I'm trying to keep up with these but its been a hectic few weeks, on and off work!
VIDEO SECTION
Olbermann interviews McClellan…this is just a piece of it. When you put together everything we know already and McClellan’s recent account of what went on in the administration it is truly a tragedy that impeachment is not being discussed. I guess to illegally kill millions, torture thousands, and shred the Constitution doesn’t quite meet that impeachment bar…at least to the cowards in the democratic party and the GOP mafia:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/05/29/mcclellan-theres-certainly-allies-that-work-in-fox-news/
Matt Taibbi – Rolling Stones reporter and fantastic writer – is on the Daily Show to talk about the “fringes” in our political spectrum. While what he says is funny about the 9/11 side, anyone who thinks the official story about that attack is kidding themselves. Do some real research, and regardless if some of those that have made the conspiracy their lives are “out there”, you’ll find reason to be deeply, deeply concerned and skeptical of our government and its role.
The stuff about Hagee is hilarious:
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/86658/
Watch Professor and author Mark Crispin Miller is here to discuss his latest book Loser Take All: Election Fraud and The Subversion of Democracy, 2000 - 2008, a subject about which we cannot be too vigilant as we near November in what is arguably the most critical national election in recent history.
C&L: (This book) is an indispensable anthology of writings covering the vast election fraud that has been perpetrated by the GOP—with the Democratic Party’s acquiescence—since 2000. Among the subjects treated here are: the myth of George Bush’s victory in Florida in 2000, and FOX News’s key role in propagating it; Senator Max Cleland’s dubious defeat in Georgia in 2002; Bush’s “re-election” in 2004, including evidence of systematic fraud outside of Ohio; startling evidence of fraud committed in the 2006 midterm elections, which the Democrats appear to have won by a far larger margin than officially reported; and, crucially, evidence that the Republicans will attempt to steal the presidential election in 2008.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/05/30/cl-welcomes-mark-crispin-miller/
Daily show points out McCain hypocrisy on supporting troops
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/05/30/jon-stewart-calls-out-mccain-for-hypocrisy-on-supporting-veterans/
Mccain and the Mclellan book…one more thing “the disgrace” is going to have to deal with now…
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/05/30/what-mcclellans-revelations-tells-us-about-mccains-judgment/
This is great, O’Donnell thrashes Pat Buchanan for his role in, and cover-up of, the Nixon administration…which until now, was the most corrupt in American history:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/05/29/lawrence-odonnell-humiliates-pat-buchanan/
Okay, this is kind of gross, but the Daily Show goes through Mccain’s medical records…and let’s just say they’re not quite as the media portrayed in the end. Let’s say he’s a bag of sickness:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/05/29/the-daily-show-on-mccains-age-71-is-the-new-30/
GOOD NEWS
Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL) is calling on Scott McClellan to testify under oath before the House Judiciary Committee about the "earth-shattering" allegations in his new book.
New York Gov. David Paterson (D) "has directed all state agencies to begin to revise their policies and regulations to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions, like Massachusetts, California and Canada." In a message to LGBT leaders, Paterson called the move "a strong step toward marriage equality."
A Field poll released this week "found that in recent decades, a growing number of Californians have approved allowing same-sex couples to marry, with 51 percent of those polled now approving, up from 44 percent in 2006 and 30 percent in 1985." The poll is the "first ever majority for same-sex marriage in a California poll," Sullivan noted. Beyond the increasingly popular support for marriage equality, courts have an obligation to protect fundamental rights like marriage for historically unpopular minorities.
ARTICLE SECTION
Robert Scheer on the latest report from the inspector general on just how widespread our torture program is…or was…hard to tell. What's not difficult to determine is how pathetic the press coverage was and how little people seem to care:
One of those top officials, who stands revealed in the inspector general’s report as approving the torture policy, is Condoleezza Rice, who in her capacity as White House national security adviser turned away the concerns of then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft as to the severe interrogation measures being employed. Rice, as ABC-TV reported in April, chaired the top-level meetings in 2002 in the White House Situation Room that signed off on the CIA treatment of prisoners — “whether they would be slapped, pushed, deprived of sleep or subjected to simulated drowning, called water boarding. …” According to the report, the former academic provost of Stanford University came down on the side of simulated drowning.
