Stopping all acts of violence everywhere

Bush describes his budget as one that “reduces and eliminates redundancy.” Also eradicates, extinguishes, annihilates and wipes out redundancy. He adds that he will hold “federal programs to a firm test of accountability,” but does not say if this test will involve Western-style accountancy.

21 are killed in Baghdad. Care to guess what they were doing? Yes, waiting on a line (to join the military), which is behaviour abhorrent in the eyes of Allah.

Denmark returns its Center-Right government to power, on a strong anti-immigrant platform. That’s the theme of European elections this year, with Tony Blair and Michael Howard also engaged in a bidding war on who can be more beastly to Johnny Asylum-Seeker.

Ariel Sharon and Mahmoud Abbas come to an agreement “that all Palestinians will stop all acts of violence against all Israelis everywhere, and, at the same time, Israel will cease all its military activity against all Palestinians everywhere”. That line comes from Sharon, who evidently doesn’t acknowledge the possibility of Israeli citizens who are also Palestinians.

So we can now forget about the Middle East because, as we all know, cease-fire agreements are considered sacred in that part of the world and are never broken. So there’s no reason to bet on how long it lasts, because it will last forever, although if you’ve got a pool, put me down for 5..4...3...2...


And then Sharon ate him.

All the different shirts

From the LA Times:

"They’re all around there in the Capitol, as you know, the different special interests," Schwarzenegger said recently, "the purple shirts and the brown — all the different shirts."

The purple shirts refer to T-shirts worn by unionized state workers who have been holding protests around Sacramento over the governor's plans to change their retirement system and take away some of their holidays, among other things. As for the brown shirts, it was unclear to whom Schwarzenegger was referring.

When an Austrian politician starts having hallucinations involving brownshirts--run.

Rep. Jane Harman will introduce a bill to ban torture. One would have thought that was illegal already, but evidently one would have been wrong. The bill would also ban “rendition.” I’ll be interested to see how Harman defines torture, something no Bush official has been willing to do.

Now, a gay activist with a trimmed beard standing on line for a mud-wrestling contest....

The London Times presents an interesting juxtaposition. Tacked on to the end of a story about Iraqi Taliban-wannabes allegedly killing barbers for trimming beards contrary to the will of Allah is this: “An American military policewoman who took part in a mud-wrestling contest at an Iraqi prison was yesterday demoted and found guilty of indecent exposure.” See, we have our standards, they have their standards.

There must also be something in the Koran about standing in line also being contrary to the will of Allah. Two more queues were bombed today, one of Iraqi policemen waiting to collect their pay, another of applicants to join the Iraqi police. This is only the 853rd and 854th time respectively that this has happened, by my count.

A gay activist, Scott McCoy, is named by D party activists to replace a Utah state senator resigning on health grounds. Should be fun.

George Monbiot writes that we may hear less UN-bashing from the R’s on the subject of the oil-for-food program in Iraq, since the Volker report says that much bigger violations of sanctions occurred through illegal sales of oil--which the US knew about and did nothing to stop, because it benefitted allies we wished to keep sweet, like Turkey and Jordan. Monbiot also has more details of the money that the CPA lost through its non-Western accounting methods: “Some $800m was handed out to US commanders without being counted or even weighed. A further $1.4bn was flown from Baghdad to the Kurdish regional government in the town of Irbil, and has not been seen since.”

Social Security Privatization and the Permanent Republican Majority

Now that Bush has revealed more details of his Social Security privatization scheme, I must say I’m relieved to see how lame it is. This turkey could pass only if the D’s efforts to stop it reach a Kerryesque level of incompetence. Which is quite possible, of course: I never thought the Medicare drug benefit could make it all the way into law still containing that idiotic “donut,” which shows what I know. But with the government managing the investment funds, with the clawback of anything below a 3% return, and with those mandatory annuities, and with even the Bushies now admitting it won’t help the long-term stability of Social Security, even the gamblers with visions of stock market windfalls won’t find this very attractive. One can only hope Bush expends lots and lots of his “capital” trying to push this turd uphill.

