Sex toy fans prefer George W. Bush in bed (not kidding)

From NCBuy Weird News:

George W. Bush may be a conservative, but he has liberal sex appeal with the ladies.

Case in point: He's the presidential candidate that women most want to bed, according to a survey by an online sex toy company.

Forty-five percent of the 1000 proud sex toy fans who answered the MyPleasure.com poll chose Bush, compared to 33 percent who prefer John Kerry as their fantasy bedroom buddy.

As for vice-presidential candidates, John Edwards gets the motor revving for 18 percent of the women polled, while Dick Cheney brings up the rear with only 3.5 percent.

You may find it unusual that sex toy users pick a conservative as their ultimate presidential sex partner, and you're not alone.

MyPleasure.com founder/sexologist Sandor Gardos admits surprise at the survey results, adding: "We assumed the sex toy buying audience might lean to the left politically. Clearly, we were wrong. It just goes to show you, whether you are Republican or Democrat, everyone loves sex."

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Salon.com details alleged atrocities in Vietnam.

One point that's been nagging me throughout the entire Swift Boat affair is that I thought the Vietnam war was pretty well discredited. I thought it was historical fact that our soldiers did some pretty nasty things over there. So then, how were the Swift Boat Veterans successfully using Kerry's criticism of the war against him when most Americans are critical of the war?

Even more importantly, the newest Swift Boat commercial includes a quote from John Kerry's 1971 testimony in which he summarized the atrocities Vietnam vets had told him they'd done in Vietnam. Are the Swift Boat boys claiming that Kerry lied in his summation, that the Vets never claimed to have committed these atrocities? Not at all. They can't call Kerry a liar because his summation was correct.

Salon.com has just published the details of the crimes alleged by the men who spoke to Kerry (excerpts below). It's clear that Kerry's testimony in 1971 was not just accurate, but damn heroic considering the extent of the crimes being alleged. Criticizing John Kerry for speaking out about these alleged crimes is akin to criticizing Abu Ghraib investigators for trying to find out what really happened at that prison.

Oh yeah, I forgot. The Republicans DID criticize folks for trying to get to the bottom of Abu Ghraib, where people were raped and abused not unlike the way they were in Vietnam.

Why is the media not reporting on the REAL ATROCITIES that were alleged to have occurred in Vietnam, and why aren't they demanding the Swift Boat boys either fess up that Kerry told the truth, or shut up?

I've strung together some excerpts from the Salon.com article:

Kerry's April 1971 testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: "They had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads ... randomly shot at civilians ... cut off limbs, blown up bodies ... razed villages in a fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan ... crimes committed on a day-to-day basis ... ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam."

Take a close look at what Kerry said to the Senate committee. He was summarizing testimony given publicly at the so-called Winter Soldier Investigation of Jan. 31-Feb. 2, 1971, presented by Vietnam Veterans Against the War, in Detroit. One hundred five Vietnam veterans testified there. Seventy-one of them said they were eyewitnesses to war crimes of the sort Kerry later mentioned. Thirteen said that they themselves had committed war crimes.

These veterans testified to rape; to torture and the killing of prisoners; to the torching of Vietnamese homes and whole villages. In sickening detail they filled in the blanks -- as the Pentagon was itself unwilling to do -- to put to work this sentence from a U.S. Army field manual: "Every violation of the law of war is a war crime."

The cutting off of heads -- on Operation Stone -- there was a Lt. Colonel there and two people had their heads cut off and put on stakes and stuck in the middle of the field.

Before we went out on the operation we were told not to waste our heat tablets on food but to save them for the villages because we were going to destroy all the villages and we didn't give the people any time to get out of the villages. We just went in and burned them and if people were in the villages yelling and screaming, we didn't help them. We just burned the houses as we went.

People cut off ears and when they'd come back in off of an operation you'd make deals before you'd go out and like for every ear you cut off someone would buy you two beers, so people cut off ears. The torturing of prisoners was done with beatings and I saw one case where there were two prisoners. One prisoner was staked out on the ground and he was cut open while he was alive and part of his insides were cut out and they told the other prisoner if he didn't tell them what they wanted to know they would kill him. And I don't know what he said because he spoke in Vietnamese but then they killed him after that anyway."

I looked out across the field and I spotted a Vietnamese woman peasant running away from the ship. I fired a burst of about six or seven rounds into her back before we fired, before we hit the ground. When I was being questioned as to what happened about two weeks later by a captain in my company, I told him what we did and what I did. We both had a good laugh about it. That was pretty much company policy. Also in Hue, during the Tet offensive in '68, I observed American fighters and bombers (Phantoms) dropping bombs and napalm into very crowded streets full of civilians. I don't know how many people were wiped out in that place.

