"Today, John McCain is holding a fundraiser with George Bush, behind closed doors, in Arizona."
"No cameras!"
"No reporters!"
"And we all know why!"
"Senator McCain doesn’t want to be seen, hat-in-hand, with the President, whose failed policies he promises to continue for another four years," [at this point, the audience roared with laughter!!].
CBS News did its own extensive research, finding that more than 6,250 American veterans took their own lives in 2005 alone. That comes to slightly more than 17 suicides every day.
Last month I attended a presentation on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, at the Anchorage Veterans Administration Clinic. PowerPoint slides provided a definition of PTSD and common causes of this disorder: IEDs, seeing the bodies of dead children, experiencing serious bodily injuries, and others.Bob Geiger, HuffPo: Dead Troops Remembered By President Who Had Them Killed
I asked the briefer, a VA psychiatrist, whether the VA also considered Military Sexual Trauma an experience that can lead to PTSD. He replied "no."
I looked at the physician with amazement. Many peer-reviewed journal articles assert that Military Sexual Trauma, or MST, is especially associated with PTSD. That the Veterans Administration continues to disassociate MST with PTSD is remarkable.
Yes, that's a harsh headline for this piece.
But I'll ask you to forgive me because, as a Veteran, there isn't a day on the calendar that causes my hatred -- and I do indeed mean hatred -- of George W. Bush to bubble over the top more than Memorial Day.
"On Memorial Day, we honor the heroes who have laid down their lives in the cause of freedom, resolve that they will forever be remembered by a grateful Nation, and pray that our country may always prove worthy of the sacrifices they have made," reads Bush's official Memorial Day proclamation, issued by the White House on Thursday.
The Chickenhawk-in Chief says a lot of things that make this Vet's blood boil but stuff like saying that he prays "...that our country may always prove worthy of the sacrifices they have made" is almost vomit inducing.
This statement comes from the same man who himself began dishonoring the sacrifices of all Veterans in such huge ways in March of 2003, when he invaded Iraq behind a veil of lies and deceit and started spilling barrels of military and civilian blood to start a war with a country that posed no threat whatsoever to our national security.
My great-great-great-great-great uncle was killed by U.S. soldiers during the Second Seminole War. Other distant relatives were killed during the Third Seminole War. Killed for trying to hold onto freedom, land, the right to self-determination.
Whether they killed warriors and women on the banks of the Pease River in Texas, the Washita River in Kansas, Sand Creek in Colorado, or Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota; whether they fought Shawnee in Indiana, Asakiwaki in Wisconsin, Lakota and Cheyenne in Montana, Chiricahua in Arizona, Nez Perce in Idaho or Modocs in California, the men in blue who were killed in the Indian Wars are among those who will be honored Monday.
But the thousands of warriors they killed – the ancestors of us original Americans – aren’t counted for the ultimately futile but unhesitating sacrifice they made for the freedom of their people. On Memorial Day, they are invisible. Monuments to the Rebel dead can be found in practically every town of the Confederacy. Memorials to Indian resistance are next to non-existent.
On Memorial Day weekend, Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK) and VA Secretary James Peake stood side-by-side in Fairbanks, Alaska to showcase their opposition to--and lack of respect for--today’s newest veterans.
Speaking at the Disabled American Veterans’ 19th Annual Department Convention, Senator Stevens told the majority of America’s most recent war veterans that they had not yet sacrificed enough to have earned a GI Bill that would cover the full cost of their educations.Sen. Ted Stevens warned of a "mass exodus" from the military Saturday if the so-called 21st Century GI Bill goes into law without major changes.What Stevens is really saying is that today's troops are unpatriotic--that they're only in it for the money and the college. And while Stevens’ "mass exodus" theory has been thoroughly discredited by the Congressional Budget Office, the true irony of the situation lies in the fact that Stevens earned his own college degree after World War Two by using the same GI Bill he’s aiming to prevent today’s veterans from receiving.
::
"There are worries that people who are already in for two years will serve one more and leave, and there’s really no incentive to stay," Stevens said.
