Why is there a Mid-Atlantic Shredding Services truck heading up to the Cheney compound? Curious. If I didn't have full faith and total trust in every member of our government, I might think he's up to no good.
Kerry Strikes Back
So John Kerry gave a speech yesterday in which he made the following statement: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq." Now, immediately when I heard this, I knew two things: 1) He was referring to President Bush being a dumbass who got us stuck in a quagmire; and 2) The White House would accuse him of talking about the troops.
Sure enough, this has played out precisely as I predicted.
White House press secretary Tony Snow was asked about Kerry's comment at his regular briefing with reporters, and had clearly come prepared with a lengthy attack. He said the quote "fits a pattern" of negative remarks about U.S. soldiers from the decorated Vietnam veteran and suggested that whether Democratic candidates — particularly those running on their military service backgrounds — agree with their 2004 standard-bearer should be a campaign litmus test.I also expected that Kerry’s staff would issue a clarification, which they did: “Kerry was supposed to say, ‘I can't overstress the importance of a great education. Do you know where you end up if you don't study, if you aren't smart, if you're intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq’.”
The White House also released in advance remarks Bush was to deliver later in the day while campaigning in Georgia, in which the president called Kerry's statement "insulting and shameful." Bush, like his spokesman earlier, said soldiers deserve an apology from Kerry.
Here’s what I didn’t expect: Kerry called a press conference and went off, bitchez.
Swift Boat him once, shame on you. Swift Boat him twice, shame on him. No shame for Mr. Kerry today.
(I’ve typed out the transcript, which is below the fold, for anyone who can’t view the video.)
“Let me make it crystal clear, as crystal clear as I know how. I apologize to no one for my criticism of the president and of his broken policy. If anyone owes our troops in the field an apology, it is the president and his failed team, and a Republican majority in the Congress that has been willing to stamp—rubber stamp—policies that have done injuries to our troops and to their families. My statement yesterday, and the White House knows this full well, was a botched joke about the president, and the president’s people, not about the troops. The White House’s attempt to distort my true statement is a remarkable testament to their abject failure in making America safe. It’s a stunning statement on their willingness to reduce anything in America to raw politics; it’s their willingness to distort, their willingness to mislead Americans, they’re willingness to exploit the troops as they have so many times, as backdrops, at so many speeches, in which they have not told the American people the truth. I’m not gonna stand for it.
What our troops deserve is a winning strategy, and what they deserve is leadership that is up to the sacrifice that they’re making. Sadly, this is the best that this administration can do in a month when we have lost 100 young men and women who have given their lives for a failed policy. Over half of the names on the Vietnam wall were put there after our leaders knew that our policy was wrong. And it was wrong that leaders were quiet then and I’m not going to be quiet now.
This is a textbook Republican campaign strategy. Try to change the topic; try to make someone else the issue; try to make something else said the issue, not the policy, not their responsibility. Well, everyone knows it’s not working this time, and I’m not going to stand around and let it work. If anyone thinks that a veteran, someone like me who’s been fighting their entire career to provide for veterans, to fight for their benefits, to help honor what their service is, if anybody thinks that a veteran would somehow criticize more than 140,000 troops serving in Iraq and not the president and his people who put them there, they’re crazy. It’s just wrong. This is a classic GOP, textbook Republican campaign tactic.
I’m sick and tired of a bunch of despicable Republicans who will not debate real policy, who won’t take responsibility for their own mistakes, standing up and trying to make other people the butt of those mistakes. I’m sick and tired of a whole bunch of Republican attacks, most of which come from people who never wore the uniform and never had the courage to stand up and go to war themselves. Enough is enough. We’re not going to stand for this.
This policy is broken—and this president and his administration didn’t do their homework. They didn’t study what would happen in Iraq. They didn’t study and listen to the people who were the experts and would have told them, and they know that’s what I was talking about yesterday. I’m not going to be lectured by the White House or by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, who’s taking a day off from mimicking and attacking Michael J. Fox and who’s now going to try to attack me, and lie about me, and distort me. No way. It disgusts me that a bunch of these Republican hacks who have never worn the uniform of our country are willing to lie about those who did. It’s over.
This administration has given us a Katrina foreign policy—mistake upon mistake upon mistake. Unwilling to give our troops the armor that they need. Unwilling to have enough troops in place. Unwilling to give them the Humvees that they deserve to protect them. Unwilling to have a coalition that is adequate to be able to defend our interests. Our own intelligence agency has told us they’re creating more terrorists, not less. They’re making us less safe, not more. I think Americans are sick and tired of this game. These Republicans are afraid to stand up and debate a real veteran on this topic, and they’re afraid to debate, you know, they want to debate straw men, because they’re afraid to debate real men.
