Iran welcomes dialogue, rejects condition. Iranian Foreign Minister, Manouchehr Mottaki has said that Iran will not negotiate about their nuclear rights but is prepared, “within a defined just framework and without any discrimination, to hold a dialogue.”
Bush has responded, “We'll see whether or not that is the firm position of their government… If they continue their abstinence, if they continue to say to the world ‘We really don't care what your opinion is,' then the world is going to act in concert."
(Abstinence? As in, abstaining from doing exactly what we want? Surely, he meant obstinacy.)
In which it comes as no surprise to anyone…
Bush: Worst President Since WWII
Bush was rated the worst of the 11 post-war presidents by 34% of those surveyed in a Quinnipiac poll May 23-30. He bested (worsted?) the runner-up, Nixon, by double.
George W. Bush: 34%
Richard Nixon: 17%
Bill Clinton: 16%
Jimmy Carter: 13%
Lyndon Johnson: 4%
George H.W. Bush: 3%
Ronald Reagan: 3%
Gerald Ford: 2%
Harry Truman: 1%
John Kennedy: 1%
Dwight Eisenhower: 0%
Don’t Know: 5%
Ronald Reagan was rated the best, with Clinton coming in a close second.
Ronald Reagan: 28%
Bill Clinton: 25%
John Kennedy: 18%
Harry Truman: 7%
Jimmy Carter: 5%
Dwight Eisenhower: 5%
George W. Bush: 3%
George H.W. Bush: 2%
Lyndon Johnson: 1%
Gerald Ford: 1%
Richard Nixon: 1%
Don’t Know: 4%
Somebody tell me who these knob-ends are who can’t come up with a best and worst president since WWII.
The Blogfather
Interesting article in Salon about Jerome Armstrong, the founder of MyDD who is now a consultant for Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, who hasn’t announced that he will be running for president in 2008, but will. It addresses some of the familiar issues about the connections between forged between the blogosphere and the Dem establishment, and also touches on the relationship between Armstrong and his Crashing the Gate co-author Kos, who launched his blogging career until Armstrong’s mentorship at MyDD.
It was the latter bit I found most interesting, particularly the sudden turn on Paul Hackett, which I had no idea was influenced by Armstrong’s employment by Sherrod Brown, whose candidacy pushed Hackett out of Ohio’s senate race.Armstrong, who had been working as a consultant for Brown, encouraged an online rebellion against Hackett. Before long, Moulitsas and other bloggers had abandoned their once-favorite son, arguing, along with Democratic Party leaders, that Brown was more electable. In one post, on Oct. 6, Moulitsas wrote, "It might be a good idea for Hackett to stand down." This shocked many readers who had cheered another Kos post just two days earlier, in which Moulitsas seemed to endorse Hackett in a race against Brown. "Give me an Iraq vet over a career politician," he wrote.
It also details Kos’ retreat from his battle against the DLC; Armstrong’s employer Warner is a DLC-aligned candidate.
"It looked like Jerome and Markos were using their big-box blogs to steamroll into Ohio," said Russell Hughlock, aka Pounder, an electrical engineer who runs the BuckeyeStateBlog. "A lot of people left Kos ... because they got pissed."
Moulitsas told me that both of his posts were, in fact, consistent, and that he had never changed his mind. "One of them spoke from the heart. The other spoke from the brain," he said, explaining that he, reluctantly, concluded Hackett couldn't win the Senate seat. "I would rather have Paul Hackett in the Senate.""We need to make the DLC radioactive," Kos wrote in August 2005. "No calls for a truce will be brooked."
I certainly take no issue with either of them parlaying their success as bloggers into careers as consultants, nor in their decision to use their blogs to support any consultancy endeavors on behalf of the people for whom either of them work. Everyone blogs for a different reason and with different goals in mind.
