Friday Night (sort of) Punk: XTC

This is an insanely early 1977 video of them playing Neon Shuffle. Safe to say they never got this wild again after 1980.

Bogus Congressional Credentials

The sheets of paper seemed to be everywhere the lawmakers went in the Green Zone, distributed to Iraqi officials, U.S. officials and uniformed military of no particular rank. So when Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) asked a soldier last weekend just what he was holding, the congressman was taken aback to find out.In the soldier’s hand was a thumbnail biography, distributed before each of the congressmen’s meetings in Baghdad, which let meeting participants such as that soldier know where each of the lawmakers stands on the war. “Moran on Iraq policy,” read one section, going on to cite some the congressman’s most incendiary statements, such as, “This has been the worst foreign policy fiasco in American history.”. . . .

For one, the quotations appeared to be selected to divide the visitors into those who are with the war effort and those who are against. For another, they were not exactly accurate. Under “latest Iraq vote,” Tauscher’s bio noted that she had voted in favor of legislation requiring the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq within 120 days of the bill’s enactment.

She did vote that way — in May. On Aug. 2, Tauscher voted in favor of her own bill, which mandates that troops be granted a leave from combat at least as long as their last combat deployment before being shipped back to Iraq. That vote might have been a little too popular with the soldiers she was meeting, Tauscher said.

Fan-tastic. Think Progress (keeps climbing as my favorite political blog) posted images of the documents in question. Also:

ThinkProgress spoke with one of the delegation’s military escorts, Maj. Toby Patterson, who said that he didn’t know who made the bios or why they were created in the first place. He added that his office, the Marine Corps liaison for the U.S. House of Representatives, usually just uses lawmakers’ readily-available bios off of congressionalquarterly.com.

So the question is, who’s lying to the soldiers? My guess is that it’s an officer acting alone over there with a political agenda. I hope, anyway. Seems a little too dumb for it to have come from the top levels. At any rate, now that they’ve been found out, I’m guessing this won’t go on again, and if something similar happens again, we’ll know it’s more than just one person.

OOH! Just saw this from snuhwolf in the comments. This would be intriguing:

If the military intelligence had the desire to find out who is printing the broadsheets it would be an easy task since all modern color printers leave a unique secret watermark:
http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/list.php
http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/21071/135/

Move Cornyn From Leans GOP to Safe GOP

For some reason, my beloved Dark Lord chose to highlight this ad for Rick Noriega, the likely challenger to John Cornyn on his front page. 

Keep in mind that Cornyn is already below fifty percent in his re-elect numbers, which means the Dems could actually win in Texas!  Noriega is an amazingly great candidate, who can really beat Cornyn.

And then you see this:

I really think that this (thump… snore… no wait I’m awake) ad is one of the greatest (thump… snore… no wait I can do this) political ads I have ever (thump… snore…)

Thompson to Announce Run for President with Online Video Followed by Three-State Campaign Tour

The waiting is nearly over

In a week the great wait will be over and the greatest threat to Hillary will enter the 2008 presidential race. Thompson has some great assets that some of the other major Republican presidential candidates do not have. He’s not directly tied into the decision to go to war with Iraq, he’s articulate and has a good physical presence, he’s conservative without being a kook,  he’s not mormon, and despite being on his second marriage to a much younger woman he is acceptable to social conservatives (he’s ‘right’ on Guns, God and Gays). All of which will be of help to him in both the primaries and in the general election against Billary. Will it be enough in a polarized nation tired of war and of Bush? Maybe not, but it will be interesting to see if he is just a flash in the pan or a real force to be reckoned with. I have never sent a presidential candidate a financial contribution in my life, but I will for Fred because I believe that this election is that important. This is a crucial and critical time in this nation’s history and I’ve made the decision that “I’m with Fred” win, lose or draw. 

His entrance immediately turns the jostling for the 2008 Republican nomination into a two man race. McCain is already finished and this should bury Romney. From here on out it is Guiliani vs. Thompson. Pick you side.

And off the subject, just how many Chicom finaciers does it take to guarantee Hillary’s victory in 2008?

“I believe that there are millions of Americans who know that our security and prosperity are at risk if we don’t address the challenges of our time; the global threat of terrorism; taxes and spending that will bankrupt future generations, and a government that can’t seem to get the most basic responsibilities right for its citizens,” stated Fred Thompson.

“The response that we’ve received makes me confident that we have an opportunity to change politics in Washington and across the country, and take on these challenges the way every generation of Americans has faced the challenges of their time – with unity, hard work and a belief that we will come out on the winning side,” continued Thompson.

This is Why We Can’t Win Wars Anymore

A Colorado school has banned tagged. Cindy Fesgen, the principal, is an idiot to be sure, but it is the parents themselves who are the real disgrace.

Melody Hatten, who has two children at the school, supports the measure. “I think it’s a fine decision,” Hatten said. “I think there are a lot of other things they can do on recess that is more constructive.”

Parent Barbara Ball, who also has two children at the school, agreed with Hatten. “It was a surprise, but I think it’s a good thing,” Ball said.

Ball said she recalled past situations in which her children told her about playmates going overboard and tagging too hard.

There’s no sense putting too fine a point on it — Melody Hatten and Barbara Ball are bad mothers. In their fanatical mania to shelter their children from reality, they do them a severe disservice. They are transfering their ignorance of human behavior to their children.

 The most sensible mind in the entire, dispicable affair is that of Jacob Hein. “It’s really unacceptable,” Hein said of the ban, while pointing out that tag was done all the time at the school without problems.

Jacob is in the 5th grade.

‘Bin Laden’ Options Trades

As if the mortgage-market meltdown isn’t enough to spook investors, some market players are worrying about unusual options bets that some observers have dubbed “Bin Laden Trades.” The blogosphere and options trading desks have been rife with speculation about these trades, which are unusually large bets that the market will make a huge move in the next month. Some entity, or entities, has taken a large position on extremely deep in the money S&P 500options, both puts and calls, that won’t pay off unless the market undergoes an extremely large price move between now and the options’ expiration on Sept. 21.

