THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

Yet listening to Cheney and Rice, it seems that they want to be excused for the measures they authorized after the attacks on the grounds that 9/11 was traumatic. "If you were there in a position of authority and watched Americans drop out of eighty-story buildings because these murderous tyrants went after innocent people," Rice said in her recent comments, "then you were determined to do anything that you could that was legal to prevent that from happening again."

I have little sympathy for this argument. Yes, we went for days with little sleep, and we all assumed that more attacks were coming. But the decisions that Bush officials made in the following months and years -- on Iraq, on detentions, on interrogations, on wiretapping -- were not appropriate. Careful analysis could have replaced the impulse to break all the rules, even more so because the Sept. 11 attacks, though horrifying, should not have surprised senior officials. Cheney's admission that 9/11 caused him to reassess the threats to the nation only underscores how, for months, top officials had ignored warnings from the CIA and the NSC staff that urgent action was needed to preempt a major al-Qaeda attack.

"I'll freely admit that watching a coordinated, devastating attack on our country from an underground bunker at the White House can affect how you view your responsibilities," Cheney said in his recent speech. But this defense does not stand up. The Bush administration's response actually undermined the principles and values America has always stood for in the world, values that should have survived this traumatic event. The White House thought that 9/11 changed everything. It may have changed many things, but it did not change the Constitution, which the vice president, the national security adviser and all of us who were in the White House that tragic day had pledged to protect and preserve.

// posted by montag @ 4:37 PM 0 Comments

George Tiller, a Wichita doctor who was one of the few doctors in the nation to perform late-term abortions, was shot to death on Sunday as he attended church, city officials in Wichita said.

// posted by montag @ 1:27 PM 0 Comments

The indictment said Bishop, a Republican election officer in the Manchester precinct in 2002 and 2004, hosted meetings at his house where candidates for office pooled money to use in buying votes.

He also bought votes at the polling place, giving voters a mark or ticket so they could get paid later, the indictment says.

Bishop and [elections official William] Stivers also used OxyContin to buy votes at the direction of [School Superintendent Douglas] Adams in 2002, former Manchester assistant police Chief Todd Roberts told investigators, according to another court document.

// posted by montag @ 12:57 PM 0 Comments

Starting tomorrow think of Canada as a foreign country

// posted by montag @ 12:33 PM 0 Comments

One of the senators, Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, reasserting himself after months of treatment for brain cancer, made clear this week that he favored a robust public health care plan, a government-sponsored entity that would compete with private insurers.

As a starting point for his bill, Mr. Kennedy favors a public plan that looks like Medicare, the government-run program for older Americans created in 1965, when he was a young senator.

By contrast, Senator Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who is chairman of the Finance Committee, has been working for months with the panel’s senior Republican, Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, in the hope of forging a bipartisan bill, which would probably play down the option of a public plan.

Mr. Grassley opposes creation of a new government insurance program and says “we cannot afford the public health plan we have already,” referring to Medicare.

President Obama has championed a public plan, saying it would help “keep the private sector honest,” though he has indicated he will be flexible on the details.

House Democratic leaders, including three committee chairmen drafting the House bill, are close to Senator Kennedy’s position.

// posted by montag @ 1:10 PM 0 Comments

Is Larry Summers taking kickbacks from the banks he’s bailing out?

Last month, a little-known company where Summers served on the board of directors received a $42 million investment from a group of investors, including three banks that Summers, Obama’s effective “economy czar,” has been doling out billions in bailout money to: Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, and Morgan Stanley. The banks invested into the small startup company, Revolution Money, right at the time when Summers was administering the “stress test” to these same banks.

A month after they invested in Summers’ former company, all three banks came out of the stress test much better than anyone expected -- thanks to the fact that the banks themselves were allowed to help decide how bad their problems were (Citigroup “negotiated” down its financial hole from $35 billion to $5.5 billion.)

In spite of all of this, on April 6, 2009, Revolution Money announced the happy news: it had just successfully raised $42 million dollars in the most difficult market since the 1930s. The investors? Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley -- bankrupt institutions that Larry Summers was transferring billions in bailout funds to.

