Late night thread

It's about 5:30 am in Paris. When I should I call John to say "Bon jour," I wonder? Read the rest of this post...

UK: Young Men Suffering From "Early Life Crisis"

And I thought I was panicking because I'm late on the rent. Read the rest of this post...

Bush begins vacation with "We are at War"

This is how he starts his 33 day vacation:

President Bush lamented the deaths of 14 Marines in Iraq Wednesday, calling the deadly attack a ''grim reminder'' America is still at war.

''These terrorists and insurgents will use brutal tactics because they're trying to shake the will of the United States of America. They want us to retreat,'' Bush told some 2,000 state lawmakers, business leaders and public policy experts gathered here.

The president spoke on a day when a Marine amphibious assault vehicle patrolling during combat operations in the Euphrates River valley hit a roadside bomb, killing 14 Marines from the same Ohio battalion that lost six men two days ago.

''Make no mistake about it,'' Bush said. ''We are at war.''

Not a bit of irony. Remember, being President is hard work. Read the rest of this post...

Was Tom Cruise Right?

USA Today reports on a new study that kids diagnosed with mental and behavioral problems increasingly get multiple drugs, even though the drugs aren't always tested for efficacy on kids or in combination with one another. Why the explosion?

• Drug companies are marketing their products more aggressively to consumers and doctors. "Many parents come in and want that 'quick fix.' "

• One drug often causes side effects; since more medications than ever are available, kids get another drug to deal with these side effects. For example, stimulants may cause insomnia, which leads to prescribing sleeping pills.

• Insurers often are more willing to pay for pills than for therapy.

Now Cruise hates psychiatry in general and opposes ALL medication for mental illness, which is crazy. (Pun intended.) But that shouldn't cloud the fact that young people seem over-medicated and that it's easier for schools to demand that parents put their kids on pills rather than just deal with a kid who may be perfectly normal, just a little bored in class (maybe they're too smart?) or just, you know, a kid.

The best part of a serious debate would be to recognize that some people do need medication and it needn't be any more stigmatized than knowing that one kid needs insulin for his diabetes and another needs medication for their ADD. Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Take it away Read the rest of this post...

Karl "Complete Confidence" Rove Scandal made the Times today

The special prosecutor is stalking his prey. Or, at least, it sure seems that way. The NY Times had a piece today about Rove's two aides being called to testify before the grand jury:

Two aides to Karl Rove, the senior White House adviser, testified last Friday before a federal grand jury investigating whether government officials illegally disclosed the identity of an undercover C.I.A. operative, according to a person who has been officially briefed on the case.

The aides, Susan B. Ralston and Israel Hernandez, were asked about grand jury testimony given on July 13 by Matthew Cooper, a reporter for Time magazine, the person who was briefed said. Mr. Cooper has said that he testified about a July 11, 2003, conversation with Mr. Rove in which the C.I.A. officer was discussed.

It's basically the same story that ABC had yesterday, but this one has "a person who has been officially briefed on the case" as the source. You know we don't like to go a day without a Rove-specific story. And we need to make sure the MSM is staying on top of this one.

Although, John did post the Novak/Guckert Gannon article from Salon earlier today. Novak, Jeff and Karl...what a threesome. Read the rest of this post...

Bush Sparks "Debate" On Intelligent Design

Some questions for Scotty about Bush encouraging schools to dumb down their curriculum and teach religion in science class.

Does the President believe students should be taught about astrology?
Does the President believe students should be taught about crystals/New Age therapy?
Does the President believe students should be taught both sides of the debate as to whether the Holocaus really happened?

Does the President believe students should be taught the idea that the US landing on the moon was faked? Why not? There are dozens if not hundreds of books pushing this theory. A certain percentage of the population believes it and it was even the subject of a primetime documentary on Fox? What possible justification could the President offer for keeping this "debate" from students? And why doesn't that justification apply to creationism as well? Read the rest of this post...

Thank Johnson & Johnson for not caving to anti-gay hate groups

The anti-gay hate groups are trying to force Johnson & Johnson to stop advertising on LOGO, the new gay cable channel.

The hate groups have the right to their point of view, and so does the Klan and David Duke. That doesn't mean we treat their bigotry with any more seriousness than we would any other hatemonger.

