The Staton Jones Report

As we reported a while back, Pakistan was under intense pressure from the Bushinistas to bag an al-Qaeda bigwig by this week. Rove just had to have Osama's head to wag in the public square this week to take the shine off the Democratic National Convention and especially John Kerry.

Well, the Pakistanis delivered ... sort of.

The AP has reported Thursday afternoon that "Pakistan has arrested a Tanzanian al Qaeda suspect wanted by the United States in the 1998 bombings at U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the interior minister said Friday. He said the suspect was cooperating and had given authorities 'very valuable' information."

The only problem is ... the timing. Pakistan claims it captured this man on Sunday. In this age of, oh say, satellites and the Internet, why does it take three days for the word to get out ... the night John Kerry delivers his nomination speech?

And get this: The arrest was actually made Sunday, the AP reported from Islamabad. But the capture was announced Thursday. The bulletins hit the wires soon after 3 p.m., or about seven hours before John Kerry delivers his acceptance speech.

Coincidence?

Obviously, I have no evidence that there's any connection between the timing of the arrest and the allegations made by the New Republic, which White House officials dismissed at the time. But the way the announcement was handled raises questions, to say the least. If you nabbed Ghailani on Sunday, why on earth would you wait until hours before Kerry's speech to tell the world -- and open yourself up to charges of politicizing the war on terror?

Coincidence? I think not!

The Seattle Times is publishing a article about documentation leaked by an unknown MS employee detailing the offshoring of core product development to India.

A Seattle labor group said it has new evidence that Microsoft is shifting high-level work to foreign contractors, including work on the next version of Windows.

Microsoft has long hired outside companies to supplement its labor force and develop partnerships in the technology industry, but its activities in India are being scrutinized amid the national debate over the outsourcing of technology work to developing countries such as India.

A concern is that even the highest-skilled and best-paying work, such as software development, is now subject to competition from lower-cost locales abroad.

The evidence is a cache of Microsoft contracts with Indian technology vendors that were leaked to the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers, an AFL-CIO affiliate that has focused on outsourcing in its effort to organize tech workers.

"The notion that next-generation technology is going to be the exclusive domain of domestic-based employees of the company is rapidly fading away with the disclosure of these documents," said Marcus Courtney, WashTech president and organizer.

The documents include wage lists and projects for Microsoft at Infosys, Wipro, Satyam and Tata Consultancy Services, the four largest Indian software and technology-services companies.

Much of the work involves testing, preparing user guides and building specialized tools. One of the Infosys projects is a guide for customers switching from an Oracle database to a Microsoft database.

White collar jobs are in the same peril today that manufacturing jobs were in the '80s.

You don't have to tell me this, but CNN Money has a story on it.

Americans' overall income shrank for two consecutive years after stocks plunged in 2000, the first time that has effectively happened in the since the current tax system was put in place during World War II, according to a published report Thursday.

The New York Times, reporting data from the Internal Revenue Service, said gross income reported to the agency fell 5.1 percent to $6.0 trillion in 2002, the most recent year for which data is available, down from $6.35 trillion in 2000. Because of population growth, average income fell even more, by 5.7 percent, and adjusted for inflation the decline was 9.2 percent.

The paper said the decline was due to a combination of the big fall in the stock market and the loss of jobs and wages in well-paying industries as the recession started in 2001.

More proof that after almost four years of Bush, we're worse off. Hope, friends, is a new President. By the way, this article refers to the years 2000 to 2002. When 2003 is factored in, it will likely be three years.

Of course, CEO pay is up by 50% this year, with the median raise a disgusting 22%.

Electronic voting records from Dade County, Florida, were lost last year, Salon reports.

A computer crash erased detailed records from Miami-Dade County's first widespread use of touchscreen voting machines, raising again the specter of elections troubles in Florida, where the new technology was supposed to put an end to such problems.

The crashes occurred in May and November of 2003, erasing information from the September 2002 gubernatorial primaries and other elections, elections officials said Tuesday.

The malfunction was made public after the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition, a citizen's group, requested all data from the 2002 gubernatorial primary between Democratic candidates Janet Reno and Bill McBride.

...

The loss of data underscores problems with the touchscreen voting machines, the citizen's group said. "This is a disaster waiting to happen," said Lida Rodriguez-Taseff, chairwoman of the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition. "Of course it's worrisome."

The group is concerned about the machines' effectiveness, following revelations about other problems with the system. Last month, state officials said the touchscreen systems used by 11 counties had a bug that would make a manual recount impossible. Earlier this month, a newspaper study indicated touchscreen machines did not perform as well as those that scanned paper ballots.

We cannot trust e-voting for this election. Contact your local election officials and find out how to vote on paper!

Fred LaRue, the "bag man" for Nixon's White House "Plumbers" died today. If he was "Deep Throat", the man who gave Woodward and Bernstein the clues needed to break the story and bring Nixon down, we should hear soon from the Washington Post reporters as they have promised to reveal their source after his death.

LaRue discounted rumors that he was Deep Throat, saying the mysterious source for Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein on the Watergate story was probably a combination of several people.

Woodward says Deep Throat was an individual and not a composite, and promised to reveal his identity only after the source is dead. A request for comment from Woodward left with the newspaper Wednesday was not immediately returned.

Among the other people who have been cited as possible Deep Throats are Earl J. Silbert, an original Watergate prosecutor; Alexander Haig, who was Nixon's chief of staff and Ronald Reagan's secretary of state; L. Patrick Gray, the acting FBI director who lived four blocks from Woodward; and deputy White House counsel Fred Fielding. All have denied it.

Salon has a long piece on Michael Moore's "presence" at the DNC.

Moore admonished the crowd that it would take unrelenting hard work to remove the Bush administration in November. "They will not go easy. Believe me, they're better fighters than we are. They eat hate for breakfast. They're going to fight, smear and hate all the way. So we have got to get out there and counter it with the truth." The right-wing likes to claim the flag as its own, added Moore, but they're not true patriots -- "they're hate-riots."

Moore ripped into docile, high-paid journalists who do the government's bidding: "You've got your little American flag pins, you're not just embedded -- you're in bed with the wrong people."

Moore said that despite his political views, he has always fared well in the entertainment industry because the "greed" of the executives who distribute his books and films "supersedes their hostility towards me." But when it came to Disney, the original backers of "Fahrenheit 9/11," "greed didn't work this time." Even though the movie has already made more money than any other Disney film released this year, Moore observed, the company decided to dump the film.

Moore said it took Canadian journalists to figure out why. He credited newspeople from the north with breaking the story that a wealthy Saudi family owns 17 percent of Euro Disney, after saving the company's troubled division with a $300 million bailout, in a deal brokered by the Carlyle Group. "Fahrenheit 9/11" makes much of Carlyle, an international financial power in which the interests of the Saudi dynasty and Bush dynasty merge. "But no American journalist will ask (Disney chief) Michael Eisner about that."

I hadn't heard that the Saudis put $300M into Disney ... I wonder if it was the Globe and Mail that broke the story (the National Post certainly didn't). That's interesting and it does provide a catalyst for Disney to drop the film despite the profits it was virtually guaranteed. I'm delighted that a Canadian company (Lion's Gate Ltd.) that profited instead.

Oh, and tonite Moore allegedly is showing Fahrenheit 9/11 in Crawford, Texas. Woot!

Crude oil reached $43 a barrel today.

