Ohio is a GOP cesspool

Okay, I admit a certain obsession with Ohio. And, of course, it relates to the election. I'm not over it.

The Toledo Blade has been all over the growing GOP rare coin scandal. The story in today's paper gives a great overview of the whole mess...and how all of the state's top GOP leaders are tied in to it.

For starters, top GOP fundraiser, Tom Noe, who was the Bush campaign fundraising guru in Ohio, had to quit a couple of plum appointments(oh yeah, Noe is facing both state and federal investigations):

A day after the state said it would pull $50 million in investments managed by Toledo area coin dealer Tom Noe, he resigned yesterday from both the Ohio Turnpike Commission and the Ohio Board of Regents.

Gov. Bob Taft said he did not request the resignations, but he did accept them.

Governor Taft, who defended Noe's rare coin debacle, had to change his position:

The governor struck a different tone yesterday, following additional reports by The Blade, which reported the loss and possible theft of 121 state-owned coins. Other stories revealed that one of Mr. Noe’s coin-fund managers, who caused the loss of $650,000 in state funds, had a felony record.

"But as more and more information came to light, it became evident that insufficient safeguards were in place to protect public money — specifically, the inadequate controls of inventory, the failure to perform background checks on associates,” Governor Taft said. “I became increasingly concerned about the security of the fund as more information came to light.”

Sounds like the Dems. are all over this one -- laying the scandal on the GOP leadership:

Senate Democrats had assignments for all of the Republicans who control every statewide executive post: Governor Taft, Attorney General Jim Petro, Auditor Betty Montgomery, Treasurer Jennette Bradley, and Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell.

Three of them — Mr. Petro, Mr. Blackwell, and Ms. Montgomery — are running for their party’s nomination for governor in 2006 and none would talk to The Blade yesterday.

LOL. Of course they don't want to talk about this...all the more reason for the Democrats to keep it up.

I have a feeling this scandal is going to stick around...and, if they can be so ballsy as to invest 50 million dollars into a risky scheme proposed by their biggest fundraiser, well, then are undoubtedly other scandals waiting to be discovered.

Okay, thanks for allowing me to indulge in my Ohio obsession. Read the rest of this post...

Tomorrow's the big dinner for DeLay

And tomorrow's NY Times has part of the guest list. No real surprises (except not many of his House colleagues)....mostly it's just the worst of the worst:

Instead, the attendees will seem like a who's who of the right, including the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition; Ken Melhman, the chairman of the Republican National Committee; and his predecessor, Ed Gillespie.

Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, a Christian conservative advocacy group, is among the hosts, as is Paul M. Weyrich, considered a founding father of the modern conservative movement. Dr. James C. Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family, will pay homage to Mr. DeLay by videotape.

This being Washington, some lobbyists are still expected, among them Mr. Keene; Charlie Black, a Republican strategist with close ties to the White House; and Cleta Mitchell, who met Mr. DeLay when she ran an organization advocating term limits for lawmakers - an idea he vehemently opposed.

Funny thing is, most members of the House aren't attending. Some, like Melissa Hart, maybe were initially, but aren't now. Somehow, there was confusion with Hart's response to the American Conservative Union...you know...that whole yes/no thing really catches people off guard:

"They were confused," Ms. Hart said Wednesday, after organizers of the event said they were initially told that she would attend. "My initial response was no."

The sparse attendance by House members, and the miscommunication about Ms. Hart, suggest the delicate nature of having a dinner in Mr. DeLay's honor.

"Delicate nature" -- you think? But, doesn't it sound like a really fun night? Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Chat, please...

and, if you get a sec, check out Raw Story's latest on Bolton. Remember, if the GOP theocrats say sex is an issue, it's an issue for their people, too. Read the rest of this post...

Mayor West Speaks: he's been "brutally" outed

AP is reporting that long-time anti-gay legislator, Mayor Jim West, is not a happy camper. Seems he has been "brutally" outed:

In an e-mail sent to nearly 140 people affiliated with a race relations task force, West wrote that the group is responsible for making Spokane a community where "harassment, intimidation, discrimination" are unacceptable.

"Does that include people who have an internal struggle with who they are sexually and are searching for a way to come out ... ?" wrote West, who is co-chairman of the task force. "Do others who desire to be out but are having similar struggles now live in greater fear because of a brutal outing?"

Um, Jim, when you are getting around as much as you did, and playing constantly on gay.com, you're kinda putting yourself "out" there. You brutally outed yourself. There are so many other things that come to mind, but it was said best by a fellow Spokane resident:

Mike Kress, vice chairman of the Spokane Human Rights Commission, suggested that West's plea for understanding rang hollow because of West's many votes against gay rights as a politician.

