Political Games - Where the fuck’s the reset button?

It packs a punch. Needs moar Mike Shinoda, but whatever… enjoy the visual montage…

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Please go watch this.

On a side note, the clips from September 11, 2001 still make me tear up.

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What Hunter sez:

I was pondering over this last night, as a matter of fact, so let’s think about this for a minute. Under six years of President Bush, there have been major terrorist attacks on two American cities, public-safety-threatening electricity blackouts artificially created by major energy corporations in an effort to extort the recipients of that electricity, deficits that have reached crisis proportions, criminal indictments of Republican congressmen nationwide and even of Republican White House staffers, one of Americas “crown jewel” cities was in large part destroyed and its population turned into refugees battling a national government response that ranged from incompetent to absent, the defacto suspensions of habeas and other Constitutional rights, the international diplomatic isolation of America, and there have been two major wars, both ongoing.

So a Democratic administration could, in theory, see major terrorist attacks on two American cities, electrical blackouts and corporate criminal extortion of our electrical grids, further massive deficits, criminal indictments of Democratic congressmen nationwide and of White House staffers, the destruction of another major city, encroachments upon various Constitutional rights, the continued international isolation of the nation, and start one major war…

… and they’d still suck less than Bush.

21 more months folks. We’re turning the corner!!

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I’ve written about abortion rights and the pro-life movement before [see here and here, for example], and while my support has, for a couple of years, been near-absolute, I’ve occasionally had misgivings about it. Well, so what? These weren’t my rights we were talking about, these were women’s rights, and I don’t get to legislate rights restrictions for others based on my level of comfort with them. Anyway, I recently came across a personal story that really really makes me more contemptuous of the pro-life movement. I recommend reading the whole thing, but here’s a poignant excerpt:

I sat there, wondering if I’d at least get my wife back after this. Then 20 minutes passed, and nothing. Thirty minutes. Forty. Forty five. I started to get worried and thought all sorts of horrible things that I will not put words to. Mainly, then, I start to think about the abortion debate. About pro-lifers, in particular. I think about all those meddling politicians that would want to interject themselves into everything that just happened to me, interject themselves between me, my wife, and her doctors. And then I had a strong, visceral reaction. I wanted the mutherfuckers to die. I wanted to rip off their heads and tear out their hearts, because how DARE they play politics with my wife’s life? The baby was fine until the end. I wondered if that would have meant they’d force us to let my wife bleed until almost death before they’d let us abort, because well, if she’s not near death, then it is just a ‘health’ exception, and we can’t have that! Fuck them. Fuck them all. They can fucking die, as far as I’m concerned. This was what went through my mind as I sat there, waiting to see if, after my baby died, my wife had died as well. I still feel that visceral reaction when I think about it, though not quite as strong - right then and there, if someone pro-life walked in and started talking about it to me, I very well might have physically attacked them. And I’m about as non-violent as one gets.

Finally, the doctors come out and tell me she’s fine and headed to recovery. Again, she’s in the same slot in recovery as she was after the birth of our daughter. I’m exhausted. It is now 1 am. She will be there overnight. I make sure she’s ok and I head for home.

Obviously, I’m still pro-choice. And I do still say that I’ll personally never have an abortion. But if anyone tells me politicians should meddle in what should be between one’s doctor and one’s self, I’ll tell them, politely, to go fuck themselves, and then explain why.

Please read the whole thing.

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Atrios has been documenting this for almost a year now, and this quote from Brownback is illustrative: “The date we set a deadline to pull out is the date al Qaeda will declare victory over the United States.” As I described in an earlier post, this mindset is childish in the extreme and acknowledges that even the most ardent supporters of this war think that “winning” is impossible in the next year or two, at least. For some reason I can’t possibly imagine, they don’t use the argument that “well, this war is going to take another three years, so who’s with me??” to the public, possibly because the 65% who oppose this war now would vote them all out of office. So instead they wrap it in the coded language of “we lose if we withdraw on date X”. Well I call bullshit. March 2008 would be 5 years of this war, and if we haven’t won by then we never will “win” in any meaningful way. Frankly, I think that statement is true if you substitute “2005″ for 2008, but that’s irrelevant at this point. Americans support the 2008 withdraw regardless of conditions on the ground, and it’s time for us to call the “leaving is losing” crowd on their bullshit.

For more of this, here are more examples of leaving is losing.

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Most radio stations these days also stream over the net, and many online-only radio “stations” have been set up. These are NOT downloadable mp3s, these are simply streams that can be tuned into and frequently include either visual ads on the page or infrequent ads during the “broadcast”. So, of course, the RIAA is trying to kill it and they may very well succeed. So you should go do something about it. Now. This has nothing to do with 12 year olds downloading the new Hillary Duff single. This is about the RIAA trying to get even richer than they already are. Enough is enough. These greedy thugs have gone way too far and it’s time we smacked them around a little.

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Not exactly news, except this time we’ve got the data to prove it. I recommend reading the whole post, but what jumps out at me are the charts.

As is explained in the report, the blue represents youth who had abstinence-only education, while the white represents those who had NO sex education. It really is nothing more than a colossal waste of resources in order to appease crazy anti-sex godbags.

