Atrios has some interesting thoughts on singling out bloggers for disclosure requirements. Check it out.
I’m Keeping My Fingers Crossed for the Sequel
Nothing would make me giddier than to find the name of this blog in the background text on a book cover just like this. (Well done, Kos!)
Via the also-ignored AMERICAblog (a truly unjust omission since John Aravosis is a key player in pushing the radical homosexual agenda of the Left, too!).
The Land of the Freaks and the Home of the Deranged
Besides being a nice chap, Jack at CommonSenseDesk is a great finder and aggregator of news, and today he links to this report from Retuers, headlining his post “This Is Just Bizarre,” which is just about all the commentary it needs.
People in Florida will be allowed to kill in self-defense on the street without trying to flee under a new law passed by state politicians on Tuesday that critics say will bring a Wild West mentality and innocent deaths.What the hell is going on in this country?
The Florida House of Representatives, citing the need to allow people to "stand their ground," voted 94-20 to codify and expand court rulings that already allow people to use deadly force to protect themselves in their homes without first trying to escape.
The new bill goes further by allowing citizens to use deadly force in a public place if they have a reasonable belief they are in danger of death or great bodily harm. It applies to all means of force that may result in death, although the legislative debate focused on guns.
The "Stand Your Ground" bill passed the Senate last week on a 39-0 vote and now goes to Republican Gov. Jeb Bush, who indicated he will sign it.
"This is about meeting force with force," said House sponsor Republican state Rep. Dennis Baxley of Ocala. "If I'm attacked, I should not have to retreat."
Critics have few objections to allowing people to protect themselves from intruders in their homes but said the provision making it easier to use deadly force in public gives gun owners a license to kill.
"For a House that talks about the culture of life it's ironic that we would be devaluing life in this bill," said Democratic state Rep. Dan Gelber of Miami Beach. "That's exactly what we're doing."
Like many states, Florida courts have ruled that people have a right to defend themselves in their homes. Florida courts have expanded that "Castle Doctrine" to include employees in their workplaces and drivers who are attacked in their automobiles.
Outside the home, however, courts have ruled that most victims must at least attempt to escape before using deadly force, a provision gun advocates say puts victims at greater risk. The proposal removes that requirement if a person has a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm.
Critics say the measure could lead to racially motivated killings and promote deadly escalations of arguments.
"All this bill will do is sell more guns and possibly turn Florida into the OK Corral," said Democratic state Rep. Irv Slosberg of Boca Raton.
Allowing citizens to use deadly force in a public place if they have a reasonable belief they are in danger of death or great bodily harm is just beyond nutty. A reasonable belief? How long before this defense is used to justify the killing of a black guy who has the bad luck to reach into his pocket and pull out a cell phone in the vicinity of some jittery white folks who were “reasonably” convinced it was a gun? How long before it’s used to rationalize the killing of a gay man who, his killer will claim, was attempting to “greatly bodily harm” him?
I would say this legislation were a fucking joke, if it weren’t so sickening—and a nightmare waiting to happen for anyone who has the misfortune of creating a visceral reaction in a gun-toting bigot of one flavor or another.
And what is wrong with the dimwits like Dennis Baxley of Ocala who say things like, "If I'm attacked, I should not have to retreat”? Who in his right mind prefers to go on the offensive and take someone else’s life on the chance that the other person means to take his? Getting clocked and having my wallet stolen, and waking up with a headache and the annoyance of canceling my credit cards, doesn’t sound pleasant, but it sounds better than living with the guilt of having taken another human’s life, perhaps unnecessarily. I’m truly and deeply disturbed by people who would rather have a shoot-out in the street, endangering not only the lives of a potential attacker, their own lives, and the lives of innocent bystanders, in some sort of morbid and pathetic cowboy fantasy, than run for it. They scare me way more than any hypothetical crime does.
Honestly! (she sniffed with disgust)
Just when you think you’ve heard it all…
Skippy’s Cookie Jill on one of the sleaziest fundraising scams of which I’ve ever heard. Truly unbelievable.
RIP Saul Bellow
Ugh. Saul Bellow has died—and of the many recent deaths of famous men, this one feels to me like our greatest loss.
