Visualize Winning

It's a nice flash animation. And while hokey, it's kind of good too. Watch it. Read the rest of this post...

U.S. Acts Against General Who Saw a 'Christian' War

Now who's wishy-washy?

The U.S. Army has taken action against Lt. Gen. William Boykin, who embarrassed the Bush administration by giving speeches in which he described the war on terrorism as a Christian battle against Satan.

Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Cody declined to give any details of the action taken in response to Boykin's remarks, which violated Pentagon rules, but said it was not "significant."

So the week before the election you chose to piss off the Muslim world (by taking a "not significant" action to address this wackjob), the fundies (by taking ANY action against their hero), and the moderates by seeming to be less than forthright in your handling of this case.

This is an administration in spin meltdown. They don't know what to be or who to suck up to, and it's showing. Read the rest of this post...

Shorter Zogby

Kerry Ahead in 5 States (CO, MN, PA, MI, WI);
Bush Still Leads in 4 States (FL, NM, NV, OH);
Tied in Iowa (45% Each) Read the rest of this post...

Andrew Sullivan: "WHY I AM SUPPORTING JOHN KERRY"

Andrew in The New Republic:

"...it is simply foolish to ignore what we have found out this past year about Bush's obvious limits, his glaring failures, his fundamental weakness as a leader. I fear he is out of his depth and exhausted. I simply do not have confidence in him to navigate the waters ahead skillfully enough to avoid or survive the darkening clouds on the horizon."

Read the rest of this post...

The REAL early evening open thread

I'll just shut up now. Read the rest of this post...

Bush Stance on Civil Unions Upsets Fundies

Well that didn't take long.

From AP:

"Civil unions are a government endorsement of homosexuality," said Robert Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute, an affiliate of Concerned Women For America. "But I don't think President Bush has thought about it in that way. He seems to be striving for neutrality while defending marriage itself."

Knight said "counterfeits" of marriage, such as civil unions, "hurt the real thing."

The head of another group, the Campaign for California Families, said it, too, wants a sweeping constitutional amendment that bars civil unions and same-sex marriage.

"Here's the truth, civil unions are homosexual marriage by another name," said Randy Thomasson, the group's executive director. "Civil unions rob marriage of its uniqueness and award homosexuals all the rights of marriage available under state law."

"Bush needs to understand what's going on and resist counterfeit marriages with all his might no matter what they're called," Thomasson said.

Not to Bobby and Randy. You're right. It is government endorsement, and it is marriage by another name. And it just got given to us by George W. Bush. So bite me. Read the rest of this post...

Early evening open thread

Among the latest news:

- Andrew Sullivan has come out in support of John Kerry's presidency.

- The White House is trying to play up the idea that no one knows if the 380 tons of explosives in Iraq were there to start with (oh, so now not knowing whether Saddam did or didn't have weapons is to Bush's credit?)

- I'm growing increasingly fascinated by Bush's embrace today of gay civil unions. This is big. It shows that Bush now feels he needs to embrace his inner homo in order to win this election. It shows that at the same time it's the middle and not the base that they now believe they need. It shows that the Mary Cheney brouhaha of 2 weeks was planned - meaning, it was part of this larger "Bush loves the homos, he really is compassionate" message they seem to think will woo the middle.

It finally shows that perhaps now we know why Pat Robertson lost it last week and fired a shot across the bow of the White House over Bush having told him there would be on casualties in Iraq. I wonder if Robertson didn't get wind that Bush was going to embrace gay rights this week, and decided to warn them in advance that they'd better not mess with the far-right bigots.

Ok, this is turning into NOT an open thread. My main point is that we just won on marriage. Sure, we don't have gay marriage yet, but now Bush is saying he supports civil unions, so the argument is over. Now we're just haggling over a word. I word I want, but a word nonetheless. You can't say you support gay couples having equal benefits rights, and then not say they deserve equal employment protection, equal social security, etc. etc. Bush just gave us a win on everything. The religious right ought to be pissed as shit.

Will Bush screw us again? Of course he will. But that's not the point. We have one of the most conservative presidents of all time endorsing our equal rights, and we'll be able to quote it back every single time we have a future battle on any gay rights issue. Culturally, this is HUGE what Bush has done in his desperation to win re-election. He just fucked the religious right. Talk about October Surprise. Read the rest of this post...

More Bush National Guard documents

And it's not even Friday evening!

Drip, drip, drip.

But gaps in the records leave unanswered questions about the final two years of his military service in 1972 and 1973. Chief among them: Why did Bush's commanders apparently tolerate his lapses in training and approve his honorable discharge?

Bush's commanders could have punished him -- or ordered him to two years of active duty -- for missing drills for six months in 1972 and skipping a required pilot's medical exam. Instead, they allowed him to make up some of his missed training and granted him an honorable discharge....

But the culture apparently did not apply to everyone. Although no records mention any punishment against Bush other than being grounded, the Texas unit's files show another airman was ordered to involuntary active duty in March 1972 as punishment.

