WE'RE MOVING!!!

New site:

Out of My Mind

Got Our Daily Foley Joke Here

The Top 5 IM Lines Sent by Mark Foley (mild version)

5. i'm putn final touches on bill right now. btw, bill sez hi.

4. i'm up for re-erection soon

3. will u b my date to the NAMBLA dance?

2. wanna meet on the floor of my house or yours?

and the Number 1 IM Line Sent by Mark Foley...

1. who's your pro-family values daddy?

Link.

Our Leaders' Lessons from Vietnam

The wrong one, of course. The correct lesson is to choose your wars properly i.e. limit yourself to necessary wars.

And then there's Iraq. Was any war less necessary?

But then, this is what the wingnuts learned from Vietnam. Their dementia is clear. This what Rummy learned:

Today the centers of gravity of the conflict in Iraq and the global war on terror are not on battlefields overseas. Rather, the center of gravity of this war are on the centers of public opinion in the U.S. and in the capitals of free nations

Link.

Obvious Insight of the Day, a Thought for Our Times

Bush + Dick = Fucked

Link.

The Money Class Thinks Our Leaders are Failing Us!!!

Link. (It's to the Journal -- sub. reqs.)

Foley: When First Known

Well at least two people know exactly how long it's going on, obviously.

But what does the press say?

Our Leaders' Successful Policies in Regard to North Korea is Nothing Less than Explosive

For dummies, here it is in a simple nutshell. Hint: Yet another failed policy of this administration. (Its successes can be counted on one hand and they're questionable: accretion of poer/weakening of the system of government and upward transfer of power.)

But I digress:

* * * As Glenn Kessler writes in the Washington Post this morning, North Korea's latest actions "may well be regarded as a failure of the Bush administration's nuclear nonproliferation policy." That's an understatement, a point Kessler makes plain as he lays out the relevant history:

"When Bush became president in 2000, Pyongyang's reactor was frozen under a 1994 agreement with the United States. Clinton administration officials thought they were so close to a deal limiting North Korean missiles that in the days before he left office, Bill Clinton seriously considered making the first visit to Pyongyang by a U.S. president. But conservatives had long been deeply skeptical of the deal freezing North Korea's program -- known as the Agreed Framework -- in part because it called for building two light-water nuclear reactors (largely funded by the Japanese and South Koreans). When then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell publicly said in early 2001 that he favored continuing Clinton's approach, Bush rebuked him."

That's just the beginning of the story; if anyone needs a primer on how we got to where we are today, Kessler's piece is as good as any.

Link.

Great Moral Exemplars from the Past

Chenoweth was a huge nutjob, she was the militia's mouth in the House. But like the wingnuts, a Randian: Confident in their superiority and, as such, secure in the knowledge that laws were not for them to obey.

And this Randian refusal to obey the rule of law got her dead:

CARSON CITY (AP) -- Helen Chenoweth-Hage, a conservative Republican firebrand who served three terms as an Idaho congresswoman, was killed Monday when thrown from a car that overturned on an isolated central Nevada highway.

Chenoweth-Hage was a passenger in the S-U-V-type vehicle that flipped just before noon on State Route 376, the main route between her Pine Creek Ranch, in Monitor Valley, and Tonopah.

***

N-H-P Trooper Rocky Gonzalez says Chenoweth-Hage was holding the baby and wasn't wearing a seatbelt. State law requires both seatbelts and babyseats. Both Chenoweth-Hage and the baby were thrown from the car but the child had only minor injuries.

Link.

This Blog's Official Poster

Link.

The GOP House's Moral Exemplary System for Dealing with Ethical Issues

Is it clear yet that these moral exemplars are just bullsh!tting hypocrites?

The General, of all people, lays it out:

Doc Hastings
US House of Representatives (R-WA)

Dear Doc,

A lot of people were worried when you took over the helm of the Ethics Committee. Tom Delay was under state and federal investigation for corruption at the time, and the names of other GOP congressmen, like Ney, Doolittle, Pombo, Cunningham, and Harris were popping up in investigations as well. Everybody was wondering what you'd do. Would you launch ethics investigations against them, or would you ignore their crimes in a Predatorgate-like display of craven partisanship.

How did you respond? You launched an investigation against Demoslamunist Rep. Jim McDermott for releasing a tape of a phone call in 1994--a tape in which Newt Gingrich and Rep. John Boehner are caught plotting to subvert an ethics investigation against Gingrich.

You'd think that'd be enough work for an ethics committee during a session, but now you're catching criticism for doing too little. People wonder how Ney and DeLay could be indicted and Cunningham convicted without an ethics investigation against them being initiated.

The GOPers must thank God that their Christofascist supporters are faith-based, not reality-based....

Weekend Foleygate Round-Up

As Josh predicted, link is down.

Meanwhile, a simply delicious mystery: For how long was Foley's predilections known?

A clue is here. And another clue is here. Yet more are here -- including what could be characterized as admissions by the once honorable gentleman from Florida. Here too. (Pretty much known for quite a while.)

And a possible answer: since 2001.

Hastert Refuses to Go -- He Should Only Stay the Course through 7 November!

[A link.]

This could have been played as a single congress-person's problem (not the gay part of course but the serial hitting on pages).

But Hastert, whose leadership is that of being a rubber stamp for the nutjobs, is, with his deputies, is making it a national issue and, one hopes, problem.

The issue isn't Foley any more.

It's: What kind of morality allows one to ignore a problem like this for years and refuse to investigate it.

It's the moral corruption of the venal and greedy and rapacious.

What We the People Need Now: A New Constitution that Reflects our Times

ARTICLE I

Section 1
All legislative Powers are hereby ceded to the Executive branch, though the Congress will still make a Grand Noise and wave their arms as if they give a Damn.

Section 2
The House of Representatives will consist of those best able to Lick the Boots of the Lobbyists and Corporations lining their pockets.

No one can be a Representative unless Fox News says that he is a Patriotic American,

Representation shall be apportioned based on numbers of people willing to Pay for the Privilege. The actual Enumeration shall be made whenever it is of benefit to Republicans.

Representatives will choose a Speaker and other Officers by how willing these Officers are to turn a blind eye to the Crimes of Republicans and how Loudly they will Declare the Daily Talking Points.

Section 3
The Senate shall... oh hell, just see Section 1.

The Vice President shall be President of the Senate and can use any Four Letter Word he wants in talking to Senators, so F-You, Leahy.

Section 4
Elections will be held whenever Diebold is prepared to provide the Right Results.

Section 5
Each House shall make a mockery of policing itself and shall be free to throw out all the Democrats they want, but Republicans who engage in Pederasty shall be protected.

Section 6
Republican Senators and Representatives will enjoy a Revolving Door of organizations who pay for votes, and give them jobs any time they are taking a break.

Section 7
The House and Senate shall apply a large Rubber Stamp to every suggestion issued by the President.

Section 8
The House shall raise all the taxes they want on the poor and middle-class so long as they leave the Rich alone.

The Congress will dodge all responsibility for decisions on War.

Section 9
The rules of Immigration shall be set in a way that protects Republican majorities.

Section 10
Any treaties are not worth the paper they are Written on.

ARTICLE II
Section 1
The President can do anything he wants, that's what's good about being President. Heh heh.

Section 2
The President can wear any uniform he wants and pretend to fly planes.

Section 3
The President and the Congress should split some beers now and then, but he doesn't have to invite any Democrats.

Section 4
Having sex is a good Reason to get rid of a President. Lying, being Incompetent, Wasting Billions, and getting Thousands of Americans Killed, is fine.

ARTICLE III
This Article was full of that Judge stuff, so we just took it out.

ARTICLE IV
We can declare any place we want part of the United States so they can call their stuff "Made in the USA," but don't go thinking they get representation.

ARTICLE V
Amendments to the Constitution will only be for Really Important Stuff, like how scared we are of Homos and Foreign People.

ARTICLE VI
You can ignore any part of this Constitution if it gets in the way of Profit or something that gets Republicans elected.

ARTICLE VII
People are supposed to be afraid all the Time, otherwise they do too damn much Thinking.

Link.

Fun Fun Fun!

Christopher Hitchens bashes the immortal Kissinger. Say what you will about Hitchens (prone to misjudgment is reasonably fair but there's a lot worse) but the man knows how to slam the prose.

