Open Thread

I am witless. Read the rest of this post...

Independent congressional study shows Louisiana governor took necessary steps to get federal aid

So where was it?

Read the study here.

Read Raw Story's quick summary.

And finally, Cong. Conyers' press release about the study. Read the rest of this post...

Andy Towle has a bit of talk about our Anderson

We heart Anderson at AMERICAblog. And we like Andy's blog too. Check it out. Read the rest of this post...

Bush's Incompetence Weakens US Abroad

USA Today reports one Iranian newspaper saying simply:

"Katrina proved that America cannot solve its internal problems and is incapable of facing these kinds of natural disasters, so it cannot bring peace and democracy to other parts of the world," wrote an Iranian newspaper, Siyasat-e Ruz, last week.

It's dangerous when governments hostile to us -- especially one in the midst of acquiring nuclear weapons -- sees America as weak and ineffective. Bush's incompetence has serious consequences. Read the rest of this post...

Apparently only Clinton administration officials get punished for improperly using classified information

Why is Karl Rove still working at the White House? Because George Bush is a liar who cares more about his friends than he does the national security of our nation.

Read what happens to Clinton officials when they misuse classified info. Read the rest of this post...

Negligent Homicide Charges in Louisiana

Hmmm...if the Louisiana Attorney General is going to start charging people with negligence over Katrina, he's got a lot of work ahead of him. He's charging a couple of nursing home owners because "their inaction resulted in the deaths of these patients." Inaction resulting in death...there's a long list of people whose inaction resulted in death. First, of course, is Bush. After all, today he did say, "I take responsibility." Read the rest of this post...

US military violates court settlement over photographing & reporting on bodies in New Orleans

Constitution, my ass. Guess our soldiers learned a nice lesson from their time in Iraq. We're fighting for the flag here, to hell with the law and the Bill of Rights. Might makes right in George Bush's America.

Outside one house on Kentucky Street, a member of the Army 82nd Airborne Division summoned a reporter and photographer standing nearby and told them that if they took pictures or wrote a story about the body recovery process, he would take away their press credentials and kick them out of the state.

"No photos. No stories," said the man, wearing camouflage fatigues and a red beret.

On Saturday, after being challenged in court by CNN, the Bush administration agreed not to prevent the news media from following the effort to recover the bodies of Hurricane Katrina victims.

But on Monday, in the Bywater district, that assurance wasn't being followed. The 82nd Airborne soldier told reporters the Army had a policy that requires media to be 300 meters -- more than three football fields in length -- away from the scene of body recoveries in New Orleans. If reporters wrote stories or took pictures of body recoveries, they would be reported and face consequences, he said, including a loss of access for up-close coverage of certain military operations.

Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

We really, really need to talk. Read the rest of this post...

Bad puppet, go to your room

Reuters

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said on Tuesday that Iraq will not set a timetable for a withdrawal of U.S. troops, backing away from his published remarks that the United States could withdraw as many as 50,000 troops by the end of the year.

Read the rest of this post...

NYT tries to kill the Internet

Starting September 19, the NYT is charging for access to op ed columnists like AMERICAblog favorite Maureen Dowd, Paul Krugman and David Brooks.

What will this mean? I'm not sure. Sure the Times has the right to charge, and I know, giving away stuff for free can get to you after a while (oh, how I know :-) But, I won't be paying for that service, and I'm not sure I know anybody who will.

People will still get copies of the articles, they'll still email them around the Net, some Web sites will still republish the entire articles illegally, and we'll end up linking to those sites instead of the New York Times (it ain't illegal to link).

So what does the Times get out of this? Maybe some increased subscription revenue. Though their page views will decrease, so their ad revenue may actually decrease as well. It's a mixed bag. But I won't be linking to any "for pay" articles if the link takes you to the NYT pay-site. We'll just start summarizing articles, posting a few choice paragraphs like we always do.

And finally, if the Times' idea catches on, this really could be the beginning of the end of the current state of Internet news. Free news online has created an amazing and new dynamic in which people are more informed than ever before. If other news sites start to follow the Times' example, we jeopardize that. Again, I get why the Times wants to make money, they're not a public service, but still, I'm not sure their move will help them influence public debate, and isn't that part of the reason they exist? Read the rest of this post...

Bankruptcy Laws: If They're Unfair To Victims of Katrina, They're Unfair To Everyone

We asked yesterday when Bush was going to demand Congress cancel those draconian bankruptcy laws going in effect October 17. How could he look at all the people whose lives have been destroyed, how could he face the owners of all those small businesses crushed by Katrina and say, "Screw you?" Apparently, we weren't the only ones asking.

