Worse and worse
Well, Iraq is going just about exactly how most educated anti-war people expected. Nothing for me to add there that you can't see anywhere else...even murmurs of unrest and disappointment being reported in the conservative media at this point!

However, I did see something on international CNN late last night that I haven't seen reported in any major news outlet within the US yet. After more than two years, CNN was finally reporting on the Bush family's intimate relationship with various Saudi families, and specifically on the mysterious Saudi airlifts that took place on September 12th and 13th, 2001.
Most of us in the blogging world have heard of this and Micheal Moore is just one of many who poses some excellent questions about why several hundred Saudis were allowed to fly around the US in the days when no one else was permitted to fly, and then allowed to leave the country WITHOUT being questioned by police.
Just imagine if Bill Clinton had allowed all of Timorthy McVeigh's family and former military buddies to board a plane and flee to Tahiti in the days after Oklahoma City and didn't even let the FBI question them beyond "did you pack your own bags?"

I only caught the tail end of the report on CNN here in Prague, but I was excited to see that perhaps someone at a BIG media outlet was going to comment on the story. But, looking around the internet today, I see nothing in domestic sources yet.

NRA's "Sportsman of the Week" Award
...goes to this man in Van Nuys California. Like a true athlete, he stayed focused on the task in front of him, blocking out the crowd of shocked onlookers around him and firing all six shots from his revolver at point-blank range.

On a personal note, I saw the footage of this on the news here in the Czech Republic and--having missed the pre-footage blurb--thought it was a scene from the CR. As I watched it with my Czech partner, I said "oh crap...more 'US Culture' seeping its way into the Czech Republic."

"No," she told me. "That was in California."

"Oh," I said. "Well, that's completely normal then. Nevermind."

Some new sources

Well, "president" Bush won't be reading these sources (see story below), but I found a few good links that provide a perspective other than the one being fabricated and then reported by the White House Press (Propoganda) department.

Veterans against the war in Iraq.

Marine-girl's blog The blog of a Marine's partner.

Bring Them Home Now "The truth is coming out. The American public was deceived by the Bush administration about the motivation for and intent of the invasion of Iraq. It is equally apparent that the administration is stubbornly and incompetently adhering to a destructive course. Many Americans do not want our troops there. Many military families do not want our troops there. Many troops themselves do not want to be there. The overwhelming majority of Iraqis do not want US troops there."

Today in Iraq.

Black is white, up is down, and objective is blatantly-biased.
(Alternative Title: Bush Boasts about Current-Events Illiteracy)

So, Bush himself has admitted that he doesn't read newspapers and prefers to get his news from what he (with no apprent knowledge of the extreme irony here) calls objective sources. Here's a great article detailing just how horribly deluded (or just dishonest) the presidents "objective sources" are.

It presents us with somewhat of a dilemma...can we blame the Emperor for not knowing he's naked? Well, since he knowingly and boastfully only listens to people who tell him what he wants to hear, I'm going to vote YES. Impeach the naked Emperor now!

Oh My! Check this out.
Here are some GREAT propoganda posters for the Right Wings. Do yourself a favor and have a look if you haven't already. There some funny stuff there.

Robbing us Blind: part 3
Once again, Matt at the Daily Outrage has the scoop on how Dick Chenney and his Haliburton buddies are liberating the American taxpayers from the burden of heavy wallets, using their monopolgy in Iraq to ovecharge on gasoline.

Another good link
Be sure to check out Misleader.org, a new site dedicated to highlighting (and debunking) a specific bit of Bush-administration misinformation each day.

Dude, Where's My Country?!? Revelations on Ashcroft

Yep, I bought the new Micheal Moore book (the edition printed for distribution outside the US, so it's uncensored!). I have to say, there's some absolutely scary sh*t in there.

For example, here is one particularly disgusting bit of treachery by John Ashcroft that I missed out on (probably because the US media barely reported it). After more than a hundred suspected terrorists were rounded up in the month following the September 11th attacks, Ashcroft stopped the FBI from running background checks to see if any of the people who'd been arrested had purchased firearms recently. He claimed, despite the fact that these people had already been denied the right to a lawyer, the right to remain silent, and most other rights we all take (or used to take) for granted, that the US government didn't have the right to keep people, even people in custody for being possible terrorists, from buying weapons! Then, when his own Justice Department officials researched the issue and determined that the government DID have the right to do the checks, Ashcroft suppressed the report.

Finally, in a horrible irony that again went unreported by the US media, Ashcroft appeared in Congress in December of 2001 before the Judiciary Committeeand and berated "liberals" for whinning about civil liberties being withdrawn to fight terror. He said that they were "providing ammunition to the enemy..." and added, "To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of 'lost liberty', my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists."

This comment is the pinnacle of hypocrisy coming from the very man who defended the suspected terrorists rights to buy and own assault rifles. But the hypocrisy doesn't stop there. Ashcroft, in the same hearing, indicated an Al-Quaida training manual and said ominously "al Quaida terrorists are told how to use America's freedoms as weapons against us."

Indeed: The Violence Policy Center reports that one al Qauida manual, "Firearms training for jihad in America" instructs al Quaida "soldiers" specifically on how to use the US's lax gun laws to kill Americans. A few exerpts:

"(in the USA) firearms training is available to the general public. One should try to join a shooting club if possible and make regular visits to the firing range."

