Will we ever learn?

It is getting to be the same old story. Information is given, dismissed as unimportant, money is diverted and innocent people are paying the price.

Salon.com - War Room: "Metaphorically speaking, it turns out, Bush did get such a PDB -- and he got it years ago. Experts have warned for years that New Orleans is particularly vulnerable to hurricane damage. And as the folks at the Center for American Progress note, the Federal Emergency Management Agency issued a report in early 2001 that identified the three catastrophes most likely to hit the United States: a terrorist attack on New York, an earthquake in San Francisco and a hurricane in New Orleans.

As of this week, FEMA is now two-for-three. That leads us to think that the residents of the city by the Bay might think about scoring some flashlights and bottled water just about now. But it also leads us to wonder what the Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress did with the warning that FEMA provided.

Here's what: They cut funding for flood and hurricane projects planned by the New Orleans district of the Army Corps of Engineers. According to one published report, the New Orleans district had $147 million to spend on such projects in 2001. In fiscal year 2005, which ends next month, the district will have had about $82 million, a drop of about 44 percent. As we reported earlier this week, the Bush administration proposed further cuts for the district for fiscal year 2006."

I remember reading those reports a few years ago. Of course as someone who has been interested in rising sea levels (I have a ridiculous fear of large waves), I had long ago decided that anyplace that is located 15 feet below sea level might not be the best place to buy property. I was having a discussion last spring with this guy who was bragging about his new property in New Orleans and I mentioned to him that it wouldn't be worth as much underwater. He thought I was crazy and politely left. I'm willing to bet he remembered me several times over the last 36 hours. Sometimes I hate being right.

Now, imaging being a Louisiana, Mississippi, or Alabama National Guardsman in Iraq. You don't know what you are there for, some of them think the war is "fucktarded" and now their homes are most likely gone or destroyed beyond the ability of their pay to repair. As they follow the news from home, while stuck in a country that hates them and wants them out at any cost, these servicepeople are probably agonizing over the double whammy that their families are enduring.

Unfortunately the hurricane season isn't over. What if there is an earthquake here in the Bay area? FEMA is definitely going to be strained by this disaster, how will they be able to respond to another? Fortunately this year the fire season has been pretty mild, but it is just a matter of time when it becomes apparent to the ruling minority who want to stay the course, that the best use of American resources might be to take care of problems at home.

Does eating less extend your lifespan?

So. Do you live longer or does it just feel like it?

Study: Super-skinny won't live longer - Diet & Fitness - MSNBC.com: "
They came up with a mathematical model based on the known effects of calorie intake and life span.

“In Japanese populations, for example, the normal male diet is approximately 2,300 kilocalories (calories) per day,” they wrote -- and the average life span for a Japanese male is 76.7 years.

“Sumo wrestlers, however, consume an average of approximately 5,500 calories per day and have a life expectancy of 56 years,” they added.

People living on the Japanese island of Okinawa eat somewhat less than the average Japanese. They also live slightly longer. This could give a basis for calculating the benefits of eating less.

Calculations based on the Okinawa and sumo wrestler data suggest that if Japanese people ate just 1,500 calories a day, the longest average life span attainable would be just under 82 years, Phelan and Rose wrote."

Interesting study, let's see them try that in America, where we sue french fry distributors.

Katrina and the waves

The prescient date on this article is September 11, 2001.

New Orleans Is Sinking: "Think of the city as a chin jutting out, waiting for a one-two punch from Mother Nature. The first blow comes from the sky. Hurricanes plying the Gulf of Mexico push massive domes of water (storm surges) ahead of their swirling winds. After the surges hit, the second blow strikes from below. The same swampy delta ground that necessitates above-ground burials leaves water from the storm surge with no place to go but up.

The fact that New Orleans has not already sunk is a matter of luck. If slightly different paths had been followed by Hurricanes Camille, which struck in August 1969, Andrew in August 1992 or George in September 1998, today we might need scuba gear to tour the French Quarter.

'In New Orleans, you never get above sea level, so you're always going to be isolated during a strong hurricane,' says Kay Wilkins of the southeast Louisiana chapter of the American Red Cross.

During a strong hurricane, the city could be inundated with water blocking all streets in and out for days, leaving people stranded without electricity and access to clean drinking water. Many also could die because the city has few buildings that could withstand the sustained 96- to 100-mph winds and 6- to 8-ft. storm surges of a Category 2 hurricane. Moving to higher elevations would be just as dangerous as staying on low ground. Had Camille, a Category 5 storm, made landfall at New Orleans, instead of losing her punch before arriving, her winds would have blown twice as hard and her storm surge would have been three times as high.

"

If the buildings can't stand 96-100 mph I sure hope the Superdome can withstand 175 (just in case).

I would call this woman

A bitch, but that would be insulting my dog.

