Well at least somebody has some morals

"Russia condemns Israel for assassination threat to Arafat."

Powell lied

But now he's trying to blame the FBI. These guys are unbelievable... I guess we should feel relieved, at least he's not trying to blame Clinton. You know somebody will eventually, though.

And who could forget this about Powell's con job?

Yet a dossier presented as containing prime-cuts of fresh intelligence material turns out to be nothing of the sort - but rather an internet cut-and-paste exercise largely lifted from a Californian post-graduate thesis focused on evidence from the invasion of Kuwait 13 years ago. Even worse, while typographical errors were maintained, a sprinkling of unfounded exaggerations were inserted to strengthen the claims made in the thesis.

CIA's fault my ass.

Bow chicka bow bow

Look who the Republicans are honoring!

Marlene Baldwin knows business.

She learned from the best business minds in the country. Chief executive officers. Business owners. The rich and famous.

And not at any snobby East Coast business school. We're talking up close and personal. Whispered in the ear, in some cases.

So it comes as no surprise that Baldwin has been named California Businessman of the Year by the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Surprise would better describe the reaction by the Republicans when they found out how Baldwin came to know so much about business.

Fifteen years as the most famous brothel madam in San Francisco.

Family values!

Saturday is Sex Day!

A couple weeks ago while out with a couple of lady friends and talking, one friend mentioned that she heard women have seven erogenous zones. She was wondering what all of them were. I thought the answer to her should be obvious since, you know, it's her body, but apparently she's not sure where all of them are and it's partly my gender's fault. Between the three of us, we were able to name six spots but had multiple guesses for mysterious number seven.

So, what are they all? Do you think there are less or more spots then seven? And what about male erogenous zones? Believe it or not, it's not just the penis! ;>

Welcome to saturday's sex thread. Discuss and feel free to be as anonymous as you want, if you get uncomfortable.

Saturday is Cartoon Day!

As always, two by Ted Rall.

Saturday Dog Blogging!

Look at Mac in his sweater... Cute or pathetic? Take your pick. ;>

The economy's doing great!

Sun Microsystems is cutting 3300 jobs. You know, good paying jobs. But doesn't worry, former Sun employees. Thanks to our fearless president, Wal-Mart and McDonalds are ready to accept your resume!

This just doesn't make sense

Somebody please explain this to me.

After months of dismal job growth, the nation's employers dusted off their help-wanted signs in March and added workers at the quickest pace in four years, swelling payrolls by 308,000.

Even so, the unemployment rate inched up a tenth of a point to 5.7 percent as more people were encouraged to start looking for work again but failed to find jobs, the Labor Department said Friday.

So, uhm, if there's all these new jobs, how come employment has gone up? And what kind of jobs are being created?

Employment was helped along by a couple of one-time events. The end of a supermarket strike in California contributed to 47,000 more retail sales jobs. Better weather after the February chill pushed construction employment up by 71,000 in March following a decline in the previous month.

But the economy added jobs across the service sector. Employment in health care and social assistance rose by 36,000. A rise in mortgage refinancing helped add 11,000 financial-sector jobs in what the Labor Department calls credit intermediation activities.

47,000 more retail sales jobs because the strike ended... Were those jobs that existed before the strike and suspended because of the strike, now just added back into the total? And the majority of these jobs are basically service/McJobs? Manufacturing hasn't added a single job?

I don't understand why we're supposed to be excited by this.

Little note: Beware of numerous grammar errors. 3 hours sleep, you know the drill...

Holy shit

Anna Perez, who worked for the National Security Council under Bush's (and Condi), directing communications, is now directing communications for all of NBC.

Ms. Perez will take up the post of executive vice president for communications, but her duties will expand when NBC becomes NBC-Universal after the expected completion of the network's merger with entertainment units of Vivendi Universal.

I'm under the assumption that this includes NBC news, which also includes MSNBC. Do you really need a sport a tin foil hat to contemplate the implications of this? Furthermore, how did she get this kind of executive position when she admits she's not qualified?!

"I love the television business," Ms. Perez said. "I have no expertise in it so I will have a bit of learning curve. But I can't remember the last time I didn't have a learning curve when I took a new job.''

Wow. This is just one step closer to state-run television.

Old news, but, sigh...

Look at what the old white men have done again.

Who are we fighting in Iraq?

In my Vietnam War class yesterday, my teacher talked about the different forces we fought in Vietnam. Then he mused an afterthought about Iraq, "...whoever we're fighting there."

Who are we fighting there?

The people who burned and kicked the corpses of four American contractors in the Iraqi town of Falluja this week were not armed insurgents or foreign fighters.

Children joined in as jubilant crowds played with the charred bodies, dragging them like trophies through the streets of a town overwhelmed by hatred for the occupying forces.

The government is able to point to polls that tell us how happy Iraqis are to have us there, but how believable are they? And even if the majority of Iraqis are happy with the occupation, will that feeling last? We can't fight a whole population if they turn against us, we learned that lesson in Vietnam. And we certainly can't fight children just on moral principle.

Are we really winning over Iraqis with this?

One tank rumbles through Baghdad with "Bloodlust" painted on its barrel. Another says "Kill them all."

And since Saddam did not have WMDs or connections to al-Qa'ida, all I can think of is the famous line from Clerks, "I'm not even supposed to be here today!" Yes, Saddam was a brutal dictator and world class asshole, but wasn't there a better way to dispose of him than this?

The economy's doing great!

Gateway is all their retail outlets, 2500 jobs gone.

