False Hope On FISA?

Glenn Greenwald has hope on FISA:

But at least thus far, from everything I can tell, the picture is more complicated and less depressing than this NYT article suggests, and the defeat is not yet a fait accompli. To begin with, the bill to be proposed today by the House Democratic leadership actually contains some surprisingly good and important provisions. . .

But that bill will never see the President's desk. As Glenn himself notes:

It is definitely possible that this is all just deceit, that House leaders introduced this bill strictly to placate their Progressive Caucus and their base and that they have no real intention of fighting for these provisions, but instead will give Bush what he wants once Mike McConnell starts accusing them of Helping the Terrorists and they begin negotiating in secret again.

Yes, that is exactly what will happen. We know the cast of characters already. This is a repeat of the Iraq Supplemental fight in March. The House bill will be eviscerated. More.

Glenn hopes for this:

But it seems that there are important House Democrats really ready to fight on these issues, to prevent Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel (who unfortunately seem to be the real Speakers of the House) from conniving like they did in August to manipulate their caucus into supporting something far worse.

Here is where Glenn and I part company on strategy and tactics:

The real problem here seems to be that the wretched, principle-free, administration-revering Democratic faction on the Senate Intelligence Committee — particularly Jay Rockefeller, joined by the Dianne Feinsteins and Bill Nelsons — is eager to reach a “compromise” with their Bush-loyal “colleagues” (such as “Kit” Bond and the Responsible, Honorable, Serious Mike McConnell). And they are, as always, even more eager to deliver bountiful gifts to their generous contributors in the telecom industry and their sleazy friends in the Clintonite-telecom-lobbying-circle.

No, they are what they are and they do what they do. The problem REMAINS, as it is on Iraq, in the House. The inability to say NO to Rockefeller, Feinstein, et al. The inability to say NO to Bush.

The House does not have to accede to anything. It can say no to the Senate. It can say no to Bush. The problem has been it will NOT say no.

As Glenn himself acknowledges:

The question, then, is to what extent the more principled members of the House Democratic caucus — and they do exist — can exert influence over the House Democratic leadership to prevent the worthless Senate Democratic caucus from enacting the bill the White House wants, complete with amnesty for lawbreaking telecoms and massively expanded warrantless eavesdropping powers.

How much worth is there in the House Democratic Leadership if pressure needs to be exerted on them to do the right and smart thing? Sorry, that is the problem. Greenwald does get this part very right though:

If the Democratic Congress capitulates yet again, there will be plenty of time and opportunity for all sorts of recriminations. I think it is quite encouraging that much of the “netroots” is now devoting its energies and resources not to supporting Democrats, but to opposing Congressional Democrats who merit defeat.

(Emphasis supplied.) Exactly right.

Cross Your Fingers

(FP’ed 4 AM EDT, Wednesday October 10, 2007

– promoted by exmearden
)

…These Guys Are Getting WORSE.

Have a look at this:

A small private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month, and around 10 a.m. on Sept. 7, it notified the Bush administration of its secret acquisition. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.

Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company’s Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.

To quote the wise one: ‘I have a bad feeling about thisโ€ฆ’

This company, SITE, is something I had no idea existed:

SITE — an acronym for the Search for International Terrorist Entities — was established in 2002 with the stated goal of tracking and exposing terrorist groups, according to the company’s Web site. (Rita) Katz, an Iraqi-born Israeli citizen whose father was executed by Saddam Hussein in the 1960s, has made the investigation of terrorist groups a passionate quest.

“We were able to establish sources that provided us with unique and important information into al-Qaeda’s hidden world,” Katz said. Her company’s income is drawn from subscriber fees and contracts.

Katz said she decided to offer an advance copy of the bin Laden video to the White House without charge so officials there could prepare for its eventual release.

But our guys blew their cover. After providing this information for free, our ‘intelligence’ agencies downloaded dozens of copies of the video. And thenโ€ฆ

โ€ฆBy midafternoon, several television news networks reported obtaining copies of the transcript. A copy posted around 3 p.m. on Fox News’s Web site referred to SITE and included page markers identical to those used by the group. “This confirms that the U.S. government was responsible for the leak of this document,” Katz wrote in an e-mail to Leiter at 5 p.m.

Al-Qaeda supporters, now alerted to the intrusion into their secret network, put up new obstacles that prevented SITE from gaining the kind of access it had obtained in the past, according to Katz.

This is not a good sign. The current administration’s insistence on filling government positions with Loyal Bushies in every nook and cranny means we have idiots running the show everywhere you look.

If they can’t manage keeping a simple secret like this, how are we supposed to trust them to manage anything we may be able to force them to do thanks to our congressional majority? Imaging these clowns trying to manage the orderly exit of Iraq, for example.

Alternatively, if this was done for political reasons, the same question applies.