So what was it about? Like tax cuts, Social Security privatization was fundamentally about “starving the beast,” circumscribing the powers of government. Connect pensions to the stock market, and any attempt to regulate pollution, raise the minimum wage, tax corporations, prevent them sending jobs oversees, etc etc etc would be denounced as threatening granny’s private personal retirement account. Almost every aspect of a progressive agenda would be measured against the Dow Jones and found wanting. The R’s would be practically assured of a permanent majority.

So maybe just as well the plan stinks up the joint.

Always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom

Rumsfeld revealed this week that he twice offered to resign over Abu Ghraib. But just as Rummy was more concerned about the leak of images of Abu Ghraib torture than with the actual torture, his faux-resignations offer the image of taking responsibility without actually taking responsibility. By offering to resign rather than simply resigning, he was signaling that he believed he had done nothing wrong, but if Bush thought otherwise, he could act. This wasn’t accountability, but passive-aggressiveness, the equivalent of asking “do these pants make my butt look big?”. Rather than treat torture as a moral issue, his actions indicate once again that he saw it purely in pragmatic terms--whether his political effectiveness had been damaged--the very same amoral stance that led his subordinates to consider torture a legitimate tool.

And as long as I’m talking about Rumsfeld’s amorality, I haven’t yet mentioned his push this week for research into “bunker-buster” nuclear weapons, but I don’t think the discerning readers of this blog need explained to them why developing usable nukes is insane.

The US has forced the UN drugs agency to stop giving clean needles to heroine addicts to prevent AIDS transmission.

A week ago I mentioned (and posted) the British Labour party poster accused of being anti-semitic. That one, and another which supposedly made Michael Howard look too much like Fagin, have been removed from the Labour website. So the latest thing is the new Labour slogan, “Britain Forward Not Back,” intended to show that Labour is too dynamic to use verbs or correct grammar. But the slogan turns out to bear a certain similarity to a Halloween episode of the Simpsons which showed Bill Clinton declaring, “We must move forward, not backward, upward not forward, and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom.”

How socks can be a direct violation of human rights

Rumsfeld says there won’t be an Iranian-style theocracy in Iraq, run by “a handful of mullahs” (yes, those mullahs are a handful), because “The Shia in Iraq are Iraqis, they are not Iranians”. He does have a way of stating the bleeding obvious in a way that makes it sound like bullshit.

Rummy says “the great sweep of human history is for freedom.” The Bushies are beginning to talk about history being on their side the way “scientific Marxists” used to.

An Israeli military court releases the captain who emptied his gun into a 13-year old Palestinian girl last November, after one of the witnesses, another soldier, recants. This is insane, there are recordings of the bastard saying “I confirmed the kill” and there are ballistics from the ten bullets he used in the confirmation process. Previous posts here and here.

I trust my silence up until now about the royal coup in Nepal hasn’t been taken as tacit approval or anything. In the unlikely case that you’ve been waiting to hear from me before forming an opinion on the subject, here we go: authoritarian rule bad, democracy good.

The now censored Nepalese press has taken to running editorials on socks, how there are many types of socks on the market but if someone insists on wearing “the same pair of socks day in and day out, not even bothering to assess the detrimental effect of the overpowering stench... Isn’t it a direct violation of human rights?” This could just be a metaphor. There have also been editorials against chopping down oxygen-producing trees, on archery, women’s cricket, and how to enjoy sunshine.

If you need help making up your minds about the coup in Togo, here’s a hint: authoritarian rule bad, idiot son succeeding father bad, democracy good, “Togo” funny name for a country.

A Hong Kong firm is making feng shui underpants.

I don’t know what he said precisely or the context

From Secretary of War Rummy’s press conference Thursday: “The number of Iraqi security personnel who have died defending their country tells without question that they have the courage to do so.” Or just that they’re not very good at it.

Asked about Gen. Mattis calling shooting people fun and a hoot, Rummy declined to condemn the remarks. “I have not read his words. I don’t know what he said precisely or the context.” The reporter, who had actually just quoted the remarks in full, did not ask what possible context would excuse the remarks or whether Rumsfeld’s laziness about looking into such matters was indicative of his own permissive attitude to such assholery. Rummy pulled the same “haven’t read his words” thing with William “My God’s bigger than your God” Boykin, and was saying quite late in the game that he hadn’t read the report on Abu Ghraib torture (Maureen Dowd wrote, “Fire Rummy, or make him read faster.”) Clearly, DRummy has still not improved his literacy skills.