At the very same time that these three megabanks were pouring millions into Summers’ former company, Obama’s economic team, starring Larry Summers, was subjecting these same banks to a “stress test” to decide how deep in shit these same banks really were. The banks wanted the government to fudge the results for obvious reasons -- who wants the world to know how deep of a hole you’ve dug for yourself?

When the stress test results were finally released, the banks all came out with glowing reports that beat expectations and caused plenty of skepticism.

// posted by montag @ 12:51 PM 0 Comments

One of the top Republicans in the Senate, John Cornyn, is repudiating recent comments by Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich which claimed that Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is a racist.

Cornyn, the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, told NPR's "All Things Considered":

"I think it's terrible... This is not the kind of tone any of us want to set when it comes to performing our constitutional responsibilities of advise and consent."

Cornyn dismissed Limbaugh and Gingrich, adding: "Neither one of these men are elected Republican officials. I just don't think it's appropriate. I certainly don't endorse it. I think it's wrong."

// posted by montag @ 7:21 AM 0 Comments

Pharmaceutical giant Aventis must pay more than 95 million dollars in an out-of-court settlement, after overcharging US and local health agencies for medications destined for indigent patients, federal prosecutors said Thursday.

“We will continue to ensure that programs for the most vulnerable portions of our population do not pay any more for pharmaceutical products than they should under the law,” Tony West, an assistant attorney general at the US Justice Department said in a statement announcing the settlement.

Aventis Pharmaceutical Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sanofi-Aventis, acknowledged that it violated the False Claims Act by misreporting drug prices for patients in the Medicaid Drug Rebate program for poor patients.

Under the program, Aventis was required to report to Medicaid the lowest price that it charged commercial customers, and pay quarterly rebates to the states for their Medicaid patients, based on those reported prices.

But Aventis deliberately misquoted the prices, underpaying rebates to Medicaid and overcharging some public health agencies for the medications.

// posted by montag @ 7:05 AM 0 Comments

Father Alberto Cutie, an internationally known Catholic priest who admitted having a romantic affair and breaking his vow of celibacy, is joining the Episcopal Church to be with the woman he loves, he said Thursday.

"I will always love the Catholic Church and all its members," he said at a news conference. "But I want to start today by going into a new family.

"Here before this community where I have chosen to serve and where I live, I am going to continue to proclaim the word of God and my love for God," Cutie said.

// posted by montag @ 7:14 PM 0 Comments

AT the time of creation, the body parts were arguing. The problem could not be solved because each one wanted to be the boss of the whole body.

Said the brain, "I do the thinking. Without me, none of you would know what to do. Do you realize I am at the highest point symbolizing my superiority over all of you? So, logically, I should be the boss of the entire body.''

The eyes declared, "No. I do the seeing. Without me, you would not know where to go. Why, you could not even move. You cannot appreciate your surroundings. In darkness, all of you would be useless. I should be the boss of the whole body!''

Exclaimed the heart, "Where do you think you get the strength? From the blood I pump to each of you. Without me, you would all be dead. I am the center of all your abilities. No question, I should be the boss of the human form!''

The lungs shouted, "What use is the blood if it has not been aerated through my function? I breathe all day to purify the whole body. For this, I should be the boss of all body parts.''

Growled the intestines, "You talk about nourishment. Where do you think the nutrients come from? It is through my digestive prowess. I grind the food and transform them to basic elements for absorption. Then the body has the energy to function. No doubt I should be the boss.''

In succession, the feet, ears, mouth, liver, kidney and every other part spoke. Each claiming the right to be boss.

Finally, even the asshole spoke of being the boss.

All the other parts found it so funny for the asshole to demand the honor of being boss. They all laughed and laughed. The asshole was so humiliated and angered.

Out of sheer spite, the asshole blocked himself and refuse to function. The body began to be poisoned by the non-evacuation of all the body waste. The brain got dulled, the eyes got crossed, the heart skipped beats, the lungs could hardly heave, the intestines were feverish, the feet and arms ached and limped.

All the body parts relented and allowed the asshole to become the boss.

And so it came to pass. From that time on, all the other body parts did all the work. The asshole just bossed around and sat on its behind.

Moral of the story: "You don't have to be a brain to be boss, just an asshole.''

// posted by montag @ 6:21 PM 0 Comments

I know lots of stupid people who went to Ivy League schools.