Someone is making some pretty big bets that the market is going to dramatically move in the next few weeks.  As the article further notates, it is reminiscent of the action prior to September 11th when large out of the ordinary put contracts were placed on many of the publicly traded U.S. airline companies.  So naturally, this is causing a stir on the street as it could be an indicator of an upcoming event…or perhaps it is just someone attempting to manipulate the level of fear already in the market. 

It’s time to take back our public toilets!

Foot Tapping Ritual Common in Sex Sting

A couple of days ago E remarked that we were in the middle of a slow news cycle when it came to the political arena. He wasn’t kidding and now we are reduced to learning about the herebefore unknown nuances of the deviant public restroom sex scene. It’s amazing and somewhat sad to see. If my children ever ask me when I fully realized that Western Civilization was on the skids I can proudly point to the moment when we all learned that you can’t bring along an ipod when answering natures call for fear that a little foot tapping might ensnare you in a homosexual sex sting operation.

Now there is always a possibility that this was in fact all some weird misunderstanding. Crazier things have happened. I think he should have gone with the following defense.

He was signaling “I am not gay” in Morse Code.

127 billion dollars

Let’s play a quick game of Jeopardy.

Alex, I’ll take Government Spending Boondoggles for 1000.

Answer: 127 billion dollars

Question: How much money has the Federal Government spent on New Orleans and the Gulf since Katrina hit?

Larry Kudlow gives us the rundown.

You might be asking, Where in the hell did all this money go? Well, the White House fact sheet says $24 billion has been used to build houses and schools, repair damaged infrastructure, and provide victims with a place to live. But isn’t everyone complaining about the lack of housing?

Perhaps all this money should’ve been directly deposited in the bank accounts of the 300,000 people living in New Orleans. All divvied up, that $127 billion would come to $425,000 per person! After thanking Uncle Sam for their sudden windfall, residents could head to Southern California and buy homes that are now on sale thanks to the sub-prime mortgage crisis and bid up the sagging house prices in the state.

The fact sheet goes on to say that $7.1 billion went to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to rebuild the levees; that the U.S. Department of Education spent $2 billion on local schools; and that the Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries has awarded more than $2.5 million (the pikers). The administration also provided $16.7 billion as part of the largest housing-recovery program in U.S. history.

So the billion-dollar question becomes: Where did the rest of that money go?…

Think of this: The idea of using federal money to rebuild cities is the quintessential liberal vision. And given the dreadful results in New Orleans, we can say that the government’s $127 billion check represents the quintessential failure of that liberal vision. Hillary Clinton calls this sort of reckless spending “government investment.” And that’s just what’s in store for America if she wins the White House next year.

Remember President Reagan’s line during the 1980 campaign about how LBJ fought a big-government spending war against poverty, and poverty won? Well think of all this Katrina spending as the Great Society Redux. And it failed. I suppose the current Bush administration would like to label this “compassionate conservatism.” But guess what? That failed, too.

Right from the start, New Orleans should have been turned into a tax-free enterprise zone. No income taxes, no corporate taxes, no capital-gains taxes. The only tax would have been a sales tax paid on direct transactions. A tax-free New Orleans would have attracted tens of billions of dollars in business and real-estate investment. This in turn would have helped rebuild the cities, schools, and hospitals. Private-sector entrepreneurs would have succeeded where big-government bureaucrats and regulators have so abysmally failed.

 

The Grownups Are Now In Charge

 Kilcullen at SWJ

David Kilcullen, who was the chief counterinsurgency adviser to General David Petraeus, has posted another item over at the Small Wars Journal. Kilcullen always makes for interesting reading, and he doesn’t disappoint with this latest.

Kilcullen offers some deep insight into al Qaeda’s current troubles in Anbar–specifically, why it is that the terrorist groups Iraqi affiliate, AQI, failed to cement its relationship with the tribal sheiks in that region.

Indeed, the Coalition Provisional Authority deliberately side-lined the tribes in 2003 in order to focus on building a “modern” democratic state in Iraq, which we equated with a non-tribal state. There were good reasons for this at the time, but we are now seeing the most significant political and security progress in years, via a structure outside the one we have been working so hard to create. Does that invalidate the last four years’ efforts? Probably not, as long as we recognize that the vision of a Jeffersonian, “modern” (in the Western industrial sense) democracy in Iraq, based around entirely secular non-tribal institutions, was always somewhat unrealistic. In the Iraqi polity, tribes’ rights may end up playing a similar role to states’ rights in some other democracies. They will remain a competing power center to the religious political parties, and hence will probably never be popular with Baghdad politicians, but if correctly handled they have the potential to actually enhance pluralism in Iraq over the long-term, by restraining the excesses of any central government or sectarian faction.

The Times, Are They A-Changin’?

Thanks to pgwarner’s excellent link to BLACKFIVE, I’ve been getting lots of different reality-based perspectives on the war. One article they linked to today from a site called Small Wars Journal was particularly interesting.

Some aspects of the war in Iraq are hard to fit into “classical” models of insurgency. One of these is the growing tribal uprising against al Qa’ida, which could transform the war in ways not factored into neat “benchmarks” developed many months ago and thousands of miles away.

. . . .

Several major tribes are now “up” against AQ, across all of Anbar, Diyala, Salah-ad-din, parts of Babil and Baghdad (both city and province). Some in Anbar and Diyala have formed “Salvation Councils”, looking to well-known leadership figures like Sheikh Sittar ar Rishawi, or to community leaders. In other provinces things tend to be quite informal, based on local elders. In Anbar the movement has acquired the name “the awakening”.

The uprising against AQI has dramatically improved security. In Ramadi, Hit, Tikrit, Fallujah and other centers the rate of civilian deaths has dropped precipitously, and overall attacks are down far below historic trends, to almost nothing in some places. For anyone familiar with these places from earlier in the war, it can be quite disorienting to watch Iraqis walking safely and openly in streets which, a year ago, would have required a major operation just to traverse. This change seems to have passed some observers by, but it is one of the truly significant developments in Iraq this year.
. . . .
The locals have formed a neighborhood watch, are policing their own community, and are enrolling in the Iraqi police under government control and cooperating with local Iraqi Army units. And recently Shi’a tribes in the south have approached us, looking to cooperate with the government against Shi’a extremists.Of course, this is motivated primarily by self-interest. Tribal leaders realize the extremists were leading them on a path to destruction, and have seized the opportunity to dump the terrorists and come in from the cold. They are also, naturally, looking forward to the day when coalition forces are no longer in their districts, and want to ensure that they, nor AQI, are in charge once we leave. And many of the tribal leaders have realized for themselves what our Army, Marines and Special Forces commanders have been telling them for years: “If you don’t like having us around, and you want us to get off your backs, the solution is staring you in the face: just get rid of the extremists, reduce the violence and cooperate with the government to stabilize your area, and we’re out of here”.

