When Morality Becomes Idiocy - the prosecution of sexually exploited children.

blog.myspace.com/duckydoolittle

I'd have more to say about this - but I'll defer to an expert. Besides, if you need an explanation as to why this is fundamentally unethical, immoral and operationally stupid, you probably wouldn't read my blogs anyhow...

Change the System!

A child can not legally consent to sex, so why does our system prosecute child prostitutes as criminals? Once locked up they receive virtually no counseling, psychological care, or help finding a safe place to live. Sadly, when young people get out of lock up, they usually return to the streets. Experts agree that prosecuting sexually exploited young people further traumatizes them and makes it more difficult for them to create any kind of stability in their lives. Sign up for the National Juvenile Justice Network email list and raise your awareness. Learn about how you can support valuable legislation and care for children who need your voice, awareness and light.

(As with all of my posts of this nature ~ please re-post and share freely.)

[EDIT: Just to clarify, I am speaking of American girls. If these girls were not American citizens they would be protected under immigrant sex trafficking laws. But because they are American citizens they do not qualify for the benefits and services given to non-citizens. We just need to recognize valid need for our protection. They have slipped through a very large crack.]

tag: child sex trafficing, child prostitution, morality, law, ethics, church-state, moralism

PSA: After Imus: What you can do

Press Release from freepress.net

The controversy over Don Imus' racist remarks goes far beyond one bigoted commentator. But getting rid of Imus won't fix the media problem.

Most of our TV and radio stations are owned by giant corporate conglomerates. They don't represent the views of most Americans -- and they make huge profits off the public airwaves.

What we need are more diverse, independent and local media owners. Yet right now less than 10% of TV and radio stations are owned by people of color or women.

But instead of addressing this national disgrace, the Federal Communications Commission is actually trying to let the largest companies buy up even more stations!

Tell the FCC: We Need More Diversity in the Media

What Imus said is just the tip of the iceberg. Scores of other TV and radio hosts regularly make racist and sexist comments. The best way to stop this race to the bottom is to change who's sitting at the top -- and making the decisions about who's behind the mic.

Today, according to one industry study, only 2.5% of radio stations have a person of color in the role of general manager, and only 4.4% have a racial or ethnic minority in the role of news director. The percentage of women in these jobs isn't much higher. No wonder shock jocks like Imus have been able to keep their jobs for so long.

Now is our chance to make a change. In 2003, we stopped the FCC from allowing more media concentration, when more than 3 million people took action to stop Big Media.

Tell Your Friends To Act

This time, we must not only stop further consolidation -- we must demand media ownership that reflects the diversity that makes our nation great.

Onward,

Robert McChesney
President
Free Press
www.freepress.net

Attn: Harry Reid. Fair elections with genuine debate are much easier when there is fair and equal media coverage. Just ask Jack Carter.

I should add that this is an important issue for real conservatives as well as liberals, because the representation of real, rational conservatism on the airwaves is even smaller than the liberal and progressive coverage, to the extent that most people think "conservatism" means being against abortion, gay rights, efforts toward energy independence (which for conservatives is a national security issue) and disbelief in climate change and it's potential impacts.

Barry Goldwater would disagree, probably in total. Nixon would differ on most if not all points. Neither would equate religious social conservatism with Republican or conservative values .

So let's get this done for everyone. It's infuriating to listen to people like Rush, Savage and Imus from a center-left perspective, but for a real conservative - and as a Lib, I share many conservative positions and views - listening to these idiots must be absolutely humiliating, realizing that such pinheads have more access to political speech than traditional economic and Constitutional Conservatives.

Or as they are referred to by Rush, "liberals."

tag: Conservatism, Conservative, Don Imus, Rush Limbaugh, Hate Speech, Liberalism, Liberty, Media, MSM, Hate Radio

Why Don Imus? Well, why the hell not?

I was listening to Randi Rhodes yesterday, talking about Don Imus's racist gaffe. She was taking a contrarian position - why him, instead of, say, Rush, who is just as offensive without being funny, or Mike Savage who's plainly talking to fellow bigots, or Hannedy, who's plainly talking to fellow stupid bigots. Why pick on the guy who's trying to be funny?

The wit and wisdom of Don Imus. - By Timothy Noah - Slate Magazine

On blacks:

"William Cohen, the Mandingo deal." (Former Defense Secretary Cohen's wife is African-American.)

"Wasn't in a woodpile, was he?" (Responding to news that former black militant H. Rap Brown, subsequently known as Abdullah Al-Amin, was found hiding in a shed in Alabama after exchanging gunfire with police. Imus is here alluding to the expression "nigger in the woodpile.")

"Knuckle-dragging moron." (Description of basketball player Patrick Ewing.)

"We all have 12-inch penises." (After being asked what he has in common with Nat Turner, Malcolm X, Minister Louis Farrakhan, Latrell Sprewell from the New York Knicks, and Al Sharpton.)

"Chest-thumping pimps." (Description of the New York Knicks.)

"A cleaning lady." (Reference to journalist Gwen Ifill, possibly out of pique that she wouldn't appear on his show. "I certainly don't know any black journalists who will," she wrote in the April 10 New York Times. The Chicago Tribune's Clarence Page used to appear, but after he made Imus pledge not to make offensive comments in the future, he was never asked back.)

On Jews:

"I remember when I first had [the Blind Boys of Alabama] on a few years ago, how the Jewish management at whatever, whoever we work for, CBS, or whatever it is, were bitching at me about it. […] I tried to put it in terms that these money-grubbing bastards could understand."

"Boner-nosed … beanie-wearing Jewboy." (Description of Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post, a frequent guest.)

On women:

"That buck-tooth witch Satan, Hillary Clinton." […] "I never admitted it when I went down there and got in all that big jam, insulting Bill Clinton and his fat ugly wife, Satan. Did I? Did I ever say I was sorry for that?"

On Native Americans:

"The guy from F-Troop, Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell." (This is a reference to the zany Indian characters on the 1960s TV sitcom F-Troop. They had names like "Roaring Chicken," "Crazy Cat," and "Chief Wild Eagle.")

On Japanese:

"Old Kabuki's in a coma and the market's going up. […] How old is the boy? The battery's running down on that boy." (Reference to Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, who died the following week.)

On gays:

"I didn't know that Allan Bloom was coming in from the back end." (The homosexuality of the author of The Closing of the American Mind became widely known when Saul Bellow published Ravelstein, a novel whose protagonist was based on Bloom, who by then was deceased.)