Well, we’re going to have a real debate in this country about this policy. The bottom line is, these Republicans want to distort this policy, and this time it won’t work because we are going to stay in their face with the truth. And no Democrat is going to be bullied by these people, by these kinds of attacks, that have no place in American politics. It’s time to set our policy correct. They have a stand still and lose policy in Iraq and they have a cut and run policy in Afghanistan. And the fact is, our troops, who have served heroically, who deserve better, deserve leadership that is up to their sacrifice. Period."
Quote of the Day
"I go out to Walter Reed quite often and see these brave young soldiers who have served and sacrificed so much. Many of them have lost limbs, as you know. And it's a very sad thing to see. But at the same time it's very uplifting. Because these young people are so proud of what they've done."—Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), campaigning for congressional candidate Peter Roskam (R), whose opponent is Tammy Duckworth (D), an Iraq war veteran who lost both legs during her service. (Via Political Wire)
More Allen Campaign Shenanigans Caught on Video
DailyProgress: “A first-year University of Virginia law student shouted a question at U.S. Sen. George Allen Tuesday at the conclusion of a rally at the Omni Charlottesville Hotel. Allen declined to answer the question about whether he had ever spat at his first wife and the student, Mike Stark, was pushed away from Allen by a former Albemarle County GOP official.”
Carpetbagger: “Stark, whom many of you may know as the blogger behind Calling All Wingnuts, wasn't just 'pushed away' by a Republican activist; he was quite literally tackled by a series of Allen supporters, some of whom may have been Allen staffers.”
You can watch the video here.
watch your mailboxes, single twenty-somethings!
Your government-issued chastity belt will soon be in the mail, thanks to the Dept. of Faith-Based Initiatives Dept. of Health and Human Services. You see, the government has decided that abstinence education isn't just for those hoodlum teenagers anymore, it is for people up to age 29 (apparently after you turn 30, you no longer have sex).
The federal government's "no sex without marriage" message isn't just for kids anymore.
Now the government is targeting unmarried adults up to age 29 as part of its abstinence-only programs, which include millions of dollars in federal money that will be available to the states under revised federal grant guidelines for 2007.
[...]
Abstinence education programs, which have focused on preteens and teens, teach that abstaining from sex is the only effective or acceptable method to prevent pregnancy or disease. They give no instruction on birth control or safe sex.
The National Center for Health Statistics says well over 90% of adults ages 20-29 have had sexual intercourse.
So "well over 90%" of adults are having sex and the government wants to "educate" them with programs that do not include birth control or safe-sex measures. Now, why would that be?
Wade Horn, assistant secretary for children and families at the Department of Health and Human Services, said the revision is aimed at 19- to 29-year-olds because more unmarried women in that age group are having children.
"The message is 'It's better to wait until you're married to bear or father children,' " Horn said. "The only 100% effective way of getting there is abstinence."
So, because there are "too many unwed mothers" by government thinking, the solution is not to further educate the public on birth control but to say "no sex for you!". Because, as we all know, sex is only for procreation.What utter bullshit. Expensive bullshit too--$50 million dollars worth.
I am vehemently opposed to AO-ed in classrooms, as it just doesn't work. The idea of it being forced upon adults as some sort of moral medication ("for prevention of whores and bastard children!") is just insane.
The Mouth of Sauron endorses Senator Hobbit
A match made in Mordor
It's somehow fitting that news of this comes out on Halloween: Zell Miller, faithless and accursed, crosses party lines to support noted Tolkien scholar Rick Santorum.
Former Sen. Zell Miller, a Georgia Democrat who supported President Bush in 2004, will head a new group of Democrats supporting Pennsylvania GOP Sen. Rick Santorum's reelection bid."I am not involved in any other race in the country," Miller said during a radio interview Monday, according to a news release from Santorum's campaign. "I am only doing this for Rick Santorum. I believe in Rick Santorum's leadership that much."
Santorum is trailing in public polls to his Democratic challenger Bob Casey, Jr.
Apparently Miller just couldn't pass up yet another opportunity to betray his former party, much as he did when he spoke in support of George Bush's reelection at the GOP convention. He's hasn't exactly backed a winner this time; not only is Santorum behind in the polls, but he's hard up for funds for TV ads in this critical final week before the election. Frankly, it's hard to imagine what Miller can possibly do for Santorum's sinking campaign that a doorstop couldn't do, and with considerably less anger.
