Here's what's wrong about Michael Moore

Nice movie? yep.
Asshole? Yeah, that too.
Sorry, but there is a link between what is said and the person who says it: you cannot like the message and ignore the messenger, but of course, he's not the messenger, is he: he is the writer.
On Americans:
"They are possibly the dumbest people on the planet . . . in thrall to conniving, thieving smug [pieces of the human anatomy]," Moore intoned. "We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance. We don't know about anything that's happening outside our country. Our stupidity is embarrassing."

On the other hand, while it may be upsetting, it appears to be factually true. You have to read it more than once. Get past the shock, and read it for content.

Kerry... it occurs to me what I don't like, what's missing

I am looking for a candidate (like Dean) who knows the history, names ,events, those things of the United States. The names of the presidents, their policies, just the history of the US.

An incredibly simple solution to real fundraising reform.

Anonymous contributions: the candidate can receive funds, but the source is confidential and not available to the candidate, processed through a clearing house.
Thus, I can support but I cannot buy influence. You can guess, you can promise, but the linking of contributions to name would be an offense. You could go to a fundraising, but even then, how much you gave and if you gave at all would be confidential.
Chile does that. Obviously, its not a panacea, but it seems like an easy approach. Why not?
Maybe its not the only approach, but shouldn't it be included? We've gone quite the opposite way: everyone gets to see everyone elses contribution, so I have NO privacy at all! Speech is thus free but not private? ouch.

The New York Times > Magazine > The Harlem Project

jointly from the good-news-dept. and the against-the-grain dept:
That shining city on the hill? Its Harlem.
...What he learned that day, he wrote, was that he and his friends ''loved one another enough to be willing to die.''
...The doctrine of accountability -- the idea that if students do poorly on standardized tests, schools should lose their financing and teachers should lose their jobs -- first emerged in the late 80's and early 90's in the Houston public schools. It then moved to the White House

MSNBC - Private rocket ship breaks space barrier

From the while-the-press-is-out-the-mice-will-have-afucking-ball! dept.
MSNBC - Private rocket ship breaks space barrier: "Rutan then added: "One of our lessons learned from doing this program is that it is a very good idea to not reveal to the media what we're doing until we have to, because if I had to do this even occasionally, we'd be a year behind. ""
and DON''T miss Rutan Aircraft

Blue eyes and brown (flash: hate outsells peace 10 to 1)

The classic exercise is described here, albeit negatively for its being placed onto unknowing children: the first time it was an experiment. Now we know it is an exericse with completely predictable results and should not be engaged in without adult consent.
On the other hand, it should be manadatory to anyone who expouses some racial superiority and a failure to grasp that raining down hate on a group of persons can destroy them and affect them long after the hate has stopped. Actually, I would like to see an exercise that rehabilitates participants after the exercise. Trouble is, there is nothing that can undo the damage except a long long protracted detoxification.
So, the exercise shows you can be poisoned. And by its absence, you can see that the poisoning cannot be undone. Or at least nobody, (really, nobody!) has worked to construct such an exercise such as creating a peaceful community: peace, alas, is not interesting at all in a literary sense.
This should rank right up there with the classis line about orange juice (It's not just for breakfast anymore).
Peace: it doesn't sell.

Clinton Backs Bush on Iraq War But Questions Invasion's Timing (washingtonpost.com)

Clinton is wrong. Saddam had to go.
The whole invasion and occupation thing was a corporate grab, greed, exploitation. No way that we had to occupy. In fact, had we merely pulled Saddam from the scene, the whole place would have just sprung to life...

Is Nader a fool or a traitor?

What if this weren't an election, but a fire that had to be put out? What if instead of an election, we were defending the walls of a city? What if instead of an election, we were trying to save a drowning man? What if instead of an election, we were toppling a tyrant?
What if instead of an election, one was merely passing a child in need of help but could not stop because one was going to deliver a paper on how to care for children.

Is the world better off without Saddam?

Depends on the cost: clearly, if we had nuked the place to get him, at least a few people would pause before they answered.
But the real question is, is the world better off with the west challenging and invading a nutso middle east Islamic world. It might look large, looking only at Iraq: but considered an attack against a middle east that was going to blow up and take pieces of us with them, it was just a little nudge to get them going.
Anyway, that's where the discussion is.
But, consider that the west may have heated up the whole planet which will soon kill us all.