The only possible silver lining of our inept and craven congress is that by doing nothing, they inadvertently prevent Bush and Co. from fucking things up even more spectacularly. Small condolences, I know, but these people are getting even worse at their jobs as time goes by. Perhaps they all are spending time brushing up their resumes rather that doing their damn jobs.

We need a new government today. I don’t know exactly what’s going to happen between now and January 2009, but I worry about these fools. More and more each day, I worry.

Pony Party, “what a character”

Who doesn’t love IMDb?  And if you didn’t think it could get better….you were mistaken.

IMDb has begun featuring ‘character pages‘.  Now you can get those Yoda quotes without having to sift through all of the other character’s whining comments… ๐Ÿ˜‰  Or make a page for your favorite, underappreciated TV or movie character.

Luke: All right, I’ll give it a try.
Yoda: No. Try not. Do… or do not. There is no try.

Need a pearl of wisdom from Marsha Brady?

Marcia Brady: Doug! I think I just felt your tongue in my mouth.
Doug: It’s called a french kiss.
Marcia Brady: But I thought you were from Nebraska!

What a tremendous improvement to our lives, easier access to gripping dialog

Rocky: Adrian?
Adrian: Rocky!
Rocky: Adrian! Hey, where’s your hat?
Adrian: I love you!
Rocky: I love you.
Adrian: [grabs and hugs Rocky] I love you!
Rocky: I love you. I love you.
Adrian: I love you. I love you!
Rocky: Yeah.

(meh….they can’t all be winners….) ๐Ÿ˜‰

Ever wonder how many quotes Silent Bob actually has?  hmmmmm?

And, while we’re on the subject, a timely quote from Banky, to Jay

Banky: Well, *you’re* in love. And you’ve both got your own monkey. What more could two guys from New Jersey want?
Jay: Well, to have all these fucks stop talking shit about us on the Internet.
Banky: What’ve I been telling you? There’s nothing you can do about it. Unless you show up at all their houses and beat the shit out of them.

spoiler alert….that’s exactly what Jay and Silent Bob proceed to do…

Please don’t recommend the Pony Party, thank you….

Without further ado, the floor is yours..

~73v

Don’t Think About It!

Thinking Causes Cancer – Kensington Report

Don’t think about it. It is what it is. Just watch and listen.

–hat tip to Scary @ The Daily Scare

Muse in the Morning

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Muse in the Morning

The muses are ancient.  The inspirations for our stories were said to be born from them.  Muses of song and dance, or poetry and prose, of comedy and tragedy, of the inward and the outward.  In one version they are Calliope, Euterpe and Terpsichore, Erato and Clio, Thalia and Melpomene, Polyhymnia and Urania.

It has also been traditional to name a tenth muse.  Plato declared Sappho to be the tenth muse, the muse of women poets.  Others have been suggested throughout the centuries.  I don’t have a name for one, but I do think there should be a muse for the graphical arts.  And maybe there should be many more.

Please join us inside to celebrate our various muses…

[Inside: Part IV of America the Ugly]

State of the Onion XXI

America the Ugly

Fruited Plains

Food?

At the edge
of forests healthy
for everything
but animals or trees
lie the fruited plains
blistered with toxins
alchemically nurtured
in a liquid
roughly water
strange brew
what’s inside of you

America Amerika

Groves of blemished trees
bearing produce
invisibly bruised
dripping venomous juices
like Snow White’s apple
We are fashioned
into laboratory mice
to ascertain
how much poison
we can consume
and remain vaguely human
while we are forced
to pay exorbitant fees
for what passes
as our health

–Robyn Elaine Serven
–March 29, 2006

I know you have talent.  What sometimes is forgotten is that being practical is a talent.  I have a paucity for that sort of talent in many situations, though it turns out that I’m a pretty darn good cook.  ๐Ÿ™‚ 

Let your talent bloom.  You can share it here.  Encourage others to let it bloom inside them as well.

Won’t you share your words or art, your sounds or visions, your thoughts scientific or philosophic, the comedy or tragedy of your days, the stories of doing and making?  And be excellent to one another!

Muse in the Morning

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Muse in the Morning

The muses are ancient.  The inspirations for our stories were said to be born from them.  Muses of song and dance, or poetry and prose, of comedy and tragedy, of the inward and the outward.  In one version they are Calliope, Euterpe and Terpsichore, Erato and Clio, Thalia and Melpomene, Polyhymnia and Urania.

It has also been traditional to name a tenth muse.  Plato declared Sappho to be the tenth muse, the muse of women poets.  Others have been suggested throughout the centuries.  I don’t have a name for one, but I do think there should be a muse for the graphical arts.  And maybe there should be many more.