"The enormously attractive [NBC political correspondent] Chip Reid, I can say without being accused of being some limp-wristed 'mo."

On the handicapped:

"Janet Reno's having a press conference. Ms. Reno, of course, has Parkinson's disease, has a noticeable tremor. […] I don't know how she gets that lipstick on (laughter) looking like a rodeo clown."

I fail to see the funny here. I don't listen to Imus, for the same reason I don't listen to Stern; I don't like feeling as if I need to floss my brain. And I consider this sort of mean-spirited "humor" to be inherently toxic, whatever the perspective, regardless of what "cause" is "served."

So, why Imus? Well, because the Rutger's Girls stepped in his form of "humor" and took it upon themselves to carve new shoes out of his reluctant hide.

I find that image funny.

Oh, and Randi, he's not the first. Spocko was the first (THIS year) to ram recordings of racist and hate-speech sideways up the noses of wingnut talk-jocks - and more importantly, their sponsors.

Don Imus, Randi Rhodes,

The Authoritarian Reflex

3 Generals Spurn the Position of War 'Czar' - washingtonpost.com

The authoritarian reflex to a failed policy is not to examine the policy, but to assume that those entrusted with the implementation were not "up to the task." The answer is always more power, concentrated more densely, with fewer checks upon the authority in question.

Now, the idea of a "War Czar" empowered to do the job right with the authority to make militarily sensible decisions based on the reality of the situation is appealing, even to this anti-authoritarian. I'm not really so much opposed to the idea of authoritative people having power as the opposite, the assumption that the power to enforce one's authority grants one the magical ability to make wise and prudent decisions. And I see that this idea comes from the latter school of authoritarianism - if only we give the right person enough power, they will be able to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

But the response of people who are qualified for the position have all demonstrated their qualifications by refusing the job.

"The very fundamental issue is, they don't know where the hell they're going," said retired Marine Gen. John J. "Jack" Sheehan, a former top NATO commander who was among those rejecting the job. Sheehan said he believes that Vice President Cheney and his hawkish allies remain more powerful within the administration than pragmatists looking for a way out of Iraq. "So rather than go over there, develop an ulcer and eventually leave, I said, 'No, thanks,' " he said.

Yep, some vague concept of what "victory" would look like is important. More significantly, it would have to be a victory on the terms of the American People as a whole, not just the cheerleaders of war. It would have to be significant, meaningful and tangible - not merely a symbolic moment.

Most importantly, it would have to achieve lasting, positive change. I do my philosophical opponents the credit of believing all of these things were not just possible, but inevitable at the start of the war. Frankly, I suspected myself that while the results would be less positive than the cheerleaders suspected, they would nonetheless be a net positive, given what I understood about rational war-planning and preparation. In other words, I made certain reasonable assumptions about what sane people and competent military organizations do before they "cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war."

I, along with everyone else, was betrayed in that assumption. There appears to have been no planning, no precautions, no allowances made for "the fog of war," no preparations made for casualties and consequences and most damning of all, no thought toward what victory would look like, and because of that most fundamental flaw - nobody has been able to plot a course toward it.

Some administration critics said the ideas miss the point. "An individual can't fix a failed policy," said Carlos Pascual, former State Department coordinator of Iraq reconstruction, who is now a vice president at the Brookings Institution. "So the key thing is to figure out where the policy is wrong."

And this is the lesson that we must take from the situation; that there are policies that are so deeply flawed, so fundamentally erroneous and unethical that no-one with the character, competence and moral stature to lead soldiers will take it on.

One of the great unstated consequences of this war - emblematic as it is of what happens to Bushite policies when they are implemented - is a broad loss of confidence in the competence of leadership. The greatest test of leadership is how you react to unanticipated problems - and the second greatest is how many problems inherent in your policies you anticipate and forestall.

While the Bush administration has clearly done everything it could to avoid anything resembling prudence and preparation, it was not sufficiently opposed by those who's very careers were supposedly based on knowing better. And those who were in a position to know better, should have known better as soon as the directives hit their desks. They must have known that the troop levels were insufficient, that training times given were insufficient, that the equipment mix and logistical trains were unprepared and that - most critically - they were woefully short of reliable intelligence and translation resources.

And yet - better to keep their jobs than to act in the interest of the men and women they were responsible to, and in proper deference to the office of Commander In Chief.

Authoritarianism is a lot like Communism - there are specific circumstances where it works, and works very well indeed - but it does not generalize to larger, more complex situations; for their inherent problems are identical - trust. People in either situation donate a portion of their liberty, their resources and personal power to people they can trust, and if there is no basis for trust, the appearance and reality will be two entirely different things - leading to a system divided against itself and effectively serving only the self-delusions of those seemingly in charge of the entire mess.

This leads me, and millions of others, to come to the conclusion that there is no way out of this current mess that resembles "politics as usual." Those trying to avoid political fallout, and who are aiming at political victory in 2008 are betting that Bush will not do something elementally stupid between then and now. I don't think that's a bet that's worth the prize. Indeed, Democrats should be looking at the question of "if we win in 2008, what will we have won?"

We do not need politics as usual; we need statesmanship. And we need to impeach the miserable failure, purge our government of his taint, and I would strongly suggest going so far as to impeach those members of the Supreme Court that selected him in the first place.

tag: Impeach the President, Miserable Failure, War Czar, Authoritarianism, Jack Sheehan, 2008, politics

Hm. A pattern emerges.

Remember going to a church dance with the assurance that it would be just as good and just as much fun as that rock concert you wanted to go to?

Max Blumenthal: Monica Goodling, One of 150 Pat Robertson Cadres in the Bush Administration - Yahoo! News: "Goodling's involvement in Attorneygate is not the only aspect of her role in the Bush administration that bears examination. Her membership in a cadre of 150 graduates of Pat Robertson's Regent University currently serving in the administration is another, equally revealing component of the White House's political program."

Yeah, The bush administration is full of people who tell whoppers like that with complete sincerity. Brainwashing will do that to ya.

Bush can't keep his lies straight

Keith Olbermann lists all the various reasons and excuses Bush has used to justify the Iraq war.

I had a roommate once who was a total sociopath, and it took me less than a month to realize that all his "reasons" were really excuses. In fact, he did what he did because he wanted to do it and gave whatever excuse he thought would work that moment. He really had no clue that sane people keep track of these things.