You've got to be kidding me

Something tells me these people just need to get laid.

That tiny bit of print on a condom packet is at the center of a raging debate now that President George W. Bush has asked the Food and Drug Administration to modify the current warning to include information about human papillomavirus, commonly called HPV or genital warts.

And just what tiny bit of print is making Bush wage war on safe sex?

Justin Kleinman hadn't noticed the condom packet wording until he squinted to read it recently.

"This is completely pointless," the 24-year-old Chicagoan said of the warning telling him that, while condoms can help prevent the spread of some sexually transmitted diseases, there are no guarantees.

So I guess this means that condoms must be the problem! Look who thinks so...

"The lack of information getting to the American public regarding this disease is beyond comprehension," said Linda Klepacki, manager of the abstinence policy department at Focus on the Family, a Colorado-based organization.

You know, I have to agree with Focus on the Family on this point: There is a lack of information getting to the America public regarding sex and STDs. I also must point out that the block in this flow of information is directly the fault of the Bush administration, groups like Focus on the Family, and anyone else who supports abstinence-only "education." What these people wish to accomplish is to scare anyone away from having sex unless you're trying to create a baby, because they think sex is just too dangerous for the general public. So instead of educating people about how to avoid STDs, they choose the most dangerous option -- They wrongfully tell people that condoms don't work, thus demonizing them. The connection that this geniuses can't make is that people are going to have sex no matter what they say, condoms or no comdoms. By publicly belittling condoms, you are increasing the chances of people contracting and spreading STDs because they are going to continue having sex anyways. My example to prove this may be in poor taste, but... Look at Africa. It's the truth.

Now let's talk frankly about genital warts. Unfortunately, Bush and the abstinence groups are right in this instance, condoms do not provide full protection against HPV because all it takes to pass HPV on is genital-to-genital contact, and a condom only covers the penis and not the rest of the genitals. What Bush won't say is that many forms of HPV are benign, some may not even show up for a while.

If you suspect that you or your partner have HPV, try to cover up your genital areas as much as possible. You or your partner may only have cysts, which are benign and NOT HPV. If you see growths in the genital region, you should also get it checked by a doctor to make sure it's not HPV or herpes, but typically warts will have a top that looks like cauliflower, whereas cysts are smooth-topped.

If you're not sure if you or your partner has HPV, consider this a great opportunity to practice hand and oral sex. HPV cannot be passed onto the hands, and it being passed onto the mouth is very, very rare.

Now wouldn't it have been much easier for Bush and Focus on the Family to say what I just said instead of trying to scare people? It's called education. I know Bush is educationally challenged, but he should give it some thought sometime.

Pigs be flyin'!

Now I can expect to cash in on a few dates...

Today's Forecast

Similar to what the rest of the week has been like, cloudy but with a bit more drowsiness than usual, which could lead to profanity in the double digits. Dubyaler radar shows a bitterness front moving in this morning, with storms of anger edging behind it. Foggy conditions could lead to comprehension of 50% or below.

Light blogging, got whacked with monthly reports at work tonight. I'll be lucky if I get these done before 5.

Welcome to Bizarro World, USA

I really, really don't get what the majority of us silly Americans are thinking. Take, for example, this article: "Clarke's Charges Gain Acceptance." The first paragraph states:

Most Americans accept Richard Clarke's key criticisms of President Bush's anti-terrorism record, but a majority also thinks that politics influenced the timing of the charges by the former White House aide, a Los Angeles Times poll has found.

One underreported fact about Clarke's book is that it could have come out earlier. All books by former members of the Bush administration have to be screened by the White House to make sure the text does not include classified information. The White House took three months to review Clarke's book (NPR's Fresh Air, 3/24/04). This book could have been released while 9 Democratic candidates were still duking it out in the primaries, but it was the White House's feet dragging that caused it to be released now.

With that said, why should it matter that politics influenced Clarke to write the book when you believe the facts? This is just silly. "Well, gee, Bush completely ignored terrorism before 9/11, but since this truthful information was released with political intentions of getting a terrible president voted out of office, that just invalidates everything Clarke has brought to light!" How does this even begin to make sense?

But it starts to make even less sense.

Nearly three-fifths of those surveyed echoed the contention by Clarke that Bush placed a higher priority on invading Iraq than combating terrorism. And a smaller majority agreed with the charge by the onetime White House counterterrorism chief that Bush did not focus enough on the terrorist threat before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Again, the majority agrees that Bush sucks. But...

And despite the attention Clarke's charges have received, almost three-fifths of Americans said Bush's anti-terrorism and defense policies had made the nation more secure.

Argh! Even when faced with the facts, people still think Bush is doing a great job as far as terrorism is concerned! The mountain of evidence against this man is astounding: Clarke's alligations, al-Qa'ida's recent bombings, al-Qa'ida's ties to members of the Saudi royal family who are personal friends with the Bush family, Osama bin Laden has not been caught, there were no WMDs in Iraq, Saddam did not have connections to al-Qa'ida or 9/11, not to mention the chaos which happened in Iraq that's left 600 troops dead, 18,000 with medical evacuations, and possibly an impending civil war. How anybody can think Bush has made the country safer is beyond me. But even when faced with the facts, Americans don't seem to care. Why?

By 57% to 37%, those polled agreed with Clarke's contention that "President Bush was more focused on attacking Iraq than dealing with terrorism."

...Bush won more support for his policies on terrorism than any other issue measured. In the poll, 56% said they approved of his handling of the war on terrorism; 39% disapproved.