Please contact Johnson & Johnson and thank them for advertising on LOGO and for not caving to the bigotry being espoused by these hate groups.

Time to take back America, folks. These groups can go live with Osama if they want a country run by theocratic bigots. Read the rest of this post...

A little Parisian open thread

Ok, it's a lousy cell phone photo, but you get the idea - this is the corner near our place. It's in the 14th, near Montparnasse (this is Blvd. du Montparnasse, and the cafe is La Rotonde, for those in the know).



I was out buying some food and bread and stuff, so wasn't toting my real camera. I did, however, manage to find some tasty treats for the cats - yes, pure bribery. I couldn't quite find any "treats" per se, as it's not clear to me what cats eat as treats - and it's not clear what, anyway, such treats are possibly called in French. So I bought some cans of gourmet cat food, 4 little ones costing 3 bucks total - they include, tuna, salmon and other cat fancies. Just fed each cat a teaspoon of the tuna can, by hand, so they'd be well aware of the hand that feeds them. They ate it right up. I even got a snuggle a few minutes later from Nasdaq, the black one. So, the plan may just be working... Read the rest of this post...

Sen. DeLay Appearing On Justice Sunday II

Because the separation between church and state is for wussies. Read the rest of this post...

Is This How Bush Was Hazed At His Frat?

The Washington Post on US soldiers' brutal treatment of prisoners, all of which they believed was "approved" from above.

Iraqi Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush was being stubborn with his American captors, and a series of intense beatings and creative interrogation tactics were not enough to break his will. On the morning of Nov. 26, 2003, a U.S. Army interrogator and a military guard grabbed a green sleeping bag, stuffed Mowhoush inside, wrapped him in an electrical cord, laid him on the floor and began to go to work. Again.

It was inside the sleeping bag that the 56-year-old detainee took his last breath through broken ribs, lying on the floor beneath a U.S. soldier in Interrogation Room 6 in the western Iraqi desert. Two days before, a secret CIA-sponsored group of Iraqi paramilitaries, working with Army interrogators, had beaten Mowhoush nearly senseless, using fists, a club and a rubber hose, according to classified documents....

"The indig were hitting the detainee with fists, a club and a length of rubber hose," according to classified investigative records.

Soldiers heard Mowhoush "being beaten with a hard object" and heard him "screaming" from down the hall, according to the Jan. 18, 2004, provost marshal's report. The report said four Army guards had to carry Mowhoush back to his cell.

Not exactly "Animal House," is it? Mowhoush was killed, of course.

"The interrogation techniques were known and were approved of by the upper echelons of command of the 3rd ACR," [the lawyer for one of the soldiers] said in a news conference. "They believed, and still do, that they were appropriate and proper."

And you know what? They were wrong to do what they did, but right to believe the people in power were all for it. Bush has made that perfectly clear again and again. If not, why has no one in charge during these outrages been reprimanded in the least? Why instead has almost everyone involved been promoted and praised? This is the sort of vile nastiness we used to condemn the bad guys for -- the sort of cruel, nasty torture our soldiers endured from the OTHER side during Vietnam and Korea and from the Nazis and the Japs in the last righteous war. It is not a sign of strength -- torture is always a sign of weakness. And it is beneath the dignity of the United States. Read the rest of this post...

JeffyJames strikes back - uh - hard

You remember that yesterday we reported about an interesting connection betwen Robert Novak and JeffJames GannonGuckert?

Well, apparently Jeffy is very angry that his ace reporting skills have been called into question by Salon.com. Salon's coverage of Jeff's response is priceless - they basically prove that Jeff, once again, got the story wrong - oh my!

Just read it.

a report Gannon filed for the now-MIA Talon News back in July 2004. In that piece, our intrepid reporter noticed that the Kerry campaign's Web site no longer featured references to [Amb. Joe] Wilson and concluded for himself -- with, it appears, no reporting at all -- that it was "likely" that the campaign had decided to "quietly break official contact with someone who proved to be a loose cannon."

