Why Are You Still Talking, Dick?

From his trusty outlet Politico:

Former Vice President Dick Cheney accused President Barack Obama on Tuesday of “trying to pretend we are not at war” with terrorists, pointing to the White House response to the attempted sky bombing as reflecting a pattern that includes banishing the term “war on terror” and attempting to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center.

Finally, this garbage gets solid pushback from our side:

A senior Democrat said in response: “It’s telling that in attacking the president and the administration, that Vice President Cheney did not condemn the attack against our nation on Christmas Day.”

I'm pretty surprised to see this from Dick:

“He seems to think if he closes Guantanamo and releases the hard-core al Qaeda trained terrorists still there, we won’t be at war."

Are there any "hard core terrorists" left at Gitmo, or did Dick and his little buddy let them all go in 2007?

Change is (still) Good

My first reaction to the "underwear bomber" story was that my trip tp India next month is going to be a huge pain in the ass, with all kinds of inconveniences that do zero to actually stop attacks.

My second reaction was to notice that, despite Republican politicians trying to get that ol' fear fest going again, the national response is much different. The President didn't give some stupid macho speech. Instead, he gathered information and then announced that there had been failures in the intelligence community and that they will be addressed. I have no doubt. Gone are the Bush days of seeming to think that admitting any kind of mistake at any level of the federal government was an admission of weakness. Gone are the days of "heck of a job Brownie!" and giving medals for failure.

Business as usual is no longer acceptable. I have no doubt from the President's speech today that there will be something that hasn't been seen in the last near decade. Accountability. Speaking of accountability, why am I not seeing either of these stories on TV?

Chris Good at The Atlantic has a statement from Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the chairman of the House homeland security committee, calling for the administration’s nominee to run TSA, Erroll Southers, to receive an up-or-down vote in the Senate:

Erroll Southers, an experienced, highly-qualified nominee, continues to be held up in the Senate by someone who obviously puts process ahead of progress. If TSA is to become the kind of nimble, responsive organization the American people deserve in times like this, it will need a Senate-confirmed administrator. If nothing else, the events of last week highlighted this lack of leadership.

Remember: DeMint is holding up the new TSA chief not because of any concerns over Southers’ qualifications. He’s holding Southers up because Southers is too pro-labor. Because the last thing you want for the safety of the nation’s airports is for the individuals responsible for their security to earn a fair wage.

ABC breathlessly reported that the bomber was trained by someone that WAS RELEASED FROM GITMO!!!!!!!!11!!1! AAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!! (by the Bush admin. in 2007. Oh wait, that didn't actually make it onto the news broadcast - just the online article.)

Two of the four leaders allegedly behind the al Qaeda plot to blow up a Northwest Airlines passenger jet over Detroit were released by the U.S. from the Guantanamo prison in November 2007, according to American officials and Department of Defense documents. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the Northwest bombing in a Monday statement that vowed more attacks on Americans.

Good riddance to the (failure at every business venture daddy bankrolled) "CEO President." Welcome to the "I expect results" President.

These Guys Must Be In On It!!

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities is clearly a socialist muslim kenyan weatherman front:

Some critics charge that the new policies pursued by President Obama and the 111th Congress generated the huge federal budget deficits that the nation now faces. In fact, the tax cuts enacted under President George W. Bush, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the economic downturn together explain virtually the entire deficit over the next ten years.

Ethics, what a concept!!

Nice article from The Hill, complete with "this doesn't comply with my programmed worldview, therefore it is a conspiracy!!1!!1!" comments section.

President Barack Obama scores well among ethics watchdog groups in his first year in office, though they’d still like to see more from the president.
...
“What I find most encouraging is that there is a core group of people at the White House who genuinely care about these issues,” said Steven Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy at Federation of American Scientists. “There is now ‘someone to talk to’ at the White House in a way that there wasn’t before. And we are already starting to see some results from those conversations, such as the Open Government Directive, and other emerging policies.”
...
“The greatest surprise is just how extensively these revolving door restrictions apply,” said Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen.

In case you didn't see this on Facebook or Youtube

Who is that masked kid??

Economic Blogs

Quick note to mention that I added Bonddad's blog and Eschaton to the blogroll. Bonddad does detailed anaysis of economic data. Eschaton is a liberal blog with a economic focus.

Eschaton was the blog that was calling out the pending financial crisis as early as late 2005. When I started seeing news stories about events that Atrios (the editor of Eschaton) had been predicting, I moved my 401(k) into the lowest risk options available and was lucky enough to avoid the losses that my colleagues suffered. Atrios is pretty concerned about the commercial real estate market right now.

For some reason blogspot isn't recognizing updates to Eschaton, so it won't rise up the blogroll list based on latest update. It's updated several times daily.

AWHQ Oral History

Went down to the KUT studios last night with my mom and got interviewed for their "Oral History of the Armadillo World Headquarters" project. It's a StoryCorps project, so our recording is headed for the Library of Congress.

There's a really nice Myspace page for the Armadillo.

Link to a few AWHQ pix.

The President and the Wars

Read this

What I got was an unexpected look into the eyes of a man who intertwined his roles as commander in chief and consoler in chief on a solemn day filled with remembrance and respect for sacrifices made - and sacrifices yet to be made.

I'm sure the cynics will assume this wasjust another Obama photo op.

If they'd been standing in my boots looking him in the eye, they would have surely choked on their bile.

His presence in Section 60 convinced me that he now carries the heavy burden of command.

Optionally, read this.

Americans Are Paying Attention

Quick post on national politics. Conservatives are happy this week because they added two Governors and lost two congressional seats (including one the Republican party has held continuously since the 1900's). To me it's a win-win. I have no plans to move to Virginia (although it's a beautiful place) or New Jersey. Hell, I can't think of any place in Texas I'd live other than Austin. The win for my side is that it just got easier to pass a progressive national agenda with two more votes in the House.

On the topic of health care, the new Republican bill is not going to help them with independents or even their base. Some excerpts from the Washington Post

In 2019, after 10 years of the Republican plan, CBO estimates that ...17 percent of legal, non-elderly residents won't have health-care insurance. The Republican alternative will have helped 3 million people secure coverage, which is barely keeping up with population growth. Compare that to the Democratic bill, which covers 36 million more people and cuts the uninsured population to 4 percent.
...
According to CBO, the GOP's alternative will shave $68 billion off the deficit in the next 10 years. The Democrats, CBO says, will slice $104 billion off the deficit.

The Democratic bill, in other words, covers 12 times as many people and saves $36 billion more than the Republican plan.

When Republicans make claims of fiscal conservatism and then do things like this, their only hope for gaining power is if people just aren't paying attention. If, as they claim, America is really a 'center-right' country, and yet they are still losing elections, maybe they ought to look at their actions in relation to their rhetoric. Putting out bills that are more expensive than those of the 'tax and spend liberals' isn't going to cut it.

I think that people on the left and the right both have reached the point where they are unwilling to have politicians say one thing and do another. On the left, that resulted in low turnout in Virginia and New Jersey. On the right, it seems to be resulting in a willingness to lose rather than put a so-called "RINO" in office (NY-23). Overall, I think it's a good sign for the country that people are demanding more accountability from politicians.

Time for a Change

OK, here's a long, rambling post. I started blogging as a way to highlight things that I found noteworthy, mostly in the areas of music and politics, my main interests at the time. As it went on, music took a back seat to the politics. This is something that I've been meaning to change. It's not just that I want to talk/think less about government and politics, I also want to change my approach to discussing both.