AnnCoulter.com - Archived Article: IT'S 'LET'S ROLL,' NOT 'LET'S ROLL OVER': "
As Republicans were saying repeatedly — captured on Lexis-Nexis for a year before it showed up in a Frank Luntz talking points memo in 2004 — the savages have declared war, and it's far preferable to fight them in the streets of Baghdad than in the streets of New York (where the residents would immediately surrender). That strategy appears to be working. Then again, maybe it's just that it's so damnably hard to find parking in New York "

I am sure the people in the World Trade Center, police, fire and emergency rescue, to say nothing of the "ordinary" citizens of New York are all happy to know they are cowards. I'm surprised she didn't go all the way and accuse them of being Un-American, you know, French.

Compassion is completely foreign to her. I wonder if her genetic make-up is XXY.

Casey Sheehan died because of this?

As if we heard any of this in the US. Everything I heard portrayed him as a lawless, uncaring fanatic.

Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs: "
I had traveled to Sadr City to cover the Bush administration's attack on the movement of Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. It didn't matter that the cleric had millions of followers or that he was the scion of an important political family with a history of standing up to tyranny. (His father was killed by Saddam Hussein's regime for fomenting revolution in 1999. His uncle, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Sadr, was killed for leading an insurrection against Saddam's Ba'ath rule in 1980.)

It didn't matter that Sadr's forces were providing food aid to the poor or organizing traffic patrol and garbage duty in an atmosphere with no basic services. The problem for Bush and his Iraq administrator, L Paul Bremer, was that Sadr was against the US occupation. So he had to be dealt with. First his newspaper was closed. (See The Shi'ite voice that will be heard, Asia Times Online, April 8, 2004)Then his top advisor was arrested. Then Bremer announced an unnamed judge was demanding that Sadr be arrested on charges of murder. 'He's effectively attempting to establish his authority in place of the legitimate Iraqi government,' Bremer told reporters. 'We will not tolerate that.'

That was the last straw. Until April 4, 2004 Muqtada had urged his followers to protest peacefully against the occupation. But the US assault led him to urge his followers to 'terrorize the enemy'. In the first 48 hours of fighting, Sadr's followers seized police stations and government buildings across the country, including the governor's office in Basra.

At least 75 Iraqis and 10 US servicemen were killed, among them Army Specialist Casey Sheehan. As an unembedded journalist, I saw only the Iraqi casualties (the US casualties being taken away to military hospitals). My translator Waseem and I weaved through roads closed by US tanks until we arrived at Sadr City's al-Ubaidi Hospital.

There, I interviewed 15-year-old Ali Hussein. "

They are joking aren't they?

Please tell me we aren't wasting money that this state doesn't have to force warnings on products that are already known as being unhealthy. When SuperSize Me came out last year there was a big OMG you shouldn't eat at McDonald's, it's bad for you. They rushed around adding healthy food to their "menu" and what happened? Nobody ate it. Most of the restaurants who changed their menus to reflect the new way of eating, have slowly gone back to the food that people will actually order when they go out.

CNN.com - California files french fry lawsuit - Aug 27, 2005

People don't care. They are going to eat what they want, just like they will drink and do drugs, smoke and have unprotected sex. Writing inane laws and litigating companies will not change human behavior.

Aren't there other problems in society that don't require legislation? Fix those potholes the president liked to talk about, pay the teachers a living wage in the area they teach, get us some decent public transportation so this country can be less dependent on non-renewable resources. Let's plan for the future while trying not to repeat the mistakes of the past.

Frank Rich strikes again!

Priceless. And the rest of the article is also hard hitting and well written.

The Vietnamization of Bush's Vacation - New York Times: "The Democrats are hoping that if they do nothing, they might inherit the earth as the Bush administration goes down the tubes. Whatever the dubious merits of this Kerryesque course as a political strategy, as a moral strategy it's unpatriotic. The earth may not be worth inheriting if Iraq continues to sabotage America's ability to take on Iran and North Korea, let alone Al Qaeda.

As another politician from the Vietnam era, Gary Hart, observed last week, the Democrats are too cowardly to admit they made a mistake three years ago, when fear of midterm elections drove them to surrender to the administration's rushed and manipulative Iraq-war sales pitch. So now they are compounding the original error as the same hucksters frantically try to repackage the old damaged goods.

IN the new pitch there are no mushroom clouds. Instead we get McCarthyesque rhetoric accusing critics of being soft on the war on terrorism, which the Iraq adventure has itself undermined. Before anyone dare say Vietnam, the president, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld drag in the historian David McCullough and liken 2005 in Iraq to 1776 in America - and, by implication, the original George W. to ours. Before you know it, Ahmad Chalabi will be rehabilitated as Ben Franklin. "

I just want to know one thing. Where was all this great writing when we needed it? This country was misinformed its way into host of bad decisions that could have been avoided if the press had done their job. I actually believe that was the point of the First Amendment. Freedom of the press, not to spread rumours, lies and gossip, but to protect the people by reporting the truth at all times and by shining a spotlight on governmental issues to prevent a madman or a group of them from abusing the power of their positions.