According to USA Today, consumer advocates and Democrats want to delay the bankruptcy law or exempt hurricane victims. Even Bush may be too embarrassed to see these meanspirited new laws applied to the families devastated by Katrina:

The Bush administration is looking at "a long list of ways to help those affected by the storm," including providing them with some relief from pending bankruptcy rules, says White House spokesman Trent Duffy.

This raises the question: if the new bankruptcy laws are so draconian or unfair for victims of Katrina, why aren't they unfair when punishing the victim of the next hurricane? Why aren't they unfair when punishing the victim of a catastrophic illness? Why aren't they unfair when punishing someone who lost their job at Enron because the white collar criminals in charge drove their company into the ground? Everyone wants to fight fraud (the pretense for passing these cruel new rules), but if the new bankruptcy law is wrong when applied to victims of Katrina then it's wrong when applied to anyone, regardless of the catastrophe that has blindsided them.

If the Democrats had any backbone, they would push to overturn that law, using Katrina as a classic example of why it's bad. If the Republicans offer the compromise of delay, they should refuse on principle, insisting on full reversal. Let the Republicans explain why these people should suffer. Read the rest of this post...

John Roberts: Ignore Almost Everything I've Written

The morning session of Roberts' confirmation hearing is over. Sen. Kennedy failed to land any blows and looked less-than-effective by asking lengthy questions and interrupting Roberts before the nominee could get two words out. Sen. Biden did a little better by mocking Roberts' assertion that his memos just reflect the opinion of his bosses. As Biden points out, Roberts in one memo writes "...and I strongly agree," making the obvious point that this sure SOUNDS like a staffer's personal opinion. Roberts danced away. But one interesting point:

The White House has trumpeted the tens of thousands of documents released from Roberts' work in the Reagan administration and elsewhere as proof of how thoroughly vetted this nominee is. But Roberts has repeatedly made clear he believes we can draw ZERO assumptions about his personal views from any of it. No matter how passionately he may argue an issue or urge a stance in private memos, Roberts insists those statements merely reflect the position of his bosses that he was hired to work for and not necessarily his own.

In short, since Roberts says we have to ignore virtually all of the 50,000+ pages of documents as revealing nothing about him and since his judicial career is extremely short, we are being asked to nominate someone that we know virtually nothing about. That should make EVERYONE uneasy (including the far right) so why is the left the only side that thinks we should know SOMETHING about what a nominee for the Supreme Court believes in? Read the rest of this post...

I've temporarily fixed the loading problem

I had to remove blogads from the site until their DNS propagates. That means I lose all my blogads page views today, which lowers my ranking, which lowers my ad sales, but at least it means the damn site will load quickly now, as will the comments. Read the rest of this post...

Did Bush just refuse to answer whether he's prepared to handle a terrorist attack?

Sure sounds that way.

The president was asked whether people should be worried about the government's ability to handle another terrorist attack given failures in responding to Katrina.

"Are we capable of dealing with a severe attack? That's a very important question and it's in the national interest that we find out what went on so we can better respond," Bush replied.

Read the rest of this post...

This is what constitutes "breaking news"

This is what he's done to the office.

Read the rest of this post...

I know the site is slow...

Blogads is having a dns problem which means their ads are holding up the site. It should be fixed momentarily, or in a few hours, but hang in there.

Consider this an open thread. Read the rest of this post...

Monday in New Orleans, from Kyle our on-the-ground correspondent

Balcony for Rent



A Bourbon street balcony remains fully decorated despite disaster. The sign reads “Balcony for Rent; Call 504-931-xxxx.”

Cleanup



A street cleaner sweeps up garbage on Canal Street.

Blackwater defending Blackwater



Three Blackwater mercenaries guard the Sheraton Hotel on Canal Street. The hotel houses the hired gunmen and I'm assuming their giant weapons.

Bourbon Tank



A Tank (or something) rolls down Bourbon Street on patrol. I thought it was interesting they had a yellow ribbon on the vehicle. Check out the signs outside the bars on the left. Read the rest of this post...

Read this entire story, then email it to all of your friends

Read this entire thing, then email it to everyone you know.

From the Chicago Sun-Times.

Say that again? 'Things are going relatively well'
September 12, 2005
BY RICHARD ROEPER SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

From the disputed presidential election of 2000 to the terrorist attacks on America on 9/11/01 to the failure to find Osama bin Laden to the quagmire of a war in Iraq to Hurricane Katrina, this has been a terrible decade, century, millennium.