At the same convention, VA Secretary James Peake--who is already under fire for the cover-up of an extraordinary number of veteran suicides and for overseeing an organization that may not be taking PTSD seriously--showed a stunning lack of situational awareness by discounting recent media reports and think tank studies by suggesting that fewer returning vets actually had PTSD than is commonly thought.
Senator Joseph Lieberman is scheduled to headline Pastor John Hagee's 2008 Christians United For Israel Washington-Israel Summit this July 22. In accepting Hagee's invitation, Lieberman became the most senior elected representative confirmed to appear at the annual gala. Last year, when Lieberman spoke at Hagee's summit, he compared the Texas televangelist to the biblical prophet Moses, dubbing him "an Ish Elochim," or "a man of God." Unless he rescinds his pledge to appear at this year's summit, Lieberman can be expected to deliver another soul-stirring tribute.
Hagee's vitriolic condemnation of Catholicism, his jeremiad declaring Hurricane Katrina divine punishment for New Orleans' hosting of a "homosexual rally," and his generally disturbing apocalyptic theology became national news last February when John McCain accepted his endorsement in a widely publicized ceremony.
Rangers midfielder DaMarcus Beasley admits his selection for the Scottish Cup final against Queen of the South caught him and his family by surprise.
The American's season looked to be over in November when he sustained a knee injury against Stuttgart in the Champions League.
However, the former PSV Eindhoven player regained his fitness ahead of schedule to make a substitute's appearance against St Mirren in the Clydesdale Bank Premier League last Monday.
Beasley then celebrated his 26th birthday by starting against Queens and scoring in Rangers' 3-2 win over the Irn-Bru First Division side.
USA winger DaMarcus Beasley has vowed to put a dent in Joe Hart's England debut with a Wembley goal.
Manchester City goalkeeper Hart is in line for his first cap on Wednesday night as England manager Fabio Capello tests a number of younger players who have caught his eye.
Beasley was the 21-year-old's team-mate at Eastlands during the 2006/07 season when the American enjoyed a loan spell from PSV Eindhoven before joining current club Rangers.
The pair have remained friends and Beasley, who is back to fitness following five months out with a knee injury, made it clear he would show no mercy should a goal-scoring opportunity come his way during the friendly.
"and now we have what ... uh ... some are reading as a suggestion that somebody knock off Osama ... uh ... um Obama .... well both if we could [giggles]"
On CNN this week, Republican strategist and CNN contributor Alex Castellanos responded to criticism of a joke that referred to Hillary Clinton as a "bitch" by saying, "[S]ome women, by the way, are named that and it's accurate."
"You needed that job, and you were the best qualified, but they had to give it to a minority, because of a racial quota. Is that really fair? Harvey Gantt says it is. Gantt supports Ted Kennedy's racial quota law that makes the color of your skin more important than your qualifications. Your vote on this issue next Tuesday. For racial quotas, Harvey Gantt. Against racial quotas, Jesse Helms."
1. Economic downturn is "psychological."
2. "Great progress economically" during the Bush years.
3. eBay is the answer for poverty and recession.
4. "Tear down" New Orleans?
5. Irresponsible, undeserving homeowners.
6. Work a second job, skip a vacation.
7. "Protect the privacy" of Cindy McCain's tax returns.
8. Opposed to SCHIP expansion, McCain speaks at children's hospital.
9. Baghdad safer than some American neighborhoods.
10. "I'm not running on the Bush presidency."
[Charlie Black's] wife, Judy Black, is a national co-chair of the fundraising group "Women for McCain," and she has a vibrant lobbying practice that includes a foreign client and several companies with business before the Senate Commerce Committee, where McCain is a senior member.
Judy Black works at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, a firm that earned $12.9 million in lobbying fees last year. She is listed as an agent of Dubai Aerospace Enterprises, whose partners include the government of Dubai, according to forms filed under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Since 2004, she has also represented telecomunications companies AT&T and Global Crossing Ltd., which have matters before the Commerce Committee.
[T]oo often the special interest lobbyists with the fattest wallets and best access carry the day when issues of public policy are being decided.