UPDATE: I provide the rage, Jon Swift provides the ‘conservative’ viewpoint. It’s not satire if it’s true…

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And that’s a good thing apparently!!! Next time you get accused of being shrill, irrational, or whatever when you accuse the Bushies of installing a police state and wanting to be a Dictator, point this out: their own supporters say that the President should have these powers. Glenn immediately says:

So apparently, the American Founders risked their lives and fortunes in order to wage war against Great Britain and declare independence from the King — all in order to vest “near dictatorial power” in the American President in all matters of foreign policy and national security. And, of course, for the Michael Goldfarbs of the world, “war” and “national security” — and the “near dictatorial power” vested in the President in those areas — now encompasses virtually every government action, since scary and dangerous Muslims are lurking everywhere, on every corner, and the entire world is one big “battlefield” in the “War on Terrorism,” including U.S. soil.

Until the Bill Kristols and John Yoos and other authoritarians of that strain entered the political mainstream, I never heard of prominent Americans who describe the power that they want to vest in our political leaders as “near dictatorial.” Anyone with an even passing belief in American political values would consider the word “dictatorial” — at least rhetorically, if not substantively — to define that which we avoid at all costs, not something which we seek, embrace and celebrate. If there is any political principle that was previously common to Americans regardless of partisan orientation, it was that belief.

Go read the whole thing. I recommend playing some sort of violent video game to vent our your rage. Any WoWers in my tiny readership?

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Here’s a hint: being a former Marine doesn’t help if you’ve been in a peace march or criticized the Bush Administration. This is what a police state looks like. As described by Professor Walter F. Murphy:

“On 1 March 07, I was scheduled to fly on American Airlines to Newark, NJ, to attend an academic conference at Princeton University, designed to focus on my latest scholarly book, Constitutional Democracy, published by Johns Hopkins University Press this past Thanksgiving.”

“When I tried to use the curb-side check in at the Sunport, I was denied a boarding pass because I was on the Terrorist Watch list. I was instructed to go inside and talk to a clerk. At this point, I should note that I am not only the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence (emeritus) but also a retired Marine colonel. I fought in the Korean War as a young lieutenant, was wounded, and decorated for heroism. I remained a professional soldier for more than five years and then accepted a commission as a reserve office, serving for an additional 19 years.”

“I presented my credentials from the Marine Corps to a very polite clerk for American Airlines. One of the two people to whom I talked asked a question and offered a frightening comment: “Have you been in any peace marches? We ban a lot of people from flying because of that.” I explained that I had not so marched but had, in September, 2006, given a lecture at Princeton, televised and put on the Web, highly critical of George Bush for his many violations of the Constitution. “That’ll do it,” the man said. ”

“After carefully examining my credentials, the clerk asked if he could take them to TSA officials. I agreed. He returned about ten minutes later and said I could have a boarding pass, but added: “I must warn you, they=re going to ransack your luggage.” On my return flight, I had no problem with obtaining a boarding pass, but my luggage was “lost.” Airlines do lose a lot of luggage and this “loss” could have been a mere coincidence. In light of previous events, however, I’m a tad skeptical.”

“I confess to having been furious that any American citizen would be singled out for governmental harassment because he or she criticized any elected official, Democrat or Republican. That harassment is, in and of itself, a flagrant violation not only of the First Amendment but also of our entire scheme of constitutional government. This effort to punish a critic states my lecture’s argument far more eloquently and forcefully than I ever could. Further, that an administration headed by two men who had “had other priorities” than to risk their own lives when their turn to fight for their country came up, should brand as a threat to the United States a person who did not run away but stood up and fought for his country and was wounded in battle, goes beyond the outrageous. Although less lethal, it is of the same evil ilk as punishing Ambassador Joseph Wilson for criticizing Bush’s false claims by “outing” his wife, Valerie Plaime, thereby putting at risk her life as well as the lives of many people with whom she had had contact as an agent of the CIA. …”

“I have a personal stake here, but so do all Americans who take their political system seriously. Thus I hope you and your colleagues will take some positive action to bring the Administration’s conduct to the attention of a far larger, and more influential, audience than I could hope to reach. “

“That’ll do it”. Hey, Bush! If you or your Bushies are reading this, why don’t you and your pseudofascist warmongering chickenhawk friends go fuck yourselves! You are a disgrace to America, a disgrace to Western Civilization, and a disgrace to democracy itself. I hope the spineless Democrats impeach your entire Administration and throw them in jail.

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Responding to Bush’s petulant whining about Congress acting like it has authority to “declare war” or some such pro-terrorist nonsense and his threats to veto the supplemental spending bill because of the troop deadlines, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has announced he will cosponsor Feingold’s stand-alone bill withdrawing all troops within 120 days of enactment and cutting off future funding past that with limited exceptions. This is huge. Reid has been a very cautious Majority (and, last Congress, Minority) Leader and has rarely taken bold, drastic stands on something unless he knows he has the votes for it. This is certainly an interesting move and it makes me wonder which Republicans we have on board for this. Best of luck to Reid, the other Senate leaders, and their counterparts in the House on getting this passed. Don’t forget that they are YOUR representatives, so make sure you apply some pressure to them as this bill gets closer to a vote.

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