It's been clear for a long, long time that whatever reason exists in George Bush's mind for the war - if any mind or reason exists in any commonly understood sense - it probably isn't one of his utterly disposable excuses.

I stopped keeping score long ago, so I hadn't realized how very damming the sum of his lies had become. But it is truly damning, and indicative of someone utterly incapable of being responsible for the consequences of his decisions. Whether he's a sociopath, a dry drunk, or simply too stupid and isolated to comprehend the issues on his desk does not matter to me, any more than his statements about his political philosophy or his "deep, Christian faith."

He's as inconsistent in those areas as he is in the context of the war, so I conclude that these positions are just as momentarily convenient as any other.

Some of his statements are particularly revealing of an incapacity to deal with the reality of other people, and the idea that his actions give legitimate cause for offense. The latest example is his dismissive reaction to Matthiew Dowd in particular and all parents of service members in harm's way as being "too emotional" to have a valid opinion.

It's pretty easy to demonstrate a widespread skepticism about our misleader.



Then, of course, there was his amazingly insensitive and inept handling of Cindy Sheehan. Whatever you think of her,she's a nightmare of his own making, a visible symbol illustrating his contempt for and impatience with an increasingly critical citizenry.

It has long since become impossible for me to have any respect for the man - and if I am to maintain respect for the office of the President of these United States, I must continue to loudly call for his immediate resignation. If he will not do that, he must be impeached.

Meanwhile, whatever he wants of Congress, and whatever he says to justify his demands must be presumed to be as disingenuous as all his previous interactions with that body, and, I must add, with people representing all parties. I would strongly suggest that various members get together and compare notes on what he has said to them to justify particular votes. I'd bet money that these stories will neither add up nor bear any great resemblance. And I'd be stunned if he's delivered on promises made to secure votes, even with solid supporters such as our own Sen. Ensign.

Congress - and particularly the Republican members - had best realized that the supporters of a liar and a fool are likely to be associated with the lies and foolishness in the public mind. People cannot help but wonder, in the face of overwhelming evidence of his willful, callus and incompetent leadership and contempt for the citizenry, whether that support is the result of blackmail, gullibility or corruption.

More to the point, they probably don't care. They just know that loyalty to a miserable failure is placed above loyalty to their constituents, and there can be no good reason for that.

tag: Impeach the President, George W. Bush, Miserable Failure, ITMFA, Congress, Veto Threat, Matthiew Dowd, Cindy Sheehan, accountability, surge, sociopath, integrety, Iraq, Iran, Too Emotional, Parents of Soldiers, War Critics, Sen. Ensign

Of Ships of State, riverboat races, and the price of meaningless victories.

I'm no fan of big government, so the siren song of Thatcherism seduced me for a while - back when the Iron Lady was still in office and Ronald Reagan was best buddies with her and "Lyin' Brian" Mulroney of Canada.

Both Commonwealth leaders were allowed to give both nations a solid dose of Conservative medicine and then shown the door. They did not achieve the cult status Regan has, and yet, I believe both will be shown in the historical view to have done more for their nations - and for less personal reward - than Reagen or any of his intellectual heirs. And I don't mean individually; I mean, in toto.

The Parliamentary tradition has certain strengths - and one of those is sort of a genetic memory of why it came to be and in the United Kingdom, especially, what happens when it is set aside in the name of expediency and a "Strong Executive."

All governments are a system of checks and balances, and one of it's most important roles is to serve as a check on the powerful, both those who have great power, and those who would like to have great power. It is a means of guiding and advising those who desire to wield power, to keep them in check and working for the benefit of all, rather than establishing their own little individual warring fiefdoms.

In our particular form of government, the tradition - though somewhat inchoate - is for citizens to seek out those who, like George Bush and Dick Cheney need power like they need air, and then hold them accountable for using it well by means well short of violence. while explicitly stipulating that the citizens hold that ultimate right at need. That's your Second Amendment, right there.

Those who try to subvert those checks in the name of some sort of "victory" are like those riverboat captains who'd put a brick on the safety valve in order to win a race. Sometimes the boiler will hold and sometimes it won't, leading to the conversion of a transitory victory into a permanent last place finish.

When the boiler of the ship of state is starting to spit rivets, prudent passengers seek to remove the brick.

Our system of checks and balances was set up to ensure that no single person was likely able to concentrate enough power to overcome the interests of competitors seeking to concentrate power, so that, in order to maintain their basis of power and defend it against the encroachments of others, they must perforce actually do their jobs and do them well.

The admiration I have for the cynical wisdom of our Founders seems to increase every day. And it is a system that, by and large, worked well enough until the unholy alliance of neocon and theocon emerged to subvert the government itself in the name of concentrating power for the sake of ... well, on that, I suspect there are significant disagreements, set aside "for later."

But what has emerged from both neocon and theocon philosophies put into action is a vast contempt for government, clad in a desire for limited government. It's easy to be fooled by this, for everyone has an idea about how government might be vastly improved with a bit of pruning. But the mechanisms of government, the number of people and the dollars spent have not decreased, and these institutions have become more intrusive and less respectful of the citizenry.

Tom Teepen: Contempt for government - sacbee.com: "Item: A meeting was set up by the staff of Karl Rove, Bush's political enforcer, to point out to contractors who do business with the General Services Administration, just which Republican House and Senate seats look especially needy in the run-up to the elections next year. A suspicious mind might wonder if the administration was perhaps, just maybe, trying to shake down the contractors on behalf of the only endangered species this White House cares about."

Tip o' the hat to reader John for this one, and it's just one of many examples given in this editorial.

One hopes that those GSA contractors think hard about the maxim about "Danegeld." If you pay it, you can never get rid of the Dane.

It's not government the Republican leadership objects to, so long as they are doing the governing. It's the aspect of accountability for the means of gaining power and the usage of that power that they find odious, as well as the idea that with great power comes great responsibility.

It's like drunk drivers, who used to have the expectation that being drunk was actually a defense against charges of vehicular manslaughter.

What they object to any expectation of self-government on their part. If one wishes to illustrate this, it's simple enough to point to any of hundreds and thousands of Bushies and fellow travelers who are all in favor of laws and regulations and restrictions on other people - so long as there's no expectation that any such restrictions are mutual.

There is a sense of arrogant entitlement to the "right" to act and speak in ways offensive and indeed harmful to others without accountability, and this is the antithesis of all Libertarian and classic conservative thought, where great weight is placed on personal responsibility and personal ethical behavior even when the cameras are pointed at someone else.