Responding to our post earlier today, Gannon says his story about Kerry and Wilson was "rock solid" and that "Wilson was dumped -- hard." Not so, says Peter Daou, who ran Kerry's Web site and says the Wilson references were deleted as part of a larger redesign. And not so, says David Wade, who was Kerry's campaign spokesman. Wade told us earlier today that Wilson drew standing-room-only crowds as a surrogate for Kerry, and that the claim that he was somehow "discarded" by the campaign is "a classic Novakian regurgitation of only-on-Newsmax misinformation."

And indeed, a little Google searching of our own suggests that Wade is right: In October 2004, just weeks before the election, it appears that Wilson was still on the road for the Democratic nominee, headlining a fundraiser for the Kerry-Edwards campaign in Arizona.

That doesn't sound like the work of someone who was "dumped -- hard," Jeff. But as for the "rock solid" part -- well, we suppose you're the expert on that.

And yeah, it's subscription only, but all you have to do is click the free link and watch a 15 second ad - I think you can handle it :-) Read the rest of this post...

"No district is safe"

That's the message to the Republicans after Paul Hackett's surprisingly strong finish in Ohio last night. The messenger is DCCC Chair Rahm Emanuel according to NBC's First Read:

Democratic House campaign committee chair Rahm Emanuel tells First Read that although the Iraq combat veteran was uniquely qualified to talk about the war, his message was primarily about the economy and education. Clearly, though, "the war is not what it was six months ago, or 12 months ago" in terms of being an automatic advantage for Republicans, Emanuel says. Based on Hackett's tally in a district that gave Bush 64% in 2004, he declares, "no district is safe."

That's what we want to hear. It's a whole new ballgame. Read the rest of this post...

Frist Dissed

Frist not invited to religious right confab, Justice Sunday. See what happens when you don't toe the line as dictated by America's Taliban, you get your head chopped off. There is no room for dissent or reason in America's Taliban. You hate who they hate, or you're toast. Read the rest of this post...

More on Bush's one-finger salute

From Nick Coleman, columnist at the Star Tribune:

The networks and most newspapers ignored Bush's Big Bird, and only a handful of papers printed stories about the incident. Most were light, gossipy and inconclusive, giving the thumb theory more weight than it deserves (try mimicking the video with your own hand; only one finger will do). White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan gave a limp denial: "I'm not going to dignify that with a response," he said the next day. "I mean, I haven't seen the video that you're talking about, but I know the way the president acts."

Yes, we know how he acts. He has flipped the bird before.

"The president knows his way around his middle finger," says John Aravosis, a Washington consultant and liberal blogger (he runs Americablog). Aravosis has helped keep the presidential finger story alive, and the White House took the unusual step of calling him to try to convince him that the videotape features Bush's thumb, not his middle finger. A weirdly elongated and misplaced thumb.

Aravosis doesn't buy it.

"The president thinks his conservative moral beliefs should be shoved down our throats. Then he flips people off. He's a phony. That's the story. I don't know about you, but my priest doesn't run around in public flipping people off."

Read the rest of this post...

Pat Robertson Prays For More Supreme Court Vacancies

Lovely. So that means instead of praying for the speedy recovery of Chief Justice Rehniquist, Robertson hopes he dies or gets so ill that he can't continue. Or Robertson hopes some other justice (Please Lord, thinks Robertson, let it be that traitor Kennedy or that turncoat Souter or that she-devil Ginsburg) also gets ill or dies. How Christian. Of course, Robertson insists he's only praying for retirements. But since Rehniquist is gravely ill but clearly wants to continue at his job if possible, Robertson hopes the Chief Justice stays too sick and has to retire. So how can he possibly pray for retirements in good conscience when he KNOWS a justice is battling a deadly illness? Again, how Christian. Read the rest of this post...

14 Troops Killed In Iraq today

Just horrible. Read the rest of this post...

Bush goes on five-week vacation, longest presidential retreat in 36 years

What can I say?

How about: Bin Ladin still determined to attack US. Read the rest of this post...

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

One of my first recollections of really great fight music, "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" by U2. The album - War - was incredibly popular when I was doing my study abroad in France, and I remember I'd bought the cassette (yes, Virginia, we bought cassettes back then) and was listening to it over and over again on the then-very-long train and boat, and train again, ride to London - my first visit to London. Sitting on that damn ferry in the middle of the night, verging on sea sickness and trying not to think of all of those who died in Denmark (or was it Greece?) on a similar passage. I met a couple of English guys who were just coming back from France - great guys, one of whom I'm still in touch with today, he lives in London, we're going to get together next time I go (7/7 was a bit difficult). Anyway, they're playing Sunday, Bloody Sunday right now on my new favorite French rock station, Oui FM.

