Mea Culpa (My Ass)

Gee, I'm sorry. I somehow missed the part where the Pope ended communism. Funny, George Bush the elder takes credit for it; so did Reagan.

Of course, in trying to take credit, they often ignore the pesky details that communism was largely starved out by the late 70s. In that respect, communism was on external life support longer than poor Mrs. Schiavo when all these men rushed to take credit for its fall.

But what would have been so important after the fall of the Berlin wall and the "democratization" of what was Russia was if we'd bothered to pour some support in there. We didn't. And now we've seen a terrible mess. Just last week, the former two halves of Germany announced they wanted a divorce. And Mr. Putin of Russia has the distinction of being even a poor democratic (note: small D) president than our King George.

If you want to gild the lily by saying the Pope did this and the Pope did that, let's balance it. OK? Note that the Pope forbade the use of condoms, a factor in continuing spread of sexually transmitted diseases and in more young kids and poor adults having babies they cannot care for. Talk about how this Pope seemed to want to take the Church back in time rather than forward into the new millennium. Or this Pope who did nothing about the priest sex abuse scandal except tell his American flunkies to stop embarrassing him. Talk about a Pope who did nothing to bring women into the Church in a significant way and did really nothing to elevate a Catholic population in many countries which remains among the poorest and least educated but with one of the largest number of children per family.

And where was the Pope as Africa watched greater and greater percentages of its people - and many Africans have converted to Catholicism - fall to AIDS? The epidemic wasn't so much a case of "promiscuous" homosexuals or prostitution (except out of base need) but from a population that believes having sex with a virgin is a way of protecting themselves from the virus.

Yes, the Pope did some notable things, including traveling to countries that no other Pope had visited. But this same Pope could have stopped American churches from doing what they did: trying to cut their losses and cry bankruptcy when the sex abuse scandal broke. While churches and Catholic schools closed here in record numbers to protect Vatican City, the Pope was still eating his elegant lunches in rooms lined with gold and some of the best artwork looted - and yes, bought with parishioners' money - from the rest of the world.

In short, I'll grant that this Pope did a few good things. But for one of the longest reigning Popes and for one who got to benefit from having the most exposure because of TV and other media, it's actually sad how little he accomplished toward bringing his "flock" to the same moral, spiritual, educational, artistic, and human richness of experience the Pope and his Vatican City consorts enjoy.

Whoopi Goldberg on Democrats

"There's not a ball between them."

You got that right, Sistah.

US Citizen Held in Iraq Without Lawyer or Charged Filed for More Than a Year

Yes, I know some people will look at this info and dismiss it as "Oh, well, see? He's a terrorist. Let 'em rot."

But if he's so really one, why have no charges been brought? Why is this being done against federal law? In fact, almost NO ONE has been charged. Most of who we hold are usually nobodies we eventually release.

From Swiss Info:

The U.S. military said on Friday it has held since last year an American citizen without chargesin Iraq as a suspected top aide to militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, drawing condemnation from civil rights activists.

The man, who U.S. officials at the Pentagon and in Iraq refused to identify by name, possessed dual U.S.-Jordanian citizenship, themilitary said.

The man was not born in the United States, but became a naturalized U.S. citizen and lived in "a couple of different cities" duringabout 20 years in America, one official said.

Thought to be the first U.S. citizen caught as a suspected participant in Iraq's two-year-old insurgency, he was seized in a raid "latelast year" on a Baghdad home where weapons and bomb-making material was found, the military said.

Air Force Lt. Col. John Skinner, a Pentagon spokesman, said the man, deemed an enemy combatant, had personal ties to Zarqawiand was believed to have served as his personal emissary in several Iraqi cities. The man has not been allowed to have a lawyer,Skinner said.

"I think it's extremely high on the outrageous scale. This is a direct violation of a Supreme Court decision," said lawyer RachelMeeropol of the New York-based Centre for Constitutional Rights.

The justices ruled last June that the government cannot hold an American citizen indefinitely in a U.S. military jail without providing achance to contest the case against him.

Tom DeLay: The Bullshit Never Stops

From The Post:

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), under fire from Democrats for what they consider threatening remarks about federal judges, plans to ask the Judiciary Committee to undertake a broad review of the courts' handing of the Terri Schiavo case, his office said yesterday.