Crude oil prices hit a record high of $43 a barrel Wednesday despite an increase in U.S. crude inventories amid record imports, as traders worried about supply after bailiffs ordered Russian oil major Yukos to halt sales.

Are you ready for $2.50 gas? I am.

Which is more ridiculous? A War Hero dressed up as a Rocket Scientist, or a Politician dressed up as a War Hero?

John Kerry is wearing a "bunny suit" while visiting a NASA facility where he inspected a space vehicle being prepared for launch. The suit is designed to keep particulate matter from coming off of people and ending up on the probe, and is a common outfit in clean room environments. Mr. Kerry had to wear this outfit to examine the probe, just like he'd have to wear a scuba suit to go diving. Nothing weird, silly or out of the ordinary here.

President Bush is wearing a flight suit (with his gentals noticably bunched in the front). The last time Mr. Bush wore an outfit like this, he was about to go AWOL from the Texas Air National Guard. It's a slap in the face of real Air Force pilots for him to don it since he didn't fly the jet that landed him on the aircraft carrier, and he could (should have?) have landed on the carrier in his Air Force One helicopter wearing a suit (which he quickly changed into after this photo was taken).

Mr. Bush was playing war hero when he wore this costume, whereas Mr. Kerry was simply wearing protective garb while visiting a space probe. Many major media outlets chose to run the photo of Kerry as if he was some kind of nut. Is that the best our "journalists" can do?

I remember marching in downtown Dallas to that slogan in the Fall of 2000. I couldn't believe something as simple and straightforward as counting votes would be so repugnant to Republicans. Man, did I get a civics lesson that year. This is a party that only cares about winning, and having won just like a dictatorship, pursues the same policies as one (e.g. starting unprovoked wars, obesssing on secrecy).

Today's Krugman column is a refresher course on this problem.

It's election night, and early returns suggest trouble for the incumbent. Then, mysteriously, the vote count stops and observers from the challenger's campaign see employees of a voting-machine company, one wearing a badge that identifies him as a county official, typing instructions at computers with access to the vote-tabulating software.

When the count resumes, the incumbent pulls ahead. The challenger demands an investigation. But there are no ballots to recount, and election officials allied with the incumbent refuse to release data that could shed light on whether there was tampering with the electronic records.

This isn't a paranoid fantasy. It's a true account of a recent election in Riverside County, Calif., reported by Andrew Gumbel of the British newspaper The Independent. Mr. Gumbel's full-length report, printed in Los Angeles City Beat, makes hair-raising reading not just because it reinforces concerns about touch-screen voting, but also because it shows how easily officials can stonewall after a suspect election.

Folks, this is as serious as a heart attack. The GOP is poised to rig elections electronically and they've focused their counter-democratic efforts in the key swing states. Voters in Texas and New York have little to fear, but Ohio and Florida are a whole other story. Start to protect your francise now by contacting your local election officials and find out if they are going to do chads or bits. Find out how to vote on paper, and do it. Maybe it's only available under certain conditions -- meet those conditions and vote on paper.

I know it sounds paranoid, but did you really think Bush would invade another country? Erode a woman's right to choose? Steal the election? Believe it.

I have to repeat this post by my fellow blogger Mike Jones (the other Mike Jones, not our Mike Jones ... oh nevermind!) where he rates the best lines from the various speeches last night:

Gold medal: Bill Clinton

When I was in office, the Republicans were pretty mean to me. When I left and made money, I became part of the most important group in the world to them. At first I thought I should send them a thank you note—until I realized they were sending you the bill.

Silver Medal: Al Gore

Friends, fellow Democrats, fellow Americans: I'll be candid with you. I had hoped to be back here this week under different circumstances, running for re-election.

But you know the old saying: you win some, you lose some. And then there's that little-known third category. I didn't come here tonight to talk about the past. After all, I don't want you to think I lie awake at night counting and recounting sheep. I prefer to focus on the future because I know from my own experience that America is a land of opportunity, where every little boy and girl has a chance to grow up and win the popular vote.

Bronze Medal: Jimmy Carter

Today, our Democratic party is led by another former naval officer—one who volunteered for military service. He showed up when assigned to duty, and he served with honor and distinction.

Honorable Mention: Bill Clinton

Here is what I know about John Kerry. During the Vietnam War, many young men—including the current president, the vice president and me—could have gone to Vietnam but didn’t. John Kerry came from a privileged background and could have avoided it too. Instead he said, send me.

Hillary spoke tonite at the Democratic National Convention, and Lordy oh Lordy! she didn't declare herself a candidate for President. The GOP must be in shock ... their whole strategy of countering her surprise nomination in the crapper! The panic in the "war room" must be palpable.

Drudge, Rush, Malloy, and all you dickheads at Fox: Get a Clue. It Didn't Happen.

Headline sez it all. Fahrenheit 9/11 earned $103M by today. It's officially a world record.

This Business 2.0 article from last year says that we will see an unprecedented job boom, brought on by demographics, beginning in the second half of this decade. Some of the BLS projections for tech workers cited by the article may be a little optimistic, but I think the demographic argument is pretty persuasive overall.

The cause of the labor squeeze is as simple as it is inexorable: During this decade and the next, the baby boom generation will retire. The largest generation in American history now constitutes about 60 percent of what both employers and economists call the prime-age workforce -- that is, workers between the ages of 25 and 54. The cohorts that follow are just too small to take the boomers' place. The shortage will be most acute among two key groups: managers, who tend to be older and closer to retirement, and skilled workers in high-demand, high-tech jobs...

What employers will have to do, of course, is not difficult to predict: bid up wages, raid competitors for employees, seduce older workers to stay on the job, outsource whatever work they can, and lobby the government to jack up the quota for skilled immigrants. What they will not be able to do -- at least not for much longer -- is ignore the problem. "People think we're going to have plentiful workers forever, but that's not so," explains David Ellwood, a Harvard University professor who recently led an Aspen Institute study of the problem. "If you want to hire somebody who has traditionally been the bread and butter of the labor force, you're soon going to have to hire them away from somebody else."

No sentient adult could have made it through the past decade without developing a healthy distrust of forecasts like these. But the case for the worker gap differs from the usual economic entrail reading in one crucial regard: It's based on demographics, a far more certain discipline. When Carnevale's model, for instance, shows that within seven years 30 million people now in the workforce will be older than 55, that's not a guess. It is virtually a certainty. "Any kind of demographic projection with respect to people who have already been born is notoriously accurate," agrees former Treasury Secretary Summers.

The AP is reporting that Bush's 1972 military payroll records have mysteriously been undestroyed in what the Pentagon is referring to as an "inadvertent oversight."

A Pentagon official said the earlier contention that the records were destroyed was an "inadvertent oversight."

Like records released earlier by the White House, these computerized payroll records show no indication Bush drilled with the Alabama unit during July, August and September of 1972. Pay records covering all of 1972, released previously, also indicated no guard service for Bush during those three months.

The records do not give any new information about Bush's National Guard training during 1972, when he transferred to the Alabama National Guard unit so he could work on the U.S. Senate campaign of a family friend. The payroll records do not say definitively whether Bush attended training that summer because they are maintained separately from attendance records.

My ass. Rove got wind of the reaction to the announcement that the microfiche had been destroyed and decided to reverse himself. He's getting sloppy! And since the release of this info changes nothing, it probably also only hurts Bush's "credibility" ("You keep using that word ... are you sure you know what it means?" -- I. Montoya).