Back in the Clinton days, I was in my late 20's. Life in America was pretty good for a lot of people and I was pretty apolitical. When I did think about politics or government, I definitiely leaned liberal, but I didn't put a lot of thought into the subject.

During the 2000 election, I had two overriding thoughts:

1) Gore was much more qualified from an intellectual level to lead than Bush, but he (and Democrats in general) were not willing or able to fight back against the Lee Atwater/Karl Rove political attack style. The Atwater/Rove playbook is basically to throw out as many baseless attacks and distortions as possible, in hopes of bogging your opponent down with bullshit which they can either spend all teir time refuting or let stand. Gore and the Democrats had took the wrong lesson from the ridiculous Clinton impeachment. They got the idea that the only way to deal with the B.S. coming from the right was to "rise above" a.k.a. ignore it.

2) Bush was a simple minded Christianist who could be easily manipulated by the Nixon administration retreads he was surrounded with. I also knew how incompetent he was from a governing standpoint because I live in Texas. I wasn't too worried at first because the debates showed him to be barely able to speak in sentences. Thanks partly to the so called "liberal press", The 2000 election somehow came to be about who you would rather have a beer with (amazing the things that seem to be important when the economy is rocking) and the alcoholic apparently was a more "likeable" guy.

Even with all that, Bush got < 50% of the vote and needed some trickery to close the deal. I don't blame him for that. I do blame Gore and the Democrats for being unwilling and unable to fight back. If you didn't really want the job, why run?

The Bush administration radicalized me politically. They increased the wealth gap, started a completely unneccessary war and declared the Geneva conventions to be "quaint" while torturing accused enemies. I could go through the top 20 ways they did tangible damage to America and the world, but that's been covered pretty thoroughly elsewhere.

The thing that really got me concerned was how, post-9/11, they used fear (fed by ignorance) to sell every crappy idea they had. It got to the point where the Republicans were using fear the way advertisers use sex. "We need to lower the capital gains tax, or the terrorists will kill you in your sleep!" It's a lot easier to make people fearful if they don't have the knowledge to independently validate what you're telling them. This is part of the reason you started seeing what some have called the "war on science" and the close alignment between Fox News and the Bush administration.

An aside about Fox:

I recently posted a link on Facebook to a Pew survey that showed that Fox viewers have a different viewpoint than people who get their news from other sources. I'm actually OK with Fox wearing their affiliation on their sleeves. What I'm not OK with is when they "report" demonstrably false "news". A quick example follows.

My oldest daughter went to San Antonio recently to visit relatives. While there, she got a heaping does of Fox News and Fox News-informed opinion. One of the opinions (stated as fact) was that the text of the Senate health care bill hadn't been posted online. She asked a couple of reasonable questions (did you look online for it yourself? "No", did you confirm that via any other news media? "No"). When she got home and told me about this, we popped open the laptop and did a single Google search for the bills, which are here (finance committee) and here (HELP committee). Hell, it took longer to load the pdf of the finance bill into the browser than it did to find it online.

If you are going to tell people "facts" that are demonstrably false, you need to get them to either ignore or discount sources that contradict you. Fox seems to be successful in getting their viewers to do both.

Anyway, now that Obama is in the White House and Democrats "control" Congress (if they could ever actually get out of their own ways), my focus is on making sure that they do the right thing. From my point of view, the worst of the crisis has passed for now. I understand that on the conservative side, they see the crisis as just beginning (believe me, I get the emails from the RNC, Erik Erickson, the NRA, etc.), but that's not my problem. I'm not fired up all the time, and I won't engage on that level. Hell, I don't even watch Olbermann that much anymore. That doesn't mean I don't have opinions, I do. What it means is that if I express an opinion, and you respond with name calling or some other attempt to attack me (rather than addressing the merits of my opinion), don't expect me to play along. I don't have a need to, and I won't.

Sooooooo....All of that was a long-winded way of saying that I will be changing the tone of this blog and expanding the subject matter. Oh, and I'll be posting more often.

Embedded ACL Fest Broadcast

Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth

Read this now:

So it is hard for me to reconcile this mass approbation of blatant stupidity with the achievements we Americans have given to the world. We as a nation and as a culture have had so many shining, glorious moments where stupidity was forced to STFU. We put a man on the moon - several, in fact - and it was the Failure Is Not An Option inventiveness that got Lovell, Swigert and Haise back to earth alive. We split the atom. We invented the light bulb, the telephone, the airplane, peanut butter and chocolate chip cookies.

We invented the circular saw, the electric hot water heater, the elevated railway system, the engine muffler, the fire escape, Kevlar, the life raft, the medical syringe, the railway crossing gate, the rotary engine, the submarine telescope, the windscreen wiper – all inventions by American women, by the way.

The pictures are priceless...

8 Years and No Conservative Mentions Him

Funny how quickly that conservatives erased the name "George W. Bush" from their vocabularies. How quickly he went from God's Warrior to the invisible man. But then again, I guess it's hard to lecture people on the constitution when you supported a man who violated American's 4th amendment right to be free from illegal search and seizure and whose administration was successfully sued for violating the first amendment rights of citizens:

The Ranks, who wanted to attend the President's Fourth of July address without being mistaken for supporters of his policies, wore homemade t-shirts bearing the international "no" symbol (a circle with a diagonal line across it) superimposed over the word "Bush." One t-shirt said "Love America, Hate Bush" on the back and the other said "Regime Change Starts At Home." Event staff and law enforcement ordered them either to leave the event or remove or cover their shirts. The couple responded by insisting they had a First Amendment right to remain and express their views. The two were arrested for trespassing, handcuffed, and hauled away in a police van. The charges against them were later dismissed and the City of Charleston, not a defendant in the case, apologized for the incident.

Another great example of the conservative's "free speech for me, but not for thee" attitude. I guess their mistake was not showing up with guns strapped to their legs.

I'm also guessing that it also could put a crimp in your "Obama is Hitler" meme if you start counting the unprovoked wars he's started compared to Bush (0-1), or if you start talking about Bush's refusal to comply with the Geneva Conventions prohibiting torture.

But the main reason why they have erased him from view is his legacy:

Bush's record on poverty is equally bleak. When Clinton left office in 2000, the Census counted almost 31.6 million Americans living in poverty. When Bush left office in 2008, the number of poor Americans had jumped to 39.8 million (the largest number in absolute terms since 1960.) Under Bush, the number of people in poverty increased by over 8.2 million, or 26.1 per cent. Over two-thirds of that increase occurred before the economic collapse of 2008.


The trends were comparably daunting for children in poverty. When Clinton left office nearly 11.6 million children lived in poverty, according to the Census. When Bush left office that number had swelled to just under 14.1 million, an increase of more than 21 per cent.

That's what the healthcare fight (and more fights to come) is really about, the fact that Americans are suffering tangibly from Republican policies. If healthcare reform and other "liberal" policies are successful, it will be a huge blow to conservative ideology in the eyes of non-partisan americans. It's telling that the conservatives are fighting so desparately to prevent people from ever seeing those policies in action.

They're so desparate that they are willing to incite the simple-minded in their ranks to violence, while trying to maintain plausible deniability ("I had no idea you would interpret my calling the President a 'grandmother killer who must be stopped at all costs while we still have our guns' as a call to violence".) It's working, and it's dispicable.

The Old Double Standard

I just got done watching ABC News trot out 3 right wing commentators to criticize President Obama for taking a week of vacation, 7 months into his first term. So I did a quick web search and found this:

well-funded anti-reform group Conservatives for Patients Rights has been preparing a new ad attacking President Obama’s Martha’s Vineyard vacation.

