Shakesville

Limted, Bitches! Limited!

Sunday, January 1, 2006:

If there’s anything this administration has taught us, it’s that the more Bush and his minions say something, the less likely it is to be true. (See: WMDs; Plame leak didn’t come from White House; the GOP is a big tent. That ought to get you started, and once your mind stops spinning, I can give you further suggestions for investigation, if you like.) So I really like Bush’s most recent defense of his spy program:

President Bush on Sunday strongly defended his domestic spying program, saying it's a limited program that tracks only incoming calls to the United States…

"This is a limited program designed to prevent attacks on the United States of America and, I repeat, limited," he said.

Monday, January 16, 2006:

In the anxious months after the Sept. 11 attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month.

But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans.

F.B.I. officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency that the unfiltered information was swamping investigators. The spy agency was collecting much of the data by eavesdropping on some Americans' international communications and conducting computer searches of phone and Internet traffic. Some F.B.I. officials and prosecutors also thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents, were pointless intrusions on Americans' privacy.

Now, I recognize that the president and I define some words very differently. Freedom. Democracy. Equality. Legal. But I never suspected we’d find ourselves in contention about a word as basic a limited, the definition of which I’ve always considered to be rather straightforward.

In truth, I’m less concerned about the encroachment of civil rights (although that is, clearly, a concern) than the utter uselessness of usurping so many agents’ time with twaddle. Hundreds of agents checking out dead-end tips the source of which were deliberately blurred so as to keep them ignorant of the illegality of their sourcing—what a time waster. What a perilous distraction from real threats to national security.

Those who rabidly defend the administration’s right to engage in warrantless eavesdropping and data mining—because it’s “necessary” to keep us “safe”—are fooling themselves. We’re not safer. Indeed, we may be less safe, because such untargeted nonsense doesn’t make finding the proverbial needle in the haystack any easier; it makes the haystack even bigger.

(More from The Heretik, Brilliant at Breakfast, and Ezra.)

PEEK

I'm doing a little guesting over at AlterNet's PEEK for the superb Evan Derkacz, and my first post is up here, pointing to a great post of Pam's, if you'd like to check it out.

Stunning Impeachment Poll

In early January, AfterDowningStreet commissioned a fourth poll with Zogby (more info on ADS’ polling initiative here) regarding impeachment. The question asked of 1,216 adults from Jan. 9-12 was: "If President Bush wiretapped American citizens without the approval of a judge, do you agree or disagree that Congress should consider holding him accountable through impeachment?"

The results? 52% agreed and 43% disagreed (+/- 2.9% margin of error). Respondents were asked to identify themselves by political ideology—Progressive, Liberal, Libertarian, Moderate, Conservative, or Very Conservative—and in each category except Conservative and Very Conservative, a majority outside the margin of error supported impeachment.

Progressive—90%. Libertarian—71%. Liberal—65%. Moderate—58%. Conservative—33%. Very conservative—28%.

What’s particularly notable about these numbers is that is even those identifying as Very Conservative support impeachment by a higher percentage than those of all political affiliations who supported impeachment and removal of President Clinton in the fall of 1998. The average support across 10 polls in August and September of that year for the impeachment and removal of President Clinton was only 26%.

That’s not only a smaller percentage than even those identifying as Very Conservative; it’s also half the total percentage of Americans who agree that Bush should be held accountable by Congress through impeachment if he wiretapped American citizens without the approval of a judge (which, of course, he has already admitted doing).

And still the media considers this a non-story. I’m, ahem, disinclined to agree.

Golden Globez

How does Gustavo Santaolalla not win for Best Score? I. Get. It. John Williams is a great composer blah blah blah. He doesn't need any more awards. And none of his scores have ever given me the shivers the way Santaolalla's did.

George Clooney thanks Jack Abramoff and makes a "Jack Off" joke. Funny.

Did Dennis Quaid call Brokeback Mountain a "dick flick"? WTF? No scenes of anything remotely gay in any clip of said dick flick. Aren't we all brave for celebrating a movie we're apparently slightly ashamed of.

Ryan Phillipe: Totally drunk. Rein it in, or you'll be watching the Globez with Chad Lowe next year.

How was CSI not nominated for anything? And why did they make William Peterson present with Pamela Anderson? What is Pamela Anderson even doing at the Golden Globes? Irony? Her dress was trying to strangle her.