A brilliant author, he was raised in and closely associated with Chicago, where he was active in the local academia, attending both Northwestern University and the University of Chicago, for which he served as a member of its Committee on Social Thought in later life. His degrees were in sociology and anthropology, just like mine—which is, unfortunately, where our similarities end, although having studied the same fields in the same city, and having, like him, used the endeavor to inform an interest in writing social commentary, I felt a certain kinship with him, as dreamy hacks are wont to do.
He was 89 and lived a rich life, so we can’t be too sad for him. He wouldn’t have been sad for himself, I imagine.
Asked about his thoughts on what happens after death, Bellow offered two scenarios: oblivion or immortality.
"My intuition is immortality," said Bellow, who was ambivalent about whether he believed in God. "No argument can be made for it, but it's just as likely as oblivion."
RIP Prince Rainier
Prince Rainier III of Monaco has died. He was Europe’s longest-reigning monarch, and he lived to be 81. Good innings.
DeLay’s Going Down
The GOP has officially turned on Tom DeLay. When Dark Lord Cheney signaled his disapproval last week, we were witnessing a fine moment in dog whistle politics; I don’t think that’s appropriate coming from the satanic cyborg’s lips seemed, to be sure, an ominous sign, but little did we know it would send the rightwing media machine into overdrive to take down one of their own.
Drudge is faithfully reporting each devastating new story about the embattled DeLay, which are now coming faster and faster, as fresh charges of ethics violations come tumbling one after another, each given a prominence previous (though equally damning) revelations had not.
Screen grab from the Drudge Report.
Last night, Raw Story leaked the Washington Post’s front page story: DeLay Russian trip paid for by firm lobbying Russian gov't, which can now be read in its entirety here, complete with a flow chart dissecting his trip. (!) And the NY Times reports today that DeLay’s wife and daughter have been paid more than $500,000 since 2001 by his political action and campaign committees.
It looks as though DeLay’s days are numbered.
This is our collective job as I see it:
1. Celebrate.
2. Refuse to allow the GOP to singularly pin DeLay as the face of their radical agenda. They’ve gone too far, and they know it. They need someone to take a fall, and DeLay, the coverage of whose blatant malfeasance was getting ever more difficult to contain, was the best option. If they are successful in sticking him with the sole responsibility for the insidious wingnuttery that has gripped our Congress, they will be able to distance themselves from their agenda as its designated posterboy crumbles and return to promoting the same extremism behind the scenes, as they were before they crossed the line. What we cannot do is allow them to effectively use DeLay to draw a line between them and their abhorrent objectives. He was an operative—a damn successful one, but still just an operative nonetheless. They will want to use him as a scapegoat; it’s up to us to make sure everything they’ve done stays attached to them, and all sense of the need for accountability doesn’t leave with DeLay.
3. Make sure that a DeLay departure does not usurp media attention if Frist goes for the nuclear option. There would undoubtedly be a media frenzy surrounding a DeLay fall from grace; it would be the perfect time for Frist and his minions to surreptitiously pass, as Mr. Shakes calls it, the “this country is now a dictatorship” legislation, rendering filibusters obsolete.
Nothing happens in a vacuum with this administration. DeLay suddenly having lost his protection, finding himself naked, cold, and alone on the front page of the Washington Post, was not inevitable, not in this media climate. This is an orchestrated takedown, and you can bet your boots it’s a red herring for something. We’ve just got to make sure we keep our eyes peeled for exactly what that something is.
(Thanks to Oddjob for providing links.)
Good Stuff
Couple of random funny things to share…
#1: Ralph from Newsfare sent me the following email in response to my post about Title IX (reposted here with his permission):
Dear Shakespeare's Sister:
Several months ago, we tried to contact you by email. Our message was always returned, eg.,
No response from shakespearessis@ter.com
Since you did not respond to those emails, your athletic programs have been cancelled.
Would you and the other girls like to try having a bake sale to get them back? We can probably give you some card tables to put out the brownies and cookies. They are left over from the football team's awards luncheon.