DeLay's office did not specify exactly what the majority leader wants the committee to do. The Constitution gives Congress the power to set the areas of authority for federal courts, but it was unclear what could be done by the committee in response to the Schiavo case, in particular.

The majority leader said Thursday he wants to examine what he called the "failure" of state and federal courts to protect Schiavo, who died 13 days after the court-ordered withdrawal of her feeding tube.

DeLay issued a statement asserting that "the time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior." He later said in front of television cameras that he wants to "look at an arrogant, out-of-control, unaccountable judiciary that thumbed their nose at Congress and the president."

Democrats continued to criticize DeLay yesterday, with Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) charging that the Republican might have broken a federal statute against threatening U.S. judges.

"Threats against specific federal judges are not only a serious crime, but also beneath a Member of Congress," Lautenberg wrote. "Your attempt to intimidate judges in America not only threatens our courts, but our fundamental democracy as well."

Bring it on, Teflon Tom. You might be surprised at the results. You've climbed out of your snake hole too many times now; people are starting to notice you and the stench and slime in your wake.

The Maple Papal

Out of a certain sense of decorum, I've decided to wait until Monday before I begin campaigning loudly to become the next Pope. However, as you can see from the title of this posting, I've already coined an appropriate catchy-but-dim phrase (The Maple Papal) for said candidacy. See this archived post for a quick summary of my platform.

I've already been in contact with Diebold's Smoke and Mirrors division to rig the vote turning black smoke to white at the key time. Thankfully, they don't do exit polling for the conclave voting so I won't have to weakly explain the irregularities between presumed and actual votes which might lead some hopelessly deluded people (read: anyone capable of thought) to question whether some electoral hanky/panky has been played (of course not and don't make me call Noni Scalia on you).

[Ed note: See? There is something to be learned from the GOP playbook.]

The Echo Chamber Project

Hmmmm.

Letter to the Editor Edited Without Notation of Same?

I wrote a letter to the Times-Argus, the paper of record for little Washington County, VT, and after about 10 days, it appeared today. The subject was James Jefford (I-VT Senate) and the Vermont GOP's appeal to out-of-state donors to unseat him in this election.

Strange thing is that the letter appears edited, missing two or three paragraphs, and at least two others have been rearranged. Now, newspapers sometimes edit for length (although I've seen much longer letters appear in the same paper). That I understand. Yet the standard of protocol is to note that a letter has been edited. In the old days, papers would even try to contact the writer ahead of time to either work with the writer to shorten it or ask if the author still wants to run the letter with the edits. Reporters see their work fouled up often, but the thought behind checking with the letter writer for edits made sure that papers didn't edit based on oh... say a little tiny bit of bias.

I didn't need the latter (someone to call me, although I supplied my number). But I would have appreciated if they had noted the editing, especially when it removed paragraphs critical to Mr. Bush, Mr. DeLay, and Gov. Jim Douglas (R-VT), and the editing is choppy enough that it makes my writing appear sloppier than it did originally.

Rudy Giuliani: Making a Mountain of Money on Misery

From The Carpetbagger Report:

Rudy Giuliani’s stature took a bit of a hit when he became a Bush campaign attack dog last year — going so far, at one point, to start blaming U.S. troops for the administration’s mistakes — but the former New York mayor still seems to consider himself presidential material.

But if his gutter politics on Bush’s behalf didn’t damage his appeal among the Republican faithful, I wonder if trying to profit from a natural disaster will damage his standing.

The most vivid recent example occurred on Feb. 9 in Columbia, S.C. Mr. Giuliani had initially been booked by the South Carolina Hospital Association through the Washington Speakers Bureau to speak for his usual $100,000 fee. But then a massive tsunami devastated South Asia and “we just didn’t feel that a big old party was the right thing,” said Patti Smoake, the hospital association’s spokeswoman. Instead, the South Carolinians held a fund-raiser called “From South Carolina to South Asia.”

Mr. Giuliani agreed to speak at the new event. He even wrote a $20,000 check to the Red Cross, the event’s beneficiary, according to figures cited by a South Carolina hospital official and obtained by The Observer. He batted away the inevitable political speculation that accompanied his visit to the crucial Republican primary state, telling a local reporter he was visiting “because I enjoy coming to South Carolina and because this is a worthy cause.”

