Back in September, I mentioned that former US presidential candidate and zany wee nutbag H. Ross Perot had put up for sale his own personal 13th-century copy of the Magna Carta. And then, as is his wont, Bill Wolfrum wrote a great bit of satire about its imminent sale.
But, once again, reality reminds us that satire is dead. Boom.
A 710-year-old copy of the declaration of human rights known as the Magna Carta — the version that became part of English law — was auctioned Tuesday for $21.3 million, a Sotheby's spokeswoman said.
The document, which had been expected to draw bids of $30 million or higher, was bought by David Rubenstein of The Carlyle Group, a private equity firm, the spokeswoman said.
The Carlyle Group. Pearl of the global military-industrial complex. You've got to be fucking kidding me. That would be the same Carlyle Group which was co-founded by Bush family fixer James Baker, has employed both George Bushes, counts the Bin Laden family among its investors, and, by virtue of its weapons company subsidiaries, is effectively one of the largest defense contractors in the US and has profited handsomely off Bush's wars.
This Carlyle Group. This Carlyle Group. This Carlyle Group.
Wow.
Via Echidne, who notes that although the objective of the Carlyle Group "sort of clashes with what the Magna Carta is ultimately supposed to reflect," there is the possibility that "the Carlyle Group could be just a bunch of very nice people who love the concept of habeas corpus and its roots in the Magna Carta. I guess there is no way to tell." Sob.
I just can't understand why people keepsaying that Ron Paul has unseemly ties to the white supremacist movement. I mean, so what if he wants to keep a donation from Don Black, proprietor of the Stormfront White Nationalist Community website, bearing the motto White Pride World Wide? Big deal.
"Dr. Paul stands for freedom, peace, prosperity and inalienable rights. If someone with small ideologies happens to contribute money to Ron, thinking he can influence Ron in any way, he's wasted his money," Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said. "Ron is going to take the money and try to spread the message of freedom."
Yeah! He just wants to spread his message of freedom—which includes negating Roe v. Wade, preventing same-sex couples from marrying, ending birthright citizenship, abolishing free basic education, and undermining multiculturalism, just for a start.
And I'm quite certain if Hillary received a donation from a white supremacist, Ron Paul's supporters would defend her right to keep it and use it to spread her ideas of freedom, too!
If the youth in your life are like the youth in my life, you’ll start off by explaining who the fuck Jamie Lynn Spears is (wink).
Seriously, I can answer that question in three words…comprehensive sex education.
Mmhmmm, teach it in the home…in the classroom…and in the car driving from the home to the classroom.
Jamie Lynn’s announcement that she is pregnant at 16 years old is a great opportunity to find out where young people are knowledge wise and how they feel about sex, pregnancy and all that shit.
One of these days we'll stop debating the undebatable.
Comprehensive sex education isn’t the enemy any more than ignorance is bliss.
Blink. ***logs off to find out who the fuck Jamie Lynn Spears is and why CNN is upset that she's having a baby***
"My life is chick power. My manager is a woman, who has been with me since I'm 18, and my wife is a strong and intelligent woman. I have three daughters. My dogs are all females. Even my sister Suzanna...she just got a double medical degree; she's now a psychiatrist and an internal medicine doctor and she speaks about 10 languages. She's so impressive. I'm surrounded by strong, intelligent women."—Harry Connick, Jr.
Here's Harry doing "Yes We Can Can," a tune The Pointer Sisters made famous.
Someone just forwarded to me this chain email going around, which must have accidentally arrived in the inbox of a non-misogynist progressive. You'll have to forgive my failure to provide the requisite field of white space through which you're meant to scroll before the hilarious punchline is revealed.
CONFIDENTIAL
Please do not forward this to just anyone. You could turn up missing. This was sent to me by an associate in the surveillance field. I am sharing it with friends and family on a "need to know" basis. I cannot vouch for its validity. But if true, it could very well rock the foundation of this country. It has to do with the upcoming election and truth in advertising!
SECURITY PHOTO: CONFIDENTIAL
The photo is a video capture from a security camera located in the North Corridor that leads to the Senate floor in the US Capitol Building. This is classified material, so do not ask how or where I got it. If you do, you could come up missing. Please DO NOT FORWARD this to just anyone. Don't even think about it!! The repercussions could shake things up more than you can imagine. A highly respected politician's head is on the line here! But I feel someone should know the truth, so I picked you! (Do not share with anyone in Iowa for sure!!!!!!!!!)