This ethos is vital to small and effective government - indeed, it's vital to any efficient system. Just ask Warren Buffet; it's how he runs his business. He hires trustworthy people and then trusts them, rewarding them according to their performance. It's not exactly a novel idea, but of course, it requires a certain measure of self-respect. In order to trust others, I have found, first one has to be trustworthy.

Those who are not trustworthy cannot imagine that those who can be trusted could be anything other than fools to be exploited. As a result, they waste time and resources armoring the system against - well, themselves while concealing their own systemic abuses, consequently making it unresponsive to anyone seeking honest, transparent access to it.

I am a Libertarian and my beliefs require me to be responsible for any aspect of my life and individual liberty I'm unwilling to delegate. At the same time I embrace my right and responsibility of myself and others to donate any amount of power they are incapable of or unwilling to use responsibly and well - with the expectation of a fair return on that investment.

The rules for money are the same as for any other form of power, for money is simply a means of moving economic power from here to there, as well as a reasonably efficient means of converting one form of power to another.

Yes, this is a seemingly selfish metric - but it also embraces the idea that every other donor has an equal right of concern, and has every right to different ideas of what their fraction of donated power should be used for, as well as recognition that individuals can and do differ remarkably on what they consider to be just compensation. It's also a recognition of reality - that nobody can afford to be altruistic at the expense of their own survival, much less the survival of the people and ideals they most value.

Therefore, any government that expects people to avoid the shortest path between need and gratification had best make the detour worthwhile - and what those in power think about those who would otherwise take the shortest path is immaterial. No amounts of "shoulds and shouldents" and no amount of laws passed in the name of those moral imperatives will change that behavior, nor will those laws ensnare those who are neither unlucky nor unintelligent in their mindful and willful refusal to comply.

Should I dislike the outcome of the balance of all the competing interests government must serve - or the performance based on promises - I have the right to either delegate another representative, or wield my power in my own name - just as I can choose to, say, self-insure against the possibility of a disastrous flood.

Whether or not that's a prudent choice depends a great deal on where you live and how much you have at stake - and the various social priorities and choices made by various states clearly illustrates that. The necessity to reasonably govern the population you have - rather than the population you wish you had - is the reason the Constitution places the states ahead of the Fed. It's not so much that a strong central government should not exist, it's rather that it cannot exist without inherently violating and suppressing entirely legitimate local interests. By restricting it's scope to those things that were clearly of overriding common concern, the Founders hoped to avoid our exact current situation.

However, in rediscovering this essential principle, our noses are rubbed in things that are of overriding common concern that can be addressed centrally, and indeed, probably can only be addressed centrally in any sort of cost-effective way and without serious impacts on essential liberties such as freedom of movement. I am speaking, of course, of social safety-net issues such as universal access to health care.

The issue of "who pays" is not nearly so critical as the idea that everyone, no matter who, no matter what their circumstances is able to access health-care at need, long before it becomes a matter of critical and unavoidable urgency, in recognition of the fact that what happens to individuals who do not have health care actually and unavoidably affects everyone in their community - via disease, bankruptcy, loss of productivity, loss of disposable income and even in loss of community participation. Nor should the systemic cost of widespread stress on the productivity and health of the population be discounted. It has a cost that can only be roughly estimated, but in any estimation has to be "very, very large."

My view is that a government that makes it easier to make wise choices, and which makes a broader range of choices meaningfully available to people is doing it's job. When it starts making choices on my behalf and trying to enforce them against MY judgment, it has become my adversary.

At that point I don't much care what the ideology behind it's choices are - once it's intruded into my life without invitation or compensation, it's excuses for doing so are meaningless. Because by definition, such blanket choices will be at the expense of many who will not benefit from them and may actually be harmed by them, far out of proportion to individual or collective gains.

That is where the abuse of power starts; when government becomes insensitive to the wishes, desires and even the guiding ethos of those it governs. When it demonstrates active contempt for entire swaths of the population, "choosing sides," as it were, it's not only just for those so abused to withdraw their consent, it's pretty much inevitable.

Therefore, open contempt for the electorate is a pretty sure signpost to the end of a dynasty. And any dynasty - and the Bushes surely consider themselves a dynasty - that thinks they can govern without the consent of a majority, much less at the expense of a majority, is not long for this world.

It's apparent that one reason eight prosecutors were fired is because that, despite having identified themselves as Republicans, they nonetheless were willing to enforce the law without regard to the political advantage of fellow Republicans, at the expense of the interests of districts they were appointed to guard and serve.

The really stunning part of this is that those advocating even more widespread firings - such as Harriet Myers - seem to be honestly blind to the inherent corruption contained in the idea. It's as if the core support of the Bush Administration sees everything in terms of partisan advantage, every program, every policy, every agenda, every word - and none of it needs have any real purpose or indeed, achieve anything more than a momentary positive blip in the polls to be legitimate.

This behavior is - aside from being probably illegal, certainly irresponsible and absolutely wrong - is a clear symptom of cancerous self-delusion permeating the entire administration, a delusion that leads them to overvalue their own judgment, not realizing how badly their addiction to unchecked power has effected it. Those who use power wisely and well do so in full understanding of and in service to the legitimate needs of those they serve, and do not confuse legitimate needs with popular whims, which if served at all, are served in small portions as dessert.

But this government does not serve, it alternately panders and bullies; expressing in it's governance the inability of those holding power to govern themselves or even casually adhere in their own lives to the values they would impose by fiat on the rest of us.

But at some point, they will find themselves in the dock, and the judge and jury will not be impressed by the argument that being drunk on power justifies the casual horrors committed in the name of being drunk at the wheel of an entire nation.

Illustration Credits:

Patriotism doesn't mean... courtesy of Totally Wrong T-Shirts.

I Am Responsible For My Own Actions courtesy of CynicalBlack


tag: Impeach the President, Impeach, George Bush, Accountability, Ethics, Government, Libertarianism, Minarchy, Limited Government, Balance of Powers, Constitutional Government, Personal Responsibility, State's Rights, Individual Rights, Individual Liberty, Freedom of Choice.

Having lain down with his Master, Dowd scratches an itch

An Administration's Epic Collapse | TIME

The three big Bush stories of 2007--the decision to "surge" in Iraq, the scandalous treatment of wounded veterans at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys for tawdry political reasons--precisely illuminate the three qualities that make this Administration one of the worst in American history: arrogance (the surge), incompetence (Walter Reed) and cynicism (the U.S. Attorneys).