SBS was, I think, my introduction to protest music, or close to it. I will always remember that song fixed in that place and time. Music does that a lot for me - fixes a time and place. Just like "Gold" by Spandau Ballet will always be an English girl dancing and spinning in an ever-widening sun dress at a late-night disco in Seville. I like music that takes me on a roller coaster ride - just picks you up and races every which way for two and half minutes, then sets you down, boom. I like articles that do the same. Read the rest of this post...

Iraqi Defense Nowhere NEAR Ready

Bush has been playing numbers with the Iraqi trained troops for years. The MSM should be pounding away at this every day. Bush claims anywhere from 140,000 to 170,000 Iraqi troops, but then adds sotto voce that they fall into "three groups" -- as in 2000 trained and capable of fighting on their own, 9000 capable of fighting if we help them, and about 150,000 who are no more prepared to secure peace in Iraq any more than you or I. And even if they were fully trained (which they're not), there's a growing mountain of evidence that the Iraqis can't even come close to properly equipping those numbers of soldiers anyway. Can't do much good if you don't have a gun.

So the insurgency is stronger than ever and Bush has all but announced "Mission (Re)Accomplished!" and told everyone we'll be pulling out in the spring as long as things don't get worse. (Things could get worse??!!)

But here's a quiet little story saying the Iraqi Defense Ministry may not quite be up to the task of securing the peace just yet.

The shortcomings of the ministry, which was overhauled under the American occupation authorities last year, are a growing concern to the American commanders. Hoping to withdraw large numbers of the 135,000 American combat troops in the next year, these commanders say their plans hinge on a functioning ministry. If American troops leave without one in place, they say, the Iraqi Army could quickly collapse.

How's this for a money quote?

"What are lacking are the systems that pay people, that supply people, that recruit people, that replace the wounded and AWOL, and systems that promote people and provide spare parts," said a top American commander in Iraq, who asked not to be identified because his assessment of Iraqi abilities went beyond the military's public descriptions.

But we've got a plan:

So concerned are military planners that, in the event that American combat troops do indeed leave over the next year, they are preparing to keep large numbers of support troops and supplies in Iraq or in nearby countries, ready to assist Iraqi units fighting insurgents, the American commander said.

And here's an AP story in the Toronto Star about Iraqi investigations into hundreds of millions of dollars that have been wasted or gone missing. (Thanks to threader aCanadianreader for pointing us to this.)Oy vey. Read the rest of this post...

He Speaks! Supreme Court Nominee Roberts Provides First Written Response To Some Senate Questions

Here's the first look at some of John Roberts' written responses to questions asked in writing by the Senate. Among the highlights:

The 10-page questionnaire yielded 83 pages of response. It included information about Judge Roberts's financial assets and net worth - nearly $5.3 million, including a stock portfolio worth more than $1.6 million; his work during Bush v. Gore, the Supreme Court case that decided the 2000 election in President Bush's favor; and his membership, or lack thereof, in the Federalist Society, a conservative legal group. Other documents, released earlier Tuesday by the National Archives, offered new information about his work for the Justice Department in the Reagan administration....

In his essay on judicial activism, Judge Roberts spoke of the importance of precedent, a concept particularly important to those who fear that he would tilt the Supreme Court in a more conservative direction, possibly undoing past decisions like Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that made abortion legal.

He wrote, "Precedent plays an important role in promoting the stability of the legal system, and a sound judicial philosophy should reflect recognition of the fact that the judge operates within a system of rules developed over the years by other judges equally striving to live up to the judicial oath...."

On the role of the courts, Mr. Roberts wrote a long article, presumably as a ghostwriter for Mr. Smith, in which he held that courts should defer to Congress and the executive branch whenever possible.

"Not only are unelected jurists with life tenure less attuned to the popular will than regularly elected officials," he asserted, "but judicial policy making is also inevitably inadequate or imperfect policy making."

Thoughts? Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

What a night. Read the rest of this post...