The New York Times has an expansive article about the trend of Indian citizens returning to their home country after working in the U.S. for decades. They are taking back their wealth, skills but also the U.S. mindset of government and a citizen's role, too. The change in India is palpable.

In some cases, they are seeking to refashion India implicitly in America's image. It takes leaving and returning, said Arjun Kalyanpur, a radiologist who returned in 1999, to ask, "Why should my country be any less than the country I was in?''

This impulse is not universally welcomed by some Indians who never left and who see a globalized elite - many of whom now carry American passports, not Indian - importing a Western culture as distorting in its way as British colonialism.

Still, returned reformers are already sparking change. Srikanth Nadhamuni, who helped design the Intel Pentium chip, is now applying his formidable skills to designing a software platform that could revolutionize the administration of India's local governments.

This is a good thing, for both the U.S. and India. India's talent is returning home and is (hopefully) going to make a difference there, improving conditions instead of just exploiting them.

Likewise, the U.S. job market is not able to sustain the enormous H1-B visa program of the 90's anymore. The jobs are not available, thus American industry really cannot employ it's own citizens plus the Indians and sustain a strong middle-class job market. This is depressing the earnings of the middle-class and creating a slump in software developers which will result in a shortage down the road -- few sane individuals would enter college to study computer science these days.

Indians are the most acclimated to bring the successes of the West back to India, whereas Europeans have historically failed to make a positive change in the nation.

This article was brought to my attention by a fellow alumnus. In short, it says that the invasion of Iraq ruined the United States' credibility in the Arab world after the 9/11 attacks boosted it.

The [9-11] commission concluded that to stop the growth of Islamic terrorism, the United States must "stand as an example of moral leadership in the world. To Muslim parents, terrorists like bin Laden have nothing to offer their children but visions of violence and death. America and its friends have the advantage -- our vision can offer a better future."

That is the greatest irony of the final report released yesterday. America had the advantage with its friends right after 9/11, to the degree that King Abdullah of Jordan said, standing beside President Bush on Sept. 28, 2001: "The majority of Arabs and Muslims will ban together with our colleagues all over the world to be able to put an end to this horrible scourge of international terrorism."

By invading Iraq, which had no tie to 9/11 and did not possess weapons of mass destruction, Bush threw away our moral leadership. It is easy to fear that by indiscriminately killing as many as four times more innocent civilians than who died on 9/11, we have already fueled future attacks against us.

We squandered the open, political support of many Arab leaders and even some of their citizens, and now face a decades' long conflict that neither side will "win". Millions will be killed, and the world will be a worse place for it. To use an old Texas phrase, "Nice shoot'n, Tex!" George W. Bush should have been impeached years ago ...

Talking Points Memo has an interesting backgrounder on the Plame investigation. It looks like Valerie Plame was potentially exposed as a secret agent twice in the past, mostly thanks to Aldrich Ames (the counter-spy). It is starting to look like the White House is going to use this information to muddy the prosecutorial waters around the Novak article, probably in an attempt to keep "Scooter" Libby out of prison.

There does seem to be a rush of articles aimed not simply at discrediting Wilson but specifically at arguing that there is no legal basis for a prosecution of the folks who leaked Plame's name. Who's so concerned? It makes me wonder.

If this succeeds, then it will set a precedent for weaseling out of breaking the law by discrediting a political enemy.

Robert Reich thinks Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan may have raised interest rates prematurely:

Last Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported what's been happening to the wages of production workers. Now you know, Alan, this is a huge group -- everyone who's not a manager -- accounting for 80 percent of the workforce. Production workers' wages dropped in June. They dropped in May, too. To put this in concrete terms, in June, production workers took home an average weekly paycheck of $525.84. That's about $8 a week less than they were taking home last January. It's the lowest level of weekly pay since October of 2001.

Here's why you ought to be concerned, Alan. Low wages are a drag on the economy because workers are consumers. If the pay of 80 percent of American workers is dropping, you've got to wonder where the money's going to come from to buy all the stuff they're producing. They can't easily borrow more money, because they're already deep in debt. Plus, you and your colleagues at the Fed have started to raise interest rates, making borrowing more expensive. So, inevitably, consumer spending is going to slow down. And this in turn will further slow job growth and wages.

You've probably already seen the JibJab cartoon by now. If not, check it out. It is a funny -- and, allegedly non-partisan -- jab at both of the presidential candidates.

But, is it really non-partisan? Or, is there an insidiously subtle underlying bias?

An acquaintance of mine had this fascinating analysis of the cartoon.

The JibJab movie is indeed funny. But I'm not so sure it's nonpartisan.

Great writing, funny song, but hidden within; a conservative message. Just like a Fox.

I'm counting the stabs being made pro and con and note that they're all a direct reflection of what's been out there in the "Fair and Balanced" mainstream media. With one side largely missing.

The Kerry cartoon responds to everything sticking to him by calling Bush a (1) Stupid (2) Warmongering (3) Nutjob over and over. Kerry also mentions his Purple Hearts several times as a counterpoint but seems to say NOTHING about the War for oil, WMD, lying, the Patriot Act, Iraqi dead, Haliburton, the Economy, and anything else the Democrats might want to be said.

The Bush cartoon seems to hit all the points conservatives want to make about being a tough, regular guy, and handing out tax breaks while bashing Kerry for: (1) Waffling, (2) being a Liberal Sissy (3) Pinko Commie (4) Botox injections. AND with plenty of hidden visual "jokes" associating Kerry/Democrats with: (5) being a liberal elite while the rest of the country are trailer trash (6) killing
vietnam civilians to win his purple hearts (7) Sexually submissive to dominant UN and French (8) Crazy John Dean pal (9) Bill Clinton with his pants down (10) messing around with Lady Liberty while (11) being slapped by bitchy Hillary.

The only conservative talking point overlooked is the "free spending" liberal mantra but that sort of sticks to Republicans just as easily these days, doesn't it?

Funny? Yes. Balanced? I think not.

No wonder these animators have enjoyed plenty of free publicity on Fox network.

In responding to my question regarding the veracity of the final comment about the Fox network connection, my acquaintance replies, "The Fox connection is gleaned only from the JibJab blog (appears with the animation if your browser is working correctly) where they mention how the animation has become so popular after it was noted on Fox. (There's even a frame in the animation that resembles Fox News branding.)"

Hats off to Jeff Simon for his daring commentary on the Bush Presidency in Tuesday's Buffalo News. While he spends a great deal of time confiming what we already know, (i.e. Kerry isn't the most exciting candidate we could hope for) he also brilliantly summarizes the key points that make Bush unelectable in November.

...I'm among the millions of Americans reeling from daily horror at the current adminisitration. For the first time in our late middle-aged lives, we can find almost nothing to like in the past 3 1/2 years.

Tell it, Jeff, tell it! He continues:

...I've not been able to find anything to dissuade me from the not uncommon opinion that he and his Administration are a nightmare unique in our lifetime.

Believe that! Believe it, believe it!

Having viewed Outfoxed on Sunday evening with 20 other like-minded MoveOn.org members, I have come to the less than astounding conclusion that all media is biased and I now find myself recognizing it instantly. Things I would have accepted before as "reporting" no longer fit the bill.