Big Media Tries to Discern Reality Or: The Blogoverse for Dummies

At first glance, three uproars that buffeted American politics in recent weeks have little in common.

Former congressman Mark Foley (R-Fla.) ended his political career over sexually charged e-mails to former House pages. Sen. George Allen (R-Va.) stumbled over his puzzling use of the word "macaca" and his clumsy response to revelations about his Jewish ancestry. Former president Bill Clinton had a televised temper fit when an interviewer challenged his terrorism record.

All three episodes, however, were in their own ways signs of the unruly new age in American politics. Each featured an arresting personal angle. Each originally percolated in the world of new media -- Web sites and news outlets that did not exist a generation ago -- before charging into the traditional world of newspapers and television networks. In each case, the accusations quickly pivoted into a debate about the motivations and alleged biases of the accusers. [Link.]

Allow me to break it down for Big Media. In no particular order:

You have the web, with all that fine info flying around, waiting to be found.

You have, of course, the bloggers, people interested in the info.

Then you have Big Media, who severely restricts and constrains their reporters. It's good old free market censorship. Which the blogoverse just doesn't have at present.

And let's put it this way: Anyone who relies on Big Media for news without any referencing of relevant blogs is just some sort of dope.

Confusing: Lying About or Covering Up a Possible Pederast to Keep One More Nutjob in the House Isn't Moral Leadership?

-- And this is who the religious extremists elect?

Again, Foley's orientation is, simply, his business -- up to a point.

But once the issue is raised, once the leadership is advised of the possibility of improper (if not criminal) behavior, the leadership has two choices.

It can investigate or it can cover up.

One is the proper thing, morally and otherwise.

And the latter is what the GOP leadership did.

And it looks like, well, reality, is a'dawning on the seriously religious.

Lieberman: Moral Leadership for Our Times

Look here. And here:

So let's see...a congressman gets exposed as a child sexual predator, having Internet sex with underage pages between House votes. A fellow Republican congressman exposes evidence that the Speaker of the House was informed of the sexual predator's behavior, and did nothing about it for months or even years. The Speaker does not deny the evidence. Yet, when lawmakers call for the Speaker to resign, what does Joe Lieberman do? He focus his major attacks not on the sexual predator, not on the Speaker who covered up the scandal - but instead, he attacks critics of the Speaker.

Poor Connecticut and indeed our nation if we lose this great, exemplary leadership!

OK, Really, Iraq is Really Better Off Since We Liberated it, Really, Right??

No. At least not for special visitors like Condi, Our Leader's brain for foreign policy matters (to the extent that President Cheney and the neocon nutjobs aren't).

As the New York Times reports, conditions in Baghad are so dangerous that Rice -- usually the very picture of modern fashion as she touches down in foreign capitals -- was forced to arrive in Iraq "wearing a helmet and a flak jacket and flanked by machine-gun-toting bodyguards to defend against insurgents."

That's once she got there. As the Times reports, the secretary couldn't just fly into Baghdad on her State Department jet and take the customary Town Car ride on her rounds. Instead, Rice had to fly to Turkey, where she ditched her usual plane for a C-17A equipped with antimissile technology. Even that wasn't enough, however. As the military transport plane approached Baghdad, pilots were forced to circle high for about 40 minutes because rocket or mortar fire was coming from somewhere around the airport.

Once Rice finally touched down, the military shuffled her into a helicopter for the short trip to the Green Zone; the highway from the airport is still too dangerous for travel.

Link.

Our Leader Speaks and Gives Us His Wisdom

I get a little nervous when I hear people say, 'Well, I don't want to be measured.' My attitude is, what are you trying to hide?

Link. Yes, I know, a cheap shot but it's what our leaders and their enablers do all the time, and this one is funny, not mean and malicious and destructive to person and nation.

Justice in America, What We Believe in, What Makes America Great

Is this a great country or what? (Answer after the quote and link.)

In a sworn statement sent to the Marine Corps' inspector general, a Marine sergeant says she heard guards from Guantánamo bragging last month about beating detainees, the Associated Press reports.

***

"From the whole conversation, I understood that striking detainees was a common practice," the sergeant said. "Everyone in the group laughed at the others' stories of beating detainees."

The AP obtained the sergeant's statement from Lt. Col. Colby Vokey, who is the Marine Corps' defense coordinator for the Western United States. Vokey is calling for an investigation, but it can go only so far: Even if the sergeant's allegations prove to be correct, the Military Commissions Act of 2006 would prohibit federal courts from doing anything about them.

Link. (Emphasis added.)

Answer: What. A ^%$*ing embarrassment, a disgrace to what it once stood for and principals upon whichh it was created.

Prison Reform

In-prison beauty contests; Miss Cocaine Mule.

Fox News: Fair and Balanced? Or Just Partisan and Demented?

FNC shares it dream....



Link.

And it gets worse.

St. Joe

Defender and enabler of defenders of sexual predators. What Congress needs. Proof that the GOP doesn't have a monopoly of the morality-crippled. (More here.)

Fight the Power

To coin a phrase....



Link.

Sigh.....

Link.

The Genius of Our Leader

The 10 Stupidest Things President George W. Bush Has Ever Said

At least, so far....

10) "Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream." --LaCrosse, Wis., Oct. 18, 2000

9) "Let me put it to you bluntly. In a changing world, we want more people to have control over your own life." --Annandale, Va, Aug. 9, 2004

8) "I've reminded the prime minister -- the American people, Mr. Prime Minister, over the past months that it was not always a given that the United States and America would have a close relationship." --Washington, D.C., June 29, 2006


7) "The truth of that matter is, if you listen carefully, Saddam would still be in power if he were the president of the United States, and the world would be a lot better off." --Second presidential debate, St. Louis, Mo., Oct. 8, 2004

6) "See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." --Greece, N.Y., May 24, 2005

5) "They misunderestimated me." --Bentonville, Ark., Nov. 6, 2000

4) "Rarely is the questioned asked: Is our children learning?" --Florence, S.C., Jan. 11, 2000

3) "Too many good docs are getting out of the business. Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country." --Poplar Bluff, Mo., Sept. 6, 2004

2) "Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." --Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004

1) "There ought to be limits to freedom." --Response to a parody web site, May 1999.

Link.

I Love Wingnut Hypocricy -- A Continuing Saga; the Latest Chapter

Roger Clemens -- juiced?

Tasteless Image of the Day

Trying to figure out whether or not this is amusing....



Link.

Really, Really Funny Quote for the Day

Always wondered how the wingnuts can crank out their patent dishonesty. What kind of dysfunctional morality lets them do it? I mean, how can one be an Ann Coulter, for example? It's certainly not ignorance? Intoxicated by the available wealth? Is it a matter of intoxicants? Booze? Drugs? The mise-en-scene, the modern gestalt?

Example: Someone was able to write the following with a straight face, presumably, and it was run in the Journal:

What the Holocaust demonstrates is the danger of a one-party state. It shows what can happen when a group of true believers, convinced of the superiority of their own ideas, have unchecked power. They are then free to rewrite history to suit their political ends, and crush those who disagree or protest . . . or who worship God in a different way.

Like, say, the mullahs in Iran.

Or, obviously, Our Leaders. Neither country is running a Final Solution but just how far are we from being a de facto theocracy?

Link.

A Date with Mark Foley

It's 1995, in the "Washington Monthly."

"IT'S THE 5 O'CLOCK COCKTAIL hour, and I'm mounting the steps to Le Mistral, the congressional power eatery.

"["Washington Monthly's] Sallie [Motsch]?" I hear behind me.

"Congressman Foley?"

Running up the steps, Mark Foley extends a hearty handshake.

Ooh la la . This congressman is a blast of exuberance. Tall and solid with sparkling blue eyes and subtly coiffed hair, his wire-framed glasses lend authority to his round face. Impeccably tailored in a Prince Charles plaid Joseph Abbound suit and a French blue shirt, he's got a real Palm Beach polish, although his district skirts that elite community.

We mount a couple of high-backed stools, and I marvel at the privacy of our date. Not only is the bar empty but the entire restaurant. The congressman orders a glass of Merlot. I follow suit, wondering if Newt's got something going with Merlot in the Contract.

