Recuse, Antonin

WaPo: Retired Generals Want Scalia Off Gitmo Case

Hamdan's lawyers have not called for Scalia to step aside. Instead, five retired generals who support Hamdan's arguments sent a letter late Monday to the court with the request that Scalia withdraw from participating in the case. They say Scalia appears to have prejudged the case.

The retired generals said Scalia's speech in Switzerland "give rise to the unfortunate appearance that ... the justice had made up his mind about the merits" of Hamdan's arguments.

In the speech, first reported by Newsweek, Scalia repeated his views from 2004 that enemy combatants held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, should not have access to U.S. courts and traditional legal rights.

[]

The letter came from five retired generals and admirals: Navy Rear Adm. Donald J. Guter; Navy Rear Adm. John D. Hutson; Vice Adm. Lee F. Gunn; Marine Brig. Gen. David M. Brahms; and Army Brig. Gen. James P. Cullen.

I doubt this show of military might and right will influence chickenhawk Scalia. (Originally I typed 'chickhawk' Scalia, one of the funniest typos ever.)

In today's print edition, WaPo:

Scalia's Recusal Sought in Key Detainee Case
Retired Officers Say Justice's Impartiality Is in Question After Remarks on Combatants

In a letter delivered to the court late yesterday, a lawyer for the retired officers cited news reports of Scalia's March 8 remarks to an audience at the University of Freiburg in Switzerland. Scalia reportedly said it was "crazy" to suggest that combatants captured fighting the United States should receive a "full jury trial," and dismissed suggestions that the Geneva Conventions might apply to detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Scalia's remarks "give rise to the unfortunate appearance that, even before briefing was complete, he had already made up his mind" about issues in the case, the lawyer, David H. Remes, wrote. Noting that Scalia reportedly had discussed the rights of accused terrorists in the context of his son Matthew's recent tour as an Army officer in Iraq, Remes wrote that this creates an appearance of "personal bias arising from his son's military service."

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In his letter to the court, Remes said Scalia's reported reference to the Geneva Conventions was of particular concern to the retired officers as it is directly at issue in the case. Their brief supports the view of the petitioner, Salim Ahmed Hamdan, that the conventions apply to him and could entitle him to a court-martial trial like that which U.S. soldiers receive.

Other calls for Scalia's recusal came yesterday from the Center for Constitutional Rights, a civil rights organization that supports the challenge to the military commissions, and from Rep. John D. Conyers (Mich.), the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee.

Previous posts: Ethics, Schmethics (March 27, 2006)

Scalia: 'Flipping a middle finger to his critics' (March 27, 2006)

Conned by Big Oil Once Again

Image courtesy Greenpeace
ABC asks the question:

Was Confusion Over Global Warming a Con Job? Some Claim Disinformation Campaign Attempted to Create the Impression Scientists Were Broadly Divided

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Ross Gelbspan blames a 15-year misinformation campaign by the oil and coal industries.

"The point of this campaign was not necessarily to persuade the public that global warming isn't happening," Gelbspan said. "It was to persuade the public that there is this state of confusion."

A 1998 memo by the American Petroleum Institute said, "Victory will be achieved when … average citizens recognize uncertainties in climate science."

To redefine global warming as theory — not fact — the industry funded research by "friendly" scientists such as [climatologist Pat] Michaels.

Of course, the answer is yes. Just like there is no litigation crisis. That meme is bought and paid for the insurance industry. It's a win-win for them. They keep raising their rates, and then point to the litigation crisis (a false story which they funded) as the cause. So insurance companies continue to collect high, unregulated premiums, legislatures put caps on lawsuits, or eliminate categories of lawsuits altogether, and insurance saves even more in payouts.

I saw this at Suburban Guerilla.

Suicide by Witness Chair

Zacharias Moussaoui makes his case for his 72 virgins in heaven:

WaPo: Moussaoui Testifies Over Attorneys' Objections

Zacarias Moussaoui testified in an Alexandria courtroom this morning that he was tapped by Osama bin Laden to hijack a plane and fly it into the White House as part of the terrorist attacks that claimed nearly 3,000 lives on Sept. 11, 2001.

Testifying at his own death-penalty trial, over the objections of his attorneys, Moussaoui said he had not known the precise date the attacks were to take place, but that he knew they would involve the White House, the World Trade Center and other targets.

He said he was supposed to head a five-man crew that also would have included Richard Reid, a British citizen who tried to set off explosives in his shoes aboard a transatlantic flight two months after the Sept. 11 attacks.

[]

Questioned by defense lawyer Gerald Zerkin for less than 30 minutes, Moussaoui was asked: "Were you scheduled to be a pilot in the operation that was to be run on Sept. 11, 2001?''

He replied: "Yes. I was supposed to pilot a plane to hit the White House. I only knew about the two planes of the World Trade Center in addition to my own plane.''

Prosecutors have argued that Moussaoui should be executed because he lied to the FBI when he was arrested in August 2001 -- and Moussaoui appears to have made much of their case in his testimony today by admitting that he lied "because I wanted my mission to go ahead.''

When he pleaded guilty, Moussaoui signed a document admitting he had lied to allow his "al-Qaeda brothers to go forward" with the plot. Asked today who he meant, he named Mohamed Atta, the leader of the hijacking teams who piloted the first plane that hit the World Trade Center.

Well, he wanted to go down in flames. He'll get his wish. The government tried to drive a stake in its own case against him with the cheating FAA lawyer, etc., and Moussaoui made himself Dead Man Walking by his desire to tell his story. The urge to be heard is always powerful. Who will ever know if he is telling the truth. If you're facing life in prison at a minimum, why not make yourself seem really important?

Dana Milbank essay, WaPo: A Terrorist's Grand Delusion

When Republicans Attack ... Each Other

If they were women, would Steve Clemons call it a catfight? Mmmrrrohwwww.

Huffington Post: Behind the Scenes: Rove and Libby in Deadly Legal Dogfight

According to several Pentagon sources close to Rove and others familiar with the inquiry, Bush's senior adviser tipped off Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to information that led to the recent "discovery" of 250 pages of missing email from the office of Vice President Dick Cheney.

[]

According to one source close to the case, Rove is providing information on deleted emails, erased hard drives and other types of obstruction by staff and other officials in the Vice President's office. Pentagon sources close to Rove confirmed this account.

Scalia: 'Flipping a middle finger to his critics'

Not this finger, the middle one

AMERICAblog: Scalia just gave the finger in church yesterday (not kidding)

From UPI:

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia startled reporters in Boston just minutes after attending a mass, by flipping a middle finger to his critics.

A Boston Herald reporter asked the 70-year-old conservative Roman Catholic if he faces much questioning over impartiality when it comes to issues separating church and state.

"You know what I say to those people?" Scalia replied, making the obscene gesture and explaining "That's Sicilian."

The 20-year veteran of the high court was caught making the gesture by a photographer with The Pilot, the Archdiocese of Boston's newspaper.

"Don't publish that," Scalia told the photographer, the Herald said.

Right back at you, Antonin. I too swore an oath to uphold and defend the United States Constitution; unlike you, I meant it.

And Now for Something Completely Different

The Sound of Young America: Unearthed Monty Python Footage From 1975

All but John Cleese. Note: the audience could be my high school class. The hair, the hair.

I saw this on BoingBoing

Turnout Wins Elections, Sayeth St. Gloria

Seattle for Dean: QUOTE OF THE DAY

"Only 30% of the country is ultra right-wing – but, here is the thing – they turn out 90% of their membership. Meanwhile the remaining 70% only turns out at about 50%."

-Gloria Steinem, speaking in Seattle[.]

