What time is it?

If you're like me, you had no idea until recently that Daylight Savings Time had been changed and its start was pushed back from April 1st to March 11th. Turns out the change was caused by a portion of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. My question--how the hell didn't I know about this? I mean its TIME for the love of Pete! Shouldn't that get at least as much discussion as Anna Nicole Smith? Or whatever the equivalent 2005 celebrity news story was?

Next thing you know they'll be changing the line up for Must See TV. THEY DID!?!?!?! WHERE THE HELL IS ER? NOOOOO!!!!!!

Angelina Jolie Nude!

Not really, but she has been nominated to sit on the Illuminati, er, I mean Council of Foreign Relations. In any event it gives me a reason to post up a really hot pic. Does this ruin my blogging integrity?

What about posting up the Youtube clip of Tyra Banks groping Katherine McPhee?

It's sweeps week. Sue me.

So...did we win?

Yglesias says we did win the Iraq war but then explains why I still feel sick:

"The problem in Iraq is that, we won a hollow victory. Defeating Saddam and replacing him with a new regime based around exiled Shiite political parties has a negative impact on America's strategic position in the world. Even were Iraq to grow substantially less chaotic over the next 2-5 years this would continue to be the case. The win-lose frame, while factually wrong, is also politically counterproductive. As Weisberg indicates, voters are reluctant to declare defeat for understandable psychological reasons. But there's no need to do that here. It's the fact of American victory that makes further involvement so untenable -- this is what winning looks like and, frankly, it looks like shit; there's no earthly reason to keep doing this; becoming "more successful" at backing the Maliki government wouldn't accomplish anything."

Wisdom means asking the right questions and fighting the right battles--this is the result of this administration's lack of wisdom.

When they ask you about the "questions" regarding Obama's finances...

...tell them this. Money quote:

"This is a classic example of the weaknesses of "objective" news reporting on ethical issues. The Times reporters don't make an explicit argument or concede the limitations of their claim. Instead, they string together a series of facts around a loose hypothesis (that Obama's actions "raise questions") and leave it to the reader to infer what they cannot prove. It's dirty pool."

Pardon me?

Rude Pundit gives a convincing argument for pardoning Scooter. Money quote:

"Brent Budowsky, a former aide to Lloyd Bentsen, agrees with Harry Reid, and then says things like the "integrity of the judicial process" and "integrity" in intelligence information and its use. But using the word "integrity" in relation to the Bush administration is like using the word "witty" in relation to Ann Coulter. We don't expect integrity from the Bush White House. We only expect craven self-interest, ideology above reality, and unending crazy threats, to individuals, to groups, to nations. And with an unpardoned Libby perhaps ready to make a deal than facing even a couple of years in the federal pen, well, shit, any feints at "integrity" or "honor" would have to be shredded like so many documents before a Congressional subpoena.

"So, c'mon, Bush administration, just get it over with. Pardon Libby. Would it really make you look any worse?"

Economy watch

Just don't say the word 'recession':

"Since the middle of last year, a downturn in the U.S. housing market has taken its toll on a wide group of people and companies, clobbering homebuilders, condo flippers, borrowers with weak credit, lenders who oversold loans, and just about anyone with a home for sale.


"Now the housing slump is hitting yet another target: housing-related jobs, a list that includes everyone from the people who build and sell houses to makers of appliances and furnishings."

Dems to introduce Iraq withdrawal...

After testing the waters with their anti-surge resolution, the Dems are taking the next step in calling for a full withdrawal of US troops by 2008 should the Iraqi government not meet certain benchmarks:

"The conditions, described as tentative until presented to the Democratic rank and file, would be added to legislation providing nearly $100 billion the Bush administration has requested for fighting in Iraq and AfgSpeaker Nancy Pelosi’s office announced plans for a Thursday morning news conference to unveil the measure, without providing any of the details. It said she would be joined by Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., and other key lawmakers. Murtha is chairman of the subcommittee with jurisdiction over the Pentagon’s budget and is among the House’s most outspoken opponents of the war.


"But Democrats familiar with the emerging legislation said the bill would require President Bush to certify that the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was making progress toward providing for his country’s security, allocating its oil revenues and creating a fair system for amending its constitution.