"...kids 4 years old, ranging up to 16 years old, came around the fence to sell GIs cigarettes, or candy, or beg for food, they were CSed. And what I mean is they were gassed. This didn't happen just once, it happened constantly,

We encountered a large amount of civilian population. The civilian population was brought out to one end of the village, and the women, who were guarded by a squad and a squad leader at that time, were separated. I might say the young women were separated from their children and the older women and the older men, the elderly men. They were told at gunpoint that if they did not submit to the sexual desires of any GI who was there guarding them, they would be shot for running away.

Two men were leading a young girl, approximately 19 years old, very pretty, out of a hootch. She had no clothes on so I assumed she had been raped, which was pretty SOP, and she was thrown onto the pile of the 19 women and children, and five men, around the circle, opened up on full automatic with their M-16s.

Regarding throwing people out of helicopters, I only saw one incident to this ... There were five Vietnamese people. I do not know if they were civilians, Viet Cong or Viet Cong suspects. Three of them were wounded, had bandages on their bodies and their legs and their arms looked in bad shape. The other two were older men, somewhere around 50 years old. The lieutenant from the armored personnel carrier and the captain from the chopper helped place these people in the helicopter. He got in the helicopter and took off. He got a couple of hundred feet up and three bodies came out.

The Toledo Blade won a Pulitzer Prize for its October 2003 series about killings committed by an elite U.S. Army "Tiger Force" unit in the course of a seven-month period in 1967. "Elderly farmers were shot as they toiled in the fields. Prisoners were tortured and executed -- their ears and scalps severed for souvenirs. One soldier kicked out the teeth of executed civilians for their gold fillings," the Blade reported. "Investigators concluded that 18 soldiers committed war crimes ranging from murder and assault to dereliction of duty. But no one was charged."

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John McLaughlin blasts GOP platform: "It's not compassionate conservatism"

McLaughlin Group, Saturday, August 28, 2004

Eleanor Clift: The [GOP Convention prime time] stage will be full of moderates who could never win a Republican primary, who do not represent the basic values expressed in the Republican platform.

John McLaughlin: You're correct.

Clift: It's a total fraud.

McLaughlin: Well it's also an abolitionist document. Ban gay marriage, ban civil unions benefits, ban abortion. It's a series of bans. It's not compassionate conservatism.

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Michael Moore proposes an ad campaign for Bush

ANNOUNCER: "Mr. Kerry's biggest supporter, Sen. Max Cleland, claims to have lost two legs and an arm in Vietnam. But he still has one arm! How did that happen? One word: Cowardice. When duty called, he was unwilling to give his last limb. Is that the type of selfishness you want hanging out in the White House? We think not. Vote for the man who would be willing to give America his right frontal lobe. Vote Bush." - MichaelMoore.com

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Bush says Bible is his favorite book

Once upon a time, years ago, I'd have found that a very sweet answer. Today it scares the hell out of me. Read the rest of this post...

An Olympic Embarrassment

Here come the republicans. My official prediction: Bush will get a considerably bigger bounce from his convention than what's been discussed so far. His campaign people are really, really smart. But I hope Americans will take a look at how the world has treated America at the olympics and at least consider how far our international stature has dropped.

Cancelling Secretary Powell's visit to the olympic games wasn't a mistake -- ever considering such an idea was. Colin Powell is a combat veteran -- he's not scared of a few protesters. But the State Department realized just how vehement opposition to the visit to the closing ceremony would be, and they wisely backed out.

This white house has tried to use the olympic games as a branding opportunity. But the olympic games are not supposed to be political. Despite the request of the US Olympic Committee to stop, preznit's campaign continues to exploit the olympics in a commercial.

But of course, this latest act of arrogance is just the tip of the iceberg. This administration has damaged our standing so much in the world that we can't even send a cabinet minister to an athletic event without embarassing our country -- and, most importantly to this administration, hurting the incumbent in those precious opinion polls of his.

Right now, I think the rest of the world still thinks worse of the American president than the American people. At the olympics, American athletes and spectators (save a few) were widely welcomed, while American politicians were not. If preznit wins this election, the rest of the world will take it -- and take US -- personally.
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Create your favorite Religious Right fortune cookie

You may recall from a post I made below that the religious right is going to be passing out fortune cookies at the GOP Convention, and the cookies will contain suggestions for messages that Bush should be using to win the election. These are the four "fortunes" you'll find inside their cookies:

Real Men Marry Women:
Support a Constitutional Amendment to Protect Marriage

Save the Constitution!
Impeach an Activist Judge

Cures for Diseases - Know the Score
Embryonic Stem Cell 0
Adult Stem Cell 45

#1 Reason to Ban Human Cloning:
Hillary Clinton

Justin, one of our avid readers, who clearly has too much time on his hands, has taken it upon himself to start coming up with OTHER fortunes that ALMOST MADE THE CUT, but JUST missed getting used by the religious right. His suggestions were so funny that I thought "why not open this up to everyone."