…As for the lack of recent rants against the organization, he says he no longer rails against the DLC because he does not want to raise its profile. "I realized that the more I talked about them the more relevant they became," he said. "That was my realization last summer." As for his friendship with Armstrong, Moulitsas makes no apologies. "There is no doubt that Jerome impacts my thinking and my thinking impacts his," he said. "The fact is that Jerome and I talk a lot."
I’m just curious as to whether they’ve crashed through the gates in a way that will ultimately benefit anyone other than themselves and their employers. The idea is (or was), I think, that the blogosphere could influence change within the Democratic establishment, but it seems to me that as big bloggers are being absorbed into the establishment in some way, the bloggers are being influenced more than they are being influential.
Perhaps that is, in reality, the only (or best) option for bloggers who want to forge a career in politics. Short of the left producing its own Richard Scaife who’s willing to fund independent bloggers, it’s going to be very difficult to sustain autonomy from the Dem establishment. When our best resource is the one organization we most need to change, I fear there’s little hope for effecting that change.
Thoughts?
How disgusted…Part 2
Meanwhile, back in Iraq, Shiite death squads are killing gays in accordance with a fatwa issued last October by al-Sistani, whose website says, “The people involved [in homosexuality] should be killed in the worst, most severe way of killing.” The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has confirmed that gay Iraqis are being kidnapped and murdered, but the US doesn’t give a crap. As Blogenfreude notes, “Here in the U.S., though, they'll start with a constitutional amendment—one step at a time.”
How disgusted is it possible to be with one administration?
Every time I think Bush and Cheney have finally spelunked to the lowest possible depths of my reserve of disdain, they manage to discover one more hidden chamber of hoarded contempt and antipathy, and boldly march in and set to work with their pickaxes of arrogance and drills of hubris, exploiting every last speck of my scorn for everything that it’s worth. By the time these two pillagers of ill will are through, I’ll have nothing but bare cupboards, and the only response I’ll have left for someone who pokes me in the eye is, “And a good day to you, too, sir!”
For Bush, Talks With Iran Were a Last Resort. “During the past month, according to European officials and some current and former members of the Bush administration, it became obvious to Mr. Bush that he could not hope to hold together a fractious coalition of nations to enforce sanctions — or consider military strikes on Iranian nuclear sites — unless he first showed a willingness to engage Iran's leadership directly over its nuclear program and exhaust every nonmilitary option.”
When it comes to Cheney, it gets even worse. “In the end, said one former official who has kept close tabs on the debate, ‘it came down to convincing Cheney and others that if we are going to confront Iran, we first have to check off the box’ of trying talks.”
And, big surprise, not everyone in that aforementioned “fractious coalition of nations” is thrilled with the ultimatum issued to Iran as a condition of holding talks. “[S]ome participants in the drawn-out nuclear drama questioned whether this was an offer intended to fail, devised to show the extent of Iran's intransigence.” A pretty decent question, considering that the US used almost precisely the same tactic in the lead-up to the Iraq War.
The administration says the conditions are “a test” of Iran’s willingness to seriously engage the West. But how on earth do we expect to be taken seriously by anyone, when we appear to consider diplomacy just another box that needs to be checked off before we can move on to the more drastic measures that have the rabid warmongers in D.C. foaming at the mouths with greedy anticipation?
Mapping Our Rights
Via Pam, you’ve got to check out this new website, Mapping Our Rights: Navigating Discrimination Against Women, Men and Families, which ranks the 50 states based on their treatment of reproductive and sexual rights, and their support of families. “Mapping Our Rights illustrates how different state policies affect who we can marry, when or whether we can have children, and if we have access to health care or social security benefits.”
South Dakota is, unsurprisingly, ranked #50. My state, Indiana, also scrapes the bottom of the barrel at #49.Indiana received 100 penalty points on the following filters:
Serious suckitude. How does your state do?