// posted by montag @ 6:54 AM 0 Comments

Bennett (Utah)
Cochran
Collins
Gregg
Hatch
Lugar
Snowe
Specter (has since switched to the Democrats)

// posted by montag @ 3:56 PM 0 Comments

A federal agency has cited Wal-Mart Stores Inc. for inadequate crowd management in the death of a worker at a New York store.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued the citation Tuesday. It says Wal-Mart should have recognized the need for effective crowd management during its sales blitz the day after Thanksgiving.

The world's largest retailer faces a $7,000 fine but has 15 days to respond to the citation. A company spokesman did not immediately comment.

A crowd broke down the Valley Stream store's doors last year. Temporary worker Jdimytai Damour (jih-mee-TREE' dih-MOHR') was trapped in a vestibule and asphyxiated.

He had been on the job about a week with no training in security or crowd control.

// posted by montag @ 3:41 PM 0 Comments

France surpasses the U.S. on every measure of health care availability, provision, and outcomes, whether it's number of doctors, access to advanced medical treatments, or outcomes. They do this despite spending 5% less of GDP on healthcare than the United States spends. Single-payer health insurance, commonly referred to as "Medicare For All", works. We have proof it works. The only reason not to do it is ideology. There is a term to describe nations where ideology trumps pragmatic reality: "Has-beens." Just ask the USSR. Oh wait, you can't...

// posted by montag @ 7:34 PM 0 Comments

"The average person can take this for 14 seconds," Marine Sergeant Clay South told his audience before he was waterboarded on air. "He's going to wiggle, he's going to scream, he's going to wish he never did this."

Mancow was set on a 7-foot long table with his legs elevated and his feet tied.

"I wanted to prove it wasn't torture," Mancow said. "They cut off our heads, we put water on their face...I got voted to do this but I really thought 'I'm going to laugh this off.' "

The upshot? "It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that's no joke," Mancow told listeners. "It is such an odd feeling to have water poured down your nose with your head back...It was instantaneous...and I don't want to say this: absolutely torture."

"Absolutely. I mean that's drowning," he added later. "It is the feeling of drowning."

"If I knew it was gonna be this bad, I would not have done it," he said.

// posted by montag @ 5:39 PM 1 Comments

The Post has the storyboards for the ads, and they read just like the infamous Harry and Louise ads that helped kill health care reform in 1993. Troubled Americans are shown being denied their choice of doctor, or forced to wait months for appointments, by faceless government bureaucrats. It’s a scary image that might make some sense if private health insurance — which these days comes primarily via HMOs — offered all of us free choice of doctors, with no wait for medical procedures. But my health plan isn’t like that. Is yours?

“We can do a lot better than a government-run health care system,” says a voice-over in one of the ads. To which the obvious response is, if that’s true, why don’t you? Why deny Americans the chance to reject government insurance if it’s really that bad?

For none of the reform proposals currently on the table would force people into a government-run insurance plan. At most they would offer Americans the choice of buying into such a plan.

And the goal of the insurers is to deny Americans that choice. They fear that many people would prefer a government plan to dealing with private insurance companies that, in the real world as opposed to the world of their ads, are more bureaucratic than any government agency, routinely deny clients their choice of doctor, and often refuse to pay for care.

// posted by montag @ 6:50 AM 0 Comments

Army ammunition officials hope to field a new, environmentally friendly 5.56mm bullet this summer.

“One of our big efforts right now is to develop green ammunition,” Lt. Col. Jeff Woods, product manager for Small Caliber Ammunition,

// posted by montag @ 7:25 PM 1 Comments

Thanks to a 279-147 vote Wednesday in the House of Representatives, visitors to the nation's parks and wildlife refuges will be able to carry weapons there if they abide by state weapons laws.

The bill is on its way to President Barack Obama, who faces a dilemma: Gun rights advocates attached the provision to a sweeping overhaul of the credit card industry, an initiative Obama strongly supports, so he has little choice but to let the gun section become law.

// posted by montag @ 7:26 AM 0 Comments

But federal authorities charged Wednesday that the success their former colleague, Paul Bergrin, had in defending drug dealers and gang leaders was based on a brutal calculus that he had boiled down to a phrase he repeated like a slogan: No witnesses, no case.