Another quick search and I found this (note the date):

08/06/2001 - Updated 10:24 PM ET
CRAWFORD, Texas — Taking a 30-day working vacation at his ranch after six months in office, President Bush is spending too much time away from the White House, according to a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll.
...
Bush's advisers are sensitive to the perception that he doesn't work as hard as some of his predecessors. If Bush returns as scheduled on Labor Day, he'll tie a modern record for presidential absence from the White House — held by Richard Nixon at 30 days. Ronald Reagan took trips as long as 28 days.

I can't help but think that the current criticism is rooted in the idea that the President is predisposed to be, you know, "lazy and shiftless" (for reasons they finally learned to not call out explicitly in public.)

The Cards Are Starting to Fall

I know it's painful to watch when our President uses his strategy, but it works. It's not even that hard to figure out.

1. Let your opponent take the initiative, while appearing to be caught off guard


2. Offer weak enough resistance to make them think they have the advantage


3. Make public attempts to compromise with your opponent, which will be refused


4. Present your case while (rightly) pointing out that your opponent has:
   a) staked out an extreme position
   b) refused your repeated efforts to work together (or in the case of the campaign, to find common ground)
   

It's no secret that this is his approach. It's exactly what he did in the campaign. It continues to be effective with the conservatives (Rs & blue dogs) because they are so willing to charge ahead and overreach.

This is not "37 dimensional chess", it's poker.

Liberals have the right and the duty to pressure their elected officials to be responsive to our agenda. I won't tell others to STFU, but I will say that there is an observable pattern here. Remembering that, I suggest not wasting energy on the "Obama is selling us out" drama.

I suspected that he would make his play toward the end of the recess. It's coming a little earlier than I thought. I think the "public option is not essential" talk was designed to elicit the response we saw both from the left (getting stirred up and active) and the right (Republican Senators stating publicly that it doesn't really matter what's in a HC bill, they're not voting for it).

And I bring up C&L today to see...

White House may ditch Republicans after all on health care reform

Anderson Cooper of CNN did a report last night that echoes the NY Times piece.

Cooper: After negotiating with republicans, conservative democrats and seemingly themselves over parts of a plan CNN has learned that the administration could be getting closer to a very big change. Namely crafting a health care bill and try to ram it through the Senate even if it passes by only a single vote.

Henry: Well Anderson there is no final decision, but Democrats close to the White House are saying that they are now actively considering the possibility of doing a go it alone strategy. It's a budget maneuver, very obscure known as reconciliation where they would only need a simple majority, 51 votes instead of 60 votes to push through health reform. Republicans would scream that this is a power grab, it's an underhanded move but White House officials privately are already laying out the ground work by saying look, we've been working with republicans for months. If they don't get something done in the next weeks we're going to have to take drastic measures....

John Amato attributes the change solely to pressure from the netroots. That may be true. I think it's also possible that Obama didn't leave his brain and soul at the door when he got to the white house and actually has a left of center agenda and a plan to implement it...

What the Rest of Us (Including Fox Anchors) See...

Update II:

A total of 33 Fox advertisers, including Walmart, CVS Caremark, Clorox and Sprint, directed that their commercials not air on Beck's show, according to the companies and ColorofChange.org, a group that promotes political action among blacks and launched a campaign to get advertisers to abandon him. That's more than a dozen more than were identified a week ago.

When we see Glenn Beck. I defy anyone to find & post equivalent incitement coming from a nationally broadcast commentator on the left.
Color of Change Petition here.

Update
Apparently the "fans" took the call to non-violence with a grain of salt:

One photojournalist said that a fistfight broke out inside the building, reports WTSP.

Many of the hundreds of protesters said that they had been inspired by a conservative activist group promoted by Fox News host Glenn Beck and some received emails from the county Republican party, according to the St. Petersburg Times:

Instead, hundreds of vocal critics turned out, many of them saying they had been spurred on through the Tampa 912 activist group promoted by conservative radio and television personality Glenn Beck. Others had received e-mails from the Hillsborough Republican party that urged people to speak out against the plan and offered talking points to challenge supporters.

Let's see what ol' Glenn has to offer...






Even Fox anchors think he's an idiot.


Here's some nice doublethink. Just one act of violence will get my show cancelled ruin the republic. Pay no attention to the acts that have already occurred...
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Before the Birthers Out Me...

Escape From L.A. California

Ok, Here's another "what Digby said" post. The Reagan revolution has reached its logical conclusion out on the west coast. I'm assuming that all the people who were counting on the state services that the Governator slashed will get food, shelter and medical care from the God-fearing Republicans and their private charities.

From Digby's post today:

Today we witness the damage that the line-item veto causes in the hands of a right-wing governor bent on using it to achieve his long-desired destruction of public services. Arnold's vetoes include:

• An additional $6.2 million cut from state parks, which will likely cause as many as 50 more parks to be closed (potentially 1/3 of parks - 100 total - will now have to close)

• Elimination of state funding for community health clinic programs

• $80 million cut to child welfare services

• Total of about $400 million in health care cuts, including further Healthy Families cuts

• Elimination of funding for the Williamson Act programs to preserve farmland from development

• Deeper cuts to HIV/AIDS programs, as Brian noted.

• Cut 80% of funding for domestic violence shelters

...

I sure hope the wealthy won't have reason to tread beyond their gated communities for the next few years because it's going to be a disease riddled, environmental hellhole out here for the rest of us. I suppose they can have supplies helicoptered in and bring their "concierge medicine" behind the fences. They're going to need to.

It's going to be expensive, but at least the losers won't be getting things they don't deserve.

Jeez, Perry must be jealous...

Repairing the Damage

New Pew poll on international opinions of the U.S. here.

The image of the United States has improved markedly in most parts of the world, reflecting global confidence in Barack Obama. In many countries opinions of the United States are now about as positive as they were at the beginning of the decade before George W. Bush took office. Improvements in the U.S. image have been most pronounced in Western Europe, where favorable ratings for both the nation and the American people have soared. But opinions of America have also become more positive in key countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia, as well.

Signs of improvement in views of America are seen even in some predominantly Muslim countries that held overwhelmingly negative views of the United States in the Bush years. The most notable increase occurred in Indonesia, where people are well aware of Obama's family ties to the country and where favorable ratings of the U.S. nearly doubled this year.

A sample:

Chuck Todd, White House Correspondent

Glenn Greenwald allows Chuck Todd of (MS)NBC to demonstrate his thought process. With "reporters" like this, it's no wonder that king george was able to break the law at will...
(the previous article they reference is here)

a sampling:

GG: So what do you think happens - I think what has destroyed our reputation is announcing to the world that we tolerate torture, and telling the world we don't --
CT: We have elections, we also had an election where this was an issue. A new president, who came in there, and has said, we're not going to torture, we're going to do this, and we're going to do this--
GG: What do you think should happen when presidents--
CT: Is that not enough? Isn't that enough?
GG: When, generally, if I go out and rob a bank tomorrow, what happens to me is not that I lose an election. What happens is to me is that I go to prison. So, what do you think should happen when presidents get caught committing crimes in office? What do you think ought to happen?
CT: You see, this is where, this is not - you cannot sit here and say this is as legally black and white as a bank robbery because this was an ideological, legal --
GG: A hundred people died in detention. A hundred people. The United States Government admits that there are homicides that took place during interrogations. Waterboarding and these other techniques are things that the United States has always prosecuted as torture.
Until John Yoo wrote that memo, where was the lack of clarity about whether or not these things were illegal? Where did that lack of clarity or debate exist? They found some right-wing ideologues in the Justice Department to say that this was okay, that's what you're endorsing. As long the president can do that, he's above the law. And I don't see how you can say that you're doing anything other than endorsing a system of lawlessness where the president is free to break the law?
CT: Well, look, I don't believe I'm endorsing a system of lawlessness; I'm trying to put in the reality that as much that there is a legal black and white here, there is a political reality that clouds this, and you know it does too.