McCain adviser Charles Black and his lobbying partners have represented some of the world's most notorious leaders. Now, that work is prompting calls by Democrats for Black's firing from the campaign. Here is a sampling of clients: [UNITA, Equatorial Guinea, Kenya, Nigeria, Phillipines, Zaire]
Longtime uber-lobbyist Charles R. Black Jr. is John McCain's man in Washington, a political maestro who is hoping to guide his friend, the senator from Arizona, to the presidency this November.
But for half a decade in the 1980s, Black was also Jonas Savimbi's man in the capital city. His lobbying firm received millions from the brutal Angolan guerrilla leader and took advantage of Black's contacts in Congress and the White House.
Justice Department records that Black's firm submitted under the Foreign Agents Registration Act detail frequent meetings with lawmakers and their staffs and lavish spending by Black and his partners as they attempted to ensure support for Savimbi, whose UNITA movement was fighting the Marxist Angolan government.
Then in his 30s, Black already had established himself as a pioneer of the revolving door between campaign consulting and lobbying, having been a senior adviser on President Ronald Reagan's reelection campaign before returning to K Street. And his clients, as often as not, were foreign leaders eager to burnish their reputations.
In addition to Savimbi, Black and his partners were at times registered foreign agents for a remarkable collection of U.S.-backed foreign leaders whose human rights records were sometimes harshly criticized, even as their opposition to communism was embraced by American conservatives. They included Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, Nigerian Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre, and the countries of Kenya and Equatorial Guinea, among others.
Jonas Savimbi, who has died aged 67, was, for 20 years, a figure as important in southern Africa as Nelson Mandela, and as negative a force as Mandela was positive. For the past 10 years, using the proceeds of smuggled diamonds from eastern and central Angola, he fought an increasingly pointless and personal bush war against the elected government in which hundreds of thousands of peasants were killed, wounded, displaced, or starved to death.
In 1965, Mobutu seized power with the backing of the military and tacit support of Western countries, who saw him as a bulwark against communist expansion in Africa. He established a one-party state, banning all other political organizations but his own.
Over the next three decades, Mobutu led one of the most enduring regimes in Africa -- and, said his critics, one of the most dictatorial and corrupt.
Despite the country's obvious natural resources, including copper, gold and diamonds, much of Zaire's population continued to sink further into poverty. But Mobutu, known for his trademark leopard-skin hat, amassed a personal fortune estimated to be as much as $5 billion, with homes in Switzerland and France.
In 1986, shortly after coming to power, he executed his bosom friend and then minister of the Federal Capital Territory, General Mamman Vatsa, and dozens of other officers convicted of involvement in a failed coup plot against him.
Scores of military officers and civilians convicted of involvement in another failed coup attempt four years later were also executed despite local and international plea for clemency.
For many though, Babangida, with his toothy smile, is synonymous with corruption, the depreciation of the country's currency and general economic mismanagement.
He is widely believed to have syphoned off tens of millions of dollars during his time in office and he looks the most wealthy of all the 2007 presidential hopefuls.
His critics allege he mismanaged or stole the some 12 billion dollars Nigeria made from oil sales during the Gulf War.
"Babangida promoted the culture of corruption into national ethos," one newspaper columnist wrote.
"If God were a Nigerian, Babangida would have attempted to bribe him," said another.
[I]n the early hours of 21 October, Siad led 20 army officers and five police officers in a bloodless coup d'tat.
Significant political figures were detained, the constitution suspended, the national assembly closed, political parties banned and the Supreme Court abolished. The country was renamed the Somali Democratic Republic and on 1 November the conspirators constituted themselves the Supreme Revolutionary Council (SRC).
[]
The complex security paraphernalia and the paramilitary organisations so typical of all repressive states, whether of the right or the left (and Somalia was a confused mixture of both), were installed. The new National Security Service (NSS) began to run its own interrogation and detention centres and even courts. Prison conditions for a growing number of political and other prisoners were uniformly harsh and torture was rife.
[]
To Siad, the mnemonics of liberation fronts merely hid angry clan groupings. Once so identified, whole areas were devastated. Among the first to suffer were the Majeerteen. But it was confrontation with the Isaak, the largest clan in the north, which revealed the depths which Siad and his relative-generals were prepared to plumb. The word ''genocide'' came to be used by international human rights observers.
