

Of course, Xan would say that Kerik is one of Rove's distractions... And she could be right. After all, the Republicans have social security to loot, and your employer-sponsored health insurance to abolish... And, amazingly. on these issues 49% of the American people have no effective representation at all.

"I knew Tom Ridge. Commissioner, you're no Tom Ridge." Words you thought you'd never hear, right?

I mean, who would have thought that Tom Ridge—He of the Extremely Non-Political Terror Alerts—wasn't sufficiently loyal? Well, amazing but true, he wasn't. After we unboggle our minds from this classic fluffing headline—"A Tough Cop Tempered by 9/11 and Iraq"—and read w-a-a-a-a-y down in the story we get this, about Bush's nominee for head of the Department of Homeland Security:

"[Bernard Kerik's] most consistent trait is blind loyalty [In the original German, Kadaver gehorsam] to his boss." [said City Council member Bill Perkins].
(via WaPo)

OK! That clears up the troubling question of whether Bernard "Bumboy" Kerik is qualified for the job! But wait! There's more! Kerik is qualified in so many, many other ways!

1. Kerik is a coward who fucked up Iraq! Just like so many other Republicans!

Appointed by President Bush to train a new Iraqi police force in 2003, Kerik came under criticism for inadequate screening of recruits as U.S. authorities rushed to deploy the force. It has been plagued by desertions and by allegations that insurgents have infiltrated the ranks.

Kerik quit four months into his six-month tenure in Iraq, telling New York reporters later that he needed a vacation.

Wow! I bet the troops wish they could take a vacation! And he can't make it for a six month tour of duty?! WTF?

2. Kerik uses the public purse for private gain! Just like so many other Republicans!

The city's Conflicts of Interest Board fined him $2,500 for sending two police officers to Ohio to help research his best-selling 2001 memoir, "The Lost Son."

3. So do Kerik's friends! Just like so many other Republicans!

Kerik several times promoted Anthony Serra, finally to bureau chief. But this summer -- well after Kerik left the department -- the Bronx district attorney filed a 146-count indictment against Serra, charging that he had over several years used corrections officers to work on his home and in Republican Party campaigns.

4. Kerik appoints thieves and looters to office! Just like so many other Republicans!

The [New York City Correction Foundation] was supposed to fund programs that strengthen the department. But it had few fiscal controls, and Kerik appointed a deputy commissioner who later pleaded guilty to defrauding it of $142,000. The former aide is serving a federal prison term.

5. Kerik fucks up the chain of command! Just like so many other Republicans!

Remember the chaos on 9/11? Remember the CPA? Abu Ghraib?

But when the city commissioned McKinsey & Co. to examine New York's response to the attacks, and later when the Sept. 11 commission held hearings, Kerik heard sharp criticism of the fire and police departments, particularly of the failure to establish a clear line of command.

6. Kerik thinks democracy is for traitors! Just like so many other Republicans!

"Political criticism is our enemy's best friend," Kerik said.

One of the most endearing things about Bush is that when he's got one of his enemies—i.e., you or me or any of the Blues—down on the ground, and he's really put the boot in, he doesn't stop. Once he's done with the ribs, he goes for the face and the balls. A totally politicized Department of Homeland Security not enough? Let's make the DHS department head a guy who's only qualification is that he's a toady and a suck-up, and looked good on TV in the days after 9/11.

And He's going to ram Keriks's appointment through and make us like it. Fuckhead.

Can someone explain to me why the Beltway Dems are putting up with this crap?

WTF?

The Republican Party of Virginia has tentatively agreed to pay Democratic lawmakers almost $750,000 to settle a federal lawsuit stemming from a 2002 incident in which the party's former executive director eavesdropped on a Democratic conference call, sources familiar with the case said yesterday.

Resolution of the case would end a two-year legal nightmare for the Republican Party. The scandal led to the resignation of several top party officials and threatened to drag the Republicans' likely nominee for the next governor -- Attorney General Jerry W. Kilgore -- into a civil trial that was set to begin Thursday in Richmond.
(via WaPo)

So.

