I love these. They describe complex systems better than words ever could.
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| [unknown origin] |
The cartoonist seems to have forgotten about politicians, who, shills though they may be, do play a rather prominent role in the whole scheme.
(via @todayspolitics)
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| Former President George W. Bush |
Last June, ex-President Bush officially became a war criminal of his own admission when he candidly declared during a CNN interview that, yes, his administration did waterboard 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. As you might know, waterboarding fits under virtually every legal (and moral) definition of “torture”, and is thus explicitly prohibited under the UN Convention Against Torture, which demands that any parties found guilty of allowing or participating in the torture of detainees, directly or indirectly, be prosecuted immediately.
However, it still wasn’t clear just how involved he was in the affair, as his admission, glaring as it may be, was limited to saying that his administration took part in torture. (Not that this really matters in the eyes of the law, where he is most definitely guilty nonetheless.) But now, ever the type to apparently think (or hope) that being honest about it will place him back in people’s good graces or allow him to escape accountability, Bush has come out in his new memoir and openly states that he, himself, personally authorized waterboarding KSM when the option was brought up:
In a memoir due out Tuesday, Bush makes clear that he personally approved the use of that coercive technique against alleged Sept. 11 plotter Khalid Sheik Mohammed, an admission the human rights experts say could one day have legal consequences for him.
In his book, titled "Decision Points," Bush recounts being asked by the CIA whether it could proceed with waterboarding Mohammed, who Bush said was suspected of knowing about still-pending terrorist plots against the United States. Bush writes that his reply was "Damn right" and states that he would make the same decision again to save lives, according to a someone close to Bush who has read the book.
Bush previously had acknowledged endorsing what he described as the CIA's "enhanced" interrogation techniques - a term meant to encompass irregular, coercive methods - after Justice Department officials and other top aides assured him they were legal. "I was a big supporter of waterboarding," Vice President Richard B. Cheney acknowledged in a television interview in February.
Of course, we can safely surmise two facts from this revelation. (That is, other than Cheney also being involved, which should come as a surprise to exactly no-one.) First, Bush really doesn’t give a damn about such things as justice, international law and upholding human rights, just so long as he’s able to have his cronies inflict some hurt on those people he holds responsible for attacking his country (whether they actually are guilty or not). But then, this isn’t exactly news to anyone who’s been paying attention to such matters.
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| Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) |
I would so love to be popular (or notorious) enough to be receiving this caliber of crazy in my inbox.
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) [pictured] apparently still quite serious about her plans to set up Constitution classes for lawmakers. Which is scarier: That lawmakers would need remedial Constitution lessons after they’re sworn in, or that Michele Bachmann would be the one teaching others about the Constitution?
(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)
I agree with Hemant Mehta: Desecrating religious books to make a point = righteous. Doing it merely to piss people off = douchebaggery.
Anti-gay religious-righters rejoice at the success of their efforts to kick out Iowa Supreme Court justices who voted for same-sex marriage. I don’t suppose there’s much use in telling them that since they can’t possibly know God’s intentions and desires, it’s therefore high blasphemy for them to claim to be “carrying out God’s will”, right?
I freaking love this, if mostly for the potential for stupendous amounts of schadenfreude and hilarity.
If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.
Tags: Daily Kos • Markos Moulitsas • Michele Bachmann • US Constitution • Hemant Mehta • blasphemy • Bible • Quran • assholes • religious Right • Iowa Supreme Court • gay marriage • same-sex marriage • Global Warming • Global Warming denialists • Nigel Leck • Twitter • Twitter bots
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| [source | full size (×)] |
Here’s a column by SF Gate columnist Mark Morford that really needs to be read by all, particularly those (generally younger) starry-eyed liberals who were first mesmerized by then-Senator Obama’s trailblazing campaign and subsequently turned sourly and moody when the President failed to live up to their ridiculous expectations. It’s witty, eloquent, funny and snarky as hell, and I would love to see this read out loud before a student body assembly at some college, preferably broadcast live on national TV.
Oh, now you've done it.
See? You see what happens when you young liberal voters get so disgruntled and disillusioned that you drop all your party's newborn, hard-won ideas about Hope™ and Change™, without any patience, without really giving them sufficient time to mature, without understanding that hugely foreign, anti-American concept known as "the long view"?
See what happens when you wallow in hollow disappointment, trudging all over your liberal arts campus and refusing to vote in a rather important mid-term election, all because your pet issues and nubile ego weren't immediately serviced by a mesmerizing guy named Barack Obama just after he sucked you into his web of fuzzyhappy promises a mere two years ago, back when you were knee-high to a shiny liberal ideology?