Now if the press was really smart they would get the heck out of New Orleans, a city that is about to go underwater. This looks nasty and I hope that packing the people who can't leave into the Superdome doesn't backfire.

One of my favorite days in History

Colby Proclaims Woman Suffrage: "ashington, Aug. 26 -- The half-century struggle for woman suffrage in the United States reached its climax at 8 o'clock this morning, when Bainbridge Colby, as Secretary of State, issued his proclamation announcing that the Nineteenth Amendment had become a part of the Constitution of the United States.

"

'Nuff said. Please use wisely and often.

This Is the Beginning

For the last five years I have felt alone, surrounded by people who just didn't understand that we were headed down a slippery slope since the 2000 election. After 9/11 I spent months trying to calm people's fears because of watching the same scenes over and over again, as if you would ever forget it once you realized it wasn't a bad movie, as the media and the government whipped people into an unreasoning frenzy. Literally. A ridiculous majority vocally endorsed both Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom, neither of which qualifies as a success. Osama bin Laden is still out there and even on a good day the Iraqi people can't go to the market without fear and the lovely three hour on and off policy of cycling electricity is something that Americans would put up with for about 1 day. Then we do things like replace our governor, another fine example of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

If you spoke out against the war, you were labeled un-American and accused of not supporting our troops. A country that cuts Veteran's benefits while going to war shows an interesting dichotomy of thinking. Not unusual in a population this large, but very unusual in a country with a supposedly free press, the ability to access information via the internet at will, and until recently a relatively intelligently designed education system. There were isolated voices, but we were considered the fringe, the wackos, the malcontents. We just didn't "understand".

Well, it's a couple of years later, over 2100 American service people dead, Osama's been forgotten and we are definitely in Messopotamia. It must be time to rewrite history. Unfortunately, for most people this will just be an effort in futility.

Salon.com - War Room: "The Inquirer reports: 'Robert L. Traynham, Santorum's spokesman, said a search of Nexis, a news database, and the office's press clippings had not turned up any account of those comments.' Traynham and Santorum both say, however, that Santorum may have made comments about Iraq that just haven't shown up in any record. 'I do a lot of interviews on TV, on radio, with print reporters who don't happen to write everything I say,' Santorum told the Inquirer. 'The fact that it hasn't turned up in print doesn't mean I haven't said it.'"

Whoever finds these imaginary comments should be given the job of finding Osama and the real reason we are in Iraq. I mean the real one, not the one in the press this week.

The blogger spell check really wants to replace Santorum with sanatorium. Psychic?

What's Wrong With The Democratic Party?

I found this post this afternoon and thought, this sort of explains the piece of driftwood that calls itself the Democratic Party. I took http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/bldemocraticloyaltyquiz.htm the other day and scored 100% Democratic and I still can't explain my position succinctly, but I can definitely tell you what is wrong with the Republican position in detail, ad nauseum.

At the age of 49 I feel like the Democrats are being led by a group of blue hairs that persist in remembering when bread was $.20 a loaf and only the rich had their own phone, while the not privileged used the party line. In reality it is the not so privileged who have the instant communication and the party leaders are stuck in the past. They need to quickly move into the future or all it will take is a charismatic person who makes sense to strike out as an Independent and they will take the middle of the electorate by storm.

MyDD :: About the Vietnam / Age / Generation Thing...: " * I have grown convinced that outside of the gay rights movement, we progressives have been losing ground to conservatives on every front for a number of years. On some fronts, we have been losing ground for around twenty-five years.
* I do not, and will not, believe that this is because we are wrong about the direction we want to take the country. As such, I can only conclude that our failure is a result of poor organization.
* I have come to believe that for too long we relied on a modernist notion of national consensus to develop our ideas and our policies. We used non-partisan academic institutions and non-partisan issue groups to develop our ideas and policies long after the national consensus was utterly smashed and the ability of these institutions to affect change within the national consciousness and to combat an overtly partisan and ideological movement was lessened dramatically. That was our first failure.
* I have come to conclude that for too long we relied on the government, via our long-term position as the natural ruling party of the country, to spread our message to the nation, while the conservative movement built a vast and unchecked anti-consensus message apparatus. That was our second failure.
* I have come to believe that for too long we relied on simply repeating long-standing means of mass public protest to object to the rising tide of conservatism. We kept doing this while the media changed and the ability of those protests to affect public opinion lessoned dramatically. That was our third failure.
* In line with everything else I have said, I have come to conclude that almost all of our current uses of political resources within the electoral realm assume that we still live in an age of national consensus. Among other areas, this can be seen in our mass canvassing operations that harken back to the era of mass participation civic organizations, and in our tendency to engage in an endless focus upon the "swing voter" who can be swayed through truth-telling and rational debate. That is an outdated view of the public sphere.
* I believe that our current failures as a party and a movement rest almost entirely within large segments of our leadership currently failing to recognize these past methodological failures as the cause for our current political backslide. As such, they continue to rely on old methods that have led to nothing but defeat for over two decades. Worse yet, many rely on trying to adopt conservative ideas."