Anyone got a brick wall handy? I need to bash my head against something.

Condi Condi Condi

So, if you and the rest of the Bush administration were sooooo concerned about terrorism before 9/11, how come al-Qa'ida wasn't even mentioned in a speech she was supposed to give on 9/11?

On Sept. 11, 2001, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to outline a Bush administration policy that would address "the threats and problems of today and the day after, not the world of yesterday" -- but the focus was largely on missile defense, not terrorism from Islamic radicals.

The speech provides telling insight into the administration's thinking on the very day that the United States suffered the most devastating attack since the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor. The address was designed to promote missile defense as the cornerstone of a new national security strategy, and contained no mention of al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden or Islamic extremist groups, according to former U.S. officials who have seen the text.

And what kind of Republican speech would this be if it didn't take a jab at Clinton?

The text also implicitly challenged the Clinton administration's policy, saying it did not do enough about the real threat -- long-range missiles.

But, but, wait! I thought Condi said that Bush continued the terrorism policies of Clinton! Is she floppity-floppitying around like that fishie at the end of Faith No More's first video?

Or maybe she's just fucking lying.

Boy is this guy a douchebag

Everytime Scott the Wonderboy opens his piehole, I pray for a lightning bolt to get attracted to his fillings. Latest example:

"We're working with the commission to move forward as quickly as possible," Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman, said. `'I think most Americans view Dick Clarke and his contradictions as yesterday's news."

To paraphrase Scotty: We think most Americans could give a planeflying ratfuck if my boss gave a planeflying ratfuck about terrorism before 9/11. Wow. So the White House doesn't care if citizens aren't concerned about failures of their government that may have helped to the mass murder of 3000 people? That's essentially what he just said.

As predicted...

OPEC cuts oil production. I can't wait until it costs more then 20 bucks to fill up my tank.

I pity da fo0

There's a rumor floating around that Google's Gmail is merely an April Fools prank. I cannot confirm this, but Google does have a rather obvious prank already in store, GCHEESE!

Google is interviewing candidates for engineering positions at our lunar hosting and research center, opening late in the spring of 2007...

The Google Copernicus Hosting Environment and Experiment in Search Engineering (G.C.H.E.E.S.E.) is a fully integrated research, development and technology facility at which Google will be conducting experiments in entropized information filtering, high-density high-delivery hosting (HiDeHiDeHo) and de-oxygenated cubicle dwelling. This center will provide a unique platform from which Google will leapfrog current terrestrial-based technologies and bring information access to new heights of utility.

Well hidehideho... Just wondering, would a "de-oxygenated cubicle dwelling" lead to asphyxiation?

It's official

There's no link between abortion and breast cancer. Not like proof will stop the pro-life brownshirts from propagating this myth, though.

Perils of Third Shift Blogging

You miss a lot of shit that happens during the day. So I'm going to completely ripoff one of my favorite daytime bloggers, Jesse at Gotham City 13, for all the news you could have missed. Hope he doesn't mind...

Yesterday, I mentioned I would have written about this story if I had time. Well, Jesse has a photo of the burnt bodies of American contractors hanging from a bridge in Falluja. Alternet has more information here.

What the fuck are these Pentagon papers found at a Starbucks? Eric Ruff left the papers there, but who the fuck is he? (Well, for starters, Jesse reveals he's a Republican operative.)

And, uhm that's about all I wanted to link to. I may raid other blogs tonight, who knows... I'm feeling a bit off and not quite awake.

So, how many medical evacuations has our military had in Iraq, you ask?

18,004.

More Uzbek dispatches

updated 03:06

This Guardian article give us another slice of what we're supporting.

Still, the stoicism occasionally broke as people voiced rare public outrage at President Islam Karimov, the country's current and Soviet-era leader who has displayed little desire for democratic or economic reform.

``Why didn't Karimov come here to see the victims?'' asked one woman.

Another woman who lived in the same apartment building as the alleged terrorists talked about what she saw but wouldn't give her name. ``I have children,'' she explained.

With no live media coverage or officials giving any news conferences, rumors compounded the fear and anger.

At the end of the day, after the hoses were put away, the official version of events finally made it to state-run TV.

The evening news, which distrustful Uzbeks cynically refer to as ``the news of paradise'' that bears little resemblance to their lives, led with Karimov meeting the former Lithuanian president. Tuesday's violence merited only a brief statement.

This really makes me want to pay my taxes. And that's before we get to the torturing.

Avozov, however, was hardly the last to suffer torture, which the HRW [Human Rights Watch] report describes as a routine action against detainees and prisoners in Uzbekistan but whose practice is particularly severe against independent Muslims in order to force confessions or testimony against others. The report documents 10 deaths from torture over the past five years, although that toll excludes cases for which there is no direct evidence, such as the death under suspicious circumstances of a 44-year-old independent Muslim prisoner, Abdurahman Narzullaev, just two weeks ago after he participated in a prison hunger strike.

Based on five years of research throughout Uzbekistan, including some 200 interviews with victims and their relatives, as well as other witnesses, human rights defenders and government officials, the report notes that independent Muslims are arrested on vague charges of "subversion," "encroachment on the constitutional order," or "anti-state activities," tried "in grossly unfair proceedings," and routinely sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. Those targeted for arrest include people whom the state deems "too pious," a term that may include those who pray at home or wear a beard.

The report details cases of numerous prisoners who were tortured by methods such as beatings, rape, electric shock, asphyxiation, suspension from wrists or ankles, and burning with cigarettes or lit newspapers.