US Prisons Hold 25% of the World's Prisoners; 1/3 to 1/2 Are Nonviolent Drug Offenders

Photo courtesy National Conference of State Legislatures

Great post on the insanity of the drug laws in America and the millions imprisoned for nonviolent drug 'crimes, by guest poster Hypatia, at Glenn Greenwald's Unclaimed Territory:

Prison & the War on Drugs: Just Say No

While the United States constitutes 5% of the world's population, this “land of the free” holds 25% of the world's prisoners – a third to a half are there for drug offenses . With all the talk of Guantanamo and extraordinary rendition, many overlook that we have a Gulag Prison System here at home, fueled by our drug laws.

Most Americans seldom think about or discuss penal policies in any systematic or focused way. That failure is itself a poltical/ethical crime, because prison and its uses is a consummately moral issue. Sentencing citizens to prison entails sending armed agents of the state after them, then placing them at the tender mercies of scalp-seeking prosecutors, and if convicted, locking them in cages and robbing them of their autonomy.

For us to collectively decide that the consensual, adult use or sale of intoxicants will be criminalized, means we are agreeing that hundreds of thousands of our fellow Americans will experience life-destroying calamity. These POWs will be ripped from their communities -- and frequently from their children -- for years, decades and for life, pursuant to mandatory sentencing schemes as Draconian as those in any dictatorship; how else to characterize putting, e.g., non-violent, vegetarian 23-year-olds in prison for life for selling LSD at Grateful Dead concerts? (It is some small measure of progress that in New York, they recently did away with the life sentences for drug offenders.)

Instead of being with their families, these citizens will be confined among a population teeming with violent predators, under harsh and terrifying conditions. Conditions in which, especially for the disabled, their health often cannot be maintained, as this shameful example shows, as does the case of Lillie Blevins, a non-violent woman who died while serving her life sentence for conspiracy to sell crack cocaine.

As bad as the wretched attention to health, if not worse, is the fact that in many prisons drug-offender “criminals” cannot be (or are not) meaningfully protected from rape and assault. And the drug war is directly feeding prison rapes.

Read the whole thing. The War on Drugs (cited by Ronald Reagan as one of the greatest achievements of his administration) has cost us dearly. There's all the federal money that's ended up enriching drug dealers and their financiers, as well as the shattered lives of nonviolent drug offenders. A sensible drug policy would be so ... sensible. Will it ever happen? In the land of Reefer Madness, that's doubtful.

We Love Lists

From Grist Magazine:

Wallet and Grimace
Stats on how much Americans pay for essentials

Some of these really make you think:

79.4 -- percentage of Americans who reported that a single-passenger vehicle was their principal means of getting to work in 2003

4.4 -- percentage of Americans who reported that public transportation was their principal means of getting to work in 2003

$8,759 -- average annual cost of owning and operating a midsize car in the U.S. in 2004 (assuming 15,000 miles driven per year)

$590 -- estimated annual cost of riding public transit (assuming a base fare of $1.25 per ride)

Bush Lies Memorialized in British Document

Doug Mills/The New York Times
Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain and President Bush arriving for a White House news conference on Jan. 31, 2003, after a meeting about Iraq that would be summarized in a memorandum by an adviser to Mr. Blair.

The war plan was definite at least by January 31, 2003: three days after Bush's State of the Union speech (filled with lies like: Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production") the date for invasion was set. (The actual invasion took place nine days later than anticipated, on March 19, 2003.) And I imagine the war plan was 'set' long before this. Contrary to Bush's lies at his press conference last week, he was set to go to war all along.

NYTimes: Bush Was Set on Path to War, Memo by British Adviser Says

LONDON — In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush's public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war.

But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons, said a confidential memo about the meeting written by Mr. Blair's top foreign policy adviser and reviewed by The New York Times.

"Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," David Manning, Mr. Blair's chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote in the memo that summarized the discussion between Mr. Bush, Mr. Blair and six of their top aides.

"The start date for the military campaign was now penciled in for 10 March," Mr. Manning wrote, paraphrasing the president. "This was when the bombing would begin."

Update: Was my face red ... must have more coffee before posting ... this is just another one of the Downing Street memos, which has been out there on the web for two months. It was reported in the Guardian (uk) on February 3, 2006:

Blair-Bush deal before Iraq war revealed in secret memo
PM promised to be 'solidly behind' US invasion with or without UN backing

I even blogged about these very documents before:

Going to the UN Was a Sham; War Was Already Decided (Feb. 3, 2006)

The charge: Blogging while sleepwalking. The verdict: guilty as charged. Penalty: We report, you decide.

Ethics, Schmethics

Surprise, surprise. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has already made up his mind about the Guantanimo Bay enemy combatant cases. And he's in favor of lifetime detention without the right to counsel. How constitutional.

WaPo: No Legal Rights for Enemy Combatants, Scalia Says
'War Is War,' Justice Tells Audience

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia reportedly told an overseas audience this month that the Constitution does not protect foreigners held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

He also told the audience at the University of Freiburg in Switzerland that he was "astounded" by the "hypocritical" reaction in Europe to the prison, this week's issue of Newsweek magazine reported.

New Chief Justice John Roberts has already recused himself from the cases, as he was a member of the federal appeals court panel whose decision is under review.

Odds of Scalia recusing himself from hearing these cases, about which he has already made up his mind and announced his position publicly? That would be about a gazillion to one. Sheesh, Scalia didn't even recuse himself from the case involving Cheney's secret energy task force meetings after he went duck hunting with Dick Cheney. (He's lucky he's still alive, but that's a separate matter. Or is it? Maybe he didn't recuse because Big Time threatened to give him the Harry Whittington treatment. Hmmmm.)

Ethically, of course, he should recuse himself.

U.S. high court judge said to slam detainee rights

Ethics experts said the impression that Scalia had already made up his mind before the hearing should mean that he will voluntarily drop out of the proceedings. However, Newsweek said he did not refer specifically to this week's case.

"He should remove himself when there is a reasonable doubt of his impartiality," said Father Robert Drinan, a professor of law at Georgetown University and long-standing human rights campaigner, who teaches judicial ethics.

"It should logically be a reason for his recusal but I don't think he'll do it ... he's so stubborn" said Drinan.

[]

"A judge has to have an open mind; when he hears the articles and reacts to briefs. If he's made up his mind on a particular issue, he shouldn't be sitting (in)," said Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

"Here he has publicly said that this is what my position is, before the arguments ... It's really stacking the deck," Ratner said. CCR has argued for Guantanamo prisoner rights.

Barbara Turner Overdrive

Barbara Turner propelled UConn into the Elite Eight of the women's NCAA basketball tournament last night with 31 points, the most points she ever scored in her four years at UConn. The game ended with 4 three pointers. Georgia's Cori Chambers hit a three with 20.3 seconds left. On the final play, Connecticut had a hard time moving the ball, and at the bottom of the TV screen, there was Turner, gesturing, no, insisting that the next pass go to her. She finally got the ball with 5 seconds on the clock, and closely guarded by two Georgia players, she fired up a desperation, falling away from the basket, hell, falling off the court three-pointer. Which went in. Georgia got off a final shot on the inbound when Tasha Humphrey, who had a huge game for Georgia, hit the rim with a shot fired from three quarters of the length of the court.

Whew. What a game.

Hope the Huskies make it to Boston next weekend. Now that BC is out of it, they're the last Northeast team with a shot.