I agree with these sentiments, just not in regards to the Iraq/Vietnam debacle. They are well thought out and presented which is why it's part of my daily news reading.

American Legion Declares War on Protestors -- Media Next?

As a Vietname era vet I say: Blow me. Not a dime of mine will they receive.

American Legion Declares War on Protestors -- Media Next?: "
'The American Legion will stand against anyone and any group that would demoralize our troops, or worse, endanger their lives by encouraging terrorists to continue their cowardly attacks against freedom-loving peoples,' Thomas Cadmus, national commander, told delegates at the group's national convention in Honolulu.

The delegates voted to use whatever means necessary to 'ensure the united backing of the American people to support our troops and the global war on terrorism.'

In his speech, Cadmus declared: 'It would be tragic if the freedoms our veterans fought so valiantly to protect would be used against their successors today as they battle terrorists bent on our destruction.”

He explained, 'No one respects the right to protest more than one who has fought for it, but we hope that Americans will present their views in correspondence to their elected officials rather than by public media events guaranteed to be picked up and used as tools of encouragement by our enemies.' This might suggest to some, however, that American freedoms are worth dying for but not exercising.
"

Bite me. Freedom does not include destroying a sovereign country, setting back women's rights by generations and then keeping quiet about it because we don't want to upset the natives.

President of Leisure

My mom is 75, she works 5 days a week in a small business and her taking an extra day off requires that her bosses wife work for her. I'm going to let her know that she seems to be more indispensable than the chief executive of a large country.

President of Leisure: "Bush achieved a leisure landmark this month. The previous record for presidential slacking-off was 335 days. On August 18, Bush surpassed that number of days off, and he still has more than three years left in his second term.

Britain's Financial Times newspaper has dubbed Bush 'the best-rested president in U.S. history.'

That's a dubious distinction for a man who is not known for his attention to detail. Critics have not hesitated to suggest that the President's rest-ethic has cost the country dearly--after all, it was in August 2001, during the President's first extended stay in Crawford, that a briefing paper crossed Bush's desk detailing Osama bin Laden's intention to launch terrorist attacks within the United States. Instead of putting the country on high alert, the President put the report aside and continued relaxing--returning to Washington only a few days before the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

While Bush may not be very good at managing major endeavors--he ran four corporations into the ground and then took a make-work job as a baseball team executive before finally turning to the family business of politics--the President is no slacker when it comes to rest and relaxation.

Now, if only he'd help the rest of us to get a break.

"

I need to work on getting a balanced life. I keep forgetting the vacation part.

British Cover-up Falling Apart?

The story keeps changing, and not for the better. The three members of the surveillance unit weren't concerned that he might be a "bomber" but the guys with guns had to see if their new training worked.

The Observer | UK News | Police knew Brazilian was 'not bomb risk': "The Observer now understands that seconds before the firearms team entered the tube train carriage, a member of the surveillance squad using the codename Hotel 3 moved to the doorway and shouted: 'He's in here.' De Menezes, in all likelihood alarmed by the activity, stood and moved towards the doorway. He was grabbed and pushed back to his seat. The first shots were then fired while Hotel 3 was holding him.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) is to investigate if the firearms officers, with only seconds to decide whether to shoot, mistakenly interpreted de Menezes's movement as an aggressive act.

For the firearms officers involved in the death to avoid any legal action, they will have to state that they believed their lives and those of the passengers were in immediate danger. Such a view is unlikely to be supported by members of the surveillance unit.

For reasons as yet unclear, members of the firearms team have yet to submit their own account of the events to the IPCC. The two members of the team believed to have fired the fatal shots are known to have gone on holiday immediately after the shooting."

Probably to their second job in Utah where they got to participate in this lovely exercise in limiting freedom. http://nerdtron.ca/blogs/index.php?title=illegal_to_dance_in_america&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1

Was it all for nothing?

What is the point? So now more service people have to die so that these deaths weren't in vain? I must be blind because I just don't see how Iraq, the US, or the people of either country are benefiting from this debacle.

NO QUARTER: WHAT GEORGE BUSH SHOULD KNOW ABOUT CASEY SHEEHAN: "Maybe George Bush could clarify why these men died. According to several press reports, they were attacked and killed by forces loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. And where is al-Sadr today? He's a player in the Shiite community in Iraq which is on the verge of installing Islam as the basis of government in Iraq. In effect, Casey and his comrades were killed by people whose leaders are on the verge of taking control in Iraq. It would be one thing if George Bush could tell Casey's mom and the moms of the other boys who died that their sons gave their lives to create a secular Iraq. But we now know that is not true. They gave their lives in a cause that is allowing some Islamic extremists loyal to Iran to play a major role in the 'new' Iraq."