Ha ha! Get it?! Hillary's got a DICK! Oh my aching sides!
Forbes.com may be the "home page for the world's business leaders," but let's hope those leaders don't take the magazine's advice on raising children. A slideshow accompanying the commentary "Where to Educate Your Children" lists St. Louis as the 9th best place in the country - out of 20 - to have your kids schooled:
No. 9: St. Louis, Mo.
Public School Support: A
Private School Options: A+
Library Popularity: C+
College Town: B+
College Options: A+
The St. Louis Arch isn't the only draw to the Gateway of the West--another, it seems, is its excellent education system. More than half a million K-12 students populate the city's 158 school districts, 16% of which choose to attend private schools.
That sound you hear is the citizenry of Gatewayville laughing aloud...or perhaps sobbing. They know what Forbes doesn't:
That there is only one public school district in St. Louis - called, oddly enough, the St. Louis Public School District
That these other school districts are scattered about the 91 surrounding municipalities in the St. Louis metro area
That the St. Louis Public School District is in such disarray that it was stripped of its accreditation by the state in March, with authority over the district being handed over to a transitional board
Apart from all that, the Forbes piece gets an A-freakin'-plus.
I'm actually quite fond of rats, despite the fact that they are destructive, disease-carrying vermin, because they are incredibly clever and seem to have just a wicked wee sense of humor. (And it's not like they're destructive and disease-carrying to be mean; they're just being rats!) Domestic rats that are kept as pets can be lovely little things, every bit as affectionate and snuggly as a cat or dog can be. They're highly underrated creatures.
And I think Matilda and Olivia would absolutely love it if I brought home a newly-discovered Indonesian giant rat for them as a new playpal!
Mammalogist Martua Sinaga holds a very amiable giant rat.
Researchers in a remote Indonesian jungle have discovered a giant rat that is about five times the size of a typical city rat … scientists said Monday. Unearthing new species of mammals in the 21st century is considered very rare. The discoveries by a team of American and Indonesian scientists are being studied further to confirm their status.
The animals were found in the Foja mountains rainforest in eastern Papua province in a June expedition, said U.S.-based Conservation International, which organized the trip in the Southeast Asian nation along with the Indonesian Institute of Science.
"The giant rat is about five times the size of a typical city rat," said Kristofer Helgen, a scientist with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. "With no fear of humans, it apparently came into the camp several times during the trip."
While sifting through today's Daily Muck, I found a couple of interesting items.
The first involves a Bush DOD nominee who is clearly not long for this world when she flies out of the gate giving Iraq an F grade on their benchmarks:
"At this time, I would give the Maliki government an 'F'," Mary Beth Long told the Senate Armed Services Committee during her confirmation hearing today. The nascent government has not performed in an "exemplary manner" to pass needed legislation, Long said. [...] She acknowledged the Iraqi government has not yet succeeded in passing de-Baathification legislation or approving hydrocarbon laws including an oil revenue sharing agreement, among other legislative goals.
Unfortunately, Mary did not receive the memo with her nomination which clearly states that as a Bush appointee, she needs to agree with everything Bush does and see nothing but progress and good vibes in Iraq. Once the next administration takes over, then she would be allowed to harp on the lack of progress in Iraq and blame it all on the new boss. (Whoops! Didn't mean to uncover the super secret wingnut strategy!)
While we're on the topic, let's take a look at a recent Pentagon report about how other things are going:
Despite a significant reduction in violence in Iraq over the past three months, the Iraqi government has made little headway in improving the delivery of electricity, health care and other essential services, a new Pentagon report said Tuesday.
The current health care center status should give you an idea as to the problems being faced:
The United States has built 85 of 142 planned health care centers, many of which have been turned over to the Ministry of Health, which has been dominated in recent years by followers of Moktada al-Sadr, the anti-American Shiite cleric. The report noted, however, that some of the medical centers have not been opened “due to a shortage of trained medical staff” and a “sectarian agenda” within the Health Ministry that has led to the discrimination against Sunni areas.
The funny part is that the administration and their ilk would still have you believe that this whole Iraq experiment is a cakewalk that will be resolved before, or after, the next administration steps in.