SNIP
In the end, what seems to have most outraged the hundreds of FBI agents interviewed for the report is that the interrogation tactics were counterproductive. Evidently the FBI’s long history in such matters had led to a protocol that stressed gaining the confidence of witnesses rather than terrorizing them into madness. But an insane prisoner is the one most likely to tell this president of the United States what he wants to hear: They hate us for our values.
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/28/9232/
US TORTURE PROGRAM...CHINA CONNECTIONS
But before we celebrate the FBI - who let's face it - still never went public with the CIA's torture program, read this from Ted Rall, who also went over the report:
Turning a blind eye to torture. Watching passively as CIA goons destroy the trust of a possible material witness to terrorism. What “mixed review”?
As usual, the Newspaper of Record’s worst sins in Gitmogate are those of omission — the really weird stuff that could deprive the Administration of its few remaining supporters. “Buried in a Department of Justice report,” reported ABC News, “are new allegations about a 2002 arrangement between the United States and China, which allowed Chinese intelligence to visit Guantánamo and interrogate Chinese Uyghurs held there.”
Like their Tibetan neighbors, the Uyghurs of western China are victims of government oppression, including mass executions. Throughout the 1990s, U.S.-funded Radio Free Asia urged Uyghurs to revolt against Chinese occupation. After 9/11, however, the U.S. agreed to help China capture and torture Uyghur independence activists — as a quid pro quo for not using its U.N. veto to stop the American invasion of Afghanistan. (There’s more about the U.S. betrayal of the Uyghurs in my book “Silk Road to Ruin.”)
“Uyghur detainees were kept awake for long periods, deprived of food and forced to endure cold for hours on end, just prior to questioning by Chinese interrogators,” said ABC. “When Uyghur detainees refused to talk to Chinese interrogators in 2002, U.S. military personnel put them in solitary confinement as punishment.”
It’s a tale bizarre enough to make Rush Limbaugh blush: intelligence agents from communist China invited to an American military base, where they’re allowed to torture political dissidents in American custody, with American soldiers as their sidekicks. In light of China’s crackdown on Tibet during the run-up to the Olympics, it’s a tasty news tidbit. But it didn’t run in The Times — as far as I can tell, it only ran in one newspaper, the Christian Science Monitor.
At the same time journo-wimp Lichtblau was penning his “balanced” take on the Justice Department’s bombshell report, the U.S. government admitted that it has more than 500 children in its torture and concentration camps. More than 2,500 children have gone through U.S. secret prisons since 2002, including at least eight at Guantánamo.
--Ted Rall
Some real good points on the state of "free speech" made by the reporter who was fired by Comcast for criticizing the fact that none other than Bill o’ Reilly just received a JOURNALISM award!! Add to this the fact that Dunkin Donuts took an ad off the air because the woman’s scarf was criticized by right wing bloggers as looking too “muslim”, one get’s the feeling we’re not quite as free as we think we are. Or, you’re free until you say or do something certain people don’t appreciate (such as those in power):
Now he speaks out:
So, I’m that TV guy who got fired by Comcast over Bill O’Reilly. I protested the fact that O’Reilly was chosen to receive the Governors Award at this year’s Emmy Awards ceremony. That’s the highest honor that they hand out. The important word here is: honor.
SNIP
O’Reilly was an appalling choice, not because of his political views, but because he simply gets the facts wrong, abuses his guests and the powerless in general, is delusional, and, well, you might want to Google: Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
SNIP
And it all got me to thinking about the myth of free speech. In today’s America, speech is only “free” when you are talking down to someone less powerful that you. Speak “up” – and look out. In your work life, they can fire you, as I found out, for quietly saying something that is widely known to be true. Put a lid on it.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/27/barry-nolan/
MCCAIN VOTES WITH BUSH…A LOT! MAVERICK????