I’m aware that you’ve been saying this since I first visited the site, but this is one of the first articles I’ve seen that seemed truly unbiased. No offense intended, of course, just that for someone who only looks at the benchmarks and the statistics, it’s eye-opening and informative to see a detailed analysis of exactly what that means and how things could be improving without any statistics to back that up. If true, this would be promising.

Of course, none of this may actually show the results needed to stop the cycle. The article itself freely admits it could easily go either way. Sectarian violence may spread anew, the tribes may begin to grow more and more insular, and there’s no guarantee they won’t come to blame the United States for its handling of the war in the long run. Just like in Vietnam, there’s no guarantee that once we leave, the same problems won’t crop up again (like in Afghanistan). But I’m going on record now as saying that I may have to eat my words.

But before you get too smug…

The other implication is that, to be perfectly honest, the pattern we are seeing runs somewhat counter to what we expected in the ’surge’, and therefore lies well outside the ‘benchmarks’. The original concept was that we (the Coalition and the Iraqi government) would create security, which would in turn create space for a ‘grand bargain’ at the national level. Instead, we are seeing the exact opposite: a series of local political deals has displaced extremists, resulting in a major improvement in security at the local level, and the national government is jumping on board with the program. Instead of coalition-led top-down reconciliation, this is Iraqi-led, bottom-up, based on civil society rather than national politics. And oddly enough, it seems to be working so far.

It seems like the impetus for this change has been a reaction to the surge, not necessarily a reaction to what the surge has done. The surge was probably unnecessary, and what was really accomplished was done through diplomatic relationships with the community, building trust, bolstering the national defense, keeping peace. Exactly the kind of things Democrats said that they should be focusing more energy on all along. Maybe if we’d taken this approach a few years ago, we wouldn’t have gone through this whole nightmare, or would at least have started moving forward more quickly.

DFV and Castro Agree

Hillary will win.

I thought I’d never see the day…. And Castro has some nice things to say about Bill and Jimmy as well.

Too Soon To Give Up

A Report from Iraq by Jeff Emanuel

This is a thoughtful and well done piece by an embedded blogger on the front lines in Iraq. Well worth the read.

It’s not over until it’s over, and my guestimate is that this conflict is, militarily speaking, about half over. We’ve seen conclusive evidence that this surge is working. It’s too bad this wasn’t tried two years ago, and not with 20,000 but with 50,000. If you are going to gamble on a war you better be prepared to gamble to win it.

This is the case both because of the growing portion of the population which does want peace and stability (and is willing to fight for it), and because, like it or not - and regardless of when or why it came to be so - a central front in the War on Terror, against al Qaeda and other extremists, is, in fact, Iraq. Whatever decision we make regarding nation-building in that country, we must, for reasons of our own security and national interest, continue to address the presence there of terrorists whose stated goal is not only middle eastern domination (the establishment of the next ‘Caliphate’), but the eradication of America and Israel, and of our way of life.
 

I have seen with my own eyes the torture and killing that al Qaeda inflicts on the people of Iraq - and, for those who would draw a moral equivalence between them and the US, or blame us for their action, I must say that, having seen them (and others) in person, no body, when finished, looks the way one dealt with by al Qaeda does. What they do was not “learned” from America, nor made possible by us - but they must be eradicated by us, lest their unspeakable and indescribable brutality spread to other reaches.

Whatever happened to: Todd Marinovich

Todd Marinovich,  the former “Robo QB” who was also nicknamed Todd Marijuanavich was busted yet again in California. After being raised by his father, former NFL lineman Marv Marinovich, to be the “perfect QB”,  Todd never lived up to the hype.  After spending 2 seasons with the Raiders, he had short stints in the CFL and AFL before getting bogged down in a vicious cycle of drug related problems.  This is his 10th drug related charge in Orange County. 

During the rise and fall of Ryan Leaf, I often thought about his similarities to Marinovich.  During Leaf’’s high school career, I went to one of his basketball games and have an image of him seared in my mind.  He was playing on the road and bullied everyone on the court around so much that the crowd began to boo every time he touched the ball.  During a timeout, he walked over in front of the home town fans, flipped them off with both hands and yelled “Don’t you know who the fuck I am?  I am Ryan Leaf and you all ain’t shit!”.    Things didn’t go so well in the NFL and Leaf is now quarterback coach and golf coach at West Texas A & M.

Sadr suspends military operations of Mahdi army

In a surprise move following Shi’ite on Shi’ite gun battles in Karbala, Muqtada al-Sadr announced that he was suspending all military operations of his Mahdi army for six months, including attacks on American troops. 

The surprise declaration was widely taken as a tacit acknowledgment of the damage done to his movement’s reputation by two days of Shiite-on-Shiite in-fighting, which killed 52 people, wounded 279 and forced thousands of pilgrims to flee birthday celebrations for the Mahdi, one of Shiite Islam’s most revered medieval saints.

Mr. Sadr’s aides declared an unequivocal end to all militia operations. Ahmed al-Shaibani, the chief of Mr. Sadr’s media office in Najaf, confirmed that this “includes suspending the taking up of arms against occupiers,” a reference to American-led coalition troops.

Clearly, the marginalizing of the Mahdi army by the surge has put the movement in a tailspin.  The Shi’ites have splintered and its most visible split was shown on their most public holiday.  Whether this was a part of the overall strategy of the U.S. is debatable but the results could be enormous.  By bringing more Shi’ites into the fold, the politcal situation could stabilize and armed resistance to the government may minimize.  But Sadr is still wise to the ways of the new surge himself.  He knows that splinter cells that have already left his group and continue to attack U.S. troops will face the wrath of our miltary.  As the article points out:

In effect, Mr. Sadr was saying, anyone who attacks Americans is by definition violating the freeze and laying himself open to retaliatory attacks.

