Porter Goss, Re-thug-lican partisan

LINK Porter Goss, who Prances in Flightsuit has nominated to lead the CIA, had this to say about the outing of CIA secret agent Valerie Plame:

"Somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I'll have an investigation,"
Goss said."

These thugs -- they're Republican first, American second.

Kerry in a landslide, so he can fire this jerk.

It's All About Oil

LINK William Rivers Pitt: 'The writing on the latrine walls'

Read this article & weep.

Bush-whacked

LINK Via Atrios, here's Juan Cole's summary of how disastrous the Bush Administration's premature identification of Khan, the Al Qaeda double agent, has been for British intelligence and the 13 terror suspects they were forced to arrest.

Bush Intelligence -- Ultimate Oxymoron

The Bush Administration, in its hysteria to justify the latest hysterical & unnecessary terror alert, named a confidential source who had INFILTRATED AL QAEDA. Just another unimportant secret government agent, like Valerie Plame, who was unimportant to the CIA -- her specialty was only WMD, right? Could these jamokes be any more incompetent?

LINK THE MOLE; TECH GENIUS OUTED FIENDS (from our friends, the ultra-liberal New York Post):

August 7, 2004 -- The Pakistani computer expert at the heart of al Qaeda's communications network has been cooperating with an anti-terror sting operation, it was disclosed yesterday.
But the revealing of Mohammad Naeem Noor Khan's name by U.S. officials may have jeopardized the effort to track down al Qaeda members through their e-mail exchanges with him, Pakistani officials said.

LINK Unmasking of Qaeda Mole a U.S. Security Blunder-Experts (from Reuters)


By Peter Graff

LONDON (Reuters) - The revelation that a mole within al Qaeda was exposed after Washington launched its "orange alert" this month has shocked security experts, who say the outing of the source may have set back the war on terror.

Reuters learned from Pakistani intelligence sources on Friday that computer expert Mohammad Naeem Noor Khan, arrested secretly in July, was working under cover to help the authorities track down al Qaeda militants in Britain and the United States when his name appeared in U.S. newspapers.

"After his capture he admitted being an al Qaeda member and agreed to send e-mails to his contacts," a Pakistani intelligence source told Reuters. "He sent encoded e-mails and received encoded replies. He's a great hacker and even the U.S. agents said he was a computer whiz."

Last Sunday, U.S. officials told reporters that someone held secretly by Pakistan was the source of the bulk of the information justifying the alert. The New York Times obtained Khan's name independently, and U.S. officials confirmed it when it appeared in the paper the next morning.

None of those reports mentioned at the time that Khan had been under cover helping the authorities catch al Qaeda suspects, and that his value in that regard was destroyed by making his name public.

A day later, Britain hastily rounded up terrorism suspects, some of whom are believed to have been in contact with Khan while he was under cover. Washington has portrayed those arrests as a major success, saying one of the suspects, named Abu Musa al-Hindi or Abu Eissa al-Hindi, was a senior al Qaeda figure.

But British police have acknowledged the raids were carried out in a rush. Suspects were dragged out of shops in daylight and caught in a high speed car chase, instead of the usual procedure of catching them at home in the early morning while they can offer less resistance.

"HOLY GRAIL" OF INTELLIGENCE
Security experts contacted by Reuters said they were shocked by the revelations that the source whose information led to the alert was identified within days, and that U.S. officials had confirmed his name.

"The whole thing smacks of either incompetence or worse," said Tim Ripley, a security expert who writes for Jane's Defense publications. "You have to ask: what are they doing compromising a deep mole within al Qaeda, when it's so difficult to get these guys in there in the first place? "It goes against all the rules of counter-espionage, counter-terrorism, running agents and so forth. It's not exactly cloak and dagger undercover work if it's on the front pages every time there's a development, is it?"

OK, people, it's time to send the amateurs packing and bring in the professionals. Kerry in a landslide, anyone?