That's brutally unqualified language; criticism that is as accurate as it is surprising, considering the source and given what effect it may have on the access of Time reporters to the Administration. Perhaps they have realized that source is only useful in a geothermal sense.

Time Magazine has always been center - right with an reflex toward conservatism, dispute rumors to the contrary - though of course it IS to the left of places such as Newsbusters, which seems to have fallen of the edge of the spectrum, a reality that is underlined by increased defections by former "hard core" supporters such as Matthew Dowd and the reaction of the echo chamber.

And despite what the echo chambers reverberate, I don't think coming out against the administration is evidence of a "shift to the left," save in the Colbertian sense, that "reality has a well-known Liberal bias." In a truly Conservative, classically Republican world-view, results count more than words. And the Administration's record on delivering any promised reality has been dismal.

Traditionally, Conservatives are fonder of facts on the ground than pie in the sky, of established and proven procedure to grand and glorious socio-economic theory. The caveat is that you must not confuse "Conservatism" with "Social Conservatism," a mindset which is much more accurately described as "reactionary" or "radical," depending upon the issue.

Read the comments - and indeed, the article itself. It's revealing of the very mindset that did in fact lead to the administration's collapse. First, a complete inability to recognize reality, a callus disregard for the feelings and indeed, the well-being of people who disagree, and of course, a stunning arrogance based upon willful ignorance.

As many actual Conservatives have come to belatedly realize, there is a huge amount of karma waiting around the corner with brazen knuckles, intending to extract a long-term payback for short term strategies. While those strategies were effective, far too many were making good livings furthering them, and too many winning elections and contracts based upon the polices of fear and loathing (as set forth in this Salon article.)

[Matthew] Dowd had been central in formulating the 2002 midterm campaign that zeroed in on the Democrats' patriotism. In 2004, he and Rove crafted the negative attack on Kerry as a "flip-flopper." Asked about the TV ads ripping Kerry, Dowd said on Sept. 22, 2004, on CNN, "I think it's totally tasteful. And the American public is going to be fine with it." He also blithely defended the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth defamation of Kerry's sterling Vietnam War record. "I think the Swift boat ads were part of that dialogue," he said in a 2005 PBS "Frontline" documentary, "but it was more important in that they pointed out something about John Kerry, which is, all this guy's talking about is his Vietnam record. What does that have to do with the war on terror?"

Dowd believed he was designing a permanent Republican majority, but, working alongside Rove, his short-term winning tactics built enormous pressure that produced an implosion. During the 2006 midterm campaign that lost the Republicans control of Congress, Dowd worked as a consultant for California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican running as a virtual liberal Democrat. "I think we should design campaigns that appeal not to 51 percent of the people," Dowd told the Times, "but bring the country together as a whole."

But Dowd neither detailed nor did the Times mention his consulting work in the campaign last year of Richard DeVos, billionaire heir of the Amway fortune, for governor of Michigan. DeVos is a zealous follower of and major donor to the most extreme organizations of the religious right. His campaign against incumbent Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm was marked by nasty ads falsely stating: "Under Governor Granholm's administration, you can stay on welfare as long as you want." These weren't a new paradigm but old racial code words.

Despite having won - so to speak - two elections and having near absolute control of the nation and it's policies for six years, there are no fruits of victory - no achievements to commemorate the triumph. And all that "Republican Revolutionary Spirit," all the fruits of the Gipper; all have resolved with seeming inevitability, into one massive, miserable and undeniable failure.

To the surprise of no-one at all, mercenary opportunists such as Dowd will be the first "dedicated supporters" to discover that - to their astonishment - George Bush has committed impeachable offenses, not so much due to a crisis of conscience - though that may indeed play a role, but due to the fact that calling for the blood of the leader may have the effect of shielding the followers from accountability as well as possibly preserving a shred or two of self-respect.

With the sheer number of Nixon and Regan retreads in this administration, the strategy is probably obvious to everyone.

So once again, the usual suspects will be "shocked, shocked to find that there is gambling in this establishment!" And once again, the real lesson of the price of stupid, precipitous and unethical conduct will be lost. We teach our kids in T-Ball and Pop Warner that winners never cheat because cheaters cannot win. Maybe the Mommy and Daddy Parties should remember that simple, kindergarten lesson in practical ethics.

Illustration: Bush Puzzled as to what went wrong by webcarve

tag: Miserable Failure, George W. Bush, Impeach the President, Iraq War, economy, ethics, lies, Matthew Dowd

In Homage to Harry Reid's Giant Testicles

I dugg this and I think you will too.
The Rude Pundit Bows down :

Each and every time Bush has tried to pathetically swing a right hook at his face, the Nevada Senator's bent back so that Bush hit only air. Reid's danced and then returned a left uppercut to Bush's chin. The Senate passes an Iraq funding bill with a timeline for troop withdrawal and benchmarks. Bush goes all batshit and says he'll veto it, doesn't wanna talk about, dadadadadamyfingersareinmyearsIcanthearyou. What does Reid do? Does he talk about compromise and "working with the White House"? Fuck no. He grabs his pendulous balls and says, "Eat shit and die," and then says he'll back Russ Feingold's bill that cuts off funds for the war except for a narrowly defined mission.

Reid's been to Iraq, been to Walter Reed - here's what he said about that visit: "To say, Mr. President, that I left Walter Reed depressed is an understatement. We've all heard the stories about Walter Reed...Go to Walter Reed. Listen to the parents. Listen to the people that are hurt." Reid describes how private contracting is destroying the hospital and the military, as well as how the lack of resources is affecting the patients there.

Yesterday, in his pissy little press conference, Bush tried to attack back, saying that Democrats are playing games and are delaying his funding request for the troops. Not missing a fuckin' beat, Reid slammed back, "Democrats will send President Bush a bill that gives our troops the resources they need and a strategy in Iraq worthy of their sacrifices. If the President vetoes this bill he will have delayed funding for troops and kept in place his strategy for failure."

Give 'em hell, Harry!

As usual, The Rude Pundit is a source of hilariously Graphic Truth.

read more | digg story

tag: Harry Ried, The Rude Pundit, Digg, , military, veterans, accountablity, George W. Bush, Walter Reed Army Medical Center, separation of powers, Congress, Emergency Spending Bill

What's really behind "Stop the ACLU:" - Pizza

ACLU - Real ID Pizza Nightmare

The government and corporations are aggressively collecting information about your personal life and your habits. They want to track your purchases, your medical records, and even your relationships. The Bush Administration's policies, coupled with invasive new technologies, could eliminate your right to privacy completely. Please help us protect our privacy rights and prevent the Total Surveillance Society.

