2008 archive
Wheels 0
Put down that Transformer and back away slowly:
He started decorating his 2007 Ford Mustang last summer to look like the police cruiser in the “Transformers” movie because his 7-year-old son, Thomas, was fond of the film.
“My intent was to re-create the movie car,” said Vigil, a 35-year-old disabled veteran from the war in Iraq. “When I came back from Iraq, I tried to spoil him. I wasn’t the best dad before.”
He said he called the district attorney’s office beforehand and spoke to Chief Deputy District Attorney Joe Ulibarri, who tried to discourage his decorating scheme but couldn’t find anything in the law that would stop Vigil as long as he didn’t impersonate an officer.
A Nation of Christians Is Not a Christian Nation 1
Some persons who either do not know or who choose to lie about the history of the United States of America are fond of saying that the United States was founded as a Christian nation.
It was not. The only excuse for making such a comment is ignorance. The only reason for making such a comment, knowing that it is false, is perfidy.
Check out this interview with Steven Waldman, founder of Beliefnet, who has recently written a book on America’s religious history.
Spitzer (Updated) 0
No, I’m not going to comment on Elliot Spitzer’s problems. (He’s not the first, won’t be the last, but at least it wasn’t in a restroom with a strange guy or a Senate page.)
Today, though, I listened to yesterday’s Talk of the Nation (I love my mp3 player), which had an excellent episode on “Why do rich smart powerful people do such stupid things”?
It’s worth a listen, particularly the segment with Peter Sagal. From the website:
Sagal wanted to get a perspective on the indulgences of others and report back to the rest of us.
In light of Monday’s surprising allegations that New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer was involved in a prosecution ring, Sagal weighs in on the correlation between power and vice.
“It goes back in history that powerful people get to break sexual rules,” Sagal says — those in power are “immune from the sexual rules that bind down the poor rest of us.”
Addendum, Later That Same Evening:
I said I wasn’t going to comment on Spitzer directly.
But am going to point you to Jon Swift, who comments incisively and lengthily (and, when you consider what those two words mean, to combine them in one essay is, actually, a heck of an accomplishment):
Excerpt:
Drumbeats 0
There was a lot speculation in Left Blogosphere that Admiral Fallon’s resignation was a prelude to more war from the Bushie War Machine.
(Interestingly enough, many of the same Left Blogospheristas speculated, when the good Admiral was appointed, that his appointment signaled preparations for carrier-based air assaults on Iran, since he was an Admiral of the Navy, rather than a General of the Army. Here is one such speculation.)
Dan Froomkin has a thorough analysis of the situation and the possibilities and reaches the following conclusion on the fourth page of his post today:
It’s still not really beyond Bush and Cheney to order a full-scale preemptive attack on Iran. But the more likely scenario is that there will be an asymmetrical U.S. response to a (possibly trumped up) Iranian provocation. And the most likely scenario is that the U.S. will encourage (or certainly not oppose) an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities — which in turn would lead the U.S. to come to Israel’s defense should Iran strike back.
I suspect he nailed it. The War Mongers in the Current Federal Administration know that they can’t market another war. So, if they have the opportunity, they will happily resort to trickery.
Because they like war.
(And, I suspect that, since none of them have been personally touched by it, they think it’s more like this than like this. It’s something that happens to other people. Like my son.)
Just as they like torture.
Sing we all together now: “Gulf of Tonkin.”
Here is William Arkin’s take on the situation.
Roll of Infamy 0
The list of those who voted against overriding the veto of the Torquemada Bill.
Let us hope there is water in their future.
Oh, My 3
Words fail me.
Joy Douglas says she dyed Cici, her white miniature poodle, to call attention to breast cancer. She says she used beet juice and Kool-Aid.
She was ticketed March 1 under a Boulder ordinance that makes it illegal to dye animals. The ordinance is designed discourage people from dyeing rabbits and chicks for Easter.
She’s No Ferrari, Not Even a Fiat 1
As a matter of policy, I refuse to address name-calling between candidates in this space.
I can do my own name-calling quite well, thank you.
I’m going to point you towards this post from Josh Marshall, which does address the current kerfuffle involving Geraldine Ferraro, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama, because I think it’s worth reading as a thoughtful consideration of the situation.
Full disclosure: The first ballot I cast for a Presidential Candidate was a write-in for Shirley Chisholm.
Most of the same points could be made about the advantages and disadvantages Sen. Clinton is under because of her gender. In fact I think there’s a pretty striking symmetry. It’s clearly helping her with her big advantage among women voters, especially her generational peers. But we’d be foolish not to realize that some of Obama’s big margins among white men are not simply a reflection of support for Obama.
You might support Obama or not, think he’s qualified or an empty suit but suggesting he’s only where he is now because he’s black is something much worse than outrageous. It just seems obviously false.
Nativists Attack 0
If I weren’t old, I wouldn’t have seen this article:
While Todd’s case is rich in irony, she is one of tens of thousands of Americans who are falling victim to a new federal rule—aimed at keeping illegal immigrants off the Medicaid rolls—requiring that recipients prove their citizenship and identity with documents many don’t have.