Consistent with our values

Condi says that the US’s Iran’s “behavior, internally and externally, is out of step with the direction and desires of the international community.”

Attorney Generalissimo Gonzalez says the Department of Justice will combat terrorism “in a way that’s consistent with our values.” Which is odd, because his previous dismissal of the Geneva Conventions as quaint and obsolete in the “new kind of paradigm” that is the war against terrorism suggests that he sees values such as civil and human rights as merely situational and revocable.

Speaking of combating terrorism in a way consistent with their miserable, vicious, desiccated values, the Iraqi police have taken to showing videos of prisoners confessing to their heinous crimes on tv. Totally voluntary confessions, I’m sure.

Loathed, loathed I tell you!

A day after Bush in SOTU said the US would work with our European allies to get Iran not to develop nuclear weapons, Condi Rice says we won’t do so because “I think our European allies agree that the Iranian regime’s human rights behavior and its behavior toward its own population is something to be loathed.” So until they change their human rights situation, they’ll just have to keep their nuclear weapons.

Condi did add that a US invasion of Iran is not on the agenda “at this point in time.” That’s a little too temporally specific to be reassuring.

“It’s fun to shoot some people”

The Marine Corps decides not to punish Lt. Gen James Mattis for saying that shooting people is “fun” and “a hoot.” Possibly they’re afraid to.

If recreational homicide doesn’t bother anyone these days, we should hardly expect torture to, and indeed Waterboardin’ Al Gonzales is confirmed as Attorney Generalissimo and Grand Inquisitor by 60-36. There were no anti-torture Republicans, including John McCain, himself a former torture victim. At Condi Rice’s confirmation hearing, during a discussion of her opposition to giving legal protections against torture to foreign prisoners, Christopher Dodd told her “I’d like you to spend about 15 minutes with John McCain.” Turns out, wouldn’t have done any good.

Oh dear, the UN oil-for-food program didn’t have “Western-style budgeting and accounting procedures.”

This Guardian article deals with some of the questions I’ve been pondering about the odd collapse of the latest Northern Irish peace efforts following unlikely accusations that IRA leaders were associated with a bank robbery in December and culminating this week with the IRA’s withdrawal from arms decommissioning, evidently in a sulk about the aspersions on their hitherto unsullied honor.

So bored that I’m blogging the Annual National Prayer Breakfast

And today, Bush follows up on the SOTU address with prayer, as do all of us under 55. Specifically, at something the White House website calls the “Annual National Prayer Breakfast.” I’m having trouble sorting out those adjectives--is it the breakfast that’s national or do we have a national prayer that I don’t know about? And it was held at the International House of Pancakes, which just confuses the thing more.

The White House chooses to use this picture of Bush doing his little-boy-closing-his-eyes-real-tight thing, although whether that’s because he was praying or that’s how he always eats eggs benedict, it doesn’t say.



He said this: “You know, last night was a prayerful occasion. (Laughter.) I noticed a lot of members were praying that I would keep my speech short. (Laughter.)” Oh no stop my sides are splitting.

Don’t know if the event was filmed, because the President of Madagascar was there, and I would dearly love to hear Shrub trying to pronounce one of those great Malagasy names: Marc Ravalomanana.

He says that “prayer has always been one of the great equalizers in American life.” I thought that was the Colt revolver.

Here’s another picture. I think the circular things are the angels that follow him everywhere.

Friday Species-in-Danger-of-Extinction-from-Global-Warming Blogging

Eli at LeftI notes “the tremendous disparity in press attention between the very real global warming crisis and the bogus Social Security ‘crisis.’” We all know what’s needed to make people give a shit about environmental issues: cute animal pictures. Therefore, I hereby invite other bloggers to join in Friday Species-in-Danger-of-Extinction-from-Global-Warming Blogging, which I’m inaugurating a day early, and calling dibs on polar bears.

Evil smug scum watch

Elliott Abrams, who did such a lovely job undermining democracy here and in Central America during the Reagan administration, has been promoted to deputy national security adviser with responsibility for advancing democracy. Back then, I said that if one good thing came out of Iran-Contra, it was that that smug prick would never become secretary of state. If you’re too young to remember this supporter of death squads, dictators and Contras, do google him. The first Google hit is a David Corn article in the Nation, which should be a good place to start. But a list of his misdeeds doesn’t convey how obnoxious this guy’s smugness was, how irritating his ubiquitous appearances on McNeil-Lehrer and Nightline.