There are also unresolved questions about what, if any, work Bush did while temporarily assigned in 1972 to an Alabama unit and why the future president suddenly switched back to training jets shortly before giving up as a pilot.

White House spokesmen say Bush fulfilled all of his obligations and was never disciplined for any wrongdoing while he was in the Texas Air National Guard from 1968 to 1973. While Bush did not meet requirements for pilots in 1972 and 1973 and skipped months of training, there is no record of his commanders ordering him to active duty or initiating an investigation.

Bush's spokesmen and the Pentagon had insisted all of the president's files were made public last February when the White House released records it hoped would put an end to the questions.

AP, however, identified large numbers of documents that should have been produced under the Guard's 1970s regulations but had not been released, such as flight logs and mission orders. It sued in both federal and Texas state court and filed supplemental document requests to get answers.

The Pentagon and Texas National Guard responded by conducting sweeping new searches that turned up more than 100 pages of new documents since August, including Bush's long-sought flight logs and dozens of orders showing what work the future president attended or missed.

But even when the government insisted in sworn affidavits that all documents about Bush had been made public last month, AP persisted and won permission to allow two law professors to review boxes of files in Texas to make sure nothing was missed.

The professors found dozens of pages of new memos overlooked in the government's searches. The government's only explanation was that dust and rat excrement in the boxes made it hard to review the files....

And records showed Bush missed some of his unit's drills, including a mission to guard the Southwest border in fall 1972.

Read the rest of this post...

Four years ago today

Bush was up by 3 points in the Zogby poll against Gore. But Gore won. Just keep that in mind. Read the rest of this post...

George Bush suddenly likes the gays

You know Bush has gotta be desperate when he thinks embracing gay civil unions is somehow going to win him the election. Talk about your last minute deseration. And I can only imagine the phone calls Karl Rove is getting from the religious right today about this little Bush bimbo eruption. So much for turning out the base.

This from the NYT:

President Bush said in an interview this past weekend that he disagreed with the Republican Party platform opposing civil unions of same-sex couples and that the matter should be left up to the states.

Mr. Bush has previously said that states should be permitted to allow same-sex unions, even though White House officials have said he would not have endorsed such unions as governor of Texas. But Mr. Bush has never before made a point of so publicly disagreeing with his party's official position on the issue.

In an interview on Sunday with Charles Gibson, an anchor of "Good Morning America" on ABC, Mr. Bush said, "I don't think we should deny people rights to a civil union, a legal arrangement, if that's what a state chooses to do so." ABC, which broadcast part of the interview on Monday, is to broadcast the part about civil unions on Tuesday.

According to an ABC transcript, Mr. Gibson then noted to Mr. Bush that the Republican Party platform opposed civil unions.

"Well, I don't," Mr. Bush replied.

He added: "I view the definition of marriage different from legal arrangements that enable people to have rights. And I strongly believe that marriage ought to be defined as between a union between a man and a woman. Now, having said that, states ought to be able to have the right to pass laws that enable people to be able to have rights like others."

Mr. Gibson then asked, "So the Republican platform on that point, as far as you're concerned, is wrong?"

"Right," Mr. Bush replied.

Of course, Bush is a duplicitous ass (or more likely, a moron) because his own federal constitutional amendment he offered would have banned civil unions in the states, and the various state constitutional amendments would do the same. So is Bush now saying he OPPOSES the state constitutional amendments and state laws, like in Virginia, that ban civil unions?

Perhaps this is why Pat Robertson took a swipe at the president last week. Bush is running scared, and he just threw the religious right overboard. Read the rest of this post...

"Why I believe in our president"

From the Gadflyer:

I believe in President George W. Bush. I've always believed him.

I believe the president invaded Iraq to secure liberty and democracy for the Iraqi people. I believe he had compelling evidence that Iraq was a significant threat to America and the world, and presented that evidence in a complete and balanced manner. Like 42 percent of Americans – and 62 percent of Republicans – I believe Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 attacks.

I believe we have enough troops on the ground in Iraq to ensure stability. I believe the rising American fatality rates, the rising casualty rates, and the rising American share of those coalition fatalities and casualties testify to the undeniable progress we're making there. I believe it is inappropriate and traitorous, however, for the media to broadcast pictures of American flag-draped caskets returning from Iraq....

Read the rest of this post...

Iraqi Prime Minister Allawi blames US coalition for deadly ambush of Iraqi troops

Chimpy's going to be vewy vewy angwy at you. Now the US is to blame for the 50 security forces executed. You know what we have to say about that?

And another thing, I thought Iraq was a part of the coalition? Remember Cheney during the debates, claiming the US has only had 50% (only 50%!) of the coalition deaths, not 90%. So how is that now Allawi is blaming the coalition if Iraq is a part of the coalition? I'm so confused! Tell me Tricky Dick didn't lie?