For instance, Monday's Buffalo News featured an article entitled Trend Breakers complete with color photos and right wing bias. The author, Greg Morago (Hartford Courant), compares reality TV shows Nip/Tuck and American Idol to Fahrenheit 9/11 and My Life. Did anyone else catch this attempt to lead us to believe that Fahrenheit 9/11 and My Life are of no more significance than live cosmetic surgery and the songstress of the moment? This article is yet another indicator of the media's belief that we can indeed be led around by the nose and don't deserve a President who is capable of having an original, intelligent thought.

In an unsurprising turn of events, GW has decided to pimp his daughters out to the press as announced in Monday's Buffalo News article. Are there any other feminists out there who take offense?!?! He couldn't keep his girls far enough away from the media during their drunken debacles and prescription writing frenzy, but now doubtless wishes to have his girls represented since candidate Kerry's daughter is stumping for him. Who reads this stuff and doesn't see right through GW, simple minded fool that he is? I have asked myself this over and over throughout his Presidency. Who really finds this President credible in any way?

Anyway, back to the Bush girls. In May, Jenna and Barbara posed for Vogue draped in an Oscar de La Renta gown & Harry Winston bracelet and a Calvin Klein gown, respectively. Okay, is it possible they are somewhat motivated to help their daddy out of a desire to preserve their own riches and royalty-like status? Certainly! Were I "fresh from a post-graduation European vacation", perhaps I too would take up my designer labels and prostitute myself for daddy's campaign. However, it's not bloody likely I would ever be in those expensive shoes as I am definitely for dividing the wealth and find such trappings offensive.

What is even more offensive is the cultural truism that "sex sells." Let's just call it what it is. This isn't about softening their father's image. This is clearly about exploiting a couple of attractive young women in the hopes of winning votes based on the size and quality of their respective racks. While they may be willing victims, it makes it no less degrading to women (and men, forever pegged as ruled by the nether regions) as a gender.

While the entertainment value may be unsurpassed, I urge you not to buy this issue of Vogue and further, to consider cancelling your subscription to Vogue should you be a subscriber. I haven't read this glossy in years and years as I learned early on that magazines of this type merely contribute to women's collective dissatisfaction with themselves in every possible sense. Let's not forget WE are the culture that perpuates the popularity of T&A and we need to stop contributing to that.

What's next for Georgie? Laura and GW's mother Barbara in Penthouse? I put absolutely nothing past this simpleton.

Here's something that should scare the shit out of Karl Rove: smart people are trying to fix the bugs in the American election process. As we know, Rove and the other Rabid Republicans are all for fixing elections, but not in the sense of reducing the problems — they're more interesting in reducing the number of Democratic votes in the tally.

The Caltech-MIT Voting Technology Project was formed by the presidents of MIT and CalTech right after the 2000 election debacle. This month, they've published recommendations to improve the accuracy of vote counting in the upcoming election.

Anyone want to bet me that even a single one of these ideas will be used?

I mean used before Kerry wins.

In keeping with the attacks on John Edwards based on the fact that he's a — gasp — lawyer, Bush said, "I am not a lawyer, that's the other guys." That's true, but there's a critical underlying detail that Bush omits (big, surprise, huh?).

Bush isn't a lawyer because unlike John Edwards, Bush couldn't get into law school. Oh, he tried, but after losing his Senate seat to Lloyn Bentsen, George Senior was unable to force the University of Texas to accept Shrub's law school application. So George W. Bush isn't a lawyer because he failed in his attempt to be a lawyer.

Bush isn't a war hero, either. Again, that's the other guy. There's been a lot of talk about how Bush actively avoided service in Vietnam, but again, there's an overlooked detail. Before joining the Texas Air National Guard, young Dubya applied to be a pilot in the United States Air Force. He failed the test.

So the next time someone points out how great it is that Bush is nothing like Kerry or Edwards, you might want to point out Bush tried to be like Kerry and Edwards, but couldn't.

Just a note that today is the 35th anniversary of the first men landing on the moon. I've pretty much always considered this as humanity's crowning achievement in technology, in part that we put some explorers up there, but also that we brought every one back home safely. That's some serious engineering.

To the moonwalkers Armstrong, Aldrin, Conrad, Bean, Shepard, Mitchell, Scott, Irwin, Young, Duke, Cernan, and Schmitt; the pilots who orbited Luna, Collins, Gordon, Roosa, Worden, Mattingly, and Evans; the guys on #13 who couldn't touch down, Lovell, Swigert, and Haise; the men on the earlier Apollo missions who "merely" orbited the moon; and the massive support team for the entire Apollo project, including George Low -- thanks, everyone.

NASA has a lot of exhibitry about the first landing as well.

How do you beat the rap that Tom DeLay is facing (illegally shuffling money around to orchestrate and finance the biggest GOP takeover in a Texas' history) ? Make sure the House Ethics Panel investigating you is bought and paid for. Four of the five members of the Panel received funds from DeLay when they ran for office. They're his beotches, and I fully expect them to do exactly as they're told.

Here's an editorial from The Dallas Morning News making the case for a special prosecutor to investigate DeLay. (For those not in the know, the DMN is Dallas' only newspaper, and hence, the conservative one.)

Let's say you get called for jury duty. It happens that the person on trial once gave you money. Would you expect to get picked for that jury?

Heck, no.

You'd expect to be sent home, pronto, and for good reason.

Even if you, as an upright and fair-minded citizen, could put the financial tie completely out of your mind, how could those of us looking on, who can't get inside your head, be confident in your impartiality?

That's essentially the situation in Washington, where Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas stands accused of unethical fund-raising practices. Four of the five Republicans on the committee investigating him have received money from his political action committee.

The sums aren't huge -- no more than $15,000 to any one person. But the payments illustrate how difficult it is for members of Congress -- a body that exists on back-scratching and favor-swapping, sometimes in the form of hard, cold cash -- to police themselves.

That difficulty is compounded manyfold when the subject of the probe is the House member with the greatest ability to reward friends and punish enemies. That's why former House ethics panels appointed outside counsels to handle investigations of former speakers Jim Wright and Newt Gingrich.

(It was Gingrich, you may recall, who held up the Democrats as the example of the effects of a single party wielding too much power. Something about "a cancer threatening the very essence of representative freedom.")

Turning the probe over to an outsider was sensible then, and it's sensible now. In fact, some scholars of congressional ethics would make such an appointment mandatory in all ethics investigations.

Without going that far, it's clear that, if ever there was a good time to bring in an impartial investigator, this is it.

To paraphrase a popular Texas bumper sticker, "Belo said it, I believe it, and that settles it".

(Belo is the parent company of the Dallas Morning News and the Big Dog in Dallas media.)

This was originally flagged on Atrios' blog, but it's more than good enough (and short) to echo here. What really happened in the Cheney-Leahy showdown.

This from The Career News:

WASHINGTON, DC -- The good news is for three months running, the labor market has again been generating significant numbers of new jobs. The bad news is new Labor Department data show that over the same three months an exceptionally large number of jobless workers exhausted their regular unemployment benefits and did not qualify for further federal aid.

The Temporary Extended Unemployment Compensation (TEUC) program was created in March 2002 to provide up to 13 weeks of federally funded unemployment benefits to those who have run out of regular unemployment benefits. Individuals who have exhausted their regular benefits since December 20, 2003 have not been eligible for TEUC aid. The lingering high level of exhaustees suggests that the program was turned off too soon.