The regime has also used mass public denunciations of the families of independent Muslims in which they are paraded before their neighbors to be denounced as "traitors" or "enemies of the state" in demonstrations that recall the Stalin period. In addition, police are known to arrest and torture family members of alleged "extremists" or "Wahhabis" in order to gain their surrender.

Yeah. We the FUCK are we supporting this country's government?

Bam!

Short blast of headlines I would write about if my shift didn't end in 5 minutes. Seven companies want to bid to build the first nuclear power plant in America 70's. Greeeeat, just when the homeland is secure! Germany is cutting their greenhouse gas emissions. And something I wish I had time to read right now, "Jubilant Iraqis Drag Burned Body Through Streets."

This can't be right

The Clarke scandal has been beating Bush over the head for the past week, so how the hell can he be pulling ahead of Kerry in the polls? Sigh. Do people actually believe Condi Rice? Well, maybe that won't last when she meets to commission publicly next week.

Why pull it?

This ad is just so cruel... I love it.

One of New Mexico's biggest American Indian-run casinos has pulled a controversial TV ad that promoted gambling as a financial solution to people who are short on cash or deeply in debt.

I wonder if stock brokers and mutual fund companies can be convinced to pull their ads, too.

It sure would be nice to have a hint as to what presidential administrations are thinking

Maybe then we would see reports like this one, out 10 years late, that Clinton ignored the genocide on Rwanda.

You know, it's America which has the superior health care system

That's why Canadian health care advocacy groups are calling upon their government to ban web pharmacies selling Canadian drugs. They are afraid of these businesses causing drug shortages because all of those pesky Americans love to buy cheap, Canadian drugs.

More violence in Uzbekistan

Fuck you, Colin. Fuck you.

The US has offered to help Uzbekistan probe the attacks which have killed at least 42 people in the last three days.

American Secretary of State Colin Powell made the offer in a telephone call to his Uzbek counterpart.

I don't like people dying in attacks by militants just as much as the rest of you, but the reaction from the Bush administration is simply appalling. Uzbekistan's government holds 6000 political prisoners captive, a massive human rights violation in and of itself before factoring in the torture that many of those people go through, yet Colin, nor any of the other assholes from this administration, will say peep about this. But the minute there's violence, probably due to a repressive government run by dictator, excuse me, Uzbek president Islam Abdughanievich Karimov, we rush to his aid. How despicable. How absolutely fucking hypocritical that we support a ruthless dictator like Karimov when Bush invades Iraq and tries telling the world that he did it to remove a ruthless dictator.

And for anybody who's about to say that Karimov doesn't compare to Saddam, shut up. Both are guilty of massive human rights violations, and I remind you that we also supported Saddam back when he was committing crimes on the "small" scale that Karimov is currently guilty of. Both are ruthless dictators, but yet we fully support one.

To understand Uzbekistan more and why we support them, I highly suggest reading this article two or three times. You'll find out stuff like this:

Karimov's American supporters – yes, incredibly, he has them! – have been singing his praises for months, the most vocal being ex-leftist Stephen Schwartz, fired from the Voice of America for his nutty views, formerly with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, and now, seemingly, a full-time publicist for one of the most un-democratic and flamboyantly repugnant regimes in the world. In his new role as attorney for the Karimov regime, Schwartz writes:

"Since September 11, the United States no longer accepts the claim that the free exercise of terrorist agitation, incitement, and organization outweighs the benefits of legal sanction. Here, the "fallacy of prior restraint" has been replaced by a reliance on the doctrines of "probable cause" and "preemption." That is, extremist rhetoric provides sufficient probable cause to take preemptive action to prevent bloodshed."

Karimov is justified in cracking down on Hizb-ut-Tahrir, interrogating and jailing Muslims who grow beards or wear the veil, closing mosques, and outlawing opposition political parties, because, as The Schwartz puts it,

"By their radicalism, groups like HT that do not presently carry out acts of violence nonetheless prepare an environment conducive to violence."

If the neocons can't quite yet implement this new principle of intellectual "prior restraint" in the U.S., Schwartz and his fellow neo-authoritarians are glad to see it being given a dry run in Uzbekistan. For the author of The Two Faces of Islam, a book that posits Saudi Arabia's Wahhabist sect as the epicenter of world evil, Uzbekistan, which bans all expressions of Wahhabism, is a kind of utopia. He has recently traveled there and now regales his readers with tales of Karimov's Orwellian domain as an 'aspiring democracy," a "transitional" society, and, anyway, he grandly announces, "Uzbekistan cannot afford to assure liberty for the enemies of liberty." Human rights advocates who criticize the modern-day Tamerlane are "naïve," says Schwartz: "In the struggle to liberate Islam from the grip of the Wahhabi-Saudi mafia, Karimov should have our backing."

He wants us to back this, and this, and this – not just with rhetoric, but with American tax dollars There is only one possible response to such a moral obscenity: Ugh!

Did I mention that the US plans on putting military bases in Uzbekistan, and Big Oil also has an interest in keeping friendly relations with murderous dictators who do our bidding? You really need to read the whole article and spend some quality time with the links it provides. Our support for Uzbekistan invalidates any moral reason Bush can muster for invading Iraq, but as you've already guessed, Bush can hardly be bothered to give a shit about the welfare of people within our borders or beyond.

JESUS!

Can you believe that CBS bleeped out Janet saying "Oh Jesus"? Honest to fucking god. They bleeped it out on an interview that aired around midnight, no less. Talk about overfuckingreaction. This kind of censorship just plain scares me. What's next, the deletion of anything insulting to Christanity from TV? That's exactly what they want, you know.