In an indictment unsealed on Wednesday in United States District Court in Newark, prosecutors accused Mr. Bergrin, 53, of orchestrating the murder of a confidential witness by leaking his name to drug dealers who shot him in broad daylight on a Newark street corner; of traveling to Chicago to hire a murderer to kill a witness in another case; of coaching some eyewitnesses to lie; and of paying others to change their stories or leave town on the day they were to testify.

// posted by montag @ 7:09 AM 0 Comments

Months before the first “torture memo” was issued by Bush administration lawyers in 2002, Alberto Gonzales – then White House counsel – personally approved “borderline torture” techniques used on Abu Zubaydah, according to a new report.

An anonymous source told NPR that in April and May of 2002 CIA contractor James Mitchell sought approval on a daily basis for so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” via top-secret cables to the CIA’s counterterrorism center. The CIA forwarded those cables to the White House, according to National Public Radio, and Gonzales would approve the technique, thus granting a legal basis for Mitchell’s actions – in theory at least.

// posted by montag @ 6:48 AM 0 Comments

Are Wall Street speculators driving up gasoline prices?

This time, Wall Street speculators — some of them recipients of billions of dollars in taxpayers' bailout money — may be to blame.

Big Wall Street banks such as Goldman Sachs & Co., Morgan Stanley and others are able to sidestep the regulations that limit investments in commodities such as oil, and they're investing on behalf of pension funds, endowments, hedge funds and other big institutional investors, in part as a hedge against rising inflation.

These investors now far outnumber big fuel consumers such as airlines and trucking companies, which try to protect themselves against price swings, and they're betting that the economy eventually will rebound, that the Obama administration's spending policies and Federal Reserve actions will trigger inflation — or both — and that oil prices will rise.

// posted by montag @ 7:45 PM 0 Comments

Have you been pleased at all with the Obama administration’s policies in Iraq and what they’ve done there so far?

I think that we have to get out. I think that we should have left both these countries a long time ago. In the case of Iraq, the reasons that we were given at the time the war began were all lies, and we all know it, and as a country we should have been willing to learn from that mistake a long time ago. We have conducted wars without paying for them for the past seven years, and the result of that is that we have come close to destroying our national economy.

At this point I’m really not terribly concerned about the well-being of the Shiites, the Sunnis, or the Kurds. What I care about is our surviving these difficult economic times, and when I’m asked to vote for $100 billion to extend occupations that fundamentally served no purpose that could not be accomplished any other way—in lieu of spending for the things that human beings need, at a time when we have schools closing in Orlando, at a time when we are laying off firefighters and police officers—I have to say, “No, there’s a better use for that money.”

Is this something you’re continuing to hear voiced from your constituents?

Well, those who feel that way. There’s obviously a great difference of opinion about this issue in the country, but you can’t get around the fact that there is no possible way that endless war could possibly be good for this country. That’s something that people really understand. In the novel 1984 Orwell wrote that endless war is one of the vices that a dictatorship uses to keep control of its people. I don’t think we need to head down that road any further.

What do you propose we do? What would you like to see done—

Get out! Get out.

// posted by montag @ 7:31 PM 0 Comments

When Jody Richards saw a homeless man begging outside a downtown McDonald's recently, he bought the man a cheeseburger. There's nothing unusual about that, except that Richards is homeless, too, and the 99-cent cheeseburger was an outsized chunk of the $9.50 he'd earned that day from panhandling.

// posted by montag @ 7:30 AM 0 Comments

Banks are using a little-known tactic to help pay bonuses, deferred pay and pensions they owe executives: They're holding life-insurance policies on hundreds of thousands of their workers, with themselves as the beneficiaries.

Banks took out much of this life insurance during the mortgage bubble, when executives' pay -- and the IOUs for their deferred compensation -- surged, and banking regulators affirmed the use of life insurance as a way to finance executive pay and benefits.

Bank of America Corp. has the most life insurance on employees: $17.3 billion at the end of the first quarter, according to bank filings. Wachovia Corp. has $12 billion, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. has $11.1 billion and Wells Fargo & Co. has $5.7 billion. (Wells Fargo acquired Wachovia at the end of last year.)

The insurance policies essentially are informal pension funds for executives: Companies deposit money into the contracts, which are like big, nondeductible IRAs, and allocate the cash among investments that grow tax-free. Over time, employers receive tax-free death benefits when employees, former employees and retirees die.