Strangely - or perhaps not so strangely - Domino's Pizza is a major contributor to conservative campaigns, though I'm not sure if they specifically oppose the ACLU. Nonetheless, the choice of a pizza parlor being able to access your private info in order to see if they can or should sell you pizza is an all-too-possible future.

With this ad, the ACLU points out a fact that seems to escape Conservatives - once a right or a freedom is eroded or eliminated, it's gone for everyone. If you suppress the right of free speech and freedom of assembly in order to, say, suppress criticism of the Bible, the next time the political winds shift, you may find the same exception applied to the "seminal works of Karl Marx."

Real ID is of little benefit to citizens - even in the name of security. Oh, it would make life easier in some senses for Law Enforcement, but for the most part they already have access to the information they need, and before I was willing to let them have more access, I'd have to be considerably more comfortable with their commitment to justice than I am currently. The current scandal in the Justice Department clearly shows that it's powers make it a terrible weapon in the hands of those willing to serve corrupt and partisan ends.

But what they do not have, and what every Authoritarian wishes to have, is the ability to micromanage society down to the individual level; to reliably identify "unreliable persons," to know who to employ and who not to employ, who to insure, who to loan money to, who to trust and who to exclude from society. And if you honestly, if inexplicalby, believe this administration can be trusted to not discomfort you in any way do to your beliefs - you have to ask your self - "But what would Hillary do?"

The key to not fearing who is in power is to KEEP the power. This is the Jeffersonian ideal that I believe in, that government has only the power that is conditionally loaned to it by the people, and only to the degree that it needs to do it's specificly permitted duties, and only for so long as that power is needed.

I suggest that there is every reason to believe that not only will government and privileged corporations misuse this data, it's overwhelmingly likely they will also misinterpret it, misappropriate it and make resoundingly bad decisions based on data points that do not mean what they thought they meant. The availability of an ocean of data makes it possible to draw wide-reaching conclusions, but there is still no guarantee those conclusions will be accurate, based on good science or made without intellectual or ideological bias. Everything I've seen in my lifetime, on the watches of governments of all stripes tells me that. The only question is who will be affected - and that seems to be as much a function of bad luck as anything else.

The right to privacy and the expectation that must and will be treated as an honorable and honest person in private dealings - and that one's private dealings are indeed private is a fundamental issue to everyone.

If a Real ID card contains your medical history, it can and therefore will contain your criminal history, your mental health history, your gun licenses and purchases, your insurance claims, your driving record and your credit history - as this little flash movie so aptly demonstrates.

You won't know who is looking at it, or on what basis they use this data to make decisions, but Right, Left or center, Christian, Atheist, Muslim or Other - you will be affected, in ways you cannot predict and often will never know or be able to address.

The massive networking of databases and the collection of individual records is, I am afraid, unavoidable and is in fact potentially an amazing tool for enhancing the liberty of citizens - if we control who can access it and when. If we cannot control our own information - then it becomes an tool for our total enslavement, doomed to living on credit in the Mall of America.

The only Real ID I support is a universal access key that permits me to choose who, if anyone, gets to access my information and to what degree and which permits me to review and question what data is there. For instance, it would display my auto insurance and licence status - but until I granted access, even a cop would need a warrant to get more out of it - and all warrant- based access would be recorded.

Further, I want to be able to place a charge on records that I am willing to share and that have economic value. Otherwise, I want my database records encrypted to a level that it would take a dedicated supercomputer several weeks to break it - with the encryption randomly refreshed on a daily basis.

By the by, I have such a "Real ID" in my pocket. It's called a "cell phone" and it's easily capable of carrying an encryption keyring, with a biometric/pass code combination for access.

But nobody should be required to carry such a device or indeed, "prove" who they are upon demand, ever. So long as they are willing to accept that some form of identification may reasonably required for access to various services, and refusal will make access more limited, expensive or non-extant, people should be able to choose that.

Yes, I realize that such customs make it possible for "terrorists and undocumented aliens" to walk among us. But it's always possible to forge identities, even under such a sophisticated scheme as Real ID - and the more sophisticated the system, the more inappropriate trust is placed in it.

Liberty is an ideal that carries some inherent risks of the "what if" variety. The answer to those "what if's" is generally "honor, a generous spirit and a fearless nature."

People, speaking in terms of statistically significant numbers, will behave fairly much as they are expected to, and will respect legitimate authority in a manner directly related to the respect given them.

tag: ACLU, freedom, first amendment, Real ID, privacy, Liberty, Pizza, information security, data encryption, universal database, government, corporatism.

Chickenhawk excuses.

"I'm fighting the cultural war. Both need to be fought and both need to be won by Conservatives."

What an astonishingly stupid thing to say. What the hell would a "Conservative Victory" in IRAQ look like? Seems to me it would involve the disenfranchising of women, the suppression of religious and political dissent, a government unwilling to consider evidence that "contradicts scripture"... Or in other words, a "Conservative Victory" seems a hell of a lot like turning over the keys to the Taliban and doing the Baghdad boogie all the way home.

Idiot.

Of course, that's exactly what a "Conservative Victory" in the "Culture War" would look like, so why don't we all just convert to Islam and get it over with?

"I'm fighting the "Cultural War." You gutless no-neck twerp, you who wish you HAD the guts to be a pansy, you phony, with your GI haircut and 'tude - I have these words for you.

Re: Jim Gibbons REF: We Told You So

TPMmuckraker March 30, 2007 09:51 AM

More Trouble for Gibbons
By Paul Kiel - March 30, 2007, 9:51 AM

The Wall Street Journal continues (sub. req.) to make life miserable for Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons. The paper first reported a month ago that Gibbons was under federal investigation for improper gifts (possible bribes) from a defense contractor.

Now the paper reports that Gibbons' business as a legislator was intertwined with a second defense contractor:

The wife of Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons was hired as a consultant to a defense contractor at the same time that her husband, who was then a member of Congress, helped the company get funding for a no-bid federal contract.

Dawn Gibbons got about $35,000 in consulting fees in 2004 from Sierra Nevada Corp., of Sparks, Nev., the company said. Mr. Gibbons, a five-term Republican who served on the armed services and intelligence committees, sought funding that year for Sierra Nevada for a $4 million contract to develop a helicopter radar-landing system.

