Iraqi security forces are a mess

These are the folks who are going to stand up so we can stand down. Or not. More from ThinkProgress. Read the rest of this post...

More on Bush's bigoted Surgeon General nominee

Being gay is a "kind of mental sickeness" to Bush's Surgeon General nominee. Are Mary Cheney and Heather Poe sick?

...in 1991, Holsinger wrote a paper entitled the Pathophysiology of Male Homosexuality. In it, he makes a biological argument that gay sex is unnatural and unhealthy. He argues that, like male and female pipe fittings, certain body parts are designed for one another.

The paper has drawn wide criticism from gay-rights groups. They say it represents an out-dated view, even for 1991, of gay sex. The American Psychological Association, for example, removed homosexuality from its list of mental disorders in 1973....

Shortly after he submitted the paper, Holsinger withdrew from the committee. At the time, the committee was beginning to form its opinion, said the Rev. Phil Wogaman, who served on the committee and is now retired.

Most of the members wanted to remove language from church doctrine that said the church did not condone homosexuality and "considered its practice incompatible with Christian teaching," Wogaman said.

The majority believed that homosexuality, if practiced in a caring, committed relationship, was acceptable, Wogaman said. "When the majority was beginning to form its views, Dr. Holsinger was in strong disagreement with that and chose to leave the committee, in some anger," Wogaman said.

Holsinger opposed any recognition of homosexuality as normal, Wogaman said. "He took the view that it's pathological, that homosexuality is both sin and a kind of mental sickness," Wogaman said. "He was quite vocal about it."

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Gay bombs

Graphic designer Joe Graci sent me his reaction, above, to the recent news that the Pentagon had considered building bombs that make you gay. Read the rest of this post...

Did Bush's watch get stolen in Albania?

He now says he simply took it off while in the middle of shaking hands with people on the street. Uh, okay. Kind of an odd thing to do in the middle of shaking hands with people, take your watch off and pocket it. Unless of course you were afraid that someone you were shaking hands with was going to steal your watch. Which means the real question for Bush is, did you think the Albanians are all thieves? Or does he just find them kind of dirty and didn't want to mess up his watch? Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Possible hail in DC. Are grasshoppers next? Read the rest of this post...

More domestic spying from ATT?

A very troubling article in today's Los Angeles Times about AT&T;. You remember AT&T;, the company that "reportedly" let the US government spy on its own customers without a search warrant? Well, it may not surprise you to learn that AT&T; is now planning on making sure that the emails you send to family and friends don't contain things that corporate America might not like. How they plan to do that is anyone's guess. But it sure sounds like one possible way is prying into your emails to make sure you aren't attaching songs, tv clips, movie clips, or even, who knows, newspaper articles? Will they look at the video clips and photos and documents you send by email to make sure that they're really your private corporate work product, your communications with your attorney, or oh I don't know, a private sex video of you and your wife? What's next, AT&T; listening in to phone calls to make sure you don't slander anybody? How about reading my postal mail? After all, it's possible I'm sending a friend a pirated DVD. Hell, I may even be carrying that DVD on my person - perhaps we should institute mandatory body cavity searches on every street corner.

My favorite quote from the article, an AT&T; spokesman says that "once a[n anti-piracy] technology was chosen, the company would look at privacy and other legal issues." That's nice. Once AT&T; already decides how to pry into your online life, then they'll look at privacy and legal concerns. A bit like - hell, a lot like - consulting a lawyer after you've already committed to doing the crime.

But please don't tell the Democrats in Congress that privacy is a big and growing concern. They have other more important issues to deal with, like making sure that George Bush isn't mean to them. Read the rest of this post...

Justifiability versus wisdom

Atrios makes a point that is bizarrely overlooked these days: "After 9/11, the justifiability of our actions quickly got confused with the wisdom of them."

Whether we can do something, in terms of ability and/or legitimacy, is far less important than whether or not we should. This is true in a variety of arenas, but perhaps never more so than with foreign policy and defense.

