November 2004 Archives

How many of you have seen the story in the New York Times today about all these prison abuses at Guantanamo Bay? It's Abu Ghraib all over again. Sigh. The International Red Cross is the source here, and they're just shocked and outraged at the treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay. Well, if you ask me -- and I know you did because you're listening -- the International Red Cross is a joke. Folks, there are terrorist-supporting regimes throughout the world, there are dictatorships slaughtering their own people everywhere, but the International Red Cross focuses on us because we make our prisons available to these thugs and of course the New York Times is once again the media outlet of choice for the U.S. bashing as in Abu Ghraib, and then the IAEA leak about our supposed failure to secure munitions in the last week of the campaign, and now G'itmo. You know, this paper, I don't know. It appears to me the New York Times just hates this country. They hate red states. They hate traditional marriage. They hate our military. It's just amazing. Here, the International Red Cross, for crying out loud! The International Red Cross never once reports on the abuses of thugs and dictators and what they're doing to their own country.

We never heard from the Red Cross, International Red Cross on Saddam Hussein. We don't hear from them about what goes on in Korea, North Korea, or in China. We don't hear from the International Red Cross about what goes on in Iran. But, no, lo and behold, when there's abuse at G'itmo, when the people committing these atrocities around the world are in our prisons, we become the bad guys. Just typical. Just typical. And this is the kind of thing that's going to continue to inspire backlash among the American people, because the American people do not think that what we're doing with prisons at G'itmo is horrible, is bad. It's going to cause this pro-American backlash among Americans as the New York Times continues down its path to who knows where.

Dover, Pa. -- The way they used to teach the origin of the species to high school students in this sleepy town of 1,800 people in southern Pennsylvania, said local school board member Angie Yingling disapprovingly, was that "we come from chimpanzees and apes."

Not anymore.

The school board has ordered that biology teachers at Dover Area High School make students "aware of gaps/problems" in the theory of evolution. Their ninth-grade curriculum now must include the theory of "intelligent design," which posits that life is so complex and elaborate that some greater wisdom has to be behind it.

The decision, passed last month by a 6-to-3 vote, makes the 3,600-student school district about 20 miles south of Harrisburg the first in the United States to mandate the teaching of "intelligent design" in public schools, putting it on the front line of the growing national debate over the role of religion in public life.

And only 35% of Americans believe in the theory of evolution? Yet another piece of evidence, backed by scientific proof, that I don't really belong in George W. Bush's America.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has charged in confidential reports to the U.S. government that the U.S. military has intentionally used psychological and sometimes physical coercion "tantamount to torture" on prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

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The finding that the handling of prisoners detained and interrogated at Guantánamo amounted to torture came after a visit by a Red Cross inspection team that spent most of June in Guantánamo.

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The team of humanitarian workers, which included experienced medical personnel, also asserted that some doctors and other medical workers at Guantánamo were participating in planning for interrogations, in what the report called "a flagrant violation of medical ethics."

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Doctors and medical personnel conveyed information about prisoners' mental health and vulnerabilities to interrogators, the report said, sometimes directly but usually through the Behavioral Science Consultation Team, composed of psychologists and psychological workers who advise the interrogators.

A harshly critical report by a Pentagon advisory panel says the United States is failing in its efforts to explain the nation's diplomatic and military actions to the Muslim world, but it warns that no public relations plan or information operation can defend America from flawed policies.

The Defense Science Board report, which has not been released to the public, says the nation's institutions charged with "strategic communication" are broken, and calls for a comprehensive reorganization of government public affairs, public diplomacy and information efforts.

"America's negative image in world opinion and diminished ability to persuade are consequences of factors other than the failure to implement communications strategies," says the 102-page report, completed in September. "Interests collide. Leadership counts. Policies matter. Mistakes dismay our friends and provide enemies with unintentional assistance. Strategic communication is not the problem, but it is a problem."

Bush was not reported to have commented on these two pieces of news by clapping his hands over his ears and shouting "LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" But you can imagine he did if you want. Maybe he made himself feel better by giving Tom Ridge the boot.

 "I'm a cop. I've got a career, a house, a family, a college degree," said one sergeant, who lives in Southern California and spoke, like most of the soldiers, on condition of anonymity.

 "I came back to the National Guard specifically to go to Baghdad, because I believed in it, believed in the mission. But I have regretted every day of it. This is demoralizing, demeaning, degrading. And we're supposed to be ambassadors to another country? We're supposed to go to war like this?"

HELP MAKE THE DISPLAY OF THE TEN COMMANDMENTS LEGAL IN ALL PUBLIC PLACES

Dear Katherine,

As you know, the Supreme Court is currently studying the Ten Commandments issue. The Supreme Court is not immune to the will of the people. While we cannot directly influence the outcome of the decision by the Supreme Court, we can express our desires as citizens of the United States.