Mr. Giuliani didn’t mention it at the time, but he also walked away from the tsunami benefit with $80,000 at a time when celebrities from Bill Clinton and the first President Bush to George Clooney were donating time to the relief effort. There was nothing illegal, or even particularly unusual, about his taking a fee from a charity event. But taking the money was not the move of a man whose political future depends on the good will of the voters of South Carolina, the decisive state in the 2000 Republican primary widely viewed as the immovable object between a socially liberal Republican like Mr. Giuliani and the nomination.

After the event, a spokesperson for the South Carolina Hospitals Association said “she was not even sure whether the benefit’s total take had exceeded Mr. Giuliani’s fee.”

Emphasis mine.

More Tax Dollars to Promote More Stupidity in the Name of "Christ"

From CNN:

An array of advocacy groups are calling on the U.S. government to take down one of its new Web sites, saying it presents biased and inaccurate advice to parents on how to talk to their children about sex.

The site -- 4parents.gov -- stresses the promotion of abstinence.

Emphasizing abstinence is fine, said the groups, but the government, under the conservative Bush administration, also should stress the need for contraception if sexual relations do occur.

Doubts on Weapons Dismissed

Story here and remember that Tenet was recently awarded by Bush with one of the nation's highest honors (Medal of Freedom? Don't recall. But yeah, these people sure deserve accolades for their ::cough:: outstanding work):

As former secretary of state Colin L. Powell worked into the night in a New York hotel room, on the eve of his February 2003 presentation to the U.N. Security Council, CIA officers sent urgent e-mails and cables describing grave doubts about a key charge he was going to make.

On the telephone that night, a senior intelligence officer warned then-CIA Director George J. Tenet that he lacked confidence in the principal source of the assertion that Saddam Hussein's scientists were developing deadly agents in mobile laboratories.

"Mr. Tenet replied with words to the effect of 'yeah, yeah' and that he was 'exhausted,' " according to testimony quoted yesterday in the report of President Bush's commission on the intelligence failures leading up to his decision to invade Iraq in March 2003.
Tenet told the commission he did not recall that part of the conversation. He relayed no such concerns to Powell, who made the germ- warfare charge a centerpiece of his presentation the next day.

At Least 20 US Troops Hurt - and Probably Countless Iraqis Killed - in Abu Ghraib Attack by Insurgents

Story here.

Of course, the only thing of interest to our beloofahed leader is that a great man of God has died (read: great, rich, powerful man who was almost as committed to repressing and harming people for his own purposes as the president himself).

The troops and the Iraqis, on the other hand, can go fuck themselves for all Mr. Bush cares. They're poor and as he's noted, he doesn't understand poor people.

Pharmacists Who Won't Fill Prescriptions

While I join the list of those who give good credit to the governor of Illinois for passing an emergency bill that requires prescriptions to be filled, I'd like to add that it's preposterous we need a bill to do this.

If a pharmacist has ethical qualms about filling "certain types" of prescriptions, let them go collect garbage, get a contractor's job with Halliburton in Iraq or get a position where they get to ask, "Would you like fries with that?"

At one job I had, our health insurance - specially crafted by the institution where I worked - allowed for contraceptive medication, something I took as a medical necessity for abnormal menses. But if I went to fill my prescription on certain days of the week, I got lectured to by a pious, holier than thou, "I got six kids at home and if my wife would let me near her, I'd have six more" pharmacist, and then usually did not get my prescription. On the rare occasion this "professional" did fill it, he would write little notes on the order stating I should get married and I wouldn't need the prescription. Why, yes, let's ALL have 15 kids.

But getting married wasn't the issue for me. Without the prescription, I would bleed so severely during an event that happened every four weeks that I would become dangerously anemic. But this "professional" couldn't see past his own twisted sense. I resolved this by getting a few other female staffers together and going through the chain of command to have this man not allowed to fill female employee prescriptions. I would have been happier to have him fired, but...

(Yet More) Evidence the Drug War is Failing BADLY

From CNN:

The war on drugs in Colombia, the world's main cocaine-producing country and a major supplier of heroin, has cost more than $3 billion in U.S. aid here since 2000. Critics of Washington's effort say the report indicates the Colombia and U.S. governments are losing the war.