[A] good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it.
Kennedy is best known as a legislative powerhouse, a tireless legend at courting allies and cutting deals, and as the battle-scarred face of the nation's most famous political family. But out of the spotlight and behind the scenes, his constituents say, the senior senator and his staff have cut through red tape to change countless individual lives, advocating for even the narrowest personal needs with a ferocity and attention to detail that still inspires awe in those on the receiving end decades later.
Few causes, it seems, have been too small to warrant his aid, be it helping an Ethiopian maintenance man seek immigration papers for his family; encouraging the activism of a young diabetes patient from Plymouth; or calling top officials in the military to stop a Westford stepmother from being deployed to Iraq.
As the well-loved senator begins his fight against brain cancer, people who have benefited from his service said they are praying for the recovery of a man who heard their cries and answered when it seemed impossible amid the din of politics.
describes Islam as "anti-Christ" and Mohammed as "the mouthpiece of a conspiracy of spiritual evil."
Senator John McCain on Thursday rejected the endorsements of two prominent evangelical ministers whose backing he had sought to shore up his credentials with religious conservatives.
Mr. McCain repudiated the Rev. John C. Hagee, a televangelist, after a watchdog group released a recording of a sermon in which Mr. Hagee said Hitler and the Holocaust had been part of God’s plan to chase the Jews from Europe and drive them to Palestine.
Later in the day, he also rejected the endorsement of the Rev. Rod Parsley of the World Harvest Church of Columbus, Ohio, whose anti-Muslim sermons were broadcast on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Thursday.
The Yankees were upset when they found out about a promotion that would cast David Ortiz of the Red Sox as a modern-day Babe Ruth at Yankee Stadium during the All-Star Game festivities.
PRESCOTT, Ariz. -- Sen. John McCain championed legislation that will let an Arizona rancher trade remote grassland and ponderosa pine forest here for acres of valuable federally owned property that is ready for development, a land swap that now stands to directly benefit one of his top presidential campaign fundraisers.
A couple of weeks ago, John McCain talked about the importance of increasing the size of the U.S. military. To entice more volunteers, he said, the government should focus on incentives: “[O]ne of the things we ought to do is provide [the troops with] significant educational benefits in return for serving.”
A few days later, McCain announced that he’ll oppose a bipartisan measure to renew and expand the GI Bill for a new generation of veterans.
In fairness to PyschoPastor Hagee, his anti-Catholic screeds (calling the Church "The Great Whore" and the like) should not go unremarked. He's not merely an anti-semite. He hates everyone who doesn't think (I use the term loosely) like him.
Nor, despite the size of his congregation, is Hagee the real issue. McCain's character is. A fool who would actively seek out this loon's endorsement. A moral coward - yes, coward - who would equivocate about denouncing such ideas and the bigots who hold them.
Such a person is not a serious candidate for president. Which is not to say he has no chance; he does. But only if the mainstream media gets away with refusing to expose him for what he is. I hesitate to leap on the paranoid bus and say the media is actively suppressing knowledge of how crazy Hagee is in order to prop up McCain, but if Bruce Wilson's documentation of Hagee's intoleration - and McCain's refusal to dissociate himself with him - doesn't lead to headlines and tv news stories, then there is little choice but to think They are up to no good.
9/1/2007
Clinton Campaign Statement on the Four State Pledge
The following is a statement by Clinton Campaign Manager Patti Solis Doyle.
"We believe Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina play a unique and special role in the nominating process.
And we believe the DNC’s rules and its calendar provide the necessary structure to respect and honor that role.
Thus, we will be signing the pledge to adhere to the DNC approved nominating calendar.
It's likely that the next president will face at least one Supreme Court vacancy. Obama should promise Hillary Clinton, now, that if he wins in November, the vacancy will be hers, making her first on a list of one.
US Senator Edward M. Kennedy, the veteran lawmaker from Massachusetts who is the last surviving brother in the legendary Kennedy family, has been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor, his doctors said today.
[]
The usual course of treatment for the tumor -- a malignant glioma -- includes combinations of various forms of radiation and chemotherapy, Dr. Lee Schwamm, vice chairman of the neurology department at the hospital, and Dr. Larry Ronan, Kennedy's primary care physician, said in a statement.