They Hate Us

LINK Deepening anti-U.S. rage casts doubt on Iraq leaders' ability to restore order


This Knight-Ridder report says the Iraqi security forces have melted away again. Therefore Allawi's Iraq government calls on the hated US military to restore order. And why do they hate us so?

LINK Abu Ghraib Victims Speak: Alleged Victim Calls U.S. Jailer ‘Disgrace to All Civilized and Democratic Values’

Maybe because, as in this quote from the ABC News article linked above:

"Most recent polls show between 80 percent and 90 percent of Iraqis call
Americans not liberators, but occupiers. And by a clear majority, Iraqis
want Americans to leave the country as soon as possible.

How did America lose the Iraqis' support? For many Iraqis, the answer
is Abu Ghraib."

Or maybe it's because we've killed over 10,000 Iraqis and the killing continues?

LINK Fighting spreads as U.S. troops kill 350 Iraqis

"The fighting in Najaf has included American F-15 fighter jets dropping
bombs, U.S. Apache helicopters shooting missiles and American tanks letting
loose with barrages of fire. "

LINK Clashes and Churches

A must-read post by River at Baghdad Burning. Here are the first two paragraphs:

"300+ dead in a matter of days in Najaf and Al Sadir City. Of course, they
are all being called 'insurgents'. The woman on TV wrapped in the abaya, lying
sprawled in the middle of the street must have been one of them too. Several
explosions rocked Baghdad today- some government employees were told not to go
to work tomorrow.

So is this a part of the reconstruction effort promised to the Shi'a in the
south of the country? Najaf is considered the holiest city in Iraq. It is
visited by Shi'a from all over the world, and yet, during the last two days, it
has seen a rain of bombs and shells from none other than the 'saviors' of the
oppressed Shi'a- the Americans. So is this the 'Sunni Triangle' too? It's deja
vu- corpses in the streets, people mourning their dead and dying and buildings
up in flames. The images flash by on the television screen and it's Falluja all
over again. Twenty years from now who will be blamed for the mass graves being
dug today?"

So, here's the big question: Why has the SCLM stopped covering the war in Iraq? More Americans were killed in July than in June, yet the war virtually disappeared from the television screens. We will hit the 1000 American death mark sometime in September yet those deaths are not marked or solemnized by the mainstream media.

We Closed Saddam's Torture Rooms & Opened Allawi's

LINK

Great, our soldiers find Iraqis torturing Iraqi prisoners & are ordered -- ORDERED, by their superior officers -- to let them alone. Let the torture continue, it's not our concern, it's their government now.

Think about this next time you hear Bush touting freedom, given to us all by god.

Kerry in a landslide.

Curse of the Bambino

Not exactly news, but farewell to Nomar Garciaparra, my favorite player on the Red Sox. Nomar always played the game the way it should be played. Plus he married Mia Hamm confirming his good taste in my book. (Real men marry athletes.) The writing was on the wall ever since his dumb agent Arn Tellem advised him to turn down the $60 million/4 year offer last year. And it was pretty much all she wrote when dumbf*** "I ate a bucket of steroids & now I think I'm a ballplayer" Kevin Millar went on Sportscenter during the A-Rod talks last year and said, I'd rather have A-Rod than Nomar. You know Nomar would never forget that. He never would have done that to one of his teammates, either. He had too much class for that.

But Theo? You just traded a first ballot Hall of Famer for two guys who are going to have to buy bus tickets to get to Cooperstown? Dude, get ready to be looking for another job in a few years. This one's gonna hurt us for a long time. Not that we thought you were a fine judge of horseflesh after you traded Shea Hillenbrand, .300 career hitter, for Byung Hyun Kim, pitcher & head case. Why would you trade for a pitcher who melted down against the Yankees in the World Serious? Ah, the eternal mystery & pain of being a Sox fan.

Good luck Nomar. If the Red Sox aren't going to win the World Series this year (they may not even get the wild card) I'll be rooting for the Cubbies.

LINK This was a bad deal: How could the Sox deal Nomar without getting a pitcher in return?

