From the CSM‘s Scott Peterson: For those who believe, the devotion is real. Tears stream down the cheeks of 2,000 men ripe for the return of the Mahdi, the 12th Imam they expect will soon emerge to bring justice and peace to a corrupt world. Eyes stare upward and arms open wide to receive God’s promised salvation. The storyteller’s lyrical song speaks of tragedy on the path to salvation, prompting
December 20, 2005
Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) expresses his rage at the Bush adminstration’s pretensions to monarchical power to a sales associate at his local Footlocker store
Feingold: “I mean, you seem like a nice ordinary Joe. Would you want that cowboy doofus and his NSA goons unilaterally deciding to listen in on your phone conversations? Because the fact is, the president cannot make up authority and legislative power when it isn’t there. He’s President. He’s not King George Bush.”* Footlocker sales clerk: “Of course he isn’t. A King might presume to tell us when it’s okay
December 20, 2005
Outrage delayed? (UPDATED to include FISA Court Review link; UPDATED AGAIN to include response from James Robbins)
Via Newsbusters, a David Burnham NYT story from November 7, 1982: “COURT SAYS U.S. SPY AGENCY CAN TAP OVERSEAS MESSAGES” A Federal appeals court has ruled that the National Security Agency may lawfully intercept messages between United States citizens and people overseas, even if there is no cause to believe the Americans are foreign agents, and then provide summaries of these messages to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Because the
December 20, 2005
Scenes from the WAR ON JESUS: “Anti-Wal-Mart agitprop”
From the Washington Times: Inside a South Florida Wal-Mart last Thursday, union-sponsored protesters handed out empty, gift-wrapped boxes to children and made them cry, according to multiple witnesses—and it appears that the arrests of two of the protesters may have been part of a grand strategy designed by Big Labor-backed WakeUpWalMart.com. Yet despite internal WakeUpWalMart.com communication—obtained exclusively by this columnist—indicating that the union-funded front instructed its protesters to test police
December 20, 2005
“Germany frees killer of U.S. diver”
From CNN: A Hezbollah militant sentenced to life in Germany for murdering a U.S. Navy diver during the 1985 hijacking of a U.S. jetliner has been freed, officials said. The German government denied on Tuesday the release was related to the freeing of a German hostage in Iraq. Mohammed Ali Hamadi was released Thursday and allowed to return to his native Lebanon on the next day, after qualifying for parole
December 20, 2005
NSA kerfuffle: redux (UPDATED and UPDATED AGAIN 10:25 PM MT)
Drawing on remarks from both the President and the Attorney General yesterday—and on the responses I was reading around the blogosphere—I began to suspect that the divisions we’re seeing in the debate over executive authority to authorize domestic surveillance is a function not merely of politics, but also of the paradigm through which one choses to view the authorization itself. Those who are committed to the civil / criminal paradigm—while
December 20, 2005
My third brief conversation with Tucker Carlson’s trademark bowtie
Me: “If Tucker were a tree, what kind of tree would he be…?” Tucker Carlson’s bowtie: “Who cares? If Tucker were a tree, that’d free me to be off helping some half-drunk teen in a rented tux score a handjob at a Prom after party. But I don’t have that kind of luck, now do I?”
December 19, 2005
Poll: Bush’s Approval Ratings Climb
From ABC News: The recent elections in Iraq and an improved economic outlook at home have shifted public support in the president’s direction, lifting him from career lows in his job performance and personal ratings alike. […] Overall, 47 percent of Americans in this ABC News/Washington Post poll now approve of George W. Bush’s work in office; 52 percent disapprove. While hardly robust, that is up from a career low
December 19, 2005
Grieving Mom Cindy Sheehan and 70s Kung-fu expert and counterculture icon Billy Jack discuss strategies for twenty-first century anti-war activism while ostensibly maintaining their commitments to fighting global terrorism, 15
“Did you catch my act over the weekend, Billy?—when me and ninety-something other irate CITIZENS OF THE WORLD protested outside the US Embassy in Spain, giving voice to inconvenient truths being buried by the Zionist-friendly western media, namely, that Iraq is worse than Vietnam ever was, and that Bush is by every objective standard a war criminal?”* “No, sorry, missed that—though in my defense, I was a bit distracted by
December 19, 2005
a CITIZEN JOURNALIST continues to look into the Natalee Holloway case and to offer theories on her disappearance that could, perhaps, prove fruitful, were the Aruban government to follow-up on them—and were Greta Van Susteren to take up the mantle and really really dig into their potentialities
Well, I’ve got nothing new—for what it’s worth, she hasn’t shown up at the bottom of my mug during a recent rum-heavy eggnog bender—but that doesn’t mean Emperor Chimpy and his geekchic NSA lackeys aren’t keeping secret from us instructive Natalee-related intelligence intercepts that could blow this case wide open… Developing…