Analysis indicates that more than two million unemployed workers have exhausted their regular benefits and are without further federal unemployment aid from when the TEUC program ended through the end of June. The next few months are also likely to see an exceptionally large number of exhaustees. Projections suggest that in July, August, and September of this year, the number of jobless workers without aid will set records for those particular months.

Well, as Karl Rove will tell you, timing is everything. Screwing the unemployed leading into an election sure sounds like a winning move to me. Keep 'em coming, Bush old boy.

From Salon's War Room blog:

After Donald Rumsfeld testified on the Hill about Abu Ghraib in May, there was talk of more photos and video in the Pentagon's custody more horrific than anything made public so far. "If these are released to the public, obviously it's going to make matters worse," Rumsfeld said. Since then, the Washington Post has disclosed some new details and images of abuse at the prison. But if Seymour Hersh is right, it all gets much worse.

Hersh gave a speech last week to the ACLU making the charge that children were sodomized in front of women in the prison, and the Pentagon has tape of it. The speech was first reported in a New York Sun story last week, which was in turn posted on Jim Romenesko's media blog, and now EdCone.com and other blogs are linking to the video. We transcribed the critical section here (it starts at about 1:31:00 into the ACLU video.) At the start of the transcript here, you can see how Hersh was struggling over what he should say:

"Debating about it, ummm ... Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib ... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."

"It's impossible to say to yourself how did we get there? Who are we? Who are these people that sent us there? When I did My Lai I was very troubled like anybody in his right mind would be about what happened. I ended up in something I wrote saying in the end I said that the people who did the killing were as much victims as the people they killed because of the scars they had, I can tell you some of the personal stories by some of the people who were in these units witnessed this. I can also tell you written complaints were made to the highest officers and so we're dealing with a enormous massive amount of criminal wrongdoing that was covered up at the highest command out there and higher, and we have to get to it and we will. We will. You know there's enough out there, they can't (Applause). .... So it's going to be an interesting election year."

Notes from a similar speech Hersh gave in Chicago in June were posted on Brad DeLong's blog. Rick Pearlstein, who watched the speech, wrote: "[Hersh] said that after he broke Abu Ghraib people are coming out of the woodwork to tell him this stuff. He said he had seen all the Abu Ghraib pictures. He said, 'You haven't begun to see evil...' then trailed off. He said, 'horrible things done to children of women prisoners, as the cameras run.' He looked frightened."

So, there are several questions here: Has Hersh actually seen the video he described to the ACLU, and why hasn't he written about it yet? Will he be forced to elaborate in more public venues now that these two speeches are getting so much attention, at least in the blogosphere? And who else has seen the video, if it exists -- will journalists see and report on it? did senators see these images when they had their closed-door sessions with the Abu Ghraib evidence? -- and what is being done about it?

Sensationalizing? Perhaps. But how would you have covered the Nazi death camps, or Pol Pot's killing fields before anyone suspected anything? We have to expose this if we are to be true to our values.

Look foward, dear citizens, soon, to your Great Leader's announcement that the budget deficit is shrinking! That is, the actual budget deficit is less than the estimate. Oh, but it's still larger than last year. So is it shrinking? Growing? Or growing like a frickin' cancer?

OMB is likely to say its latest projection shows the fiscal 2004 deficit will be around $420 billion, about $100 billion less than the $521 billion the administration forecast when it released its budget in February. Administration officials will say this is an indication of how much better the budget outlook has gotten over the past few months and that the president's policies are working.

What they won't say is that the deficit situation is actually getting worse. A $420 billion deficit will be a new all-time high in nominal terms. The $420 billion record will replace the one set last year, when the deficit reached $375 billion.

Fuzzy math, my ass. Why can't the GOP do simple arithmetic? For that matter, why do I come from a nation of innumerates?

You're reading it.

Wow, 500 articles in only a few months. Must be an election year.

We report, you deflect ... er ... decide.

Thanks for being with us ... the ride's not over yet.

Ariana Huffington brands Bush the real "flip-flopper" in her column today.

The list of Bush's major policy U-turns is as audacious as it is long. Among the whiplash-inducing lowlights:

In September 2001, Bush said capturing bin Laden was "our No. 1 priority." By March 2002, he was claiming, "I don't know where he is. I have no idea and I really don't care. It's not that important."

In October 2001, he was dead set against the need for a Department of Homeland Security. Seven months later, he thought it was a great idea.

In May 2002, he opposed the creation of the 9/11 commission. Four months later, he supported it.

During the 2000 campaign, he said that gay marriage was a states' rights issue: "The states can do what they want to do." During the 2004 campaign, he called for a constitutional ban on gay marriage.

Dizzy yet? No? OK:

Bush supported CO2 caps, then opposed them. He opposed trade tariffs, then he didn't. Then he did again. He was against nation building, then he was OK with it. We'd found WMD, then we hadn't. Saddam was linked to Osama, then he wasn't. Then he was ... sorta. Chalabi was in, then he was out. Way out.

In fact, Bush's entire Iraq misadventure has been one big, costly, deadly flip-flop:

We didn't need more troops, then we did. We didn't need more money, then we did. Preemption was a great idea -- on to Syria, Iran and North Korea! Then it wasn't -- hello, diplomacy! Baathists were the bad guys, then Baathists were our buds. We didn't need the U.N., then we did.

Barbara Ehrenreich's editorial in the New York Times today is especially good.

This is a surprise? Groupthink has become as American as apple pie and prisoner abuse; in fact, it's hard to find any thinking these days that doesn't qualify for the prefix "group." Our standardized-test-driven schools reward the right answer, not the unsettling question. Our corporate culture prides itself on individualism, but it's the "team player" with the fixed smile who gets to be employee of the month. In our political culture, the most crushing rebuke is to call someone "out of step with the American people." Zip your lips, is the universal message, and get with the program.

...

The list goes on. Sibel Edmonds lost her job at the F.B.I. for complaining about mistranslations of terror-related documents from the Arabic. Jesselyn Radack was driven out of her post at the Justice Department for objecting to the treatment of John Walker Lindh, then harassed by John Ashcroft's enforcers at her next job. As Fred Alford, a political scientist who studies the fate of whistle-blowers, puts it: "We need to understand in this `land of the free and home of the brave' that most people are scared to death. About 50 percent of all whistle-blowers lose their jobs, about half of those lose their homes, and half of those people lose their families."

Remember, only children should play "follow the leader".

Our buddy, Paul, brought the Air Car to our attention.

This is interesting. I think it is real. Best I can tell, it runs (ideally) on compressed air. The designs they show on the web site appear to have a range of about 60-70 miles if you travel at 30 mph. In order to do this, you must charge the compressed air tanks, which in Europe (with 230V supply) will take about 3 hours for the small 2-seater; in the U.S., it could take considerable longer unless you can tie in to the higher voltage lines in your home, like the ones that electric clothes driers use. I couldn't tell whether there is any regeration from braking; if not, then the range could be extended, but I kind of suspect that they are doing some kind of energy re-capture, so probably not much improvement there.

In general, though, I'm pretty skeptical about such complex mechanical systems. I suspect there are a number of serious issues with, for example, the air filters, which would probably need serious regular
maintenance -- like on a weekly or daily basis, depending on the air quality of one's locale. Air compression just doesn't tend to stack up to any thermodynamic advantages over competing technologies, like pure electric, hybrid electric or even fuel cell, although this is mostly opinion/speculation on my part.