LINK (From El Guapo's Ghost blog) NOMAH FIVE IS NO MORE

LINK Jim Fennell:Don’t blame Nomar for this one, Sox fans

LINK (registration required) Trashing of Garciaparra continues in Boston

OK, this article is so good I will put it in in its entirety:

By RICK MORRISSEYChicago Tribune
CHICAGO - Day 4 of the attempted demolition of Nomar Garciaparra included an assertion by Red Sox owner John Henry that his former shortstop recently had to be talked out of demanding a trade.

This followed accusations in Boston that Garciaparra was a slacker, a malcontent, a clubhouse cancer, selfish, weird, an injury waiting to happen, a faker, a liar and anything else you can think of except a cheap tipper, although that's being nvestigated.

The way it's going, Day 6 will dawn with news that Garciaparra often wore lacy Yankees-logo undergarments and that close personal friend Osama bin Laden, though thinking the bra was a bit much, approved.

The Red Sox know they messed up. We know the Red Sox know they messed up because, ever since they dealt him to the Cubs, they have tried to tear him down. This is what you do to buildings that are dilapidated and lack character. You don't do it to one of the best players in team history.

But the Red Sox carry on, sledgehammer in hand, because they know they received the weaker part of the deal. They know their fans are upset about losing a Boston icon, a man with a career .323 batting average.

I'm not sure I can recall such a lengthy, all-out verbal assault on one player after he had been traded. Know this: The harsher the attacks, the more indignant the protests, the more likely it is that a team is doing the backstroke. The Red Sox have backstroked so much, they're halfway to Europe and spitting out saltwater.

Garciaparra is a Cub now, and although it's all that matters, he would need news conferences between innings to answer the onslaught of charges against him. Somehow he has managed to play well.

The most surprising thing is that his Achilles' tendon, the one that kept him out 57 games this year, hasn't turned into angel-hair pasta. The Red Sox seem to be waiting for that to happen. That, or they're waiting for his Pinocchio nose to take out about seven Cubs' kneecaps in the team clubhouse. They can't seem to decide whether he's delicate or disingenuous.

The Red Sox are getting heat for acquiring Doug Mientkiewicz and Orlando Cabrera in the four-team trade that sent Garciaparra to Chicago. You'd get blow-torched, too, if you made that deal. What they'd like everyone to know is: It's not our fault! That's what all this petulance is about.

The Red Sox weren't able to sign Nomar to a four-year, $60 million contract extension, presumably because Garciaparra didn't like the deferred money in the deal. The Red Sox didn't like their chances of signing him when he became a free agent after this season. So they traded him. Fine. But be adults and swallow it.

They aren't talking much about their role in the lead-up to the trade. They're the team that tried to acquire superstar Alex Rodriguez in the off-season. They're the team that would have traded Garciaparra if the Rangers had traded Rodriguez to Boston.

If you were trying to offend a man who considers himself one of the best shortstops in the game, the best way to go about it would be by trying to acquire Alex Rodriguez.

They expected a proud superstar to put it all behind him? To remember it's just business and to not take it personally? And yet, despite the slap in the face from the Red Sox, Garciaparra and his agent both have denied that he wanted out of Boston.

Trying to put the blame on Garciaparra for Saturday's trade is like blaming Hawaii for Pearl Harbor. This is about Red Sox officials Larry Lucchino and Boy Wonder Theo Epstein attempting to clean up their mess without getting dirty. The egg on their faces would seem to indicate they haven't succeeded.

So almost a week after the trade, Garciaparra is still defending himself against an extremely defensive franchise. Character witness Todd Walker, a former teammate in Boston and a current one in Chicago, said Garciaparra was well-liked in the Red Sox's clubhouse. That doesn't match up with the characterization in the Boston media of him as "cancer."

Wonder where that could have come from.

How the trade will be remembered will depend on how well Garciaparra plays and whether, perish the thought, he wins a World Series ring somewhere other than Boston. It won't be the curse of the Bambino, but it will feel like a close relative.