Platforms

Nader:http://www.votenader.org/issues/index.php#electronicvoting
Kerry:http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/
Bush: (best I could find)http://www.irregulartimes.com/realgop.html
Kucinich: http://www.kucinich-washington.org/tiki-download_file.php?fileId=2

For breadth, clarity, simplicity: Nader has it hands down.

On torture

Thou shalt not get caught ( the 11th commandment )
It is much that same as things like speeding, cheating, burning garbage, spilling oil: it you do it in fair measure, you will not disturb the order of things and YOU WILL NOT BE CAUGHT, thus fulfilling biblical directives.
If, however, you are cavalier, if you do not recycle, if you populate your planet with SUVs, you will be caught, and in some real measure, you will die.

We, we dumbass liberal talking machines, got all bent because Rumsfeld koaned us with the "some things we don't know, some things we know we don't know, but there are things we don't know that we don't know" and that is a perfect and reasonable statement that could have come out of Rubin in the Clinton administration: it is zen, it is existentialism, and out of the mouths of babes, etc... I don't like Rumsfelds policies, and I don't like Bushes policies and that has nothing to do with whether I like them or not: they are there to do the job of the gods, and if you can't hack it, you have to go. You may go back to your ranch, you may go back to your yacht (gads, how DO you spell that thing... boat?)... and that's OK, but you can't stay here!

Now, to Rumsfeld: the are things we know we don't know, and that's when we put some real hurt on the guy or gal that does not want to tell us what we really really really need to know. It is absolute high church nonsensical detached reality that will not do what is needed.
Now, to the 11th commandment: if you are stupid, and you just beat the shit out of everyone that comes in the door, and you do not use even the semblance of judgment, you are caught. And you should die. You broke the 11th.

Now, I would be willing to torture Terry Jones for this. Not much, but just a little, to help him see that there is a cost to creating stupid and dangerous realities in writing. This is high church crap.However, on the reasoning noted herein: it is in math what we call the empty set: that is, those actions that could actually be torture, ie the pointless infliction of pain without any excuse: there is no such thing. There can always be a purpose. There is always a reason, as Chris Rock says: it may not be a good reason, but there is a reason.
In matters of morality, well, torture can be anything. But this is law, and torture needs to be defined. And it is not funny to pick on the law when it needs to be defined and applied (it is fair to look at a stupid law and call it what it is.)
Torture has to be limited, it has to be well founded in suspicion, it has to be carried out with skill, it should NOT damage the person but all bets are off when one is 1) pretty sure you've got the guy 2) pretty sure the guy has info 3) pretty sure that if you do not get the info, there is going to be a storm of damage.
If you are stupid, if you are not civilized, indeed, if you don't have enough money, you just torture everyone and see which one goes: sort of like putting all the small stones into hot oil and seeing which one is the popcorn.
Besides, there is simply no NEED to physically damage someone to inflict pain!
Is there some logic to letting the info slip? Do people not know that it is NOT good to go to jail because you can get raped? Does it count to know that if you get caught, you are going to be hurt?

Torture without purpose (except just the sheer joy of it) is called sadism.

Google: everything anyone else knows is a threat to "security"

Google changes the landscape.
To the man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. To the nation with a fear of terrorists, everything looks like a weapon. (umm, what were you planning on doing with that ashtray? Is that a stick you are holding? What is in that jar labeled "aftershave". Why are you taking pictures. Why are you standing so long looking at that bridge? Our records show you are 19 years old but you searched for "sex with girls". Why did you search on "subway accidents".
Why are you so interested in "John Ashcrof" and illegal.
That google bomb "Weapons of mass destruction"? That undermined Americans faith in their president: just what a terrorist would want.
Google is VERY strong, so it is unlikely to be attacked successfully by anyone except the United States government.
Expect to see this:
The Department of Homeland Security is still trying to find out who launched that attack... (hint: it will be DHS that cannot find itself)

The American Experience | Reagan

I do hate waffling... but, that seems to be what I do. And yet not.
But, in this view, Reagan, far more than Bush, is really fighting a war, the US is at war, which appears cold but is really not.
Gorbachev, so necessary to peace, was in part a creation of Reagan. Gorbachev is picked by Andropov to be the successor, chosen as one who could deal with Reagan.
Yeah, the man looks like a one trick pony, but oh what a trick. He loved his country, he was in no way a mean man, he never destroyed or took pleasure in stories of destruction, and all his life, he hated the soviet union, and were they not our nuclear equals probably would have been invaded.
Reagan fought a war, he withstood world wide opposition and opprobrium, he did "stay the course", you could take your eyes off him because you know where he was going.
Yeah, someone should do a story: the US without Reagan.