"Useful courses to learn are sniping...Handgun courses are useful, but only after you've mastered rifles."

"If you live in such a country [that allows citizens to own assualt weapons, and the US was previously specifically mentioned], obtain an assault rifle legally, preferably an AK-47..."

"Repsect the laws of the country you are in and avoid dealing in illegal firearms...Learn the most of what you can according to your circumstances and leave the rest to when you actually go for jihad."

So, as Moore asks in his book, why--when the Bush administration is recinding the Bill of Rights for suspected terrorists right and left--why are they bending over backwards to ensure that they DON'T encroach on their right to bear arms?

(all quotes courtesy of Moore's Dude, Where's My Country)

Congress and "President" agree: killing mothers is "pro-family"

That's right. The US Congress has passed the deceptively-titled "partial birth" abortion bill, which makes it illegal for doctors to perform an emergency extraction procedure to save the life of a pregnant woman.

Now, when a pregnant woman (possibly already the mother of other children) finds herself in the horrible situation of a potentially-deadly birthing emergency, there is no longer any question about whose life will be spared. Before, it was between the woman, the father (if present), and the doctor. Now, the Congress has come in and removed any decision by decreeing: the woman must die. That's what has happened with the passing of this bill. That's the truth behind the "partial birth abortion" proceedure which has been so vilified by the anti-choice faction.

This kind of inaccurate rhetoric is typical of the anti-choice movement: "Rick Santorum, R-Pennsylvania, a lead sponsor of the bill, called the late-term abortion procedure an "affront to the dignity of human beings."

"This kind of treatment to an innocent child, who would otherwise be born alive, who is healthy with a healthy mother ... there is no excuse for it," he said."

The problem is that this proceedure ISN'T done on healthy women with healthy babies. It's done when a pregnancy (one being carried to term mind you...in other words, these are women who WANT their babies) goes horribly wrong and if the doctor does nothing, then both the mother and baby will die.

I'm disgusted but not surprised that the reactionary, "christian" right-wing has enacted this law, a law which goes beyond pre-Roe-V-Wade laws (becuse even before Roe V Wade, abortions to save the mother's life WERE legal). But I am extremely disappointed to see the way CNN is reporting it.

--According to the Alan Guttmacher Institute, a non-profit group that conducts sexual and reproductive health research, 2,200 late-term abortions were performed in 2000. That was less than 0.2 percent of the 1.3 million abortions performed that year.

During the procedure, known to doctors as intact dilation and extraction, the fetus is partially removed and its skull collapsed. The bill the Senate passed Tuesday would impose penalties of up to two years in prison for doctors who perform the procedure, and they could face civil lawsuits as well. --

The problem here is that CNN has fallen prey to (or perhaps deliberately repeated) a common distortion used by the anti-choice faction. They site statistics for "late term abortions" (which can be any abortion performed in the third trimester, and SOME statistic-compilers even include anything after the first trimester) and then use the description ("skull collapsed") for the extraction proceedure, which is only done a few hundred times a year and ONLY to save the mother's life. The extraction proceedure is the method officially endorsed by The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists to deal with specific life-threatening birthing tragedies. I'll repeat, if it is not done, then the woman dies.

Then, the article says "Abortion opponents have said the procedure is cruel, while abortion rights advocates argue any move to restrict abortion would erode a woman's constitutional right to terminate her pregnancy accorded by Roe vs. Wade. " creating a perfect (but incorrect) "strawman" pro-choice argument. Actually, pro-choice people, and anyone who cares about mothers and women, are against this law because it means WOMEN (some of them already mothers) WILL DIE.

As an afterthought, the article does note:
--But Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-California, called it a "very sad day for the women of America, a very sad day for the families of America."

"This Senate is about to pass a piece of legislation that for the first time in history bans a medical procedure without making any exception for the health of a woman," she said in remarks before the vote.

"I want a civilized society. That means you care about the women of this country. That means you care about their pregnancies. That means you want to help them through the most difficult times. That means you don't play doctor here."


Now, I don't have much faith in the average American, but even I can't believe the average American is so cruel and mysogynist that s/he'd want a grown woman with a family and friends who love her to be allowed to die in miserable pain in a hospital bed so that a doctor can pull her now-motherless baby from her still-warm corpse. And yet, that's what the truth of this bill is. So, I have to believe most people were simply duped by the increadibly despicable (and, unfortunately, effective) propoganda by the "religious right" on this issue. They actual believe that there are women out there who carry a pregnancy through to the last minute and then tell the doctor "I don't want this baby after all, will you just crush it's skull for me" and that there are doctors who say "sure, no problem".
The people responsible for this propoganda--and ultimately responsible for this law--are the most reprehensible people I can think of right now.

To beat a dead horse once more (hey, if we're going to be pulling babies out of their mother's corpses, why not beat a dead horse or two), you can check out the rant I wrote about this bill a couple months ago.

Barbara Speaks Out
Here are two stories about Barbara Bush joining in the Republican whining about attacks on her son (which are nothing compared to the dirty politics her husband made famous) and saying she shouldn't be bothered with the details of how many US soldiers die each day in Iraq.