September 2004 Archives

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BushCo has unleashed their Debate Facts.

They really are quite something.

Issue: Iraq -- They keep talking about a vote for "war." Bad idea. Kerry will nail this one.

Issue: Diplomacy -- Kerry "insults" allies. And by allies they mean unelected leaders that Bush has installed into power. Again, easily batted down.

Issue:Intelligence -- I don't even understand what they are saying in this one...

Issue:TroopRealignment -- More out of context quotes...

Issue:Afghanistan -- Voted against blah blah blah...voted for a bill Bush threatened to veto yawn

Issue:North Korea -- Talk is stupid, except when we talk, then it's cool and good and groovy. You look French.

Issue: Israel -- The first real zinger. Too bad almost every US politician blows it on Israel/Palestine. Still, no excuse. Kerry should get clear on this one.

Issue: Cuba -- Bush flaps around in the wind on Cuba. The only thing he stays steady on is hating Castro. Big deal...like that's hard.

Issue: The Patriot Act -- $10 says Bush hasn't read the damn thing to this day.

Homeland Security -- I'm sure that first responders are going to Kerry is making Bush really happy.

So they best they had was Israel. The whole document should liven up the GOp Team Leader crowd. Amazingly, I still have 0 Team Leader Points...

You know you've crossed the line into hopeless wonkdom when you subscribe to GAO updates.

I have been working on a retort to "What About The Artist, Stupid?" since I first read it via diepunyhumans. Most importantly before we start, I do not speak for EFF in any way. I no longer work for EFF. These thoughts, opinions and statements are my own.

I made sure my EFF buddies heard about it and Ren gave a nice reply. Mr Ellis has already left a lengthy and thoughtful reply. I'm still working on mine. It's not a "You spoke ill of EFF now you die" reply either. Mr Ellis makes a number of good points about creative control, making money, and how the system is broken. But one thing that I think should be addressed is that P2P is a tree in the forest and we don't want to loose site of the big picture.

EFF is fighting "for" P2P because they understand that when you make general-use technology illegal you are going down the wrong road. EFF is not fighting "against" artists or "against" copyright. Those are ludicrous positions to attribute to EFF. EFF has never said they have a "perfect plan" to solve the problems surrounding the music industry. They have offered up a number of ideas, all which have real world flaws.

It's perfectly reasonable for Mr Ellis to worry about his own direct interests before anyone else. He would be unwise not to do so. But Mr Ellis cannot expect EFF to put his interests at the front of the efforts either.

It really is despicable when the Vice President of the United States of America tries to sell a load of crap to the American public.

This is despicable politics. It's not just polarizing - it also undermines the efforts of the Justice Department and the Central Intelligence Agency to combat terrorists in America. Every time a member of the Bush administration suggests that Islamic extremists want to stage an attack before the election to sway the results in November, it causes patriotic Americans who do not intend to vote for the president to wonder whether the entire antiterrorism effort has been kidnapped and turned into part of the Bush re-election campaign. The people running the government clearly regard keeping Mr. Bush in office as more important than maintaining a united front on the most important threat to the nation.

'Our side is the only real American side' is not a campaign strategy. Bad monkey! (via Daily Kos)

Today on NPR Weekend Edition Juan Williams tells us that President Bush is calling Senator Kerry a flip-flopper because of his vote to go to war. Now, correct me if I'm wrong Mr. Williams, but wasn't the vote to give the president the authority to go to war? I would say those are two very different things, especially considering how much lip service Bush gave to us and the world about not wanting to go to war.

Mr. Williams needs to cry 'Bad monkey!' here.

Write to the NPR Ombudsman with a correction.

Apparently he thinks that saying "the terrorists" want Bush to loose is testing the conventional bounds of political rhetoric.

President Bush and leading Republicans are increasingly charging that Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry and others in his party are giving comfort to terrorists and undermining the war in Iraq -- a line of attack that tests the conventional bounds of political rhetoric.

President Bush, Vice President Cheney, no! Bad monkeys! Dana also starts a list of other bad monkeys on this topic:

• Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), chairman of the Judiciary Committee
• GOP Senate candidate John Thune of South Dakota
• House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (Ill.)
• Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage
• Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.)
• Ann Coulter
• CNN analyst Bill Schneider

In TIME Magazine, Jon Stewart answers 10 Questions. The last two are about the role of the press.

DOES IT WEIRD YOU OUT THAT PEOPLE TAKE YOU SERIOUSLY AS A POLITICAL PUNDIT? Well, I don't know that that's the case. But I will tell you this: I don't put any stock in political commentating. Political commentators at this point are mostly rewarded by the extremity of their viewpoint. Most of the analysis you see on television doesn't reflect the general sense that the public feels about a situation. It's two sides advocating, with no arbitration.