Correction

Hey, remember the story about a senior al-Qa'ida member being caught? Well, he wasn't caught. First we hear bin Laden is cornered, wrong. Then Zawahri is cornered, wrong. Now this story. What can be believe?

The Charms of Outsourcing

I had a conversation with Matt tonight. He goes to a business college, and today they brought somebody in to lecture them on how great outsourcing is.

Matt told he me told the speaker that if outsourcing is so great, he'll gladly take his job for 50% of what he's making.

The speaker replies, "Typically, companies who outsource save more than 50%."

Matt replies, "Then I'll do it for 25%."

He also told me that something happened a tray and sandwiches. They were gone, only thing left was a note, "Relocated to India."

Break out the KY

Gas prices are going up up up, if this article is any indictaton.

World oil prices jumped half a dollar on Wednesday, led by a rally in gasoline to an all-time record after an explosion and fire at the third largest refinery in the United States.

Explosion? Fire? In US? What? Us third shifters always get the news late...

Prices were already on the rise before the Tuesday evening refinery blast at BP's plant in Texas...

BP said there was no indication of "any outside influence" in the blast and fire, which comes less than a week after the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation issued Texas oil refiners a warning about possible terror attacks to coincide with U.S. elections in November.

As if the news couldn't get worse, it looks like OPEC is ready to annouce a cut in oil production.

Early comments from OPEC ministers from Qatar, Libya, Algeria, Iran and Venezuela indicated the one-million-barrel-per-day output reduction would go ahead on April 1 as agreed at the previous meeting in February.

Great. Well, at least I know I'll lose weight this summer, I won't be able to afford to go out as much and make myself fat.

And they can't blame file sharing for this one

Major label EMI cuts 1500 jobs, some of which are in America. It's not that they're fighting to keep their heads above water, though.

EMI, home to the Rolling Stones, Coldplay and Radiohead, also said recorded music sales in the year to end-March 2004 held close to the previous year's levels, despite rampant piracy and competition from other entertainment.

Though, in interest of fairness (EMI has their reasons for the cuts, "retooling their business model, etc.), I'll also print this article since in the previous post I bitched about major labls releasing shitty music.

"We believe that by concentrating our efforts on a tightened roster of artists we will increase our revenue-generating potential while reducing our costs." Niche and under-performing artists would go, EMI said, without giving names.

So you want proof that file sharing helps album sales?

Here you go. That's a lnk (to a link) of a study which draws a correlation between the most popular songs downloaded and the albums which contain them not suffering from sales. So maybe the record companies are "losing money" (they're still raking in multi-billion dollars worth of profits) because they continue to release a constant barrage of shitty music?

On that topic, what's the last major label album you bought? Compare that with the last CD you bought and whether or not it was released on an independent label. Besides the latest Offspring album I got this Christmas, the last major label album I bought was Johnny Cash's "The Man Comes Around." I purchased that in October of 2002, so it's been a year and a half since I found it worthwhile to purchase anything released by a major label. How about you?

Love him or loathe him

You have appreciate Nader for quotes like this: "Things have gotten so bad in this country, you look back at Richard Nixon with nostalgia."

Tee hee hee

Devil Rays - 8
Yankees - 3

Yankess suck. :)

Roll your eyes on 3... 2...

Outsourcing computer jobs great for the economy, or so says The Information Technology Association of America. And just who is the ITAA?

...according to the ITAA, whose 500 members include Microsoft Corp., Hewlett-Packard Corp. and Amazon.com.

Oh, no, they're not biased. Never! A group whose Board of Directors include executives of corporations who oursource IT jobs could never be biased! This article is innocently titled, "Study: Outsourcing Tech Jobs Helps Economy." The short blurb in it that mentioned who the members of the ITAA were came near the end. "Study." This is such horseshit.

This isn't a solution

John Kerry wants to lower gas prices by restricting oil to goto our emergency stockpile. I can't see how this is a good idea... What happens in case of an embargo? It's not like we haven't pissed off the Middle East enough right now. Speaking of countries that we've pissed off, we can't fall back on Venezuela to help maintain our oil supplies.

If he wants gas prices lowered for reasonable means, I'd like to suggest placing a higher tax for gas on suburban SUV owners who are using so much gas that it's trashing the balance of supply and demand, but that would be hugely unpopular. (Even if it's fair, as fa as I'm concerened.) For a suggestion that would be more popular, I'd like it if Kerry proposed keeping and increasing the tax credit for people who purchase hybrid automobiles, but this won't provide immediate relief for gas prices. Cutting the reserves may provide the only immediate relief, but it's not really a good idea.

Kerry needs to do the right thing and create a plan for alternative energy. Why drill for oil in Alaska when you can power cars immdiately with corn ethanol, while putting in place a 10 year plan for hydrogen cars to go from pipe dream to mainstream?

Think using corn ethanol is a radical idea?

Illinois doesn't. Neither does Canada, who (I believe, but I can't read French) go beyond a mere 10% blend of corn ethanol with gas and allow you to fill up completely with corn ethanol.

I've filled up at both these pumps and my car ran fine. But it seems that no matter how much I preach about the benefits of corn ethanol, nobody ever listens to me. (Well, nobody super important, at least.)

I've said it once and I'll say again: Alternative energy, alternative energy, alternative energy! I want you to say it, too. When John Kerry's campaign blog makes a post about this issue today, go there and post a comment about alternative energy. Link to this post. Maybe it will get somebody's attention.