The doctors said decisions regarding the best course of treatment for the 76-year-old senator would be determined after further testing and analysis.
But other specialists said that the diagnostic details released by the hospital indicated that Kennedy has terminal brain cancer and most likely less than three years to live -- perhaps much less.
"Unfortunately, it's a really serious tumor," said Dr. Patrick Wen, clinical director for neuro-oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Mass. General's description of the tumor as a malignant glioma probably means the tumor is at stage 3 or 4 on a four-point scale of severity, with 4 the most serious, Wen said.
"The average survival for a Grade 4 tumor is 14 or 15 months," he said. "For a Grade 3 tumor, it's two to three years. Unfortunately, the older you are, the worse it is. The biology of the tumor is worse, it's more aggressive."
Mass. General did not mention any plan to operate to remove the tumor, and specialists say that is probably because it is located in an area of the brain, the left parietal lobe, with many important functions, including speech and language. Tumors in this region can affect the ability to understand spoken and written words.
But that's just the tip of the McCain Lobbyists Express iceberg. McCain's campaign is run and bankrolled by the very lobbyists he claims to be free of.
Yesterday, his fifth campaign staffer was forced to quit in a week. This time one of his most important advisers, Tom Loeffler, self-jettisoned after reports that his lobbying firm had pulled in up to $US 15 million in fees from the Saudi Arabian Government since 2002.
McCain's campaign has also been guided by lobbyists. [Rick] Davis, the campaign manager, is a former lobbyist who represented major telecommunications companies. The campaign's senior adviser is Charles R. Black Jr., chairman of BKSH & Associates, which represents drug companies, an oil company, an automaker, a telecommunications company, defense contractors and the steel industry, among others.
Former congressman Tom Loeffler (R-Tex.) was brought in to shore up the campaign's finances and operations. Yet he maintains his day job as chairman of the Loeffler Group, whose clients include oil, auto and telecommunications companies, as well as a tobacco firm and an airline.
Other occasional McCain advisers include lobbyists Timothy P. McKone of AT&T, Robert S. Aiken of Phoenix-based Pinnacle West Capital, John W. Timmons of the Cormac Group and John Green of Ogilvy Government Relations. Also at Ogilvy is a major McCain fundraiser, Wayne L. Berman.
Their firms' clients have been a significant source of contributions to McCain's campaign. Executives for the clients of Ogilvy Government Relations gave at least $271,000 for McCain's presidential bid. Loeffler Group client employees donated $118,500, according to a Washington Post analysis. BKSH clients' executives gave $24,000.
Robert Aiken
Grant Aldonas
Philmore B. Anderson
Rebecca "Becky" Anderson
Stanton Anderson
Susan Auther Andres
Robert Asher
William J. Bailey III
William Ball III
David Beightol
Rhonda A. Bentz
Wayne Berman
Steve Betts
Charlie Black
Judy Black
Kirk Blalock
Carlos Bonilla
Christine Burgeson
Kerry Cammack
Kirsten Ardleigh Chadwick
Rob Chamberlin
Susan Charlton
John Clerici
Josephine "Jo" Cooper
James Courter
Bryan Cunningham
Alfonse D'Amato
Ashley Davis
Kurt Davis
Rick Davis
Mimi Dawson
John Diamond
Frank Donatelli
Melissa "Missy" Edwards
Kevin Fay
Christian Ferry
Chris Fidler
Thomas Jr. Fiorentino
Sally Furman
Samuel K. Geduldig
Ben Ginsberg
David Girard-di Carlo
Michael Glassner
Juleanna R. Glover Weiss
Phil Gramm
John Green
Janet M. Grissom
Wes Gullett
Kristen Gullott
Kent Hance
Robert Harding
Vicki Hart
Robert van Laer Hartwell