LINK From the ObeyPedro blog:

The best quote I've read so far concerning the Garciaparra trade has to be from Larry Mahnken:

Meanwhile the Red Sox pointed a shotgun at their face, pulled the trigger, and said, "I think we look better now." A lot of reports list the Red Sox as trade deadline winners, which is true only in the sense that everyone who participates in the Special Olympics is a winner.

I don't necessarily agree with him, especially now that Bellhorn is on the DL with a broken thumb, but it's funny nonetheless.

Terror Alerts Are Always Political

LINK

This links to a great aricle which points out what Tom Ridge's terror alerts respond to. Bad news on Enron? Bad news on Iraq? Bad news on the economy? Good Democratic convention? Next step: Be afraid, be very afraid, get the SCLM* to knock that bad news off the front page for even scarier news.

Kerry in a landslide.


*So-Called Liberal Media

Manchester United v. Celtic -- 1-2 -- July 28, 2004

Last night I traveled to Philadelphia with my mom & sister to see Man U. (the NY Yankees of international football) v. Celtic, the best team from Scotland.  This is the second year international teams have traveled to the United States to play each other as part of the Championsworld Series. 

It was a fun game to watch, though not as good as last year's game against a better team, Barcelona.  Man U. at least made an attempt to field a good squad.  (They played their first game in Chicago last weekend, and only one starter even played.  It was Captain Roy Keane and a bunch of raw recruits.  Like going to see the New York Yankees and having them show up with Derek Jeter and the Columbus farm team.)  So I was relieved when Man. U. started Tim Howard at goal, a back line of Specter, Keane & Gary Neville,  John O'Shea, Phil Neville, Djemba-Djemba, and Richardson at midfield, and Alan Smith, Eagles and Bellion up front.

I have to admit, the only people I knew on Celtic before this game were Henrik Larssen (who is now gone, recently signed by Barcelona) and their coach, the incomparable Martin O'Neil.  O'Neil did show up, even though he missed Celtic's first two games of the tour as he was home with his wife who is seriously ill.  Celtic is pretty lame without Larssen's punch.

It was a chippy game right from the start.  The new kid Eagles (a dead ringer for Colin Ferrell, minus the cigarette) made a bad foul on a Celtic player in the first 5 minutes, sending the guy off for stitches.  Then poor Specter (hope I'm spelling it right, he's also a newbie) made a horrible pass to the center of the  field from the corner of the box and committed a foul to stop the sure goal.   One penalty kick later and it was 1-0 Celtic. 

Man U. came back with a nice goal in the second half on a set piece.  Eagles took the corner kick and sent it right to Alan Smith who headed it in.  I am really impressed by Smith.  Mom has liked him for a long time & can't figure out why he hasn't been named to the England squad.

The second Celtic goal was a nightmare.  Celtic sent a long pass to Beattie in the corner, and Roy Keane made a long & valiant run attempting to stop him.  He intercepted him but fell as the ball spurted out.  Timmy Howard came out trying to cut off the angle & Beattie nutmegged him.  Ugly.  The Celtic fans were jubilant.

Howard had a terrible game, looked very rusty.  He almost gave up a third goal when he attempted to catch a simple shot which went through his hands & bounced off his chest.   Djemba-Djemba saved his bacon by clearing the ball off the goal line.

About 15 minutes into the second half the Man U. began warming up their subs.  The bench pretty much got cleared, meaning we got to see Diego Forlan (also known as Forlorn for his lack of goal scoring since coming to MUFC) & Ryan Giggs, the best Welsh player in the world.  Plus more of the back benchers, Luke Chadwick, Bardsley, & others.  Giggs is coming off an injury & was carefully monitored, worked out & massaged by a personal coach before coming in the 77th minute.  The last 15 minutes of play were exciting with Man U. rush after Man U. rush but they just couldn't finish.

It began to rain during the 85th minute & everyone scrambled into their ponchos (no umbrellas allowed, more ridiculous antiterrorism stuff).  At the end of the game both teams just hustled off the field.  I guess the thrill of being in the US is gone.  Last year both teams circled the field after the game, applauding the fans.

