At the End of the Day

Bush's War If the newswrap ends up a little bit lacking tonight, it is because I am rounding up items of interest while I'm watching, and you can stream it at the link. This is all so infuriating. I mean, it isn't like we didn't know this stuff...but holy hell! They're war criminals! Period. Can we charge them, arrest them and try them already?

What the hell??? Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who co-chairs the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's Red-to-Blue Program, is refusing to help three democratic challengers who are running against Cuban-American wingnut republican incumbents in Miami-Dade because she is afraid to make enemies of any of the sitting republicans by publicly working against them!!! Reps. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Mario Diaz-Balart, and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen are wingnuts! They aren't going to work with her anyway! Can you stand this??? It's simply intolerable. She is a weak-kneed candy-ass, and she needs to step down from her role with the Red-to-Blue Program because she is too chickenshit to stand up the the republican wingnuts in her own state.

The Surge™ Worked!!! Petraeus and Crocker today gave Bush the war plan for the remainder of 2008, and it keeps troop levels at fifteen combat brigades after the last Surge™ troops leave in this summer. Since the whole purpose was to move the ball down the court a year so the whole mess could be handed off to the next president, it worked! (900 dead notwithstanding, you understand...)

Someone call a WAHHH-mbulance for little Mikey O'Hanlon. The phone has stopped ringing and he isn't getting nearly as many opportunities to fluff aWol's futile war. “I was getting on average three to five calls a day for interviews about the war” in the first years," he whined. “Now it’s less than one a day.” He blames you and me for his wide-open schedule. You see, in his estimation, now that the Surge™ has worked spectacularly, war opponents aren't interested in hearing about it. I think his dearth of commitments is more likely a result of the fact that he has been absolutely wrong about absolutely everything all the way through this fiasco, and someone checked his record.

Pakistan has a new Prime Minister The new Parliament overwhelmingly selected Yousaf Raza Gillani of the Pakistan Peoples Party (he got 264 of 342 votes) and immediately upon being sworn in, he released the judges that Mushareff had ordered detained last year. He also said that he would officially request the United Nations conduct an investigation into the assassination in December of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. “Our slain leader Benazir Bhutto sacrificed her life for the cause of democracy, and now it is our responsibility to strengthen the democratic institutions in line with the aspirations of common people,” Mr. Gillani said.

Diebold makes this sort of thing easier but since he doesn't he'll have to stuff ballot boxes. Tendai Biti, secretary general of Zimbabwe's main opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change, is accusing the government of president Robert Mugabe of printing millions of extra ballots for the upcoming presidential election. Information supplied by Fidelity Printers, the printer of the countries banknotes, indicate that the government ordered 9 million ballots for 5.9 million eligible voters. They also said that 60,000 absentee ballots had been requested for a few thousand soldiers.

The third shoe falls Remember back just over five years ago, when we were told that we had to go to war because the Saddam Hussein was an ally of al Qaeda who was developing weapons of mass destruction. And besides that, "he tried to kill my daddy." Well, the lie has been adequately put to the first two assertions...and now, the same Pentagon report that disproved any operational link between Iraq and al Qaeda also implies that the supposed 1993 plot to assassinate Bush pere during a trip to Kuwait probably didn't really happen. So...a hat trick of lies! That's an accomplishment!

Last week it was the sex revelations, this week it's drugs. New York's new governor is coming clean on everything he has ever done. He admitted in a television interview that he used cocaine a couple of times in his twenties and he smoked the reefer as a young man, too. Pretty tame stuff, really. Next week, we can only presume that he will get to his high-school misbehaviors. Me? I am waiting for the following week, when he confesses to snitching cookies after his mommy told him no, and spoiling his dinner when he was five.

The demand for platinum, used in electronics components and in the catalytic converters of automobiles is prompting human rights abuses by the Anglo American mining company and it's subsidiary Anglo Platinum. In the last five years, 20,000 people in South Africa have been misplaced and people who resist giving up their tribal lands have been shot with rubber bullets and forced off to yield to the mining company.

Didn't any of the people occupying positions of power learn life's basics when they were growing up? Lessons like "if something seems to good to be true, it probably is"??? Biofuels is the latest perpetual motion machine/fountain of youth/wart remover/miracle hair regeneration tonic to come along, and the advent was heralded with much fanfare. But not so fast there, sportsfans. Maybe it isn't a panacea after all. Not only are food prices going up because we are putting far too much of our cereal grains into gas tanks; the carbon footprint is just as big. So why are we rushing toward that mirage again? (Especially now that we know it's a mirage.)

Ya know why I'm looking forward to the Beijing games? There are going to be thousands of reporters running around loose in one of the most tight-assed authoritarian regimes on the globe. There are going to be far too many of them for the Chinese government to keep tabs on. That just tickles my fancy and delights me no end. It makes me grin ear to ear. I have been waiting for this since 1995, when the International Decade of Women conference was held in Beijing. Teeheeheeheeheeheehee!

Mondale totally dissed Darth Cheney in a presentation he delivered on the vice presidency at the Humphrey Institute. He accused Cheney of a "wholesale assault on the Constitution, the balance of powers, and the system that evolved since World War II to coordinate intelligence and defense policy..."They wrecked that system," Mondale said.

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The LA Times has been caught practicing something that resembles journalism While he bets big on Iraq and the *ahem* reduced violence *ahem* that has resulted from renting the temporary loyalty off insurgents with cash and guns and al Sadr ordering his militia to stand down since last August the (unsustainable) Surge™ that has succeeded in kicking the can down the lane for a year. The LA Times actually looks at all the stuff the McShame got wrong on Iraq for over a decade. His track record is pretty dismal, and I am betting that Bob Drogin isn't invited to the next bar-be-cue at Chez McCain, since he had the temerity to point out St. John's many failings.

The New York Times reminds us that the senator hasn't always been the bedrock conservative he presents himself as now. Twice this decade he has almost switched parties - first in 2001 and again in 2004 when there was talk about him becoming John Kerry's running mate.

The inimitable Glenn Greenwald takes on the issue of overt racism as it relates to movement conservative tribalism and applies the full Greenwald to the twisted jingoism of the soulless fucks on the right.

Chuck Hagel isn't endorsing McCain, at least not yet. In an interview on ABC's This Week he said he was not ready to endorse McCain because the two men are too far apart on issues of foreign policy, especially on the issue of Iraq. When asked if he agreed with the Democratic candidates on the issue of timelines for withdrawal, he said "we need a clear plan, and yes, withdrawal. We're going to have to start working our way out of this. How we do it must be responsibly. We're in a deep hole. I think we're in a quagmire. But at the same time, we have national interests there. We have allies there." Hell of a mess these morons have made, innit?

Are Senator McCain and presidential candidate McCain two different guys? First taxes and now climate change.

Will Airbus anger turn Kansas blue in November? With the economy of Kansas tied to aviation and the defense industry, anger over Boeing, which employs about 30,000 in it's Wichita plant, could put the state in the Democratic column this fall, for the first time in nearly half a century.

A Connecticut newspaper has apologized for endorsing Lieberman in 2006 - When The Day endorsed Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman for re-election in November 2006 it was supporting a candidate who demonstrated a history of pragmatic leadership and a willingness to seek bipartisan solutions...We wonder what happened to that senator...

My friend Steve Benen has some much needed context for the Jeremiah Wright controversy. I was one of those who made with the eyerolling when I first heard the context defense. I retract it. The context does matter and if you watch the video, I think you will agree that it casts the M$M in a pretty damned unflattering light.

Taiwan has elected a new president Ma Ying-jeou (roughly pronounced Ma ING-gee-oh) was elected president of Taiwan in Saturday's election, and when he is inaugurated May 20, he will take over a struggling economy during a global downturn. He created some pretty high expectations for himself during the campaign, and then there is the fact that his party has a long history of corruption and thuggery, and American conservatives are uneasy about his vow to move closer to Beijing.