"They said if Bush certified the Iraqis were meeting these so-called benchmarks, U.S. combat troops could remain until September of next year. Otherwise, the deadline would move up to the end of 2007."

Sounds pretty decisive yes? Then comes the politics:

"At the same time, it permits Bush to issue waivers of these standards. Democrats described the waiver provision as an attempt to embarrass the president, but their effect would be to permit the administration to proceed with plans to deploy five additional combat brigades to the Baghdad area over the next few months."

Let me check to see if I have this right--you have a troop withdrawal bill that allows a President, who may or surely lied to take us into this war of convenience, to add more troops and 'waive' the established benchmarks to keep them there because, when it blows up in his face he'll be 'embarrassed.' Who the hell thinks of this stuff? And then the Democrats wonder why the public thinks that they flip-flop. This President is beyond embarrassment. You have enough embarrassing material on Bush to make a series of DVDs hosted by Bob Saget, but at the end of the day he's programmed to 'stay the course,' even when his notes tell him that he never said 'stay the course.' I will say one thing about the Prez--he's never wavered from his position no matter how the polls have swayed or what his daddy or the rest of the world has said. He has a pathological inertia that keeps his internal compass aimed downward. If you give him the ability to keep troops in Iraq how can you not believe he won't keep them there? That's like telling a crackhead, "Look we're hiding your crack, but if you really want it we put it in that bag labeled 'Crack'."

Jokes aside, this game is being played with human lives. Either you want the troops out or you don't, but you can't have it both ways. As the opposition party the Democrats are not supposed to want it both ways. While this is a nice metaphorical step, its vague language will only insure more deaths in a situation whose outcome is determined. We've already lost our military struggle, now you're just drawing straws to see which one of our GIs will be the last to die.

Something we can do now for our children...

The debate continues regarding new NY Gov Eliot Spitzer's heath care budget. Many people argue that his budget will cut over 244 million to city hospitals but Spitzer contends that he's siphoning the money away from traditional care and moving towards community outpatient facilities.

Yet there is an important drug already supposed to be offered free of charge to NYC's poor youth that's not reaching them:

"The new cervical cancer vaccine isn't available at many city clinics - and girls who are eligible to get it for free or at low cost are often told they have to pay, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum said yesterday.


"None of the 11 city clinics designated to treat sexually transmitted diseases offers the three-shot Gardasil series, Gotbaum said.

"Federal guidelines recommend that 11- and 12-year-old girls get vaccinated routinely against the human papilloma virus, which causes 70% of cervical cancers."

Sometimes when our politicians focus on the big picture in terms of health care they forget that its small thing like vaccination that can make the large difference.

It took them this long?

NASA fires Lisa Nowak:

"NASA dismissed Nowak on Wednesday, a month after she was charged with trying to kidnap a woman she regarded as her romantic rival for the affections of a space shuttle pilot.
Nowak's dismissal did not reflect the space agency's belief in her guilt or innocence, NASA officials said. The agency said it lacked an administrative system to handle the allegations because Nowak is a naval officer on assignment to NASA, rather than a NASA civil servant."

Bloomberg once fired a dude on the spot because he was playing Solitaire on company time--but yet it took NASA a month to fire Lisa after charges of kidnapping? In this situation it's not about guilt or innocence it's about image, and frankly when a story like this breaks the first thing the suspect should think is "damm, guess I won't be going back to work on Monday." Especially when they're a friggin ASTRONAUT.

Then again you'd think after they found Libby guilty the President might want to distance himself from the Veep. Just shows you what I know.

Homeless figures rise in NYC

From the NYDailynews:

"The average number of homeless families last month totaled 9,287, marking an all-time record high since the city began tracking this data about 25 years ago.


According to the report, during the past year, the number of homeless New Yorkers in shelters increased by 11.1%, the number of homeless families in shelters increased by 17.6%, and the number of homeless children increased by 18.1%."

But yet the economy is doing fine. I wonder what are the figures on low income housing build vs. luxury condos.

More news you won't hear from CNN

From Stories in America:

"According to the United Nations Children's Agency (UNICEF), about one in 10 children under five in Iraq are underweight and one in five are short for their age. This means that some 4.5 million children in the country are under-nourished."