A frightened woman on the Standing Rock Reservation feels her pregnant belly and checks the weather. It’s below freezing. Should she stay and get beaten again or flee? There’s no money for a hotel. She can’t stay but she can’t risk the lethal cold.
She has called Pretty Bird Woman House women’s shelter, but their building was destroyed by arson. They have no place for her. Georgia Little Shield, Director of Pretty Bird Woman House promised to try shelters on neighboring reservations and see if there was room. The woman feels the baby kick as she stares at the phone, not daring to hope. It rings.
“It’s Georgia,” says the lady on the phone.
“There’s room in another shelter?” asks the woman.
A long silence follows,then Georgia says, “We’ll work something out. Let’s get you safe. Okay?”
Another Christmas; and a expectant mother with nowhere to go. But there is good news: The ending to this story has not been written. You will write the ending.
Georgia Little Shield can’t keep pulling miracles out of thin air. She needs help and we can give it. This is all about what we fight for: giving power to the powerless. Helping women and minorities gain equal treatment. Making wrongs right.
Let me tell you the story thus far…
About Pretty Bird Woman House The shelter was founded in memory of Ivy Archambault, whose Lakota name translates to Pretty Bird Woman. In 2001, Pretty Bird Woman was kidnapped, raped and beaten to death. Her sister, Jackie Brown Otter, decided that something had to be done for other victims, to put an end to this nightmare.
As things stand now, the situation for women on the Standing Rock Reservation is a nightmare. Amnesty International documented it better than I ever could:
High levels of sexual violence on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation take place in a context of high rates of poverty and crime... The unemployment rate on the Reservation is 71 per cent. Crime rates on the Reservation often exceed those of its surrounding areas. According to FBI figures, in 2005 South Dakota had the fourth highest rate of "forcible rapes" of women of any US state.
Amnesty International was told of five rapes which took place over one week in September 2005. Many survivors reported that they had experienced sexual violence several times in their lives and by different perpetrators. There were also several reports of gang rapes... A common response to such crimes is blame, but directed at the survivor rather than the perpetrator.
Tribal and federal authorities have concurrent jurisdiction on all Standing Rock Sioux Reservation lands over crimes where the suspected perpetrator is American Indian. In instances in which the suspected perpetrator is non-Indian, federal officials have exclusive jurisdiction. Neither North nor South Dakota state police have jurisdiction over sexual violence against Native American women on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. State police do, however, have jurisdiction over crimes of sexual violence committed on tribal land in instances where the victim and the perpetrator are both non-Indian.
"[N]on-Native perpetrators often seek out a reservation place because they know they can inflict violence without much happening to them." Andrea Smith, Assistant Professor of Native Studies, University of Michigan
Wecome to the world of Rape Tourism.
Georgia Little Shield gives us one example of what victims face in the courtroom:
I recently attended a court sentencing of a man that pled guilty to a charge of sexual assault against a Native American Woman and the Mayor of his town testified that he was an upstanding community member and that the community would accept him back with open arms and to just give him probation.
The First Netroots Miracle Pretty Bird Woman House represents the first time women on Standing Rock have had a support system in place to tackle these injustices. However, it has been a struggle for Pretty Bird Woman House to survive. It took three years to get off the ground. Finally a grant from the South Dakota Coalition Against Domestic Violence hired Georgia Little Shield and things started happening. But in May of 2007 the grant ran out and with no funding, Pretty Bird Woman House looked like it would close its doors. Raising the necessary money on Standing Rock seemed an impossibility. Tribal government remained supportive of the shelter but had no financial resources to share
And where hope appeared to end, that’s where the magic started:
At this time this situation came to the attention of Daily Kos user Norman Bier and he created a chip in page for the effort and followed up with a series of diaries trying to raise funds. And then a miracle happened. Other Daily Kos members diaried about this: flautist, sarac, njgoldfinch and frontpager Devilstower jumped in. From Daily Kos the news spread virally and Christy Hardin-Smith at Firedoglake, mole333 at Culture Kitchen, DB at Queen of Pentacles, William Neuheisel at Creative Evolution.... and many more I have missed kept the torch lit.
The result? Over 680 strangers donated $27,500...