Support on bills: 2008 (through May 15, 2008) - 100%
2007 - 95%
2006 - 89%
2005 - 77%
2004 - 92%
2003 - 91%
2002 - 90%
2001 - 91%
CNN'S YELLIN SAYS NETWORK EXECUTIVES PUSHED PRO-WAR STORIES: Last night, Jessica Yellin, a CNN journalist who covered the White House for ABC News in 2002 and 2003, said that during the lead-up to the Iraq war, "the press corps was under enormous pressure from corporate executives" to present the war in a way "that was consistent with the patriotic fever in the nation and the president's high approval ratings." She said that "the higher the president's approval ratings, the more pressure I had from news executives." "They would turn down stories that were more critical and try to put on pieces that were more positive, yes," Yellin added. Last September, Katie Couric said she felt "corporate pressure" from NBC executives to "not rock the boat," particularly after a tough interview with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Former MSNBC pundit Phil Donahue, on last year's award-winning Bill Moyers documentary, said, "Our producers were instructed to have two conservatives for every liberal." Salon's Glenn Greenwald emphasizes that, though there was in fact a vigorous debate about the war in 2002 and 2003, journalists "ignored it and silenced it because their jobs didn't permit them to highlight those questions."
More than 100 countries "have reached an agreement on a treaty which would ban current designs of cluster bombs." However, the United States did not join the ban, calling the controversial munitions "an integral, legitimate part of its arsenal." A Pentagon spokesman said the bombs "have demonstrated military utility."
The DUHHHH….AWARD:
CQ writes although Attorney General Michael Mukasey was supposed to be more independent than his predecessor, he has largely been "Gonzales, take two." "He's just Alberto Gonzales with slightly more brains, but with no ability to say 'no' to the president," said Bruce Fein, a former Justice Department official in the Reagan administration.
Bowing to a court order, the White House released a long-delayed report yesterday on the "mainly harmful, impact of human-caused global warming in the United States." According to new projections in the report, "the poor, elderly and communities with lagging public-health and public-works systems will face outsize health risks from warming."
The U.S. military suspended a Marine yesterday "for distributing coins quoting the Gospel to Sunni Muslims" in Fallujah. The incident has "enraged Iraqis who view it as the latest example of American disrespect for Islam." Residents of the Iraqi city perceived the effort as "a 'humiliating' attempt to convert them to Christianity."
from brad blog:
HBO's 'Recount' Gets It (Mostly) Right, Even if America Didn't Retelling of Florida's 2000 Election Debacle Condenses 36 Days of Aborted Democracy into 2 Hours of Taught, Heartbreaking Political Suspense ...
Even if All the Lessons Continue to be Ignored... I don't mind admitting it. For an Election Integrity journalist, HBO's Recount is pure pornography. Anticipation for Sunday's Memorial Day premiere showing was at the top of last weekend's holiday agenda.
And the excitement grew still more late Friday when the good folks of PDA Florida made my week (my month? my year? my last four eight years?) by sending me an actual Palm Beach County "CES Votomatic III" voting booth, one which they tell me was among the 24 used in HBO's film itself.
When I first opened it, actual chads (HBO's film advises the plural of "chad" is actually "chad") from the 2000 election spilled out of the machine all over the office floor. The gods of democracy and the goddess of the Butterfly Ballot were taunting me. I rather enjoyed it. I learned long ago that I'd have little choice.
So it was with great anticipation that I sat down on Sunday night to watch the film as it premiered, along with the "Diebold Document Whistleblower" (and my new colleague at VelvetRevolution.us) Steven Heller and his wife, and Robert Carillo Cohen, one of the filmmakers of HBO's landmark documentary, the Emmy-nominated Hacking Democracy which enjoyed a re-airing earlier in the day, as the cable net set the stage for its newest democracy thriller/heart-breaker, Recount. None of us, including Heller, who anticipated hating the fictionalized re-telling of America's crushing democratic abortion of 2000, would be disappointed...
FULL ARTICLE/REVIEW: http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6026