It's got to get better in 2006, doesn't it?

In the meantime, we're two weeks into one of the most tragic and shameful events in American history. Here, in chronological order, are some of the most memorable quotes from evacuees, politicians, journalists, media personalities and celebrities.

*"I wasn't going to let a little thing like a hurricane keep me from wearing my bathing suit." -- Eva Longoria on the Video Music Awards, Aug. 28. Had Longoria known what was going to happen in the days to come, one imagines she would have come up with another bit.

*"The looting is out of control. The French Quarter has been attacked." -- New Orleans councilwoman Jackie Carlson, Aug. 30. Meanwhile, President Bush was playing guitar with country singer Mark Willis in San Diego. Bush would return to Crawford, Texas, that night, for one more night of taking it easy before finally cutting his vacation "short."

*"I must say, this storm is much bigger than anyone expected." -- FEMA Director Michael Brown, on CNN, Aug. 31.

*"Excuse me, senator, I'm sorry for interrupting . . . for the last four days, I've been seeing dead bodies in the streets here in Mississippi. And to listen to politicians thanking each other and complimenting each other, you know, I got to tell you, there are a lot of people out here who are very upset, and very angry, and very frustrated . . .

"And when they hear politicians . . . you know, thanking one another, it just . . . cuts them the wrong way right now, because literally there was a body in the streets of this town yesterday being eaten by rats because this woman had been laying in the streets for 48 hours . . ." -- CNN's Anderson Cooper, Sept. 1, in an awesome tirade directed at Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), who had been tossing compliments to fellow politicians and blowing bromides up the wazoo before Cooper cut her off.

*"George W. Bush gave one of the worst speeches of his life yesterday, especially given the level of national distress and the need for words of consolation and wisdom. In what seems to be a ritual for this administration, the president appeared a day later than he was needed." -- New York Times lead editorial, Sept. 1.

*"It was chaos. There was nobody there, nobody in charge. And there was nobody giving even water. The children . . . they're all just in tears. There are sick people. We saw . . . people who are dying in front of you." -- CNN producer Kim Segal, describing conditions in the New Orleans Convention Center, Sept. 1.

*"Considering the dire circumstances that we have in New Orleans, virtually a city that has been destroyed, things are going relatively well." -- FEMA chief Brown, Sept. 1.

*"From here and from talking to police officers, they're losing control of the city . . ." -- CNN's Chris Lawrence, Sept. 1.

*"We just learned of the convention center -- we being the federal government -- today." -- FEMA Director Brown, trying to deflect criticism to local government, on "Nightline," Sept. 1.

*"Don't you guys watch television? Don't you guys listen to the radio? Our reporters have been reporting on it for more than just today." -- Koppel's response.

*"Many of these people, almost all of them that we see are so poor and they are so black . . . " -- CNN's Wolf Blitzer's well-meaning but unfortunate description of the evacuees, Sept. 1.

*"Brownie, you're doing a heckuva job." -- President Bush, Sept. 2. One of the most idiotic, misguided, clueless and smug things the president has said during his two terms in office.

*"I'm satisfied with the response. I am not satisfied with the results." -- President Bush, later that day.

*"Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house -- he's lost his entire house -- there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." -- President Bush, cracking wise in Mobile, Ala., Sept. 2. And maybe when he sits on that porch, one of those unemployed evacuees can bring him a nice iced tea and a fan. After all, they'll be looking for work.

*"George Bush doesn't care about black people." -- Kanye West Sept. 2 on an NBC telethon for hurricane relief, as a deer-in-the-headlights Mike Myers stood beside him, no doubt wishing he was off making "Shrek 57."

*"I know you didn't want to interrupt your vacation and I know how you don't like to get bad news. Plus, you had fund-raisers to go to and mothers of dead soldiers to ignore and smear. . . . Mr. Bush, you just stay the course. It's not your fault that 30 percent of New Orleans lives in poverty or that tens of thousands had no transportation to get out of town. C'mon, they're black! I mean, it's not like this happened in Kennebunkport. Can you imagine leaving white people on their roofs for five days? Don't make me laugh!" -- Excerpt from Michael Moore's open letter to President Bush, Sept. 2. Moore is reportedly considering making a documentary about Bush and Katrina. It would be the easiest film he's ever done.

*"I open the television, there's people still there, waiting to be rescued, and for me that's not acceptable. I know there's reasons for it. I'm sorry to say I'm being rude, but I don't want to hear those reasons." -- Celine Dion in an interview on "Larry King Live," Sept. 3. An hour later, yours truly was in the audience at Dion's show in Las Vegas, where she told a baffled audience that she had cried and yelled at Larry King earlier that evening.