Norman Bier's thank you post at the completion of the first successful fundraising drive
This money was the operating funds for the shelter from May through September of 2007. The Progressive Netroots paid for crisis phone lines, Georgia Little Shield's salary, court costs, operating expenses, food, clothing, toiletries and other incidental expenses. This money literally saved the lives of women on the Standing Rock shelter:
I just got off the phone with Georgia Little Shield... Over the weekend, the shelter received a call from a woman who needed to be evacuated. If this had happened on Thursday, the shelter would not have been able to do much more than take the call. But because of your efforts, Georgia was able to tell this woman: "Don't worry about the money--we have money coming. Just get out and come in."
In late September 2007 a Federal grant was awarded, paying the salaries for Georgia Little Shield and two more full time shelter staff/advocates. The future of Pretty Bird Woman House seemed assured. With the support of the Tribal Government, which donated a building to house women in danger and the federal grant, the pieces had finally come together.
Until vandals, thieves and arsonists destroyed the house.
Losing The House The first signs of danger came when Pretty Bird Woman House offered shelter to a woman whose batterer had a record of extreme violence. Fearing for her safety, they transferred her to a shelter off of the reservation. The next day someone cut the shelter's phone lines. After this, unknown men kicked and tore a hole through the drywall wide enough to walk through and looted the shelter of anything they could carry: televisions, computers, clothing, toiletries (all donated or purchased with donations) - literally anything that could be carried. This happened in broad daylight while the shelter was empty - the staff were all absent transporting women to court or other shelters. Clearly the perpetrators watched for such an opportunity.
Local government and Pretty Bird Woman House realized that the shelter could not function safely. The staff moved out into unheated donated office space. The day after they moved out the crisis line got a telephone call:
Lady, your shelter is on fire, they are burning down your shelter.
Arsonists had thrown some kind of molotov cocktail through a basement window, setting fire to the building.
This blow dealt a terrible setback to Pretty Bird Woman House. The grants they depend on require that they have a building. All the advantages they gained - not having to make three and four hour trips transporting women to neighboring shelters (assuming those shelters had room), having a stable base of operations - vanished.
It seemed like the five years of work that had gone into creating the shelter, all the efforts of the progressive blogosphere and the donations of the tribal council… all of that was for nothing.
The Second Netroots Miracle Begins Then, in late October this year, Betsy Campisi, a PhD student and a volunteer from the previous fundraising effort for Pretty Bird Woman House called shelter director Georgia Little Shield to see how the things were going. Betsy was completely unaware of the problems facing the shelter. When the thieves stole the computers they also stole all of the email addresses of the people who had put together the first fundraising drive. Georgia had no idea how to get in touch with her internet friends who had helped out last time
Betsy immediately put up a Chip-In page and she and Georgia decided to shoot for the moon – $70,000. On the Standing Rock reservation, that will buy you a house and a $10,000 security system.
Betsy and Winter Rabbit began to diary about Pretty Bird Woman House on Daily Kos, Docudharma, Culture Kitchen, Street Prophets and other venues… and money trickled in. Then Devilstower agreed to front page a diary of mine on Daily Kos and that got a lot of attention – and then a commenter posted a challenge: if we could reach $10,000 by 9pm, he would give whatever it took to bring the total to $15,000. Kossacks like a challenge! People donated like mad, everything from $5.00 donations to $1,500 donations came in! It was amazing as people challenged each other, left and right. When Georgia Little Shield woke up the next morning, Pretty Bird Woman House had $15,000 in the bank.
Since then the netroots has not slowed its generousity or creativity. It’s like riding a tiger – before you can internalize what is happening, something even newer and better is taking place.
I think this is, what we say in Lakota country, Ata Kili, Lela Waste.... in other words "Cool beyond words, and really good". I'm from the neighboring resevation and understand how important it is for woman and children to have a safe and warm place to escape to. I was one of those women, years ago, with two babies, that had to run in the extreme cold to escape an abuser.
Each and every one of you who have donated are indeed helping to create a save haven for women and children. And although they may not get to thank you in person, each one is silently thanking you as they will finally be able to crawl into a safe and warm bed and sleep safely…
thank you for being dedicated to PBWH and creating this blog.... Zintkala Waste Wiyan (Pretty Bird Woman) is smiling and thanking you from the heavens…
From Shirley Erhart, Member of the Board of Directors PBWH:
I just feel as if we, as a B.O.D, have been so remiss in not expressing our wonder and awe at what the good folks out there have done and are doing for Pretty Bird Woman House… I think one of the biggest problems is that there are not words to truly convey how we feel… Our vision, our dreams for the women of Standing Rock....it's happening and it is happening because of folks the likes of yourself, Norman, your colleagues, and all of the caring folks out there who believe and want to make a difference in the world…
What I'm saying is the actions of all of you… tells women and their children...."we believe you and you don't have to live that way. You have a right to be safe and we're going to help you be safe."