John D. Heubusch
Deborah Hohlt
Richard Hohlt
Gaylord T. Jr. Hughey
Peter Huntsman
Aleix Jarvis
Greg Jenner
Christine Jones
Nancy Johnson
Mary Kate Johnson
Ned Johnson
Charles N. Kahn III
Mike Kennedy
William Kilberg
Steve Kuykendall
William "Bill" Lesher
Jack Lichtenstein
Gail MacKinnon
Peter Madigan
Mary Mann
Paul Martino
Mary McAuliffe
John McGovern
Mike McKay
Timothy McKone
Alison H. McSlarrow
Kyle E. McSlarrow
Michael E. Meece
David A Metzner
Susan Molinari
John Munger
Ken Nahigian
Susan Nelson
Jack Oliver
Steve Perry
Nancy Mitchell Pfotenhauer
Steve Phillips
Elise Pickering
James L. Pitts
Timothy Powers
Anthony Principi
Michael Racy
Sloan W. Rappoport
James Rill
Steve Roman
Matt Salmon
Joseph Samora
Randy Scheunemann
Katie Stahl
Milly Stanges
Aquiles Suarez
Fife Symington
Jeri Thompson
Dirk W. Van Dongen
David Vennett
Raymond T. Jr. Wagner
Jeffrey Weiss
Richard "Dick" Wiley
Tony Williams
James Woolsey
Joseph Wright
Fred Zeidman
May 19, 2008: Jon Lester, vs. Kansas City
Sept. 1, 2007: Clay Buchholz, vs. Baltimore
April 27, 2002: Derek Lowe, vs. Tampa Bay
April 4, 2001: Hideo Nomo, at Baltimore
Sept. 16, 1965: Dave Morehead, vs. Cleveland
Aug. 1, 1962: Bill Monbouquette, at Chicago
June 26, 1962: Earl Wilson, vs. Los Angeles
July 14, 1956: Mel Parnell, vs. Chicago
Sept. 7, 1923: Howard Ehmke, at Philadelphia
June 3, 1918: Hub Leonard, at Detroit
June 23, 1917: Babe Ruth and Ernie Shore, vs. Washington
Aug. 30, 1916: Hub Leonard, vs. St. Louis
June 16, 1916: Rube Foster, vs. New York
July 19, 1911: Smokey Joe Wood, vs. St. Louis
June 30, 1908: Cy Young, at New York
Sept. 27, 1905: Bill Dinneen, vs. Chicago
Aug. 17, 1904: Jesse Tannehill, vs. Chicago
May 5, 1904: Cy Young, vs. Philadelphia
CHICAGO (May 15, 2008) -- U.S. Women’s National Team captain Christie Rampone had surgery yesterday morning to remove her gall bladder at the Little Company of Mary Hospital in Torrance, Calif. The procedure was performed by Dr. Craig Smith.
Rampone, who played the full 90 minutes against Canada on May 10 in the USA’s 6-0 victory over Canada at RFK Stadium, should be able to return to training in several weeks.
The laparoscopic surgery is deemed minor, but was necessary as Rampone had been suffering from abdominal pains. The surgery is usually done if the organ is inflamed or obstructed, and the incisions during the procedure are very small.
Paul Pierce had one of the biggest games of his career. He shot 56% from the floor and 91% from the line. On top of that he had 5 boards, 4 assists and 2 steals. And those assists don't account for the two times he got Leon Powe to the line. He was dialed in and even called the final 3 minutes the toughest 3 minutes of his life. Keep in mind the fact that he was brutally stabbed once and almost died. I'm assuming he's completely blocked that out.
All political art is propaganda (that is the point), but most political posters are bland, forgettable, wallpaper, like Fred Thompson on an off day. [Artist Shepard] Fairey wanted something more iconic -- aspirational, inspirational -- and cool. In other words, he wanted to make posters that the cool cats would want. The 2008 Democratic primary season equivalent of the Che poster (with all that implies). More Mao, more right now. The kind of poster that might make its way onto dorm room walls of fanboys. The kind of poster that might sell on eBay, as a signed Fairey Obama recently did, for $5,900. He wanted his posters to go viral.
"I wanted strong. I wanted wise, but not intimidating," Fairey says of the look for his Obamas. The agitprop pop art has become a must-have accessory among a certain subset of the candidate's supporters, who have gobbled up more than 80,000 of Fairey's posters and 150,000 postcard-size stickers since Super Tuesday.