Cecilia Sarkozy has moved on as well The ex-wife of French president Nicolas Sarkozy married a Morrocan-born PR executive named Richard Attias in a private ceremony in the world-famous Rainbow Room in New York City's Rockefeller Center. It was a very conspicuously secretive affair, right there in the middle of Manhattan - no word on why, if they wanted to be so secretive, they didn't wed in the Hamptons?

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Dith Pran is facing an adversary every bit as harrowing as the Khmer Rouge. Pran is the photojournalist who shared the Pulitzer Prize in 1976 with Sidney Schanberg of the New York Times for their work covering the war in Cambodia. Eight years later, they were the subjects of the Academy Award winning movie The Killing Fields. Mr. Pran has faced starvation, torture, and the murderous children's brigade. Now he is battling pancreatic cancer. No stranger to adversity, he is battling the illness with dignity and serenity, and is using his experience to promote early cancer screening. Send white light toward New Jersey, where he has made his home for many years.

I remember consumer protections Another safeguard for the citizenry is becoming a thing of the past - the FDA, staffed by ideologues who do the bidding of big pharma, is on the verge of stripping away the rights of citizens to petition the courts for redress when they are wronged by faulty products. Citizens should never be never be barred from accessing the courts to appeal for justice - when people are denied access to the third box, they tend to move on to the fourth one. Imagine we learn that contaminated Heparin that recently killed at least 19 people was contaminated on purpose, and the families of those killed are denied access to the justice system. How could that ever be tolerated in this ostensibly free country?

Political Games Frank Walter Steinmeier, the German Foreign Minister, has issued a stern warning to China that the way they handle the unrest in Tibet could jeopardize this summer's Olympic games. ''This much is clear: the Olympic games don't work like they did 80 years ago. You can't just host glamorous events for television while things are going topsy-turvy in your own backyard. The host has to allow thousands of journalists into the country -- you won't be able to sweep anything under the rug,'' Steinmeier said.
No Fallon Testimony Late Friday the Pentagon announced that Admiral Fallon will not be included when Petraeus and Crocker go before congress to offer testimony about the status of Iraq on April 8 and 9. After their testimony, aWol will be announcing his plans for suspending troop drawdowns for the duration of his presidency and handing the clusterfuck off to the next president, who will have no choice but to wind it down, because both chambers of the congress will have stronger Democratic majorities and the republican obstructionists won't be able to continue their petty, obstreperous, contrarian ways.

Homeland Security painted itself into a corner with Real ID Chertoff sent out threatening letters on Friday to states that have explicitly refused to go along with DHS on the whole "Real ID" thing. The letters informed the states that anyone presenting drivers licenses from those states at the airport would be treated as if they had no ID at all. But hours later another letter went out - to the State of Montana. In it the feds backed down. In so many words they said "Never mind - you have met most of the requirements on your own, so we aren't going to hammer your citizens and piss a bunch of people off," and they granted Montana an extension that the state explicitly did not ask for. Governor Brian Schweitzer was all "whatever" about it, saying the state is simply not going to comply. "We sent them a horse. If they choose to call it a zebra, that is their business," said Schweitzer. He isn't stupid. He's a Democrat. These fuckups are about gone, and he's tellin' 'em to piss off, they are trying to save face and everyone is running out the clock. Good times. I love it when my government turns into a joke, don't you? [/sarcasm].

The pushback against these criminal bastards is coming from everywhere these days A new book due out next month by a retired Chilean diplomat and former head of the U.N. Security Council gets into the dirty details of aWol personally bullying other nations to support going to war against Iraq. The frat-rat president mocked allies who balked, threatened trade reprisals, and threats to fire U.N. envoys. Well, he has weakened this country so much there is no danger of another American president bullying anyone into anything for a good long time, if ever again. Yeah, this is great! I love it when my country is run by the idiots I hated in high-school for being drunken, arrogant jerks. [/sarcasm]

Militia trouble is cropping up as the surge winds down After the bloody chaos of 2006, 2oo7 saw the coalition forces make deals with the devil as they armed and paid Sunni militiamen about ten bucks a day to rent their loyalty. The "Awakenings Councils" are largely credited with the decrease in violence over the last months. But the downside - the very existence of these groups has deepened political divisions in Iraq. Not only that, but now the relationships are going south rapidly. As one awakening commander put it in late February: "We'll all be patient for another two months. If nothing changes, then we'll suspend and quit. Then we'll go back to fighting the Americans."

Militia trouble is cropping up as the surge winds down II Trouble isn't just brewing with Sunni militias. In the Shiite South, the the Jaish al-Mahdi fought the Iraqi Security Forces in Kut in a battle that started on Thursday night and lasted well into Friday. One Sadrist member of Parliament charged that the ISF was cracking down in the south in an attempt to keep Sadrists from making political gains in provincial elections to be held this fall. "They have no supporters in the central and southern provinces, but we do," Ahmed al-Massoudi told the AP. "If the crackdown against the Sadrists continues, we will begin consultations with other parliamentary blocs to bring down the government and replace it with a genuinely national one."

OK, Ace, spin this Certain frothing fuckwits on the right have been flapping their wings and squawking quite hysterically that McCain should never have corrected himself on the whole al Qaeda and Iran business. They have done some logical gymnastics to "prove" it, too. Thing is, these same foam-flecked lunatics are totally rock-star stricken by one David Petraeus, the modern-day Mars at whose feet they worship - and he isn't even singin' from that hymnal, let alone harmonizing with the Clueless Choir. It also makes me think that he wasn't all that thrilled with McCain jetting over to Iraq unannounced to chew him out for going off message with a realistic assessment a week or so ago. Or did Petraeus lose the unflagging devotion of his chickenhawk fanclub on the right when he started looking beyond Bush; and at his own career and his own legacy. Let me put it this way - he would rather be remembered alongside Eisenhower than mentioned in the same breath as Westmoreland, and that means he needs to start the damage control now.

Grover Norquist Hearts John McCain Go out right now and buy some flip-flops to take to the convention in Denver, because John McCain has sold his soul to the anti-tax whack jobs. (If I ever get to choose between drowning my government or drowning Grover Norquist in the bathtub, Grover is gurgling.) In 2001 and 2003, Senator John McCain voted against the Bush tax cuts, arguing that they hurt the middle class and they were too expensive in a time of war. In 2008, presidential candidate John McCain has done a complete one-eighty. Now, he doesn't just embrace them, he wants to extend them and expand them and put even more of the burden on the backs of the middle class. How much more, you might ask? Oh, just a mere two trillion over the next decade. Chump change, really. (This on top of Bush's three trillion dollar war that has been waged on credit extended by the Chinese.) Now, if we can just get tax rates to zero, receipts will approach infinity. Right?

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Dana Perino says that the public had our chance to weigh in on Iraq in 2004 and we should all just sit down and shut up. During a White House press briefing on Thursday, Dana Perino told Helen Thomas that very thing in so many words when the Doyenne of the Press Corps asked about Dick Cheney's dismissive "So?" When Ms. Thomas pressed her, Perino snapped that "You had input. The American people have input every four years and that's the way our system is set up." What an unctuous little guttersnipe.

Bachmann Busted On March 14th, Rep. Michelle Bachmann (Wingnut, MN) published a fearmongering screed on the op-ed pages of the Minneapolis StarTribune, in which she screeched that Democratic leaders were a bunch of terrorist-enablers who were making her constituents less safe! But she wasn't quite in the same room with reality when she sat down to write, and today, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes responded with an op-ed of his own, in which he torched all of her her magnificent strawmen - including the fact that the assertions made by DNI McConnell on February 5 were retracted on February 23 - and her op-ed didn't run until nearly three weeks later.