Yet another example of Republican lawbreaking. And the Dems are, essentially, letting the Republicans pay them off to make the problem go away. Why? And can't they at least get the award to seven figures? Six figures is so... paltry. Makes a girl look cheap, don't ya know.

Good God:

NEW YORK New York area Democrats say they're pleased the city's former police commissioner has been tapped to head the Department of Homeland Security.

But some are still smarting from comments Bernard Kerik made in campaign appearances for President Bush this year. And they say they hope he'll be less partisan in his new role.
(via KESQ)

"Less partisan in his new role...." What was it Garth said? Was it Garth? "When weasels fly out of my butt?"

Kevin Drum made a good start nailing Kerik's slippery little opportunistic butt right here.

When are the Dems going to figure out that the duty of an opposition party is to OPPOSE?

What a turnabout to see the wingers support something public—besides looting the public purse, of course.

So, there's good news!

[A] bus system will provide free transportation. No cars will be allowed in the city at first ...
(via the once-proudly-mediocre NY Times)

Oh, wait ...

... to prevent car bombs.

It's Fallujah.

Not that every city in the US won't look like Fallujah, after the wingers get through with raining fire from Heaven onto the heads of the ungodly their Fuck-the-Blues policies.

Of course, there's a slower moving front in the same war here in Philly: The Republican legislature is gutting our own much-loved [cough] SEPTA, thereby encouraging their constituents to drive their SUVs into Blue Center City, filling it with deadly fumes, asbestos, rubber particulates, dirty oil, noise, and the odd bloody mess from flattened pedestrians. Can't anyone see that this is not sustainable? What could possibly be the incentive? Oh, of course! Could it be money? The Republicans in the legislature took over the Philadelphia Parking Authority, so now every parking lot in Philadelphia is a cog in the Republican patronage machine. Spreading Santorum indeed. Now it all makes sense. Phew. My faith was shaken there for a minute. Please continue with your Godly activities. Fuckheads.

Keith at The Invisible Library has an excellent holiday gift idea:

John Halbo suggests that Joseph Moncure March's The Wild Party would make an excellent stocking stuffer. And I agree. Just search inside the book and you'll see (Gads! Now I'm rhyming! Oh what luck, and timing...)

See Twice a Day, In Vaudeville

I agree too. A friend of mine gave me a copy of "The Wild Party" (the lost classic from 1928) several years ago. Illustrated by Spiegelman and released in 1994 here's a couple of snips:

His woman at present was Mae. She was blonde, and slender, and gay: A passionate flirt, So dumb that it hurt, And better for night than for day.

And:

He had two cars. He had been behind bars - For theft, public nuisance, rape: Once extra for trying escape. Too bad? Nonsense! He was fun. A good sport: The only son - Of some un-heard of preacher father - Who had kicked him out as too much bother...[and so on and so on]

Well, you get the idea. Definetly one for Steve Bates to add to his doggerel library. (assuming he doesn't already have a copy on the shelf.)

*

The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,
But swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread:
Besides what the grim wolf with privy paw,
Daily devours apace, and nothing said;
(Milton)

If that last sentence doesn't send a chill down your spine, you're dead. - Charles2 at The Fulcrum

I could never before imagine reading something like this about my country: [continue reading...] Fascism by Degrees

*

Fortunately the "news" theater department at CNN, etc - this very frosty morn - is once more hot on the heels of that Michael Jackson weirdo - whew! While also asking important questions such as: why won't conspiracy theories surounding Princess Di go away? Or something like that, which, of course, has nothing to do CNN's own seemingly endless cavalcade of Princess Di royal family "fairytale" courtship neverland gah-gah story "conspiracy theory" coverage. But, well, you know... its CNN, it doesn't have to make any sense.