Why does this matter? Well beyond the morality of the situation, remember that we're supposed to be winning their "hearts and minds?" Well letting children starve isn't a winning tactic. Then again it's not like we're doing that much better here.

Then again maybe suffering is a good thing? This theocon thinks so, and takes Obama to task for trying to alleviate pain.

Is it just me, or does it feel that sometimes that we have just lost all sense of decency?

Libby makes strange bedfellows...

What does a Greek liberal, a conservative man, and a gay pundit have in common? They all think Libby should be further investigated by Congress. From Sully:

"It's come to this? I'm watching Scarborough and see both Buchanan and Huffington agreeing that the Congress needs to take the Libby verdict from here on. Both opposed the war. I didn't. But at this point, I agree with them. Why are those of us who favored the war not as eager to investigate whether we were deliberately misled? Weren't we potentially conned as well?"

Better do it now, before Libby gets pardoned.

The last word on Coulter...

...is best left to Sully here. Not only does fantastically deconstruct what Coulter said, but his post is also very telling about hateful language that we all may say without thinking it's "hurtful." Money quote:

"Coulter's defense of the slur is that it was directed at an obviously straight man and so could not be a real slur. The premise of this argument is that the word faggot is only used to describe gay men and is only effective and derogatory when used against a gay man. But it isn't. In fact, in the schoolyard she cites, the primary targets of the f-word are straight boys or teens or men. The word "faggot" is used for two reasons: to identify and demonize a gay man; and to threaten a straight man with being reduced to the level of a gay man. Coulter chose the latter use of the slur, its most potent and common form. She knew why Edwards qualified. He's pretty, he has flowing locks, he's young-looking. He is exactly the kind of straight guy who is targeted as a "faggot" by his straight peers. This, Ms Coulter, is real social policing by speech. And that's what she was doing: trying to delegitimize and feminize a man by calling him a faggot. It happens every day. It's how insecure or bigoted straight men police their world to keep the homos out.
And for the slur to work, it must logically accept the premise that gay men are weak, effeminate, wusses, sissies, and the rest. A sane gay man has two responses to this, I think. The first is that there is nothing wrong with effeminacy or effeminate gay men - and certainly nothing weak about many of them. In the plague years, I saw countless nelly sissies face HIV and AIDS with as much courage and steel as any warrior on earth. You want to meet someone with balls? Find a drag queen. The courage of many gay men every day in facing down hatred and scorn and derision to live lives of dignity and integrity is not a sign of being a wuss or somehow weak. We have as much and maybe more courage than many - because we have had to acquire it to survive. And that is especially true of gay men whose effeminacy may not make them able to pass as straight - the very people Coulter seeks to demonize. The conflation of effeminacy with weakness, and of gayness with weakness, is what Coulter calculatedly asserted. This was not a joke. It was an attack.

Secondly, gay men are not all effeminate. In the last couple of weeks, we have seen a leading NBA player and a soldier come out to tell their stories. I'd like to hear Coulter tell Amaechi and Alva that they are sissies and wusses. A man in uniform who just lost a leg for his country is a sissy? What Coulter did, in her callow, empty way, was to accuse John Edwards of not being a real man. To do so, she asserted that gay men are not really men either. The emasculation of men in minority groups is an ancient trope of the vilest bigotry. Why was it wrong, after all, for white men to call African-American men "boys"? Because it robbed them of the dignity of their masculinity. And that's what Coulter did last Friday to gays. She said - and conservatives applauded - that I and so many others are not men. We are men, Ann.

As members of other minorities have been forced to say in the past: I am not a faggot. I am a man."

Nice to be wrong (for a change)

Scooter found guilty on four of five counts. From MSNBC.com:

"WASHINGTON - Former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby was convicted Tuesday of obstruction, perjury and lying to the FBI in an investigation into the leak of a CIA operative’s identity.

Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, was accused of lying and obstructing the investigation into the 2003 leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity to reporters.

He was acquitted of one count of lying to the FBI. "

I wish I could get the above picture as a poster. Let the spinning begin!

Prediction...

...Scooter will wheel his ass outta court, not guilty.

