Molly Ivins: most entertaining

thanks to grail76 for pointing me to this article.

this gives us an opportunity to revisit one of my all-time favorite statements by Feith, a key member of the neo-con inner circle that dominates foreign policy in this administration. On May 4 this year, Feith observed in a speech, "No one can properly assert that the failure, so far, to find Iraqi weapons of mass destruction stockpiles undermines the reasons for the war."

Uhhh. What a bunch of clear thinkers they are. An enterprising student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Devon Largio, has done an honors thesis delineating 27 separate rationales advanced by the administration for the war in Iraq. The only one left, of course, is "Saddam was a bad guy" — in other words, the human rights argument, the only one specifically rejected by the administration before the war.

but what I found most disturbing:

Unnumbered weirdness by John Ashcroft (it's too hard to keep count): The Department of Justice has asked the Government Printing Office "to instruct depository libraries to destroy five publications the department has deemed 'not appropriate for external use.' Of the five publications, two are texts of federal laws. They are to be removed from libraries and destroyed, making their content available only to those with access to a law office or law library," according to the American Library Association. All the documents concern either federal civil or criminal forfeiture procedure, including to how to reclaim items that have been confiscated by the government during an investigation.

I don't know how you feel about living in a country where the citizens are not allowed to read the law, but I find it ... surprising.

EDIT: After prompting by Scott, I found both confirmation of this request

http://listserv.access.gpo.gov/scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind0407&L=gpo-fdlp-l&F=&S=&P=1404
http://www.resourceshelf.com/2004/alawon7_23.html
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/07/24/libraries_ordered_to_destroy_us_pamphlets/

and a piece on the DOJ withdrawing the request

http://www.ala.org/al_onlineTemplate.cfm?Section=American_Libraries&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=72146

(no subject)

I tried this survey and got the following result

Score Love Language
6 Words of Affirmation
8 Quality Time
3 Receiving of Gifts
3 Acts of Service
10 Physical Touch

While I don't disagree much with the results (touch is certainly the most importatnt to me, but IMO I value affirmation more than quality time), I doubt the value or effectiveness of the quiz over simply asking people to rank-order their priorities. The quiz asks one to choose between two statements that are frequently (at least to me) of equal value or (worse for an instrument of this sort) one comparative and one not ("I feel closer when..." vs. "I feel close when..."; both of these coudl be true!) Plus some of the language is excerable ("I like for you to..." ugh!)

Arecibo scientists rubbish SETI claim

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3621608.stm

Cheney

I had dinner with the charming and lovely azbound at a small Indonesian restaurant of her choosing, then we went back to her dad's place to I could lavish attention on her cats, watch a West Wing rerun with her, and listen to some of Cheney's convention speech.

I was struck not only by the usual self-serving and cynical mischaracterization of John Kerry's words and record, but by the fact that almost all of his speech was either about Kerry (isn't there someone you're running with, Dick?) or about the war in Iraq, which the administration has made such a tremndous hash of. I guess they've decided that they can't actually win on their own record, and that if they say "we're winning the war against terrorism" often enough, people will just forget the coffins that keep slowly sliding back to the US, the total failure of the "coalition of the willing" to provide security for the people of Iraq, and their failure to create a safe and secure environment for elections in Afgahistan.

One could argue whether they've effectively disrupted al Qaida for the moment, but they've certainly not defeated it, and by the way they handled the Iraq situation have created a vast new constituency for anti-American anger and terrorism that was before only a simmering but unempowered anti-American resentment. People could argue whether US-supported UN sanctions were killing Iraqis or whether the Iraqi government's handling of the sanctions was to blame, but when US warplanes blow up Iraqi houses and US soldiers shoot Iraqis in the street, there's really no question who's to blame, whatever the reasons for the actions.

All in all, it looks as if this is going to be a very negative election (the sort that Karl Rove runs only too well), concentrating not on Bush's record (since he can hardly run on a failed war strategy and a stagant and sickening economy) but on nebulous pangyrics about the war on terror and repeated attacks on John Kerry.

I'd really like it if Sen. Kerry would stand up and make a full-throated response, challenging the president's performance, and if the media would actually cover it instead of simply acting as the president's PR firm.

:-(

Sadly, our work ssytem is smart enough to block gmail along with other types of webmail. And here I thought this might be a way around those barriers.

some games have the silliest components

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=30&item=5917702764&rd=1

HRC Condemns Fortune Companies' 'Pets Not Partners' Insurance Policies

WASHINGTON, Sept. 1 /PRNewswire/ -- The Human Rights Campaign today condemned Home Depot, Sprint, Ecolab and Waste Management -- all Fortune 500 companies -- for offering their employees pet insurance but not domestic partner health insurance.

"Paying for a parrot's but not a person's hospital stay is absurd," said HRC President Cheryl Jacques. "This is no joke. Employees deserve better from these companies."

thanks to robbysmom for the link.

mazzie is a peach

She pointed me to this testimonial:

My job tonight is an easy one: to present to you one of this nation's authentic heroes, one of this party's best-known and greatest leaders – and a good friend.

He was once a lieutenant governor – but he didn't stay in that office 16 years, like someone else I know. It just took two years before the people of Massachusetts moved him into the United States Senate in 1984.

In his 16 years in the Senate, John Kerry has fought against government waste and worked hard to bring some accountability to Washington.

Early in his Senate career in 1986, John signed on to the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Deficit Reduction Bill, and he fought for balanced budgets before it was considered politically correct for Democrats to do so.

John has worked to strengthen our military, reform public education, boost the economy and protect the environment. Business Week magazine named him one of the top pro-technology legislators and made him a member of its "Digital Dozen."

Remainder here.

And who was this heaping praise on Sen. Kerry? Zell Miller... shweet!

There's a link to a quotes from this speech in this column in the Post, as well as some more background on Flip-Flop Zell, including a list of ten questions he asked the president in an op-ed before the war that, if answered honestly, might have resulted either in no war or a very diffrent one.

this election is about democracy

...the important thing isn't the falsity of the [Republican] charges [that Democrats are failing to support the military during wartime], which Republicans continue to repeat despite press reports debunking them. The important thing is that the GOP is trying to quash criticism of the president simply because it's criticism of the president. The election is becoming a referendum on democracy.

from Slate

I really couldn't agree more. How often have we heard the VP, or the A-G, or other mebers of the administration attack someone because they were commiting the heinous crime of "not supporting the president" or "criticizing the commander in chief"? Are we going to go back to the days when sedition was a crime? In a second Bush Administration, it seems quite possible.

Kerry v. Bush on GLBT issues

garked from Mr Squeaky Pony Himself (xydexx)

http://www.livejournal.com/community/johnkerry04/206999.html

give people money and they will spam you forever ;-)

the Kerry campaign included these excerpts from Sen. Kerry's rally tonight in Springfield, OH. I think they strike the tone we've all been hoping for.
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