Meanwhile....silly "internet conspiracy theory" stories which might interest people over the age of 12, or involve, oh, lets say, flip little matters such as the integrity of national elections in, oh, lets say, the United States of 'Murica, will no doubt be dismissed with a giddy tut-tut and a haughty southern sniff by the playpen "fairytale" wowsers in Atlanta....

So contact C-SPAN for, hopefully, further information...

Via Hungry Blues:

Tell C-SPAN and Your Senators and Representatives They Must Attend!

Democratic Representative John Conyers, Jr. of Michigan, ranking Minority member of the House Judiciary Committee, will hold a hearing on Wednesday 08 December 2004 to investigate allegations of vote fraud and irregularities in Ohio during the 2004 Presidential election. The hearing is slated to begin at 10:00 a.m. EST in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington DC.

[...]

Expert testimony will be offered, and a good deal of data on potential fraud previously unreported to the public will be discussed and examined at length.

EMail C-SPAN: events@c-span.org
Tell em to cover the hearings. More info, including contact numbers, at Hungry Blues link (above).

*

I hope somebody with good technical skills is trolling the online photo albums for atrocity photos... God knows what else will turn up...

The Amazing Froomkin in Salon:

If current workers are allowed to invest some of their Social Security taxes, that amount will have to be made up in some other way, unless the government reduces payments to current or future retirees. So what's it going to be?

How can the government reduce the deficit if it won't increase taxes and it doesn't reduce spending?

If the tax code overhaul is to be revenue neutral, and one goal is to reduce the tax rate on savings, what taxes go up?

If preemptive war against Iraq was justified, what other nations might merit preemptive action?

Not that Bush will answer, of course.

(Thanks to Burnt Orange Report)

Gee, I hope the guy in the hood isn't a voter. But if he is, I bet he's not undecided....

UPDATE More from Robert's soapbox.

A Friday night horror:

THE PHOTOS: Dozens of photos appear to show Navy SEALs in Iraq sitting on hooded and handcuffed detainees, while others appear to show bloodied detainees and the aftermath of commando raids on homes.

WHAT'S NOT KNOWN: The identities of the troops, the detainees and the photographer, and what happened before and after the photos were taken.
(via AP)

More fraternity pranks. Again, don't blame the troops. Blame the chickenhawks who put them where they are.

Of course, this violates Navy regs and the Geneva Convention (which, an international treaty ratified by the Senate, is the law of the land):

John Hutson, a retired rear admiral who served as the Navy's Judge Advocate General from 1997 to 2000, said they suggested possible Geneva Convention violations. Those international laws prohibit souvenir photos of prisoners of war.

"It's pretty obvious that these pictures were taken largely as war trophies," Hutson said. "Once you start allowing that kind of behavior, the next step is to start posing the POWs in order to get even better pictures."

At a minimum, the pictures violate Navy regulations that prohibit photographing prisoners other than for intelligence or administrative purposes, according to Bender, the SEALs spokesman.
(via Kansas City Star)

And the Navy's reaction? Investigate how the photos got out!

"They presented copies of them to us last week and once we were presented with these photos we then launched an investigation as to how the photos got on the Internet and who is responsible," navy Commander Jeff Bender said.
(via ABC News)

Interestingly, the photos predate Abu Ghraib.

Some of the photos have date stamps suggesting they were taken in May 2003, which could make them the earliest evidence of possible abuse [torture] of prisoners in Iraq. The far more brutal practices photographed in Abu Ghraib prison occurred months later.
(via Strib)

Oh, and how were the photos found? Google:

The images were posted to the Internet site Smugmug.com.

The images were found through the online search engine Google. The same search today leads to the Smugmug.com Web page, which now prompts the user for a password. Nine scenes from the SEAL camp remain in Google's archived version of the page.

Before the site was password protected, the AP purchased reprints for 29 cents each.

Some men in the photos wear patches that identify them as members of Seal Team Five, based in Coronado, and the unit's V-shaped insignia decorates a July Fourth celebration cake.