So, the lesson I take from this is that no matter what a President (past, present or future) does, the corporate owned media (in this case, a joint venture of MSFT & GE) will be cheerleading (unless it impacts their bottom line). No wonder people are abandoning traditional media as fast as credible alternatives become available.

Scientists Have Opinions

Hey, what do you know? Well educated people who make their living using logic, and are willing to submit the rationale behind their conclusions to inspection have certain characteristics in common. From the Pew Research Center for People and the Press:



Ok, so Americans have a pretty positive view of scientists (slightly below teachers). Scientists, however, aren't quite as impressed with the American public's knowledge of science:


Scientists see an American public that is poorly educated about science, can't tell real science from junk science, and is poorly served by the media on science topics.

Could things like this have anything to do with it?

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) has chosen Gail Lowe, an outspoken creationist, to run the state's Board of Education.

It was actually the less controversial choice. Cynthia Dunbar, reportedly under consideration for the post, believed government should be guided by a "biblical litmus test" and thought public education was a "subtly deceptive tool of perversion." (She home-schooled her own children.) She has also endorsed conspiracy theories suggesting President Obama is not a natural-born citizen.

These next two are your opportunity to guess the punchline.



Think you have it?



How about now? Give up?



9% conservative, 6% republican. So that's what people mean when they say that reality has a well known liberal bias!

Buffet on the Economy

Warren Buffet quoted in Reuters:

Buffett, a supporter of President Barack Obama during last year's election campaign, said a second economic stimulus package might be needed. The Obama administration says it does not see a need for a second stimulus yet.

"I think a second one may well be called for. It is not a panacea. A stimulus is the right thing. You hope it doesn't get watered down," he said.

He likened the first $787 billion stimulus package passed by Congress to "half a tablet of Viagra and then having also a bunch of candy mixed in --- it doesn't have really quite the wallop."

...

"We're going to come out of this better than ever, the best days of America lie ahead but not next week or next month," he said.

Not Perfect, But Full of Promise

A few more songs for the 4th.
Here's one that has become near to my heart in recent years. Check out the band - Chuck Berry, Linda Ronstadt, Keef, Bruce (in a beatles wig).


This Land


Somebody get me a cheeseburger!


Living in America

America the Beautiful

Brother Ray.

Marvin Gaye: Star Spangled Banner

My Independence Day weekend starts right now. Here's Marvin:

Whatever Happened to That Guy??

Congratulations Senator!

The Iceman (Part 2)

George Gervin. 6'7", a buck fifty. School is in session.
A nice highlight reel

The Iceman (Part 1)

Remembering Albert Collins, the master of the Telecaster.
If Trouble Was Money

Mainstream Americans Agree

From the Washington Post:

A sizable majority of Americans want the Senate to confirm Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, and most call her "about right" ideologically, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Senate hearings on Sotomayor, President Obama's pick to replace retiring Justice David H. Souter, begin in two weeks, and 62 percent of those polled support her elevation to the court. Sotomayor, 55, is currently a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit in New York.
...
Partisan differences, however, abound. Nearly eight in 10 Democrats and about two-thirds of independents said they want the Senate to confirm Sotomayor, but that drops to 36 percent of Republicans. Overall, most Republicans deem the judge a "more liberal" nominee than they would have liked.

But Obama's nominee also divides Republicans: While conservative Republicans are broadly opposed, most Republicans who describe themselves as moderate or liberal support her. More than seven in 10 conservative Republicans said she is too liberal, which is more than double the proportion of centrist or left-leaning Republicans who say so.

It's a matter of "when", not "if".

Black Joe Lewis

This kid is from Round Rock. He's got a smokin' band and a some good tunes. I'm calling his ACL fest set a must see & I'm calling this my song of the summer. If you come by my house, you're bound to hear it playing. Get the studio version and check out the lyrics. Check out his website, buy his music, see his show.

Hey, These Guys Are Pretty Good!

Best. Healthcare. System. Ever.

From the Washington Post:

Many Americans pay higher premiums for the freedom to go outside an insurer's network of doctors and hospitals. When they do, insurers typically pay a percentage of what they call the "usual and customary" rates for the services. How insurers determine the usual rates had long been opaque to consumers and difficult if not impossible for them to challenge.

As it turns out, insurers typically used numbers from Ingenix, a wholly owned subsidiary of the big insurer UnitedHealth Group. Ingenix had an incentive to produce benchmarks that low-balled usual and customary rates and shifted costs from insurers to their customers, the report said.

Ingenix got its data from the same insurers that bought its benchmark information, the report said. Insurers that contributed information to Ingenix often "scrubbed" their data to remove high charges, and Ingenix further manipulated the numbers, removing valid high charges from its calculations, the report said.

Cuomo found that insurers under-reimbursed New York consumers by up to 28 percent, the report said. A dozen insurers have reached settlements agreeing to change their practices; UnitedHealth agreed to the largest payment, $50 million, to help a nonprofit organization set up a new database to replace Ingenix.

In March testimony to Rockefeller's committee, UnitedHealth chief executive Stephen J. Hemsley said UnitedHealth stands by "the integrity of the Ingenix data."

No wonder these guys are so scared of competing with the government (which is funny, given how the government is so incompetent and all). Who came up with this insurance (protection) racket, the Mafia?

Americans Ahead of Politicians (water is wet, also)

The CBS News/New York Times poll on healthcare shows that 72% of Americans (including 50% of Republicans) support a public healthcare option (pdf of full poll results here). Gee, I wonder why all Republican congress members and some Democrats are opposed to a public option. I tried to contact them, but they were busy counting the $$ from insurance and drug company lobbyists...

Hey, That Guy's Pretty Smart

From The Hill:

In doing so, the president appeared to be steeling and warning Democratic fundraisers that Republicans were sharpening their attack lines for the midterm elections, a subtle prod to "dig deep" lest they lose control of Congress.

Obama noted that many of the actions that he has taken are "not necessarily popular," and he warned that the criticisms of his administration will only get worse as he takes on more issues.

"But that's the nature of things," Obama said. "This is when the criticism gets louder. This is when the pundits get impatient. This is when the cynicism mounts."

The president dismissed those who say he is not changing the way Washington works, laughing at critics who question whether or not change is possible.

"Can't do it. System overload. Circuits breaking down," Obama said, mimicking a robot. "It's so predictable.

"So this is exactly the moment when we need to fight the hardest. This is the moment when we need to band together.

To critics of his healthcare agenda, Obama issued a challenge for alternative ideas but brushed off Republican proposals for tax cuts for the uninsured as more of the same, asking, "What's your plan?"

...And Then There's This

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/06/15/neo_nazis_army/index.html

The lax regulations have also opened the military's doors to neo-Nazis, white supremacists and gang members — with drastic consequences. Some neo-Nazis have been charged with crimes inside the military, and others have been linked to recruitment efforts for the white right. A recent Department of Homeland Security report, "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment," stated: "The willingness of a small percentage of military personnel to join extremist groups during the 1990s because they were disgruntled, disillusioned, or suffering from the psychological effects of war is being replicated today." Many white supremacists join the Army to secure training for, as they see it, a future domestic race war. Others claim to be shooting Iraqis not to pursue the military's strategic goals but because killing "hajjis" is their duty as white militants.