Michael Newdow: if god makes good cases, god was on his side

One nation, ..... indivisible.
"under god" should be removed: lacks humility.
On the other hand, as an atheist, God Bless American, American the Beautiful, Thou shalt speak of him when thou liest down, when thou wakest up and when thou waketh by the way. They shall bind thy hand and they shall be as frontlets before thine eyes...
So, I know god in my depths.

Cheney, Milo Minderbinder, and war criminals

We will have to hurry to get these men into prison before they die a comfortable old age. Do we go for Cheney, who is going fast? Or Bush, who is much younger and we could really get the whole Bush/WW II klan?
I'd vote to get Bush. And Wolfowitz, Powell, Rumsfeld, et al.

with the acquiescence of the Bush Administration

Iran goes nuclear George Bush has truly truly weakened the UN military. Talk about raiding the grainery.
The world know what we can and cannot do. Moreover, it knows where we are: totally overcommitted.
"George Bush will get us all killed. Let's not re-elect him."

He was a shit president with better than average charisma.

Reagan.
Like the GOP and other creationist manifestations always like to say, there are two sides*...

*even when there are NOT, as in evolution.

The reason for [Bush's] failure matters less than the consequences."

Duh, NOT: what if it's because Bush is looney? or if his vision as such is an hallucination? Or more simply, if he is desperately holding off the news of disaster with ever growing costs until after he is (ohmygod) reelected.
You can't say you weren't told. You might say you don't care: That does indeed put you with the president.

Bush Sr. Gave Saddam diplomatic OK To Invade Kuwait

"'One of those messages, delivered in late July by U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie to Saddam in a private meeting, said that the United States did not take a position ''on Arab-Arab'' disputes. Saddam understood that to mean that the United States would not react to his invasion of Kuwait.'"

Bush Sr. Gave Saddam diplomatic OK To Invade Kuwait

"'One of those messages, delivered in late July by U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie to Saddam in a private meeting, said that the United States did not take a position ''on Arab-Arab'' disputes. Saddam understood that to mean that the United States would not react to his invasion of Kuwait.'"

Yellowcake

From the "This-is-not-a-cat-license-this-is-a-dog-license-with-the-word-dog-scratched-out-and-cat-written-in-in-crayon" dept.
It was eventually disclosed that the "intelligence" possessed by the administration was a set of poorly forged documents on letterhead from the government
of Niger, which described attempts by Iraq to purchase yellowcake uranium for a nuclear weapons program.

Ronald Reagan: another view of a warrior

He gave the trapped and armed PLO safe passage from Lebanon. The thirteenth tribe: terrorists, and real ones at that. The mother of all terrorists.
His policies directed the attacking and subversion of any small country
His politices pummelled Lebanon safely from battleships.
He established the policy of withdrawing when attacked, as when we precipitously withdrew from Lebanon, setting the state for Mogadishu.
He traded arms for hostages, arming the enemy and using the money to fund a covert and illegal war in El Salvador against, yes, another small country.
Yes, he put more missles into Europe, but note: that was Europes head on the table. And star wars, then as it is now, protects us, not anyone else: when the bombs fall, nobody but the folks from The Big Nipple get into the shelter.
He was crazy enough to go head to head with the Russians at just the right time, a time surely that was part of his making, and he must get credit: it is NOT clear who else could have done that. Consider Carter, who signaled a nations retreat from any future claims to greatness and where Carter was taking the country.
Yes, (nodding, Reagan style) he had one great accomplishment and we paid for it and we are still paying. And so is Russia, who fell under our hand when they fell: we gave them a few head shots, just to be sure they would stay down.