WaPo: Turner's Late Basket Bails Out Connecticut

Boston Globe: UConn heaves sigh of relief

ESPN: Turner the star, but gets plenty of help (with video of the final sequence in a box on the right hand side of the page)

I Had No Idea

That Markos Moulitsas of dailykos looks like a twelve-year-old! Who doesn't shave yet! This is a screen cap from his appearance on CNN today:



You can watch the video on Crooks & Liars.

He's so cuuuute.

Rene is a Weenie

Rene Portland, the head coach of Penn State's women's basketball team, has been openly discriminating against lesbian players for years. Coach Mom & Dad & I were at the Women's Final Four in New Orleans in 1991 when she was given the National Division I Coach of the Year Award. We sat on our hands when the award was announced. We were too polite to boo, but Coach Mom did mutter "Discriminator!" loudly when she stepped to the podium.

Massachusetts has big billboards on the highways as you enter the state warning about our gun laws (at least we used to -- has our series of Rethug governors had them taken down?) I wish we had big billboards warning people like Rene Weenie Portland that Massachusetts doesn't tolerate discriminators and haters. Get out of town, and take your medieval attitudes with you, Rene Weenie.

Boston Globe: When the fouls get very personal
Player's suit claims Penn State coach was biased against lesbians

By Bob Hohler, Globe Staff | March 26, 2006

HARRISBURG, Pa. -- They echo through the years, voices from a generation of female basketball players who say their lives were marred by a powerful college coach's campaign against homosexuality.

Their legacy of pain began in 1982, when, Cindy Davies says, Penn State coach Maureen T. ''Rene" Portland threatened to expose her as a lesbian. The legacy endured as Portland in 1986 publicly espoused her opposition to coaching homosexuals and reaffirmed her stance in 1991, all the while allegedly engaging in a pattern of bias based on sexual orientation. And the legacy grows as Jennifer Harris pursues a federal discrimination claim that Portland cut her from the Penn State team last year in part because the coach considered her a lesbian.

As the women's basketball community converges on Boston this week for the Final Four of the NCAA Tournament, the Portland case looms as a watershed chapter in a decades-long struggle to eradicate prejudice that has long festered in the sport against homosexual players and coaches. Numerous athletes and coaches said in interviews that nearly every facet of women's college basketball, from recruiting to hiring practices, has been affected by discrimination based on sexual orientation.

''This lawsuit is the most significant thing that has happened in trying to address homophobia in the sport to date," said Pat Griffin, a professor emerita at the University of Massachusetts whose educational program aimed at curbing bias against homosexuals has been distributed by the NCAA to every member school. ''It's a cautionary tale for coaches and athletic directors that they cannot discriminate with impunity anymore."

While the NCAA prepares a survey on the impact of homophobia in the sport and the Women's Basketball Coaches Association plans at its national convention in Boston this week to adopt a code of ethics that bans discrimination based on sexual orientation, Harris, 21, is seeking unspecified monetary damages and a number of institutional reforms in her 20-count civil rights suit against Portland, Penn State athletic director Timothy Curley, and the school. The list of proposed reforms includes annual mandatory anti-discrimination training for Penn State's athletic staff.

[]

Confrontational coach
In Portland's case, the timeline of her campaign against homosexuality dates to 1982, her second full year at Penn State (she was hired by the school's legendary football coach, Joe Paterno, who then doubled as athletic director). Suspicious that Davies, one of her prized players, was romantically involved with the team's female student manager, Portland dismissed the manager and confronted Davies, the former player said in a telephone interview.

''It's seared in my mind to this day," Davies, 43, said of the confrontation. ''[Portland] said, 'I don't know if it's true, but if I find out it's true, there's nothing that will stop me from going to your parents, the university, and the media.' "

Davies said she ''felt like I was being blackmailed" but lacked the support she would have needed as a 19-year-old to challenge Portland.

''I was scared to death," she said. ''I felt like I was cornered. I ended up saying I would leave the program to concentrate on my academics."

After leaving Penn State, Davies said, she entered a lengthy period of depression in which she contemplated suicide.

Big Week for Plagiarists

First Box Turtle Ben, then George Bush's good friend Vladimir Putin. Guess Smirky McAWOL didn't see the plagiarism when he looked into Putin's heart and soul. If I had Photoshop, I'd be changing the "Red State America" banner to "Red State Plagiarist" with Vlady's picture.

The Sunday Times (uk): Putin accused of plagiarising his PhD thesis

THE career of President Vladimir Putin of Russia was built at least in part on a lie, according to US researchers. A new study of an economics thesis written by Putin in the mid-1990s has revealed that large chunks of it were copied from an American text.

Putin was labelled a plagiarist yesterday after a pair of researchers at the Brookings Institution, a Washington DC think tank, established that the Russian president’s academic credentials were based on a dissertation he had lifted in part verbatim from the Russian translation of a management study written by two professors at the University of Pittsburgh in 1978.

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According to Clifford G Gaddy, a senior fellow at Brookings, 16 of the 20 pages that open a key section of Putin’s work were copied either word for word or with minute alterations from a management study, Strategic Planning and Policy, written by US professors William King and David Cleland. The study was translated into Russian by a KGB-related institute in the early 1990s.

The Washington Times reported yesterday that six diagrams and tables from the 218-page thesis also appeared to “mimic” similar charts in the US work. The newspaper quoted Gaddy as saying: “There’s no question in my mind that this would be plagiarism.”

"[T]he serious debate has quietly ended. Global warming [] is the real deal"

The photograph taken in 1928, above, shows how the Upsala Glacier, part of the South American Andes in Argentina, used to look. The ice on the Upsala Glacier today, shown in 2004 below, is retreating at least 180 ft. per year

Time Magazine's cover story this week (I had to watch an ad to get access to the article; it's time well spent):

Polar Ice Caps Are Melting Faster Than Ever... More And More Land Is Being Devastated By Drought... Rising Waters Are Drowning Low-Lying Communities... By Any Measure, Earth Is At ... The Tipping Point
The climate is crashing, and global warming is to blame. Why the crisis hit so soon--and what we can do about it


Some of the side articles are very good, also:

Feeling The Heat
Global warming is already disrupting the biological world, pushing many species to the brink of extinction and turning others into runaway pests. But the worst is yet to come

What troubles scientists especially is that if we are only in the early stages of warming, all these lost and endangered animals might be just the first of many to go. One study estimates that more than a million species worldwide could be driven to extinction by the year 2050.

The Climate Crusaders
They saw which way the wind was blowing and set out to save the world

How It Affects Your Health
Expect more risk of heatstrokes, asthma, allergies and infectious disease


Vicious Cycles

The debate over whether Earth is warming up is over. Now we're learning that climate disruptions feed off one another in accelerating spirals of destruction. Scientists fear we may be approaching the point of no return THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT Without the greenhouse effect, life on Earth would not be possible. Energy from the sun is absorbed by the planet and radiated back out as heat. Atmospheric gases like carbon dioxide trap that heat and keep it from leaking into space. That's what keeps us warm at night.