My favorite Abrams story: a Congressional committee once asked him if any foreign governments had contributed funds to the Contras. He said no, which was technically true only because when Abrams had solicited $10 million from the Sultan of Brunei, he gave him the wrong Swiss account number, so the money hadn’t technically gone to the Contras but to one temporarily lucky (until he got caught) Swiss citizen.

So Abrams’s rehabilitation continues. At a glacial pace, I suppose, compared to the near-instant whitewashing of torture apologists like Alberto Gonzales (yesterday I caught a bit of the Senate speeches, with Orrin Hatch outright accusing D’s of racism). Still, even Bush daren’t put him up for a position requiring Senate confirmation (he was after all convicted of lying to Congress, later pardoned by Bush the Elder) or make the announcement on any but a busy news day. I think the best response to this is a reminder that Bush’s father still hasn’t answered questions about his role in Iran-Contra, about which he said the Reagan administration had “erred on the side of life.” Ah, the culture of life.

Alternative caption: Republicans display fingers they had dipped in the blood of infidels.

Marc Cooper on this stunt: “These congress-twerps who spend their days and night suckling on the special interests tit braved no more than the risk of camera-light sunburn for their efforts.”

Opening the door to freedom, but not to frivolous asbestos lawsuits

The Czech Republic is going to lower the minimum wage. I can’t remember a country ever doing that before.

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) has boldly come out against old people having sex, which we can all agree is as icky as anything thought up by the other Stephen King. The Medicare drug plan will cover Viagra in cases of erectile disfunction, but Mr. King says “If we are going to subsidize someone’s recreational sex, I don’t think that’s what our founding fathers had in mind.” Right, they had slaves for that.

Allawi claims that all the suicide bombers caught on the day of the elections were non-Iraqis, which is not a claim I’ve heard before (nor do I believe it).

Clean-up on the SOTU post, below: Bush said “We expect Syria to end all support for terrorists and open the door to freedom.” 1) Is that what you expect, really? Megalomaniacal much? 2) I understand the ending support for terrorists bit, but what exactly are they supposed to do to comply with the door-opening part?

Really, blogging that travesty with a cold was not the funnest experience ever. I must have been coughing during the “frivolous asbestos lawsuits” line, cuz I missed it. And life is definitely too short to bother with the Democratic response. I’m ready for my nap now, I’ll tell you. Do Republicans party after the SOTU, I wonder? Tomorrow morning will D.C. call girls be scrubbing purple ink out of their various orifices?


I don’t really have a caption for this one, I just thought Bush looks particularly goofy in it.



We’re number one! No wait, we’re purple! Hey, did you say indelible?




That look of smug bemusement does not go with that tie.



Donald Rumsfeld and John Snow wait patiently to receive their kisses.

The State of the Union is private, I mean personal, I mean strong, I don’t know what I mean

6:06 Bush enters, shakes a lot of hands. I’m hoping some of that purple ink rubs off on his hand.

Oo, the state of the union is both confident AND strong. A twofer.

6:11 CNN camera finds John McCain, who is managing to both glower and look bored at the same time. He sees the camera and immediately pretends to be asleep.

Taxpayer funds must be spent wisely or not all. Guess which one he prefers.

We must raise children to meet the demands of the 21st century. Translation: troops to occupy Iran, Syria and, just for the hell of it, Togo.

6:15 Joe Lieberman doing one of those things where you look like you’re applauding but make no sound. They learn that in Senate school.

6:18 As much as his mispronunciation of nuclear annoys me, following it up with “Clean Skies policy” is even more obnoxious. And he calls for ethanol, even though last week’s West Wing was specifically designed to scuttle that.

6:20 There’s Hillary, giving the most grudging applause on record.

6:22 He has a message for everyone 55 or older: don’t let anyone mislead you. And a message to everyone younger: let me mislead you.

6:24 I don’t think I’ve heard so many voices raised in opposition (to Bush’s lies about Social Security) in one of these things before.

6:27 The Boy in the Bubble says he’ll listen to anybody with good ideas. Except increasing payroll taxes.