Canadian Supreme Court takes on Guantanamo The Canadian high court ruled on Thursday that it would consider petitions on the international legality of the U.S. military detainment center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. "Certainly, what the Supreme Court of Canada says about the legality of Guantanamo Bay and the actions of Canadian officials with respect to a citizen there, will reverberate in the political sphere in terms of bringing greater attention to, and a requirement of justification by the government of Canada about why it refuses to intervene," said University of Toronto law professor Audrey Macklin, who will represent the university's law clinic and Human Rights Watch at the hearing.

Oh, please, please, please, please, please Cuyahoga County, Ohio has launched an investigation into crossover voting. Before the Ohio and Texas primaries, Rush Limbaugh urged listeners to cross over and vote for Hillary Clinton in order to prolong the Democratic nominating process. As the investigation progresses, there is a huge open-ended question hanging out there: Will county officials go after the ringleaders of apparently illegal electioneering? In other words, will they indict Limbaugh for illegal electioneering?

With friends like these Extrajudicial slayings are on the rise in Colombia. The Colombian military, straining to show results of the U.S. funded war against leftist guerrillas are slaughtering civilians and calling them rebels. Human rights groups in the United States are questioning whether the United States is upholding U.S. law and withholding funding from units accused of human rights abuses. The Fellowship of Reconciliation and Amnesty International found that military aid was approved for 11 units of the Colombian armed forces last year, in spite of the fact that there were "credible allegations regarding killings, disappearances and collaboration with outlawed paramilitary forces," said Renata Rendon of Amnesty International. "It's outrageous this is happening. It's up to the [U.S. government] to ensure that we are not providing aid to abusive units."

Fighting broke out between Palestinian factions in the Ain al-Hilwe refugee camp in Lebanon between followers of Fatah and followers of the Islamist group Jund al-Sham. One Fatah member was killed and four others were wounded in the street fighting that broke out after Fatah arrested the Jund al-Sham commander on Thursday and handed him over to the Lebanese army. Jund al-Sham is a radical splinter group, estimated to have only about 50 armed members in the camp. Given the fight they apparently are capable of mounting, their small numbers are a good thing.

Taiwanese are at the polls today to choose a new president, and turnout among the 17 million registered voters is expected to be high. Both candidates favor a closer economic relationship with the Chinese mainland, and the candidate favored by Beijing was leading in the polls...until all hell broke loose in Tibet, now it's not just a horeserace, but a likely photo-finish.

Democracy by royal decree will commence on Monday. The people of Bhutan might prefer for their exalted monarch to run the show, but he has a different notion - he wants to turn the country into a constitutional monarchy, and the Bhutanese to elect their own leaders. "We are reluctant democrats," said one candidate for parliament. "It's been forced on us, and we have to embrace it."

In a sweeping speech today, French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced Friday that the nation would scale back their arsenal to about half the cold-war number, or about 300 warheads total. When making the announcement, Sarkozy stressed that France will maintain a vigorous defense and warned against threats to Europe by Iran and other powers, but he also encouraged European powers to work toward deterrence via diplomacy. He also urged the U.S. and China to ratify a nuclear test-ban treaty that was signed over 40 years ago.

And lets end on a lighthearted note...I love squirrels - love 'em, love 'em, love 'em. I can sit in the woods and watch squirrels for hours - I could have made a career of watching squirrels. So this didn't really surprise me - squirrels have social networks. They tend toward other squirrels with similar personalities and characteristics. Read the whole article - then go to the park.

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AP President calls out the government Tom Curley, president of the Associated Press, chided the Bush administration today, accusing the government of attempting to control information by imprisoning journalists. The charge is centered on the arrest two years ago and continued detention of Iraqi national and AP photographer Bilal Hussein. The government accuses him of "working with the enemy." Curley responded that "To say the least, we see things very differently," and he pointed out that a dozen more photographers have been arrested or detained in Iraq, in an attempt to control the access to and flow of information from the war zone. "It's impossible not to conclude that the words and pictures these journalists produced were considered unhelpful to the war effort and that their arrests would have served a broader strategy of information control."

Tucker's man-crush is showing...again. By now you all know that Dick Cheney responded with utter disdain toward the American people in an interview with Martha Raddatz of ABC. When she asked him about the 2/3 of Americans who don't think the Iraq war has been worth it, he responded "So?" (Noted without comment that if a Democrat showed such disdain, the streets would be full of pitchfork-wielding mobs demanding the head of the arrogant prick who would say such a thing.) And Tucker would be leading that mob, you just know it. But since it was Cheney who said it, Tucker is on board. "He's kind of a hero in that way," Carlson suggested. "I know I'll probably have my car egged for saying this, but ... it's so nice to see someone that old-school. 'Hey, you kids, get off my lawn.' That's Dick Cheney. I love that."

Make this kid a citizen already! Marine Lance Cpl. Mario Ramos-Villalta is getting ready for his third deployment. After two tours in Iraq, he is getting ready to ship out for Afghanistan. "A lot of the papers I get [say], 'You're a great American,'" the 22-year-old Purple Heart recipient says. "I am not an American citizen yet, but I still fight for it," quickly adding "Sometimes, I do get depressed about still not being a U.S. citizen and going over there." In the wake of the attacks of September 11, 2001, immigrants were offered a fast-track to citizenship, and about 37,000 have become citizens, and 107 citizenships have been granted posthumously - but over 7,000 are still in the pipe, including, Corporal Ramos-Villalta. (Can we give him Jenna or Not-Jenna's citizenship?)

Tell us again how McCain would benefit our military personnel? For the entire time he has been in the Senate, Jim Webb has been trying to get a new GI Bill for post-9/11 veterans that would mirror the sweet deal that WWII vets got for making the world safe for Democracy. President Roosevelt stated it simply when he said “[The GI Bill] gives emphatic notice to the men and women in our armed forces that the American people do not intend to let them down.” McCain is the only presidential contender who has not signed on - both Senators Obama and Clinton have signed on as co-sponsors, as well as Senator John Warner, former Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and now the Ranking Member. Why hasn't McCain signed on? Education benefits for veterans are a sound investment in the nation - it is estimated that every dollar spent on the GI Bill after WWII was paid back seven-fold in increased productivity and prosperity and made the American middle class the envy of the world.

Tibetan violence spreads The official Xinhua News Agency reported today that violent protests had spread into the Chinese provinces of Sichuan and Gansu, which are heavily populated with ethnic Tibetans. The Dalai Llama insists that he is powerless to rein in the protests.

How will it play in Taipei? The tensions with Tibet have spilled over to the presidential election in Taiwan, and support has drained away from Ma Ying-jeou, the Harvard-educated lawyer and candidate Beijing had hoped would win Saturday's election easily. Now, even if Mr. Ma wins, he will not have the mandate to move Taiwan closer to mainland China that Beijing was counting on.

What do you get for hundreds of millions of dollars spent on eradication efforts? Over the last six years, the international community has set aside vast amounts of money for poppy eradication programs in Afghanistan, and emissaries have been dispatched to the country side to try to persuade farmers to plant wheat, saffron and fruit trees instead. And what have the efforts netted? For the first time ever, the nation produced fully 90% of the world's opium and heroin supply.

Barbara Boxer has some questions for Dirk Kempthorne Ms. Boxer chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and she wants Mr. Kempthorne, Secretary of the Interior, to present himself to the committee and explain why, three months after his deadline, there has been no action taken on classifying the viability status of the polar bear. Typical of the Bushies, he has not even bothered to indicate whether he will even bother to appear.

Eufor peace keepers in Chad will henceforth shoot back Two weeks after the death of a Eufor soldier along the Chad-Sudan border the head of the European peace force in Chad announced that his forces would return fire if rebels attacked any refugee camps under their protection.

It turns out that money can buy happiness, if you don't try to prove title A new study shows that when we spend our money on others it gives a discernible boost to our affect, but selfish little piggies who spend it all on themselves get no such benefit. So keep that in mind and look for donate buttons on your favorite blogs! The benefits will be compound!