The photos surfaced amid a case of prisoner abuse involving members of another SEAL team also stationed at Coronado, a city near San Diego.
(via Kansas City Star)

29 cents? Well worth it!

And I can't seem to get the photos out of Google's cache. Readers?

UPDATE Ah, here are some photos (thanks to Memeorandum)

(Via CNN)

Via Thom Hartmann, via Common Dreams, gives another glimpse into the deep historical grasp and razor sharp reasoning skills of Tony Baloney:

Antonin Scalia, the man most likely to be our next Chief Justice of the Supreme Court [G-d forbid!], turned history on its head recently when he attended an Orthodox synagogue in New York and claimed that the Founders intended for their Christianity to play a part in government. Scalia then went so far as to suggest that the reason Hitler was able to initiate the Holocaust was because of German separation of church and state.

The Associated Press reported on November 23, 2004, "In the synagogue that is home to America's oldest Jewish congregation, he [Scalia] noted that in Europe, religion-neutral leaders almost never publicly use the word 'God.'"

"Did it turn out that," Scalia asked rhetorically, "by reason of the separation of church and state, the Jews were safer in Europe than they were in the United States of America?" He then answered himself, saying, "I don't think so."

Scalia has an extraordinary way of not letting facts confound his arguments, but this time he's gone completely over the top by suggesting that a separation of church and state facilitated the Holocaust. If his comments had gotten wider coverage (they were only noted in one small AP article, and one in the Jerusalem Post), they may have brought America's largest religious communities - both Christian and Jewish - into the streets. Scalia To Synagogue - Jews Are Safer With Christians In Charge

Myself, I’m beginning to doubt that ANYTHING will bring folks into the streets. Everybody’s outrage-o-meter is clipping red, and there are too many issues to count. This black-robed fool can spout things like this in public, and nobody cares.

I’m thinking that a new Anti-Imperialist League might do the trick. Surely we can all agree that Imperial Power and Ambition is the central problem, the motivation being greed, the tool being fear? Problem is, we don’t have churches to meet in weekly, and I can tell you that house parties—while a lot of fun—don’t match up organizationally. And in the country there ain't no streets to go into.

But good ol’ Dr. Zinn is on target… A few highlights:

The reelected Bush triumphantly announced that he had the approval of the nation to carry out his agenda. There came no sign of opposition from what was supposed to be the opposition party. In short, the members of the club, after a brief skirmish on the campaign trail (costing a total of a billion dollars or so) were back having drinks at the same bar…

Freed from the sordid confines of our undemocratic political process, we can now turn all our energies to do what is discouraged by the voting system--to speak boldly and clearly about what must be done to turn our country around…

…Will the Democratic Party, so craven and unreliable, face a revolt from below which will transform it?

Or will it give way (four years from now? eight years from now?) to a new political movement that honestly declares its adherence to peace and justice?

Sooner or later, profound change will come to this nation tired of war, tired of seeing its wealth squandered, while the basic needs of families are not met. These needs are not hard to describe. Some are very practical, some are requirements of the soul: health care, work, living wages, a sense of dignity, a feeling of being at one with our fellow human beings on this Earth…Harness That Anger Howard Zinn

What existing structures do Lefties have that will serve for organizational purposes? And what issue—like the antiwar issue once did—unites us? Peace and justice too broad? No outrage left? And what do us rural folks do? It’s even harder to organize out in the sticks, especially in the winter (of our discontent). But then, the city-dwellers seem fractured, too. Arrggghhh? Call out the instigators, coz there's something in the air...

Burn a book for Jesus:

Onward and backward. Cultureghost has this item with quotes from Rep. Gerald Allen (Republican) Cottondale, Alabama - on books and literature:

"I guess we dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them," he said. When asked about Tennessee Williams' southern classic "Cat On A Hot Tin Roof," Allen said the play probably couldn't be performed by university theater groups.