"The U.S. government's own data provides stark evidence that the drug war is failing to achieve its most basic objectives," said John Walsh, of the Washington Office on Latin America, a think tank critical of U.S. drug policies in Colombia.

The report by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy said that despite a record-setting aerial eradication offensive, 281,694 acres of coca remained in Colombia at the end of 2004 -- an increase from the 281,323 acres left over after spraying the year earlier.

And this is just ONE part of the drug war. We've destroyed a whole country because of it (Colombia - they haven't quite finished destroying the US completely yet).

Yes, the Pope is Really Dead

(I suspect he was yesterday about the same time it was originally reported.)

War in Blogville? Important Battles But No Real Combat

Except for posting a note about the National Press Club's um... interesting choice of Ana Marie Cox of Wonkette and Jeff Gannon (aka JD Guckert, aka Cock for Hire) to sit on a panel about blogging, journalism, and ethics and the fact that some bloggers had rallied to let the NPC know this dynamic duo doesn't exactly represent either blogs or journalism, I've stayed mostly quiet on the issue.

On the one hand, I'm more apt to blow this away as "yet another bogus fair and balanced panel". I mean, when was the last time you saw a panel that really represented the full range of expert opinions on a particular subject? Even when I watch something like Democracy Now or Link TV's news where I get opinions and info CNN wouldn't give me if my life depended on it, I lament the fact that everything gets "packaged" before it gets to me. People decide whom to interview and you either end up with a gross imbalance or just people shouting at one another (and let's face it, MSNBC, Faux, and CNN ALL now often present just one person on one side of an issue, and usually, it's not representative of the majority).

But I respect Steve Gilliard and others who are quite upset about this NPC issue because the supposedly serious organization's choice represents two non-serious, clownish extremes that show neither intelligent "liberal" dialogue or conservative (let alone the diverse range between). If you wanted to have both on a panel to discuss say, "blog celebrity" or even "the joys of sodomy", both would be excellent choices. I have never sought celebrity (let alone through a blog) or ass fucking, so I'd be a rotten choice.

Ana Marie probably didn't help her cause much when she posted yesterday saying she was joining the liberal blogger camp and then making snarky comments. But that's what she does. That's the Wonkette blog. On a good day or when I need a laugh, I venture over to Wonkette for a quick snark. But she's not where I go for serious news. And when I need a laugh with some meat to it, there are a ton of other blogs like Skippy, General JC Christian, and TBogg who fill the bill very nicely.

At the same time, however, while Ana Marie certainly accepts media invitations regularly (she's probably the most often televised blogger), I have to say I've never heard her pretend to be other than she is. Let us also not forget that she's decent eye candy. Certainly prettier than Andrew Sullivan, etc.

Were I her and got an invitation to a gig like the National Press Club, I suspect I would not accept until I learned what the subject was and who else was being presented. If I saw no obvious role for me or where I felt I had no special expertise, I'd decline while offering some smart suggestions for better choices. I've done this in the computer field.

The fault lies mostly, however, with the National Press Club. If they wanted to have a panel where Wonkette and Jeff Gannon were appropriate, there were lots of ways to handle it. But they didn't need to call it an "ethics in blogging and journalism" discussion when their panel members don't fit the bill. I can fault Ana Marie for accepting (Jeff's just an idiot and plagiarist) but the blame lies solidly with the National Press Club.

Rate of Malnutrition Among Iraqi Children Has DOUBLED Under Our Control

From Juan Cole by way of Pudentilla at Skippy:

shouldn't it be wrong that the rate of acute malnutrition among children in iraq has doubled in the last year? shouldn't americans be holding vigils and protest rallies? shouldn't tom delay and bill frist hold hearings and passing laws?

Apparently Mrs. Schiavo wasn't the only one being "starved" (and stopping eating is a very normal part of the death process, although not in children).

Choice

Again and again with the Pope's condition, we hear how the Pope chose not to return to the hospital or have extra measures taken.

But not one nitwit media type notes the irony here. The Pope was allowed to choose what he wanted. Terri Schiavo and her husband as guardian were NOT supposed to choose what they wanted. In fact, if you bother listening to the Schindlers now, you'll hear them say the right to choose needs to be removed and that they'll fight in both state and federal legislature to do that.