Terrifying

Hanson is releasing a new album, 7 years after they had their only hit. In other news, record companies are still bitching about sales, wondering why nobody buys CD's anymore.

Maine is trying a statewide healthcare program

Read all about it.

Gee, what reason could terrorists have had to bomb Uzbekistan?

They have 6000 reasons. Start counting. And no, I'm not condoning the bombings there, but what the fuck? Uzbekistan has 6000 political prisoners, some of whom (maybe many) have been and continue to be tortured in horrible ways, and we're sending them $160m in foreign aid because they support the war on terror. The only surprise here is why they haven't already had suicide bombings. And why the hell are we supporting such an atrocious government?

Wow, Drudge sure is outscooping that liberal media!

He says that - shockola! - Clarke's book is, god forbid, making a lot of money! Oooh! That's hard hitting fucking journalism. What's Drudge's next headline going to be? "!!!EXCLUSIVE!!! Clarke has corn in his shit! MUST CREDIT DRUDGEREPORT.COM!"

God, what a pathetic, useless piece of fuck this man is.

Latest news from Texas!

You know, I just can't make this shit up.

A Texas woman heating fish sticks was shot in the leg by a gun that had been stashed in her oven, police said.

Roxanne Perez, 29, was taken to a local hospital where she was in good condition, police said Friday.

They said a friend of hers had hidden the .357 caliber handgun in the stove two weeks earlier without telling her after she told him no guns were allowed in her house.

When Perez heated up the fish sticks she also heated up the gun, which caused several rounds to be fired. One hit her in the leg.

No charges have been filed because the shooting was accidental, police said.

Give Nader a little credit

Could you imagine the shitstorm from Democrats if it was annouced that Nader was meeting with Bush? But he's not, instead he's meeting with Kerry. If he was working for the GOP, he wouldn't be meeting with Kerry to discuss the best way to defeat Bush.

And I'm not sure how this meeting was scheduled, but if Kerry reached out to talk to Nader, then he deserves a little credit. Gore and the Democrats simply ignored Nader in 2000, then decided to blame everything on him after the whole Florida fiasco, ignoring nearly everything else that happened in that state which were much bigger problems. Nader got 3 million votes last election, which may not sound like much, but given how much votes count these days I'm happy to see a Democrat candidate finally trying to bridge the Green boundry instead of looking upon us Greenies like were some kinf of nutcase group that doesn't need to be listened too.

Invasion of the Klingons

Fark has a Condi Rice photoshop contest. You didn't have to work for the next 5 minutes, did you?

I really feel safer with Bush in office. Really! Part Two!

Remember that boondoogle of a missile defense system that could only pass a test if it was rigged? It's baaaaack. Bush is trying to put the system online before the elections (gee, I wonder why), but it's so riddled with problems that even the military is urging caution.

A congressional audit recently found that the system is largely unproved and its technical challenges "remain significant." A senior Pentagon official told Congress last week that one of the missile shield's key satellite systems will cost more and take longer to get into orbit than planned. A day later, 49 retired U.S. military generals and admirals, including William Crowe, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, urged President Bush to delay building the system until the bugs are worked out. Among other things, no one knows whether the system will work at night or in bad weather.

Bush wants to blow $10.2b on this next year, but where could that money go?

The retired generals would rather see it spent securing the nation's nuclear weapons and materials and protecting ports and borders against terrorists armed with unconventional weapons.

For one thing, securing the ports makes a lot of sense since a problem-riddled missile defense system would be hard pressed to stop a nuclear warhead somebody floated into one of our ports. And you can chalk that one up under the big ole "Duh!" column generally used for common sense, something which alludes der monkey again and again. But since Bush wants the missile defense system in place by November, expect him to use it in the campaign, lie to us about it, and say it's another plank in the war on terrorism. Also expect the right wing press to parrot whatever he says like it's the gospel, claiming that Democrats and anyone who does not support Bush are leaving us unprotected from all of those imaginary nukes from Iraq.

I really feel safer with Bush in office. Really!

He's done so much to prepare us for the next attack, let me tell ya.

Two years after a report on the 2001 anthrax attacks was completed, the Pentagon has released parts of the unclassified document, which concludes that the nation is woefully ill-prepared to detect and respond to a bioterrorist assault.

In a sweeping assessment, the report identifies weaknesses in "almost every aspect of U.S. biopreparedness and response." But perhaps equally significant is the two-year battle over the Pentagon's refusal to release the study. That struggle highlights the growing tension between public access to information and the government's refusal to divulge anything it says terrorists could use to attack Americans.

I just don't know what the silly liberal media is talking about. Of course Bush has prepared us! They gave us Ready.gov, the site that tells us citizens to be ready for the next terrorist attack because you know it's fucking coming! (Wouldn't it be more proactive to have "Prevent.gov"?) And let's not forget what they told us to do in case of a chemical attack by terrorists - Seal off your home with duct tape and plastic! Don't allow any air to get in! Which means you'll suffocate and die after a few hours, but hey, at least you didn't die from any nasty chemicals!

God, I think the next Bush program to combat terrorism is to give every citizen a gun with a note, "In case of terrorist emergency, place gun in open mouth and pull trigger." This makes about as much sense as the rest of the shit they've done.

And let's not forget the priceless pictures our government provided to us through Ready.gov.

Man, if we could only be as calm as Joe Average here, pondering the swirling vortex of fish.

Fuck the worker!

I honestly can't believe what the money-changers are complaining about now.

