Senator Franken

The Al Franken Decade finally begins.

Congratulations, Emy. Your hard work paid off!

Monsters

Bob Herbert's column:

"No one seems to know how old Mohammed Jawad was when he was seized by Afghan forces in Kabul six and a half years ago and turned over to American custody. Some reports say he was 14. Some say 16. The Afghan government believes he was 12.
...
In a sworn affidavit, Colonel Vandeveld said, “This abuse included the slapping of Mr. Jawad across the face while Mr. Jawad’s head was covered with a hood, as well as Mr. Jawad’s having been shoved down a stairwell while both hooded and shackled.”
...
The colonel said he lacked the words “to express the heartsickness” he felt as he came to fully understand the way Jawad had been treated by American soldiers.

On Dec. 25, 2003, Jawad tried to kill himself by repeatedly banging his head against a wall of his cell.
There is no credible evidence against Jawad, and his torture-induced confession has rightly been ruled inadmissible by a military judge. But the Obama administration does not feel that he has suffered enough. Not only have administration lawyers opposed defense efforts to secure Jawad’s freedom, but they are using, as the primary basis for their opposition, the fruits of the confession that was obtained through torture and has already been deemed inadmissible — without merit, of no value."

As Thers stated in the post I linked to yesterday, "...there are lots and lots of perfectly legitimate reasons to criticize the Obama administration..."

Continuing some of the monstrous misconduct of the Bush administration is certainly one of them.

Hoax Couture

Another rightwing conspiracy theory melts in the bright light of reality.
Whiskey Fire:

It's a very odd thing: there are lots and lots of perfectly legitimate reasons to criticize the Obama administration, but the right wing blogosphere has yet to come up with a single line of attack that isn't totally loony.

Thers actually takes the time to do what wingnuts should have done before buying this latest conservative think tank sponsored attempt at spreading blatant corporate propaganda.
You know, when someone decides not to publish a fiction disguised as a climate science report by two guys with no climate science credentials, I wouldn't exactly call that "suppressing".
In the same way I wouldn't call refusing to let an auto mechanic diagnose my mother when she's had a heart attack "suppressing" a medical opinion.

Paul Krugman's op-ed:

I’d call this a crazy conspiracy theory, but doing so would actually be unfair to crazy conspiracy theorists. After all, to believe that global warming is a hoax you have to believe in a vast cabal consisting of thousands of scientists — a cabal so powerful that it has managed to create false records on everything from global temperatures to Arctic sea ice.

To put it into terms they might understand - If these deniers don't get on the right side of this and soon, there won't be a habitable Argentina left to house their mistresses.

Update
Just because this, so far, is the best quote I have read on the story:

"a ragbag collection of un-peer reviewed web pages, an unhealthy dose of sunstroke, a dash of astrology and more cherries than you can poke a cocktail stick at."

The Perversion Of A Persian

I knew it would be only a matter of time before Mr. Wabu used the image of Neda Agha-Soltan, bloody and lifeless (a close up with a comical caption, no less, all you money-shot fans!) to further his conspiracy-laden political something-or-other agenda.
Was it a relief to him that that he found this photo? After all, he can only exploit images of the exploding twin towers so many times before his desensitized fan base start talking about how he just keeps repeating himself.
I'm certain he thinks he's being "Unflinching"™ and all "Up In The Grill"™ of his enemies by posting it but one gets the creepy feeling that it's just porn for this guy.
Just Mother Whackin' insane.

To paraphrase TBogg, Neda is the BFF that Abu Wabu never would have had.

Inglesh Ownlee

Pat Buchanan's Vowel Movement Rawks!

Found In Translation

Meet The Press as heard without the filter.

Stupid Human Tricks

A sampling of the vicious left the high-minded who sit in judgment of that awful man David Letterman who make crude comments about children :

"Should we talk about his son?" one protester asked Green. "I believe his son was born out of wedlock. I believe there's a term for that."
...
"How dare he?" asked yet a third, the most offensive of all. "When he has a bastard son, and a slut for a wife" (Letterman's wife Lasko has kept a notoriously low profile).

So that's what the high road looks like.
It's a good thing that, as some have brilliantly predicted, Letterman's ratings are dropping like a f****n' stone!
Yes, there's nothing like controversy (even one full of Hot Air) to rid a show of it's viewers.

Winkin' Memorial

Poor Bible Spice.
Now that she's got her apology from Letterman, she'll need to conjure up some other Palin-the-victim whine festival to keep the spotlight on herself.
I've been having a hard time believing the sincerity of this latest attack of the vapors that has overcome so many in the Palin camp. After all, when the issue moves from dealing with talk of rape to dealing with an actual rape, Palin's response has been far less sensitive:

"...as AMERICAblog has documented (and the media is now reporting), when Sarah Palin was mayor of Wasilla, the town charged rape victims for the exams."

Nothing so classy as screwing a rape victim.

Turns out I'm not alone in my skepticism. Perhaps Letterman was the last straw for them but I doubt it. Conservatives have never met a straw they weren't willing to snap at in anger so the first one usually is as far as anyone gets.

As James Wolcott says:

"I fear some on the political-cultural right may be losing their sense of proportion, along with their few remaining marbles."

Who Would Jesus Shoot In The Head?

Looks Like Radical Rightwing Terrorism Wins This Round.

Asked whether he felt efforts should be made to keep the clinic open, (Dr. Warren Hern) said: "This was Dr. Tiller's clinic. How much can you resist this kind of violence? What doctor, what reasonable doctor would work there? Where does it stop?"

"I will never be safe the rest of my life," Hern said. "No matter what I do. Even if I close my office. They've told me, don't bother wearing a bulletproof vest, we're going to go for a head shot."

Update:
Say, isn't this one of those Ticking Time Bomb Scenarios the right loves to use as a torture justification?
Why all the silence, then (cough, not a muslim, cough)?

Or as Roger Ailes (the good one) puts it.

Hens In The FOX House

Sean Hannity, FOX's go-to alarmist who is equally afraid of waterboarding and elite mustards, and Mark Steyn (rapper name: Nostradumbass) hit the panic button over the horrible conciliatory tone President WorsethanHitler took in his Cairo speech when talking about Hamas.

Except, of course, he didn't.