Gotta respect that.

VOA News - Microsoft Founder, Norway Pledge $1 Billion For Vaccine Campaign

I don't like your company Bill, but that's a power charity move.

Kudos.

5 out of 6 Int4rweb users are morons or newbs

News Story - NCBuy

Only 1 in 6 users of Internet search engines can tell the difference between unbiased search results and paid advertisements, a new survey finds.

Or as the Farkline went: "Only one in six Internet users can tell difference between actual search result and paid link. To solve this, experts recommend cancelling AOL accounts and returning computers to Wal-Mart"

Just got one of these.

Product Overview

Sweet.

Google Video Search

Google Video Search

Google does it again. Search tv transcripts this time.

From the It's Mississippi file:

Conservative group to meet with state lawmakers
- The Clarion-Ledger

Some Mississippi lawmakers are scheduled to speak Thursday to the Council of Conservative Citizens, an organization that the Southern Poverty Law Center calls "a patently white supremacist group."

Check out the C of CC site yourself. Warning... the filter where I posted this from blocks that site. I had to go to the google cache to read it. It's nasty virulent hate, but hey it's Mississippi lawmakers in question here. They are allowed to be racist.

Bingo

pike speak: Parsing Bush and Clinton

"Depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is." --Clinton Administration

"Depends on what the meaning of the word 'torture' is." --Bush Administration

Tinfoil time

MSNBC - Carson was everyman, with charisma

Jay Leno had him killed for feeding jokes to Letterman.

But he dies at the end... badly.

Yahoo! News - 'Braveheart' Becomes Role Model for Christian Men

Remember all ye Christian "warriors", warriors get killed in battle quite often.

Towelgate the finale.

Madden not T.O.? Ick.:

It turns out that John Madden was initially supposed to be in the "Desperate Housewives" Monday Night Football intro. /me shudders.

Money quote from the story from Desperate Housewives producer Marc Cheery who helped write the intro

"'I feel really bad about it,' Cherry said. 'I didn't want to upset people. I didn't realize that 'Monday Night Football' was such a family viewing experience. I wouldn't let my 5-year-old watch beer commercials with big-busted cheerleaders, but that's just me.'"

Definitely a geek.

Man robs doughnut business with laser

Why? He robbed a donut shop (so it's either a cop or a geek) /with a laser pointer/ (so it's a geek).

Nice point.

From a Slashdot comment

"Oh and don't you dare bring up the other hot spots where genocide and regular slaughter are going on. That's just man against man, whereas the Tsunami represents God against man, and we're going to KICK gOD'S ASS!!!111 WTF!!!!11"

More people have died in the Sudan in the last year then were killed in the tsunami. Why aren't we helping them? That's a question, not a criticism.

Top 10 times in history when the use of the 'f-word' was appropriate.

anfield: The 'F word: "The 'F word

10th - 'Scattered Fucking showers, my ass!' - Noah, 4314 BC
9th - 'How the fuck did you work that out?' - Pythagoras, 126 BC
8th - 'You want WHAT on the fucking ceiling?' - Michelangelo, 1566
7th - 'Where did all those fucking Indians come from?' - Custer,1877
6th - 'It does so fucking look like her!' - Picasso,1926
5th - 'Where the fuck are we?' - Amelia Earhart, 1937
4th - 'Any fucking idiot could understand that.' - Einstein, 1938
3rd - 'What the fuck was that?' - Mayor Of Hiroshima,1945
2nd - 'I need this parade like I need a fucking hole in the head!' - JFK,1963
1st - 'Aw c'mon. Who the fuck is going to find out?' - Bill Clinton
"

Neat but a hoax.

The VW suicide bomber ad is a hoax, but a good one. Check it out.

Nice blog.

A Call To Action

Wow

BBC NEWS | Europe | Man found after weeks in cave

Good info on the Coronation Protests

t r u t h o u t

Iraq's Red Dawn

Free Iraq:

"Why do they fight us?

