Bubble Boy's Big Bad Karma: His Legacy "Will Please Only Bin Laden"

The following are excerpts from an interview with As'ad AbuKhalil, professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus, and visiting professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

The repercussions of the Iraq debacle are very likely to affect more places in the Middle East, not less. There is now an explosion, literally, of militant fanatical groups that are bent on destroying the ties of amity and brotherhood between Sunnis and Shia. One can see that this was effective.

The latest International Crisis Group [report] points out the cynical and destructive ways by which the US administration manipulated Iraqi social, sectarian, ethnic, and tribal divisions for its own sake.

Bush, far from being remembered for establishing democracy in Iraq, will most likely be remembered as the man who brought ayat allahs' rule to Iraq, next door to Iran.

Ironically, the model of "democracy" and "secularism" that [George] Bush and the neo-conservatives were planning in Iraq had degenerated into a model of mayhem, pillage, and plunder, and the ayat allahs rule in all but name.

Bush, far from being remembered for establishing democracy in Iraq, will most likely be remembered as the man who brought ayat allahs' rule to Iraq, next door to Iran.. . .Far from seeing evidence of rejuvenation of democracy, one can argue that authoritarian rule in the Middle East has been consolidated due to Bush's doctrine . . . .

One also notices that in all three cases that the Bush administration focused on as showcases of the Bush doctrine - Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq - societies are standing on the verge of civil war. . .

I have no doubt years from now people in the West and East will look back and remember George Bush as the most incompetent and most unwise US president ever.

[Bush's] legacy in the Middle East will grow more horrifically. It will be seen that he has unleashed destructive forces in the Middle East, and has consolidated the rule of most authoritarian regimes in the Middle East. . . . He has also contributed to the rising conflict between Arabs/Muslims and Western governments.

His contribution in that regard will only please Osama bin Laden.

Why are we unsurprised?



Full story here.

Also see, here,"Bubble Boy Wastes Blood and Treasure to Install Medievalist Islamic Theocracy" and "Bubble Boy Brings Back Burqas" all the way from last August, here.

Bush
Iraq War
Photo: Reuters

While We're On the Subject of Hurting Others

The "Reverend" James Dobson beats his own dachshund and recommends whipping toddlers. With real whips. Does that work for you?

(Extra credit: what's the name of the Dachshund Dobson proudly beat? For what crime was the puppy beaten?)













Here's what happens to an unwanted, unloved infant. More here. Does this outcome work for you?

Whaddaya think? Are children better off wanted, or unwanted? Does adding another baby with about as much forethought as if one were picking up an extra carton of milk work for you?


Here's Democracy on the march, below. Read all about it--in the complete Abu Ghraib files--the Salon story here.

Does this work for you?











The Naziest part of these last three photos is that the American troops--who by the way are installing Democracy in Iraq--are deliberately causing painful wounds, then stitching them up, all ready to inflict the painful wounds again.

And giving a big thumbs up, and a hearty grin!


Spread that democracy, girls and boys! Spread it far and wide!


Abu Ghraib
torture

Mad Cow, Alabama

ALABAMA COW TESTS POSITIVE FOR MAD COW DISEASE

WASHINGTON - A cow in Alabama has tested positive for mad cow disease, the Agriculture Department confirmed Monday, the third case in the U.S. . .

A routine test last week had indicated the presence of the disease. Results were confirmed by more detailed testing at a government laboratory in Ames, Iowa, Clifford said.

U.S. investigators have found two previous cases of mad cow disease. The first was in December 2003 in a Canadian-born cow in Washington state. The second was last June in a cow that was born and raised in Texas.

Different types of tests indicated the presence of mad cow disease. Two versions of the initial "rapid" screening test suggested the cow had the disease, and a more detailed Western blot confirmed that finding.

Full story here.

Now, why am I thinking that if we had a government that didn't have a death-wish by Grover Norquistian bathtub drowning, maybe there would have been strict regulations in place that would have prevented these THREE cases of mad cow in the United States? And however many more to come?

And if we had a party in charge that believed in regulations and the rule of law, as opposed to believing in the Conservo-American Idol, Deregulation, which pretty much means believing in greed-fueled lawlessness? As in Enron, and, all the rest of the windfall profits over people industries? Ring a bell?


Oh, but that would be a nannystate, and we don't want to be pussy girlie nannystaters, do we? No, we prefer the every man for himself, social Darwinian (although we don't believe in Darwin), survival of the fittest, cull the weak from the herd (unless they're braindead and on life support), muy macho, I don't need no stinkin' regulations culture of life "'n" death from preventable diseases.

(Pound on chest here, making simian noises).

People who don't believe in government--all the neo-con krypto-anarchists--shouldn't be in government.

"If they have no wonks, why, then--let them clear brush!"


mad cow disease
Grover Norquist

Somebody Fix This Guy Up, Quick

Soulful-looking, thoughtful (well, kinda) blue-eyed, libertarian male conservative NY Times columnist who once dated funny centrist NY Times redhaired single female columnist writes column suggesting that if gay marriage can be furthered by the acceptance of polygamy, then polygamy's ok with him.

And if the specter of legalized polygamy is the best argument against gay marriage, let the wedding bells ring.

Hunh? Can you say "non sequitur"?

Is he still pining for Maureen Dowd, or what? Does he need a vacation in Hawaii?

Why is he obsessed with unmarried college-educated females?

What does gay marriage have to do with polygamy?

Please, shouldn't we all, having had his sore plight pluck at our heart-strings, take up a collection to get John Tierney a contract with some nice professional Jewish matchmaker (see below)? To find him Ms. Right, so he can get over Maureen? So we don't have to read any more wierd columns?








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The first round of voting for the Koufax Awards closes tomorrow, March 13. Link with Wampum, above, to vote. (Full disclosure: this blog has been nominated in these categories: Best New Blog, Best Blog Deserving of Wider Recognition, and Best Post).
John Tierney

Censure Bush? Nah. A Scolding's Just Not Good Enough. Send him to Club Gitmo.

Senator Russ Feingold is calling for the formal censure of Preznit Toad-Exploder.

"What the president did by consciously and intentionally violating the Constitution and laws of this country with this illegal wiretapping has to be answered."