I urge you to join with other Americans in expressing a desire that the Ten Commandments can be legally displayed in all public places. It is important that we have a moral basis for our laws. The Ten Commandments are in essence the foundation for our laws. Should the foundation be destroyed, the building will fall.

Please join me in supporting the display of the Ten Commandments in all public places, including schools and courtrooms.

 >From time to time the number of Americans who have expressed a desire to see the Ten Commandments legally displayed in public places will be released and forwarded to the Supreme Court. It will take millions of Americans participating for us to be successful.

 Thank you for participating in this effort. If we are to be successful, we need you to forward this letter to others today.

This Village Voice article drives home this very simple fact.

One thing military officials are not saying is that the behavior of the Marine in the video closely conforms to training that is fairly standard in some units. Marines call executing wounded combatants "dead-checking."

The war is doing terrible things to soldiers' psyches.

There were other times when the enlisted men in the unit fell into violent quarrels with others whom they felt were too aggressive and risked civilian lives. In one instance, enlisted men nearly came to blows with an officer whom they accused of firing a weapon into a house that they believed contained civilians. Despite their concern, terrible mistakes were made. I was standing next to a 22-year-old Marine from the Humvee I rode in when he fired his machine gun prematurely at a civilian car approaching a roadblock, striking the driver, an unarmed man, in the eye. The unit was subsequently ordered to drive past the car without rendering aid. I sat next to the gunner as we crept past, listening to the dying man gasp for breath. The gunner didn't talk for the next three days. A few days earlier, the youngest Marine on the team had shot a 12-year-old boy four times in the chest with his machine gun, mistakenly thinking a stick the boy had been carrying was a weapon. When the mother and grandmother of the boy later dragged him to the Marines' lines seeking medical aid, the sergeant who led the team dropped down in front of the mother and cried.

The conclusion...

Another Marine in the unit I followed—a Democrat's dream, he returned home from fighting in Falluja in time to vote for Kerry—added, "Americans celebrate war in their movies. We like to see visions of evil being defeated by good. When the people at home glimpse the reality of war, that it's a bloodbath, they freak out. We are a subculture they created and programmed to fight their wars. You have to become a psycho to kill like we do. To most Marines that guy in the mosque was just someone who didn't get hit in the right place the first time we shot him. I probably would have put a bullet in his brain if I'd been there. If the American public doesn't like the violence of war, maybe before they start the next war they shouldn't rush so much."

These were originally supposed to be part of a full pebble piece, but ended up being two separate halves. I cut out and applied the little leaves by hand. The piece with the stone came out a bit rougher around the top, unfortunately...

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said today that the United States did not view the election results as valid. "If the Ukrainian government does not act immediately and responsibly there will be consequences for our relationship," Mr. Powell said in a news conference.

• More Americans have a favorable view of Democrats than of Republicans? More Americans have an unfavorable view of Republicans than of Democrats?
• More Americans think Bush will divide the country than will unite it?
• A majority of Americans oppose amending the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage? That they also support domestic partnerships for same-sex couples, at minimum?
• A plurality of Americans say that invading Iraq was a mistake?
• Two-thirds of Americans say it's more important to cut the deficit than it is to cut taxes?

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said Monday that a religion-neutral government does not fit with an America that reflects belief in God in everything from its money to its military.

"I suggest that our jurisprudence should comport with our actions," Scalia told an audience attending an interfaith conference on religious freedom at Manhattan's Shearith Israel synagogue.

Scalia, 68, addressed the topic of government and its relationship to religion.

In the synagogue that is home to America's oldest Jewish congregation, he noted that in Europe, religion-neutral leaders almost never publicly use the word "God."

But, the justice asked, "Did it turn out that, by reason of the separation of church and state, the Jews were safer in Europe than they were in the United States of America? I don't think so."

Alan Greenspan came to the home of the euro on Friday and warned anxious Europeans to expect little relief from the dollar's relentless decline against their currency.

In a speech to a banking congress here, Greenspan, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, said the persistently high U.S. current-account deficit posed a risk to the dollar's value, as foreign investors would eventually resist buying more American assets.

"It seems persuasive that, given the size of the U.S. current-account deficit, a diminished appetite for adding to dollar balances must occur at some point," he said. "But when, through what channels, and from what level of the dollar? Regrettably, no answer to those questions is convincinGreenspan likened predicting the dollar's path to "forecasting the outcome of a coin toss."

So I was reading some of the messages people have been sending us. A couple were quite amusing.