But as humans pour ever increasing amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, more of the sun's heat gets trapped, and the planet gets a fever BURNING FOSSIL FUELS RELEASES CARBON FUELING THE FIRE The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is climbing fast. Most of it comes from burning fuels for energy--gasoline in cars or coal for electricity, for example. The U.S., with less than 5% of the world's population, produces one-quarter of all greenhouse gases BURNING FORESTS REDUCES OXYGEN AND INCREASES DROUGHT SPREADING THE PAIN Deforestation, through clear-cutting or burning, sows havoc far beyond the affected area. The fires release still more carbon into the atmosphere, fewer plants survive to convert CO2 into oxygen, and scorched soil absorbs more heat and retains less water, increasing droughts •Plants take in CO2 •Fires release carbon •Less carbon absorbed •Soil dries out RISING TEMPERATURES MELT POLAR ICE AND PERMAFROST THAWING OUT The North Pole may be seasonally ice free by 2050. Melting permafrost will release vast amounts of trapped carbon into the air LESS ICE MEANS MORE HEAT WHICH MEANS LESS ICE SPEEDING UP Ice reflects nearly all the sun's energy that hits it. As the planet's ice melts, more of that energy is absorbed by Earth--which further raises the temperature. That, in turn, makes the remaining ice melt quicker •20% reflected by vegetation and dark soil •10% reflected by ocean water •90% reflected by ice MELTING ICE RAISES SEA LEVELS INUNDATING LOW COASTAL AREAS WASHING ASHORE The ice at the North Pole is floating, so as it melts, the sea level won't change much. But the massive ice sheets over Antarctica and Greenland are another story. If both melted completely, sea levels could rise nearly 220 ft. (72 m). That's a worst-case scenario. But the melting is accelerating, and sea levels are projected to rise gradually, threatening low-lying communities.

Know Your "Charities"

WaPo: Red Cross, Humane Society Under Investigation

The Louisiana attorney general has launched inquiries into two of the country's best-known charities -- the American Red Cross and the Humane Society of the United States -- after receiving complaints that they misused some of the millions of dollars they raised in the fall to help the human and non-human victims of Hurricane Katrina.

Attorney General Charles C. Foti Jr. plans to announce tomorrow that he is looking into allegations that Red Cross volunteers diverted money and supplies meant for hurricane victims in New Orleans, spokeswoman Kris Wartelle said. And the attorney general's office has begun an inquiry into whether the Humane Society spent the money it raised after Hurricane Katrina appropriately.

The Red Cross said yesterday that it has dismissed three of its volunteers who had been involved in food and shelter operations in the stricken city after the storm. The volunteers "have been relieved of their duties" after it was determined that "allegations involving waste and abuse were substantial enough to warrant their immediate removal," said a senior Red Cross official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

[]

Yesterday, Red Cross volunteer Jerome Nickerson Jr., a Baltimore lawyer who was asked by the Red Cross in the fall to team with another volunteer to investigate complaints of misuse of supplies and cash, said he found numerous problems in the disaster-relief operation.

He said they found "rogue warehouses" filled with Red Cross supplies that they believed were being sold. Also, some disaster staffers were ordering suspiciously large volumes of such supplies as cooking oil, coffee and canned food from Red Cross warehouses for areas in which they weren't needed. Large numbers of prepared meals were also being ordered and, in at least once instance, were delivered to local restaurants, Nickerson said. Red Cross volunteers were also using multiple debit cards loaded with thousands of dollars in Red Cross funds. "It was completely out of control," he said.

Nickerson said other Red Cross disaster volunteers and staffers interfered with their investigation, corrupting computer files and refusing to give them documents.

But in December, after Nickerson and his partner, Michael Wolters, a Wisconsin security guard, presented their findings to Red Cross officials in Louisiana, and told them they wanted to investigate further, they were sent home.

"It was very disappointing," Nickerson said.

Of course, the Red Cross isn't really an independent charity. It's a quasi-governmental organization, and in this era of corrupt Republicans, it's run by corrupt Republicans.

From the socialistworker.org:

The right-wing, scandal-ridden “charity” that isn’t really a charity
The truth about the Red Cross

People who think of the Red Cross as a “private charity” would be shocked to discover its actual legal status.

Congress incorporated the Red Cross to act under “government supervision.” Eight of the 50 members of its board of governors are appointed by the president of the United States, who also serves as honorary chairperson. Currently, the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security are members of the board of governors.

This unique, quasi-governmental status allows the Red Cross to purchase supplies from the military and use government facilities--military personnel can actually be assigned to duty with the Red Cross. Last year, the organization received $60 million in grants from federal and state governments. However, as one federal court noted, “A perception that the organization is independent and neutral is equally vital.”

The leading administrators and officials of the Red Cross are almost always drawn from the corporate boardroom or the military high command. Among the past chairs and presidents of the Red Cross are seven former generals or admirals and one ex-president.

The current president Marty Evans is a retired rear admiral and a director of the investment firm Lehman Brothers Holdings. Bonnie McElveen-Hunter, the chair of the Red Cross, is also CEO of Pace Communications, whose clients include United Airlines, Delta Air Lines and AT&T--a group of companies known for their vicious treatment of workers.

The Red Cross has become particularly tied up with the Republican Party in recent decades. Both McElveen-Hunter and Evans are Bush appointees--for her part, McElveen-Hunter has donated over $130,000 to the Republican Party since 2000.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
THOUGH IT is technically a nonprofit, the Red Cross is run more like profit-hungry corporation than what most people think a “charity” would act like. The most deadly example of this was the Red Cross’ criminally negligent response to the early stages of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.

The Red Cross has been for many decades, and remains today, the largest blood bank in the country. In 1982 and especially 1983, when it would have possible to contain the outbreak--or at least stop the spread of the disease through infusions of infected blood--major blood banks, led by the Red Cross, opposed national testing of blood for HIV.

The Red Cross’ opposition was based on the financial cost. As investigative journalist Judith Reitman wrote in her book Bad Blood: “It appeared it would be cheaper to pay off infected blood recipients, should they pursue legal action, than to up the Red Cross blood supply.”

Previous post: Please, Give to Charity. Just Not the Red Cross (Sept. 25, 2005)

War Crimes

The Sunday Times (UK)

Iraqis killed by US troops ‘on rampage’
Claims of atrocities by soldiers mount

[]

One eyewitness told Time: “I watched them shoot my grandfather, first in the chest and then in the head. Then they killed my granny.”

[]

“Women and even the children were blindfolded and their hands bound. Some of their faces were totally disfigured. A lot of blood was on the floors and the walls.”

Khalaf said he had found the body of his mother Turkiya with her face unrecognisable. “She had been shot with a dumdum bullet,” he claimed.

While many allegations of US atrocities have later turned out to be exaggerated or false, the Abu Sifa incident was supported by hospital autopsy reports that said all the victims had died from bullet wounds. A local Iraqi police commander — supposedly co-operating with US forces — confirmed that the bodies had been found with their wrists tied.

[]

Last week Jalal Abdul Rahman told this newspaper about the death in January of his 12- year-old son Abdul. It was a Sunday evening and father and son were driving home after buying a new game for the boy’s PlayStation.

They were a few hundred yards from their home in the Karkh neighbourhood of Baghdad when — according to Rahman — US forces opened fire on the car, killing Abdul.

Soldiers approached the car and told Rahman he had failed to stop when ordered to do so. Rahman said he had never heard an order to stop. The soldiers searched the car and, as they departed, they threw a black body bag on the ground.

“They said, ‘This is for your son,’ and they left me there with my dead son,” he added.

Rahman claimed he had had nothing to do with the insurgency until that moment. “But this is America, the so-called guardian of humanity, and killing people for them is like drinking water. I shall go after them until I avenge the blood of my son.”

Republican Thieves; or, It's All About the Benjamins

From large to smaller, the Republican party has been ripping off the country for the last five years. Just look at the Iraq War Cost Clock in the post below, for the big rip-off. What follows are some of the smaller rip-offs. I was tempted to say small, but how can you say that people who are siphoning tens of thousands and millions of dollars are small rip-off artists? They're just smaller. And ethically, and morally, they have to look up to see the curb. Worms.

Front page of the Washington Post, today:

Former DeLay Aide Enriched By Nonprofit
Bulk of Group's Funds Tied to Abramoff

Tom Delay's chief of staff created a nonprofit then paid 1/3 of its monies -- more than a million dollars - to himself. Nice work if you can get it.