He added, "Proper accountability is a censuring of the president, saying, 'Mr. President, acknowledge that you broke the law, return to the law, return to our system of government.'"

Mr. Feingold, who spoke on the ABC News program "This Week," said he planned to introduce legislation on Monday that would censure President Bush and condemn his authorization of the eavesdropping program.

We respectfully disagree. A simple scold just doesn't go far enough. Torture, on the other hand, which Bubble Boy has made as American as apple pie, would go far enough--too far--because that's what torture's all about.

We've said it before, and now we're saying it again--send the guy to Gitmo. For good.

It's the least he can do to atone for his sins. You know, driving the country into moral AND fiscal bankruptcy. Plus the torture thing, the breaking the law spying thing. Hey--it's Lent. Let's get on with it.

Clueless on Compassion

Roman Catholics I admire: Thomas Merton, Pope John XXIII, St. Francis of Assisi, among others.

Roman Catholics I don't admire: Torquemada, church pedophiles, church homophobes, cruel nuns and priests who created and ran the Magdalene homes, William A. Donohoe, that blowhard from the Catholic League, and the guy above, the president of Catholic Charities of Boston, whose religious sensibilities are more offended by other people's sexuality than by the carnage of the Iraq war.

This latest story is just so bizarre: rather than allow gays and lesbians to adopt children, the Roman Catholic Church-affiliated Catholic Charities in Massachusetts is SHUTTING DOWN ITS ADOPTION SERVICE.

What a frickin' joke.

For their church members they forbid birth control, they forbid abortion (though this has nothing to do with their priestly and nunly labor shortage--no one is really interested in cheap labor, are they?). If the Catholic Church had its way, we'd all be bowing to their religious dictates--think Griswold vs. Connecticut.

Now the church is letting us know that they'd rather have kids languish in foster homes than give up their phobias about homosexuality. Compassionate? Christian?

Meanwhile, the very same Catholic Church is still hiding their long history of harboring and cosseting pedophile priests who sexually abused defenseless children over decades.

Theme: protecting pedophile priests, that's ok. Cruelly abusing and mistreating kids in slave-like conditions, that's ok. Intruding into the private lives of adults, that's ok. Helping abused and neglected children find adoptive homes, not ok.

Perverted, is it not?

I'm glad they're getting out of the child welfare system. I trust their abilities in caring for children about as far as I can spit.

What would Jesus say? I mean, He was so BIG on homophobia, and so SMALL on, like, love thy neighbor as thyself, was He not? He liked the Old Testament stuff so much that that He never bothered to create a testament of His very own, now, did He?

Never mind.

It all reminds me of one of my favorite Betty Bowers bumper stickers:

MY PEDOPHILE PRIEST SUPPORTS TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE

Full story here.

CATHOLIC CHARITIES TO HALT ADOPTIONS OVER ISSUE INVOLVING GAYS

BOSTON --The Boston Archdiocese's Catholic Charities said Friday it would stop providing adoption services because state law allows gays and lesbians to adopt children.

The social services arm of the Roman Catholic archdiocese has provided adoption services for the state for about two decades, and said it would discontinue once it completes its contract with the state. It said that the state law allowing gays to adopt runs counter to church teachings on homosexuality.

"The world was very different when Charities began this ministry at the threshold of the 20th century," the Rev. J. Bryan Hehir, president of Catholic Charities, and trustees chairman Jeffrey Kaneb said in a joint statement. "The world changed often and we adapted the ministry to meet changing times and needs. At all times we sought to place the welfare of children at the heart of our work.

"But now, we have encountered a dilemma we cannot resolve," they said.

The state's four Catholic bishops said earlier this month that the law threatens the church's religious freedom by forcing it to do something it considers immoral.

Eight members of Catholic Charities board later stepped down in protest of the bishops' stance. The 42-member board had voted unanimously in December to continue considering gay households for adoptions.

Catholic Charities has been involved in adoptions for about a century, but has had a contract with the state for the past two decades. Its contract with the state expires June 30.

In the past two decades, Catholic Charities has placed 720 children in adoptive homes. Of those 720 children, 13 were placed with same-sex couples, Catholic Charities said. Since 1977, the state Department of Social Services has contracted with Catholic Charities to provide special needs adoption services to children with severe emotional and physical needs.

"We recognize the complexity of the issue, and we are aware of the debates which have swirled around it, Hehir and Kaneb said in the statement. "As an agency, however, we simply must recognize that we cannot continue in this ministry."

Fine by me. I'm all for a little more separation of church and state.



Catholic Charities
Catholic League
Bush

Free Speech? What Stinkin' Free Speech?

PROFESSOR BELIEVES FBI GRILLED HIM FOR HIS POLITICAL BELIEFS

What? There must be some mistake. Democracy's on the frickin' MARCH, dude!

Full, lovely story, here.

A Pomona College professor who is an outspoken critic of U.S. policy in Venezuela was questioned yesterday by two agents from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) in what he calls an act of intimidation.

The detectives visited Miguel Tinker-Salas during his office hours at about 2:40 or 2:45 pm Wednesday. They questioned him for about 20 minutes in his office at Pomona College in Claremont, Calif. The detectives identified themselves but their names are being withheld at the request of the FBI. . . .

"They were fishing,” says Tinker-Salas, "to intimidate and silence those who have a critical analysis of U.S. foreign policy."

After they left, several students outside Tinker-Salas' office told him the detectives had asked them about his background, his classes and his politics, and even took note of the cartoons on his door.

Tinker-Salas says the detectives told him this was part of a larger policy to interview people on various campuses. . . . He says the agents who visited him did not interview the other Venezuelan-born professor at Pomona College. . .

A Latin American and Chicano histories professor, Tinker-Salas believes he was targeted as a result of his outspoken politics regarding the U.S. policy toward Venezuela and Latin America. . . .

According to the ACLU of Colorado, the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force, which operates across the country, is violating First Amendment rights by equating nonviolent protest with domestic terrorism.

"The FBI is unjustifiably treating nonviolent public protest as though it were domestic terrorism," said Mark Silverstein, Legal Director of the Colorado ACLU, following the release of new documents obtained from the FBI under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) on Dec. 8, 2005.