More from Cultureghost

And JC Christian writes "Mr. Cottondale" a letter: here

Ya know, "Cottondale" (just east of Tuscaloosa) sounds so, uh, gay. What a sissy name for a town, huh? I say burn the whole cousin fuckin' nest to the ground. Whaddya think? Moving along.....

Hey all you hero worshipping Right Wing little green booger picker 101st Fighting Keyboarders! Listen up! Nows your big chance to hang up your JC Penny Cotton Docker pants and pay your land-lady and kiss your Laura Ingraham calendars goodbye and head off to Iraq! Dreams do come true. Yeah, sure, I'll bet all the cute little Charles Johnson's and Virgin Ben's will be lining up at the induction center well into early 2005. Oh sure.

Via Marines Girl -

Don't be left out in supporting YOUR cause and YOUR party. Dear Leader needs YOU!

If I can just get one Reserve Recon guy of the right rank to go active, maybe mine can be sent home. You think? - help bring a real Marine home

Dick should take up ice fishing... dipping his pole in a hole in a frozen lake and..., oh, no, wait a minute...Via TBogg:

For the past twenty-so odd years, Dick Cheney has successfully avoided .....um...how should I put this? Oh yeah, he has avoided "drilling" in the "frozen tundra" of Lynne Cheney preferring to pass his spare time fly fishing,..."...Rock me like a hurricane."

hehehe...I wish I'd written that - I'm glad TBogg is back...

All added to the blogroll - finally:
Unscrewing the Inscutable
It's My Country, Too (Riggsveda)
inanis et vacua
The Daily Delay (Tom Delay Watch)
Now More Than Ever
Left in the West
Dahr Jamail
Spontaneous Arising
Grannyinsanity
WA State Political Report
Loudocracy
Fierce Planet (Jennifer)

*

Kevin Drum has a very interesting post up over at his blog. Go read it. I'll wait.

Okay. As a historian, it's always interesting to watch someone else tackle historical topics.

In many ways I think Kevin is onto something very important here. I think Beinart is wrong because it is obvious to anyone who pays attention that Islamic terrorism is not the threat that communism and a nuclear-armed USSR was. Republican policy choices and behavior today prove that they really don't view it as much more than a political issue as Kevin has said.

However, let me be contrary and make a different sort of historical argument. I would contend that Truman OVERSOLD the communist threat in his administration in the middle 1940s by knowingly exaggerating the threat in Greece and Turkey and then spending the next couple of years convincing Americans that monolithic Soviet communism was truly the coming of the anti-Christ. Well, after successfully selling this simplistic good vs. evil view of the world, then several things happened that put Democrats and Truman in a world of hurt. China fell to communism, thus making the Cold War a global struggle. And then, lo and behold, the devil got the bomb. Now Americans were truly scared to death.

And this was exactly what Republicans needed to run the Democrats out of all three branches of government by the early 1950s. The Republicans said "Hey, these guys have screwed it all up, you've got to elect us! We won't screw it up."

In many ways I would contend that Bush may very well have made Truman's mistake. He has oversold the terror threat in such a way that it has won him an eyelash narrow re-election effort -- just like Truman's in 1948. Now the hard part begins. If the terrorists strike again it's going to be hard for him to defend his administration's record. Democrats can make the case that W screwed it up horribly, you've got to elect us -- and they won't need scumbags like Joe McCarthy to make their case for them, it'll just be obvious.

I always tell my students that when "good vs. evil" tropes start appearing in our foreign policy, dangerous things happen: disastrous wars are embarked upon, soldiers die, and the world becomes a much more dangerous place.

Was Truman right to resist communism? Absolutely! Was he right to pursue the Marshall Plan and attempt, therefore, to understand what caused communism and put a stop to it? Again, absolutely!

However, Truman's ultimate failure was in overselling a threat and scaring Americans to death. It was then awfully easy for Republicans to make the case that Truman wasn't doing enough to combat the threat and defeat Democrats at the polls.