~ Abortion method bans (also known as ‘partial-birth’ abortion bans)
~ Mandatory counseling before abortion
~ Mandatory waiting period before abortion
~ Mandatory parental involvement in minors’ abortions
~ TRAP (targeted regulation of abortion providers) laws
~ Abortion coverage under the Medicaid program
~ Contraceptive equity in private insurance
~ Medicaid coverage of family planning services
~ Confidential family planning services for minors
~ Emergency contraception (EC) in the emergency room
~ Emergency contraception (EC) pharmacy access
~ Hate crimes legislation for LGBT Community
~ DOMA (Defense of Marriage Acts) and similar constitutional amendments
~ Same-sex marriage laws
~ Abstinence-only education
~ Legal status of midwifery
~ State constitutional guarantee of equal rights for men and women (ERA)
~ “Conscience” or refusal clauses
~ Fetal endangerment laws
~ Fetal homicide laws
Indiana received 50 penalty points on the following filters:
~ Introduced: Ban on abortion except to save a woman’s life
~ Lack of protection or restriction: Second-parent/Step-parent adoption by same-sex partners
Al Gore in a landslide, or Hillary in a crushing defeat
A new behavior prediction model, called Affective Encryption Analysis, which was originally developed as “a potential tool for the intelligence community” (much like George Tenet), has found that Al Gore is the only possible Democratic challenger who could win in 2008. Having absolutely no idea whatsoever what the methodology behind this model is, which gives me no ability to critique its value or possible efficacy, I pass on this information with the caveat that my personal opinion of its worth is nothing other than amusement. (Even if the methodology is sound, it’s far too soon for predictions like this to be viable, anyway.)
Using a new research tool called Affective Encryption Analysis, Dr. Herndon led an investigation into the likely outcome of the 2008 Presidential election…Gore/Clooney ’08!
Among the surprises was the overall weakness of potential Democratic presidential challengers.
“Despite the widespread public dissatisfaction with the George W. Bush administration, our results showed even greater ill-feelings toward potential Democratic challengers,” says Dr. Herndon. “But there was one exception: Al Gore.”
“With a predictive accuracy of 93%, our results showed that Al Gore would easily defeat any Republican challenger in 2008. However, he is the only Democrat on the scene today who has the ability to defeat the likely Republican challengers, who we believe will be either John McCain or Jeb Bush.”
Results were not rosy for Hillary Clinton. “Hillary Clinton would suffer a disastrous defeat at the hands of any Republican who receives the nomination,” states Dr. Herndon.
Should Al Gore decide not to seek the 2008 nomination, the Democrats “have their work cut out for them,” according to Dr. Herndon.
“Our results suggest that a potentially successful Democratic nominee may be lurking in the entertainment industry. Does this sound strange? Maybe. But when it comes to politics, we may have to get used to a future full of surprises.”
(Hat tip Political Wire.)
Swastika left on driveway in suburban Chicago
The house has been under construction for two years and is nearly finished. Recently, the construction crew has been working on the long driveway, composed of red brick. Sometime last weekend, someone went onto the property and removed about 100 of the bricks in the shape of a swastika.
Though the bricklayers are still working, [Shenaz Sait] hasn't covered the swastika up yet.The story points out that the Sait’s aren’t Jewish, but Indian—and they’ve lived in the US for 36 years. What is doesn’t say is that many Indians, particularly Sikhs, were harassed after 9/11 by ignorant fuckwits who mistook them for Arabs. Who, you know, shouldn’t have been harassed, either, but try telling that to someone so vile and idiotic that they shrug away distinctions between “Sikh” and “Arab” with comments like, “A raghead is a raghead.”
"I need the neighbors to know if this happens, they should report it to police too," she said. "It's revolting. I want the people who did this to know that they cannot come back and do this again."
Sait and her husband have been working on the home for two years. She says it won't deter them from moving in.
"I've spent enough blood and tears and sweat on this," she said. "It's just scary that someone has this much hatred. It's kind of sickening, but nothing is going to scare us away."