Perhaps most important, one must consider where the energy is coming from, and how efficiently it is being utilized across the entire flow, from source to end use. That compressed air won't be free. I'm trying to imagine what my electric bill would look like if I ran my electric clothes drier for six or seven hours every night, and what changes would be required to the local grid to support *everyone*
in my city doing this every night. Where will that electric energy come from? Currently, most electric energy in the U.S. comes from the burning of coal, which is very dirty. So, someone needs to estimate how the electric power infrastructure must change to accommodate these cars, and then compare that to changes related to competing technologies.

On the web site, they refer to using windmills and river currents to charge the cars. That sounds fine, although I think some serious analysis needs to be done to estimate both the efficiency and the
scalability of that scheme.

In short, it looks kind of nifty, but I'm quite skeptical.

PS Personally, I really like the Twike!

Nils Pratley at the Guardian reports on speculation that the U.S. dollar will collapse sometime in the next six years.

The American dollar is a flawed currency and will collapse in value before the end of the decade, taking with it the prosperity of the American nation. Investors should be buying commodities - platinum, lead, wheat, sugar, oil, the sort of assets that haven't been fashionable for a quarter of a century or more. While you're at it, teach your children to speak Mandarin, the coming language of the 21st century. And don't encourage them to do an MBA: "Tell them to be a farmer and do a real job."

Meanwhile, I note that oil is on its way back up due to larger-than-expected (by a factor of four) inventory drawdowns, as well as fear of supply disruptions from terrorist attacks (on both foreign and domestic energy infrastructure) and labor strikes in Norway and Nigeria.

Mmmm... commodities!

Apparently, even with the blessing of the President and the Religious Right, the insipidly evil Defense of Marriage Amendment is going down the drain. Two different groups of GOP Senators (let's call them Wingnuts A and B) cannot decide on how best to strip the rights of a select group of Americans using the Constitution (for the first time in our nation's history). This loggerhead comes as a relief to me. My wife and I were not married by a religious git in a gown in a tax-free building so we would most likely not be considered married under this Amendment.

Cheryl Jacques, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay political organization, said the last-minute effort to get votes on two different versions reflected a lack of care in drafting the amendment.

"I think it is outrageous and frankly surreal that at the 11th hour in this debate, they are literally rewriting the Constitution on the back of a napkin," she said.

Democrats said opening the proposed amendment to changes could open the Constitution itself to other amendments ranging from campaign finance to flag burning.

"We're treating it like just another little old amendment," Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota said of the Republican demands for separate votes on each version. "This is an amendment that will be added to a document that is precious, that we treasure, that we ought to have respect for."

There will still be a rollcall vote which is intended to hurt Democrat Senators who will almost certainly vote against this wingnut Amendment. Don't let it. Write your Senator if he/she votes for this piece of shit and let them know you think they're a goddamned idiot for doing so. Do it!

Gotta love those GOP. While they're busy bashing John Edwards for being a trial lawyer, they turn out to have a "love child" lawyer themselves, James E. Sharp. Yes, Mr. Sharp has the fine distinction of being President Bush's counsel if (and when) he gets dragged before a Grand Jury and at the same time, he's Ken "Kenny Boy" Lay's defense attorney. Before he took on these two stellar clients, he represented Mr. Magruder of the Watergate scandal.

"He's an absolutely superb trial lawyer, but as good as it he is, he's a very private guy," said Tom Mills, managing partner of the Washington office of the law firm, Winston & Strawn, where Mr. Sharp worked several years ago. "From the president's standpoint, he was a superb choice. From Jim's standpoint, he probably loves the client but hates that he raises his profile."

...

Mr. Sharp, however, has been entirely nonpolitical in giving his time and expertise. During the Watergate scandal of the 1970's, Mr. Sharp represented Mr. Magruder, the deputy director of President Richard M. Nixon's re-election campaign who was charged with obstruction of justice and was sentenced to four years in prison. He served less than a year.

Mr. Magruder was so appreciative of Mr. Sharp's counsel that he thanked him with an acknowledgement at the beginning of his 1974 book "An American Life: One Man's Road To Watergate."

Fascinating piece from the Washington Post on how General Electric is shaping the corporate tax code to benefit it's bottom line:

No company in the nation had more to lose than General Electric Co. when the World Trade Organization decreed in 2002 that U.S. tax laws violated international treaties. The multinational conglomerate was saving hundreds of millions of dollars a year in taxes from the export subsidies that the United States had to discard.

But in a two-year campaign, fueled as much by brains as political brawn, GE has shaped the legislation that would replace the old export-promotion law in ways that would allow it to save as much, if not more, in taxes, according to both GE lobbyists and congressional aides. In pursuing its financial interest, the company may also have turned the U.S. corporate tax code away from domestic manufacturing and toward expansion of operations abroad.

"The bill is truly amazing," said Michael J. McIntyre, a tax law professor at Wayne State University and an expert on international corporate tax issues. "We had an incentive for exports that was illegal and had to be repealed. Now Congress takes the money saved by the repeal and uses it to reduce taxes on the income earned by U.S. companies in foreign countries, thereby making foreign investment more attractive than U.S. investment."

Advocates and detractors alike say such concerns -- broadly shared -- make GE's lobbying feat more remarkable. House and Senate negotiators are expected to begin final talks on the corporate tax bill this week or next. GE's final push is about to begin.

GE was far from alone in trying to fashion what has become the most important corporate tax bill in nearly 20 years. Lobbyists for the nation's biggest companies have dusted off their favorite tax benefits and tried to sell them as part of the legislation. As a result, the measure, which began as a simple repeal of the $5-billion-a-year export subsidy, has swollen to include more than $140 billion in tax breaks over the next 10 years.

But GE's clout stands out. Of one provision eventually worth $2 billion a year, GE will reap an "overwhelming percentage," said John Buckley, chief tax counsel for the Democratic staff of the House Ways and Means Committee.

"They're getting a lot more out of this than they ever had" from the export subsidy, Buckley said.

CNN is reporting that Diebold is being sued (again) under a whistle-blower law.

Critics of electronic voting are suing Diebold Inc. under a whistle-blower law, alleging that the company's shoddy balloting equipment exposed California elections to hackers and software bugs.

California's attorney general unsealed the lawsuit Friday. It was filed in November but sealed under a provision that keeps such actions secret until the government decides whether to join the plaintiffs.

Lawmakers from Maryland to California are expressing doubts about the integrity of paperless voting terminals made by several large manufacturers, which up to 50 million Americans will use in November.

The California lawsuit was filed in state court by computer programmer Jim March and activist Bev Harris, who are seeking full reimbursement for Diebold equipment purchased in California.

The article goes on to note that the plaintiffs would receive up to 30% of the judgement against Diebold. Good luck, guys!

Fahrenheit 9/11 broke $80M this weekend and will almost certainly hit $100M before it finishes in the art house theaters.

Check out this Onion "infograph" about Fahrenheit 9/11. I particularly liked "Role of Michael Moore played by Michael Moore instead of camera-friendly John Goodman".

This story came out last week: Bush won't appear at NAACP Convention, turning them down for a fourth year in a row. Apparently the "uniter, not a divider" President is too big a coward to appear before an audience of critics (and that's putting it nicely). Rove apparently cannot "manage" the situation to his liking (say, buy getting the Mormon Tabernacle Choir positioned behind Shrub while on camera) so he just pulled the plug. Oh, excuse me, President Bush made that decision! What was I thinking?