// posted by montag @ 6:47 AM 0 Comments

5 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT OBAMA'S PUBLIC HEALTH INSURANCE OPTION

1. Choice, choice, choice. If the public health insurance option passes, Americans will be able to choose between their current insurance and a high-quality, government-run plan similar to Medicare. If you like your current care, you can keep it. If you don't—or don't have any—you can get the public insurance plan.

2. It will be high-quality coverage with a choice of doctors. Government-run plans have a track record of innovating to improve quality, because they're not just focused on short-term profits. And if you choose the public plan, you'll still get to choose your doctor and hospital.

3. We'll all save a bunch of money. The public health insurance option won't have to spend money on things like CEO bonuses, shareholder dividends, or excessive advertising, so it'll cost a lot less. Plus, the private plans will have to lower their rates and provide better value to compete, so people who keep their current insurance will save, too.

4. It will always be there for you and your family. A for-profit insurer can close, move out of the area, or just kick you off their insurance rolls. The public health insurance option will always be available to provide you with the health security you need.

5. And it's a key part of universal health care. No longer will sick people or folks in rural communities, or low-income Americans be forced to go without coverage. The public health insurance plan will be available and accessible to everyone. And for those struggling to make ends meet, the premiums will be subsidized by the government.

// posted by montag @ 6:13 PM 0 Comments

Complaints were filed against 12 individuals, including former attorneys general John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales and Michael Mukasey and former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, said a member of the groups. The complaints filed with bar associations in the District of Columbia and four states — New York, California, Texas and Pennsylvania — say their licenses should be revoked for "moral turpitude."

"These lawyers misused their license to practice law to provide legal cover for the war crime of torture," said Kevin Zeese, executive director of VotersForPeace.US and a board member with VelvetRevolution.US, the two groups leading the effort.

John Yoo, Jay Bybee and Stephen Bradbury, who worked in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel

_ Ex-Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith

_ Former Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, David Addington

_ Pentagon lawyer William Haynes

_ Former deputy White House counsel Timothy Flanigan

_ and Alice Fisher, former director of the Justice Department's Criminal Division.

// posted by montag @ 6:15 PM 0 Comments

Waterboarding was not used to produce intelligence that linked Iraq to al Qaeda in the run-up to the war in Iraq, former Vice President Dick Cheney's daughter said Sunday.

// posted by montag @ 7:23 AM 0 Comments

New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd has admitted to using a paragraph virtually word-for-word from a prominent liberal blogger without attribution.

Dowd acknowledged the error in an e-mail to The Huffington Post on Sunday, the Web site reported. The Times corrected her column online to give proper credit for the material to Talking Points Memo editor Josh Marshall.

The newspaper issued a formal correction Monday saying Dowd "failed to attribute a paragraph about the timeline for prisoner abuse" to Marshall's blog.

// posted by montag @ 7:16 AM 0 Comments

None of the proposed military assistance is directed at the nuclear program. So far, America’s aid to Pakistan’s nuclear infrastructure has been limited to a $100 million classified program to help Pakistan secure its weapons and materials from seizure by Al Qaeda, the Taliban or “insiders” with insurgent loyalties.

But the billions in new proposed American aid, officials acknowledge, could free other money for Pakistan’s nuclear infrastructure, at a time when Pakistani officials have expressed concern that their nuclear program is facing a budget crunch for the first time, worsened by the global economic downturn. The program employs tens of thousands of Pakistanis, including about 2,000 believed to possess “critical knowledge” about how to produce a weapon.

The dimensions of the Pakistani buildup are not fully understood. “We see them scaling up their centrifuge facilities,” said David Albright, the president of the Institute for Science and International Security, which has been monitoring Pakistan’s continued efforts to buy materials on the black market, and analyzing satellite photographs of two new plutonium reactors less than 100 miles from where Pakistani forces are currently fighting the Taliban.

“The Bush administration turned a blind eye to how this is being ramped up,” he said. “And of course, with enough pressure, all this could be preventable.”