Foley, 40, has been a Florida politician since he was 23. State and local governments were steppingstones to his childhood dream of a congressional seat. Half Polish, half Irish, he grew up in West Palm Beach in a close-knit family. He points to a young dishwasher behind the bar, unloading glasses. "I've done that. And I've been a waiter and an owner," Foley says, referring to a former restaurant venture.

Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep. "Oh, God," he says. "Message from the Republican cloakroom . . . 15 minutes to record their vote . . ."

He's off, coatless, into the dusk.

Twenty minutes later, he's back, breathless. Once again, the sprint-for-the-vote leads to the issue of footwear. "I love these Allen-Edmonds," Foley says. He also loves clothes, confessing a passion for Bill Robinson and Neiman Marcus shirts: "American-made."

We polish off our Merlot.

Another? He hesitates, I insist, he agrees.

Foley's Palm Beach politicking has given him some pretty heady contacts. It's no wonder that he needs to keep one tuxedo in Washington and another in Florida.

"I bumped into Joe Kennedy the other day, and he said, 'Hey, we've got to go fishing sometime,'" Foley remarks.

"Is the Kennedy compound in your district?" I ask, fingers crossed. Fishing will, no doubt, lead to sailing. Who needs Patrick?

"No, but it used to be," he answers.

Workable. Not only is this fellow connected, but judging from his easy manner and relaxed laughter, he's happy.

"I was at the party for the opening of Mar-a-Lago," Foley continues, launching into another story. "Miss Germany was my date and . . ."

"Miss Germany?" I interrupt. I'm wondering about this trend of freshmen congressmen and German women.

"Yes, Miss Germany," he continues, "and Donald Trump rushes over to me and asks if there's anything I can do about his air space," Foley says, waving his hands over his head, mimicking The Donald imitating flight patterns. "He said the air traffic over Mar-a-Lago was terrible, and he wanted to know if I could change it."

Foley clearly is on the move, and not just because of his social contacts. He was appointed deputy majority whip and sits on key committees.

In his downtime Foley heads to the sea or the slopes -- he shares a condo in Aspen. Of all of his classmates, Foley seems the most capable of balancing his life and work -- he even lives off-campus: "Capitol Hill is too claustrophobic."

"Where do you live?"

"The Watergate."

"The Watergate!" I repeat, relishing the chill I get when it rolls off my tongue.

Foley raves about the conveniences of the Watergate: the Safeway, the Chinese take-out, the dry cleaner, the wine selection. He admits that long days often end with loneliness, so far from home and close friends. Eager to start entertaining again, he's looking for an apartment with a fireplace where he can host dinner parties.

Pick me up off the floor.

"But what's fun about the Watergate is the star-studded group there," he continues. "Bob and Elizabeth Dole, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Caspar Weinberger."

My chest tightens, I must get Sophie into obedience classes. Mid-dinner party I can see her tugging on Dole's suit cuff, leaping up and tearing Bader Ginsburg's pantyhose.

Beep-beep-beep-beep-beep. Again, the blasted beeper. He helps me into my coat and offers a warm handshake.

"Thank you, Congressman."

"Mark. Call me Mark."

Link.

Woodward: Despite "State of Denial" is Still In a State of Denial

Link.

Whoa, I Just Found Out I'm a Terrorist!?!?

Torture Bill States Non-Allegiance To Bush Is Terrorism (Prison Planet)

Buried amongst the untold affronts to the Bill of Rights, the Constitution and the very spirit of America, the torture bill contains a definition of "wrongfully aiding the enemy" which labels all American citizens who breach their "allegiance" to President Bush and the actions of his government as terrorists subject to possible arrest, torture and conviction in front of a military tribunal.

***

This is another telltale facet that proves the bill applies to U.S. citizens and includes them under the "enemy combatant" designation. We previously cited the comments of Yale law Professor Bruce Ackerman, who wrote in the L.A. Times, "The compromise legislation....authorizes the president to seize American citizens as enemy combatants, even if they have never left the United States. And once thrown into military prison, they cannot expect a trial by their peers or any other of the normal protections of the Bill of Rights."

The New York Times stated that the legislation introduced, "A dangerously broad definition of “illegal enemy combatant” in the bill could subject legal residents of the United States, as well as foreign citizens living in their own countries, to summary arrest and indefinite detention with no hope of appeal. The president could give the power to apply this label to anyone he wanted."

Calling the bill "our generation’s version of the Alien and Sedition Acts," the Times goes on to highlight the rubber stamping of torture.

"Coerced evidence would be permissible if a judge considered it reliable — already a contradiction in terms — and relevant. Coercion is defined in a way that exempts anything done before the passage of the 2005 Detainee Treatment Act, and anything else Mr. Bush chooses."

Since with this bill, in the aggregate, Bush has declared himself to be above the Constitution and the laws of the United States, the allegiance of American citizens is no longer to the flag or the freedoms for which it stands, but to Bush himself, the self-appointed dictator, and any diversion from that allegiance will mandate arrest, torture and conviction in a military tribunal under the terms of this bill.

Link.

Messages from MAF54

The then-gentleman from Florida wrote:

Maf54: I miss you
Teen: ya me too
Maf54: we are still voting
Maf54: you miss me too

The exchange continues in which Foley and the teen both appear to describe having sexual orgasms.

Maf54: ok..i better go vote..did you know you would have this effect on me
Teen: lol I guessed
Teen: ya go vote…I don't want to keep you from doing our job
Maf54: can I have a good kiss goodnight
Teen: :-*
Teen:

The House voted that evening on HR 1559, Emergency War Time supplemental appropriations.

According to another message, Foley also invites the teen and a friend to come to his house near Capitol Hill so they can drink alcohol.

Teen: are you going to be in town over the veterans day weekend
Maf54: I may be now that your coming
Maf54: who you coming to visit
Teen: haha good stuff
Teen: umm no one really

Maf54: we will be adjourned ny then
Teen: oh good
Maf54: by
Maf54: then we can have a few drinks
Maf54: lol
Teen: yes yes ;-)
Maf54: your not old enough to drink
Teen: shhh…
Maf54: ok
Teen: that's not what my ID says
Teen: lol
Maf54: ok
Teen: I probably shouldn't be telling you that huh
Maf54: we may need to drink at my house so we don't get busted

Link.

And a link to more.

Just remember that besides young friends, he had the GOP House leadership as enablers with their knowledge and tacit consent.

And then there's the Scientology connection.

Hey, W., Here's Your Quote!

"Blessed are the young, for they shall
inherit the National Debt."
-- Herbert Hoover

Mark Foley: GOP Leadership in Action [Reader Discretion, etc.]

Maf54 (7:25:14 PM): hey

Auto response from Xxxxxxxxx (7:25:14 PM): scrounging for food...brb

Maf54 (7:25:25 PM): ok

Maf54 (7:25:35 PM): kep scrounging

Xxxxxxxxx (7:31:51 PM): boo

Maf54 (7:32:13 PM): bo dude

Xxxxxxxxx (7:32:17 PM): lol

Xxxxxxxxx (7:32:26 PM): whered ya go this afternoon

Maf54 (7:33:39 PM): i am in pensecola...had to catch a plane

Xxxxxxxxx (7:33:47 PM): oh well thats fun

Maf54 (7:34:04 PM): indeed

Xxxxxxxxx (7:34:14 PM): what are you doing in pensecola

Maf54 (7:34:21 PM): now in my hotel room

Xxxxxxxxx (7:34:39 PM): well ..like why did you go there

Maf54 (7:35:02 PM): for the campaign

Xxxxxxxxx (7:35:29 PM): have you officialy announced yt

Maf54 (7:35:45 PM): not yet

Xxxxxxxxx (7:36:06 PM): cool cool...

Maf54 (7:37:27 PM): how my favorite young stud doing

Xxxxxxxxx (7:37:46 PM): tired and sore

Xxxxxxxxx (7:37:52 PM): i didnt no waltzing could make you sore

Maf54 (7:38:04 PM): from what

Xxxxxxxxx (7:38:34 PM): what do you mean from what

Xxxxxxxxx (7:38:42 PM): from waltzing...im sore from waltzing

Maf54 (7:39:32 PM): tahts good

Maf54 (7:39:32 PM): you need a massage

Maf54 signed off at 7:39:37 PM.

Maf54 signed on at 7:40:35 PM.

Xxxxxxxxx (7:40:44 PM): got kicked off?