Sadr is smart enough to realize that he can’t take care of his own Shi’ite enemies but the U.S. can.  By eliminating rivals, he can use the six months to shore up his hold on the impoverished Shi’ite population. . . or so he thinks. 

If this is not what he is thinking, then he has simply overplayed his hand.  Gun battles on a holy day were probably not too popular with the average Shi’ite.  Sadr had to make a hasty political move so that he would not seem like the gangster that he is. 

In either case, it is clear that the shifting of American strategy has had profound effects.  Al-Qaeda is on the run and the Shi’ites now have no real armed resistance to rally around.  When the Iraqi parliament reconvenes, look for some real political decisions on power and oil sharing to be hashed out.  And if the political situation can be stabilized as quickly as the military situation has, we will have made genuine progress in Iraq. 

I miss PGWarner

PG, this long distance dedication goes out to you!

Andre adds:  I miss him, too.  Come back PG!

Damned Kids! Get Off My Lawn!

Lucky bastards.  I guess I will send them a few bucks.

(I haven’t typed that address in a while).

Groundbreaking ceremonies for the new Computer Science building will be held Friday, September 21 at 10:30 AM on the plaza between the Lory Student Center and the Warner College of Natural Resources.

We were always stuck two blocks off campus.  There’s nothing like trudging through a Colorado blizzard because the terminal server was offline.   Ack.

Miss South Carolina Teen USA Explains Her TV Meltdown

 Don’t know much about … geography?

This is actually almost painful to watch. We’ve all ‘flubbed’ an answer to a question at one time or another (well, maybe not DFV) but rarely this badly and probably not in front of a few million people.

Any speculation whether or not she is one of the “one fifth of Americans” that can’t find the US on a map?

Specifically, she was asked why one-fifth of Americans can’t find the United States on a map.

“I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because some people out there in our nation don’t have maps,” she ventured.

During her meandering response, she also tossed in out-of-the-blue references to “the Iraq” and “Asian countries” and their need for the support of the American educational system in identifying the United States on the map.

Must… Stop… Giggling…

Ok, I can’t:

Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) was arrested in June at a Minnesota airport by a plainclothes police officer investigating lewd conduct complaints in a men’s restroom, according to an arrest report obtained by Roll Call Monday afternoon. Craig’s arrest occurred just after noon on June 11 at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. On Aug. 8, he pleaded guilty to misdemeanor disorderly conduct in the Hennepin County District Court. He paid more than $500 in fines and fees, and a 10-day jail sentence was stayed. He also was given one year of probation with the court that began on Aug. 8.

A spokesman for Craig described the incident as a “he said/he said misunderstanding,” and said the office would release a fuller statement later Monday afternoon.

After he was arrested, Craig, who is married, was taken to the Airport Police Operations Center to be interviewed about the lewd conduct incident, according to the police report. At one point during the interview, Craig handed the plainclothes sergeant who arrested him a business card that identified him as a U.S. Senator and said, “What do you think about that?” the report states.

Craig was detained for approximately 45 minutes, interviewed, photographed, fingerprinted and released, and police prepared a formal complaint for interference with privacy and disorderly conduct.

According to the incident report, Sgt. Dave Karsnia was working as a plainclothes officer on June 11 investigating civilian complaints regarding sexual activity in the men’s public restroom in which Craig was arrested.

For some reason, making fun of a man who consistently voted and lobbied against gay-rights issues, while actively seeking some hot man-on-man action on his way to and from the Senate, just feels wrong to me.

I’ll leave that to the two dudes that are now Wonkette!

Update:  Seriously.  I must stop giggling.  It’s starting to hurt.

MR. RUSSERT: Larry Craig, would you want the last word from the Senate be an acquittal of the president and no censure?

SEN. CRAIG: Well, I don’t know where the Senate’s going to be on that issue of an up or down vote on impeachment, but I will tell you that the Senate certainly can bring about a censure reslution and it’s a slap on the wrist. It’s a, “Bad boy, Bill Clinton. You’re a naughty boy.”

The American people already know that Bill Clinton is a bad boy, a naughtyboy.

I’m going to speak out for the citizens of my state, who in the majority think that Bill Clinton is probably even a nasty, bad, naughty boy.

The question issue now is simply this: Did he lie under oath? Did he perjure himself and did he obstruct justice? And that’s where we’re trying to go now in this truth-seeking process. And I hope we can get there. And then I’m going to have the chance to decide and vote up or down on those articles. After we’re through with this impeachment trial, it’s collapsed, it’s gone, then the Senate will make a decision on if it’s a censure or not.  (emphasis mine, of course)

Military forced to apologize for charity

Question:  When is one forced to apologize for gifts given?

Answer: When you are dealing with Islamic radicals, of course.

In a normal world, one would accept a gift given to their children and graciously say ‘thank you.’  But when you are dealing with the supposed Islamic sensibility, all civility and common sense goes out the door.  Only when dealing with the filth that is fundamental Islam would one have to monitor the soccer balls given to children:

The U.S. military in Afghanistan on Monday expressed regret for a publicity campaign aimed at winning hearts and minds that ended up offending scores of Muslims.

U.S. troops on Friday dropped dozens of free footballs for soccer-mad Afghan children from helicopters in an area of southeastern Afghanistan, all marked with flags of various countries.

But the balls depicted the Saudi Arabian flag, which features the Islamic declaration of faith and includes the names of Allah and the prophet Mohammed.

Only in the Middle East can you find such backward thoughtless bullshit.  Apparently Islamic radicals in Afghanistan will acquiesce to the creation of poppy into the most addictive drug known to man but god forbid the Saudi flag appear on a device designed to bring joy to children. 

These same jokers kill wantonly, deny rights like they get paid for it, use western technology as they see fit, and kidnap their political adversaries, but kicking a soccer ball with the Saudi flag is insensitive.  Right. 

I now anxiously await Blubonnet and Andre’s rebuke about how backwards Christians are because they may or may not believe that there can be something learned from the book of Genesis.  They seem to reside in that bizarro world that heaps scourn on those who call such archaic thinking of Islamic radicals into question.

Speaking of Chertoff

Am I the only one who thinks these two pictures look way too similar?