Please join us inside to celebrate our various muses…

[Inside: Part V of America the Ugly]

State of the Onion XXII

America the Ugly

I do not set aside
the grace of God,
for if righteousness
could be gained
through the law,
Christ died for nothing!”
–Gal 2:21

Shedding Grace

God’s Eye

God sheds grace on us?
The shedding of grace
has a human face
We are graced with hunger
to measure our sense of charity
We are graced with poverty
to challenge us
to solve economic
inequity and despair
We are graced with pestilence
but also graced
with the scientific curiosity
necessary for us
to defeat disease
We are not graced with war
That is our doing
it is our responsibility to end it
We are not graced with greed
which is rather a byproduct
of the rotting
of human souls
We are not graced
with the false profiteers
who use religion
to tear us apart
when its purpose
is to bring us together
to give us common bonds
under our separate roofs

God sheds tears for us
tears of frustration
of shame and contempt
of anger and outrage
of pain and disgust
at what people have done
in God’s name
God sheds no grace now

America Amerika

We have spurned
the grace of God

–Robyn Elaine Serven
–March 30, 2006

I know you have talent.  What sometimes is forgotten is that being practical is a talent.  I have a paucity for that sort of talent in many situations, though it turns out that I’m a pretty darn good cook.  ๐Ÿ™‚ 

Let your talent bloom.  You can share it here.  Encourage others to let it bloom inside them as well.

Won’t you share your words or art, your sounds or visions, your thoughts scientific or philosophic, the comedy or tragedy of your days, the stories of doing and making?  And be excellent to one another!

Muse in the Morning

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Muse in the Morning

The muses are ancient.  The inspirations for our stories were said to be born from them.  Muses of song and dance, or poetry and prose, of comedy and tragedy, of the inward and the outward.  In one version they are Calliope, Euterpe and Terpsichore, Erato and Clio, Thalia and Melpomene, Polyhymnia and Urania.

It has also been traditional to name a tenth muse.  Plato declared Sappho to be the tenth muse, the muse of women poets.  Others have been suggested throughout the centuries.  I don’t have a name for one, but I do think there should be a muse for the graphical arts.  And maybe there should be many more.

Please join us inside to celebrate our various muses…

[Inside: Part IV of America the Ugly]

State of the Onion XXI

America the Ugly

Fruited Plains
Food?

At the edge
of forests healthy
for everything
but animals or trees
lie the fruited plains
blistered with toxins
alchemically nurtured
in a liquid
roughly water
strange brew
what’s inside of you

America Amerika

Groves of blemished trees
bearing produce
invisibly bruised
dripping venomous juices
like Snow White’s apple
We are fashioned
into laboratory mice
to ascertain
how much poison
we can consume
and remain vaguely human
while we are forced
to pay exorbitant fees
for what passes
as our health

–Robyn Elaine Serven
–March 29, 2006

I know you have talent.  What sometimes is forgotten is that being practical is a talent.  I have a paucity for that sort of talent in many situations, though it turns out that I’m a pretty darn good cook.  ๐Ÿ™‚ 

Let your talent bloom.  You can share it here.  Encourage others to let it bloom inside them as well.

Won’t you share your words or art, your sounds or visions, your thoughts scientific or philosophic, the comedy or tragedy of your days, the stories of doing and making?  And be excellent to one another!

Muse in the Morning

What a little racehorse taught me about life

(John Henry showed me that it’s all about how you run your race, not necessarily “winning.” – promoted by jillian)

I read the news today, oh my. And, for a follower of the “ponies”, it is a sad day indeed. The legendary racehorse, John Henry has passed. Gone to the big race in the sky to battle down the homestretch with the other greats of the sport. And, I am heartbroken, indeed. For John Henry, although giving me great thrills at his exploits at the track, also taught me a great deal about life.

No..really.

John wasn’t from the true “blue” blooded side of the track. His sire, Ole Bob Bowers was once sold for $900. John himself wasn’t purchased for millions at the well-heeled sales at Saratoga. He barely brought in $1,100 at the Keeneland sales, after bashing himself in the head in the stall and arriving into the sales ring bloody.

He “suffered” the indignity of being gelded because he had his own mind…and mean temper. He also was undersized. Underweight. Underbred with unremarkable conformation.

He raced early on. He was a “workhorse” and managed to bring in some money and some attention. He was finally purchased by Dotsam Stable, the stable of Dorothy (Dot) and Sam Rubin. They shipped him out to California to the stable of Ron McAnally.

And…in the California sun and the glare of the racing public….John Henry blossomed. He started winning. Big. And the racing “elite” took notice. The fans turned up in droves to see “the little horse” that could. He captured the nation’s imagination.

He certainly captured mine.