A top adviser to former House Whip Tom DeLay received more than a third of all the money collected by the U.S. Family Network, a nonprofit organization the adviser created to promote a pro-family political agenda in Congress, according to the group's accounting records.

DeLay's former chief of staff, Edwin A. Buckham, who helped create the group while still in DeLay's employ, and his wife, Wendy, were the principal beneficiaries of the group's $3.02 million in revenue, collecting payments totaling $1,022,729 during a five-year period ending in 2001, public and private records show.

Notice that Buckham's wife was one the beneficiaries. That's because she was designated as a 'fundraiser' for the nonprofit, so she got 10% off the top of anything that was donated.

Apparently this thieving model was circulating in Republican circles, because Rep. John Doolittle's (R-CA) wife took 15% of the monies contributed to his campaign, and Rep. John Sweeney's (R-NY) wife took 10% of the monies donated to her husband's campaign. Neither woman had any prior experience as a fundraiser. Nice work if you can get it, no?

Barbara Bush earmarked a charitable contribution ostensibly for Katrina victims to her ne'er-do-well son's company, Ignite! Problem is, Barbara Bush is also an investor (Washington Post, December 28, 2003) in Neil Bush's company. So she earmarked a charitable donation to enrich her own investment. Nice work if you can get it. I guess given that she's filthy rich anyway, this is working out very well for her.

One Way to Measure

Cost of the war in Iraq, from the National Priorities Project, via we move to canada:



Click on the link & click again on "See the cost in your community". It will astound you.

And that's just the cost of Commander Codpiece's Cockup measured in money. It measures nothing of the lives shattered, American and Iraqi.

They're Coming To Take Me Away ho ho hee hee ha haaa

K.T. McFarland on MSNBC's Hardball, March 6, 2006
Not that Hillary Clinton has to lift a finger to get re-elected Senator from New York, but her cakewalk is assured if this is the best New York Republicans can come up with:

NYPost: KOOKY KT'S SPY TALE

ALBANY - A Republican challenger to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is bizarrely claiming that the former first lady has been spying in her bedroom window and flying helicopters over her house in the Hamptons, witnesses told The Post yesterday.

Former Reagan-era Pentagon official Kathleen "KT" McFarland stunned a crowd of Suffolk County Republicans on Thursday by saying:

"Hillary Clinton is really worried about me, and is so worried, in fact, that she had helicopters flying over my house in Southampton today taking pictures," according to a prominent GOP activist who was at the event.

"She wasn't joking, she was very, very serious, and she also claimed that Clinton's people were taking pictures across the street from her house in Manhattan, taking pictures from an apartment across the street from her bedroom," added the eyewitness, who is not involved in the Senate race.

Suffolk County Republican Chairman Harry Withers, who hosted the reception in East Islip, confirmed McFarland's paranoid statements.

"Yes, she said that," Withers told The Post.

Which brought to mind this song from my youth:

Napoleon XIV
They're Coming To Take Me Away (1966)

[]

And they're coming to take me away ha-haaa
They're coming to take me away ho ho hee hee ha haaa
To the funny farm
Where life is beautiful all the time
And I'll be happy to see those nice young men
In their clean white coats
And they're coming to take me away ha haaa

You thought it was a joke
And so you laughed
You laughed when I said
That losing you would make me flip my lid

Right? You know you laughed
I heard you laugh. You laughed
You laughed and laughed and then you left
But now you know I'm utterly mad

And they're coming to take me away ha haaa
They're coming to take me away ho ho hee hee ha haaa
To the happy home with trees and flowers and chirping birds
And basket weavers who sit and smile and twiddle their thumbs and toes
And they're coming to take me away ha haaa

[]

Common Ground

Too funny.

Yellow Dog Died: What I have in Common with Bush

As you all know, I am all about building bridges. In that spirit, I have decided I must search for some common ground with the President. Here goes:

1) I was born and raised in New England. When it serves my interests, I must fake a Texas drawl.

2) I, too, have a hard time putting food on my family.

3) I don't spend alot of time thinking about Usama Bin Laden.

4) I really have no concept of how the other half lives.

5) I don't believe that my history of drug use is any of your business.

6) I have a silly laugh for a grown man.

7) I am not prepared to run a whole country.

8) I had no idea that Usama Bin Laden intended to attack us.

9) I once swore an oath to protect and defend the US Constitution without having read it.

10) I wasn't smart enough to get into Yale either.

'End the Gendercide'

Great article by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born Dutch legislator, who "lives under 24-hour protection because of death threats against her by Islamic radicals since the murder of Theo van Gogh, with whom she made the film 'Submission' about women and Islam."

From the International Herald Tribune, via commondreams:

Women Go 'Missing' by the Millions

As I was preparing for this article, I asked a friend who is Jewish if it was appropriate to use the term "holocaust" to portray the worldwide violence against women. He was startled. But when I read him the figures in a 2004 policy paper published by the Geneva Center for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces, he said yes, without hesitation.

One United Nations estimate says from 113 million to 200 million women around the world are demographically "missing." Every year, from 1.5 million to 3 million women and girls lose their lives as a result of gender-based violence or neglect.

How could this possibly be true? Here are some of the factors:

In countries where the birth of a boy is considered a gift and the birth of a girl a curse from the gods, selective abortion and infanticide eliminate female babies.

Young girls die disproportionately from neglect because food and medical attention is given first to brothers, fathers, husbands and sons.

In countries where women are considered the property of men, their fathers and brothers can murder them for choosing their own sexual partners. These are called "honor" killings, though honor has nothing to do with it.

[]

We need a worldwide campaign to reform cultures that permit this kind of crime. Let's start to name them and shame them.

In the past two centuries, those in the West have gradually changed the way they treat women. As a result, the West enjoys greater peace and progress. It is my hope that the third world will embark on this effort. Just as we put an end to slavery, we must end the gendercide.

Eight Ounces of Crude for Breakfast

Another way of looking at the 'cost' of food: What amount of fossil fuel does it take for me to get my coffee from Sumatra, or olive oil from Spain, or ham from Poland? More than you would think. From tomdispatch.com, via truthout:

My Saudi Arabian Breakfast

On the table in my small Berkeley apartment this particular morning is a healthy looking little meal - a bowl of imported McCann's Irish oatmeal topped with Cascadian Farms organic frozen raspberries, and a cup of Peet's Fair Trade Blend coffee. Like most of us, I prepare my breakfast at home and the ingredients for this one probably cost me about $1.25. (If I went to a café in downtown Berkeley, I'd likely have to add another $6.00, plus tip for the same.)

My breakfast fuels me up with about 400 calories, and it satisfies me. So, for just over a buck and half an hour spent reading the morning paper in my own kitchen, I'm energized for the next few hours. But before I put spoon to cereal, what if I consider this bowl of oatmeal porridge (to which I've just added a little butter, milk, and a shake of salt) from a different perspective. Say, a Saudi Arabian one.

Then, what you'd be likely to see - what's really there, just hidden from our view (not to say our taste buds) - is about four ounces of crude oil. Throw in those luscious red raspberries and that cup of java (another three ounces of crude), and don't forget those modest additions of butter, milk, and salt (another ounce), and you've got a tiny bit of the Middle East right here in my kitchen.

Now, let's drill a little deeper into this breakfast. Just where does this tiny gusher of oil actually come from? (We'll let this oil represent all fossil fuels in my breakfast, including natural gas and coal.)