S. Epatha rocks.

Why do all the conservative celebrities run for office? Ahnold, Clint Eastwood (borderline conservative), Ronald Reagan, Sonny Bono (borderline celebrity), etc. I think the liberals need to step up to the plate. Clooney/Robbins '08.

That is all.

More Argh

I find it interesting that on the same day Bush is prattling on about Dr. King’s legacy and the need for equality, the first female African president, Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, was sworn in—and Bush, who has (if memory serves; correct me if I’m wrong) made only a single trip to Africa (July 2003) during his five years in office, dispatched his wife and his work wife to traipse around and pretend as if his administration actually gives a crap about either women of any color.

(Which, in case anyone is under the dire misapprehension that they do, they don't. "W is for Women" and Ken Mehlman's heartfelt outreach program to the black community are, as it turns out, just two big loads of horsepuckey. Sorry to ruin Christmas for you, Shakers.)

"Wheeeeeeeeeeee!"
I guess the first female president in a continent’s history isn’t worth his time. Of course, millions of people dying of AIDS, starvation, war, and exposure aren’t worth his time, either, so I suppose we can hardly expect him to raise much fuss over one person.

To give him an opportunity to correct the record, in case I was being unfair, I sent one of my highly-paid correspondents to ask him why he didn’t feel compelled to join the Bush Bitchez in Africa. He wasn’t available for an extended interview, but did give us a quick comment:

Dude, it’s ’cuz I’m a total jag.

In Which I Inappropriately Presume the Sentiments of a Man Whose Thoughts I'm Not Fit to Consider

Pig

President Bush hailed Martin Luther King Jr. Monday as one of the greatest Americans who ever lived, but said more must be done to ensure that his dream of equality becomes a reality.

HOW ABOUT YOU START WITH NOT SUPPORTING BULLSHIT LIKE A FEDERAL MARRIAGE AMENDMENT THAT CODIFIES INEQUALITY INTO THE CONSTITUTION, YOU FREAKING KNOB?!

"At the dawn of this new century, America can be proud of the progress we have made toward equality, but we all must recognize we have more to do," Bush said during a Martin Luther King Jr. holiday celebration at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. "The reason to honor Martin Luther King is to remember his strength of character and his leadership, but also to remember the remaining work."

It’s not too bloody hard to “remember the remaining work” when you and your ass-faced conservative cronies take every opportunity possible to ensure that NO FURTHER WORK TOWARD FULL EQUALITY gets done.

"We recommit ourselves to working for the dream that Martin Luther King gave his life for — an America where the dignity of every person is respected; where people are judged not by the color of their skin -- by the content of their character; and where the hope of a better tomorrow is in every neighborhood in this country," Bush said.

FUCK. YOU.

Anyone who doesn’t believe in those words hasn’t earned the right to utter them.

Thanks a Bunch, Hon

The Reasons Tom Cruise Sucks List just got a little longer:

TOM CRUISE has given his pregnant fiancée KATIE HOLMES a unique 27th birthday present - a DVD compendium of every movie he has acted in.

The WAR OF THE WORLDS star, 43, decided there was no better gift for his wife-to-be than a full history of his long and fruitful career.

A source tells British newspaper the Daily Express, "Each was inscribed with a special handwritten love message to the future mother of his child."

Cheapass mofo.

Luckily, one of my top-secret anonymous informants has managed to secure copies of the handwritten notes for us.

Adorable.

Catastrophe!

Oh, Martha-Ann, lend me your fainting couch. I have just read the most alarming report in the Boston Globe, and I need a soft place to catch me as I swoon, a mint julip, and a handsome, preferably dark-skinned, man to fan me with palm fronds STAT. It seems that the number of male anchormen on the teevee news has reached an all-time low. Great Caesar’s ghost, Martha-Ann! How are we to understand the news if it is not delivered with the gravitas that only a proper baritone can convey?

In the television news industry, a good man is getting hard to find.

Heavens, just like everywhere else. It’s all ladies, metrosexuals, and poofters anywhere you look these days.

The ascent of women is a natural progression in the industry. The scarcity of men in the pipeline is another story.

The numbers of anchormen, which started declining 10 years ago and now are at an all-time low, have left station managers scratching their heads and college journalism professors pondering their enrollment. At Emerson College, there is just one man in the graduate broadcast journalism program. There are 20 female students.

''A lot of young men are encouraged to go into law and medicine, engineering and math," says Coleen Marren, WCVB's news director, who has noticed the trend.

Noted: Women are succeeding because men aren’t trying.

