AP on Tsunami donations: "Bush himself plans to make a personal donation but has not done so yet."

What an ass. And yes, I already donated days ago. Read More......

Late evening open thread

I still can't believe the Dems have already signaled they're going to confirm Gonzales. Have they no shame? Read More......

Democrats with balls

Brilliant new ad campaign. How the Dems are giving this criminal a slide is beyond me. Torture, folks. The man is an architect of the Abu Ghraib scandal, so we make him attorney general. Orwell - or Stalin - party of one? Read More......

Frist caught lying about filibuster

Via Kos, via Atrios, we discover that the good Senator supported a filibuster against one of Clinton's judicial nominees, then lied about it on CBS the other week. Frist and other have called filibusters unconstitutional and a tool of radicals. That means Frist knowingly committed an unconstitutional act while serving in the Senate, and he's a radical unfit for office. I hope Frist plans to resign soon. Or at the very least, again if we actually had a left-wing to speak of, this should be the issue the GOP is confronted with EVERY SINGLE TIME the issue of filibsters and/or Bush's judicial nominees is raised in the future. Ask why it's okay for Senator Frist but not for the Democrats?

Again, if we actually had a left-wing in this country that did anything, this would be the end of the debate. Having said that, two point to the organization that found this. Not let's see if anyone can make it stick. Read More......

Krugman on Social Security privatization

Paul Krugman, NYT:

he people who hustled America into a tax cut to eliminate an imaginary budget surplus and a war to eliminate imaginary weapons are now trying another bum's rush. If they succeed, we will do nothing about the real fiscal threat and will instead dismantle Social Security, a program that is in much better financial shape than the rest of the federal government...

The long-term cost of the Bush tax cuts is five times the budget office's estimate of Social Security's deficit over the next 75 years. The botched prescription drug bill passed in 2003 does more, all by itself, to increase the long-run budget deficit than the projected rise in Social Security expenses.

Of course, it would have happened if Tom Daschle and the other Dems-in-Name-Only hadn't voted for Bush's inane tax cut (you'll recall that Daschle, may he not rest in peace, was the profile in courage who countered Bush's ridiculous large $1.6 trillion tax cut proposal with a $1.3 trillion tax cut proposal of his own). Read More......

Open thread

Just got in. Checking my email now. Read More......

BREAKING NEWS: Staples drops advertising on Sinclair news shows

This just in from Media Matters. Staples has decided to stop all its advertising on Sinclair-owned TV networks news programs as a result of complaints from Media Matters and other concerned citizens. You'll recall that Sinclair is the notoriously pro-Bush media outlet that ran decided to run the anti-Kerry movie right before the election.

This is Staples' statement, courtesy of Media Matters:

We appreciate your inquiry concerning this issue. As a result of Staples ongoing review of its advertising media activity, Staples will no longer be airing advertising on any Sinclair stations news programs as of Jan 10, 2005. Thank you for your patience concerning this matter.

Steve Staples Customer Service Supervisor

Contact Staples and thank them, because the Republicans are going to flip out over this. While they should stop advertising on Sinclair across the board, it's still good that they're sending the message about boycotting the news programs. That doesn't look good for Sinclair, and only puts more pressure on other businesses to do the same.

Email: support@orders.staples.com
phone : 1-800-3STAPLE (1-800-378-2753) fax : 1-800-333-3199

Read more about Media Matters' Sinclair campaign here, and let's take on the next advertiser. It's about time we gave the right a taste of their own medicine. Read More......

When it comes to body armor, it's the thought that counts

Wonkette catches Bush by the, er, balls. Read More......

To Bush, politics is the "ultimate sacrifice"

Yesterday, at the White House, Bush told the new Members of Congress that politics is "the ultimate sacrifice."

I want to welcome you all here; Laura and I are so thrilled you're here. We want to welcome your spouses. I particularly want to say a thanks to your spouse for having supported your run for the Congress or the Senate. Laura and I know how hard it is on a family to be in the political arena. It's the ultimate sacrifice, really: sacrifice your privacy; it's a sacrifice of time with your kids. But you're going to find it's worthwhile -- serving this great country is an unbelievable honor, and both the elected official and the spouse are serving our great country.

Maybe this explains why the Bush Administration isn't all that concerned about the troops not having the appropriate armor in Iraq.

I bet, and this is just a hunch, that there are probably around 1500 families in America who think sending their loved one to die in Iraq was "the ultimate sacrifice." That really inhibits your privacy and the time you can spend with your kids. Read More......

Open thread

Any ethics rules you'd like to be exempt from? Read More......

And what happened then? Well...in Whoville they say, that the Grinch's small heart grew THREE times that day

The Republican National Committee caved after we exposed their stinginess about not even reporting on the Tsunami on their Web site, let alone not soliciting donations for relief (unlike the Democratic National Committee Web site which already had Tsunami relief front and center). But in all fairness to the RNC, maybe they just didn't want to get ahead of their president, who also couldn't care less about the disaster.