I'm not sure which is worse - that Jim Gibbons can be had, or that he can be had so cheaply! Either way, it's embarrassing to be a Nevadan.

Update: The Las Vegas Sun has an article listing several donors to Jim Gibbon's Legal Defense fund. Interesting to see who they are and speculate why they would want to see Jim stay in office - and out of Club Fed.

tag: Gov. Jim Gibbons, Nevada, Corruption, Bribary, Scandal, Abramoff, Dawn Gibbons, Sierra Nevada Corp., improper gifts, Corrupt Bastards Club

Illustrating Breast Cancer Awareness on your blog.

I have a personal twitch about Print on Demand as a tool for things other than moneymaking. I mean, making money is all fine and good. I manage to make a little here and there, enough so that my server costs are covered and enough extra for beer. If you want to spend a lot of time promoting your products, you can do well at this. But if your main goal is to say something, right this second, on your blog - they can be amazingly handy.



Let's face it, if your article is illustrated, it will attract more eyeballs than ones that are not. If you have a graphic, it makes a more interesting feed entry. And sometimes, the best way to make your point is with a honking BIG graphic, right at the top of your page.

Allow me to illustrate My point.

Breast Cancer by webcarve

Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

I'd like to share a nifty trick I've been using to illustrate my various blogs. It's a way that might possibly earn me some revenue and more importantly, will not ever get me sued, because I know for sure that it's ok to use the graphic.

I'm using Breast Cancer Awareness because the topic is coming up and you will probably want a graphic to go with your obligatory blog entry. This is a tutorial on how to do it with Zazzle.com, which in my humble opinion is the easiest service for this use.



First, you will want to create an account. After all, you may not find the exact design or saying that you need - and this amounts to free image hosting that pays YOU money.



Once you have that out of the way, you pop over to zazzle when you want a fresh illustration for a story. We are talking about breast cancer awareness, so we'll type "breast cancer" into the top of the page and scan for a design that meshes with our entry.



Since it's me, well, I'm struck by THIS design. Your mileage may vary.

Save Second Base - Race for the Cure Edition by Coleend

The above design works either as a simple small line graphic, or as a shirt graphic, so it will work for all kinds of blog posts and sidebars. To get it to show up, simply go to the product's page and select the "link to this" option in the upper right hand corner. This will enable a javascript popup window (so enable them for zazzle) giving you several options for generating html code to simply dump into your clipboard. It's just that easy.

But, let's suppose you want a particular saying, and it's unique to you, or at least, you can't find it on zazzle? Well, that's why you want an account. Aside from the "getting paid" part.



So let's assume you have done that, and have a new saying. Here's what I'm going to put on it.

My  nipples get hard when I'm scared.

When I'm scared, I run like hell!

Run for a cure - April 21

And here's the result, five minutes later.

I run when I'm scared

by

webcarve



Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

I used the ribbon I have, of course. If you want a graphic, you'll have to create or find one you can legally use and upload it. (Creative Commons has a lot of images you can freely use.)



And once you have a stock of images at zazzle, you can illustrate your blog with images like this in a matter of moments. There's a wide variety of fonts, colors, background colors and more to choose from. so it's a heck of a flexible tool. And you just might make some money doing it. I think I have a good chance with this sticker, because it's perfect for groups to customize, and my own text is pretty apt too.

Have You Been Squished Lately? by webcarve

Get this custom sticker at Zazzle

These last two images are the same product - the first with the product view chosen, the next with the design view.

Defeat Breast Cancer Keychain

 

Defeat Breast Cancer Keychain by webcarve

Tomorrow I'll cover the same topic using Cafepress instead. It's got some advantages too, and, like Zazzle, it's best to have a shop of your own, but all you really need is an affiliate account to get some great use out of it.

Technorati Tags: breast cancer awareness, graphic art, customisable, bob king

This will come as no surprise to anyone who ever lived in the Tenderloin...

elephant,
by
Gay_Art

Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

BARBARA'S TCHATZKAHS : Bizarre Sex Habits of The Extreme Right-Wing

It's pretty much a truism that folks project upon others the behaviors and "sins" they are most guilty of.

In 2005, anti-abortion extremist Neal Horsley was a guest on The Alan Colmes Show, a FOX News radio program. The topic was an interesting one - whether or not an internet service provider should allow Horsley to post the names of abortion doctors on his website. Horsley does that as a way of targeting them and one doctor has been killed. In the course of the interview, however, Colmes asked Horsley about his background, including a statement that he had admitted to engaging in homosexual and bestiality.

At first, Horsley laughed and said,

"Just because it's printed in the media, people jump to believe it."

"Is it true?" Colmes asked.

"Hey, Alan, if you want to accuse me of having sex when I was a fool, I did everything that crossed my mind that looked like I..."

AC: "You had sex with animals?"

NH: "Absolutely. I was a fool. When you grow up on a farm in Georgia, your first girlfriend is a mule."

AC: "I'm not so sure that that is so."

NH: "You didn't grow up on a farm in Georgia, did you?"

AC: "Are you suggesting that everybody who grows up on a farm in Georgia has a mule as a girlfriend?"

NH: It has historically been the case. You people are so far removed from the reality... Welcome to domestic life on the farm..."

Colmes said he thought there were a lot of people in the audience who grew up on farms, are living on farms now, raising kids on farms and "and I don't think they are dating Elsie right now. You know what I'm saying?"

Horsley said, "You experiment with anything that moves when you are growing up sexually. You're naive. You know better than that... If it's warm and it's damp and it vibrates you might in fact have sex with it."

Um. No, not actually. I speak from experience, having grown up on a farm, though not in Georgia. Fact is, some of us actually think that the being possessing the warm damp parts has some say in the matter. Furthermore, there are actually penis bearing organisms - such as myself - that find anything less than enthusiastic co-operation to be rather revolting and repellent. Even at a "foolish" age.

And come to think of it, I didn't know of or even have reason to suspect such a thing of any of my neighbors, who, if not inherently morally superior, considered masturbation to be far more sensible from a risk-benefit perspective. 1200 pounds of hooves and teeth take a lot of convincing. I suspect he had some help from his Daddy or big brother. I mean, where do you even get such an idea in the first place?

Of course, nothing has actually changed for Horsely. He is still fucking people non-consensually. He's just abstracted and sublimated the essential disrespect for the will and consent of others and made it seem respectable. That way, metaphorically, but obviously significantly, he gets laid more often. Oh, and as he gets paid for it...