This is how much the President values homeland security:

This morning, CNN’s Suzanne Malveaux reported that “very senior level sources” inside the administration are telling her that Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff will replace Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Additionally, these sources say Chertoff will be replaced at Homeland Security by Clay Johnson III, the Deputy Director for Management at the Office of Management and Budget.

Well, I guess I was wrong. It might be the perfect time for Alberto to resign, because Bush could make appointments now if he decided he didn’t want to bother with those pesky checks and balances. Good thing, too, because…

Clay Johnson is the Deputy Director for Management at the Office of Management and Budget. The Deputy Director for Management provides government-wide leadership to Executive Branch agencies to improve agency and program performance. Prior to this he was the Assistant to the President for Presidential Personnel, responsible for the organization that identifies and recruits approximately 4000 senior officials, middle management personnel and part-time board and commission members.

From 1995 to 2000, Mr. Johnson worked with Governor George W. Bush in Austin, first as his Appointments Director, then as his Chief of Staff, and then as the Executive Director of the Bush-Cheney Transition.

Mr. Johnson has been the Chief Operating Officer for the Dallas Museum of Art and the President of the Horchow and Neiman Marcus Mail Order companies. He also has worked for Citicorp, Wilson Sporting Goods and Frito Lay.

He received his undergraduate degree from Yale University and a Masters degree from MIT’s Sloan School of Management. In Austin, he helped create the Texas State History Museum, and was also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Texas Graduate School of Business. In Dallas, he served as President of the Board of Trustees for St. Marks School of Texas, and as a Board Member of Equitable Bankshares, Goodwill Industries of Dallas, and the Dallas Chapter of the Young Presidents Organization.

If that CNN report is true, I can only guess this is merely a dirty political tactic. Appointing someone wildly unqualified in one position in the hopes of getting Michael Chertoff through unnoticed. Otherwise, Bush might have just handed the Democrats the entire next election cycle.

On a completely unrelated note, is it sad that I just now realized the bizarreness of pesky being the adjective form of pest instead of pesty?

Goodbye Gonzalez

Don’t let the gavel hit you on the way out. Though I respect you for resigning to prevent us the long, drawn out process to find the piece of documentation that would prove how you perjured himself.

He really should have resigned earlier in the year, at least politically. How hard is it going to be for Bush to get a replacement sworn in after Congress knows that he’s looking for an AG to essentially micromanage the entire country’s judicial system and prevent Congress from overseeing the President’s actions?

Operation Phantom Strike

How the U.S. military is demolishing al Qaeda in Iraq.

More news from battlefield Iraq. Has the US finally found its Grant?

Such results are an early return on investment for the doctrines developed by Petraeus. The Counterinsurgency Field Manual, formulated under his command and released last December, chews through a lot of theory to arrive at one basic practical tenet: “Intelligence drives operations.” The counterinsurgency manual specifies that being able to distinguish between insurgents and civilians is the key to victory…

…Of course, al Qaeda has not taken all of this lying down. All the good news coming out of Iraq recently is even more depressing for al Qaeda than it is for Harry Reid, if that is possible, and al Qaeda could smell that something like Phantom Strike might be coming. It had to pull off a spectacular attack–and it did. On August 14, four near-simultaneous car bombs destroyed whole rows of mud-brick houses in a pair of small farming villages in Yazidi, killing on the order of 400 Iraqis, and wounding many more–a horrifying toll even for today’s Iraq.

But the site of the terror attack–in the far northwest of Iraq, 75 miles west of Mosul beyond the upper Tigris–was very interesting… 

Re: Bill Kristol is One of the Great Intellects of the Right

I believe that Andre only read the paragraph he pasted, and just copied the link to the article from whatever lefty site he found this on. Because I’ve known Andre for about 15 years. He’s actually very bright. There’s no way he read the whole article.

The article isn’t really about Bush, but about Vietnam and specifically the consequences of US retreat. Kristol tells a moving story of a freedom-loving hero who died because he trusted the word of the United States. For the last 30 years, the Left has said that they simply don’t care. They have forgiven or dismissed or excused or denied the millions and millions of murders that followed a US retreat. They couldn’t care less about those dead Asians, and they certainly don’t care a bit about the potential of that happening again with some Arabs.

Kristol says that US retreat had severe global consequences. Does Andre dispute this? [Wes apparently does]. Kristol supported Reagan’s words that our cause in Vietnam was a noble one. Does Andre dispute this? Kristol layed out the carnage that followed US surrender. Does Andre dispute this? Who knows. All we got in response was a strange, non sequitor Simpson’s link.

Hairy Beast is right: Kristol nailed it.

When You Feel Like You’re Going Insane

Because you can’t take it any more… A little Izzard helps.

Did I mention I was talking to a member of the Israeli Air Force for the better part of the day?  “They deserve EXACTLY what they get.”…

Sigh.  And I work for them.

Favorite Back to School Movies: Animal House

Damien brought it up on his weekly edition of Saturday Night Souse…I lived love this movie.

Bill Kristol is One of the Great Intellects of the Right

“And all honor to George W. Bush for following in Reagan’s footsteps, grasping the nettle, and confronting the real lessons and consequences of Vietnam. The liberal media and the PC academics are horrified. All the better.” 

I think, uh…

No, wait, I think, uh…

Oh, just go read it for yourself.

Total Lunar Eclipse: 4:51 a.m. EDT Tuesday 8/28

For you stargazers out there, look towards the moon early Tuesday morning to witness a total lunar eclipse, which gives the moon a reddish or orange glow. 

Skoll the wolf who shall scare the Moon
Till he flies to the Wood-of-Woe:
Hati the wolf, Hridvitnir’s kin,
Who shall pursue the Sun.
              Grimnismal, The Elder Edda

The Vikings tell a tale about two wolves who wish to eat the Sun and Moon. Skoll (repulsion) goes after the Sun and Hati, running ahead of the Sun, goes after the Moon. When either are caught, there is an eclipse. When this happens, the people on Earth rush to rescue the Sun or Moon by making as much noise as they can in hopes of scaring off the wolves.

Just one of many myths involving the total lunar eclipse.