Marren said that although her stash of resumes from prospective males and females is the same size, the stronger candidates are women. That became a problem in 2003, when she began a 17-month nationwide search for a fresh male face to replace Everett at 11 p.m. ''We auditioned at least 10 people," Marren said.

In the end, [WCVB-TV anchor Ed Harding] got the job. ''The best person was in-house," Marren said. ''We did a thorough search."

Noted: The majority of strong candidates being female is “a problem.”

Also noted: A man still got the job.

Shari Thurer, a Boston psychologist, adjunct associate professor at Boston University, and author of ''The End of Gender: A Psychological Autopsy," goes further. ''In the era of 'Good Night, and Good Luck,' newscasters were macho and fiery. Now they have to be so neutral and unbiased that . . . it doesn't seem manly," she says.

''It's more respected to be a pundit than an anchorman because a pundit can have an opinion," Thurer adds.

Noted: Women are neither fiery nor opinionated by nature, so perhaps they’re just better suited to the bland dissemination of factoids that masquerades as news these days. (Which probably also explains the dearth of female pundits and prominent columnists, I guess.)

Once all the pop-psychology and gender stereotypes were exhausted, we finally get down to some more viable possibilities that could explain the disparity.

Yet experts say young men are backing off from the low-pay scale that awaits them upon graduation.

The $20,000 salary of the average anchor in a small market is more than what a woman in a smaller town could expect to make directly after graduation in lots of fields. This is not exclusively the result of pay inequality, but also because of a disparity in what is considered entry-level work for women vs. men. Women who graduate with a business degree, for example, are much more likely than men to find themselves in an administrative role in their first post-graduate job. Women start their business careers as secretaries, and hence with lower starting salaries, in larger numbers than do men. So women may not consider the starting salary in one field as an impediment in the same way their male cohorts do. That’s not a good thing, but it’s reasonable to assume this is a contributing factor to why women may outnumber men in the field.

But, some argue, women move up faster in the business.

''If you dress up the average woman coming out of college and put on makeup, she looks like an adult. The average man coming out of college looks like he's going through puberty," said Bob Papper, a professor of telecommunications at Ball State in Muncie, Ind., and the director of the RTNDA's annual study on television news.

Women may advance more quickly than men for a reason that’s outwith their control. It’s, again, not a good thing that men are hindered by arbitrary expectations predicated upon image, but it’s also reasonable to assume this makes the field more attractive for women and less attractive for men.

''There is so much interest in sports broadcasting, more than the jobs out there can support," [Chris Tuohey, an associate professor of broadcast journalism] warns. ''We keep encouraging our male students to take a look at doing news. The market is right now for moving up."

If men, in greater numbers than their female counterparts, are going into broadcast journalism to compete against one another within a limited niche, while more woman retain a larger focus—making them more prepared for anchor roles—then men are self-selecting themselves out of the competition. Ditto if they’re eschewing the field entirely because they see opportunities for more money and quicker advancement elsewhere. And that’s really not much of a story.

Of course, it’s a lot more fun to pretend otherwise.

ARGH

GORE V. BUSH: If a tree falls in a forest... A former Vice-President of the United States delivers a major speech accusing George W. Bush of breaking the law. What do all three cable news nets cover under the "Breaking News" banner? An overturned tanker truck on a New York highway. THIS is the problem for the left. And as I've said a hundred times: if the Dem establishment doesn't go after the media institutionally, things simply will not change. It's astonishing to me that they haven't gotten it yet. The only other option is for the progressive netroots to organize and fight the media on its own, an uphill struggle, to say the least...

Seriously pathetic.

I swear to Jeebus if aliens landed on US soil with the express purpose of delivering to us an environmentally-friendly fuel source which could be utilized by our existing infrastructure and costing nary a penny to implement, Pat Robertson would give a speech on his own crackpot television show claiming the aliens were sent by God to slaughter us as retribution for homosexual deviance, Gore would give an important policy address about the environmental, economic, and national security benefits of the new fuel, and Robertson would get the fucking headline. That is, until Fox News pulled a single line out of Gore’s speech about how he once voted to fund an experimental extraterrestrial communications program, and report it as “Unstable Gore Says He Personally Invited Aliens.”

Meanwhile, Cheney would show up on Meet the Press gravely intoning that the aliens have ties to bin Laden, Bush would declare them a threat to national security, and we’d immediately be three weeks away from war.