Love,
Your College Administration
#2: Right after arriving home from work, my dear friend in London phoned, and, honestly, every time we speak, we both end up in absolute fits of giggles, which often begins with shooting Woody Allen lines back and forth like dueling machine guns, but tonight began with a discussion of reality shows, which both of us abhor (except for my inexplicable devotion to The Contender, my recommendation of which sparked the topic), during which he said:
“I’ll never understand the people who watch nothing but Big Brother and Survivor and all that. I get that there’s a sociological element to it—something compelling about studying human behavior—but you’ve got 2,000 years of western culture and civilization to choose from, and you decide to watch five baboons sitting on a couch scratching their armpits?! What a bunch of shite!”
Question of the Day (Fun)
After revealing my deep and abiding love for Morrissey, I’d love to hear about your favorites. Who’s the greatest performer ever (in your unhumble opinion)...and why?
When you're dancing and laughing and finally living,
Hear my voice in your head and think of me kindly.
Question of the Day (Practical)
My rank on the Ecosystem, which compiles rankings based on links, but only among other members, has tumbled almost 200 places in the last few days, even though I have more trackbacks than usual. I’ve noticed, however, that many of the people who link to me most often are not members of the Ecosystem. So here’s my question—does the Ecosystem matter?
(That’s not a philosophical question; I’m really curious to know whether people pay a lot of attention to it. I use it mostly to see who’s linked to me so I can thank them, but I don’t put it to much other practical use, perhaps to my detriment.)
Check It at the Door, Please
I’m officially sick of reading about religion in the political news.
This was the straw that broke this camel’s back: New Pope Could Influence Political Life in America. That’s the headline of a column by Adam Nagourney in yesterday’s NY Times, discussing Catholics’ role in American politics, which of course follows dozens? hundreds? of stories—especially when one adds in television coverage—examining the increasing role of religion in American politics and the alleged mandate given the president by religious conservatives. (And now I see the President will be attending the Pope’s funeral, even though he has yet to attend a single funeral of a fallen American soldier.) Although I’m all too aware of the church’s history of interference in political issues, the question is why, in a country that grants and protects freedom of religion, yet makes a provision for the separation of church and state, does the Christian church—in all its forms and denominations—continue to try to stick its big nose into the political sphere, and why do we, as a country, continue to engage the escalating noise coming from the religious? Religion simply shouldn’t play any role in the public discourse.
Despite its dodgy history of political activism, religion is meant only to inform the morality and ethics of its adherents, who can then bring their principles with them into the public (governmental) sphere—while leaving their religion behind. Easier said than done, Shakespeare’s Sister, someone, surely, will tell me, but I’m not entirely convinced that’s true.
You see, one of the things that irks me about the religious is that god-fearing people tend to decide what they believe, then shop around for a religion that suits. It’s rarely, in my experience, that someone tries to discern an objective truth about religious laws and beliefs and then adjusts their behavior accordingly. Rather, behaviors and beliefs are formed, either within or outwith a religious context, and then a denomination is chosen based on its ability to approximate the chooser’s existing beliefs. And even then, passages of the holy text of choice which conflict with personal values are generally ignored, with preference given to teachings that reinforce preexisting opinions. Hence, religion’s all-too-common role as a justification for ingrained beliefs.
I know this isn’t categorically true of all religious people, and I don’t mean to suggest that it is, but it’s true of enough people (and examples of those who can do just as I'm suggesting are plentiful enough) that I find specious the claim that a religious person cannot enter the public sphere and leave one’s religion behind.
The problem, obviously, is that we’ve permitted religion to become untrumpable. No amount of rational or scientific evidence is allowed to supersede faith, and simply by virtue of being “religious” is one assumed, even within the public sphere, to be a good person, even if they are resolutely unethical. There is no regard for a personal moral code derived from earthly sources; an atheist will never be president, in spite of the fact that someone who seeks to be a good person purely out of respect for other people, without promise of eternal reward, is arguably more altruistic.
Though it is not my personal choice, I won’t identify defining one’s sense of right and wrong using religion as intrinsically faulty; I do, however, strongly believe that the belief system one brings into the public sphere, even if molded and informed by religion, should be able to stand on its own without invoking its source. If you have no other justification for your political position than “God says so,” it doesn’t belong in the public sphere. Not in this country.