But then, you also won't hear that for all the venom directed at Michael Schiavo for being with his wife when she died (myself, I was so pleased to hear he was, and that he cradled her as she passed) while her brother and sister and parents were not, the media also won't say that Terri's mother had not gone into the room for days before Terri died (her last visit was Easter; Terri died on Thursday). There is some question whether Bob Schindler was there in the final day or so.

Now, I'm not condemning the Schindler parents for not visiting Terri. I've seen some people devoted to a dying person who simply cannot bear to be there at the end. It's very tough.

But what irritates me is that a) the MSM jumps all over the husband without sufficiently noting the circumstances and b) others have choices beyond the Schindlers. And now the Schindlers want to remove choice from the rest of us. I have no doubt they'll find more like Tom DeLay, Rick Santorum, and Bill Frist to support this removal of rights.

You know, the same Congress critters who ruled for deep nursing home cuts and veterans' cuts and for allowing life support to be disconnected when a patient can't pay.

So the Networks Are Really Committed to This?

For a week, all we got was Schiavo death bed coverage. Now? Non-stop Catholic services and Pope death watch. I'm half expecting Bob Schindler to call a press conference in which he announces he's told the Vatican that it would be nice if Terri and the Pope could have their funerals together (actually, he says he's already at work on changing legislation so that no one is allowed to die as his daughter did - earth to the grieving Mr. Schinder: this is the way a large percentage of Americans DO die).

What's a word stronger than obscene?

Just for shits and giggles, I messaged a bunch of my still-Catholic friends and co-workers. Not only are they not humungous fans of the pope of their lifetime, they can't stand the non-stop coverage. So who exactly is watching this?

Now This is Moderately Interesting

From CNN:

After a few close calls, astronomers have finally obtained the first photograph of a planet beyond our solar system, SPACE.com has learned.

The planet is thought to be one to two times as massive as Jupiter. It orbits a star similar to a young version of our sun.

The star, GQ Lupi, has been observed by a team of European astronomers since 1999. They have made three images using the Very Large Telescope (VLT) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile.

But you might want to close your eyes for the part where they talk about a fairly new solar system and a young star and crap like that which suggests Earth isn't the only planet out there and that science knows anything. I mean, a term like Big Bang Theory has three strikes against it already:

* Scientists came up with it
* The term includes the word, bang
* Tom DeLay's sure that other planets are where alien workers come from

Uh... When is Tom DeLay Going to Convene Congress to Keep the Pope Alive?

[Ed. note: Update: While lights burn in the Pope's apartment, the Papal bedroom itself has been dark for sometime. It's been more than five hours since the Vatican has updated the Pope's status and then only to refute the initial reports of his death.]

Where's the outrage? I mean, just yesterday he was talking about moral poverty and threatening judges and Michael Schiavo?

Is the Pope too Catholic for him?

Hey, I'm not leaving my newsfeed tonight until Tom DeLay makes sure that the Pope gets to appeal this and snarks at activist Vatican lawyers. I'm waiting until DeLay and Frist demand that federal marshals take both the Pope and the poor late Mrs. Schiavo into custody so they can lie in the Capitol Rotunda for a GOP photo op. Maybe the Bush twins will sing Amazing Grace while they drunkenly wonder aloud how many thousands of more times they've had sex over the two dead people.

Oh wait... there's Jesse Jackson on TV. I know he'll step in. Oops. Nope. He's in memorial mode. Come on, Jesse. Here's another limp body to jump! Once again, you can provide some color to an otherwise black-and-white situation (and with the Florida group and the Vatican, the faces are still mostly white). [In seriousness, Jackson is mentioning that the Pope did vocalize his opposition to apartheid, something I'd forgotten and for which he deserves credit. But this revisionist history that this Pope grabbed charge of the priest sex scandal and shook the American bishops, trying to get them to protect the children no matter what is sickening. Have people really forgotten how badly everyone handled it?]

Oh goodie.. both CNN and MSNBC have announced this is the only story they'll cover ALL night. They've even got new theme music and that's after they just bought Terri Schiavo theme music. I guess it's safe to watch an old movie (actually, I'll be working on a novel and two reference books but same diff). And yes, making popcorn or ordering in Chinese food - unless you were already planning to do so - is tacky.