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Third times the charm For the third time a military judge has authorized attorneys for Salim Ahmed Hamdan to send questions to top-level al Qaeda detainees in the Guantánamo Bay prison camp. Military Judge Navy Captain Keith Allred refused to let Pentagon prosecutors hide beneath the petticoats of "national security" arguments.

Wildly off the mark Remember five years ago, when the deserter-in-chief was humping hard to sell his glorious war, he and administration lackeys were singularly dedicated to trying their damnedest to convince a gullible America on the notion that the whole thing could be done for the bargain-basement price of 50-60 Billion bucks? Yeah, well, those were the days. Even the Pentagram Pentagon pegs the costs at $600 Billion and counting. As for me, I'm more inclined to believe the Nobel Laureate in Economics who says it's going to cost us $3 Trillion.

Heparin Contaminant Identified The contaminant that led to the deaths of nineteen critical care patients in the United States who received Heparin from Chinese sources was molecularly modified Chondroitin Sulfate. "This is a biological compound that is not found in nature," said Janet Woodcock, director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. "At this point, it's still to be determined if it was introduced intentionally or by accident." If it was an accident, the protocols and chain of custody procedures are lacking. If it was added intentionally to boost profits, its even worse. Either way, it's criminal.

Political Turmoil in Kuwait The Emir or Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, dissolved the parliament on Wednesday claiming that it was necessary to preserve national unity and citing security concerns in the region. New elections have been set for May 17, in keeping with the Kuwaiti Constitution which specifies that new elections must be held within 60 days of a parliamentary dissolution.

Is there anybody out there? Just nod if you can hear me...The organic compound methane has been detected on a planet orbiting a star 63 light years away from our solar system. Water has also been detected in the atmosphere of the planet, but scientists stress that the planet is far too hot to support or sustain life.

Asian stocks slump as credit crisis worsens Doubts about the global economy drug down Asian stocks and caused a dramatic dip in the prices of commodities and precious metals. "Commodities was the one area that had been untouched by the credit chaos, but that seems to be changing," said Robert Rennie, chief currency strategist at Westpac in Australia.

Wall Street gets all the love. Main Street, not so much...While the Fed pumps billions into flagging Wall Street corporations in an effort to reverse the swing of the economic pendulum, Main Street continues to struggle as consumer confidence remains low and most Americans are convinced that the economy is in a recession, no matter what aWol says.

Kosovo recognized by Baltic states A month after Kosovo unilaterally declared independence from Serbia, their nationalist cause is advancing as Hungary and Croatia recognized the nascent nation on Wednesday. Bulgaria will do so tomorrow. Of course, Serbia had a tremendous hissy-fit, with Serbian foreign minister Vuk Jeremic declaring on Wednesday during a trip to Athens that "[E]very country that decides to recognize the illegally declared state of Kosovo breaches international law."

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Childhood's End Arthur C. Clarke, author of over a hundred books, including 2001: A Space Odyssey has died. He was 90 years old. He and the good Dr. Asimov were my constant companions growing up, occupying a special revered spot as far as I was concerned, because they were both working scientists and wrote textbooks, too. Clarke is credited with coming up with the concept of communications satellites - in fact, geosynchronous orbits are commonly called "Clarke's Orbits" after him.

The Dalai Llama is threatening to step down as the head of Tibet's government-in-exile if violence between Chinese soldiers and Tibetan independence protesters does not abate. Speaking at the site of the exile government in Dharamsala, India, he said: "I say to China and the Tibetans – don't commit violence. Whether we like it or not, we have to live together side by side," adding that "if things become out of control then my only option is to completely resign".

Reconciliation talks in Baghdad got underway, but without the main Sunni bloc who are boycotting the meeting, claiming that "Maliki is stonewalling them by failing to meet demands that include the release of security detainees not charged with specific crimes, disbanding Shiite militias and wider inclusion in decision-making on security issues."

A power-sharing deal in Kenya Kenyan lawmakers on Tuesday unanimously approved a power-sharing deal intended to salvaging a country once seen as one of the most stable and prosperous in Africa, but which disintegrated into ethnic bloodletting when both President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga claimed victory in the countries presidential election, and brought a bloody end to decades of peaceful coexistence between disparate ethnic groups in Kenya. Now they face the challenges of healing the nation and rebuilding a tattered economy that was once one of the most promising in Africa.

The oldest, thickest and most resilient ice around the North Pole is melting This was confirmed Tuesday by data collected from NASA satellites. "Thickness is an indicator of long-term health of sea ice, and that's not looking good at the moment," Walt Meier of the National Snow and Ice Data Center told reporters in a phone interview.

Pakistan's new parliament was seated on Monday The opposition parliament has vowed to restore the judiciary which has been decimated by Musharraf. An inevitable clash between Musharraf and the new parliament is brewing, and some parliamentarians are openly disdainful of the president. "Musharraf has to go. He has no future in this country, at least," said Khawaja Muhammad Asif, a newly elected legislator. "Maybe he has a future in the U.S."

Paterson preempts the press hounds Tuesday was David Paterson's first full day on the job as governor of New York, and he called a press conference and dropped a bombshell or three. He admitted openly and freely that he and his wife had both engaged in extramarital affairs, but had worked through their marital problems and had been faithful in recent years. One of the women he admitted to having had a relationship with is a state employee and a member of the staff that Paterson "inherited" from the disgraced Spitzer. Which probably prompted the preemptive confession session.

Well knock me over with a feather, the M$M might actually do some follow up! The New York Times is giving a few column inches in tomorrow mornings paper to McCain's foreign policy fuckups in Jordan earlier today, where he repeatedly asserted a connection between (Shi'ite) Iran and (Sunni) al Qaeda. Karen Finney, a spokeswoman for the DNC issued a statement in which McCain's obvious incompetence in foreign policy was underscored and his ties to this failed war and this failed president were reinforced. “After eight years of the Bush administration’s incompetence in Iraq, McCain’s comments don’t give the American people a reason to believe that he can be trusted to offer a clear way forward. Not only is Senator McCain wrong on Iraq once again, but he showed he either doesn’t understand the challenges facing Iraq and the region or is willing to ignore the facts on the ground.”

What creeps me out most about Cheney isn't just that he lies so easily, it's that he believes himself. Talking to soldiers at a sprawling base north of Balad he reasserted the fictitious connection between Iraq and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. "This long-term struggle became urgent on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. That day we clearly saw that dangers can gather far from our own shores and find us right there at home," he told the soldiers. "So the United States made a decision: to hunt down the evil of terrorism and kill it where it grows, to hold the supporters of terror to account and to confront regimes that harbor terrorists and threaten the peace," Cheney said. "Understanding all the dangers of this new era, we have no intention of abandoning our friends or allowing this country of 170,000 square miles to become a staging area for further attacks against Americans."

No Regrets If you had any doubts that Bush is a sociopath with no conscience, he still glibly insists that invading Iraq five years ago was worth what it has cost in lives, treasure and stature.

I think this family would probably disagree with the president and his romantic notions of war.

Hat tip to skippy for the photo.

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At the End of the Day

Badtux, the Inquisitive Penguin wondered about presidential pardons and just how far reaching they are. Turns out that presidential pardons can be issued in advance of conviction, even in advance of charge. (Nixon, remember, was never indicted or charged, yet Ford issued the infamous pardon.) The issue was laid to rest by the Supreme Court in the days immediately following the Civil War, in a statute known as Ex Parte Garland:

9. The power of pardon conferred by the Constitution upon the President is unlimited except in cases of impeachment. It extends to every offence known to the law, and may be exercised at any time after its commission, either before legal proceedings are taken or during their pendency, or after conviction and judgment. The power is not subject to legislative control.