Wht will they think of next?

I never thought that A- in Logic class would come in handy. Critical thinking seems to be in short supply over there at the 700 club. Assassinating heads of state and equating war protesters with terrorists.

Why is calling for someone to be killed which is against the sixth commandment ok, but saying we don't want to kill innocent civilians is equivalent to being a terrorist?

CBN News- How Leftists Aid Radical Islam

Now who are you going to believe

A guy who has been on vacation for almost one out of five years and admits he doesn't read or the current and historical evidence that women under Shariah law have virtually no rights. Before we "liberated" the country from a despot, the Iraqi women had the most democratic rights in the Middle East. They could hold jobs not just medical or for religious reasons, but dress the way they wanted, drive, vote and had some measure of protection in the courts. Now it is beginning to look like a totally different story.

Secular Iraqis Say New Charter May Curb Rights - New York Times: "President Bush, in an appearance in Idaho on Tuesday, asserted that the Iraqi document guaranteed women's rights and the freedom of religion in a country that in recent decades had only known dictatorship.

Labeling the Iraqi constitution an 'amazing event,' he said, 'We had a little trouble with our own conventions writing a constitution."

What a crock! Sliding backwards is not progress, unless your goal is to return the world to a time when women and minorities were forced to obey without question. When Abigail wrote to her husband John Adams in March of 1776 she made a point of stating "remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a Rebellion and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice or Representation." Now I know that only 229 years have passed so there is no reason to think that the world might have changed in that period of time?

"Many Iraqis say they are already concerned at the strengthening grip of political Islam in many areas of southern Iraq, where alcohol is banned in many places, women are forced to dress conservatively and religious minorities often feel compelled to mimic those in the majority.

Most of the cities of southern Iraq have fallen under the sway of the same Shiite political parties that make up the ruling coalition in Baghdad, one that many people believe has a good chance at capturing a majority of Assembly seats in the elections scheduled for December."

"This is the future of the new Iraqi government - it will be in the hands of the clerics," said Dr. Raja Kuzai, a secular Shiite member of the Assembly. "I wanted Iraqi women to be free, to be able to talk freely and to able to move around."

Intermittent running water and electricity, snipers, IEDs, suicide bombers, poor quality food and medical services, having to be accompanied by a male relative to travel outdoors, now that's what I call progress. The quality of life is such an improvement over what they had. They no longer have to worry about a single megalomaniac with friends and family that are disconnected from reality. Nope, now it will be any male that might be in a bad mood and feels the need to kick the dog.

Salon.com News | Iraq: The unseen war

Powerful photos that should be seen, just not before 7 am. When I was a little girl in the 60's I used to read the newspaper every morning. We were stationed in Puerto Rico at the time and got the NY Times and Post. One morning I picked up the paper, looked at the front page and put it down. My dad asked what was wrong and I told him I wasn't going to read the paper again until the war was over. This was 1967 and I was 11. A little too graphic for me, since my dad had told me we would end up leaving with nothing accomplished.

We all remember certain images from Vietnam. The little girl burning with napalm, the guy being executed, etc. This current debacle is sanitized, like we are children who must be protected from reality. Just in case we might object and finally become united against testosterone and fear driven stupidity. In the medical profession there eventually comes a time when you realize that the treatment is doing more harm than the original disease. Or the disease has progressed, become more invasive and destroyed the ability of the host to survive, then it is time to think about the quality of life, not the quantity.




Salon.com News | Iraq: The unseen war: "A U.S. soldier lies dead on the kitchen floor of a house used as a base by insurgent fighters in Fallujah, on Saturday, Nov. 13, 2004. The soldier was shot and killed by insurgent fighters when he entered the room. Two other U.S. military personnel were wounded by the insurgents, who escaped."

Was this poor guy one of the "few" and the proud who had the shoddy so called bulletproof armor that didn't work?

So sad.

No wonder

Now I know why I have no links, besides the fact that I don't always post everyday. I'm working on that.

The Tail That Wags the Blog: "The continual focus-grouping explains why most bloggers write as though their primary goal is to rise in the Google search results. The more you mention people like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, the more readers you will have, and the more links, and the more you will rise in Google's estimation. I have nothing really to say about Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, and am not even remotely interested in Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, but I know that my blog will be read by more people if it mentions famous celebrities who might be secretly boinking, such as Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie."

I hope this will be the only time you see the above-mentioned personalities in my blog.

I'll bet

Rodney King, who was actually guilty of something, is thinking he actually got off really easy.

USATODAY.com - Outrage grows in England over mistaken police killing: "Officers trailed Menezes for more than a half-hour before the shooting, and no attempts were made to stop him, according to ITV. The surveillance officer who called in reports about Menezes described him as wearing a denim jacket and carrying nothing, but suggested he was 'worth someone else having a look.'