Nearly 20% of this oil went into growing my raspberries on Chilean farms many thousands of miles away, those oats in the fields of County Kildare, Ireland, and that specially-raised coffee in Guatemala - think tractors as well as petroleum-based fertilizers and pesticides.

The next 40% of my breakfast fossil-fuel equation is burned up between the fields and the grocery store in processing, packaging, and shipping.

Brought To You By The Bushco Cretins

1. Our government refuses to give one dime to any world organization that teaches contraception, gives out condoms, or mentions abortions, resulting in horrors like this:

feministing: 90 African women die every day from unsafe abortions

90 percent of the abortions in Africa are done using terrifying methods: “inserting sharp objects into the uterus, flushing the vagina with caustic liquids, throwing oneself from high places or repeated blows to the abdomen.”

Just horrible.

2. The chickenhawks running our government may have yellow ribbons on the bumpers of their Hummers, but they don't really give a shit about the troops. Otherwise they'd make sure they had proper body armor, wouldn't let Halliburton give them dirty water to drink, and for damn sure they wouldn't be taking back the signing bonuses of Purple Heart winners:


dailykos: Purple Heart recipient forced to repay signing bonus

Iraq War veteran who received Purple Heart says Army is making him repay money

When Fontana resident and 2001 Fontana A.B. Miller High School graduate Kevin Stonestreet joined the U.S. Army in the summer of 2001 as a member of the infantry, he was given a $20,000 bonus to be paid out over his six-year enlistment.

However, when Stonestreet was honorably discharged from the Army in 2005, he found out he needed to repay $3,800 of that bonus because he did not complete his six years.

But Stonestreet, who is now 23, said he was kicked out of the Army because he was diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression from serving in Iraq.

In addition, Stonestreet, who was awarded the Purple Heart and was considered for the Bronze Star for bravery in combat, said the amount he was to pay back was originally $6,000, but the government repossessed his final paycheck of $2,200.

"They were nice enough to take out the $170 for my child support," Stonestreet said, laughingly.

Stonestreet is represented by Congressman Joe Baca -- a Democrat -- whose office hasn't managed to return Stonestreet's calls yet. Let's give him a ring on Monday, shall we? (909)885-2222


3. And, finally, the party that hates government regulation is a danger to all American workers.

Confined Spaces: Just Another Day In The American Workplace (go to Confined Spaces for links)

There are no good days in the American workplace.

Still, it seems like some days are worse than others. This is a small sampling of what arrived in my in-box today:

OSHA investigates Metro East man's workplace death

SAUGET, Ill. Federal workplace-safety officials are investigating a man's death while he worked at a Metro East plant.
Police say 27-year-old J-D Croom of Cahokia died yesterday when he was sucked into a large machine at the Mid-America Fiber Company plant in Sauget.

Worker Dies After He Is Pulled Into Machine

NEW HAVEN -- A worker died after he was pulled into a machine at a scrap metal yard Wednesday, police said.

The accident occurred at about 4:15 p.m. at Regan Metal Corp., 69 Poplar St., police said. Richard Larson, 54, of Kensington, was taken to Yale-New Haven Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 4:45 p.m., Sgt. Robert Dudley said.

Police said Larson was loading metal into a machine that coils the metal. His work glove apparently got caught in the machine when he went to adjust a bar, and the machine pulled him in, Sgt. Andrew Muro said.

OSHA is to review fatal work accident

BRUNSWICK HILLS TWP. - The federal Occupational Safety & Health Administration is expected to probe Tuesday's death of a delivery man crushed by about a ton of granite slabs.

Owatonna man killed in job accident

OWATONNA, Minn. — A 25-year-old Owatonna man died in a workplace accident, police said Wednesday.

Patrick Donahue was pinned under a crate that weighed nearly a ton while working in the shipping area at Viracon Inc., an architectural glass fabricator based in Owatonna.

White Mills Man Dies In Construction Accident

(RADCLIFF, Ky.) -- A construction worker died on Thursday morning when the trench he was working in collapsed on top of him.

Tommy Hensley, 42, was standing about eight feet deep in the trench in a new construction site off Hill Street when the sides of the trench caved in, Radcliff Police spokesman Bryce Shumate said.

Days like this always bring to mind the wise words of the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Senator Michael Enzi (R-WY):

Cooperation, not confrontation is essential in making our workplaces safer. The notion that employers care little about worker safety, or are prepared to sacrifice worker health in the pursuit of profit is a dangerous myth.

In fact, most employers are concerned for the welfare of their employees and are fully prepared to comply with laws aimed at enhancing their safety on the job.

Just for Laughs

I received this in an email:

A Lesson In Political Science

DEMOCRAT

You have two cows.
Your neighbor has none.
You feel guilty for being successful.
Barbara Streisand sings for you.

REPUBLICAN

You have two cows.
Your neighbor has none.
So?

SOCIALIST

You have two cows.
The government takes one and gives it to your neighbor.
You form a cooperative to tell him how to manage his cow.

COMMUNIST

You have two cows.
The government seizes both and provides you with milk.
You wait in line for hours to get it.
It is expensive and sour.

CAPITALISM, AMERICAN STYLE

You have two cows.
You sell one, buy a bull, and build a herd of cows.

BUREAUCRACY, AMERICAN STYLE

You have two cows.
Under the new farm program the government pays you to shoot one, milk the other, and then pours the milk down the drain.

AMERICAN CORPORATION

You have two cows.
You sell one, lease it back to yourself and do an IPO on the 2nd one.
You force the two cows to produce the milk of four cows. You are surprised when one cow drops dead. You spin an announcement to the analysts stating you have downsized and are reducing expenses.
Your stock goes up.

FRENCH CORPORATION

You have two cows.
You go on strike because you want three cows.
You go to lunch and drink wine.
Life is good.

JAPANESE CORPORATION

You have two cows.
You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk.
They learn to travel on unbelievably crowded trains.
Most are at the top of their class at cow school.

GERMAN CORPORATION

You have two cows.
You engineer them so they are all blond, drink lots of beer, give excellent quality milk, and run a hundred miles an hour.
Unfortunately they also demand 13 weeks of vacation per year.

ITALIAN CORPORATION

You have two cows but you don't know where they are.
While ambling around, you see a beautiful woman.
You break for lunch.
Life is good.

RUSSIAN CORPORATION

You have two cows.
You have some vodka.
You count them and learn you have five cows.
You have some more vodka.
You count them again and learn you have 42 cows.
The Mafia shows up and takes over however many cows you really have.

TALIBAN CORPORATION

You have all the cows in Afghanistan , which are two.
You don't milk them because you cannot touch any creature's private parts.
You get a $40 million grant from the US government to find alternatives to milk production but use the money to buy weapons.

IRAQI CORPORATION

You have two cows.
They go into hiding.
They send radio tapes of their mooing.

POLISH CORPORATION

You have two bulls.
Employees are regularly maimed and killed attempting to milk them.

BELGIAN CORPORATION

You have one cow.
The cow is schizophrenic.
Sometimes the cow thinks he's French, other times he's Flemish.
The Flemish cow won't share with the French cow.
The French cow wants control of the Flemish cow's milk.
The cow asks permission to be cut in half.
The cow dies happy.

FLORIDA CORPORATION

You have a black cow and a brown cow.
Everyone votes for the best looking one.
Some of the people who actually like the brown one best accidentally vote for the black one.
Some people vote for both.
Some people vote for neither.
Some people can't figure out how to vote at all.
Finally, a bunch of guys from out-of-state tell you which one you think is the best-looking cow.

CALIFORNIA CORPORATION

You have millions of cows.
They make real California cheese.
Only five speak English.
Most are illegals.
Arnold likes the ones with the big udders.