(Cross-posted.)
Happy Halloween from President Dwight D. Eisenhower
“Soon we will be celebrating one of our holidays, one that typifies for me much of what we mean by the American freedom. That will be Halloween. On that evening I would particularly like to be, of course, with my grandchildren, for Halloween is one of those times when we Americans actually encourage the little individuals to be free to do things rather as they please. I hope you and your children have a gay evening and let's all give a little prayer that their childish pranks will be the only kind of mischief with which we Americans must cope.” (Link.)
Back to the Reality
A quirky sci-fi adventure about a time-traveling stem cell research advocate named Marty McFly and a hideous monster named Biff Limbaugh. (Because when the Shakers ask, the Shakers receive.)
Fin.
The Narrow Window When No Means No
Jessica finds what she describes as "perhaps one of the scariest rulings I've ever seen," and I totally agree:
An appellate court said Maryland's rape law is clear -- no doesn't mean no when it follows a yes and intercourse has begun.This is truly, deeply disturbing. As Jessica says: "So ladies, once it's in, it's in. Ain't nothing you can do about it. Changed your mind? Suck it up. He's hurting you? Oh, sorry -- should have thought of that before. After all, it's not like your body is yours or anything." Patently absurd. What kind of FUBAR ethical paradigm allows someone to argue that consent to have sex means you cannot change your mind if you're being hurt or forced to do something you don't want to do or any one of a number of other reasons, including just not bloody enjoying it?
A three-judge panel of the Court of Special Appeals Monday threw out a rape conviction saying that a trial judge in Montgomery County erred when he refused to answer the jury's question on that very point.
The appeals court said that when the jury asked the trial judge if a woman could withdraw her consent after the start of sex, the jury should have been told she could not. The ruling said the law is not ambiguous and is a tenet of common-law.
The entire premise of this decision appears to be that women are not active players in the sexual act, but instead consent to turn their bodies over to their partners, who are then free to do with it whatever they please until they're damn well ready to be finished. Feministing commenter Thomas says: "They have made a policy choice that a man has a right to orgasm once intercourse begins and that this right supercedes a woman's right to decide who gets to be within the boundaries of her own body. That is a policy choice that cannot be justified except as bareknuckled patriarchy." Absolutely spot-on.
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK.)
You Chose a Child Molester's Jam!
Right. I'm about to do the frug on some very thin ice here, so let me just spell out a few things right off the bat.
1. I do not support or condone anyone that sexually assaults a child.
2. I am not in any way suggesting that convicted sex offenders should not be punished for what they did.
3. I believe that extra caution and taking steps to protect children from being assaulted is a good thing.
Okay. We have that out of the way? Let's dance.
I've kind of touched upon this subject before, in a post I wrote critiquing the MSNBC "To Catch a Predator." I'm of the opinion that the big bugaboo in America right now (aside from those eeevil terrorists, of course) are sexual "predators." There is a lot of media attention being paid right now to pedophiles, in particular. From MSNBC to Mark Foley, molestation is getting a lot of air time.
So, my clock alarm goes off yesterday morning; I have it set to news radio. The story at that moment was reporting that the Illinois Attorney General had issued a press release suggesting that parents go to the Illinois Sex Offender Registry website to look up convicted sex offenders in their area, and plan a safe trick-or-treating route. I also saw, in googling for this press release, that Illinois isn't the only state making this suggestion. In fact, in Maryland, sex offenders are being ordered to keep off their porch lights on Halloween, and are not allowed to decorate their homes. Similar orders are being handed out in other states.
Now... on one hand, I think this is intelligent. By showing a little forethought, and advocating parental responsibility, they are hoping to prevent children from being exposed to possible risk.
On the other hand, I have a few problems with this.
A little background: A guy I work with recently went out on a date. The guy he dated is a cop, and one of his duties is to go "undercover." Basically, he does a plainclothes patrol in "cruisy areas;" namely, a public place where men go for anonymous sex. He'll hang around in this area, and if some slob flashes him, he's immediately arrested and taken in. Men that are caught in this manner having consensual sex (in other words, not flashing the cop, but caught by the cop) are also arrested. Now, my issues with this go a little further; the whole thing smacks of entrapment to me, but my big problem is this: when Flashy is convicted, he's convicted as a sex offender. And who does he get lumped in with? Child molesters.