Before



After



It's a small victory, but it shows we can get under their skin. Read More......

The other shoe drops on House ethics vote

We were right. According to this article, the House GOP simply dropped a few of the most controversial provisions but IS STILL moving ahead with the rest of its plan to gut the ethic rules:

The proposals will make it harder to proceed with an ethics investigation by requiring a majority vote of the evenly divided ethics committee. The current system allows an investigation to begin automatically if there is no action within 45 days.

So now the GOP has as say as to whether there's an ethics committee investigation of a GOP member. Good way to kill any investigation in the future.

Among other provisions of the package, lawmakers and their staff would be able to take a relative along on lobbyist-financed trips. Currently, they can be accompanied only by a spouse or child.

Well isn't that nice. Now mom and dad, or sister and brother, can receive gifts from lobbyists too. Phew! Imagine members of Congress and their staff having to survive all these years without bringing mom and dad on business trips.

Now I'm wondering what else they've snuck in this rule change. But we were right. They were up to something. Drop a few of the most controversial provisions, then pass the rest of the crap. Slimy slimy slimy. Read More......

Virginia is a fucking hateful state

It really is time we took one state as an example and boycotted the hell out of it. What is is it with this state? Beautiful country, but what a bunch of bigots it has in government. No wonder that Virginia was the state that argued in FAVOR of miscegenation laws in the Supreme Court back in the late 60s. Apparently prejudice is a Virginia family value.

I really mean it. We need to cut this state off at the knees and finally set an example for other states.From 365gay.com:

Virginia lawmakers will consider legislation to amend the state constitution to ban same-sex marriage in the new session of the legislature.

The state is one of what is expected to be up to a dozen states to take up the issue following voter approval in 11 states last November of similar amendments.

But, the legislature will also look at a measure that would put the marriage issue on license plates. The bill calls for traditional marriage to be displayed on car licenses. If passed the plates would interlocked gold wedding bands superimposed over a red heart over the legend "Traditional Marriage."

Read More......

Selfish, family-hating, blue state Hollyweird donating for tsunami relief

Surely those good Christians in the Red States are pitching in as well because we know how much they care for mankind and those Hollywood types are all greedy.
Read More......

UK private donations hit $144M

Wow! Talk about generous, the Brits are really digging deep. I hope to see Clinton and Senior round up even more but this is pretty impressive from a country of 60M people.
Read More......

Back online, what's the deal with...

After a two week visit with my family in the Philadelphia area, I'm back home and online again. This was my first visit back to the US in about a year and I now am wondering if the American flag-ribbon that says "Support The Troops" is a standard issue for all SUVs. Gee, I thought that since we are a nation at war and the Prez talks about sacrifice I might actually see a little but apparently not. Somehow the ribbon-sticker that says "I volunteered to send my son/daughter/grandchild/self/etc. to Iraq" just never made it. I guess as long as it's someone elses kid it's all OK.

What's the deal with all of the advertisements both in magazines and TV for pharmaceuticals? It seems like they have way too much money to be spending.

The media really was gentle on the administration after the tsumani disastor and helped promote the "Bush may be cheap but corporate America is taking care of it" line. I couldn't stop laughing with one article that talked about corporate America pitching in and then it proceded to include a few European businesses in that list of "US" companies. Funny how it was only US businesses that were pitching in. Rah, rah...Go USA! We're #1!

Thankfully my father did not watch Faux News (at least around me) but I did have to suffer through a few evenings of NBC Nightly News. Their Iraq coverage was about what I would have expected from People Magazine...piss poor.

It is impossible to watch TV in the US with all of the TV commercials. Wasn't cable supposed to take care of that?

The Barnes Foundation is excellent. My eight year old neice Kara asked my wife "how come there are so many paintings of naked women?" The answer of course is "because there were so many men who painted." BTW, no, the third grader was not traumatized by the paintings. We all survived.

As noted earlier below, what's the deal with the Eternal Reign Bush Family? I couldn't help but think of this while visiting the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall when the guide talked about the Kings of England who were born into their position. Hmmmmm.
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GOP caves to pressure...WOW

As John notes below, the House GOP reversed course on ethics today. Apparently, it became clear that they were heading towards Tom DeLay's House of Corruption.

I got a kick out of this quote in the AP article from John's post:

Brendan Daly, spokesman for House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, said Republicans pulled back on the discipline rule because "the issue simply became too hot for them to handle."

If the issue became too hot for the Republicans, it was because of the activists...led by the bloggers...kudos especially to Josh Marshall at TPM. The bloggers put pressure on House offices after the earlier DeLay vote. No one else was aggressively challenging House Republicans to find out how they voted behind closed doors.

The Democrats in the House should learn from this. The grassroots wants the Democrats to fight back. The GOP caves in to public pressure even if it means fucking with DeLay. So, while they are all patting themselves on the back up on the Hill, they should really learn to be an opposition party. Read More......