...Costco Wholesale Corp. often is held up as a retailer that does it right, paying well and offering generous benefits.

But Costco's kind-hearted philosophy toward its 100,000 cashiers, shelf-stockers and other workers is drawing criticism from Wall Street. Some analysts and investors contend that the Issaquah, Wash., warehouse-club operator actually is too good to employees, with Costco shareholders suffering as a result.

"From the perspective of investors, Costco's benefits are overly generous," says Bill Dreher, retailing analyst with Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. "Public companies need to care for shareholders first. Costco runs its business like it is a private company."

Unbelievable. God forbid a large chain company gives most of their workers health care if the shareholders aren't raking in the dough! Seeing stories like this make me want to support the death penalty in certain cases.

The article also shows where all those jobs Bush talks about being created have come from.

Wal-Mart last year added 99,000 jobs in the U.S., making it the country's biggest job creator, and nearly all those positions pay by the hour.

Remember, the economy's doing great!

We can only hope this man has yet to breed

Get that knife away from me!

Cambodian cuts off penis to feed spirits

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - A Cambodian man cut off his penis when he said he was visited by four hungry spirits in a dream and he had no chicken or duck to offer them.

According to police, 33-year-old Soun Ney told the spirits to go away when they first appeared to ask for food, and waved his penis at them in defiance.

"Devils, I don't have any chicken or duck for you," he was quoted as saying by local police chief Phoeung Vat. "If you want to eat anything, you can eat my penis."

Soun Ney said the spirits agreed to eat his penis. He was rushed to a hospital near the capital Phnom Penh after he castrated himself with a butcher's knife.

"He is lucky to be alive," Phoeung Vat told Reuters.

Villagers in the deeply impoverished southeast Asian traditionally offer chicken, duck or cake to the spirits of the dead to ward off bad luck.

You know, if spirits offered me a choice between bad luck and my tallywhacker, it's the latter hands down any day of the week.

Something got your goat?

Or maybe someone...

There were three goats on the farm Chris Weathersbee's mother bought seven years ago. Now there are 300 — including 70 living in his house, much of which is covered with a mix of goat droppings and hay.

Blood Democracy

Bush wanted democracy in Iraq, right? Well, the Shiites are giving him one. They're really against the proposed Iraqi constitution.

Posters have gone up at universities in Baghdad and elsewhere, leaflets have circulated among prayer-goers and Sistani's cadres -- from young clerics to devoted laymen -- have gathered tens of thousands of signatures on the petitions.

...Kadhim Atshan, a member of the committee, said a third of the people wanted to sign with pens dipped in their own blood.

Luckily, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani won't accept those signatures for his petitions.

Some Shiite who are speaking out are getting shut down by the US, like this Shiite newspaper which we just banned. I don't know exactly what was printed in this printer, but I thought that having a free press was something necessary for a healthy democracy to exist. Newspapers must, and should very well be, critical of the government.

Who really fought a war on terror?

With my third shift schedule and random patterns of sleeping, I never get a chance to listen to NPR's Fresh Air during the week, so I felt lucky to catch a repeat while running some errands yesterday. Richard Clarke was he guest on the repeated show, and near the end he had this to say which I found very interesting, if not very incriminating. (No link, found transcript via Lexis/Nexis.) It's a rather long exchange between Clarke and Gross, so put on your reading goggles.

GROSS: Let me read something you say about President Bush in your book. You write, 'When he focused, he asked the kind of questions that revealed a bumper-sticker description of the problem. Once he had that, he could put energy behind a drive to achieve his goal. The problem was that many of the important issues, like terrorism, like Iraq, were laced with important subtlety and nuance. These issues needed analysis, and Bush and his inner circle had no real interest in complicated analyses on the issues they cared about. They already knew the answers. It was received wisdom.' Let's get back to what you're saying about President Bush here; that he had a 'bumper-sticker description of problems.'

Mr. CLARKE: Well, I think one of my favorite quotes from President Bush is, quote, "I don't do nuance," unquote. That's his self-description. And, you know, many of these problems are very nuanced, technical, detailed kinds of things that you can't reduce to a bumper-sticker slogan, like, 'Fight the war on terrorism.' And it takes attention, it takes time, it takes analysis. And they're not too fond of analysis.

GROSS: What do you hope your testimony to the September 11th commission will accomplish?

Mr. CLARKE: Well, I think, for one thing, it will set the record straight about what the Clinton administration did and did not do; set the record straight about what the Bush administration did and did not do. You know, the Clinton administration is not blameless here. And recent press coverage of my book has focused on my criticism of the Bush administration, but that's one chapter in the book. There's a lot of blame to go around. The Clinton administration did accomplish some things, which are not widely known, but it also failed in some areas. Among the things it did, which are not widely known, is it did retaliate militarily for terrorist attacks against Iraq, against al-Qaeda, which the previous Bush administration and the previous Reagan administration had not done. We had hundreds of Americans killed during the Reagan administration in Beirut, and there was no military retaliation against the terrorists. Hundreds of Americans killed by Libya in Pan Am 103 in the Bush administration, and there was no military retaliation against the terrorists.