Maf54 (7:41:24 PM): must have

Xxxxxxxxx (7:41:57 PM): ugh tomorrow i have the first day of lacrosse practice

Maf54 (7:42:27 PM): love to watch that

Maf54 (7:42:33 PM): those great legs running

Xxxxxxxxx (7:42:38 PM): haha...they arent great

Xxxxxxxxx (7:42:45 PM): thats why we have conditioning

Xxxxxxxxx (7:42:56 PM): 2 days running....3 days lifting

Xxxxxxxxx (7:43:11 PM): every week

Xxxxxxxxx (7:43:14 PM): until the end of march

Maf54 (7:43:27 PM): well dont ruin my mental picture

Xxxxxxxxx (7:43:32 PM): oh lol...sorry

Maf54 (7:43:54 PM): nice

Maf54 (7:43:54 PM): youll be way hot then

Xxxxxxxxx (7:44:01 PM): haha...hopefully

Maf54 (7:44:22 PM): better be

Maf54 (7:46:01 PM): well I better let you go do oyur thing

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:07 PM): oh ok

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:11 PM): have fun campaigning

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:17 PM): or however you spell it

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:18 PM): lol

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:25 PM): ill see ya in a couple of weeks

Maf54 (7:46:33 PM): did any girl give you a haand job this weekend

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:38 PM): lol no

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:40 PM): im single right now

Xxxxxxxxx (7:46:57 PM): my last gf and i broke up a few weeks agi

Maf54 (7:47:11 PM): are you

Maf54 (7:47:11 PM): good so your getting horny

Xxxxxxxxx (7:47:29 PM): lol...a bit

Maf54 (7:48:00 PM): did you spank it this weekend yourself

Xxxxxxxxx (7:48:04 PM): no

Xxxxxxxxx (7:48:16 PM): been too tired and too busy

Maf54 (7:48:33 PM): wow...

Maf54 (7:48:34 PM): i am never to busy haha

Xxxxxxxxx (7:48:51 PM): haha

Maf54 (7:50:02 PM): or tired..helps me sleep

Xxxxxxxxx (7:50:15 PM): thats true

Xxxxxxxxx (7:50:36 PM): havent been having a problem with sleep though.. i just walk in the door and collapse well at least this weekend

Maf54 (7:50:56 PM): i am sure

Xxxxxxxxx (7:50:57 PM): i dont do it very often normally though

Maf54 (7:51:11 PM): why not

Maf54 (7:51:22 PM): at your age seems like it would be daily

Xxxxxxxxx (7:51:57 PM): not me

Xxxxxxxxx (7:52:01 PM): im not a horn dog

Xxxxxxxxx (7:52:07 PM): maybe 2 or 3 times a week

Maf54 (7:52:20 PM): thats a good number

Maf54 (7:52:27 PM): in the shower

Xxxxxxxxx (7:52:36 PM): actually usually i dont do it in the shower

Xxxxxxxxx (7:52:42 PM): just cause i shower in the morning

Xxxxxxxxx (7:52:47 PM): and quickly

Maf54 (7:52:50 PM): in the bed

Xxxxxxxxx (7:52:59 PM): i get up at 530 and am outta the house by 610

Xxxxxxxxx (7:53:03 PM): eh ya

Maf54 (7:53:24 PM): on your back

Xxxxxxxxx (7:53:30 PM): no face down

Maf54 (7:53:32 PM): love details

Xxxxxxxxx (7:53:34 PM): lol

Xxxxxxxxx (7:53:36 PM): i see that

Xxxxxxxxx (7:53:37 PM): lol

Maf54 (7:53:39 PM): really

Maf54 (7:53:54 PM): do you really do it face down

Xxxxxxxxx (7:54:03 PM): ya

Maf54 (7:54:13 PM): kneeling

Xxxxxxxxx (7:54:31 PM): well i dont use my hand...i use the bed itself

Maf54 (7:54:31 PM): where do you unload it

Xxxxxxxxx (7:54:36 PM): towel

Maf54 (7:54:43 PM): really

Maf54 (7:55:02 PM): completely naked?

Xxxxxxxxx (7:55:12 PM): well ya

Maf54 (7:55:21 PM): very nice

Xxxxxxxxx (7:55:24 PM): lol

Maf54 (7:55:51 PM): cute butt bouncing in the air

Xxxxxxxxx (7:56:00 PM): haha

Xxxxxxxxx (7:56:05 PM): well ive never watched myslef

Xxxxxxxxx (7:56:08 PM): but ya i guess

Maf54 (7:56:18 PM): i am sure not

Maf54 (7:56:22 PM): hmmm

Maf54 (7:56:30 PM): great visual

Maf54 (7:56:39 PM): i may try that

Xxxxxxxxx (7:56:43 PM): it works

Maf54 (7:56:51 PM): hmm

Maf54 (7:56:57 PM): sound inetersting

Maf54 (7:57:05 PM): i always use lotion and the hand

Maf54 (7:57:10 PM): but who knows

Xxxxxxxxx (7:57:24 PM): i dont use lotion...takes too much time to clean up

Xxxxxxxxx (7:57:37 PM): with a towel you can just wipe off....and go

Maf54 (7:57:38 PM): lol

Maf54 (7:57:45 PM): where do you throw the towel

Xxxxxxxxx (7:57:48 PM): but you cant work it too hard....or its not good

Xxxxxxxxx (7:57:51 PM): in the laundry

Maf54 (7:58:16 PM): just kinda slow rubbing

Xxxxxxxxx (7:58:23 PM): ya....

Xxxxxxxxx (7:58:32 PM): or youll rub yourslef raw

Maf54 (7:58:37 PM): well I have aa totally stiff wood now

Xxxxxxxxx (7:58:40 PM): cause the towell isnt very soft

Maf54 (7:58:44 PM): i bet..taht would hurt

Xxxxxxxxx (7:58:50 PM): but you cn find something softer than a towell i guess

Maf54 (7:58:59 PM): but it must feel great spirting on the towel

Xxxxxxxxx (7:59:06 PM): ya

Maf54 (7:59:29 PM): wow

Maf54 (7:59:48 PM): is your little guy limp...or growing

Xxxxxxxxx (7:59:54 PM): eh growing

Maf54 (8:00:00 PM): hmm

Maf54 (8:00:12 PM): so you got a stiff one now

Xxxxxxxxx (8:00:19 PM): not that fast

Xxxxxxxxx (8:00:20 PM): hey

Xxxxxxxxx (8:00:32 PM): so you have a fetich

Maf54 (8:00:32 PM): hey what

Xxxxxxxxx (8:00:40 PM): fetish**

Maf54 (8:00:43 PM): like

Maf54 (8:00:53 PM): i like steamroom

Maf54 (8:01:04 PM): whats yours

Xxxxxxxxx (8:01:09 PM): its kinda weird

Xxxxxxxxx (8:01:14 PM): lol

Maf54 (8:01:21 PM): i am hard as a rock..so tell me when your reaches rock

Xxxxxxxxx (8:01:23 PM): i have a cast fetish

Maf54 (8:01:27 PM): well tell me

Maf54 (8:01:32 PM): cast

Xxxxxxxxx (8:01:44 PM): ya like...plaster cast

Maf54 (8:01:49 PM): ok..so what happens

Maf54 (8:01:58 PM): how does that turn you in

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:02 PM): i dont know

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:04 PM): it just does

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:08 PM): ive never had one

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:16 PM): but people that have them turn me on

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:27 PM): and if i had one it would probably turn me on

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:29 PM): beats me

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:32 PM): its kinda weird

Xxxxxxxxx (8:02:50 PM): but along with that i like the whole catholic girl look....thats our schools uniform