Historical Anecdote of the Day

The Tale of the Tomb of Cyrus the Great

“..I am Cyrus, king of all, the great king, the mighty king, king of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad, king of the four corners of the earth…”  - from a clay cylinder known as ‘the cylinder of Cyrus’ narrating the story of the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus the king of Persia.

“Thus sayeth Cyrus, king of Persia. All the kingdoms of the earth hath the Lord God of heaven given me…” (II Chron. 36:23 The Holy Bible)

King Cyrus appears several times in the Bible. Fifty years before his conquest of Babylon the kingdom of Judah (from whence we get the name ‘Jew’) had been conquered by the Babylonians and nearly all the inhabitants of the land were forcibly removed to Babylon. (Not to be confused with the kingdom of Israel that was annihalated by the Assyrians and became the ten lost tribes of Israel).

King Cyrus allowed the Jews to return to their homeland and rebuild Jerusalem. Some forty thousand exiles began the 800 mile trek back to the Holy land (Ezra 2:64-67) and eventually rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem. They followed the same track which had been taken by Abraham 1400 years earlier, when he left the land of his fathers to go to Canaan, via Damascus and long the foot of the Hermon to Lake of Galilee.

“In the first year of Cyrus the King, the same Cyrus the King made a decree concerning the House of God at Jerusalem, let the House be builded, the place where they offered sacrifices, and let the foundations thereof be strongly laid: the height thereof threescore cubits, and the breadth thereof threescore cubits. ” (Ezra 6:3).

King Cyrus was long remembered for his vast kingdom that spread from Egypt to Turkey through Iraq and Iran to the Indus river in the East. As the founder of the Persian empire he was admired for not only his military and political skill, but also for his wisdom and tolerance.

Saturday Night Souse

The Saturday Night Souse

Back to School Edition

 

 

“Now son, you don’t want to drink beer. That’s for daddies, and kids with fake IDs.”

Homer Simpson

Ave Maria! I once taught at a Catholic high school that had a liquor license. It was great. The Christmas party put other schools to shame, and the collegiality among the faculty was impressive. Not only that, it wasn’t at all uncommon to receive a bottle of wine from a parent as a gift, or to have a dad go out with you some weekend and buy you a shot. The experience has always made me think more highly of both the school and Catholicism. 

Let schoolmasters puzzle their brains
With grammar, and nonsense, and learning,
Good liquor, I stoutly maintain,
Gives genius a better discerning

— Oliver Goldsmith (1728 - 1774), Irish poet  

Hurry, Bartender, I’m late for class! I also went to a college that had a bar in the basement of the student center.  As with the booze-friendly high school, I found this to be something approaching genius. It was often the case that we would gather for a pitcher or so before class, and even more frequently we would meet there before evening functions like student senate.  

A professor of chemistry wanted to teach his 5th grade class a lesson about the evils of liquor, so he produced an experiment that involved a glass of water, a glass of whiskey, and two worms. “

Now, class. Observe closely the worms,” said the professor first putting a worm into the water. The worm in the water writhed about, happy as a worm in water could be. The second worm, he put into the whiskey. It writhed painfully, and it quickly sank to the bottom, dead as a doornail.

“Now, what lesson can we derive from this experiment?” the professor asked.

Little Johnny raised his hand and wisely responded, “Drink whiskey and you won’t get worms!”

Obligatory Disclaimer Okay, okay, for real this time. ConClub sometimes writes satire. Nothing herein should be construed to advocate illegal activity. I don’t want my students to drink alcohol. I don’t want Eric’s students to drink alcohol.

The picture of “Paul” above would seem to depict a boy of less than the legal age, and for that I apologize.

The picture that shows some high school girls sneaking in alcohol is not meant to represent all high school girls, just the vast majority.

The pictures from Animal House suggesting that college life is synonymous with wanton drunkenness, probably understate the problem.

When teenagers steal cheap booze, they almost always get sick, so they should start with the good stuff.

Oh, and no other members of ConClub preview, approve, or agree with Saturday Night Souse. And none of them ever got drunk when they were in high school or college.

Honest.

Headbanger’s Ball: New Music Night

First up is a video from the band Sixx a.m., which is the Nikki Sixx (Motley Crue bassist) project associated with his upcoming book the Heroin Diaries. 

Next, click on the link for a video from the Group Hell Yeah!, featuring Vinnie Paul (former Pantera drummer and brother of Dimebag Darrell who was gunned down on stage by a disgruntled fan) as well as members of Mudvayne, Damageplan and Nothingface. 

Hell Yeah-You Wouldn’t Know

Dave’s Quote of the Day

“While the biological act of fathering entails no real commitment, the ongoing process of daddying requires a lifelong commitment to your chldren. But it’s never too late to begin the process of becoming the father you want to be, the one you always wished you had.”

-Allan Shedlin Jr.  from Wisdom of Our Fathers: Lessons and Letters from Daughters and Sons by Tim Russert

Nobody ****s With The Opus

If only to prove that I do peruse the wingnut blogs.   This is gay.

Update: Then again, CASTRO IS DEAD!  Oopsie.  Who could make such a mistake?  This is why I pull my hip-waders up before I wade in.

A Little Weekend Fun

This is freakin’ awesome (via Mo-K)

Saturday Morning Punk- Bowling For Soup

(WordPress was fubar last night) 

“Punk Rock 101″

If I had a nickel for every time I was asked how I could love punk rock with zero tattoos or piercings… well, I’d have about a buck fifty.

Drinking bleach and being bullied on ‘Lord of the Flies’ reality show

“Reality” TV meets Lord of the Flies

The CBS network placed 40 children, aged 8 to 15, in the abandoned New Mexico town of Bonanza City and followed their efforts to live without the guidance of adults….

…Every three days, jobs were shared out in a “showdown”, with the children divided into four groups: the “upper class”, “merchants”, “cooks” and “labourers”. To fuel rivalry between the groups, the “kid government” awarded a $20,000 (£10,000) gold star at the end of each three-day cycle.

…Parents and children were required to sign contracts committing the children to do whatever they were told by the producers or risk expulsion from the show. The contracts also held parents and the minors solely responsible for any “emotional distress, illness, sexually transmitted diseases, HIV and pregnancy” resulting from an intimate relationship with another participant or anyone else.