Their policies suck

I don't know that I liked Ronald Reagan any more than I like George Bush: these are NOT my buddies, they are the premier executive in the United States. One spoke very well, the other speaks incredibly poorly, both are likeable, surely to some, definitely to their moms: so what.
I recall the line between Fitgerald and Hemmingway:
"The rich are different from us."
"Yes, Ernest, they have more money."
Well, the Republicans are different from us: their policies suck. They sell their meanness as something that's "Good for America". They toss people into deep water so they will learn to swim fast. Duh.

conservatism

I'd rather take some chances. I'd surely rather you did NOT help out lots of people who have fallen because they are screw-ups! I know I may disturb people because I am too loud: so what! My lawn isn't all that neat, my house has no pastels. Its OK if I pollute a little! Geez! Go after the big guys, sure, regulate. And I don't like the litigious society: if I get hurt it's your fault. That's not at all unlikely, but can't it be done without the anger?
Maybe there are just too many of us. Well, yous.

Reagan is dead...

Emotion does not fit into boxes. Reagan surely did some good things. And lots of nasty stuff. Perhaps what history does is desiccate the emotional part. Then one has a chance of judging, but only a chance.
One thing for sure: the man changed things. From where they were when he came into office: short term things right then, and long term things that are here now and show no signs of going away.
Bush will transfer the emotion from Reagan to himself, and he will wrap himself in glory on 6/30 when Iraq goes solo, and he will have a ball on the 4th.
We may find that while Americans may poll on emotion, which does not count for shit, they vote on issue: the economy IS no good, the deficit IS big, you have dragged me through SHIT, and you did EVERYTHING POORLY. I really like you, but I am NOT going to hire you and pay you for another 4 years. Oh my, no.

Black Box Voting: Ballot - Tampering in the 21st Century

"And while the man glued his eyes on the man, another man carefully slipped his wallet out of his pocket and his watch off his wrist"
The moral: watch what you're watching!

Weekly Review (Harpers.org)

From the I-want-one-of-these dept:
Stunning! (Harpers.org)
The Pentagon denied that a new "non-lethal" ray gun that fires millimeter-wave electromagnetic energy, which penetrates the skin and instantly heats water molecules to 130 degrees, might be used as a torture device. No one has been able to stand the pain caused by the weapon, known as the "Active Denial System," for more than 3 seconds.

If George can win the election, he should

Oil prices droppingI guess the propostion of George "should" win is unattractive, but then again, why not?
No I don't like him, but if Americans like that shit, well, they get to vote. And we get to immigrate, just like everyone else, lots of whom come here.
But really, is there no place better we can go?

Red and Blue

Red and Blue are very very very different. But few Americans are really really red, and few Americans are really really blue and most Americans don't even LIKE the really really red or the really really blue. (I sure as hell do not.)
Actually, by intent or accident, we have introduced a notion where real hatred and racism can grow: it's not much different from, no, it's exactly like the public school class experiments: the class is divided, and one of the parts is told they are better than the other. In short order, there is deep felt hate and fear, and real damage and the experiment has to be stopped.
Blues are better than reds, of course (if you're blue) and the same goes quite well for reds. And the games have begun.
A simple notation is creating a split. We humans are really quite something. We handle fire pretty well, but not ourselves.

Chauncey Gardener aka Ronald Reagan Dies (washingtonpost.com)

Match the names:
Clinton/Reagan to:
1) I did not have sex with that woman
2) Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall
sigh.

This is the man who preached supply side economics, thought missles could be recalled, mistook notes from readers digest as confidential notes from the agency, mistook a movie of a bomber pilot for real life: such a man was untouchable.
In this untouchable life, he did some very very risky things: supported Afghanistan, put missles into Europe, escalated the missle race with star wars, and in the process scared the Russians into producing Gorbachev. All else follows from that: human rights, the wall, and the fall of communism.
He also made homelessness in America a real and growing thing, ignored Aids, and directly violated the will of the congress. But, in his mind, he really did not know.
There is a link between great accomplishments and utter stupidity: some shit is just too scarey, so the best way to approach it is with closed eyes and mind.
In memory, I recall his beautiful voice: I used to watch tales of the west sponsored by 20 mule team borax just to hear him speak in introduction of the story: handsome almost to excess in every manner of his being, and a voice to match.
I also recall his working on his ranch: as the article said, that what was surprising was not that he could do it, but that he really loved doing it. And he did.
And he loved Nancy.
He did not get there by accident: he worked hard.