The game was played at Lincoln Financial Field, the home of the Philadelphia Eagles.  I saw Man U. play Barcelona there last summer, which was the first ever event at Lincoln Financial Field.  So last year, being that it was the first ever event and all, I could forgive them for the snafus at the concession stands.  I stood in line for the entire halftime to get my diabetic mother a hotdog for dinner.  They had hotdogs, but couldn't figure out how to turn on the hotdog cooker.  So mom had peanuts for dinner.

This year, my sister & I stood in line for 25 minutes to find that at 7:35, 25 minutes before game time, they were already out of hamburgers, cheeseburgers and chicken sandwiches.   Before the game even started!  They had sold over 55,000 tickets and ran out of food before the game started!  Whoever runs the concession stands is truly incompetent.

But that was the only negative of a great night.  Saturday Mom & I travel to Giants stadium in NY for Man U. v. AC Milan.  Whee-hoo!

LINK

Halliburton stealing our $$$$

I read the NYTimes and the WashPost this morning but it was not until I went on the Knight-Ridder site that I saw this little gem about Halliburton:  Knight-Ridder story

"Three whistleblowers Thursday charged - and top executives strongly denied - that spending by Defense contractor Halliburton in Iraq was reckless and wasteful. They said the company's KBR unit charged the government $45 for cases of soda, submitted $100 bills for laundry, put up personnel in five-star hotels and abandoned $85,000 trucks on roadsides because of flat tires.......

Truckers Warren and David Wilson of Venus, Fla., said KBR did almost no routine maintenance on its vehicles, which at times meant trucks had to be abandoned when they broke down.
KBR transportation chief Keith Richard denied those charges, saying regular maintenance was performed every two weeks.
Ten other current and former KBR truckers who spoke with Knight Ridder sided with Wilson and Warren, however.
"I never got a truck maintenanced the whole time I was there," former driver Shane Ratliff of Ruby, S.C., told Knight Ridder in April. "

But of course, the Republican-controlled House refuses to do anything.

Slower than sludge

I wrote three posts this morning and posted them, according to blogspot "successfully".  Now, 11:30 p.m. at night, more than 12 hours later, they're still not showing up.  What gives? 

Small Shrub

Harpur's has an excellent list of all the things Commander Codpiece does not know -- from his own mouth.

Freep Family Circle

Vote in the great cookie-off:  Family Circle 2004 Election Cookie Cook-Off

Why doesn't George Bush care/call?

Last night I read an article in Yankee magazine about a boy from Deerfield, Mass. who was killed in Iraq.  The article isn't online, but here's a LINK to an interview with the author.   When Greg Belanger died, Senators Kerry and Kennedy called his parents the next week with their condolences, as did Senator Chafee of Rhode Island (where Greg lived).  But no call from George Bush.  Just a form letter, over a month later.
 
As you can imagine, the family is bitter. 
 
Kerry in a landslide.

Did everything really change, or was it all a dream?

Some days the "news" just gets to me.  This morning I was flipping through the morning shows.  There was Katie Couric, sitting on a high chair, interviewing three people about Martha Stewart.  (Am I the only person who can't look at Katie any more without thinking, "Navy Seals ROCK!")  Robin Roberts on ABC is directing a man through making and demonstrating homemade cleaners.
 
Remember after September 11th, when people were saying everything had changed forever?  When the media had a hiccup of regret over spending the summer covering Gary Condit and Chandra Levy?  That's when we got constant tickers crawling beneath the announcers on every news station.  Those tickers told us how many people were thought to be dead, the rumors of life in the pile, stories that made us feel and care.  But now our tickers are telling us about the Scott Peterson trial, and Martha Stewart's sentencing, and Kobe Bryant.  And they never tell us anything about the Americans or the Iraqis who died in Iraq today, other than counting them like the score of a sick baseball game.  What are their names?  How old were they?  How did they die?  Tell us.  Their deaths matter. 
 
Frank Rich says it is the fault of happy talk news.  I don't know why journalism has sunk this low, but it makes me sad.
 