The Brazilian calmly entered the Stockwell subway station, paused to pick up a free newspaper and used his travel card to pass through the barriers, according to the ITV report citing documents apparently based on closed-circuit TV footage.

After descending the escalator and running to catch his train, Menezes took a seat. One of at least three surveillance officers who had followed him onto the train pointed him out to armed police.

The surveillance officer says he then 'heard shouting which included the word 'police,'' ITV reported. Menezes stood up and walked toward the surveillance officer, who tackled Menezes and pushed him back into the seat. Then 'I heard a gunshot very close to my ear and was dragged away on to the floor,' the officer said.

A police spokesman told AP that officers have the authority to decide to shoot to kill if they believe their lives or those of the general public are at risk, especially regarding a suspected suicide bomber.
"

What were they thinking? They knew nothing, had no evidence and proceeded to an irrevocable decision. 7 times. To the head. Point blank.

I am so grateful that I wasn't a direct witness. Imagine, sitting on the train with your coffee and paper, all of a sudden "BOOM" many times, flying pink stuff and lots of screaming. Oh wait, that already happened, just that this time it was the people you depend on to protect you.

A whole different type of terror.

Pat Buchanan speaks sense?

A nattering nabob of negativism?

WorldNetDaily: Cindy Sheehan: Anti-war catalyst

WILD SECTS: "We Don't Care"

No kidding. And they are PROUD. So proud.

WILD SECTS: "We Don't Care": "'We Don't Care'
...tell us something we don't already know.

Well, I think we’ve met the new Repug/RW slogan. It's been shouted at a Gold Star mother who is trying to turn the grief over the loss of her son into change. It's been shouted here by disruptors against everything we say is wrong with this administration and where it's taking our country and the world.

Hey, at least they’re finally being honest.

And, I hate to tell them, but they aren't telling us anything we didn't already know about them."

Cindy's Victory

What will they do now? As with most problems, soonest tended, soonest mended.

t r u t h o u t - William Rivers Pitt | Cindy's Victory: " They are sunburned and storm-lashed. They sleep in tents that sit along the muddy earth of drainage ditches by the side of the road. They have been heckled by 'counter-demonstrators' who chanted 'We don't care!' during a rendition of 'God Bless America.' They have been attacked by fire ants and hassled by local health inspectors. On Thursday morning, at about 5:30am, they were blasted awake by a fourteen-car convoy of Secret Service SUVs which roared through the camp at high speed while leaning on their horns the whole time.

"

Ooh, I'm impressed

by the extreme lack of intelligence and caring demonstrated by the driver and anyone who believes this is acceptable behavior. Whether you disagree with Cindy Sheehan or not, desecrating a memorial to fallen soldiers is a little bit beyond the pale.

FOX23 - Coverage & Convenience - White crosses at site of anti-war demonstration run down by pickup


This sounds like the same guy who mowed down the ducks in the car wash. At least there's a reward out for him.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8966058/

Soon to be history

Comcast Home

I hate Comcast. Pissed me off for the last time. Slow. Expensive. Erratic. service. Bundled, so if you don't like one, you stay because you might like the other. Cow excrement.

They forced me to have digital cable, with a box and another remote, just because I wanted Sci-Fi channel. $9.95 per month for one station that a good portion of the US receives as part of extended cable. Plus, every channel isn't digital, and my tvs are old. Ripoff. I have had cable internet for many years. First in San Diego, now up here. By any name Comcast sucks.

Ever since their fancy upgrade in March, my connectivity has been slow, intermittent or nonexistent. With every service call they contradict the person before them and either remove or install a switch. Whatever. The problem goes away for a few days, gets slower and then winks out.
My most recent incident resulted in a service date a week away. Absolutely unacceptable. $98.40 a month of money that I really don't have, to be irritated switching on the cable box one hour a week and only having blinding fast speed at 3 in the morning.

Enter SBC. Broadband speed starting at 1.5 Mbs for $24.99 per month for a year. Special offer of a 3 month rebate of my cable bill, $42.95/mo = $128.85 savings to me in addition to the difference of $17.96/mo. DiSH with a DVR for two rooms $43.98/mo saves me $11.47/mo. $68.97/mo total bill. What's not to like?

I hope we can have a Dish in the apartment, otherwise this might not work, but I'm so angry that I might cancel Comcast anyway.

Update: I was just searching through a discussion board on a Battlestar Galactica site and I guess Comcast just enacted the same policy in Chicago. Except they have a 3 week waiting list just to get the digital box.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Comcast sucks.

Self-help nation

I enjoy Esalen. I have taken all of my massage classes there. It is beautiful, has great food and the baths just rock. What I don't like is the psychological babble about "empowerment". There is always a part of every class (I'm usually there for five days) that deals with getting in touch with yourself, letting go, etc. At the same time there are four other classes that are exclusively devoted to these ideas, surrounding you with about 180 people, all believing that they have the right to be "number one" That their "process" should be allowed to develop.