Gore

Raw Story’s got the entire text of Gore’s speech today. Here’s just an excerpt:

An executive who arrogates to himself the power to ignore the legitimate legislative directives of the Congress or to act free of the check of the judiciary becomes the central threat that the Founders sought to nullify in the Constitution - an all-powerful executive too reminiscent of the King from whom they had broken free. In the words of James Madison, "the accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."

[…]

The Congress we have today is unrecognizable compared to the one in which my father served. There are many distinguished Senators and Congressmen serving today. I am honored that some of them are here in this hall. But the legislative branch of government under its current leadership now operates as if it is entirely subservient to the Executive Branch…

I call upon Democratic and Republican members of Congress today to uphold your oath of office and defend the Constitution. Stop going along to get along. Start acting like the independent and co-equal branch of government you're supposed to be.

But there is yet another Constitutional player whose pulse must be taken and whose role must be examined in order to understand the dangerous imbalance that has emerged with the efforts by the Executive Branch to dominate our constitutional system.

We the people are-collectively-still the key to the survival of America's democracy. We-as Lincoln put it, "[e]ven we here"-must examine our own role as citizens in allowing and not preventing the shocking decay and degradation of our democracy.

Thomas Jefferson said: "An informed citizenry is the only true repository of the public will."

…And it is "We the people" who must now find once again the ability we once had to play an integral role in saving our Constitution.

And here there is cause for both concern and great hope. The age of printed pamphlets and political essays has long since been replaced by television - a distracting and absorbing medium which sees determined to entertain and sell more than it informs and educates.

Lincoln's memorable call during the Civil War is applicable in a new way to our dilemma today: "We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country."

…It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it is up to us to do the same.

We have a duty as Americans to defend our citizens' right not only to life but also to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is therefore vital in our current circumstances that immediate steps be taken to safeguard our Constitution against the present danger posed by the intrusive overreaching on the part of the Executive Branch and the President's apparent belief that he need not live under the rule of law.

I endorse the words of Bob Barr, when he said, "The President has dared the American people to do something about it. For the sake of the Constitution, I hope they will."

…As Dr. King once said, "Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us."

The whole thing is pretty amazing. Say what you will about Gore, but he’s about the only one who’s got the balls to use whatever platform he has to say what needs to be said, at every opportunity he’s given.

MLK

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today my friends - so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification - one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together…

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi – from every mountainside.

Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow freedom to ring - when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children - black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics - will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

— August 28, 1963

Sigh

Mark Helprin in the LA Times:

THE PRESIDENT believes and often states, as if it were a self-evident truth, that "democracies are peaceful countries." This claim, which has been advanced in the past in regard to Christianity, socialism, Islam and ethical culture, is the postulate on which the foreign policy of the United States now rests. Balance of power, deterrence and punitive action have been abandoned in favor of a scheme to recast the political cultures of broad regions, something that would be difficult enough even with a flawless rationale because the power of even the most powerful country in the world is not adequate to transform the world at will.

Nor is the rationale flawless…

Even without reference to the case of a democracy that, finding self-defense insufficient justification and retaliation an insufficient end, makes war on a non-democracy so as to make the non-democracy a democracy, the postulate on which the president has in all good faith chosen to rely is contradicted by inconvenient fact.

Helprin, btw, is a conservative who has served as a columnist for the Wall Street Journal and as a speechwriter for former GOP presidential candidate Bob Dole.

I’m beginning to think that the only thing that may save us from the seemingly unstoppable conservative movement in its current, anti-democratic incarnation is an allegiance between ethical, traditional conservatives and real progressives, who share in common a respect for democracy, the Constitution, and civil liberties—not to mention a willingness to debate each other honestly on process and policy. I’m perfectly willing to set aside ideological differences with someone with whose politics I tend to disagree, as long as we share the same desire to put an end to the destructive forces currently leading us in a very, very wrong direction, and I hope that both progressives and traditional conservatives with the power to actually effect change share that opinion. The Gore-Barr hook-up scheduled for today is an encouraging start.

“What if we faced a constitutional crisis and hardly anyone noticed?”

So asks Jonathan Alter in Newsweek, in a scary but vital piece. I won’t even excerpt. Just got read.

Laziness

I just needed a day to do absolutely nothing, so I spent the day vegging out like the biggest slackmonster in the world, watching an entire season of The Amazing Race. I’ve never watched the whole series before, though I’d seen an episode. It was really enjoyable, especially because (don’t read any further if you don’t want to know who won the series that ended almost a year ago, lol) I got to watch the wonderful Uchenna and Joyce Agu make an absolutely stunning come-from-behind to crush the hell out of some irritating duo called Rob and Amber who apparently were on the show Survivor at some point.