So Clinton did use military retaliation. He effectively stopped Iraqi-sponsored terrorism against the United States. He effectively stopped Iranian-sponsored terrorism against the United States. He prevented al-Qaeda from taking over Bosnia when it was trying to do so. He stopped the attacks in the millennium period. He stopped many al-Qaeda attacks. But he did not eliminate al-Qaeda. Why? It's easy for us now, after 9/11, to say that we should have done this or that beforehand. But when Clinton left office, fewer than 50 Americans had been killed by al-Qaeda over the course of eight years. Contrast that to the figures I just gave you for the terrorist deaths under Reagan and Bush. A lot of people [tasnote: read Bush] thought that al-Qaeda was a kind of nuisance-level problem. Clinton didn't. His administration was working hard to go after al-Qaeda. It didn't do some of the things that it might have done. For example, it didn't bomb all of the infrastructure, all of the terrorist camps. It did once bomb in Afghanistan, but it didn't go back and bomb and bomb and bomb and destroy the terrorist camps. It should have done that.

GROSS: In terms of the Clinton administration and its attempts to destroy al-Qaeda, you were very angry about the distraction of the impeachment process and how much attention was paid by the government to the Monica Lewinsky scandal. You write, 'Clinton was weakened by continued political attack. He couldn't get the CIA, the Pentagon and FBI to act sufficiently to deal with the threats.' To what extent do you think that the impeachment process hindered the United States' ability to stop the threat of terrorism or to at least decrease that threat?

[tasnote: And here's where we're reminded of just how much Republicans cared about terrorism before 9/11.]

Mr. CLARKE: After the two US embassies were attacked in August of 1998, President Clinton responded with a military retaliation against al-Qaeda camps. And instead of the Congress and the media and the American people saying, 'Yes, that's what we want; use military force against terrorists,' what happened was a wave of criticism of Clinton. The Republicans and many in the right-wing media said what the president was trying to do was to divert attention from his own personal problems in the Lewinsky investigation.

They recalled a movie called "Wag The Dog." And you remember that movie had the following scenario: A president in trouble politically decides to use military force to divert attention, and he makes up a reason to invade Albania. And so after Clinton attacked the camps, he was accused of 'wagging the dog'; in other words, using military force when it wasn't necessary in order to divert attention. Well, after you've used military force once and you get that kind of reaction, let's just say you're not precluded from doing it again, but the threshold is raised. It becomes more difficult for the president to decide to do it again. And, frankly, Terry, if anybody has wagged the dog here, I think it's not Bill Clinton. It's George Bush because, just as in the movie when we made up a reason to invade Albania, I'd say we've made up a reason to invade Iraq.

As far as I'm concerned, this is pretty damning for the Bush administration, and the GOP in general. Look at what Clinton did before 9/11 compared to Bush, who's administration called focusing on bin Laden "a mistake" (link via Buzzflash).

These people didn't give a damn about terrorism before 9/11, and nothing Condi Rice says will change that. I didn't catch her 60 Minutes interview tonight (third shift/sleeping, blah) but honestly, do I think I would have learned anything from it? Would I have been converted? Would I have even believed a word she said? No, of course not. I hate to be that closed minded, but I simply can't believe a word anybody from this administration says anymore. Whenever the White House speaks out against its opponents, they simply attempt to smear them without addressing the facts of the situation. You know what I'm talking about, in this case it's what Clarke's motives are? Well gee, try this one on for size: Maybe his motive is to make the country a better, safer place. Shockola! One would hope that Clarke, Bush, and his defenders would all have that same motive in mind, but apparently they don't since one is willing to deal with the facts and the other doesn't want those facts to see the light of day.

And speaking of Rice, how come she has enough time to go in 60 Minutes, but somehow can't bring herself to testify publicly in front of the 9/11 Commission? And it's amazing that she can go on national television and tell us, "al Qaeda is not more dangerous today than it was on September 11," and "The world is a lot safer and the war on terrorism is well-served by the victory in Iraq." Try selling your snake oil to the people of Spain, Condi.

Oh, this is rich

With comments like this, the Bush campaign will need to shell out some emergency medical funds to surgically remove feet from the mouths of those who speak for him.

John Kerry cited a Bible verse Sunday to criticize leaders who have "faith but has no deeds," prompting President Bush's spokesman to accuse Kerry of exploiting Scripture for a political attack.

Christ. I'm not even sure where to start with this one. It's as if Bush simply doesn't give a damn about being hypocritical anymore. This is the man who speaks for the party which is home to the Christian Coalition, 700 Club, and rabid anti-lifers who do nothing but use the Scripture for political attack. But if a Democrat mentions religion, suddenly it's wrong? What's Bush gonna say next?, "Shame on you Kerry! Don't you know it's only right to use the deaths of 3000 people for political gain?"

Hindsight

Last friday, I made this post which ended with a comment about ovens. I received an email about it from someone who wishes to remain anonymous, but it has me a little concerned. This is a rather strong post and I probably did cross some sort of line in the sand as to what is and isn't acceptable. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

Call in CSI

dKos lists all the major, high profile investigations that Republicans are under right now. They have ten, and the Democrats have zero. GOP is number one!

The driving up of drive-offs

As gas prices continue to rise, so do the number of people filling up and driving away without paying for it. Somehow, I just can't feel sorry for the gas monopoly companies on this one, seeing that every time the gas prices go up, somehow their profits mysteriously go up. I realize that part of the equation when factoring how much gas is depends upon how much it's selling for on the world market, but their profits have gone up quite a bit, while the prices of gas seem to rise at the same time and stay uniform to each other no matter what station you goto. It makes you wonder.

Golly, who wouldn't want to run away from these reasonable prices? This horror story comes to us from California, coming to a state near you this summer.

One more note: OPEC meets this wednesday, they will decide then if oil production will be cut and by how much.

I'll be checking this out when I get bored

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