Maf54 (8:03:02 PM): ha thats wild

Xxxxxxxxx (8:03:14 PM): ya but now im hard

Maf54 (8:03:32 PM): me 2

Maf54 (8:03:42 PM): cast got you going

Maf54 (8:03:47 PM): what you wearing

Xxxxxxxxx (8:04:04 PM): normal clothes

Xxxxxxxxx (8:04:09 PM): tshirt and shorts

Maf54 (8:04:17 PM): um so a big buldge

Xxxxxxxxx (8:04:35 PM): ya

Maf54 (8:04:45 PM): um

Maf54 (8:04:58 PM): love to slip them off of you

Xxxxxxxxx (8:05:08 PM): haha

Maf54 (8:05:53 PM): and gram the one eyed snake

Maf54 (8:06:13 PM): grab

Xxxxxxxxx (8:06:53 PM): not tonight...dont get to excited

Maf54 (8:07:12 PM): well your hard

Xxxxxxxxx (8:07:45 PM): that is true

Maf54 (8:08:03 PM): and a little horny

Xxxxxxxxx (8:08:11 PM): and also tru

Maf54 (8:08:31 PM): get a ruler and measure it for me

Xxxxxxxxx (8:08:38 PM): ive already told you that

Maf54 (8:08:47 PM): tell me again

Xxxxxxxxx (8:08:49 PM): 7 and 1/2

Maf54 (8:09:04 PM): ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Maf54 (8:09:08 PM): beautiful

Xxxxxxxxx (8:09:38 PM): lol

Maf54 (8:09:44 PM): thats a great size

Xxxxxxxxx (8:10:00 PM): thank you

Maf54 (8:10:22 PM): still stiff

Xxxxxxxxx (8:10:28 PM): ya

Maf54 (8:10:40 PM): take it out

Xxxxxxxxx (8:10:54 PM): brb...my mom is yelling

Maf54 (8:11:06 PM): ok

Xxxxxxxxx (8:14:02 PM): back

Maf54 (8:14:37 PM): cool hope se didnt see any thing

Xxxxxxxxx (8:14:54 PM): no no

Xxxxxxxxx (8:14:59 PM): she is computer dumb though

Xxxxxxxxx (8:15:01 PM): it makes me so mad

Maf54 (8:15:04 PM): good

Maf54 (8:15:08 PM): haha

Maf54 (8:15:11 PM): why

Xxxxxxxxx (8:15:23 PM): cause she cant do anything

Maf54 (8:15:31 PM): oh well

Xxxxxxxxx (8:15:41 PM): she couldnt figure out how to download a file from an email and open it

Maf54 (8:15:53 PM): haha

Xxxxxxxxx (8:16:14 PM): and she only does it like a million times a day

Xxxxxxxxx (8:16:16 PM): oh well

Xxxxxxxxx (8:16:18 PM): whatever

Xxxxxxxxx (8:16:53 PM): well i better go finish my hw...i just found out from a friend that i have to finish reading and notating a book for AP english

Maf54 signed off at 8:17:43 PM.

Link.

Haiku of the Day

Torture Bill Haiku

The Constitution
Was cast aside by Congress.
Hideous corpus!

Good News!

Tje courts are %$#@ed up, the judges our leaders have appointed and put on the bench do suck.

A Thought

You go to war thanks to the policymakers you have not those you wish you had. Or voted for.

Iraq for Dummies (Including Our Leaders, of Course!); Updated Edition

Link.

Obama Says it Far Better than I

Mr. President, I am proud to be sponsoring this amendment with the senior senator from West Virginia. He’s absolutely right that Congress has abrogated its oversight responsibilities, and one way to reverse that troubling trend is to adopt a sunset provision in this bill. We did that in the Patriot Act, and that allowed us to make important revisions to the bill that reflected our experience about what worked and didn’t work during the previous 5 years. We should do that again with this important piece of legislation.

But I want to take a few minutes to speak more broadly about the bill before us.

I may have only been in this body for a short while, but I am not naive to the political considerations that go along with many of the decisions we make here. I realize that soon, we will adjourn for the fall, and the campaigning will begin in earnest. And there will be 30-second attack ads and negative mail pieces, and we will be called everything from cut-and-run quitters to Defeatocrats to people who care more about the rights of terrorists than the protection of Americans. And I know that the vote before us was specifically designed and timed to add more fuel to that fire.

And yet, while I know all of this, I’m still disappointed, and I’m still ashamed. Because what we’re doing here today – a debate over the fundamental human rights of the accused – should be bigger than politics. This is serious.

If this was a debate with obvious ideological differences – heartfelt convictions that couldn’t be settled by compromise – I would understand. But it’s not.

All of us – Democrats and Republicans – want to do whatever it takes to track down terrorists and bring them to justice as swiftly as possible. All of us want to give our President every tool necessary to do this. And all of us were willing to do that in this bill. Anyone who says otherwise is lying to the American people.

In the five years that the President’s system of military tribunals has existed, not one terrorist has been tried. Not one has been convicted. Not one has been brought to justice. And in the end, the Supreme Court of the United found the whole thing unconstitutional, which is why we’re here today.

We could have fixed all of this in a way that allows us to detain and interrogate and try suspected terrorists while still protecting the accidentally accused from spending their lives locked away in Guantanamo Bay. Easily. This was not an either-or question.

Instead of allowing this President – or any President – to decide what does and does not constitute torture, we could have left the definition up to our own laws and to the Geneva Conventions, as we would have if we passed the bill that the Armed Services committee originally offered.

Instead of detainees arriving at Guantanamo and facing a Combatant Status Review Tribunal that allows them no real chance to prove their innocence with evidence or a lawyer, we could have developed a real military system of justice that would sort out the suspected terrorists from the accidentally accused.

And instead of not just suspending, but eliminating, the right of habeas corpus – the seven century-old right of individuals to challenge the terms of their own detention, we could have given the accused one chance – one single chance – to ask the government why they are being held and what they are being charged with.

But politics won today. Politics won. The Administration got its vote, and now it will have its victory lap, and now they will be able to go out on the campaign trail and tell the American people that they were the ones who were tough on the terrorists.

And yet, we have a bill that gives the terrorist mastermind of 9/11 his day in court, but not the innocent people we may have accidentally rounded up and mistaken for terrorists – people who may stay in prison for the rest of their lives.

And yet, we have a report authored by sixteen of our own government’s intelligence agencies, a previous draft of which described, and I quote, “…actions by the United States government that were determined to have stoked the jihad movement, like the indefinite detention of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay…”

And yet, we have Al Qaeda and the Taliban regrouping in Afghanistan while we look the other way. We have a war in Iraq that our own government’s intelligence says is serving as Al Qaeda’s best recruitment tool. And we have recommendations from the bipartisan 9/11 commission that we still refuse to implement five years after the fact.

The problem with this bill is not that it’s too tough on terrorists. The problem with this bill is that it’s sloppy. And the reason it’s sloppy is because we rushed it to serve political purposes instead of getting the job done.

I’ve heard, for example, the argument that it should be military courts, and not federal judges, who should make decisions on these detainees. I actually agree with that. The problem is that the structure of the military proceedings has been poorly thought through. Indeed, the regulations that are supposed to be governing administrative hearings for these detainees, which should have been issued months ago, still haven’t been issued because we’re so intent to rush this through in time for Election Day. And so we are once again creating a situation in which this legislation is vulnerable to Supreme Court challenge.

This is not how a serious Administration would approach the problem of terrorism. And I know the President came here today and was insisting that this is supposed to be our primary concern. He’s absolutely right it should be our primary concern – which is why we should be approaching this with a somberness and seriousness that they have not displayed with this legislation.

But politics is what won today.

The only thing I hope for those who plot terror against the United States is that God has mercy on their soul, because I certainly do not. And for those who our government suspects of terror, I support whatever tools are necessary to try them and uncover their plot.

But we also know that some have been detained who have no connection to terror whatsoever. We’ve already had reports from the CIA and various generals over the last few years saying that many of the detainees at Guantanamo shouldn’t have been there – as one U.S. commander of Guantanamo told the Wall Street Journal, “Sometimes, we just didn’t get the right folks.” And we all know about the recent case of the Canadian man who was suspected of terrorist connections, detained in New York, sent to Syria, and tortured, only to find out later that it was all a case of mistaken identity and poor information.

And yet, in the future, people like this may never have a chance to prove their innocence. And they may remain locked away forever.

And the sad part about all of this is that this betrayal of American values is unnecessary. We could’ve drafted a bipartisan, well-structured bill that provided adequate due process through the military courts, had an effective review process that would’ve prevented frivolous lawsuits being filed and kept lawyers from clogging our courts, but upheld the basic ideals that have made this country great.

Instead, what we have is a flawed document that in fact betrays the best instincts of some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle – those who worked in a bipartisan fashion in the Armed Services Committee to craft a bill that we could have been proud of. And they essentially got steamrolled by this Administration and by the imperatives of November 7th.