The children each received a $5,000 fee, which they forfeited if they left the set early — as several reportedly did.

Sign my kids up for that. This actually sounds more like one of those ‘let’s attempt to teach children the benefits of socialism and the evils of capitalism’ type games that are found throughout the public school system and some colleges than a true attempt at creating a Lord of the Rings style experiment.

If they want to do that they should just set up some cameras at some inner city school riddled with drugs, gangs, and racial tension.

Dying for that last inch

As a D-coordinator, I find this inspiring.  Enjoy.

True Love Waits… for a year or two, anyway.

Edit: This is in no way meant to criticize the Christian faith or beliefs, it is meant to criticize the Christian political movement.

An op-ed from the Baltimore Sun:

The American public is unaware of the new wave of anti-contraception activism by opponents of abortion, which makes it much easier for politicians to appease the anti-contraception base. Take, for example, President Bush. While he has delivered some big anti-abortion victories for the religious right in the last seven years (Supreme Court Justices John G. Roberts Jr. and Samuel A. Alito Jr., and the so-called partial-birth abortion ban), anti-contraception work has taken up more of his energy. He attempted to strip contraceptive coverage for federal employees; appointed anti-birth control leader David Hager to the FDA panel that approves and expands access to contraceptive methods; chose another contraception opponent to oversee the nation’s contraceptive program for the poor; defunded international family-planning programs, and invested unprecedented sums into sex-ed programs that prohibit mention of contraception.

For now, the candidates vying for the Right to Life endorsement are doing their best to avoid directly answering mainstream voters’ simple questions on the subject, such as, “Do you support couples having access to safe and effective birth control options, including emergency contraception?” Considering that even 80 percent of self-described “pro-life” voters and a majority of Republican voters strongly support contraception, it’s no wonder why.

Which says nothing new, but raises a big, BIG problem I have with evangelical Christianity. The whole stance on issues like media censorship, stem cell research and abortion are only tangentially connected to the actual issues themselves. The underlying thing they want to control is premarital sex. It has always been premarital sex. They are against anything that might possibly mean more of it. And they sincerely want to prevent you from being able to have it. They have campaigns against it. I myself am a dropout of True Love Waits. I think most of us who went through that are. But the issue is still right at the forefront, and it leads to a lot of the complaints people have today about the lack of compassion in today’s Church.

Uh… WTF?

Who is the new White House speech writer?  Holden Caulfield? 

Dear Leader:

In 1955, long before the United States had entered the war, Graham Greene wrote a novel called “The Quiet American.” It was set in Saigon and the main character was a young government agent named Alden Pyle. He was a symbol of American purpose and patriotism and dangerous naivete. Another character describes Alden this way: “I never knew a man who had better motives for all the trouble he caused.”

After America entered the Vietnam War, Graham Greene — the Graham Greene argument gathered some steam. Matter of fact, many argued that if we pulled out, there would be no consequences for the Vietnamese people. In 1972, one anti-war senator put it this way: “What earthly difference does it make to nomadic tribes or uneducated subsistence farmers in Vietnam or Cambodia or Laos whether they have a military dictator, a royal prince or a socialist commissar in some distant capital that they’ve never seen and may never heard of?”

This was his latest attempt to explain Iraq. 

Really, it was. 

Bring back Frum.  At least “The Axis of Evil” made sense in some way.  I really think his staff is just effing with him now.  Better for book sales, and all that.

How the Mighty Have Fallen

Let’s invade Iran!  That’ll fix it!

It’s hard to believe that, not so long ago, neoconservative foreign policy thinking overflowed with ideas and idealism. The descent has been steep, and nowhere is it more apparent than in the pages of The Weekly Standard–particularly in William Kristol’s editorials, which have come to consist of stubborn denials of any bad news, diatribes about internal enemies, and harangues against the cowardice of Republican dissenters.

…

There was a time when neoconservatives sought to hold the moral and intellectual high ground. There was some- thing inspiring in their vision of America as a different kind of superpower–a liberal hegemon deploying its might on behalf of subjugated peoples, rather than mere self-interest. As the Iraq war has curdled, the idealism and liberalism have drained out of the neoconservative vision. What remains is a noxious residue of bullying militarism. Kristol’s arguments are merely the same pro-war arguments that have been used historically by right-wing parties throughout the world: Complexity is weakness, dissent is treason, willpower determines all.

Kristol’s good standing in the Washington establishment depends on the wink-and-nod awareness that he’s too smart to believe his own agitprop. Perhaps so. But, in the end, a fake thug is not much better than the real thing.

It’s nice to see that TNR finally came to their senses (sort of).  But for those of us who have said this stuff all along, it’s little comfort. 

I still remember Kristol’s speech being the hightlight of the trip DFV and I took to D.C.  (there were many low points, which I shall not mention).  But we sat in awe at his ability to wow us.

Now I just shake my head, and wonder what the hell happened to him.

Thursday Night Bluegrass

OK, not a recurring theme.  But this video is somehow disturbing and intriguing at the same time.

Good Luck This Season E!!

Daily Show: Soldiers Wish Parliament a Nice Vacation

Rob Riggle has been in Iraq (for real this time) all week, and here’s his report from last night, which amused me.

Also something else, but it’s more political, so only watch if you’re so inclined.

Andre adds:  The bit below the fold is probably the most funny segment TDS has ever done.  Take a look.

Lame.

I know that this is a issue-oriented group with an agenda and not funded by the government, but still… lame. Seriously lame.

Don’t feed me nonsense about it just being politics or whatnot, this is just lame, period. More Americans should be calling Congress, not less. I don’t care what your views are, if you have a voice, you should use it. Either they should give the number for their congressman or they should not do this patching through thing at all, but this concept is just very, very wrong.

Good Times Are Comin’

Conclub has a couple of good science posts about the possibilities awaiting us in the near future. Dave writes about the revolution in genetics, and Wes takes a look at the awesome potential of computers to make life-like predictions.

Many fear the advances on both fronts, but I’m unqualified in my excitement. On the page Dave linked, there are some articles about the coming wave of “personalized medicine.” Consider just three impressive factors.