Now, what implications does this have for the present situation? Are Republicans putting themselves into a similar situation today?

I'm really not quite sure. But I would caution you Kevin that there are dangers in overhyping a threat, in playing the scare-o-matic at too high a volume. Truman did it -- and it cost the Democrats bigtime the following eight years.

I guess my main point is that Truman's approach of trying to ameliorate the conditions that led to communism was certainly the proper one. However, the overhyped threat (and it was overhyped until the Soviets got the bomb in 1949) was what ultimately led to a frustrating decade for the Democrats in the 1950s.

W may have set Republicans up for a similar fall. However, the consequences for the world of W's failure will be doubly disastrous because W and the boys have done absolutely nothing to ameliorate the conditions that led to the rise of Islamic terrorism and fundamentalism in the first place.

Truman paid a political price for his exaggerations in the early Cold War but ultimately did the right things to combat communism in western Europe. In contrast, Bush has done absolutely nothing to deal with the root causes of terrorism and has in many ways made the problems worse.

That means the price for W's mistakes will be more than political. The whole world and the rest of us will be paying for them -- not just with money but with our dearest blood.

Many great comments, alert readers. Thanks!

Get a load of this:

Calling the current system of Social Security benefits unsustainable, a top economic adviser to President Bush on Thursday strongly implied that any overhaul of the system would have to include major cuts in guaranteed benefits for future retirees.

"Let me state clearly that there are no free lunches here," said N. Gregory Mankiw, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, at a conference on tax policy here.
(via NY Times)

Sure there are. For a generation, payroll taxes were raised precisely to keep the system solvent. Those funds were left in general revenues, and then Bush blew them on tax cuts for the super-rich.

That's outright theft.

So, if you're already rich, you do get a free lunch.

In fact, you get my lunch.

NOTE More here.

Six months in office,and UN ambassador Danforth wants to spend more time with his family. What's up with that?

Because I have someone in mind:

Walter Cavanagh owns 1,497 valid credit cards (he assumes a card is valid until he hears otherwise) with a potential credit line of about $1.7 million.
(via AP)

Love the URL, too—"Plastic Fantastic". Those droll wire services guys!

WalMart advertising low prices is like Hooters advertising, well... I mean, everybody knows it, so why say it?

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., stung by a lackluster start to the holiday shopping season, said Thursday it is launching a new advertising campaign to remind its customers of its low prices.
(via AP)

Cheap clothes are OK; but as Xan points out (somewhere, sigh), cheap clothes that fall apart because of cheap thread are not OK.

Patronize a local retailer, and you might get satisfaction, and even be able to improve the product line. Walmart? Ha. Besides the fact that Walmart doesn't pay a living wage, and its "associates" need to get welfare in addition to their lousy wages.

The wingers are voting for their guys; LGF is #1. Go thou and do likewise.

From WaPo via The Amazing Froomkin, who informs us that the backdrop of FDR and Churchill is "White House" designed.

Say, where's Stalin? Oh....

And moments of self-righteous moral excellence...





LOUISIANA
The State Baptist Annual, circa 1927:

Decent people no longer find lake and sea-shore a place of rest and relaxation. Modern bathing suits make modest men and women feel like hiding their faces in shame. Again and again I have been told, in different parts of Louisiana, that the present day swimming-pool is a menace to the morals of the young. Mixed bathing must be abolished.

Dance-halls are ticket-offices to Hell. The dance-hall has always been the handmaid of the brothel and the saloon. If we are to have men and women worthy to become parents of the coming generation, we must abolish the dance-hall. It leads to carnality and ought to have been abolished when we abolished the brothel and saloon. I would as soon have my son frequent a saloon as to have my daughter visit dance-halls. The modern dance, with its music, is nothing if not carnal. It leads to carnality, and, when kept up for hours, it leads straight to Hell. Two-thirds of the women of the street fell as the result of the dance-hall. The majority of the men who frequent dance-halls go there with nothing but carnal thoughts in their minds. The youth who goes to the dance-hall looking for clean pleasure is considered lacking in carnal technique. Innocence can not endure dance-halls, where the atmosphere is heavy with sensual music, and men and women seem to be held together with adhesive tape. If girls would dance with girls and men with men the movement against dance-halls would not be necessary.