Okey dokey. What a load of crap. When I went to school, I learned to count. There is only one number one, with many other numbers following. You can empower yourself by understanding that you are not always the center of the known universe, things will not always break your way and hope that you can find a way of accepting the accident of birth that has made you unattractive to society and find a way to turn it to your advantage. Maybe smiling more, standing up straight, look people in the eye, say hello when you pass people on the street, listening to the people around you, actively caring about how the world sees you, instead of how you see the world, might be a little more beneficial and satisfying in the long run.

Salon.com Books | Self-help nation: "Still, the particular conditions of late capitalism have added a new twist to the fantasy of self-creation. The current permutations of self-help reflect what McGee sees as a crisis brought on by the movement of women and minorities into the workplace. She points out that the 'self-made man' (an idea traceable all the way back to ancient Greece) was never really that; the unpaid labor of a mother and usually a wife helped 'make' him, and he often benefited as well from the underpaid labor of servants and others prevented by skin color or class from enjoying the same opportunities. Now that all those previous unpaid and underpaid workers are demanding their own shot at the brass ring, it's become painfully apparent how impossible it is for individuals to really make it all by themselves. At bare minimum, someone still has to teach us to walk and talk.

No wonder, then, that child rearing and the roles of mothers stand at the center of so much controversy. What Salerno dislikes about the self-help industry is that it makes some people feel entitled to more than they can get and it permits others to shirk personal responsibility. What McGee sees as the problem with self-help is that it deceives us into thinking that we can function in complete independence, that every problem in our lives can be addressed as a purely individual challenge. Child rearing (and to a lesser degree caring for the sick and elderly) challenges this notion because it's both essential to the survival of humanity and proof positive that everybody needs somebody sometime.

For centuries, raising kids has been the unpaid work of women. Now that they have the chance, if women instead choose to invest their time and labor in the kind of self-cultivation -- networking, overtime, maintaining a marketable appearance, acquiring new skills -- essential to survival in today's unstable, loyalty-free workplace, you can hardly blame them. They're only doing what every shrewd "self-made" person is supposed to do. In defecting from the home they're also unwittingly demonstrating that the American ideal of rugged individualism is a big lie. No wonder career women make conservatives apoplectic. Nowadays, those women who do decide to donate their time to rearing their children can count on little job security and the decay of their employability. Rick Santorum likes to complain that "radical feminists" devalue stay-at-home moms, but it's really the free market that treats their contribution as worthless (or worth only the pittance paid to childcare workers)."

The article wanders into the political arena with the following:

McGee has the sense to insist that activists ask themselves "why people have embraced self-help groups -- what do they get there that they don't get in political organizations?" What she fails to consider is the possibility that those organizations have yet to articulate a coherent, alternative and post-socialist vision of society that's sufficiently appealing to lure people away from the siren song of capitalistic individualism. Many people look at the ever-widening gap between rich and poor in this country and think to themselves, Hey, it's a great time to be rich.

As Salerno points out, a motivational speaker who tells all 250 members of a sales staff that with the right attitude every one of them can be the No. 1 salesman is obviously promising the impossible. No one laughs, though, because at that moment, sufficiently pumped up, each candidate believes she's talking only to him. Commentators like to say that self-help speaks to the American faith in the Protestant work ethic. But perhaps what it really taps into is the same impulse that makes poor people waste their dollars on lottery tickets.

On my way to get one now.

CBC News: Flyers passing through U.S. have few rights, Arar judge told

Yup, I'm going to be in a hurry to travel outside the US with this idiotic practice in place. Of course, that might be an unintended (more than likely) way of keeping the populace at home and completrely uninformed. It never fails to amaze me that "my" government continues to find new levels of stupidity in dealing with the rest of the world. We have gone from being a gracious host to an unbelievable cad. This will protect me how?

CBC News: Flyers passing through U.S. have few rights, Arar judge told

No wonder the airlines can't run on time.

No wonder they hate us

The mafia isn't going to like this. What possessed these people? Were they thinking? Charging rent on property you don't own? Prison photos, shooting innocent civilians, this is getting out of hand. Next we will probably find out some Company set up a brothel that serves alcohol and hot dogs.

Guard members from East Bay said to charge Iraqis 'rent': "Earlier this year, according to military officials and members of the battalion, soldiers from the battalion's Bravo Company approached several businesses owned and operated by Iraqis. Bravo Company is based in Dublin, and the 1st Battalion has its headquarters in Modesto.

The businesses -- a dry cleaner, a convenience store and others -- catered to U.S. soldiers and were located on the fringe of the U.S. military's operating base inside the Green Zone, the fortified hub of the Iraqi government, U.S. occupation officials, foreign embassies and contractor headquarters. The businesses were asked to pay the soldiers 'rent.'"