Good stuff. It’s nice to have a lazy day, sprawled on the couch like a side of beef, every once in awhile.

Five Weird Things About Myself

The Fat Lady Sings has tagged me with the “Five Weird Things About Myself” meme, so here goes…

1. I can affect a lazy eye on command.

2. I love raw carrots, but don’t particularly care for cooked ones. I love cooked mushrooms, but don’t particularly care for raw ones. Just about any other vegetable, I like either way.

3. My hands are extremely lined—both on the tops and the palms. They’re not wrinkled, just covered in thousands of little lines. People have always commented on them; I’m quite fond of them, although they are certainly weird.

(That picture, btw, barely does them justice. There are hundreds more little lines you can’t see. On the palmside of my pinky finger alone, I count 65 lines.)

4. My first word was “cat.” I’m fairly certain it was a self-defense mechanism.

5. I share a birthday (May 11) with Irving Berlin, Salvador Dali, Doodles Weaver, Louis Farrakhan, and Kris Novoselic. I also shared a birthday with my grandmother, who passed away many years ago.

Not going to tag anyone, but if you do it, let me know!

RIP Shelley Winters

Oscar winner Shelley Winters has died at age 85.

Winters was in some films I absolutely adore—A Place in the Sun, The Diary of Anne Frank, A Patch of Blue—but my all-time favorite film of hers is The Poseidon Adventure.

She had one of those personalities people either love or hate. I happened to love it. She was a great actress as well as an opinionated and vocal feminist, and I just always thought she was utterly fabulous, both onscreen and off. A most excellent, excellent broad.

I have bursts of being a lady, but it doesn’t last long. — Shelley Winters

al-Zawahiri Not Dead

What a fucking shocker.

Two senior Pakistani officials told The Associated Press that the CIA acted on incorrect information in launching the attack early Friday in the northwestern village of Damadola, near the Afghan border.

Citing unidentified American intelligence officials, U.S. news networks reported that CIA-operated Predator drone aircraft carried out the missile strike because al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, was thought to be at a compound in the village or about to arrive.

"Their information was wrong, and our investigations conclude that they acted on a false information," said a senior Pakistani intelligence official with direct knowledge of Pakistan's investigations into the attack.

His account was confirmed by a senior government official who said al-Zawahri "was not there." Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the subject's sensitivity.

Washington had no comment on the reports that the attack was aimed at al-Zawahri…

Pentagon, State Department, National Security Council and intelligence officials all said they had no information on the reports concerning al-Zawahri. A U.S. military spokesman in Afghanistan, Lt. Mike Cody, referred questions on the matter to the Pentagon.

America: Land of Bad Intelligence.

We can only use that excuse so many times, boys. After awhile, people might start getting suspicious that we're actually just doing whatever the hell we want to without regard for anyone else. And we certainly wouldn't want people to get that impression, now would we?

Sacked

Hair tragedy, shady bastard, and GOP Ohio Congressman Bob Ney is under pressure from House Speaker Denny Hastert to resign as chairman of the House Administration Committee.

…Justice Department documents linked Ney to a bribery scheme involving convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Ney's committee has jurisdiction over the Republican reform agenda in the wake of the Abramoff scandal, and Hastert believes it is inappropriate to let Ney run it, said a GOP leadership aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the negotiations between Ney and the speaker.

Yeesh—a guy’s got some kind of serious ethical problems when the odious, oversized bloatsack known as Hastert thinks you’re too crooked to stay your course.

BradBlog's got more.

al-Zawahiri May Be Dead

Or not. Or maybe so. Or not. Or maybe so.

Today, according to Pakistani military sources, U.S. aircraft attacked a compound known to be frequented by high-level al Qaeda operatives. Pakistani officials tell ABC News that al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, may have been among them.

I wish I could muster the energy to give a shit, but I just can’t. Possibly getting the #2 man in an organization that perpetrated a four-year old attack which has repeatedly served as a justification for undermining our civil liberties and was tacitly linked to a completely unrelated regime to rationalize an unjust war, when the mastermind of said attack still hasn’t been “smoked out”—either dead or alive—just isn’t making me feel particularly orgasmic.

But then again, I’m a traitorous liberal, so what do you expect?