The New Yorker story about the Iraq prisoner abuse is online

"Breaking chemical lights and pouring the phosphoric liquid on detainees; pouring cold water on naked detainees; beating detainees with a broom handle and a chair; threatening male detainees with rape; allowing a military police guard to stitch the wound of a detainee who was injured after being slammed against the wall in his cell; sodomizing a detainee with a chemical light and perhaps a broom stick, and using military working dogs to frighten and intimidate detainees with threats of attack, and in one instance actually biting a detainee. " - New Yorker

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Another fundie bites the dust

Another religious right poster boy bites the dust in the Republican primaries. First Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania (who was challenging Senator Arlen Specter in the Senate Republican primary), and now Eric Miller, who lost his bid today to be the Republican candiate for governor of Indiana. Even more interesting is that in both cases the White House left the religious right candidates high and dry - Bush supported their moderate Republican opponents. But don't think that the religious right hasn't taken notice. The Family Research Council, a far-right anti-gay hate group, issued a screed today condemning Bush for turning his back on all the fundamentalist candidates. To the president's credit, he knows his party isn't going to win by endorsing these fruitcakes (pardon the expression). Too bad Bush hasn't realized across the board how toxic the fundie message really is. Read the rest of this post...

BREAKING NEWS: Kansas kills state anti-gay constitutional amendment

Seems the fundies ticked off a few of the republican lawmakers by baring their teeth a little too publicly, thus proving that this debate was about enshrining bigotry in the state constitution. Read the rest of this post...

Lou Sheldon puts gays on a par with Islamic terrorsts

Karen Hughes, step aside:

"Our nation needs to pray for guidance concerning our international war on terror and the culture war here at home. Islamic terrorists are seeking to destroy Western Civilization and militants here in the U.S. are determined to destroy traditional marriage and all standards of biblical morality. Both of these forces must be defeated and only God can give us the ultimate victory through our prayers and actions!" - Lou Sheldon, Traditional Values Coalition, May 4, 2004

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Bremer knew of prisoner abuse last November, Iraqi minister says

The departing Iraqi human rights minister says Bremer was informed of the Iraqi prisoner abuse last November:

"Former Iraqi human rights minister Abdel Basset Turki said US overseer Paul Bremer knew in November that Iraqi prisoners were being abused in US detention centres.

'In November I talked to Mr Bremer about human rights violations in general and in jails in particular. He listened but there was no answer. At the first meeting, I asked to be allowed to visit the security prisoners, but I failed,' Turki told AFP on Monday.

'I told him the news. He didn't take care about the information I gave him.' The coalition had no immediate comment about Turki's meeting with Bremer.

The minister, whose resignation was formally accepted by the coalition on Sunday, said he told Bremer about his meetings with former detainees.

'The prisoners I spoke to, they told me about how Iraqi prisoners were left in the sun on US bases for hours, prevented to pray and wash and left for two days on a chair and kicked at Abu Gharib,' he said. " - AFP

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Rumsfeld and Myers STILL haven't read the report

"[Pentagon Spokesman Larry] DiRita told reporters Monday that neither Rumsfeld nor Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has yet read the 53-page report of an Army investigation that is said to have detailed serious abuses of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib." - USA Today

Something funny is going on, in a big way. It's been over two weeks since the Pentagon was notified by CBS of the photos showing American soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners. It's been 5 days since the allegations were publicly aired by CBS. It's been 3 days since the president was forced to comment on the affair publicly. And it's been 24 hours since General Myers was asked repeatedly by Stephanopoulous on THIS WEEK why he hadn't yet read the report. All that, and Myers and Rumsfeld STILL haven't read it?

There is something very fishy going on. As a former US Senate aide, let me make one thing really clear. When your "important Washington boss" appears on national TV and Stephanopoulos repeatedly embarrasses him by asking "why haven't you read the report," you make damn sure that report is on your boss's desk when he returns from the interview (and you also make sure it's on the Secretary of Defense's desk as well (i.e., his boss)). The only reason Rumsfeld and Myers would not have read the report after all of that is that they HAVE AFFIRMATIVELY CHOSEN NOT TO READ IT.

I can't as of yet fathom what their reasoning is, but for some reason Rumsfeld and Myers want plausible deniability here. They want to be able to honestly say that they're not aware of how bad this problem is. But why? This is already a scandal, an international scandal at that. It's already making the troops look bad, makiing the president look bad, and making Rumsfeld and Myers look bad. Why on God's earth wouldn't they want to read the damn report and at least publicly acknowledge that they're taking the issue seriously? These are some pretty serious questions that some enterprising journalist needs to demand some answers to. Read the rest of this post...