To whom it may concern: I was reading today about how an organization is calling for congress to allow non-naturalized citizens to be eligible to run for president. It's called http://www.amendforarnold.com. This reminds me of what happened in Germany in the 30s. I am speaking to you because it is a concern. IT COULD HAPPEN AGAIN. And although this may sound rediculous, history tells us that all that is needed is control of the media and control of the courts. I am sure that people scoffed at Noah before the flood, I am also sure that people thougth the Nazi party was harmless before they came to power. Don't get me wrong, I like some things about Arnold, it just seems like Dejavu and it's scary. I am just an average schmo expressing my concerns. Maybe you can bring some light that will help prevent another potential holocaust. Your feed back would be appreciated. Thank you

and

Hi Guys, Im a minister in Toronto Ontario Canada, I can legally marry same sex couples and the licence is legal , so if you are having bush problems LOL e-mail me at [...] best regards [signature].

I'm upgrading to the latest version of Movable Type. Is this thing working? Tap, tap. I hosed HTMLArea, but maybe that's OK — I might want to see if there's a more recent version or try TinyMCE or whatever it's called. Does anyone really care? Probably not, but hey! At least I'm not blogging about politics!

Source of Powell's Iran intelligence under scrutiny

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The source of intelligence used this week by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell to suggest Iran is working on a nuclear weapons program may not be reliable, knowledgeable sources told CNN Friday.

I listen to Air America Radio. Apparently, I listen to Air America Radio a bit too much, because I seem to have memorized every ad they play and now the ads are stuck in my head. (Makes me long for the days when I'd get "Broken Wings" lodged in my cranium on infinite loop instead...)

"Medicinal cannibis, for medicinal purposes..." Check. Male sexual performance enhancement  treatments? Check. "Manhattan West, the skyline lending company..." Check. "Adios taco {CRUNCH!}..." Check.

Amusing picture.

What is Bush doing?

Why does he have that weird look on his face? How does he do that very odd thing with his neck?

Seriously, what's wrong with him?!

"The administration seems to think we're facing a wolf, and can just cut its head off to kill it. In reality, Islamicist terrorism is more like a mold. To kill a mold, you must either (a) flood the room with toxins, and repeat regularly or (b) remove the mold's habitat by drying out the room and bringing in sunlight. Current policy falls far short of (a), since there are nowhere near enough soldiers (fungicide) in the country. And option (b), which would involve a reconsideration of broad swaths of US policy in the Middle East and elsewhere, is completely invisible. Outside of the leftist press, it isn't even possible to raise it as a question." (From Strata Lucida)

From JTA:

CLEVELAND, Nov. 17 (JTA) — A day before she was slated to address the General Assembly of the United Jewish Communities — the continent’s largest annual gathering of Jewish leaders — Shoshana Cardin predicted that her comments would create a stir.

Once again, she hit the mark.

“I have always felt that we are guests in a host country,” she said during her 20-minute address to one of the most well-attended sessions of the Nov. 14-16 conference, a Monday afternoon plenary focusing on the 2004 presidential election.

“The calendar is Christian. We are guests in a wonderful, wonderful society because we are free to worship as we feel.

“But once again, we are afraid.”

Then, clearly irritating some Jewish Republicans in the crowd, she noted that President Bush has said that he is willing to “reach out to all who share my goal.”

Cardin paused and said, “That doesn’t exactly include me, but I don’t know if it includes you.

“To reach out means to all, not only to those who share his goals. That picture I painted is disconcerting, but it’s realistic.”

She also said...

“If faith is going to be the impetus for policies, we need to be more aware of our faith. People of faith usually understand people of a different faith if the people have an understanding that is rooted in principle,” she said.

“Our sages, our Torah, our teachings, have given us the teachings of responsible behavior. We need to speak faith language comfortably. As a rule, we have shied away from it.”

The work must start, she said, within the Jewish community, since 69 percent of Orthodox Jews voted for Bush. “We must participate in a healing process among ourselves because we have differences,” she said.

Bob Herbert:

As I watch the disastrous consequences of the Bush policies unfold - not just in Iraq, but here at home as well - I am struck by the immaturity of this administration, whatever the ages of the officials involved. It's as if the children have taken over and sent the adults packing. The counsel of wiser heads, like George H. W. Bush, or Brent Scowcroft, or Colin Powell, is not needed and not wanted.

Some of the world's most important decisions - often, decisions of life and death - have been left to those who are less competent and less experienced, to men and women who are deficient in such qualities as risk perception and comprehension of future consequences, who are reckless and dangerously susceptible to magical thinking and the ideological pressure of their peers.

I look at the catastrophe in Iraq, the fiscal debacle here at home, the extent to which loyalty trumps competence at the highest levels of government, the absence of a coherent vision of the future for the U.S. and the world, and I wonder, with a sense of deep sadness, where the adults have gone.

Just heard about this today...