As a matter of diplomacy, however, the buildup presents Mr. Obama with a potential conflict between two national security priorities, some aides concede. One is to win passage of a global agreement to stop the production of fissile material — the uranium or plutonium used to produce weapons. Pakistan has never agreed to any limits and is one of three countries, along with India and Israel, that never signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Yet the other imperative is a huge infusion of financial assistance into Afghanistan and Pakistan, money considered crucial to helping stabilize governments with tenuous holds on power in the face of terrorist and insurgent violence.

// posted by montag @ 7:09 AM 0 Comments

Stories of missing drugs, of desperately ill-equipped doctors and of patients left to suffer the consequences are everywhere in Iraq's public health care system. Some hospitals are filthy and infested with bugs. Others are practically falling down. More and more, the blame is being placed on Iraq's U.S.-backed government, which by many accounts is infested with corruption and incompetence.

There's no doubt that years of economic sanctions, followed by years of war, have taken a heavy toll on all public services in Iraq. However, with violence down and some tentative sense of normalcy returning, improvements in health care should be coming far faster than they are, according to doctors, patients, aid organizations and some public officials.

They fault widespread problems at all levels of Iraq's government, and the examples they cite are troubling. Health ministry workers routinely siphon drugs from hospital orders to make extra cash on the black market. Bribery is rampant. Millions of dollars meant for clinics and equipment have gone missing. Millions more have been wasted on government contracts to buy expired medicines.

The health ministry's inspector general openly admits the problems. Even so, the culprits are rarely punished.

Corruption and ineptitude aren't limited to health care, of course; they're endemic in most Iraqi public institutions. When it comes to public health, however, the repercussions are devastating, and they bring into sharp focus the failures that are threatening Iraq's American-financed effort to rebuild itself as a democracy at peace with itself and with its neighbors.

// posted by montag @ 1:48 PM 0 Comments

"Everything's different this time," answered Robert Zirkelbach, a spokesman for America's Health Insurance Plans, a leading industry group. "Everybody learned valuable lessons from 15 years ago."

So now we're looking at kinder, gentler insurance companies?

"Unlike last time around, our industry has made a commitment to come to the table with workable solutions," Zirkelbach said. "We're taking a dramatically different approach to reform than we did 15 years ago. Back then, we opposed reform. Now we support it."

I feel better already.

But when I asked Zirkelbach about the $2 trillion in cost reductions that the healthcare industry says it can come up with over 10 years, he said the details were still being hammered out.

As for Obama's proposal for a public plan to compete with private ones and keep costs down, Zirkelbach said, "We have significant concerns about that, absolutely."

And he wasn't very committed to the insurers' recent claim that they'll stop denying coverage to sick people or those with preexisting conditions. Zirkelbach said this would be contingent on lawmakers approving a national mandate for health insurance -- in other words, a requirement that everyone has to buy the industry's products.

Are those changes still possible without a mandate?

"Probably not," Zirkelbach replied.

"It's wiped out all our savings," Monica told me. "But we're at an age where if anything happened to us, we'd be paying far more.

"We can't afford health insurance," she said. "But we can't afford not to have it."

The same goes for the rest of us. That's what Obama and members of Congress need to remember as healthcare executives start haggling over terms -- or if, yet again, they get up and leave the table.

This isn't about their needs. It's about ours.

// posted by montag @ 1:27 PM 0 Comments

I used to agree with President Obama, that it was better to keep moving and focus on our myriad problems than wallow in the darkness of the past. But now I want a full accounting. I want to know every awful act committed in the name of self-defense and patriotism. Even if it only makes one ambitious congresswoman pay more attention in some future briefing about some future secret technique that is “uniquely” designed to protect us, it will be worth it.

I’m not a fan of Washington’s blue-ribbon commissions, where political compromises can trump the truth. But the 9/11 investigation did illuminate how, a month after Bush received an intelligence brief titled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.,” 3,000 Americans were slaughtered on his and Cheney’s watch. If the Obama administration really wants to move on from the dark Bush era, it will need a new commission, backed up by serious law enforcement, to shed light on where every body is buried.

// posted by montag @ 10:06 PM 0 Comments

Nothing is simple if you’re Harry Reid. This week the Senate was working on a consumer rights bill for credit card holders when Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican, suddenly proposed an amendment to allow people to carry loaded guns in national parks.

This would seem relevant only if consumers are worried that they will not be able to use their American Express at a souvenir stand in Yellowstone, and will need to hold up the cashier in order to bring home a much-anticipated geyser refrigerator magnet.