Footnote: this makes Bush the first President since Hoover™ to do this. He's really after that coveted Hoover Award, now isn't he? The winner gets one term and a Great Depression thrown in as a door prize.

CNN is reporting that the GOP has had discussions with various members of the Federal Government to delay the national elections to "thwart terrorists plots" against our Nov. 5 date.

The news that such discussions have taken place raised other eyebrows on Capitol Hill as well.

"I don't think there's an argument that can be made, for the first time in our history, to delay an election," said Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, a member of the Intelligence Committee.

"We hold elections in the middle of war, in the middle of earthquakes, in the middle of whatever it takes. The election is a statutory election. It should go ahead, on schedule, and we should not change it."

But the Republican chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Christopher Cox of California, said on "Late Edition" that he sees Ridge's request as part of a prudent effort to plan for "doomsday scenarios."

"We don't have any intelligence to suggest that it is going to happen, but we're preparing for all of these contingencies now," Cox said.

Am I the only person who sees this as a coup d'etat?

DELAY the Elections because of a "terror threat"? What kind of CRAP is that? "Doomsday scenarios" ... like the GOP losing in a LANDSLIDE? The only example given by the GOP for justifying this is the Spanish election in which the incumbents, staunch supporters of Bush, were blown out of power days after a horrific terror attack. Do the GOP really think they can just seize power claiming the threat of terror attacks invalidates the fucking citizen's franchise?

Folks, if this doesn't scare the be-jeezus out of you, then you just don't realize how power mad these bastards are. The fact is they are (obviously) going to remain in control using any tactic they can sell to the public. Don't buy this argument -- it's bullshit pure and simple.

Hats off to Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson for defying her GOP masters and voting against Shrub's pick for the U.S. Circuit Court. He nominated a man who is quoted saying that rapes lead to pregnancy as often as Miami gets snow, and who was the head of the anti-abortion Movement in Arkansas. In other words, a fucking lunatic who thinks women should follow the Bible and literally be subservient to their husbands. What a fantastic judge he'll make: he passed the Senate on a 51-46 vote with five GOP Senators voting against him ( which Dem. Senators -- Zell "I'm A Democrat" Miller aside -- voted for this dickhead?).

The New York Times is reporting that the GOP is going to ease off the "felon voter list" it used so sucessfully in Florida in 2000 to keep likely Democratic voters from exercising their francise rights (in simple terms: keeping the blacks from voting) because this time it will cost them Hispanic votes. So, like the recent revelation that Bush has been putting the pressure on Pakistan to produce Usama bin Laden before the Democratic Covention opens in Boston at the end of the month, the GOP is finally doing the right thing for the completely selfish and (in some cases) too late reasons.

Gov. Jeb Bush said that not including Hispanic felons on the list "was an oversight and a mistake." He added, "We accept responsibility, and that's why we're pulling it back."

Governor Bush said the mistake occurred because two databases that were merged to form the disputed list were incompatible.

When voters register in Florida, they can identify themselves as Hispanic. But the felons database has no Hispanic category, which excluded many people from the list.

The article pointed out that less than 70 Hispanic felons were identified in the combined databases, effectively missing all but a handful.

How frigging convenient.

Bush's payroll records from a critical period in 1972-3 have been lost, according to the Pentagon. According to the article, this comes as a complete surprise to people doing research, both pro and con, about Bush's time in the Texas Air Guard.

It said the payroll records of "numerous service members," including former First Lt. Bush, had been ruined in 1996 and 1997 by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service during a project to salvage deteriorating microfilm. No back-up paper copies could be found, it added in notices dated June 25.

The destroyed records cover three months of a period in 1972 and 1973 when Mr. Bush's claims of service in Alabama are in question.

The disclosure appeared to catch some experts, both pro-Bush and con, by surprise. Even the retired lieutenant colonel who studied Mr. Bush's records for the White House, Albert C. Lloyd of Austin, said it came as news to him.

I think Rove was sloppy to do it so late in the election cycle. They're erasing Bush's history and rewriting it to hide his nine month AWOL drunken spree.

The Lies and Cover-Up continue ...

From Salon:

Lay could dish the dirt on several important topics: the Karl Rove-brokered push that resulted in Enron paying Christian conservative turned super-lobbyist Ralph Reed $300,000; Lay's dealings with secretary of state turned super-lobbyist James Baker; why Enron hired Ed Gillespie, the man who now heads the Republican National Committee; the reason for Lay's decision to allow the Bushes to use Enron's fleet of airplanes as their own; what happened in those meetings with Dick Cheney and his energy task force; and what really happened with the California energy crisis.

You know, for an unassuming and self-described clueless CEO, "Kenny Boy" could really, really spill bean after bean after bean, ad nauseum, about Shrub.

CNN is reporting that a Houston grand jury has indicted Ken "Kenny Boy" Lay, former CEO of Enron (or as Mr. Jones prefers, "Heads on Sticks™" Corp.).

Prosecutors were expected to center their case against Lay on his efforts in the months leading up to Enron's fall to reassure workers about the energy company's financial health at the same time that he was quietly unloading his own Enron stock.

In recent days, as rumors spread that an indictment was near, Lay and his defense lawyers have mounted a public campaign declaring his innocence in the hopes of warding off criminal charges. Lay and his advisers have argued that he knew nothing of the secret partnerships managed by Fastow and fully believed in the company's long-term viability when he urged employees to hold onto their Enron shares.

Kirby Behre, a former federal prosecutor who is now in private practice in Washington, D.C., said it comes as no surprise that Lay has been charged. "The government seems to have successfully worked its way up the food chain and enlisted the help of senior officers of the company who obviously were cooperating."

Behre added that ex-CFO Fastow most likely provided the missing link the government needed to bring the indictment.

"I don't think Fastow would have gotten the plea offer he did unless he had something to deliver on Ken Lay," said Behre, now a partner in Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker.

All we can say here at SJR is about fucking time!

I'm reading a lot of newspaper stories about John Kerry's choice of John Edwards for VP, and a theme that comes up often is how brief Edward's political career is.

He's been in the Senate for six years. He's running for VP. Let's compare his record with G. W. Bush's.

While he was the "Guv" of Texas, Shrub held office for less than four years before announcing his campaign for President. In case you didn't already know, the Gov. of Texas is almost a ceremonial office. I hasten to remind you that Bush had held no public office before he ran for the relatively harmless role ofGovernor (aside from a veto, he's got little or no power). Bill Clements, the first GOP Gov. of Texas, used to play cards when the Lege was in session, he had so little to do. In Bush's case, Bob Bullock ran the Lege and made Bush look good by passing many of his signature bills (Bullock was a Democrat in name only). Before that, Bush was a partner (minor) with the Texas Rangers where he "made his millions", and before that, he was CEO of various oil companies (all of which he drove into the ground).

Update: read this essay by E. J. Dionne to get a handle on the hypocracy of the "experience" issue and the GOP.

Edwards is the first son in his family to attend college, earn a degree, and a license to practice law. He is a very successful trial lawyer who has won several landmark cases for poor plaintiffs. He's been in the Senate for six years, enacting real legislation. Stepping up to President of the Senate is not that big a step for him (the VP is also the Pres. of the Senate).

It's a slam dunk case, really. Republicans who are grousing about Edwards' alleged lack of experience are setting up Bush for a big fall -- a simple comparison of resumes is devastating to Bush.