Just a Minute...
John's got a great post about the MinuteMan Project over at Big Brass Blog. Check it out.
Unpatriotic Act
What a convenient time for this to come up, amidst the continued uninterrupted coverage of Popeapalooza and nonstop attacks on the judiciary by Congress:
The Bush administration's two top law enforcement officials on Tuesday urged Congress to renew every provision of the anti-terror Patriot Act. FBI Director Robert Mueller also asked lawmakers to expand the bureau's ability to obtain records without first asking a judge.Senators Larry Craig, R-Idaho, and Dick Durbin, D-Illinois, plan to reintroduce legislation which would adjust some of the more outrageous provisions of the Patriot Act. (Once again, I wonder if it’s possible to make the amazing Dick Durbin a household name by 2008.)
[…]
"Experience has taught the FBI that there are no neat dividing lines that distinguish criminal, terrorist and foreign intelligence activity," Mueller said in his prepared testimony.
He also asked Congress to expand the FBI's administrative subpoena powers, which allow the bureau to obtain records without approval or a judge or grand jury.
The Patriot Act is the post-Sept. 11 law that expanded the government's surveillance and prosecutorial powers against suspected terrorists, their associates and financiers. Most of the law is permanent, but 15 provisions will expire in December unless renewed by Congress.
Among the controversial provisions is a section permitting secret warrants for "books, records, papers, documents and other items" from businesses, hospitals and other organizations.Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified that these provisions are integral parts of fighting terrorism and must remain available to authorities. I suppose he finds civil liberties kinda quaint.
That section is known as the "library provision" by its critics. While it does not specifically mention bookstores or libraries, critics say the government could use it to subpoena library and bookstore records and snoop into the reading habits of innocent Americans.
[…]
Craig and Durbin want Congress to curb both expiring and nonexpiring parts of the Patriot Act, including the expiring "library" provision and "sneak and peek" or delayed notification warrants. Those warrants — which will not expire in December — allow federal officials to search suspects' homes without telling them until later.
I have yet to hear a compelling reason that necessitates granting these powers to the FBI without the involvement of a judge or grand jury. Suffice it to say, this is just another attack on the judiciary…and, insomuch as it is yet another elimination of an important layer in our system of checks and balances, an attack on the American democracy.
Stinks
I was invited (I have no idea how I got on the list!) to listen in on a conference call arranged by the Coalition for a Fair and Independent Judiciary, regarding their plans for thwarting the threatened “nuclear option.” I was asked to give my real name, which I did, and my home phone number, which I did, and the name of my employer, which I would not, so I was brutally rebuffed. They wouldn’t accept me as an independent interest, even though I clearly got the invite as a blogger, and for no reason having to do with my paying gig. They apparently had no list of invitees to consult to confirm my reason for being there, and the name of blog wasn’t considered sufficient. I suppose I could have made something up, but, well, you know how I feel about liars.
It was truly sucky as I got to hear the first 10 minutes or so, and then they came back on the line to tell me to get lost, since not being affiliated with a particular company wasn’t good enough or something. The same crap credentials managed to get Jeff Gannon into the White House, but couldn’t get me on a conference call.
So I was hoping to have an awesome report for you this afternoon on this exceedingly interesting topic, but instead it’s just a bitch about how the opposition still doesn’t know how to organize things to get as many people involved as possible.
Mr. Popularity
Atrios notes:
According to Gallup, Bush's approval rating is the lowest of any president in March of their 2nd term - 45%.Good question.
A big part of the general deference the press gives this administration is based on this false notion that he's a popular president.
[…]
How low does Bush's approval have to go before WE STOP SAYING THAT.
Of course, the supposition that the press defers to popular presidents doesn’t quite explain their treatment of Clinton, who was extremely popular yet was shown little but contempt by the press in his second term. There was, clearly, something worth covering, but I would argue there’s plenty more and then some worth covering about Bush and his Congressional minions.
The conventional wisdom about the press laying off Bush because he’s popular may be just as flawed as the underlying notion that Bush is popular. Bush & Co. are ruthless media manipulators and vengeful toward members of the press who write anything unfavorable about them. The press is cowed by the fear of retribution, end of story.