'Back in the 1980s, a film came out that was a masterpiece of Cold War propaganda. The film 'Red Dawn' depicted an invasion of the United States by a combined Soviet/Cuban force that came up through Central America and down from Alaska.
'Red Dawn' centered around the patriotic struggle of a bunch of kids from a small Colorado town, who armed themselves and took to the hills to fight the invaders. They were afraid and angry, and over the course of the movie most of them are killed. Each of the fallen is treated as a hero, their names etched upon a rock that eventually becomes a national monument once the war ends.
I was young enough that this movie had a pretty profound effect on me. In short, it scared the hell out of me and got me all jacked up at the idea of defending my country against an invasion by commie Huns.
... I am casting it now in a new context that throws the whole premise into a cocked hat. These Soviet/Cuban commie invaders kept the lights on, kept the stores open, and saw themselves bringing 'freedom' to a nation held in thrall by capitalist oppressors.
Why, then, did those kids fight? In other words, this film glorifies armed resistance by patriotic fighters bent on repelling invaders.
...Yet in Iraq today, the kids playing the role of the resistance are vilified as terrorists and thugs. Are they not doing what those all-American kids did, to great applause, in 'Red Dawn'?
....We're the 'liberators' this time around, trying to get the lights on, trying to hold some sort of election. Why do they fight us? They fight, I think, because home is home, and because invading armies are never, ever welcome (my italics).
All the neo-cons in the Bush administration who thought this was going to be a 'cakewalk' should have probably watched 'Red Dawn' before undertaking this farce."

Liberal media my ass

No room for progressives on primetime in inaugu ... [Media Matters for America]

A well reasoned Christian blog.

Blog In My Own Eye: The One Where I Lose Friends

Check out his take on gay marriage. If there were more Christians like him the religious right would be a hell of a lot less scary.

Juan Cole's Pictoral commentary

Cole's brilliant pictoral commentary on the first line of Bush's inaugural address.

Yeah right.

" I'm a 37-year-old woman with two children. Men aren't beating a path to my door.'"
--Nicole Kidman

Just lemme know where the door is and I'll start beating a path.

George hails his true master.

Ok ok, so it's the "Hook 'em Horns" salute for the University of Texas marching band, but hey...

Imaginative parents

People in the news - 1/21/05:

"One name is all this coach needs

Caitlin is such a popular name among teenage girls that Reno Galena High, according to NevadaPrep.com, used a starting lineup of four Caitlins and one Kaitlin on Tuesday night in a 65-30 basketball victory over Reno Damonte Ranch.

Imagine the confusion whenever Galena Coach Karen Friel called a starter by her first name.

But all the Caitlins and one Kaitlin did well, apparently."

Wheaton pointed this out.

Amazon.com: Everything Else: JL421 Badonkadonk Land Cruiser/Tank

Now that my friends is a geek's dream ride.

The Elaborate, and Likely Benign, Threat Against Boston

The Elaborate, and Likely Benign, Threat Against Boston


Yeah that's more like it. Why import Chinese "scientists" to build a dirty bomb when any moron with access to the materials can build said bomb?

That's just kind of sad.

CNN.com - Homeless man blended in at school - Jan 19, 2005

Armitage gets it right.

The Australian: Reflections of a straight shooter [January 20, 2005]:

"And Armitage's disappointments? Not a lugubrious person, Armitage doesn't nominate disappointments spontaneously. But he'll answer a question honestly: 'I'm disappointed that Iraq hasn't turned out better. And that we weren't able to move forward more meaningfully in the Middle East peace process.'

Then, after a minute's pause, he adds a third regret: 'The biggest regret is that we didn't stop 9/11. And then in the wake of 9/11, instead of redoubling what is our traditional export of hope and optimism we exported our fear and our anger. And presented a very intense and angry face to the world. I regret that a lot.'"

Of course this guy, who has apparently been the hit with the cluestick, is /leaving/ the administration. I'm sure the new Dep. Sec. State will tow the "everything turning up rosy" line.