So keep on complaining, GOP. We welcome you to "bring it on". Your Vietnam vet never went to 'Nam but ours did. Your VP candidate was in the Senate and voted against military weapons bills. Ours is in the Senate, too, and unlike yours, isn't a sneering, "fuck you" kind of CEO. In fact, he seems to genuinely like the citizens of this country (even the poor ones) -- maybe because he's still one of us and Cheney and his Highland Park, Texas neighbor G. W. Bush ain't.

Memo to G. W. Bush: Get a Fucking Clue

Apparently, Tony Blair, sensing the end of his time as PM, has made the Earth-shatteringly obvious statement that the infamous WMD may never be found.

``We know Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction but we know we haven't found them,'' Blair said. ``I have to accept we have not found them, that we may not find them.''

Would someone please tell Dick "Fuck Yourself" Cheney and Shrub this little factoid? The sad thing is that even though Blair is admitting the obvious, he cannot let go of the lie that Saddam had WMD in the first place. Pathetic.

It's official, John Kerry overcame his problems with John Edwards and selected him as his running mate.

This choice, while obvious to the lay political observer, was not a shoe-in. Kerry reportedly didn't warm to Edwards and of course, the two of them were running against each other for the nomination which probably made for some hard feelings. But he also had to face the music -- Edwards is a superb campaigner, a charismatic and quite handsome fellow, and Kerry needs a strong running mate.

Edwards' back story is as powerful as Clinton's, so he has a lot of appeal to middle-class and poor voters. Unlike Dan Quayle, John Edwards is exceptionally talented, well educated and very, very articulate. And he's a Southerner.

Remember that Karl Rove first did opposition research on Edwards -- he's the guy that Rove was afraid of back in 2002. He bests Bush on charisma, and obviously on any other attribute involving intelligence and public speaking. If Rove was looking for dirt on him before all the others, it means that he knows he can be beat by John Edwards.

Just as he promised, John Kerry's campaign first sent notice of the selection by e-mail. I received my message at 8:13am EST, and the announcement was made at 9:00am EST.

CNN has a profile of Bev Harris, an opponent of electronic voting in California, one of the states destined to have an election crisis this fall thanks to Diebold and other high-tech, Windows-based voting scams.

Ambushing registrars and tracking down executives at their homes and offices, Harris, 52, has uncovered conflicts of interests and security flaws inside the companies that make electronic ballot machines.

Searching the Web and poring over newspaper clippings, Harris has unearthed obscure arrest records, ties to conservative political groups and other embarrassing secrets of senior executives at voting companies.

Her conclusion: there will be so many problems with the more than 100,000 paperless voting terminals to be used in the November presidential election that the fiasco will dwarf Florida's hanging chad debacle of 2000.

"We have a train wreck that's definitely going to happen," Harris said. "We have conflict of interest, we've taken the checks and balances away, and we know the votes are already being miscounted fairly frequently. This is going to be huge."

Joe Bob sez check her out.

I can hardly wait for The Onion's response to this whopper. A "Catholic" lawyer (the law recognizes sectarianism now?) is "suing John Kerry for heresy".

Everyone stop what you're doing and double check your digital watches to make sure we're still in the twenty-first century. Done? Good. Now back to the 16th c. non-sense:

"Heresy is a public, ecclesiastical crime," said Mr. Balestrieri, 33, whose complaint is posted at www.defide.com. "It affects entire communities. It is one of the greatest sins you can commit." If the Boston Archdiocese, which is refusing comment on the case, decided to press heresy charges, the Massachusetts senator could be excommunicated. "My goal is his repentance, not excommunication," Mr. Balestrieri said. The charges do not seek monetary damages.

Is there some kind of race to the top of mount "Fucking Idiot" between the Protestants and the Catholics in this country? Why in the hell is this kind of bullshit being bandied about during this election cycle? Is this really all that Karl Rove can fling at John Kerry? That religion (organized, I might add) is being used to attack political opponents is nothing new in the U.S., the fact remains that the level of petty, insipid and ass-backward stupidity of it is astonishing. Not since another Catholic ran for President has there been so much partisanship of the election -- and this is a Catholic attacking a Catholic candidate!

Where are the "Baptists to Beat Bush" when you need them?

Check out the dilligent anti-porn efforts of Fox News. While running a story railing against online porn, they showed a screen shot of a typical adult website with a woman's breast blurred out ... but the genitals of the fellow who's mounted her still clearly in the "shot". Way to go, Faux Nudes!

To whom do they make out their "Decency Act" $275,000 fine check?

Let's say you're a regular kinda guy who goes to your local Methodist church regularly, and for the most part goes through the rituals of service and worship but who doesn't get too involved in the extra activties at church. Then one day you start getting GOP literature addressed to you from out of no where. Wonder where it came from?

How about your local church. The Washington Post found a memo from the Bush/Cheney campaign instructing Christian volunteers to loot their church's database for potential GOP voters:

• Send your Church Directory to your State Bush-Cheney '04 Headquarters or give to a BC04 Field Rep.
• Identify another conservative church in your community who we can organize for Bush.
• Recruit 5 people in your church to help with the voter registration project.
• Begin to organize a voter registration drive at your church.
• Encourage new Bush Volunteers to attend Bush/Cheney '04 training session in your area.
• Host a coffee/pot luck dinner/"Party for the President" with church members - July 15th, 2004.

Why do churches get to do PAC work and still get tax free status? Could someone explain that to me?

The New York Times is running an article that comes as no surprise to those of us in the software industry.

In a campaign season of polarization, when Republicans and Democrats seem far apart on issues like Iraq, the economy and leadership style, it is perhaps not surprising that the parties find themselves on different sides in the politics of software as well.

The Web sites of Senator John Kerry and the Democratic National Committee run mainly on the technology of the computing counterculture: open-source software that is distributed free, and improved and debugged by far-flung networks of programmers.

In the other corner, the Web sites of President Bush and the Republican National Committee run on software supplied by the corporate embodiment of big business - Microsoft.

E. J. Dionne on the military's stop-loss orders for the Iraq war:

The possibility of getting caught up in one of those stop-loss orders -- where tours of duty are extended -- is written into the fine print when volunteers enlist, so they are not illegal. But in the current circumstances, they are outrageous. Back home, those being held on duty have neighbors and friends who never thought to serve and could thus enjoy a lovely July Fourth weekend at the beach or in the mountains with their families. But God help those already serving.

Volunteers are told suddenly that they are not free to go after their period of duty is up. They are in this position because our political leaders ignored the counsel of military leaders who knew the occupation of Iraq would require more troops than the politicians were willing to commit. When they were selling the war, those politicians did not want to admit how hard things might get. Nor were they willing to be candid about how their expansive foreign policy requires more troops than the administration is willing to pay for.

God forbid that Americans earning, say, more than $1 million a year be asked to pony up a little more in taxes to support a larger military at a time when, we are told over and over, the country is in the middle of a war on terrorism. Millionaires can't be asked to sacrifice even a little bit. No, they deserve to have their taxes cut while others fight and die. And anyone who speaks up in opposition to this injustice risks being called unpatriotic by those who give up absolutely nothing themselves. Patriotism is defined as a solicitude for tidy incomes, a belief in anything Rush Limbaugh says on the radio and a demand that those in charge of the country never be held accountable for their mistakes.