Happy Anniversary, Mr. Atrios...

Three years blogging. That makes him ancient. Read the rest of this post...

Sunday night open thread

I'm back in DC. Was a gorgeous day in NYC today, low 70s, sunny, wow. Just catching up on the Sunday shows, Trek and Charmed, then back into the groove tomorrow. And yes, LOTS of orchid photos to last us months of Orchid Blogging. Here's one shot to make up for our lack of orchid blogging this past Friday. (If you can't tell, I was in a bit of a Zen moment while shooting this and a number of the to-be-seen photos from the NY international orchid show.)

Read the rest of this post...

Three 1/2 Years After 9/11...And Airport Security Still Sucks

The day after 9/11, two simple tasks faced the President after airplanes had been hijacked to commit the deadliest attack on US soil in our history.

1. To bring together the watch lists of all our intelligence agencies and make sure the flight lists are checked against the best data possible. At least then we'd be able to redline the terrorists who traveled under their own names. Almost four years later...and this still isn't done.

2. Improve airport security. Some way. Any way. Almost four years later...and this still isn't done. Two new government studies say that security at airports which is run by the federal government is just as bad as security run by local powers and another says security at ALL airports -- no matter who's in charge -- still sucks and isn't any better than it was pre-9/11.

So we're taking off our shoes and leaving our laptops at home to avoid the hassle and dumping nail clippers in the public restrooms like some common criminals and it's all a farce. Thanks, Mr. President! Read the rest of this post...

Leading Candidate for Pope has Nazi past

Well, well, well...the leading candidate to become the next pope is Germany's Joseph Ratzinger. Today's New York Post reports he has a Nazi history:

A "fuhrer" furor is dogging the papal candidacy of Germany's top Roman Catholic cleric — over revelations he was a member of the Hitler Youth.

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger — a favorite to become the next pontiff — joined the Nazi children's corps in 1941 as a 14-year-old and was later an anti-aircraft gunner.

At one point, he guarded a factory where slaves from a concentration camp were forced to work. He was later shipped to Hungary, where he reportedly saw Jews persecuted.

Hmm, maybe there's a reason his nickname is "God's Rottweiler." Read the rest of this post...

Hagel voting against Bolton?

Wow.

AP has the story:

A top Senate Republican raised the possibility Sunday that he might vote against President Bush's nominee to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations if more accusations surface about John Bolton's alleged harassment of analysts who disagreed with his views

With a Senate Foreign Relations Committee vote expected Tuesday, Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska was asked whether he would endorse Bolton.

"At this point, I will ... but I have been troubled with more and more allegations, revelations, coming about his style, his method of operation," said Hagel, the committee's No. 2 Republican.

"We need a uniter," he told CNN's "Late Edition." "We need a builder. We need someone who will reach out to our friends and our allies at the United Nations."

Read the rest of this post...

Tom DeLay Hits The Trifecta On Sunday Morning News Shows

Yes, Tom DeLay's ethical morass and hate-filled speech was the focus on all three major Sunday morning news shows. "Meet The Press" did the best job and Rep. Barney Frank had the best line. He said he'd been the focus of ethics probes fifteen years ago because he'd "behaved inappropriately." But here's the difference.

"I changed my behavior," said Frank. "Tom DeLay changed the ethics committee."

As everyone knows, DeLay was admonished three times in 2004 for ethical lapses, more than any other politician, I believe. But as Frank points out, instead of cleaning up his house, DeLay hammered the Republicans into weakening the Ethics Committee, reverting to the rules they'd just changed in 1997, making it far more difficult to bring an ethics investigation forward and purging the committee of the three Republicans who dared to stand up for ethical behavior and had DeLay slapped on the wrist. Read the rest of this post...

Michael Schiavo's Good Name Cleared? No One Pays Attention

When my computer was down, I didn't get to weigh in on a lot of issues, but one drove me the craziest. In the last days of Terri Schiavo, I didn't see ANY balanced reporting. Every lead story on TV, every lead article in the paper was a variation on "Terri Schiavo's parents continue to fight to keep their daughter alive" or "Terri Schiavo's parents fail in their latest attempt to fight for their daughter." CNN Headline News was reduced to airing the years-old doctored footage of Terri edited to mislead people and backed with New Age guitar music. There wasn't ONE story I saw -- and I started looking obsessively -- that began "Michael Schiavo continues to fight to fulfill his dying wife's wishes" or "Michael Schiavo continues the fight to let his wife die with dignity." Drove me bonkers. Couldn't one news outlet at least have pretended to do balanced coverage?

So now that the MSM has moved on, we get a quiet news item on A-7 of The Washington Post that, by the way, all those baseless absurd charges against Michael Schiavo about abusing his wife were absolutely without merit. Per the Washington Post:

In the four years after Michael Schiavo won the right to remove his wife's feeding tube, the state's social welfare agency investigated 89 complaints of abuse but never found that he or anybody else harmed Terri Schiavo, records released late Friday show.