Soldiers' associations with extremist groups, and their racist actions, contravene a host of military statutes instituted in the past three decades. But during the "war on terror," U.S. armed forces have turned a blind eye on their own regulations. A 2005 Department of Defense report states, "Effectively, the military has a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy pertaining to extremism. If individuals can perform satisfactorily, without making their extremist opinions overt … they are likely to be able to complete their contracts."

The Best Health Care System in the World

From Roll Call:

House Republicans presented a four-page outline of their health care reform plan Wednesday but said they didn’t know yet how much it would cost, how they would pay for it and how many of the nearly 50 million Americans without insurance would be covered by it.

Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), who heads a GOP health task force, said that when the details are drafted in the coming weeks, they would present a plan that “costs far less than the Democrats’ [plan] and provides better results for the American people.”

But Republicans who stayed at the press conference to answer questions — the leaders made statements but didn’t stay — could not answer whether their plan would include a tax increase to pay for such costly items as refundable tax credits for low- and middle-income workers to help pay for insurance.

Other reforms proposed by the GOP were largely minor tweaks to a system that House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said is already the “best health care system in the world.”

“We want to work within the existing market structure,” said Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), ranking member on the Energy and Commerce Committee.

In other news:

An investigation by the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations showed that health insurers WellPoint Inc., UnitedHealth Group and Assurant Inc. canceled the coverage of more than 20,000 people, allowing the companies to avoid paying more than $300 million in medical claims over a five-year period.

It also found that policyholders with breast cancer, lymphoma and more than 1,000 other conditions were targeted for rescission and that employees were praised in performance reviews for terminating the policies of customers with expensive illnesses.

"The Movement"

A great article. Take the time to click on the link and read the full post.

The Movement may speak in normal political talking points from ‘Republican’ institutions. Yet is is not committed to Dahl-esque pluralistic politics. It has has never sought compromise or ‘moderation’. That’s because for the Movement, politics is existential warfare. Compromise is defeat.

Because Krugman et al. fail to grasp the fundamental difference between the Movement, the former Republican Party and the Democratic Party, talking heads refer to the Movement as the ‘Republican base’. As if somehow the Movement and its Manichean zero-sum nihilism is the same as the Democratic base. Say the the Sierra Club or unions. How one can be a professional political analyst and assume a base is a base is a base. Well, we live in truly decadent (technically defined) times.
...
As a sign of their increased power, the Movement’s rage, paranoia, and conspiracy fever in 1993 seemed novel. By 1994 and certainly 2000. the Movement had completed its subversion of the Republican Party.

Wonder why after Obama the ferocity is turned up to 11? The answer is intrinsic to the Movement as functional social, cultural and political creature. It governed for 6 years and hung on for 2 more. Its Counter-Enlightenment, racial, authoritarian /hierarchical impulse was the official American government. With Obama’s victory its rejection is not only personal but for the first time, in 2006 and 2008, it as dominant political force (not as a minor coalition partner within the Republican Party) was rejected.

Right Wing Terrorists and the Talking Heads Who Egg Them On

(If you don't want to plow through this whole post, just read this from the U.K. paper The Guardian. It's a great analysis of these developments.)

Funny how "law and order" right wingers abandon regard for the law or even the U.S.A itself when they lose an election.

Let's review:
There's James G. Cummings

BELFAST, Maine — James G. Cummings, who police say was shot to death by his wife two months ago, allegedly had a cache of radioactive materials in his home suitable for building a “dirty bomb.”

Dirty Bomb? That's huge news! A terrorist in our midst! Do you remember when this was all over the news? No? That's because it wasn't.

Wonder what James' problem was...

The FBI report also stated there was evidence linking James Cummings to white supremacist groups. This would seem to confirm observations by local tradesmen who worked at the Cummings home that he was an ardent admirer of Adolf Hitler and had a collection of Nazi memora...She also said that Cummings was “very upset” when Barack Obama was elected president.

Then there's Richard Andrew Poplawski:

No longer obscure, the 22-year-old is charged in the worst police shooting in the modern history of Pittsburgh. No one is calling his actions anything but pointless.

"He was really into politics and really into the First and Second amendment. One thing he feared was he feared the gun ban because he thought that was going to take away peoples' right to defend themselves. He never spoke of going out to murder or to kill," said Edward Perkovic, who described himself as Mr. Poplawski's lifelong best friend.

Mr. Poplawski's view of guns and personal freedom took a turn toward the fringes of American politics. With Mr. Perkovic, he appeared to share a belief that the government was controlled from unseen forces, that troops were being shipped home from the Mideast to police the citizenry here, and that Jews secretly ran the country.

"We recently discovered that 30 states had declared sovereignty," said Mr. Perkovic, who lives in Lawrenceville. "One of his concerns was why were these major events in America not being reported to the public."

Believing most media were covering up important events, Mr. Poplawski turned to a far-right conspiracy Web site run by Alex Jones, a self-described documentarian with roots going back to the extremist militia movement of the early 1990s.

Yeah? What else?

With Obama's election, Poplawski became convinced that there would be "federal gun bans on the way" and that the people would be rendered defenseless in the face of a police state in which the military would be used against American citizens....Once more, wild speculations about SHTF ("s--t hits the fan") and TEOTWAKI ("the end of the world as we know it") scenarios became rampant.

Poplawski bought into the SHTF/TEOTWAKI conspiracy theories hook, line and sinker, even posting a link to Stormfront of a YouTube video featuring talk show host Glenn Beck talking about FEMA camps with Congressman Ron Paul. When the city of Pittsburgh got a Homeland Security grant to add surveillance cameras to protect downtown bridges, Poplawski told Stormfronters that it was "ramping up the police state." He said, too, that he gave warnings to grocery store customers he encountered (but only if they were white) to stock up on canned goods and other long-lasting foods.

Then there's Scott Roeder - a man who killed a doctor in his church on a Sunday.

The man charged with murdering a high-profile abortion doctor claimed from his jail cell Sunday that similar violence was planned around the nation for as long as the procedure remained legal, a threat that comes days after a federal investigation launched into his possible accomplices.

Possible accomplices?

Now the news is coming out: murder suspect Scott Roeder’s contacts with Operation Rescue adviser Cheryl Sullenger (convicted of conspiracy to bomb an abortion clinic in 1988) were much more frequent than she first acknowledged. Apparently, Roeder was in touch with her as recently as the beginning of this year, when Sullenger was helping him to track Dr. Tiller’s court appearances.

Most recently, the Holocaust Museum killer:

Giving some insight into what might have driven Von Brunn to allegedly take action at the museum, acquaintance and white supremacist John de Nugent cited, as one factor, the election of President Barack Obama as a "tremendous signal of alarm" for Von Brunn. Rage among white supremacists has escalated considerably, as they view the election of a black man as a sign that white people are losing power.

So, we have a bunch of violent people who believe that Obama will take away their property and power. They also appear to think that the political or legal actions will not solve their urgent need to "stop" those with whom they disagree. And for every one who acts, how many are plotting to act?

Cowart told the FBI that Schlesselman had also talked about targeting a predominantly black school and killing "as many as he could". But it was what Cowart said next that made the feds sit up. The two men planned to culminate the killing spree with a last dramatic act: they would dress up in white tuxedos and top hats, then drive at high speed, with guns blazing, towards an individual then very much in the news. "The final thing we had discussed," he said, "was trying to assassinate Obama. We did not plan on living past that day."