It just makes me ill when this stuff happens. I’m glad the Saits haven’t been deterred—and I hope their neighbors (none of whom, rather curiously, were interviewed for the story) are, too.
That Darn Liberal Media
Yesterday I mentioned an article in the WaPo which took Harry Reid to task for accepting “free ringside tickets from the Nevada Athletic Commission to three professional boxing matches while that state agency was trying to influence him on federal regulation of boxing,” even though the acceptance of gifts from governmental agencies (like the Nevada Athletic Commission, from whom the tickets came) are legal, and even though Reid voted against the legislation for which the Commission was seeking his support during that period.
Paul Kiel’s dug up some additional problems with the article.The crux of Solomon's story was that Reid acted wrongly by accepting free boxing tickets from the Nevada Athletic Commission. In particular, Solomon focused on a title bout in September 2004 that Reid and McCain both attended. "Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., insisted on paying $1,400 for the tickets he shared with Reid for a 2004 championship fight," Solomon wrote.
Sloppy reporting at best; a total smear-job at worst. In either case, a clear attempt to perpetuate the notion that the Dems are as dirty as the GOP. The media has decided that the corruption meme is “Bipartisan, bitches!” and even the truth won’t dissuade them. Problem is, how many people read the WaPo and walked away from that article sufficiently juiced up with the notion that both parties really are just as corrupt after all? Kiel’s done great work tearing this piece to shreds, but it won’t undo the damage that’s been done.
But it turns out that it would have been illegal for Reid to reimburse the commission for the seats. That's because these weren't actually tickets - they were credentials with no face value given to V.I.P.'s. And according to the boxing promoter who awarded those credentials to Reid, it is illegal for the commission to accept payment for them. Despite that, McCain insisted on paying, and so the commission simply gave his check (written for a seemingly arbitrary amount) to a charity since it couldn't accept it.
What's more, that same promoter says that in other cases where Reid and McCain received tickets that could be reimbursed, Reid paid.
"She beaned' em!"
Via Ezra, this recording of a guy’s description of a car accident he’s just witnessed has me absolutely ending myself with laughter! Totally hysterical.
RFK, Jr. on the 2004 Election
BradBlog’s got the scoop about the article RFK, Jr. wrote for Rolling Stone, which will hit newsstands this Friday.
The article -- headlined on the cover as "Did Bush Steal the 2004 Election?: How 350,000 Votes Disappeared in Ohio" -- has been several months in development and will contend that a concerted effort was undertaken by high-level Republican officials to steal the Election in Ohio -- and thus the country -- in 2004!Good god. What hope do the Dems have this November, or any other November, if the GOP continues to get away with this shit?
Kennedy told The BRAD BLOG this morning that "the best evidence says the Republicans succeeded" in their plan.
He writes in the 10-page long article, and confirmed to us today, that evidence shows Ohio Sec. of State J. Kenneth Blackwell was "certainly in on" the scheme, and there are indications that the effort went all the way up to the White House.
Talkin’ Shit
The US has agreed to talk to Iran, on the condition it “first agrees to suspend its programs to enrich uranium and reprocess spent nuclear fuel.” Condi Rice sent the message to Iran via the Swiss government.
"We urge Iran to make this choice for peace, to abandon its ambition for nuclear weapons," Rice said.I don’t see how useful and productive diplomacy can start with the issuance of an ultimatum, the parameters of which we’re not even willing to adhere ourselves, but wev. That’s why I’m some schlub in Indiana and not the Secretary of State.
Refusal to do so, she said, "will lead to international isolation and progressively stronger political and economic sanctions."
Huh?
I don’t even know why I’m surprised by this shit anymore, but I am:
When was the president first briefed about the events in Haditha?So, Time started making calls to the White House in January, two months after the incident, and only then was Bush made aware of it. I can’t find in any news reports what the official timeline of the military investigation was, but we know that the story about what happened has changed at least twice, prompting a separate inquiry into a possible cover-up and suggesting that someone in the military knew there was a problem—and if the allegations about what happened turn out to be true, it’s a major fucking problem. A human rights problem, an ethical problem, a PR problem…a problem of Abu Ghraib proportions, of which the president should have been made aware for reasons other than an interested reporter, one would think.