There's been a lot of discussion recently about what We Must Do about Iran, a conversation that recently got a contribution from Crazy Uncle Joe, formerly sane Senator of the Connecticut for Lieberman party. Lieberman suggested that military action is the logical recourse if Iran does not respond to U.S. demands, apparently referring to repeated (though shaky) claims that Iran is significantly contributing to the insurgency in Iraq.

Now, I have no problem with U.S. power, and in the right hands, I think U.S. foreign policy, including the use of force when appropriate, can be a tremendous force for good. The idea, however, that the use of force is somehow an intrinsic good, is astonishing, especially in the face of the continuing Iraq debacle.

Even leaving aside the issue of precisely *what* we would bomb, what do these people think would happen if we attacked Iran? First of all, the Shia in Iraq would erupt, seriously threatening not only tens of thousands of soldiers, but our entire strategic posture with regard to supply lines and fortifications. Targeting Iran would worsen Iraq far more than it would help.

Regarding Iran itself, the regime clearly believes it needs a deterrent, and a nuclear weapon certainly is that. The lesson of Iraq for Iran was this: three countries were identified as the Axis of Evil. The one with nukes, North Korea, has escaped unscathed, even been offered incentives. One without nukes, Iraq, had its government overthrown. Not hard to imagine why Iran wants the bomb, and an attack on Iran would convince them that they don't need a deterrent . . . how, exactly?

What we are "justified" in doing is really less important than what would be, y'know, a good idea. No amount of posturing changes that fact. Read the rest of this post...

Democrats subpoena Harriet Miers and former Rove Deputy, Sara Taylor

CNN is reporting that subpoenas will be issued to key White House players in the U.S. Attorneys scandal: Harriet Miers and Sara Taylor.

No subpoena for Rove yet.

Has Harriet weighed in yet on her blog?

Update: The Senate Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Taylor. The House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Miers. Read the rest of this post...

GOP Sen. Olympia Snowe says Bush lost Senate for Republicans

Interesting article in today's edition of The Hill about how Bush is not the fundraising champ that he used to be. The first line says it all "Financial projections for the President’s Dinner tonight confirm that Republican confidence in the president is in a state of collapse."

That's pretty tough, but tucked into that piece are some harsh words, very harsh words about George Bush from Maine's Olympia Snowe. Keep in mind, she said this on the very day Bush trekked to Capitol Hill to plead his case for immigration. If what Snowe thinks is pervasive among her caucus, then Bush is in trouble. Now, Olympia Snowe isn't your average Republican Senator. She's somewhat moderate...way more moderate than any of the others, including her colleague from Maine, Susan Collins. But, Snowe gave the sense that Bush is leading Republicans off the cliff:

Bush visited the Senate Republicans’ weekly luncheon yesterday for the first time since September to build support for immigration reform. Lingering concerns about the president’s stubbornness and his stance on the controversial issue may undermine his outreach effort.

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) said she thinks her former GOP colleagues Sens. Mike DeWine (Ohio) and Lincoln Chafee (R.I.) lost reelection because of Bush’s unpopularity.

“It’s definitely because of the president and his policies, more from the standpoint of immovability and not being willing to adjust policies in response to real-time circumstances,” she said. “It wasn’t just the fact that things weren’t working well in Iraq, it was the president wasn’t willing to adjust his policy to recognize and acknowledge that.”

Last year’s losses at the polls have shaped her Republican colleagues’ view of the president in 2007, she said, adding, “All of that had manifested itself in ways this year, leading to concerns about the president’s policies.”

Snowe said that during yesterday’s meeting, her thought was that Republicans would still be the majority if not for Bush’s failures.

“What’s disconcerting is that Republicans shouldn’t be in the position of having lost the majority,” she said, adding that because of the president Republicans had an “uphill battle” running for reelection in New England last year.

Even after the 2006 election losses, most of the Republicans on the Hill are still willing to do Bush's dirty work. We'll see over the next couple weeks whether Republicans stick with Bush on Iraq. My bet is they will. Read the rest of this post...

Senate planning more votes on Iraq policy

Senate Democrats are planning a series of votes over the next couple weeks on Iraq. They're going to start the pressure on Bush and the GOP again. The main problem has been the Bush-protectionist Republican Senators -- and that includes Joe Lieberman.