49% Uniter + 49% Divider = 100% Divider

CNN.com - Poll: Nation split on Bush as uniter or divider - Jan 19, 2005

If half the people consider Dubya a divider, doesn't that make him one regardless of what the other half think? Further which part of the USA considers our little miserable failure a uniter? How exactly does "with us or against us" translate into anything but the most divisive of statements? Bush is nothing if not a polarizer. People love him or hate him. How does that unite?

We're Moving Again!

My blog will be moving back to my home page again. For those of you who care it will be at http://www.mcsey.com/blog/ starting whenever I get it moved over. This will be the last post to the blog at this address.

Juan Cole on Boxer and Iraq the Model

Informed Comment : "IraqTheMOdel"

Sarah Boxer writing in the NYThas more on the saga of the Fadhil brothers and their pro-Bush website, which is idolized on the American Right.

She notes that Ali Fadhil, one of the three brothers, has begun his own website, 'Free Iraqi where he expresses some doubts about Bush administration policy, unlike his two brothers.

I became suspicious of the original site when they mysteriously attacked Rashid Khalidi and me for simply pointing out that Fallujah had had a long history of anti-British political agitation during the 1920s and the monarchy, something which is well known in Iraqi history and about which there is famous nationalist poetry. They depended on a secondary source by a sociologist to question something that shows up in numerous historical sources. Being dentists, of course, they don't know their way around the British archives and don't realize that secondary works aren't exhaustive. So it was strange that they were questioning something that every informed Iraqi knows, and which is attested in British sources. And it was strange that they went after Khalidi, a Palestinian- American and an eminent historian who opposed the Iraq war.

What really seems to bother the Right bloggers is that the defection of Ali Fadhil introduced doubt and ambiguity into their closed little world in which American Iraq is a virtual paradise and real Iraqis are all tickled pink to have been occupied by a Western army. There has been excellent professional opinion polling in Iraq by Gallup and the State Department that demonstrates that the original IraqTheModel site's views were far out of the Iraqi mainstream.

For American observers concerned with Iraq not to realize how truly awful the situation is, and to fail to understand that the US faces a grave crisis if key policies are not changed, makes them poor Americans. The United States is a democracy and a democracy only works if the citizens are informed and exercise their faculties of critical reason. Looking for token pro-American Iraqis to say nice things while ignoring all the evidence of US failure is pitiful. I sometimes get messages from readers who are excited by all the rebuilding work the US has done in Iraq and think it is unfair for it to be overlooked. This way of thinking is just wrong. The British in India built railroads and lots of infrastructure. By the 1940s, no Indians were grateful, and they just wanted the British out so that they could have their independent country. The railroads, they said, were after all mainly built to transport British troops and merchandise. When you mess with a people's independence, they stop being grateful for infrastructure. Ask King George III.

From Newsmax?

Our Troops Are Dying for Sycophants

When, as Fargus dubbed it, Teen Beat Bush Edition starts publishing anti-Bush editorials... well it makes me happy. It's one thing for Bush's "enemies" to attach him, but when his "friends" start, we may be making some headway here.

Chrenkoff in attack mode

Chrenkoff denigrates NYT columnist for reporting the truth.

Ali formerly of Iraq the Model and currently blogging from Iraqilibe has started to have doubts about his occupiers. Fair enough.

As Ali said in the NYT piece: " 'Me and my brothers,' [Ali] said, 'we generally agree on Iraq and the future.' (He is helping his brother Mohammed, who is running on the Iraqi Pro-Democracy Party ticket in the Jan. 30 election.) But there is one important difference: 'My brothers have confidence in the American administration. I have my questions.'

to which the NYT columnist Sarah Boxer adds

"Now that seems genuine."

to which Chrenkoff adds:

Now that seems offensive - an Iraqi can only seem "genuine" if he shares the liberal media elite's doubts about the liberation of Iraq. God forbid that anyone could possibly be happy that Saddam's gone and Iraq now has a chance for a better future - such people must obviously be frauds, or better still, frauds on American payroll

So it's offensive to say that it seems more genuine that someone would have doubts about "liberators" who had razed multiple cities and killed 1000's of their fellow civilians than that those same people would welcome us still and love us unconditionally?