Well, maybe not totally the end of the story. It also has to do with media ownership, and the fact that being kind to Bush is far more likely to result in relaxed rules governing the aforementioned than being kind to Clinton ever would have.
And it might also have the teensiest, tiniest bit to do with the fact that the media is probably none to eager to face their own complicity in concealing the truth about this administration from the American people for the past four+ years.
Best Wishes, Peter Jennings
Link:
Peter Jennings, the chief ABC News anchorman for more than 20 years, has been diagnosed with lung cancer and will begin outpatient treatment next week, the network said Tuesday.
Attack on the Judiciary
Well, at least Conyers has some sense.
Tonight, my staff showed me a quote from Senator John Cornyn (found on Americablog) that speaks for itself: "And finally, I – I don't know if there is a cause-and-effect connection but we have seen some recent episodes of courthouse violence in this country. Certainly nothing new, but we seem to have run through a spate of courthouse violence recently that's been on the news. And I wonder whether there may be some connection between the perception in some quarters on some occasions where judges are making political decisions yet are unaccountable to the public, that it builds up and builds up and builds up to the point where some people engage in -- engage in violence. Certainly without any justification but a concern that I have that I wanted to share."
This apparent effort to rationalize violence against judges is deplorable. On its face, while it contains doubletalk that simultaneously offers a justification for such violence and then claims not to, the fundamental core of the statement seems to be that judges have somehow brought this violence on themselves. This also carries an implicit threat: that if judges do not do what the far right wants them to do (thus becoming the "judicial activists" the far right claims to deplore), the violence may well continue.
If this is what Senator Cornyn meant to say, it is outrageous, irresponsible and unbecoming of our leaders. To be sure, I have disagreed with many, many court rulings. (For example, Bush v. Gore may well be the single greatest example of judicial activism we have seen in our lifetime.) But there is no excuse, no excuse, for a Member of Congress to take our discourse to this ugly and dangerous extreme.
My message is not subtle today. It is simple. To my Republican colleagues: you are playing with fire, you are playing with lives, and you must stop.
Girls Are Icky
In women’s war against the attempted shove backwards into the days of yore being legislatively coordinated by George Bush and pals, the newest frontier of the battle is Title IX—the landmark 1972 law prohibiting gender discrimination in any education program or school activity that receives federal funds, which led to fuller participation by girls in the classroom and on the playing field. From yesterday’s Seattle Post-Intelligencer:
One step forward, one step backward. Push and push back. It is ever thus in the struggle for human rights, in which progress, if any, is usually measured in millimeters.On a side note, this certainly seems to be a class issue as well; not every student has a personal computer which makes e-mail readily accessible at all times. In other words, the poorer you are, the less likely you are to receive and respond to the e-mail in time.
[…]
[T]he Bush administration, without one public hearing, stealthily hacked away at Title IX with new guidelines that say colleges can comply by merely sending out e-mail surveys asking female students if they are interested in playing sports.
If there is little or no response, a school is free not to provide those sports opportunities. This change now trumps the three-way compliance test previously in force.
Under that test, compliance could be achieved by showing the percentage of female athletes was proportionate to female enrollment, the school had a pattern of expanding opportunities for women, or proving that the sports interests of women had been "fully and effectively" accommodated.
E-mail replies, or rather the lack of them, are going to determine whether women are granted access to a team in any given sport! A low response can be interpreted as no interest, and therefore no need, to provide equipment and access to gyms for women.
[…]
It is a pathetic excuse to evade the purpose of the law. The Department of Education has created a new loophole through which schools may return to the bad old days of denying women and girls an equal opportunity to participate in team sports. Decisions about who gets to play what sports are now in the hands of telemarketing techniques.
In what I feel can safely be classified as “not shocking,” Democrats and Republicans have vastly divergent reactions to Title IX.
Former Sen. Birch Bayh, D-Ind., the author of Title IX, was outraged. "Sports is all about advancing the ball, but the Department of Education has thrown women's athletics to the back court," he said.It is well documented (plug any combination of girls, sports, and self esteem into your search engine of choice) that girls, on average, suffer greater losses of self esteem during adolescence than boys, but girls who are involved in sports have less trouble struggling with self esteem issues than girls who don’t. (The same is true of boys who are involved in sports.) This makes it imperative to make sports available and accessible to girls—as opposed to attempts to undermine girls’ participation so as to reserve greater funding for boys.