Study of Pesticides and Children Stirs Protests Staffers Fear EPA Project Endangers Participants

By Juliet Eilperin Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 30, 2004

An Environmental Protection Agency proposal to study young children's exposure to pesticides has sparked a flurry of internal agency protests, with several career officials questioning whether the survey will harm vulnerable infants and toddlers.

The EPA announced this month that it was launching a two-year investigation, partially funded by the American Chemical Council, of how 60 children in Duval County, Fla., absorb pesticides and other household chemicals. The chemical industry funding initially prompted some environmentalists to question whether the study would be biased, and some rank-and-file agency scientists are now questioning whether the plan will exploit financially strapped families.

As I said to a Republican friend who kept trying to bait me yesterday, and who just had a baby earlier this year... "The good thing is we only have to live with the consequences for a few decades... it's people with kids I feel sorry for."

 Morocco: slums breed jihad

In Morocco violent jihadist organisations have emerged over the past few years in shanty towns on the edges of cities, inhabited by the despised and forgotten migrants from the countryside. They are creating the conditions for a rebellion born of despair.

It seems to have started getting this bad starting in 1999... the time when everything seemed great. Also, Morocco had just gotten a new young king. (1999 was also the year I visited Morocco. Were there signs then?)

I know, I know. Some pathetic blog this is, huh? I should be writing about personal stuff and posting pictures of my cats. Instead I go whining on and on and on and on about how f**cked up the Bush administration is, and how utterly wrecked this country is going to be by the time they get done with it. Some of my friends think I'm insane (well, the Republican ones do, anyway.)

I love this story. Ashcroft went and bragged to the International Association of Chiefs of Police about how much safer he'd made the country, blah blah blah, and they released a statement the next day saying, "Yeah, RIGHT, buddy!"

The International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) said that cuts by the administration in federal aid to local police agencies have left the nation more vulnerable than ever to public safety threats. The 20,000-member group also said in a statement that new anti-terrorism duties for local cops — which have come as state and local budgets have declined and historically low crime rates have crept upward — have pushed police agencies to "the breaking point."

I'm less pleased to see that the FDA Saw Problems at Vaccine Plant in 2003 and didn't do squat about it.

I'm unsurprised, but absolutely furious, that the House GOP Changes Rules to Protect DeLay. It's pretty funny (not funny ha-ha, though) that this rule that they're overturning was originally put in place by Republicans to nail Democrats.

And Bush keeps appointing more and more of his bestest buddies to high positions, and the hell what the rest of the world thinks.

I'm not even getting into that Marine who shot the apparently unarmed Iraqi. Let's just say: it doesn't look good. I'll leave it to Riverbend to discuss it. But this is what war looks like in Iraq.

Boy, the next four years are going to be fun. We should live so long. (Speaking of which, it looks like we just passed the 1200 dead soldiers mark.)

Iraqis Angry, Distraught at Aid Worker's Murder

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqis reacted with anger and disbelief on Wednesday to news that British-Iraqi aid worker Margaret Hassan, who worked in Iraq for decades before being kidnapped a month ago, had been killed by her captors.

Irish-born Hassan, 59, moved to Iraq more than 30 years ago after marrying an Iraqi engineer. She learned Arabic and became a pillar of support in local communities, often helping the needy in the face of opposition during Saddam Hussein's regime.

Those who knew her, worked with her or were helped by her described Hassan as a formidable woman who went about her work with determination. She helped the disabled, the orphaned and those without water or sanitation calmly and efficiently.

One of the hospitals she regularly supported was a spinal cord clinic in Baghdad run by Qayder al-Chalabi, who said her loss was a huge blow to all Iraqis.

"(The killers) made a very big mistake. This was the wrong person," he told Reuters on Wednesday.

"I cannot imagine that these things could happen to her because she was a very humanitarian person. She felt our suffering, she understood the suffering of the Iraqi people.

"We need to admire and remember her. We must have a ceremony every year to remember her," he said, adding that he believed a statue should be erected in her honor.

"Volunteer a little time or a lot, but if you're as upset over the election results as everyone seems to be, offer to do something to make sure that next time, things happen the way you think they should. My experience with most of the local dem organizations is that they're all crying out for competent and experienced volunteers who aren't over 60. Sure, right before the election there were a bunch of people helping (but still no where near enough), but now things are dry. And there are still races that matter. We've got city council elections in May apparently, with some dens trying to take places away from republicans. I'm sure there are similar races all over the country. And if not, you can ALWAYS work on voter education. Volunteer with social studies or current event classes to educate the kids and get them to ask questions. Help your current elected officials to make the right decisions about things so they'll keep getting elected and maybe help others do so as well."