Reagan Dies After Long Battle With Alzheimer's Disease (washingtonpost.com)

Nixon, Bush, Bush, Reagan. That's what the GOP serves up.
I will remember that Regan had the balls of a true believer when he was totally rude to Russia and called them an evil empire, the tear down the wall thing, and the totally improper procylitizing of Russian citizens.
And who will forget trickle down economics, supply side economics (surprise: there IS no such thing. It does fit with creation science, except there are NO economists who have anything at all to say about the voodoo economics), remember his secretary of the interior, and star wars and the deficit... this is what the GOP calls a good president :-)
Clinton, alas, was the clumsy carp of presidents... the whole legal thing with Paula was his to just step aside from and end it: pay, with no admission of guilt and get on with the country.

This guy is absolutely amazing!

From the lucky-us-accident-of-birth dept
A World Connected - Muhammad Yunus: Banker to the Poor
Think it's simple to erradicate poverty? It is! And this guy does it. Poverty is NOT created by the people, but by our institutions. Yep. Our institutions create poverty. They do it all for us. For me, for you.

I do NOT agree

We are here today because we believe that every qualified man, woman and child has the inalienable right to a college education, no matter what race, creed, color or income bracket they belong to..

Hey, that inalienable right shit is really getting overdone. Just cause a parrot can talk, does NOT mean the bird really understands. Case in point, see the above bird shit.

In the vernacular, I have the inalienable right for you to blow me, kid :-)

NPR interviews Brahimi

Ah, what a sweet and brilliant man. Who knew? Who could tell from all the "news"?

Differences

The difference between liberals and conservatives is not how they measure but what they measure.
The conservative will measure the number of SUVs built and sold. The liberal will measure the amount of gas they burn and the hours they spend in traffic plus the people they kill while protecting no one.
The conservative will feel good after a morning at church. The liberal will feel good after a healty meal, some clean water.
The conservative will measure the number of enemy killed. number of days until the war ends. The liberal will measure the number of days the world has gone without killing people.
Its a fair dinkum either way, but I'll take liberal.

Molly and Zinni

"Our strategy that the road to Jerusalem led through Baghdad was flawed, and just the opposite is true -- the road to Baghdad leads through Jerusalem. In other words, an Israeli-Palestinian settlement is the key to peace and progress in the region."

On June 30, the Iraqies, having gone through fire and a whole lot of other shit, will be free. Really. On June 30, the Palestinians will still be fucked. Totally.

Somebody else besides me is going to notice.

Used with purpose and then, naturally, discarded

Tenant and Chalabi, and let's see, who else might we have known to be totally incompetent while giving the administration the story they wanted. "Oh, oh, oh, he pressed himself on me!" Powell was mislead? Nah, he absolutely knew the info was no good.
George Bush, that sweet born again Christian: color him very very dirty.

Bush, the fat dumb fish

A few years ago, fish and game dept found that after adding thousands of brown trout to a native brown trout stream to increase the numbers, the total number actually went down!
The hatchery trout, hand fed, wasted energy going after food in the wild. They died. They also cleaned out the food supply in the process, taking food that the native trout would have gotten. They also died.
Bush is that brown fish, hand fed, and just fucking up the stream. Only difference: the sonofabitch still doesn't have to get his own food like the rest of us. It's not that he isn't stupid enough: he more than qualifies on that account!

Marx brothers? Stooges? Keystone cops?

How fucking stupid does a plot have to be before the American media notice? (Answ: we really don't know yet: we need even more stupider yet.)

ok, here it is: the species problem/question:in the face of some success, we are unable to keep in balance the costs of that success. Thus, Bush can say "we have gotten rid of a bad person" and we cannot summon to mind in even a modicum of balance, the cost, let alone the alternatives which could have yielded the same conclusions faster, cheaper and with less death AND more enduring!
That emotional valuing is endemic in our biology. It took us to the moon, it was there on Normandy, and it fueled the fires in the death camps. It is the essence of excess, the clown.