Box Turtle Ben Go Bye-Bye

It had to happen. Box Turtle Ben has fallen on his sword:

Ben Domenech Resigns

In the past 24 hours, we learned of allegations that Ben Domenech plagiarized material that appeared under his byline in various publications prior to washingtonpost.com contracting with him to write a blog that launched Tuesday.

An investigation into these allegations was ongoing, and in the interim, Domenech has resigned, effective immediately.

When we hired Domenech, we were not aware of any allegations that he had plagiarized any of his past writings. In any cases where allegations such as these are made, we will continue to investigate those charges thoroughly in order to maintain our journalistic integrity.

Plagiarism is perhaps the most serious offense that a writer can commit or be accused of. Washingtonpost.com will do everything in its power to verify that its news and opinion content is sourced completely and accurately at all times.

We appreciate the speed and thoroughness with which our readers and media outlets surfaced these allegations. Despite the turn this has taken, we believe this event, among other things, testifies to the positive and powerful role that the Internet can play in the the practice of journalism.

We also remain committed to representing a broad spectrum of ideas and ideologies in our Opinions area.

Jim Brady
Executive Editor, washingtonpost.com

So, Brady has another wingnut in the wings? Or will BlueStateBlogger commence? (Note to Jim Brady, I'm available! For a high price.)

March 24, 1911

Today is the 95th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire.

Dailykos: Today in Labor History: They Died For Us; Let's Not Forget Them

One of my teachers used this case to inspire me as a lawyer. Did you know that

The factory owners were put on trial but acquitted.

So it's not whether you win or lose. Sometimes you change things just by fighting the fight.

Cornell University Triangle Shirtwaist Factory website.

University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC) Triangle Shirtwaist Fire Trial website


Update: Good article from commondreams.org pointing out that workers are still being locked into their factories, in places like Bangladesh: Triangle Shirtwaist Fire – Then and Now

Today's Climate News

GREENLAND: Some 130,000 years ago, in a period just slightly
warmer than today, much of the region's ice cap melted away.
AP/FILE
Christian Science Monitor: Little time to avoid big thaw, scientists warn
Arctic temperatures near a prehistoric level when seas were 16 to 20 feet higher, studies say.

Global warming appears to be pushing vast reservoirs of ice on Greenland and Antarctica toward a significant, long-term meltdown. The world may have as little as a decade to take the steps to avoid this scenario.

Those are the implications of new studies that looked to climate history for clues about how the planet's major ice sheets might respond to human-triggered climate change.

Already, temperatures in the Arctic are close to those that thawed much of Greenland's ice cap some 130,000 years ago, when the planet last enjoyed a balmy respite from continent-covering glaciers, say the studies' authors.

By 2100, spring and summer temperatures in the Arctic could reach levels that trigger an unstoppable repeat performance, they say. Over several centuries, the melt could raise sea levels by as much as 20 feet, submerging major cities worldwide as well as chains of islands, such as the present-day Bahamas.

The US would lose the lower quarter of Florida, southern Louisiana up to Baton Rouge, and North Carolina's Outer Banks. The ocean would even flood a significant patch of California's Central Valley, lapping at the front porches of Sacramento.

These estimates may understate the potential rise. []

Good article, though I do have to question the use of the phrase 'some 130,000 years ago, when the planet last enjoyed a balmy respite from continent-covering glaciers'. Is the author trying to be funny? Or is he trying to soft-pedal the ominous message? It's inappropriate, either way.


A NEW US COAST? In a few centuries, the US could lose major portions of its coastline (shown in red) because melting polar ice caps could slowly raise sea levels 20 feet, according to new research.
MAP BY JEREMY WEISS AND JONATHAN OVERPECK, UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA; RICH CLABAUGH - STAFF

How Does Your Organic Milk Rate?

From gristmill:

Got organic milk?

with a handy alphabetical list of organic milk producers and their ratings:

The Cornucopia Institute Organic Dairy Report

I buy Organic Valley, which gets 4 cows in the ratings.

Sign of Spring

From the Gothamist, via green-links.org:

Pale Male and Lola Are at It Again

Is it so wrong of me that I want the hawks to drop more dead pigeon carcasses on Paula Zahn?

The Dog Ate My Homework

Remember that old Reader's Digest feature, "Was My Face Red?" WaPo isn't there yet, but it will be:

Howie "Married to a Republican Strategist Who Currently Works for John McCain" Kurtz, WaPo: Some Readers See Red Over Post.com's New Blogger

Late yesterday, the liberal Web sites Daily Kos and Atrios posted examples of what appeared to be instances of plagiarism from Domenech's writing at the William & Mary student paper. Three sentences of a 1999 Domenech review of a Martin Scorsese film were identical to a review in Salon magazine, and several sentences in Domenech's piece on a James Bond movie closely resembled one in the Internet Movie Database. Domenech said he needed to research the examples but that he never used material without attribution and had complained about a college editor improperly adding language to some of his articles.

All his editors were in a giant conspiracy to scour the web for better writing to pass off as his? Balderdash.

Update: Roger Ailes (the good one) has the funniest Box Turtle Ben headline yet:

Bitch Set Himself Up

RedAmerica Lives Another Day

As I predicted, the racist plagiarist is still employed by the WaPo. Amazing. What do you have to do to get fired by that paper? Here's a great deconstruction by Joe Conason on salon.com. (I saw this on AMERICAblog.) You have to register to read it, but it's worth it:

salon.com: A portrait of the blogger as a young plagiarist

First sentences:

Does the Washington Post intend to maintain journalistic standards in the brave new blogosphere? Or are those standards incompatible with the Post company's ambitions for WashingtonPost.com?

Last sentence:

For now it looks like the paper hired the love child of Janet Cooke and Donald Segretti.

Steal This Post

The Washington Post's new racist Republican blogger exhibits many of the traits that characterize Republicans. For example, he's a thief! He's plagiarized work from many other publications in his illustrious "journalist", blogger and college journalist past.

So far (and the hits just keep on coming) it has been determined that (as Atrios hilariously calls him) Box Turtle Ben stole and republished the work of

P.J. O'Rourke

Stephanie Zacharek of salon.com

Steve Rhodes of IMDB (the Internet Movie DataBase)

Mary Elizabeth Williams of salon.com

Cox News Service

Liz Braun at AllMoviePortal.com

crosswalk.com (stealing from a Christian website! Who'da thunk it?)

and

da-da-da-da

Edward Walsh and Roberto Suro of the Washington Post


Ben, if you can't think of anything to post on the Post tomorrow, you can steal this post.

When I wake up in the morning, will the racist word-thief have a job? Normally plagiarism is a line real journalists aren't allowed to cross, but Ben's not really a journalist, and the WashingtonPostonline doesn't seem to be populated by any journalists. So the forecast for tomorrow is Ben keeps his job. Let's hope I'm wrong and Jim Brady is burning the midnight oil, sweating buckets over his latest gaffe.

Amazon Rainforest in Peril

Reuters: Amazon residents stand on logs felled from the Amazon rainforest in Ressaca village in the state of Para, northern Brazil, in this August 18, 2005 file photo. About 40 percent of the Amazon's rainforests could be lost by 2050 unless more is done to prevent what could become one of the world's worst environmental crisis, scientists said on March 22, 2006.
Reuters: Greater efforts needed to save Amazon rainforests

LONDON (Reuters) - About 40 percent of the Amazon's rainforests could be lost by 2050 unless more is done to prevent what could become one of the world's worst environmental crisis, scientists said on Wednesday.