And from Georgia Little Shield:
It just seems that we can not tell you in words how much your group of humans have done for us and to thank you all for your support … My feelings of how much you mean to me and our group here in McLaughlin can not be told in words that we are so proud to have been introduced to so many understanding men and women. Thank you from the bottom of my heart…
BUT WE ARE NOT DONE YET!
As it stands, we have just over $50,000. Enough that Pretty Bird Woman House is putting in a bid on a house across the street from the police station. We are almost there, just a mere $20,000 short. I told you that the ending had not been written for this Christmas story; now is the time we write that ending. Will the expectant mother find a sanctuary or not?
Now is your chance to write that ending. Now is your chance to give sanctuary, not just to this one hypothetical woman, but to thousands of women, throughout the years that Pretty Bird Woman House will serve this community. Let’s make this ending a happy one.
We have a team working on an application for Extreme Home Makeover (please don't bombard them with requests to do PBWH - trust us, we have a way to approach them that offers a lot of promise).
Another team is approaching Oprah.
We are signed up for igive which gives a percentage of your online shopping to PBWH – please do this, it cost free and a percentage of all of your online purchases go to Pretty Bird Woman House.
What are we failing to do? Join our Yahoo Group and tell us!
One important final note: men are also victims of domestic violence. Since we are discussing a women’s shelter, the examples I have given are of men abusing women. I don’t want to detract from male victims; they too deserve recognition and support. This isn’t about hating men; it’s about helping people.
Thank you so much for your generosity and kindness this holiday season. Blessings to you and yours.
This image, taken by US photographer Stephanie Sinclair in Afghanistan, has been named Unicef Photo of the Year. Pictured are Mohammed, 40, and his new 11-year-old wife, Ghulam.
The terror in that little girl's eyes breaks my heart into a thousand pieces—especially because we are meant to have freed her; we are meant to have given her a better life.
"In the last two-and-a-half years, we have seen remarkable and hopeful development in world history. Just think about it: More than 50 million men, women and children have been liberated from two of the most brutal tyrannies on earth—50 million people are free. All these people are now learning the blessings of freedom."—President George Bush, claiming victory over tyranny on behalf of women at a White House Celebration of International Women's Day, March 12, 2004.
According to Unicef, about 60 million girls around the world are married while still children. The blessings of freedom.
"It is now difficult to keep track of the vast array of publicly endorsed and institutionally supported aberrations—from homosexuality and pedophilia to sadomasochism and necrophilia."—Mike Huckabee, in his 1998 tome Kids Who Kill. Joe Carter, Huckabee's director of research, helpfully clarified today: "He's saying there's a range of aberrant behavior. He considers homosexuality aberrant, but that's at one end of the spectrum. Necrophilia is at the other end." Well. That's all right then.
Suffice it to say, the opinion of this queer-brained fag hag is kiss my likes-to-be-spanked ass.
1. Which movie that you loved as a kid still holds up when you watch it now?
2. Which one doesn't?
Leaving aside more obvious favies like the original Star Wars trilogy and the Indiana Jones movies for more esoteric shores, I'll answer part 1 with Dragonslayer, which still looks pretty good effects-wise and has a female lead who isn't laughably shameful, and part 2 with The Dark Crystal. Don't get me wrong; I still adore TDC (Aughra, I love you), but what were fantastic and scary creatures when I was 8 are now obviously dudez in costumes on stilts (or wev). But the realistic movement and lifefulness of the dudez on stilts is what made it so wonderful when I was a kid and lacked the capacity to see it as I do now, so I'm not complaining.
For outright "OMG this movie is so bad" after thinking it was good when I was a kid, I offer Solarbabies. Wow.
While I'm categorically averse to terms like gray rape because they essentially serve to tease out some bit of unnecessarily complicated nuance in what is possibly the easiest concept in the history of the world, I'm also not a fan of the term "date rape," either. Its ostensible purpose is admirable—to convey the ideas that rape is not just a masked man jumping out of the bushes forcing a woman at gunpoint to submit to his will, and that not all rape victims look like they've been brutalized. But, functionally, the term tends to instead reinforce the erroneous notion that not all rape is equal.