So here goes. Please submit your favorite religious right fortune cookie message for those ideas that didn't get out of the planning stage. I'll post the best ones in a separate post later. Here are Justin's two examples so far:

"Queers are the Antichrist. Lucky Numbers 2, 7, 12, 15, 19, 22."

"Reason #2 to Ban Human Cloning: No One Wants an Army of Ann Coulters."

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"Heterosexual Pride" parade is a big bust (well, you know what I mean)

Just got a report from Pam Spaulding who decided to visit the Straight Pride parade in Chapel Hill, NC with her partner Kate, and Pam reports that it was a big bust. The attendance was so pitiful that Pam and Kate didn't even use the signs they brought with them. Perhaps we need to teach the hets a thing or two about recruitment. :-)

Here's Pam or Kate with my fav sign:

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Open Thread: On a scale of 1 to 10 - 1 being "no big deal," 10 being "very big deal" - how big a scandal is this Israeli spy story?

Is this a story, as DOD claims, about a simple middle-level DOD official who had no influence on policy, or is this a major scandal involving more people who had a major impact on US policy with regards to the war in Iraq and beyond? Read the rest of this post...

"I got a young man named George W. Bush into the National Guard"

"I got a young man named George W. Bush into the National Guard when I was lieutenant governor of Texas, and I'm not necessarily proud of that, but I did it." - AP

What a good thing it is that Bush wanted to make the Vietnam era such a big issue. Go figure, George received preferential treatment to jump ahead of others already in line. (I wonder how those pushed to the back of the line fared.) It's not like people didn't warn him that if he pushed it too far it would come back to his own record during Vietnam. Let's face it, he brought this issue on himself by his own arrogance. This story is nice timing, just before the convention. We now have moles in the administration, a team that outs CIA agents, a shaky economy, more poor and uninsured, and a man who only knows priviledge. And this is the record that they want to push?

Barnes, who was House speaker when Bush entered the Guard, later became lieutenant governor.

He said he became ashamed after walking through the Vietnam Memorial and looking at the names of people who died.

Click here for the video link. Ouch! Read the rest of this post...

Wash Post: Subject of investigation is reportedly Larry Franklin

Wash Post:

The FBI is investigating a mid-level Pentagon official who specializes in Iranian affairs for allegedly passing classified information to Israel, and arrests in the case could come as early as next week, officials at the Pentagon and other government agencies said last night.

The name of the person under investigation was not officially released, but two sources identified him as Larry Franklin. He was described as a desk officer in the Pentagon's Near East and South Asia Bureau, one of six regional policy sections. Franklin worked at the Defense Intelligence Agency before moving to the Pentagon's policy branch three years ago and is nearing retirement, the officials said. Franklin could not be located for comment last night.

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Religious right announces homophobic & misogynistic publicity campaign for GOP convention

From the Family Research Council:

August 27, 2004 - Friday
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: August 27, 2004
CONTACT IN NEW YORK: Genevieve Wood, (202) 465-5259

How to motivate the pro-family base

NEW YORK - It has been widely reported that four million evangelicals stayed home in 2000. What will turn them out in 2004? President Bush's "fortune" on Nov. 2 rests with the pro-family base. During the Republican Convention, Family Research Council is handing out thousands of fortune cookies containing four messages the Bush campaign should use to motivate pro-family voters:

Real Men Marry Women:
Support a Constitutional Amendment to Protect Marriage

Save the Constitution!
Impeach an Activist Judge

Cures for Diseases - Know the Score
Embryonic Stem Cell 0
Adult Stem Cell 45

#1 Reason to Ban Human Cloning:
Hillary Clinton

WHAT & WHO: "Turning Out the Pro-Family Vote"
Family Research Council President Tony Perkins and other pro-family leaders
WHEN: Monday, August 27th - 11:00 a.m.
WHERE: Holiday Inn - Penn Station
215 West 34th Street
Second floor

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Spy investigation going on for a year, OTHER OFFICIALS being investigated

"The FBI is investigating at least one mid-level Pentagon official on charges of spying for Israel, possibly as part of a larger probe, according to government sources.... But according to one senior government source, the investigation has been ongoing for over a year and has also focused on other officials in Feith's operation who may have passed other information on to Israel." - Newsday

A year-long investigation AND it has also focused on other officials who might have been involved. This is bigger than one mid-level guy. One final point: What other investigation began about a year ago? Valerie Plame. What did the Plame investigation deal with? Bush administration retaliation against a CIA officer for her husband having debunked false evidence for going to war against Iraq. Who would be interested in stopping people from debunking such evidence? Someone who had devoted their career to taking down Saddam Hussein. Who are some of the top people with that devotion in the Bush administration? That leads us to the very-long post I made below. Read the rest of this post...