Let's leave out how off the rocker someone would have to be to believe that the megacorps that control the media would allow it to be "liberal". (Though Chrenkoff's unfailing support of the Swiftboat liars should give you a view into his world.) Let's just ask one question, "Which seems more genuine to you at this point, an Iraqi with doubts about the US occupation or an Iraqi without doubts?"

I'd pick the former and wonder whether the latter was a tool or a fool.

Riverbend Sums it up

Baghdad Burning:

The weapons never existed. It's like having a loved one sentenced to death for a crime they didn't commit- having your country burned and bombed beyond recognition, almost. Then, after two years of grieving for the lost people, and mourning the lost sovereignty, we're told we were innocent of harboring those weapons. We were never a threat to America...

Congratulations Bush- we are a threat now.

Duchovny says X-Files sequel in works.

So sayeth the Sun.

I, for one, welcome our new alien overlords.

34 Scandals worse than Whitewater

Salon.com News | The scandal sheet

Prediction: One of these 34 will blosom into a major second term scandal ala Iran-Contra (you know, something important as opposed to who's blowing the President).

Site Note: Pics are down.

mcSey
Don't know why yet. Say "Hola," to the little red X (blue ? for you OS X people).

At least he paid his taxes.

The Vote on Mr. Gonzales (washingtonpost.com):

"DESPITE A POOR performance at his confirmation hearing, Alberto R. Gonzales appears almost certain to be confirmed by the Senate as attorney general. Senators of both parties declared themselves dissatisfied with Mr. Gonzales's lack of responsiveness to questions about his judgments as White House counsel on the detention of foreign prisoners. Some expressed dismay at his reluctance to state that it is illegal for American personnel to use torture, or for the president to order it. A number of senators clearly believe, as we do, that Mr. Gonzales bears partial responsibility for decisions that have led to shocking, systematic and ongoing violations of human rights by the United States. Most apparently intend to vote for him anyway. At a time when nominees for the Cabinet can be disqualified because of their failure to pay taxes on a nanny's salary, this reluctance to hold Mr. Gonzales accountable is shameful. He does not deserve to be confirmed as attorney general. "

Not like Vietnam how again?

Telegraph | News | US deserters flee to Canada to avoid service in Iraq:

"An estimated 5,500 men and women have deserted since the invasion of Iraq, reflecting Washington's growing problems with troop morale."

How'd I miss this?

Screenhead

I've been checking out Defamer, Gawker and Wonkette often enough. Hmm.

That'd work.

Gizmodo : HOWTO: Hack iPod into iPod Shuffle

For a crowd of angry voyeurs on the make

For a crowd of angry voyeurs on the make

Check this blog out and leave comments. And remember they're striped for goshsakes;) Do so especially if like us you have about three comments in your entire blog. We (I at least) will then visit your blog and give you cake with frosting (or comments).

Don't have a blog? Oh please join the late 90's would ya? Yeah my archives only go back a couple of years, but check out e2.com for my stuff prior to that. I'll lift your double secret probation if you can figure out my username over there.

It's mcsey. Jeez, you people

From Sullivan

www.AndrewSullivan.com - Daily Dish:

"'I attended a continuing legal education seminar for Army Reserve and National Guard lawyers last weekend. I was struck by one thing: The biggest response from a ballroom full of JAG lawyers was when one dynamic Colonel spoke and said the Army needed to do a better job in handling detainees. He quoted a dispatch from WWII when the commander of a US prisoner of war camp reported back that his camp was under air attack by the German air force, that he could not protect his German prisoners of war, and he had opened the gates and set them all free. This is the standard for the US Army and we need to live up to it. The room cheered. My impression is that the people who have been trained in this stuff (at least the citizen solders) may not be terribly pleased and indeed may be somewhat embarrassed with how this is unfolding. This is also consistent with the JAG lawyers being kept out of the loop.' "

Now I suppose we'd stack them into a pyramid to make it easy for one bomb to get them all.

Rathergate vs. WMDgate

The Poor Man: Compare and Contrast

Rake muck Greg. Rake much muck.