That is not how we should be doing business in the U.S. Senate, and that’s not how we should be prosecuting this war on terrorism. When we’re sloppy and cut corners, we are undermining those very virtues of America that will lead us to success in winning this war. At bare minimum, I hope we can at least pass this provision so that cooler heads can prevail after the silly season is over. Thank you.

Link.

You either believe in and live under a system of law or you're our leaders. Refusal to enforce the Constitution: High enough crime?

Hail W!

Arts and crafts for the weekend: Frame your personal presidential portrait.



Link.

Out of My Mind Competition: What lie is W speaking in this photo?

Oh My God -- He Still Lives!! Proof that Scum Never ies

Link. A blast from the past, as it were.

What's the Answer? Where is He? Won't Our God-Fearing Leaders Tell Us??

Link.

Link.

Sign of the Times

Link.

And also from the General: He thinks we're there yet -- at the bottom of the slope our leaders have taken us down, the slope to the valley floor that is the end of the democratic American Republic (over 200 years is a great run for something like this but nothing i forever):

A few last words from my Inner Frenchman

The memorial to the United States I posted yesterday caused a few people to wonder if I'd given up. They were wrong. I was merely doing what I do every day here, expressing the way I felt about the day's events.

Although I expected we'd lose the fight in the Senate, the final result nonetheless brought tears to my eyes. I had witnessed the death of the nation I loved, or more specifically, the murder of a set of ideals, upon which a nation was structured. I felt a need to memorialize that loss.

I target patriotism almost daily with my satire, but it's not a love for country I mock, rather it is the simple-minded nationalism of the right; a patriotism that values symbols over substance; a patriotism that drives legislators who angrily acted to ban flag burning to pass a law gutting our Bill of Rights.

The basic values I love most, the ideals that made me proud to be an American, due process, habeas corpus, the proscriptions against cruel and unusual punishment and the use of coercion to compel confession were destroyed in the name of that kind of patriotism yesterday. Our America, liberal America, died with those ideals.

That's why I mourned.

But today is a new day, a day in which I hope we will all resolve to fight harder than ever to bring our America back. The first step is to retake Congress and the Senate from the tyrants and cowards who committed yesterday's crimes. That means doing everything we can to ensure that the Democrats win in November.

Each of us need to pick a candidate in a congressional or senate race in our respective states and work our asses off for him or her. We need to canvass neighborhoods, man phone banks, and talk to everyone we know, urging them to support our candidate, and ensuring that those who do get out and vote on election day.

For some, it will be easier than others. The people of Eastern King County in Washington are blessed to have a candidate like Darcy Burner, while the citizens of Ohio are cursed with the coward, Sherrod Brown. The latter will have to find a way to stifle their gag reflex and work like hell to get him elected, because, in the end, he'll vote for a Democratic Majority Leader. Then, future bills like the Bush McCain Torture Compromise will die in committee.

Are the Democrats perfect? Certainly not. We'll need to purge many of them in primaries over the next ten years. That means we'll need to actively search for candidates more honorable than a Sherrod Brown or a Bill Nelson (perhaps a pimp or a heroin dealer) to run against them. But in the end, we can build a party for which we can be proud if we're willing to work for it.

Lastly, we need to get corporate money out of politics. It limits our power as individuals and tempts our representatives into corruption. Public funding of campaigns is the only way to achieve that.

We have to do these things. We can't afford to sit back and wait for things to change. Waiting will allow the tyrant to strengthen his grip. 2006 may very well be our last chance to bring about change peaceably. We're getting very close to a time when the only option will be revolution. I don't like our odds if that happens. Technology has given enemy the kinds of tools it needs to create the most efficient police state the world has ever seen.

I'm sure you're all tired of hearing from my inner Frenchman, so I'll put him away and bring back the General. Thanks for indulging me, and thanks again for fighting so hard this week.

So the Stock Market's on the Efge of New Highs; Are you Better Off than You were before W?

Link. And see this too.

Add to your Xmas List

Link.

If Only Dems had Spines... Essential Reading for the Weekend

Link.

A Question for the Ages

I forget: Why do minority groups hated and fought by the wingnuts want to be wingnuts themselves? I presume it's some complex psychological thing I can't wrap my mind around but what is it? I mean, how do you explain this:

A new, factory-produced front group named the Black Republican Freedom Fund is running ads saying - sit down for this, and do NOT have a cup of coffee anywhere near your face - "Martin Luther King, Jr. Was a Republican."

Link.

Weekend Humor Piece

Our Leader rewrites the Bill of Rights so that it's... right -- as in wingnut.

Quote of the Day; Why We Love Our GOP Wingnut Leaders

"Why do they hate each other? Why do Sunnis kill Shiites? How do they tell the difference?" Lott asked. "They all look the same to me."

The Times' Friday Editions are Starting to Look Like Pravda

Two... delicious -- and journalistically justified headlines:

Democrats See Strength in Bucking Bush

New Woodward Book Says Bush Ignored Urgent Warning on Iraq

If only they could do this every day....

And as to the Woodward book:

Terrorism warnings: On July 10, 2001, Woodward says, CIA Director George Tenet and his counterterrorism chief met with Condoleezza Rice to try to "impress upon her the seriousness of the intelligence the agency was collecting about an impending attack," the Times says. They left the meeting with the feeling that Rice didn't appreciate the gravity of the situation, Woodward says. As 9/11 drew nearer, he says, Tenet came to believe that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was impeding plans to capture or kill Osama bin Laden. Rumsfeld suggested that the intelligence the CIA was collecting about an impending attack might actually be part of some sort of misdirection by al-Qaida.

Iraq warnings: Woodward says that Robert Blackwill, who served as the top Iraq advisor on the National Security Council, told Rice in September 2003 that the U.S. was in desperate need of more troops in Iraq. Woodward says that Blackwill and Paul Bremer subsequently briefed Rice and Stephen Hadley about the need for troops but that the White House took no action in response.

Rumsfeld's detachment: Woodward says that Rumsfeld didn't involve himself much in the reconstruction of Iraq, such as it was, and that he fell into such a spat with Rice that Bush had to order him to start returning her phone calls. Woodward quotes Gen. John Abizaid, the commander of U.S. military forces in the Middle East, as saying in 2005 that Rumsfeld "doesn't have any credibility anymore" with the public. Woodward says that Colin Powell suggested that Rumsfeld be sent packing from the administration with him after the 2004 elections, and that former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card tried to dump Rumsfeld in 2005 but failed when Bush objected.

Cheney's obsession: Woodward says the vice president was so fixated on finding WMD in Iraq that his aides were phoning David Kay -- once at 3 o'clock in the morning -- with the satellite coordinates of suspected weapons sites. When Kay began to believe that Saddam Hussein might have had the capability to build WMD but no WMD yet, Woodward says CIA Deputy Director John McLaughlin warned him not to say anything: "Don't tell anyone this. This could be upsetting. Be very careful. We can't let this out until we're sure."

Link.

Big question will be how it sells compared to the rest of his library of W hagiography.

And the rhetorical question is will it have any effect on the WaPo editorial page? (Editorial pages are irrelevant so that's why the question's rhetorical.)

Abramoff Innocent

He just visited the White House and met with Mehlman and Rove 485 times more than I:

[T]he report "single[s] out two of President Bush's top lieutenants, Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman, as having been offered expensive meals and exclusive tickets to premier sporting events and concerts by Abramoff and his associates."

Our Leaders' Hypocricy on the March; Exemplar of the Week

Foley pushed child porn bills, asked: "Do I make you a little horny?

Before he resigned from the House of Representatives today, Florida Rep. Mark Foley was the co-chairman of the Congressional Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus and somebody who spoke out a lot about the risks young people face from adults who might sexually exploit them.

When Foley wasn't doing that, ABC News says, he was instant-messaging male House pages with questions like, "Do I make you a little horny?"

Among the other highlights from Foley's congressional career:

In July of this year, Foley's office issued a press release congratulating the U.S. Senate for passing the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006, a bill Foley co-sponsored in the House. Among other things, the act expanded the definition of sex offenders who must register with state authorities to include those who "use ... the Internet to facilitate or commit a crime against a minor."