Date rape should be treated differently from attacks on women by strangers, John Redwood has said.
The former cabinet minister - now a senior Tory party adviser - suggested rape accusations made by women against their partners should be treated as "disagreements" between lovers.
…"None of us want men to rape women, but there is a difference between a man using unreasonable force to assault a woman on the street, and a disagreement between two lovers over whether there was consent on one particular occasion."
Actually, no, there isn't. What defines rape is a lack of consent—not where it happens, nor whether the rapist has a decent haircut and natty fashion sense, nor if he's known to his victim. In fact, given that women are three times more likely to be raped by someone they know than a stranger, and nine times more likely to be raped in their home, the home of someone they know, or anywhere else than being raped on the street, making what we commonly refer to as "date rape" by far the most prevalent "type" of rape, one might suggest that trying to address the epidemic of sexual assault by diminishing the gravity of "date rape" is akin to claiming to have cured cancer simply by renaming it tumory booboo.
Generally, we need to rethink how we talk about rape, so as not to suggest that there are different kinds, or types, or levels, or whatever of rape. A big part of the obstacle to refining the language is that discussions of rape tend to leave out the rapists—although, in truth, the distinction between "date rape" and "stranger rape" is effectively just shorthand to signal our recognition that there are really two different kinds of rapists.
"Date rape" is regarded as the province of, for lack of a better term, opportunistic rapists, who take advantage of women in particular situations, e.g. a borderline or overtly impaired state of consciousness. These are the rapists at whom ideas about enthusiastic consent are directed, because we acknowledge that they are primarily sex-seeking rapists. "Stranger rape," on the other hand, is regarded as the province of sadistic rapists, for whom using rape as a deliberate weapon is central to the act, for whom the lack of a woman's pleasure isn't a bug, but a feature.
But this is wrong. Plenty of "date rapists" fall into this latter category—which is extremely important to acknowledge, given that "date rape" is far commoner than "stranger rape."
Redwood, like many before him, seems to be suffering from the misapprehension that it is only "a man using unreasonable force to assault a woman on the street" who rape specifically to hurt their victims, but "date rapists" are just good boys who made a mistake—nothing that can't be cured by a Feminism 101 class (or a public official redefining rape). Well, no. Sometimes "date rapists" are sadists who use "unreasonable force" because that's what makes rape so much fun.
That you may have started out on a date with a rapist like that is not the important distinction.
The most vicious cases of stalking and repeat rape that women experience almost without exception follow a relationship with the stalker/rapist. Calling that "date rape," just because they knew (and dated, or were married to) their rapists is manifestly useless—except, perhaps, in minimizing the scenario. Not exactly the direction in which we ought to be heading.
Rape needs to be called rape. Not gray rape. Not date rape. Not "a disagreement between two lovers over whether there was consent on one particular occasion." There's really no need for anything fancier when it simply describes after all, in every situation, a terrible act for which there was no consent.
Chris Dodd took a moment to express his gratitude to the tons of people who supported his refusal to include retroactive immunity in the new FISA bill:
"Today we have scored a victory for American civil liberties and sent a message to President Bush that we will not tolerate his abuse of power and veil of secrecy. The President should not be above the rule of law, nor should the telecom companies who supported his quest to spy on American citizens. I want to thank the thousands of Americans throughout the country that stood with me to get this done for our country."
Despite myself being personally tattoo- and piercing-free (with the possible exception of single ear piercings that likely resealed long ago), I am a resolutedefender of body modification (your body; do whatevthefuck you want with it) and generally find all manner of body modification (including the natural sort) anywhere from intriguing to beautiful.
Welcome to Shakesville, a progressive feminist blog about politics, culture, social justice, cute things, and all that is in between. Please note that the commenting policy and the Feminism 101 section, conveniently linked at the top of the page, are required reading before commenting.
I just can't understand why people 
"At this time, I would give the Maliki government an 'F'," Mary Beth Long told the Senate Armed Services Committee during her confirmation hearing today. The nascent government has not performed in an "exemplary manner" to pass needed legislation, Long said. [...] She acknowledged the Iraqi government has not yet succeeded in passing de-Baathification legislation or approving hydrocarbon laws including an oil revenue sharing agreement, among other legislative goals.
The First Netroots Miracle