*"The guy who runs this building I'm in, emergency management, he's responsible for everything. His mother was trapped in a St. Bernard nursing home and every day she called him and said, 'Are you coming, son? Is somebody coming?' [starting to cry] And he said, 'Yeah, Mama, somebody's coming to get you. Somebody's coming to get you on Tuesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Wednesday. Somebody's coming to get you on Thursday. Somebody's coming to get you on Friday.' And she drowned Friday night. She drowned Friday night." -- Jefferson Parish president Aaron Broussard, Sept. 4, on NBC's "Meet the Press," in one of the defining media moments of all the hurricane coverage.

*"We lost everything. Katrina didn't care if you were poor or rich; all the houses look the same now." -- Mississippi resident Penny Dean, quoted in People magazine, which has covered the hurricane story in honorable and comprehensive fashion.

*"What I'm hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this, this is working very well for them." -- Former First Lady Barbara Bush, sounding like a bad caricature of a "Dallas" character, in the Houston Astrodome, Sept. 5.

*"I understand there are 10,000 people dead. It's terrible. It's tragic. But in a democracy of 300 million people, over years and years and years, these things happen." -- Republican operative Jack Burkman, MSNBC, Sept. 7, in an obvious attempt to go for the Humanitarian of the Year Award.

*"Go f-- yourself, Mr. Cheney. Go f-- yourself." -- Off-camera citizen heckling the vice president during a live interview that aired on CNN and MSNBC, Sept. 8. The "Go f-- yourself, Mr. Cheney" guy has his own Web site and is auctioning copies of personal video footage on eBay.

*"First time I've heard it. Must be a friend of John, er, uh, never mind." -- A chuckling Cheney's nonsensical, half-joke of a response when a reporter asked if he'd been hearing a lot of that sort of thing.

*"We finally cleaned up public housing in New Orleans. We couldn't do it, but God did." -- Rep. Richard Baker (R-La.), Sept. 8, in a quip to lobbyists quoted by the Wall Street Journal. Baker is denying the quote; the WSJ reporter stands by his story.

*"How, then, did we get here? How did the richest country on Earth end up watching children cry for food in putrid encampments on the evening news? How did reporters reach crowds of the desperate in places where police, troops and emergency responders had not yet been--three days after the storm?" -- Time magazine, in a report to be published today.

Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper are hosting a special benefit screening of "Walk the Line" starring Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon on Sept. 25. All proceeds to hurricane relief efforts. To purchase tickets, go to ticketmaster.com.

Read the rest of this post...

45 found dead at NO Hospital

Gruesome:

The bodies of 45 patients left in a hasty evacuation were recovered from a New Orleans hospital, officials said Monday, as the city braced for the scenes left by the receding waters.

The news of the grim recovery at the Memorial Medical Center, the largest such discovery since Hurricane Katrina struck, came hours after President Bush completed a tour of parts of the city and spoke to local officials. He defended his administration's record, even as the chief of the federal emergency agency, Michael D. Brown, said in Washington that he was resigning after being yanked off the hurricane relief job three days ago.

Read the rest of this post...

Operation Yellow Elephant recruits at the Sept 11 "Freedom Walk"

Hysterical. Read the rest of this post...

Bush says he can do more than one thing at a time

Problem being, of course, that Bush will screw up everything he does:

President Bush is balancing a harried schedule of diplomatic duties - from Iraq to China and the United Nations - while working to stay on top of hurricane recovery efforts that most Americans say should be his No. 1 priority.

"I can do more than one thing at one time," the president assured Monday on the first of two planned visits this week to the Gulf Coast. He's fitting those in between meetings with world leaders who came to the United States for a gathering of the United Nations in New York, where he planned to publicly thank world leaders for their contributions to storm relief.

And, if you have to say you can do more than one thing at a time, you probably can't. Read the rest of this post...

Another famine crisis brewing in Africa

For the fourth straight year, drought is causing crop failures which are pointing towards another famine crisis in Africa. Experts believe that the world community has up to six months to help with famine relief but so far nothing has happened. Let's hope that action is taken sooner than later. Read the rest of this post...

Late Night Open Thread

Sweet dreams. Read the rest of this post...

National Journal's Hotline Blogged Roberts Hearings

National Journal's The Hotline blogged the Roberts hearings. An interesting and more relevant use of blogs by the media. Read the rest of this post...