God save the Chimp

I hate when that happens...

Mr Hu, on his first US visit as Chinese leader, was welcomed at the White House in a colourful ceremony with military honours... Earlier, in a protocol gaffe, when China's national anthem was announced, it was referred to as the anthem of the Republic of China - the formal name of Taiwan. China's formal name is the People's Republic of China.

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Open thread

Kind of a cool new anti-war video made by AMERICAblog reader Andy Cobb. It's pretty cool, he did the non-musical voices and acted it out with videogames, spliced in real music, etc. Meant to appeal to a youth audience, but I just love how he acted out the characters using actual video games. Read the rest of this post...

St. Maarten's newspaper pines for the good old days when it was okay to beat the crap out of "faggots" and "homos"

TAKE ACTION: Email the St. Maarten tourism bureau: info@st-maarten.com. Also contact the St. Maarten Bureau for Constitutional Affairs - apparently they're still part of the Netherlands and want to become an independent country. Feel free to explain to them that they just hurt their cause: sxmconstiburo@sintmaarten.net
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You are not going to believe this one. Remember I wrote a week or two ago about the senior CBS producer who was viciously attacked with a friend in St. Maarten's, a Dutch colony? Well, the local paper has entered the fray, and like I said, you're not going to believe their editorial:

Now we don't know what the news producer and his male pal, who also works for a syndicated news organization in New York, might have been drinking or ingesting before the unfortunate incident. They were in a bar setting, from accounts of eye witnesses they were "all over each other" and four upset young men didn't like it.

They didn't like it so much that after they were asked to leave Bamboo Bernie's, they glared at the gay men, who have also been known as faggots, homos, homosexuals and other names that won't go into this family newspaper. They glared at them hard and they exited the place.

And waited in the parking lot.

Gay bashing has taken many forms over the decades. During and after World War II, it was considered common sport for military guys to let themselves be picked up by a faggot in a bar in Los Angeles or San Francisco. The one who was picked up would pretend to go along for the ride, only to turn around and beat up or rob the homo who picked him up, leaving him without wallet and sometimes teeth.

All that has changed, of course, largely due to American laws that are being spread around the world. Gay bashing is now a no-no. Slurs against homos, a no-no. And beating a person over the head for flagrant public behavior that once was considered criminal misconduct is a no-no.

This is a sorry case and we hope the police find the attackers. But it is made much worse when silly homosexuals use their power in the New York media to trash a friendly island for a one of a kind incident. The homosexual community should be ashamed.

More from GLAAD here. Read the rest of this post...

Kentucky's Republican governor is obsessed with gay sex, and the business community has had enough of him

Seems folks in Kentucky have REALLY had enough of Republican Kentuckky governor Ernie Fletcher's anti-gay bigotry. And good for them.

Governor Fletcher chose "diversity day" in Kentucky to repeal worker discrimination protections for GLBT state employees. Apparently that's what you do when your approval ratings are at 33 percent.

You'd expect the gay media and a few others to get pissed. But you might be surprised to find out that the local business paper, Business Lexington, wasn't very happy with the governor either:

While Kentucky businesses are begging the governor to obsess over workforce training, skyrocketing health care costs and incentives for job growth, he seems more focused on meddling in the choices people make in their private lives as to what sort of companionship best suits their personal needs.

But wait, it gets better:

How ironic is it that on "Diversity Day," the governor of Kentucky let the Vice President of the United States know that his daughter isn't welcome on his staff - which is a sad thing, because Mary Cheney is intelligent, articulate, and accomplished and might have the talent to transform the governor's dismal approval ratings overnight.

This one is definitely worth a read. It's one thing when we call a Republican governor a bigot -- but it's HUGE when the business community in a red state does it for us. Read the rest of this post...

33%

From Atrios, Fox has Bush at 33%.

Yes, 33%.

Even the Fox poll shows almost everyone hates their President. Read the rest of this post...

Roberts, as Chief, wants peace with Congress

Sounds simple enough:

Chief Justice John Roberts acknowledged Thursday that relations between Congress and the judiciary are strained and he is relying on a new official to help ease the tension.

Here's an idea for Roberts. He needs to get his right-wing pals to stop inciting violence against the judiciary. That might go a long way towards easing tension.

Oh, and once the Roberts Court starts overturning individual rights and stripping away existing constitutional protections, the hard-core will love judges again. Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Speak now. Read the rest of this post...

CBS's Bob Schieffer thinks Rummy isn't long for this administration

Madison Daily Record

Schieffer said he wasn't sure that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, under fire for his handling of the war in Iraq, would endure much longer in his post. He didn't put much stock in President Bush's recent declaration of support for Rumsfeld.