The GOPers have blocked every reasonable proposal to curtail Bush's war. Bush is leading them on a political death march, and they're happily following. The American people have had it with the Iraq war. Over the next couple weeks, we'll see if they GOPers are still sticking with Bush and his failed Iraq policy:

The first amendment, crafted chiefly by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), mandates the start of a troop withdrawal from Iraq within 120 days of passage. The second amendment, crafted chiefly by Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), would set strong troop readiness standards and ensure a minimum period between Iraq deployments.

The third amendment, a hotly sought goal of Reid’s that was crafted chiefly by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), would block spending on a future military presence in Iraq after April 2008, save for troops on counter-terrorism and training missions.

A possible fourth vote could come on revoking Congress’s original 2002 war authorization, a tactic favored by many but agreed upon by few. Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) has suggested “de-authorization” followed by a new, targeted mission, while Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) have suggested forcing President Bush to seek a new authorization from Congress.

It'll be pretty clear where Senators stand on Iraq after these votes.

Meanwhile, Baghdad is under a curfew:

Early morning blasts Wednesday destroyed two minarets at the same Shiite shrine in Samarra where an attack last year demolished the mosque's gilded dome and plunged the country into a wave of deadly sectarian violence.

The 9 a.m. explosions at the revered Askariya shrine in Samarra, about 65 miles north of Baghdad, is the sort of event that could spark a spiral of retaliatory bloodshed. U.S. officials have long worried that a major attack in Iraq could lead to uncontrollable bloodletting and undo recent gains in reducing violence made by the addition of thousands of extra U.S. troops stationed at high-profile posts on the streets of Baghdad and elsewhere.

Read the rest of this post...

Wednesday Morning Open Thread

Just suffered through watching Senator Lindsey Graham on the Today Show. Immigration has become the great intra-GOP debate. The Republicans been doing ugly politics for so long they don't know how to do real policy.

Get it started. Read the rest of this post...

Two weights, two measures for Romney and pardons

Decorated Iraq war veteran guilty of shooting a BB gun at age 13 was rejected for a pardon by Romney, though the recently convicted Libby, would be worth considering for a pardon. The primary difference here being that Libby is the right wing favorite at the moment and we all know how much Romney loves to play a crowd if it wins him a few points whereas the war vet is just a regular person who honorably served the country and even received a Bronze Star while in Iraq. Another day, another changing position by Mitt. Read the rest of this post...

The Independent responds to Blair attacks

Editor Simon Kelner asks the right question: Would you be saying this, Mr Blair, if we supported your war in Iraq? Kelner also points out how Blair was not even able to say the word "Iraq" during his attack, instead broadly mentioning the Middle East, clearly an indication of Blair's own discomfort with his failed venture not to mention the unpopularity of the war. Blair should have saved his energy for actual policy and not right wing talking points.

But, after 10 years of the Blair administration, a decade of spin and counter-spin, of dodgy dossiers, of 45-minute warnings, of burying bad news, of manipulation and misinformation, we feel that the need to interpret and comment upon the official version of events is more important than ever. And we are confident that our readers can differentiate between news and opinion.

Other UK media sources chimed in as well, including even SkyTV which is owned by Rupert Murdoch. Responses have all been negative for Blair, ranging from "bizarre" to "sour grapes." Read the rest of this post...

EU warns on air travel privacy data

There have been enough abuses in recent years, not to mention the continuing problem of both government and industry to properly store data, to give the European Union enough to cause hesitation with providing a blank check to the US.

"More and more statements are being made by leaders and representatives of member states which seem to suggest that rights afforded by privacy and data protection legislation are viewed as incompatible with security and justice," Hustinx said.

This is not an either or situation. It is also not a matter of caving to the Bush administration on every issue related to security because there has been plenty of that in the past as we are now discovering with the CIA flights in Europe. Of course, everyone wants security but there is also nothing wrong or improper with asking questions or safeguarding personal privacy. It is definitely possible to have both security and privacy. Read the rest of this post...