Threatening to act?

Federal prosecutors have charged a man with making threats against President Barack Obama after he allegedly told a bank employee in Utah he was on a mission to kill the president.

You have all these weak minded individuals who believe that Obama is going to take their guns, their money and their power. Who could be (profiting from) giving them that idea?



Hell, the results are even scaring an anchor at Fox...

Meanwhile, you can get the image at the top of this post on a t-shirt at Cafe Press.

Unbelievable.

Barack Rocks Green Bay

You can have your Reagan & your Bush (hell, even Clinton), no president since I've been alive has this kind of touch with people. There's so much to appreciate in this clip, from "Kennedy? That's a cool name" to listening to the question and responding while writing the note. The guy is by no means perfect, but he's the best I've seen.

The haters can't lay a glove on him and it's literally driving them crazy (more on that later).

SEC to Start Doing Its Job!

From Marketwatch:

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- It was created in 1934, but just this month the Securities and Exchange Commission decided to form an Investor Advisory Committee charged with protecting investors and to give people a voice in oversight.

Um, excuse me, but wasn't this supposed to be the SEC's mission all along?

The whole reason the U.S. created the agency in the first place was to regulate the stock market and stem abuse following the Great Crash of 1929. Look at how it has strayed, representing largely the interests of Wall Street at the expense of Main Street.

Indeed, during the Bush administration, SEC Chairman Christopher Cox routinely was criticized for passing rules and regulations that weakened investors' rights. For years the commission was warned of Bernie Madoff's scam but chose not to fully investigate.

Commenting on the committee's formation, SocialFunds.com said it's a "marked departure from many of its activities under the previous administration." The agency admitted it fell down on the Madoff case and others. Lapses of enforcement have been chronic and well publicized.

Weekend Coming - Music Time!

Weekend is almost here. I hope to get some blogging in. Let's get started with Stevie Wonder on Sesame Street, 1978.

P.S. - Check out the kids rocking out!

Why Aren't We As Stupid And Fearful?

Amanda Marcotte (a great blogger from Austin) has a few ideas about something that I've been wondering about for a while. From where I've been sitting, Americans in the latter half of the Clinton administration through the Bush years have been extremely easy to manipulate, mostly through fear. I always assumed that it was because people in general are pretty stupid. So now I'm wondering whether there are more smart people that I thought, or if the smart people are just more engaged.

Here's a clip from Amanda's post:

...one of the most interesting and underrated things that Obama did was quietly but decisively demonstrate that you don’t have to fit the badly-dressed fishing and chewing stereotype to be a Real Man. And in doing so, I think he woke up the right wing and mainstream media to something that should have been obvious, which is that the redneck set and their worshippers don’t actually have a lock on secure masculinity. It’s really kind of silly, because the right wing noise machine and their mainstream enablers knew for a fact that the way to stir up the troops was to provoke those insecurities---imply that someone was out to rob them of their manhood or provoke insecurities about being ignorant and provincial by calling liberals “elitist"---but despite this, I guess they must have honestly not realized that said insecurities were easily provoked because the people who have them are, duh, insecure.

But America is getting more urban, more diverse, and we’re even getting exposed to more things, and it’s changing the equation. As each generation comes up, fewer of them feel left out of the sexual revolution. (I went to a condom couture show on campus a few weeks ago, and even the College Republicans had entered a dress. Made of condoms. This should make their elders realize they’re losing the war rapidly.) And frankly, there’s a lot more models for how to be a Real Man nowadays, despite mainstream media’s brave attempts to shame men who shower and dress nice by calling them “metrosexuals”. Geeks aren’t excluded from the manhood club, not when the most famous business owners in the country aren’t car manufacturers so much as the guys who brought you your computers and iPods and video game systems. Intelligent, urbane men are a constant right wing target for masculinity shaming, but let’s face it, said men have a couple aces in the pocket, namely they aren’t little babies that are scared of dealing with women as equals and they win the sexual prowess contest without even breaking a sweat, and good luck defining masculinity without that.

I don't think that she's completely answered the question (for instance, she doesn't address the whole "there's a terrorist under your bed" thing). This country has made a pretty significant shift in attitude in a remarkably short time (although sometimes hard to tell, living in Texas). But it's nice to see I am not the only one wondering about this.

Sotamayor's Refusal To Legislate From Bench Could Prompt Conservative Backlash!!

From Fox News:

The chief concern is her position in the 2009 Maloney v. Cuomo case, in which the court examined a claim by a New York attorney that a New York law that prohibited possession of nunchucks violated his Second Amendment rights. The Appeals Court affirmed the lower court's decision that the Second Amendment does not apply to the states.

The ruling explained that it was "settled law" that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government might seek on individual gun rights.

Really?!?! this is the best they have?? She upheld a lower court ruling instead of engaging in the dreaded "judicial activism". Wow - Supreme Court pick #1 (of ??) looking like an easy confirm.

U-Neek

Summer's almost here. Let the reggae flow!
Eek-A-Mouse!!

What Glennzilla Said

Remember this when you hear that Sotomayor engaged in "judicial activism" in the Ricci case:

...And the idea that her decision in Ricci demonstrates some sort of radicalism -- when she was simply affirming the decision of a federal district judge, was part of a unanimous circuit panel in doing so, was supported by a majority of her fellow Circuit judges who refused to re-hear the case, and will, by all accounts, have at least several current Supreme Court Justices side with her -- is frivolous on its face.

President Obama Calls For Release of Aung San Suu Kyi

Today:

Making his first statement on the trial of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, President Obama issued a stern statement late Tuesday calling on the Burmese government to release her "immediately and unconditionally."
...
The Obama administration has been conducting a high-profile review of policy toward Burma, including the effectiveness of sanctions. But the sudden trial of Suu Kyi, just as her detention was set to end, has instead inspired calls for increased sanctions.

"Suu Kyi's continued detention, isolation, and show trial based on spurious charges cast serious doubt on the Burmese regime's willingness to be a responsible member of the international community," Obama said, adding the government had "an important opporttunity... to demonstrate that it respects its own laws and its own people."

Burma Democracy and Development has the full text. Another excerpt:

By her actions, Aung San Suu Kyi has represented profound patriotism, sacrifice, and the vision of a democratic and prosperous Burma. It is time for the Burmese government to drop all charges against Aung San Suu Kyi and unconditionally release her and her fellow political prisoners. Such an action would be an affirmative and significant step on Burma’s part to begin to restore its standing in the eyes of the United States and the world community and to move toward a better future for its people.

Whacked-out Lib General Petraeus

What's his take on closing GITMO?

"With respect to Guantanamo," Petraeus added, "I think that the closure in a responsible manner, obviously one that is certainly being worked out now by the Department of Justice -- I talked to the Attorney General the other day [and] they have a very intensive effort ongoing to determine, indeed, what to do with the detainees who are left, how to deal with them in a legal way, and if continued incarceration is necessary -- again, how to take that forward. But doing that in a responsible manner, I think, sends an important message to the world, as does the commitment of the United States to observe the Geneva Convention when it comes to the treatment of detainees."

Elections Have Consequences

This is a nice summary of the change as exhibited yesterday

A view from the Justice Department

Found this to be pretty interesting:

I think the President respects, and wants to restore, the Department of Justice to its rightful place: as representatives of the American people in the cause of justice in defense of the Constitution. And not, as it has been in large measure for the last 8 years, a White House tool for implementing ideological policy goals, law be damned; and, perhaps more damaging, as a shop to help cover, excuse me, a lot of ass.