Well, now you know. This is what happens: The U.S. House of Representatives, the most insufferable gaggle of political mongrels this side of, well, the rest of Congress, reverts to GOP control like a brain tumor reverts to a more aggressive form of cancer, and everything gets bleaker and sadder and, frankly, a whole lot nastier.
On the second page (worry not, it’s not that long), he ends with dropping the snark (mostly) and lays it plain and simple:
But here's your big takeaway, young Dem: It ain't over yet. The 2012 election is just around the corner. If we've learned anything, it's that two years whip by insanely quickly. Anything can happen, and usually does. You'll have another chance. And probably another after that. Maybe more.
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As you may have heard, Republicans got their wish yesterday with a (small) tsunami in Congress that allowed them to retake the House of Representatives, though the Senate remains under Democratic control (for the little that’s worth, anyway). And, always eager to stick to tradition, they’re now playing the long-suffering victims and demanding that President Obama and Democrats “pivot in a different direction” and work with them to “stop the agenda Americans have rejected and turn the ship around” – in other words, as those fluent in GOP-speak have learned to recognize, that Democrats give in to Republicans’ every whim.
Of course, people who aren’t stricken with seasonal Alzheimer’s and who have been paying attention to all the antics the GOP has pulled in the last two-plus years (and for much longer still) can’t help but gag a little in rightful indignation in the face of such blatant and transparent hypocrisy. These are the people who have constantly and consistently voted against the will of the American people whilst projecting this betrayal unto Democrats, who have doggedly insisted on policies that have failed catastrophically every damn time they’ve been implemented, who have opposed some of the most righteous and sorely needed legislation imaginable, who have constantly fought against the rights of persecuted minorities (and even additionally demonized several of them to fit their political goals), and who have pulled so many dirty tactics and cheap shots that they’ve successfully turned the US political discourse into a long-running Jerry Springer episode, only without the educational quality.
And those are just some of my gripes with the modern incarnation of the GOP.
And so, seeing this latest bit of victim-playing on their part made me think. And thus, I take to this lonely little blog and ask you all, in all honesty:
What good have Republicans done in the last few years?
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| Gil Kerlikowske |
The Obama administration has made no secret of its contempt for California’s Prop 19, which would have decriminalized recreational use of marijuana for adults 21 and over, effectively constituting the first real blowback against the nearly four-decades-old War on Drugs. We even had Attorney General Eric Holder openly declaring that the federal government would continue to prosecute and imprison Americans caught smoking pot in California even if Prop 19 was passed. Now that’s contempt for the will of the people.
Now that Prop 19 has sadly been defeated (all thanks to a low voter turnout – again, thanks to all disaffected lazy idiots), White House drug policy director Gil Kerlikowske was quick to break out the trumpets and champagne in the following statement:
"Today, Californians recognized that legalizing marijuana will not make our citizens healthier, solve California's budget crisis, or reduce drug related violence in Mexico," read the statement. "The Obama administration has been clear in its opposition to marijuana legalization because research shows that marijuana use is associated with voluntary treatment admissions for addiction, fatal drugged driving accidents, mental illness and emergency room admissions."
Witness the typical Drug Warrior boilerplate response: Distortions about Drug War opponents’ actual arguments completed with a generous amount of outright fabrications.
Firstly, no-one ever said legalizing pot would, or was in any way intended to, make people healthier. The argument was that pot simply doesn’t make people less healthy; years and years of various research have found no credible indication of long-term physical or psychological harm from light-to-moderate use of marijuana. (And that’s just apart from the obvious and well-known pain/stress management effects, hence the existence of medical marijuana in the first place.)
Secondly, no-one also said that pot legalization would fix the state’s budget crisis. But they do argue – as with any other sensible person – that decriminalizing such a popular substance and regulating and taxing it – ie., turning it into its own legit business – would bring in lots of much-needed cash at the very least. Solve the deficit? No. But it sure as hell wouldn’t hurt.
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| Christine O’Donnell (R-DE) (Now has a lot more time to masturbate over her cauldron) |
I won’t be writing about the Midterm results in detail, as they’re already covered by, oh, just about every single other politically-inclined blog and website out there. I can say, though, that I’m somewhat relieved that it wasn’t as bad as it might well have been; the serious crazies of Christine O’Donnell (R-DE), Sharron Angle (R-NV), Joe Miller (R-AK) and Carl Paladino (R-NY) were rejected, but that’s sadly counterbalanced by, amongst others, the loss of the great Russ Feingold (D-WI), one of the only spine-equipped Democrats and renown for being the only senator who voted against the PATRIOT Act in 2001.
And now, onto your non-Midterms-related news.
On a sadly surprising note, California’s Prop 19 to legalize recreational marijuana failed 53.7% to 46.3%. As usual, a low voter turnout in favor of the measure is what doomed it. Lazy idiots.