(Lest you think this is some starry-eyed person living in Marin or something... this was written by a blogger in Texas.)

http://www.livejournal.com/users/seidl/65467.html

I'm sitting listening to "Big Eddie" on 960 AM and he just mentioned the list of states ordered by IQ, and how the states with lower average IQs voted for Bush, and the higher-IQ'd states voted for Kerry... total horseshit, of course.

It really bugs me... not so much that someone would play that prank (which it is), but that so many people earnestly want to believe it, and so they do.

Thanks guys, but I'd prefer not to give the conservatives any more ammo for their accusations that liberals are condescending!

And remember, snopes.com is your friend!

From a spam I just received... "asia adanoma"

"ASIA ADANOMA IS READY TO ROCK U!"

What do you think? Er, maybe not...

Former CIA agent Michael Scheuer, asked in an interview if he thinks Al Qaeda is going to attack us again soon with something big...

Josh Marshall today, on the Bushies' purge of the CIA...

Talk about the battle of the bands... or, in this case, websites! Within a week of the most hotly contested election in recent memory, the website "Sorry Everybody" was set up, and people started posting photos of themselves (or Photoshopped artwork) apologizing to the world for inflicting Bush on it for four more years. In response, the Bushheads came up with the terribly original "We're Not Sorry". (There's also another site set up called "Apology Accepted" or something like that. No word on if there's "Go F*** Yourself" yet.) Update: "We're Not Sorry" has been replaced by a generic domain registrar's page; it appears it's been hijacked or something. Apologies Accepted is still active)

Anyway, I thought I'd post the ones I considered most memorable. Be warned, I say mean things about Republicans and Bush voters.

The group effort

The humor (although her dad's probably not laughing)


The punch in the gut

The namechecking

That last one brings me to the "I'm not sorry" crowd...


...Where we find lovely sentiments such as this.


And equally lovely ladies.


Even though I disagree with his vote, this guy said something really nice here. (He must be a recent convert. He hasn't learned to be a true a*hole Republican yet.)


Bravely fighting straw men, armed only with beer!


Dude! What's up with your eyebrow?


Sure it is. It covers your mouth.



Yessirree! Just the kind of classy attitude (and spelling) I'd expect from this bunch.

Finally, the rest of the world weighs in. There's a lot of "We forgive you... but don't let it happen again." There are invitations to come crash on couches in Sweden, Canada, and Brazil. There are comforting words from China. There are expressions of sympathy from Britons living under Blair. There are apologies from Austrians about Ahnold.

This one was the most affecting.

Via a blog at Daily Kos, we find this quote from Joe Glover, president of the Family Policy Network:

"The day after George Bush was elected president again, because of this morals revolution taking place in our country, he allows his vice president to not only put his lesbian daughter on the platform, but to bring her lesbian 'partner' up on the stage with him," Glover says. "It almost seems to be a slap in the face from the get-go against the very conservatives that re-elected the president at a time when he ought to paying them some homage and respect." Glover says the Cheney daughter's open flaunting of her homosexuality is the antithesis of what the administration claims to stand for -- and that the post-election display sends a mixed message to Bush supporters.

Hey you, Lynn Cheney. If Kerry is "not a good man" for mentioning that your publicly gay adult daughter is a publicly gay adult, what does that make Joe Glover when he utters hateful bullshit like this? I won't hold my breath waiting for your response. (I do wish you'd hold yours, though)

The New York Times reports that San Jose bought its police officers a Windows-based system that has been installed in each squad car.

With the system, officers in the field can receive orders, send messages, write reports, call up maps of the city and, using the Global Positioning System, see not only where they are but where other patrol cars are at any given time.

Sounds good, right? But...

When first installed, the system was unstable. A day or two after the new system went into operation, it crashed, and for several days it was periodically down. "That didn't engender a lot of trust," said Sergeant DeMers of the police union.

Ms. Dilbeck acknowledged, "That was a really bad start."

When the system was running again, a number of bugs were discovered, said Aaron Marcus, president of Aaron Marcus & Associates, a user-interface design consulting firm in Berkeley, Calif., that studied the new system at the request of the union.

Some of the map information, it turned out, was inaccurate, screens were cluttered with unnecessary information, the on-screen type was difficult to read and officers could not easily perform one of the most basic tasks - the license-plate check.

"This is almost a casebook study of what not to do and how to do it wrong," Mr. Marcus said.

Perhaps the biggest misstep of all, Mr. Marcus said, was that the officers themselves were not consulted beforehand, especially when it came to the design of the interface. [Italics mine]

No kidding.

For more examples of things which seem designed to fail, see This Is Broken.

You can give grocery certificates to military families, or donate phone cards to deployed troops so they can call home. If you want to help in some other way, Operation Truth has a list of other support organizations. Also consider supporting Disabled American Veterans... unfortunately, their numbers are likely to grow for some time to come.