Those days are gone. I can see it from here, where I sit, on the inside.

So, for President Obama to make that statement--"The Department of Justice and our courts can work through and punish any violations of our laws"--he meant it.

He is not shutting the door on prosecutions. He could have shut the door today, but he did not.

He's going to let this Department--a group of attorneys who cherish their independence and role as protectors of the Constitution and the laws of this nation--look into the matter.

And:

Here's another little secret: I work with conservatives. People I would clearly classify as conservative ideologues. I have a guy next door with some pretty zany views on some things. He walks into a booth and likely pushes every candidate button I do not. The guy is Hannity lite. He's a nut bag.

But you know what? You put my legal writing next to his, and there's no difference in argument. His position on certain sections of the law are the same as mine, and the same as everyone in our office. Because it's the law. It says A, we argue A. Because in 90% of our cases, the law always says A. And that's true even though we're doing some things in a relatively hot policy area. Not to brag, but my office is not doing asset forfeiture work or postal truck crashes. We are doing stuff in hot areas.

You can read the whole thing at Daily Kos.

Memorial Day - CHECK YOUR MEAT!

100,000 pounds of ground beef are being recalled after 3 infections and one child's death in Cleveland. Details at the USDA site.

Petition to the U.N to Demand Aung San Suu Kyi's release

Sign Here

Saw This on CrooksAndLiars

That is some sweet singing. Reminds me of a place I went...

"Trial" News video

Sham Trial of Aung San Suu Kyi Begins

News coming out of Burma:

The state media have avoided making any mention of the arrest of Ms Suu Kyi, who is being detained in Insein Prison after the intruder, John Yettaw, secretly swam across a lake to the house where she has been held under house arrest for most of the past 20 years. Today US consular officials reportedly were allowed into the prison, where he too is to be charged with entering a restricted area and immigration offences.

...

Her latest six-year term of house arrest was due to expire later this month, and Western governments have accused the Burmese regime of using the current case as a pretext for prolonging her detention. According to reports in the state media, Mr Yettaw, a Vietnam veteran and Mormon, swam across Inya Lake and spent two nights in Ms Suu Kyi’s compound, despite her pleas for him to leave. He was arrested by the security forces as he took the same route out again.

He made a similar visit last November, when he escaped detection. Ms Suu Kyi has been charged with violating the terms of her house arrest by not reporting the intruder to the authorities, as have her two friends and house keepers, Khin Khin Win, and her daughter Win Ma Ma.

Burmese courts invariably find for the government in political cases, and the authorities further stacked the odds in their favour on Saturday when one of her lawyers was struck off for “not abiding by professional ethics”.

This Is What Happens...

...when you cut funding to NPR and "allow" them to make up the shortfall by taking corporate advertising. Another corporatist news outlet. Today's example:

I listened to this Planet Money interview yesterday and it wasn't even close. Elizabeth Warren, a class act in every sense, totally destroyed the host's argument that concerning herself with the economic health of the American family was somehow her liberal "pet cause" and outside her bailiwick as TARP oversight chair. Not that it made any difference in his evident scorn!

NPR may have some nice little essays, but the only time their hosts show anything resembling teeth is when they attack... people who attack corporate interests! From the Columbia Journalism Review's "So That's Why The Press Won't Cover Elizabeth Warren!" by Ryan Chittum:

A couple of times in the last few months I’ve taken the press to task for ignoring the Congressional Oversight Panel and its report on the TARP. I’ve talked to reporters in the biz since and got the impression that many of them don’t really take it seriously because its chairwoman Elizabeth Warren is a liberal who, they say, pushes her agenda.

So it’s worth listening to this entire Planet Money podcast from NPR, where Adam Davidson badgers Warren for more than an hour to justify her existence, so to speak.

If you want a peek inside business-press mentality, and why certain stories get reported and others don’t, you can do worse than start here. It sees Warren as an outlier whose views, based on decades of research, are suspicious. It would never, ever have badgered a former bank exec, say, like this if one had been chairman of the panel. Davidson, like the reporters I referenced above, has been talking to too many bankers and insiders who sneer at someone not inside their bubble. Perhaps he’s trying to prove his objective journalist bona fides at “liberal” NPR by taking it to a liberal.

Yeah, what right does she have trying to make the taxpayer-funded bailout provide some actual benefit to taxpayers?!?! Doesn't she know that we're all here to provide executive bonus guarantees?? She is such a liberal!

Aung San Suu Kyi Ill, Imprisoned

Two stories developing regarding the democratically elected leader of Burma and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi. First, she has fallen ill and was initially being refused medical treatment after her doctor was arrested. Second, she has been arrested herself and taken to prison through no fault of her own. So, just to be clear, she has been arrested while under 'house arrest'.

From UPI:

Nyan Win, a spokesman for Aung San Suu Kyi's party, said she met with a doctor Monday who put her on a drip and there was no longer cause for concern about her health, CNN reported. The doctor was allowed to see her after being barred earlier from doing so.

The CNN report said while it was not clear why she was put on an IV, the procedure is used to give saline solution to patients facing dehydration.

The doctor attending on her was not her regular physician Tin Myo Win, who was arrested last week on an undisclosed charge, Nyan Win was quoted as saying.

Regarding her arrest, the story is strange to say the least. I received an email from Burma Campaign UK containing this information:

This morning Burma’s democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi was arrested by the regime and moved to Burma’s notorious Insein prison. It appears she will face trial for breaking the terms of her house arrest which forbids visitors, after an American man, John Yettaw, swam across Inya Lake and refused to leave her house.

Aung San Suu Kyi has committed no crime, she is the victim of a crime. There was an intruder in her house who refused to leave, yet she is the one being imprisoned.

HELP AUNG SAN SUU KYI - TAKE ACTION NOW
The United Nations and ASEAN must dispatch envoys to Burma to demand the immediate release of Aung San Suu Kyi and all Burma’s political prisoners.

Please go to this page where you can email the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon and ASEAN leaders to urge them to send envoys immediately. http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/ASSK_action.html

Guardian U.K. has this:

Hopes for the release of Burma's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi were dashed today with the announcement she has been arrested for violating the terms of her house arrest and could face up to five years' confinement after a bizarre intrusion by an American who swam across a lake to her home.

The news was greeted with anguish by supporters of the increasingly frail Nobel peace laureate: her most recent six-year term of house arrest was due to end in less than two weeks.

International reaction was swift, and appalled.

The UK prime minister, Gordon Brown, who included her in his book on courage, said: "I am deeply disturbed that Aung San Suu Kyi may be charged with breaching the terms of her detention. The Burmese regime is clearly intent on finding any pretext, no matter how tenuous, to extend her unlawful detention.

"The real injustice, the real illegality, is that she is still detained in the first place. If the 2010 elections are to have any semblance of credibility, she and all political prisoners must be freed to participate. Only then will Burma be set on the road to real democracy, stability and prosperity."

Please contact the U.N. and/or your members of Congress and ask them to intervene on Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's behalf.

Should I Stay or Should I go?

If this is true:

But the stem cell battle is not just a high-profile clash of values. The dispute provides a sharp focus on how science may help reshape America. Several states have set aside billions of dollars to support stem cell research, and the new federal money Obama is promising will generally flow to those areas. That means states supporting stem cell research will experience an economic windfall while attracting highly educated technology workers who tend to vote Democratic. The more conservative states restricting stem cell research will attract fewer funds and fewer socially liberal voters. In short, a state's stem cell policy will influence electoral results and help determine whether a state turns red or blue.