Now, it could of course be argued that anyone that would flash someone in public needs to be kept away from children, and on one level, I agree. However, I would also argue that some, if not most of these men haven't the slightest interest in any sort of sexual act with a child. But now that they have been registered as a sex offender, they are cemented with that stigma, permanently. And if a concerned parent finds this person on the R.S.O. (I'm getting really tired of typing registered sex offender) website, they will immediately assume that this person is a child molester, when they may in fact just be a closeted, horny guy. So, because he got a little desperate, went to a cruisy area, saw this really hot, buff guy and assumed he was there for the same reason... he's going to be thought of as a pedophile by his neighborhood. The R.S.O. website does not describe the crime of the convicted person. Therefore, because people are looking at the website specifically for people that have sexually assaulted children, and because of the current mindset in this country that sexual offenders are all pedophiles, and the fear of assault that's been whipped up with all the media coverage, the conclusion will always be drawn that anyone on the site is a child molester.
Again, I'm not saying this might be someone you would want giving your kid a tootsie roll, but I'm also concerned about people being slapped with a stigma that they don't necessarily deserve.
Which brings me to my second point. When you're encouraging every parent to search for sexual predators in their neighborhoods, there is always the possibility of "witch hunt" mentality. Now, when I was told that the men mentioned above were being labeled as R.S.O., I was pretty surprised. I always assumed that conviction was for the more severe and heinous sexual crimes; rape, pedophilia, etc. In this case, a crime that seemed to me to be pretty benign was being lumped in with the lowest of the low. What if a neighborhood's citizens got together and decided to run one of these guys out of town? Or worse?
I'll throw in another bit. Statutory rapists are also listed as registered sex offenders. So, an 18-year-old guy that gets caught having consensual sex with his 17-year-old girlfriend (or whatever ages would be appropriate for a particular state's consent laws) would also be lumped in with (and most likely thought of as) the pedophiles. When non-consensual and consensual sexual crimes are, according to the state, equal, sending people to keep tabs on the R.S.O.s in their area could lead to some bad situations.
Again, I'm not saying that statutory rape is fine and dandy.
I'm all for keeping children safe. I'm all for working to eliminate possibilities of children being exposed to the risk of sexual assault. However, I also feel that the nature of sexual crimes have to be defined a little more accurately when people are listed as registered sex offenders. I don't think it's really fair to label someone a pedophile, when they're really just a "pervert."
(Post title taken from one of my favorite Kids in the Hall sketches. The fabulously creepy "Boogeyman" painting was done by Michael Whelan. Thanks to Shakes. These are the cross-posts I know, I know... )
Happy Halloween—here’s some Jesus Christ!
Why give out candy when you can proselytize?
Bruce Watters used to simply hand out candy on Halloween, just like his neighbors in St. Petersburg, Fla., until he decided the holiday's ghoulishness really didn't jibe with his Christian beliefs.Wow—lucky kids. I never got any religious tracts when I was trick-or-treating. When we built our Halloween bonfires around which to dance in Satanic rituals, sometimes it took hours to find all the kindling.
But rather than skip the neighborhood ritual, he's put a Christian stamp on it. For the third year in a row, kids will leave his porch with a piece of candy, plus a religious tract - a concise, colorful handout telling how to attain salvation through Jesus Christ.
"If they want supernatural, let's give them Godly supernatural," Mr. Watters says.
…Halloween, long associated with pagan traditions, is now high season for an old American tradition of evangelizing through tracts. The nation's four major publishers of tracts say they sell more at Halloween than at any other time of year, including Christmas and Easter. And the push is on to grow the seasonal market. This year, thanks to new glow-in-the-dark tracts, the Texas-based American Tract Society expects to set a new Halloween record by shipping out more than 4 million tracts.
Buoying tract sales, observers say, is a rising tide of evangelical passion for Halloween rituals. Four years ago in Frisco, Texas, for instance, most churches either shunned the holiday as a perceived festival of mischief or staged their own alternative event.Look for my new book Culture Warrior: Protecting Halloween from the Religious Right and Other Tales of Progressive Fun Protection on bookshelves next spring.
This year, at least 11 congregations are equipping members with tracts for doorbell-answering adults and trick-or-treating kids to hand out.Look for my follow-up book How to Turn Your Kid Into a Lunatic in One Easy Step on bookshelves next summer.
For his part, Watters regards Halloween as "a satanic celebration" that he tries to counter by displaying a cross and an angel statue on his porch. He also asks parents for permission to pray over their children.I can imagine he’s got loads of takers.