10. A pardon reaches the punishment prescribed for an offence and the guilt of the offender. If granted before conviction, it prevents any of the penalties and disabilities consequent upon conviction from attaching; if granted after conviction, it removes the penalties and disabilities and restores him to all his civil rights. It gives him a new credit and capacity. There is only this limitation to its operation: it does not restore offices forfeited, or property of interests vested in others in consequence of the conviction and judgment.

So there ya go, Sweetie - the president can indeed pardon pre-conviction. Which is why we need to impeach, so he can't pardon.

(Tip o' the Tam O'Shanter to Shortstop for doing the legwork on this.)

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If I was a cynic I would think that The Politico has an agenda...Tell me now - how else to explain that mash-note to Mad Jack? And by the way, is the Tom Davis they quote saying this about Republican prospects for November:

“It puts a whole new set of states in play for us,” Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) said of McCain’s candidacy.

Davis, a former NRCC chairman with an almost unmatched command of political demography, said McCain’s chief strength is that his appeal among independents, the fastest-growing affiliation in many states, can compensate for the decline in self-identified Republicans.

“Where we have been losing ground is among independents, and in every survey I’ve seen, he’s very competitive with independents,” Davis said.

The same Tom Davis who said this?

"It's no mystery," said Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.). "You have a very unhappy electorate, which is no surprise, with oil at $108 a barrel, stocks down a few thousand points, a war in Iraq with no end in sight and a president who is still very, very unpopular. He's just killed the Republican brand."

Stuart Rothenberg summed up the Republican prospects this way "The math is against them. The environment is against them. The money is against them. This is one of those cycles that if you're a Republican strategist, you just want to go into the bomb shelter."

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It's harder to quash dissent these days, but China is sure as hell gonna try They have always censored the internet, but they stepped up their efforts over the weekend and YouTube went away after video of the protest in Tibet were uploaded to the service. This comment was left at Kevin Drum's place a few hours ago:

It is now 7:53 am, on Monday, March 17th, inside China. Yahoo.com has ceased to exist on the internet - as well as YouTube (which bit the dust over the weekend). The New York Times is still available on the internet. Posted by: XinTianDi on March 16, 2008 at 7:54 PM | PERMALINK

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Mad Jack won't be strolling through Shorja this trip because it isn't safe - even with a hundred soldiers around him, a kevlar vest and helmet, three Blackhawks and two Apache gunships overhead.

Today, CNN reported that they tried to visit the Shorja market, but it was too unsafe and they were unable to go:

We got close to that marketplace today, Jim, but our own security advisers here in Iraq did not want us to go there. They didn’t believe it was safe for an American to be in that area. We were in a thriving marketplace nearby.

For the record, the Shorja market is in the control of Sadr's militias.

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When a Republican says stuff like this, does he need a tinfoil hat, too? Ben Stein sees a sinister motive behind the undoing of Eliot Spitzer.

Stein is troubled by what he calls the actions of a few "nosy civil servants" using evidence gained from wiretaps to unravel the career of the outgoing New York Governor, and undo a majority vote by the people of New York.

"Something sinister is happening," he says, "and it scares me."

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Missiles launched into Waziristan kill at least 20 A barrage of seven missiles rained down on the tribal area of Pakistan, launched from Afghanistan, destroyed the home of one militant and killing at least twenty persons. No one has claimed responsibility, but american forces have launched attacks into the area in the past.

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Us B-Listers gotta stick together...Blue Gal (the other one) who blogs around almost as much as yours truly - is passing the hat, and could sure use a little help if you have it to spare. Readers were so great to me a couple of months back that I was able to set aside a few bucks in a "Share the Love Fund" to help out fellow bloggers when their fundraisers roll around. I am pleased to say that she was one of the bloggers I shared the love with, and I hope you can toss something in her tipjar, too. She works hard at this blogging thing...

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At the End of the Day

No Twits Watch: Mrs. Pale Rider threw this month's edition of The Atlantic into the trash when it arrived at our home today. Why, you may ask? Because that stalwart magazine that we have enjoyed for its lengthy articles on foreign affairs, homeland security, and the American culture had Britney Frickin' Spears on the cover. No, we don't care. I know you gotta sell magazines, but damn.

March is really suckin' for John Ashcroft: First a vacant farmhouse owned by the former Attorney General was struck by lightning and burned to the ground, he has been invited to come chat with some nice congressmen and women about a sweetheart deal bestowed on his lobbying group by a US Attorney who was his subordinate when he was AG; and then today, the gravy train derailed. The Justice Department issued new rules that prohibit US Attorneys from dispensing patronage deals to friends, cronies and other insiders to implement and monitor corporate fraud settlements. The deal that went to Ashcroft's lobbying firm that was worth millions and millions for little actual work was just so egregious that even a Loyal Bushie DoJ was embarrassed into doing something about it.

China is in the grip of spiraling inflation fueled by skyrocketing energy and food costs. The blizzards that paralyzed the country a few weeks ago - the worst in 50 years - pressed prices upward and pegged inflation for the year at 8.7%. Americans better hope that part of their economic strategy doesn't involve calling our debt.

Southern Baptist leaders now say the time is right to fight climate change. Forty-six members of the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant denomination in the United States, signed “A Southern Baptist Declaration on the Environment and Climate Change.” They aren't telling their members to accept the science, or even that climate change is anthropogenic, mind you, just that the change is real. So let me see if I understand...They aren't accepting that the actions of mankind are causing it - but the actions of man can reverse it. Oy vey.

It's a good news-bad news sort of thing. The good news is, MSNBC finally canceled "Tucker!" The bad news? That addle-brained sycophant David Gregory is getting a show. Can you stand it??? David "Mr. President, would you describe yourself as iconic, or heroic?" Gregory! A nightly show! Seriously! WTF??? Shoot me now...

Raise your hand if you remember the financial hi-jinx of the 80's (Chrysler bankrupt, Michael Milken, Junk Bonds, bank failures, farm foreclosures, the S&L bailout, the Keating Five). Why does this stuff make me think of some of that stuff? On a day in which the stock market tumbled to its lowest point in two years and rumors flew that a major Wall Street firm might be in trouble, Blackstone said Monday that its profit had plunged...The firm said earnings tumbled 89 percent in the final three months of 2007 and warned that the deep freeze in the credit markets — and, by extension, in the private equity industry — was unlikely to thaw soon...“They see the handwriting on the wall,” said Martin S. Fridson, a leading expert on junk bonds, said of buyout firms. “They’re staring into the jaws of hell.”

Jeebus! I was JOKING when I said we needed Valium in the water supply! (Besides, I just meant for the rest of the primaries!) As it turns out, there are lots of pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter meds in municipal water supplies throughout the land. Take unused medications to your doctors office or your pharmacy, folks, where they can be put in a biohazard container and incinerated. Or check with the public health services in your area. Some states allow unused medicines to be redistributed via free clinics and public health facilities.

Gulf War Syndrome is Real That is the consensus of a review of medical studies. They have determined that exposure to an anti-nerve gas pill and a pesticide that was widely used to eradicate disease-carrying sand flies (Leishmaniasis is a nasty disease, with the visceral variety being fatal) is responsible for the group of symptoms that are known collectively as Gulf War Syndrome. This strengthens the claims of veterans who have been fighting for treatment for their health issues for years.

Fifteen Dead in Pakistani Blasts Two bombs exploded in Lahore on Tuesday, killing fifteen people. One blast detonated outside the multi-story building that houses he Federal Investigation Agency. The building was heavily damaged and thirteen victims perished in that attack. The second blast occurred in a residential area a few miles away, claiming the lives of two children.

The number of Americans killed in Iraq is now 3980. Eight Americans died in two suicide bomb attacks on Monday. Five soldiers died when a suicide bomber approached them, indicating he wanted to talk to them. As he approached, he set himself off, killing the five Americans and two Iraqi civilians. Eight were wounded. Three soldiers and their Iraqi interpreter were killed in a second attack in Diyala province. A fourth Soldier was wounded in that attack. Remember them, and the 3972 others who have fallen in Iraq when you vote in November. Remember them, and remember the lies they died for. Then vote accordingly.