Coburn said it was not a “gotcha” aimed at forcing the opposition into a corner on a hot-button issue, although when you say you’re offering an amendment “to protect innocent Americans from violent crime in national parks and refuges” I think you are kind of stacking the deck.

But one way or another, the Democrats clearly did feel trapped into placating the gun lobby. Twenty-seven of them wound up voting yes on an amendment that would arm the tourists and make final passage of the credit card bill more complicated. Including Reid.

// posted by montag @ 1:04 PM 0 Comments

A total of 43 children were directly and indirectly shocked by electric stun guns during simultaneous ''Take Your Sons and Daughters to Work Day'' events gone wrong at three state prisons, according to new information provided Friday by the Florida Department of Corrections.

Also, a group of kids was exposed to tear gas during a demonstration at another lockup.

Three prison guards have been fired, two have resigned and 16 more employees -- from corrections officers to a warden -- will be disciplined due to the incidents that unfolded April 23, said DOC Secretary Walt McNeil. An investigation is ongoing.

None of the children in any of the incidents required medical attention or was notably harmed, McNeil said. He said the children, who ranged in age from 5 to 17, were all children of prison officials.

// posted by montag @ 6:10 PM 0 Comments

Six major insurance companies have received preliminary approval to get billions of dollars in fresh capital as part of the government’s financial rescue program, a Treasury Department spokesman confirmed on Thursday.

The department said the Hartford Financial Services Group, Prudential Financial, Lincoln National, Allstate, Ameriprise and Principal Financial Group have all received approval for capital infusions, subject to terms still to be negotiated...

...several insurance companies took extraordinary steps to qualify for taxpayer money, which has become even more attractive as the economic environment has worsened.

For example, Lincoln National and the Hartford both bought up smaller banks to qualify as savings banks, which made them eligible for government support.

The insurers followed investment banks Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, which received emergency waivers from the Federal Reserve to become bank holding companies last fall.

GMAC, the auto lender, and American Express, the credit card company, also have transformed themselves into banks to qualify for government support.

“You want the regulatory program to be as broad as possible,” said Scott E. Talbott, a lobbyist for the Financial Roundtable, a group of the nation’s biggest financial services companies. “If all it took was regulatory gymnastics, that expands the program.”

// posted by montag @ 6:47 AM 0 Comments

Likewise, what I have learned is that as the administration authorized harsh interrogation in April and May of 2002--well before the Justice Department had rendered any legal opinion--its principal priority for intelligence was not aimed at pre-empting another terrorist attack on the U.S. but discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and al-Qa'ida.

So furious was this effort that on one particular detainee, even when the interrogation team had reported to Cheney's office that their detainee "was compliant" (meaning the team recommended no more torture), the VP's office ordered them to continue the enhanced methods. The detainee had not revealed any al-Qa'ida-Baghdad contacts yet. This ceased only after Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, under waterboarding in Egypt, "revealed" such contacts. Of course later we learned that al-Libi revealed these contacts only to get the torture to stop.

There in fact were no such contacts. (Incidentally, al-Libi just "committed suicide" in Libya. Interestingly, several U.S. lawyers working with tortured detainees were attempting to get the Libyan government to allow them to interview al-Libi....)

// posted by montag @ 6:19 PM 0 Comments

The Explorers program, a coeducational affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America that began 60 years ago, is training thousands of young people in skills used to confront terrorism, illegal immigration and escalating border violence — an intense ratcheting up of one of the group’s longtime missions to prepare youths for more traditional jobs as police officers and firefighters.

“This is about being a true-blooded American guy and girl,” said A. J. Lowenthal, a sheriff’s deputy here in Imperial County, whose life clock, he says, is set around the Explorers events he helps run. “It fits right in with the honor and bravery of the Boy Scouts.”

The training, which leaders say is not intended to be applied outside the simulated Explorer setting, can involve chasing down illegal border crossers as well as more dangerous situations that include facing down terrorists and taking out “active shooters,” like those who bring gunfire and death to college campuses. In a simulation here of a raid on a marijuana field, several Explorers were instructed on how to quiet an obstreperous lookout.

“Put him on his face and put a knee in his back,” a Border Patrol agent explained. “I guarantee that he’ll shut up.”