A few well-intentioned friends of mine keep sending me politically themed emails — ranty ones, inspirational ones, action items from Moveon.org. Not a big deal, since I get tons of email all the time (usually from perveyors of home furnishings and sexual enhancement medications, or organizations asking me for money) Yet something about it is starting to irk me.

Where were they during the runup to the election? What were they doing then? And what good does it do after the election to send ME these things?

Sigh. I suppose I'm also guilty of preaching to the converted. There's something about filling out little forms, hitting that send button, that makes us all feel like we're accomplishing something even when we're not.

Says Jon Carroll today:

Although the Internet was proved to be a wonderful fund-raising tool (particularly for Howard Dean), I'm not sure whether it was an equally wonderful organizing tool. I suspect that the Republicans spent more time in meat space, where real, undistracted humans were gathered in a nonvirtual setting, places like churches and town halls and community centers. The Republicans networked along networks that city people could not even see. They did not issue sentimental reports about seeing democracy in action.

And look what happened. Although I do think he exaggerates a bit. Some of us did go register voters in "meat space", and even went and pounded the pavement in Reno. It's just that it didn't work, or we didn't do enough of it, and look, I'm not gonna go join a church, sorry!

OTOH, I may not be able to resist sending this to my nearest and dearest. Because it's very funny and cute. It will not save the Western World for Democracy, however.

Maybe I will send out an email though... telling my well-intentioned friends what they can do with their intentions! (Give money, write letters, and volunteer for the cause next time around.)

So these people are saying it with photos. Perhaps I shall join them. 

This is really scary, and an example of what I'm talking about when I say that women are going to be negatively impacted by Bush's reelection in a way that many people just don't get. (My friend who likes to tease me about Kerry's loss may feel a little differently about it if his wife can't get a refill on her birth control pills!)

On a related note, I have a dim recollection of somebody important at UC Santa Cruz, perhaps a chancellor, who was said to have been one of the plaintiffs in a landmark case in the 1960s concerning birth control... something about him and his wife not being permitted to get condoms?

Drug May Relieve Crohn's, Other Disorders 

An experimental drug that selectively tamps down part of the immune system can offer dramatic relief to many victims of the painful bowel disorder Crohn's disease, and might also work against illnesses such as arthritis and multiple sclerosis, researchers say.

Other drugs are already available against Crohn's, but their effectiveness is spotty. This is the first study to show that a certain immune system protein could be key to the poorly understood disease.

In the small, preliminary study, researchers at the National Institutes of Health and other sites found weekly injections ABT-874 reduced symptoms in as many as three-quarters of patients, or three times better than dummy injections.

"A lot of work has to be done, but it's very exciting," said Dr. Richard MacDermott, director of Albany Medical Center's inflammatory bowel disease center and scientific consultant to the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America.

The drug's maker, Abbott Laboratories, has not yet decided whether to conduct further tests and seek approval of the drug, spokesman Jim Bozikis said.

Researchers believe Crohn's disease is triggered when the immune system, for unknown reasons, overreacts to harmless bacteria normally present in the intestines and attacks tissue there. Symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal pain, fever and weight loss.

I know several people with this disease. If this pans out, how wonderful!

An estimated 500,000 to 1 million Americans have the disorder. There is no cure. The treatments now on the market do not work in some patients. Many stop working after awhile. And they all have side effects, ranging from diabetes, cataracts and high blood pressure to liver, pancreas and kidney problems.

Why would a reasonable person living in the Bay Area vote for Bush? After listening to this opinion piece by Bill Whalen on KQED today, I still have no friggin' idea. Hey, Bill: if you want to convince people you're not a brainwashed a**hole, try 1) not mouthing every single meaningless and cliched talking point of the Bush campaign ("taking the fight to the enemy" / "the choice is kill or be killed" / "taking the fight overseas" / "Bring our government into the 21st century" /  "Bush is genuine, he says what he means and means what he says,") and 2) don't be an a**hole.

I just heard 16 troops have been killed so far. We won't know how many civilians we've killed, because we've seized the local hospital. This really, really, really, really sucks. The rest of the world, and history, are not going to judge us kindly.

So continuing from my earlier post...

I grew up nonreligious, but with certain beliefs and rules.

• Be kind to people.
• Help the less fortunate.
• Be honest.
• Try to do work that helps the world in some way.
• Violence is bad.
• Attempt to understand other points of view.
• Bigotry is bad bad bad.
• Take care of the environment (don't litter, waste energy, etc.)
• Be good to your family and friends.
• Help others when you can (and maybe they'll return the favor).
  