CBS' COWARDICE AND CONFLICTS BEHIND PURGE


Network's Craven Back-Down on Bush Draft Dodge Report Sure to Get a Standing Rove-ation at White House

Liars, Incompetents, or Incompetent Liars?

Seattle Post-Intelligencer: AP - Washington, D.C.: Bush administration comments on WMDs: "Statements by the Bush administration before and after the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 on Saddam Hussein's weapons programs:


BEFORE THE WAR

'Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us.' - Vice President Dick Cheney, Aug. 26, 2002.

'The problem here is that there will always be some uncertainty about how quickly he can acquire nuclear weapons. But we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.' National security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Sept. 8, 2002.

'After 11 years during which we have tried containment, sanctions, inspections, even selected military action, the end result is that Saddam Hussein still has chemical and biological weapons and is increasing his capabilities to make more.' - President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002.

'Saddam Hussein is a man who told the world he wouldn't have weapons of mass destruction, but he's got them.' - Bush, Nov. 3, 2002.

'The gravity of this moment is matched by the gravity of the threat that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction pose to the world.' - Secretary of State Colin Powell, Feb. 5, 2003."

AFTER THE WAR

"Although we have not found stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, we were right to go into Iraq. ... We removed a declared enemy of America who had the capability of producing weapons of mass murder." - Bush, July 12, 2004.

"We got it wrong. We have seen nothing to suggest that he had actual stockpiles." - Powell, Oct. 1, 2004.

"We were all unhappy that the intelligence was not as good as we had thought that it was. But the essential judgment was absolutely right. Saddam Hussein was a threat." - Rice, Oct. 3, 2004.

"It turns out that we have not found weapons of mass destruction. Why the intelligence proved wrong I'm not in a position to say, but the world is a lot better off with Saddam Hussein in jail." - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Oct. 4, 2004.

"He retained the knowledge, the materials, the means and the intent to produce weapons of mass destruction and he could have passed that knowledge on to our terrorist enemies." - Bush, Oct. 7, 2004.

"Based on what we know today, the president would have taken the same action because this is about protecting the American people." - White House press secretary Scott McClellan, on Wednesday.

Brilliant

U.S. Tells D.C. to Pay Inaugural Expenses (washingtonpost.com):

"D.C. officials said yesterday that the Bush administration is refusing to reimburse the District for most of the costs associated with next week's inauguration, breaking with precedent and forcing the city to divert $11.9 million from homeland security projects."

Big Media smells its own irrelevance

MSNBC - The 'Media Party' is over

They weren't there. We were lied to.

Yahoo! News - Search for Banned Arms In Iraq Ended Last Month

They have crappy strip clubs in FL

Florida Strippers In "Dirty Dancing" Bust - January 11, 2005

And the Smoking Gun is there.

Apple - Mac mini

Apple - Mac mini

Well the rumor is reality.

Mel Gibson on Fahrenheit 9/11

The New York Times > New York Region > Boldface Names: Call Us Crazy, but We See a Buddy Movie Here:

"'I feel a strange kinship with Michael,' Mr. Gibson said. 'They're trying to pit us against each other in the press, but it's a hologram. They really have got nothing to do with one another. It's just some kind of device, some left-right. He makes some salient points. There was some very expert, elliptical editing going on. However, what the hell are we doing in Iraq? No one can explain to me in a reasonable manner that I can accept why we're there, why we went there, and why we're still there.'"

Decentralized Bit Torrent

freshmeat.net: Project Reviews - Kenosis and the World Free Web

Sweet.

Heard about the sub-$500 Mac

'iHome' pictures and video

That linkee there is supposed to be pics of the rumored sub-$500 "headless Mac". Rumor has it that this is a "media device" somewhere between a Tivo and a Windows Media PC, running OS X goodness though of course.

Man against the sea.

Yahoo! News - Tsunami Survivor Picked Up After 15 Days


15 days at sea. Five on a five foot plank. 10 on a "large raft with a hut on it".

Bligh would be proud.

Santorum

This is old news, but I'm gonna go ahead a link this Santorum

NSFW (That's Not Safe for Work you dunderhead).

Doug Bandow meet reality.