"It was also this president who said, 'Brownie, you're doing a heckuva job,'and that was just before Brownie got canned," Schieffer said, referring to former FEMA Director Michael Brown.

Much like retired CBS anchor Walter Cronkite -- who famously criticized the Vietnam War on-air after initially giving it robust support -- Schieffer was not optimistic about U.S. prospects in Iraq.

"I'm very pessimistic about this thing right now," said Schieffer, an Austin, Tex. native who had supported Bush's decision to order the invasion in 2003.

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$10 billion a month for Iraq (and Afghanistan)

We're going to be paying for Iraq for a very long time. The actual money spent continues to spiral. But, hey, the White House is getting a new press secretary:

The cost of the war in U.S. fatalities has declined this year, but the cost in treasure continues to rise, from $48 billion in 2003 to $59 billion in 2004 to $81 billion in 2005 to an anticipated $94 billion in 2006, according to the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. The U.S. government is now spending nearly $10 billion a month in Iraq and Afghanistan, up from $8.2 billion a year ago, a new Congressional Research Service report found.

Annual war costs in Iraq are easily outpacing the $61 billion a year that the United States spent in Vietnam between 1964 and 1972, in today's dollars. The invasion's "shock and awe" of high-tech laser-guided bombs, cruise missiles and stealth aircraft has long faded, but the costs of even those early months are just coming into view as the military confronts equipment repair and rebuilding costs it has avoided and procurement costs it never expected.

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Baptist bigots may lose $10 million because of their anti-gay hate

Hate doesn't pay.

The boyfriend of a Kentucky college student expelled for declaring his homosexuality on the Internet called Wednesday for a halt to $10 million in state funding for the private Baptist school....

Brett Hall, a spokesman for Gov. Ernie Fletcher, said Wednesday the governor hasn't yet decided whether to use his line-item veto power to remove the funding for the pharmacy school from the state budget.

Hall said Fletcher is concerned that the proposed pharmacy school might not be able to win accreditation because of its policy against accepting gay and lesbian students. Hall said the governor also has sought a legal opinion from his general counsel about whether the state can give money for a building project to a religious institution.

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Thursday Morning Open Thread

Still have the same President. Still have the same Vice President. Still have the same failed policies. Still have a quagmire in Iraq.

Trying to figure out what's different. As Josh Marshall points out, there really are no new faces.

So why is the media so frenzied? Read the rest of this post...

Wal-Mart CEO calls MD health insurance law "ridiculous"

He's still whining but he still intends to expand in Maryland despite having to pay something towards employee health care. The GOP politicians all cried about Wal-Mart going away but they were wrong. Looking at the numerous CEO's who receive increasingly high compensation packages, I see nothing wrong with companies spending a few extra dollars on employee health care. This is no longer 1900 folks and if companies can afford to pay tens of millions per year to CEOs, they can afford this.

For the record, H. Lee Scott, CEO Wal-Mart managed to scrape together more than $17,000,000 in total compensation in 2004 so something tells me that the company has money to spare if they can afford such a luxurious plan for one person. Read the rest of this post...

Blair supports Bush Iran warmongering

Once a poodle, always a poodle.

Differences opened up yesterday between Mr Blair and the Foreign Secretary over growing alarm in the US at the refusal of Mr Bush to rule out military action. Mr Straw said on BBC Radio 4 that it was "inconceivable" that Britain would support a military strike against Tehran. Four hours later, Mr Blair refused to go that far when challenged to do so at Prime Minister's questions by the former minister, Michael Meacher.

Mr Blair accused Iran of fostering international terrorism, and said young people were signing up to be suicide bombers directed at US and UK targets. " I do not think this is the time to send a message of weakness," he said.

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"We need a greater sense of urgency on climate change"

Rambling thoughts of a lefty? Hardly. This is from the leader of the UK's Conservative Party. Can you even imagine the GOP of today delivering such a message? With some of the police-state decisions rammed through the system by Labour, not to mention the war in Iraq, I can see Cameron and the Conservatives chipping away at a Blair-fatigued nation. I'm not buying everything that he is saying, but wow, I just can't even imagine the GOP saying anything remotely similar to this any time soon.

From climate change to cleaner streets, from cutting waste to cutting noise pollution, environmental issues are all about improving our quality of life. Piecemeal policy-making is no good. That is why we have set up policy groups to look at these inter-connected issues.

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Open thread

I'm tired. Chat. Read the rest of this post...