One, the explosion of effective drugs into the medical tool box. Concerning almost any ailment, we are inventing new drugs that not only render unnecessary the more difficult treatments like surgery, but that in many cases work more effectively anyway. Specifically, psychotropic drugs (anti-depresants, ADD drugs, etc.) are a very new phenomenon, whose improvement continues to be stunningly rapid.

Almost all of us knows someone whose life has been transformed by one of these drugs. It is humbling to consider that none of this would have happened just a decade or two ago, and it is enticing to dream of the effectiveness that is possible a decade or two hence.

Two, the new knowledge of the brain. New techniques allow doctors to pinpoint depression, anxiety, ADD, addiction, OCD, and many other neurological maladies with infrared accuracy. No longer does a psychiatrist have to merely question a patient to diagnose the problem, and then begin a marathon of trial-and-error medicinal administrations whose medical conclusion is determined by asking the patient, “So, how do you feel now?” The combination of the rapid advance in drugs for the brain and our quantifiable data about brain functioning presents the clear conclusion that very soon, people will obtain a personalized prescription drug especially designed for their own brain.

And three, the silver bullet of genetics. Since we have mapped the human genome and perfected the cell manipulation necessary to change gentic structure, the possibilities appear to be limitless.

In terms of non-organic advancement, Wes is unimpressed by the latest example, which he himself provides. But I take from his post a different view. This particular advancement may or may not be useful in the future, but it exposes the possibilities of computers to make sophisticated predictions. Contemplate the past 10-15 years of computer advancement, then ask yourself how much more effective still will the next 10-15 years be?

Some are frightened by these developments. Others are skeptical. Put me down as an unabashed, exited fan. I truly believe that amazing developments in how humans live and enjoy life are soon to come. In fact, I think future generations will lable this era in which we live. Beginning with the comunication revolution of the past 10-15 years, and now with the medical revolution that will follow in the next couple of decades, this half-century may well go down as one of fundamental shift in the human experience.

McCain’s New Ride

Reason number 1226 why McCain will never be the GOP nominee.

Davis says he’s been able to balance the books a bit by focusing McCain’s bare-bones operation on three states—Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina—and finding a cheaper Straight Talk Express. “The next time we roll it out, it’ll be much more like the original version.” What did the original look like? “A piece of shit.”

Op-Ed from Retired General

Ret. Maj. Gen. John Batiste posted this at Think Progress, of all places:

It is disappointing that so many elected representatives of my party continue to blindly support the administration rather than doing what is in the best interests of our country. Traditionally, my party has maintained a conservative view on questions regarding our Armed Forces. For example, we commit our military only when absolutely necessary. In the same way conservatives have always argued against government excess in social programs, the lives our young men and women in uniform, our most precious resource, are not to be used on wars of choice or for nation building.

. . . .

Besides the fact that many conservatives allowed President Bush to jump head-first into a war of choice, the bullheadedness of Congressional Republicans who argue for staying the course runs contrary to conservative values. Many politicians of my party continue to argue that we must liberally use up whatever our military has left.

. . . .

Our military and our treasury are not unlimited resources. The war in Iraq is breaking our fine Army and Marine Corps, and we are perilously close to doing damage that will take more than a decade to fix. Our brigades and divisions in Iraq today are at near full strength because the rest of the force has been gutted.

. . . .

The only way to stabilize Iraq and allow our military to rearm and refit for the long fight ahead is to begin a responsible and deliberate redeployment from Iraq and replace the troops with far less expensive and much more effective resources–those of diplomacy and the critical work of political reconciliation and economic recovery. In other words, when it comes to Iraq, it’s time for conservatives to once again be conservative.

I don’t exactly share his seemingly sunny attitude regarding the implications of withdrawal, but I definitely share his views regarding the wastefulness of this war.

pgwarner, I know this is nothing new, but you asked (or was it DFV?) awhile back which generals I knew of that had spoken out against the surge and the war. Here ya go.

Challenging Iran without Arms

An editorial from the Christian Science Monitor:

One of the central problems with the Bush administration is that it thinks military first and sometimes military only – with disastrous results for America. Though military action is an option, the consequences of the United States or Israel attacking Iran would be catastrophic.

. . . .

The Achilles’ heel is that Mr. Ahmadinejad’s popular appeal only works when the West is unpopular, and nothing could be more unpopular to Iranians than a US-inspired attack. An external attack often shifts public opinion to the hard right.

. . . .

The time for doing this is perfect. President Ahmadinejad has failed to deliver on his campaign promises of better consumer prices. Iranians are also distressed by unprecedented oil rationing.

Some in Washington might say that this is attributable to US-led sanctions, though it is worth noting that America’s allies are resisting and perhaps with good reason. Unilateral sanctions have not proved to be an effective way to change a country’s behavior.

….

The internal vulnerabilities of Iran’s ruling circles make this a perfect time to extend an olive branch to the people of Iran with a diplomatic initiative that involves economic incentives and development opportunities for the poor, the middle class, and the reformers. Multilateralism is a must if we want this to happen, because Europe, Russia, Japan, and others maintain good relations with Iran’s business sector, the kind necessary in order to provide socioeconomic development assistance. If the Revolutionary Guard and the president block these gestures then “it is on their heads,” and we will likely see them increasingly marginalized.

I completely agree (and said something similar not too long ago). War with Iran would put us at war with three contiguous countries at once. And would be precisely what they need to justify their own rhetoric and stay in office. We need to do this one diplomatically and spend our time strategizing and consolidating our military strength if we need it again soon (and I think we will).

Judith - Guiliani’s Princess Bride

The Princess Bride

I am not sure why this election cycle has featured such an unusual focus on the potential first ladies. Perhaps it is because a former one wishes to become president herself. Perhaps it is the drama that comes with one of them having cancer, or one being unusually attractive and young, or one being little more than the second coming of Hillary. More likely, it reflects the grotesquely long presidential campaign fatigue factor for the public and a crowded field of candidates that aren’t really all that interesting to begin with. For whatever reason, the public’s interest and obsession with the potential first ladies will only continue to increase.

Senator Hillary Clinton stood in the aisle—until she was unceremoniously pushed by a phalanx of four burly cops entering the tent, these guarding Judith Nathan, Giuliani’s girlfriend. No apologies were offered, one observer noted.

“The nerve of that woman!” Hillary explod