Well cripes, ya just can't seem to please some folks these days. (bold emphasis above is mine) Theres a duct tape joke somewhere in there - too - so go at it.


"The dance has a secret language.... I would not like to die dancing. Would you?"


IOWA
Des Moines. Leaflet circulated circa 1927:

REASONS WHY I DON'T DANCE
BY EVANGELIST CARL BASSETT
I would not like to die dancing. Would you?
Three-fourths of the fallen girls in America were ruined by the dance, according to the testimony of dancing masters.

Dancing is contrary to the spirit of the whole Bible. The dance originated in a house of prostitution and was never danced outside of a house of prostitution for the first hundred years, and the steps they used then are tame compared to the steps they use now.

There are no soul-winning dancing Christians.
I couldn't pray at a dance. Could you?
I wouldn't enjoy reading my Bible after the dance.
No young man will go through the motions of the dance, hour after hour, without thinking impure thoughts.
I would be miserable if I knew God were watching me while dancing.
A girl who dances cheapens herself in the eyes of the finest men in town.
If a girl heard the ordinary conversation of men between dances, as they discuss her, that girl's cheeks would blaze with mortification and she would run home and never dance again.

The dance has a secret language, by which the man can silently learn if the girl in his arms is pure or not, without one word being uttered.

Dancing has created a condition in the public schools that is almost as bad as the white slave traffic.

I'm confident that CBS and David Brooks and all the rest of our newly recruited SCLM Christian crosslighters will be all over the story. Especially with respect to the "testimony" of them "dancing masters." Don't want to let them buggers slip away without a good goin' over.

I wonder what our "founding fathers" would do?:

"There is nothing that holds the family together like a little family prayer. Our Puritan fathers lived on parched corn, but they talked about God. They shot Indians through the port hole with one eye and taught the Bible to their children with the other."
~ remarks of Pastor Perry C. Hooper, as reported by the Toledo 'Blade', 1927.

Thats what I thought. Thats why them divorce rates is so much lower in Massachusetts. No womenfolk be runnin' off with some tall romantic swarthy savage as long as the port hole is blazin' away. I hope they emphasize this old time moral standard in the revised Red State highschool textbooks. Perhaps a new sticker is in order. As for all that naked carnal spirit dancin' and hooting and whoopin' it up around some pow-wow inferno of pagan lust till all hours of the morning... why, that'll get ya heaved into the Lake of Fire faster than a pair a blazing mortified cheeks at a dusty Ken Mehlman bunkhouse mixer. Serves them crazy chowder-head "Indians" right.

And keep your damned nebular hypothesizing to yerself, hippy!

*

DNC—or DeanC? Kos has a nice post here on a Reform Democrat showing the other guys how it's done.

"Will the nominee please raise their right arm?"

A steady stream of high-level officials are headed for the exits as President Bush prepares for his second four-year term, and the administration is grabbing the opportunity to exert greater influence over agencies that often act independently - too independently, some say - of White House control.

In selecting replacements, the president appears to be taking a course that differs in a subtle way from the manner in which he chose his first Cabinet. In 2001, he displayed a willingness to tab potential public servants - like Powell and Rumsfeld - even if he had no personal ties to them.

This go-round, to a large extent, Bush is nominating people who are close to him and, hence, establishing "there is only one boss in this administration," according to Richard Skinner, a government instructor at Bowdoin College.
(via Scripps-Howard)

Blest be the ties that bind...

More proof that we're winning!