And that's it for Monday - I'll try to meet the midnight deadline tomorrow...

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At the End of the Day

(courtesy posting for Blue Girl, errors are DocLarry's)

Fun and games with statistics! Consider this: the average unemployment rate in this decade, just above 5 percent, has been lower than in any decade since the 1960s. Yet the percentage of prime-age men (those 25 to 54 years old) who are not working has been higher than in any decade since World War II. In January, almost 13 percent of prime-age men did not hold a job, up from 11 percent in 1998, 11 percent in 1988, 9 percent in 1978 and just 6 percent in 1968. In other words - while the unemployment rate is falling, so is the employment rate. Get your head around that one.

John "Four more years! Four more wars!" McCain collected the endorsement of the Worst. President. Ever. today. Isn't that swell? He said today that he wants to appear with the president-popularity as often as the president's schedule will allow. (This idiot keeps a schedule? What's on it besides his daily workout?) A new ABC poll shows McCain losing to both Obama and Clinton. VoteVets puts the lie to his claim that he has unequivocal military support in short order.

The Vintage Dairy Biogas Project went on line Tuesday in California's inland empire. It is the brainchild of life-long California dairyman David Albers. The project derives natural gas from cow manure, and is projected to provide the gas to heat 1200 homes.

Something for the fans of weird science Researchers have discovered a hybernating fish in the Antarctic. The cod Notothenia coriiceps goes into a dormant state to conserve energy in the long and brutal southern winter.

The inimitable Bob Somerby just cuts to the chase. Maureen Dowd is a lunatic and Ruth Marcus is the biggest Idiot in the Village. Yes, yes, we knew these things already. I just like repeating it.

How's that free market working out for ya? Maybe not so well if you are hospitalized with a heart condition or coagulation disorder and receiving heparin therapy. Counterfeit heparin has been linked to at least 19 deaths in the United States. In each instance the constituent compounds came from China.

A speedbump on the fast track to media consolidation A bipartisan group of Senators led by Byron Dorgan of North Dakota has offered a "resolution of disapproval" to stop regulators from easing media-ownership rules in the nation's 20 largest cities that would allow for vertical consolidation of news outlets. "When nearly half of the people in this country are told that in their cities and towns the media will get the green light to consolidate, they will not be happy," said Dorgan in a release. "The proposal would also create a greatly relaxed approval process for newspapers to buy TV stations in any U.S. media market and spur a new wave of media consolidation in both large and small media markets."

A collection of human rights and aid organizations has declared that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza worse than at any time since the Israeli occupation started in 1967. The report, Gaza Strip: A Humanitarian Implosion, is highly critical of the Israeli blockade of Gaza, calling it illegal collective punishment, and pointing out that if fails to increase security in the region.

There is no more.

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At the End of the Day

Rumors of her demise were greatly exagerated Hillary Clinton ain't out yet. Obama took Vermont, as was expected, but in the other three states, it was all Hillary. She ran away with Ohio, 55% to 43%, and Rhode Island was a blowout, 58% TO 40%. Texas was a little closer - 51% to 47%. In the Texas caucuses, Obama is leading with 5% of precincts reporting, but there have been rumors of chicanery at the caucuses.

The citizens of Brattleboro, VT voted today to indict Bush and Cheney by voting yes on this question: "Shall the Selectboard instruct the Town Attorney to draft indictments against President Bush and Vice President Cheney for crimes against our Constitution and publish said indictments for consideration by other authorities, and shall it be the law of the Town of Brattleboro that the Brattleboro police, pursuant to the above mentioned indictments, arrest and detain George Bush and Richard Cheney in Brattleboro if they are not duly impeached, and prosecuted or extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them?" The vote was 2012 to 1795. Marlboro, VT beat them to it by a few hours when they enacted a similar measure at their Town Meeting. Will anyone honor the warrants? You know those assholes aren't going anywhere near the home turf of Howard Dean.

At first it was funny, but toward the end, it was just sad - The Huckabee campaign, that is. It was humiliating to watch him hanging on long after the numbers eliminated him, hearing him cheerfully chirp that he wasn't a math guy, he was a miracle guy. There was no Chuck Norris at the concession speech.

Master Sgt. Woodrow Wilson Keeble on Monday became the first full-blood Sioux to receive the Medal of Honor, 25 year after his death. Drafted to serve in WW II, Keeble volunteered for service in Korea, and it is for valor there he received the honor. In a fierce battle, fighting uphill, Keeble saved the lives of the American soldiers he was fighting with, pushing on in an uphill battle, wounded, until he had taken out both of the machine gun nests protecting the hill. Family members accepted the honor on his behalf, he passed away in 1982.

Bernanke touts recovery item that drew veto threat from Bush when the stimulus package was being debated in January. The Democratic provision that inspired the most ire from the resident was one that would have given bankruptcy judges the authority to reduce the principal amount on mortgage loans when the mortgage holders are before their bench. Today, Bernanke said that banks may have to absorb reductions in the principal of some troubled home loans to ward off greater losses that could result from outright default.

Favre Retires - Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre announced his retirement today after playing 17 record-breaking seasons for the Packers. He said the stress of living up to his high own high standards had become too much. He sounded to me like it just wasn't fun any more.

With friends like these...In the last year China has stepped up their hacking game, prompting fears by the pentagon to arrive at the conclusion that they face a new and potentially dangerous military threat. Network breaches at the Pentagon and other government agencies, policy organizations and government contractors that happened last year all appeared to originate in China. Similar attacks have taken place against networks in Germany, France and Great Britain. Last year, British intelligence alerted financial institutions across the country that they were targets of "state-sponsored computer network exploitation" from China. "The techniques that are used, the way these intrusions are conducted, are certainly very consistent with what you would need if you were going to actually carry out cyber-warfare, and the kinds of activities that are carried out are consistent with a lot of writings we see from Chinese military and Chinese military theorists," Sedney said.

Sweet!!! “A Federal Communications Commission official has asked for an agency inquiry into the blackout of CBS News’s ‘60 Minutes’ by an Alabama television station. FCC Commissioner Michael J. Copps said he had asked Chairman Kevin J. Martin to open an inquiry into the Feb. 24 incident at WHNT, a CBS affiliate in Huntsville, Ala. Martin said he would look into the matter but has not indicated yet whether he would issue a letter of inquiry to the station, a source close to the commission said.”

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At the End of the Day - February 26, 2008

The GOP fears charges of racism and/or sexism during the general election for president. Not, of course, because they're racist or sexist, no, no, perish the thought. (Strannix)

I'm not sure why they're worrying about being racist: Time's Mark Halperin includes playing the race card as his tactic #6 (of 16) that John "Mad Jack" McCain can use to defeat Barack Obama in the general. He should have included a tactic #17: never listen to an asshat such as Mark Halperin. (Strannix)

Starbucks took a coffee break today. I'd complain more about this, but I'm jonesing too bad for a caffeine fix....!! (Strannix)

Tom Ricks isn't hopeful about America's involvement in Iraq. He hosted an online forum this afternoon on the WaPo website. One of the first questions was from a field-grade officer five months into a fifteen month deployment in Iraq. [M]ost of us do not see an end here in Iraq. If we stay, we are attacked; if we leave, Iraq falls aprart. I used to believe in the system, but I do not anymore. Is there an end in sight? What do you see ahead for Iraq? The senior leaders will not admit to it, but the Army is dying a slow death ... things will be worse than the late '70s. Ricks didn't beat around the bush: Hello, Baghdad....This is a very good question. With you, I think we are stuck in Iraq for years to come. That is to say, the best case scenario isn't that different from what some would call a quagmire....That said, I do think it might be possible to reduce troop numbers and get the casualty rate down in coming years. Does that sicken you as much as it does me? (--BG)