"The FBI’s misplaced priorities threaten to deter legitimate criticism of government policy while wasting taxpayer resources that should be directed to investigating real terrorists."

Once again, ladies and gentlemen, major dudes and dudettes: YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK.


FBI
freedom of speech
Bush

Unpacking the Backpack of Sexist Privilege

A game about who said what, on Blog Against Sexism Day:

"Feminism is hated because women are hated. Anti-feminism is a direct expression of misogyny; it is the political defense of women hating."

"Women should remain at home, sit still, keep house and bear children."

"I beg you to speak of Woman as you do of the Negro —- speak of her as a human being, as a citizen of the United States, as a half of the people in whose hands lies the destiny of this Nation."


"Uncle Charlie: The cities are full of women, middle-aged widows, husbands dead, husbands who’ve spent their lives making fortunes, working and working. And then they die and leave their money to their wives, their silly wives. And what do the wives do, these useless women? You see them in the hotels, the best hotels, every day by the thousands. Drinking the money, eating the money, losing the money at bridge. Playing all day and all night. Smelling of money. Proud of their jewelry but of nothing else. Horrible. Faded, fat, greedy women.

Charlie (his niece): They’re alive. They’re human beings!

Uncle Charlie: Are they? Are they, Charlie? Are they human or are they fat, wheezing animals? Hmmm? And what happens to animals when they get too fat and too old?"


"The misogyny that shapes every aspect of our civilization is the institutionalized form of male fear and hatred of what they have denied and therefore cannot know, cannot share: that wild country, the being of women."


"The souls of women are so small that some believe they have none at all."


"Women are taught that their main goal in life is to serve others—first men, and later, children. This prescription leads to enormous problems, for it is supposed to be carried out as if women did not have needs of their own, as if one could serve others without simultaneously attending to one’s own interests and desires. Carried to its 'perfection,' it produces the martyr syndrome or the smothering wife and mother."


"They have the right to work wherever they want to--as long as they have dinner ready when you get home."


"A pedestal is as much a prison as any other small space."


"A woman, especially, if she have the misfortune of knowing anything, should conceal it as well as she can."



The candidates: Anonymous Woman; John Wayne; Ursula K. Le Guin; Martin Luther; Thornton Wilder; A. Dworkin; Samuel Butler; Susan B. Anthony; Martin Luther; Jane Austen; Jean Baker Miller

Happy blog against sexism day.



Kudos to vegankid, whose brainchild this is.

blog against sexism day

To Those Wanting More Unwantedness

The notorious South Dakota bill to protect the all-important right of rapists to breed, and to ensure future generations for family pedophiles is raising eyebrows and blood pressure. Mine, too. It's also raising questions.

Is pregnancy resulting in giving birth to unwanted children a suitable punishment for sex?

Does an unwanted child live a life of gaiety and happiness?

Do wanted children wind up as shown here, as sweet little babies with two black eyes?

When the government forces maternity on a woman who has already decided she is unable properly to care for the child, what happens to the kid? And why don't rightwing blowhards care?

Because they're greedy selfish bastards, really. Which is why when I ran into one rightwinger's blog here that tried to spin this thing the other way, it was pretty darn funny. Well, sorta.

He insists that planning a family is "selfish."

Now, I'd bet that this person is probably a conservative Roman Catholic, and if that's how he wants to live, that's fine with me.

My problem is his attempt to dictate to me and others how we must live--which is according to his religious rules.

I'm Buddhist. I'm not after his mousetraps. I'm not ridding his house of Raid. I don't use mousetraps, and I don't use Raid. But I'm not in this guy's face about it, and he definitely is in mine.

Trying to make laws to force women into having kids that won't be well-cared for is irresponsible, and cruel. Making laws that support childbearing in loving conditions is hardly selfish, but responsible. Suggesting, like Preznit Toad-Exploder, that that feti should have health care that expires upon birth is reprehensible.

The radical right wants to suppress the data that unwantedness leads to criminal behavior, but it's out there all the same: "estimates suggest that legalized abortion can account for about half the observed decline in crime in the United States between 1991 and 1997." {The Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime, Quarterly Journal of Economics, May 2001).

Where do child abuse and child neglect come from? Outer space?

From "The History of Child Abuse," here:

The Child as Poison Container

The main psychological mechanism that operates in all child abuse involves using children as what I have termed poison containers--receptacles into which adults project disowned parts of their psyches, so they can control these feelings in another body without danger to themselves.

In good parenting, the child uses the caretaker as a poison container . . . A good mother reacts with calming actions to the cries of a baby and helps it "detoxify" its dangerous emotions.

But when an immature mother's baby cries, she cannot stand the screaming, and strikes out at the child. As one battering mother put it, "I have never felt loved all my life. When the baby was born, I thought he would love me. When he cried, it meant he didn't love me. So I hit him."

Rather than the child being able to use the parent to detoxify its fears and anger, the parent instead injects his or her bad feelings into the child and uses it to cleanse his or herself of depression and anger.

One must wonder--just how many of those hysterically active in the forced maternity movement were themselves unwanted?

How many of those screaming for women to remain barefoot and pregnant have the slightest interest in improving economic and social conditions, so that children can be well-cared-for? How many are devoted to improving parenting and education? To improving the social climate?

As historian Lloyd deMause asks:

If war, social violence, class domination and economic destruction of wealth are really revenge rituals for childhood trauma, how else can we remove the source of these rituals? How else end child abuse and neglect? How else increase the real wealth of nations, our next generation?

How, indeed?

[update: this law has now been signed, story here, by the Governor, who is Catholic. South Dakota, The Coathanger State]


planned parenthood
child abuse
unwantedness
South Dakota abortion ban

2005 Koufax Awards Voting Opens at Wampum

The polls are open at the Koufax Awards for best lefty blogs in many categories, here.

No Blood for Hubris was nominated for Best New Blog, and Blog Most Deserving Wider Recognition. (Also, for Best Post: here and here.)

It was an honor to be among the nominees.

Quoth Wampum:

From our point of view, the important work of the awards is mostly complete. We view the nominating process and the posting of links to all the nominated blogs, posts, and series as the core of the awards.