From USA Today:

Iraq's interim prime minister blamed U.S.-led coalition forces Tuesday for "great negligence" in the ambush that killed about 50 American-trained soldiers, and a U.S. airstrike in Fallujah killed an aide to Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the military said.

Read the rest of this post...

Kerry up 5 in PA

From Campaign Extra. Read the rest of this post...

Consumer confidence hits 7 month low

Chimpy going dowwwwwwwn. Read the rest of this post...

Kerry up, Bush down in WaPo tracking poll

For whatever it's worth, the poll is trending in favor of Kerry who yesterday took the lead (49% to 48%). Bush remains in seriously dangerous territory but we need to take it over the top on election day and get people out to vote. Read the rest of this post...

Gov. Arnnold Keeps Distance From Bush

Schwarzenegger might make one quick daytrip to Ohio for Bush. But other than that, he won't waste his political capital on Furious George.

"But I'm not going to hop around from state to state because the people did not elect me to do that," Arnold told the LA Times.

Besides, Arnold knows a loser when he sees one.
Read the rest of this post...

Iraqi War: $225 Billion and Counting

Ok, a few weeks ago John Kerry was shredded for suggesting that the total cost of fighting in Iraq was $200 billion. He was quite reasonably taking the total amount already spent by the debates ($125 billion) and the money that was going to be needed in the coming fiscal year that started in the beginning of October. That money was already needed and in fact delaying the requests meant the final bill would be higher (delayed repairs cost more). But Bush was afraid to let the American people know the truth about what the real financial burden of the war was becoming.

Now the Washington Post reports that Bush is going to be requesting about $70 billion (more than the year before) and when you add in special funding requests, the cost is now $225 billion and counting. That only gets us to next October and of course the stronger the insurgency gets, the more money we'll need. That's more than $1000.00 for every single adult in the country. Guess you can hand that modest tax break right back, along with your sons and daughters.
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CYA Alert! CYA Alert! Explosives now reported to be missing before invasion

So I guess this is going to come down to an issue of trust. Who are you going to believe now that they are reporting the explosives were missing before the invasion of Iraq? Are we going to believe the crew that told us about WMDs, Iraqi connections to 9/11, nothing to see with Abu Gharib? I didn't think so. Who knows where the truth lies with this but the Bushies should have thought about that before they lied and lied and lied and lied and lied. Maybe George should have read "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" instead of My Pet Goat.
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Rumsfeld Lies To American People

A rather dry New York Times article adds further details to what we've known for a while: Bush thinks he is above the law and has been ignoring the Geneva Convention in Iraq by sending non-Iraqis to undisclosed locations for torture or worse by "allies" like Saudi Arabia (gotta ignore our principles to defend our principles) or hiding them from the International Red Cross. (They don't use Guantanamo Bay for the real baddies because they know the world is watching.)

But here's the kicker: Rumsfeld lied to the American people about what they've been doing. We've been transporting non-Iraqis captured in Iraq out of the country (which is a war crime under the Geneva Convention) for a year and a half.

"As recently as May 2004, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld reiterated in public testimony the administration's view that "everyone in Iraq who was a military person" as well as "the civilians or criminal elements" who were detained by the American authorities would be "treated subject to the Geneva Conventions.""

Why doesn't some Congressperson demand Rummy come back to them and explain why he lied to the American people?


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IL Governor wants to import flu vaccine from Europe

Doesn't he know that drugs from Europe could be dangerous? President Bush is trying to protect us from such problems, isn't he? Forget about those one or two companies that even know how to make drugs such as Novartis, Roche, Pharmacia, Aventis, Bayer and GlaxoSmithKline. They're only in business because of America. If the president tells us that there is no problem and there is nothing to worry about, we should all believe him because he's a man who knows how to tell us the truth.
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California broadcaster donates $325K to GOP candidates, FCC quiet

I've had it with the FCC as well and will look forward to Powell having for his daddy to find him a new job next week. Absolute power corrupting absolutely. Is it election day yet?
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Spring Break Fallujah: The Game!

Well, we just launched "Spring Break Fallujah: The Game!" over at ENJOYtheDRAFT.com. Please check it out, and then check out our home page which we've redesigned, and which now includes a nifty new draft blog that we'll be updating up until the election.

Then give us some love (ok, forget the love, we need cash). We need as much money as possible ASAP to run online ads about the site to get the word to the youth vote and beyond. If you can help, you're a trooper :-) Read the rest of this post...

Does your BradBlog bite?

BradBlog: 1 - White House: 0

As you may recall, Brad at BradBlog.com has discovered a few weeks ago that the coalition of the willing had become the coalition of the disappeared over at the White House Web site. The White House had removed the detailed list of coalition members, apparently after they'd dropped down to 30 from the original 48 or so, because so many have said sayonara.

Well, Brad got his revenge. The story got covered twice in the Washington Post today, here and here.

Two points for Brad :-) Read the rest of this post...