Greenspan revises comments...

...says now that there's a one-third possiblity of recession:

"SINGAPORE - Former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan was quoted as seeing a “one-third probability” of recession in the United States this year, according to an interview with Bloomberg."

That's right calm them down. Problem is the tumor's still there. Still, if you're like Mort Zuckerman you might want to put your money in government bonds in the next couple of months. From the March 4 Mclaughlin Group:

"MR. ZUCKERMAN: My pillow is stuffed with U.S. government bonds. That's the way I sleep, John.

MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Did you move into government -- did you see this coming?

MR. ZUCKERMAN: No, of course not.

MR. MCLAUGHLIN: Did anyone have the sense to move into government bonds before it hit?

MR. ZUCKERMAN: I'm sure some people did, but I don't think they did it in anticipation of the Shanghai market going down by 9 percent.

MR. MCLAUGHLIN: How can you seem so elated, almost, here today?

MR. BUCHANAN: John --

MR. ZUCKERMAN: I'm elated because I'm on this show, John. You know, it's such a thrill.

MR. BUCHANAN: Right. (Laughs.)"

Horrible...

Dozens of Shiite pilgrims killed. From MSNBC.com:

"BAGHDAD, Iraq - Two suicide bombers killed at least 90 Shiites making a pilgrimage south of Baghdad ahead of a weekend holiday, police said Tuesday.
The pilgrims came under attack as they streamed south, mostly on foot, toward a shrine in Karbala. Two bombers exploded themselves in a crowd of pilgrims in Hillah, about 60 miles south of the capital."

And just in case you thought the US got away scot free:

"Separately, U.S. officials said nine American soldiers died in explosions north of Baghdad on Monday the deadliest single day for U.S. troops in Iraq in nearly a month."

Blogs are political tools...

...as the Guardian discovers:

"Westerners assume Middle Eastern bloggers are liberal. But the Muslim Brotherhood has just started blogging in force."

Is this a surprise? Are we to be shocked because the East has their Ann Coulters?

Al-Qaeda at Thermopylae

So a couple of days ago I bought and finished 300: March to Glory, the video game that accompanies 300 the movie, coming out on March 9th. The game was overall a pretty fun button masher, with decent graphics and story board. However, and quite a large however, I was a bit confused and puzzled by the game's use of suicide bombers.

For those of you unfamiliar with 300, it's a movie based on the graphic novel by Frank Miller. The story depicts the tale of the 300 Spartans who stood up to the million strong Persian army at Thermopylae at around 480 BC. Stylistic, Miller does take some liberties in developing the story, however I don't remember any suicide bombers in the novel. Enter the video game which features "Persian Slaves," picture Gandhi in a diaper carrying some flaming device. He runs up to a Spartan and boom! It's like downtown Baghdad.

Now I'm not one for political correctness, but why would the makers of the game add such an odd fiction to their game? I wish I could answer that point. I wish I didn't have a feeling that there is a deep down political purpose to the bomber which further enhances the already apparent neo-conservative ideas of the story (west vs. east, freedom and democracy vs. slavery and theocracy), all I do know is that on one hand the "bomber" totally took me out of the game, and in some way was offensive not only to the modern day descendants on Persians (hey Iranians have enough bad press to deal with) but to me having to deal with such an overt political ploy in the middle of my video game which I play to escape reality. If I need to watch someone on a screen twist reality I'll turn on Fox News. What's next, a video game based on the Spanish-American war where Pancho Villa rides up in a low rider? Or how about a video game based on Shaka Zulu? Instead of throwing spears the Zulu's will do drive bys while selling crack to the British. What's wrong with a little racism? It's all just a game.

A sane conservative voice

Ed Morrissey makes sense regarding the Coulter at the CPAC. Money quote:

"First, criticizing Coulter's use of the word "faggot" is not a suppression of free speech; it is an exercise of free speech. We're not advocating her arrest for using the word. We're just saying it was stupid, unnecessary, and hateful. This is no different than Melissa McEwan calling Christians "Christofascist Godbags" and Amanda Marcotte's incendiary hate speech about Catholics. We howled about that when John Edwards hired them; why do we defend Coulter's appearance at CPAC?"

Bingo.