Why hasn't one of the networks shown the video of Bush sitting in that Florida classroom for 7 minutes after learning the 2nd World Trade Center Tower had been hit?  Why don't I have that video burned into my brain, instead of poor Howard Dean shouting over the crowd in Iowa?
 
Show me the My Pet Goat video.  The country will not fall apart if we see Prances in Flightsuit as he really is.  Give him his seven minutes of fame.  Show some courage.  Show some guts.   Be journalists, not parrots.  Do your job.

War is Peace

Richard Cohen has a good editorial in the Washington Post today. Bush, Safely in Denial

Constant anxiety is safety, so says our fearless leader Prances in Flightsuit.

Boston is agog about the ridiculous "safety" precautions being taken for the Democratic Convention. They are shutting down the main drag through Boston, Route 93, in the afternoons and evenings, for 20 miles north and south of the city. So people were told to take the T. (T is our abbreviation for the public transportation agency, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, shortened to MBTA, but like all things Boston, shortened even further to "T".) But now you can't take anything larger than a purse the size of a sandwich on the T. What if your job requires you to carry something larger than that, like tools? Tough nuggies. And you can't take a bike on the T, unless it is one of those hugely expensive ones that breaks down into component parts. A regular bike that someone might really own, not allowed.

I'm not sure if this is just an over-reaction to the Tom Ridge terrorism warnings, or just the small town version of security. I've found that the further you are from New York City (where most of the death & destruction of 9/11 actually happened) the more stringent the security precautions. I've spent a lot of time in NYC since 9/11. New Yorkers understand that everyone is not a threat. At Madison Square Garden, for example, you can bring a backpack. You have to open it up for inspection, but once they get to know you the inspection is pretty cursory. & why shouldn't it be? A 47 year old lawyer? I'm a threat to America? Of course not. But in Boston, and Baltimore, and Fort Wayne Indiana, backpacks are not allowed in sporting events. (Because the 9/11 terrorists used backpacks, right? No, they used briefcases. They don't allow backpacks because that means you are a 60s liberal, the most dangerous of all Americans. You might be bringing in dangerous ideas, like free speech, dissent, tolerance, equality, right? So backpacks are banned all over America. Get it?)

War is peace, and Oceania is always at war with Eurasia.

blogspot is broken

Gee, it only took 4 days for my last post to publish. It's hard to be topical with that kind of time frame. I feel like US News & World Report.

Whee-hoooo!

John Edwards for Veep!

Re-defeat Bush

I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 today. On a whim, headed out to the suburban 16 screen theatre for the 4:30 showing.

Was surprised to find the theatre 3/4 full, for the matinee. I guess I am in Massachusetts, and it is a holiday weekend. Had to wedge myself in next to a large man wearing aftershave.

It was great to see all that I know to be true strung together for the mainstream audience. All the corporate media has been hiding from us. I tried not to annoy the poor man next to me as I answered Moore's rhetorical questions throughout the film. Managed not to say "Commander Codpiece" out loud when they showed the money shot of Bush in his ridiculous Mission Accomplished flight gear.

I did get choked up during the non-Moore narrated parts of the film -- the sounds of the planes hitting the World Trade Towers, the interview with the 9/11 widow, and the wrenching footage of the mother of the boy killed in Iraq.

There was one moment that made me gasp, during the final quarter of the film, and I will have to see it one more time because the fact has eluded me. It was another one of those Michael Moore rhetorical questions, and I was surprised and shocked by the answer.

So, if you haven't seen the film yet, stop reading now, because here's the final line:

[Commander Codpiece, leaning earnestly over the lectern]

"There's an old saying in Tennessee—I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee—that says, fool me once, shame on....[long pause]....shame on you. Fool me....[longer pause]....you can't get fooled again."

—Nashville, Tenn., Sept. 17, 2002

We won't get fooled again.

Job Growth Not There

Job growth last month was less than 50% of what economists expected. NYTimes, WashingtonPost.

Maybe this is why Bush isn't getting any bounce from his economic rebound????