"When a Time reporter first made the call,'' Snow said. "Time began asking questions about it.''
The president then was briefed by National Security Adviser Steve Hadley, Snow said, and the president "began asking questions then.''
UPDATE: The preliminary inquiry has found "evidence that U.S. Marines killed two dozen Iraqi civilians in an unprovoked attack in November, contradicting the troops' account, U.S. officials said on Wednesday." Bush comments:
I am troubled by the initial news stories. I am mindful there is a thorough investigation going on. If in fact laws were broken there will be punishment.Troubled by the stories. Interesting word choice.
Shakes Makes Sense of It All*
First, a little quote of the day for you: “Marriage is under vicious attack…from the forces of hell itself…”
Thanks for the hot tip, Dr. Dobson. He’s always so helpful.
Meanwhile, Oddjob pointed to this post at Sully’s place, which shares a little tidbit about the Antichrist in the Left Behind franchise—he’s conceived by a woman and “the genetic material” of two men; her husband and his gay lover. Interesting. I see that whole contempt for science thing continues unabated. The evil spawn then goes on to—I shit you not—become the head of the UN after the Rapture, thusly rendering a parody of the Left Behind books a total impossibility.
So the Antichrist has partially (1/3?) gay DNA in conservative Christian fiction, and marriage is under attack from the forces of hell and from gays (who will destroy the earth) in conservative Christian “reality.”
This is all mooshing together in my mind to create a Big Gay Satan, which in turn conjures The South Park Movie, in which a Big Gay Satan is Saddam Hussein’s lover, which leads me to believe that the conservative platform, including both domestic and foreign policy, is all based on a movie subtitled “Bigger, Longer, and Uncut,” a cheeky penis reference, which reminds me that our president’s name is Bush, a euphemism for a vagina, and now it all makes sense why we’re well and truly fucked.
-----------------
* Or loses her mind once and for all.
"I Kick Ass for the Lord!" Part 2: The Ass-Kickening
As you may recall, a while ago I posted about the upcoming video game based on the "Left Behind" series of laughable tripe books. Well, the games will soon be released, (in October, just in time for Satan's birthday!) and now we can see that extremely violent video games aren't just for heathens anymore! (bolds mine)
Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued high-tech military weaponry, and instructed to engage the infidel on the streets of New York City. You are on a mission - both a religious mission and a military mission -- to convert or kill Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, gays, and anyone who advocates the separation of church and state - especially moderate, mainstream Christians. Your mission is "to conduct physical and spiritual warfare"; all who resist must be taken out with extreme prejudice. You have never felt so powerful, so driven by a purpose: you are 13 years old. You are playing a real-time strategy video game whose creators are linked to the empire of mega-church pastor Rick Warren, best selling author of The Purpose Driven Life.
The game, slated for release by October 2006 in advance of the Christmas shopping rush, has been previewed at video game exhibitions, and reviewed by major newspapers and magazines. But until now, no fan or critic has pointed out the controversial game's connection to Mr. Warren or his dominionist agenda.
This is really incredible... a "Christian" video game, the purpose of which is to kill as many people as possible. And not only non-believers... no no no. Other Christians (not true Christians like you, the player, of course) are also fair game! It's all done in the name of Jesus.
Has your irony meter overheated yet? No? Well click on over to read more and check out some screenshots. It's "The Sims"... Judgment Day style! And lucky you, you get to play judge, jury, and executioner!
But what's that you say? You play video games to escape? You're a crazed, bigoted religious nut in real life, and you want to try something new? Well, fear not, young hatemonger... you can also join the forces of Satan!