So does this mean he will be willing to say the same thing in front of Congress, under oath? Whatever KKKarl. You can deny you were behind the Siegelman witch-hunt on Faux Noise until the cows come home. I won't believe a word out of your fetid maw until you tell it to Representative Conyers, under oath, in front of the cameras and live on CSPAN. And then I'll be suspicious. (--BG)

Colonel Morris Davis was back in the news again today, this time with the revelation that Pentagon general counsel William Hayes, who resigned abruptly yesterday, had pressured him to bring Australian David Hicks to trial in advance of the Australian elections. You may recall that Bush ally John Howard took a thorough beating, losing not just the presidency, but his own seat in parliament. (--BG)

Dumbest. Babies. Ever. Remember Monica Goodling? Well, she just got engaged, and you will never guess to whom...Mike Krempasky of RedState. I saw her testimony, I have read his ranting - I stand by my prediction. It is a given that this union is guaranteed to produce the Dumbest. Babies. Ever. (--BG)

For this, I will be keeping my checkbook in my desk drawer next pledge drive. Memo to the programming wizards at NPR's Morning Edition - if we wanted to be assaulted by the inanity of the towering jackass Glenn Beck...we would not be tuned in to NPR! Waking up to that nastiness this morning can only be described as a "rude awakening." Stop sucking up to the wingers, you morons, and start doing some real reporting about them. Let me put it this way - pledge drive is coming, and I have already decided to sit this one out. I will continue sitting them out for the foreseeable future, until you stop making nice with foam-flecked loons. What else would you call a guy who thinks Rick "Man on Dog" Santorum is the second coming of Winston Churchhill? I mean, c'mon - the guy is clearly insane...(--BG)

McCain had a run-in with the far-right fringe today at a rally in Cincinnati. He was introduced by Bill "Willie" Cunningham, who viciously attacked Barack Obama as a "hack" and used his middle name (Hussein) about a dozen times. When McCain took the stage, he rebuked the wingnut, and we acknowledge this and thank the senator for taking that stand against such stupid and divisive rhetoric by desperate wingnuts who are pulling out all the stops in an effort to change the direction of the pendulum in mid swing. (--BG)

Attention Idaho Parents! Senator Larry Craig is looking for summer interns and the application deadline is approaching fast.

And that's it for Tuesday. You know the drill - it's an open thread, leave anything we missed in comments, and we'll see you tomorrow.

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At the End of the Day - February 22, 2008

19%...We have known for seven years that Bush is the Worst. President. Ever. - and now we have the math to prove it! Nothing is helping him. Gallivanting across Africa didn't help him at home; even as his minions here fearmongered to beat the band, his job approval rating dropped to Nixon-in-August-1974 levels. And here is a really interesting tidbit from that poll: "A total of 42% of Americans, however, say they believe the national economy will be better a year from now, which is the highest level for this question in the past year." I can read what's writ large between those lines, can't you?

We need John McCain and one campaign staffer (presumably female)…For a special appearance before the Federal Elections Commission...Given John McCain’s alleged affair with a whiff of regulatory impropriety coming close on the heels of his “I was for public campaign financing before I was against it” attempt to apparently defraud the Federal Election Commission and the American taxpayer, via his campaign committee, and the currently quorum-less FEC now saying McCain’s fiscal sleight of hand needs another look, it’s clear we have the stage for a perfect train wreck...The Schmuck Talk Express™ needs to have casual sex with one of his campaign staffers, ideally someone in either fundraising or legal issues, so as to have direct connection with his loan agreement, so he can then go interfere with the FEC on her behalf!

While we're flogging McCain on campaign fundraising irregularities, why not take a moment to mention the fact that a number of his paid campaign staffers seem to also be high profile Washington lobbyists when they're not hitching a ride on The Schmuck Talk Express™?

One last shot at Straight Talk John McCain, enemy of all that is corrupt. Greg Sargent reports for TMP that "it turns out that one of McCain's top advisers, lobbyist Charlie Black, does lots of his lobbying from the Straight Talk Express. From aboard the bus itself..." Says Josh Marshall: "I have to confess that this new detail has vanquished my ability to snark." Mine too, Josh, mine too.

Oh what the hell? One more last shot at St. John the Hotheaded - So much for John McCain on his supposed "green" cred on global warming and such. The League of Conservation Voters has given him a zero rating.

The GOP in the Illinois 11th is looking for a new congressional candidate after Tim Baldermann, who won the primary to replace the retiring Rep. Jerry Weller withdrew suddenly and unexpectedly. Baldermann said he could not juggle a campaign and the responsibilities of his job as mayor of New Lenox and police chief of suburban Chicago Ridge - but behind the scenes, it appears that traffic on Dissillusionment Boulevard was snarled...

Baldermann won his party’s primary earlier this month but has endured some early problems. He expressed reservations about raising the amount of money needed for the race, recently parted ways with a campaign manager under federal investigation and was criticized for using a newspaper’s logo in a misleading way on his campaign literature.

One source said Baldermann was disappointed with the amount of fundraising support he was getting from the party, and party leaders were similarly disappointed with his output on that front.

State Sen. Debbie Halvorson, the Democratic nominee, has raised more than $400,000, while Baldermann raised jut $100,000 through mid-January.

The chances for another Democratic pickup just got one better.

This certainly doesn't happen every day...Former Air Force Colonel and Guantanamo chief prosecutor Morris Davis is going to testify for the defense in the case of Salim Hamdan, a Yemeni accused of delivering weapons to Al-Qaeda operatives, and whose trial by a special military commission is scheduled for May. Davis made headlines when he resigned his position to keep his Honor intact. He had been overruled on admissibility of evidence obrtained via torture, and a political appointee who had told him "we can't have acquittals" was placed above him in the chain of command. Davis is no champion of Hamdan. He is a champion of Justice. For that, he deserves our gratitude, and if appropriate, our most crisp salute. (Listen to the Day to Day interview with Madeline Brand and the Pentagon's response by General Hartmann here.)

The war in Iraq seems to be losing it's luster, one wingnut at a time...speaking at a town hall meeting in Muskogee, Oklahoma's junior Senator Tom Coburn admitted aloud the folly of Iraq. "I will tell you personally that I think it was probably a mistake going to Iraq," he said to a small audience. Of course, he isn't ready to talk about withdrawal, but then,Rome wasn't built in a day, either.

By now you know that Rick Renzi has been indicted for pretty much everything, but what you might not know is that it has been a long time coming. Remember all those cases they wanted to rush indictments on before the 2006 election when the target was a Democrat? Yeah, well, the opposite happened in the case of Renzi. The DoJ stalled his indictment. But timing sure can be a bitch! The fallout from the DoJ scandal happened just in time to give cover to Charlton's crack team, and they managed to keep their jobs, being too radioactive to fire, and they moved the indictment forward. So...Emptywheel has a question...What Got Added to the Renzi Indictment Since October 2006? I would like an answer to that question, too.

That's it for Friday. If we missed anything, let us know in comments, and we'll be back to do it again tomorrow.

Tonights End of the Day was put together with the help of Gadfly, bmaz and Strannix.

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At the end of the day - February 20, 2008

Remember, when they say our economy is in the most vicious cycle ever, that includes 1929...The subprime crisis is far beyond what anyone has managed to get their heads around yet.

Bank of America delivered a report last night highlighting the current losses of the "credit crisis." According to the report, the meltdown in the U.S. subprime real estate market has led to a global loss of $7.7 trillion in stock market value since October.

It is affecting banks and economies world wide. We have taken a large chunk of the world along on our out-of-control handcart ride to hell.