For extra credit - two google searches:

Republican Sex Offenders (Personalized Results 1 - 10 of about 1,200,000 for Republican Sex Offenders.)

Republican Pedophiles (Personalized Results 1 - 10 of about 406,000 for Republican Pedophiles.)

My dear wingers; we have met your enemy and it was you. Furthermore, you look ridiculous in drag.

tag: Neal Horsley, Bizarre Sex Habits, Republicans, Anti-Abortion Activists, Sexual Sins, Christianism, Moralality, Sublimation, Right-Wing Hypocrites

A Stained Blue Fifth Amendment.

Meet George Bush's "Monica," just the sort of shiny-eyed, blond and Bushie-tailed fanatic loyalist that you'd need to help you betray your country. And after a few years of "all Monica, all the time," is the irony not palpable?

Hullabaloo:

"[W]hat were the Pat Robertson' U grad Monica Goodling's primary qualifications before joining the Department of Justice? She worked with Barbara Comstock and Timothy Griffin (the US Attorney from Arkansas who Rove pushed through under the patriot act) at the Bush Cheney oppo research department in 2000.

It doesn't automatically make her a criminal, but it sure stinks of unethical politicization of the Justice Department.

I heard Orrin Hatch filibuster for what seemed like hours this morning on Meet the Press about how there wasn't a 'shred of evidence' that there was any wrongdoing. Well, except for the totally unethical phone calls by Domenichi and Iglesias and the US Attorneys' publicly stated suspicion that they were let go for partisan political reasons, I suppose not. But they need to lay off the tequila if they actually expect to get the benefit of the doubt about their good intentions after they populated the Justice Department with dirty tricksters in extremely sensitive jobs.

Many of us were told to pipe down when we complained that the Justice Department and the NSA had been involved in spying on Americans with no oversight. But now that we know that Barbara Comstock, Monica Goodling and Tim Griffin, Karl Rove's personal smear artists, were promoted to the highest reaches of the federal police agencies with access to records on their political opponents and every other American, then it's clear that we weren't suspicious enough. At this point, I think we have to assume that with these people in charge and having the use of all the new powers of the Patriot Act, there have been no limits at all on the partisan, political use of the government's investigative powers.

I am no longer confused about why Monica Goodling took the fifth. I have little doubt that there are many crimes that took place and she's not taking any chances. This is bigger than the US Attorney scandal."

Clearly, when asked if she would do "anything" for the President, she didn't even have to be asked in person, and - in MY personal opinion - "oppo research" that is intended to be used to smear, defame and denigrate opponents is one HELL of a lot more of a moral compromise than oral sex between consenting adults, a usage I'd consider it immensely more degrading than being used to moisten a cigar, which is, after all, not actually a "Big Ten" no-no.

However, Ms. Goodling seems untroubled by having started her career in government as a professional "bearer of false witness," something the Bible frowns upon rather more harshly than more literal forms of whoredom, professional or amateur.

I mean, being used as a cigar moistener might be somewhat embarrassing (we shall not be so rude as to say "tasteless") but it's not something one needs to plead the fifth about. One pleads the fifth when there is a more than reasonable chance that some portions of one's actions might be seen as being, well, illegal.

From her Law.com Bio: Goodling graduated in 1995 with a degree in communications and a minor in politics, then started law school at American University. But she quickly transferred to Regent University in Virginia Beach, Va., a school founded by Pat Robertson. (The motto: "Christian Leadership to Change the World.") There, she enrolled in a joint public policy master's and law degree program. The school, which was accredited by the American Bar Association in 1996, has a standard law school curriculum, but also encourages students to talk and think about how law interacts with their faith and values.

From the public record, I believe that discerning Christians and Lawyers may come to rather damning conclusions about the substance of those discussions and their effect upon faith, values and graduate's respect for the Law.

tag: Monica Goodling, Oppo Research, Regent University, Treason, theocrats, theocons, Impeach the President, Alberto Gonzalez, Fifth Amendment, Justice Department, US Attorney

A Reality-Based Republican

Alan K. Simpson - Bigotry That Hurts Our Military - washingtonpost.com:

"As a lifelong Republican who served in the Army in Germany, I believe it is critical that we review -- and overturn -- the ban on gay service in the military. I voted for 'don't ask, don't tell.' But much has changed since 1993.

My thinking shifted when I read that the military was firing translators because they are gay. According to the Government Accountability Office, more than 300 language experts have been fired under 'don't ask, don't tell,' including more than 50 who are fluent in Arabic. This when even Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently acknowledged the nation's 'foreign language deficit' and how much our government needs Farsi and Arabic speakers. Is there a 'straight' way to translate Arabic? Is there a 'gay' Farsi? My God, we'd better start talking sense before it is too late. We need every able-bodied, smart patriot to help us win this war."

The former Republican Senator from Wyoming goes on to wryly observe that the armed forces have been forced to issue an increasing number of "moral waivers" to convicted felons, leading us to wonder how, say, a convicted rapist is less of a problem in service to our nation than a gay man or woman who has committed no such offense.

"Don't Ask, Don't Tell" was a bastard compromise that had one benefit; to allow some time for it to percolate through the military that gay people could, have and do serve without it becoming an issue. It seems that it has.

Military attitudes have also shifted. Fully three-quarters of 500 vets returning from Iraq and Afghanistan said in a December Zogby poll that they were comfortable interacting with gay people. Also last year, a Zogby poll showed that a majority of service members who knew a gay member in their unit said the person's presence had no negative impact on the unit or personal morale. Senior leaders such as retired Gen. John Shalikashvili and Lt. Gen. Daniel Christman, a former West Point superintendent, are calling for a second look.

There's another point here. It was properly Conservative to be concerned about the potential effects on the military of open service in '93. I would have argued that the concern was misplaced, but nonetheless I could not then and cannot say now that I'd have been correct. Open service, given our military culture, might well have led to some very ugly problems - though probably more due to the attitudes of "straight" service-members.

But that was then and this is now. Sen. Simpson demonstrates for us what a "reality-based" Conservative looks like.

tag: don't ask don't tell, gays in the military, military readiness, Iraq War, Supporting the Troops, Uniform Code of Military Justice, cultural warfare, Alan K. Simpson

This article is illustrated with a beautiful Gays in the Military design kindly provided by The Last Straw, an extremely gay shop featuring a variety of patriotic and flag designs.