Also in July, Foley introduced the Internet Stopping Adults Facilitating the Exploitation of Today’s Youth (SAFETY) Act, a bill aimed at cracking down on child pornography on the Web. "We have to stop the supply of child pornography by attacking the source," Foley said in the press release. "Authorities tell us the Internet has made child pornography easier to disseminate, easier to produce, and easier to turn a profit on."

In testimony before the House Judiciary Committee in 2005, Foley said: "Sex offenders are not petty criminals. They prey on our children like animals and will continue to do it unless stopped. We need to change the way we track these pedophiles. ... It has often been noted that a society can be judged on how it best treats it children. We have a moral responsibility to do everything in our power to protect our kids from these animals. This bill will turn the tables and make prey out of these predators. Failing to act on this measure is just playing Russian roulette with our children's lives."

In July 2004, Foley celebrated Internet Safety Day by warning parents that the Web had become "a new medium for pedophiles to reach out to our most vulnerable citizens --America's children."

And in 2003, Foley held a press conference to denounce Democratic activists for engaging in a "repulsive" campaign to tag him with the "slur" of being gay.

Link. And here's a little proof. And:

According to the CREW posting, the boy e-mailed a colleague in Alexander's office about Foley's e-mails, saying, "This freaked me out." On a request for a photo, the boy repeated the word "sick" 13 times.

He said Foley asked for his e-mail when the boy gave him a thank you card. The boy also said Foley wrote that he e-mailed another page.

"He's such a nice guy," Foley wrote about the other boy. "acts much older than his age ... and hes in really great shape ... i am just finished riding my bike on a 25 mile journey now heading to the gym ... whats school like for you this year?"

In other e-mails, Foley wrote, "I am back in Florida now ... its nice here ... been raining today ... it sounds like you will have some fun over the next few weeks ... how old are you now?" and "how are you weathering the hurricane ... are you safe ... send me an email pic of you as well."

Link.

The smoking gun is here. (ABC News makes penitence for "The Note" and all ABC's other sins -- til the inevitable next time.)

...Foley had been expected to be a "shoo-in" for reelection until it was reported Thursday that he had sent a series of e-mail messages in which he asked the page for a picture and a description of the "stuff" he liked "to do."

Foley's office and campaign staff had insisted that there was nothing inappropriate about a 52-year-old member of Congress engaging in such communications with a 16-year-old former page. Foley spokesman Jason Kello had accused Democrat Tim Mahoney's campaign of distributing the emails as part of a "political smear campaign of the worst sort." "They have taken these e-mails out of context in order to smear a good man," Kello told the Associated Press. Now Foley says that he's "deeply sorry ... for letting down my family and the people of Florida I have had the privilege to represent."

While the e-mail messages were vague enough that Foley might have explained them away successfully, ABC News says it has obtained instant-messaging text he sent to other underage male pages in which the congressman "made repeated references to sexual organs and acts." ABC says Foley's resignation came shortly after it questioned him about the IM content.

Link.

And among Foley's great moments in leadership:

“It’s vile,” said Rep. Mark Foley, R-West Palm Beach. “It’s more sad than anything else, to see someone with such potential throw it all down the drain because of a sexual addiction.”

One can only hope this is a tip of an iceberg, more like the iceberg the Titanic hit, causing the ship to go down (pun acknowledged but not necessarily intended -- Freudian slip maybe?). Or maybe it'll be the tipping point, not just a matter of losing Foley's district but the point at which a critical mass has had it with being led by anti-American nutjobs.

And a disclosure: None of the above is to cast any aspersion on Foley's sexuality -- any aspect of it. The issue is hypocrisy and dishonesty (what all politicos are made of but what the wingnuts are exclusively made of but for greed), in this case interfering peoples' private lives.

The Wrong Lessons of Vietnam and the One No One Mentions

The former:

Mr. Moyar draws lessons from Vietnam that subtly but unmistakably apply to contemporary warfare: that national leaders make life-and-death decisions sometimes without understanding the complexities of a distant and unfamiliar theater of war; that a nation initially committed to going to war is sometimes reluctant to expend the resources, both human and financial, to finish it; and that our society has a proclivity to lose confidence and resolve should a conflict last too long. The lesson is clear: Iraq and other, related post-9/11 conflicts will require perseverance, resources and resolve.

(Link. Sub. required.)

And why do we not persevere?

That's the lesson no one discusses.

The people are more likely to persevere if that war is a necessary one and we're succeeding and success is likely. At risk of over-simplification, Vietnam was strategically unnecessary and the American people were never persuaded of the necessity of it, such as it was, other than Now that we're here, we have to stay until victory -- the victory even the South Vietnamese couldn't be bothered to fight for.

There is no good reason for us to have gone into Iraq. Our Leaders can lie and lie but can never change that.

And how happy are the Iraqis?

Waterboarding for Dummies

Link.

What America Stands For

Apropos the detainee bill:

"Taken together, the bill’s provisions rewrite American law to evade the fundamental principles of separation of powers, due process, habeas corpus, fair trials, and the rule of law, principles that, together, prohibit state-sanctioned violence. If there is any fixed point in the historical understandings of constitutional freedom that help to define us as a people, it is that no one may be picked up and locked up by the American state in secret or at an unknown location, or without opportunity to petition an independent court for inspection of the lawfulness of the lockup and of the treatment handed out by the state to the person locked up, under legal standards from time to time defined by Congress. This core principle should apply with full force to all detentions by the American state, regardless of the citizenship of detainees."

Link.

We stand for less and less of anything good while Our Leaders remain in power....

Historical Quote that Still Speaks Truth

Our leaders' teacher speaks from the past:

"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."

-- Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials

Link.

Olbermann on Clinton Vs. Fox

The headlines about them are, of course, entirely wrong.

It is not essential that a past president, bullied and sandbagged by a monkey posing as a newscaster, finally lashed back.

It is not important that the current President’s portable public chorus has described his predecessor’s tone as “crazed.”

Our tone should be crazed. The nation’s freedoms are under assault by an administration whose policies can do us as much damage as al Qaida; the nation’s marketplace of ideas is being poisoned by a propaganda company so blatant that Tokyo Rose would’ve quit.

Nonetheless. The headline is this:

Bill Clinton did what almost none of us have done in five years.

He has spoken the truth about 9/11, and the current presidential administration.

"At least I tried," he said of his own efforts to capture or kill Osama bin Laden. "That’s the difference in me and some, including all of the right-wingers who are attacking me now. They had eight months to try; they did not try. I tried."

Thus in his supposed emeritus years has Mr. Clinton taken forceful and triumphant action for honesty, and for us; action as vital and as courageous as any of his presidency; action as startling and as liberating, as any, by any one, in these last five long years.

The Bush Administration did not try to get Osama bin Laden before 9/11.

The Bush Administration ignored all the evidence gathered by its predecessors.

The Bush Administration did not understand the Daily Briefing entitled "Bin Laden Determined To Strike in U.S."

The Bush Administration did not try.

Moreover, for the last five years one month and two weeks, the current administration, and in particular the President, has been given the greatest “pass” for incompetence and malfeasance in American history!

President Roosevelt was rightly blamed for ignoring the warning signs—some of them, 17 years old—before Pearl Harbor.

President Hoover was correctly blamed for—if not the Great Depression itself—then the disastrous economic steps he took in the immediate aftermath of the Stock Market Crash.

Even President Lincoln assumed some measure of responsibility for the Civil War—though talk of Southern secession had begun as early as 1832.

But not this president.

To hear him bleat and whine and bully at nearly every opportunity, one would think someone else had been president on September 11th, 2001 -- or the nearly eight months that preceded it.

That hardly reflects the honesty nor manliness we expect of the executive.

But if his own fitness to serve is of no true concern to him, perhaps we should simply sigh and keep our fingers crossed, until a grown-up takes the job three Januarys from now.

Except for this.

After five years of skirting even the most inarguable of facts—that he was president on 9/11 and he must bear some responsibility for his, and our, unreadiness, Mr. Bush has now moved, unmistakably and without conscience or shame, towards re-writing history, and attempting to make the responsibility, entirely Mr. Clinton’s.

Of course he is not honest enough to do that directly.

As with all the other nefariousness and slime of this, our worst presidency since James Buchanan, he is having it done for him, by proxy.

Thus, the sandbag effort by Fox News Friday afternoon.