I would ride the Greyhound bus from Santa Barbara down to the tracks in the Los Angeles area, camera in tow and Racing Form in hand. And watching John in action truly was breath taking. Coming from the “nose bleed” section of the pack to win by a whisker he would give us thrills and excitement, and, yes, disappointment. He didn’t win them all, but you knew he gave it his all. And we all loved him for it.

He was a ham. He truly loved the fans..almost as much as we loved him. I would squeeze up to the paddock rail to see the little guy. He would look around the ring, and, I kid you not, spot the cameras. As he was being walked around the ring, he would stop infront of someone who had a camera and “pose” until he heard that shutter click. I have a couple of great photos of him “smiling” at me.

So, what did he “teach” me, you ask…well…

John showed everyone that one can truly go from “rags to riches.” It didn’t matter if you weren’t from the good side of the tracks or bloodlines, you could still have the talent to prove yourself an individual.

John showed that you could turn your anger and “meanness” to do good, and be productive. He was cantakerous, often ill-tempered, even after being gelded. That was just who he was…and he turned that “meanness” into a productive end result. Dogged determination.

John showed that winning wasn’t the only thing….it was HOW YOU RAN YOUR RACE. It was the effort that mattered. Sure, winning was a great thing, but it wasn’t the ONLY thing. Showing heart. Giving the task at hand your best effort. THAT was the important thing.

John showed that intelligence was part of any game, too. Chris McCarron often said that John knew when to move in the race, all by himself. He (Chris) was just along for the ride.

John also showed that knowing yourself was a key component to a “winning” life. He would walk carefully to morning workouts, making sure he didn’t stumble on rocks or collide with other horses more “high strung.” He knew that taking his time to the track was his “modus operendi”. His “peeps” understood that too. John trained them well.

John was the “working man’s” horse. He earned his place of greatness in the sport, and in our hearts, through toughness, tenacity and hard work rather than sheer brilliance. He taught us that life involved hard work, and having to work was nothing to be embarassed about. It was to be celebrated.

His final race record stood at 83 starts, 39 wins, 15 seconds, and 9 thirds with $6,497,947 in earnings.

  * Voted 7 Eclipse Awards
  * Voted Horse of the Year 1981 and 1984
  * Won Horse of the Year more than once, but not in consecutive years
  * Voted Eclipse Award for Outstanding Older Male Horse 1981
  * Oldest horse to win Eclipse Award for Horse of the Year – at age 9
  * Oldest horse to win a Grade 1 race – at age 9 (tied)
  * Voted Eclipse Award for Outstanding Male Turf Horse – 1980, 1981, 1982, 1984
  * Won 30 stakes races
  * Only horse to win the Arlington Million (G1) twice – 1981 & 1984
  * One of only two horses to win the Santa Anita Handicap (G1) twice – 1981 & 1982
  * Won more grade stakes than any other Thoroughbred – 25
  * Voted racehorse of the decade for the 1980’s
  * Still the richest gelding of any breed in history
  * Retired as the world’s richest thoroughbred – July 28, 1985
  * Inducted into National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame in 1990
  * Ranked #23 in the Blood-Horse magazine List of the Top 100 Racehorses of the 20th Century

It wasn’t the awards and the acclaim that were bestowed upon him that made him so legendary, it was his dogged tirelessness and his “never give up” despite the odds attitude. It was the lessons that he taught this little railbird girl, and his millions of other fans around the world, that will never be forgotten. It was the hope that he gave us, all of us “non-blue bloods”, that someday, we, too, could show class and greatness.

And, one of the most controversial, but most exciting of John Henry’s racing days….the Santa Anita Handicap of 1982. I was there. Screaming my throat and lungs raw…cheering him on…jumping up and down along the rail along with the thousands of others….rooting on the “little horse that could.”

John Henry, the “Steel Driving” horse with a “cinderella” story.

God speed.

International Blog Action Day – 0ctober 15

(FP’ed 3:18 pm EDT, Tuesday, October 9. 2007.

Time to take action again one week from today.
– promoted by exmearden
)

Bloggers Unite - Blog Action Day

International blog action day — this year it will be for the environment — is set for October 15:

On October 15th – Blog Action Day, bloggers around the web will unite to put a single important issue on everyone’s mind.  This year, Blog Action Day will be co-ordinating bloggers to tackle the issue of the environment. link

More below the jump…

What Each Blogger Will Do

1.  Publish a post on their blog which relates to an issue of their own choice pertaining to the environment.

and/or

2.  Commit to donating their day’s advertising earnings to an environmental charity of their choice. link

There’s also a choice of graphics that one can put up on their blog and a blogroll on the site of participating blogs (they’re up to 7,800 blogs at last count).

This is planned as a yearly event with a different focus each year. Unless the earth really starts to melt — then it may just be the environment again. 

Here’s that link again:

http://blogactionday…

Bob Herbert and The Manifesto Project: Abolish No Child Left Behind?