The state Department of Children and Families repeatedly concluded that Michael Schiavo ensured his wife's physical and medical needs were met, provided proper therapy for her and had no control over her money. They also found no evidence that he beat or strangled her, as his detractors have repeatedly charged.

The 45 pages of confidential abuse reports made public by court order show that despite the litany of complaints, investigators never found that Terri Schiavo had been abused.

The records show that DCF took seriously its duty to investigate abuse allegations, which became familiar fodder on the Internet: Terri Schiavo was dirty and unkempt. She did not receive proper dental care or rehabilitative therapy. She was kept in isolation. Her husband beat her and broke her bones. He wanted her dead for her money or to remarry. He pumped her full of insulin, hoping to kill her. He often asked, "When will (she) die?" Her lips were cracked and dry.

But DCF investigators looked into the charges and closed them as unfounded with such comments as "the spouse has always been courteous and very compassionate toward his wife" and "all her needs being met."

Michael Schiavo got poor press for a number of reasons: he tried to keep his wife's plight from being turned into a media circus, he didn't court the media, he refused to taunt and bait his parents with outrageous accusations the way they attacked him, he didn't align himself with fringe groups willing to exploit the situation for their own ends (some of whom didn't give a damn what Terri may have wanted, by their own admission) and so on. But reason number one was an MSM that didn't do its job.

Now that they have a chance to right some of those wrongs and make clear the spurious allegations against Michael Schiavo were unfounded, the MSM can't be bothered. Because clearing someone's good name isn't nearly as important as besmirching it.

Read the rest of this post...

Open thread

Off to enjoy a few more hours of NYC, then back to DC. Beautiful day out east, enjoy it! Read the rest of this post...

ACTION ALERT: Tell the fundies to shove it

Iunderstand that tons of emails have already been sent, from you guys and others, so the point's been made - don't send any more, and thanks!

I'm told that the religious right is inundating the Denver Post with angry letters because, egads, a gay writer wrote a beautiful article for them about a lovely gay wedding. And, as you can imagine, the religious right has reportedly unleashed the 7 plagues in response.

Read the article, it really is quite lovely, then write the Denver Post editors and let them know what you think of the article and their having published it. We need to stop America's Taliban from taking over our country one paper, and one community, at a time.

Greg Moore - gmoore@denverpost.com
Jon Wolman - jwolman@denverpost.com Read the rest of this post...

Sunday Morning Open Thread

Frist, DeLay, Scalia, Theocrats....I'm going out for a long run....chat away Read the rest of this post...

DeLay needs armed support

Wow. DeLay really is in trouble if he wants those around him to be packing. So, a couple weeks ago, Tom DeLay issued this menacing threat:

The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior, but not today.

That comment caused enormous controversy. Since then, DeLay's ethical problems have multiplied and he has become even more embattled. Last night at the NRA's convention, he sent another message to his enemies, the Associated Press reports:

"When a man is in trouble or in a good fight, he wants all of his friends around him, particularly armed," the Republican from nearby Sugar Land said. "So I'm in good company tonight."

Armed for what particular reason, Mr. DeLay? Read the rest of this post...

30th anniversary of Khmer Rouge government

It's amazing that 30 years later there still have not been any war crimes trials or international action. The "communist" leadership that is in power has always balked at any international attempts to move this forward, probably because many of the old guard were part of the Khmer Rouge themselves.

The entire history of the Khmer Rouge and their international assistance is beyond sad. China financially supported them, Vietnam aided them (initially) with troops, the US under Reagan supported Pol Pot in the UN, the King of Cambodia even supported the Khmer Rouge in his own lust for power and after 20-25% of the population died over four years, even today nothing has happened and nobody has ever been held accountable. The UN has somehow spent over $30M in creating a war crimes tribunal but there's nothing to show for all of its spending. Read the rest of this post...

Anti-Japanese/Ultra Nationalistic protests continue in China

This is simply bizarre. I thought that the anti-French routine in the US was silly but this is scary. When the Premier even steps in to such a crazy debate, one has to wonder about just how foolish the leadership of China is. We may not be anywhere near the Cultural Revolution but these protests should make foreign investors nervous about wanting to do business with China and let's face it, the "communist" leadership is all about money maintaining power these days. If this plan explodes, as it very well could, I wonder how long Wen Jiabao will be around. Read the rest of this post...

The Washington Post dares tread where the old-time liberal non-profits dare not

Another great publication on that issue that I told you weeks ago the lefty non-profits should have jumped on - this time it's the Wash Post lead Sunday op ed. Namely, that the GOP's anti-judge hate campaign is BEGGING for a major hardball response from the big progressive non-profits that have been in town for decades. Kind of hard to find anything more significant, and indicative that this is a major issue, than the lead op ed in the Sunday Post.

So where is that new campaign about the GOP having crossed that red line, threatening judges, threatening our democracy, and now threatening to impose a theocracy on America, all in the name of fighting activist judges? Hell if I know. Maybe we should ask Phil. Read the rest of this post...