SO YOU'D LIKE TO SEE MORE ARBITRATION? That's the change I would like to see — that the news media take a more active role in arbitrating, in mediating, in credibility. The way I've always looked at it is, politicians are — When you go to a zoo and you see a monkey throwing its s___, you can't get mad. That's what monkeys do. But you want the media at some point to go, "No! Bad monkey!" And that's really the direction that it should be going in. Not for Republican desires or Democrat desires but for truth.

So today I will begin noting instances of the press calling out bad monkeys. At least, the ones that I find. Hopefully somebody will a lot more readers will pick up on this as well.

MoveOn wants it. My "personal message" is in italics.

TO: President Bush
CC: Senators, and Representatives
FROM: (Your Name and Email)
SUBJECT: Level With Us On Iraq
__________

Dear President Bush,

When Donald Rumsfeld asked the tough questions about metrics for success in Iraq, he was not portrayed as a weak Secretary of Defense. He was doing his job. His patriotism and leadership were not question. When we the people question your plan in Iraq, we are not being unpatriotic. We are doing our job of holding you accountable for your actions and your plans.

When you give us sound bites like that it's better to fight in Baghdad than in Chicago, I can only wonder exactly how Iraq was going to invade the United States. There has been no evidence found that has corroborated your assertion that Iraq had sponsored terrorist acts against the United States of America.

The world needs less failed states Mr. President. Your plan for Iraq, whatever it is, is clearly not working. If staying the course means Iraq falls further into chaos and further into the control of terrorist organizations, you will bear the brunt of the blame. You have not be able to see that a problem exists with your Iraq strategy. Therefor you have done nothing to fix the problem except to say that everything is fine and that there is no reason to change course. The buck stops with you Mr. President.

The world is not made of binary decisions Mr. President. It's not simply a matter of siding with 'good' or 'evil', as you like to put it. It's about executing a plan that will work to accomplish goals that will protect America. At this, Mr. President, you are failing the American public.

You say "Our strategy is succeeding," and Iraq "is headed toward democracy... Freedom is on the march."

Yet the CIA's July 2004 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) reportedly says the possible scenarios range from "an Iraq whose stability would remain tenuous" -- a quagmire -- to civil war.

This mission is not accomplished. More than 1,000 of our troops have been killed in Iraq, with no end in sight.

You owe us the truth about Iraq. Release the National Intelligence Estimate.

Sincerely,
Patrick Berry

Juan Cole:

I have a sinking feeling that the American public may like Bush's cynical misuse of Wilsonian idealism precisely because it covers the embarrassment of their having gone to war, killed perhaps 25,000 people, and made a perfect mess of the Persian Gulf region, all out of a kind of paranoia fed by dirty tricks and bad intelligence. And, maybe they have to vote for Bush to cover the embarrassment of having elected him in the first place.

How deep a hole are they going to dig themselves in order to get out of the bright sunlight of so much embarrassment?

State Senator Barack Obama

On behalf of the great state of Illinois, crossroads of a nation, land of Lincoln, let me express my deep gratitude for the privilege of addressing this convention. Tonight is a particular honor for me because, let’s face it, my presence on this stage is pretty unlikely. My father was a foreign student, born and raised in a small village in Kenya. He grew up herding goats, went to school in a tin-roof shack. His father, my grandfather, was a cook, a domestic servant.

But my grandfather had larger dreams for his son. Through hard work and perseverance my father got a scholarship to study in a magical place; America which stood as a beacon of freedom and opportunity to so many who had come before. While studying here, my father met my mother. She was born in a town on the other side of the world, in Kansas. Her father worked on oil rigs and farms through most of the Depression. The day after Pearl Harbor he signed up for duty, joined Patton’s army and marched across Europe. Back home, my grandmother raised their baby and went to work on a bomber assembly line. After the war, they studied on the GI Bill, bought a house through FHA, and moved west in search of opportunity.

And they, too, had big dreams for their daughter, a common dream, born of two continents. My parents shared not only an improbable love; they shared an abiding faith in the possibilities of this nation. They would give me an African name, Barack, or “blessed,” believing that in a tolerant America your name is no barrier to success. They imagined me going to the best schools in the land, even though they weren’t rich, because in a generous America you don’t have to be rich to achieve your potential. They are both passed away now. Yet, I know that, on this night, they look down on me with pride.

So here I am reading Dan Froomkin's White House Briefing column, which says that Iraq will be big in the news this week, and up pops a new mail from John Kerry.

Turns out things aren't going so hot and Bush isn't turning to miss the ice berg. Giblets will have a field day with this one...

I used to think that online apps would never take the place of native desktop apps. Early apps had a number of browser issues that they had to deal with that put them at a distinct disadvantage. Web-based application developers these days seem to be aiming at the generation of browsers that support the current standards.