...then what should one conclude from this?

Texas researchers who thought President Barack Obama’s executive order lifting the restrictions on embryonic stem cell research would finally free them to ramp up work with the cutting-edge science are facing a new obstacle: the state Legislature.

Eighteen of the state’s leading scientists signed a letter sent to the Legislature Monday objecting to a provision inserted in the Senate budget bill last week that would ban state funding from supporting research involving the destruction of human embryos.

“Such an amendment would be detrimental to Texas,” said the statement. “A ban would halt ongoing research projects and negatively impact the ability of Texas academic health institutions, both public and private, to competitively recruit and retain world-class scientists, professors and students in the biological sciences.”

Doctors Fighting for Real Health Care Reform

Over on DKos there's a diary that I thought needed more exposure, so I'm linking to it here so 1 or 2 more people will see it :) When you start seeing all the BS ads about how public health care will make your life so bad, ask yourself why these 8 doctors were willing to get arrested in an effort to keep the publicly funded option on the table...

On May 5, eight health care advocates, including myself and two other physicians, stood up to Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and the Senate Finance Committee during a "public roundtable discussion" with a simple question: Will you allow an advocate for a single-payer national health plan to have a seat at the table?

The answer was a loud, "Get more police!" And we were arrested and hauled off to jail.

The fact that a national health insurance program is supported by the majority of the public, doctors and nurses apparently means nothing to Sen. Baucus. The fact that thousands of people in America are dying every year because they can’t get health care means nothing. The fact that over 1 million Americans go into bankruptcy every year due to medical debt — even though most of them had insurance when they got sick — means nothing.

Good Work by Republican Senator (no snark)

Props to Charles Grassley for adding Fed transparency to the bankruptcy bill:

A last-minute amendment to the bankruptcy reform bill passed in the Senate Wednesday opens the Federal Reserve to congressional scrutiny.

The amendment was pushed by Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the highest ranking Republican on the finance committee, and quietly breezed through 95 to 1. Grassley said that his measure wasn't aimed at limiting the Fed's independence, but that Congress just wanted to know a little bit about what it's doing.

The proposal is, said Grassley, "an important reform for holding the entities involved in the massive taxpayer-funded economic bailout accountable to the public."

How the Mighty Have Fallen

I've been trying to hold off on the conservative bashing as much as I can. It seems a little gratuitous at this point. But then I see something like this from RedState (no link):

4. DNC Chair and Obama lose two council seats in their backyard
The media will ignore it, but they shouldn't.

Democrats lost two seats on the Alexandria, Virginia city council.

Boy, how long has it been since I've been able to report good news on an election night for Republicans? With results from 26 out of 26 precincts, and absentees included, Republican Frank Fannon and GOP-endorsed independent Alicia Hughes appear to have won seats on the Alexandria City Council. The Democrats will still control a majority of four out of six seats, but this is a couple rippes of red in a deep blue community in a purple state - the best news for local Republicans in a long time.

But the implications are bigger. Barack Obama won this county 72-27. Senater Mark Warner is from Alexandria. Democratic National Committee Chair Tim Kaine is the Governor of Virginia.

Barack Obama lost today. The Democratic National Committee lost today.

That's right, Alexandria city council. A massive loss for the Democratic National Committee (and the President). I guess the tide is turning. Palin '12! Whatever gets you through the night...

Corporate Taxes

This is worth reading. I think I'd hit this point in a press conference, not just on the White House blog if I were president:

Jason Furman: Kyle, you are correct that the United States has the second highest statutory tax rate in the world, the official rate published in the tax code. But the United States also has more loopholes and special tax preferences than many other countries. As a result, the United States has a much lower effective tax rate. If you look at corporate taxes as a share of GDP they are below those of most major economies.

Cyclone Nargis anniversary

It was a year ago (May 2-3) that Nargis devastated the Irrawaddy delta region of Burma (Myanmar). The people are still struggling:

Foreign governments and charities provided US$315 million for food aid and emergency assistance in the months after the tropical storm hit the country May 2-3, 2008, leaving 138,000 people dead or missing and another 800,000 homeless.

But international charities and U.N. agencies like the World Food Program say hundreds of millions of dollars are still needed over the next several years to rebuild the delta's decimated infrastructure and provide farmers and fishermen with the cash they need to regain their livelihoods.

Many noted the funds raised so far are about 40 times less than US$12 billion raised for the 2004 tsunami, even though Nargis was the worst natural disaster in Myanmar's modern history and the world's fifth deadliest in the past 40 years.

At least the illegitimate military dictatorship has stopped obstructing aid, even if they are not doing much to help:

But perhaps the most shocking aspect of the disaster was the military government's indifference to the suffering of its own people.
The ruling generals said Burma did not need "chocolate bars donated by foreign countries", and refused to allow aid into the region for nearly three weeks.

The international community was appalled, and eventually - after intense diplomatic lobbying - Burmese leaders were persuaded to accept foreign assistance.
A full-scale aid operation got under way, and the world heaved a collective sigh of relief.

Burma's military generals are wary of any outside influence
A year later this aid operation is still in full swing, and while lots of people remain dependant on outside help, most have now been given some form of assistance.
The government has not spent much of its own money on the relief effort, but at least it has mainly left the aid agencies to their own devices, enabling them to distribute supplies throughout the region.

Sitagu Sayadaw has had great success both raising funds and getting supplies into the country (including during the first three weeks). If you want to contribute to his efforts, you can do so here.

Power to the Peaceful

A little Michael Franti in celebration of his upcoming return to ACL Fest. His first visit was a real breath of fresh air in the dark early days of (as Michael sang in "We Don't Stop") Bush War II.

Saint Ronnie??

Greenwald (as usual) has a point:

The views that Ronald Reagan not only advocated, but signed a treaty compelling the U.S. to adhere to, are ones that are now -- in the view of our dominant media narrative -- the hallmarks of The Hard Left: torture is never justified; there are "no exceptional circumstances" justifying it; it must be declared to be a serious criminal offense ; and -- most of all -- the U.S., as Ronald Regan put it, "is required either to prosecute torturers who are found in its territory or to extradite them to other countries for prosecution." Reagan's explicit view that the concept of "universal jurisdiction" permits signatory nations (such as Spain) to prosecute torturers from other countries (such as the U.S.) is now considered so fringe that it's almost impossible to find someone in mainstream American debates willing to advocate it.

If you now believe about torture and prosecutions exactly what Ronald Reagan advocated in 1988 -- or what Israel today advocates -- then, according to our establishment narrative, you are, by definition, a member of the Hard Left.

He also references the Pew poll released today:

White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified -- more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.

The analysis is based on a Pew Research Center survey of 742 American adults conducted April 14-21. It did not include analysis of groups other than white evangelicals, white non-Hispanic Catholics, white mainline Protestants and the religiously unaffiliated, because the sample size was too small.

Andrew Sullivan comments:

So Christian devotion correlates with approval for absolute evil in America. And people wonder why atheism is gaining in this country.

Notice the poll does not even use a euphemism like "coercive interrogation" - forcing Allahpundit to substitute it. (Even HotAir, it seems, finds it difficult to write the sentence: "Evangelicals are more likely to be conservative and conservatives are more likely to support torture.") But it remains a fact that white evangelicals are the most pro-torture of any grouping. Mainline Protestant groups were the most opposed. A mere 20 percent of non-Hispanic Catholics believe that torture is never justified.