(snip)
“This rule was the answer to a problem that really doesn’t exist,” says Donna Cohen Ross, an analyst with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in Washington, a nonpartisan research organization.
In fact, the year the rule was passed, Mark McClellan, then the administrator for CMS, said that a report by the CMS inspector general did “not find particular problems regarding false allegations of citizenship, nor are we aware of any.” Most states agreed with that assessment.
This would seem pretty typical of the Republic Party. Claiming that it is protecting American citizens, it solves a problem that doesn’t exist, thereby damaging American citizens. It also is able to throw a bone to those amongst its constituency who don’t like brown people by raising, then tilting at the windmill of fraudulent Medicaid enrollments.
(Haven’t they figured out that the last thing a sane illegal immigrant is likely to do is to join a government program, for heaven’s sake?)
It’s sort of like their phony voter fraud campaign. (Election fraud historically has not occurred at the polling place; it’s occurred at the counting place).
Hell, what about the War in Iraq–claiming to protect Americans, the Republic Party has (failed to) solve a problem that didn’t exist, created a whole slew, maybe two or three slews, of problems that didn’t exist before, all the while causing the death, injury, and displacement of hundreds of thousands of persons.
The Republic Party is clearly not fit to govern.
Empty Suit, Redux 0
Corporatism 1
Food for thought from Delaware Watch.
Home-Grown Hatred 0
From the Southern Poverty Law Center (Morris Dees is the real deal–send him a check today):
The end of 2007 brought to a close another year marked by staggering levels of racist hate in America. Even as several major hate groups struggled to survive, other new groups appeared, and the radical right as a whole appeared to grow.
Bushonomics 0
Ensuring the future of our children . . .
(Support the troops, go shopping).
. . . will be crap.
In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the “burn” rate of its earliest years, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and coauthor Linda J. Bilmes write in a new book.
Beyond 2008, working with “best-case” and “realistic-moderate” scenarios, they project that the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term U.S. military occupations of those countries, will cost the U.S. budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion – or more – by 2017.
Interest on money borrowed to pay those costs could add $816 billion to that bottom line, they say.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has done its own projections and comes in lower, forecasting a cumulative cost by 2017 of $1.2 trillion to $1.7 trillion for the two wars, with Iraq generally accounting for three-quarters of the costs.
Drinking Liberally 0
Tomorrow, 6 to 9 p. m., Tangier Restaurant, 18th and Lombard, Center City, Philadelphia, right behind Jeff.
I can tell you right now that I would much rather be there tomorrow night, instead of at the meeting I am scheduled to attend.
Moe Mentum 0
On the Media looks at whether or not the idea momentum in a nomination campaign is anything other than a steaming pile of media fantasy:
Go to the website or listen to the story here:
Talk of the Nation explores the question of “experience.” The guest pretty much concludes, as I did, that it is irrelevant. From the website:
Presidential historian Robert Dallek talks with guest host Robert Smith about the experience previous U.S. presidents had before they took office. Callers weigh in with what they would like to see on the next president’s resume.
Meanwhile, Dick Polman does the math:
In the competition for pledged delegates last week, she gained almost no ground on Barack Obama. And she will probably lose ground again tomorrow.
No spin can mask that fundamental fact. For instance, the latest CBS-tabulated results show that, for all her electoral success in Ohio, Texas, and Rhode Island last Tuesday, she has managed to trim Obama’s lead by only six delegates. Then, when you factor in the results of Saturday’s Wyoming caucuses (where she lost by another landslide), her net gain over the past week stands at four delegates. And when you factor in tomorrow’s Mississippi primary (where African-Americans will vote heavily), and the resulting delegate allocations, Clinton’s March gains are likely to evaporate completely.
(snip)
But enough of that. The most significant moment yesterday came when Tim Russert asked (Pennsylvania Governor–ed.) Rendell whether he thought that Obama was qualified to be president. Rendell replied, “I think he’s qualified” – certainly qualified enough to be vice president, and, moreover, if Obama turns out to be the nominee, Rendell said he would work his heart out for him.
Well, those were certainly inconvenient remarks – given the fact that Clinton during the past week has suggested precisely the opposite about Obama’s creds. Here she was last Monday: “I think it’s imperative that each of us be able to demonstrate we can cross the commander in chief threshold, and I believe that I’ve done that. Certainly Senator McCain has done that. And you’ll have to ask Senator Obama with respect to his candidacy.”
Rendell was then asked to square his assessment of Obama as “qualified,” with Clinton’s intimation that Obama is not.
His response: “Well, I, I think he’s ready. He’s not nearly as ready as Hillary Clinton is, there’s no question about that. But, look, make no mistake about it, he’s a talented, dynamic politician and, and a, and a good senator, and I think he would make a fine president…”
Rule of Law 0
Over at Susie’s place.
Who Was Responsible for 9/11 0
Follow the trail.