If the idea is to build community and honor people who have provided free information, enlightenment, and entertainment over an entire year (and it is), that job is mostly done.

Wampum has done a great job of community-building; if you are able to offer them some financial support to encourage their efforts, please please do so.

What? You mean, them Gitmo sub-humans have names? And maybe rights? YUH. As IF.

I don't know what this country is coming to.

We have these "people" who have been held virtually incommunicado in Cuba, at Guantanamo Bay, of all places, and have been subjected to Fearless Leader knows what, and now, after four long years, we're finding out that they actually have NAMES?

Who said they could?

All this pansy spoiled-brat Club Gitmo (see Amerikins in Club Gitmo T-shirts, left; see Amerikin prizners in Gitmo, right) stuff what with four squares a day, by torture if necessary, just makes me want to SPIT. As an Amerikin. Read all about it here.

So what if they're mostly goat-herders and chauffeurs and total nobodies? Just because they weren't responsible for anything, aren't they responsible because they were THERE?

Wherever they were, they were there.

So there.

Look at these stories.

Detainee [Qari Esmhatulla]: They asked me where I had come from and I told them I came from Rhohaniesha (ph) the shrine. They replied with rage and force and ordered me to say that I had come from Shahi-Kwowt. I don't know it nor did I come from there. When I repeated that two or three times, the beatings started and after receiving a few hard kicks and punches I told them it was fine.

Whe the first group put me in the hands of the second group of Afghani soldiers, and the second group heard about Shahi-Kwowt, they delivered me a couple of butt strokes and demanded that I say that I carried this and that (the grenade and radio).

Assisting Military Officer: Sir, I'd like to interject one thing. The term butt stroke means that "he was hit by the butt of a rifle".

Somebody has to take responsibility.

But no one is. Gitmo's a damn pussy palace.

The food's too damn good. The justice is too damn good.

Take the gloves off, Bush, wilya?

Shee-it.

Vets
PTSD
Club Gitmo
Bush

You Break 'Em, You Fix 'Em -- Unless You're a Bushist Fascist Pseudo-Conservative

OK, it's the middle of the work week, I don't have time to do justice to the whole subject now, but I wanted highlight a particularly repulsive op-ed in the New York Times today by a little lady with a big fat axe to grind.

Oh, I forgot, you can't get there from here--here's the little intro to silly Sally Satel's piece: it's really so stupid it's not even worth reading--but it's certainly worth ridiculing.

Silly Sally's silly take: "For Some, the War Won't End: More rigor in diagnosing post-traumatic stress disorder will conserve resources for veterans who are truly deserving."

"Truly deserving"? What, like Bubble Boy?

Dickensian deserving? As in, "Please sir, can I have some more"?

"Rigor"? As in--anyone who admits to PTSD symptoms must be a pussy?

Oh, goodie. Silly Sally's got her spin on all those troops who suffer yet are undeserving.

Yes, we have the deserving poor and the undeserving poor, the deserving wounded, and the undeserving wounded--because, why would we want to pay for the damage we've caused?

I've written several times previously on the Bushist administration's penchant for exposing troops to conditions that engender PTSD, and then trying to change the rules so as not to have to actually pay for the treatment of PTSD that their splendid little war caused: see here "First We Maim Your Minds, Then We Dump You: It's Hard Work," with links to prior posts.

Their first attack on Veterans' benefits didn't succeed.

But--they're at it again.

Pigs.




Vets
PTSD
Sally Satel
New York Times

Happy Tibetan New Year 2133

Tashi delegs -- auspicious excellent bliss -- to one and all on this first day of Losar, Tibetan New Year, the Year of the Fire Dog.

(Yo, that means you, too, Bubble Boy. You look like you could use some auspicious excellent bliss, what with your approval ratings down to 34% and that of Chappaquid-Dick down to 18%, oh, and the Iraq war approval rating thing down to 30%. Tashi delegs. Big-time.)

Photo: Andreas Neumann, carto:net.

Pass the Cherry Kijafa, I'll Drink to That

No, on second thought, keep the cherry stuff, but you can pass the Havarti.

From a recent pro-free speech rally in Washington, DC, outside the Danish Embassy, via Corsair.

SERFIN' U-S-A!! . . . (an appreciation of Corporation Appreciation Week, for the CorruptCo Blogfest)

How do we love thee, Bushist fascist corporate corporations of America?

Let us count the ways:

We love thee for pimp-slapping us out of the very notion of pensions.
We love thee for pimp-slapping us out of the very notion of job security.
We love thee for pimp-slapping us out of the very notion of health benefits.
We love thee for pimp-slapping us out of the very notion of a single job being enough to support anyone, much less a family.

We love thee for destroying unions and making us love you for it lest we lose our jobs.

We love thee for disabusing us of the notion that "factory workers at successful companies can achieve a secure, relatively prosperous middle-class life for themselves."

We love thee for creatively creating useless products like Coke and Pepsi which have no nutritional value and yet make beeg money.

We love thee for creatively creating and selling useless products like Camels, Marlboros, etc. etc., totally unecessary & addictive items which actually ruin health and/or kill and yet make beeg money.

We love thee for creatively creating and hypnotically selling products like McDonald's and Burger King and Wendy's junk food made out of junk which contribute to obesity and illness and yet make beeg money (see Left of Center's Corruptco post here on high fructose corn syrup and bring your barf bag).

We love thee for successfully poisoning the natural environment and getting away with it, so far.

We love thee for buying and installing Preznit Toad-Exploder who has never actually held an actual job, like both his daughters and I think his mother, and who therefore is able to slap an innocent lady citizen on the back as congratulations to her for her good luck to be living in a country like America where she can hold three jobs--three!--at once.

We love thee for buying and installing Preznit Toad-Exploder who exploded toads in his youth.
We love thee for buying and installing Preznit Toad-Exploder who thinks that invading Iraq and thus making money for Halliburton, the Carlisle Group, and KBR and the rest of the military-industrial complex is way more important than the actual lives of actual troops or the actual lives of actual citizens.

We love thee for always putting profits before people and therefore providing us a sense of security in this impermanent world.

We love thee for your iron grip on corporate media, and your continuing hypnotic hold on the American populace.

We love thee for Enron's happiness at successfully stealing money from little old ladies in California.

