you can call yourself chewbacca, but that doesn't make you a wookie

regarding this asshat:

why the fuck are we supposed to be against eugenics? can't we do anything to flush these dipshits out of the gene pool?

thanks, joe

mr. wilson:

i would like to thank you on behalf of the democratic party for your outburst wednesday night. nothing expresses just how republicans think and the content of their characters better than your bullshit catcalling. neither you nor any of your "colleagues" have produced evidence that health insurance reform would actually provide coverage of illegal aliens, and the charge has been debunked by non-partisan factcheck.org. but you still feel the need to express outrage based on ignorance, and in the most inappropriate way possible. what better example of how your party operates, what it values, and just how much respect you have for your fellow americans than last night.

you know, when code pink interrupts a congressional hearing with anti-war slogans, they get escorted out. where was the capitol police when we needed them? your outburst has taken the question "do we really need republicans in our discourse?" and put it center stage, where it belongs. even during the worst of the bush administration, democratic elected leaders had the decency to shut up and let bush finish hanging himself. you couldn't even let a man speak the truth. way to show us what you're made of.

regards,

culuriel

It's only socialized insurance if OTHER people have it

A few things regarding this incident:
1- No finger biting!!!! Why was this the appropriate response to getting hit in the face?!?!?! Turn yourself in and face the music. You have at least one witness that it was provoked, which will get you a lighter sentence.
2- If you don't want to get your finger bitten, don't start a fight. Seriously, I'm supposed to feel sorry for this guy? He wanted a fight. He got one. He can come and kiss my cellulite-y ass if he wants sympathy.
3- I guess it's a good thing Bill Rice has government run and subsidized health insurance. He could go right to the hospital and get treated without worrying about paying. It never occurs to Bill that maybe other people should be able to get this great insurance, too. But letting others have access to the sweet deal you get yourself by the great virtue of living to 65 is socialism. It's always perfectly reasonable when YOU get the government services, and it's always socialism when SOMEBODY ELSE does. Remember that, boys and girls.

all about me

the last 2-1/2 months have been shitty. just plain shitty. a job that i thought would get me through these times has turned out to be a madhouse that i will get out of on august 11. there is a laundry list of things wrong with this "office", so i will describe it like this: unemployment is better. the shittiness of the this "office" has made my after-work life sucked dry of human enjoyment. the shittiness of the people running this "office" has ruined me for working for anyone else who thinks they're full of bright ideas. the shittiness of this place has taught me that "we do things differently here" really means, "we're too cheap to do things the right way- let's cheat." i might not even get my last paycheck from these fuckers.

so what is there to do? leave, and hope that a three-month stint somewhere doesn't look too goofy on my resume. leave, and study for a license that may or may not get me a better job. leave, and enjoy what's left of my summer. leave, and catch up on my podcasts.

thoughts on whether it's torture

i've been hearing some references from rightwing nutjobs that the cia's use of violence isn't torture because we had medical professionals supervise it. well, isn't the cia sweet. here's a clue: if you need a doctor around to make sure the suspect doesn't die from what you're doing to him, it's torture. if you need a shrink around to make sure you're not inflictng lifelong trauma on your suspect, it's torture.
and i'm tired of hearing how releasing the photos will degrade any self-control the muslims have. somehow, we all survived the release of the abu ghraib photos. so here's my last clue: if people finding out about this will lead to mass demonstrations and sporadic violence at symbols of the abusers, it's torture. please stop fucking with us all.

tortured logic

i know, it's a cliche. but it fits so well, and i don't have all day to come up with another title.

so now rush limbaugh cares about women breaking the glass ceiling. it says something, and not complimentary, that republicans care more about whether nancy pelosi knew anything about torture then the fact that the bush administration approved of and practiced it. if waterboarding and slamming people into walls and cuffing people into painful, harmful positions is okey-dokey, then who cares what she knew and when? it only matters if what the cia did was illegal, unamerican and flat out shitty. and it was.

so what should nancy pelosi have done? let's go through her options, or i should say lack of them. house members are required to take an oath not to release classified information that they gain in the course of their house of representatives duties- we've had it since the 104th congress. and peter hoekstra, a republican representative, actually called for more stringent legal secrecy requirements. and apparently, the same administration torturing people hated leaks of classified information from congress. remember, these assholes never regret committing the crime; they are always incensed by the exposure of their crime. so nancy pelosi can't tell anybody anything.

so could she have stopped it? please, girlfriend. don't waste my time. what authority does nancy pelosi have to stop this? it's already illegal through the convention against torture, which ronald reagan signed and the u.s. senate ratified. so the bush administration is willing to do something that anybody with any passing knowledge of the convention against torture must know is illegal. what law was nancy pelosi going to pass that she could expect the bush administration to care about? so let's say she goes to the bush administration, secretly, and tells them it's illegal. well, that's what yoo's & bybee's memoes were for! i'm sure the bush adminstraton loved shoving those across the table for nancy to read, as a sort of "we checked with lawyers that already agreed with us- and they told us we are right! isn't that great?" i suppose nancy could have gotten her own lawyers to write legal opinions pointing out what the law actually is. but how can she get other lawyers to declare illegal techniques she's not supposed to tell those lawyers about? and that is ostensibly what john yoo and jay bybee are supposed to be able to do. i don't know anyone who could say the bush administration would have acted differently if the house minority leader, who they think is a commie terrorist sympathizer anyway, told them to stop (rememer, she became speaker in 2007, and was still bound to secrecy by her oath). if nancy had stalked into the oval office and denounced these techniques, george would have just chuckled at her and dick cheney would have stuffed her in his man-sized safe. let's face facts: the bush administration didn't care if torture: 1- is illegal or 2-is illegal even when john yoo and jay bybee say it's legal or 3- is illegal even if it's nancy pelosi saying it's illegal. if you think differently, what the fuck closet do you live in?

so let's get this straight- nancy pelosi can't tell anyone about the torture without fear of prosecution. since whistleblower protection isn't what it used to be, this is a serious consideration. and she can't do anything, since the bush administration is blithely pretending this is all legal no matter what she thinks anyway. and she's responsible? are republicans trying to torture us too?

and now for the photos. i love how all of a sudden we give a shit about what the muslims will think of what we've done. i wonder if john yoo and jay bybee, in their infinite wisdom, could have seen this coming. i wonder if maybe it ocurred to them that people's outrage over doing these things might indicate it's torture, and since torture's illegal, they've got to rule it out. and i wonder why we get to (outrage people) torture, but muslims can't touch a hair on our heads? perhaps, in the future, yoo and bybee can worry about what exposure of the government's crimes will bring before the government commits the crime. i don't see how you can blame nancy pelosi when it was dick cheney who couldn't be bothered to do that.

the right wingers' lord's prayer

in belated honor on the national day of prayer, which i will celebrate at about the time i get around to giving up my stuffed bunny.

our father, who art 100% straight,
american be thy birth certificate.
thy supreme court justice come,
limbaugh’s will be done,
in new york as well as san francisco.
let us take this day our service workers’ daily bread,
and forget that we trespassed, but let us bomb others for imagined trespasses.
and lead us not into socialized medicine,
but deliver us from michael moore.
for thine is the legislative, executive and judicial branches for as long as republicans can get the votes,
dittos.