6:30 We have to pass on values to the next generation. Like homophobia. As he talks about a “culture of life,” CNN turns its cameras to Christopher Reeve’s widow. Awkward... . Says values don’t come from the government. Except abstinence. And faith-based programs. And...

6:35 He proposes a program to keep young men out of gangs (he’s never heard of girl gangs?). You will never hear another word about this.

Wants to focus AIDS spending on African-Americans. Not butt-fuckers. Managed to talk about AIDS without mentioning gays, just like he called for banning gay marriage without mentioning gays.

6:38 Wants competent defense lawyers in capital cases. Of course in Texas that’s defined as “awake more than 50% of the time.”

6:40 Our military operations are determined, successful and continuing. If they’ve succeeded, why do they need to continue?

Will continue to build the coalitions that will defeat the dangers of our time.

The only thing that will defeat tyranny and whatnot is “the force of human freedom.” He makes it sound like a weapon; the words “force” and “freedom” don’t belong together. I’ve said it before: only Bush can make freedom and liberty sound like a threat.

Will support democratic movements in the Middle East and beyond, with ultimate goal of defeating tyranny in the world. Is there any example of Bush now supporting the democratic opposition to an established government in the Middle East?

Evidently there’s an arc of freedom or something from Morocco to Jordan to Bahrain. Please consult your globes. It’s an arc, really it is. They’re really reaching for geometrical expressions.

6:51 Several people aren’t standing to applaud the brave Iraqi people. I’m sure Fox is taking down their names.

They’ve even got one of those voters, sitting next to Laura. She can’t decide how many fingers she’s supposed to hold up.

6:59 If he had to pick just one soldier killed in Iraq to mention by name, wasn’t it a bit tacky to pick one from Texas?

Who you gonna call?

Should it worry us that the CIA website’s Terrorism FAQ page hasn’t been updated since April 2002? And this, I swear to Allah, is an actual logo on the actual CIA’s actual website.

Complete nonsense

I may live blog the State of the Union Address, and I may not, depending on the state of my personal union, i.e., how bad my cold is. If I can’t do it live, you’ll have to amuse yourselves. May I suggest: each time Bush uses the word “personal” to describe some aspect of his Social Security plan, respond by saying “private” in a different funny voice.

A while back I said that I wanted the Gonzalez nomination to become an up-or-down vote on torture, because I really am curious how such a vote would go, how badly damaged the moral compass of this countries’ elected representatives had become. I half-way got my wish: the D’s have proclaimed this a vote on torture, but say that they intend to confine themselves to impotent squawking. This is the lead of a WaPo article by Dana Milbank: “Senate Democrats angrily denounced White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales yesterday as an advocate of prisoner torture but said they would not block his confirmation as attorney general.” Tells you everything you need to know about the D’s.

That article ends with this quote from Orrin Hatch: “To have this man, who has come from nowhere, from the most humble of circumstances, who typifies the struggle every immigrant family to this country has gone through, to not give him this opportunity when he is fully qualified for it, I think would be a travesty.” Yes, he deserves to be attorney general because he’s an immigrant. But does Hatch have a deeper agenda in that remark? Because the LA Times also quotes Hatch today, supporting a constitutional amendment overturning the ban on immigrants like Governor Terminator becoming president as “an anachronism that is decidedly un-American.”

Iraqi “President” Yawar says it would be “complete nonsense” to ask for American troops to be withdrawn. Right, like every previous action taken by the US in Iraq wasn’t based on complete nonsense. Wasn’t that Bush’s campaign slogan?: 4 More Years of Complete Fucking Nonsense.

Do as we say, not as we do

Now the bastards are taking our action figures hostage. THIS MUST BE STOPPED!

Compare and contrast:

Today’s NYT, p.9: “the State Department sharply rebuked Egypt on Monday for arresting a major opposition leader ahead of what may be a sixth referendum on Mr. Mubarak’s rule.”

And another story, on p.8 (the facing page), notes that Abu Ghraib and Camp Bucca detention center have “been swollen by more than 2,500 arrests of suspected insurgents in the last month, part of a nationwide pre-election crackdown.”

The Israeli attorney general rules that the land seizures I mentioned yesterday are illegal.

Secretary of Edukashion Margaret Spellings and George Bush. Don’t tell Condi that someone’s eyeing her husband.