Read it

Wow. Atrios found one hell of an article about Pat Tillman, the football player who recently died in Iraq. Hard to summarize it, other than to say, enough of the glossing over of all the war deaths. Just read it. Read the rest of this post...

Anti-Islam US General probably won't face discipline

Funny, isn't it, that our head of military intelligence says, with impunity, that Muslims don't worship a "real God," then our soldiers in Iraq, in an effort to gather military intelligence, torture the bejeesus out of Iraqi prisoners. Linkage? You decide.

Arab- and Muslim-Americans are increasingly frustrated by the Pentagon's failure to discipline a top U.S. general who said Muslims do not worship 'a real God,' and say it raises questions about whether the so-called war on terrorism is not a war on Islam.

Army Lt. Gen. William Boykin, head of military intelligence, touched off a brief firestorm last October after publicity about speeches he gave while in uniform that referred to the war on terrorism as a battle with 'Satan' and said America had been targeted 'because we're a Christian nation.'....

Sources familiar with the investigation said Boykin would probably not face disciplinary action, noting that officials had signaled that Boykin's remarks fell into a "gray area" in rules governing the public speeches of military personnel.

Gray area, my ass. It falls into a pattern of this administration repeatedly giving overt nods to its followers (in this case, Christian right and military follower wrapped in one) to take pot shots at "infidels" who don't believe in the exact same interpretation of God as they do. Read the rest of this post...

A Kerry Landslide?

Fascinating analysis by the Washington Monthly about how Kerry might rout Bush, assuming he doesn't screw up. My favorite line in the article? "Bush: the new Carter." No offense to Jimmy Carter, but I want that button :-)

"2004 could be a decisive victory for Kerry. The reason to think so is historical. Elections that feature a sitting president tend to be referendums on the incumbent--and in recent elections, the incumbent has either won or lost by large electoral margins. If you look at key indicators beyond the neck-and-neck support for the two candidates in the polls--such as high turnout in the early Democratic primaries and the likelihood of a high turnout in November--it seems improbable that Bush will win big. More likely, it's going to be Kerry in a rout. "

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John Kerry and the gay vote. My take.

So here's my take on John Kerry and the gay issues.

Look, the guy ain't perfect on gay issues, by a long stretch. His vocal "opposition" to gay marriage sounds gratuitous. And his endorsement of the Massachusetts constitutional amendment was downright bizarre and glaringly self-serving - not to mention, really bigoted. Having said that, George Bush is a raging bigot. Or at the very least, he's more than happy to pander to raging bigots, which is pretty much the same thing.

Putting the marriage snafu aside, Kerry actually has a very good record on gay issues. He was one of only 15 Senators to vote against DOMA (though he probably regrets that now). He opposes the federal constitutional amendment. Supports civil unions. Supports adding sexual orientation to already-existing federal hate crimes law. Supports ENDA. Opposes Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

As for Bush? Where to begin? He actively supports, and is pushing, a federal constitutional amendment to make gays and lesbians second class citizens, and to take away many currently existing civil rights enjoyed by the GLBT community. He's appointed anti-gay nutjobs to the AIDS commission (e.g., Coburn). Some of his best friends are some of the worst anti-gay bigots on the planet: Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, James Dobson, and Gary Bauer. Bush tried to revoke job protections for gay federal employees. He had HHS launch an ongoing witch hunt of AIDS organizations. He's done all he can to put out the message that condoms are bad and that abstinence is the only, ONLY, method of stopping AIDS transmission. He fired a gay DOD contractor at the beginning of his administration, simply because the guy is gay. He opposes adding gays to already-existing hate crimes legislation. He hasn't even come out and said where he stands on civil unions. And, reportedly, he still hasn't even used the word "gay" once in 4 years.

So, the choice is between a guy who's 90% perfect on gay issues, and a guy who has a record that's probably 10% positive and 90% bigoted, including supporting a constitutional amendment that would permanently make us second-class citizens.

John Kerry ain't perfect by a long shot. And, if elected, he'll probably squirm on a lot of our issues, but he'll also probably do a lot of good. Two things we do know. John Kerry won't actively try to f*ck us like Bush has done for four years now. And George Bush won't be penning a pro-gay op ed for a gay Web site any time soon. Read the rest of this post...

Protesters greet Karen Hughes at book signing

Yeehaw!

Make sure you sign the Planned Parenthood petition as well - they've already gotten over 27,000 signatures in just a few days. Read the rest of this post...