We love thee for replacing the notion of American labor with the notion of American serfdom; for replacing noblesse oblige with pure greed and ego; for replacing three classes with the classic two: haves and have -nots--and for blaming the have-nots for not having.

We love thee for not giving a shit about anyone but yourselves.
We love thee for thinking that giving a shit about anyone but yourselves is somehow "quaint," not unlike the Geneva Conventions.

Not only do we love thee, but we worship thee and we bow down.

Ha.




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This post is part of the CorruptCo Blogfest, created by LosetheNoose.

Bolton Pot Blasts U.N. Kettle: Sex Still Troubles Our Swinger Ambassador?

This story troubles moi, aussi:

BOLTON BLASTS U.N. "SEX AND CORRUPTION"

NEW YORK - The U.S. ambassador to the
United Nations said Saturday that the world body is hobbled "by bad management, by sex and corruption" and a lack of confidence in its ability to carry out missions. . .

"We find an organization that is deeply troubled by bad management, by sex and corruption and by a growing lack of confidence in its ability to carry out missions that are given to them," Bolton told an audience at a Columbia Law School symposium held by the Federalist Society, a conservative law organization.

Say, isn't that the society that John Roberts didn't remember he belonged to, and Samuel Alito didn't remember he belonged to? Funny. I can't remember.


Well, ok, I can't remember that, but I do remember this, via meat-eating leftist:

JOHN BOLTON: NECOCON, APPOINTEE, WIFESWAPPER?

Larry Flynt of Hustler infamy has recently claimed that John Bolton frequented the famous swinger's club Plato's Retreat in the 1970s and coerced his ex-wife to perform in group sex while he watched.

Corroborated allegations that Mr. Bolton’s first wife, Christina Bolton, was forced to engage in group sex have not been refuted by the State Department despite inquires posed by Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flynt concerning the allegations. Mr. Flynt has obtained information from numerous sources that Mr. Bolton participated in paid visits to Plato’s Retreat, the popular swingers club that operated in New York City in the late 1970s and early 1980s. . .

If this is true, on the one hand, its another example of a neocon doing some nasty things behind closed doors. On the other hand, well, its just a hilarious story. The soon-to-be ambassador to the UN watched his wife having sex; it does not get any better than this.

I dunno about that. It could get better if it turns out that Bolton is the leaky source for the Traitorgate Plame name, could it not?

On the other hand, it gets way worse when one realizes that Ambassador John Bolton has, significantly, mistaken problems with "rapes" for being problems with "sex."

How sick is that?




John Bolton
U.N.

Hero Ohio Senator's Bill Will Bar Republicans From Adopting Children: Egos Too Big to Parent Well

Finally, an Ohio lawmaker after my own heart, complete story here.


PLAN WOULD BAR OHIO ADOPTIONS BY GOP

If a Youngstown lawmaker's proposal becomes Ohio law, Republicans would be barred from being adoptive parents.

State Sen. Robert Hagan sent out e-mails to fellow lawmakers late Wednesday night, stating that he intends to "introduce legislation in the near future that would ban households with one or more Republican voters from adopting children or acting as foster parents." The e-mail ended with a request for co-sponsorship. . .

Hagan said his legislation was written in response to a bill introduced in the Ohio House this month by Rep. Ron Hood, R-Ashville, that is aimed at prohibiting gay adoption. . .

Hagan wrote . . .that `"credible research" shows that adopted children raised in Republican households are more at risk for developing "emotional problems, social stigmas, inflated egos, and alarming lack of tolerance for others they deem different than themselves and an air of overconfidence to mask their insecurities."

However, Hagan admitted that he has no scientific evidence to support the above claims.

Just as "Hood had no scientific evidence" to back his assertion that having gay parents was detrimental to children, Hagan said.

"It flies in the face of reason when we need to reform our education system, address health care and environmental issues that we put energy and wasted time (into) legislation (Hood's) like this," continued Hagan, who has been in the Ohio Senate nine years. Before the Senate, he served 19 years in the Ohio House.

Chappaquid-Dick: Secret Service Sez Shooter Cheney Plastered

From Doug Thompson at Capitol Hill Blue, complete story here:

Secret Service agents guarding Vice President Dick Cheney when he shot Texas lawyer Harry Whittington on a hunting outing two weeks ago say Cheney was "clearly inebriated" at the time of the shooting.

Agents observed several members of the hunting party, including the Vice President, consuming alcohol before and during the hunting expedition, the report notes, and Cheney exhibited "visible signs" of impairment, including slurred speech and erratic actions.

According to those who have talked with the agents and others present at the outing, Cheney was drunk when he gunned down his friend and the day-and-a-half delay in allowing Texas law enforcement officials on the ranch where the shooting occurred gave all members of the hunting party time to sober up.

We talked with a number of administration officials who are privy to inside information on the Vice President's shooting "accident" and all admit Secret Service agents and others say they saw Cheney consume far more than the "one beer' he claimed he drank at lunch earlier that day.

"This was a South Texas hunt," says one White House aide. "Of course there was drinking. There's always drinking. Lots of it."

One agent at the scene has been placed on administrative leave and another requested reassignment this week. A memo reportedly written by one agent has been destroyed, sources said Wednesday afternoon.
Cheney has a long history of alcohol abuse, including two convictions of driving under the influence when he was younger. . . .someone like Cheney, who is taking blood thinners because of his history of heart attacks, could get legally drunk now after consuming just one drink.

If Cheney was legally drunk at the time of the shooting, he could be guilty of a felony under Texas law and the shooting, ruled an accident by a compliant Kenedy County Sheriff, would be a prosecutable offense.

Doug Thompson has good sources inside the White House--especially when it comes to confirming tantruming by Bubble Boy, Preznit Toad-Exploder and the various suspicious activities of "Dick" Cheney. Thanks, Doug.




Top image: Tram Drunk, Prague, 1992 by James Fassinger, more here.