Existing laws and preserving public wildlife reserves will not be enough. Measures are also needed to protect rainforests from the impact of profitable industries such as cattle ranching and soy farming, they added.

"By 2050, current trends in agricultural expansion will eliminate a total of 40 percent of Amazon forests, including six major watersheds and ecoregions," Britaldo Soares-Filho, of the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais in Brazil, said in a report in the journal Nature.

Gratuitous Katherine Harris Photo

From Princess Sparkle Pony:

Washington Post's New Racist Blogger

Steve Gilliard points out that Ben Domenech posted this last month, without comment, at First Things:

People who are poor and black are a drag on society. We would all be better off if there were fewer of them. Since we have, with little success, spent trillions of dollars over the past several decades trying to make poor blacks non-poor, it is time we recognize that there are more efficient means of eliminating the drag. Stated so bluntly, many readers might find that way of putting the matter morally problematic. The extermination of anti-social elements does, after all, have a somewhat controversial history.

So the Post has given an out-and-out racist a blog platform. Shame, shame. Katherine Graham must be rolling over in her grave.

RedAmerica, the blog, should be exterminated.

A Tale of Two Halves

Corey Gibbs (USA) battles Gerald Asamoah (GER)

Dismal 2nd Half Spells Doom for U.S.
Germany 4, USA 1

Way overblown headline by the WaPo. This was a good tuneup & a good lesson for the 5th in the world US squad. As in, that ranking is bogus & you're going to have to play your best to advance.

The US controlled the first half, but didn't do much in the final third of the field. Ching was a block of wood except for one fine shot. Gibbs, Mastro, & Convey shone and GAM (Eddie Johnson) looked good. I haven't seen Gibbs play much & was suitably impressed. He was super fast and very poised against a big rough German team.

Arena started out with his beloved 3-5-2 lineup but returned to sanity and went 4-4-2 after about 15 minutes. I hate three in the back. We're not fast enough or technically skilled enough to play that way -- especially when we're playing our B squad.

2nd half, Germany's A team finally broke through USA's B team. Giving up all those free kicks had to come back to haunt us & it did. Berhalter was abysmal in the back and left Conrad out to dry a few times. Even Cherundolo made a few uncharacteristic errors.

This was definitely our B team, though. Look at the missing: McBride, Donovan, Beasley, Reyna, O'Brien, Dempsey (Clint, control your temper!), Gooch, Pope, Hejduk, Lewis. Add Keller to that ten and you'd have a fine starting "A" lineup.


*I'd put in a pretty picture, but blogger's photo function is screwy. Sorry.
Update: Apparently this is a blogger problem, lots of folks over there at blogger help getting the white screen instead of "Done".

I *Heart* Will Durst

I saw Will Durst in a comedy club in Cambridge during the administration of Bush-my-son-makes-me-look-smart, back in the 80s. I laughed so hard and so loud that he kept looking over at me, like, who is that loon?

He's still at it, and he's still got it.

Impeachment? Hell, no. Impalement.

I don't know about you guys, but I am so sick and tired of these lying, thieving, holier-than-thou, right-wing, cruel, crude, rude, gauche, coarse, crass, cocky, corrupt, dishonest, debauched, degenerate, dissolute, swaggering, lawyer shooting, bullhorn shouting, infrastructure destroying, hysterical, history defying, finger-pointing, puppy stomping, roommate appointing, pretzel choking, collateral damaging, aspersion casting, wedding party bombing, clear cutting, torturing, jobs outsourcing, torture outsourcing, "so-called" compassionate-conservative, women's rights eradicating, Medicare cutting, uncouth, spiteful, boorish, vengeful, noxious, homophobic, xenophobic, xylophonic, racist, sexist, ageist, fascist, cashist, audaciously stupid, brazenly selfish, lethally ignorant, journalist purchasing, genocide ignoring, corporation kissing, poverty inducing, crooked, coercive, autocratic, primitive, uppity, high-handed, domineering, arrogant, inhuman, inhumane, insolent, know-it-all, snotty, pompous, contemptuous, supercilious, gutless, spineless, shameless, avaricious, poisonous, imperious, merciless, graceless, tactless, brutish, brutal, Karl Roving, backward thinking, persistent vegetative state grandstanding, nuclear option threatening, evolution denying, irony deprived, depraved, insincere, conceited, perverted, pre-emptory invading of a country that had absolutely nothing to do with 911, 35 day vacation taking, bribe soliciting, incapable, inbred, hellish, proud for no apparent reason, smarty pants, loudmouth, bullying, swell headed, ethnic cleansing, ethics eluding, domestic spying, medical marijuana busting, kick backing, Halliburtoning, New Deal disintegrating, narcissistic, undiplomatic, blustering, malevolent, demonizing, baby seal clubbing, Duke Cunninghamming, hectoring, verbally flatulent, pro-bad- anti-good, Moslem baiting, photo-op arranging, hurricane disregarding, oil company hugging, judge packing, science disputing, faith based mathematics advocating, armament selling, nonsense spewing, education ravaging, whiny, unscrupulous, greedy exponential factor fifteen, fraudulent, CIA outing, redistricting, anybody who disagrees with them slandering, fact twisting, ally alienating, betraying, god and flag waving, scare mongering, Cindy Sheehan libeling, phony question asking, just won't get off the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge drilling, two-faced, inept, callous, menacing, your hand under a rock-the maggoty remains of a marsupial, oppressive, vulgar, antagonistic, brush clearing suck-up, showboating, tyrannizing, peace hating, water and air and ground and media polluting which is pretty much all the polluting you can get, deadly, illegal, pernicious, lethal, haughty, venomous, virulent, ineffectual, mephitic, egotistic, bloodthirsty, incompetent, hypocritical, did I say evil, I'm not sure if I said evil, because I want to make sure I say evil...EVIL, cretinous, fool, toad, buttwipe, lizardstick, cowardly, lackey imperialistic tool slime buckets in the Bush Administration that I could just spit. Impeachment, hell no. Impalement. Upon the sharp and righteous sword of the people's justice.

Imagine He Is President

I saw this on dailykos:

Lost Al Gore Documentary by Spike Jonze

Al Gore, the rightly-elected President of 2000, smart, warm, funny, in this 13-minute compilation of clips. The full video is available at Wholphin.

Have a nice day, Sandra Day O'Connor.

Yes

(via Blue Gal)

Planned Parenthood Finds a Home in Virulently Anti-Choice South Dakota

A leader of courage. Cecilia Fire Thunder, I salute you.

DailyKos: Oglala Sioux Stand up to SD abortion Law

According to an Native American Times article by Tim Giago, {Cecilia Fire Thunder, president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe at Pine Ridge, SD] was "incensed...that a body made up of mostly white males would make such a stupid law against women."

"To me, it is now a question of sovereignty," she said to [Tim] last week. "I will personally establish a Planned Parenthood clinic on my own land which is within the boundaries of the Pine Ridge Reservation where the State of South Dakota has absolutely no jurisdiction."

Update: Enterprising Kathrynt spoke directly to Ms. Fire Thunder, and they are accepting contributions toward the establishment of the Planned Parenthood clinic.

If you want to mail donations to the reservation, you may do so at:

Oglala Sioux Tribe
ATTN: President Fire Thunder
P. O. Box 2070
Pine Ridge, SD 57770

OR: and this may be preferred, due to mail volume:

ATTN: PRESIDENT FIRE THUNDER
PO BOX 990
Martin, SD 57751

Enclose a letter voicing your support and explaining the purpose of the donation. Bear in mind, the Pine Ridge Res is not exactly dripping with disposeable income, so do consider donating funds directly to the tribe as well as specifically for this effort.