On a slightly better note, Colorado’s Personhood Amendment, a scientifically illiterate anti-abortion measure that would have granted human rights to zygotes, failed by a 3-1 margin. Naturally, the anti-choicers are vowing to try again in the next election.
Little Billy’s letters to famous (and infamous) people – and their replies.
(via The Agitator)
“But none of these things prove that you will leave the U.S.” The account of Canadian poker pro Terrance Chan who tried to enter the US and was instead treated as a criminal and denied entry.
(via The Agitator)
If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.
Tags: midterms • US midterm elections • Proposition 19 • Prop 19 • Personhood Amendment • anti-abortionists • zygotes • Little Billy • celebrities • Terrance Chan • US Customs • border security
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| Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi |
From Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, dismissing continued reports of him accompanying underaged girls to parties:
'As always, I work without interruption and if occasionally I happen to look a beautiful girl in the face, it's better to like beautiful girls than to be gay,' he told a meeting at a motorcycle industry show in Milan.
Because the best way to address suspicions of inappropriate relations with underaged girls is to glibly deride gays. Both logical and classy.
Tags: Silvio Berlusconi • gays • girls
We can always use more videos showing the beauty, greatness, mystery, intrigue and outright coolness of the cosmos, and how pitiful our meaningless little manmade religions and their anthropocentric claims are in comparison. Here’s the latest work from YouTuber Phil Hellenes, which is made only better with the inclusion of some of the finale music from Sunshine [2004]. (And shame on you if you don’t recognize it, you heathen.)
The money quote (at the 2:57 mark):
‘It’s like the universe screams in your face. “Do you know what I am? How grand I am? How old I am? Can you even comprehend what I am? What are you, compared to me?” And when you know enough science, you can just smile up at the universe and reply, “Dude, I am you.”’
It’s beautiful ’cause it’s true. Needless to say, I’ve just given Phil Hellenes’s subscribers list a slight increase.
(via Pharyngula)
Tags: universe • Phil Hellenes • cosmos • God
It looks like the mingled moderation and fear-mongering craze has spread all over the globe, even in the unlikeliest of places:
Why, those crazy Antarcticans. (Pictured: Continent’s entire human population. Or close to.)
(via @todayspolitics)
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| Jonah Goldberg |
Have you voted yet?
5 Popular Safety Measures That Don't Make You Any Safer. Most are no surprise, but to be fair, things like bike helmets do work as intended in themselves and are only betrayed by people being reckless idiots. And the sunscreen one genuinely took me by surprise.
(via The Agitator)
Beauty in death: The dancing chromatophores of a dying squid.
PZ Myers asks, in all merited seriousness, why anti-Left thug Jonah Goldberg [pictured] is still allowed to promulgate his assassination fetishism of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in the Chicago Tribune (or anywhere else).
New Haven, Connecticut Mayor John DeStefano admits that maybe sending an aggressive SWAT team to bust up a private Yale University party out of suspicion of underage drinking wasn’t such a great idea. T’is a start.
(via The Agitator)
If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.
Tags: safety • security • bicycle helmets • sunscreen lotion • airport security • squid • chromatophores • death • Jonah Goldberg • PZ Myers • Julian Assange • WikiLeaks • John DeStefano • SWAT • Yale University • underage drinking
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| NYPD cruiser parked in bike lane |
One anonymous pissant neighbor gets beloved annual Halloween haunted maze canceled by police because it overlaps on the sidewalk.
(via The Agitator)
Chutzpah Award: NYPD cop parks cruiser in bicycle lane [pictured], then tickets cyclists riding around his car for not keeping to blocked bike lane.
(via The Agitator)
Spineless Dem Syndrome strikes again: White House considering a strategy to extend Bush tax cuts for the wealthy and middle class to appease Republicans.
(via @todayspolitics)
Video of people doing amazing things. Admit it, the music makes them seem cooler.
(via The Agitator)
If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.
Tags: Halloween • Byran Norfolk • NYPD • cops • bicycle lane • Democrats • tax cuts • White House • Republicans
![Joé McKen (18) [taken 07/13/10]](http://i.imgur.com/2wvlR.jpg "Joé McKen (18) [taken 07/13/10]")
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I’m a liberal skeptic, rationalist & third-wave atheist stuck in a rut in Québec, Canada and who spends his time composing, writing, drawing, harboring a layman’s passion for science and technology, getting angry at social injustices, and most of all, jabbing cretins and trolls with sharp pointy sticks. (Oh, and blogging.) Proud owner of a Nize Hat!, an indomitable SIWOTI syndrome and an itchy snark finger.
You can find all my musical, literary and artistic works at my art blog, Creativitas.
![There is probably no [superstition]. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life](http://i933.photobucket.com/albums/ad171/crispianjago/Probably-No.gif "There is probably no [superstition]. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life")