Bubble Boy: Keeping A Tight Lid on Vegan Terror While Allowing State-Linked Foreign Firm to Run Six US Ports

Picture of blonde Vegan terrorist above was taken by undercover government agents on the vegan terror surveillance team, paid with your tax dollars. Meanwhile, even more horrific plots to turn America peaceful are being thwarted as Bushists crack down on peace activists in their search for Al-Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden in Seattle--once again, at our expense:

Recently disclosed FBI files show that in Seattle in recent years, federal agents and local police looked for signs of civil disobedience among activists preparing to protest Navy ships arriving for Seafair:

# Local anti-war groups such as the Raging Grannies, Not in Our Name and Ground Zero were watched for intent to disrupt Navy ships through civil disobedience such as chaining themselves to ships. It never happened.

# A Navy criminal investigator traveled to Eugene, Ore., to find out if anarchists blamed for violence at Seattle's 1999 World Trade Organization conference might return to protest the fleet. They never did.

# A law enforcement agent conducted surveillance as two small, Peace-Fleet boats were launched in West Seattle. . .

"This is part of a troubling pattern by the government of spying on peaceful groups," said Kathleen Taylor, executive director of the ACLU of Washington.

Keeping watch on "groups like Raging Grannies doesn't make us safer," she said. "And it interferes with people's right to protest government policies. When government believes that advocacy of peace is a threat, we are going in the wrong direction. The government needs to focus on real threats to public safety rather than to presume that anyone who objects to government action is a safety threat. . ."

In the wake of 9/11, the Bush administration responded to its failure to detect the attacks by broadening the rules for the FBI to open a national security investigation.

The old guidelines required that a crime had been committed or was being planned. The new guidelines create a category called "threat assessment," and no crime has to be committed or planned to perform a threat assessment.

Under a threat assessment, a federal criminal justice source said, agents can attend public meetings without identifying themselves and conduct such simple surveillance as watching a protest march. . .

It's unclear whether information about local political activists has been collected in the database intended for military installations to use to share intelligence. The Pentagon did not make itself available to answer the question. . .

[A} memo apparently from a police member of the FBI's Washington Joint Analytic Center says: "The Snohomish County Peace Action of Edmonds is a merge between the Lynnwood SNOW and Peace Action of Snohomish County. They support the anti-war, anti-Bush, anti-nuclear, anti-weapons movements."

For Democracy to be on the march, see, you have to make sure that them bloodthirsty cut-throat Vegan and Quaker terrorists are taken care of. Big-time.

In order that your buddies and Halliburton and Dubai Ports World can cash in on even more sweetheart deals. Got a problem with that, buddy?

Like, we shouldn't be doing business with countries who don't even have token women in the boardroom? Like, just because there aren't any gals in this picture above of dudes wielding power means that we shouldn't be making ourselves and them money hand over fist? Yuh, as if.

Not to mention the secret deal that assured Dubai Ports that it wouldn't have to make its records subject to subpoena in U.S. courts. (Well, we don't even put anyone under oath in the Senate anymore, do we?) And heck, Preznit Toad-Exploder didn't even know about it before he knew about it and supported it and then didn't know about it. Heckuva Job, Toady!

It's all about the Benjamins. And that's just it way it should be. Because poor people, as Fearless Leader Bubble Boy Bush said long ago, poor people are poor because they're lazy.


And if you don't let us run your ports, we'll jack up the price of oil times ten and watch all you Westerners (who failed to listen to prescient President Carter so long ago when he warned you to get off the oil teat) with your miserable Western culture twist slowly slowly in the wind. Just kidding.



Dubai Port deal
Bush

A Rose of Mohammed By Any Other Name Would Be -- A Danish

Tehran, Iran (AP) -- Iranians love Danish pastries, but when they look for the flaky dessert at the bakery they now have to ask for "Roses of the Prophet Mohammed."

Bakeries across the capital were covering up their ads for Danish pastries Thursday after the confectioners' union ordered the name change in retaliation for caricatures of the Muslim prophet published in a Danish newspaper.

"Given the insults by Danish newspapers against the prophet as of now the name of Danish pastries will give way to 'Rose of Mohammed' pastries," the union said in its order. . .

Iran's Danish renaming wasn't the first time a food name has become a symbol of protest.











A Republican congressman from North Carolina helped lead an effort to make sure Capitol Hill cafeterias changed their menus to advertise "freedom fries" instead of french fries after France opposed the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

On a related note, a story here about a fatwa against those Danes who published cartoons depicting Mohammed. (Picture below from a medieval Muslim manuscript).













Cleric Offers $1 Million to Kill Muhammad Cartoonist

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) A Pakistani cleric announced Friday a $1 million bounty for killing a cartoonist who drew Prophet Muhammad, as thousands joined street protests and Denmark temporarily closed its embassy and advised its citizens to leave the country.

Police confined the former leader of an Islamic militant group to his home to prevent him from addressing supporters over the cartoons, amid fears he could incite violence, after riots this week killed five people. . .In the northwestern Pakistan city of Peshawar, prayer leader Mohammed Yousaf Qureshi announced the bounty for killing a cartoonist to about 1,000 people outside the Mohabat Khan mosque.

Qureshi said the mosque and his religious school would give $25,000 and a car, while a local jewelers' association would give another $1 million. . . "This is a unanimous decision by all imams (prayer leaders) of Islam that whoever insults the prophet deserves to be killed and whoever will take this insulting man to his end, will get this prize," Qureshi said. . .

A Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, first printed the prophet pictures by 12 cartoonists in September. . . Denmark has already temporarily closed its embassies in Lebanon, Syria, Iran and Indonesia after anti-Danish protests and threats against staff. . .

Unrest over the cartoons has spiraled in Pakistan, even as it has ebbed in the rest of Asia and in the Middle East. Big riots in Lahore and Peshawar this week caused millions of dollars in damage, as hundreds of vehicles were burned and protesters targeted numerous U.S. and other foreign-brand businesses, including KFC, McDonald's, Citibank, Holiday Inn, and Norwegian cell phone company Telenor.

Intelligence officials have said scores of members of radical and militant Islamic groups, such as Jamaat al-Dawat, joined the unruly protests in Lahore on Tuesday and had incited violence in a bid to undermine President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's government. . .

Renaming pastries and junk food is a reasonable (if silly) and peaceful response to events not going in one's own way.

Killing others and/or advocating killing others who do not subscribe to one's religious beliefs is heinous, whether it be Ayatollah Khomeini or Ann Coulter who's egging the misguided zealots on.