New Drugs for Women

Sent in an email.



DAMNITOL
Take 2 and the rest of the world can go to hell for up to 8 full hours.

ST. MOMMA'S WORT
Plant extract that treats mom's depression by rendering preschoolers
unconscious for up to two days.

EMPTY NESTROGEN
Suppository that eliminates melancholy and loneliness by reminding you of
how awful they were as teenagers and how you couldn't wait till they moved out.

PEPTOBIMBO
Liquid silicone drink for single women. Two full cups swallowed before an
evening out increases breast size, decreases intelligence, and prevents
conception.

DUMBEROL
When taken with Peptobimbo, can cause dangerously low IQ, resulting in
enjoyment of country music and pickup trucks.

FLIPITOR
Increases life expectancy of commuters by controlling road rage and the urge
to flip off other drivers.

MENICILLIN
Potent anti-boy-otic for older women. Increases resistance to such lethal
lines as, "You make me want to be a better person... can we get naked now?"

BUYAGRA
Injectable stimulant taken prior to shopping. Increases potency, duration,
and credit limit of spending spree.

JACKASSPIRIN
Relieves headache caused by a man who can't remember your birthday,
anniversary,phone number, or to lift the toilet seat.

ANTI-TALKSIDENT
A spray carried in a purse or wallet to be used on anyone too eager to share
their life stories with total strangers in elevators.

NAGAMENT
When administered to a boyfriend or husband, provides the same irritation
level as nagging him.

Shopping is hard

I hate to shop. I like knowing what I want, walking into a store, pick up said item, pay for it and leave. I do not like to dither. I don't wear makeup because I don't have the patience to figure out what particular shade of sugar cinnamon I am. Plus it makes me itch, but I digress.

So my brother is selling his house and all his possessions and he drops off this area rug that is black with a border that has some shade of burgundy and something that might be a pale shade of yellow. My living room is drowning in blue and black. Way too much water. My options are to paint an accent wall in the room (apartment!), buy new furniture ($$$), the suddenly fashionable slipcovers ($$), or as HGTV points out, I can buy accessories to pull it all together ($).

I spent 3 hours at Bed, Bath and Beyond looking for pillows, throws, etc. My back and feet are killing me. In return, I have matching pillows, candles and a new fountain to harmonize the disparate elements. Looks great. The pillows match the colors of the rug perfectly. I haven't been this coordinated since I had that gay roommate back in the 80's.

The living room looks calm, peaceful and slightly elegant.

He gave us his dining room table, which is a pale green with a white pine border. Nice, it matches the little bookcase that I already own, but now my computer desk is too big.

His downsizing is costing me money.

Support Our Troops

Who's Paying for Our Patriotism?

Before all of the falderol about going to war, when I was accused of being unpatriotic, I sent around an email with all of these same points and more. It is easy to "support our troops" from afar. But as far as being personally involved, Amurica isn't. One of the other blogs had a comment that said our military members aren't poor in comparison to the "poor" of America, and what is the problem? They are being compensated. When you consider that almost 50% in Iraq had other jobs, owned houses that were bought on the premise of making a certain salary, have kids that are older (closer to college), the pittance that they receive to die for a false cause in a country that doesn't want our help, really isn't worth it.

Who's Paying for Our Patriotism?: "The strategic shielding of most voters from any emotional or financial sacrifice for these wars cannot but trigger the analogue of what is called 'moral hazard' in the context of health insurance, a field in which I've done a lot of scholarly work. There, moral hazard refers to the tendency of well-insured patients to use health care with complete indifference to the cost they visit on others. It has prompted President Bush to advocate health insurance with very high deductibles. But if all but a handful of Americans are completely insulated against the emotional -- and financial -- cost of war, is it not natural to suspect moral hazard will be at work in that context as well?

A policymaking elite whose families and purses are shielded from the sacrifices war entails may rush into it hastily and ill prepared, as surely was the case of the Iraq war. Moral hazard in this context can explain why a nation that once built a Liberty Ship every two weeks and thousands of newly designed airplanes in the span of a few years now takes years merely to properly arm and armor its troops with conventional equipment. Moral hazard can explain why, in wartime, the TV anchors on the morning and evening shows barely make time to report on the wars, lest the reports displace the silly banter with which they seek to humor their viewers. Do they ever wonder how military families with loved ones in the fray might feel after hearing ever so briefly of mayhem in Iraq or Afghanistan?

Moral hazard also can explain why the general public is so noticeably indifferent to the plight of our troops and their families. To be sure, we paste cheap magnetic ribbons on our cars to proclaim our support for the troops. But at the same time, we allow families of reservists and National Guard members to slide into deep financial distress as their loved ones stand tall for us on lethal battlefields and the family is deprived of these troop"

Now, I wonder what's on tv tonight? Ooh, I see dead people. How appropriate.