Oh, this just makes all kinds of sense...The Philippines is a poor and struggling nation, surviving on the remittances of a migrant workforce already. So what kind of sense does it make for an impoverished country, already incapable of producing enough food to feed it's own population, to take what farmland it has and lease it to grow rice for EXPORT to China? Brilliant.

Greg Mitchell, the editor of Editor & Publisher has a new book coming out next month - "So Wrong for So Long: How the The Press, the Pundits -- and the President -- Failed on Iraq." You can listen to a podcast preview of the book here.

Now the US Military is backing away from the story that two female suicide bombers had Down Syndrome. Now they are saying that the women had received psychiatric treatment, but were not mentally retarded. "Both had recently received psychiatric treatment for depression and/or schizophrenia. From what we know now there's no indication that they had Down syndrome," said a spokesman, citing records obtained by the military.

Is anyone really surprised? After FEMA screwed the pooch on deploying trailers for victims of Hurricane Katrina and then realized the trailers were poisoning the people in them, it’s hardly news that they misused the money they made from selling said, poisoned trailers.

Increased Hurricane Losses Due to More People, NOT Stronger Storms...(.pdf alert) A new paper from noted tropical researchers have concluded that damage from hurricanes and tropical cyclones have increased in the U.S.... but not from stronger storms.

Chris Landsea and others found that it was due to population growth, infrastructure and wealth along the coastline... not a spike in the number or intensity of hurricanes in the Atlantic basin.

"We found that although some decades were quieter and less damaging in the U.S. and others had more land-falling hurricanes and more damage, the economic costs of land-falling hurricanes have steadily increased over time," said Chris Landsea, one of the researchers as well as the science and operations officer at NOAA's National Hurricane Center in Miami. "There is nothing in the U.S. hurricane damage record that indicates global warming has caused a significant increase in destruction along our coasts."

Interesting to see how the issue of rendition plays out in the U.K. where concern for civil liberties seems to be more important than fear-mongering (today's special: humble pie).

Dog and Pony Shows™ are going to get someone killed. I have been saying it for ages. I don't want a potentate to perish, but it's going to happen, and that is the only way the stupid, wasteful, tax-payer funded junkets are going to stop. They never get the real scoop anyway. For the second time in recent months, an aircraft in a war zone has been in peril with lawmakers aboard who are traipsing off to war zones for photo ops and to perhaps do a bit of shopping.


And that's it for Thursday - I hope when I wake up on Friday it isn't 1979 any more...


Tonights At the End of the Day has been brought to you with the help of Deb-TUD and Sniderman.

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At the End of the Day - February 20, 2008

Inflation Watch: The 2007 numbers are in and inflation hit 4.3 percent last year. And, if it’s going anywhere, right now, that number is up. Numbers for this January show a rise of 0.4 percent. Multiply by 12 and you get 4.8 percent, just a tad bigger than 4.3.

It’s clear that Big Ben Bernanke the Clueless, Big Ben the Bubble Builder, has not an idea about just how much a problem inflation could be. Five bucks says that, in spite of the inflation news, he’ll try to ram through another rate cut before the end of May at the latest.

The only good news, or perhaps stupid news, is that new home groundbreakings edged up in January. Good in the sense of economic activity. Stupid in the sense of a slowing economy and a huge backlog of unsold homes.

Just for the record - a theory isn't merely something we come up with after we've been up all night drinking Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters. Florida has updated their science standards and will now teach, explicitly, the "theory of evolution."

A note to Cindy McCain - Honey, didn't your Mama ever tell you that when you steal a man; all it really proves is that he can be stolen. And you really gotta beware the ones that are eager to give away the keys.

South Korean President Elect Lee Myung-bak has been cleared of fraud charges. "We found the president-elect was not involved in stock manipulation," Special Prosecutor Chung Ho-young said in a statement. The announcement was made four days before the president elect is to be sworn into office.

Eighty million a month, and no receipts??? That is what the Washington Post is reporting the United States pays the government of Pakistan for the posting of troops along the Afghan border. The US pays from spreadsheets, no receipts attached.

A little good news - The Navy has apparently been successful in hitting the cripled spy satellite that was falling from orbit. Don't buy the BS about hydrazine and public health danger - that bird never powered up, so it is chock-full of brand new MASINT equipment, and our intel agencies aren't too eager to have the thing fall out of orbit, not burn up on reentry, and a less-than-friendly government get hold of those pristine spook tools. I mean, we're all grownups here, lets get real...

And Wednesdays a wrap...

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At the End of the Day

What is it about Sunday? It seems neither fish nor fowl; is it the end of the week, or the beginning of another, or does it exist somewhere in it's own lazy dimension (on a rainy, dark weekend that we're experiencing here in SWMO, that definitely seems the case).

Let me clear the murk from my mind, and see what I can dredge up for you saucy little squabs (beware of drunken vice presidents with shotguns).

• Does Wikipedia have a prophet motive?

Wikipedia, the free online encyclopaedia, is refusing to remove medieval artistic depictions of the Prophet Muhammad, despite being flooded with complaints from Muslims demanding the images be deleted.

More than 180,000 worldwide have joined an online protest claiming the images, shown on European-language pages and taken from Persian and Ottoman miniatures dating from the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, are offensive to Islam, which prohibits any representation of Muhammad. But the defiant editors of the encyclopaedia insist they will not bow to pressure and say anyone objecting to the controversial images can simply adjust their computers so they do not have to look at them.

In a robust statement on the site, its editors state: 'Wikipedia recognises that there are cultural traditions among some Muslim groups that prohibit depictions of Muhammad and other prophets and that some Muslims are offended when those traditions are violated. However, the prohibitions are not universal among Muslim communities, particularly with the Shia who, while prohibiting the images, are less strict about it.

'Since Wikipedia is an encyclopedia with the goal of representing all topics from a neutral point of view, Wikipedia is not censored for the benefit of any particular group.

• Is this what Mike Huckabee had in mind?

Egyptian police have stepped up arrests of persons suspected of having HIV, detaining four men this month in a crackdown that violates basic human rights, two international rights groups said Friday.

New York-based Human Rights Watch and London-based Amnesty International warned in a joint statement that the arrests could undermine HIV/AIDS prevention effort as people in Egypt become increasingly afraid to seek information on the subject.

Police denied making any HIV-related arrests but one police official speaking on condition of anonymity said there is a campaign to get persons registered in hospital records as HIV-positive into treatment in "special clinics." The official said he was not authorized to speak to the media.

The latest arrests bring to eight the number of HIV suspects in detention.

• Speaking of Huckabee, he's making sure that Tom Scholz is not feelin' satisfied.

Tom Scholz, the chief songwriter and founder of the band Boston, has written to Mike Huckabee, complaining of his use of the group’s 1976 song “More Than a Feeling” in his presidential campaign without permission, The Associated Press reported.

Mr. Scholz, who supports Senator Barack Obama, Democrat of Illinois, for president, objects to the implication that the band has endorsed the candidacy of Mr. Huckabee, a Republican.

• I could take a third of my $$$ and simply set it on fire. It would prove about as effective as this.

President Bush on Sunday said Congress should renew his global AIDS program and preserve a requirement that steers money into abstinence efforts.

Some Democrats want to eliminate a provision in the bill that requires one-third[emphasis mine] of all prevention spending go to abstinence-until-marriage programs. Critics say that while they don't oppose abstinence programs, the inflexible requirement hampers the effort.

• Wait a minute, I think I've seen this movie.

While arguing in court that states are free to enact tougher mercury controls from power plants, the Bush administration pressured dozens of states to accept a scheme that would let some plants evade cleaning up their pollution, government documents show.

Internal Environmental Protection Agency documents and e-mails, obtained by the advocacy group Environmental Defense, show attempts over the past two years to blunt state efforts to make their plants drastically reduce mercury pollution instead of trading for credits that would let them continue it.

An EPA official said the agency's job "is not to pressure states."

Not the agency's job, just a hobby.

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