[…]
Generally, Title IX has worked -- other schools have largely addressed most unfairness issues. Millions of girls not only get the desired exercise but win valuable scholarships too. But conservatives such as House Speaker Dennis Hastert, a former wrestling coach, complained that to make room for women's programs some schools have killed minor male sports.
Two years ago, the Bush administration created a special commission to review the law and its social implications, stacked with Title IX opponents. But the administration underestimated the popularity of Title IX not just with girls but their daddies and mommies and the panel buckled under public pressure to protect the law.
The group could not come up with a consensus, although one recommendation was the one the administration has now sneakily adopted -- that compliance could be met simply by surveying students to determine their interests.
It's no coincidence the administration waited until after the election to pull the plug on women's sports.
I understand Hastert’s frustration that there are schools who may need to cut a boys’ sport with less interest (say, lacrosse) to make room for a girls’ sport with greater interest (say, basketball), but his ire is misplaced. Neither the boys’ lacrosse team nor the girls’ basketball team should have to suffer. If he’s concerned about school funding, he would do well to look to his party’s continued tax cuts for the wealthy and pork barrel spending during wartime, ballooning state deficits, and his president’s unfunded education mandate, which puts an increased financial burden on schools. Women’s interests have been sacrificed enough in deference to men’s success. If the boys’ lacrosse team is getting left behind, it isn’t up to the girls’ basketball team to save them.
The Beast’s 50 Most Loathsome People in America, 2004
Oh my god.
This is so fucking hilarious, I nearly pissed myself laughing. I have no idea whether this has already circulated around the internet three thousand times, but just in case there’s anyone who hasn’t seen it (like I hadn’t), you must go.
I can’t decide which is my favorite, but this has to be up there (it’s the “Punishment” that really got me):
40. Laura BushGood lord. I’m weeping.
Crimes: Oh the first lady, what an inspiration she must be to android researchers everywhere. Smile, nod, smile, (look interested) nod, put on $50,000 dress, suck off the president and there you have a typical day for the first lady. Corporate yes-wives like her will hasten the coming of mandated burkas for American women. Actually looks related to George, which might explain their mongoloid children.
Smoking Gun: She married George Bush.
Punishment: Chugging a gallon of stem cells on Fear Factor.
(Hat tip to Mr. Furious' hubby, Mr. Curious.)
Random Bitchin'
Nothing is inspiring me to write this evening, so I’ll share with you a conversation I had with a local police officer, part of whose job is to go undercover to a gay pick-up area near the lake and bust men, usually married ones, who are living on the down low.
“There’s a special place in hell for you, where you’ll be buggered for all eternity by the men you collared.”
“Probably.”
“You know, what difference does it make? These guys aren’t hurting anyone. And if people weren’t so homophobic, they probably wouldn’t be doing that.”
“I know, but it’s against the law.”
“Do you ever get turned on while you’re doing it?”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“Isn’t there any other crime you could be stopping? Maybe they need to fire your asses and fix the potholes.”
This is the kind of shit that drives me fucking bonkers. Far be it from me to defend infidelity; it’s not good for a whole lot of reasons, not the least of which is the potential of a careless cheat to bring home a disease to an unwitting spouse—and in the days of deadly STDs, that’s no small matter. But the cops aren’t out tracking cheating husbands who are running around with other women, or cheating wives who are running around with other men (or other women, for that matter); even when cuckolding couples are caught in public, they’re usually sent home with a stern warning, not taken to jail and thoroughly humiliated by having their names printed in the paper. In fact, I’d wager one or two of the cops involved in such sting operations have dabbled in the adulterous arts, but that, of course, is different.
I’m totally annoyed that my tax dollars are being put to work to harass and embarrass gay men. Does it matter to my life or this community one way or another if a couple of dudes get it on in the woods, miles away from anything? Not a bit.
I would, however, be eminently pleased if the giant pothole in front of my house was fixed.