I was raised as, in the words of a friend of my sister's, a "what the fuck" Jew. Although I went to a Jewish day camp for a while, and expressed some interest in "Harmonica" as a small child, it never turned into a lifelong religious commitment. I'd go to the occasional temple service and find my mind wandering. The whole thing just feels foreign to me. I know people find great solace and inspiration in their religious faith, but on an emotional level, I don't "get" the religion thing.

And I'm not alone. Many of us living in the Bay Area, and around the country are like this. Hollywood recognizes our experience as well. Remember when Contact came out several years ago? And remember the scene where Jody Foster's character loses the opportunity to go on a space mission? I watched the look of blank incomprehension on her face when committee members grilled her about her belief in G-d. She simply couldn't understand the relevance of the question or the desired answer.

Unfortunately, us Jody Foster types are now clearly outnumbered by people like those on the committee (and like the guy who was deemed sufficiently faithful to earn a place on the spaceship.) The result is that evangelicals helped return Bush to the White House through their energy and vast organization. Meanwhile, agnostics and "secular humanists" like me wonder if there's a place for us in America anymore.

I'll have more thoughts on this later.

We liberals like to throw around words like "fascist" and make comparisons between Hitler and our current crew. Hyperbole? After reading this, I'm not so sure it is.

Remember this store?

It's just over a week since we got married, and today I get spam from "Affair Zone" with the subject "You have been invited to join the Safe Sexual Affair Club." Golly! {JUNK!}

Because you can never have too many cat photos. OK, yes, you can. But it's my blog, and you don't want me to write about the presidential election all the time, do you? (I can tell you, though, that Princess and Boppers are not thrilled about the current situation, no, not at all. Harrumph.

 

California may not be a Dem stronghold next time around. While the Bay Area and the coast as a whole supported Kerry, the interior was a different story.

OK, that's bad enough, but this part really worries me:

For some California voters, religious beliefs and moral values trumped concerns about the day-to-day events in the news.

Damon Grant of Santa Rosa supported Bush because he liked the president's moral values.

"He's a churchgoing man who isn't afraid to say he didn't used to be, and that's more important to me than stuff like Iraq,'' Grant said. "I disagree with a lot of what's happening in Iraq, but that's not most important in my head."

So he doesn't think the fact that people are getting hurt and killed as a result of the president's decisions really matters, because what Bush says about his religious faith matters more. Does he not see the problem here? Don't deeds matter more than words? What strange form of disassociation from reality is this? This is quite literally insane. I cannot even being to understand or explain it.

In addition to being angry, I'm now really really scared... of my fellow citizens.

Very very interesting arguments that the election was stolen.

Surface-to-air missiles missing in Iraq. Wonder who was supposed to be guarding them — and who's got them now?

WASHINGTON, Nov. 5 - American intelligence agencies have tripled their formal estimate of shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile systems believed to be at large worldwide, since determining that at least 4,000 of the weapons in Iraq's prewar arsenals cannot be accounted for, government officials said Friday.

A new government estimate says a total of 6,000 of the weapons may be outside the control of any government, up from a previous estimate of 2,000, American officials said.

The officials said they did not know whether missiles from Iraq remain there or have been smuggled into other countries, though a senior administration official said Friday that "there is no evidence that they have left the country.''

It was unclear whether Iraqi military or intelligence personnel removed the missile systems during the initial invasion of Iraq or whether they disappeared from warehouses after major combat ended.

Shoulder-fired missiles - which are small, lethal and easy to use - are attractive weapons for terrorists. In recent months, Western intelligence and law enforcement agencies have repeatedly warned that Al Qaeda intends to use them to shoot down planes. In 2002, attackers who launched two small Russian-made SA-7 missiles almost hit a commercial aircraft taking off from Mombasa, Kenya. The new estimate of a larger number of the missile systems was discussed at a classified Defense Intelligence Agency conference in Alabama this week, the officials said. They declined to discuss the methods by which the new estimate had been reached, saying that it was classified.

Enjoy your war on terrorism!

Taylor Mali is a teacher and slam poet who was interviewed on NPR today, where they also played him reciting his masterwork How to Write A Political Poem.

However it begins, it's gotta be loud and then it's gotta get a little bit louder. Because this is how you write a political poem and how you deliver it with power.

Mix current events with platitudes of empowerment.
Wrap up in rhyme or rhyme it up in rap until it sounds true.

It must be heard to be truly appreciated. NPR's got the interview but not the performance here. Oh, here's a sample

Some words of inspiration as we prepare to bomb the bejeezus out of Fallujah:

"To treat a patient when (his) brain is coming out ... ," she said, before her voice trailed off. "There are things that I will never understand. It's beyond my comprehension; a higher power will have to explain why these things have happened." — Melissa Kaime, Navy surgeon.

Enjoy your war!