President Bush's contentious nominee for the Federal Election Commission removed his name from consideration Friday, potentially ending a lengthy stalemate that had paralyzed the work of the agency.
Hans von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department official who never had Democratic support to win confirmation, withdrew his nomination, saying it was time for the protracted deadlock to end.
[]
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., welcomed von Spakovsky's withdrawal. Democrats have charged that von Spakovsky tried to suppress voter participation through new restrictions such as voter identification laws and voter roll purges.
"Democrats stood united in their opposition to von Spakovsky because of his long and well-documented history of working to suppress the rights of minorities and the elderly to vote," Reid said. "He was not qualified to hold any position of trust in our government."
To remind you of some of the lowlights of Spakovsky's career at the Justice Department: his attempt to disenfranchise thousands of voters in Arizona singlehandedly (and then his false testimony to Congress about that), his petty attempts to retaliate against Department employees who did not agree with his legal philosophy (and his contested testimony about that), and his advisory letters that led to restrictive voter roll policies in a number of states.
CLEVELAND - At times it felt like the Celtics had eight opponents on the floor last night instead of five.
Boston not only lost Game 6 to Cleveland, 74-69, but got the wrong end of the whistle, too. The Celtics were called for 25 personal fouls, while the Cavaliers got 16. Boston also shot just 13 free throws to 25 for the Cavaliers, including 15 by LeBron James.
That was, by far, the worst, most embarrassing performance by an officiating crew in the history of the NBA.
The only thing that comes even close is when they decided to give Dwayne Wade a few games in the NBA finals a few years ago.
LeBron James had more free throw attempts than the entire Celtic team. Which would have been okay—if the Celtics weren’t taking the ball to the hoop. But they WERE.
Paul Pierce couldn’t buy a call. Taking the ball to the hoop and drawing contact did nothing to help him.
I understand that Glen Davis is a rookie, but he was fouled seven times and didn’t make it to the line once. He was MUGGED under the hoop. Yet no call.
Kendrick Perkins was thrown off the spot when attempting a defensive rebound, no call. Yet he was constantly called on the other end for minimal contact.
I’m not rational right now.
I was ready to blast the Celtics for losing on the road again, or praise them for finally getting over the road hump.
But what I witnessed was not a basketball game. It was a WWE event, where they had a scripted outcome designed to build up the next episode, which is Game Seven in Boston on Sunday.
LeBron James is hard enough to beat by himself. He doesn’t need help.
Then he has the nerve to complain CONSTANTLY in the second half? Are you kidding me? He’s the most unenjoyable superstar since Reggie Miller. And unenjoyable isn’t even a word.
The NBA is broken. Completely and utterly broken.
.....exactly the kind of appalling attack that's divided the country and that alienates us from the world.....
If George Bush and John McCain want to have a debate about protecting the United States of America, that is a debate that I'm happy to have any time, any place, and that is a debate that I will win because George Bush and John McCain have a lot to answer for.
Appeasement, literally: calming, reconciling, acquiring peace by way of concessions or gifts...
Diplomacy is the art and practice of conducting negotiations between representatives of groups or states.
Two years ago, just after Hamas won the Palestinian parliamentary elections, I interviewed McCain for the British network Sky News's "World News Tonight" program. Here is the crucial part of our exchange:
I asked: "Do you think that American diplomats should be operating the way they have in the past, working with the Palestinian government if Hamas is now in charge?"
McCain answered: "They're the government; sooner or later we are going to have to deal with them, one way or another, and I understand why this administration and previous administrations had such antipathy towards Hamas because of their dedication to violence and the things that they not only espouse but practice, so . . . but it's a new reality in the Middle East. I think the lesson is people want security and a decent life and decent future, that they want democracy. Fatah was not giving them that."
WASHINGTON -- Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand became the sixth lawmaker to have a baby while serving in Congress when she gave birth to her second son Thursday morning.
Henry Nelson Gillibrand was born between 5 and 6 a.m. at Bethesda Naval Hospital in suburban Maryland, according to the congresswoman's office. Birth stats: 7 pounds, 14 ounces, 20 inches long.
Posts
All Comments