"The hypocrisy, cynicism and lies upon which Mr. West built his political career harmed homosexuals in our state, and his sexual orientation is thus a legitimate topic for discussion," Kress wrote in an opinion piece in Wednesday's Spokesman-Review.

Jim, Jim, Jim, you really don't get it. There are a lot of gay men and women in Washington State who don't have simple basic guaranteed rights because of Jim West's legislative history. You were in a position to make things happen.

See, Jim, it's like this, you not only didn't help...you aggressively worked against the GLBT community -- and seemed to relish it. You don't like the gay community. You've said that over and over. So, now, don't come asking for sympathy. Read the rest of this post...

Jesus Bush Fish....I wish this was a joke

Wonkette exposes the latest linkage between Bush and Jesus:



Who says it's not a theocracy? Read the rest of this post...

NCFR -- still bigoted sell-outs, but almost sorry about it.

The National Council on Family Relations is frankly a little suprised that people are so upset with them. You remember NCFR -- the group that's putting together the White House's next version of the online debacle 4parents.gov -- but this time on straight-only marriage. That's right, research on gay marriage is verboten on the federally-funded marriage research clearinghouse NCFR is putting together.

And they're breaking their own rules about discrimination and banning their own research on gay marriage to do it. I guess if you index for inflation, thirty pieces of silver is worth about $5 million today -- the value of the contract the Bush White House is giving NCFR.

Apparently a lot of NCFR members are pissed too, so NCFR Board members sent a letter out with some startling and curious admissions:

From last April (2004), when Michael Benjamin, the Executive Director of NCFR, told the Board he was considering seeking a grant for a Healthy Marriage Clearinghouse... We anticipated controversy surrounding this project, but we regret to admit that we did not anticipate the intensity of the reactions.

Well, duh. They only rejected their own stated values to score a government contract. Why should anyone be pissed about that? Then they quote a letter they sent to HHS regarding 4parents.gov -- they didn't sign on to the letter every sane organization in the world signed, but apparently sent their own:

We believe that government sponsored websites should contain information that reflects the state of the science -- and when there is not consensus among scientists, then the diversity of findings should be represented on the site. The website should reflect what is known, what is unknown, and what is disputed.

Unless it's information about gay marriage. On a marriage clearinghouse website. Scheduled to go live in June. That they're developing.

Michael Benjamin (email mbenjamin@ncfr.org , phone (202) 659-1190 ) is NCFR's executive director and the primary investigator on the project. He's the guy responsible for breaking NCFR's own rules and banning his group's own research from the clearinghouse. Maybe he needs another reminder of the rules:

NCFR's Executive Director shall not allow practices, activities, decisions, or organizational circumstances which violate the Board's value that NCFR provide a context supportive of diversity by race, ethnicity, culture, age, gender, religion, physical ability, country of origin, and sexual orientation.

Maybe he just forgot the last three words.

Their own rules. Their own research. Their own letters.

Their own stubborn, arrogant, bigoted hypocrisy. Read the rest of this post...

Breaking News: White House and U.S. Capitol Evacuated

CNN is reporting that the White House and U.S. Capitol were evacuated a few minutes ago. I heard the F-16s flying over a few minutes ago.

UPDATE 12:18 p.m.: The all clear was sounded....apparently a plane violated air space over D.C. which is what brought out the jets. And they were loud.

ANOTHER UPDATE 12:31 p.m.: Bush wasn't at the White House. He's out riding his bike. Hey, it is a beautiful day here....what would you expect him to be doing?

Reading My Pet Goat? Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

There's a lot swirling around this week while John is in Morocco.... Read the rest of this post...

Now it's Dept. of Agriculture paying for propaganda

USA Today has another story about the Bush Administration's foibles today. Add the Department of Agriculture to the list of Bush agencies which paid for good press. When the government does that, it's called propaganda. These people are shameless and apparently there are no repercussions:

A third federal agency has admitted it paid a journalist to write favorable stories about its work. Documents released by the Agriculture Department show it paid a freelance writer $9,375 in 2003 to "research and write articles for hunting and fishing magazines describing the benefits of NRCS (Natural Resources Conservation Service) programs."

Three articles by the writer, Dave Smith, appeared late last year in two magazines aimed at hunting and fishing enthusiasts: Outdoor Oklahoma, published by that state's Department of Wildlife Conservation, and Washington-Oregon Game & Fish, published by Primedia.