Sigh. I love the Mambo content management system so far, because it's powerful and it's free... but the documentation could still use a little work. On page 75 of their manual (which is still in draft mode, to be fair...) we have this masterpiece of circular reasoning:

• Menu Type: This is the menu type as defined in the module.
• Module Name: This is the name of the Module displaying this menu type.

None of which answers my question: how the heck do I rejigger the top menu so it lists links horizontally instead of vertically? Ah well.

I've made two mixes lately.

One for some friends called alt.mush. Because I'm feeling mushy. I'm not usually one for ballads — Celine Dion makes me hurl — but somehow these always get to me.

1. "Such Great Heights"  — The Postal Service
   (Reminds me of the Pet Shop Boys)
2. "O Grande Amor"  — Antonio Carlos Jobim
3. "Sailor"  — Hem
4. "Hold On To Me" — Cowboy Junkies
5. "It's Only Time"  — The Magnetic Fields
   (In which a gay man sings the ultimate wedding first-dance song)
6. "Anniversary Song"  — Cowboy Junkies
   ("I wear your ring.")
7. "All The Way To Heaven"  — Amy Rigby
8. "Halloween"  — Kirsty MacColl
   (I like this one for obvious reasons)
9. "Sol Y Sombra"  — Fugu
   (Featuring the lead singer of Stereolab)
10. "Asleep And Dreaming"  — The Magnetic Fields
11. "Diamond in the Rough"  — Sean Colvin
12. "Forever in My Life"  — Prince
13. "Half Acre" (live version)  — Hem
14. "My Baby Just Cares For Me"  — Nina Simone
15. "Blue Skies"  — Benny Goodman (Art Lund, Vocals)
16. "At Last"  — Etta James
17. "Head" —  Kirsty MacColl

and another one reflecting my mood this week:

1. "Who the Fuck?" — PJ Harvey
   (Needs no explanation)
2. "Free World" — Kirsty MacColl
   (A song written for Thatcherite England is sadly appropriate to Bushy America)
3. "Don't Lie to Me" — Big Star
   (I dedicate this song to President Bush!)
4. "Big Hollow Man" — Danielle Dax
   (She did this one back in the 1980s. Why does it still have to sound so relevant? And it rocks like nobody's business)
5. "Oualahila Ar Tesninam" — Tinariwen
   (I don't know what they're singing, but they sure sound like they mean business too)
6. "Sticker Song / Shirat Ha'Sticker" — Hadag Nachash
   ("How much evil can you swallow?")
7. "High Water" — Bob Dylan
   ("You're dancin' with whom they tell you to / Or you don't dance at all.")
8. "There Won't Be Trumpets" — Bernadette Peters
   (A little hopefulness creeps in...)
9. "Luna y Sol" — Manu Chao
   ("Todo es mentira en este mundo / Todo es mentira la verdad")
10. "Mississippi Goddam" — Nina Simone
    (And Ohio, and Illinois, and Nevada, and Utah and... YAHHH!)
11. "40'" — Franz Ferdinand
    (I just like the funky feeling of dread)
12. "Turbulent Times" — Dele Sosimi
    (Title kinda speaks for itself, doesn't it?)
13. "Lovers in a Dangerous Time" — Bruce Cockburn With Rob Wasserman
    (Ditto)
14. "Fightin' 4 Rebirth" — The Dining Rooms
15. "Move On" — Bernadette Peters
    (Because we just can't be bitter the whole time. "I chose and my world was shaken / So what? / The choice may have been mistaken / The choosing was not...")

Edited to add: I could have also added Eminem's "Mosh" or Nine Inch Nails "Head Like A Hole". Next time?

An account of volunteering in New Hampshire and another one from Ohio. A reminder of things we have to be grateful for, still. And Michael Moore's list of reasons not to slit our wrists just yet. Raed of Raed in the Middle says, "The victory of bush today, is a big defeat for anyone in the middle, like me." (though he was not impressed with Kerry either.) And Riverbend, in a post which made me laugh and cry at the same time, expresses her disappointment and rage quite well, and in verse, yet.

 I'm thinking of offering up the idea of "Election Condolences" to Hallmark or Yahoo Greetings. The cards can have those silly little poems inside of them, like:

Condolences and heartfelt tears-
You get Bush for four more years!

or

Sympathies in advance
For when they reinstate the draft!
We hope (insert_name_here) stays as safe as he/she can
And writes frequently while in Iran!

or

Bush and Cheney- what a pair!
Who said life isn't fair?
While Iraq gets tanks and occupation-
You have idiots to run your nation!

or

Cheer up...
Your son was too young for Afghanistan.
And it's still a bit early for Iran-
But there's plenty of time for Syria...
And he'll definitely serve in North Korea!

I guess justice was too much to ask for.

This got a giggle out of me. You have to hear it.