Once the nay-sayer, I've become dependent on the following online-apps:

• flickr
  • My Photos
  • My Profile
• gmail (I have invites if you need an account)
• bloglines
  • My Blog
• del.icio.us
  • my del.icio.us
• Movable Type
• Netflix
• Amazon
• Wells Fargo Online
• Basecamp

When my network connection goes down, it's as if my computer died. Damn you Scott McNeally!

SECRECY IN THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION (655k pdf)

This review of the nation’s open government laws reveals that the Bush Administration has systematically sought to limit disclosure of government records while expanding its authority to operate in secret. Through legislative changes, implementing regulations, and administrative practices, the Administration has undermined the laws that make the federal government more transparent to its citizens, including the Freedom of Information Act, the Presidential Records Act, and the Federal Advisory Committee Act. At the same time, the Administration has expanded the reach of the laws authorizing the Administration to classify documents and to act without public or congressional oversight. Individually, some of the changes implemented by the Bush Administration may have limited impact. Taken together, however, the Administration’s actions represent an unparalleled assault on the principle of open and accountable government.

Hotter days to cause more deaths in California, report says

Heat-related deaths can be expected to increase up to 180 percent annually by 2050 and as much as 500 percent annually by the end of the century if the atmosphere continues to warm, according to the report by ATMOS Research and Consulting.

Media Matters:

On the September 9 broadcast of The Rush Limbaugh Show, radio host Rush Limbaugh claimed that global warming is "malarkey" and that "[t]he idea that we [human beings] have any power over nature is absolute absurdity."

But then who can really fault Rush for being wrong? It's not like he lives in an area that will be effected by global warming. Oh wait...he does (61k pdf). I'm sure Rush doesn't worry since it's all "malarkey" anyway. It's not based on "sound science." And by "sound science" I mean it doesn't sound like something he agrees with, so it's bogus.

Piss off you wanker! Your country blows goats as well...

In September of 2001 I was at my wits end. I was a ball of stress. I was working on projects that I hated and that hatred boiled over to the people on the other end of the project. It became a situation where no matter what happened it multiplied my sourness towards the whole situation.

As is so often said, September 11^th changed everything. At least about how I put things into perspective. It's still hard as hell for me to read what I wrote that day. It pains me that even in those moments of pure emotional reaction, I was more right that I could have imagined.

This is a very dark day and there is only more bloodshed to come.

More bloodshed is indeed all we have gained from our reaction to 9-11. We are loosing this "War on Terrorism." As much as it pains me to recognize this, it is nevertheless true. We had the entire world with us for those few precious moments. It was a grand opportunity with amazing potential to unite the world in the cause of peace and to shine light where there was only darkness before.

I guess it wasn't meant to be. Instead we turned to old vendettas. The world took this as a lack of seriousness on our part and has since lost the emotional connection it had to the US. Now Osama is more popular than Bush in too many parts of the world. To those that claim I'm "blaming America first," well, we clearly have nothing to talk about.

If all of our actions are to be determined by those that would strike against us, we have already lost for we are doing what they want us to do and not what we need to do. Today is a hard day for me because it reminds me that tragedy and bloodshed have become the de facto standard.

The swifties get cash. Lots and lots of cash.

The largest contributor was T. Boone Pickens, a famous Texas oilman and longtime Republican supporter who was a major political backer of Mr. Bush's father, who gave $500,000 to the Swift boat group. Aubrey McClendon, chief executive of Chesapeake Energy in Oklahoma, gave $250,000; Bob Perry, another Bush supporter from Texas, gave $200,000 to seed the group; and Albert Huddleston, a Texas energy executive who has raised money for Mr. Bush, gave $100,000, records show.

Sam Wyly, the wealthy Texas entrepreneur who financed commercials attacking Senator John McCain in the 2000 Republican primary against Mr. Bush, also made the list at $10,000 , as did his brother Charles, records show. At least two Swift boat donors are also listed as Bush Pioneers, meaning they raised at least $100,000 for Mr. Bush.

"The words 'tidal wave' come to mind,'' said Mike Russell, a spokesman for the group, who added that "you don't often see that type of grassroots reaction." (emphasis mine)

Yes, I often think of "grassroots" when I hear that donations are coming in with at least 4 zeros to the left of the decimal point.

Sure...I've used cvs before. But I've never really used it. I never dealt with branches, which I've come to see as one of the more useful things about cvs. Yes, yes...I've always heard how useful they were and I knew that someday I would need to figure them out and actually use them.

Well, that day is today.

Man, the Moore Country, North Carolina 6th grade technology curriculum (.doc) is pretty tough!

Aliens have kidnapped Pat Buchanan and replaced him with a robot that has the wrong personality. They aren't fooling anyone with this phony.

MR. RUSSERT: They are not attacking us because they hate us and hate our culture?