Doug Bandow: Can Democrats be pro-life?

For instance, the Web log "BlameBush!" recently opined "that the bizarre creature brutally extracted from" Bobbie Jo Stinnett, the pregnant woman apparently murdered by another woman who wanted a child, "was a fetus." Yet, complained the author, "the anti-choice crowd still insists on referring to the damned thing as a 'baby.'"

Go to http://blamebush.typepad.com/ Does that look like a parody site to you? Cause it sure does to me.

If there's no RNC talking points, Fox doesn't cover it.

Salon.com News | Fox News gets blown away

When Hentoff and Sullivan agree

village voice > news > Liberty Beat by Nat Hentoff

They're probably right. And retired rear admiral Don Guter, former navy judge advocate general, says it plain: "That branch [Congress] has really abdicated its responsibility to set rules and oversee what's happening [to the detainees], and we are paying a price for it."

CNEWS - World: Iran endorses Bush for president

CNEWS - World: Iran endorses Bush for president

A little late, but it's interesting I didn't hear about that. If Iran had endorsed Kerry, I think we would have heard about it.

Big Unit Shoves Cameraman

Randy Johnson looks like he has the New York media figured out.

Doh!

The Sunday Mail QLD: I glued my eyelids shut! [09jan05]

Pot meet kettle.

FOXSports.com - NFL - INSTANT ANALYSIS: Daryl Johnston on Vikes-Pack:

"That is more disturbing than leaving the field early. It is totally unacceptable. The league will fine him, but it is only money to a guy like Randy. Make a statement and suspend him for the game next week if the Vikings win."

Moose Johnston on Randy Moss' faux moon of Packerland.

Moose you work for a network that's currently broadcasting "Who's Your Daddy" and a show about wife swapping. Lighten up.

The Air Force "'deeply regrets the loss of possibly innocent lives'"

Several killed as U.S. bombs wrong target in Iraq

Mistakes like that don't win hearts and minds.

Boing Boing: Googling unsecured webcams

Boing Boing: Googling unsecured webcams

One who actually cares.

Senator Barbara Boxer cries as she announces her objection to the certification of the electoral count.

Iraqi war veteran speaks out against Gonzales

One veterans take on Gonzales' nomination for AG. Hint, he's against confirmation.

And you thought you had the vapors.

Biggest Space Explosion Creates Giant Bubbles

Gas bubbles blown from a black hole with the mass of a /trillion/ suns.

Just buy the media's support.

USATODAY.com - White House paid commentator to promote law

Hell why spend $240,000 to get Armstrong Williams to say it for you when you can simply tell Fox News what to say for free?

Obviously the lawsuits spurred sales.

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | US sees growth in CD sales market

Yeah right.

Snowday yesterday.

No int4rweb no blog.

We'll just take this slow.

Yahoo! News - Tortoise Adopts Stray Hippo at Sanctuary

Awww...

Diebold + Ken Blackwell == Ohio for Bush?

Raw Print | Republican Ohio Secretary of State boasts about "delivering" Ohio to Bush

Somebody had to say it.

Found at AMERICAblog: Because a great nation deserves the truth

GOP does have ethics

House GOP Giving Ground on Ethics Rules

They're repealing the rule they forced through in 1994 to oust Dan Rostenkowski and repealed in 2004 to protect Tom DeLay regarding indicted House leaders. I guess DeLay doesn't think he's going to get indicted.

I am familiar with the works of Pablo Neruda

Twenty-eight Chilean women took all their clothes off in the middle of a busy road in Santiago to pay homage to a poet.

Yes that would be cool.

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Virgin soars towards new frontier:

"The best part of all, Rutan added, was that 15 years from now, 'every kid who dreams, 'Wouldn't it be cool to fly in space?' will know that in your lifetime, you are going to go to orbit."

Yahoo! News - Elder Bush, Clinton to Lead Relief Effort

Yahoo! News - Elder Bush, Clinton to Lead Relief Effort


Now wasn't Dubya pissed at Clinton the other day for publically expressing sympathy before Dubya could be bothered to cut short his vacation?