Neither identified Smith as having been paid by the government. The stories focused on how money from a 2002 agricultural subsidy bill had been used to help preserve wetlands that hunting and fishing enthusiasts enjoy in Oklahoma and the Northwest.

Smith, a biologist by profession who now works for the NRCS in Montana, said Tuesday that the magazines knew he'd been paid by the Agriculture Department. "I clearly spelled out to them," in writing, "that I'd been hired to do this," he said. He said the magazines did not pay him for the articles. "I knew I couldn't be paid by them" since he'd already been compensated, Smith said.

Are we ever going to find out every press person who is on the Bush payroll? C'mon, this scandal erupted a couple months ago when Armstong Williams was outed as being a paid shill for the GOP. And, the info. is still dribbling out. Didn't Congress have hearings on this already? Read the rest of this post...

Will the Coalition of the Going grow soon?

It looks like the Japanese are seriously considering leaving and of course, Italy appears to be leaning in that direction as well. With Blair getting slapped in the election we may see cutbacks there as well. Yes, it's hard to imagine anyone wanting to leave such a peaceful and well planed venture but what can you do? Read the rest of this post...

Ridge Comes Clean: Terror Alerts based on "flimsy" evidence

Okay, this is rich. If we had a real Congress, there would be investigations. There would be outrage. USA Today reports on what most of us suspected, that the terror alert was often raised based on "flimsy" evidence:

The Bush administration periodically put the USA on high alert for terrorist attacks even though then-Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge argued there was only flimsy evidence to justify raising the threat level, Ridge now says.

Ridge, who resigned Feb. 1, said Tuesday that he often disagreed with administration officials who wanted to elevate the threat level to orange, or "high" risk of terrorist attack, but was overruled.

His comments at a Washington forum describe spirited debates over terrorist intelligence and provide rare insight into the inner workings of the nation's homeland security apparatus.

Yep, Tom Ridge admits it. So, the obvious question is why were the terror alerts raised if it wasn't based on real evidence. Was it politics? And which "administration officials" made the call? John Ashcroft? Karl Rove?

So all the red state voters who thought Bush would keep them safe...the GOP played them perfectly. The propoganda of fear....Joseph Goebbels would be proud. Read the rest of this post...

Good Morning, Morocco

Still in Morocco, hard at work, and it's difficult to imagine that the US has such problems in this region when you get to know the people. Some of the nicest people EVER live in this country. It's my second trip - I was here years before - and it is truly amazing the Moroccan smile. These people have a wide, toothy grin of a smile that could lift heart on the saddest day. Really great folks, and I'd daresay, the American psyche gets along quite well with the Moroccan - well, at least the Greek (or Mediterranean American) one. They're a nice, cool, laid back people. Again, it's so hard to imagine how bad things are between the various worlds out there when you meet the people and everything is just so cool. Sigh.

I've only got Internet access once a day or so, thus the infrequent postings until this weekend, then I'm online a lot. More later.

JOHN Read the rest of this post...

Grenade discovered close to where Bush spoke in Georgia

Some may criticize the security services there for missing something so serious, but of course they were busy looking for Democrats or individuals who wanted to ask an unscripted question for Bush. After all, it's people asking questions who are the real problem. Read the rest of this post...

Preacher Who Kicked out Dems. Quits

Damn, I wanted him to lose his tax-exempt status. But, now, we'll hear how he was forced out by the liberals or something like that. Poor guy, if only the GOP theocracy was in complete control already.

No, instead, the North Carolina preacher, who kicked out members of his flock who didn't vote for Bush, quit today, according to the Associated Press:

A Baptist preacher who was accused of forcing nine members to leave his church because they refused to support President Bush said on Tuesday that he was stepping down.

"For me to remain now would only cause more hurt for me and my family," the preacher, the Rev. Chan Chandler, said as he left a meeting at East Waynesville Baptist Church.

Congregants of the 100-member church have said that Mr. Chandler endorsed Mr. Bush from the pulpit during last year's presidential campaign and said that anyone who planned to vote for the Democratic nominee, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, needed to "repent or resign."

See, in his whacko world, those pesky rules really shouldn't apply to Reverend Chandler because he opposes abortion. He'll become some kind of martyr for the radical right wing nuts. We'll hear that if the Senate could just end the filibuster, Chandler would have nothing to worry about. He'd still have his job and those pagan Democrats would be gone.

Chandler will probably be the poster boy for the nuclear option, because it's the evil filibuster that stands in the way of the theocracy. And, in the GOP theocracy, all politics will be religion and all religion will be politics. Read the rest of this post...