// posted by montag @ 6:47 AM 0 Comments

Cheney has replaced Sarah Palin as Rogue Diva. Just as Jeb Bush and other Republicans are trying to get kinder and gentler, Cheney has popped out of his dungeon, scary organ music blaring, to carry on his nasty campaign of fear and loathing.

The man who never talked is now the man who won’t shut up. The man who wouldn’t list his office in the federal jobs directory, who had the vice president’s residence blocked on Google Earth, who went to the Supreme Court to keep from revealing which energy executives helped him write the nation’s energy policy, is now endlessly yelping about how President Obama is holding back documents that should be made public.

Cheney, who had five deferments himself to get out of going to Vietnam, would rather follow a blowhard entertainer who has had three divorces and a drug problem (who also avoided Vietnam) than a four-star general who spent his life serving his country.

// posted by montag @ 7:16 AM 0 Comments

It is torture...It's drowning. It gives you the complete sensation that you are drowning. It is no good, because you -- I'll put it to you this way, you give me a water board, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders.

// posted by montag @ 6:51 AM 0 Comments

Hartmarx, known for its Hart Schaffner & Marx and Hickey Freeman suits, and for making President Obama’s inauguration tuxedo and topcoat, has long been America’s leading clothier for men. Now its workers want to make the company, which is in bankruptcy, a leader in a different way.

Hoping to save their jobs and start a national movement, Hartmarx workers are pressuring Wells Fargo, the company’s main creditor, to approve the sale of Hartmarx to a buyer that would keep it alive instead of liquidating it, and most likely putting its celebrated labels on suits made overseas.

Seeing a political and public relations opening, the workers and their union are arguing that Wells Fargo, having received $25 billion in the bank bailout, should keep a 122-year-old American company like Hartmarx in business and preserve some 3,600 jobs.

// posted by montag @ 7:12 AM 0 Comments

The Tennessee House has passed a bill that would allow guns to be carried in bars where alcohol is served. Law abiding citizens should be allowed to carry guns in bars, Tennessee State Senator Doug Jackson told Fox’s Brian Kilmeade on Monday, calling armed drunks in bars a “dreamy scenario.”

“Senator, you ever seen a bar fight?” asked Kilmeade.

“Yes,” he said.

“You ever been in one?” the host pressed.

“Oh, no, I’ve never been in one but I …” the senator trailed.

“Then you know they’ll go to extremes,” said Kilmeade. “They’ll break a bottle and use that bottle as a weapon. Now you’re arming people who are extremely angry. So, you ready for that scenario? That’s not a dreamy scenario. You agree with that? We watch bar fights every day. Every three minutes there’s a bar fight. Right now.”

// posted by montag @ 6:49 AM 0 Comments

SOCom chose the SCAR system — which consists of the 5.56mm MK16 and the 7.62mm MK17 — to replace weapons including the 5.56mm M4A1 carbine, made by Colt Defense LLC.

The command selected FN Herstal to develop SCAR in 2004 after holding a competition to find a reliable, modular weapon system for its elite forces.

The SCAR has a short-stroke, gas-piston operating system. The upper receiver is aluminum and houses a free-floating barrel for improved accuracy. The lower receiver is polymer to help reduce weight. Both versions can be equipped with different barrel lengths to suit missions ranging from close-quarter fights to long-range shooting.

Operators can chose a 10-inch, 14-inch or 18-inch barrel for the MK16 and a 13-inch, 16-inch or 20-inch barrel for the heavier MK17. Each of these can be changed out by the shooter in minutes, FN officials say. The MK16 uses a 30-round magazine; the MK17 uses a 20-rounder. Eighty percent of the parts are common to both the light and heavy versions to reduce long-term maintenance costs, FN officials say.

The SCAR also includes the MK13 40mm grenade launcher, designed to fit on both the MK16 and MK17 or fire in the stand-alone mode.

Like the M4A1, both versions of the SCAR can fire on full automatic. The conventional Army’s M4 carbine uses a three-round burst instead of full auto

// posted by montag @ 7:56 PM 0 Comments

The point is that there’s every reason to be cynical about these players’ motives. Remember that what the rest of us call health care costs, they call income.

// posted by montag @ 6:49 AM 0 Comments