Oh yeah he was.

We Didn't Start the Fire

These people did.

The old Billy Joel song as a flash animation with all those people and events as the video portion. Pretty cool.

Sitting in Silence

So I sat in silence with my new girlfriend. We rode all the way back to Chicago. I think I said maybe three words, her less. She held Jack the Cat who slept like a er... content cat. I felt the same way. Nothing to say, but no need to say anything. I think that's good. I didn't have that "Gosh I should be saying something to fill this silence" feeling I get so often. I think that's good too.

Justice Dept. admits it authorized torture.

The New York Times > Washington > Justice Dept. Toughens Rule on Torture:

The Justice Department has broadened its definition of torture, significantly retreating from a memorandum in August 2002 that defined torture extremely narrowly and said President Bush could ignore domestic and international prohibitions against torture in the name of national security.

Who signed off on that 8/02 memo that we are backpeddling so quickly from? Why that's right! It was the current nominee for attorney general, Alberto Gonzales. I'd prefer my attorney general not support torture, but maybe that's just me.

Obviously these actions were condoned at the /highest/ levels of government, yet only a few grunts have been punished.

Typical.

More Isolated Incidents

The New York Times > National > Fresh Details Emerge on Harsh Methods at Guantánamo:

None of the approved techniques, however, covered some of what people have now said occurred. Mr. Kahtani was, for example, forcibly given an enema, officials said, which was used because it was uncomfortable and degrading.

Pentagon spokesmen said the procedure was medically necessary because Mr. Kahtani was dehydrated after an especially difficult interrogation session. Another official, told of the use of the enema, said, however, 'I bet they said he was dehydrated,' adding that that was the justification whenever an enema was used as a coercive technique, as it had been on several detainees.

Happy New Year!

Let's get through 2005 now.

Bye bye Passport... and good riddance.

The Seattle Times: Business & Technology: Microsoft's Passport fails to travel far as Web strategy

I dropped Hotmail a few years ago when they started that Passport crap. It's not a bad idea, but it's /such/ a bad idea from Microsoft. No one wants to trust that kind of info to a company that can't make software securely. Now if Google tried it...

Creepy

Jessica Simpson: Jessica Simpsons Virgin Vow

JESSICA SIMPSON's father JOE made the singer promise to stay a virgin until she married, during a ceremony when she was twelve.

Simpson sr, who doubles as Jessica's manager, handed the 24-year-old a promise ring and vowed to be the only man in her life until she married.

He explains, "I'm going to tell you how beautiful you are every day. Even when you make a mistake, you are someone special. And I am going to be that person until the day you find a man to do that in my place."

It'd be funny if it wasn't true.

Billionaires For Bush

Even though it's a parody site, it's still too close for comfort.

Da Vinci Code cribbed

Salon.com Books | The Da Vinci crock

Guardian Unlimited | World Latest | Ohio Official Refuses Interview Over Vote

Guardian Unlimited | World Latest | Ohio Official Refuses Interview Over Vote

You have got to be kidding me! Way to feed the conspiracy theorists Blackwell. I can't think of a better way to drum up publicity for the people protesting the Ohio results... unless you are really hiding something.

Boston.com / News / World / US disclosures signal wider detainee abuse

Boston.com / News / World / US disclosures signal wider detainee abuse

Free FM radio!

CNN.com - Pirate radio calls for inauguration protests - Dec 22, 2004

You gotta love "pirate" radio. The subjugation of the FM band to the FCC is a crime against free speech. Vast swaths of it remain unused and those that are belong Clear Channel, and the FCC sits there and protects their monopoly.

Now that's a bank robbery

Gun threats and kidnap: how raiders netted £30m as shoppers strolled past

TimesDispatch.com | Mosul attack kills 24, wounds 64

TimesDispatch.com | Mosul attack kills 24, wounds 64

Damn.

KR Washington Bureau | 12/20/2004 | Harsh interrogations in Iraq went beyond FBI standards, memo says

KR Washington Bureau | 12/20/2004 | Harsh interrogations in Iraq went beyond FBI standards, memo says

More "isolated incidents" of us torturing people. C'mon people we're Americans. We don't do this crap.