--------------------------
Second image from the bottom is from demonstrations in Beiruit; third from last is from an on-line archive here. Final picture is of the Buddhas of Bamiyan, now demonstrating the truth of the impermanence of all things, thanks to the Taliban.

Danish cartoons
freedom of speech
Ann Coulter

Canned Hunts: Killing for Fun

Ok, ok, so call me Buddhist, but "Go Fuck Yourself" Dick Cheney's armed and hammered quail kerfuffle that almost killed his hunting buddy brings Cheney's take on life way more clearly to mind. As a confirmed pro-torture-ist, Dick's stance on how actual life should be conducted is pretty sadistic. As a long-term devotee of canned hunting, his commitment to not taking life is pretty feeble, if not outright sadistic, too.

Cheney was doing a passel of canned hunting down Texas way over last weekend, when he shot a buddy after having a beer, and then, after he'd shot him, fixed himself a nice drink while buddy went to the hospital, Cheney had certainly killed before.

The tale of Cheney's "hunt" at Ligonier, Pa. a while back, here:

Statement by The HSUS in Response to V.P. Cheney's Shooting Spree at a PA Canned Hunting Facility

WASHINGTON--Monday's hunting trip to Pennsylvania by Vice President Dick Cheney in which he reportedly shot more than 70 stocked pheasants and an unknown number of mallard ducks at an exclusive private club places a spotlight on an increasingly popular and deplorable form of hunting, in which birds are pen-reared and released to be shot in large numbers by patrons. The ethics of these hunts are called into question by rank-and-file sportsmen, who hunt animals in their native habitat and do not shoot confined or pen-raised animals that cannot escape.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette [reported]that 500 farm-raised pheasants were released yesterday morning at the Rolling Rock Club in Ligonier Township for the benefit of Cheney’s 10-person hunting party. The group killed at least 417 of the birds, illustrating the unsporting nature of canned hunts. The party also shot an unknown number of captive mallards in the afternoon. . .

"This wasn’t a hunting ground. It was an open-air abattoir, and the vice president should be ashamed to have patronized this operation and then slaughtered so many animals," states Wayne Pacelle, a senior vice president of The Humane Society of the United States. "If the Vice President and his friends wanted to sharpen their shooting skills, they could have shot skeet or clay, not resorted to the slaughter of more than 400 creatures planted right in front of them as animated targets."

The Humane Society of the United States deplores the shooting of captive birds and animals where traditional “fair chase” hunting ethics are discarded and kills are guaranteed. . . For more information, visit The HSUS’ Web site – www.hsus.org.

Another article on sadistic, shooting-fish-in-a-barrel canned hunting:

In Their Own Words: How Canned Hunting Ranches Advertise the Means to a Kill

In their brochures and advertisements, operators of canned hunting facilities routinely flout the most basic principles of fair chase in hunting. Here's a sample of what they're saying, and how these operations brag about stacking the odds against captive animals:

"No kill no pay."
—Triple R Ranch

"...comfort of a large enclosed blind with sliding window overlooking heavily used corn feeders."
—Barnes-Keith Ranch

"...all weather blind overlooking feeding areas."
—Beaver Creek Ranch

"...hunts are from elevated box blinds overlooking food plots, senderos or feeders."
—Edmund Tom Ranch

"The animals are fed on a feed routing that runs daily."
—Gunn Ranch

"...we have the daytime cover and water...so they MUST come to us to hide and drink."
—Itchy Acres Ranch

"The preferred hunt will be from elevated blinds and enclosed tri-pods overlooking automatic feeders."
—Kinsel Cattle Company

"Our hunters have 90% to 100% success...we put 40 lbs of corn at each stand twice a week so the deer and hogs are used to coming to them. You may put out corn at the stand you are hunting...36 comfortable box stands."
—Lange Ranches in the Texas Hill Country

"Hunting is done from tower blinds overlooking feeders which have been operating continuously since August. Any predators seen may be taken as well."
—Mann Outfitting

"...hunting is usually done from double box blinds overlooking feeders...we're going to do everything legally possible to make your hunt a productive worthwhile experience!"
—Rojo Grande Ranch

"Each stand has mineral licks and timer controlled feeders."
—Solano Ranch

This isn't hunting, it's just killing.

If he likes killing, there's something wrong with him.



(Painting by Jose Picayo, "Dead Quail and Duck")

More Revolting Aspects of Cheney's Chappaquiddick

So I've been having some problems with the Cheney shoots his buddy thing.

One, that Cheney failed to travel to the hospital to look after the welfare of the buddy he had just shot in the face. I mean, really. If you shot one of your buddies in the face, wouldn't you go along to the hospital to find out how he was doing? To show concern? Is there a reason you would not, unless you were plastered?

And how about going back and having dinner while the friend you just shot is off to the ER (the nearest fundamentalist hospital, not the nearest trauma center, also)? How about Cheney not calling this guy's kids, but making himself a drink and eating dinner instead? How about the hostess, Armstrong, not immediately telling the guy's wife?

Two, the Chappaquiddicky whole waiting-until-the-next-day to talk to the sheriff thing, the pulling-rank so he could get away with it thing. Is there a reason you would not unless you were hammered at the time?

Three, the setting up of Katherine Armstrong, who sat in the car and was thus a clear non-eyewitness, in the guise of an actual eyewitness, having her call a local paper, and trying to spin press unhappiness at the delay as some kind of local vs. national media turf war. Try harder, Turdblossom.

Fourth, the line-of-fire thingie. Hunters walk in a forward direction, together, in line, and no one shoots behind the line of fire. A thing that Cheney inarguably did. Was he drunk? Angry? Stupid? Your call.

Fifth, Cheney's lack of apology for shooting his friend in the face. Pretty well jibes with being a pro-torture kinda guy. Or a I'll do what I damn well please kinda guy.

Sixth, Cheney's victim's apology today. Frickin' WHAT? Cheney fails to apologize, but his VICTIM does? It's just so Bushist fascist up-is-down-ist.

It's just so (no offense to the battered) so battered woman-y:

"My family and I are deeply sorry for all that vice president Cheney has had to go through this past week."