Consider the timing: the very weekend the National Intelligence Estimate would be released and show the Iraq war to be the fraudulent failure it is—not a check on terror, but fertilizer for it.

The kind of proof of incompetence, for which the administration and its hyenas at Fox need to find a diversion, in a scapegoat.

It was the kind of cheap trick which would get a journalist fired—but a propagandist, promoted:

Promise to talk of charity and generosity; but instead launch into the lies and distortions with which the Authoritarians among us attack the virtuous and reward the useless.

And don’t even be professional enough to assume the responsibility for the slanders yourself; blame your audience for “e-mailing” you the question.

Mr. Clinton responded as you have seen.

He told the great truth untold about this administration’s negligence, perhaps criminal negligence, about bin Laden.

He was brave.

Then again, Chris Wallace might be braver still. Had I in one moment surrendered all my credibility as a journalist, and been irredeemably humiliated, as was he, I would have gone home and started a new career selling seeds by mail.

The smearing by proxy, of course, did not begin Friday afternoon.

Disney was first to sell-out its corporate reputation, with "The Path to 9/11." Of that company’s crimes against truth one needs to say little. Simply put: someone there enabled an Authoritarian zealot to belch out Mr. Bush’s new and improved history.

The basic plot-line was this: because he was distracted by the Monica Lewinsky scandal, Bill Clinton failed to prevent 9/11.

The most curious and in some ways the most infuriating aspect of this slapdash theory, is that the Right Wingers who have advocated it—who try to sneak it into our collective consciousness through entertainment, or who sandbag Mr. Clinton with it at news interviews—have simply skipped past its most glaring flaw.

Had it been true that Clinton had been distracted from the hunt for bin Laden in 1998 because of the Monica Lewinsky nonsense, why did these same people not applaud him for having bombed bin Laden’s camps in Afghanistan and Sudan on Aug. 20, of that year? For mentioning bin Laden by name as he did so?

That day, Republican Senator Grams of Minnesota invoked the movie "Wag The Dog."

Republican Senator Coats of Indiana questioned Mr. Clinton’s judgment.

Republican Senator Ashcroft of Missouri—the future attorney general—echoed Coats.

Even Republican Senator Arlen Specter questioned the timing.

And of course, were it true Clinton had been “distracted” by the Lewinsky witch-hunt, who on earth conducted the Lewinsky witch-hunt?

Who turned the political discourse of this nation on its head for two years?

Who corrupted the political media?

Who made it impossible for us to even bring back on the air, the counter-terrorism analysts like Dr. Richard Haass, and James Dunegan, who had warned, at this very hour, on this very network, in early 1998, of cells from the Middle East who sought to attack us, here?

Who preempted them in order to strangle us with the trivia that was, “All Monica All The Time”?

Who distracted whom?

This is, of course, where—as is inevitable—Mr. Bush and his henchmen prove not quite as smart as they think they are.

The full responsibility for 9/11 is obviously shared by three administrations, possibly four.

But, Mr. Bush, if you are now trying to convince us by proxy that it’s all about the distractions of 1998 and 1999, then you will have to face a startling fact that your minions may have hidden from you.

The distractions of 1998 and 1999, Mr. Bush, were carefully manufactured, and lovingly executed, not by Bill Clinton, but by the same people who got you elected President.

Thus, instead of some commendable acknowledgment that you were even in office on 9/11 and the lost months before it, we have your sleazy and sloppy rewriting of history, designed by somebody who evidently read the Orwell playbook too quickly.

Thus, instead of some explanation for the inertia of your first eight months in office, we are told that you have kept us "safe" ever since—a statement that might range anywhere from zero, to 100 percent, true.

We have nothing but your word, and your word has long since ceased to mean anything.

And, of course, the one time you have ever given us specifics about what you have kept us safe from, Mr. Bush, you got the name of the supposedly targeted Tower in Los Angeles wrong.

Thus was it left for the previous president to say what so many of us have felt; what so many of us have given you a pass for in the months and even the years after the attack:

You did not try.

You ignored the evidence gathered by your predecessor.

You ignored the evidence gathered by your own people.

Then, you blamed your predecessor.

That would be a textbook definition, Mr. Bush, of cowardice.

To enforce the lies of the present, it is necessary to erase the truths of the past.

That was one of the great mechanical realities Eric Blair—writing as George Orwell—gave us in the book “1984.”

The great philosophical reality he gave us, Mr. Bush, may sound as familiar to you, as it has lately begun to sound familiar to me.

"The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power...

"Power is not a means; it is an end.

"One does not establish a dictatorship to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship.

"The object of persecution, is persecution. The object of torture, is torture. The object of power… is power."

Earlier last Friday afternoon, before the Fox ambush, speaking in the far different context of the closing session of his remarkable Global Initiative, Mr. Clinton quoted Abraham Lincoln’s State of the Union address from 1862.

"We must disenthrall ourselves."

Mr. Clinton did not quote the rest of Mr. Lincoln’s sentence.

He might well have.

"We must disenthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country."

And so has Mr. Clinton helped us to disenthrall ourselves, and perhaps enabled us, even at this late and bleak date, to save our country.

The "free pass" has been withdrawn, Mr. Bush.

You did not act to prevent 9/11.

We do not know what you have done to prevent another 9/11.

You have failed us—then leveraged that failure, to justify a purposeless war in Iraq which will have, all too soon, claimed more American lives than did 9/11.

You have failed us anew in Afghanistan.

And you have now tried to hide your failures, by blaming your predecessor.

And now you exploit your failure, to rationalize brazen torture which doesn’t work anyway; which only condemns our soldiers to water-boarding; which only humiliates our country further in the world; and which no true American would ever condone, let alone advocate.

And there it is, Mr. Bush:

Are yours the actions of a true American?

Link.

Liars (What Else is New?)

President Bush on Tuesday said it is naive and a mistake to think that the war with Iraq has worsened terrorism, as a key portion of a national intelligence assessment by his own administration suggests.

Link.

What utter scum, to be the lying face of the most dishonest administration in over a century, if not more.... It's an administration of Joe McCarthy's, not a one with shame, Nazi and Soviet soul mates believing the end -- accreting power -- justifies any and all means. This is a leader? No, just a stupid, weak figurehead, something for those who have dropped out of living a reality-based life.

Just the Latest Proof That We're Lead by Patently Partisan Lying Scumbags

Link the first. Link the second.

And for that matter, the water-carrying Big Media is little more honest.

Clinton Finally Strikes Back at the Wingnuts, to the Extent H Can with a Politician-Wife, Ten Years Too Late

He had, if nothing else, great popularity, and maybe could have actually used it against them -- and maybe we wouldn't be where we are now....

But I digress.

Link. Let the good times roll....

We Have the Greatest Healthcare System in the World and Here's Proof That it's Getting Even Greater

FORT WAYNE, Ind. -- Last year Russ Moore Transmission Inc. adopted a health-insurance plan in tune with the "consumer driven" philosophy President Bush has been touting. The plan requires employees to pay as much as $5,250 a year in medical costs out of their own money before insurance kicks in, with the goal of turning them into savvy shoppers for doctors and drugs.

The new strategy has motivated some workers to research what they are paying for medical care. One found an over-the-counter replacement for a more expensive brand-name heartburn drug. That is good news for Nick Bond, who runs the business and had suspected some employees were overusing medical care because they didn't have to pay for much of it themselves.

The bad news: The employees' research often consists of going to Mr. Bond and asking for his help, even after they have had 19 months to get familiar with the plan. At one point, he and his office manager had to hole themselves up in their offices for about two weeks developing a spreadsheet with price information on 32 drugs.

Mr. Bond's experience suggests that although information about the price and quality of health care remains sketchy, the president's push to make the health-care market more like the market for other services can change consumers' behavior. However, some managers have to turn themselves into instant experts both on health care and on the law. Mr. Bond knows about a transmission rebuilder's heartburn, a technician's blood-pressure medication and a visit to the emergency room by a mechanic's daughter. If he uses health information in firing or demoting an employee -- or is perceived to do so -- he might be in for a lawsuit.

"There are things I'm not supposed to know -- but I know," says Mr. Bond, who is part-owner and general manager of the company previously run by his father-in-law.

Link (WSJ; sub. reqd.).

Why We're going to lose in November; A Continuing Series

The Dems stand for nothing more than "We're not them."

Read this and weep for what might have been....