MR. BUCHANAN: This is the fundamental point. Are they attacking us because of who we are and what they believe or are they attacking us because of what we do? I believe it is our policies, not our principles that are causing these attacks. Osama bin Laden wasn't sitting in some cave in Afghanistan and stumble on the Bill of Rights and go bananas. It is because of what we are doing. Most fundamentally, it wasn't Israel number one. Number one, Saudi Arabia, female soldiers, American soldiers sitting there on the land of Mecca and Medina.

They certainly don't take the same approach as the swiftvets. The ad seems quite simple. I was there, I didn't see him. Unlike the swiftvets, their one simple claim has yet to be debunked. I'm sure people will take a crack at them. But without the missing paperwork that the AP is still trying to track down, it is unlikely that they will get shot down.

President Bush knows no shame, whatsoever.

THE PRESIDENT: We made a commitment to our troops and to the loved ones -- and to their loved ones -- that we'll support them in their missions. That's why I went to the Congress last September and proposed supplemental funding for body armor and spare parts, ammunition, fuel, that which is necessary to support our men and women in Afghanistan and Iraq. It's an $87 billion request; it was necessary. As a matter of fact, the Congress believed that. It was -- there was overwhelming support, and so overwhelming, only 12 United States senators voted against it, two of whom are my opponent and his running mate.

AUDIENCE: Booo!

THE PRESIDENT: As a matter of fact, only four United States senators voted to authorize the use of force, and then voted against funding our troops. Two of those senators were my opponent and his running mate.

AUDIENCE: Booo!

THE PRESIDENT: So they asked him, they said, you know, why didn't you vote? He said, well, I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.

AUDIENCE: Booo!

THE PRESIDENT: Then they pressed him further and he said he's proud of his vote, and then he said, well, the whole thing is a complicated matter. There's nothing complicated about supporting our troops in combat. (Applause.)

How does he have the gall to stand up there and say these things? Kerry votes no because he wants to help pay for the $87 billion by rolling back Bush's top 2% tax give-away. How freaking hard is it to say "I want to help the troops but that there is a better, more practical way to pay for it?" How does he have the gall to stand up there and say these things when his administration tried to cut combat pay but was shamed out of it? How can he say these things when he sent Marines in underfunded? Never mind the most basic fact that they are in Iraq at all...

How is this reality? Kerry is not (yet) Commander in Chief, so all of those things lay at the doorstep of George W. Bush. Period. The president should be ashamed of the way he is acting in this election. It's shameful and cowardly and isn't befitting the President of the United States of America.

Update: Jesse Berney also had a nice reply over at "Kicking Ass."

Don't let him fool you. Supporting the troops — getting them what they need to get the job done — is enormously complicated. Bush would like it if members of Congress just ignored the details and wrote him a blank check. But our Representatives and Senators have a duty to their constituents — and to the troops — to make sure those funds are well spent. But Bush and his special interest friends would be much happier if Congress shirked that duty.

O'REILLY:  I'll tell you.  Here's what he thinks has gone wrong [in Iraq].  Not enough troops on the ground, number one. 

COULTER:  Yeah, but that's not a problem.  That's something that can cause a problem. 

O'REILLY:  Well, it's a problem in the sense we can't provide the security that we need to provide for the country to be free.

COULTER:  But it's pretty darn safe over there. (emphasis mine)

Friday, May 28, 2004
Author Ann Coulter Enters the No Spin Zone
The O'Reilly Factor

About 1,100 U.S. soldiers and Marines were wounded in Iraq during August, by far the highest combat injury toll for any month since the war began and an indication of the intensity of battles flaring in urban areas.

Sunday, September 5, 2004
U.S. Troops in Iraq See Highest Injury Toll Yet
The Washington Post

This past week I made a conscious effort to post interesting entries at Forwarding Address: OS X. The other contributors are posting and making comments. We might just get this thing moving again!

Can it really be a whole year since I left EFF? It certainly doesn't seem like a year.

The EFF is certainly no worse for the wear. Their site looks fantastic!

I miss you guys. I still don't miss the drive, the sidewalk fecal matter, the fog, or the smell of urine. Some things never change...

I found this gem on a Slate Chatterbox.

If Steenburgen and Monica are not ample enough demonstration, realise that fifty percent of American Familes are headed by single women, test scores are dropping, misandry is rampant, American is being bought up by the EU, Women make 90% of retial purchase decisions in America and the democrats continue to pander to womens issues

-Glaucon

There you have it. It's the damn EU and women that are bringing this country down. At least you know who the real enemy is now.

Juan Cole breaks our CEO President's performance down:

Bush's basic characteristic is not steadfastness, as the convention attempted to argue, but rashness. He is a gambler who goes for the big bang. He loses his temper easily, and makes hasty and uninformed decisions about important matters. No corporation would keep on a CEO that took risks the way Bush has, if the gambles so often resulted in huge losses.

Well, no good corporation anyway...