What HE'S gone through? What about the fact that you have a lead pellet in your 78-year-old heart? Are you kidding? Hel-lo?

Let's review the battered woman syndrome:

DENIAL

The woman refuses to admit--even to herself--that she has been beaten or that there is a "problem" in her marriage. She may call each incident an "accident". She offers excuses for her husband's violence and each time firmly believes it will never happen again.

So Whittington refuses to believe there was a problem. He calls the incident an accident. He offers excuses for Cheney's violent behavior, and apologizes to the person who shot him for having been the recipient of Cheney's shooting.

Come on, people.


More info on battered woman's syndrome here, RJ Eskow on Cheney's Chappaquiddick here and here. Not to mention "The Unbearable Lightness of Responsibility" at Adventus and "We Are All Harry Whittington," here. Visit Firedoglake, above, for your very own "DICK CHENEY--ARMED AND HAMMERED" t-shirt.

In a related story, here: Paul Craig Roberts on "Conservatives Endorse the Fuhrer Principle."


Cheney's Chappaquiddick
Whittington
battered woman syndrome
Cheney

Dalai Lama (no kidding?) Urges Non-Violence and Tolerance

Haaretz story here.

Dalai Lama visits Israel, asks Hamas to renounce violence

The Dalai Lama on Wednesday urged Hamas to renounce violence, but refused to take sides in the increasingly bloody dispute over cartoons of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed. . .

The Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet more than four decades ago during a failed revolt against Chinese rule and now lives across the border in India, brushed aside reports that China is upset with Israel for allowing him to visit . . .

Asked about Mideast strife, [the Dalai Lama] appealed to Hamas to renounce violence, in the wake of its victory in last month's Palestinian parliament election. Hamas is under growing pressure from the West to end attacks, recognize Israel and honor Israeli-Palestinian interim agreements.

The Dalai Lama noted that Hamas won a democratic election.

"I want to take this opportunity, and also my appeal to Hamas, now through violent way it won't solve, it won't achieve what it wants," he said in halting English. He called for "mutual respect" and urged the group to approach the situation "more realistically" . . .

The spiritual leader, who advocates religious tolerance, would not take sides in the dispute over Danish newspaper cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed which have sparked protests, some deadly, across the Muslim world. He said it would be unfair to hold all Muslims responsible for the violent acts of a few.

Asked to take a side, he said: "I think tricky question ... so difficult. If you give me permission, I remain silent. No comment."

Spreading Democracy: More From Abu Ghraib

Via the Sydney Morning Herald: "the photographs America doesn't want seen." Here, the story of Australian TV station SBS showing these latest graphic images (linked online here via Raw Story).

Update: More (warning: graphic) photos here in a later story from Salon.

Australian television has broadcast previously unpublished graphic images of the alleged physical abuse of Iraqi prisoners at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad.

SBS television's Dateline program screened video and still images of the wounds allegedly inflicted on the Iraqis by their American captors.

They included photographs of blood-soaked Iraqi prisoners who had been tortured or shot dead, footage of a prisoner repeatedly slamming his head into a metal door, and a film of naked male prisoners being forced to masturbate in front of the camera.

The Bush administration is reportedly attempting to prevent release of the images in the US, arguing that their publication could provoke antagonism towards the US. . .

Some antagonism appears to be well-warranted. What's wrong with these people? Why do they persist in their vile spin that it's the publication of photos of torture that is objectionable, not the torture itself? What is wrong with them?

George Negus, host of Wednesday's Dateline program, told SBS viewers it was important to televise the images to make the public aware of what taken place at Abu Ghraib prison.

"Despite the currently overheated international climate, we're showing them because they show the extent of the horror that occurred at Abu Ghraib," Negus said. . .

ACLU lawyer Amrit Singh told Dateline the images were evidence of "systemic and widespread abuse" of prisoners by US soldiers.

As if we already hadn't seen enough. How many Bushist fascists does it take to screw up an entire country?

Not so many.

We've already heard about those who have driven our country into moral AND fiscal bankruptcy.

So, like. What's left?

Bush Fires CIA Counter-Terror Expert Who Would Not Stoop to Torture

From The Sunday Times UK:

CIA CHIEF SACKED FOR OPPOSING TORTURE

The CIA’s top counter-terrorism official was fired last week because he opposed detaining Al-Qaeda suspects in secret prisons abroad, sending them to other countries for interrogation and using forms of torture such as "water boarding", intelligence sources have claimed.

Robert Grenier, head of the CIA counter-terrorism centre, was relieved of his post after a year in the job. . . Vincent Cannistraro, a former head of counter-terrorism at the agency, said: "It is not that Grenier wasn't aggressive enough, it is that he wasn't 'with the programme'. He expressed misgivings about the secret prisons in Europe and the rendition of terrorists.”

Grenier also opposed "excessive" interrogation, such as strapping suspects to boards and [near-drowning] them in water, according to Cannistraro. . .

AB "Buzzy" Krongard, a former executive director of the CIA who resigned shortly after Goss's arrival, said . . . said it was up to President George Bush to stop the rot. "The agency has only one client: the president of the United States," he said. "The reorganisation is the way this president wanted it. If he is unwilling to reform it, the agency will go on as it is."

"History will judge how good an idea it was to destroy the teams and the programmes that were in place."

Link here to whole story.

I've made jokes about Bush's documented youthful penchant for animal sadism, when he amused himself by putting lit firecrackers into live frogs and blasting them to bits. I've called him "Preznit Toad-Exploder" and made reference to the pro-sadism policies of Cheney and Gonzalez. Krongard's quote here makes me think the number one pro-torture sadist IS actually Bush. Which is quite in line with the pathology of his youth, I fear.

On another related unhappy note, here is the story of a returned Iraq vet who had survivor guilt and PTSD (related to witnessing civilian deaths and CIA torture) who was unable to get the inpatient psychiatric care he needed as the beds in the PTSD ward were full. Supported by outpatient therapy, he later killed his father and then himself.

It's not just a Buddhist thing. Actions have consequences. People are injured not merely by being subjected to torture, but by subjecting others to torture, and by having to witness others being tortured.

How hard is that to figure out?


Torture
Bush
PTSD
CIA