The casualty figures are coming in. And the trendlines are not good:

Fueled by fierce fighting in Fallujah and insurgents' counterattacks elsewhere in Iraq, the U.S. military death toll for November is approaching the highest for any month of the war.

At least 134 U.S. troops died in November, according to casualty reports available Tuesday.


On Nov. 8, U.S. forces launched an offensive to retake Fallujah, and they have engaged in tough fighting in other cities since then. More than 50 U.S. troops have been killed in Fallujah since then, although the Pentagon has not provided a casualty count for StalingradFallujah for more than a week.

So 134, the total everyone is reporting, is not the real total, which is higher. Fuzzy math with the troops' lives; disgusting. And I don't know why they're holding the totals back—we already had the election. Maybe they just play politics all the time? Say it isn't so!

From the viewpoint of the United States and Iraqis who are striving to restore stability, the casualty trend since the interim Iraqi government was put in power June 28 has been troubling. Each month's death toll has been higher than the last, with the single exception of October, when it was 63.

Looks like the insurgents wanted Bush re-elected...

The monthly totals grew from 42 in June to 54 in July to 65 in August and to 80 in September.

And another bad trendline:

U.S. forces have put extraordinary effort into countering the IED threat, yet it persists. U.S. troops in Fallujah reported finding nearly as many homemade explosives over the past three weeks as had been uncovered throughout Iraq in the previous four months combined.
(via Mining Journal)

Oh, and guess what? Iraqi civilians are dying in even greater numbers, with nary a mention.

Boy! Aren't you glad "major combat" has ended? I sure am.

Shitheads.

Since Microsoft is a fast follower, I guess this news means the bloom is off the rose:

Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) on Wednesday said it will offer blogging to the online many-headed. Under the rubric MSN Spaces, Bill Gates' colossus will debut the Web journal service in test form on Thursday. It will be specifically geared to Internet "civilians" without vast technical acumen.
(via Forbes)

So, what's next for cutting edge bloggers like Corrente and, alert readers, you? Not more of the same, but what?

TROLL PROPHYLACTIC No anti- or pro-MS ranting, please. Keep the focus on the blogosphere and its direction (if spheres can be said to have a direction).

Well, that was depressing. I ran into a brother who’d I’d worked with some on the GOTV efforts while I was out on the road this week. We hit the same café at breakfast. He’s a spontaneous guy, always has a fresh idea.

And he’s just now crawling out of the whiskey bottle he crawled into on November 2nd. I wasn't even sure I wanted to tell his story.

I mean, he looked bad. Not that I look much better, but still…

We ate some eggs and toast and swilled coffee. He said that he wasn’t sure America would survive four more years of Bushco. He said he smelled more wars, more repression, economic collapse, civil liberties boiling away. And he said he couldn’t take it any more.

And so, of course, I said, well, yeah. But what do we do, man? What’s to be done? I ran down all of the possibilities, most of which have already been posted, and he said, yeah, sure, we should do all that.

But, he said, you know what? It isn’t going to do any good, man. These fuckers have thrown so much shit at us at once that we can’t fight back. And the rest of the country won’t fight—they’re brainwashed. Zombies. My friends are all back to their single issue politics, fighting amongst themselves about what to do, what went wrong…

So what, then? I asked. We just give up, go underground, and wait for the shit to hit the fan so hard that there’s a spontaneous uprising, the country wakes up and says No More?

Yeah, I guess. That’s what I’m going to do, anyway. I’m headed underground and root for the underdog until the smoke clears.

And this was the spontaneous guy who always had a fresh idea.

Shit… and then on the way home I hear this on the radio:

"We just had a poll in our country when people decided that the foreign policy of the Bush administration ought to stay in place for four more years," Bush said at a joint news conference with Martin.

Iraq polls show that indeed, the 51ers like the war. And listen to George iWaq Bush preening in public.

Shit. And now one more of the 49ers has gone underground. I hope he was just moping, but he didn't sound like it.