"After we saw the evil side of this night, we decided we were going to bring light to it," Pam Malone says. The Malones now set up tables in their front yard, play recorded Christian music, and hand out doughnuts along with collections of scripture verses to trick-or-treaters.I like how they still hand out sweeties along with the unsolicited religious dogma.
Of course people are free to do whatever they like, but I find this just ridiculous. There are plenty of Christian parents who don’t want their kids exposed to conservative religious rubbish, no less non-Christian parents. Two Halloweens ago, my nephew got two Christian books in his goodie bag that represented a version of Christianity about which my sister was decidedly unthrilled. She took the books away from him immediately—and this is a kid who’s been to church every week of his life and attends a Christian school. (You can see the books here and here.)
Something tells me the people handing out this stuff wouldn’t be too happy if their kids came home with an Islamic tract or pamphlet on atheism in their bags, so why do they presume that it’s fine and dandy to hand out their crap which might be greeted with the same animosity? Oh right—because they don’t give a flying shit about anyone else’s beliefs.
When I read about stuff like this, I can’t help thinking about how the religious right is always going on about the radical homosexual agenda, and how gays try to recruit children for “their lifestyle.” Yet in all my many gay-filled years, with all the time I’ve spent in gay bars, at gay film festivals, baking in the sun at the gay pride parade, and hanging out with queers of every description, I’ve never met anyone who had joined up as part of a recruitment program—and no one ever tried to recruit me. (Maybe I should be offended!) On the other hand, the religious right is constantly trying to recruit people, especially children, and here we have the perfect example of a campaign to do precisely what they erroneously accuse gays of doing. Worse yet, it’s a stealth campaign, where unsuspecting kids go to their doors on a hunt for candy and walk away instead with a religious tract. (Or, in some cases, the candy they’re after and a religious tract to boot, as the proselytizers treat them then throw in a trick for good measure.)
Like I said, people are free to do what they like, but as long they’re going to do it, they need to can the projection. It isn’t liberals who are commandeering holidays, and it isn’t gays who are out on recruitment drives. And it isn’t we who are shoving our lifestyles in anyone else’s faces—no less in kids’ Halloween bags.
Fox Fires Back
At an event for Ohio Senate candidate Sherrod Brown, Michael J. Fox explained, in no uncertain terms, his decision to keep campaigning on behalf of candidates who support funding stem cell research:
As you may know, I had a run-in with a less than compassionate conservative. I guess I'm not supposed to speak with you until my symptoms go away, or maybe I'm supposed to go away, but I'm not going to go away and neither are the millions of Americans and their families who live with these diseases...Meanwhile, in the battle between Fox and that less than compassionate conservative, Americans have chosen their sides—and they aren't too keen on Rushbo, who gets a 26% approval rating to Fox's 75%. Says John Amato, who’s got the video at Crooks & Liars, "I guess attacking people with diseases isn't a very popular move." Huh. Who woulda thunk it?
The stem cell policy of President Bush that was supported by Senator DeWine is a rejection of the future of medical research. Well, forgive me for this, but it's time we get back to our future...a vote for Sherrod Brown for Senate is a vote for hope and for a better quality of life for millions of Americans...
I'm asking you as an advocate, and a husband and a father to all get active and to stand up for what is right—what is right for the future of hundreds of millions of Americans who have or are touched by debilitating diseases.
(Crossposted at AlterNet PEEK.)
Guh.
So, I have the tube on last night, and I see a political ad... I can't even remember who it was for, or what it was about in general. I was too busy groaning in disgust.
In this ad, Barack Obama appears, and states how he and Tammy Duckworth support John McCain's "plan for immigration," and how he is against amnesty.
Barack Obama and John McCain. Together at last.
I think I may need to go back to bed for the next twenty years or so.
Update: Here it is.
Question of the Day
What's your least favorite traditional Halloween treat?
Mine's got to be those popcorn balls, followed closely by candy corn. Ugh. I have a terrible sweet tooth, but candy corn is too sweet even for me.
Good Lord
I just received the following email from Angelos:
Subject: vlhjkbs bdlfghjkasgr losdhfbvpiaesobrgiaeyubrgpbaeyrgNeither did I. There's nothing I could add to his commentary, except perhaps a bunch of four-letter words.
I have nothing else to say about this.
Go to listen to ads.
Try #17.
That's the one we've heard about.
I didn't realize there were 24 of these fucking things.