Check this out:

"We have also instructed our personnel not to participate in interrogations by military personnel which might include techniques authorized by executive order but beyond the bounds of FBI practices," the top FBI official in Iraq reported to bureau officials in Washington. The FBI official wasn't named in the memo.

The memo includes several references to an "executive order" signed by President Bush, but the two government officials said that was an error and that the reference was to Defense Department directives.

White House officials also said the memo's reference to an executive order from the president was a mistake.

"No such executive order exists or has ever existed," said Frederick Jones, a spokesman for the National Security Council.

So the "top FBI official in Iraq" doesn't know the difference between an Executive Order and a Defense Department directive? Seems a little fishy to me.

EPIC 2014

EPIC 2014

Future history.

Jeri Ellsworth -- naked and petrified

Google Search: jeri ellsworth

Not really, but she's my newest "it" geek girl. She designed a "C64 in a joystick" emulator from the ground up. She's also teh hot in an elfin geek sort of way. So I dub her N&P.

Jeri if you happen across this ego surfing. I'm not stalkerish or anything. No really... I'm not.

Fallujah in Pictures

Fallujah in Pictures

Is back up. It's gruesome but so is war.

Favorite Neil Young lyrics

NEIL YOUNG LYRICS - Only Love Can Break Your Heart from the LP After the Goldrush:

"I have a friend
I've never seen
He hides his head
inside a dream
Someone should call him
and see if he can come out.
Try to lose
the down that he's found."

course this little bit of Cripple Creek Ferry runs a close second:

"All alone the captain stands
Hasn't heard
from his deck hands.
The gambler tips his hat
and walks towards the door.
It's the second half
of the cruise.
And you know he hates to lose."

Ali Leaves Iraq the Model

Iraq the Model is a pro-American Iraqi blog whose main three writers Mohammed, Ali and Omar have been thoroughly vetted even been invited to the White House on a recent US visit. It's been trumpeted throughout the conservative press as "See things aren't so bad. These guys like us." And reading the blog, you see why. The point out all the good things that are going on in Iraq. Reading their blog gives me hope for Iraq. If there are enough people there like these guys, Iraq will be fine.

So I was a little surprised to read this this morning:

This is the last time I write in this blog and I just want to say, goodbye. It's not an easy thing to do for me, but I know I should do it. I haven't told my brothers with my decision, as they are not here yet, but it won't change anything and I just can't keep doing this anymore.
My stand regarding America has never changed. I still love America and feel grateful to all those who helped us get our freedom and are still helping us establishing democracy in our country. But it's the act of some Americans that made me feel I'm on the wrong side here. I will expose these people in public very soon and I won't lack the mean to do this, but I won't do it here as this is not my blog.
At any rate, it's been a great experience and a pleasure to know all the regular readers of this blog, as I do feel I know you, and I owe you a lot.
Best wishes to all of you, those who supported us and those who criticized us as well.

Yours sincerely,
Ali.

I don't know what happened. No one does it seems, but I doubt it's good.

I Am A Conservative Christian, And The Religious Right Scares Me, Too

So says Chuck Baldwin in another conservative anti-Bush piece. I can get with a guy like that even if his bio (in the column) makes me nearly ill. True conservatives are finally coming out against Bush. Way to go guys.

San Antonio strippers to wear permits

San Antonio strippers to wear permitss

I guess there are no more fully nude strip clubs in San Antonio.

The New York Times > International > Asia Pacific > Intelligence: A Hostile Land Foils the Quest for bin Laden

The New York Times > International > Asia Pacific > Intelligence: A Hostile Land Foils the Quest for bin Laden

Didn't Bush say something about "never letting another country" interfere with our security? Looks like Pakistan just vetoed us chasing Bin Laden down. This leaves me with two possible conclusions:

1)Bush is a liar.
2)Bin Laden is not a threat to national security. (Which would make point 1 true).

Ah here we go:
"I will never give another country veto power over our national security."
-- George W. Bush, 10/20/04