This game immerses children in present-day New York City -- 500 square blocks, stretching from Wall Street to Chinatown, Greenwich Village, the United Nations headquarters, and Harlem. The game rewards children for how effectively they role play the killing of those who resist becoming a born again Christian. The game also offers players the opportunity to switch sides and fight for the army of the AntiChrist, releasing cloven-hoofed demons who feast on conservative Christians and their panicked proselytes (who taste a lot like Christian).
Yes, you read that right. You can also play a Satanic demon. Apparently, it's okay to be aligned with the Prince of Lies... as long as you're killing homos and Buddhists.
I'm really flabbergasted by this. I mean, there's part of me that thinks this must be a colossal joke. How could anyone in their right mind not see the hypocritical nature of this game? Real Christians should be horrified by this game.
Is this paramilitary mission simulator for children anything other than prejudice and bigotry using religion as an organizing tool to get people in a violent frame of mind? The dialogue includes people saying, "Praise the Lord," as they blow infidels away.
The designers intend this game to become the first dominionist warrior game to break through in the popular culture due to its violent scenarios and realistic graphics, lighting, and sound effects. Its creators expect it to earn a rating of T for Teen. How violent is that? That's the rating shared by Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell - Chaos Theory, a top selling game in which high-tech gadgets and high-powered weapons - frag grenades, shotguns, assault rifles, and submachine guns -- are used to terminate enemies with extreme prejudice.
Man... I hope it's a joke. However, more than likely, this is simply the end result of Religious Fanatacism and Extreme Right-Wing Ideology that has almost become the norm in this country. Eliminationist rhetoric is now seen as normal discourse. See the excellent blog Ornicus for more examples than you can shake a stick at. These are the same people that think that the best way to protest an adult bookstore is with chemical weapons.
Part of me thinks that this game will be played, for the most part, by people that are laughing at the absurdity of the whole thing. You know, the same people that read Chick tracts for yucks. But another part of me realizes that other people will be using this as a fucking training tool. Check out more on Rick Warren and his "stealth evangelist" schtick at the link above. I've got news for you, Ricky-boy... if you're having to spread your message of Christian "love" by stealth, then perhaps you're not really doing God's work.
Looney.
(Energy dome tip to Crooks & Liars.
(Jesus loves me, this I know... for the cross-post tells me so...)
Anti-Gay Shirt May be Headed for SCOTUS
A legal battle being waged on behalf of a suburban San Diego teenager who was barred from wearing a T-shirt with anti-gay rhetoric to class could end up in the US Supreme Court legal analysts suggest.Any kid who wears a shirt like that probably has a truly fucked-up home life. He reminds me of kids I knew in high school who would go off on religious tangents about “queers and faggots and Sodomites” and ended up sucking dick in the parking lot of the Scuttlebutt Lounge to finance their meth habits. Anyway…
A federal judge in San Diego is weighing arguments over whether the Poway Unified School District violated Tyler Chase Harper's First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and religion for keeping him out of class when he wore a shirt on the National Day of Silence in 2004.
The T-shirt was hand-lettered with the words "I Will Not Accept What God Has Condemned" on the front and on the back it read "Homosexuality is Shameful" and "Romans 1:27," a reference to a Bible passage.
What do you think? Should that shirt be considered protected speech and religious expression in a public school?
Seems to me this falls under the same principle as t-shirts bearing images of alcohol and tobacco are banned in most public high schools. The argument is that the adverts could entice students to smoke or drink when they’re not of legal age. A similar argument about inciting intolerance against LGBT students could be made about this shirt, I believe. Plus, I still hold to my firm belief that religious freedom is limited to the right to practice your own religious beliefs, full stop. If you believe homosexuality is a sin, then you have the right not to be homosexual. You don’t have the right to harass people who disagree with you.
Would this even be up for debate if the shirt said “Blacks are inferior” or “Women belong in the kitchen”? Those statements don’t seem qualitatively different from “Homosexuality is shameful.” The only difference is that the latter has a biblical citation after it.
